[0:00] Hello.
[0:01] Hey, how's it going?
[0:02] Very good. First off, I just wanted to apologize for kind of being in a grump kind of before I've assumed, assuming makes an ass out of you and me, but it was me that time.
[0:12] It was a good helpful lesson and, you know, we all do it. So good to be reminded for everyone. No problem at all.
So, yeah, so I got your message and do you want to lay it out for me how I can best help you?
[0:24] Yeah well i'm i'm hoping that the issue that i have is something just kind of silly and technical that like that could be applied to anyone regardless of like you know i i don't want it to be oh like like woe is me kind of like you know tough life all that stuff it's like i don't i don't like doing that because it's not it's uh like kind of being in like a spiral or kind of like i feel like i'm in a negative feedback loop i don't know like what your opinion is of of that of like you're just stuck on kind of like the ruts that you're in you don't know how to get out of them there's probably something very obvious that you're missing or maybe i'm i'm lying to myself, about things of of what i actually want to do and i'm i guess i'm full of shit to myself i don't think so like the issue that i have just like a technical one is mainly procrastination to the the point where it's it looks like it's going to i mean at the moment right now it's it's uh 5 a.m and i'm trying to catch up with like i talked about procrastination and kind of putting things off it's all like at the i've left even though i have every incentive to do the right thing or to do something that benefits me and like you know if you have to do your chores and it doesn't benefit you you can you can you can put that off but i have something that is actually really good that I keep on delaying and just filling it with just nothing.
[1:53] I look back and I'm doing nothing. And I, and I, and I'm really worried like at the moment of thinking, well, I'm either going to crash and just burn out.
And then like, I don't, I don't know, like, you know, I don't want to think about that, but I, but I have to, because I can, I can feel that coming.
And I'm like, I, I don't, I don't know what to do.
Like I can, like, it's hard to when you're doing something by yourself you can't there's no technical help for what you're doing like field wise because it's like completely new not completely new but.
[2:30] There's just no help and I don't know what to do so I'm just kind of hoping that I don't know like I don't know where you want to go for context like it's to do do with basically, intentionally finding every excuse possible in your head to not do the thing that you need to do, that there's every incentive for you to do it i i i can't figure out like it's it's just a habit that i have it's just at the moment i can't get away with like ignoring that or going oh yeah that's just like a quirk that i have that's just my personality it's like no like now it's you know it's like it's like being irresponsible like as a kid you get away with that when you're a kid but But when you're an adult, you're on your own, or you have people that depend on you, it's like, oh, shit, now you can't do that anymore.
And it's like, well, is it a tram line? Is it something else? I don't know.
I don't even know how to frame that.
[3:32] Is it a tram line? Is that what you say? A tram line. I'm not sure what you mean.
[3:38] Oh, I mean, sorry, what I mean, not negative. I don't know what your opinion is on you being in a positive feedback loop.
Like you were inspired to do something and everything's going well and you kind of you're on like the upswing i feel like i'm on a downswing of well i'm i'm stuck in a i'm stuck in a rut and i'm going around in circles and and the lines are kind of like affixed and getting deeper of i don't yeah i i just don't know what to do but and.
[4:06] What's your age range and how's your life.
[4:09] As a whole, Uh, I'm 28, I don't know, like life-wise, like I, like I already said, like I'm at home.
Uh, I've been like housebound, not housebound, but I can, I can go out.
It's just, I have a lot of trouble walking.
[4:29] I've been on and off crippled with, uh, a type of like juvenile arthritis since I was a kid.
So I, um, I don't know. No, I think considering the circumstances, I'm pretty positive as a person.
I used to, in October last year, I had to stop working at a local airport.
That was my part-time job, and I was trying to transition into doing something else because I knew that my body physically, it's like, I like my job and I like the people there.
And that was my socializing, really.
Um but it was it was going to work and uh helping like and doing all the airport stuff i love that i love interacting with people um and i didn't used to uh but um because i i couldn't put pressure on like my my knee anymore and it's okay well if i'm it's back to like it was when i was like living and working on the farm uh like dragging my leg behind me it's like well people won't hire you it's like you're not you're not disabled enough to be counted as disabled but you're You're disabled enough that it's completely fair.
No one's going to hire you to do... I couldn't work at the mines or do any of the typical stuff that other people do to earn a high income.
I just had to stick around on the farm as a plow horse.
[5:56] Sorry, I'm not sure when you're finished, so I don't want to interrupt.
[6:01] Oh, sorry. I didn't want to keep on rambling. you feel oh hold on hold on like yeah um yeah so life-wise, I don't know. I think if other people were in my position, they wouldn't be happy.
It's just that I've been in my position for being alone for just so long that there's no point in sticking about it. I don't have a partner.
I don't think I will.
[6:29] It's not even being defeated. I don't think that's fair to other people.
The dog that's been on its own for too long, Like, you know, like kind of let it live its life on its own.
It's going to be like, just not get along with other people.
Not even that, like I'm nice to people. I don't have an issue.
I don't know. It's, it's, it's that thing of, um, like, I guess I dealt with social insecurity from having been isolated in a, in a bad way that it ended up working where I got fed up because something bad happened.
[7:06] Uh, and I just gave up and thought, you know what? like fuck people like absolutely fuck them like i put so much effort into like pussyfooting around people and caring about other people's feelings and then this thing happens like well clearly my feelings don't matter and i kind of spat the dummy and when i spat the dummy or everything to do with socializing got better because i spat the dummy in a way that oh it's like like you have personality change like you're not i'm not pre-planning conversation i used to like pre-plan conversations before i had them if i would do deliveries for my family's farm of like oh i'll talk about the weather i'll talk about this thing in the news of like it feels smart if you're autistic but it's completely it's not off the cuff so all someone has to do is say something that's not off the cuff and it's like oh crap like you don't have like the decision tree to actually engage with people like i couldn't i couldn't talk like to you like even over like a microphone like like not that long ago of just not being just being afraid of just yeah just saying what i think of just yeah like being raised to always like like be very concerned about other people's feelings and kind of like who cares about yours so, i'm i'm finished okay.
[8:20] Thanks i appreciate that we'll need to have like over over now out. That's fine.
And what is it that would be the best outcome for you in a conversation with me?
[8:37] I mean, it's kind of like someone going to church and then waiting for the religious experience that might not happen.
It's, well, on your show, the times where I've seen you kind of grill into someone and there's something, quite often it's like you'll say something like, no, this isn't true. You know that's not true.
You're lying about this thing. You're lying about what you want. or something like it it feels like i kind of want that of like oh like that kind of not eureka moment of it's like you can tell someone if they're overweight that they need to eat less and exercise more but the odds are very good that they they understand that like that's not that's not the issue it's like why aren't you doing the thing that you could be doing and there might be a whole bunch of legitimate reasons for that but that's not it's like the thing that's actionable and the thing that's to do with a narrative that you see everything through that warps everything.
It's like if you think all women are shit and terrible, then you're not going to interact with women nicely and then you're not going to have nice outcomes.
For me, I don't think I'm interacting with myself very nicely.
[9:48] I'm not doing right by me and I'm not doing right by my future.
[9:55] At the moment, it's very clear, clear kind of like two paths of either the thing that I'm doing works, uh, or like it doesn't.
And like, I don't know what comes after that.
Uh, like I'm blessed at the moment, like for even having, uh, like for the advent of Starlink because before that I couldn't like even get like a proper signal.
I could doing anything. Like I had like no, no options for doing anything because internet's like completely shit where I am.
So yeah. Uh, over.
[10:28] Right. What do you think I was asking for when I asked you what you're trying to get out of this conversation?
Because I need to know how I'm landing for you.
[10:38] What outcome?
[10:39] Hang on, let me finish. I'm not saying anything negative. I just really want to understand.
Because I don't understand what you want out of the conversation other than you're glad to have gotten better internet and you feel you might be alone forever and I've told other people that they're lying.
So what specifically, like, how would you gauge this to be a successful conversation for you?
Like, what would you hope, what insight would you hope to have?
What barriers would you like to overcome?
[11:08] Sorry sorry about that i didn't mean to um kind of warbler no no i don't i'm.
[11:13] Not i'm not saying this to correct you or i'm not saying you're doing anything wrong i just want to make sure that i know.
[11:21] What you're looking for yeah no what like oh like at the if we if we do something and the outcome is positive what does the positive outcome look like that well the positive outcome is like i it's kind of like when you framed i assume this this doesn't apply to me because i spat the dummy for socializing and that is kind of what fixed my issue because then i realized it's kind of like having if you tell someone that like having sex isn't a big deal well like that's all well and good but that doesn't solve that doesn't get rid of the monkey off someone's back but if someone does actually get rid of that monkey off the back then they can look back on man think yeah it wasn't actually that big a deal but if your problem is that dude dude i'm trying to be patient here what do you want to get out of the conversation i i appreciate.
[12:10] These monkey analogies they're very interesting but i still don't know what you want to get out of the conversation.
[12:16] Okay i want to be, i i want to not procrastinate i want to not actually self-sabotage and rep things for myself okay.
[12:31] Do you want.
[12:32] You said that you're practicing and it's quite complex, oh no i i know like even just saying that it's like well let's that's even just saying that it's like well that's that's so like complex and like open ended of like oh no no i'm.
[12:47] Not i didn't ask you to judge what you've said i just asked you what you wanted so overcoming procrastination that's a big one for you right.
[12:57] The biggest yeah that's.
[12:59] The biggest okay what about your woeful retreat into rural isolation that you are going to be alone forever and ever amen and so on is that something that you want to overcome or is that something you're more or less content with.
[13:20] Uh well i don't like i mean i i've lived in like lived in the city i didn't like it so it's not like the things that i'm hung up on like did i.
[13:29] Ask you which city.
[13:30] Ideally hang on hang on you.
[13:32] Need to listen to please i beg of you listen to what i'm saying and answer the question if you want to tell me about the cities you've lived in that you liked or didn't like that's not my question right do you want or do you view.
[13:44] As a no.
[13:44] No let me finish let me finish now Do you view it as a problem to be overcome that you experience severe isolation and expect to for the rest of your life?
[13:59] For the rest of my life, yes. But if you mean isolation as in living in a rural area itself, which is inherently isolating, then no.
That's not actually something I have an issue with. That's something that I prefer.
But to do with, like, socializing, like, at the moment...
[14:13] No, no, you know, fuck socializing. I'm sorry. I'm happy. No, what about... Hang on. What about a wife?
What about kids? What about all of that sort of stuff?
[14:26] Probably not. Like, I can't I can't suck about not having something if I haven't put in any effort to acquire it.
[14:33] OK, that's not about I'm not asking about the effort you have or have not put in.
[14:37] I'm asking, is it a problem that you could that you would like to overcome, which is to be without a partner and without children for the rest of your life?
[14:54] The only reason it feels like a problem is because it's an expectation so hang on but who's expect is it your expectation of other people's expectations, no like no no i mean like no i mean like social expectations of like well why don't you have x and y by this age or that age it's like well like i can i can give myself like a whole bunch of legitimate excuses of yeah like i didn't do blah blah because of x y z okay no no hang on hang on Hang on.
[15:20] Hang on. No, so I'm not asking about social expectations.
So, and I'm sorry to have to interrupt. I just want to make sure that we get a good use out of our time together. So...
[15:30] No, you're all right.
[15:31] So you don't want to fall in love. You don't want to get married.
You don't want to be a father. Is that right? Forget social expectations.
You, in your heart, you want to go through life without a partner, without a lover, without a mother for your children.
Is that right? And I'm not criticizing. I'm just curious.
[15:49] It's not about the alternate timeline where that's a thing.
Yeah, that sounds great. great. I just, I don't think that, like, if I'm going to put an effort into something first, it should be the thing that's, like, my immediate problem, which is to deal with, like, business and being successful.
Like, if I can figure that out, it's like, well, you know, like, if I'm, if I make excuses because I'm sick and I'm isolated and then that becomes kind of a negative feedback loop of, well, there's no point in pursuing all the things you're talking about because, like, well, I've already lost, you know, it's kind of like you're, like yeah you're the you're the bald dwarf at like 15 or something of like you like you you're downranked like you you downrank yourself and then you don't put in effort because you think what's the point of putting in effort because you're only gonna all right this is all very abstract now.
[16:44] This is all very abstract and you're giving me some odd philosophy of something or other but i'm basically just asking the question if you could have.
[16:52] Hang on let me.
[16:54] Let me ask the the question, if you could have a happy marriage with children, would you want that?
[17:03] Yeah.
[17:04] Okay, okay. So the reason I'm saying is that, don't you...
[17:08] I don't see that as bad.
[17:09] I'm sorry?
[17:13] I don't see that as bad, it's just that I wouldn't put myself out there in the position that I'm in now.
It's like, there's no point. Right.
[17:24] Well, I'm not asking you about now. I'm asking over the course of your life.
Like, let me put it to you this way. When you want to build a house, you don't just start throwing bricks together, right? What's the first thing you do?
[17:39] Plans for where everything goes.
[17:41] Well, you design the house. Right? Do you want one story, two stories, how many bedrooms, what size attic?
Is it going to be centrally heated? Do you want air conditioning?
Is it going to be built in?
Is it going to be on the window? Like, you plan the house, right?
And then you only start building once you know what the end goal is, right?
So I'm going to have a different conversation with you. Hang on. Sorry.
I'm going to have a different conversation with you if your end goal is to overcome procrastination or if your end goal is to have a wife and kids.
I'm just telling you, that is going to condition the conversation.
I don't care what goal you want. I'm like the taxi driver. All I'm saying is, where do you want to get to?
Now, if you say, I want to go down the street, that's one thing.
If you want to say, I want to go across the city, that's another thing.
So I'm just asking, what is the end goal of an ideal life that you would like to achieve?
[18:36] Well, hang on. Well, ideal life and conversation with you that leads to a more ideal life is not the same thing.
Like, having a wife and kids would be wonderful.
But at the moment, like, the problem that I really want to deal with, like, maybe if I become successful, that leads to me becoming, yeah, in my mind, like, marriageable.
Like i don't see myself as that at the moment and i i wouldn't i wouldn't put that on someone you know i wouldn't.
[19:04] I get that you've you've said that a bunch of times and again i'm sorry about the the uh diabetes that you're suffering from the ailments and so on have you ever been coached before i i'm going to assume not in sports but have you been coached before in math or or have Have you taken writing courses?
Have you experienced coaching before?
[19:29] Yeah.
[19:30] And what were you coached in?
[19:32] Yeah, sure.
Well, I guess for the most recent thing, it would be not just coaching, but also teaching vertical rescue.
[19:42] What's that?
[19:42] Are you talking about writings? Are you talking about something academic?
Well, when I used to volunteer. Yeah, like I used to do, you have to learn how to do all the things for like state security services.
[19:58] Okay, so have you experienced coaching from an expert before?
[20:04] One-on-one coaching, yes.
[20:09] And how did that go?
[20:10] It was very nice. It was very nice to have some. It was wonderful not feeling confident in the beginning and then afterwards, you know, like you can do something.
And it's a wonderful feeling.
[20:21] Okay. Because I'll tell you, my experience of talking to you so far is that we're kind of wrestling for authority, or not quite control, but something like that, right?
So we've been talking for, what, I don't know, 15 minutes or so, and I have a particular methodology for approaching these conversations, and you're fighting me every step of the way, right?
For me, it shouldn't take 10 minutes to get an answer to a simple question, do you want to get married and have kids? Yes or no?
And I'm getting all this stuff about, well, maybe later or procrastination is my biggest issue, but down the road and ideal and vertical security.
It's just as far as efficiency goes. All you have to do is answer the question.
But I think that's tough for you because you won't surrender to a particular kind of process that is my coaching, right?
Because you want to tell me about why it's not appropriate now and why you may not have something to offer and all of that sort of stuff, right?
As opposed to, I'm asking you questions for a reason, you know, just give me the answers. I don't need an essay.
It's not, I mean, it's kind of yes, no. Some people, they don't want to get married and have kids and some people do. And if you're one of those people, say yes, in the long run, it would be nice to be married and have kids.
[21:45] I'm procrastinating.
I'm essentially procrastinating on the answer. I'm procrastinating on the answer of coming to you with my problem being procrastination, and I'm not answering that.
I don't, like, during my day, I don't think about having a wife and kids at all. Like, I just don't.
[22:06] Did I ask you? Hang on. Hang on. Did I ask you if during the day do you think of….
[22:12] Can I just say yes or no?
[22:14] Yeah. That's the whole point. That's efficiency.
[22:16] Can I just say yes? Okay. Okay.
[22:20] It's just answering what I have. I care more about procrastination.
I'm sorry?
[22:27] You're asking, oh, you don't, or you want to be alone. You'll say, oh, you want to be alone forever. It's like, okay, but that's leading, because I won't be alone.
It's just that I might not have a wife and kids. It's like, I don't care about that.
If I really cared about that, then I would have pursued it. So, no.
I'm going to say no. I'm probably not going to have a wife and kids.
[22:47] Well, of course, you wouldn't have pursued it because you have a problem with procrastination.
Right? So say, well, no, no, no, I'm so decisive that I would have just pursued it.
If you say, oh, no, if I wanted a wife and kids, I'm so decisive I would have just pursued it.
When you've told me that your biggest single issue is procrastination, I'm looking at your level of self-knowledge here, right?
Of course, you wouldn't have just pursued it because you have a huge problem with procrastination.
You want to defer to later. Even in the reply to me, you say, well, a wife and kids would be nice in the future, but not right now.
Now I'm not ready. Now is not the time. Now is this, even though you've been an adult for 10 years. You've been an adult for a decade.
So you're saying, no, no, no, wife and kids, yeah, I'll put that off till later.
[23:40] I don't know if you were crippled and you were sick all the time you wouldn't give up I guess you wouldn't give up on those things I'm just weaker on that Okay.
[23:52] So tell me a little bit about physical symptoms, which of course I massively sympathize with but tell me a little bit about the development of the illness and what's going on.
[24:03] Uh it's uh spondyloarthropathy or ankylosing spondylitis basically just like really bad arthritis um like that was like i was bed bound at like 10 i had to wait a very long time to get medicine so that i could walk but then there was this issue where if i like it actually started it because i i went on like a weight loss kick when i was a kid and that somehow that kind of triggered my immune system of like oh i lost too much weight too quickly and then something that's, genetically predetermined whatever kind of like propped up uh the the pattern is from like.
[24:47] Like 15 onwards really for you know like a condition kind of waxes and wanes and like Like you've, you've got like the medicine works, then I'll start losing weight.
I'll start putting in effort and then it would just like the medicine would just stop working and I have to move to something else.
So you kind of got like, you get your hopes up and then it's like, well, you just get kind of like kicked down again and again.
At the moment, I don't have anything other than a prednisone to, uh, to, to walk because there's nothing left.
So it's like yeah like like can i make the best of like what i have at the moment it's like yes i yes i can but like anything else is like like that'll be that'll be wonderful but you know like do what you can do first and like don't don't be don't be too hard on yourself but like those other things right.
[25:47] Okay and i'm so at the moment you use a pegnazone i think it's a anti-inflammatory i'm not a doctor obviously is that a painkiller is that what you use to to so you can more easily.
[25:58] Get around it's that it's steroid it's a it's a steroid it's you're not meant to be on it long term and.
[26:05] When you're on this and it's working how functional are you.
[26:13] It lets me well i don't need crutches but it's like it doesn't get rid of it's just like inflammation and stuff is like too big like i can i can take a dog like i can take the dog for a walk but like this it gets it allows me to like bend my name and stuff and like put pressure on my feet and it's i i don't know like i've at least i'm like i'm in america I like healthcare here it's not that bad of being able to like, you know like my rheumatologist is good but I've like I've just been through every medication since I was a kid so it's like okay like whatever that's it like on that front that's it it's like okay well, you know as a kid I thought well it would be kind of be would be.
[27:01] Not this is completely selfish but it would be better to be crippled like in like a permanent way where you don't feel something thing like you're in a wheelchair i know that's not it's that's a horrible shitty thing to say but it's no i get it like if you as opposed to you like like you can you can at least like write something off and go okay now like there's no there's no treatment and you can you have to deal with that and you uh like but when you have your kind of like yo-yoing or you know what like you know what it feels like to like you have better days than others and it's like well why I can't like all the better days now it's just like sympathize with like elderly like people like elderly neighbors of like oh yeah like I understand your back pains of like yeah like we're all hobbling over and like we're all got our walking sticks right.
[27:51] And how heavy were you in your mid-teens that you did this dieting and how much did you lose.
[28:01] Uh i was 130 when i was 10 6 2 and i got down to 80 maybe 85 in a year but i that was, basically going nuts and like and being really like horrible to myself like not eating or eating like diet jelly kind of aspartame and stuff like i like i, And because I was doing a school over the air at the time and the workload wasn't that much, I would just like spend, like, I could spend like all day just like walking like around because the farm that we're on at that point was huge.
Like just, just walking, like listening to audio books and stuff on my iPod.
Like that's, that's in like the, it's in like the bush, but there's like no one there.
So it's like, there's no one, there was no, that was before I was crippled.
And then like once I got down to oh my god wait it's like but once things started looking like holy crap like I can do I can do like uh like a hundred setups it's like and just just feeling amazing and thinking okay like like where am I going like should I join the military or something or or anything it's like any physical job before we get there I'm.
[29:18] Trying to figure this out you said you were 130 at the age of 10 does that mean pounds.
[29:25] No No. No. They're not as big as a kid.
[29:31] So, sorry, 130, is that... Oh, that's kilograms.
[29:38] Yes, it's huge, yes.
[29:40] What the heck? Isn't a kilogram 2.2 pounds?
[29:46] Yes.
[29:48] So, wait, you were pushing 300 pounds at the age of 10?
How on earth did that happen? I'm not blaming you. I mean, you were a kid.
I'm just... I mean, you have parents, right? You're not raised by wolves. What happened?
[30:11] Well, like, it's...
I can blame my parents for that, but, like, I have agency.
[30:19] No, no, no, no, no, no. I'm not doing that.
No, no, hang on, hang on. John, I'm not doing that with you.
Of course you blame your parents. They're in charge of your diet and your environment and your health. Of course you blame your parents.
I mean, you can't give a five-year-old or an eight-year-old full moral responsibility.
Otherwise, they'd be out there signing contracts and driving cars.
It's your parents' job to inform you about health, to keep healthy food around, to encourage you to eat healthy, to eat healthy themselves.
Of course it's your parents' responsibility. I mean, who else would it be?
You can't blame kids for these decisions.
[31:08] It's more that, like, whether it's, it's not like they didn't like me or anything.
Like, I know if you let a child become like that, well, you can't like them as much as you could.
But it's like well if something wasn't done with like malevolent intent it's like well if i if i'm raiding the fridge if i if i'm the one that's doing like the like whatever like when i was like a kid there wasn't there wasn't okay like your kid is depressed they go to like therapy or something like that wasn't it wasn't a thing like there was no like were you dependent and the counseling.
Yeah. Like, but.
[31:50] Okay. So what were you depressed about as a kid?
[31:53] The thing is, I mean, like, not just being fat, of just, like, not getting, like, along with people, not having, like, friends at school.
Just, like, I don't know. I feel like it's normal stuff of, like, you know, like, didn't grow up with my real dad.
Like, maybe I was upset about that. I didn't like my stepdad a lot.
Like, I like him now because I get him more as an adult.
And, like, there's a level of respect there of, like, As a kid, if you're seven or eight and your stepdad's calling you Dudley and stuff and making fun of you for being fat, it's like, yeah, that's not nice.
But then someone just grows up with that's normal or that's banter or something, then there's no point looking back and being resentful.
Is that healthy? like i don't feel like i just it doesn't feel like that's healthy to kind of like look it's like if i was circumcised as a kid but my parents thought that it was a good thing there's no point in being upset at them having done it if they thought sorry i don't quite i don't quite sorry i.
[33:06] Don't quite understand what you mean there's no point i mean you have the emotions or you don't i don't like do you just kill your emotions by saying well what's what's your purpose Show me your papers. I need to know your project plan.
I mean, you have the feelings or you don't.
I mean, if the feelings are there, you have the feelings, then you deal with them.
But I don't think that you would interrogate your feelings and say, well, if you don't lead to some productive purpose, you can't be here.
[33:36] Yeah, kind of. I mean, if you say something to me, and for the things that you've talked about, like, yeah, I'm not as upset now, but I was upset before, but it's not like that was your intent.
[33:47] I'm sorry, how do you know what people's intent is? I don't quite understand.
[33:57] Well, it's not knowing what someone's intent is. It's just that you're better off, like for your parents, at least, if you're assuming that it wasn't malevolent.
Like if you if you have like every indication that it wasn't apart from okay like you're big but you're also the i get that it's just it's it's that thing that people like like you would.
[34:18] I'm sorry i'm sorry i'm sorry but i i don't know what you're talking about is it not the case that your parents let you get and i'm sorry if i've misunderstood something please correct me if i i go astray is it not the case that your parents let you get so fat that when you dieted it wrecked your health like in a semi-permanent fashion am i am i wrong about that, it's no that's not yes no do i do i have i thought you said that the diet i know you're gearing up for another speech which i really can't do so as far as i understood it you were were almost 300 pounds when you were 10 years old, you dieted so savagely that you triggered some kind of autoimmune response. Is that right?
[35:06] That's the theory of, well, if your immune system fucks up, you don't necessarily know why.
It's just that that was the precursor of, okay, what's the biggest change in my life? It's going from A to B, and now I can't walk.
[35:20] I assume that you've looked this up I don't know if dieting has anything to do with autoimmune disorders I assume you've looked this up is there a theory out there in the world that you know of that says that extreme dieting can lead to autoimmune disorders, yes okay so that seems to be the most probable cause someone.
[35:46] That I know has MS because of it.
[35:48] Wow okay Okay. So your parents allowed you or created an environment where you got so fat that dieting might have permanently wrecked your health as far as this stuff goes, right?
[36:05] Yes.
[36:06] Do you think that parents don't know that a 300-pound 10-year-old is unhealthy?
[36:16] Healthy i think if you yes of course they know that it's unhealthy it's just that if you're if you're a kid and you're being fought every step of the way it's like yeah you can like you can put the hammer down like you could well no you can't put the hammer down like if you're talking about like smacking or something but like yeah it's that i guess it's that that that periscope kind of bargaining that parents will do with their kids it's like well if this if this shuts them up or stops them from sucking it's like yeah like have a happy meal have a like like this or that irresponsible. It was irresponsible.
I, I, I don't want to feel resentment to people that I like now, the things in the past of like, I just don't, I don't want to feel that.
Like, I don't want to like, but all the things that I can steal on for the problems that I have, like, like adding, like not liking my parents is not one of them.
[37:06] Okay so you have answers for your life so i'm not sure why we're calling right because i'm trying to sort of give you an outside view and you're saying well i'm not going to do that and that's fine look i you obviously it's your life you can do whatever you want or don't want, but if you're going to put so many rules on what we can talk about or the approach that we can take then i'm not sure what value i can provide well.
[37:31] What about no i i apologize then.
[37:34] Like if i sorry Sorry, if you're a tennis player, if you're a tennis player, hang on, if you're a tennis player, and I'm the coach, and I say, you need to keep your eye on the ball, and you need to stand this way.
And you say, no, I'm not standing that way. And I'm not keeping my eye on the ball. Thank you very much.
Okay, but that's fine. And then you can play tennis the way you want to play tennis. I'm just telling you that as a coach, and I'm fairly good at this kind of stuff. This is kind of what you need to do.
And if you say, well, I'm not going to do that. that's fine that's fine but then then i don't know how to coach you i.
[38:07] I called i called i called i called i called i i messaged and called you because you were because you're good at this stuff so if you're.
[38:16] Saying no no no but you're you're fighting me every step of the way you're fighting me with tangents you're fighting me with abstractions you're fighting me with there's no purpose to this you're fighting me with i don't want to feel this you're fighting with this i don't want to like just like my parents who i now like you're just you're fighting me on everything it's like Like your immune system is now attacking me, not just you. Do you know what I mean?
[38:38] I'm sorry. The issue that I have with what you've said is that I can't see mentally how it's productive to feel resentment towards my parents.
Like I get if they were.
[38:53] Okay. What did I say? What did I say? Hang on. Hang on. Hang on.
What did I say about emotions and productivity? I'm not saying whether you agree with it or not, but do you remember what I said?
[39:06] You have to, I've forgotten what you said specifically, sorry.
[39:10] Honestly, this was like seven minutes ago. So I'll repeat it, but you really do have to find a way to relax and listen.
And listening to me doesn't mean that you agree with me at all, right?
You can listen to me and say he's full of crap and I don't, but I would appreciate being listened to because otherwise my motivation to give you input kind of diminishes if you're really not listening.
And again, listening doesn't mean agreeing. What I said was you either have the feelings or you don't.
And so demanding that your feelings show you proof of product productivity in your life or some sort of end goal that you approve of is just another way of rejecting your feelings like let me give you an example so let's say i'm at some roadside diner i'm driving across you know the country i'm at some roadside diner and i eat some fairly dicey sushi right And I'm driving along and I get stabbing pains in my gut.
I've got some kind of food poisoning. Now, do I just grit my teeth and tell my stomach to shut up and stop complaining because I'm never going to eat there again.
We're just driving through, so there's absolutely no point me having these stabbing pains because that's all in the rear view and I'm never going to eat at that place ever again.
So shut up and stop feeling nausea and pain.
If I had that relationship, would that make any sense?
[40:32] No.
[40:34] Right. So you have feelings. I mean, your parents, I mean, from what I can see, they poisoned you with food, and then your cure poisoned you further.
I mean, a kid 300 pounds is dying, isn't he?
And setting yourself up for lifelong health problems no matter what happens.
[40:55] Yes, it is. It's just that... You're right.
It's just... so feeling like like just sad things it's like oh okay let's add something else to the list like you're right like i like i'm like i'm not happy about the past but i can't change that like it's like.
[41:14] To me it's like okay well i have you don't like come on man but it's done come on no no no you got to stop insulting both of our intelligence if you're going to spend time in our conversation in informing me that you can't change the past i i don't even know how to have this conversation honestly i'll be straight up with you man because saying i can't change the past it's so obvious and factual that saying it as some sort of thing in a conversation it's like it's like me saying well you know clearly my friend i can't reverse gravity you understand that you you understand that i can't reverse gravity it's like well of course but what on earth would your feelings your feelings are about the future not the past.
[41:56] Okay, then I'm not used to dealing with my emotions in a way that is productive towards the future.
[42:01] Forget the productivity. It doesn't matter. Productivity is irrelevant to your emotions.
Who are you to judge how your instincts that have developed over hundreds of millions of years, who are you to judge the productivity of your instincts?
[42:16] They are part of your personality. You should listen to them.
You should not rule them. They should not rule you, but they should have a seat at the table.
Who are you in your conscious mind mind, who has problems with procrastination, who are you to say to your feelings what they should and should not be, what they should and should not tell you, whether they're appropriate, inappropriate, productive, or unproductive? You have feelings.
Listen to them. Accept them. Doesn't mean that they run your life.
But you do not have the knowledge or the wisdom to say to your feelings, and neither do I, if it's any consolation, to say to your feelings, thou shalt not be you have to prove to me your end goal and your end plan before i'll let yourself, i'll let myself feel a damn thing that's just cutting yourself off from all of your instincts and all of your feelings and that's very bad for this is really important information for you to have so how did you get all this weight on as a kid what was in the house what were you eating uh did you grow up in a rural area as well and therefore you couldn't even run down to the local sweet shop or tuck shop what what's happening as a kid that you got this obese.
[43:32] Um it was more just like um moving uh away from like my mom was single when she was young and at that point like i was i was i was like real thin like i was i was i was i don't know know healthy but whatever like i was skinny i was a skinny kid and then um she met my stepdad and we moved to because he was a farmer so we moved out to where he lived and it's like okay well all my friends are gone uh from school and i met at a new school and everyone's you know you're the weird person there and i didn't get along i was kind of scared of sorry why would you it was never like, I don't know. Like, I don't know.
Like, I was just, I'm not, I don't know. Maybe I'm being narcissistic and doing that. Oh, I'm so spectacular.
[44:24] No, no, no. Just don't. Please don't tell me another psychological thing.
Please, I'm begging you.
Why were you the weird kid? Just being the new kid doesn't mean that, I've been the new kid at a bunch of schools when I was a kid.
Being the new kid doesn't mean that you're the weird kid. I'm just curious.
Why were you the weird kid?
[44:43] Kid the boss kind of class clown, that like i didn't but but also coming into a school where it's like you don't you don't know anyone and everyone already has kind of like their their thing set up no i get that.
[45:00] I get that i've been in that situation.
[45:02] A bunch of.
[45:02] Times too so why does that make you the weird kid and i'm not criticizing i'm just curious.
[45:10] I i guess i just framed that as me being the weird kid like maybe i was fine maybe i was maybe i was normal it just i i felt like the i'm just telling you feelings i felt like the odd one out but that's probably oh no now your feelings now your feelings are important right.
[45:26] Because you felt this all right so what was weird about you in your estimation what was what was the weird part.
[45:41] I didn't get along with people my own egg. I preferred just talking about people or talking to people that were older about things that were older.
[45:50] No, but you did in your previous school, right?
[45:54] I just...
No. It's more that I grew up with... From kindy to...
For the people that I knew at school. Well, I knew those people. So it's like you're...
But maybe maybe a weird but it's not a negative it's like oh like i'm saying weird and i'm framing it as a positive i'm framing it as a negative it's like but it's it's fine if it's like you're not boring like i wasn't i certainly wasn't oh god no.
[46:21] No nobody wants to be the weird kid come on man let's not start redefining ourself into up is down and black is white so you had friends in your old school you moved to the country with your stepdad and you can't make friends at the new school right.
[46:38] It's like the kids are farming kids it's like well like you've got town kids kind of rural but live out kind of in the sticks kids of yeah they're just being like a disconnect there of like okay well what are they doing on the weekend it's like well they're going they're going hunting they're like pig trapping and stuff like that okay all that stuff like completely like bizarre to me and like kind of like yeah it's not my thing, and sorry do you have any siblings if you do, I have two sisters.
[47:08] Okay so did your parents attempt to get you to fit in more to the social environment that they moved you to.
[47:19] Uh like now like i do you mean oh no like the social outings for things like okay signing up for tennis and things like doing doing extra you mean extracurricular stuff then like yeah they did what they could but it's like also the like being like grain farming and like being kind of like in the desert it's like it's it's quite hard like for you got a kid out in the middle of that It's like, well, yeah, I can't just go over to my friend's house like I used to before and just kind of run amok and ride bicycles all around town.
It's like, well, you're in the middle of nowhere. It's like 48 degrees. It sucks.
And it's like, yeah, just stay inside and, yeah, play video games.
[48:05] And did your mother notice that you had lost your social life?
[48:16] Now it's like if I'm not causing it's like the bare minimum I guess if I'm not in trouble if I haven't got like a report written up sorry is.
[48:27] That just a no.
[48:28] I'm doing that, no so.
[48:32] Your mother didn't care that you had lost your social life enough to do anything about it.
[48:42] If i was crying and tormented by it then she probably would have done something it's like but i didn't do that so like oh so now.
[48:50] It's your fault because you weren't.
[48:51] Right i could pick up on more like.
[48:53] You know it's the parents job right.
[48:54] No i mean it's.
[48:56] The parents job to know how their children are doing.
[48:58] It is but but it is but but i i'm not i'm not a parent so i can't i can't shit on a parent that like might not have done a perfect job it's like it feels It feels horrible.
[49:12] What do you mean?
[49:15] It feels horrible when you think, okay, well, it's not someone let you down.
They let you down, but they didn't mean to.
It's like, well, they weren't paying attention. They could have paid attention.
Maybe they're basically blind and they're stupid and they're arrogant and stuff, but they didn't.
Like for my mom, were you saying, well, for my stepdad, it's a bit different because it was a bit of like, well, you're not my kid.
You've got that kind of energy there. It's like, but put that to whatever.
For my mom.
[49:44] Oh, no, no. You marry a woman, you marry your children. No, you marry a woman, you marry your children.
Having the option to say, well, you're not my kid, so I don't have to parent you, that's abusive. Like, that's not an option, right?
I mean, it would be as crazy as saying, well, I'm going to feed my kids, not your kids, right?
It's like you married the woman, he knew that your mom had kids, right?
So, yeah, I mean, there's no excuse for your stepfather either.
I mean, it's the parent's job to know if the children are unhappy and do what they can to fix it, right?
We understand that, right? I mean, that's not massively complicated parenting.
If you take your kid out of the city and put him into the country where he can't see his friends, you need to see if he's happy and work to try and give him a social life.
Like, this is not really complicated parenting. Does that make sense? Yes.
[50:39] Yeah, it sounds wonderful.
[50:44] So what's wrong with saying that it was bad, that wasn't done?
[50:54] You haven't said anything wrong. There's nothing wrong with what you're saying.
It's that it's right in a way that's really uncomfortable.
[51:00] Okay, so I'm sorry that you're uncomfortable. I understand that, but I'm certainly happy to hear about your discomfort. Why is that uncomfortable?
[51:12] Because it just means that, yeah, like, I made excuses for other people when I didn't have to, I guess.
Like, it's like treating myself like I have agency, but I would never treat another kid that way.
Well, like, well, I, like, it comes to, like, I must be better than other kids.
Like, I must have been capable of more than other kids because, like, I wouldn't say that about any other kid. Like, I know I wouldn't, so.
I don't know, that kind of feels like narcissistic.
Yeah, like I broke the dam of like that. Yeah.
[51:51] I'm not following what you're saying, if you could break it down some more.
[52:01] You're talking about like agency for kids.
It just wasn't an environment where you discuss disgust emotions you know like that like it's like therapy like therapy was the like people that were insane uh like it's like yeah like it like an attitude it's a bit like people who are like homophobic in the past and now like you hear them now when like oh like they don't say a bad word at all it's like i know what you were like before of yeah like things the culture has changed and like that's not an excuse for uh like how i was treated it's just that just not used that's not something that i was expecting to like try and unravel of like does that matter like don't need to go back to productivity it's like okay just that's just the feelings like just on their own it's like but like i'm sorry have you listened to uh have you sorry you've.
[53:01] Listened to call-in before right.
[53:02] Yeah like okay i mean are you aware.
[53:07] That i talk about people's childhoods a lot.
[53:13] Yeah, I know you are, but maybe I was just trying to, I was hoping that my headcanon of, yeah, that that wouldn't, yeah, maybe that wasn't the issue.
It's like, oh, you'd say, okay, you don't need that.
It's like, okay, it's just this bullshit technical thing of, yeah, do blah, blah. up.
I was looking for a quick fix, I guess, of thinking, okay, maybe there is just a sentence someone can say that fixes everything.
It's like, okay, well, if it's not and it's some type of something more challenging, it's like, okay, uphill battle.
That's what I call in for.
I have to deal with if I have to deal with all these other things, if I have to deal with the feelings first and then everything else comes after, then that's, that's good. Like, it's just, I don't know.
I'm just not used to dealing with that. It's like, like you just like for the background that I was raised in, you just shut the fuck up and you just do what needs to be done.
You don't say anything. If you like man up, like you just, you just, you just don't deal with it.
Or you, you, you, you cry in silence, kind of on your own.
[54:30] So you're supposed to just have productive outcomes man up and get things done, right?
[54:38] Yes.
[54:39] Okay. So why didn't, so, so that's the, hang on.
Sorry, if that's the case, that you're just supposed to man up, get things done and do the right thing, then how did you end up almost 300 pounds as a 10 year old?
Right? Why didn't your father just, your stepfather man up and make sure you didn't get the damn food, keep it out of the house and, and get you out and walking about?
Out and like if you're just supposed to deal with things and get things done and be productive why didn't your parents do that with you when you were gaining such a huge amount of weight.
[55:16] Because anything to do with me was not a priority like well it's it's sisters or it's farm or it's themselves like well like it's kind of like the that he can look after himself.
Okay, so that's a theory.
[55:35] The theory is that you can look after yourself, but clearly you weren't looking after yourself because you were becoming morbidly obese and half-wider than you were tall.
[55:50] Yes, but it's like, yeah, that's true.
There's nothing else to say there. Yeah, then they fucked up on that. It's just...
[56:03] Okay, how long did it take you to go from being a skinny kid to almost 300 pounds?
[56:16] How long did that take me? Four or five years, maybe?
[56:25] So from like the age of six for the age of 10?
[56:31] Around that but i was like quite i was very tall as a kid so like i know that's still like fat is fat like it's irrelevant it's just that yeah like i haven't i haven't grown much like since then like the height wise okay.
[56:45] You weren't you weren't over six feet when you were six right.
[56:51] What no i wasn't over six feet but i was six foot two like when i was like 10.
[56:57] Okay you know that six foot two is in no way healthy at 300 pounds right.
[57:04] No no it's it's it's no that's it it's like if i was if i was five foot at, it's not filling out it's not like i like oh he looked better because he kept it all kind of even even it's like no i was just yeah like it was mainly like being at home being sedentary and playing video games and kind of like hiding away from like when i stepped out of like okay like i don't want to get growled at for not having done this or that or like just like yeah and then and then it's then obviously well if you're fat then that's going to have a negative feedback loop of of, well, you're insecure because people make fun of you for being fat.
And kind of fair enough if it's other kids. Kids will be horrible.
[57:51] Well, I don't want to deal with kids because we didn't deal with family stuff.
So your stepfather would growl at you for being fat or swear at you for being fat, which obviously didn't help.
What did your mother say or do about you gaining weight?
[58:04] He'd make fun of me for being fat.
[58:06] Okay, but what did your mother do?
[58:07] He never growled at me for being fat.
[58:09] Oh, he just made fun of you?
[58:11] She would, like... yeah he never grabbed anything it was like chores or like it's kind of like, like trying to think of like what it's kind of like a Very passive aggressive like he was it was never it was never violent like my mother woods was violent like she would like get angry and like she'd like smack or, Like he's like a jug cord or something like that like when I was again, but then she said She didn't, Like a like the power cord for like a like a at all sorry another jug, I'll get smacked.
[58:56] Wait, so she beat you with electrical cords?
[59:04] Not often, but...
[59:08] She beat you with electrical cords?
[59:16] I can... Your tone, it does sound kind of silly. Of...
[59:22] Honestly if if you had yes if you had a female friend whose boyfriend beat her with electrical cords and you pointed at that out and she said well not often what would you say.
[59:35] I'd say you're fucking evil.
[59:42] Well the girlfriend is telling you the girlfriend is telling you maybe.
[59:46] Not maybe i wouldn't go that.
[59:48] No, a friend of yours who's a girl, a woman, is telling you her boyfriend beats her with electrical cords, and you say, well, that's basically, he beats you with electrical cords, and she says, well, not often.
What would you say to the girl, to the woman?
[1:00:03] Sorry, I'd say, like, you need to get out of there, of, like, this guy's insane. No, no, no, but she would say.
[1:00:10] No, but he doesn't have any bad intent, he doesn't have any bad intention.
You know he's not acting malevolently you know he's trying to help in his own way I guess.
[1:00:24] Yeah, it's completely hypocritical on my part to treat myself differently from how I do other people.
[1:00:32] See, now you're just attacking yourself.
[1:00:34] It's just great.
[1:00:35] Now you're just attacking yourself, saying, do you really think that the problem I have with you being beaten with electrical cables when you were a child is that you're mildly hypocritical about it as an adult? Do you really think that's my major moral issue?
Is the effect that these kinds of beatings have had on you as an adult? Yeah.
[1:00:55] No it's it having it said that way it sounds really stupid yeah well it is it doesn't sound stupid it is now.
[1:01:07] You're insulting yourself again right now you've gone from.
[1:01:10] Hypocritical to sounding stupid but if how do I be honest how do I be honest without sounding like I'm being shitty to myself like yeah how about you judge your mother Your mother for beating you.
[1:01:25] With an electrical cable when you were a little boy. Instead of how hypocritical or stupid sounding you might be, how about you judge your mother for beating you with an electrical cable when you were a helpless and dependent child?
[1:01:43] Adly, what do I do with that? It's like, well, at the time, of course, at the time I was upset by it. At the time, it's like.
[1:01:55] What do you do? Do you think we're going to get a chance to connect emotionally at all here, or are you just going to keep jumping out of your body and analyze and abstract everything?
Well, what am I supposed to do with this knowledge now?
You were beaten as a child by your mother repeatedly with an electrical cable.
That's appalling. That's horrible. That's immoral at the extreme.
I'm so sorry, that's terrible.
That's terrible. Listen, I have a daughter, and the idea of anyone beating her with an electrical cable makes me, frankly, murderous.
And maybe the beatings had something to do with the eatings.
Maybe you needed to put on a lot of flesh to protect your skeleton from the beatings.
You needed padding.
Maybe the fact that your body was used to torture and punish you meant that you tried to counteract the torture and punishment that your body was used for by praising and rewarding your body with excess food.
[1:03:25] Yes.
I know that if I say this, I know what it sounds like, but if it was reserved for the worst thing, like you talk from someone like, I don't know, for you, for anyone in the old days, it was like, okay like they were smacked and they said well it was good that they were smacked of like that maybe that's cult maybe that's all bullshit and it was and it was always negative and it's never been a positive or it's never been neutral of just something that you integrated and moved past of like well you you suffer the same thing i do and you because you're you you integrate it and you move forward but i don't and it kind of eats away at me it's like well like what's the difference Or is it just, to me, it's just like the narrative that you see it through.
[1:04:13] This filibustering verbal nonsense has got to stop in this conversation.
Please. It's so alienating and dissociating that we're talking about you being beaten with electrical cables repeatedly as a child.
And you're just skating right over all of this.
[1:04:39] I don't know what the correct response is other than going.
[1:04:43] No stop just okay your your response of abstracting and babbling is not the correct response it's a way to have yourself stop feeling anything stop experiencing anything and maybe because of your illness you're still living at at home, is that right?
[1:05:04] No, I have my own place.
[1:05:06] Oh, you have your own place, okay. Maybe your mother helped you a lot with your illness, and maybe you feel some obligation, maybe you feel there's some disloyalty, I don't know.
But you said to me, emotions weren't processed in my house.
Well, anger is an emotion, rage is an emotion, and that emotion was very much acted on and practiced in your house, because you were beaten as a kid with an electrical cable.
So there were some emotions that were absolutely allowed in your house.
What was your relationship like with your mother when you were little?
[1:05:42] Yeah, just not.
Probably kind of, like, I don't know what the term is.
Like, the malevolent mother goose, I guess, of, well, everything's great until it's not, and then you're just like your father, of that being, like, the worst possible thing that you could be.
Like, biological father of, like, yeah, like, she'll...
Go and she'll she'll fight for you like but if you say like one thing then it's like oh like you like you're basically not my mother like where's she gone you know like you were wonderful before you're on my side before and i was on yours kind of like i don't know like like friends like it was it was more like a like not friends if you get beaten i guess that like the relationship there was like okay well i'd spend like my sister didn't get along well with my mom like i was, mom's single mother's boy i guess.
[1:06:48] Sorry i thought you were abandoned to your own room.
[1:06:50] To play video games and.
[1:06:52] Eats i'm sorry i'm not i'm not accusing you of anything i just want to make sure i understand because i thought you were kind of abandoned by your mother and now it sounds like she was kind of clingy.
[1:07:01] No no no you you were saying okay like yeah like i got i got smacked a lot when i was younger but i didn't it wasn't sorry now i'm also confused i thought you said it wasn't too often now.
[1:07:14] You say you get smacked a lot i'm trying to figure these things out.
[1:07:20] No no no like when i said that i got like smacked by a jug cord i also said that that was reserved up with like the worst things that i could do it wasn't like i was beaten like every day or like it was like i don't know like maybe like once like you might get smacked like once every two weeks, like if like i you would say that that they would say that's too much like you'd say that's too much it's like okay but like if i was if i was feral or i broke something or this or that like like no like i didn't you deserved it i didn't talk back right so you're like.
[1:07:52] You're like the abused wife.
[1:07:54] You're like the abused wife.
[1:07:56] And she talked back, or she didn't listen, or the food was served cold, and she just deserved to get beaten. Is that your theory?
[1:08:07] No, well, then I guess it's more like, well, if the abused wife makes sure that dinner is on the table at the right time and everything's perfect, then there's no problem.
It's like, well, if you don't say anything that pisses me off, we don't do anything that pisses me off, then we're fine.
So that to me was framed as like, okay, well, if I'm on a good side, then it's a good day.
But you could say it's a bad day that i'm in that position of well like i'm i'm kind of juggling that of but when you're a kid you don't get to choose you don't get to choose that stuff of, when you say sorry when you say that you were smacked every two weeks.
[1:08:48] What do you mean like how open fist sorry open hands closed fist implement like an electrical cable what do you mean when you say you were smacked every.
[1:08:56] No it would be like a wooden spoon like you get like the wooden spoon and get like a really hard smack it's like but for like the like uh like if we're in like a there was one time where we i broke their railing uh on a in a hotel room and that was when i got loved but that was when my mom was single and she was at the end of her rope like for just like being stressed out or whatever there were other times on the farm where that happened oh so it's okay it's okay to hit children it's.
[1:09:27] It's okay to hit.
[1:09:28] Children not okay if you You screwed up your.
[1:09:30] Life to the point where you can say, well, I'm stressed. Like if your girlfriend said, well, my boyfriend did beat me up, but he was stressed.
He's been stressed at work. What would you say? There's no excuse, right?
[1:09:44] It's no excuse whatsoever, but it's.
[1:09:48] Then why are you putting it forward like it's an excuse?
[1:09:53] Because it's easier to make up stories, I guess, like to frame it as not as bad as it was.
[1:09:59] Okay, we'll stop doing that because here, you know, you said to me one of the most valuable things that I did in these calls was to call people out on falsehoods, right?
[1:10:11] Yeah, like, yeah.
[1:10:12] And it's all valuable with other people, but it's not so valuable with you, right? Because you want to keep minimizing and dodging and prevaricating.
[1:10:19] Yeah, sure. Yeah. Right?
Yeah.
[1:10:25] When did the hits hitting stop?
[1:10:33] I mean, honestly, when I became, like, taller than them. Really?
Like, really, like... yeah it might have been like around like nine or ten or something it's like.
[1:10:43] Yeah so when you hit your growth spurt and you got taller okay so the reason why your mother hit you isn't for any other reason than she was bigger because it stopped when she wasn't bigger right so it wasn't because she was stressed and it wasn't because she was a single mother and it wasn't because there were money worries and it wasn't because she was mad at your dad the only reason the only reason that your mother hit you is because she was bigger than you, which makes her a bully.
There's no other reason. Otherwise, are you saying that your mother was never stressed after you were nine or ten years old?
Of course she was, but she didn't hit you because you were bigger than her.
[1:11:26] Well, then it's like the fear of, I don't know, like being hit back.
That's no better for me like a child.
[1:11:32] He's able to control her behavior.
[1:11:34] You don't hit someone because you're afraid of them.
[1:11:35] She's able, she's perfectly able to control her violence when she's not bigger than you.
When you might hit her back. Then she's like, oh, well, we can't use violence now that you're big. And I'm never going to hit you again.
So that means, of course, she had, she had the complete choice to never hit you. She just chose to hit you when you were too small to fight back.
But the moment you got big enough to fight back, she stopped hitting you.
So she always could have stopped hitting you. she hit you because she chose to she hit you because she was bigger she hit you because, she could without fear of retribution and when her fear of retribution became too big oh look at that she magically finds all of this self-control and ability to reason things out and no longer uses violence anymore yeah.
[1:12:25] Yeah that's i i can't i can't i can't weave anything thing there of like yeah like it's.
[1:12:33] So she was a child assaulting bully and you say it wasn't that often every every two weeks you're getting hit right so over 10 years that's well over 200 assaults, It's over 250 assaults, in fact. 260, to be precise.
[1:13:03] What do you think it's like for a child to be assaulted 260 times?
Or we can just say 200, maybe it didn't happen when you were a baby, I don't know, 200 times.
Have you ever been assaulted as an adult?
[1:13:20] No. No.
[1:13:22] Okay, what do you think it would be like as an adult if you were assaulted 200 times?
In prison, say.
[1:13:31] I'd feel very upset if something wasn't done about it.
[1:13:35] Well, we can assume after 200 times, not much is being done about it.
[1:13:44] Yeah. One would be too much.
[1:13:48] Sorry, I can't hear what you're saying. you're away from the mic sorry.
[1:13:53] I'm sorry i said uh once would be enough as an adult for me to like kick up a stink and get upset and actually do something about it.
[1:14:00] Okay but 200 times as a child you're defending people and saying they didn't have any bad motivations or bad intent and nothing was really wrong and it's just the way they were raised so you have nothing but excuses for child assault but you'd probably call the cops if it was an adult assault.
[1:14:19] No it's that i'm applying different standards to myself.
[1:14:25] Oh so if it was another child being assaulted 200 times you would raise a stink about that right.
[1:14:36] If i had it if i saying i've had a time machine like would i like report my mother if i was, i don't know like i like you've got that i don't know like stockholm syndrome of like like just stop please you know like you'd rather than not do it then like send them to prison then, you know, it's...
[1:15:00] Well, forget about the practical outcomes.
[1:15:02] Right?
[1:15:03] No, because... Forget about whether if you had a time machine, but it was evil and outrageous and appalling and immoral how you were treated.
Now, you say your stepfather didn't hit you, is that right?
[1:15:19] He never hit me, no.
[1:15:20] And what happened to your biological dad?
[1:15:22] He didn't need to.
Uh uh there was an issue uh with my like it came to a point like when we were young where um because they lived in another country and then they moved to, but they there was a very very messy um they weren't even divorced for a long time like she She kept the name and stuff. And it was nasty.
[1:15:52] No, I don't mean legally. I mean, what happened to your relationship with your biological father?
[1:16:00] Oh, I got in contact with him when I was younger, like maybe like eight or nine.
Like we got back in contact.
And then there were, there's just a disconnect there of like, well, this person is very much, he looks like me.
Like he's not my dad. You know, like he is my dad.
It's just that, like, I don't, I don't know him. So there's, yeah, we just, just dropped off.
Like, and like, oh, like you get like the email at like Christmas or birthday or something like that.
But it's, yeah, like he, he didn't, he didn't put in like that much effort either.
Like he could have put, he could have done more. Okay.
[1:16:41] So you didn't really have much of a relationship with the biological dad, right?
[1:16:47] No, like I genuinely like my stepdad more than my biological.
[1:16:52] And your stepdad knew that you were being beaten, is that right?
[1:17:00] He did, and he wasn't happy with it. But if he was around, it didn't happen.
[1:17:07] Well, but he married and provided for a woman who beat her children, right?
[1:17:19] Yes he came from oh now we're going to get excuses for him are we going to play this game again like excuses oh yeah no you're right no you're right, that's exactly what I was about to start doing like yeah like you're right like he did he wasn't happy with it and I don't know like he made that compromise I guess of like well like maybe not my kid not my place or something, Well.
[1:17:49] No. I mean, he's married to the woman. He's taken on responsibility, legal responsibility for the children. Right?
So, saying that it's not my deal, it's not my business, it's not my responsibility is not even remotely true. Of course, it's his responsibility.
[1:18:08] Possibility no i just mean like if you grew up with a stepdad like i don't i don't know like you i don't i think you you didn't you didn't have a stepdad did you where there is just like a disconnect there of like male on male disconnect of like you're not like we just weren't the same it's like he was outdoorsy he was very gruff farmer type and i was like indoor he's like a a dog and I'm like a cat.
Like, he's just, we're just different people. Like, completely had no interest in anything that my wife was doing.
[1:18:39] I feel like a cheese grater on your defenses here, man. I'm not talking about your fucking personality differences.
I'm talking about the fact that he was stood in a household, married a woman, and knew that she beat her children with implements.
[1:18:52] Yes, that reflects, that reflects, of course, bad him. It reflects poorly on him. Yes, it does.
[1:19:05] Okay, so do you want to know I feel like I feel like I'm going to drown in these defenses, so I'm going to tell you why I'm talking about all of this stuff Do you know why I'm talking about your childhood?
And its relationship to procrastination.
[1:19:24] I'm sorry?
No, I was waiting for you to continue. I said that it's a source of...
It's something that I'm not dealing with. I didn't want to deal with that, but that's good because that's what I came to you for.
[1:19:41] So I'll tell you why you procrastinate since you want the sensible stuff, right? You want the stuff that is practical, right?
[1:19:57] It's what I'd like, but it might not be what I need for what you've gone through right now.
[1:20:02] Oh, no, I can tell you. Yeah, I can tell you why you procrastinate.
So procrastination is another word for excuses.
We procrastinate, and I do it too, right? So we procrastinate because we're giving ourselves excuses.
Oh, I don't really need to do this right now. I'll get to it later.
I can defer, you know, I deserve a break, I've been working hard.
So we give ourselves excuses.
I don't know if that fits with your experience of procrastination at all.
[1:20:29] Yeah, yeah.
[1:20:31] Okay, so you give your parents excuses, and therefore you give yourself excuses.
Your parents are not responsible, therefore you're not responsible.
Your parents can't be held accountable, thereby you cannot hold yourself accountable. accountable.
That's why you procrastinate, because you give all these excuses to your parents.
That's why I'm asking about your childhood and focusing on holding your parents accountable, so you can hold yourself accountable.
You can't hold yourself more accountable than you hold your parents.
If you give your parents excuses for beating children, of course you're going to give yourself excuses for whatever it is you want to do in your life, life because nothing's more important than how you parent and if your parents get excuses for beating their children there's no shortage of excuses you will ever get for any of your own behavior.
[1:21:19] That the issue that i have is that i've i've talked to them about it and i put my foot down and said hey like but my stepdad what you said to me like when i was a kid like and making fun of me and being like that i said that was horrible i also said to my mother like yeah like Like, you smacked and that was horrible. It's like, well, what?
Like, I've already done that kind of like, oh, like, you're not meek anymore. Like, not knowing.
Yeah, like, you are just being a wet noodle and bending over and just, like, letting people be shitty to you.
It's like, like, for me, maybe it wasn't right.
Maybe it wasn't enough of, like, for me, standing up myself on that front was, at the very least, pointing out that, like, that was bad. but then maybe pretending to move on from it of if you're saying that well.
[1:22:07] Well you're right like if i make what was there everyone else why the hell have you have you ever heard of me talking about what is needed for restitution when you've really wronged someone.
[1:22:24] Just sincerity. Everything seemed sincere.
I didn't have any reason to assume that they weren't sincere about it.
[1:22:35] Sorry, sincere about what?
[1:22:37] I didn't think.
Sincere about feeling like they had actually done me wrong.
[1:22:45] Sorry, so they said with sincerity that they had done you wrong?
[1:22:51] Yes. success like as an adult of like coming up to them oh yeah like this was terrible that was terrible or not having uh like for being depressed as a kid it's like well like like why didn't i go to counseling or something say like yeah we fucked up there it's like well that's all well and good it's like but like that's like why not like i was like asking and then everyone gets uncomfortable so why are you bringing that up at the table it's like if someone's you know someone's being like like mom or my stepdad or like being like if i go to their place and i'm like being shitty about like uh something i did as a kid of like oh that was embarrassing it's like well everything's pulling on you like not me like but i i have like i don't know what else to do like if, If I make excuses for other people, why wouldn't I have trouble not making endless excuses for myself?
If you are the failure or if you are this or that, then yeah, it's easy to just defer to other people and pretend that they're not shit.
[1:24:02] Sorry, once more, I'm lost in fog land. I have no idea really what you're saying at the moment. so how long ago was it that you confronted your parents on what they did wrong.
[1:24:14] Oh like like probably like my early 20s like 21 22 of like like it but it wasn't like i said like sit down at the table we need to talk about this it was just like in a like conversation of like oh like everyone's kind of like having a joke and like having a laugh at my expense it's like well like no like i'm sure like swear words were kind of passed across uh but it was also okay like why does my sister like get an excuse for having bpd but i'm just a piece of shit that should know better you know i'm sorry can you say that last part again what do you mean that i said if my if my sister uh has like bpd as an excuse for being horrible but i'm but if i do the same thing i'm just a piece of shit and i should know better it's like well like who has agency and who doesn't it's like i was treated as a kid as having more agency like i had no agency as a kid of like well like this reflects paul like no reflects pauline but yeah like so your sister is yeah your sister is sorry.
[1:25:20] At least one of your sisters is kind of messed up too, yes, And when you pointed out that there were deficiencies in the parenting, your parents said, yeah, I guess we fucked up and they just kind of moved on. Is that right?
[1:25:40] They seem embarrassed, but it's a bit like, okay, well, how would they make it up to you?
[1:25:46] Well, no, they just keep asking you how things have affected you.
They try to find out how things have affected you.
I mean, when you were losing that much weight, you were living at home, right? I mean, you were 15 or so?
[1:26:03] Yeah.
[1:26:04] Okay, so you're crashing weight, right? You went from 130, did you say down to 80 or 50?
I can't remember. Sorry for not remembering the exact number.
[1:26:17] No, 85. No, no, no, 85. No, fair enough, 85.
[1:26:23] Okay, so you went from 120.
[1:26:24] To- It was a year and a bit, yeah.
[1:26:27] Okay, so you were losing weight at extremely rapid pace, right?
[1:26:33] Yes, but it was because I was outside and doing lots of exercise.
[1:26:38] I thought you said that you restricted your food. Sorry, please let me finish my sentence.
I thought you said that you restricted your food to the point where you were eating these kinds of aspartame and jellies. Did I get that wrong?
[1:26:52] I was doing both. No, I said as well that because we lived on a farm, I would just go for walks all day.
I did both. I dieted and I couldn't run at that weight for my joints.
It's like running sucks So I would just walk And I would just walk Today I did like 40 kilometers It's better than my room You would be morbidly.
[1:27:19] Obese And you would walk 40 kilometers?
Yes Okay so let me just I'm just so 220 You went from 220 down to 85 right?
[1:27:35] What? No, you're doing it in pounds.
[1:27:37] Sorry, 120. My apologies. I got that. Sorry, 120. I was doing it in my head at the same time as I was doing it on the screen.
Okay, so you went from 130 down to 85. Is that right?
Okay, and it's 2.2.
[1:27:54] It was 130.
[1:27:57] 130, okay. And I'm just going to... I'm sorry to just... I grew up on Imperial, so I still can't do metric very well. My apologies.
Okay. So let's see here.
KG to LBS. So you lost 77 pounds as a kid. Yeah, so it's 2.2.
Okay, so you lost 35 kilograms. You lost 77 pounds. Is that right?
[1:28:31] I don't know. I don't know how to calculate it.
[1:28:33] No, that's fine.
[1:28:35] I'm 30, take 85. 45?
[1:28:37] 45 pounds. Sorry, yeah, 45 pounds. Okay. So 45. 45 kilos.
[1:28:42] Kilos.
[1:28:44] 45 kilos, right? So 2.2. So you lost almost 99 pounds.
We just rounded up. So you lost 100 pounds as a kid in a year and a half, right?
[1:28:58] But it was but it was a positive like i had at the time.
[1:29:02] No no no no please i didn't i'm not asking for excuses or clarifications so i'm not asking for any of that now that's a huge amount of weight loss in a short amount of time i'm i'm no expert but that seems like a lot right, yes now did you tell your parents I'm going to go on an extreme diet and exercise program or did you just do it on your own.
[1:29:30] I just did it. I wanted to get fit so that I could leave.
[1:29:35] Okay. Now, your parents noticed you obviously losing weight, right?
[1:29:44] Yeah.
[1:29:45] Okay. So did they take you to a doctor to make sure that you lost weight in a healthy manner?
[1:29:54] No.
[1:29:55] Why not? Didn't you get annual checkups?
[1:29:57] I was happy that I was...
Well if i was ever talked to like by a doctor it was like you're too big so if i'm losing weight then that's frame is a positive no not always because hang on i know i know what you're saying of course of course i.
[1:30:15] Mean didn't it produce potentially the autoimmune issue that you're still dealing with 13 years later yes.
[1:30:24] But that's not something that anyone anyone would have predicted of like that being very rare to happen like if you're if you're overweight if someone says okay well like i'm i'm on a weight loss kick like yeah like you don't want someone starving themselves and not eating right and doing but as opposed to the opposite of where you're like my 600 pound life it's okay this person is going in the opposite direction it's like well like when they get to 65 kilograms like then we kind of like intervene i guess it was was well if you're not if you're not getting bigger then that's a positive and certainly if i was framing it while i was i was happy while i was doing it it's like well i'm happy just doing my thing and like i'm like i because i said i was doing school of the air it's like the school workload wasn't that hard it's like well like it's like oh he's going at that but you you lost hang on but you lost pressure you.
[1:31:15] Lost almost a third of your body mass in 18 months.
[1:31:21] But that was a positive to me.
[1:31:24] No, no, sorry. Oh my God, man.
[1:31:27] Oh my God.
[1:31:28] Will you please just listen and stop? Every time I say something, you come up with another excuse or a justification or a speech.
Every time I say something, I feel like I'm fighting against this wind full of daggers.
Every time I open my mouth, you come up with some excuse or some pushback or some explanation or some abstraction.
It's impossible to talk.
[1:31:53] I'm so i'm sorry i'm i don't i don't want.
[1:31:56] To cool your jets a little bit let me talk, please you called me so i could talk right i've listened have i listened yes okay you have yep so i'm no expert of course but my understanding is that weight loss is tricky for the body women can lose their periods boys can lose muscle mass they can lose bone mass they can have malnutrition they can have severe problems, and a third of your body weight in 18 months, sounds to me again as an amateur kind of extreme you need to monitor your blood you need to monitor your glucose you need to monitor your body fat percentage you need to make sure you're not doing any damage to your heart, and you need to lose weight and then you need to plateau for a while and then you need to lose a little bit more weight.
I mean, did you read a bunch of books or how did you come up with your weight loss program?
[1:33:02] I was a kid. My weight loss program was just don't eat stuff and walk lots.
It wasn't well thought out.
The strategy, yeah, it was just like, oh, and WeFit came out at the time.
I was like, okay, well, I'll just do WeFit at night, right before I go to bed.
It's like, okay, I'm going to live two hours.
[1:33:19] It sounds like you're smiling at this. I just went nuts.
[1:33:23] Oh, no, well, it's kind of... Because you say, well, don't you understand that that's not healthy? Of course I do, in hindsight.
It's just at the time, it's like, well, if you're fat and you're going from being fat to not being fat it's like well that's better than getting fatter like that like it's dumb it's it's no no come on i'm not saying to go with these two extremes hang.
[1:33:43] On i'm not going to go with these two extremes thing that the only option is extreme weight loss or extreme even more morbid obesity right.
[1:33:52] No i'm not of course i'm not saying that that's the only that was i'm telling you what i did i'm not saying that it was smart i'm just that was how i interpreted it that's that's how i saw things at the time the way that i saw it as a kid with dumb kid you said that kids don't have agency like okay well if i was a kid and i made that choice like oh well i'll just do this and i'm not going to think it through like yeah that reflects poorly on everyone around me who was like okay well you've lost weight and it's good that you're losing weight it's not like they didn't say hey like maybe you're going a little little bit too far they get you to a doctor hang on hang on.
[1:34:29] They get you to a doctor they get you to a dietician they make sure you're doing it in a way that doesn't produce i don't know an auto immune disorder like.
[1:34:39] That that wasn't known of like okay like well if you have issues, like even even when i was young for the thing that you're talking about of like women like exercising a lot and they're like they'll lose their periods no dieting even dieting like, that stuff was or dieting but like that stuff correct me if i'm wrong but i don't think that stuff was like well known in like the like 2000s of that being a like women can go in the military and kind of everything's fine and then it's like oh hang on that they go through like all the training are you saying that the doctors and nutritionists.
[1:35:13] Had no idea that a 10 year old who's 300 pounds just stopping eating stuff and exercising while also going through puberty over the course of this maybe i don't know when your puberty hit or whatever you don't think that a doctor or a nutritionist might have any concerns about crash dieting from a 10 year old.
[1:35:34] Who's 300 pounds, Of course they would. It's just that I wasn't a doctor looking at a 10-year-old who's doing his own thing. I was the dumb 10-year-old.
[1:35:46] You are one of the toughest callers I've ever had. I'll tell you this, man.
I'm trying not to get annoyed because I know that this is just provocative.
But you're actually informing me, you're loftily informing me that at 10 years of age, you weren't in fact a doctor. That's what you're telling me?
That's the contribution you're having to this conversation?
Did you think I thought you were a doctor? do you think that i'm expecting you at 10 to know everything about nutrition what am i talking about when it comes to your parents having some responsibility.
[1:36:23] You're talking about my parents you took of.
[1:36:25] Course i am why.
[1:36:26] Didn't they actually yeah yes yes it's all comes back to parents i don't want to come back to but it does it's like yeah it's like yes it's like at that time they They were, we've already established that, okay, well, if they screwed up in one dimension, it's like, well, they screwed up in another.
It's like, but that, it's not like, it doesn't matter.
It's like, okay, well, like, you hit a kid and then, you don't know what it does. Like, you don't have an excuse for that.
You don't, yeah, they weren't paying attention.
It's like, they just saw kind of, like, they just saw everything on a surface level of, okay, well, he's happier and he's not moping.
Helping and like yeah like disengaged but it's like whatever like he's not he's not getting fatter that that's that's then.
[1:37:16] That's so the fact is fact is brother you've never held your parents to account never you've made a couple of comments in passing close to 10 years ago, they've never acknowledged responsibility they've never apologized in any important way they've never been curious about your experience they've never made any restitution and they've never figured out a way to ensure that they'll never harm you again.
[1:37:42] For having been crippled okay well then maybe this isn't the thing that hasn't come up yet it's like okay well, then it's like the Munchausen's I guess of well like when I was sick they were there they didn't like lead me to the wolves I know that's the bare minimum bare minimum of okay like I'm miserable and I'm sore it's like well they never, it's like I didn't have anyone else It's like, if you don't have anyone else, it's like, you don't, you don't not like the, the shitty people that you're with sometimes. Okay.
Like they're, they're shitty, but in this area, like they're looking after me.
Like as a kid, it's like, you have nothing. You have no one else.
It's not an excuse. Anything.
[1:38:31] That's what I said. Maybe they were nice to you when you, maybe they were nice to you when you got sick.
Yeah. My, my, my, my mother was nice to me when I was sick. So, because you're not a threat and you're not provoking them and so on, there's maybe some sort of softer side that emerges.
So, I get that. So then rather than talking to me all this bullshit about motivations and this and how they were raised and the standards of the time to say, I didn't want to criticize them because I needed them to help me with my illness.
Like, you're giving me all this other crap, which is just nonsense.
I mean, the fact is that you couldn't criticize them because you needed them to help you with your illness, which is something I said, like, 45 minutes ago.
[1:39:09] No, no, no, I disagree with that, like, very strongly.
I didn't, like, it wasn't selfish on my part of thinking, oh, well, I'm not going to criticize them because, well, I just need handouts.
It was, oh, like, I'm at the point where, like, I want to kill myself for pain.
And the reason that i don't is because i don't want them to suffer i don't want them to be upset and like wreck my family of okay well like yeah like your your contribution in life is that you're the kid that killed himself it's like if like i i do like people can be horrible to you and you can still love them like it's again so help me help me understand and i'm sorry for the suicidal thoughts.
[1:39:53] You understand that you're bringing this in late in the game, right?
Like when I really start to talk about criticizing your parents, you start to talk about your suicidal tendencies when you were younger, right?
Which is another way of distracting me from your parents, by the way.
[1:40:08] Being crippled. No, no, no. No. Hang on a minute.
I got sick and the sickness crippled me and it crippled me with pain.
We didn't even get, the whole time we've been talking about everything leading up to that, I wasn't suicidal before, but when I had thoughts of, okay, well, if my life is just pain and misery, I saw that as a positive.
If my life is just pain and misery and I could just kill myself, why don't I?
I was like, well, I don't want to because I don't want to upset the people around me that I care about.
[1:40:39] Right. But when I'm, I understand all of that.
[1:40:42] If that kept me alive.
[1:40:44] I understand all of that. And I said that, I said that exactly back to you.
Right. But what I'm pointing out is that when we talk about zeroing in on some of your parents' immorality, you bring up your suicidality, which you hadn't done for the last two hours.
Right? So it's a way of distracting.
[1:41:05] Because we hadn't actually got to the point of being crippled.
[1:41:07] I'm sorry?
[1:41:11] We hadn't actually got to the point where I was crippled.
[1:41:15] Well, I know, I know. But hang on, hang on.
[1:41:17] Yeah, that was the...
[1:41:18] Hang on. One of the first things I asked you about was to tell me about the history of your illness and how it is now.
So we had actually talked about the history of your illness and how it started. We did all of that.
So saying that we hadn't got.
[1:41:32] To the uh the ideology of.
[1:41:34] My illness is not a true statement because that's one of the things i started out with i'm not blaming you obviously i'm just saying that to say that we hadn't talked about it is not true.
[1:41:46] As a kid like thinking okay i had a condition it was way worse in the past than it is now now i'm not i'm not i'm not bedridden like i was like paralyzed as a kid of like okay like my jaw to my toes we didn't we didn't go into that because i was thinking okay well hopefully fingers crossed like all of that stuff isn't entirely relevant that well clearly that's not true but like yeah like what's like oh like you've had like the lowest point like you don't i didn't see it as like necessary to bring it up except in the context of like hold on a minute it like like to to hit back like i was well you could you could say well that's the cope on my part but like yeah i did feel like quite angry when you said like oh well like it's like your motivation for uh like like you had selfish motivations for staying with your parents because i don't know no i i did not use the words i.
[1:42:42] Did not use the word selfish i didn't i did not use the word selfish.
[1:42:46] Now if you interpret it that.
[1:42:47] Way you can you can just have a conversation with yourself and you can call me back when you're done but I didn't did I say selfish?
[1:42:57] It sounded like something, well, I'm wrong. It's not my head, so I was angry and I misheard then.
[1:43:06] I don't know what misheard means. I mean, I don't know what misheard means. You made something up.
[1:43:14] No, it means wrong.
[1:43:18] Well, no, but misheard is like I said the word doubtful, and you thought I said Mrs. Doubtfire.
But I didn't say shellfish, and you misheard selfish, right?
You just made up a word, and you're responding to the word, not me.
[1:43:32] No. Okay. I apologize, but could you repeat what you said before?
[1:43:40] What I said was that your parents were helpful to you when you were unwell, and so you're unwilling or you don't have a desire to criticize them because they were helpful to you or very helpful to you when you were unwell.
[1:43:59] If that's what you said then that's 100 true yeah.
[1:44:03] So i'm not sure what we're fighting about.
[1:44:08] Well i don't know what you started right so i.
[1:44:12] Don't know what we're fighting about.
[1:44:13] Yeah i am yeah yeah okay well i'll i'll assume that like i i'm wrong like not misheard that i'm just wrong it just said yeah i thought that the way that you said something it sounded Yeah, like, that my first thought was, like, my own self-interest, where, like, no, it's like, oh, like, the thing that helped me was thinking about other people of, like, well, what reason do I have?
It's like, well, like, don't do harm to other people or don't make things worse for other people. And yeah, like, okay.
[1:44:46] So we've got the principle. We've got the principle called don't do harm to other people, right?
That's important to you, right?
And your parents, obviously, your parents did harm to you, by having food in the house and not monitoring your eating or not helping you deal with your problems and letting you be 300 pounds or so at the age of 10, right?
So they did harm to you. Your mother did harm to you by beating you hundreds of times times with implements, wooden spoons, electrical cables, and so on.
And your stepfather did harm to you by mocking you and so on when you were gaining weight and not asking what was going on or how he could help.
Your biological father abandoned you, abandoned the family, and then was an indifferent person to be around when you got older and you said you got back in touch with with him at about the age of nine or so so a lot of people did you a lot of harm and i i deeply sympathize with that also of course after you gained all of the weight then losing a third of your body weight without any medical supervision whatsoever to me seems as an as an absolute amateur, it seems quite dangerous.
[1:46:14] Yes. It is. It was. It's just... That's on your parents.
[1:46:20] That's on your parents exposing you to massive dangers.
In terms of the weight gain and the weight loss.
[1:46:31] I'm sorry? Yes. I wouldn't have been in that position if I hadn't been big in the first place.
[1:46:38] Well, yeah, if they hadn't allowed you to be overweight.
I mean, nobody looks at a fat cat and says the cat's just greedy and the owner is innocent, right?
[1:46:51] Yeah, of course.
[1:46:52] Okay. So you have been very hard done by, and I really sympathize with that.
That I really, really sympathize with.
The excuses and the defenses is what we're talking about.
Now.
[1:47:12] Here's a big-ish question.
You said that people can be horrible to you and you can still love them.
Now, my definition of love is it's our involuntary response to virtue if we're virtuous.
Now, if you were listening to this and you weren't you, and you heard about parents, the mother chose a man who abandoned the family or drove the man away or both, she takes her kid out into the country takes her kids out into the country away from all their friends and never tries to figure out how to effectively have them a social life the kid gains 100 pounds over a couple of years and ends up 300 pounds at the age of 10 and then goes on a crash diet without medical supervision she beats him twice a month or more, and nobody intervenes to help him Nobody intervenes when he's depressed.
Nobody intervenes when he's distracting and dissociating himself with video games or, I don't know, pornographic materials you may have found on the internet.
Oh, I guess you said the internet was bad out there, so maybe you were spared from that.
[1:48:23] Yeah, I was quite lucky, yeah.
[1:48:25] Okay, so if you were to hear about other parents, not your parents, if you were to hear this story from a third perspective, from a third-person perspective, these are other parents not yours other parents who ignore overfeed beat neglect mock their children all.
[1:48:49] The hits yeah.
[1:48:50] Yeah all the hits indeed would you say that these were parents who who were lovable.
Would you say that the child should love the parents?
[1:49:13] I would understand if they did, but I would probably try and take a similar position to you.
Just me being weak then, I guess, if I was that kid.
[1:49:28] No, stop insulting yourself. Stop it. Stop insulting yourself. Stop it.
Every time I talk about your parents, you attack yourself. Stop it.
I won't put up with it. I won't be on this conversation if you insult yourself.
I will hang up on you, because I won't support that.
I won't do it.
[1:49:52] Yes, like, the parents... Yeah, like, I would say that those parents were terrible.
[1:50:01] And yet, the child, the adult child of these parents, who, it may be the case, has a lifelong physical painful disability ability that has half wrecked his life, perhaps partly as a result of the parents overfeeding and not getting medical intervention for a rapid diet in a child.
And the child says, as an adult, well, people can be terrible to you, and you love them.
That is the definition of bonding with the abuser.
If a woman said, my husband beats me, starves me, overfeeds me, ignores me, neglects me, mocks me, attacks me, undermines me, and I love him.
Would you take that as a robust statement of health?
[1:51:06] No you'd recommend counseling of some kind or well like a protective shelter first maybe and then everything after that and.
[1:51:18] He also has never really.
[1:51:20] Apologized and never will.
[1:51:30] And then that person, that wife, who loves and bonds with the people who abused her, that wife says, you know, my biggest problem is procrastination.
[1:51:44] Yeah, okay.
It's kind of petty.
[1:51:52] Well, it's a small shadow cast by a large monster. monster.
It's like the shadow from one of the claws of the giant monster.
If you meet a woman, and, you know, maybe you meet a woman who's got, I don't know, lupus or some similar ailment that you have, and you'd have that in common, right? There's no reason why that couldn't happen.
You say, oh, well, you know, but I'm not a great partner. Well, you know, you would have someone to go through life with where you would share the struggles, and that could be a great and beautiful thing.
There's nothing wrong with that at all. It's a good thing. So you would meet this woman, and she, let's say she's a good, strong, moral, intelligent woman, cares about you.
And then you say, oh yeah, here are my parents. They're going to be around us for the rest of their lives and they're going to help raise our kids and yeah, these are the people you're going to be spending the next 30 years with.
What would the strong, virtuous, intelligent woman who really cares about you think of that?
[1:53:03] They wouldn't approve.
I don't know. But if I said with my hand on my heart that they're wonderful to everyone else, that being a thing, would you believe me for a second?
[1:53:21] Yeah, of course I'd believe you.
[1:53:22] Oh, as a kid.
[1:53:23] It's called camouflage. It's incredibly common. It's almost the cliche.
My mother was wonderful to people outside of the family. Yeah, she was very funny. She was very warm.
Yeah, yeah, it's camouflage. I get that. I mean, go look at the history of Jimmy Seville, one of the most popular men in England who was a brutal raper of ill children.
Oh yeah being nice is a very common defense, or you go to a woman who cares about you or it could be a male friend who cares about you and you say these are the unapologetic parents who abused me as a child, they've never apologized they've never made restitution they don't even really admit that what they did was wrong.
They did me incredible harm. And I love them.
[1:54:26] More you're not more it's not more like you're you're right like it is what you're saying it's just.
[1:54:33] Oh let's say you care you care about a woman rationalized no it's not rational it's not cold at all it's very passionate so you care about a woman you love her she's wonderful and her family, mistreated her horribly in the past and continues to mistreat her horribly in the present by not allowing her to talk about what happened in the past.
See, the abuse doesn't end while you are still silenced.
Do you follow? If you can't talk about what happened to you, the abuse is not over.
[1:55:15] If you're still sworn to secrecy and punished for honesty, the abuse is not over.
And in some ways the cover-up is worse than the crime because the cover-up is now.
Because you said, well, I don't have a time machine. I'm not talking about the past. I'm talking about the present, right now.
You cannot talk to your parents and be listened to about what happened to you as a child.
And whether you like it or not, you are angry, of course, because you're a human being who was cruelly mistreated as a child and as an adult still now.
For the sake of their fragile egos, you can't tell the truth, and you participate in that deal. Okay, fine. I'll shut the fuck up.
I touched on it eight years ago, but I'll shut up. I won't talk about it anymore.
It's okay. I'll shut up about it. You think that this is about the past?
This is something that's happening right now. Right now.
You can't be honest.
[1:56:17] So, like, what is it then for... Is it like corrosive stoicism?
It's like fake stoicism. Are you going to get real abstract on me again?
[1:56:30] Because I don't know if I can take any more of this weird abstraction stuff.
Can you tell the truth to your parents? Can you be honest with your parents?
[1:56:42] I can tell them that, yeah, like, I mean, but what good does it do?
Like, when you're in the position that you're in now, it's like, okay, like, you're kind of post-wreck.
[1:56:51] And it's like, yeah, like, is it better to just kind of, maybe not.
If I come to you with X issue and you're saying, well, look at issues A, B, and C that you haven't dealt with, that's the actual cause of it.
But it's like, what are the actionable steps of, okay, you've got feelings, you're annoyed, and you spin that in a whole bunch of ways that make you dysfunctional later on. Yeah, I'm sorry.
[1:57:21] I find myself really spacing out with these defenses. So you're saying, what is the purpose and value of being honest with the people around you?
Is that really what you're asking me?
What is the purpose? What is the goal of being honest? with people i claim to care about no.
[1:57:39] It's like if i've already said that.
[1:57:42] No but it hasn't been listened to it hasn't been acknowledged and the conversation that encompasses the first 20 years of your life doesn't get dealt with in one flyby abstract conversation eight years ago, okay so the reason why you're honest about the reason you're honest with your parents, is to to tell yourself that your childhood is over because you couldn't be honest with your parents when you were a kid, because you were dependent upon them, and they were very aggressive, and you could get beaten with yet more wooden spoons and electrical cables.
So the reason you're honest with your parents is you're signaling to your mind that you're all grown up and you're free, and you no longer have to go with this weird blood libel or murder silence about the abuses that happened within your family.
The reason you're honest is because you're an adult, and people should not terrorize you into silence when you're an adult.
That's how you know you are an adult is you can speak your mind.
And if people don't like it, well, that's too bad. You're still going to speak the truth, right?
That there's a real purpose to it so.
[1:58:45] You can't, in terms of like for what you've talked about in the past okay well if people are toxic and you're like you just got them out uh or something if someone was toxic in your life, that they're just they're just a thing now if they're not they're not they're just there they're just a reminder of negative things it's like do you okay i don't know i don't know i don't know what any of this means sorry.
[1:59:10] I'm i'm i'm really bored of these abstractions i apologize for being so direct, but going off on these Waffelberger philosophical treatises doesn't deal with anything that's actually happening in your life at the moment.
[1:59:20] People that abuse kids must talk.
[1:59:21] If you don't know, forget people this, people that are talking about you and your parents.
It's not people this and abstract that, it's you and your parents.
Is there value in you telling the actual truth of your experience to your parents? Of course there is.
Because being silenced out of fear is not growing up.
[1:59:46] Now, you can say, I'm too scared of my parents to tell them truth.
That's fine. That's an honest statement.
I'm not going to call you a coward. I'm not going to, right?
But this, like, what's the use?
And I don't know the practical purpose and all of that. Hang on.
Still talking. Still talking. Still talking.
So you're saying, well, I don't understand. I just want you to be honest.
And I understand your parents are scary, right? Your stepfather is caustic and makes fun of you in pretty dark ways, and he decided to marry a woman who beats her children.
Your mother is violent and beats you hundreds of times as a child.
They're scary people. And I am not putting you down for being scared at all. At all.
That's totally healthy. It would be weird if you weren't. It would be very unhealthy if you weren't scared.
But if you're scared, then you can say, I think the most honest statement is, I'm terrified.
Tell the truth to my parents. That's fine. I can live with that.
I mean, that's an honest statement. And I'm not saying whether you should or shouldn't say anything to your parents. I'm just asking you to be honest about your motivations.
But hiding behind these lofty theories of abstractions and hiding behind, oh, well, I don't know the practical purpose and and I can't turn back time, and this, that's not it. You're scared to tell the truth.
And I'm not disagreeing with you about that. I just, let's just be honest about it.
[2:01:14] I am worried about the consequences.
It seems that the pros don't outweigh the cons, to me.
[2:01:26] No, that's another lie. I'm just going to be straight with you.
[2:01:29] That's another lie.
[2:01:31] The cons only come from their side.
The pros are for you to tell the truth and break the cycle and speak honestly to those who abused you about how it affected you. That's a pro.
The only negatives come from their side. So don't weigh the pros and cons like it's something internal to you.
The cons are they'll attack you, they'll scorn you, they'll mock you, they'll trash talk you, they'll whatever. I don't know what they would do, right? You know.
But there's no pros and cons. I'm weighing the pros and cons.
It's like, no, the pros are entirely to you.
The cons entirely come from them, which means that if the cons are outweighing the pros, it's your fear of them or outweighing your desire to be honest.
So we're back to the fear, which again, I have no problem with.
I'm not putting you down for that, but let's just be honest.
[2:02:18] Well, I said it's like it's fear of the consequences, but the consequences are not, oh, I'm worried about like them doing something to me.
It's that it doesn't seem right.
It doesn't seem fair. It's like if you let something go for just a long period of time, it's like, oh, now it affects you?
It's like now you're suddenly talking about... I know that they wouldn't do that, but to me, that's how I feel like, oh, if you didn't suck before, it's like, why are you bringing this up now?
It's like because you're upset and other things aren't working for you? It's like...
[2:02:58] Oh, this is what they would say.
[2:03:00] Where is this coming from?
[2:03:01] Well, let's close off on this. Let's close off on this. So you be your parents, I'll be you, okay?
Because I want to understand how their thinking goes, because it sounds like you're arguing their side, right?
Okay, so I'm sitting down with you. You can be both parents or one, I don't mind.
And as you say, listen, mom, dad, I've got stuff I really, really need to talk about.
I've been thinking a lot about my childhood, and my life's kind of stuck, and I think some of it has to do with childhood habits and all of that and you know I had this massive weight gain and then this catastrophic weight loss which may have triggered my autoimmune disorder and it's kind of crippled me for the last 13 years and you guys were in charge you were responsible for that you were responsible for the food that was in my house you were responsible for making sure I ate well you can't expect a six or seven year old kid to make all the wise decisions in the known universe and then you never took me to a doctor when I was losing weight and mom you beat me with these these electrical cords, and it was pretty terrifying and appalling and painful. It might have had something to do with my weight gain.
And, you know, stepdad, you like mocked me and made fun of me for being fat without ever asking me what was going on or whether I was unhappy.
And I just kind of locked myself away in the tomb of my room playing video games until all the hours of the morning and nobody seemed to care or didn't seem to matter.
And I've just, I've got real problems with how I was raised and you guys were in charge of all of that.
[2:04:29] Uh who would be but where is this coming up like okay like the response would be like oh okay i'm i'm sorry like it would just be something like completely cut and dry of like just yeah i'm sorry you you feel that way like uh it didn't mean that like yeah like we we messed up sorry that's that's that is that is exactly how i them i'm not asking you to get commentary i don't need footnotes.
[2:04:54] I don't need the director's cut.
[2:04:55] No, I was.
[2:04:57] Okay, so then they would say what? What would they say?
[2:05:03] What I just said. I wasn't doing commentary. That was what they would say.
[2:05:08] No, you were doing commentary. So they would say where's this coming from?
[2:05:13] Oh, I'm sorry. Where's this coming from? Okay. I'm sorry you feel that way.
[2:05:19] No, it's not a feeling. These are facts, Ted. I'm angry and I'm upset.
But these aren't just feelings, these are actual facts that I have stated.
[2:05:33] Okay, like, it would just be, I'm sorry. I'm sorry.
[2:05:39] But sorry, what are you sorry for? Help me understand. What are you sorry for?
We talked about a lot here. So just help me understand.
[2:05:44] No, I would just say sorry. I'm the parent, yeah.
[2:05:47] Okay, so dad, mom, what are you sorry for? Because I talked about a lot.
[2:05:51] We messed up.
[2:05:53] Okay, in what way did you mess up?
[2:05:54] They would say, we messed up. We messed up. Yeah, we should have done more.
We didn't we didn't know at the time a whole bunch of things like yeah like we could we could have put in more effort like we could have like very sorry like that's just how it would go.
[2:06:09] Yeah but sorry what are you which aspects are you sorry for and also you said you didn't know but and a it's your responsibility to know and b i didn't get that excuse when i was a kid like if i didn't study for a test i wasn't given the excuse i was beaten if i did badly so i wasn't given the excuse, well, I just didn't know.
So how do you have an excuse as parents that I didn't even have as a kid?
[2:06:36] Like, they were beaten out of. Their lives were shittier.
Like, yeah, you had it pretty good. Like, yeah, sorry, we did our best.
[2:06:45] I'm 300 pounds at the age of 10 and you're saying I had it pretty good?
What is the matter with you? What are you talking about?
That's terrible.
[2:06:56] Terrible well you did that you did it to yourself like yeah.
[2:06:59] So it's my fault at the age of seven or eight or six for for eating too much and you were helpless because you mean you beat me a lot right so you weren't helpless in changing my behavior but you were helpless with the food i don't understand i mean different parents you guys gave me a lot of feedback and criticism and beating so what do you mean it's all my fault it's all my responsibility you guys did a lot of aggressive parenting what are you talking about.
[2:07:29] Well like your sister wasn't fat it's like we didn't like yeah like like you you chose to to eat like it wasn't yeah like we didn't want you to be fat like oh sorry like i like like i made like i teased you like because i hope that like that would make you like want to lose weight.
[2:07:47] Like sorry like that's just right yeah so you teased me for half a decade and it didn't work So obviously, if something isn't working, you change what you're doing, right?
[2:08:00] Yeah, but it clearly didn't.
[2:08:03] I mean, if you were driving in the wrong direction, you didn't just keep driving until you ended up in the fucking ocean, would you?
You turn around. You change what you're doing because it's not working.
So, you saw me gaining 100 pounds in a couple of years as a little kid.
You didn't take me to a doctor. You didn't take me to a therapist.
You didn't ask me what was going on you didn't care that I was obviously depressed and had no friends and no social life and was locked up in my room on computers like it's your job to keep me healthy I'm a little kid, like what was going on, and now you blame me for this you take no responsibility Responsibility?
How dare you?
[2:09:02] Like, yeah, we're responsible.
[2:09:06] Okay, so you just lied to me when you told me that I was responsible.
[2:09:09] That's what it is.
[2:09:11] So you just lied to me and you blamed me for my weight gain and now you say that you're responsible. What is wrong with you?
[2:09:19] Yeah, I don't like your tone here.
[2:09:20] I don't give a shit whether you like my tone or not. You just lied to me and blamed me for my own weight gain, and you're concerned?
I'm concerned about being abused with food to the point where I was half dead at the age of 10, and you're worried about my tone 18 years later? Are you kidding me?
[2:09:43] Okay, what do you want me to do about it? I'm sorry.
[2:09:46] How about don't lie to me and blame me and then say, no, it was my responsibility?
[2:09:57] Okay, like, fine. Like, fine.
[2:10:01] Fine what? I don't know what that means.
[2:10:02] He fucked up.
[2:10:05] No, not in the past. You're still fucking up. Because you just blamed me.
You just blamed me for my weight gain and then you said, no, no, no, it was my fault.
So you're still fucking up. It's not about the past. It's about the present.
You just blamed me for my weight gain when I was six to ten years old.
You're still doing it. Yeah, like, Like, does it not bother you at all that you blame a little kid for his weight gain when he's obviously depressed and isolated and lonely?
Does it not bother you at all to blame your kid for his weight gain?
Does it not strike you at all? Yeah. I'm sorry?
[2:10:46] I was still pretending. Oh, well, it sounds shitty when you frame it that way.
Like, yeah. Like, oh, you're only going to cover all the bad things.
Like, what about all the good things? like yeah like.
[2:10:57] No the good things okay there were good things that's the only reason i'm having this conversation and we've had uh 28 years of talking about the good things now we're going to talk about some bad things because you don't get to run my side of the relationship right this is what i want to talk about and if you care about me you'll let me talk about it and if you don't care about me you won't but i will not i will notice that deeply and significantly this is what i need to talk about this is what i want to talk about and you don't get to run my side of the relationship, this is what's important to me you've.
[2:11:32] Got others, you've got other shit to deal with i don't know what you want from me like i'm sorry there you go.
[2:11:41] No that's not you know that's a bullshit non-apology right that's not a real apology you don't even know what you're apologizing for because you just blamed me like three minutes ago you just blamed me for it so sorry doesn't mean anything sorry it's just trying to get me to shut up and i won't because this is my side of the conversation i'm running my side of the conversation not you okay.
[2:12:04] Well like i don't have to listen like.
[2:12:07] That's absolutely true that's absolutely true if you're too busy to listen to what's really important to me, you absolutely I can't force you to stay I can't force you to listen I can't force you to engage with me like an actual adult rather than a petulant child I can't force you to do any of that of course you're totally free to get off your ass and walk out the door is that what you want to do.
[2:12:33] Well, no, but.
[2:12:37] Okay, good. Then let's stay and have a conversation. I appreciate that.
[2:12:39] Why are you being a pussy about this? Yeah, yeah.
[2:12:44] What do you mean by being a pussy?
[2:12:46] Why now?
[2:12:49] Because it's on my mind. I don't know. Why did you dream about an elephant last night? Because that's what was on your mind. What the hell does that matter?
[2:12:58] Why this? Why now?
[2:13:01] Why on earth would that matter?
[2:13:03] What do you want?
[2:13:05] I'm sorry?
[2:13:08] If you want to deal with it, fine. What is it? What do you need?
[2:13:13] Well, I need you to not lie to me and blame me for what you're responsible for.
I need to understand what on earth was going on in this family that I got beaten, overfed, and ended up half-starving myself into the grave. That's messed up, man.
I need to know what was going on in the family. What was your thinking?
Thinking. I don't want to hear excuses.
I don't want to hear minimization. I don't want to hear non-apologies.
I don't want to hear any of that crap.
I want to genuinely know what was going on in your guys' hearts and minds when all of this stuff was happening.
I mean, you noticed me getting fat and all you did was mock me for it and continue to beat me. That didn't work.
I ended up having to try and solve the problem all on my own, which might have caused this horrible stuff I've been been dealing with for the last 13 years?
I mean, other than beatings and pulling me out to the country and having no friends, I mean, what kind of parenting was really going on?
I don't remember getting much advice. I don't remember getting any curiosity.
I don't remember anyone asking me how I was doing or what I wanted or whether I was happy or what I needed.
Like, what was going going on in this household?
What were you thinking? Let me ask you this. What were you thinking when I was gaining all this weight as a little kid?
[2:14:40] That's bad, but yeah, like, you don't have to do that.
Like, that's on you. Like, but if I, I don't know, like, how I was raised, like, if I tease you a bit, like, I thought that would work.
Like, oh, I did it out of kindness. Like, I teased you out of kindness or something.
[2:15:00] No, but it did work.
[2:15:01] A bit of banter.
[2:15:02] You had five years of something not working, so you're not a dumb man, right? So, of course, you don't try five years of something not working and think you're doing something smart. So there had to be something else.
[2:15:18] You can't just be a dumb man, though.
[2:15:20] I'm sorry?
[2:15:23] You can't just be a dumb man, though. That is like an option.
[2:15:28] To just be a dumb man?
[2:15:30] Of someone just... to just be a dumb person.
[2:15:34] Well, no, but then you wouldn't be manipulative in this kind of way and blaming me and half-apologize. Like, you wouldn't be cunning and manipulative in this kind of way.
[2:15:41] That shows in intelligence, so I can't give you the dumb stuff.
[2:15:44] Right? Yeah, I guess.
[2:15:45] Right, so no, he's not a dumb guy because he's very cunning and manipulative, and therefore he's got the intelligence to answer the question.
[2:15:57] You're dumb when it's convenient, yeah.
[2:15:58] Well, play dumb, yeah, that's a very common tactic, right? now unfortunately like in the role play here i'm asking questions of your parents that you wouldn't have the answers to so there's a limit on the role play here right like what was going on in the family that they just let you gain all this weight and then let you half starve yourself half to death with no consultation or i mean your father was a farmer right.
[2:16:24] Yeah he was like.
[2:16:26] Okay so if like if his if his farm animals or anything yeah if his farm animals were losing weight catastrophically and suddenly would he call the vet.
[2:16:41] If they were all doing it at the same time.
[2:16:43] Then yes. There's some animal that's losing weight.
[2:16:46] He would kill them. Yeah, he would kill, yeah.
[2:16:48] He would call the vet, right?
[2:16:49] Oh, no, I thought you were about to say something. I was like, oh, yeah. Oh. No, like, it depends.
Like, oh, when you were saying what you were saying, I was like, oh, yeah, like, he would, like, blow their brains out. It's like, oh, wait, no, you're talking about the vet. Okay, yeah.
[2:17:01] But I assume that he called the vets over the course of being a farmer from time to time, right?
[2:17:09] Of course, yeah.
[2:17:11] Okay. So he called the vet to get medical interventions for his animals.
So he called the vet to get medical assessments on his animals, just not his stepson.
[2:17:27] It's not like I never went to the doctor. It's just I never went to the doctor for that specific...
Oh, okay, try Weight Watchers. It's like, okay, well, the issue with being overweight is that you're depressed because of everything else around you and then you eat stuff it's like well if that's not being dealt with like no like no counseling or anything because that's just that that's weird like you don't you want to go to counseling if you're like insane so well no i mean hang on hang on she was eating too much and not interrupt.
[2:17:55] So but what your parents would do is they.
[2:17:58] Would go to.
[2:17:58] The doctor and they would say our child is gaining weight right and the doctor would say i assume uh well um don't have the bad food in the house, don't take him to restaurants with bad food.
[2:18:16] I mean, that's the ideal, but that's not how it went.
[2:18:19] No, that's not an ideal, that's a basic. If your father's animals were gaining weight, would he restrict their diet?
[2:18:31] Yes.
[2:18:32] Of course he would. He knows that.
[2:18:34] Not for sale.
[2:18:36] Sorry?
[2:18:40] Oh, sorry. I was thinking, well, barn animals, okay, well, he's...
If it's like cattle, no. That's great.
[2:18:48] No, but if his animals were gaining weight in an unhealthy and destructive way, he would restrict their diet, right?
[2:18:58] Yes, he would. If he was paying attention to Yeah.
[2:19:01] He wouldn't put all the food in the animal's trough and then just lecture them to not eat it, right?
He would not put as much food in their trough, right? He would restrict their calorie intake so that they would stop gaining weight and hopefully lose some weight, right?
It so your father your father your stepfather knows everything there is to know about what to do if you're gaining weight you said you mentioned mcdonald's so is it true that you were gaining weight and they took you to mcdonald's i.
[2:19:36] Mean like of course like it's not like oh he put on a gala let's take him to mcdonald's it's like you're fat and you go to mcdonald's you know It.
[2:19:48] Wasn't like all parents with children who were gaining weight take their children to restaurants to serve bad food, at least for weight gain, right?
[2:20:03] Actually, my stepdad, he wasn't actually pro junk food.
It was my mom that would buy it, and then he'd be like, oh, we need to cook everything at home and stuff.
Stuff uh like he would just yeah i said that he never he would just make like jibes and stuff and oh actually no he would do the thing where it's like okay you come home with like a like a chocolate bar or something it's like if you say oh i'm trying to like not eat like health unhealthy like he would come home specifically with something unhealthy so that's the only time I'm very worried of, those things of like, okay, well, if the only times that you...
Why do you never do this? Why do you do this in this context?
It's like, well, it seems kind of malevolent, but not really.
He would be, okay, junk food is expensive.
And so we just cook everything and just be miserable and have sandwiches and stuff like that.
Except in the context of, well, if you say...
Like for being angry like when i was losing weight of like i told you not to get me something it's like oh if i'm telling you i'm doing this and then like now it was like now now why are you okay with all this stuff it's like you don't even want to eat it like it's wait.
[2:21:21] Sorry who are we talking about your stepdad would.
[2:21:22] Yeah like home food.
[2:21:23] That was bad for you when you were.
[2:21:25] Trying to lose weight, Yes, but he wouldn't do that before because he was, like, he grew up in a really rough kind of, like, living off the land type, but borderline subsistence, like, and, like, rural, like, and so, yeah, like, he, like, penny, penny pincher kind of attitude, like, you don't go to McDonald's.
It's like, ah, but, like, in the context where you do, it's, it's not, like, something that I'm pro.
Oh, like, you only, you only, like, you only do this thing when I say not to do it.
It's like well that's yeah it's like it's the passive it's a passive like I said before that he was he wasn't like violent or aggressive or anything about it but his thing was just like passive aggressive kind of stewing and doing like the, one up of like, well like if you fail then I'm kind of like better than you know if like, helping kind of what was this thing like I still use it today get people enough rope to hang themselves themselves of well it's like okay like give give you enough temptation for you to fail i guess.
[2:22:37] So sorry i understand that he sabotaged your weight loss.
[2:22:45] Yes, but we've been talking about that so far, of like, okay, well, they both sabotage a lot of things, but yeah, there's the only times, I knew it was.
[2:23:03] Passive aggressiveness and malevolence, I'm framing them as different things, of like, okay, well, someone's salty, but they're upset, and they they, it's like if you if you succeed then like they fail i guess of like okay well if you're if you're if you're doing if you're doing well then they're doing poorly and if they're and if you're if you're if you're upset and you're miserable then they have company and i think that that's kind of the the way that he was raised with his family like okay well if we're all kind of miserable like then yeah like well like no one no one's winning like we're all losing at the same time.
[2:23:47] Like not not very nice but i but because of the way like for the the times when he would talk about like how he was raising the shit that he went with i couldn't not feel sorry for him, you know like okay like like it's like someone say like they're not like a child predator or something, but someone is abusive, but you know that they're abused and you would want them to get...
You sympathize with someone that's bad.
You can sympathize with bad people.
And I've done it for him. And I've done it for everyone, I guess.
But it's like it doesn't...
Yeah, I don't know what to... I don't know what to do with those those emotions i'm too juvenile to kind of like know what to do with them.
[2:24:37] Do you do you notice it all when you do you notice it all when you filibuster, would you just take someone on a like language journey from here to everywhere to nowhere.
[2:24:54] Well i'd rather just listen and hear answers but.
[2:24:58] No no you wouldn't no you wouldn't you absolutely wouldn't because i've been trying to give you your answer is you really don't i mean or rather you do but your parents don't so like your inner parents but yeah so the last thing i'll say is that um you say that you can treat somebody somebody can treat you horribly and you still love them that may be your relationship with procrastination because the procrastination is causing you significant discomfort right.
[2:25:28] Yes.
[2:25:29] So it's almost like you're treating yourself horribly, but still trying to love yourself.
If the procrastination is causing serious problems in your life, which is like, well, but I still love myself.
It's like, well, I think self-love or self-respect does have to be earned that way. Sorry, go ahead.
[2:25:50] I, I, I like, like whatever feelings I have for myself, I don't think self-love is one of them.
Like, I think it's more like, like, like contempt or just like being upset of i don't know like i don't wake up and think i love being me or i love like fake.
[2:26:09] No i understand that oh i'm a good person because i'm not angry that's why that's why i said self-love has to be earned right but may or or maybe on the other side you're used to mocking and contempt from your stepfather and so you just fulfill that that's that's the role you have that's the role you know i i write about this in my book real-time relationships which you should check out if you haven't already it's a it's free at free domain.com slash books, which is the repetition compulsion of i'm unworthy i'm not good enough i'm a failure i'm like whatever you may have internalized in order to try and find a way to to get along with your stepdad or your mom if she was that way inclined as well you just kind of continue doing that stuff because that's the role you're in and that's you know you don't have control of your parents but you have control of your own emotions and so uh if managing contempt is your childhood experience, then you're going to need that contempt as an adult to continue putting it sorry.
[2:27:08] I said that's a really good way of putting it, of managing contempt, of like, oh, yeah, kind of like, just like, don't let it boil over until it, you know, like, just kind of turn the dial down however you can.
[2:27:22] Well, what's, you know, what's life for you like if you don't have, like, this is why I had to really forcefully intervene in you insulting yourself before, right?
So what's your life like if you're doing all the right things?
What's your life like if you're taking responsibility and holding people accountable and not procrastinating? I mean, we all do a little bit, but nothing major, nothing serious. What's your life like?
Well, I think it would be kind of tough, because if you're worthy of respect, then your parents were disrespectful.
If you're kind of just a screw-up and a failure, and you can't get anything done, and you can't get your life organized, and you always procrastinate, well, then your parents were right.
And then they weren't abusive, or they weren't verbally abusive or destructive.
They were just, you know, identifying factual thing, right?
Like, if I can't sing, and my parents say, you really can't sing that well, you know, know, they're not being abusive, right? I just can't sing that well.
But if I am a really good singer and my parents say, you sound like shit, then they're being abusive.
Or, you know, you're a bad singer when I'm actually a good singer, then they're being abusive, right?
So if your parents say all these negative things about you, then if you stop all of that stuff in your life and they continue to do it, they're exposed as abusive.
If you continue to conform to their expectations, hey man, they're just identifying facts. They're not being abusive.
[2:28:40] And that may be a place to start as well i also do have fdrpodcast.com i have a whole show on procrastination uh you should yeah obviously watch it later not now kidding right but uh you might want to check that out that's a good video about master-slave morality and its relationship to procrastination.
[2:29:05] I'm going to have to look at the relationship kind of stuff first, maybe.
I wasn't expecting to get upset by any of that. I didn't think that it would.
Well, clearly it does because it upset me, but that's good.
Okay, well, then that's the thing that I'm not dealing with.
It's like, well, that's uncomfortable as shit, but it's meant to be. well.
[2:29:30] Technically I didn't upset you I upset your inner parents because.
[2:29:35] They're the ones who don't want to be confronted no you've been wonderful I wasn't, being rude kind of slagging on you you did me wrong you've done everything right but I'm still upset which means that it's my thing to deal with yeah like.
[2:30:01] Well listen i really do appreciate the call and i hope that you'll um keep in touch and let me know how things are going and i hope that you enjoy the the video or find it useful on procrastination i think it was pretty good.
[2:30:11] Oh thank you very much for answering and but all the stuff about like rambling and going around like i do apologize for that of that just this this isn't a position that like you do this stuff all the time.
It's like, I just wasn't expecting to be upset.
I wasn't, I wasn't expecting to be that upset by things, but like, I didn't think all the stuff that like, I don't deal with and for contempt management, it's like, okay, like you kind of, you made the, you made it similar. I think kind of.
[2:30:47] But I mean, you know, in the future with people, the more honest thing just to say is I'm really upset and I'm not sure why, rather than going on this exhausting filibuster.
That's the more direct thing to say. But all right. Well, keep me posted.
Thanks a lot for the call. And I look forward to getting an update.
[2:31:02] Thank you.
[2:31:03] Take care, brother. Bye.
[2:31:04] Well, thank you very much. You have a nice day. Thank you.
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