Don't Blame Me! - Partner Lies About Watching Corn

Episode Date: March 21, 2022

Meghan and Melisa give advice on: Update: Friend lied about getting tested for Covid Sharing drunk videos with boyfriend that does drink Using dating apps as a parent Long distant boyfriend has a friend that's too friendly Partner keeping secrets Don’t Blame Them: Queer people meeting friends on dating apps Buy our merch: https://store.dftba.com/collections/don-t-blame-me Subscribe to our new show: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/but-am-i-wrong/id1591757891 Follow Us! @meghanrienks www.instagram.com/meghanrienks https://twitter.com/meghanrienks @sheisnotmelissa www.instagram.com/sheisnotmelissa https://twitter.com/sheisnotmelissa @dontblamemepod https://www.instagram.com/dontblamemepod/ Affordable Therapy By State (Curated by Crissy Milazzo): www.tinyurl.com/y64kwdnf Need Advice? www.dontblameme.show Domestic Listeners Call: [phone] International Listeners Send a Voice Memo To: [e-mail] … with as much detail as possible under 3 minutes! WeI'll do our best to share our wonderful words of wisdom. If you're under 18, please get your parent's permission. Advice is for entertainment purposes only, so you can't blame us if we screw up your life. I kid! Our advice IS AMAZING. Want to WATCH this episode as well? Become a patron! https://www.patreon.com/dontblameme Join the Facebook Group! https://www.facebook.com/groups/dbmsecretgroup Support the show: https://www.patreon.com/join/dontblameme Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

hello everybody and welcome to another episode of don't blame me the best podcast ever tied with but am i wrong but am i wrong and you might think you're a little biased yes we are did you think we were gonna get up here and say call her daddy i chose violence someone messaged me and told me that their villain origin story was finding out that the girl from call her daddy bought a house in la in two days and she goes and i've been watching you try and buy a house and like i just i'm angry like thank you thank you me too one day but maybe maybe or we'll move to atlanta just talking about that with my other set of friends all right so what's the game the whole yeah everybody's down so maybe we just we just all move and we everyone works in

the industry we just start our own thing yeah and it's cheaper to shoot in atlanta too we can essentially just like transfer all of our friends who work in our industry like even if we can't if they don't want to leave we can make we can make the their we can replace them we can it is it'll work it'll work our hair will look great i will have to sell my dyson air app we can all buy houses on the same street we could probably build our own houses like from oh yeah nothing just by the people keep suggesting that i do that in los angeles where like so you're gonna buy a house for 1.8 million dollars knock that house down and then build your house and then it'll be in a neighborhood where the house isn't supposed to be okay got it right beautiful beautiful beautiful

or i could just move to santa clarita because it's only 20 minutes away right it's only 20 minutes away i will never be over it here's the thing everybody i love your suggestions cal southern california natives who are suggesting like places i am from california i've also lived in southern california um for like 10 years literally 10 years so you're 10 years too wow so it's not isn't that crazy but like we've all like but we didn't all cross paths at that time they're all here little babies but there is not you're not gonna introduce me to a place near la that i've never heard of before like and when you tell me i should move to whittier that's not Los Angeles when you tell me I should move to Chino Hills that's not Los Angeles when

you tell me I should move to again Santa Clarita not Los Angeles did you hear that song that went viral the Riverside song no it's about Atlanta that's not Atlanta and it was hot for like two days but she was like naming all these places that are part of like the Atlanta metro area and she's like that's not atlanta that's not atlanta and and they were saying they need to make an la version of it that's like so wholeheartedly how i feel and like i just need people to know that you're not going to let me know of a place that i've never heard of before that like is like nearby where we need to live boulder statement if you live in whittier you cannot tell people who live in los angeles that you also live in los angeles no you don't because you don't

like you can tell your cousins from ohio that you live in la you can't tell people from california that you live in l you can tell people from fresno that you live in la i'll i'll settle for that but it's the same thing that i felt like growing up when i would like meet kids at camp from like oh i'm from daily city but then they'd be like oh yeah i'm from san francisco and i'm like oh my gosh really like yeah i'm from i'm from right outside of san francisco and they're like oh and they start getting nervous and then they let me know they're from like daily city or like don't know what that means but i feel like he's even closer but like just very much like no so i appreciate it and we will know we will not be moving to orange county

i'm not moving you can you imagine i cannot imagine you in orange county you would fight like every day every day you would fight you would be in a fight with someone here's the thing we need to we need to contain my fighting to the internet do you think i will get i will physically fight people and the thing is because you would blend in so well with i'd be the greatest fighter they would be they would be confiding in you and then you would immediately fight yeah long i could play the long con here's the thing i would need to develop some patience though it's not gonna happen i wouldn't want that for you no i first of all it's too late like i'm too old to develop a trait such as patience and like no no no but like no just no here's i've already said this

before i'm already taking i'm already downgrading for a lot of things from marin to los angeles and then there are better things about los angeles than marin but like you're not going to catch me going anywhere like you're not going to catch me going to a suburb a non-liberal red suburb of a like a coastal california also oc is so far away like i don't think people realize how far the oc is from LA like here's the thing like Disneyland is far. Disneyland is far away from us and still

when I'm like a friend in town we can go to Disneyland once. Imagine commuting to Disneyland. I mean I've you know wanted a Sonic drink and I've driven there. Truly you literally have to like essentially cross states to get to a Sonic here no but like and I think that people

think because like I work from home for like a large majority of like the pandemic but like Out of the pandemic, I literally have to drive all across town in LA every single like I'm in the car for hours and I'm not leaving a 20 mile radius like you're fucked if you go out past that. But I think LA is also a unique city in the sense that like there isn't necessarily a city center.

So like you can go to like downtown, I guess, is technically the city center. But like I think mid city is technically that is true. Mid city would be the city center. but like it takes you an hour to go from like santa monica to hollywood and like that's still like an hour commute and that's la it's technically not la though santa monica is its own city but it gets lumped in because it's part of la county santa monica is not la no when people tell me like oh just this place is 20 minutes 20 minutes outside of la i go no that this is 20 minutes outside of the farthest point of LA

that I've never even been to that I don't even consider LA. They're like, move here. It's only 30 minutes from Van Nuys. And I'm like, I've never been to Van Nuys until this year. I had a production office in Van Nuys once. And that was, it took me an hour and a half

to get there. Also where like the headquarters for Penguin Random House on the West Coast, that's LA. it's the furthest northwest point of technically la an hour 45 minutes when i went there no so people just don't understand the commute aspect that like wherever you move it's going to be a minimum 20 minute commute but like that's like within la so like it's 20 minutes like to me from me to you and we're only 1.3 miles away from each other i think so the notion that people are

like just move a couple miles outside of la no i will never see motts like ever like i will literally he will be up in the morning when he used to work across town like in still la town like he literally it was so he would have to leave before he would have to leave at like 6 a.m and get back at like 9 30 to like miss out on majority of traffic and that's like eight miles away yeah when i had an internship in malibu i would just hang out in malibu until like eight or nine and then go home yeah so for the days where i had class at ucla that was another nightmare everyone who's not from la is like we don't care it's fine let us complain okay it's like that skit that used to be on snl that's matas favorite like he thinks it's like he laughs at that like someone who

doesn't live here and talk about that i'm like you're laughing too hard like that's us you know that right you should feel personally attacked okay we're an advice podcast where we give you advice and it's not about taking the 405 to the one i'm not good at it because like i have no sense of direction so i couldn't tell you what highways go to one i don't think with the things that they were saying even made sense anyway so okay that makes more sense take the five to the 101 to the 405 to the 10 then you're gonna go a little crazy you're gonna take the 210 time wow okay um yeah we're an advice podcast we give wonderful amazing life-changing advice and we are not going to read you to filth we're not going to be mean to you if you tell us that

you're a pisces or a cancer but we give advice that we would give each other we give the advice we'd like to see in the world it's tough love it comes from a good place um but we are not afraid to call you out on your bullshit so that's why you called us and if you're angry about that you're not someone who called you are just a rachel can i read a uh review oh god it's a negative review i just want to can someone leave a positive review i mean please this one is old ish it's a little i know that people like our podcast i like obviously know it like we get to we talk to people all the time but the people who hate it just love to tell you but this one i i want to say it because i want to address some of the things that they said oh i'm excited so um

this said give callers the benefit of the doubt i call in and misspoke a little because i was nervous and only had one take. First of all, that's incorrect. You can call in as many times as you want. A lot of people do. Also, we've said numerous times to write things down and practice it. I was immediately called out and I cringed listening to my episode. I couldn't even finish it. Well, it was the last call in the episode. So I think by listening to the rest of what I said, it was obvious that my intentions were good and I wish I was given the benefit of the doubt as just a person seeking advice the thing is when we give advice we can't really give the benefit of that we have to go by what you say and if you say something offensive which you did then we have

to read it for what it is we can't just like think your heart's in a good place because then our advice wouldn't be honest also i thought you didn't listen to the whole i thought you i so this is so odd also we give unbiased advice i don't know we don't know you right i don't know that you're not racist exactly that's the whole like we don't know that if you were racist or not and if you were racist or even not realizing that you were racist then we should be able to you know yeah call you in for that thank you so much for letting me know that that was the incorrect terminology if i was perfect i wouldn't be calling it into an advice podcast that is true right not everyone has the same vocabulary and choice of words as y'all but you said that you were

nervous so you misspoke so which is great you misspoke so you agree you think you're really pretty i said the word normal and it was taken in the context that not everyone like me isn't normal that's the definition nope i just meant that i don't have any special circumstances in regards to my call that in itself is offensive that's the same thing yes same same same racist sentiment different font yeah you're just doubling down on what you said also i recommend listening to the call twice because sometimes the facts from the original call are messed up when giving advice making the advice less meaningful but you only listened to the first thing we said so how do you know what advice we gave also i will add that like there are times that we've and we edit

this out but there are times that we will be like wait what did they say and then we will go back and listen to do that kind of stuff if we are unsure about something but like we're not gonna listen multiple times to try and decipher your tone and your meaning but like to try and like infer something that's not that you're not saying you know yep and i think it'd be helpful to reach out to callers that have been selected for an episode for more context if needed you have three Minutes. If you write it down in practice, all the context should be there. That's not on us. That's on you. We have to take the call for what it is. Also, there's no amount of context that makes racism not racist. Right. And then on top of that, we also do updates. So if you had a problem with what we said, you could have said, hey, I want to call in and, you know, do an update and follow up with what I said.

I'm like, who has the time to sit here and call everybody that calls in? Literally, you're calling us. I think if I was allowed to provide details that weren't captured in my short call, it would have been received better and the feedback would have been greatly approved. You also had a whole minute and a half left, so you had time to give the rest of your advice. My advice to anyone calling in is to include as much information as you can fit without making it obvious you're the caller and reiterate important facts. again it's almost as if we say that we say that every single episode it's also in the show notes to give as much information as possible you have three minutes write it down it's there and it's also verbally said at the beginning and the end of every episode and we stress it and even in calls

where we're saying we wish you gave more context here please do like that's what we want but like we assume that you have done your due diligence when calling into the show and so when you say something that you you don't include information or you don't say something or whatever most of the time when you don't include certain information like we have to infer that there's a reason why you're not including something that's incredibly obvious like and for this again there is no amount of context that changes this and like just take the l and just be like wow also i didn't even explicitly immediately noticed that that's what they said until you said it it was like oh my god it was offensive to me and that's something that like checking my own privilege at the door that

like that wasn't something that flagged in my ears and that was something that when i heard her say it just kind of glazed over and then as soon as you said it it was glaringly obvious and i'm like oh shit my bad but like you can't get defensive with this like you're gonna make we're all gonna make mistakes we're all gonna say something that is going to inevitably like again we live in like white supremacy and patriarchy like world like it is ingrained and taught in us our own internal biases the language that we use around this white women we're gonna fuck up and like there's no way that you can improve like it doesn't matter if you accidentally hit someone with your car you hit someone with your car like an impact versus intention like it it doesn't matter and nobody

truly deep down wants to believe that every single person is like an absolute horrible murderer menace like absolutely terrible like worst person in the world no one necessarily wants to believe that but that doesn't mean that those are the only people you should be calling out like accidentally saying something that's harmful you don't get points for being like no i'm not spewing hate speech constantly so like i should be fine like you get to be checked for all spectrum of like fuck ups it's just you look so goofy yeah like you look so goofy and like it's you're just like you did nothing for your case except double down that i think you're more racist now than i did before it's like when people like slide into my dms and like or just respond to my comments like

use me as google and i'm like i would never have the balls to do that to somebody else like i like do not want to inconvenience anyone but just thinking that like even like with like the but am i wrong where it's like i'm not even gonna bother to like word count check this i'm like oh my god like what like yes we're putting out content for you all but we've created like boundaries and parameters and guidelines and if you're just gonna ignore them like you're not to quote my own book i'm like you are not special like why do you think that you can just like hop into this like thing that is established that we have worked to create this thing and we have told you what to do just to be like ah fuck it and then be upset when we're standing by

the thing that you neglected to do and you're like i really wish i did that thing they should tell people to do we did every day every fucking episode multiple times i know i say a lot but like come on all right should we get into the update if you all want to call in for an upcoming episode you can leave us a voicemail at 310-694-0976 international listeners you can send us an audio message at meganpodcast at gmail.com please convert it to an mp3 before you send it to our email address so it is compatible so you need to keep it under three minutes you will be cut off if you are sending a voice email you'll be cut off by us and we are not going to play it we're not even going to go through the first three minutes you're just not going to be it's not

going to happen and if you are calling the phone number google will cut you off so we ask that you here's again who's definitely not listening write down everything you want to say provide as much context and details as possible give ages pronouns let us know everything that is important and fundamental to the advice we give because the more information the better advice we can give and practice it a couple times and time it out because if you get nervous and you want to read it that's the thing don't do bullet points literally write down everything you're going to say and then practice and we've had lots of people who have done callbacks or called back like after a couple times and then like you know what i i thought i was better than that and i'm

not and it's so much more helpful so literally write down word for word what you're going to say and then just read it and you will notice if you pay attention that the best calls on this are clearly being read like and it's obvious and like we prefer that it doesn't make you sound stupid it doesn't make sound goofy it doesn't make you sound bad like that's like actually our preferred way to do this and if you're sensitive you need to let us know but also if you do something really horrible and you're sensitive like that's a personal failure on your part like if you are a sensitive pisces like maybe you shouldn't have done a hit and run like maybe you should have thought that ahead of time and we have reported you yeah maybe you should

have just been born later like maybe your mom should have crossed her legs and you should have just stayed up there instead of trying to burst and free oh megan i know okay anything else that we say before let's just get into the update oh yeah all right so my call was basically that i went on a cottage trip with my friend and we all had to get tested for covid beforehand that was kind of the requirements and she had lied that she got tested she said in the group chat i got my negative and we're good to go so once we got there or no I only found out two months later that she had actually lied about getting tested in the first place so my question to you guys was kind of just do I confront her and I wanted to confront her because this had been it had been bothering

me but we've been friends for like 10 plus years so I wanted to kind of keep the friendship at the same time. So you guys didn't really know how to navigate that. But you're just kind of saying to tell her but also just say that you disrespected me but also say it nicely so that she would and just see how she takes it basically. So I sent her a text. I said, Hey, like, just want to let you know, like, I found out about this information. And I felt really disrespected. And I just wanted to see what she had to say. So she basically answered and said, actually it's i told someone this in confidence so you're invading my privacy by knowing this information and she was like this is a HIPAA violation and she told this to her ex-girlfriend

who she cheated on so i'm like this girl doesn't owe you anything also like privacy like she obviously doesn't care well it affects me too but also like she doesn't need to keep your secrets anymore yeah and she said getting tested goes against my beliefs and she just basically was like throwing back at me every time like you hang out with your friends and you hang out with your boyfriend and you don't make them get tested like I didn't see why it was a point like what the point was and stuff like that so she was acting like a child threw everything back at me and we haven't talked since and that was in May so oh wow since that text we haven't spoken and she gave a mutual friend of mine like every single photo like film photo she had of us gave them to mutual

friend to give back to me so i guess that was her way of saying like we're done hipster dramatic moves it's amazing how people just once you confront them about one thing they show their true colors completely and it was just funny because like i was like i'm gonna be the bigger person i'm gonna try and stay friends even though i'm mad at you and then she said i know we're done so wow I mean that's how it goes sometimes where like you know people disrespect you people like do shitty things and you're like you know what I'm like a mature adult like and I can take a step back and like see this relationship and like you know I want to see this through I can put this work and then it goes oh wow you disrespected me and I for some reason and I do this too where it

was like I thought that like that was an isolated incident and then it goes oh no I guess that's who viewer and all the it all comes crumbling down yeah then it's like oh for sure so i should have taken your advice and been a little bit meaner but i'll know for next time at the same time though like as much as like being petty and being an asshole feels great sometimes it also feels great that like when you are like extending an olive branch or like you are being nice and then they just like absolutely blow it up in their own face and you go you look even more stupid because like when i come at you with fire and you come back with fire that's expected but like when i come at you with like a peace offering and like oh like kindness and you come back with fire like

you look so much worse like it looks so disproportionate wow so is she in the part of like the trucker's convoy like yay freedom well that's the thing because you guys are saying like this was back in january where it was before we were all vaccinated and stuff so it's like you didn't really have those stances like in a group conversation she wouldn't say anything and she would just kind of like not say her political views at all but then it was actually from one of your instagrams where you said figure out who your friends follow is um what's her name like candace owens who followed check which one of your friends follows her so i did and she did she's like oh my god and that's literally how i realized yeah there is nothing more illuminating

than when you see a canadian following like all right american politicians she's canadian she's a woman and she's lesbian and that's why I didn't expect it you know yeah that's the disappointment there came out of nowhere dude it's it's that's always that you know it's now yeah so you helped me figure it out actually so oh god well I'm happy for you but also you know it's a it's a rough go of it well I mean I applaud you for you know being the higher person usually we want people to take our advice but like being like that to say higher better taking the high road than being like the bigger person yeah i don't words are hard you still got to have that satisfaction of the oh this was the right call that she she essentially did it for you exactly like i tried my best but

i still i'm not missing out on much anymore so you're missing out on anything at all especially now it was a long friendship but it's like that was enough for me to be like oh i do not want to be associated to you at all real canadian superstore has everything you need this back to school season save on lunchbox savers like ziggy sliced le me products for always 375 and get life brand pure vita shampoo or conditioner for eight dollars each at real canadian superstore when you're ready we're ready with a whole world and more no and now you got the truckers convoy now is not the time that you want to be associated with those friends it's embarrassing it really is Well, thank you for giving us the update.

Of course. And I hope you have many more wonderful cottage trips with people who are vaccinated and who don't follow Candace Owens. And take better film photos. Better ones. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Bye.

Bye. Stunning. Great. Absolutely stunning. You know, radical Canadians. Them Canadians. I mean, yeah. I mean, like, I think we idolize Canada a lot when in reality, like, no, no, but I was

going to say, in reality, I don't think that the sentiment is incorrect. I do think the logic is incorrect because I think the logic behind it is Canada is marginally better than the United States. So, like, it is achievable. Like, I think if, like, we're, we're, we're, like, being, like, Denmark, we need, we want countries that are, like, even, like, relatively more leaning socialist. Like, we're pretty far from that. like i think if we aspire to be like a canada like we have problem like it's not this utopia

but therefore i think it's more plausible so that's my logic behind it okay yeah yep canada okay so canada is that the song yeah okay i always think of the song from the princess diaries genovia you know who loves that movie mott's yeah he thought he was like this movie is great and i was like i know i've probably seen that movie a million times that was a very popular movie in the mott's household it was something that all three of us girls and my mom loved so we it's a classic julie andrews like it's just well done and i dare i say i don't even dare i say i stand by anne hathaway's best role best role except i did love her in the oceans that's what i was gonna say that was gonna be my next one i was like i think oceans eight might be number

one but that is definitely number two yeah and three if we count the second princess diaries with chris behind written by shonda rhimes yep okay so we are going to uh get into the calls Hey, Megan and Melissa. All right. So I'm just going to get straight to the point. I was listening to one of y'all's episodes, and I heard Megan talk about how she doesn't like being around drunk people. And so I thought maybe you guys could really give some insight to the situation that I've been dealing with. So basically, me and my boyfriend are both finishing up our first year of college, and I made a promise to myself right when I was beginning that I would get the full freshman experience.

And that does include going out, drinking, and partying. And so far, it has been so much fun for me. Like, I'm really, I don't have any regrets about doing that. But my boyfriend has always had this dislike towards drunk people, always. It roots from his family getting too drunk at restaurants and, like, him having to drive them home and his mother embarrassing herself. There's a lot of history behind it. So I totally understand where he's coming from. But he has always supported me and never said that he wants to hold me back.

So he lets me go out and do my thing, and then he just chooses to take a different route. But here lately, I noticed that, you know, the next day I'll try to show him, you know, funny videos, and I'll try to show him, you know, I'll tell him all the stories about what happened the night before, and he will not be interested. Now, he hasn't told me, oh, I don't really care about that, but I can just tell from the way that he responds and, you know, the way that he acts, that truly the things that I found funny the night before, he doesn't find funny at all because he doesn't think drunk people are funny, and I get that.

But I just need help on how not to be a bad girlfriend in this situation because we definitely hang around two different crowds, and that's not a problem for us at all. We've always had separate friend groups, and it's worked great for us. But I just need to know if I am being a bad girlfriend by telling him what I did the night before or if that's the right thing to do, if I need to keep on explaining what I did, even though he seems to not care

and, you know, not really think the stuff that I thought was fun is fun. So he's never been evil about it. I want to make that clear. He's never been cruel. He's never told me that I make bad decisions. You know, he just lets me live my life. But it's just definitely somewhere where we see differently. And he doesn't like to be around my friends because they drink.

And it's just something that I need help on how to be a better girlfriend in this situation. And if I should stop telling him or how I can have these separate lives without making him feel uncomfortable thank you guys so much and Megan if you have some insight on this please please let me know because I feel like a jerk sometimes thank you guys so much I'm sorry but you are being a jerk I want to say I mean this like kindest way possible because you sound very nice but even if you take out the drinking aspect like I want to ask you about your day but like I don't really want to see videos of your like that's there's that's not really much substance to a relationship and it also has nothing to do with the both of you it's like there's nothing

more annoying again even when people are all sober involved that they're like oh my god the funniest thing happened yesterday and you're like telling us and you weren't there like it's just not it's just not interesting and like i understand that like drinking and partying can kind of feel like like you've described it like your your first year in your college and it's like you're describing this as like two different lives when drinking becomes kind of a personality trait for a lot of people when they first start drinking hello I was definitely one of them but like you're not really being a girlfriend like you're not really having any comfort like if all your conversations and stuff is just like telling about the things that people did yesterday and like the

stupid videos of them drunk and all that like that's just not a lot of effort put into the relationship like it has nothing to do with either of you and like there's a difference between like he knows you went out the night before and it's like oh how was it you're like oh it was really fun it was like and if there's something that like is actually interesting that happened you're like you're never gonna believe it brad pitt walked into the bar like tell him that but like if it's like oh my god like kelly did a keg stand again and then she felt like i mean even like you know what i mean like stuff where it's like it's just not that interesting it's like showing pictures someone pictures of your vacation that you weren't on this is this is i want to explain why i say

you're being a jerk because you said that he's been traumatized from oh yeah his childhood of having to like family members drinking too much in public and him having drive home and now you're showing him videos of people that are doing the same things that are from his childhood trauma so imagine something that traumatized you as a child and then he goes and records it and shows it to you how awful is that that's just not it's being used as like how funny is this but like when you have trauma regarding something even if it's like you're not showing your friends fighting or like someone having to drive them home like the whole everything around that is soured and like becomes triggering and traumatizing so it's not funny or fun for him at all and like you're doing

it for you not him and he doesn't have to be there you have other people that you could show Yeah. You're like, look how much fun we were having, which most things that are funny to people when they're drunk is not funny when people are sober. And then sharing with someone that wasn't even there is not enjoyable. So just talk about a few things that happened in the night if he asked you how things were. I mean, share how much fun you had, but you don't have to go into the specifics. And I just think it's jerk behavior to re-traumatize him and think it's funny yeah i think that you might be like thinking that because this is something that he's not involved in that you have to inform him so much about your life so like he's not like worried but

he seems from what you've said like he's totally fine with you going out and drinking and it's like okay with that but he's made the active choice to not participate and also not be around that so you don't need to bring that home like if there's any point where he starts to feel uncomfortable with you going out and drinking that is his responsibility to tell you that's not your responsibility you don't need to go above and beyond by like making him feel included in something he has actively taken himself out of and like i don't know if part of you makes me maybe feels like you want to make sure that he knows that you're making better decisions or you're making good decisions and all that but like he's with you he knows that you're going out like

you don't need to do any of that when it's traumatizing it's traumatizing like it doesn't He doesn't need you to like reassure him through that stuff. And like, again, I can't explain enough that like, even without all of that, it is just so uninteresting and not fun. I think about how much fun I had in college drinking and partying and going out. And I know there's videos. We've destroyed a lot of them. Luckily, there wasn't like YouTube around until like later college.

So like, and no, there was no Snapchat. Thank God. facebook was very simple you can even put videos up on facebook at that time um but we've destroyed a lot of them but i know if i go back and look at them right now they're gonna be obnoxious and not entertaining at all like no one needs to see that no no one needs to see that at all and i think that like this is actually like you have a really wonderful opportunity here to prevent drinking and partying excessively from becoming your entire personality which kind of feels like an inevitable for most college age kids who are partying that you are going to be able to develop foster a

relationship that is like completely separate from all of that and like i think that's great and also if you find yourself this is not a read this is coming from personal experience but if you find yourself that like all you really want to talk about is the party you went to the night before and all that stuff you want to do the entire night blah blah constantly uh that's that's kind of a red flag that like you start defining yourself by who you are when you are drunk and the circumstances you're in when you're drunk the things that you're doing the people you're with and all of that and if even sober you and all your friends start really like putting that stuff as like the funniest the best like the most wonderful part in all of that we

start romanticizing inevitably we all start to kind of romanticize who we are when we are drunk and that is like a very very very slippery slope to having an unhealthy relationship with alcohol yeah i mean i was there oh that was 100 me 100 me too um but you know i grew out of it but yeah it's just something to to look at i think that it's possible for a lot of people to grow out of it recognize early on that your relationship with alcohol your friend's relationship with alcohol your boyfriend's relationship with alcohol even if it's not him consuming it are predisposed by their genetics and are by their life circumstance so how you view it is not going to be how everybody else views it and you also just need to be really aware everyone when you

are drinking yes pay attention to how other people are handling their alcohol but really pay attention to you and like how you are because i think a lot of the time we look at everybody else to like as our vantage points of like where we where we fall on that but we drink too much yeah like as a society we drink way way way too much and we romanticize a lot of that stuff and it's not good And I think you've got a great, like I said, a really great opportunity to have that just be one small aspect of your social life. And it's not just your social life is drinking and then your school life. Like you have your sober social life as well. And I think that's great.

Yeah. Next call. Hi, Megan and Melissa. I am 24, almost 25. And my pronouns are she, her. I am a single mom. I have a one-and-a-half-year-old, was never married until the father broke up shortly after I had him. I have downloaded a dating app, and I have the profile like 50% done, and I have no idea how to finish it.

I have two selfies, and I want to add more pictures of myself full body, but all my pictures that I have right now are of me and my kid because that's mainly what I do with my life. So I was looking for some advice on how to start using a dating app. I don't know. I've never dated like this. I was in a relationship in my last one for six years, five or six years, and it was crazy and not the healthiest, but I'm getting better and working on myself, but I'm slowly adjusting to the idea of starting to date again, and I have no idea what I'm doing, and I need

help and i'm it's so nerve-wracking the idea of using a dating app so any tips just general advice for using dating app and how to go about that and yeah that's it pretty easy question thank you so much bye i mean i think that if you are comfortable i think you should have like a full body picture with your kid you don't have to show your your kid's face like you can block out your kid's face or cover the whole their whole body or whatever but i do think that like it should be there because like like you said like that's like your kid's your life like that is like your vast majority of your life and dating as a single mom like your kid is not your entire identity in your entire life but like your kid is a huge part of your life and like i think that you would be doing

yourself a disservice if you didn't share that i don't not in like the sense that like disclosing that so people know but just like it's a wonderful thing like being a parent it's like a that's like it's a very hard thing but it's also like a really great thing and like having somebody who loves their kids so much and is like so like their primary caregiver like incredibly involved in their life like some people might not be their thing but for other people like that's a the biggest green flag ever I'm sure it's like hard but I think that as long as you I don't know I think the good thing about dating apps you can kind of like get that conversation out of the way in your bio and in the photo so you include the photo and you're like uh and yes that is my

daughter or like my son i don't know my kid yeah i mean there's a place where it says do you want kids or have kids or whatever and you can just mark that you have kids yeah and then i think that like then once you have that kind of out of the way it can be a conversation piece if someone like brings it up but like you can kind of focus on just dating dating and not having it be they they already know that you're a single mom you know but I mean my formula two selfies and a full body with the kid I think is a great I think it's perfect I think at this point on most of them you have to have at least like five ish yeah yeah so I would do I wouldn't do two selfies back to back I would do like a selfie then I would probably do probably picture a kid

second photo and then i would do you could do another selfie or then a funny one and then round it off with another selfie that's what i would do if that's probably not five but like yeah you could have another full body without the kid and ask a friend to take the picture or set up your camera and put the timer on or set the video and then play the video and take pictures of the screen yeah i also think that like dating apps are a great point now that like once you have a couple photos of you like including something that's like funny like i love i love when people would have like a screenshot of like something like fun like a like some just something that it's like but it's you've already got enough pictures of them but they're trying to meet the

minimum requirement like you know what they look like and you're they're showing your personality more i think that's like the best way to kind of utilize dating apps is because everybody everybody's got faces like everybody like we're all looking at pictures of you of people and what's actually distinguishing the difference between them is their personalities like who they are that's not necessarily something that everyone has a is a great at conveying through photos but i think that the way you'll have the most success rate is if you can convey your personality through your profile so therefore you're doing a lot more vetting before you ever meet these people versus like, Oh, I'll just see how they're like in person. And then your

personalities are completely mismatched. Yeah. I agree. I think, you know, just more so you're kind of psyching yourself out of the dating apps. Like you want to date, but you're like, I don't have enough information. I'm only 50%. I'm very of the mindset that you need to put, like, be very intentional about what you want to do with dating apps. Cause some people, You might just want to be on there because, and this is just a general thing, just because you want a boost in your own serotonin and you're just on there because people are swiping and you're like, oh, this person thinks I'm cute. This person thinks I'm cute. And that's fine. You could be on there just because you want to casually date. And if you just want to go on dates and just hang out

or have another adult to hang out with, then great. But be clear about that. If you want to just be on there and hook up with people be clear about that if you actually want a relationship be clear about that so yeah i think the picture thing is the least of anything i think that what you actually the substance that's in your profile is more important yeah and i think that like if you can look at it on the way that like you know the job resumes that you like cater to each job that you're looking for like this isn't catered to the people that you're trying to like that you're not trying to like be someone or have your profile fit the mold of what you think people are going to like you just be you be all of you be like as candid be funny be whatever like you

feel comfortable with and like that is the most you and the right people will find you the right people will swipe on you that that's i mean maybe not all of them will be the right one but like your responsibility is to not make yourself like palatable and like presented perfectly for these other people it's for them to see you and be like wow this is great this is awesome but like just don't mold it to what you think people want to see because like that's like anytime i was helping my friends dating apps or whatever i was like you are so clearly like this is not your personality this is like not you at all and like they're gonna be you and like if you're gonna have to keep a facade for months like this is not and you're doing yourself a disservice because there

is somebody out there who is like live like who you really are it's like their fucking dream but if you don't express that you're gonna match with all the wrong fucking people and you're gonna be like what's happening and I'm like well your profile is like not you like you're so vanilla one of my friends was looking at my dating profile and she was like you need to do she was basically saying I need to present something that wasn't me at all and I was like I'm first of all your relationship track record is not good like that's not the advice yeah second like I'm not gonna put information that's not true just to attract more men because then it's gonna be someone that's not into me and it's just fake i'm not here to be fake like i'm looking for a

relationship i'm not here just to cast my net out and just catch whoever falls in no yeah i remember i had friends who would always put like looking for something casual even though they weren't and they would always put like like drinks yes and then and like even if they didn't really drink because they were basically trying to like catch the widest net possible and not have anyone rule them out and i'm like you're putting so much more work on yourself then like so you're gonna have to weed through and work through all of these people but then also like you're gonna then feel like an asshole because you feel like you led them on to someone who's not you right like why are you giving yourself more work to do like these this ai works pretty well like it does a pretty decent job but

i will just say like i like when i was on dating apps i definitely swiped on people who had kids and were holding kids and sometimes it was like this is my niece this is my nephew like this is my kid and always say in the description that that is your kid if it is your kid because it's always a little odd when it's not but when i looked at that i never like looked down on anybody who had a kid at this age if i was single it's something i would definitely like consider more but like when i was younger i was like no not ready to date someone who has a kid like and that just has to do with responsibility and age so i also don't i don't think you oh you're 24 almost 25 so okay last piece of advice look out i don't know where you are and location wise but do look

out for in a bad way like of those older guys who their kids are in college they understand the dad thing in that kind of sense there can be a lot of that like silver fox and shining armor for like young moms set your age parameters yeah set your age parameters and like the whole notion of like oh young people like there there is a range and also me as a 18 to like 20 year old who wasn't ready to like be with a guy who had a kid is very different than like a 25 26 27 28 like 30 year olds but anyone over 30 yeah you're 25 anyone who's five six seven i mean that's let's say seven eight nine years older than you even six years they shouldn't they shouldn't be interested in not in you because you have a kid but in the reason why they're interested is probably a little

bit yucky i really hate that like trend of like that silver you see that you see i mean to a very also see that a lot on youtube of like teen moms who end up getting with a lot older men who have kids who are pretty much their age and it's uncomfy yeah i can do to make everything about age gap anyway should we take a break yes let's do it And we are back from our break, and we're going to get into the rest of the calls. Hi, Megan, Melissa. I love the podcast. I'm calling in for some advice about a situation I'm in with my boyfriend. So I am a 22-year-old female, she, her, and my boyfriend is 21.

He uses he, him pronouns, and then there's another person's story. We'll call her Tiffany. I think she's 21, she, her. So basically, my boyfriend and I have been in a long distance relationship for the past four years while we've been in college. And we've always had really good communication and trust. Like I've never doubted him or worried that he was going to cheat on me during that time. And part of the reason is that we're both very honest with each other about like if other people hit on us and we're out or anything like that. People, you know, act like they're flirting with us, things like that. So, for the past year or so, this girl, Tiffany, I've actually met her several times when I've gone to visit my boyfriend. So, I've met her several times. She's always been really nice, but then recently, especially a lot in the past few months, whenever there's some kind of event at my boyfriend's school that she's also at, she talks to him a lot, searches him a lot, and he's made it very clear to me that she seems to be interested in him, despite her knowing the fact that he has a girlfriend and despite the fact that she's met me several times. So I was just kind of wondering how I should approach the situation. I'm getting a little angry because I feel like she's blatantly disrespecting our relationship. And then in turn, him allowing her to disrespect our relationship is him disrespecting our relationship, even if she's not reciprocating her feelings or acting on it in any way. So I was just kind of wondering if you had any advice on how should I approach this, if it's, you know, uncalled for for me to ask him just to not communicate with her at all or, you know, talk with her at all at these events.

But yeah, any advice would be really appreciated. Love the podcast. And we're Capricorn and Leo combination. Just saying that because I know you and Moth are also. But anyway, thanks for the podcast. Bye. I am a little curious if you're the Leo or he's the Capricorn. I'm a... I don't know.

Maybe because you said it, you know that we're that same combo. Maybe you're also Leo, but I don't know. i i think you know the crux of the issue is like him allowing it because like this girl doesn't owe you anything i don't think it's like out of pocket to like be like can you just like not hang out with her and talk to her in that way or like ever but also i'm just curious kind of why this is raising red flags in you because if he was as uninterested in her as he says like he wouldn't have any instances in which they like spoke would be like so few and far between it would have been like a one-time kind of thing and i think like men think like that they've like really gotten

our heads about like women are crazy like let's be honest most women if they find out that a guy is like completely not interested they're not going to keep pursuing it but so like usually you're getting a little something to make it think that that door is not completely shut and sometimes guys like well no she knows i have a girlfriend i'm like but how are you acting like are you acting like you're still inviting this are you using that as kind of like sorry i have a girlfriend instead of being like i'm not interested you know like why is she around so much why is she around so much especially if he doesn't like her why is he she around when you're not there why is she around when you're there like in what situations are you together but

I'm just confused here's the thing if she's made it clear that she's interested in him as you said has he made it clear that he's not interested in her has he said point blank hey I have a girlfriend which you've met several times I love her we've been together for four years I do not want to be with anyone else please leave me alone has he said that yeah so here's the thing you've been together it's a four-year long distance relationship you have all been in college together there is a reason why you feel differently about this than you have had before like there's a difference and the from what it seems like from what you said like the very open communication so you tell each other when someone else flirts and all that

the reason why you feel different is because not because you've met her but because of how he talks about it and that's what you're reading into it and like there's also a reason why it's four years in he's known this girl she's gone to school and that she's known you met you's been nice to you and now is suddenly disrespecting your relationship and it's because you're not only is your boyfriend allowing her to he essentially gave an invitation to do so like you don't start off like that like i don't want this to be like mean at all but like he has most likely left a door open in like whether it's complaining about you whether it's just kind of like being like oh or whatever like and like making shit up like i'm not saying you're doing anything wrong or bad at all but like

he has given somebody who has met you who knows you who's always been kind to you has been prior respectful of your relationship because no one is doing this for four years like she's not doing this before she has not this has been the last couple months that she has now she thinks that she knows something that you don't that like he has let her he's opened that up and like he's now telling you and he's banking on hiding something kind of in plain sight and it doesn't mean that he's cheating on you but it means that like he is welcoming and inviting in this invitation and he's making you be the one to tell him to not talk to her so he can then vilify you as opposed to him just being like, yeah, I'm not interested.

Like, but the fact that this has repeatedly come up and come up and come up, like he wants you to have to tell him that so then he can retaliate, I think. If he's not interested, then he needs to say that he's not interested because obviously he's doing something to make her think that he's interested.

And you said that he's disrespecting you by not making that clear. Yes, he is disrespecting you. I mean, she sounds like she's not a good person because she knows you exist and she's still pursuing your boyfriend she's not a good person but she's not the one that you're in a relationship with he is yeah i she doesn't owe you anything and like even though she's been nice to you before again vast majority of the time there are absolutely evil women out there absolutely evil women but most of the time in these situations the other

woman has been fed a story in which you have become the villain men have made this more palatable and they have reshaped it into making it something where they feel like they are not only special, but they are, oh my God, she's so bad. She's so awful that you are actually the villain in that story. And when someone has feelings for you and is like very clearly, obviously into you

and you have a partner, if they're actively pursuing you constantly enough that you feel the need to tell your girlfriend, like that's uncomfortable. That would make you uncomfortable. And if you're not a horrible person, you wouldn't want someone to feel like, to continue to put themselves out there and like continue like that's embarrassing for both of you

and it's just like uncomfortable you can't it's not fun like when someone you like likes you that you don't like you're just like oh my god this is like oh i feel so bad this is so like oh this is not it's not a sustainable thing no so like he has not made that clear to her i think he's done the exact opposite there's no way that they're going to all these events that they're going to where she would think just from going to these events that he's cute and i want to be with him they're having some types of conversations there they have to be it's not just like she's seeing he just sees her while he's passing by they're talking in some type of way yeah this is he's not being truthful he's being disrespectful and you need to be he needs to be up front if he

wants to be with you he needs to be up front and i don't think he's being completely up front with you or her this is what i would do i would i would i would talk to him about it i would ask him to be honest i would be like come on and if he's i can tell that it's it's just not adding up because again like there are only so few instances in this that like men have banked on the fact that like we women turn on each other constantly and so very fucking quickly that like they can paint us to be the villains that they absolve any sort of responsibility and that's what constantly happens but like if you've only ever seen her at events or whatever is she stalking you like but you're not saying like that you have there are these extremes here but like women are not crazy

unless you're talking about someone who is like actively stalking you are you worried for your safety like do you have access to help are people been alerted like that if you can't have this like middle ground kind of thing of like she's obsessed with me without explaining what you're doing so i would also reach out to her ask her send her a message or something and then watch his reaction the next couple hours when you realize that she has reached out to him to tell him that you've reached out to her and you can clearly see that they are they've spoken they're in communication then they appear that he's letting on and also gauging her response to that 99 of the time women are going to look out for other women and what i was going to say if you are dating someone who if

you have like a secret thing with someone it's either because you are like you like being the other woman other people or you have been manipulated to think that like it's an it's it's a horrible relationship you're already breaking up like blah blah blah blah it's bad but either way either one of those reactions you're going to be able to you'll you'll know you'll be able to gauge what that is and like that the very slim chance that she is actually stalking him and it is like really sketchy and like bad that will be abundantly clear in her response like you will be able to tell and get a read from her but i think your boyfriend is banking on the fact that like he has been faithful and he has been like so overly overtly honest and

telling you things that you would never have known before and letting you know that like informing you so much that it makes you feel like he's not hiding anything when that is i mean that's how like you know get away with so much shit when you're a kid right like i'm gonna tell these i'm gonna tell parents about like all my other friends and doing all of that stuff so i don't have to talk about me i'm gonna like there's a way that you do that and he's banking on that being his like record of credibility and you are also doing that but like your trustworthiness and your record of credibility for that's irrelevant absolutely irrelevant you don't get bonus points that you have like not been a shit before if you're being a shit now like no i don't trust either then i

don't either and i think it'll be abundantly clear the second that you talk to her about it even if she doesn't respond i think you'll then you'll see how his reaction is even if he doesn't say it to you but you'll be like just suss it out or does he have a really nice friend who you love like a friend who maybe is like the guy the guy the guy of the friend group who kind of gets picked on the most by all of them and it's kind of the butt of the joke i personally would keep it with keep the communication with the boyfriend yeah but you're less messy than me i know it's a skill and a I like other people's messes, but not my own. Yeah, but I would, I think if you force him to tell you the exact truth, then it's going to be the actual truth.

Yeah, hopefully. Yeah, because things, it just doesn't add up. But no, no, no, no. Anyway, next call. Hi, Megan and Melissa. I'm 29 years old and my pronouns are she, her. I'm calling because I need some advice about my partner. His pronouns are he, him.

He's 27, and we've been together three and a half years. Two years ago, my partner was staying the night at my place and had dropped his phone from the bed. He has his phone set so that the screen doesn't switch off unless you physically push the lock button. So I woke up before him, so I went to make coffee, and I saw his phone on the ground. So I went to pick it up and put it on the nightstand and saw that it was open to a paused porn video. When we first got together, my partner said that he used to watch porn but no longer did since we'd been together. At the time, I was mad because I didn't understand why he needed the porn since we were very sexually active. And he'd explicitly told me he wasn't watching it anymore.

He had a lot of opportunities to tell me that he still was, as we're pretty open about our sex life and what we like and what we don't. At the time, we talked it up to a misunderstanding about the porn, and he apologized profusely for lying to me about it and swore up and down that he wasn't going to do it again. So I forgave him, and we moved on. Now, two years later, we live together, and we recently got a dog that tries to eat everything.

One morning, I woke up and saw that his phone was laying on the bed next to him, and our dog was trying to grab it. So I grabbed it before our dog could, but saw that the phone screen was again paused on another porn video. At this point, I understand more why he watches the porn. And so the watching of the porn doesn't really bother me anymore. It's more the issue that he lied to me about it and that it was an issue that he said he wouldn't lie about anymore. So I confronted him once he woke up and he again apologized profusely for lying to me about it. He said he felt awful and feels horrible about continuing to watch it and asked if I could forgive him again.

I told him that I don't understand why he felt the need to lie to me again about the same issue, why he felt he couldn't tell me, and that above all, I feel hurt that he lied to me again about the same issue he promised he wouldn't. I also asked why he's still watching it, and he said he isn't really sure, and he does it when he's bored. At this point, I'm just questioning if I can still trust him not to lie to me about this or really anything else. Am I stupid if I just let it go and stay with him? Or am I not valuing myself enough if I just let it go? I don't really want to leave him to keep my person and I love him more than I've ever loved anyone. But I also feel like your person shouldn't keep things from you or do things behind your back and lie about them.

Am I overreacting? Any advice you both could give me on how I should handle this situation would be greatly appreciated. I love you both and I love the show. Thanks in advance for any wisdom you can provide. We have strong feelings about porn. Very pro-porn. as two women with a podcast and actually kind of

an unpopular opinion. Yeah. I think, hot take, this is coming from somebody who does not watch porn. I think you should assume everybody watches porn. Yeah.

I think you should always assume everyone watches porn. And I think that the conversation around porn is a shameful topic, which is why people lie about it. And even the terminology you used, you kept calling it an issue.

Mm-hmm. And I'm not one ever to say, like, especially in like a heterosexual relationships when it's a woman calling about a man that i'm like well have you given him is there a reason why he might have felt the need he needed to lie and hide it like because she's shamed him she's shamed him every time that he's watched it she shamed him about it why do we need to have why do you need to watch porn when we're have an active sex life like why why are you watching this why why why do you have this why are you lying about

it because you've shamed him and that's like when we bring shame into porn we're bringing shame into sex and like that's how sex workers get incredibly disrespected it's because we're treating this thing as like dirty and not okay and something needs to be kept quiet and it's also how people start exploring dangerous versions of kinks it's like it's really not good and porn is only an issue when it starts affecting your own sex life or their mental health and that's something that they don't want to participate in anymore that it hasn't been like doctrinaided by like wild christian like uh that whatever the fuck and what you're talking about before i start recording yeah those ones like but like there is and even before i started dating you like he's saying that

like oh i don't watch porn but like if you've ever had an open conversation as a woman with a man about porn there's so much shame like there is so the first time mott's never talked about porn he was I was like oh I don't care if you watch porn he was like really and I was like no I don't I don't care I mean like if I'm home and I'm like you know not like I would always like to know if you're like in the mood like let me know ahead of time but like if you're like home alone or you're like I'm working like I've got my period or like I'm but like go for you don't have to tell me you don't have to ask my permission but like if I'm home and you're choosing porn over sex like I'd like to have a conversation as to why but also like I also think that like choosing masturbation

over sex is like also not something i personally take offense to like if it's a repeated kind of thing but like there are times where i'm like i do not have the energy of sex but i can have the energy to like solos quick solo session like every form of like sexual expression or like anything involving like arousal that doesn't necessarily have to lead to like an orgasm or whatever like there's such a huge fucking range of that there's like do you want to have sex with a partner do you have a one-night stand you want to have sex someone you love do you want to like fuck do you want to make love like do you want like there's so many different like versions of that and there's also just like i need a release like i need i need to relax i need to go to sleep

i need i i need to wake up like there's just there's so many different i just i just want to fill your fork for a second like there's so many you don't have to i just well when you make it about you and your relationship you make then watching porn is a personal failure and you make i hate saying that like you push people to lie about things but you do when you don't create a safe space for someone to be honest or to express themselves or you create these i'm gonna call them unrealistic standards and when you attach like meaning to someone watching porn as like an issue in your relationship or something with you that's something that you personally need to work on and i don't mean to be an asshole if you have an issue with your partner watching porn and they have no

issue with porn there is no like and this is a very hot take people have very strong feelings if porn makes you insecure that is i love you all so much that is not your partner's problem like it's not and like if they are doing something that repeatedly disrespect makes you feel disrespected makes you feel bad about yourself you are more with them within your right to ask them to like take a hiatus and break from that well you go to therapy and you work on your stuff but like the solution to your insecurities is not other people it's not like it's just never going to be and it doesn't mean that you have to suddenly not become insecure that's not what i'm saying at all and i think it's also really important why we should talk about porn with

our partners you should know what kind of porn your partner watches you should know what they're watching and you should have a partner who feels like sex workers should be compensated who feels like sex workers are human beings and if you don't talk about these things with your partner and you make them feel like they have to hide then they start hiding on the deepest darkest corners of internet and they're on some nasty fucking shit and they can't be honest and truthful with you i know that you said that like you've grown up and like porn doesn't really matter as much to you anymore anything like that but like have you had that conversation with him yeah that was going to be the next thing it seems like you just assumed that he knew that you were okay with it

and you guys haven't actually talked about it because if you've talked about it and he knows that you know you're fine with it which i don't think you are i think you're just saying that you are then he wouldn't have to hide it from you unless that's his kink where he likes to be caught on purpose which i don't think that's what it is i don't think so either but i also think that like if there are pitfalls of like our current modern day porn industry and not like the only fans porn but like the lack of uh pay the how things are going about and like just you know but the the solution to making sure that porn is ethical is not banning porn and it's also not villainizing porn and when you disrespect sex workers and the porn industry as a whole and you make it about

that being a dirty gross thing and that being a bad thing you are also inadvertently and this is a bold claim but you're also inadvertently putting all of your you're disrespecting women like you truly are because female sex workers get the absolute shit out of it compared to men like absolute absolute and then not even a double standard that goes with it yeah and not even like speaking on uh uh trans sex workers like the just the amount that like you are fostering a man to hate the women and the things that he's getting off on and like there are times where like yeah it can affect your life it can affect your sex life and like sometimes men can have unrealistic standards based on like the sex the porn that they're watching but your sex life is great all

this is great so then why does he need this like no it's clearly not affecting your relationship your issue is the lying, but I think you really dislike porn a lot more than you are letting yourself recognize. And I don't think that you, if you can take a step back and recognize that like you have given him like that, he can't lie about this anymore. And he said, but like, I don't think your reaction when he's lied has been good. Like it's hard. And I will say too, when people have like shame about stuff and like, I don't want to say training people to not lie anymore, but like when you tell someone, like, I really don't want you to lie to me. What you have to say is like i really want you to come tell me the truth and i'm not going to be mad and we can

practice it and it can happen and then you have to fucking practice what you preach and like it might take a while they might continue to lie about some certain things ahead of like prior to that before and like it's going to take a while because they need the trust to build back both ways the same way that you need to be able to trust them they need to be able to trust you that you're not going to like absolutely lose it on them for this thing that is like very normal and very healthy but again if we keep shaming all this shit we keep putting it to like that dark shit the percentage of the porn industry that is horrendous is only going to get worse it's only get worse it's only to get more unregulated it's only to get more dangerous and like you can be an

insecure person i'm an insecure person i'm a depressed leo so i really ebb and flow but like porn has absolutely nothing to do with me like that has nothing to do with me and when you make it have something to do with you you also make your partner feel like they've failed as a partner And that becomes an even deeper pile of shame that once you start feeling like you failed, you're going to start acting in ways you're like, well, I already failed, but I already fucking suck. You're not setting him up for anyone up for success in that sense. And if you want to date someone who doesn't watch porn, it's going to be far and wide to find like that's hard. Well, and I will also say as someone who like I never really read into like why so much like I didn't watch porn growing up and like my therapist was the one who was like, no, never like not into that. i was like no makes me uncomfortable and our it was our couple therapists and mox was like she

doesn't even like watching people kiss on tv and she was like hmm and then we had a whole breakdown that like my reasoning for not wanting to watch porn and the vast majority of people because it's just again it's your brain chemistry natural thing that people like get off on watching that kind of thing in when intimacy is like not when that's something you're familiar with and like affection as a kid like that becomes like a very foreign and uncomfortable thing and so i'm like the people who are really anti-porn if you talk to people who are not anti-porn who like personally don't watch porn none of us have stories of like yeah no just like it's just it's usually people who like yeah it's there's a reason did you read fan fiction that had sex in it oh yeah so that's the

difference it's the visual aspect of it and i also was if it was characters i knew that i had a much better time with but even like tv shows even when the couples kiss on tv shows that i really like i can't i have a i can't watch it i have a i'm so uncomfortable like i'm so uncomfortable watching it and i can do but i've always been able to read fanfic though yeah and that's still erotic it's still a form of porn exactly but like when we start we stop treating this like people are an anomaly for being like liking porn or whatever like it's a biological response that we have and you need to unpack everyone if you have an issue unpack what your issue is and then work on that issue yeah wow we haven't had like a pro porn rant in a while and i just can't wait to

read the comments well we're a little bit safer because we're not on youtube anymore oh yeah do the anti-porners are they attacked us they came for us hard they they come out with statistics that they make up they come out with numbers and stuff they come out with shit that i'm like you do realize you are pushing like literally like alt-right propaganda shit like come on they come out with the red like the save our children shit like wayfair like i'm ready for that all right well it's time for don't blame them whoo so this is where a listener will call in with their own advice pertaining to a call we had on a previous episode so maybe they have their own personal insight or um they have their own personal insight it's pretty much it

I'm Alyssa Megan. I'm calling for a Don't Blame Them in regards to Season 9, Episode 12, about the call with a queer girl meeting friends on dating apps. I'm a bi girl with a new girlfriend and a few queer friends. I met both my girlfriend and some friends on dating apps. It's a pretty common thing for queer AFAB people to meet friends on dating apps, and people are pretty clear in their profiles on what they are looking for. It feels like a safe, approachable way to meet other queer folks and form good friendships. Of course, for you specifically, only do this if you have a clear conversation with your partner. And if you still set the boundary after you explain your intentions, then totally respect that. Other good online ways to meet queer friends is Discord.

I know in my city and a lot of other cities, they have an LGBTQ section. And that is a great way to chat with people online first if you don't feel comfortable doing in-person things like joining like queer kickball leagues and that type of thing so yeah that's it thanks for hearing me out bye someone needs to make a new dating app we got a lot of messages about this from queer people saying the same thing so this is very common they also said y'all straight is showing which i thought it was funny yeah you should hear us talk about dicks that's the biggest time showing when passing around a photo of somebody in grace web dance no but then this is i mean that makes total sense like i that yeah but like damn someone needs to make an app i guess i wonder

if it i wonder if the hesitation behind it is that it might feel like it could target hate campaign like people yeah but i mean like bumble has bff that people use my friend i just feel like this we could eliminate a lot of like this because that that seems great because i think like instead of going out of your way to try and to meet people and like let's hope they're not homophobic like have an app that vets all that ahead of the time you know i mean so you can just like common interest but yeah so that was don't blame me starring two girls two clearly obvious straight sorry the straight the straights the straights were straightened again the straights are not okay and the straights are not well just so you know just your tuesday your two straights

checking in daily for your for your straight update straight up not well straight up now tell me if you're really gonna love me forever well that's it for episode if you want to call in uh do it give us give us a call at 310-694-0976 international listeners you can send us an audio message at meganpodcast at gmail.com um all the same things we said at the beginning apply if you want to watch the video version we're on patreon for a dollar a month or you could sign up for five dollars a month where we do live streams twice a month they're very fun we have a great time great way to socialize meet people hang out and follow our instagrams our personal ones but also the podcast and if you are listening this far comment down below your favorite fan your

favorite straight and why is it kate blanchett comment down below you don't have to comment down below your favorite we get enough attention it's yeah i also like so not everyone you think is straight and then that's true it's like when people are like lady gaga what an ally i'm like isn't she bi yeah we'll say that about katie perry too and i'm like i think all of you have okay it's not not want to contribute to bi erasure here at all oh comment down below the best thing you've ever seen in someone's dating profile whether it's like a picture a response to a prompt like something funny it can be like horrendous or hilarious did you ever watch the one that I sent you? Yeah. The straights aren't okay. No, they're not. Okay. We will

see you all next time. Goodbye. Goodbye. Don't Blame Me is a production by me. Executive produced by Melissa DeMonts and Diamond and Print Productions. Edited by Coco Lawrence. Post production sound by Chris Henry. Production assistance by Melanie D. Watson. Music by Ryan Hunter and Giacomo Picasso.