Jennette McCurdy: Half His Age

What is up, Daddy Gang? It is your founding father, Alex Cooper, with Call Her Daddy. Jeanette McCurdy, welcome to Call Her Daddy. Thank you. Good to see you, Alex. Good to see you. You are officially my first guest of 2026. That's so cool. It's really good. I feel like we're kicking it off on a strong note. Are you someone that does New Year's resolutions? I'm huge, like huge, into New Year's resolutions and goals and I sort of map out my whole year. It never winds up happening the way that I plan it to, but I'm very into like the workbooks and the list making process. Are you buying like a new notebook for it? I do Aaron Connorm planners. I do the Artist of Life workbook, both of them every year. You're like laminating things. You've got like a board up. My floral stickers, I like pin them in the corner. Okay, wait, what are your New Year's resolutions? I do goals rather than resolutions and I sort of break them down by season. This is going to get really nerdy, really. And my favorite part of the year is the week between Christmas and New Year's and I take that week to kind of evaluate my life and reflect on it and think, where do I want things to go? And then I plan from there. I love this and you're going to make everyone, no, you know what? Because it's funny, it's like by the time this is out, everyone's going to be like, so I had this goal and I'm already a weekend and I didn't fucking do it. God damn it. No, I'm someone that used to do it and now I've just completely stopped on like the concept of New Year's resolutions. But I do like your vibe, which I do a lot of like goals. Like I'm like career goals. I've got in my brain of like what I want my 2026 to look like for me and my company and my career. But I don't say it's a resolution. We have to talk about this. Okay, because I feel I have done the same thing for so many years where I go like my main focus is or my primary focus is career. My secondary sort of relationship. What are my goals with these two areas? The rest of like the pie chart of life goes by the way side. It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. We'll figure it out. But career is the thing that's always driven me. And just as of this year, I've started thinking, you know, because I've reached so many milestones that I wanted to and I'm feeling the success that I wanted to for so long. There's something about that that has caused me to want to maybe reframe my life a little bit and wonder what else can I do for you and do for myself exactly. Oh my God, you're like, we should I take care of myself this year instead of maybe like completely focusing on work? Like what a concept. Wait, is there more than achievement? That is so relatable. So maybe actually, yeah, that's a good way to think about it this year. Make sure that your bucket is not all career, right? Or not all one thing. It's just so I don't know. I feel like it's such an easy thing to do because it's I put so much of my worth in that and identity in that. So I want to try to divvy up the worth a little more. I love that we're talking about this. Me mom, like you have a new book coming out. We're like, you haven't stopped working. No. Okay. First of all, we need to talk about you are the best selling author of I'm glad my mom died. Yeah. Now you have a new novel coming out half his age. Congratulations. Thank you. How are you feeling? I'm so excited. I'm so proud of this book. And I think this is I think because I've I've left my kind of my heart and soul on the line with this. I do feel like that's what's motivated me to go. Okay. Maybe maybe I take a step back. Maybe I take a breather and and and reevaluate things. But I think that's because I've left it all on the table. Exactly. Um, your memoir sold 3 million copies and now it is being turned into a television show. What has it been like working on that project? Um, it's been interesting. It's been complicated. There are a lot of politics involved, which is not my forte. My favorite thing is to sort of be it's really interesting because writing for writing, you're really rewarded for being truthful and you know, I'm show running and creating executive producing this thing and producing your kind of rewarded for not being truthful. So it's a lot of like, okay, how can we tell this person one thing, but kind of do another? And so it's it's been I won't lie. It's been challenging navigating the politics of it. And I feel much more connected to my books. Like I'm so, so much more excited about talking about half his age because that's something that's 100% what I have chosen. That's 100% every decision that was made in the process of this is something that I believe in and something that I support and something that I love. It's not been there's no games involved. There's no like chess match involved. It's just take here's my heart, take it or leave it. It's crazy because like we both have an inside look into the film and TV industry, which I know a lot of people watching may not be fully privy to. And it's like, it's horrifying. It's literally horrifying. It's so crazy. I was on a call the other night with my husband, we were talking about this one show and it's like, we were helping our friend and we're like managing directors and this and this and we're like, Oh my God, all the optics and all the egos and all the things. And it's like not even about the project. It's about like stroking one's ego and make it and it's a dick size competition. And it's like, there's so much that goes into it. So I can imagine that writing for you. It's like, you are writing about and it's you in a room and it's all on you. And it's truly freedom. It's freedom. Yeah. And so we're going to move on from this TV show that's causing you stress, but it's going to be great. Jennifer Aniston is playing your mom in the show, right? Yeah. It's so crazy. It's so wild. What conversations have the two of you had? She actually had, I don't want to speak for her, but I think she said this publicly. So I hope she'd be comfortable with me sort of resharing, but she has a lot of, she relates to the material a lot. And so in that way, we've really, really connected. And I think it's kind of the only way to do this project is to be doing it with people who relate deeply to the material. Otherwise, it's a moot point. If somebody's just doing it for the wrong reasons, I think it really gets lost in a project like this. I think that can work for a lot of projects, but I think for something that comes from this personal of a place, it's other people have to relate that deeply or it just gets watered down. I can't wait to see it. Thank you. This new novel centers around a relationship with a very clear power and balance between a 17-year-old and her high school teacher. What made you want to explore this theme? I'm really interested in themes of desire and power and the things that we desire being confused with some form of power. I think sex being the most prominent example. When I was younger, I really confused sexuality with power. When I first started developing and first started feeling attractive to men and started getting that kind of attention, I really believed that was power. I really believe now as a 33-year-old, it is not. I think one of the biggest motivators was maybe anger, some anger I felt toward situations. I'd been in in the past that emulated some version of the dynamic that's in the book. Angers are really useful emotion for me in writing. I find it to be the place that I write what I think the most effective work from. I didn't even realize it at the time. I thought, why is this the thing that's coming out? Then I tried to check that part of my mind and just keep typing, keep typing. Then after looking back a few drafts later, I mean it's many, many drafts now, but a few drafts in, I realized, I'm still really fucking angry about some of this. This needed to come out in this way. I think I assume a lot of women will feel really angry reading this, whether they've been in a significant age gap relationship or just any kind of relationship where they haven't really had their needs met, where they've really clawed or embarrassed themselves to attempt to have their needs met. I think, unfortunately, so many of us can relate. I hope that in some way, if there's some anger kicked up for people that it's useful in their processing of their own experiences. There's so much that I know my audience is going to be able to take from this. I think it's important that before we almost get to that and your personal experience and what inspired this novel, I do want to go back and I want to talk about some of the ways that power and control showed up in your childhood because obviously those are the most formative years and talk about those experiences with your mother. Then fast forward, yes, and get to more like the relationships. Cool. So are you down to go back? Yeah. We're going back to childhood. Let's go back. Good old childhood. Haven't spent enough time in childhood and therapy, so might as well do more. Perfect. Let's just relive it. Okay. Your mom was diagnosed with cancer when you were really young. Like two? I was two. I was two years old. Okay. How did this shape your family dynamic? Wow. What a beautiful, uncomfortable question that I appreciate. Our whole family, the way I describe it is that it felt like it was a held breath and that it was like, okay, when's mom going to die? It was stage four metastatic ductal carcinoma. She had a mastectomy and she had bone marrow transplant radiation, chemotherapy. It was really, really dire. It was really serious. And me being at that age, it's really pretty preverbal. And I think that's really influenced my life for a long time. I think feeling the weight of the gravity of, okay, this person's death is imminent and obviously not being able to articulate any of that or put any words to it or understand it. But I think that I'm looking at you, I'm looking at adults, looking at you, a child with this grave serious, oh, it's going to be hard kind of look. So I think some of my earliest memories are of like church ladies with coiffed hair and casserole standing in front of me with pity and looking really like, oh, you poor thing. And so I think that definitely did influence some of my initial narratives about the world and how it works and how scary it is and how, yeah, how scary it is. To reframe those narratives and find new ones. How do you think that kind of taught you to prioritize your mom's wants and feelings over your own? Oof. I mean, I think that was maybe the most pivotal piece that caused me to do that. I felt like she could be gone at any moment. And I think when you're young, you don't necessarily know what you need, but you know the person in charge can help you with that. And so I think it was a mode of survival that I was in for a long time of how can I do whatever I can to help keep my mom alive because if my mom's alive, then I'm safe. And how do you think your mom's sickness impacted the way that you thought you were allowed to just like feel about her as a whole? Like could you ever be like, oh, I don't, oh wait, well, she's sick. So I can't like, were you ever able to feel like you could be annoyed or resentful or Wow. Wow. You've gone deep. No, I think it's both because of my mom's cancer and because I grew up Mormon. And I think those two things are really, they are in tandem with guilt. They're really sort of rooted in guilt. It's like, okay, this person has cancer, she's dying and you're Mormon and you have to be nice, nice, nice, nice, nice. So it was really, I would feel such profound guilt if I even thought an annoyed thought or felt anything that was other than, oh, mommy's the greatest thing that I think I would just stuff down that annoyance. Any resentment that was brewing, I would stuff it down. Any anger, I would stuff it down and it was just, okay, I'm allowed to feel these three emotions and anything else is bad. So I can't feel that and I'm going to just keep stuffing it down until eventually, of course, it can't stay stuffed forever. And it came up. You were two and she got sick. So she went into remission though. At some point she became healthy. She was in remission and then she was healthy by when you were four. But then when you're 10, this is still a topic of conversation. Do you know what I'm saying? How long did this linger and play out? She went into remission within, I want to say like a year and a half, somewhere around there, but she really, in my eyes, utilized her cancer. You could say utilized, you could say weaponized, one's a little more judgmental, but I think either one's appropriate, honestly. She really did not let me or I thrilled her brothers or any of us forget, you know, mommy had cancer, mommy could go at any minute, the cancer could come back at any minute. It was a constantly used phrase in the household is mommy's cancer could come back at any minute. So it was kind of, we were living in the state of okay, she's better, but not really. Like it's going to come back at some point and that's going to take her and that's going to destroy our family. And so it was really just this tense, tense feeling in the household. I mean, eggshells feeling all the time. This is a paid ad by better help. I think it's so important, especially for women to talk about people who've been in your life that have helped you, right? You don't have to go through things alone. Maybe it's your sister, your best friend, your partner, your, you know, a female figure you have. It's important that we are able to identify people who we can go to and hard moments. You shouldn't have to do this alone. Women deserve to be celebrated, right? But we should also recognize that many women carry emotional weight at work in relationships and families and in the roles they play for each other, whether you're navigating career expectations, parenting, caregiving or more therapy with better help can help you check in with yourself, unpack what's feeling heavy and build healthier pathways forward. Daddy gang, make sure you're taking care of yourselves. We all look to women in our lives, but it's a lot of pressure also for us to carry so much. So take care of yourself and make sure people around you are taking care of themselves as well. Your emotional well-being matters. Find support and feel lighter in therapy. Sign up and get 10% off at betterhelp.com slash daddy. That's better H-E-L-P.com slash daddy. You obviously were a very successful child star. That was not something that you decided for yourself. Your mom made that choice for you. What do you think that she was trying to achieve by making you act at such a young age? How old were you? I was six when she put me in it. I think she was trying to, if I like feel into what I think, I think she was trying to be seen, feel seen through me. I think she was living vicariously through me. I think she felt really, I guess I'll never know, but really what I, my gut instinct is that she saw it as an opportunity to feel seen because she never really did. She never felt she got the attention that she needed or her needs matter, whatever. And so she thought this is an opportunity for that to happen. And I think at first it kind of did seem like it was useful in that way for, I think at first it did make her feel, when I would get recognized, I could just, her face would just light up, just blow into the hugest smile and she'd be so thrilled. But what type of pressure did that put on you as a child? A lot. So much. Did you recognize the pressure initially? Did it ever feel fun? No. Oh my God. Oh my God. No. Yeah. It was really a lot of pressure. You're asking questions people haven't asked before. So it's really interesting because I'm sort of like finding it as I go. Thank you. It really just, my life just felt like pressure for so long. And that kind of ties into what we were talking about earlier with like trying to find what are the other aspects of the pie chart of life because I think from such an early age I was so programmed for achievement, success, that equals mom's happiness. Mom dies and it's like, okay, but still achievement and success equal happiness. And then it's like, okay, now I've achieved things. What else is there? There has to be other means of joy. And I know that there are and it just can't be the thing that I think you plant a flag in. But I think that's what I did from an early age was, okay, success equals mom's happiness, achievement equals mom's happiness, let's achieve, let's succeed, let's do whatever it takes. Did you ever recognize when you were younger that you were the breadwinner of the family or was it kind of smoke and mirrors? I think I started to realize that around 13, 12 is when I started really making consistent money. I had booked a bunch of guest star roles that year and commercials and things that were bringing in more steady streams of income than beforehand where it had been kind of more sporadic. And that's when I remember, I would overhear my parents' conversations and, okay, well, actually, I can't cover that. We can get this and that'll be fine because she got this print PCS commercial. So it did, I think there was an added layer of kind of pressure at that point of, okay, so I need to kind of take care of my family and this is the way to do that. This will be helpful. Coming back, how do you think the financial success that you were having impacted the power dynamic with your mother? I wish it had impacted it. I wish I was just a little diva rolling around like, mommy, give me my latte, just saying what I wanted and what I needed. Instead, I feel like I was really just kind of a, everybody says this, so I'm wary of saying it, but I do feel it's true. It was kind of a chronic people pleaser and trying to, like, so consumed with being polite and saying the right thing and saying, you know, the appropriate thing and the thing that the person needs to feel okay about themselves. And so that was kind of, that was my mode of operating. My primary mode of operating was how can I just make this other person feel comfortable? Meanwhile, I was a nervous wreck, uncomfortable ball of stress for so, so, so long. You mentioned that you, it was never fun. You're like, no, oh my God, you like almost laughed. You're like, oh my God, no, acting was never fun. I was always stressed. I was always like, oh my God, I've got to go and do this to make my mom happy. Were you ever able to articulate that to her like, hey, mom, I'm not loving this? Yeah, there's one memory that comes to mind. And also I will say, you know, there was an aspect of, I did feel I was good at it at a certain point. I wasn't initially, like I really was very stiff in my body and really, like I just couldn't access the thing that I feel like makes for good acting, just that leading off of instinct and impulse and just kind of being free. I couldn't access that for a long time. Once I started being able to access that, I did feel good at it, which was helpful. It was nice to feel good at something. I think that's just universal, right? It feels good to be like, okay, I'm good at this thing. But no, there was one time when I had tried to bring it up to my mom and said, like, I really, I don't want to act anymore. I was in the car. We were in our old four windstar on the 101 and she really instantly went into that kind of the mood switch that she was really, really common to her where it was, what? No, you're going to break mommy's heart. What? No, you're so good. This is our chance. This is our chance. This is our family's chance. And it's, I mean, it's hysterics. It's that, but it's like tears pouring down and she screaming, like really, really hysterical response. And so as a kid, I think it's impossible not to program that as, okay, don't do that again. Don't ever say that again. That's not okay. But that's also programming of speaking up for yourself as a child. You were essentially taught, don't do that. Yes. Yes, exactly. This is, this is, this is the thing. This is the thing. This is the theme of my life is how can I find opportunities to speak up for myself to voice my opinions to, you know, even if it means somebody doesn't like me, even if it means it's hurt somebody's feelings, how can I be authentic in myself? Because so much of my childhood and adolescence was rooted in being inauthentic to please other people. And your primary caregiver is essentially manipulating the situation in front of your eyes where she's becoming the victim. She's becoming this poor, poor person because if you don't keep doing this, the mommy's going to be so upset and it's never that she can actually take the role. It's like, aren't you 45? Right. Okay. So there was an extreme amount of pressure being put on you and then you were essentially losing your voice because the time that you did go to be like, Hey, can we turn off for a second and me not be the actress? Yes. And then when you're like, Mom, she's essentially saying, I'm not having it. Keep it moving. I didn't feel like she wanted and I know she was trying her best and it also makes me sad that that was her best. Right. It really makes me sad. I know she had a lot of trauma growing up. I know she was in a really difficult position. I sympathize with that, but also work on yourself a little bit. Like, come on, you got four kids. See them a little bit. Maybe try seeing them. What would that look like, Deb? I didn't really feel that she did that. I felt that it was just kind of, you know, if I'm being a character, then it's, oh my God, you're Josie. You're so good at being Josie. You're so good at being this character, but it wasn't, what's going on with Jeanette? Are you okay? It seemed like you were dealing with a lot of pressure. How can I help? Okay. Four kids though, did you ever get resentful of your other siblings because I know you've said that you were the main focus, obviously, of your mother? Yeah. Yeah. There was a lot of pressure on me and then on my oldest brother, Marcus, and then my two middle brothers, Dustin and Scott, did, for whatever reason, did not have the same standards, did not have the same goal posts that my mom just didn't have that for them. They could play video games hours every day and that was fine by her. I don't know why she sort of chose Marcus and myself. And I think at a certain point, I did feel, I did start feeling some resentment. I certainly, I really don't anymore. But you know, as a teenager, as a kid and a teenager, it was hard to see, well, why, why are the standards so different from them? And I'm sure they felt it toward me because it's like, why is mom giving Jeanette so much attention? Why is she doing all this for her? She doesn't, I'm sure some of their video game playing was some kind of act of rebellion because, well, she doesn't care about us. She's taken her to CSI auditions, Law and Order SBU auditions. Like, she's letting us play Donkey Kong Country. Oh my God. And meanwhile, it's like, 007. And you're like, I'd rather be playing Donkey Kong and you go to the CSI thing. But it's like, that's also just like creating such a triangulating situation where she's dividing all of you. So like, you're resentful of your siblings somehow. Really they could be your allies, but there's such a triangulation that you're like, I can't even turn to you because I'm resentful of you. But then you're like, wait, no, now you can see you can have commonality with them and you can like now not be resentful. But in the moment, it's a little too strategic. 100%. And I've really tried, I've, I've, I've begged them to tell me like, please tell me everything. How uncomfortable was that for you? How frustrating was it for you? And they're just, they're so kind. They, they, they don't, they don't go there, but I, I'm open. If sometime they do, I'd love to hear. I really would. Cause I'm sure there's a lot of uncomfortable stuff in there for them somewhere or maybe not. Maybe they're, you know, maybe not, but I would imagine there, there is. You have talked about and written about some of the extreme codependency tactics that your mom used growing up, like not allowing you to shower by yourself, making you share a diary with her. You couldn't have your own. You had to share it with her. Like how did that impact your sense of identity and more importantly, freedom? I didn't feel I had either, I guess. Um, I really didn't feel I had either. Writing has been a such a profound source of identity for me. It's been the place where I have found myself and, um, and, and learned about myself and explored myself and I don't, I can't imagine what it would have been like if I didn't um, if I didn't have writing, I feel like it would just be kind of a floundering existence of like who am I without her and what, you know, it would just be very, very confusing. You had your mom even start to control your body and what you ate. Um, how did she initially start to explain these intense dieting strategies to you? This is where it gets, so this is where it gets really complex, right? And it's so, um, specific and anecdotal and whatever, but I, because she'd had breast cancer when I was so little, I one day wake up and I feel like a lump in my right breast. Right? I'm like, oh my God, I have cancer. I'm dying. That's my thought. So I go to my mom and I say, oh no, I have a lump. Not realizing that's breast tissue developing. I was 11 years old at the time it happens. And she instantly kind of, there was no moment of, oh, you know, you're just, you're developing and this is normal and we'll get you a training bra and we'll whatever and this is the process. It was just, oh my God, we got to get you on a diet plan kind of thing, you know. And so it was then we would team up together and count our calories together every day. And I'm smiling because it's like it felt, I remember how it felt fun for me at the time. It felt like a form of connecting with my mom at the time. Oh, we can write down everything that we eat and we had two bites of this shrimp scampi lean cuisine and like, you know, just whatever the little things were that we ate that day. And then we'd compare our notes and then she would advise me on the next day and what we could do and how we could streamline a little bit more, cut back a little bit more. Her thought being, you know, if you develop early, that's more likely that you'll get cancer. I think that's one of her things that she was really, really scared of me getting cancer. Fair, right? And then I think the other thing is she really just did not want me to grow up. I think me growing up represented to her differentiation of the two of us. And I think that was very, very uncomfortable for her, very uncomfortable for her. The idea that, oh, Jen, that's a different person from me because that means she can't live by carersly through me anymore, right? If I'm a different person, I have my own wants, my own priorities, my own goals, aspirations, and she can't sort of intercept that anymore. And I think that was really, really threatening to her. So I think puberty was really threatening to her. And therefore she doubled down on the control. Exactly. So through, you know, using this almost as a bonding moment, how do you think, do you think your dynamic shifted in terms of you actually got closer through the eating disorder? Yes, absolutely. Okay. I think, I mean, I had been so close with her for so long or I thought that I was, I thought I was the close that really is, I thought I was genuinely intimate with her. And years later, today, I realized it was completely not that, it was not that. But the eating disorder stuff really, really bonded us in a way that was like, this is our thing, we're in this together. It was very secretive. We're not doing it in front of the whole family. We're not comparing notes of what we ate today and counting our calories together and tracking things and planning out meals the next day in front of anybody else. It's after everybody falls asleep and then we do it in the kitchen or we do it on the couch and we sit there and nobody else is home. We figure that out together. So it was this really kind of secret bond that I think fueled the disorder thinking in such a significant way because it was that thing that we had together. Together. Yeah. Control and suppression of anger are tied to developing an eating disorder. How did those two states of being relate to your mother? I'm thinking, I don't know why I'm like thinking of anger. I'm thinking of suppressing anger. It's such a theme in my life. I think it's something that's so important to feel fully and be able to stand with yourself in and it's been, that's the one. That's the one that I really was like, ooh, that's a bad one. So we can't go near that. What was the question? Did you feel her anger ever? Yes. Oh my God. Yeah. I mean, she would chase my dad around the house with a steak knife. There were outbursts frequently. There were mood swings constantly, outbursts frequently. Daily, I would say, our neighbor, Bud, would like peers head over the fence and say he was going to call social services and we need to do something about this. It was really kind of public knowledge at a certain point where she couldn't hide it anymore and it was, okay, there's a lot of anger here. But I was just scared of her anger and I think being so scared of her anger is what made me really unable to process my own, see my own in any way. I also think this is, I don't want to speak for my brothers, but I do sense this theme where we're like, we all have this thing where we're polite and we're, yes, of course, and oh my God, dad, no, I would never, and really trying not to offend people. But I kind of want nothing more than my brothers just be like, I'm fucking angry. I just want to see that in them because I know how helpful it's been for me and I hope to just continue exploring anger more. Well, you never had any other option other than to be prim, proper and perfect. And so then again, that then creates even more anger where children should be able to have a moment where they have a tantrum and they lash out and they're angry and they're upset and then they are consoled and they're held and they're listened to and they voice their feelings and then their parent is supposed to be like, I hear you, let's make sure this gets done and happens for you. And for you, you're like, how can I make sure mom is okay and mom doesn't have a temper tantrum and mom is, and so you've never been able to be like, what is Jeanette want? Yes. Ever. And what the memoir made me realize is how unfortunately common that is. I mean, that's the biggest thing that people tell me when they come up to me is that they had that same experience with their parent and they couldn't vocalize their own needs. They couldn't stand in themselves. They couldn't feel their own emotions. Because of the power imbalance. Exactly. How are you going to tell your mother? Oh, exactly. Six, seven, you're going to stand up to your mother? Ten, thirteen. Well, actually, I'm feeling some resentment towards you. It's not even a, no. You said that you didn't know what anorexia was until you overheard your mom talking about it with your doctor. When do you think it finally started to really sink in that your mother was actively not only enabling, but also encouraging an eating disorder? I think, I mean, in that moment when I heard her speaking with the doctor, it was when I first started piecing things together of, okay, at that point we'd really been in the trenches of cataloging everything we wrote, restricting calories, really monitoring, weighing me all the time. I remember my thighs, all of these behaviors had been in play for a while. And then hearing my doctor speaking with her, I didn't know, you know, I guess I don't know, it was maybe 11 or 12 maybe at that point. And so I didn't know exactly what was going on, but I had a feeling that gut instinct, something was wrong. And I shoved that gut instinct down and I said, okay, there's no place for that because mom would never do that to me, right? Mom would not, come on, she's my mom or whatever. Give her the benefit of the doubt. And I just kept giving her the benefit of the doubt at the expense of my own self-trust for a long time, for a long time. I know that you've been eating disorder free for years. And you said on your podcast that you can now finally accept and love your appearance. Can you talk about how you were able to get to that point? Well, the therapist I saw specifically for eating disorders was really instrumental in the process. His name was Jamie Farquhar. He was in Toronto. He was working on a thing at the time and saw him and he did a mixture of, he worked with me using DBT and schema-based therapies. And I think the modalities are really specific because I think something like CBT, I'm like a therapy nerd, right? But like CBT, cognitive behavioral therapy is so much talking that for a person like me who I'm already in my head enough, we don't need to spend, we are good. We don't need to spend any more time up there. So DBT really helped me to kind of unravel my thought process and assess it in a way that was more scientific and clear cut. And then schema-based therapy was more the feeling kind of sense of things and understanding the root of the traumas to then unpack from there. And I think those two modalities were really, really, really pivotal. I don't know if it would have had the same results from any other kinds of like equine therapy, like petting a horse or whatever people do. Like I don't know if that's going to do it for me or finger painting my trauma. Not going to work for me. CBT, I don't think would have been as effective, but those two modalities were really, really effective. I suggest them for anyone. Anyone who's struggling with it, I think there's a lot of promise in those two modalities. What was the biggest challenge that you had to overcome in your recovery process? There was this moment early on where Jamie had encouraged me to see, he said, in what ways is your eating disorder helping you? And I was shocked. I was like, what are you talking about? Like I'm sitting here to try to get over this thing. I don't want to have this anymore. I don't want to be throwing up fucking eight times a day. I'm tired of this. I'm exhausted. What do you mean? What good is it bringing? He goes, well, you have to accept that it's bringing you something good in order to move through it and find something that can bring you at least something as effective, if not more, preferably more, so that you can replace this with that new thing. And so really recognizing its value was this odd kind of process of going, okay, I have to really accept that this thing was a positive for me in certain ways and really helped me survive in certain ways. And it felt really counterintuitive, but I think it was very helpful to the process. Interesting. Yeah. Isn't that wild? Interesting. I think it was my first realization of the gray areas of life. I'm such a, like, I tend to be such a black and white thinker and I like to compartmentalize in that way because it makes things simpler, right? It makes it, okay, this is the villains and the victims. This is the good and the bad. This is whatever. And I can put it in these two buckets, but that was the beginning of realizing, oh, life is a gray area. Like, it's not so clear cut. It's not so simple. And trying to make it that way is actually pretty unhelpful because you're going to do the pendulum swing instead of finding that balance somewhere in the middle. You also wrote about and have talked about that the first time you went to therapy, you quit because you couldn't handle the thought of your mom being abusive when you started to get underneath all of it. What do you remember about that first session? Oh, my God. I was feeling like my body was on fire when that was even kind of suggested, you know, you know, your mother is abusive. This is, you know, she kind of laid it out for me and I just felt instantly like I have to run. It was that fight or flight instinct. I can't do this anymore. This is not, I can't go near this. I couldn't face it. And it was quite, you know, a while before I was able to reconsider it and face it again. Where do you stand today with how you feel about your mom? I'm able to just miss her sometimes, which is something that I will take full credit for, you know. I think she left me with a lot of shit to kind of parse through. And the nail in the coffin being when I realized that, when I found out from my, who I thought was my dad, that he was not, in fact, my dad and that came a year and a half after her death. The kind of piece of information that I needed to go, okay, let me consider that maybe this person didn't have my best interest at heart all the time because she couldn't, because she wasn't capable of that. And there was so much anger initially. There was so much frustration, so much hurt and pain, but really just masked with deep, deep, deep anger. And I really don't feel angry at her anymore. And I think that's because of the work I've done. And also if I'm being totally candid, I think because the book was successful. I don't know if it had just gone, like I cringe saying that, but it's also true where it's like if the book had petered out and whatever, like would I be sitting here and be like, I'm happy with where I'm at. It's all, it's like almost, you got the closure that you deserve from all the pain and you were able to pour into that book everything in you with regard to your mother, but then I can't help but think like, you finding out that the father that you thought was your biological father, your entire life wasn't, but she was dead so you couldn't even ask her these questions. Yes. Another form of resentment of like, are you fucking kidding me? Why did she not say that when she knew she was dead? Right? This wasn't a sudden thing. It's not like she died in a car accident didn't have enough, she knew for years. She knew for years when I was two, I get why you don't tell your children then. She knew again when I was 18 and my siblings were all three, five and nine years older than I was. So we were at that age where we could have, it would have been uncomfortable. It would have been painful, of course. But I- You would have gotten the answers. Exactly, I would have gotten the answers. I would have gotten some closure. And honestly, I would have respected her more. Say the fucking truth. I think it's really been helpful though for my life in that way that it's really led me to recognize what a value truth is. My senses are up for anything that's bullshit and I can't fucking stomach it. And I'm at this place now, I'm like, I don't care, I'm not gonna say the thing I'm supposed to say. I'm not gonna say, oh, I'm so grateful for what I, like starry eyed fucking idiot. It's worth it to be honest. And I'm hopeful that that helps somebody who needs to hear it and needs to find that path of truth themselves. It's also so sad but symbolic of on her way out, she couldn't grant you this one last thing that would actually really be quite helpful for you and who you are and your development and your story because it's your life too. And for her to take that, I do think it kind of wraps back to like, yes, we're looking for truth within people, but half the time like you can't rely on anyone in terms of to be a good person with integrity and be honest. And so sometimes you have to stop looking for the truth and just know your truth and keep it moving. Do you feel like you can rely on people? Or they're like, do you feel like there's some? I have a lot of people I've learned that I can rely on, but I think, yeah, in life, I've had like a lot of ones where I'm like, wait, like you wanna shake someone and be like, this is not true, this is not happening. And you can drive yourself down the barrel of like, I must get them to tell me what, and it's like, why am I making this so much harder on myself? Leave, just leave, right? Yes, yes. Like, and would you even believe them if they said it's the truth? God, yes, yes. Okay, power and control, as we've been discussing, these themes, obviously, and they are a huge conversation and theme in your new book, Half His Age. Can you, I know we kind of talked about it early, but can you just kind of set the scene for my listeners of like, what this novel is about? Yeah, the main event of the novel is a senior in high school's sexual relationship with a creative writing teacher. But to me, in a way that's kind of, I guess similar to, I'm glad my mom read it, that's sort of the main event, the big noisy event, but underneath it's really about desire and loneliness, and why do we desire things that might not be good for us? And why do we so desperately paw at the things that we desire, even if we know deep down, they're not good for us. Why do we still pursue them so relentlessly, so exhaustively at the expense of oftentimes our own self-esteem, our own self-worth? That's sort of the deeper, career. Every girl's gonna be like, yes, yes, and, no, it's really relatable. And it's scary and it's uncomfortable, and it's, I've had versions of this in my life, and I know you when you were 18, your first relationship was with a man in his mid-30s. How did your personal experience inspire the book? I wanna hear about yours as well. I'm really curious, but, you know, I think I don't know how to not write from a deeply personal place. I was really excited to write fiction. I thought, oh my God, like this is, and I completely wanna keep writing fiction. That's my really biggest takeaway from writing half his age, but I also can't help but write from that place because that's the thing, like I mentioned earlier, sort of the anger, that if there are those deep, deep, painful feelings, writing is my way to closure for those feelings, is my way to closure for past experiences, and I think my way for connection with other people who were kind of seeking a similar closure in some way. But I didn't even realize how angry I still was about that I thought I was done, I thought I was good, I thought I didn't really consider that I didn't think of him ever, this person I was in a relationship with at all, like he wasn't on my mind, right? And then I'm writing this book, and it was only several drafts in where I look back and I said, why this, why now? And it was, oh, because I have so much anger left about this thing, because there's so much left to process about this thing, because I have to find closure on this stage of my life through this. Interesting. Yeah. Well, it's so hard because when you're that young, it feels like you're just in it. Like there is kind of no processing. Sure. And then you get out of it, and you kind of need to really, really remove yourself to a certain degree to actually have anywhere with all to look back and unbiasedly look at yourself and be like, what happened there? And you can actually look at your younger self as like your older sister of your younger self, if that makes sense. It totally does. So you feel like there, did you feel like there were, for me I feel like there were micro moments of processing or micro moments of like, something's not adding up. It's not quite right. Did you feel that? Yes. And I think I like still haven't fully processed it. Like I think through my show or whatever, I'll like tell stories. And even sometimes I think I romanticize it. And so it's still like a little like- Say more. What are the ways that you romanticize? I think that when I was, so I was 18 and he was like 33. I was 19, he was 33 or 34. Okay. Weird. That's weird. That's weird. Can you imagine now being with a creepy, it's so creepy. Imagine me being with a 19 year old. Like, no, that's a great way to put it. When they have, when they are older than you, it doesn't matter what their career, there is a power imbalance. And so there is something enticing about it. There's something mature about it. There's something kind of elusive about it that you're like, oh, this is gonna make me, it's all to like, it kind of helps you fuel your ego at such a weird, susceptible time to like, I don't know who I am. And so you kind of like migrate into their world and you feel like, oh my gosh, they're helping me find my identity. When really then when you have the actual capacity, when you hit that age to look back and be like, oh my God, in your 30s, I shouldn't even be talking to an 18 year old. I think it's confusing because you want to believe that you're like smart and you have mature. Mature. Yeah, of course. I can tell you, which we're gonna get to. Yeah, it's complicated. It's very complicated. So I have a lot of empathy for women that are listening and we're gonna get into this conversation that I acknowledge there's probably potentially some still romanticization that you can be romanticization that you can be doing to the previous relationship if you had an older person in your life, but also let's start to unpack the other side to it. Yeah, my mind just went to also like those moments where I would piece together that something was wrong, but I feel shame in saying this, but I remember that there was this point when he introduced me to his friends and he would take me to kind of barbecues and I would meet the friends and their wives and the guy friends would be, hey, like to all smiles, whatever. And the wives would be like, mm-hmm, hi, nice to meet you. What's your name? Okay, Jeanette, yeah, great. And I thought like, are they being mean to me? And now I say, oh no, they fucking hated this guy's guts because they knew shit then that I didn't know. And they're looking at this man like- And they're going, what a fucking loser. You run another younger one here today? Yes, exactly, exactly. How young is she this time? And it's like, and you took it personally because you didn't even fucking know the conversation at hand was like, you didn't even know what it was. You didn't even know what they were thinking. Exactly, and I'm just saying, oh my God, they were being protected, they were being helpful. They knew so much more than I knew. If only I had sat and talked with one of them instead of splitting a vegan hot dog with, I almost said his name. Can I ask like, how did you guys meet? You met through- Through work, yes. There's nowhere to meet anybody else. All I did was work. You met at work. So you are a young actor at the time. Were you 17 when you met him? 16? I think I was 18 by the time he started working on the show, I think. I'm not sure about that. It's possible I was younger, but I was at least eight. I was most likely 18. And how did this relationship start? A lot of like hanging out on set, a lot of hanging around the writers, we would hang out in the writers room after work. He would show me movies that he thought I would like, like Dazed and Confused, which I did not like, but I pretended to like. He would play me music that he liked, which I did not like, but I pretended to like. It's also like, why do they all have terrible taste? They have such a bad taste. Or, or Jeanette, pause. Maybe it's because they're 30 fucking whatever in your 18. So there's no way you're gonna have the same taste. Maybe when you get to that age, you actually would like that movie or that song. But how are you at 17, 18? I saw it like that. I still think these are the best. You're like, actually fucked that shit, fucked that shit. But you know what I mean? Half the time you're like, they're showing you shit. You're like, who? Yes. What? Yeah, exactly. And everyone else in the room that's at age is probably knows what that is. Because they're of the same decade. Yes. Yes, exactly. Okay, so he's, you guys start hanging out. And then how does it like progress to a relationship? He comes over. The feelings part of it, like us saying our feelings, I don't remember the sort of nature of that, but I remember him coming over really drunk one night to my apartment. At this point, I've moved out of my mom's place. I'm very new, like also red flags all over. I've been living away from my mom for maybe two months. And I'm like, great, okay, a relationship. That'll be great. And he comes over and he has beer stands on his shirt and he's bumbling around. And at this point in my life, I've never had a sip of alcohol. So I don't understand how drunk he is. Like now I go, okay, he was drunk off his ass, but I didn't know, did you drink one drink? And that's how drunk you are. How drunk is one drink? How drunk is 10 drinks? I had no frame of reference. So he just comes over really drunk and we like make out and it's a lot of dry humping. And it's that for months. And I tell him, you know, at that point, I was still very, I was no longer going to church, but I was still kind of tied to my Mormon roots and didn't want sex before marriage and didn't feel ready for that. And I certainly was not in terms of maturity. And so he and I just made out a lot and kind of, you know, dry humped a lot. Very high school. What do you remember about how you felt about the age gap? Thinking that I was mature, thinking that I was so smart that this could happen. And also I hadn't really felt a deep connection with anybody my age at that point yet. I had felt one connection with a friend who, a female friend who I still love to this day, but she was, you know, seven years older than me. So not nearly the age gap that it was between he and I. But I remember thinking like, oh yeah, there's just something about me that's a little different. Like I'm special. Like that's what it felt like for me. I'm special. I can connect with older people. Younger people aren't on my wavelength, like please. And how did he talk about it and justify it? Like that, like that, like fucking that. It was, you know, you're so mature. I can't talk to anyone this way. I can't believe how smart you are. Like are you kidding me? I was such an idiot. I'm so embarrassed. Also how humiliating that he thought that was smart or even used it as being smart as a manipulation tactic because how stupid of him. Yeah. In the book, the teacher manipulates his student by saying things like, you're so mature for your age. Which I am so happy that now in the conversation online and socially, like I do believe everyone knows that is a red flag. Maybe again, when you're in it, it may not feel like a red flag, but I think socially that concept has been spread around enough where people like, got it. If a man is calling a woman fucking mature for her age, please pause for five seconds and someone protect that young woman. Yes. I think in people are a lot savvier than at that point. A lot more confident. Which you hope is because- A lot more mature. Now it's sounding like I'm doing the him. Oh my God. No, but I think it's also because of this kind of stuff, right? Yeah. You're finally feeling able that can talk. Yes. Women actually have a place where we can talk about this and we're not being silenced. Thank God. And we're not being made to feel like we're making things up in our head and you're being dramatic. Dramatic, totally, totally, totally, totally. What other similarities did your relationship with this older man kind of share with the one that you write about in the novel? Ooh, what similarities? I think there's this element that both Mr. Corgi gives to the protagonist Waldo and that the person I was in a relationship gave to me, which is that feeling of specialists, that feeling of that it was ultimately my choice, that it was ultimately up to me, that ultimately I was the one in charge. And I think if you feel really powerless, you'll take that bait. You'll take that and you'll go, okay, I really want that feeling of power, even though my gut kind of knows this isn't that, I'll take what you're saying and I'll try to run with it and I'll try to make it into some semblance of power. If you're that desperate for it, you will take the bait. And I think I did and I think Waldo does as well. You just obviously referenced that you were a virgin when you met him and you were wanting to wait for marriage. How did that impact the way that sex played a role in this relationship? Okay, this begs for a story. Okay, so we had a plant, he had a girlfriend, did I say this? He had a girlfriend, okay. Felt a lot of guilt and shame about that for a long time. He had a girlfriend while you were seeing him. While I was seeing him, yes. While the dry hump make out sessions were happening, he had a girlfriend that he lived with. How that he lived with? That he lived with. So where were you guys hanging out? My apartment. And how did he explain the girlfriend to you? That he's in a relationship and he, oh man, I can't believe, okay, yeah, it was tricky because it was initially positioned to me as sort of like, he's not, I'm not gonna leave her. I'm not gonna leave her, but I want this, which is, I mean, come on, right? I'm not gonna leave, but I wanna pursue this with you. So it's like, don't get your hopes up. I can have my cake and eat it too, but you can't. You're gonna not have any cake, but I get to have my cake and eat it too. And this went on for, I think we started, actually like the physical relationship again in maybe August. And by October, November, I was starting to feel like, I can't do this anymore. Like it's too difficult to want something this bad to feel this at the disposal of someone else's kind of whims and availabilities. And it's these half hour pockets here and there. And like, I just have to be at his every back and call. And then when he calls and I'll go, whatever. And it was just exhausting. It was exhausting. And I couldn't do it anymore. And then finally, once I say that, suddenly it's, I'm gonna leave my girlfriend. I need to be with you. I'm gonna leave my girlfriend. Which what great messaging to send to an 18 year old. It's like the whole process was just so twisted. And so I think, okay, is he gonna leave his girlfriend? I hope he's gonna leave his girlfriend. I wanna be with him, whatever. His plan is that he's gonna go home for Christmas break, which he actually does go home, but he's gonna say that the trip is longer than it is. And he's actually gonna be staying at his friend's place. And I'm gonna go stay with him at his friend's place. We're gonna have a couple nights to ourself. Which I didn't realize then, of course I realized now was like the trial period, seeing, okay, does this actually work? Can I, do I actually have enough in common with an 18 year old to be with this person? Is that, what is this gonna look like? And so we spent those few days together. It went quote unquote well. And he was going to stay firm on leaving his girlfriend. Around this time, my mom had been hospitalized for having, she'd had a seizure. She was hospitalized. And then she got out of the hospital and was gonna come stay with me at my apartment. But he was gonna come stay with me at my apartment because he was breaking up with his fucking girlfriend. So I can't have my dying mother and my boyfriend, she doesn't know about and would never approve of at my apartment at the same time, right? We have a dilemma on our hands. So I'm going, okay, what do I, how do I like treat my dead mother with some, my dying mother with some kind of respect? And how do I keep the place for her? And how do I do this thing? And he's saying, I shouldn't have broken up with her. It was the worst mistake of my life. This is, see, this is what I'm talking about. Like you can't, he uses that you can't meet my needs thing a lot. And so I go, okay, I'll get us a hotel room. I'll leave the apartment. I'll tell my mom I'm hanging out with my friend, which I did. And she was like very suspicious, very, it didn't matter. She was dying. She still had a mother's instinct. She was still like, something's not right about this. Who's who's friend? Who, how long? So I ran us a room at the Sheraton Universal, right in our Universal Studios. That was like my idea of like a good hotel. I also love that we're not even acknowledging that why is the 30 whatever year old not getting the hotel room? Why does the 30 or whatever, what does he not have an apartment of his own? Did he, he asked, he shared it with the girlfriend. Like, why didn't he get the hotel? Thank you. Well, you know. Let the 18 year old do it. Let the 18 year old do it. Also, I was like, maybe we can go on like Hogwarts, the Hogwarts right? He's like, what's Hogwarts? You're like, oh right. Shit. You don't know what I like. And I don't know what you like. Pretend. Oh my God. Okay. So you're at the Sheraton. He's completely drunk again, doing the bumbling around thing that I didn't know what that was indication of. And we go into the hotel room and he asks me for a blow job, which I don't know what that is because I was raised Mormon and because I was home schooled and I didn't have, I didn't fucking know. He explains to me what it is. And I'm like, that sounds kind of weird. I'm nervous to do this. He's like, I'll guide you through it. I'll guide you through it, whatever he does. And then he's like, I'm gonna come. And then it's squirts in my mouth. And I'm like, what was that? What was that? Something came out. I thought, did he pee in my mouth? What the fuck just happened? I did not know what cum was. He explains. And then that was sort of, that was my entry point into a real form of sexual activity. And it was, now it's funny, but at the time it was really uncomfortable and I didn't, I was, it was difficult to kind of regroup and figure out, well, what was that exactly? And this moment of this blow job, like was it not all under the guise of, I just left my girlfriend. So like, now I'm with you. And was there any form of like pressure of like, if I left this former person, what are you gonna provide for me? 100%. There were phrases like, you know, similar to, I have to know that my needs are gonna be met. Like this is something that I'm a blank year old man, mid 30s man, and this is something that I'm used to. And this is something I have to know. I'm respectful of your, it was very, I'm respectful of your boundary that you can't have sex before marriage, but I also have needs of my own. And I think that's something interesting to also explore is cause it's not gonna be this mustache, corally villain kind of way of saying like, get on your knees, bitch. Like nobody's saying that, but there are, there is a nuanced power dynamic at play and things that can be said in discreet ways that are, you know, now I would know to read between the lines. Now I would know how to have that kind of conversation with somebody at 18. I did not, I didn't, I didn't. And I don't think most 18 year olds know what to do because again, go back to the beginning of this relationship, it starts with your feeling special. And so when you're feeling so special, but you are the underdog, there's gonna be moments where when every idiot is like, well, why didn't you just not do it? It's like, there's so much psychological warfare that you're going through in your head, trying to understand like, how do I keep this thing going? Cause it's making me feel so special. And it's like giving you your sense of identity. 100%. And then yes, there's a moment where you're like, but they're the older ones. Like this feels right. If they're telling me this is gonna be okay and normal. Like I should trust this person, right? You're trusting of this person. And then it's like, to what extent? I'm fully getting taken advantage of here. I'm 18, this is the person with their right mind and they're fully formed from to lobe has happened. Yours hasn't yet. There's a responsibility that they completely neglect in those situations. 100%. Did you have any similar experiences to that? Or was it were you, what was your age gap relationship like? Had you had other relationships before? I had other relationships, but they were all very similar in age. And I think with sex for me, I felt like there was a performative element that I felt like it was always told to me. And I kind of forget how he would like word it because like you said, it's not like fucking suck my dick bitch. It's very, it's very discreet. But I always knew there were other women. If I wasn't there, that could like take my place. And so in that moment where you're not feeling like, I don't really wanna, I don't really wanna do this tonight. Or I'm tired, I'm whatever in the back of your head. You're like, well, if you don't like, guess what he's gonna be able to do and you're gonna lose your spot. And so there's like a pressure you put on yourself, but it's not, you put it fully on yourself. It's because of the things they're telling you, but somehow they are not in the wrong and you feel horrible. You feel like, well, I should do this, right? Like why don't I wanna do this? And if I don't, then this is gonna happen. So, and it kind of all becomes a game within yourself. And they're not even a factor somehow. Yes. Yeah, I'm also curious if you had this thing where I feel like sex or anything sort of physical intimacy can be confused as it's almost like more of a turn on if they're not available. Like it's uncomfortable to say that, right? But there's some element where it's like, I would, things would happen in my body where I would feel the relationship is threatened where I would feel he was pulling the rug out from under me. Okay, he's not as interested. Oh, he's gonna go to one of his other options or he's gonna go back to his other girl. There's all these other factors that if I would feel one of those at play, you know, just, yeah. But I'd really crave sex. I'd really want sex. It was sex for me was a means of finding commitment, was a means, a misguided means of assuming I'd found commitment, a misguided means of assuming I'd found attachment, a misguided means of assuming I'd found safety. And the second that the two of us come, it's gone. It's fucking gone. Dude, that's so bleak. And it's so real. No, it's so real. Cause I bet so many women are listening to this and it's like saying it out loud is maybe rare to hear that statement that you just said. Cause I don't think a lot of women have the confidence maybe to admit it. And I really respect you for saying that. Because I think a lot of women are gonna watch this and be like, yeah, I have had the same thing where you're like, in the moment, you're just like, I literally don't know what else to do other than physically give myself to this person. And you can feel it in that moment. You're like, yes, yes, yes. And you're right, the minute it's over, you have never felt dirtier. You have never felt more worthless. And it was like a high to go, if anything you go farther down low. Cause you're like, how did I think that this was gonna solve anything? They're on their phone immediately after they leave the room immediately after and you're literally like, I did the most intimate thing I could give you and I'm still nothing. Yes. Yeah. It's exhausting because what you eventually will come to realize as all of us will have our moment in life where you're like, that is not how it, that is not what sex should be. Sex should not equate to power. But when you are in a power imbalance, of course, as a woman, you're thinking, this is something I have that I can give to the man, right? Yeah. I understand too that this is a process that so many women have to experience on their own. And that like here, if there's somebody 21 watching that it's gonna be hard to relate to maybe the things you were I or saying or they're just in a different position. And I wish so badly that I could just have that not happen for women. Like I love women so much. I think they're so much cooler than men. No, you're right. It is like, I guess as I sit here, I'm trying to think of that like 18 year old version of you or myself. Yeah. And what could you say? What could you do? What could you do? Because the way we're speaking right now may be too reflective and to meet yourself where you're at, you have to think about all the insecurities and all the instability. And it would require such like a, I don't know, like, or is it you have to go through it? Cause I was thinking for you, it's like this is a very common thing for women. And then I feel like for you, and correct me if I'm wrong, but you had such, you had already kind of learned this game a little bit from your mother, where if you give her what she wants and what she needs, then you are going to avoid rejection and abandonment. Ugh, the trigger words, yes. Right. So then this is kind of a similar thing where it's like if you give him what he wants sexually, you're going to avoid that rejection, but it's fleeting. So then how, can you talk to me about how the sex continued to play a part of this dynamic for you with this relationship? Cause like we're saying you do it, and then it's kind of like, huh, so how much did you compromise your self-esteem and your self-worth in that relationship and where did sex fall into that? So I eventually did have sex with him. I disregarded my self-imposed rule of no sex before marriage. And that was definitely the right decision for me. I'm so glad that I did that. But having sex with him was, there was this, the only way I can describe it is that there was an addictive component where it was, that's the thing that I'm chasing. That's the thing that I'm, my nervous system is sort of hijacked in waiting for. And then when it happens, afterward there's the crash. And then it just kind of ramps up again in anticipation for the next sexual encounter. And then once that tapered off was really when the relationship tapered off. And I felt that with several relationships I was in where it was really, they were really rooted in sex and sexual connection. And I think the sexual connection was actually a distraction from anything else because I thought, well, we're having good sex or we're having intense sex or whatever, passionate sex, whatever it was that I was confusing as a legitimate connection. But then sex always, I mean, it's going to taper off. It's going to fade. It's not going to have that charge that initially does. And then when that would happen, I'd go, oh, I don't really know if I like what I'm left with here. I don't want to be doing this anymore. How did it ultimately end, the relationship? My mom was dying and I, like weeks away from dying. I felt this kind of this mode of almost invincibility of, okay, it all has to go. I don't fucking care about, okay, what means anything? My mom's dying. I don't care about anything. And then we did get back together briefly after my mom died and then that ended sort of quickly. So it was one of those we were over, but we kind of tried it again for a second. Having other partners, and you kind of mentioned this pattern of the emphasis on sex to avoid the other things going on. Are there any other patterns that you can kind of look back on in romantic relationships that you started to see in partners that you were with? Oh yeah, all unavailable. All completely unavailable. Whether they had a girlfriend or a mental disorder or whatever, there was something that was keeping, yeah, they were not available. And I think there was something in me that really relentlessly wanted to chase that and felt like, oh, if I can only make this unavailable man who is showing me by every measure of availability that he is not available, if only I could make him available, then I would matter, then I would have some sense of self-worth. The more difficult, give me a challenge. Like I'm always up for a challenge, that's what I wanted. And because that's what you did your whole life with your mother. Yes, exactly, exactly. You're not available, you're not emotionally there for me at all, but hopefully you'll notice me if I tap dance hard enough and I'm staying loud enough. Then like, mom, was that good? And she's like, huh. And it's almost like, again, that's the horrible part of a young woman where then sex becomes another thing you can throw at the problem. I hate to say it like that, but like, it is so sacred. And when you can learn to be like, no, I don't need to use this to get closer to someone. It's so powerful, but maybe it is. Like we're saying, you kind of have to go through it as a woman. And some have to go through it in a much more heightened and intense capacity than others sometimes get away with like one bad relationship and they're like, okay, never again. They're good, they know. Love that for you guys. Love them. Love them. You know, it's interesting because I'm thinking of, in half his age, I wanted to write it, it's told through this girl, Waldo's point of view, the entire book, and it's not, we don't have her perspective when she's 30, looking back on it and going, ah, here's what happened then. Which I think can be kind of a hallmark of books that cover this subject matter is that there's this territory where you get to see the person with their wiser self, looking back in hindsight. And I think as you and I were kind of realizing, oh, I think it's kind of something you have to go through. I think that was, I literally am only piecing it together right now, but I think that was part of the motivation because I kept thinking, oh, should I have this section later on where she's older and she's piecing it together for real and what it actually meant, but it felt so important to not have that. It felt like I had, I literally could not, that was not an option for me. I had to stay in her experience. It felt so, so, so important. And I think it's because it's gonna fall on deaf ears. It like, I don't wanna be here sitting here preaching or teaching or trying to, like that's not, I don't have the answers. It's just the situation laid out very plainly and take from it what you will. No, it's fuck, right? It's really frustrating because you're as a woman who has gone through a lot in relationships and as have you, I agree, we're kind of sitting here being like, what's the advice? What's the takeaway? And I just feel like especially in the world that we live in today, like, yes, still women are not considered equal to men in this country, that is a fact. And so it's like the only way to like garner strength and to become more of yourself is unfortunately as a woman to go through like extreme adversity instead of just like a lot of times being a man is just like, be the man, be the man. It's like, are you woman enough? Is she woman enough? Is she feminine enough? And we're constantly battling as women, like, are we enough? Are we this? Are we that? And sometimes you have to go through all of that hell to then come out on the other side and be like, all right, I now I'm not gonna take shit and I'm gonna have confidence and I'm gonna do this and that. But like, should we have to do that? No, but is it the world that we live in? Unfortunately. A little bit of a pivot here. I was thinking about, you know, I think a lot of people who understandably and unfortunately are constantly in survival mode for a good portion of their life can feel restless in secure dynamics. Have you ever found yourself feeling bored in healthy relationships? Only occasionally. And I try to sit with, I really do try to kind of sit with that boredom when I feel it cropping up and recognize what a thing it is to be grateful for. You know, that it's not chaos, that there is something so sturdy. In my good moments, I'm able to do that and in my not good moments, I'm like, you know, I gotta do something, I gotta, whatever, but take a trip, whatever it leads to, it's gonna be something positive versus something self-destructive, which it had been for so long. But yeah, I've been in a relationship now for nine, nine years, we were friends for 11 years. We've been together for nine years and it's so healthy. And yeah, every year it truly gets better, but there are definitely pockets where I, my nervous system will kind of want to latch on to, but where's the chaos? And I just have to sit with that and journal through it, whatever tool works, but it's the element of my life that I'm by far the most grateful for. I think I had this conversation recently with another guest about, you know, when you have abusive parents, sometimes it can complicate your feelings about becoming a parent one day yourself, right? It can either scare you or excite you. And how has your childhood influenced your idea of motherhood? I don't want kids, that's what you're asking. Do you want kids? I do. Do you do, okay. When I was, I think if you asked me in my 20s, I really didn't think I did. That's interesting, because most people know. I feel like most people know early on and they stick with that. Okay, okay. So you're 20s, you're like, I didn't think I wanted to get married and I didn't think I wanted to have kids. Now I got married and I want kids. You want kids, okay. But it really changed for me. And I think it was just like a lot of self work that I had to do on myself, not saying that like you have to do self work to want to have kids. It just, for me, in the place I was in my life, I couldn't even fathom it. And then something changed. And I think that's okay that I was just like, you know what, I actually think I do. And so I don't know when and timeline, but like for right now, I'm like, this is something I definitely know I want and I wasn't sure of. Okay, so talk to me about- I'm so happy for you. That's really exciting. What an exciting trajectory. And okay, so talk to me about how you know you don't want kids. Well, I will say, I think I know, I know I don't want kids at this point in my life. I'm also open to wanting kids at some point. So actually a couple of months ago in September, I went through the egg freezing process. And because I don't know if I'm gonna change my mind. We've discussed it and neither of us really want kids, but we are also open to changing our minds and being in that process together. And so I didn't want to change my mind 10 years from now and it'd be too late. So I wanted to- How did you decide like what were those conversations like to freeze your eggs? Cause I know there's a lot of women that are always like, should I, should I not? Like if you don't mind sharing, just kind of the process. No, I was, so the first time I looked into it, I went to a doctor in Beverly Hills, which was, I mean already a red flag, but I sat down with her and she's like, yeah, the best time to do this was two years ago, but like otherwise right now, she starts like drawing this graph, which always stresses me out. When somebody starts drawing a do, like when a doctor starts drawing, like you should have been an artist if you wanna be drawing. What are you doing? Please stop, tell me. Give me the medication, what is it? She's like drawing things. She's like drawing these spears, going up my vagina and like telling me how she's gonna pull out that whatever. And I'm like, this is terrible. This seems awful. I don't wanna do this. No, thank you. And then about a year and a half later, which was this, this past summer, I started thinking about it again. I went to a different doctor and they seemed much more comforting. I felt much safer in that environment. And I thought, okay, you know what? I'm gonna go for it. I thought it was gonna be terrible. I was warned that it can be really, really emotional, having these big mood swings. And for me, it was actually really, really not that. It was really straightforward and simple. And I was lucky in that a nurse could come to my house every night. I think it would have been a lot more stressful if I'd had to like formulate the things myself and put the powder in with the liquid and inject it. Like that seems like a nightmare. But having somebody kind of come and administer everything was really, really helpful. And the process was very simple and seemed effective. How would you describe, obviously, we've gone through so much of your life and your childhood into relationships. And now you being able to write a novel about one of those young formative relationships. Now you're in this nine year relationship. How would you describe this time in your life? Hmm, most definitely the most grateful I've ever been. Like by far, the most connected I've been. And the most authentic I've been able to be. And there's still so much road to cover. And so I hope I stay on this path. I hope I don't switch to a different path. But something I read that you had talked about is you really struggled for a while to celebrate your success and to own any of your success, which is so relatable. Right, it's like, I felt like it would make me rude, a bitch, diva, like whatever, to just be like, yeah, no, this is where I belong, I've earned this. This is something that I worked really hard for. I deserve this. It felt like I had to, oh my God, I get this thing or, I hate when it happens sometimes on Zooms, but I call it my like G Willikers persona, where it'll, it comes out as somebody. I haven't heard a word in so long. G Willikers, right? Yeah, you shouldn't, it's a good thing you haven't since Leave It To Bieber episodes. But it really is this part of my personality that comes out if I'm like taken off guard in a Zoom meeting. If somebody, I'm thinking of one maybe like six months ago where somebody said like, how do you feel, Jeanette? And I just wasn't expecting it. At the end of it, it was like the closer of the Zoom. Like we'd all heard whatever kind of mediocre news and it's a Zoom that should have been an email that should have been a whatever text. So we're going through the motions and they're like, how did you feel? And I'm just like, I'm just so happy. I'm just so happy to be here with all of you amazing people. I'm just so grateful. Like I completely reverted to this fucking, it's the Mormon homeschool seven year old. Just, I'm just happy to be here. I'm just grateful. No, no, like, right. And you're like, literally. And then you, we played afterward and I'm going, I wish I would have just been like, that's kind of mediocre news, but we'll all be fine. Like we're smart people. We'll figure this shit out. It's kind of bullshit. Don't really want to be doing this as a Zoom. I like half of you, half of you, I hate you. Bye. Then click off. Half of you wish I hadn't agreed to work with you. Bye. Soon you're literally like, and thank you. I'm grateful. Then you end the Zoom and you're like, fuck. Yes. And I think that creates that thing where it's like this discordance inside when it's wide and then what happened is I'm beating myself up after the fact. Of course I'm not, I don't wish that I'd said, oh, I hate happy, but I do wish that I said something. A little bit more authentic. Yes. Yes. Oh, I'm just so happy to be here. It's not authentic. It's not true. I earned my seat at the table. But it's like, we're so conditioned to be that way. Because the minute, I have said this so many times, if I'm in a meeting with my husband, he's like, yeah, that's not good enough. I want to be like, yeah, that's not good enough. Instead, I'm like, we can progress in a way. And I'm like, why can't I just say it like that? Because they'll be like, she's a fucking cunt. And I'm like, and so now I sat with Shonda Rhimes and she was like, be the bitch. Be the bitch. And I was like, I'm taking that. You know what, I'm taking that into 2026. Yes. And half the time it's like, be the bitch. Oh, wait, no, just like, say what you're feeling. Yes. And most of the time that means you're not being a bitch. Yes. You're just being honest. And then it's on people to receive that information. If they take you being a bitch from that, then that's on them. 100%. Oh my God. Okay, we're almost done. Okay. Are you having fun? I am. I forgot that we were filming for a second. I'm like, okay, we're back. This has been really nice. I forgot too. I know, we're like at the same point. We're like sitting here just talking about like, like we're like theorizing about life as women. And we're like, oh wait, yes. Okay, we're still recording a podcast. So overall, what do you think you're most proud of in your life and your career at this point? In my life and career, life, I think that easily goes to overcoming a dating disorder. I think that was the hardest thing I can imagine doing. And I've done it. And I think it's so important to say, they always say to say, you know, you're always in recovery and it's always, I think that's really negative. I think that's really unhelpful. I think saying, hey, look, I haven't countered a calorie, tracked anything that I've been binged, purged, restricted, nothing in years is a message worth sharing and something that I think a lot of people, I hope can benefit from and something that I know my past self could have benefited from. And then I'm proud, I'm, I'd say I'm proudest of this book in terms of career. I love this book. I put every part of myself into it, blood, sweat, tears, my heart and soul is in it. And I hope and think that really comes through. So can you talk to me more also about the writing process of half his age? Like where did you begin? And what was the vision when you first started writing to then what it netted out to actually be? Yeah, weirdly, I had the first idea for this book. It's so strange to me now. When I was 24, I was taking a solo trip to Japan and I was on a Shinkansen, a bullet train. And at this point, I had, I had quit acting like a year prior and I had just been writing every day, getting nowhere, writing plays and short films and screenplays and whatever. I had not written any books and I knew, I thought, oh, it's gonna be a student-teacher relationship and it has to be a book that has to be the format that it comes in. And fiction. Yeah, yeah, and fiction. Which you hadn't done. Hadn't done, I literally hadn't written any book, nothing. Like didn't, didn't even consider, I didn't, hadn't considered that. And yet I knew in that moment, and I remember doing a bit of journaling about it and feeling like, okay, when the time is right, this thing's gonna come through and I just have to follow it. And then, you know, however many years, seven years later, it kind of came through in a very palpable way. I was writing something else and I couldn't, it's like this demanded to be written and I thought, okay, I'll take a couple days off that other thing and then this will wear itself out. And then I just wound up writing, writing it very quickly, the first draft very quickly. When you go from writing a memoir to fiction, obviously that's like a complete 180, but obviously you like infused themes into the book about your life that, or like inspired by your life. Right. How were you able to keep a distance with the characters, but also still infuse inspiration from your own life? That's such a good question. I feel like it's really a beautiful aspect of writing fiction is that you can kind of get away with a lot where it's, I can say point of view that maybe I'd be too scared to own in myself. Like this character, Waldo is bolder than I am in certain ways. She's who I wish I could have been at 18 in so many ways. And so I can say those things that I can kind of retroactively go, oh, I wish I could have said that. And then I can say it this time around. I can do it this time around. She's bolder and braver than I was and I respect her character for it. And I think I've learned from the writing of her how to kind of incorporate that more in my own life. This is still a personal piece of work. It can't not be for me. It can't not be. Is there any part of you that's nervous or is it all release excitement? Like what are you feeling? I feel excitement. Am I nervous? No, it really does feel like I'm just really excited for, this has been, it's been in myself and my sort of orbit for so long. And it's something I've worked on. I've worked on for two years while working on other things, but it's been a long process and a lot of just kind of me in the vacuum and the bubble of the writing dome, right? And now is the portion where I get to kind of see those effects and see it connect with people and that's what makes it all feel worthwhile. Do you feel like the work that you have done in therapy allowed yourself to be ready to write this? Cause I know you mentioned like, it was kind of like in you weirdly where you're like, I wasn't planning it. And then it kept coming up for me. Like, do you think that's because of the therapy work that you had done or was it still just this unfinished business? That's so interesting. I do think that for me, therapy and self work really kind of ties into career and achievement, all of that. Like it kind of feels like it has to start with something that I'm working on myself. I think I'm lucky in that way. I don't know if that, I think some people can achieve great things and be super successful and like deeply unhealthy in their trauma and deeply a disaster. Yes. You know, but for me, it really seems like it's one foot in front of the other and it has to cut the first foot has to really be in that therapy chair. And then I think everything else kind of trickles out after that. Okay, last question. Okay. You said- Oh, I just felt sad. I know, me too. No, we'll keep talking after this, don't worry. You said in an interview that the more uncomfortable something is to write, the more important it is to write. What types of conversations do you hope your new book will start? I hope it's first conversation, the conversations around desire and power. Those are the two areas where I think there's so much to discuss. I think talked some of it through today, but I think it's just endless. There are endless conversations to be had around those areas and also loneliness. I think there's a lot that's said about loneliness. And I think right now, despite being so plugged in as a culture so constantly, I think there's a real epidemic of loneliness. And I think that's explored in the book too. I'm so happy for you. It's so obvious that writing has, you said, from a young age, you wanted to be a writer, but to now to see you walking the walk and living it and now coming out with your second book, it's so incredible to see you doing something you love that's also cathartic and is helping you, but also helping so many other people. From your memoir, I agree. It's like there are so many people I sit across from that I go to dinners with, that I know personally, that are in my family that have struggled so much with the parent-child dynamic. And again, that's something that I don't think has been explored as much as it is being recently because of shame, right? How dare you talk ill of family for the first, just that at the surface, but then especially your mother, that's a really complicated dynamic that you took on and you did it so well that I think allowed other people to probably be like, okay, you know what? I can finally now start to also look inward and start to heal myself from that pain that I've experienced. And now this new book, I think there's something so prevalent and important and just honest about the themes that you've brought up that I think we hopefully will continue to explore. Again, I think we were both like in a good way, like we don't know the answer. And a lot of times that means that then this is just the beginning of the conversation. Yes, we don't know the answer. Why has this not been a bigger conversation? And thank you for saying all that. I do feel like my experience of life has so often been, like why is nobody saying this? Whether it is sitting on a Zoom or sitting at a dinner table or sharing a holiday with a bunch of people. It's just like, why are we not talking about anything? Why are we, it just feels like I'm gonna fucking explode. And writing is the place where I can not explode, but explode in that way. I'm not explode in real life, but on the page and get it all out and hopefully connect in that way. It's I think the truest form of myself and the thing that I hope connects the most to people and I think does. Well, all the way back to the beginning of this episode, maybe that is something people will take from this. It's like 2026 is the year of say whatever the fuck you actually feel and stop putting on a front and stop pretending to be prim and proper in this or whatever you think people want you to be and just be yourself and see how that goes for you this year. I'm gonna try it. Oh fuck. Are you scared? I'm excited. I think it's a great wake up call for all of us because I agree, I think we've been doing it too much. And I hope with your, I hope with your story you felt like we dived in enough today where your message came across because I felt like it was such a powerful message and like I appreciate you trusting me with your story because it is a very vulnerable and honest one. So thank you for coming on Color Daddy. That's so nice. Thank you for having me. Thank you. I'm gonna go back to the room. I'm gonna go back to the room. I'm gonna go back to the room. I'm gonna go back to the room. I'm gonna go back to the room. I'm gonna go back to the room. I'm gonna go back to the room. I'm gonna go back to the room. I'm gonna go back to the room. I'm gonna go back to the room. I'm gonna go back to the room. I'm gonna go back to the room. I'm gonna go back to the room. I'm gonna go back to the room. I'm gonna go back to the room. I'm gonna go back to the room. I'm gonna go back to the room. I'm gonna go back to the room. I'm gonna go back to the room. I'm gonna go back to the room.