What's Your Drama - Sasha Answers: Is It Really Cheating If He Doesn't Remember It???

Episode Date: January 24, 2017

On this week’s show: how to deal with your body shaming friend, do you leave your cheating boyfriend if he didn’t know he cheated and how to get down with your own culture.Lainey and I had fun hashing all of these out so we hope you enjoy it! Thanks for all the love and feedback but most of all thank you for trusting us with your personal problems. Keep them coming at [e-mail] and of course please check us out on iTunes and Google Play! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hi, this is Lainey, and welcome to the Lainey Gossip Podcast for Sasha Answers. Hi, Sasha. Hi, how's it going? It's good, but it's been… It's hard. Right? Yeah. It's good, but it's hard.

Maybe we're being overly dramatic, but I feel like many women especially would agree that the last few days have been in, what is it, a whirlwind of emotion? Yeah. Well, I hope that no one's over talking about this. We were talking a little bit about this before we started the podcast, which is like, this is a conversation we need to continue to push and people shouldn't feel tired about talking about women's rights and equal rights. And this weekend was really tumultuous.

It started with like a bummer. You know, we got together on Friday night. When I think back on that car ride, it's kind of hilarious. I was very uncomfortable. So we got together because it was Kathleen's birthday party. So I got in an Uber and then I Ubered over to your place. And then you and Corey got in. And the three of us were just like, uh, we don't, like, not in a party mood.

No. Everyone was in super buzzkill mode, which is fair. Corey was in, like, he was simmering with anger and frustration. And, like, the kind of person when they don't talk, but then you can just feel that he's shooting out rage. he was he'll kill me but he like literally cried for an hour

before we got into the Uber and when we got into the Uber was very angry and was like looking out the window the whole time like

like it would be in a montage of a movie he's like looking out the window and this sad song is playing yeah and then cut to Joanna then Joanna gets in the car

and we're all over into Kathleen's party together and we are all of us just like miserable every 30 seconds sighing yeah

yeah and then we go to Kathleen's party and it's fun I mean she is in her element every

like everybody a lot of people we know are there she is like rocking her cleavage that she's rocking her cleavage that night

we had a good time and then Saturday happened and it was a different turnaround of emotion right

so it was a wonderful wonderful wonderful inspiring day love that I loved yesterday or Saturday

I love Saturday so much I just loved you know every time I looked at Twitter or whatever, there were more aerial shots of like Chicago, Denver, and they were like exceeding expectations, more women, peaceful, love. The signs were hilarious. Yeah, they were great. But now we're back to, we're taping this on Monday and I don't know about you.

I'm now, I still want to continue the fight, but I have to say Trump's decisions today have been another downer for me. well the big decision are i mean in terms of female focused issues global gag and for those of you who don't know what that is google it it's very self-explanatory but it has to do with taking away women's reproductive rights and that is why especially on saturday planned parenthood had such a presence at the women's march this these are organizations that educate people specifically women on their choices their options their body yeah um and uh yeah we we need to keep up the fight i after mental fight too right can we talk about the correct pipeline as well so women's

issues environmental issues i mean it's it runs the whole gamut of what a fuck up trump is going to make this world but continue sorry no i mean and i feel like we you know i think that for us what was said on Saturday is that Saturday couldn't be a one-off and that people had to keep talking about it and keep having a conversation. So what we would like to do is continue that conversation

and remind people what organizations are important, people who are doing great work, to support them, not only with your mouth, but if you can, if you can, with your pocketbook.

I made donations to Planned Parenthood in Canada and in the U.S. today. And then hopefully for us, you'll be okay, for those of you listening, for us, given that Sasha and I have this little platform, this little podcast, we would like to, whenever we can, advocate for those causes. Amen. Okay. Well, now it's time to judge people.

Where we feel at home. You know what? We can be, human beings are complicated and contain multitudes and we can have balance. It's all about social culture. Yes. All right. So, I guess it's just a given that I read. Yeah, yeah.

Have you not established that? Okay. 60 podcasts. Okay. Hello, Sasha. This is an hello, not a hello. Oh, really? It's an hello, Sasha.

I have a friend, Leanne, who recently joined my gym. I was initially super happy about it because I love working out with friends. If this is gym gossip and, like, gym drama… You just got back from the gym, so this is perfect timing. This is the best. Okay. Anyway, sorry. Leanne has reached out to me a couple times for fitness advice in the past, and I'm always

happy to help with her with tips and tricks for making a routine stick. During my underground, I lost, or sorry, during my undergrad, I lost a considerable amount of weight through exercise and healthy eating. Croissants are not sandwich bread. But I'm not a professional athlete or an Instagram model by any stretch of the imagination. I am, generally speaking, really happy with my body and thankful for my health. Leanne, on the other hand, is really negative and is constantly talking to me about how fat she is, gym, book club, weekend parties. Trust me, she has a rock and bod and is nowhere near overweight. I always tell her to focus on her health. But now that she's at my gym and is in the same class as me, I'm worried about becoming her body shaming

soundboard. And I'm really not interested in having that conversation on a consistent basis. I also don't want her negative attitude rubbing off of me. She has hinted, in my opinion, about struggling with an eating disorder in the past, so I'm particularly mindful about being positive and supportive. But I also want my gym time to be a time where I can turn off and unwind too. Any advice on how to deal with the negative body talk going forward? I want to be a good friend, but it's stressing me out. Please keep my name anonymous.

Okay, well, we will keep your name anonymous and call you Joan. Oh, okay. Okay, Joan. I like that you're feeling Joan. This is so interesting because I think as females, we hear this negative body talk all the time. And I feel like there's kind of two main reasons why maybe girls do this. One is because obviously what's happening with Leanne is she feels insecure and she

wants, she's looking for a compliment. And then I feel like the other one is something that like someone like Chrissy Teigen does a lot, which is kind of levels the playing field and says like, oh, look at my cellulite. like, oh, look, I'm pounding back burgers in my face because I'm just like you. Don't feel threatened. Don't feel threatened. Don't feel threatened. Right.

But both of those, at the end of the day, I think are quite… And sometimes it could be a cry for help, like… Yes. …which we're trying to figure out here. Yes. Yeah. But I guess I think while one is more likable, right? Like, I like the Chrissy Teigen style, they're still both kind of negative body talk, right?

I don't necessarily know that they're really uplifting women in general or making people feel good. So that's just interesting. But I've done it before. Oh my God, I've done it so many times. I think we all negative body talk in front of people. Yeah. And I don't know.

Is it conditioning? Is it imagery? Is it this idea that like only one type of body is perfect? All of the above? all of the above yeah and then what do you do yeah like and i get how joan is feeling because she's at the gym for her um health both body health and mental health like they say that when you go to the gym you are working out also what's in your head i certainly when i get back from the gym i feel a little less pissy yeah like yeah you you have some like happy emotions going

on your head not your angry ones I hate being at the gym and I'm angry when I'm there it fucking sucks but it's a weird thing as soon as I'm done

remember when we worked out before you are actually terrifying to work out with you're not fun in those environments at all

because you're like get it over with you don't ever want to like socialize or smile I'm miserable at the gym I'm glad that you

are like providing evidence of how terrible I am I don't think we work out anymore because you're really not fun no but then after

I'm like in a great mood. I just worked out before this podcast. So I get where Joan's coming from, but I also want to attack what the issue is underneath Leigh-Anne's negative talk. And I feel like we're all there. What do you do when you have a friend who's just like, nah? Well, I think you can, like once in a while, because we say like lots of people do that, right? And it's okay. Sometimes your friend, you're like, you want to just get, if all your friend needs is a compliment, then you just give them one and they feel better and it's all good. But if it keeps on happening over and over again, and God knows I feel like I've had friends

like that, it's fucking really boring and annoying. I think something that you can do, especially in a gym environment, is create like a pact, right? You say, Leanne, oh my God, we're here every, you know, once a week. Let's just make sure that like this is like such a positive time, like we're just always talking about how positive we feel about our bodies for this hour and there, right? Like, you're going to wrap it up like that. Like, let's do a gym pact. Like, we're super positive. We're super body positive.

Yay. Do you know what I mean? You can do that to shut her up. Yeah. That's something you can do for that hour for sure. Yeah. And then I guess that's the start, right? It's like then you counter everything with like, hey, but you're going to feel so great

after this class. It's, it's, um, Haley, you know, I trained with Haley when I, when I am in Vancouver and Haley, that's what she has to do every single day with her clients. Haley writes this money fitness column on our blog. And so she has clients. But she's paid to do that. She is paid to do that. But I mean, nobody wants to be paid also to be like dragged down all the time.

Do you know what I mean? And, like, at a certain point, she also gets to be selective about which clients she takes. That's the beauty of it. And so I know that, like, of course, you just said that when I work out, I'm the worst person ever. A dick. Yes. And Haley kind of wouldn't let me do that. She would just be like, you got to push through this now.

You know, it's okay. Think about how good you're going to feel later. Think about all those calories you're burning. Like, you know, whatever she knows that motivates me. Well, she has to be motivational. Yeah. Yeah. I just don't know if that's Leigh-

But you weren't sitting with Haley being like, oh, I feel so fat. I can feel my thighs rubbing together. Like, I'm sure you weren't doing that. Like, I'm sure you were just like, I don't want to do fucking 10 more reps. Well, I wouldn't say that, but I would be like, I'm pathetic. You know, I'm so weak. I'm such a weak ass. I can't lift anything.

I have such a weakling body. Like, because I have zero upper body strength. okay oh right you have weak arms like you've told me that before no you told me that i don't think they look like that but you've told me that they are very bad so i don't know i feel like yeah that is the first step to be like the positivity police or the cheerleader but then what if it continues then what happens i think you have to ignore it like i think you have to deflect every time she says that something like you're like okay well let's not talk about that like instead like did you see this thing on you know tv the other night like i think you just kind of slap it away every

time it comes your way. Yeah. And now let's talk about, do you think Leanne is a cry, is it a cry for help? What about those hints about a possible eating disorder? Like this is, if this is a mental health issue, I would also then think about having a conversation that is more serious and more focused. Hey, I'm worried about you. But outside of the gym, like outside of like, hey, why don't we, you know, after go get a, I don't know what, a smoothie, healthy drink, a juice. And then over the juice or whatever, the kale juice, you, you say like, Hey, I'm a little bit worried about you. You know, like I, um, I've been hearing a lot of things that you're saying about yourself and I want to be your friend. I want to be supportive. Um, do you, do you want to go together to a

program? Do you want to go talk to somebody together? I'm here for you. I think that, but only you can figure out what those signs are in your friendship. Yeah. Like I think, yeah, keep one eye open and start to see her like rapidly losing weight or if she's like running to the bathroom. If you see those kind of eating disorder cues, then yes, completely do what you just suggested, which is like be there for her and help her through that time. But my vibes is that Leanne is just one of those people who's looking for a compliment, you know, who has some body issues like a lot of women do. And, but other than just sucking it up and just trying to deal with it on her own, she's extending that need for a compliment. And that gets really tired.

Yeah. Like that gets really, as I said before, it gets really boring too. I will say though, I think that like, you know, we all though have to work on changing our language and especially in terms of what we consider to be attainable and what our goals are. And I'm the first to call myself that. I'm so much harder on myself. And that's the thing where I can relate to Leanne, I think, where Joan is saying, Leanne's not even overweight in the very least, but we're always so hard on ourselves.

Yeah, 100%. But we reach out differently, though. You know what I mean? like we are all hard on ourselves but you don't you don't barf out all your insecurities to me well I know I do to Yassic okay yeah but that's what Yassic's there for which is great but you don't do that I don't think you do that with your close friends like you know if you're having a rough day of course like I want to hear all of the things that you're feeling but I think you're sensitive enough to know like you can't pummel somebody with your insecurities all the time

And that's not fair. And again, like, I am not good at it either. This weekend I went to go see my hairstylist and she's 25. She's so, like, she's hot. She's rad. She's just awesome. And I find myself now, now that I've turned 38, like, I'm, like, desperate for age compliments. So I kept on fishing and fishing and fishing for compliments.

Yes. Yeah. Like, a total fucking psycho. Like, what were you like? I kept on being like, oh, well, like, when you get, like, as old as me. like and I kept on dropping these things and she fucking wouldn't bite she wouldn't bite like she wasn't what I was hoping for her to be like it's like oh no like what you're like five years older than me nothing and so I realized what am I doing like I walked out of there on Saturday I was like

I'm the biggest idiot like I just spent a solid hour desperately trying to feel like some like a young person would also think I was young, too. So I get it. Like, we all do it. But now, see, I have the forethought. Like, I'll never do that again because that's really annoying. Yes. Right. But I don't know. But yes. But I feel like in your position, like, in your defense, like, do I look 38? You really don't. Not to me. Okay. Great. But to my hairstylist, I look like 80. But okay. I know

I was just trying to point out how old I am yeah but people tell you you look young all the time anyways whatever I really like hearing it though yeah I'm not gonna

I'm not gonna fucking complain about hearing like about that yeah but listen I don't know if we've reached a conclusion here

for Joan I thought my pact thing was a really good idea that's a really good starting point is a good starting point but yeah keep your

as you said keep one eye open for issues that you think may be a little bit more significant and if that is the case then I think that you need to like be there solid as a friend and take her out of the gym have a very serious compassionate talk but we understand too that your mental health and your spiritual health and your physical health is important too

So for sure, if this is getting to the point where it is like eating away at your mental health, then let's regroup and talk about this again. But right now, you sound pretty good. Let us know, though, if we need to revisit this. Okay, next. Yes. I started Ornod in 2013, and we make bike apparel. The best part of Shopify for me is our ability to run the business as essentially non-technical people.

We're able to admin everything on the back end, front end, and sell things online easily. If Shopify were a bike accessory, I think it would actually be the bicycle. It's the thing that you do the thing on. We run the business on Shopify. Start your free trial on Shopify.com. now that we fucking feel so good about ourselves or not um okay hi sasha a few months ago i married my boyfriend of six years congratulations we have an amazing life together however we recently took a vacation and my husband got deliriously drunk i was tired that night and decided to go back to

our hotel room while he stayed out with a few people we met at the resort the next morning he woke up and told me that he felt like he had sex. It obviously wasn't with me, but I just brushed it off because he was so drunk that he could barely remember anything the night before. He didn't even know how he got back into our room. My husband is a bit of a hypochondriac, so when he started freaking out about maybe having an STD from someone he can't remember, I just blamed it on maybe getting a rash from swimming in the pool all day. Fast forward to when we get back home and he's still worried that something happened, so he went to the doctor for a checkup so he can stop obsessing. Turns out he did contract something. He came back as HIV positive.

I don't know how to feel about this. I know that I've not contracted this illness because after his night out, we didn't have unprotected sex, but I will be tested to make sure. I don't know what to do now. Do I leave him? I love my life and I'm not as hurt as I think someone that was cheated on should be. Does this mean I don't love him? I'm not even all that worried as to what might happen to his health. Is this even… What did she just say? She said, I'm not even all that worried as to what might happen to his health. Is this even considered cheating when someone isn't conscious of what happened? Should I stay or go? I can't bring myself to tell anyone else about this and really need advice on how I should handle it. Any guidance would really help. Thank

you, Q. And we, Q used her real name when she wrote to us. Yes. And we have tried to get in touch with her for a little bit more information, but she has… we haven't heard back, but we thought we'd address it anyway. Okay, so anyway, they're married, there was a holiday, he got really wasted, came back, thought he might have had sex, now he's HIV positive. So, okay, so what she really wants to know is whether or not she should leave him. Right. Like, this is the dilemma here.

it's interesting though she doesn't even seem to be very bothered by the fact that I mean she's I'm sure right now she's so confused and doesn't understand any of the emotions she's feeling because in this letter she says that she doesn't really know how she feels about the cheating almost didn't care afterwards and also isn't worried about him having HIV you know what I mean like I'm trying to figure out what she actually is really affected by and for me I think both situations are of like dire dire need of attention yeah like the dude has HIV uh you need to as she said was going to get tested thank god um but like that that's a a serious health issue that you should really be invested in and worried about right yes uh and then yeah I guess it's

Like, what's your stance on blindly, drunk, blindly cheating? What's your take on that? Like, do you forgive someone if they don't remember it? I don't know. Like, I, I, God, I, if this were me and Yasik and I were on holiday, I don't, I feel it would be to me and this is just our life and the way our relationship works it would be really weird to me for him to like go out and get so blitzed that he couldn't remember what happened and without you and without me it's just at home is one thing because like you know the environment

and those are your friends and i'm going to trust that you're out with your boys your girls your crew and you're gonna have each other's backs but when you're alone together and you're like in a foreign place it just that just I don't know that to me is weird okay it's not like just going on a walk it's like right let me go party with these people strangers these strangers so but I don't know is that am I being closed-minded is that we I just feel like that's just weirding me out yeah i mean i'll be honest all of this weirds me out um but but let's just get to like the crux of the situation let's say yasik for whatever reason stayed at the bar later came back home to you in your hotel room and was like uh i think i might have fucked someone not

quite sure you later find out that he's fucked someone because he's fucking has hiv how do you feel about that like then i'm worried i'm like was he roofied okay like all that like then i'm And I'm like, oh my God, like now I'm worried like he was violated. Now I'm worried that he was sexually assaulted. Okay, that is totally, that's a great point because that could totally be it. When you're blackout drunk, you, I mean, it doesn't almost matter if you're roofied or not. You're not in your right mindset, right?

So I would say. So do you forgive that? So I would say that Jacek would not have been in his right mind to give consent. Okay. And then if he was not, like, clearly if her husband doesn't remember what happened, then I don't think he can remember giving consent. And so we have talked on this podcast before that consent, like, can't be given when you can't remember giving, like, you know?

So to me, you would approach it as, I wonder in this case, if you approach it as a sexual assault. How about if he wasn't roofied? How about if he just drank himself into a crazy, dark stupor? It's the same. So is it the same? Like he wasn't in a position to give consent. But how about if he's at the bar and he's drunk and he isn't saying no.

But there's like, there's movement. He's hitting on a girl, right? Because you do some crazy shit when you're drunk. I just think that to me… So he negates it no matter what. I think that in this case, if this were a woman, I would apply whether or not she was in any capacity to give consent. If we would understand how a woman could find herself in that position and is drinking and

then is taken advantage of or doesn't remember and all that, I would be like, then don't we have to apply the same to a man? But typically men, and this is a generalization, but we're generalizing everything at this point, is men typically are the people who make the moves, right? It happens, though. Men can be sexually assaulted. Totally. Yes.

A hundred, a hundred thousand percent. But we're just kind of like, everything is, we're kind of like juggling this problem up in the air. So maybe… This is like, can we agree? This is a really weird situation, right? So maybe I feel like, let's just give, so if he was roofied or if he was, wasn't able to give consent because a woman was coming on to him and jumped on his dick, then we

say you stay with him, right? Because he didn't in fact cheat on you. Is that what we're saying? I don't know. I mean, we haven't even explored the issue of like, trust here. oh hey bring that fucking monster in then i just like this is so like yeah what is she needs to that's why like we had so many follow-up questions because she needs to find yeah and i guess that's it really she needs to come up with these answers which are a what was your relationship like before

this have you b have you always trusted him c has he has he had sketchy sexual behavior before You know, like these are kind of the questions that we don't have the answers to, but she does. Yeah. And if those are yes, yes, yes, if in fact he has had sketchy past, if he is not trustworthy, if he has kind of sometimes cheated on you before, if you don't have any trust in him, chances are he fucking ran around behind your back during the vacation and indeed you should probably leave him.

But the thing here is that she doesn't seem to care. like she's saying I love my life and I don't know if I'm even that mad should I be mad like but then you're in denial

homegirl I don't and this is where this whole situation like I would like I you know if we could

really get more information or if I could just be in front of her I would be like I don't want to invalidate the things that she's saying like it's not

it's not up to us to be like you should be mad like I mean but mostly she's obviously she's obviously very confused

and conflicted with a lot of emotion because she wouldn't write in. So I think she needs to get in touch with some of her emotion, whether it be anger or sadness, because this is, like, a heavy motherfucking situation. Yeah. So I'm going to tell her right now. Like, you might not want to tell her,

but I'm telling her she needs to feel something about this in order to make a decision. But I mean, like, most critically, though, he's HIV positive, so now he has to work out a plan, like, a treatment plan. You know, the diagnosis has happened, so now I'm assuming that he is in regular care of a medical plan of medication to – people live – hello, Magic Johnson. I was just going to say. Yeah, so you can have great lives with a combination of drugs. Like, they have made so many great breakthroughs with HIV treatment and medication.

so you know that has to be the priority too um and and supporting him through that or not does she support him through that like you know she's saying that she's not really that bothered as you said there are so many things that need to be answered here but this is such a big big big situation that i don't think that it can be answered in a completely um in a complete way Without professional assistance, I do think that Q needs to go with her husband, first of all, in terms of the medical, on the medical side of this, and then to, you know… To see what they can do with the relationship. Yes.

Yeah. Because, wow. Yeah. Like, Q, we're really, really sorry about how, like… We feel for you in this situation. We feel for you. And we wish we had more of the answers to our questions, but even beyond that, I think this is above our pay grade here, and that I think she really should be taking this to a therapist, as you said. But I think that the reason why we wanted to bring this forward is because in situations like this that are so tricky, you start by asking questions, and you start by…

Oh, thank you for reaching out, right? Yes. You start by asking questions. And Sasha and I have been trying to examine all the angles. There are probably 18 angles that we haven't even addressed. We were trying to look at it from so many different sides. And I think what we try to do here on this podcast is to have those conversations and to keep looking at things from different sides. And so if you're out there listening, this may not have anything to do with you, but it is, I feel like even if it doesn't have anything to do with you, I think that these are questions that are worth exploring for everybody, even in healthy relationships. Like, you know, you, you're, it's almost like preparation or at least safeguarding or just opening that up. Yeah, absolutely.

Okay, last one. Hi, Sasha. After kissing frogs with the emotional equivalent of crusty, pus-filled warts, yummy, I finally found my amazing prince two years ago. I love him. He loves me, blah, blah. My problem, he's white and I'm not. I'm South Asian, and growing up, I rejected everything to do with my heritage.

As an adult, I don't feel all that connected to my peeps, and I'm having a major cultural identity crisis. I guess I assumed I'd marry someone exactly like me, and I wouldn't have to work at it. My boyfriend is so awesomely supportive and I wouldn't change a single thing about him, but I can't help but feel lost. Both of you married white dudes.

Please help me. Love recently down with being brown. Wow. Okay, so… And does she mean by… Sorry, she said something about her peeps. Did she mean her, like, white peeps or her South Asian peeps? Sorry, I was confused by that.

so she said that when she was growing up she rejected her heritage and now as an adult she doesn't feel quote all that connected to my peeps because i guess she didn't have that history okay got you yeah okay um okay well talk to me about marrying a white guy i don't even think that the guy has anything to do with that no that's what i was gonna say i was like i could tell you about what it is to be married to a white person but i don't even know like that doesn't apply here. I think what applies here is, you know, you feel disconnected from your heritage. And I think that's like a really important thing to highlight. And it's important to get to know that. And you can still be in a relationship with a white dude, a yellow

dude, a black dude, and still forge on and find out more about who you are, where you come from, like culturally, what your people love to do, their traditions. Like these are all things that you can do whilst being in a relationship with a white dude? Yeah. I honestly don't think this is about your relationship with him. It's about a relationship with yourself. Yeah. As corny and as sex in the city as this sounds, this is about your relationship with yourself. And I can tell you from personal experience that as a Chinese girl growing up in Toronto, I was often growing up the only Chinese girl in my class. And a lot of what you're feeling has to do with a sense of otherness. Like at that age, when you're young, you don't want to be other. You want to be the

same. You want to fit in. And so in North America, especially, there are so many communities where it's almost default. Whiteness is a default. So anything that isn't white, anybody who isn't white is made to feel intentionally or unintentionally to feel like they're, they're an outsider. And then when I was younger was, had like total white wannabe-ness. Right. I don't think that that, I'm not going to be mad at myself for that. No, but you were also very heavily rooted in your Chinese culture. Well, I had parents.

You had that when you got home. Yeah. I mean, I had no choice. Like, my mother was like, you're Chinese, and I'm going to speak to you like you're a Chinese person, and this is who you are, and this is what you're going to learn. Do you feel like you rejected your Chinese-ium for being white? Like, trying to be more white or trying to hang with your white friends? I think that, I think so.

Like, would you eat your smelly Chinese lunches in front of your white friends? Well, I didn't have a choice because that's what was packed for me. Well, no, some people would toss that shit and, like, eat nothing. I'm just curious to know how much you rejected or didn't. I didn't because, like, I also have no willpower when I'm hungry. Like, I just had to eat. But what I would do is, like, think about getting a perm, you know, and want to change my features and dream about it.

There's a really – you know the movie Precious? Yes. And so there was a really awful but amazing scene where Precious looks in the mirror and what looks back at her is a skinny white woman and it's it resonated with me i am not a black girl but and i certainly have i have i have had the luxury of not having to you know live through the hardship and the prejudice that um uh black americans and black canadians have had to live with 100 so i'm not at any point here trying to be like yeah i know what that is but i do understand what it is to look in a mirror and my ideal version of myself in the past

my ideal version of myself was like to look like a white girl yeah um and so and it's all it's all those influences as movies right like your favorite rom-coms the hot hot guy falls for the hot hot white girl so all of that is contributing to it so I don't I don't really want to I don't really want to be hard on the person who's writing in because I get it I've been there but but we're cut to the fact that she's probably in her I don't know late 20s early 30s so this is something that you were feeling in elementary school and high school and then you found yourself yes and you realized how important your culture was and how amazing it is yeah so i think that this is uh an opportunity for our our letter writer to um embrace that now yeah you know

and and feel the pain that you probably felt growing up feeling rejected feeling like the other and now embracing the fact that the other is quite awesome. Yes. And surrounding yourself with messaging that reflects that and rejecting messaging that doesn't. Yeah. And that's hard. It's hard in our, like, in, we are trying to change that in arts and entertainment and

in culture, but it is hard to escape, for sure. But on the flip side, it's quite easy to learn about your culture, though. that's what's kind of exciting about this like this isn't that difficult of a problem if she does want to re-immerse herself in her culture right she can go to her parents she can go to her cousins you know I mean she can really start educating herself on all the stuff that she sort of missed out on so it's I think it's kind of actually a really liberating fun thing she can be doing in 2017 is getting to know everything that she missed yeah and in a you know to go back to the relationship with yourself, it's almost like you are getting to, you're dating

you. Like you're, it's that process of discovery of, and again, this is so corny, but it's true. Like self-acceptance is about figuring out or meeting the best parts of yourself and identifying them. So I want to have, I wish people would have more conversations about this because it is something that is difficult to escape when you are different. Yeah. Especially in, especially here. Oh, and around the world where, like, even where, where our ancestors are from, Sasha, or some of our ancestors, like mine, definitely, and half of yours, like, there is, like, white

worship in Asia, too. Oh, yeah. Right? The whiter the skin, man. My mom, my grandmother loved that I came out like a porcelain, like, Casper. Mm-hmm. She loved that I was white. You know, that's something that is ingrained in our culture very much so.

It's like, the whiter your skin, the better you are. That's right. And so we have to, like, I mean, I don't just knock it in North America. Like, in Chinese culture, I mean, we can speak, I can speak directly to Chinese culture. That's some bullshit, too. And we kind of have to, you know, address those. And it happens in different iterations and in different ways. Like, I'll talk about JASIC right now.

Jacek is a white guy, but I don't want anybody to misconstrue. I'm not, like, I'm certainly not trying to say that this white male has it the same as people of color. But I will say, I just want to say, tell a story about him in that he was born in Poland and then came to Canada when he was very young, like six or seven years old. and only spoke Polish, and his family is like super cool. And so he, when he started going to school, this young boy going to school in Canada, he has talked about how he didn't keep up with the Polish language.

He, maybe rejection is too strong of a word, but our reader here used the word rejection. He kind of became as Canadian as he could, and he only spoke English. and gradually he lost his comfort level with the Polish language to the point where he's too shy to speak Polish now. He understands it perfectly and he could, like he gets by. And when we went to Poland a few years ago, he totally could. But I remember him saying to me, like, this is what I did because I didn't want to feel other.

I didn't want to go to school and be made fun of my accent or whatever. And as an adult, he was like, I don't know if that was the right thing to do because my brother, his brother is older than he is, has totally retained it and is like super comfortable being Polish and speaking Polish and Jacek isn't. And so you look back on these things and the decisions that you make when you're younger and they're valid decisions because you want to fit in, right? but I wouldn't go so far as to say that he's mourning what he's lost but you kind of like you have those tinges of regret oh it's the same with me I mean I got as I've said like I was born in Hong Kong lived there came to Canada and I got totally whitewashed you know I would when people were like oh because I look I guess more Chinese than Yugoslav I'd be like no I'm like I'm also Yugoslav like don't forget the other half of me right and then yeah like same deal my

sister is like super china woman and knows you know can speak fluently and i lost that all and i have major major regret about that so gasic 2017 i'll learn cantonese again if you if you know how if you want to learn polish oh are you saying yes do you need a microphone okay he's not in but i that's something that i really want to do and i think that's that's how i that's why i can kind of relate to our writers like yes i want that too like i think we all want to um like learn stuff about us now when you're older and you're not such a dickhead but just to leave it there for one more thing i to be honest have been talking and duanna's been talking about it and sarah's been talking about it and we've all been talking about it on laney gossip about the value of other

stories chimimanda you know we all know chimimanda if you don't google her she is the one who um Beyonce sampled in Flawless her voice about feminism she had a great TED talk and it was a few years ago I encourage you to listen to it and her TED talk was about other stories and the importance of hearing other stories because for too long especially in storytelling in mainstream storytelling we've only heard one story Leonardo DiCaprio's fucking story no but like that Revenant story, right? Like the white guy goes out in the wilderness and whatever. Anyway. And I want to tell this person who's written into us that I'm so curious about your story. So you have to be curious about your story in order to tell it to me. So hopefully you will find yourself as

interesting as we find you and have a story to tell that is so uniquely yours and isn't told very often I want to end on that anyway that was really good Jimmy Madness TED talk go listen to it go watch it and thank you for sharing that with us that was you know it's not it's hard to it's hard to say that you're not really into yourself

yeah it's hard to be vulnerable so thank you to all of our writers for your questions and keep them coming to Sasha at LaineyGossip.com and check us out on iTunes and Google Play and we will talk next week guys bye We'll be right back.