HealthyGamerGG - Botez Sisters: From Rivals to Ride-or-Die w/ @BotezLive

Episode Date: August 9, 2025

In this candid conversation, Dr. K talks with Alexandra and Andrea Botez—sisters, chess streamers, and co-creators of @BotezLive. Which is about growing up competitive, finding their voices online, and supporting each other through the ups and downs of fame. They open up about their family history, early rivalries, and how streaming changed their relationship. Topics include: How sibling rivalry pushed them to excel (and sometimes clash) The challenges of building a career in the public eye Navigating burnout, criticism, and high expectations Balancing independence with family loyalty Why they see each other as “ride-or-die” partners today It’s an honest, funny, and heartfelt look at the bond between sisters who’ve turned competition into connection. Both on and off the chessboard. HG Coaching : https://bit.ly/46bIkdo Dr. K's Guide to Mental Health: https://bit.ly/44z3Szt HG Memberships : https://bit.ly/3TNoMVf Products & Services : https://bit.ly/44kz7x0 HealthyGamer.GG: https://bit.ly/3ZOopgQ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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I'm Dr. Al-Ako-Knoja, but you can call me Dr. K. I'm a psychiatrist, gamer, and co-founder of Healthy Gamer. On this podcast, we explore mental health and life in the digital age, breaking down big ideas to help you better understand yourself and the world around you. So let's dive right in. Okay, we should be good. All right. Welcome to another Healthy Gamer Gigi stream.

My name is Dr. Al-O. Kanoja, just a reminder that although I'm a psychiatrist, Notting we discussed on stream today is intended to be taken as medical advice. Everything is for educational or entertainment purposes only. So if you all have a medical concern or question, please go see a licensed professional. So we are going to be talking to the awesome Botez sisters today. I have no idea what we're going to be talking about. That's just how we do things here. We just, we're going to talk about whatever they want to talk about, whatever we feel

like talking about. We're just going to be vibing. And so hopefully it'll be a great conversation. They live very interesting lives, you know, are absolutely in the public eye, are super awesome and competitive. So I'd be super curious just what, like, a day in their life looks like. But without further ado, let's hop in. So...

Thank you for having us. Can we start with what do you all go by? What should I call you today? I go by Alex or Alexandra. Okay. And I go by Gremlin. Just kidding. I just go by Andrea or Andrea.

Either way it works. My parents say Andrea. And that's what my sister says when she's angry. So there's really no right way because the American way is different. And what is what's the original way? What what culture, country, ethnicity, language? We're Romanian. So we roll our ours.

It's a Latin language. Okay, cool. Yeah. So can you all tell me a little bit? So I know we've, I think I've met maybe Andrea before. I don't know if I've met Alex, but I feel like we met like a few years ago at the streamies. but anyway I don't know

I don't remember which one of us it was I don't think he met I've seen you around it may have been me may have been you so yeah can y'all tell me

just a little bit about like okay so how did y'all get to be here like what did y'all do how did you get here y'all are like streamers y'all play chess like tell me about that

so I started streaming in college for fun and then later on I ended up going full time into it and my sister, she was always very funny so I would have her on as a guest stream sometimes and then the pandemic hit when she was supposed to go to college and I was like, don't go to college, come stream with me. And basically she's never been to college since.

At first the parents were not very happy about it, but they accepted it over time. Yeah, so to give my rendition of it, When I was supposed to go to college, it was right when our streaming boom was happening. So right at the beginning of the pandemic, my sister, she was at Stanford. She was streaming chess. Our parents are traditional immigrants. And my mom would be like, I don't know why she went to Stanford to just play chess on the internet with strangers.

She was very confused. The women, the ladies at church would always ask. And my mom would just lie sometimes and say she works in finance or something else. But then the pandemic happened. and she spent a lot of time at home, and our stream just started working together. And that year, I was like, well, what's the point of going to school?

If everything's online anyways, I have no clue what I want to study. So I moved with her for a couple months in New York. We butted heads a lot, but that was the beginning of Botez Live. Okay, and what is Botez Live? That is our channel. Okay.

And what is it now? I would say it's our Twitch channel, it's our YouTube. We're also maybe changing some of the branding to Botas sisters since we've been doing things more than just live, but that's all of what it encapsulates. Cool. And so what's it like? So I noticed that, so, you know, usually when we talk to people on the channel, we'll talk to like one person. Like sometimes we'll do something like a panel and stuff.

But I'm curious, what's it like to be a streaming or a content creation duo? Andrea, you start. I'm curious what you're going to say. So at the beginning, well, obviously it had its ups and downs because we had an age difference. So I was fresh out of high school. Alex had a college degree. It took a little bit of maturing. But then after we got through that, I think we realized very quickly that this industry is very difficult and gets very lonely.

And honestly, without the other one, I don't think we would have ever been able to go as far as we did in content. So obviously we're number each other's number one. reporters and that goes both through like our individual projects and all the content we do together. And then of course it also entails that people will always compare us often confuse us. I love getting comments on my DJ channel where they're like, oh, this girl's a DJ. I just watched her beat Magnus Carlson. I'm like, that's not me, but I'll take the credit. So that's like the lighter side. Of course, there's more a comparison of like people always want to pin us by our looks and whatnot. We don't really focus on that, but that's just a result of being

sisters on the internet. Yeah, so can you all tell me, so I have so many questions. So first question is you said that you all have like traditional immigrant parents. What does that mean? I'll let Alex start. It means they came in with certain values where my parents took a really big risk to come to the U.S. and then later Canada. So for them, one of the things they really wanted for us growing up was stability.

So, like, our parents were like, my, the dream job we could have had for our parents would be to be doctors. They wanted something or, or, no, actually, dad told me not to become an engineer because he didn't think it was stable enough. He thought it was too hard to find a job. So they just really liked medical field. And they were like, with medical field, you'll always have a job because there's always a need. So that was sort of their take. And I think for them, they saw all of the kids of the other parents do somewhat similar things. like that. So to be more entrepreneurial or to be a content creator was definitely a little different

than what they expected. And our parents are from Romania, for those of you asking. So they're Eastern European, which is a very particular type of immigrant. Just to add to it, I mean, the things that we appreciate a lot now as adults, I would also just say is we grew up a lot with European values. Like, we grew up in a really poor apartment complex where everyone had just immigrated to Canada and everyone would help raise each other's children. So a lot of it was like just good mannerisms where like, you know, you have, you really care for other people. Some of it was, for example, our mom was always really frugal. That's something that now hasn't even changed. And like always asking the question, are you sure that the internet's not going to disappear and it's all going to come crashing down?

So I would say like, you know, a lot more concerned, but also very loving and have a big European in heart. Yeah, and even though our parents didn't have a lot when we were growing up, they were definitely poor immigrants. They really valued education and family. So that's why our dad taught us both chess from a young age. It always really mattered to our parents, or at least my dad, that we did extremely well in school.

So there was a lot of pressure there. And yeah, that was sort of how we grew up. So how did your dad learn chess? Our dad learned from our grandma. So in Romania, there's a really big chess culture. So it was one of those things that was sort of passed down from the generations. Okay. And when did you all start playing?

Do both you all play chess competitively? Not really any more competitively, as in like that's the number one priority. We grew up playing chess competitively growing up. And, you know, last year we were competing in tournaments again, but now definitely content is the biggest. Okay. We were competitive from like six to age 18 because obviously in high school and getting into college. That's when I was still trying to qualify for Olympiads and whatnot. And then as soon as we

started getting into content, we stopped competing, which was the plan anyways. So what, so it sounds like your parents had, you know, pushed y'all a fair amount. I don't know if that's fair to say. My dad pushed me a lot in chess when I was a kid. Basically, he taught me when I was six. When I was eight, I won a national tournament. And then it was sort of this mentality that I was good at chess so I should just focus on chess. So like, I really like gymnastics, but my dad said, well, you'll never be as good at gymnastics as you are at chess. So just focus on chess. And similar things with Andrea, she'll tell you that because she was really into dance. Well, I was a second child. So I grew up with a bar graph on the fridge of Alex and I's chess ratings at each age, which there was one year

that I surpassed her. And then it was a little downhill from there because, frankly, I wasn't as interested in chess at a lot more ADHD. I really enjoyed music and creating things. And I did not enjoy spending all my weekends locked in the chess club in the stinky dark Portland chess club as much as I loved that place. So for me, it was a much more hate-rel-love relationship with chess. Alex, I think, had a little bit more success. And she also traveled a lot more from chess.

So a big part of her, her social life was with chess players as well, which is very much how she got into streaming. Well, it's deeper than that. But go ahead. go go tell me deeper um i i think for so we moved from canada when we were third when i was 13 and andrea was a lot younger and i felt like i lost all of my friends that i grew up with because there is something special when you grow up in a community where you have a lot of people who share your culture so there were a lot of romanians where we grew up um and like other immigrants

and we when we moved to the u.s i definitely had a harder time making friends and chest was this thing that i carried with me um and before i used to get a lot of like my happiness and validation from social groups, but when we moved, I couldn't have that anymore. So then I sort of started playing chess because it was something that I could get results and then it would make me feel good about myself. So it was sort of a switch like that. And I was also less popular in high school than Andrea was. And a lot of my friends were in chess.

So that was a big reason why I liked playing chess more than my sister, I think. It was funny in a way that it was less about the chess game and more about what it did for me in my life. You have anything that you want to say, Andrea? I wasn't necessarily more popular. Sorry, look me and I and tell me you were more popular. Okay. I just had a couple more friends, but I wasn't like a popular girl.

I just compared to Alex. Okay, let's relax. Okay, what just happened? I'm just trolling her, as I always do. Okay, so this is, okay, all right, so we can stop this at any point, but I'm going to make things weird or we, or you all, I know, you can't be right. We can go as weird as you. Okay, so I know it's weird because you don't know what I'm going to say. So this is really weird.

Like, it's cool. So I don't know if you'll notice, but you'll do this really interesting thing where you guys like bounce things off of each other. So one of y'all will answer a question. So like, it's weird because when I say something, one of y'all will start talking or you'll pitch things over to the other person. And then like one person will say something like you'll see that. And then you'll make a lot of internal comparisons. So like Alex will say like, oh yeah, like I wasn't as popular as Andrea was. and like so it seems like you guys were like literally compared

and then but y'all have this really interesting dynamic where y'all like bounce things does that kind of make sense? I feel like I'm getting 50% of an answer from each of you. We're very well PR trained Dr. Kaye, just kidding. You'll get what I'm saying? Does that make sense? We definitely bounce things awful lot from each other because we also obviously know a lot of other person

where we think they're going to go. And the comparison, I think I'm just sort of trying to put that in the framework of chess and like why it was a bigger part in one of our lives than the other. Yeah, I mean, we, sometimes my sister knows me better than I know myself. So, like, sometimes I'll eat a food and she'll be like, I'm going to predict what your reaction is before you eat it. And I'll eat it. And she's like, that's exactly what I thought.

The first therapy session I went to, she was like, but tell me about you. I know enough about your sister and your mom. She's like, I don't know anything about who you are. You're just talking about your sister. I'm like, but yeah, my sister's everywhere. Like, I do everything with her, which, you know, it's partly. like a joke. But yeah, number one, we know each other really well. And also we do a lot of content together. So like these stories, we like to tell them together. So it's a mix of both.

Yeah, that's so interesting. So it sounds like that works very well for you all. Yeah. Except when we have our petty arguments. Otherwise, it's 99.9% flawless. Maybe like 98. But you know, we do our best. Yes, that's so interesting. Because like you did it again, right? So one person says 99.9. Next person says 98, you all have a great rapport. So, so, but do you all ever have non-petty arguments? Not very often. Occasionally.

Occasionally. I mean, obviously, like, we've known, I've known her all her life. We've had some serious debates over time. Yeah, I would say maybe when I was younger, they were more serious. But honestly, now it's generally just petty stuff. Because obviously we worked with each other on some new projects that usually when we started arguing, where it's like, okay, you're really annoying to work with, but who else would you want to work with? Nobody else. And then we just like, cowl. And then we're like, okay,

let's go to Trader Joe's and then we make amends. And that's usually how goes. Cool. So I, so I have kind of like a curiosity about this, which like, y'all let me know if this like works for you for a direction. So y'all seem to be really good siblings. And I know there's like a PR aspect, but I don't think it's just PR. I think it seems like you guys. We have no PR. I was trolling. RP. So what I'm curious is like how, right? So when I look at the world today, I don't see many siblings who are as close as y'all are. And what I'm really curious, like, because generally speaking, so advice that I've gotten is, like, never go into business with family.

Like, don't do it, right? Like, that's really common, like, don't ever go into business with family. So there's, like, conflicting relationships and, like, how do you value the business versus the personal relationship? And there's a conflict of interest. So how do you all, how are you all such? good sisters. So I think first we have to give some credit to our parents and our family. Our family is extremely close.

Like everybody really loves each other. And even if we don't see each other all the time, we basically have a good relationship with everyone in our family. And that's always been a top priority for us. Like even when our young, our parents would always say, like, it's just most important for us that you two get together. And then I think,

the biggest challenge between me and my sister when we weren't as close was because I was a little bit older. So I went off to college and I never came back and she was in high school. So then I would see her a lot less and we'd have less in common. But now that we've spent so much time together, it's really moved beyond that. Or it's like, yeah, she's my sister, but she's also my best friend and she's also my roommate and she's also my business partner. And I have no idea how we haven't killed each other yet. But we really, I'm genuinely, I'm genuinely impressed. by how well we've been able to make things work. And Andrea, I'll let you add stuff too, because I talked a lot. Yeah, no, I think the majority of it, honestly, just are Romanian roots. And like we

said from the beginning, like one thing, the older and older I get, and the more time I spend in Europe versus in America is just I really started appreciating the values from our parents. And like, our dad was so loving. He had a great sense of humor. He was always like a giant social butterfly at the chest room to be talking to everyone. So we were raised by number one, a really supportive father, our mother's the same. Like family is always number one to her, and we were just always really loved. And I honestly, I just think we reciprocated that for each other. And to us, our top priority is like always going to be family and our family's health.

And of course, you know, our work stuff. But I really just think we got it carried on from our parents. That's so interesting because I think right now, you know, what I see, and I'd love to get y'all's thoughts on this. So what I see is like people don't prioritize family in our society today, right? So actually like most of the time, like if you go on, I don't know if you'll browse Reddit, but that's my poison of choice. You know, if you look at things like relationship advice like subreddits or you see things like TikTok or whatever, I don't spend a whole lot of time there. But like, you know, I think there's generally a sentiment of like fuck your family, like bluntly, right? Like, like, if you, you know, if your family, like, if they're not respecting your boundaries, like cut them out, like go no contact, go low contact. Like, people can be narcissistic. You got to look out for yourself first. What your parents want for you isn't as important as what you want for yourself. I think there's a very, very, like, independence or individual, like, prioritization. Are you all kind of seeing that, too?

I think we had some of that where, you know, I made some decisions about my career that my parents didn't support. right away. But eventually our parents have always come to support whatever decision we make, even if it's tough at first. And, you know, when Andrea moved in with me, when she was 18, at first it was really difficult because she was just out of high school, she had never had a boss. And like I was teaching her the ropes. And sometimes it was really difficult to work with. So it's not like we haven't had times where it clashes with our individuality. I think it's just one, our family is so supportive and eventually like we can talk through anything.

And like I know if we butt heads, we'll always, always figure it out. But it's not like we haven't had our challenges. We just sort of work through everything long term. And yeah, I guess it is easy to take it for granted sometimes. Like when you grow up with parents and like a sibling who really loves you and you have a really good relationship.

But I know that it's very special and I'm really, it's one of the things that I think I'm most grateful for. I don't get the sense that you take it for granted at all. Quite the opposite. I think it's very clear that y'all are like, like you've talked basically from the first moment about the value of growing up with the family that you grew up with. I mean, it sounds like it really is number one. What I'm kind of curious about is like how it seems like y'all's family prioritizes family over individuals.

And even when the way that, and I think it's interesting because you said when I made some decisions that my family wasn't happy with, you know, So even from your parents' perspective, they're prioritizing family, which is why they come around. Does that kind of make sense? Right? So you're like, okay, I want to start streaming. Andrea wants to come and, or like we want to live together or whatever. And they're like not super happy about Andrea not going to medical school. Like, oh my God, you know, ruining your life.

But they kind of come around. And I was just kind of curious, like, if you all are seeing similar trends of like individualism over family or over the collective. collective, the board collective, but... Like just in general? Yeah, just in general. Do you all see that? Or maybe it's just the parts of the internet rabbit hole that I go down? Define individualism.

So by that you mean just like, I don't need anyone else. I've got myself. No, that the top priority is me. Right? So if people, like, if my family is not supportive of what I am doing, like, it's kind of like, I think there's a very large mentality. I see this a lot in dating too of kind of like, my way or the highway. I think a lot of people will talk about like red flags that I think are like

normal and I don't think are red flags. Like my wife prioritized my career for like a solid decade and arguably still does. And so that's something that like is a professional accomplished woman like you don't sacrifice your career for the sake of your husband. You know, that's like a big red flag. But I think that, you know, we tend to be pretty like family oriented too. But I'm not noticing that there's like a trend towards individual comes first over family. And I'm just curious if you all have seen that trend as well. And if not, like not a big deal. We can move on to something else.

I'll answer. I can't tell if Alex is frozen or stuck in hard thought, but it looks like she froze. Yeah, I think she's frozen. I'll let Alex debug. But it's not necessarily that I noticed the trend. And I hate to keep being like American versus European culture. But again, like there's so many being in. you know, the LA industry and experiencing all so many different circles.

I don't feel like it's necessarily a trend. I just feel like it really depends on the group of people and just the way our parents were raised. Like we're also, number one, so blessed that, you know, both my sister and I, we have the same incentives, same values of like working really hard, but also spending time with loved ones, taking care of ourselves, taking care of others. I think, like, number one, we're blessed that neither of us have to deal with, like, a really difficult mental illness. Like, so many of my best friend's siblings are, like, in a mental hospital and they have

to, like, fight through so many more things that Alex and I, obviously, like, we were academic from the beginning. We had our goals. And we were also just blessed to have such an amazing family. So I think for us, it's just honestly, I'm also, yeah, like, I don't even ever think of it more as a trend. I just see, like, okay, there's groups of people who don't value family, values and aren't as compassionate for others and tend to stray away from those as much.

So I can't say if it's a trend or more just like people who haven't really been raised the right way. I don't know if that's a good answer, but Alex is back. Hi, I'm back. Sorry. No problem. I was just wondering if you all had noticed a trend towards individualism. I haven't really noticed it or thought about it as much.

and maybe one of those things were because it hasn't been an issue in my life, I don't really seek more information about it on the internet. But like at least the trend towards individualism that I do see is like people being more comfortable with themselves and like finding these small niches in the internet where they can truly be themselves. But, you know, the one thing I would add is I would definitely say that especially as we started, you know, the first couple of years of Botez Library, both two chess streaming sisters, also always being the younger sister.

It was definitely difficult to find my own sense of individuality, individuality and my own personality. Sorry, I didn't sleep very much, especially because I'm always compared with her. We have a chess brand. She's better at chess, better than I will ever be. So it took many years for me to figure out what actually makes me me that is not me trying to uphold this image that my sister

and the brand that we built together. So I think there is difficulty for sure in finding your own sense of individuality, but not in the terms of like being selfish and putting yourself always over others that was just not a value. Thanks for answering that. So what's it like to be compared all the time?

You all both get compared to each other? All the time, yeah. Like what kind of comparisons do people make? Like people will say one person is more attractive or one person is more smart or they'll put one person up at the expense of putting another person down. My favorite one is Alex has lost a lot of weight. It must be because Andrea is eating all her food or something.

Sometimes it's like random things like, oh, one of them's overweight now. And I was like, hey man, leave me alone. I have my stuff. But like, it's really obviously ridiculous stuff. But like, are people, even in this stream, I've seen so many, oh, comments about lip filler, which has never happened. But there's just so many things. Like, people always want to look like, oh, Botox sisters.

Sister has got plastic surgery. One of the sister looks too old. One of the younger sister doesn't look enough like a younger. So it's always the most ridiculous thing. But of course, it is the Internet. So people are allowed to comment on your appearance as much as they want. Yeah. And part of it is, I guess, the comparison.

And part of it is just like people leaving nasty comments on the Internet, which obviously is just always going to be a thing. Exactly. And people being nasty. Yeah. So how do you all deal with? Because it sounds like the comparison started when y'all were young on your fridge with the Elo ratings on chess or whatever. That was more the, yeah, the academic of Alex's The Poster Child.

You must get into a really great school because of your sister. And then obviously the internet just put it always like looks and what they define as smarts and obviously what they know about us. So what's it like being the younger. So I mean, I can sort of relate. So my brother graduated high school at the age of 16. And was a triple major in college. Ended up going to Harvard for grad school and then went to law school and was managing.

I'm the less successful one. Let's go. High five. I'm just kidding. Right. Yeah. So, so I. You know, it was like I have my own experience of it, but I'm curious what was it like growing up as the younger sibling of someone who's like a national chess champion at the age of eight and goes to Stanford?

Yeah. And then also is blowing up as a streamer. Yeah. I would say the hardest years was the first years we started streaming. I was also like 15, 16 when I first started becoming a streamer. And I would always just get comments that I'm stupid and I'm a bimbo. And again, I was just a young girl. Like, I like being loud and making jokes.

And I had never been a streamer before. So, you know, I'd let my silly side out more and people would think that that was all there was to me. So it was often just feeling like I'll never be as intelligent as wise as my sister, who's the chess master with the Stanford degree. And a lot of that honestly just came from the internet and me being pretty young where I hadn't really figured out my own identity yet. and people were telling me what to believe about myself. So I don't even think that came as much for my sister,

but it was definitely like easier for people to egg me on because I was, you know, the dumber botas or whatnot. Is it okay for, Alex, is it okay if I talk to Andrea for a couple minutes? Yeah, go for it. You can chime in if you want to. So you said that it took you a while to figure out how, to figure out what makes you, you, right? Yes.

What was that process like? Honestly, a lot of it happened when I started. taking risks and doing things outside of the regular routine of streaming. Because when I dove into streaming with my sister, we just became full-time streamers for a year, two years. And of course, you know, you have to, there's many moments. You have to ride the highs and grind and stream a lot more hours. But I realize, like, my strengths aren't necessarily always just being live in front of the camera.

And that only happened because of, like, a very bizarre series of events. For example, I had two boxing fights. first the chess boxing and then a real physical boxing fight where I had six months to train. I had to train seven days a week for three months. I had to cut out everything. And then from boxing, I was like, oh, if I can fight a woman in front of 10,000 people and do this, I can actually do anything that I want. What is it that I actually want?

That for me ended up being music. But none of that would have happened if I didn't give myself a break to be like, I really love chess. Chess is what made us and what our community. is, but I don't think that what I want to do every day is be live and play online chess. I still want to make chess content, but I want to make something that feels more impactful that I can feel like I'm actually adding something to it. So much of, you know, being the chess streamer was you're just doing trends and doing more

quantity over quality. And I felt like, sure, our videos are going viral because we're doing trash talking matches and whatnot. But so can every other girl, every other chess girl can do this. not really out of like my own art or because I'm special. So yeah, I was taking a break from that. Yeah. So I'm noticing it's interesting the language that you use because I'm noticing that

there's like a fulfilling expectation, right, which is like moving kind of like upward in this direction where there's like a target that you're trying to hit. And your journey was a little bit about you said kind of what you can add. So like visually in my mind, I kind of saw like, okay, there's this other path where like you're you're kind of forging your own path and you're adding something else. You're not just like living up to expectations. Yeah, exactly. And a lot of those expectations is just also,

which Alex and I like helped each other do this direction is realizing we want to step out of the box of being just online chess streamers. And that's a really scary risk to take. Like, you know, you're technically leaving your main job and you're taking a risk to try their things. And we did that together as well, which definitely helped us both. What was that like?

um i'll uh Alex should i speak about when we made our i'll let Alex start this no no you go continue with what you want okay um hmm i'm trying to think so i don't want to say it was our decision to quit twitch because like we still do occasionally stream but obviously we do not stream as much as we used to and that was mainly because we just felt like we did at all that we could in this type of of content and the things that we really enjoyed, for example, podcast is finding really interesting guests and like preparing questions and connecting with people and learning about them. And there's so much content on the internet. Well, I think one thing is like you should enjoy and be proud of the content that you make. And I realize like the more low hanging fruit type of chess content wasn't content I was proud of nor enjoyed or wanted to consume myself.

So we decided together that we are going to step away from Twitch to focus on our YouTube. And, you know, numbers might be kind of dead for a year. And we still were taking little risks to keep the ball moving. We always compare ourselves to cockroaches. And we say, we just survive. And you keep going through more seasons. And that's what it was. Like the first chest goes through so many booms.

So it was like two, three years of just surviving the booms and adapting when we finally decided to step away. And for me, that was also when I got to really commit more time to my passion project, which is music. Alex had similar experience with her poker projects. But together we just decided Botez Live is more than just chess. It's actually about our sibling personalities and us as people and connecting with people, which we do best through podcast content, other content that we've been planning. But necessarily it was just the decision to be more than just the chess use.

YouTuber or chess streamer. That's so cool. What's up with the poker, Alex? I actually learned poker for my dad as well when I was a kid. And then I would always play for fun. And then I started getting invited to poker tournaments when they were looking for creators. And they're like, oh, she plays chess.

He'll probably like poker. So I ended up, and I'm still somewhat playing poker as part of my profession now. Cool. And so I'm kind of curious. what's it like being the golden child elder sibling eight year old chest champion? Yes please shining light.

It's really interesting because I don't think I ever saw myself as the golden child. I really struggled with self-esteem when I was in high school and even in college and like I would look at myself and I would think like I'm not very smart

I'm not very attractive. So like I guess I just need to work really hard because that's the only way I'll have a chance at a happy life So I never really saw it like that. And even when Andrea came and I took her under my wing, you know, you'd get a lot of comments about people were like, oh, like she's the prettier sister and this and that. And it's like I was always getting compared in that way also or she's funnier. Same way we always get comparisons. So like being the golden child, it had a lot of expectations because I think my parents were harder on me than they were on Andrea just because you,

lose energy as you're older, you know, like you crack the whip for the older child and then you see they turn out somewhat okay and then the other kid has it a little bit easier. But part of it actually is I had initially gotten a scholarship to the University of Texas for chess and then I, this happened when I was 15. So then my parents stopped like putting pressure on me in school because they're like, oh, like she already has it covered. But my dream was always to get into Stanford. And I was like, if I do, like, can I go there instead? So when I got into Stanford, my mom was like, your dream, our nightmare, because it's just so much more expensive to go to Stanford than a free school, even though we got financial aid and a lot of it covered. Mom cried when she decided to go to Stanford.

Like imagine, not tears of joy, tears of upset that Alex is taking a free scholarship at UT and going to Stanford. Yeah, and that was really tough. And then the deal was that, like, my parents would help me pay for college partly, but then I would help Andrea after. Which I forget about that. You technically owe me college money. I would like to cash out on that too. Oh, please. Oh, please. I think I've taken enough snacks. So, so, no, and then even when I brought Andrea, like, I always thought she was really talented on content and stuff like that. But there was, like, a lot of things that she didn't understand yet because she was so young. Now she's absolutely grown into that role where it But a lot of times at the start, again, not now, I would have to do a lot of the work and the responsibility and then also share the credit.

And to me, that was like a very painful thing internally because it's like to grind something from zero to one when you don't know is going to work and then like bring in someone after like you've already gone viral and now all of a sudden you're sharing credit. What's tough at the time? But like still, I was like, I don't care. It's my sister. It's my family. And like I know eventually she's going to grow into this role. but it was basically like always having this feeling of a lot of pressure and a lot of my self-worth tied into external validation and especially when I started streaming you know like it was pressure

because I had just graduated from Stanford my startup had just failed and I went full time into streaming chess to the point where like one of my investors was like Alex has to do real life last time Alex has to do real life eventually or my friends would be like you're just going back into chess, like it just, I would take a lot of big risks and get sort of criticized, and then I'd have this feeling internally that, like, I will do whatever it takes to get success. And then I would make that my gold star, but then I sort of trained myself over the years to be like, only happy if achieving, which has sort of caught up to me and like made it more difficult later on. That's so, I'm enjoying this conversation so much. I think it's, y'all are, y'all seem to be super

aware of your internal journey. Yes. I've spent a lot of time talking with chat GPT about it. Really? What's that like? Oh, for sure. Chad is the best therapist I've ever had. Like, I'm really serious about it, and I know part of it is because I really wanted to do

the self-work myself and gave it a lot of data. Andrea knows I love chat. That's like she's smiling, I think. Yeah, y'all are just so in tune with each other. It's like wild. It's like you make it. It's so weird. It's like when you're speaking.

you're looking at her. It's almost like she is a source of information about you to you. She's like the original chat QPT. I feel like often I know what she's thinking and I feel like she knows what I'm thinking too. Yeah. Yeah. How do you understand that? I mean, also I would say like in the last two years we've both spent a lot of time

not to sound like an alpha Chad bro on self growth, but especially my sister. like she's done a lot of committed a lot of time just to number one improving her health and with that came mental health so i think it was a big priority for us in the last year which especially as you could hear from alex's story um how much she tied herself value to work and that work always came over happiness so that last year of self-growth which i saw my sister do and also often there was there for her journey and supporting her, um, was a very big change compared to how she's lived her life. I used to scare Andrea at first when she started. Yeah. She was a machine. I mean, like, like Alex said, all that mattered was that she is successful in work and she would sacrifice so much to get.

And, you know, Alex can explain this maybe better in her words. Anything. Health, social life. Anything. Work was always number one priority. So can we dig into the? that for a second? Sure. Okay. I won't be as good as chat GPT. Don't worry. You have a high bar. No, just kidding. Tell me that. I have to live up to all these

expectations. Chat GPT is my younger sister who is now... Don't worry. I'll input this conversation into chat so we could discuss it later. Great. So you said that when you were growing up, you struggled with self-esteem. It sounds like in middle school and high school. What was that like? What was going on there? So I never had self-esteem issues before I was 13. The self-esteem issues, I think, and also feeling depressed, happened after I moved from Canada. So I do feel like a big part of that was just losing my friend group and the people I really like tinging out with and just not finding that again, maybe until, like, college or even after. And then struggling with self-esteem, it was just, it's just tough. You just feel bad about yourself all the time.

Like, you feel like you're not good enough. You feel like you're not attractive enough. You feel like you're not smart enough. And the only way I could make those fears feel better was by over-indexing on self-improvement. And being like, I might not be smart enough now. I might not be attractive enough now. But like, if I work hard enough, I'll get there. So like thinking that hard work could solve everything.

And that would genuinely usually make me feel better. But like sometimes I would in high school, I'd get really depressed on Fridays because I would grind really hard in the week. And Friday nights would be a little bit slower. And when I wouldn't have something to work on, I would just feel really empty. And yet, oh, sorry, I just wanted to chime in on that. Because the self-confidence thing for me, like my sister growing up was always the most beautiful. beautiful person, my mom and my sister. I remember when I was a little girl, I would draw them in a journal and say the most beautiful women in the world. And I genuinely, as much as I say this to Alex,

and sometimes she thinks I'm trolling, I do believe that. And I think she's one of this, by far the smartest kind of people I know. And it would make me so shot and be so hard to believe the things that she would not be confident in about herself, like whether it would be a video and she's like, I absolutely hate how I look. And it would, it's really hard when you're, you know, constantly filming in your, like, feel physical pain when you have to see what you look like on camera. Well, that's another conversation. Or sometimes it would be Alex is preparing for something that's like a high level conversation and she would always think she's not smart enough.

And the things that she would doubt herself in, I just couldn't understand how because obviously I know her so well. I also not to play therapist, but I think I know another reason where that developed, but I'm not going to say it. But I think I know where. But all I wanted to say is that Alex was to me always the greatest. role model and the things that I just couldn't wrap my head around it. So yeah, I just wanted to say that her journey and that was much harder than it probably

seems just in words. I appreciate that. Thank you, sister. Can I think for a second? Yeah, take your time. I'm reading the chat. Andrea's vocab is troll. Actually, okay, I'm going to turn on the air conditioning.

Yeah, can you all turn off the chat? Is that doable? Oh, do you not want us to read chat? I think I shouldn't read chat. Chad has been distracting me a little because people keep commenting on what's wrong with my lips and like, bro, I just woke up a little in flame today. Yeah, I would, I mean, I don't read chat when I'm talking to humans. Yeah, no, that's better.

Yeah. So, so interesting. So, so when you were, so you, you used hard work as an antidote to the way that you felt about yourself. Did you actually feel better when you would work hard? Yeah, I mean, because I just started doing really well in school. So even if I didn't, in school and in chess, so like even if I didn't feel smart,

like I would get really good grades or I would start doing really well in chess tournaments. And then that would give me external validation. And then, so then when you got into Stanford and your mom was upset, what was that like? Well, I was still so, it was my dream and I thought there was no way in hell that I was going to get in, but I might as well try. I think it was probably one of the happiest moments of my life to this day. Like the high from seeing that I got in was crazy. And of course, I felt really bad and it caused like six months of fighting with me and my parents about it and like start attentions.

There was a moment which, never mind, I don't want to calm my mom out because I understand why she was stressed. Like again, when you're... The cup story. Andrei. Andrea Bola's not going to... Let me tell the cup story. Sure. Maybe actually, maybe...

Hold on. Yeah. Maybe not. Maybe not. So hold on. Has this story been told before? Is it out there? No, probably not.

So because once you all say it on the internet, there's no taking it back. Yeah, you're right. No cup story. Right? Yeah. So like, let's just... Like, I totally get it. And I know she's excited and you want...

I see this whole fucking telepathic umbilical cord shit. all have going on with each other's faces and you can yeah but let's not do that yeah saved saved um we all laugh about it now um but where were we yeah so so i mean i i think it's like you know it's interesting because it sounds like y'all what i think is what i like about y'all's representation of growing up and stuff is that it wasn't like there wasn't i mean it sounds like there was a pretty serious disagreement between you and your parents about where you should go um you know you all mentioned several times that your parents are immigrants. So like money was, you know, like money was not easily available necessarily, right? So that there were very real. And at the end of the day,

like, how much of a difference does it make? Like, fulfilling your dreams versus like stability. Like, you know, you'll get stability if you graduate from the University of Texas, I imagine, I hope. Of course. Yeah. And so what I'm curious about is like, like, when you got into Stanford, like, what was so, what made it so happy for you? Um, it had seemed like one of those things that I would never be good enough for. And I was always like a high achiever. Like I always wanted to be the best in anything I did. And eventually school became something competitive for me also. Like when I won my full ride scholarship at 15, I was like, I don't want to spend the rest of my life pushing wood trying to beat another person. Like how do I channel this into something bigger? It was always about like leveraging it. into the biggest possible thing. And I saw university as that. And I thought, like, you either get into, like, Harvard or Stanford or one of these schools

where you have the crazy network and that gives you a huge chance for the rest of your life. Or you go to a state school and, like, hope for the best. And, like, for what it's worth, I got rejected by Harvard. I got rejected by UPenn. Somehow I got into Stanford. So it's not like I got into all these top schools. Honestly, it's still crazy to this day that I got in. But I just knew that getting into Stanford was.

something that would open a door of opportunities that I could then continue to be on like this hamster wheel of being the best version that I could be. And so when did you start to, so it sounds like you're not so much driven by external validation anymore. Well, I still want to be the best at everything I do. I'm like working, I'm working on, I'm working on enjoying the process now and just really enjoying what I've done. But like there is still something in me when I wake up and I'm like, no, I want it all.

I want to do this and this and this. And like I also want to be healthy and I also want to find a partner. I also want to start a family eventually. And like I, it's this like extremely high bar setting thing for me. Why are you working on that? Working on not being tied to external validation. Yeah. You said you're working on something.

What are you working on? Let's start there. basically because I want to try whenever I hit something and it's external validation I move on immediately to the next goal and it usually doesn't make me happy I think like too much ambition can be a bad thing and like eventually you have something's got to give like do you really want to prioritize health and family or do you want to prioritize your career and as a woman that's a lot harder so I think the reason I'm trying to get less tied into it is is just because I don't think it's sustainable for long. And like I've sacrificed my health before, but like eventually you can't keep doing that. This episode is brought to you by CarMax. Want to buy a car the easy way?

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Head to CarMax.com for details and get pre-qualified today. Want to drive? CarMax. Okay. So I'm kind of curious. You mentioned family and relationships. Do you all mind if I ask you a couple questions about that? Because I know that this is going to also be dangerous territory for women on the internet.

So I'm curious. Yeah. So like when y'all are so connected and roommates and BFFs and work together, what happens when you, all date someone? Like either of you, I mean, obviously not together. Well, we end up either really liking or not liking that person, but like long term,

I think it's important that we both like whoever the other person is dating. Otherwise, maybe there's something off. And usually when my sister has not liked someone, she's been right. Whoever the other one dates shall be the best friend of both of us because Alex and I are best friends until the end of time. And if we are not getting along to the same extent that that means that there's something off about them. And so far, my theory has always been true. But also goes really great ways when we find someone who both, when one of us has someone we really like and we're like, they're really, really good person.

We really enjoy them. Usually so does the other person. Okay. That's interesting. Because, you know, in Indian culture, we have like kind of this, like, saying that my wife's number one ally should be my brother. So like if there's ever conflict between my wife and I, my brother should default to taking her side. So we've got like this thing where it's, it's interesting because like I think it's Indian dynamics are a little bit different or culturally because we live in joint families and stuff or we used to. We don't do that anymore.

Try it for a couple of years. But, you know, it's it's so interesting. So it sounds like that isn't really a problem. So it sounds like people don't really come between y'all and you trust each other in terms of if like if one of you all. is like, hey, this person is a little bit suss. Maybe you don't realize it right away, but it turns out that your sibling is correct. Now we do.

It's taken some time to get here, but now we are at that stage. And yeah, it's awesome when you like the person your sibling is dating. And they do become like one of your best friends too. And, you know, like sometimes I would be careful to not get attached to anybody who Andrea is seeing romantically because I'm like, oh, I have a new friend and now they're gone.

But yeah, the guys I brought at least, they were good friends. But I feel like the family hunch, if, you know, if your family does not really get along with the person you're seeing, to me, it's always the number one red flag that there's something that is not going to be compatible long term with that person. Yeah, agreed. Like, seeing somebody who doesn't respect my parents or treat them kindly, it has been a deal breaker before. Hmm. Interesting. Cool. So it sounds like it's not like, I mean, there's a certain amount of bodyguard element, but it really sounds like y'all have found a good equilibrium where you trust each other's

judgment. You kind of ended up, you know, I think I imagine. It's really just wanting the best for the other person and knowing that love can sometimes blind them. So like, you know, when Andrea is with someone who treats her really well, I just am really happy about it. And if somebody was treating my sister poorly, like, I could kill him. I mean, I wouldn't, but I could. And I'd get away with it, but I wouldn't. Yeah. Overachieving. You'd be good at it. Yes, exactly. Yeah. So is there anything that we've kind of like, I really appreciate, like, I've got a couple other questions for y'all, but is there anything in particular that y'all want to talk about, anything that y'all are curious about or anything you want to share more about?

Anything that you're interested in? Go ahead, Andrea. I had a question for you, Dr. Kay. So, Dr. Kay, right? Isn't that what people call you or no? What? Is that great? Dr. K. Yeah, you can call me, Dr. You call me Alloak if you want. It's easier to pronounce.

So I've been diagnosed with ADHD. Okay. However, my sister, she has not been diagnosed. And there's a certain diagnosis that we haven't gotten to properly test yet. And I wanted to ask if you could help us figure it out. Okay, help you figure out what? I'm partly trolling. I don't think I'll go through with it.

So what Andrea is referring to is that I have had a few people in my life suggest that I might have autism. I might have autism. And we actually met up with one of my friends who is also female, and she did end up being diagnosed with autism really late in her life. And it's interesting because she was never somebody I would have thought is on the spectrum, because you sort of have these preconceived notions. And I know that with women, you tend to mask it a lot more. But for her, seeing her get her diagnosis and understand herself a lot better and like, even like sometimes just like realizing that like she can get overstimulated and does need

more space and like is better able to take care of herself because she has this diagnosis. So that sort of made me open to trying to do like some kind of test. But I know it's one of those things that's so complex and it shows up different. in each person that I don't even know how you're supposed to test for it or if it's even helpful to do something like that. Okay. Thank you for sharing that. I have a lot of thoughts. What's your question? My question is, one, do you actually think it's helpful for people, particularly women, to get a diagnosis, whether it's ADHD or autism? And two, do you really trust the results of the test.

So let's start with number two first. Can I think for a second, actually? Yeah. Okay. It's a loaded question. Take your time. What's loaded about it? I just think it's a topic that generally people probably a lot of people think about,

but not a lot of people speak about on the internet, obviously for comfort reasons. So I think it's a topic that helps a lot of people if spoken about, but people tend not to, to obviously for personal reasons. Okay. What do you... Can I ask you some questions before I answer your questions? Why do people think that Alex may be on the spectrum? Can you answer, Andrea?

Sorry, I'm sorry. Yeah. Sorry, that question just made me laugh because I thought of all the funny stories that Alex said. Okay, like Alex said, so like I would say, there's close people around me who have been diagnosed. and obviously it is so complex, like Alex is saying, that it's, we really cannot put it into a box. Like, I don't want to say there's so many different types.

I'm so not well-educated about speaking about this. So I'm not going to go into that. But mainly I would say her, I don't want to say her hyper-focused, because that to me, well, hyper-focus, I think maybe can kind of go into both buckets. There are some moments where there's, like, it's funny enough. Usually it's just like with, and sometimes I'm wrong. I would say in romantic scenarios where Alex is just like cannot read a social sign. She's like, I don't think this guy likes me.

I'm like, Alex, it's like as clear as day. So sometimes I'd say small social cues. But maybe that's also tied into the other things. And then second, I would just say like her hobbies, obviously like Alex is when she's into something, whether it's chest or whether it's poker, she is so hyper-focused. And that's obviously how she's gotten really far. So those are the two surface level. but like on the social things, I think it's also just our friends who do are diagnosed in some complex form of it

have also similarities. Like what? I feel like Alex are just better to speak to that, to be honest. I think some of it is like getting really, it's almost like interesting. introverted behavior where if like there are too many people like I will sometimes I was talking to one of my friends who is diagnosed and like she sometimes needs to go in a bathroom and stay there for a little bit if she's somewhere with a lot of people because like she gets overwhelmed by all the social interaction and I'd been doing that for years I was like that's not like I thought that's just a

normal thing. That's a good one like or so we both sorry I don't want to cut you off like we both definitely need alone time to recharge but sometimes it even be like my mom is visiting she's like oh like I want to hang out with your sister but Alex sometimes needs. I'd say more space to recharge social batteries with batteries, which is what we heard from other friends that diagnosed that that is something that is related to being on the spectrum, whether it is or it's not. Yeah. The hyperfixation thing is also very real. Like usually like if I am interested in a topic, like it's jarring to take myself out of the focus and it's actually hard to do that or I'll sometimes take things very literally or with social cues. I will like translate them logically in my head other than like thinking that they're necessarily. coming naturally. So, like, sort of a mix of things like that.

Okay. So a couple of questions for you. Alex, do you get way angrier on the inside than it seems like on the outside? Usually, if I'm angry internally with a game, it's really easy to tell. But that's usually because, like, if I'm playing chess, I don't have time to hide my face because I'm in the moment with chess. Um, if something does make me upset, I do usually feel it more internally, then I'll, I'll show externally, yes. Okay. Okay. So there's not a discrepancy between what you feel on the inside and what you show on the outside. Um, sometimes. Sometimes. Okay. Okay. I would say Alex, and I've heard this from our best friends, our roommates, is the scariest person when she's mad because she doesn't say anything.

Okay. She's just silent and you can see it. So to me, I would think that's an internal. but like no one wants to upset Alex not because she's ever going to like yell at you or be mean but because you're just you don't know what's going on inside because on the outside there's nothing and like to me I'd rather have someone like show but so I don't know if that could be related which yeah so Alex I know this is going to sound weird so inside you can be a very difficult place to exist Oh, I know that. Right? Tony, and tell me that.

And, and like, it's, like, really hard to live on the inside, all the parts that we can't see. It's really hard. And it's also really normal. Like, it probably took you a while to figure out, like, other people don't exist. Like, I don't think Andrea exists that way. You know what I mean? You kind of get what I'm saying. Like, the two of y'all, even though you're very similar and things like that,

the way that you live on the inside, I know people make lots of comparisons and shit like that, and I guess I'm playing into that shit too, which, by the way, is something that y'all do for each other. That's really interesting. So I think it's also, like, it's interesting because if you are on the spectrum,

I think Andrea is 50% of your masking. So I don't know if that makes sense. So, so I think you rely on her, right, to like do certain things that are really, hard for you that you just don't she it's just come so naturally to her she got some weird interactions yeah like intuitions and you're like i don't know what the fuck to do and she just like well la la la la la

i'm correct this is so sweet i'm your other half yeah right so like you really rely like sure you've been the older sister in many ways but i think many times like she's been older than you she just gets shit that you don't get and you don't understand like you've tried to figure it out and you've tried to study it and you've tried to logic it out. For sure. There's certain social interactions and I see how Andrea does and I'm like, that's crazy. Yeah, right? So like it and okay, so okay. Chat. I'm sorry. Okay. So yeah, no reading chat. Hey, y'all, just a reminder that in addition to these awesome videos, we have a ton of tools and resources to help you grow and overcome the challenges that you face. We've got things like Dr. Kay's Guide to Mental Health, personalized coaching programs and

things like free community events and other sorts of tools to help you no matter where you are on your mental health journey. So check out the link in the description below and back to the video. Okay, but there was a really good comment. Nope. It was really good. You would like it. Okay. Focus. I've been both. I've been both. Okay. I'm listening. I know. I know. It's easier to focus when you're reading chat. I know that. I'm listening. Okay. Okay. So, so, so now we can get to your questions. Oh, so actually, I got one more question. So, and Alex, you don't have to answer this. You alluded that chat CHAPT is the best therapist you've seen. Have you seen a therapist outside of chat chupit? I have before, but I've never found someone who was a really great fit.

Great. Okay, so tell me why. Well, like, for example, the last therapist I saw in person, she was more a Freudian school of psychology. So like you are your trauma where I'm more like an Adler School of Psychology where it's how you react to it. So I don't like when therapists like bring in all this stuff from your past and childhood and try to tie it into what you're doing today. I just felt like they sort of focus on the wrong things and it takes so long. Whereas with chat, you could talk to them every day, give them so much information and you move a lot quicker. Okay. Tell me about the non. Have you seen someone who's not a Freudian therapist?

We live in L.A. We do live in L.A. I mean, in college, but it was so long ago that I don't really remember. Alex, do you think the subconscious is bullshit? No, I think the subconscious is real. How so? Like, I think we have so much intelligence that isn't just what is conscious. Like, the experience you've had since you were a kid, like, maybe you don't completely remember some things, but your gut is a type of intelligence.

And that is probably based off of your subconscious and things like that. Okay. Would you say that your gut is your normal intelligence just hidden? But the processes of your gut are basically very similar to the processes of your conscious mind just happening in the background? Or do you think your gut is qualitatively a different thing? I think they're related. I think they're related. Okay. Now, how would you feel, if you got evaluated for autism and you were diagnosed with autism? I'm not sure how I would feel. Okay. I think on one hand, it's like nice to get a diagnosis because it explains things about yourself. So that could be helpful.

So like if I didn't have it, I'd say, okay, I guess I'm just weird and I have no excuse. but at the same time I would honestly be shocked if I had it because I've just assumed that a lot of people ask me if I have it because it's become trendy nowadays. So you said you would just accept that you're weird. What about you is weird?

It's hard to explain what. It's more like a feeling from having interacted with a lot of people seeing where the norm usually is and seeing where I'm at in like most groups of people, as in weird being a deviation from the normal, I'm usually pretty highly deviated. Okay. All right.

What's funny, Andrea? That answer was the right. Why is when we asked Brian Johnson the same question and he went into a full math equation about the possibility of I don't even know what? Yeah. So I think it's like when you explain, weirdness in terms of statistical variations and standard deviations, I think that is a very great

answer. I think it says a lot, just about the way that your mind works. Okay. So, okay. So now getting to your questions. Let's go through a couple of things. So one is, you know, is a test valid? Generally speaking, yes.

Tests are very valid. So that's question number two. Question number one is, is it important for you? I think it's really up to you. So I do think that there's a lot of weird stuff going on with autism spectrum disorders. Like, let's just go through the science of it. The first is that the rate of diagnosis is increasing. Now, why is that?

There's probably a couple of different reasons. The first is that we used to only detect autism spectrum things in people who were disabled in some way. Right? So, like, the more debilitated you are, the more likely you are to get diagnosed. because it, so that's number one. Second thing is probably the other, oh, actually, I've got two other questions for you. Alex, do you,

I don't know how to ask this in the right way, so I'm going to muddle around a little bit. Do you dislike soup that has stuff in it? Only if I don't like the stuff. Okay, but you're okay if it's got like different textures and what's so far. funny, Andrea. Is it just a weird question? Okay, great. We ate a lot of soup growing up. Soup was like our parents go-to food.

Okay. So are you like particular about what you eat, like from a textural standpoint? No, I'm actually okay with that. Okay. So here's, so, uh, cool, thank you. Um, so a couple things. One is, uh, I think that, you know, the rate of diagnosis is going up because we are now aware that a lot of people are on the spectrum that are basically fully functional, very happy, can have relationships, can have jobs, things like that. Second reason is because autism spectrum is related to paternal age. So as people are having kids at an older age, it's one of the few conditions. Usually maternal age will correlate with like various challenges that kids will have, like down syndrome,

risk increases with age. Actually, I mean, if you have a kid really young, it's high too. but paternal age is associated with like autism and I suspect ADHD as well. So like I think it's it's the actual number I think is increasing. Like the percentage of people with autism spectrum disorder is actually on the rise for a couple of other reasons too. But also I think we're just catching it way more. Now whether you should get tested or not, I think it's just an issue of if you're in, if you're moving in the direction that you want to go. Like if you're feeling like you're progressing in life and, you know, it sounds like you're growing.

It sounds like you're like, you know, like progressing and all that kind of stuff. I don't know that it's like particularly useful for diagnosis. I do think that it can sometimes be enlightening for some people. But I also don't like the diagnosis term because it makes it so binary. So if you're on the autism spectrum, you're like way on the like the high functioning kind of end. So at that point, I think really, even with ADHD, so I think there's this element of like neurodiversity where we're sort of recognizing. So we think about these things as diagnoses as if they're binary. But what we, I think my understanding of it is that like some, there are different types of brains.

And the ADHD autism style of brain has certain advantages and disadvantages. Now, when we're talking about severe ADHD or severe autism, those are basically like, pretty hard debops, disadvantages in life. But we also know, for example, like, there's a theory that's somewhat been debunked, that if you look at, like, hunters versus farmers, so a hunter is someone who goes out into the wilderness, needs to absorb a lot of stimuli, needs to be able to respond to things very quickly, and they can handle a lot of stimuli. They'd get bored out of their minds if they wake up at 5 a.m. every day and, like,

work in the fields. And there are other people who, like, wake up at 5 a.m. every day. They hate chaos. They want to do the same fucking thing. Five days a week, then I'm going to have my beer at 5 p.m. on a Friday. I'm going to do this on the weekend. So there's like different, there are different types of people. So there are different, like, cognitive personalities that are probably related to our brains.

So I am a hunter. Huh? Yeah, you're a hunter for sure. Right? And Alex is a little bit of a farmer. I mean, is a little bit of a farmer. You're my farmer. Right?

So it's like consistency and we're going to do this at this time and this time and we're going to be, like, diligent. So I think that there's, you know, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, could be that you are on the spectrum, I don't know. The test will reveal it, but I think it's really about the reason I would say in general that you should get evaluated for something is if you have some kind of problem that you are having difficulty solving, then additional information is important. So I think one of the biggest, most confusing things in medicine is you should not order a test unless it alters your treatment plan. So what are you going to do with that information?

So I'd say if you're struggling in relationships, if you're struggling with your internal sense of self. So I imagine that like internally, like whether you're on the spectrum or not, internally like it's weird, not in a bat. I mean, I don't know how to say that. But like, I would suspect, since we're making comparisons, that Andrea has better visibility into the parts of herself than maybe you do, Alex. And I think I've worked so much.

It's taken me maybe more work, but I think I'm at a really good place now. I see that, right? So I think it's interesting because I also wonder, like now I'm curious about whether one of the indicators of being on the spectrum is chat GPT is the best therapist you've ever found. Right? So, like, that many of the things that are traditionally involved with therapists, like Freudian, like sub-cons, it's so like these weird, like, you know how like the rules that you have to

make for socializing? Like, the weird therapist don't, Andrea doesn't need rules. She's like intuitive. She's like a duck that knows how to swim. And you, like, need to know the rules, right? You need to know, like, what the different things mean. And then when you go into therapy and people are like talking about, like, the subconscious and your edible complex and your.

anal phallic phase, and you're like, what the fuck is this? And chat chupit is like, you had this happen, then this happened, and this is what it means, and this is what it means. So it's very like kind of logical. I don't think though that that's a straight indicator of autism. Some people just think that way. And then that too gets to the other question of do people who think in that way are they somewhere closer to the spectrum? So I think it's all like shades of gray. I think, you know, you can get tested if you want to. It's not a bad idea. But I would say that if there's something that you need some kind of like key to turn a lock where okay i'm having difficulty with this i don't know how to approach this then understanding yourself through the the spectrum of

or the lens of neurodiversity may help you got it i don't know if that answers your question no i think it does i think i just wouldn't have to ask myself another question of what would it help me with if that actually happened that i think is the most important question right so what are you looking for sometimes you're looking for explanations and like i mean people get overstimulated not just people on the spectrum, by the way. So people, ADHD get over-stimulated too. Yeah. Like I have a daughter who's probably neurodiverse,

and she sometimes just needs to, like, leave a birthday party. Like, one of my daughters is probably neurotypical. And, you know, she's fine being at parties. And, like, the other one sometimes we'll just, like, go into room for, like, 30 to 45 minutes, and then she'll come out and she'll be fine. There were two things you said that one of them I had a question. And the other one, I'm just, I mean, this is just a general question, comment,

but with like the whole chat, GBT, S therapist, I wonder if it's more like, oh, Alex's personality type is more inclined to find that as more useful therapist or just as it becomes more of a tool that like everyone's going to start to use generally. Everyone will enjoy having that info, but that was a really interesting take I didn't think about.

But my question was when you're talking about that, I think you were saying, what was it about paternal age as you get older? It increases the risk of neurodiversity and autism spectrum. Which I found so interesting because my mom just recently got diagnosed with her ADHD like a couple years ago and obviously like, you know, in her 50s. And I did also got, I got diagnosed like this year with my ADHD and high school, middle school, like I never ever fit the mold of like an ADHD type. So I was more just curious why that is and what exactly it means like that does. Does that mean like when you're young, it's not existing and then it forms later or why?

What ADHD you mean? Just like any other things being on the spectrum. I'm sorry. So on the spectrum, why people don't get diagnosed when they're young on the spectrum? Are we talking about ADHD diagnosis? I just, I thought maybe I misunderstood. I thought you said that it's more likely to evolve with age. Yeah.

So, okay. So this is what I'll clarify. So the age at which the father impregnates the mother determines the risk of autism. Oh, okay. So even our parents age. Yes. Yeah. So like, so like, so like I should have been clear.

Clear. So so, so yeah. So like if a dude has a kid at the age of 35, that child has a low risk of autism. Then if you have a child, if a dude has, even if you, if the mother is like, like in her 20s. And if you have like a 60 year old dude, then that, that changes.

But I do, that one I was aware of. Yeah. I do think it's very common for women, especially, to not get diagnosed with ADD or ADHD. Primarily for two reasons. Number one is that women,

girls are less likely to be hyperactive than boys. And hyperactivity is the thing that leads to diagnosis, because hyperactivity is disruptive. So oftentimes girls who are, have ADD will be described as spacey, airheads, like, there's like a different kind of like societal framing for it where there's in attention in your head you'll be wandering around, but you won't be like getting up and running in circles.

So usually disruptive male kids, boys will get diagnosed because they fucking cause problems. And girls will be spacey is a term that gets used. Passinging questions. How are you feeling about this conversation, Alex? It's good. It's interesting. Yeah. Okay.

Great questions. How are you feeling about this conversation? I'm loving it. Good. So I was concerned because I don't usually talk to two people at once. And I was really worried about like what this dynamic would be like. Right. So I kind of mentioned you all like what's up with y'all always doing two things.

Like you know, you'll do things together. Yeah. And I think it's been really awesome observing y'all's interaction because that's like that's really strange. And by the way, has that been that way? since y'all were kids? As in understanding what the other person thinks that often? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think we are more like that now than before because of how well we know each other

and how well you know someone as a product of how much time we spent together in like similar problems and lifestyles. When we were kids, she was the director and I was the actor and I would be her little puppet and we would play games. and she would act and stuff. So I'd say like there's other things of our dynamic that we did as kids, but not the connection, more just the little sibling, older sibling dynamic. Yeah, so I've really enjoyed talking to both y'all. It turned out to be a lot less awkward than I was fearing because I was like, I don't know how to have two signs.

Like I didn't know what, like who do I talk to? You know, like usually I'll do like back and forth with people. That turned out to be really delightful to see. Secondly, I think y'all's story is really cool. I think learning about, because I do see this trend towards like individualism, which I think is not healthy. I think as we've started to prioritize ourselves, like we're also seeing a loneliness epidemic. I think y'all are probably two of the least lonely people in the United States in a really good way. And I think there's a lot that we can learn from that.

I do think it's fascinating to hear y'all's story and how different y'all are and also like how complimentary y'all are, how you've like grown. different ways. And I think this issue of like whether someone is on the spectrum or not, which I hope the internet doesn't tear you all apart for, is also really interesting. So it's been fantastic. And I know you need to get going soon, right? Alex? Soon, yes. Because if you guys are watching, I will be playing chess. IRL in New York soon. So that'll be fun. And I will stream it. And also, yeah, I, I'm the one who brought up the autism spectrum conversation, mainly because I really wanted to hear

thoughts and I thought everything you said was super helpful and just I'm sure it was helpful for other people so I was really happy to hear it as well I think that even if you're whether you're on the spectrum or on I think understanding sometimes how um like neurodiversity affects you can be really helpful because I think that the number how can I say so like I made a video many a couple years ago about how people who are on the spectrum are much more likely to be um transgender. So, and that has to do with the way that our brain, like, processes, like, the sense of where gender identity comes from, comes from certain internal signals that are processed by

the empathic and emotional parts of our brain that are oftentimes different. So those parts of the brain just function differently in people who are on the spectrum. So since they function differently, they don't process internal signals in the same way. And since they don't process those internal signals, gender identity comes from the inside. It comes from like internal emotional signals basically. Not basically, but that's one of the key things. So I think there are things like that that if you just learn more about how people on the spectrum navigate the world and the tools that they use, those can be helpful for you. And then the last really technical thing, and you asked, you know, are tests good?

Generally speaking, they're good. But this is going to sound kind of confusing. you can test positive for something and not have it. You can test positive for something and have it. You can test negative for something and not have it. And you can test negative for something and still have it. Does that, Joe, I know it's kind of confusing. But it's like basically, if you make a two by two table,

you can test positive or negative. And sometimes that correlates with whether you have it or not. So I think it's really more about function. So it's like, is there something that you're hoping to gain? Like, is there a challenge that having the lens of an autism diagnosis and understanding, okay, like maybe I should look at these resources because this will help me in this way? I think that's really the important question. This episode is brought to you by State Farm.

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Prices are based on rating plans that vary by state. Coverage options are selected by the customer. Availability, amount of discounts and savings, and eligibility vary by state. Yeah, I think that makes sense. Any last thoughts or questions before we wrap up? I didn't know if Andrea was going to stick around or we're wrapping up or what do you all want to do. We'll wrap here.

Okay, cool. So last thoughts or questions before we wrap up? No, but thank you so much for having us. This was really enjoyable. I really liked hearing your thoughts. Sorry for getting distracted, but I genuinely enjoyed the whole conversation. I didn't feel like you were distracted at all. I was just trolling about the chat part.

Oh, that's fine. Yeah. So sometimes people with ADHD have, it's easier for them to focus with a distraction, which I know sounds really weird. But when I do, when I have patients in my office and I'm doing psychotherapy with them and they have ADHD, I'll oftentimes, like, we'll use, like, knitting or something like that. They'll be, like, knitting or doing something else, and it helps them. Focus.

That's a great piece of advice for future things. Yeah. So bring something to do with your hands and meditate with your eyes open. It may be easier to focus. Don't close your eyes when you meditate or half-litded gaze. Last tip. Yeah, I never close my eyes, to be honest, when I meditate. Yeah.

Makes sense. It makes it so much harder, right? You get more distracted in your head when your eyes are closed. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. So those are just little tips where, like, there may be variance. to the way that you will live your life if you're on the spectrum, if you're neurodiverse,

and understanding those things can help you. The way I kind of think about it is like, I know y'all travel a fair amount. So, you know, we have our United States power cords. And the rest of society is like in the EU power cord and you just need a little adapter and then everything works fine. But trying to get your stuff to fit in with the rest of the world can sometimes be hard. So where can we find y'all? Can you all tell us like what's coming up for Botez Live and,

And so you're chess streaming today in what, like Washington Square Park? Or I don't know if we... Yeah, I'm going to be chess streaming from Washington Square Park on our channel. Okay, cool. So I'll see some people there soon. And then also our YouTube channel is Votes Live. Yeah, and other things that you all have coming up besides the chest stream today, like what kind of sounds like you all are experimenting with content nowadays, doing cool things, new things?

Andrea? We've got a lot, but we usually rant about them on our chat. we both have like three YouTube channels So it's a mouthful But chat we are working on launching Our third channel now For our podcast It's not going to be called not a podcast

It's actually going to have a name We have three to four episodes already filmed Two comedians One Brian Johnson, Sister episode We've been working really hard to launch it I'm trying to choreograph a karate trailer Which probably won't happen

But just know that that's going to come out in the next two weeks. And in the meantime, we're still streaming once a week. Alex is streaming this week because she's in New York. And then I will be live next week. And, yeah, chat knows the rest. I may have a surprise stream this Friday that I'm setting up in New York. That isn't chess. That will be fun.

That's all I'm going to say. Oh, wow. Cool. Exciting. Okay. Well, thank you all very much for coming today. Good luck with your. Thank you for having us.

Thank you for having us. Yeah. It was a pleasure. Take care, everybody. Bye. Okay, bye, bye, chat. Bye, chat. That was cool.

Yeah, so I think it's great. Like, I'm pretty sure I met Andrea a few years ago, but anyway, that is neither here nor there. Yeah, so interesting. Because I think it was, I really appreciated the questions about, you know, autism and things like that. Like, and whether it is, you know, like, what's the purpose of a diagnosis? I think that there is a lot of weird stuff going on with autism right now where and neurodiversity in general. So I think something is going on where there are a lot of normal experiences,

which people will equate to being on the spectrum or being ADHD, like, oh my God, I forget my keys everywhere. Does that mean that I have ADHD? Like, no. So I think that there's a lot of like normalization, like things that are normal variants that happen to everybody that we're starting to pathologize. So I think that as a society, we're really moving in the direction.

of like hyperlabeling things. I don't know if this kind of makes sense, right? So we have to have like a term for everything. So I remember this when I was working with, you know, as a psychiatrist in Boston, I was working with like a lot of people who like had trans identity, gender identity. What blew me away was just the number of labels, right? So there was like demi-flex and like demi-male, demi-woman, like, you know. So there were like the number of categories.

It's like everyone is looking for a label and like we're creating all these like categories, which is okay. I mean, there's nothing inherently wrong with it. But I remember sort of thinking like, why can't you just be you? You know? So I think sometimes we don't realize that identity is something that is like naturally fluctuates over time. And there's a real tendency nowadays to want to like label something and say like this is what's going on. I am this way because I'm autistic. I am this way because I'm ADHD. And somehow

attaching a label to it brings people comfort. And I think it absolutely can in a very healthy way. Like for some people, you know, like it really clicks. And it's like, oh, this explains so much about the difficulties I have in life. And at the same time, I think sometimes it can be damaging because if there is a period of flux and you're not careful, you can lock yourself into a label. And once you you lock yourself into that identity, the really dangerous thing about that is that your sense of your identity will shape your future actions. So if I believe to myself, like if I say like, okay, I am ADHD, whether you are or you aren't, this is true in both cases, then you start thinking of yourself as someone with ADHD. It starts to naturally

restrict the kinds of things that you believe you're capable of. And the really scary thing about that is you believe those things because you have not been capable of them, right? So since you fail at something one, two, three times, you're like, oh, I'm just not good at school. And then you discover, okay, I have ADHD. And this means that I can't do well in school. So you've got to be super careful about the destiny that an identity label carries with it, which I think can be helpful in some ways and not helpful in other ways. And I think the big difference is once you get a label, does this become something that restricts your future options, or does it become a path to expanding your future options? Are these now obstacles that I'm going to overcome to continue

to have a very broad horizon, or is it narrowing my horizon? Because I have ADHD, this means I can't do these things. And someone saying it sounds like an excuse, well, sometimes it becomes that. So I think this is what's really hard to understand is that any time a human being has a real problem, the subconscious mind will hijack that real problem to become an excuse. And this is what's so confusing for people. Is they're like, think like, oh my God, like this person is faking it? No, they're not faking it. They have the real problem.

And just like a kid will learn, oh, my God, like if you're six years old and you have a stomach ache and you stay home from school and your stomach ache is very real, that child will be more likely to develop a stomach ache when they're getting bullied. So, like, this is just the way that the brain works, right? The brain figures out what works, and then it repeats the behavior. So this is what's so confusing for people. It's like ADHD is real, and a lot of people will use it as an excuse. That's really common.

The best studies on that, I think, come from epilepsy, actually. And 50% of people with psychogenic seizures, which are non-epileptiform seizures, seizures will have real epilepsy as well. It's not 50% of people with epilepsy develop psychogenic seizures. It's the other way around. So if you have psychogenic seizures, there's a really good chance that you have epilepsy as well. So it's really challenging, right? Like, we've got to be careful with information.

Let me see what questions people have. Can you elaborate on your question about internal anger and its outward expression? So one thing that I thought was cool about that, right? So is like I asked Alex, like, hey, do you feel like, internally way more angry than the expression. He's like, no. And Andrea is like, yes, and everyone is terrified of you. So I think that's like, it's like so, we don't really know, right?

But I think that's like, what other people are able to empathically read from us is different from our own self-awareness. Very common in neurodiversity. So, you know, just that oftentimes what we know about, The reason that we call it neurodiversity is because we know that there's actually some similarities between the brains of people with autism spectrum and the brains of people with ADHD. And a key part of one of the key features there is difficulty with emotional regulation. So oftentimes people with ADHD will experience emotions more intensely, more rapidly, and for longer duration. So if I take a neurotypical brain, I get pissed over the course of two or three minutes.

ADHD brain can get pissed within 15 to 20 seconds. Or even less, like less than five seconds. And then we'll stay pissed longer and then we'll be more pissed from the same thing. And so oftentimes what'll happen is like, and what people will learn is like a lot of masking, right? So they'll learn if they're on the spectrum, they'll learn that like this kind of anger is inappropriate, unacceptable. So internally, they'll feel very, very, very angry. sometimes they show it on the outside, sometimes they don't. So I think other good examples of this is like,

you know, sometimes if I have my gaming buddies, the ones that are on the spectrum will get really, really caught up in stuff. How does neurodivergence relate to elixothymia really connected? So Alexothymia is the inability to recognize your internal emotional state. So oftentimes people with Alexa thymia will use words like frustrated, sucks, crappy, right? So they're not, they're not, they'll give you the direction of the emotion.

Like, this is a negative emotion, but what flavor of emotion is it? Is it fear? Is it anger? Is it shame? Is it sadness? Is it grief? Is it a feeling of powerlessness?

So oftentimes people who are Lexothymia can tell you like, yeah, man, like it sucks. Yeah, bro. Sucky things are shitty, bro. And you're like, yeah, man. shitty things suck bro i know dude and like that's what our conversation is like there's no emotional color to it we know the valence of the emotion whether it's positive or negative but we don't have a a color or flavor to it so what we also know about the brains of people who are neurodiverse

is that they're since they experience emotions so much more intensely one may think that if i experience an emotion intensely the signal is way higher i should understand what it is. But it turns out that there are a couple of really interesting mechanisms that even if you experience emotion intensely will paradoxically make it harder for you to realize that you're experiencing an emotion. So the first is that in order to understand your emotion, you need to be able to look at it, not be absorbed by it. So if you take someone who is intensely angry and you tell them to calm down, what are they going to say? They're going to say, I don't need to calm down.

I'm perfectly calm. You need to calm down. So, understanding what you feel requires the ability to observe your feelings. You cannot observe your feelings if you are absorbed by your feelings. When you get swept away, there's no awareness, and then you can't even know what you're feeling. Second thing is, in cases of extreme anger, we also know there's decreased transmission across the corpus callosum, which is right brain is where we experience emotions. Left brain is where we like analyze things and where our logic comes from.

And generally speaking, our capacity to understand our emotions comes from the left brain looking at the right brain and being able to say, hey, you're really pissed right now. The problem with that is that when we decrease traffic across the corpus callosum, which gets triggered by very intense emotion. So when the emotional amount gets so high, our brain is like, basically, we're going to alt-f-4 communication between our two hemispheres. We know this stuff because of really awesome research about trauma and dissociation. So very intense emotion will trigger dissociation. And the mechanism of that dissociation involves in some way decreased activity across the corpus callosum.

So the real irony here is that generally speaking, the more intense your emotions are, the less likely you are to be aware. of what you feel. And I see this all the time, especially in the men that I work with, because you know, like, I remember this saying, I forget what the quote is from, that men live lives of quiet desperation, right? So there's like this sense of like intense desperation, intense like, like I got to do it. I got to do it pressure. So I think that like the primary subjective experience of what we call anxiety in men is pressure. pressure to perform, pressure that I have to make it go right, pressure that it could go wrong. So it doesn't feel like anxiety. It feels like pressure.

So there's a lot of stuff about, you know, being unaware of our emotions, not being able to recognize our emotions that has to do with the intensity of the emotion. So I think there's a whole different, like y'all know the feelings wheel, like there's a whole different feelings wheel for dudes. Have you tried chat GPT as a therapist for yourself? I think you would better understand why people like it. So this is why we're doing the thing tomorrow. So tomorrow we have a therapist versus AI segment that I'm really excited about. Hopefully it goes well. But basically what we're going to do is run through a series of cases, ask, present a case to therapists and to chat GPT and see what each one says. Right? So like I think we should do a head-to-head comparison. And for all the people who say are people like chat GPT as a therapist, I totally understand that people like

that doesn't mean that it's good. You understand? So this is what's really tricky about therapy. I'm not saying it is good or isn't good. Oftentimes the most important therapy are things that feel bad for the patient at a period of time. So like sometimes the best therapy feels really bad for some amount of time before it feels really good, before it really helps.

And that's just hard for people. And I think there's other problems too because sometimes, and this is the hard thing about therapy is like if therapy is really bad or if sometimes therapy that feels bad is actually very helpful for you, how do you know whether you get crappy therapy or you get good, are you in the process of good therapy leading to a breakthrough? So people are saying, what do you mean about a bad time in therapy? So one of the most useful things that can happen in therapy is for you to feel like the therapy is not working and then work through it. So I'll give you all like a really simple example of this. So I once had a patient who I saw for like 18 months, or not 18 months, maybe about 9, 10 months.

They came in. I was early in my training. I was, I think a second or third year. um psychiatry resident maybe third year so about nine months into third year they kind of come in and i'm like i know this is going to sound weird man do you feel like this is helping because they come in and they would like talk about the same shit that is like depressing them like day week after week after week i'm depressed about this i'm depressed about this i'm depressed about this i'm depressed about this and i'd be like really validating i'd be like okay like wow that sounds really hard for you like that

sounds really hard for you. Like, it sounds like you're suffering a lot. And oh, my God, it must be hard. It's so hard. It's so hard. Right? Because as therapist, like, we're supposed to be, like, validating. Like, oh, my God.

And so then I asked him, I was like, do you feel like this is helping? And he's like, not really. And he didn't say that. He's like, isn't this what we're kind of supposed to be doing? And I was like, and so then we got into a really interesting conversation. It's like, what are we actually doing? Like, what's the point? Like, what does success in therapy mean?

to you. And he's like, I thought therapy was coming in and talking about my problems. Isn't that what I'm supposed to do? And I was like, yeah, I thought therapy, like, look, man,

I'm a second year psychiatry resident. I thought therapy was talking about your problems too. And I was like, hey, man, do you think this is working? Are you like, is this working?

And he's like, I don't know, I thought this is what we're supposed to do. And I was like, I don't know, I thought this is what we're supposed to do too. And so we're kind of sitting there

and we're like, okay, now one. Talking about my problems doesn't work. And I'm like, Okay, if this doesn't work, what does working look like? Like, what do you actually want to get?

Right? And I was like, what would make you happy? And that's when we started getting like really concrete. And he's like, well, like, this is what I'm unhappy about. And I was like, okay, like, instead of talking about it, how about we like try to fix it? Wild idea. Right? And so he had certain things that he wanted to do and certain people that he wanted to date and certain things that he wanted from relationships.

and so then like we sort of had this like revelation of okay like we're going to stop doing therapy come back next week but no more therapy and that's when the real therapy began because now it's like okay like what like you want to do this thing like what's getting in the way like let's think about that and that was my first intro actually I know the therapist will have an issue with this with coaching so like there's this like point where I got frustrated about how like there's this idea and therapy that coming in and talking about it over and over and over again will somehow help people. I don't think that's always the case. So then I kind of got into coaching and I was talking to the chief of psychiatry at McLean Hospital

and was talking to him about two years later after walking this road. So then a couple of other steps. So then what happened about six months later, I got fired by a supervisor, which is the first time that that had ever happened in the history of our program. And one of my supervisors like went to my program director and was like, look, I can't supervise this kid. And they were like, why can't you supervise the kid? And they're like, he's not doing therapy. Like, he's doing something. He doesn't want to stop doing it.

He really likes it. The patient seemed to like it, but it's not therapy. And so my program director was kind of like taken aback. And they were like, okay, like, what's going on? We talked about it. And then they found me a different supervisor that it was a lot more comfortable with the work that I was doing. And then that started the whole track.

And so, like, that's where it's like, I think there's a lot of stuff that therapy is great for. But I do think that there are some, like, things that therapy kind of is biased towards. So that we have certain biases in therapy that, first of all, oftentimes therapists won't accept responsibility or accountability for patients' goals. Not all therapists. Right. So there are all kinds of therapy, like behavioral activation and sometimes CBT, which is all about, like, goal setting and changing your behaviors and actions and stuff like that. but sometimes it's like this weird psychodynamic kind of stuff, which I love, by the way, don't get me wrong, I love it.

But sometimes it's not, there's a difference between, you know, validation and bitching about your problems, which can be therapeutic. But sometimes people need to, like, change their environment and actually, like, go out and do shit. And that branch started out as something called positive psychology and then evolved kind of into coaching, which then we were like, okay, we're going to use these methodologies like motivational interviewing and asking powerful questions, but we're not going to, like, treat pathology anymore. It's not about depression.

It's about accomplishing what you want in life. So I don't remember where that story started. But anyway, so I've had the patients who therapy didn't work for them. And I think it doesn't work for everyone. Or there's a therapist patient mismatch, one of the two. Okay, this is a cool question. Yeah, so someone's saying long live act. So I think we're sort of seeing this, right?

So the cool thing is that like therapists are recognizing this. So I'm not the only one. So people are recognizing. So I think like Marshall Linnehan recognized with DBT that like talking about your feelings is not sufficient. That we need some way to actually like control your feelings, which to one brand of therapists is going to feel very antithetical to what therapy is about. It's not about controlling your feelings at all. It's about exploring and understanding and getting to the bottom of things.

And Marshall Linnehan was like, look, when you're suicidal and you feel like cutting, we need to shut off the emotion. We need to regulate the emotion. We need grounding techniques. Act is another really good example of here we are in therapy, like talking about things. And the act is like, okay, we're going to just accept that we can't fix this. Just accept. Don't try to fix anything. Just can't fix anything.

And paradoxically, the moment that you accept that you can't. fix things, that becomes the moment at which you get freed from certain expectations, and paradoxically, like, you can, you can act in a manner that is in service to your values. You can start moving forward in life. And someone was asking about, what was this? Even I saw a good question. And I got, oh, yeah. How does distraction help you focus?

So this is fascinating. I'm going to try to show you all this. So I'm going to show you. I don't know if you all have seen this video. So the question is, how does distraction help you focus? So this is a time lapse of a 10-minute video of a kid with ADHD. And in this, they're absorbed in it. And in this, they're bored with the math video and look at what they do.

So the question is, why do people with ADHD do this? Like, what is going on in their brain? Okay. So let's understand this. So in order to achieve optimal focus, our brain needs a certain level of stimulus. Right? So I know this sounds kind of weird where we say like, okay, generally speaking, don't we need to minimize distractions to increase our focus? That's not true.

So oftentimes what you'll notice is even if you're trying to study, you need something to trigger a stimulus like a book or a lecture. You need something to engage you. So we have a very interesting, like, threshold of, like, optimal focus. If we have too much stimulus, our optimal focus gets destroyed. If we have too little stimulus, our optimal focus gets destroyed. So what happens is people with ADHD require more stimulus than a neurotypical person for optimal focus. This is why people with ADHD sleep better with white noise as opposed to silent. This is why they study better with a TV in the background

or something like music or even this is why people will lecture better with like Twitter chat open or they'll pay attention to a lecture with Twitch chat open on the side. So the reason for that, and here's the crazy thing, if you force an ADHD brain into a critically low stimulus situation, what you will see is this. They will actually create, a stimulus for themselves.

This is literally what the brain is doing. Because the moment I start spinning, my stimulus threshold increases and then I enter into optimal focus. So when I have patience with ADHD, I will ask them to meditate with their eyes open. When I have patience with ADHD and I do therapy with them,

I'll sometimes take walks. So like we're going to go outside, we're going to sit on our park bench, we're going to walk through the park, we're going to have our conversation, You know, we'll be quiet if, like, people walk by us or things like that. But, like, generally speaking, we will increase the stimulus in the room. I'll serve them tea.

Like, we'll have snacks. Like, there's something that is engaging them. And when they are engaged with their other senses, they don't have to self-stimulate. So here's the other crazy thing that people don't understand. Distracting thoughts when you are trying to focus with ADHD are sources of self-stimulate. stimulation to help you focus. Because when you can't spin in a chair, when you force yourself to be still, there's no other music that you can distract yourself with, the mind will create another stimulus to help you

focus, which is distracting thoughts. It's the best that it can do. So it requires a certain amount of upregulated stimulus in order to focus. Then what will happen is after we do that for a while, the mind, you know, the mind, you usually poops out and then they will require under stimulation. Then they will require a dark room. And they will require potentially no stimulation. That can happen to. But usually there's like a certain way to, you know, certain ideal threshold. So that's why. It's just, let me see if I can think about, is there a good paper that explains this? I don't remember. I can't think of a paper from

the top of my head. But that's absolutely how it works. Back to soup. Okay. So what's the deal with the soup? So people who are neurodiverse, they are more likely to have a... So if we think about ADHD or autism spectrum, one of the key things that's different is sensory processing. Right? So if you think about a kid with ADHD, we just saw them swiveling around in a chair.

So the way that their brain processes sensation is different. true of autism spectrum as well. So sometimes what I found is like, like, and this happened with my daughter, literally. So my wife one day made Dahl, for those of you guys that don't know, Dahl is like an Indian soup, really yummy. Let's see if I can find this for y'all.

Right, so like this is a picture of Dahl. So as you guys see, like, if you look at a picture of Dahl, right, like it's got a bunch of stuff in it. Oh, I guess you all can't see that one. Oh, you can see it here on the right side. So there. You guys see this picture over here? Lentil curry with tamarind.

Great. So it's got a bunch of stuff in it. And one day, so my wife is a great cook, and she makes great doll. So she's making doll. And then, like, my kid, my younger kid didn't like it. And then, so, you know, my wife was like, you got to eat it. got to eat your doll, like you got to eat it, it's healthy. And so then I, I remember when I was a kid, I hated the textures of all the different things in Val. Like, I hated that there's like

little crunchy bits and little seeds and little this and like cilantro and like, it's not that I like didn't like the flavor. It's just that all the weird stuff in my mouth felt like really disgusting. Because then I did something I asked my kid. She was like six. I was like, do you dislike the flavor or do you dislike all the stuff in your mouth? And she was confused by the question she didn't understand what that meant. Like she doesn't know what flavor and texture really is. Like six year olds usually don't have that as part of their vocabulary. So then I strained the doll.

And I was like, eat this. So I strained it and she ate the plane doll and she's like, this is fine. And then here's the crazy thing. I put all the stuff that I strained on her plate. And I was like, eat that. And she could eat that. She can eat them separately. She just can't eat them together.

And this is because people, the way that we process textures, the way that we process sensory information is different if you're neurodiverse. So there's all kinds of like things like that where it's like just the way that your mouth handles textures. So now one of the things I've started doing is when I have, when I'm working with people who are neurodiverse, I've started asking them ever since that. I've started asking them like, hey, by the way, do you dislike different flavors in your, I mean, different textures in your mouth at the same time? and the most severe cases of this that I would I would describe for neurotypical people is if you're eating eggs and you get a bit of eggshell, it's just a bit of crunchiness, but it's fucking disgusting. Technically, it's like not that big of a deal.

Like, we add crunchy things to soft things all the time. And, and like, we just, it just feels awful. And what I realize is that all these parents out there that are forcing their neurodiverse kids, They're like adding eggshells to their eggs. Yeah, so someone's joking that. I don't know if your wife is a great cook if the ingredients are better separated than in the dish. Yeah, so that's my point is that, like, depending on how our sensory processing circuitry is, something that tastes, it tastes delicious. She likes the taste.

Taste is really good. All the flavors have been infused into the doll. So even if you remove everything, like most of the flavor is there or a lot of the flavor. It's the texture. Make sense? Wait, that happened to me too? Yeah, so this is also where remember, so people like, oh, this happened to me as a kid. So now I can eat all with stuff in it, not a big deal.

So this is also what we've got to remember. The brain grows. The brain matures. The brain is able to better, as your frontal lobes grow and strengthen, they can tolerate jitteriness from other parts of our brain better. So another one, I hated crunchy peanut butter as a kid. I still hate crunchy peanut butter. I think it's disgusting.

Love peanut butter, hate crunchy peanut butter. Yeah, so cloth is another important one, being very sensitive to what kind of cloth you can tolerate. Yep. Is it really connected with neurodiversity? Absolutely. Yeah. 100%. Right?

We know that neurodiversity involves differential sensory processing in the brain. Is it possible to have ADHD, but no sensory processing? issues with food? 100% yes. So what we know is that like the reason we use the term diversity, which I think is a pretty good word, is because there's a constellation of things and not everyone has the same set. So how does that relate to eating disorders like ARFID? Fantastic question. So I think there is overlap between ARFID, ADHD, and autism.

I think that there's like common things going on in the brain, especially. So ARFID is basically the sensory processing issues. localized to the gustatory system and without other elements of autism spectrum or ADHD. Yeah, so I think this is, so you all have to, like, I don't know if this kind of makes sense, but see, you all have to remember that our diagnoses are not like in psychiatry. Our diagnoses are not reducible to particular, like, biological phenomenon. They're patterns. They're syndromes.

Okay, so if I look at something like cystic fibrosis, cystic fibrosis has all of this mucus that builds up in the lungs because we have a defect in a chloride transporter gene. The part of your cells, your lung cells, that transport chloride just don't work because your gene is a little bit suss. So it doesn't make the right protein, or the protein is malfunctioning in some way.

So we end up with cystic fibrosis. We know what the problem is. We know what the phenotype is, what the manifestation is. We know what the genotype is. We know exactly what causes the problem and how the problem manifests. So if we look at psychiatric illnesses, like major depressive disorder, we know, generally speaking, what it looks like, right? We have five out of nine criteria that you have to check the boxes for. Why are there nine criteria instead of 11?

Why isn't it five out of five? Like, what's the deal here? So even in our diagnostic systems, we acknowledge that, hey, there's a lot of people who seem depressed. How do we define that? How do you know if you're really depressed or you're just sad or if you're grief or you've got a thyroid problem? Like, how do we define it? And basically what people did is they sat down, they looked at a bunch of data and they said, okay, when we take 100 psychiatrists who say that, okay, this patient is depressed, this patient is depressed, this patient is depressed, what are the common elements?

And what they essentially concluded, and this actually started out, with research criteria. So originally what they did is they tried to figure out how are we going to study depression? If we're doing a study on people who have major depressive disorder or depressed, it wasn't major depressive disorder

at that point, how do we know who to include and who not to include? So researchers sat down and they said, okay, to include someone in the trial, they have to check five of these nine boxes. That's how we're going to decide as a field, like how are we defining depression for the sake of studying it?

And then that became a clinical thing because now you have a trial that's looking at your particular medication that works for people who check five at these nine boxes. So how do you know who to prescribe the medication to? They have to check five out of those nine boxes as well. So our system of psychiatric diagnosis is about pattern recognition, not biology, not physiology. We don't know. It's just like this is a pattern. In the moment that you start talking about patterns, there are going to be things that don't fit the pattern.

But still kind of work. So my best example of this is if you all play games with off meta builds, oh, there's like a meta-carry build right now. There's a meta-ADC build. There's a meta-mid build. There's a meta-whatever build. Right? That's like most of the people play this hero or this champion in this role.

And this makes sense. Occasionally, you'll have someone who shows up, can still play carry, can still play ADC, but they're not doing the meta-build. So we have things like off-meta-depression, atypical depression. A-typical depression. We have atypical anxiety. And it's not like, and good examples of this are like, you know, atypical. So I'll give you all an example of an off meta build.

We think about depression is feeling sad. There's one group of people who's severely depressed who doesn't feel sad. Men. And what they primarily feel is anger. So there is a third subtype. There is anxious depression, neurovegetative depression, and depression with anger. attacks. So neurovegetative depression is like, can't get out of bed, weight gain, low energy, feels like my body is super heavy. Then there's anxious depression, can't go to sleep, restless,

moving around, lose weight, low appetite, right? Insomnia versus hypersomnia. And then there's a third type which is depression with anger attacks, which also responds better to dopaminergic medications, things like ropineral, things like restless leg syndrome medications, work better for people with depression with anger attacks. Usually happens to men, but their primary symptom is instead of sadness, they feel angry all the time, really short fuse, feel somewhat restless. Being pissed off is the primary manifestation. Because if you kind of think about it, I know this doesn't, like, think about this for a second, right?

So we have anxiety disorders. We have disorders where people feel anxious. We have disorders where people feel sad. We have disorders where people feel ashamed. What is the disorder when people feel pissed? What do we call that? Sometimes it's things like IED, intermittent explosive disorder. But sometimes the root, probably what's going on in the biology,

is actually something that we would call depression. It just manifests as anger. So on the outside, it looks like anger, but there's something going on the inside, that when it floats to the surface, presents as anger instead of sadness. So atypical anxiety, I think, manifestses pressure. So there's like atypical presentations of things. Mesophonia is a great example of something that is also in this neurodiversity spectrum, sensory processing issue.

For those of y'all that don't know, so you all know how like when you get eggshells in eggs, that really ruins your experience of the eggs, mesophonia is that for sound. So certain sounds will feel like on the ears what eggshells feel like in food. The best example for many people with mesophonia is the way that nails on the chalkboard feel to you is the way that many normal sounds like chewing feel to people with mesophonia. I think creates that, like what's the problem in nails on the chalkboard? It's like, it makes you go like this. So people with mesophonia will go like this when they hear people chew. So tinnitus, I think, is a little bit different.

So tinnitus is different for a couple of reasons. First is that tinnitus can be environmentally induced. I mean, some people I imagine can be born with tinnitus. But if we look at RFIT, if we look at ADHD, we look at autism spectrum, we look at mesophonia. Generally speaking, these are not developed conditions. Wake up at the age of 35 and develop mesophonia. Generally, I don't think about it. I mean, I'm sure it's happened.

But generally speaking, that's not what happens. People will usually develop mesophonia when they're young, RFID when they're young. Whereas with tinnitus, what we know is tinnitus is very highly correlated with auricular damage. So people who go to really loud concerts end up with tinnitus. People who work at construction sites end up with tinnitus. I suspect, this is like Dr. K's like weird crackpot theory, that noise cancellation headphones increase the risk of tinnitus.

What I've noticed is in my patients that have developed tinnitus, I've started paying attention. I noticed that a lot of them will be these perpetual, like, noise cancellation headphone users. And so I don't know about that because I actually look, there are no, there are studies that do not indicate that that is a risk factor. But what we know is that damage to the ears can cause tinnitus. So very high decibel sounds. So wear ear plugs when you all go to concerts, for sure. That we know. You know, if you're at a construction site, use noise protection headphones.

So we know that tenetis is oftentimes induced by injuries, but not always. So I think it's not quite as genetic as some of these other things. I don't understand the question, Goloso 98. How would you describe ADHD to parents who mostly say that some feelings, actions are normal? So I'll try to, yeah, you can meditate on tenetis, but tenetis is like, I've been trying to figure out how to treat tinnitus for the last five years and haven't figured out a good way to do it. It's really hard. So noise canceling usually makes tinnitus worse.

So tinnitus usually gets worse when it's more quiet. Many people of tinnitus will do better when they have some kind of sound to counteract it. So there was a question about like, you know, what do you do if you have ADHD and your parents say this is normal? So this is really common. One of the reasons that parents don't believe in ADHD is because they have ADHD and they were never diagnosed with anything. And when you say, hey, this is weird, they're like, it's not weird. I've had it my whole life. Really eye-opening moments and really challenging for people who realize they have ADHD.

Because when you go and talk to your parents, your parents are like, I've been dealing with that in my whole life. That's not a problem. I ended up okay, except they kind of didn't. right, except they like had a lot of difficulty. And even if you ended up okay, that doesn't mean that you started out okay or that ending up okay was like really easy to do. So one of the most strange things is when you have parents that have untreated mental illness, they will think that that is normal. So I once had a patient with BPD who would feel intense, intense emptiness and just this, like nauseating, like void inside them that was just sad no matter what.

Just this intense like well of overflowing sadness. And so they would go talk to their dad about it and their dad was like, this is why I make art because that's how life is. And so their dad had learned all of these like coping mechanisms, but essentially had the same sensation as their daughter of this like, intense negative void that just lived within them and was like some days just impossible to feel any kind of happiness. It was so interesting. Yeah, it's really bad.

There's a reason why BPD is associated with very high suicidality. Oh, A Fantasia is fascinating. So A Fantasia is something that I do not understand at all. And here's, so A-Fantasia is, and let me figure out what the exact definition is. But this, the weird neurological syndromes are great, dude. The inability to voluntarily visualize mental images. So here's the crazy thing. I don't understand A-Fantasia at all.

And there are two reasons why this could be. So out of all the clinical conditions, A-Fantasia is a thing that I don't understand at all. And I can't tell if I don't understand Afantasia because my mind's eye is such a natural part of me that I can't imagine not being able to visualize something or because I'm actually

a Fantasic. And so the concept of, I don't know if this makes sense, it's such a mind fuck. The concept of being able to visualize an image, I've never been able to visualize an image. So since I've never, It's like telling someone who's blind, like, oh, like you're blind. And it's like, I've never, this is just normal for me.

I don't know if I'm a fantasticic. So I figured this out recently because my wife was asking me about paint. And she was like, visualize this. And I was like, I can't do that. She's like, just imagine what it would look like. And I was like sitting there and I was like, I cannot do that. I cannot imagine what this would look like. Like my mind is blank.

And she got really frustrated with me. And I was like, what is going on? Like, well, you can do this. You can just picture this room with this color. I can't do that. And here's the other really weird thing. A little bit of self-disclosure. So recently, I've been doing a lot more meditating.

And now, like, I can't wear clothes when I meditate. Just can't wear them anymore. It feels really bad. Anytime I meditate, if I'm wearing clothes, just can't do it. Feels terrible. It's really weird. I don't know what's going on. So it's like, like, you know, like, it's kind of weird.

Like, I, I, like, get it now. Like, when I meditate, this is great. Wool feels like sandpaper. Clothes feel like sandpaper. It's weird. Have y'all ever experienced this when you meditate? That you just can't wear anything anymore? I'm just fucking weird.

I don't meditate fully naked, but I'll let Chardis. Nuditation. Dude, I love Chanty. Oh, my God. So based. We're going to do nuditation. I love it. I love it.

That's okay. Welcome, Jacob. Thanks for catching us live. We're about to sign off because we're now talking about nuditation, the meditemptor. It's so good. Will there ever be yoga practice videos to compliment the guide? I hope so. But I don't know when. I hope so. You all. Look, there's like a ton of stuff to do. Yeah, so can you use Memory Palace? I never understood Memory Palace. I was like, what are these people talking about? Like this visualizing of memories in different places? No idea what they're

talking about. What does Dr. Kaye know about the Kotard delusion? You think that I don't know what the Kotar delusion is, the feeling that parts of your body are melting away or dead inside you, that you have organs that are rotting. Usually a manifestation of interestingly enough, not schizophrenia, but depression with psychotic features. I think more likely to be Kotard delusion. And a really interesting thing, so this is really cool about Kotard delusion. So Kotar delusion is like when people believe that a part of them is rotting. So if you look at the mechanism, it's fascinating. What people usually have is a smell. They smell something that smells foul or rotting. Then what happens is their association cortex becomes hyperactive,

and they start to try to interpret what could be the reason why everywhere I go I smell a rotting smell. They also have probably some kind of like proprioceptive blindness combined with a smell, combined with a hyperactive association cortex. So I don't feel, something feels missing inside me. I don't feel something inside me. The ability to tell where I am, like if I, If I close my eyes and I go like this, I'm going to be able to feel where my arms are. So that sense is somehow impaired. I have this constant smell that follows me around that smells a little bit rotting or stinky. And then I have a hyperactive association cortex that tries to make sense of these two things.

And usually my thought process is psychotic, which means that when I have a thought, I believe the thought is real. And these four or five things, I think, is what results in the Kotard dilution. Anybody else want to pimp me? We can play this game. Can cannabis induce psychosis? Absolutely. So cannabis has multiple psychoactive compounds. The really interesting thing is that cannabis, the THC in cannabis is pro-psychotic, the CBD in cannabis is antipsychotic. So what tends to happen, this is why synthetic cannabinoids like K2, which are usually isolates of THC, are much likely, much more likely to induce psychosis than natural cannabis. So people who are saying

gets balanced. It maybe used to be. But now what started to happen is as we concentrate cannabis, the balances, I think, going away. Can meditation help with going through a breakup or going through finding a goal? I think so. But I mean, it's like you got to be a little bit careful. All right, y'all. We'll see you all tomorrow for doctors versus AI. Hopefully it'll be interesting. So it's great. So Alex is like, chat GPT is better than any therapist I've ever had. So let's see. Let's see how therapists and AI will respond to various scenarios or cases. And we'll see.

Like, I think that's what we're here to do. Just see what happens. Right? So some people say AI sucks. I tried. Other people say AI is great. I have clients and stuff that use AI. I have told me that's very helpful.

So we'll see. Let's see what happens. Thanks for joining us today. We're here to help you understand your mind. and live a better life. If you enjoy the conversation, be sure to subscribe. Until next time,

take care of yourselves and each other.