Don't Blame Me! - S8E25: Flirty Fitness Instructor

Episode Date: November 15, 2021

TW: (In The Update) Self-Harm    This week we're sharing advice on:  Feeling Guilty About Flirting  Brother and Best Friend Secretly Dating MEGA Update Captain Hook Drag Stage Fright Making True Crime Content Misgendering 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/ Listen to ad-free on Stitcher Premium! For a free month of Stitcher Premium, go to stitcherpremium.com and use promo code 'BLAME.”   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 Support the show: https://www.patreon.com/join/dontblameme See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

hello everybody and welcome back to another episode of don't blame me i'm megan i'm melissa are you wearing clogs no i mean they're crocs she says as if that's supposed to make it better i know that doesn't make it better but because of my back these are the only shoes that i can wear like in the house to do not quote i think they are the ugliest things that have ever been but they are the only i can't wear my slippers anymore because my back hurts i'm just curious why you opted for the clog versus like the original croc the original croc um has holes in them yeah swiss cheese these are like the ones that are for like service workers so they have a grippy bottom to the bottom like nurse shoes yes they're nurse shoes and so the other rooms i

have them but they were slipping on the floor so i got these because they grip the floor she's thriving can you lift a leg up for the patreon well i just want you to know that she is wearing they're very ugly and i will never wear these in public i will never wear any crocs in public but inside while my back is still healing i have to wear these ugly ass shoes i mean here's the thing i feel like i would be open to having some crocs if i got crocs i'm gonna lean in like i'm gonna get tie-dye rainbow crocs i mean like i have purple ones and i have some yellow ones but the yellow ones like have lining in the inside and i thought that would would have been like a good move for like slippers inside but they smelled immediately well things i'm learning

about you you own three pairs of Crocs yeah one of them's my outdoor Crocs that i wear like to take the trash out and i don't want to track him five seconds after she says you will never catch me wearing like out in public but like i've only worn them outside to take the trash so if people live on your block then they've seen catch me outside in my Crocs but that's the only time I will never be out at a public place with them on. Hey, live your life. Live your best life. I'm really mad because, you know, I had really cute slippers that I was wearing all the time.

But whenever I stood up to walk, my back would collapse. Yeah, they don't have a lot of support in them. They don't have any support. Well, this is Don't Blame Me. We're an advice podcast. We're going to recommend everybody to get Crocs. And yeah, if you want to call in for an upcoming episode, you can leave us a voicemail at 310-694-0976. And we ask that you keep it under three minutes.

Let us know your pronouns, write everything down before you start recording, because again, you'll get cut off and you have to be 18 or over, have your parents' permission. I guess I should give you more of like a lowdown of what the show is. We give advice because we are perfect human beings who have never done anything wrong. And we sit on a throne of lies. Fingers crossed because we're fitting. Lying, lying, lying, lying. so we love giving advice and we are going to be giving all of you some hopefully wonderful

fantastic amazing advice i had a hiccup oh before we get into it if you have missed the last couple episodes or you are not up to date you might have missed we announced that we started a second podcast it is called but am i wrong and we have had two episodes out now so we just recorded that it's a great time there's a good story in there you will all be able to tell me if i'm wrong in my story and it pertains to who knows by the time it comes out maybe things have changed we'll see but it pertains to a item of jewelry that is often worn on the left hand yeah yeah it might have been wrong and here were my thoughts on it and i have insider information that megan did not know about yep yep yep yep so what's new with you i'm very tired from working a lot but

as i've been doing for years i in my days watching my soap operas general hospital is my number one bitch but right now it's days of our lives because they're doing a devil possession story oh my god like it's like the same person that got possessed by the devil in the 80s dr marlena evans but like they're redoing it now like the devil came back and has jumped into her and they're just like bringing people back from the like the devil is rising people back from what yes it is so crazy and they're like walking around like zomb but like they're like zombies but not with zombie personalities like they're like fully awake and know what's going on they just look like zombie five versions you're fucking kidding me it's the actors playing like they're dead characters and

so they're coming and like they've already killed one person and like also the double is like picking people in the town that they like villains in the show they're like those are my people it is so funny and it's killing me i'm gonna have to like look up some clips that's not what i think of when i think of like oh crazy fucking soap opera storylines i mean it's like a redo from the 80s but like in the 80s the devil went around and like killed a whole bunch of people and everybody thought all these people were dead but then like somehow like when the spirit was taken out the people were like alive again so people thought like everybody in town i just want to know like what drugs are these writers taking well ron who writes days of our lives he's very

funny and i would like to i bet in real life yeah you have to be so quick and funny and creative to like come up with this kind of stuff especially when like you know like you think of like schitt's creek and shows that like you know are very i don't want to say intentional and say that soap whoppers aren't intentional but like intentionally like wrapped up in a bow like you can't you have to leave every thread like loose or be like no shame we really tied that one up and let's slash it open and start it over again so if you're not watching days of our lives and you've never watched it in your life i highly recommend starting watching like the episodes from october because they're all on peacock actually they're all on like hulu too you can watch on there like the

old episodes and start in october and then build your way up to where we got to last night where i was just like okay i'm 100 that's fucking insane i'm literally gonna watch close to this that's wild yeah okay so i know we normally like talk about like podcast reviews at the very end of the episode but i have to share this one with you and i'm not gonna read the whole thing i just need to ask you a question about this because when it's not supposed to be mean and i'm not reading it as mean i just disagree okay someone said megan always says and all that kind of stuff i agree i definitely have phrases that i say way too much i already know which one you're talking about and that's mostly because eventually you'll notice how my speech pattern changes

depending on where we are in the episode and that's usually you can like hear and if you're watching see the adderall wear off this one i'm not gonna read the whole thing but they said i'd almost say that megan and melissa are radically liberal i'm not like disagreeing like i when i take political quizzes again i was raised uh green party you know this can be a very triggering statement to people who have like left very like oppressive regimes or whatever but like my dad is a self-proclaimed like old commie that is like his shtick so i was not raised like democratic at all i would say that like yes i am radically liberal but what on this podcast has been radically liberal that's what i was like that's what i'm stuck on what is radical liberal like

when i think of radically liberal i think like anti-capitalism which we've never fucking discussed on this podcast and i'm kind of not no that's what i yeah that's what i mean that i'm just like i would say like anti-capital i mean anti-capitalist leaning more like socialist i don't think a cab is radically liberal no and i can't for the life of me rack my brain about like do you what i mean well that was a four-star review not a one no i know it's not a negative review and like i don't disagree with them specifically calling me radically liberal but Like, I don't know where the fuck that has ever come up on the podcast. No.

The only things that we really stuck to are the vaccine. And fuck Trump. And fuck Trump and racism. None of those things are radically liberal at all. I would just love to know. This is kind of just like a follow up question. And like, you can't count my Instagram because like I mean solely on this podcast. I would just love to know.

But I do wonder if I'm going to we're going to get an influx of reviews from pissed off manifestation girlies because i pissed them off on tiktok which again i will explain here manifestation girlies are not women who practice manifestation manifestation girlies are the mlm girlies of manifestation where they charge you 500 for an ebook on how to make 500 how to manifest 500 they are the scammers that's where the girly term comes in someone's like just let women enjoy things i was like circling back to our first episode of this no if you enjoy problematic things no i will not let you enjoy them true okay so we are going to get into the calls we're actually going to do the update at the end because it is incredibly long so let's get to the calls

i make it in melissa my pronouns are she her and my boyfriend's pronouns are he him we've been dating for two years and six months of those two years have been long distance we're 24 and 25 i'm very much getting married and super attracted to each other we have a great sex life and a healthy relationship. I'm calling in because I'm feeling extremely guilty for being attracted to a coach at my workout classes. He's a very good looking man and we make jokes at each other in a very friendly way. I'm feeling extremely guilty because I do not have feelings for this man in any way, but it's very flattering to have a good looking guy give me attention. I think it's because I've been in a relationship for two years and that's how long it's been since I've gotten

attention from another man, as it should be, but it's just flattering. I think about if he wasn't good looking, I probably wouldn't feel so guilty. And if the roles were reversed, I would feel super hurt. I just want to know if I should tell my boyfriend, am I a bad person? Is this normal? I feel so horrible about it. And is me thinking that this man is attractive, is that cheating? Am I self-sabotaging? I pretty much just want to know what the heck is going on because I just have this overwhelming feeling of guilt for just like having plain attraction towards this man not in like a sexual attraction way but literally just finding him attractive and being flattered by being paid attention to even though my boyfriend pays plenty plenty of attention to me and he is

very obsessed with me what is going on i feel horrible thank you love you guys you want to on my thoughts. I think that attention's fine. I think that your workout coach probably is just friendly and it's not actually flirting because that's part of their job. I also think, you know, when you're working out, a lot of endorphins are going and sweating and breathing heavily. And so it triggers something in your brain that makes things more attractive than they actually are. And I think now that you're aware of it and you said it out loud, then stop flirting with the man. And also as long as you don't act on it, then you're fine. But now that you're aware of it and you've said it out loud, you need to stop flirting. Yeah, no, I agree. I think that like, usually when

you feel guilty, there's because there's something going on there and you even said yourself, I would feel hurt if it was the reverse and there is something specific about workout coaches there's a reason why so many actors are also like workout like fitness instructors especially in la because you have to be charismatic you have to be funny like attractive good looking and then you also give people specific attention who are going to then come keep coming back to the classes like like attention that they might be coming around and touching you to adjust you a little bit and saying like, Oh, you look good. Or like just saying things of encouragement, but that is their job. I think fitness instructors give everyone the same kind of thing as camp goggles where it's

like, if a fitness instructor is like nicely and mildly cute, I will think they are 10,000 times cuter because of the circumstance, the situation, like the, again, like the physical touching all of that kind of stuff. But I don't think that like finding someone else that is cute is like cheating or self-sabotaging. If it is something that you would feel uncomfortable with your boyfriend seeing, being near or knowing about, that is when it becomes like, okay, let's unpack this. I agree. I don't think you should be flirting with him anymore. And I also think like if you maybe like just as an experiment, stop going to this person's like workout classes for a bit and then what's happening with your relationship like are you feeling like oh I'm

like missing this kind of thing because I don't think it means anything more than that but I think it can there's nothing wrong with finding anyone else attractive but if you feel like you need to hide something from your partner then you know what you're doing is like you said not something that you would want him to do to you so you have to stop doing that I mean there's plenty of workout classes go to a different class yeah like would you feel comfortable if your boyfriend came with you to a workout class with this instructor you know right and if the answer is no then it's like okay we're definitely crossing a boundary then and so i need to not do this and if it the guilt is really eating away you you can tell your partner that it's like yeah i feel like kind

of weird like i definitely like think this workout instructor is cute but i'm not gonna take his class anymore because like it made me feel really like guilty and i felt just kind of like uncomfortable and i wouldn't want that to be in like the reverse and then you can say like have you ever felt that in a situation you haven't told me but at the same time do you want to know because if you don't want to know then don't bring that up right i think this happens to like so many people but then you see a fitness instructor outside of like and you're like no it's not hitting the same right also they're probably putting on for the class anyway and that's not their actual personality there is like a fitness studio in la i'm not going to name names because

it is a wild allegation i'm about to say it's just an allegation that like this fitness studio really caters to gay men and almost all of the instructors are straight men married to women and that's like their shtick and my friend who is gay his term for it he's like oh yeah they're all gay for pay and like he's like we all know that i believe the fantasy like i just lean into the fantasy of all of it and he's like it's the same of like when you go to like the gay clubs that are here in west hollywood and the dancers like most of them are straight yeah so it happens but again like there is something weirdly like that i would never be attracted to any of them and the second the lights are on no but like while it's happening and i'm like okay yeah they're yeah

sweaty just told me yeah my footwork was great it's like great form and you're like oh thank you that time when we walked out and they're like you you all look like a squat yeah something like that we were all just like fucking giggling at this like not attractive man and especially once we looked at his instagram i know yeah and then we were all like yeah no this is not the bubble has been burst yeah the bubble is fully immersed i do think it is funny though how instructors when they are catering to heterosexual women it is like i'm either going to be your gay best friend leaning into like that kind of thing which i've had friends who've been fitness instructors and it's like i'm just exhausted i feel like i'm on drag race every day and he's like i just have to

keep saying yes queen to everything like that's what cody on a peloton yeah like you have to like lean into that kind of aspect of it which just feels like very performative or it is and that's a non-threatening male presence especially because so many of these instructors are very huge and jacked or it's like i'm really sexy and i'm really hot and i'm a gentle giant and you're going to fantasize about like me coming into like the steam room at the same time and like just fucking boning each other but then the women instructors are all like those are the classes like if i wanted to get my ass whooped in a workout class i'm going to woman yeah they're going to hurt me more than any other man and i love seeing the straight guys who go to women's

workout classes because i'm like you like to get yelled at in bed right you without you love to be bossed around like this is hot we had one workout instructor at my old gym and she was just like if you were even five seconds late she would pause and she was like am i not important to you uh what's your name let us know your name and these guys would just be like blushing so excited she's like and they she would like walk by and about that fucking pervs i was like i love you like i just want to be them like you're so iconic and your biceps are huge right oh okay let's get on to the next hi so i'm 21 years old pronouns she her i'm originally from virginia but i now live in la working full-time the gist of this call is that my older brother 23 he him is dating my best

friend 21 she her we have been best friends since freshman year of high school while my brother was one grade above us. They knew of each other and were in some clubs together but they only started dating a year ago during quarantine. For context my brother and I are pretty close and our family is even closer. My best friend and I were close in high school but we got even closer in college when I moved to LA and she really put in an effort to stay in touch with me and I did the same with her. When she started dating my brother while we were all home during quarantine I was told nothing except for what my mom told me. All my best friend told me was I don't know what we're doing and even that I had to pull out of her. Things got even worse when I went back to LA.

I was left completely out of the loop and kept having to learn things from my parents like the fact that he gave her a promise ring after only a few months together. This continued until I came home for this past summer with my best friends from college. They were all super excited to meet my best friend, my brother, and the rest of my family but the entire time they were here my brother and my best friend were in their own world and it felt like I didn't even exist and that my friendship with my best friend took a backseat to everything and when it was just my brother hanging out with me and my family she was constantly calling him and asking him to come over even though I expressed how important it was to me for us to spend some time together

my friends from college noticed this and were also upset with how I was just being brushed to the side even though I expressed so many times how important this time was to me as I'm not able to come home as often as I would like because of financial reasons when I sat my brother down to explain that I was hurt and confused. I was met with defensiveness and guilt tripping because this reaction was so unexpected. I broke down and became really upset. He still responded to this with seemingly no empathy and could not seem to understand how I could feel pushed out and like an outsider, especially because I don't live at home anymore while they both still live super close to home in my family. When this info got back to my best friend, I was told by my brother

that she was having an anxiety attack because of it and was throwing up he basically blamed this on me and told me to stop causing an issue and like just to go back to normal because this is too much i went back to la feeling completely unresolved while they get to continue on as if nothing ever happened we've never talked about it again to this day but because of this situation and like my unresolved feelings i'm no longer really prioritizing my friendship with my best friend and because it's long distance we don't really talk much um i'm home again in virginia and she's made no effort to see me my brother now acts as if she's solely his girlfriend and has no connection to me it's completely ridiculous and i just don't know if i should say something to

her please help wow i would be so mad yeah like i would be i would be hurt like i would be really really really fucking hurt i know that you said you and your brother are closed but like i think that that convert that initial conversation, I think you probably should have had a conversation and talk to like to her first, because even though like it can feel like family kind of owes you more, his relationship with his relationship with his siblings, like is more passive, like a friendship you have to put more effort into. And like, you're just not going to show up at Christmas and all of that kind of stuff. So like, I think that like the fact that you had to pull so much of this information out of your friend at the time, and then you were getting

nothing like to me if I was in a situation I'd be like okay this is a clear indicator that like we're not friends anymore and like that's okay but like I'm just gonna stop putting an effort and like being disappointed in you and like being disappointed with like where things are going and I'm just gonna be done but that's also hard if you don't have that conversation so like if it was me I would have that conversation with her where it's like I've been like felt disappointed for a really long time about this like this whole thing has kind of sucked like I have no issue with you dating my brother but like the way that you guys have gone about all of this stuff just feels really sucky and I don't have you as like a friend anymore and I just like want to let you know that

I'm like not gonna put forth that effort anymore and like I hope you guys are happy but like I really wish we could have been able to maintain a friendship yeah I think that with you moving away even if she didn't date your brother I don't think that you guys would have remained friends really even she said they got closer when she went to college though but did they oh do you think that might have been some guilt yeah um that's a good point yeah like i would understand if like they've been dating but they didn't want to involve you because they didn't know where things are going and didn't want to make things weird between you and like the friendship and then the sibling relationship but like it seems like your parents know everything that's going on

so that's the weird part of it to me it's like your parents know everything that's going on your parents are telling you things but they're not telling you everything why is everyone leaving you out of this it sounds like to me that your friend feels really guilty and is like but if they felt guilty why is it when the caller went home why didn't the friend allow the caller to be with her brother maybe she's pretending that she feels guilty that's why she's not telling her i think she stopped being your friend a minute ago yeah i fully agree it sucks but i think that like you've said that your brother treats it as if like this is his girlfriend like not your friend and i think that like as cunty as it sounds like you need to treat that this is your brother's

girlfriend this is not your friend because she stopped being your friend yeah and like that sucks and like you just don't really like your brother's girlfriend right now and like whatever but okay can we loop back you know this is like a very unrelated not important part got our promise ring yeah educate me i thought promise rings were when you're like christian and like 15 16 and before like you're too young to get engaged and so you get a promise ring because you're not gonna have sex with anybody else and you guys are like your one true soulmate and then that's like a temporary until engagement that's what it is for them to be adults with promise rings is odd to me but i don't know that's what a promise ring has meant to me as a child or high school age uh but you

might live in a different area and it means a different thing i looked into it when i was obsessed with the jonas brothers because they had purity purity rings that's different no but then it was like oh is he gonna is kevin gonna propose to danielle or is he gonna give her a promise ring and that's what I learned yeah so I that's like one of my questions because I'm just like what yeah it's like that either the promise ring thing or like if your partner was like I don't even feel right calling someone a partner when they're like 15 but like if they were like lettered in something and had like a class ring then you'd give it to them but like when you wear someone's hat or like their letterman jacket yeah but yeah it's just it's just like fucking weird yeah I

haven't ever heard of adults with promise rings but yeah i don't know i mean again i think you just tell her like hey we're not friends anymore just letting you know because i'm not putting the effort in or you just stop being friends there but i think this whole like guilt tripping thing and like the communicating through other people and that stuff i think it's best to just like tell her straight up and then here's the other thing she has anxiety hurt she's guilt like feels like horrible all this stuff this is all preventable even if she was like i'm really anxious to have this conversation with you that i really like your brother and like like blah blah but i do think it's an act not the anxiety i don't think anxiety is an act i think the i'm so guilt

ridden is an act it's an excuse also like i feel like the brother should be explaining things too i don't i i mean i do i just i don't think it's all on her no no no i don't think so but i think that like for him he doesn't seem concerned about your relationship with her which makes me feel like she doesn't seem concerned about your relationship with her either about the relationship I'm talking about just sharing that they were dating and things. And then on top of that, while the caller was visiting, the girlfriend kept calling and pulling him away from the family. Like he's, he could have said, no, like I'm here with my sister.

Like that responsibility is on him. A hundred percent. I just think that like, he knows, and it's not like the correct way to go about this, but like you're his sister, you're always going to be around. And like, he's just, he knows that. So like he's being lax about the whole thing, which sucks especially because like there are two parties that you have pre-existing

relationships with in this relationship so like when he's doing that it's not just oh my brother has a new girlfriend and like he's not around so much anymore and this sucks we're really close it's not only that but you are with my best friend who's like not hanging out with me like do have you either of you talked about how this is clearly affecting me and like all of that stuff So it just seems like neither of them are concerned about how you feel. And the only time that they are saying that they're concerned with how you feel is when it's a form of manipulating you to not be upset. Because again, like, I think like, if it was like, oh, I feel really guilty. And like, I don't feel comfortable talking to you about all of this. Like, then when you were in town, it would have been like, okay, I'm just gonna hang out with you this whole time and like, make up for it. But it's like, oh, yeah, no, I'm just gonna hang out with him and like, call him all the time and like, pretend like we're not even friends. but i'm like oh so you don't you don't feel super guilty you just like want to move past this i'd be pissed this is fucked it's fucked oh and then tell your parents to stop telling you but i think she's asking if you have this conversation with her and you're like i'm done like you're my

brother's girlfriend like you live your best life with your relationship but like i need to take a back seat like i'm done with our friendship i need to take a back seat from like being around because it's like has sucked and then tell your parents like hey i don't want to hear about their shit anymore yeah sorry yeah this is like the beginning of like every teen movie and they always make it be like but then they lived happily ever after maybe you just need like a rainy day so you can like have a fight outside where it's raining it's like you don't call i don't do what i mean like it's very dramatic shit it's like every teen movie it's like she's dating my brother yeah and i'm like this is not like horrible when chandler and monica

got together and ross was like everybody was keeping it from ross my best friend and my sister but then he got happy about it my best friend and my sister okay we're gonna take a break and um we'll be back so we are back from our break and we are actually going to get into the update because it is a long one and it is multiple calls it's updates on multiple calls yeah you think like five i truly think five and i don't know if any of you will at this point be able to recognize voice we can't Like we knew, we knew, we knew who this was for like all of this. I don't think we discussed it in this, but if anyone discussing about this,

this color, their pronouns, are they them? If you're discussing on the group, Facebook group or anything. And yeah, should we get into that? Let's do it. So one was Captain Hook. The advices you gave me about switching up positions kind of helps, but it's still hurt a lot, but no worries. We broke up.

sometimes the dick doesn't fit yeah but mostly because they abandoned me in the downtown area of my state that i will not say because anonymous right and just because some guy like was harassing me and they're like give me your pepper spray and i'm like i don't have it like i legit didn't have it this time which is weird and then a huge fight came out and then they blamed me for it and while I was having a panic attack oh my gosh oh wow the dick is the least of the problems yeah and then literally last week they got mad at me for again having a three hour long panic attack and they told me either calm down which do not ever tell me to calm down especially when I'm having a panic attack or get the fuck out and then I went manic like I don't know what happened I

went blank and i will say trigger warning i ended up relapsing from self-harm and i haven't done that in two years sorry i hate crying you can cry that's okay so i don't know we tried being friends but after that i just felt like no yeah yeah no that's hard like those are the moments that like we need people to show up for us but especially when you're in like really vulnerable mental health moments yeah and to not only have people not show up how we need them to but to make things worse and then be the voice of that like anxiety voice of like this is all of your fault it's just horrible and i'm so sorry and recovery isn't linear i i know that like the the term relapse is like very like clinical and like that kind of stuff but also like it shouldn't

ever feel like a personal failure but like you don't have to identify with that term of like relapse specifically of just like i had like a misstep in like my recovery but things are still like on the up and up and yeah yeah oh i'm so sorry i'm sorry it's all good i have a zoom meeting with my therapist in like two hours so okay hopefully that'll help yeah yeah sending you a virtual hug thank you so and then another one was lighter topic um the drag stage fright so i like have friends who are drag queens and i've seen them perform and i've seen what i love and what i don't love like i've also seen miss bangy once recently i still have chills but i met kylie sony glove and i like cried and like kylie gave me like really good advice saying

just like kind of like what you guys said like it's like when you're on stage and like what everyone else tells me like you're like this whole different person like you can be a superhero if you want to and um you told me it was like my go-to hold my drink song and I grew up listening to metal music so I didn't really have one yeah my parents are kind of emos and I grew up as a gay emo that's yeah I could see that though as like some persona yeah like are there metal drag queens I know drag queen whose name I would not say because they are problematic is a metal drag i feel like there like could be a niche for like an emo like metal drag queen especially in the era of like everyone's loving those throwback emo songs but also that like all these new artists are

making songs like that and we've seen you do your makeup before yeah we know that you would you have so much of this on lock already yeah and i only did kind of one show but i had my i guess now drag mother help me they're like and coming into the stage my drag name and I was just like I need help and they're like well if I only know this one middle song and it was from bring me the horizon and I felt great I was like whipping my hair I'm surprised my wig kept because I know for a fact like I didn't want to be like no shade to this drag queen but Heidi in class when her wig fell off it's the greatest the greatest gift of all time yeah and yeah I felt great that was my only one and only show and I was like scared to like grab the tip money

because I didn't want to be like money money I didn't want to be like that or anything like that did you take the money though yeah they were offering it I know but I felt shy like I grew up like my parents telling me don't take anyone's money I'm like okay so we're in the age of take the money take the money and also like the amount of like work and like sheer talent and like yeah just the work you put into like a drag performance I'm like you deserve all of those tips and all of that do you have anything else you're gonna any other shows like coming up or anything that like you want to do again hopefully I just need to be like 100% ready at that time I think I was like 60% yeah you'll get there yeah hopefully because I still don't know how to walk in heels I mean I

can't help i i but but but what if it's metal can you wear like if you're like embrace like the metal persona can you wear like big platforms or like doc martin martin type things yeah i had my doc martin song and they were like the ones that has like an extra inch on it yeah i say in general opt for platforms with thicker heels and any as someone with bad ankles usually people who like don't have experience walking in heels it's because like you haven't used those like ankle muscles so anything that laces up on the ankle or anything that's a little like tighter around the ankle but once you like have a platform on like it doesn't even really have to be any sort of like difference between the heel like a platform like it gives you that like nice

look too have you thought of doing any sort of like drag content stuff on tiktok so i already have a tiktok we're switching to this topic now about how i make true crime content and i just want to say that i do not glamorize true crime i do not like glorify it like most people do when they say like oh this person's really hot like i find it actually extremely disgusting and very disrespectful to the families who's lost their lost ones and i always always sympathize to the victims as well as their families because I've actually lost family members from gang violence in my home country which I will not say because again privacy reasons to the point where sadly enough there's like only 40 percent of my family left so like in my home

country the police they are some don't care and some are actually scared of this certain gang members yeah so and like i said like i and on most of my tiktoks i always make sure the sources are like legit make sure that from like the local town newspapers and all that stuff and i always avoid stuff from daily mail fox news and the sun because i've heard that they're very problematic um news outlets out there and i have taken a break from that because again like every time i do my research i don't know what goes in my mind i sometimes see myself in those stories and it's actually kind of scary yeah especially coming from someone with sleep paralysis right and then knowing that your your family has lived through that too i'm sure yeah yes yeah so like again

like i do not glorify any of that i just want to let you guys know that yeah it was a blanket state no no and i i know don't think that you glamorize it at all the issue is that the content is glamorized and we can't control how other people consume it and like the sensationalism of it that like i think a lot of the people who make true crime content like have great and like very good intentions and i think people always start off with like very very good intentions just it's just the in the issue of the fact that like that the people who consume it like if you look at the comment sections on some things and all of that and even people who don't comment and all of that i think that like spreading awareness when families have asked for it i just think that

the bare minimum that like should be required when talking about true crime is that there's no shortage of families who have like a family member who has gone missing or something like that you always see those things like everywhere and like there's no shortage of those people who want to get those stories out there that those are the those are the stories that should get out there versus like people who've like followed me have had like their family members or their friends or whatever, who've like been brutally murdered. And then they go onto the podcast app and see that like one of the top podcasts is like their best friend's name. And they're like, what? Like got no warning, none of that kind of stuff. And so, and I think also with like your

career and like what you want to do, like what you're going to study for and all of that stuff, like that, it all completely makes sense. And I think that like with the popularization of true crime, I think that it inherently in the way that we consume it is problematic and it's really hard to recognize that because if it was so problematic why is it so popular and why are why is it so validated by so many people and like that I think is like a hard thing for everyone to kind of swallow and like realizing that like there are ethical ways to kind of do it but most people aren't doing it that way and so it's more hoops to jump through it's more work and it's like more effort and all that stuff and it is typically less entertaining like the podcasts that are

done by like former detectives and that stuff like they're not as they're more news like yeah they're not trying to be kind of entertaining in that sense and i those don't naturally perform as well and all of that stuff but and we had so many people defending the true crime like podcasts and like my ones that we're defending they i think they heard what they wanted to hear and then like they were saying the things that we were saying and then i was like but we said that Yeah, the one that I've had to like consistently argue with people that I'm like, they should ask family's permission. And you do that before you put all of this work into that. So it's not manipulative in that sense. And even people who are like the families don't want to be bothered. I go, well, they don't want to podcast about them. that like that's like the whole thing so like there's like a way to kind of do that i think that there's a really great niche and opportunity for someone to do that in the true crime community

and be able to have that be like a hey we're gonna have on like this is going to podcast all about missing teens who have gone missing and i'm having please if you are a family member or a parent of like a bit in your child has gone missing i want to get the word out like do all this stuff i'm going to do these episodes about that you know yeah it feels like there's like there's a there's a way to like kind of get on in there but or also just you know focus on the school aspect of it and the studying aspect have you talked to your therapist about it she is also like maybe take a break okay because she notices as well that I kind of like somehow accidentally envision myself in those stories and she was just like saying is it something because of like past traumas or

something like that so that we're actually working on okay yeah because it does have something to do with that well that to me like obviously i'm not a therapist but that would make sense to me that like it's easier to kind of put yourself in other people's shoes and make it kind of like you you know what i mean like how unpacking it through the lens of somebody else when it's like oh this is definitely something I need to unpack that's not re-traumatizing myself in the process you know yeah and like I do agree with you guys like in the episode where you wish there was like more minorities being talked about especially since I forgot I wish I wrote this down um a news anchor woman said that we have uh white girl syndrome where we like focus on like certain like pretty

white girls and like yes like we should look for them as well but it's also like we have the minorities like i still write down i wish i wrote down where i got it from but like with the whole shoe exhibit where they found 215 indigenous children yes in canada yeah like that like i knew so much about missing indigenous people but when i saw that that actually broke me and i noticed that that news went away so fast i'm just like why wasn't it talked about so long well yeah i mean if you look at the major true crime podcast like the missing white woman syndrome is so real like you can like break down like how many minorities are talked about but also how many every major podcast has done every like major quote-unquote true crime story which

always is a white woman it is just a a very wild thing because it also it's just a lot of discussion of violence against women and lots of stuff like that yeah i do in my bio like have like the donation for cult cases yeah great hopefully some of my followers would see that yeah i think that like being passionate about wanting to help especially in terms of like missing indigenous women and like minorities and all of that stuff if after you take a break and you've like discussed this with your therapist if this is something you still want to get into i would like add an email to your bio of being like hey if you are a family member of someone who has like gone missing or something like that please reach out i want to get your story out there and like a like an immediate

family member yeah like not like a cousin or that stuff because even when you reference when you're citing news sources and like all of that kind of stuff by the time things are getting written up in the news there's so much the families have kind of been put through and there are so many more people who are trying to still trying to get the attention of local news it's still recent they still have missing like all of that kind of stuff that those going straight to those sources who haven't been able to get the attention of news outlets those are tend to be the most helpful It's like Twitter can be really helpful finding missing people is because it's real time versus when we're waiting for journalists to write it up. Basically, it's it's really sad to say, but we're we're usually you're usually writing when something horrible has happened and like the missing person has been found and it's not a good outcome.

And so like when you can kind of get to the source, it can be, yeah, really helpful. and i'm sure and i yeah there's tons of families who are actively really wanting help and wanting to get attention especially from like smaller creators because those big podcasts aren't doing that stuff right yeah i will be more aware of that as well yeah we're just right now i'm just like in a pain just a break yeah it's a lot your education too helps you in a different way than just some person that's like let me start a true crime podcast do you consume a lot of true crime content right now lately no i've just my therapist lately just told me to just consume more either happy stuff yeah and weirdly it's just been cartoons oh valid this what cartoon are you

watching foster's home for imaginary friends okay i think i can picture it's the one with the little blue man uh-huh uh-huh uh-huh yeah that's it the last thing i was gonna say is it took me personally taking a pretty decent break from true crime to I kind of get like I was desensitized to a lot of it that by the time I recently listened to a true crime podcast that was recommended to me because people like oh this person helped a lot and like it works with the family and if I had listened to it a couple of years ago I'd have been like wow this is so amazing everyone has to listen to this all that and I listen to it now and I was like this is ridiculously self-righteous and like people were backed into a corner and like sure they helped in some way but like this didn't

have to be like, I had a lot of criticisms of the ethics behind it that I wouldn't have had if I didn't have that very long break from it. Because the standards that we have at me as a former true crime fan, the standards that I had for the way that people spoke about things that I was consuming was so low that when someone did a slightly better, I was like, this is amazing and so wonderful that now listening to it, I was like, this isn't good. Like it still is not like a good way to do this thing and there is a better way and I also feel like I am much more intentional with the stuff that I like listen to because the break has made me more self-aware of how problematic it is but also how much it did affect me that like I thought it didn't and it was like

oh I'm sleeping better oh I am not like I mean I'm jumpy all the time but like there are other things that I was like this is been like this was staying with me in a way that naturally it should because it's like a horribly traumatic thing that I can be more intentional with. Do I want to feel like this at this moment? You know? Yeah. I've just taken a break from True Crime Man.

I also do makeup on my TikTok. As you should, because your makeup is fantastic. Thank you. I'm obsessed. Yeah. And like so many people were like saying how great I looked and I'm just,

and I've never had that many compliments. It's just like real. I love it. Real Canadian Superstore has everything you need this back to school season. Save on lunchbox savers like Ziggy's sliced deli meat products for always $3.75. And get Life Brand Pure Vita shampoo or conditioner for $8 each. At Real Canadian Superstore, when you're ready, we're ready.

With a whole world and more. Last thing is sisters misgendering me, which by the way, both of them go by a she, her. Okay. They actually were embarrassed because they didn't realize that it was hurting me. and they've now gotten a little bit better and not a little bit they've actually gotten really good like my sister right away corrects herself like she took um melissa's advice saying the more you correct yourself the more you'll get into the habit of actually remembering the right pronouns which my youngest sister is doing that and the second youngest is i would say like

70 percent okay yeah like she like right away corrects herself like they oh they both do and so does the oldest one I totally forgot how many sisters you have three and she's even like teaching um my niece on pronouns as well which my niece was like oh yeah I already know about that of course yeah they know yeah she was like yeah I know Tio has a lot of eyeshadow palettes and i'm just like oh thanks yeah and then she was like oh and they have a flag and i'm just like yep hey kids kids are perceptive yeah especially i mean i think now because like these conversations are much more uh mainstream yeah like it's like they've always existed but like they're just existing in more public spaces but yeah i mean i also think the

the gender binary is taught like you know similar to like hate racism all of those things are taught but like you know gender is also very much taught so do you mind sharing how you went about telling them about correcting just you know just in case that helps someone else you don't have to if you don't want to so i just text them the podcast on our group chat i live for that i was just like skip to this time when we spoke directly to them yeah they were like well i'm actually glad they didn't scream at us like you said that you wanted them to first of all they were like why didn't you tell us before and i was like i did and they're like oh and then then they were embarrassed and then they were now more aware of it and they are still trying their best they know

that it's new but they still right away like correct themselves and whenever we meet someone new and they use the wrong pronoun they're like ahem it's they and then i'm just like okay that's too aggressive okay i really appreciate the sentiment but like let's go about this in a different way oh that's how are you feeling better about your relation like relationship with them yeah and now it's just more i have to tell my parents but again since they are older and from a different country it's different so that hopefully which we look soon oh we will and i think i'm glad that you are able to like when doing that having not also having to kind of like really worry about this with your sisters and have them kind of be able the way that they

correct other people in conversation that they can also correct your parents or kind of unload some of that i don't want to say responsibility because like it's not none of it's your responsibility at all but like our responsibility is like people around to like self-police to be like yeah hey no no no like don't dump that on them you know yeah I think it like they've learned how to do it better when I was like oh hey by the way Demi Lovato and Halsey go by they them by the way and they're like oh cool and then they just started calling I think that's what made it easier for them as well yeah because um every time like someone knew like Billy Porter and Janelle Monae i love genome on a2 they're like oh and they were like right away learned that yeah no i think it's

helpful for people in general that like a lot of the times people won't respect like celebrities pronouns and i'm like that's the best way to be aware of this before you have somebody in your life who goes by pronouns that you are either unfamiliar with or someone that you know who has changed who has now had like is not using the pronouns that you knew them as once before like the best thing to do is like a celebrity that you have referred to and known as like this is wonderful practice of so and not harming someone that you like are having like a personal conversation with and that so yes i recommend that to people i've had people who i've corrected them on celebrity ones like they're not here like it's fine i'm like no no no no no first of all it's disrespectful

and also like how are you going to get into the habit it's just wrong yeah but also like how are you going to get into the habit when you it's someone that you know like this isn't a performative thing it's not just like when people are looking like what yeah it's like that one paparazzi who kept misgendering jimmy lovato right it was like their team yeah i remember that well i'm happy for you and your sisters and all of that stuff and wishing you the best in therapy today and yeah this sounds so corny but like yeah be gentle with yourself and like the relationship stuff and like all of that like that's it's a lot and it's not it's a lot for every everyone to kind of handle and i think you're doing a really great job yeah thank you of course we're sending you

so much love and a virtual hug thank you so much for giving us all of these updates and we're we're sending you love yeah thank you so much of course have a good day you as well bye bye so that was the update or the updates i guess we should say updates updates well that is it for our episode hope you all enjoyed if you want to call in for an upcoming episode you can leave us a message at 310-694-0976 and international listeners you can send us an audio message at meganpodcast at gmail.com if you would like to go leave a review on the podcast app we would greatly appreciate it should we see sure if rachel i mean i mean she has we let's not spotlight rachel okay we won't give rachel a spotlight do you want to read this one or do

you want me to i can read it okay they challenged my thoughts in the friendliest way wow i absolutely adore megan and melissa and moss i guess i live for this also all three of our names are spelled right that is that might be the first time it's ever happened great already off to a great start They have such an educational yet relatable and entertaining way of explaining things in a way that challenges my prior beliefs. I've been listening for years now, and I love that their opinions have grown and evolved with them. They're also super hilarious.

No, I'm not in love. I just highly recommend listening to this podcast. They give me hope for the future. Wow. That is so kind. So great. Thank you so much. So kind.

i i always know like when people are saying like oh they challenge my thoughts i know like what it's pertaining to but sometimes i like to pretend that it's about like really stupid shit do you what i mean like they've challenged my thoughts on ghosting i now ghost every person i meet like things that like i have no significant you know so i think that's quite funny um but thank you so nice if you want to leave a review we would appreciate it and if you also want to listen to our new podcast episode two is coming out this week of but am i wrong where we tell you if you're wrong and you tell us if we're wrong and then we talk about celebrities and pop culture and decide if they were wrong but you really want to go listen to this one yeah i done goofed i done

goofed and you're gonna want to listen it's really funny realization as we were going through and i was battling myself like do i share my side of the story yeah it's funny but it's very funny please go listen comes out on thursday if you want to follow us on socials we are there uh by megan and melissa on instagram and i'm pretty sure we're the exact same on tiktok no tiktok it says don't fucking shit you did it and then i didn't want to say anything i didn't think about it okay well if you want to follow me my socials are all at megan ranks if you head over to my instagram mods and i are currently looking for a house so there's some great house hunting vlog content where you can rub it in my face that you live in iowa and your house was two hundred

thousand dollars i sent you a great house i can't even get it out straight go on patreon so you can see my facial reaction to this the one i sent her was like people with pumpkins on their heads pumpkins and doing just like everyday stuff in their zillow listing it's almost as bad as the fucking house that was like 3.7 million dollars that no one cleaned up and they just had their squatty potty out yes um anything else i want to promote no oh or patreon Please go join our Patreon if you want to support the show. It is incredibly helpful in us continuing to do the show. And we have a lot of fun doing it.

You could watch the video versions of the episodes for only a dollar a month. It's so incredibly cheap. And then for $5 a month, or you can, you know, decide that you want to do more than that. Join us for Zoom. So we hang out every other week and we have a great time. And it's very, very, very fun. Yeah. Yeah.

We had one a couple of weeks. So it's like three hours long. um if you want to follow melissa you can go to she is not melissa please follow me on instagram i thought you're gonna keep the uh third person up please follow her on instagram she would greatly appreciate that she would if you work for a company that like does podcast ads have them shoot us an email and we will see you all next time goodbye don't blame me is a production by me executive produced by melissa de monts and diamond and print productions edited by coco lawrence post-production sound by chris henry production

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