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Babes in Bookland
A podcast celebrating women's memoirs, one story at a time!
Babes in Bookland
Hair, Hope, and the Burden of Being Human // Allison Landa's "Bearded Lady"
What defines beauty, and who decides if we're worthy of love?
In this deeply personal conversation about Alison Landa's memoir "Bearded Lady," my friend, Misty, and I explore the profound struggle of living with congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH), condition that causes excessive body hair growth, and the lifelong journey toward self-acceptance.
Allison's story begins in childhood when her mother, rather than filling a prescription that could help manage her condition, simply teaches her to shave. This moment sets the stage for years of struggle with both her physical appearance and her self-worth. Through bullying, failed treatments, and romantic disappointments, Allison questions whether she'll ever find acceptance... from others or herself.
As we unpack this powerful memoir, we weave in their own experiences with body image, parenting, and the search for self-acceptance. Misty, pregnant during recording, shares candid reflections about her changing body and her fears about motherhood while I talk about my own experience with bullying due to body hair. We hope our conversation creates a safe space to discuss the vulnerability we all face in our bodies.
The episode culminates with Allison's discovery that wanting to change something about yourself isn't always about conforming to society's standards—sometimes it's simply about honoring your own desires. Her eventual finding of love with someone who accepts her completely while supporting her choices provides a beautiful resolution to her journey.
This conversation will resonate with anyone who has ever felt defined by something they wish to change about themselves, or who has questioned where the line between self-acceptance and self-improvement truly lies. Join us for this thoughtful exploration of the burden—and beauty—of being human.
Subscribe now to hear more thought-provoking discussions about books that explore women's diverse experiences and the courage to live authentically.
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Buy “Bearded Lady” by Allison Landa
Transcripts are available through Apple’s podcast app—they may not be perfect, but relying on them allows me to dedicate more time to the show! If you’re interested in being a transcript angel, let me know.
This episode is produced, recorded, and its content edited by me.
Technical editing by Brianna Picone
Theme song by Devin Kennedy
Special thanks to my dear friend, Misty!
Xx, Alex
Hey there, I'm your host, Alex Franca, and this is Babes in Bookland. Thank you so much for listening, and if you want to further support the show, you can find us on Patreon or subscribe on Apple Podcasts to access the extended version of this episode, plus other fun bonus episodes where I do deep dives into some of my favorite movies growing up. You can also find super cute merchandise, like our Read More Women's Memoirs t-shirt on TeePublic Just search for the Babes in Bookland podcast page there. Okay, so my friend Misty is back and we're discussing Alison Landa's Bearded Lady. When you're a woman with a beard, your secret is written all over your face. Let's get to it. Hi, Misty, Hi, glad to be back. I am so excited to talk about Bearded Lady with you.
Speaker 1:I know you didn't get a chance to read it, but I think one of the biggest takeaways from this book is how we feel beautiful, how we go through the world as women, judged a certain way, and you have always been someone who I personally feel just is very comfortable existing in your own skin. You don't wear a lot of makeup. You haven't done a lot of the you know like, have you ever touched your eyebrows? No, and I think that's so incredible and I really admire that. So I'm really excited to get into that with you today, along with a few other fun topics, but that's kind of the overall theme. So Bearded Lady is a funny and heartbreaking account of Alison's struggle to feel beautiful, to feel worthy and to feel loved. I was really rooting for her to find peace and to feel valued and valuable, and I appreciated her vulnerability and honesty about her struggles and the dark thoughts that we can all have when we don't quote fit in, whatever that means to us. So you ready to dig into it Ready? So Bearded Lady was published in 2022, and this is her dedication for Adam Baz, Jack and Maisie.
Speaker 1:Everything Okay, so you know. I like to start off my episodes with my quick topics. At one point, Allison writes about how different friends bring out different sides of her. She writes With Missy, I am both considerate and considered calm and seemingly collected. But Tina is different. She brings out the brass in me, the bitchiness, All my hard edges show around her, and I kind of like it, and so I was wondering do you have specific friends that you feel bring out different sides of you, or do you ever catch yourself acting differently with different friends?
Speaker 2:I do think that I behave slightly different depending on who I'm with, because I feel like different people have different vibes or different things that they enjoy talking about or discussing, or you relate to people differently on different topics. I may talk to my friend, let's say I have an old colleague, a friend, a mentor, that I'm talking to about work-related, and we're talking about that. I wouldn't talk about that in my book club, right? So you know, the energy is just different. So I do think that I'm different. I will say my husband is polar opposite. He is the same all the time, it doesn't matter who he's with, and I think that's also an admirable quality, because you're just who you are all the time, versus kind of calibrating to who you're with.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think. For me it's almost like the closer I grow to someone, the more comfortable and relaxed I get You're not trying to produce conversation or orchestrate conversation.
Speaker 1:Right, yeah, okay, let's dive deeper into bearded lady. So Alison, through lots of trial and tribulations, finally she ultimately gets diagnosed and treated for something called congenital adrenal hyperplasia. And Alison has the most common version of this 21 hydroxylase deficiency. She writes my body overproduces hormones, which in my case causes male pattern hair growth and baldness, irregular periods, infertility and obesity. The disease can cause height retardation. It also causes genetic ambiguity. This manifests differently in each CAH patient.
Speaker 1:I'm lucky enough to only have a mildly enlarged clitoris and reduced vaginal opening, which makes intercourse difficult. So hence the title of her memoir Bearded Lady. She has excessive hair. It grows on her face and on other parts of her body and this is really, like I said earlier, her journey to feeling beautiful through this condition, despite this condition, and also the conquering of this condition, because it isn't just this simple thing where she's diagnosed with this and starts taking a pill and gets it under control. That's unfortunately not what happens for her and a large part of that has to do with her family. So let's talk about her family a little bit. I think our initial sense of value and self-worth comes from our relationships with our parents. Do you agree? And how do you feel like your parents helped create how you feel about yourself.
Speaker 2:My parents were not very about looks or physical appearance, did your?
Speaker 1:mom ever wear makeup. I'm trying to remember.
Speaker 2:My mom wears very minimal makeup, and there was never a time in my life where my mom was telling me, oh, you really should consider wearing foundation or blush or mascara, or you should do your eyebrows. She's never told me that. I feel like my sense of value and self-worth has always been focused on internal things intelligence I don't know if behavior is the right word, but how I behave or treat people. One of the things that helped me with my self-worth was I got glasses in the first grade and you were my first friend to tell me that I looked intelligent, and you told me that I looked intelligent and not beautiful or something like that, and so I think also your friends, not just your family, can impact your identity and your sense of value First off go first grade, me that's very cool.
Speaker 1:So to continue that though because no matter how little or how much, I think sometimes our parents can put an emphasis on beauty sometimes, when we get to high school and junior high, the pressure to fit in in that way just comes at you, and so do you feel like your friends in high school. Do you really kind of credit them for also not really caring so much about how they look.
Speaker 2:It just was not something that I focused on. It wasn't until college, when I was living with three other girls, that I realized women take these everything showers where they're doing dozens of things. They're not just washing their hair and washing their body Just like wow, I brush my teeth after I get out of the shower. That's good, but it just wasn't a focus for me within my family, but in my older age. So I do have severe eczema all over my body, so I do have to, I guess, focus on my skin more, but it is hard for me because I don't have that foundation of in childhood. Okay, you do this every day, so to me it's like a chore, yeah.
Speaker 1:Well, to me, shaving my legs and stuff washing my hair is a chore too. Okay, so probably touch more on this stuff as we continue to talk. But let's get back to Alison. So her mother is Joan, but Alison, throughout the memoir, calls her nails, because she had really long red nails, especially in Alison's childhood. She writes this about her. She is prone to crying fits and lengthy explanations. These ride on one premise Once she had dreams, now she had kids. And let me tell you this woman is not. You know, in a lot of these memoirs there are a lot of controversial, difficult mother figures. There really are, and this one so far has taken the cake for me. We'll get into it more, but it was hard to pick the first quote to introduce her to you. But this one I mean once she had dreams, now she had kids, isn't that just so?
Speaker 2:harsh, just from reading your notes, it seems like she doesn't villainize her mother the way that she probably could.
Speaker 1:Yes, and her mother is villainized because Allison just gives us the facts. But you're right, allison has a really difficult relationship with her. You can tell that she still wants to love her mother, wants love from her mother. It isn't this black and white thing where she's just like my mom was a bitch. Let's move on. It was like my mom did a lot of and said a lot of really horrible things and I'm going to tell you about them in the memoir. But also, reader, I still desperately wanted to be accepted and loved by her, which I understand. That line between mother and child can be a really hard one to sever.
Speaker 2:And the quote is really gut-wrenching because she says once her mother had dreams and now she has kids, which really makes you feel like the mother resents her children because she had them. I actually fear that I will be that way with my own child. Which is one of the fears that I've always had about having a child is that I have this life that I've built, this independent life where I do what I want and I don't have to consider anyone else, and then, when you bring a child into the world, consider anyone else. And then, when you bring a child into the world, it's only appropriate that they become your responsibility and you care for them, because you have to do everything for them, and I think that that's a balance that people have to learn and that I will learn. It's not that your child is taking away your dreams, it's just creating a new reality for you.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and a new dream. I think that is so amazing, how honest that you are about that, because parenthood is not easy. I love that you are already thinking about that shift in your life and that tells me that you are already being such a responsible parent. And you know we all have these fears because we choose our partners but, like you, don't choose your children in the sense that you have no idea what personality is coming out to shoot. You know what I mean and you have so much love to give and you're also just very pragmatic about that sort of thing. I feel to where you're right. Like you own the responsibility of having the decision to have a child and what it means, and so I don't think that you're ever going to. I don't know if your fear is kind of like the child knowing that you resent them, the way that Allison clearly knows that her mother resents her, because that's also a very important distinction. We can have those thoughts, but you don't ever let your child know that Like what the hell is wrong with you.
Speaker 2:I wrote this down somewhere else here that I think it's very important. I'm not a parent yet, but I think it's very important that you never let your child feel this way. I would be devastated if I ever in my lifetime thought that I was a burden to my parents and that they preferred life without me. I would never want any child or adult to feel that way when interacting with me, because that's a words hurt situation that I wouldn't want someone to feel from me.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's like a how do you ever feel valued in this world when you don't feel valued by the one or two people who decided to bring you into it? You know like it makes so much sense why Alison isn't starting at zero, with a mother who has shown her unconditional love and a father who's shown her unconditional love her entire life, and then she's diagnosed with this thing that makes her very other growing up. She's starting at negative a hundred, but she's already feeling like the enemy in her house. And yeah, I completely agree, people annoy you, kids annoy you. You're only human. You're not always just going to be able to have good days. I get that, but figure out a different way to get it out of your system.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Don't project it onto them. I mean your patients will run thin with any person, adult or child, and if you project that back onto them, a child may not know how to process that Exactly.
Speaker 1:All right, let's talk a little bit more about nails and Allison's relationship. Her mother at times seems to literally despise Allison, and vice versa. But Allison can't help but want and need her mother's love. After one particularly cutting exchange, allison ponders. She writes does that mean she's the villain? I never saw her that way. Maybe we're programmed not to give up on our families as much as we want to, as hard as we try, biology won't allow it. And you know we brought up nails being villainized in the memoir. But I don't know. What do you think about family and boundaries? Because I think it is okay to cut people out of your life, even if they gave birth to you. Is that harsh? Am I harsh? I don't know an acquaintance. I do think that relationships.
Speaker 2:They're not going to be mutually beneficial at all times. But if someone is sucking the life out of your relationship and it's not healthy, then you do have to analyze whether or not it's worthwhile to stay in that relationship or maybe change the relationship that you have.
Speaker 1:I wonder sometimes if hope is a dangerous thing in these circumstances, because I feel like, especially with Allison's relationship with her mother, she does have these nuggets of beautiful moments of connection. But I think when someone does show you who they used to be or who they still could be, it is so hard to completely cut the cord because there's just a part of you that's like maybe one day they'll wake up and they'll apologize or they'll realize that they've been so hurtful. I see these moments with them where everything is exactly the way that I want it to be and then they go back to being who they are. I don't know. I think it can be really tough. Let me tell you, give you some of the examples that Alison writes about in her memoir with her mother. So as a daughter and as a mother myself, these really had my stomach just turning with anger and they were upsetting.
Speaker 1:At one point, nails slaps Alison once when she's 12, and then twice later she just smacks her across the face and then she tells allison that she made her do this. So it's not even just an emotionally abusive relationship. It turns into a physically abusive relationship and I know that there are degrees of abuse, physical abuse that happen in households, but I personally think it's never okay for a parent to hit their child and then to turn around and blame the child for it, as though Nails has absolutely no control over herself at all, is really upsetting. It's a very tense, sometimes combative relationship. Allison does talk to her mother in a very disrespectful way but as the reader you're like, well, this woman doesn't seem to deserve any respect and also has conditioned her daughter to have this sort of response to her. When someone is just constantly cruel and cutting, you start to build up a wall and you start to build aggression and resentment towards them. It makes sense to me that Allison feels this way about her. At one point Allison asks Nails if she's mad and she responds I'm always mad, I'm a mother. So again, just kind of these like broad stroke remarks about motherhood in general. That just makes it seem like this terrible, horrible thing. At multiple times she tells Allison that she hates her father, which in my opinion is just extremely immature. It's an inappropriate discussion to have with CAH. He just diagnoses her with hirsutis, which is the excessive body hair that's happening on her, and he hands her mom a prescription and says if this were my daughter, I'd want to get this taken care of ASAP. And instead of going to the pharmacy and filling the prescription, the mom basically tosses it up, puts it in the back of her car and just teaches Allison how to shave. She'll later use Allison's new physical condition against herself. She taunts her saying other girls don't have a beard.
Speaker 1:At points, nails calls Allison's razor burn on her face ugly. She tells Allison that she can't believe she gave birth to something like you. The word something thing. It really cuts into Allison. At one point Allison flees to her friend's house and they tell her. She writes you're a kid, it's your mother's job to take care of you. And Allison responds but she doesn't. I can't say I've accepted that, but I've gotten used to it. I see the panic in Nail's eyes when she's called upon to do something motherly. She doesn't know how to do that job. I say and like I said before, I how to do that job. I say, and like I said before, I think what makes the relationship so difficult is that it wasn't always this way.
Speaker 1:Alison writes when I was a child I would sleep in bed with her. When my dad went on business trips I would climb into their big king-size bed, rest my head on her stomach and listen to the gurgles there, move my head to the space above her breast and feel the ticking of her heart. There I would fall into a deep, reassuring sleep. So it feels like she's just trying to get back to her mother being a comfort in her life and I think it's really hard to rectify who her mother is with, who she wants her to be and who she needs her to be. She's freaking, going through puberty. She's in junior high, high school, having to shave her face every morning. A five o'clock shadow still shows up later in the day. It's such a difficult situation for her to be in and she doesn't have really she doesn't have one safe place that she can fall apart to or feel comfortable anywhere really.
Speaker 2:It's sad that her mom is not that person for her or that she doesn't have a family member or a close friend at this point. That is like that for her.
Speaker 1:She does have these close friends, but she doesn't acknowledge the facial hair to them. And they try to bring it up and we'll get into it. She just would rather not talk about it, but her mother is the one person who has the name for this condition and all her mother does is throw it in her face, taunt her with it.
Speaker 2:This may be totally off base, but I feel like maybe the mom throwing away the prescription and teaching her how to shave was an attempt to normalize her, Like maybe saying you don't need medication, you're not ill, you just need to shave. And so maybe we don't know the mother's intent there. But maybe the mother had intentions and didn't think that it would be that big of a deal, but then obviously, as she progressed through her life, it was a bigger deal. So you just never know.
Speaker 1:Well, that makes me realize maybe we do need to share our intentions with our kids. I think there are certain things that we shouldn't talk to them about, but I try to explain my decisions to my child as often as possible because I want her to understand where I'm coming from and that it's not just a mommy's way or the highway, because I think that also helps her figure out how to walk through her life later. You're right, misty, that very well could be what her mom was thinking, and if she had said that, then Allison could have understood it a little bit more. But their relationship wasn't like that. What she does say is she tells Allison that she's not a freak and that she loves her. And Allison writes Nails doesn't bust those words out lightly, she's not what you would call gushy, and so it also makes me wonder if Nails didn't want to have a daughter who had to be on medicine.
Speaker 1:I wonder if it was kind of like a selfish thing on her end. Again, now we're just kind of armchair diagnosing her. But as a reader of memoirs, I mean, you are introduced to these characters, you see their actions. You try, as you fall in love with these women who you're reading about Like I grow so attached to all of these women that I read, I root for them. I feel like I know them so well because they share so much of themselves with us. I want to know why. I want to know why Nails wasn't a good mother to Allison, why she failed her in this way when it seemed so easy that she could just get her the medicine and Allison's life would have been so different.
Speaker 2:But later on don't you read that she takes some sort of medication and it does not improve her situation?
Speaker 1:We will get to that? Yes, but also no. So let's keep moving, we'll get there. So they go home and Nails teaches her how to shave, alison writes. She starts with my sideburns bushy and generous, running the length of my face from ears to jawbone. I've noticed them, but I always thought they were normal, like eyebrows or the hair that springs from my father's knuckles. I have hair there too. Through her mother's eyes, allison is also realizing certain things about herself, parts that maybe she wouldn't have thought were abnormal, until her mother goes to shave them away.
Speaker 1:I mentioned that Nails would tell Allison that she hates her father. Her parents do end up getting divorced, and very quickly a 24-year-old named Bill moves in At this point. Nails is, I'm honestly, not the best with ages, but at this point Allison is kind of in high school, so I'm thinking her mom is in her late thirties, early forties at this point. So 24 year old moving in. That's an interesting situation. Nails had met him because she starts a career in real estate and Bill keeps a journal and Allison reads it and she writes that in it he refers to her as a hairy back toad. To have people like that in your home again, this woman just doesn't seem like the best mom and it's just. It's a heartbreaking situation for Allison.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's really harsh. I mean, obviously we don't know anything about Bill. 24-year-old dude wrote something you know. But it's still very, very sad that the mom is kind of putting her in this situation where she doesn't feel loved or accepted by anyone that's coming into her home.
Speaker 1:No, and there's also no regard to how the children because Allison has two brothers how any of them feel about anything. Really she just didn't put-.
Speaker 2:She just went about it wrong she just went about it wrong.
Speaker 1:There you go, there you go. Okay, so her father she calls him rooster because he yells a lot and he's really you know, he's maybe not quite as bad as nails, but he's right there. She writes about having to compete for his attention with the TV and later he also puts the kids very much in the middle of the divorce and just says some really inappropriate things about their mother to them. Okay, so now we're going to really get into what I think is Alison's journey finding self-love and love and self-worth. It's funny because I don't know if she would quite call it that herself, because there is this brazen confidence about her that you get.
Speaker 1:There is a strength to young Alison that is obvious in the pages. I think it's a defensive strength. I wouldn't necessarily say that it's the type of strength that I think she would have had she not grown up in such a tumultuous environment with her family. But she could have been a type of person who just really hid away from the world and sunk into herself. And she still makes friends and she still goes to college and goes to parties and dates. She doesn't let her facial hair stop her from living her life. It doesn't completely defeat her.
Speaker 2:It's just a constant uphill battle, is what I gathered from.
Speaker 1:That's exactly right. High school and middle school are not easy places for her. This is when, like I said, after puberty is when all the excessive hair starts growing and her peers are so mean as we know that kids can be at that age. They cackle at her, they call her a werewolf, they call her it, they call her the animal she writes on the bus ride home. I glance at my arms. Were they this hairy all along Already? My body feels different a trap rather than a tool, an object of shame rather than a point of pride. I want it to be beautiful. This isn't beautiful Inside. I am not a werewolf Inside. I laugh at the girls who look like me.
Speaker 2:That's so sad, I know.
Speaker 1:I'll never understand exactly the degree to which Allison had to face her peer because I don't have her stuces, but I had really dark body hair and I had people commented on it a lot. I was right there with the laser hair treatments as soon as I could afford them In fourth grade. I'll never forget I was called a monkey because I had dark hair on my arms not the same condition that Allison had and I'll never forget the day that I shaved my arms. In junior high my mom finally allowed me to shave my arms. It was such a relief. It was like I've taken some of their power away. I think kids can be cruel and-.
Speaker 2:So unnecessarily cruel, like why and I, yeah, I think it's something that I think has to be taught at home. You know, you have to teach your kids that someone may look different, and I don't know. I mean I was teased about how I looked. My mom just kind of, as I said in the last discussion, my mom was just kind of like, well, not everybody's going to like you or think that you're pretty. So that was kind of her way of saying well, get over it, you know. But yeah, I mean I can't imagine to the degree at which she has all this body, hair and how you know self-conscious she might feel. Because you can hide, say, if you're. I've always been self-conscious about my teeth. You know you can get braces and then you have a temporary. You know braces and that, but you have a fix to that. To this point she doesn't know how to fix her problems, so she's just trying to live with it, and that's really hard, especially for a child at the age of puberty.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and it's interesting you were saying how we have to teach our kids at home not to comment on or make fun of people for any differences, really, but I don't know if you have to teach that as much as like it feels like bullying is taught. My daughter would never. She probably asked a question. If we saw a woman at the supermarket with a beard, she would say, oh, that's so interesting. Did that woman have a beard? Like I didn't know women could have beards and then I could have a conversation with her, but she would never make fun of that person. She hasn't been taught to be a bully, you know.
Speaker 2:So I wonder, like which way?
Speaker 1:is it taught? Do we teach children to be mean by our actions and our remarks and the things we say, or do we have to teach children to be kind? I think, inherently, children are kind and I think they're taught to be mean.
Speaker 2:I've never thought about it like that. But I mean you have to hope that kids are innately kind and innocent and that any behavior otherwise is learned yeah, it's conditioned. Or are they neutral and they learn one way or the other from what they see and take in?
Speaker 1:Lots to think about as we navigate motherhood ourselves. Back to Allison. Fortunately, she does have two amazing friends, missy and Tina. I talked about them during the quick topics and her friend Missy tries to comfort her. Allison writes that Missy says don't listen to them. Her hard not to hear it.
Speaker 1:Try. Effort defines my life. I try to be good as a student, as a friend, as a daughter and as a sister. I try to be fair in arguments. At home during softball practice I try to hide my face, my stubble, myself. But what happens when trying's not enough? What if the odds are so strongly stacked against you that it's impossible to put up a fight? She is not only self-conscious about her body, hair, but her weight too. Dress thin, I write in my journal. Take attention away from the fact that you're wide. Boys like big boobs but they like skinny girls. How can you have both? I mean, these are just such great thoughts, like I was definitely thinking the idea of wanting to feel attractive to the people that you were attracted to and not quite knowing how to do it if your body didn't fit into this preconceived notion of what hot was right.
Speaker 2:I have been flat chested my whole life.
Speaker 1:Well, that's about to change. I'll be curious if you enjoy it, because I definitely liked it when it happened, and then I was glad that they went away. It was nice to try on big boobs for a little while.
Speaker 2:Have them temporarily. Have them temporarily, I mean so far they look good Like. Where have these been my whole life? Because, let's be honest, any growth would be improvement. But I was self-conscious about being flat chested growing up because I mean, I was really really flat and you know we grew up where girls would stuff their bras and stuff yes, gosh, I mean high school in junior high can be cruel.
Speaker 1:It's a cruel, cruel place. She writes the hair offers a challenge Get rid of me. It says cover me up. I dare you. No effort is ever enough. After she shaves, she applies foundation, trying to cover the shadow and even her skin tone, but she writes these are all band-aids. Anyone can see what lies underneath. People bring it up. They ask her if she shaves. She says no and she writes they may or may not believe me, but what can they do about it? They can take my word or not. Leave me, but what can they do about it? They can take my word or not, but I'm not going to give these people any more ammunition. And just the word ammunition, right, it hurts. You can tell it hurts.
Speaker 1:She talks about going to her friend Tina's house and Tina kind of doing like a little makeover on her, and she writes this heartbreaking statement. She writes about looking at herself in the mirror and feeling like beauty is available to her. You know you talked about how your mom wore a little bit of makeup, but that was never something that was emphasized in your house. My mom, I kind of remember playing makeup growing up and I had the little kid kits and I would watch my mom get ready for like an event or a date, and she'd curl her hair and do her makeup, and so it was always this kind of exciting thing to me that felt really grown up like a rite of passage, right, like once I started wearing makeup. I was older, but I always felt like beauty was available to me. I always felt like, with enough help, I could feel pretty, enough, you know, to like be fine, you know, but like to not ever feel that way.
Speaker 1:I want every woman on this planet to feel like beauty is, at the very least, available to them, whether they wake up and they have to do some stuff or not. Do you feel beautiful when you look in the mirror? Do you just look in the mirror and you're like, hi, I'm Misty?
Speaker 2:I think that's one of the things that I've struggled with recently is, I've always looked in the mirror and seen kind of the same person, the same look, the same hair color, the same skin tone or whatever. And now I look in the mirror and I'm really different.
Speaker 1:But your face looks the exact same. It's your body that you're changing, body that you're struggling with.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and so I don't feel like I've ever been this person that has really focused on what I look like. When I look in the mirror Again, I'm looking in the mirror for functionality, like is there something in my teeth, something on my face that I need to wipe off. But it has been hard the first couple of months of pregnancy to look at myself. But I do think in this day and age, with different types of beauty being shown, more beauty is not 5 foot 11, 105 pounds, 24-inch waist situation, and I think that that helps, because there's all types of women being portrayed as models and as beautiful, and it's probably easier to say that now than in what the 90s, when she was living this.
Speaker 1:Totally. I mean, there was a way more narrowed scope of what beauty was for sure. It's just. It's this weird thing, because I feel like, as women, we're not supposed to say I think I'm pretty or I want to be pretty. But pretty people have easier lives and beauty is a currency in our society, in our world, and those are just facts you can't deny. You know, do you think that you're pretty? You know, I do think I'm'm pretty.
Speaker 1:I also have gotten to the point where I feel beautiful without makeup on. I think that that comes from love from my family and loving myself. But I didn't feel pretty in junior high and high school absolutely not. I felt I felt short and freckly and at one point like I had monkey hair on my arms, you know, oh. So yeah, I think a lot of it was through my husband's love, which maybe that makes me a bad, weak person, because, like it took someone else really loving me for me to really love myself. I don't know, we don't have to keep talking about that, but what I would just say is to add to your other friends' words of encouragement. I did a shrill episode by Lindy West and Jamie brought up body awe. Just, you know, remind yourself. It's pretty awe inspiring that there are like 10 little fingers and 10 little toes inside of you. Right now I have two brains right now you do have two brains right now.
Speaker 1:I love it. I love it. Okay, let's get back to Allison. So it's her senior year of high school and there's a teacher who is telling Allison and all of her peers that they need to map out their future, and this includes choosing a good college and figuring out what you want the rest of your life to look like. It's kind of a daunting task to do at 18.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So I'm like the polar opposite of you when it came to college and planning. I actually didn't apply to any colleges until two weeks before graduation. My parents were like so what is your plan here? You're graduating. I didn't apply anywhere, and it's not because I didn't have ambitions to go to college, it's just I didn't have this calling in life, Like I want to be an actress or I want to be a doctor or veterinarian or anything like that. I just you go to college. That's how I was raised to think you go to college.
Speaker 1:And so when it was time you were like, yeah, but for what?
Speaker 2:Right. So that's how I ended up. You know, I had been to College Station with some of my friends and I had enjoyed the town and I thought it was a. You know, I didn't have the background of Aggies in my family or anything like that, but I enjoyed going and visiting the people that I knew that were there, and so that's kind of how I just fell into. Well, I don't know what I'm going to do. It's hard for me to ask my parents for $20,000 a year to not know what I'm doing. So the alternative is go to Blinn for $1,500 a year and decide from there. But even after going to community college and crossing off the basics, I still didn't have this calling in life for work right.
Speaker 1:And you majored in psychology right, Majored in psychology.
Speaker 2:Which is not what you're doing.
Speaker 1:Although I bet it is helpful in sales.
Speaker 2:Business is part of my degree as well too, so it's not like it's just psychology. But yeah, even with my job, it wasn't my passion to go into instrument sales, it was something that just kind of found me, and so, yeah, I think it's hard for an 18-year-old child to look at their lives and decide what they want to do for the next decade.
Speaker 1:Or decades. I mean to kind of like start on that path. I think there are so many jobs that you don't even know exist until you sort of get into an industry too or meet other people.
Speaker 2:And I like what you said about constant recapping what you're doing and evaluation of what you're doing in your life, because I also kind of did that at 25. And then at 30, you know what am I doing, what do I like about my job, what do I not like about my job? But it wasn't until I was 25, 30, that I realized that that's something that you should be doing. Yeah, I was just kind of floating in the wind until then.
Speaker 1:I think that's kind of what your 20s are for, though Exploration, and you know, I think that's okay. Clearly you figured some things out along the way, so you're doing good, thank goodness, yes. So Allison realizes that she loves to write and her teacher's kind of like, yes, but what's your career out of that? And Allison's like I don't know, I'll kind of figure that out, and I do love this that her teacher tells her. She says that's where success comes from. Specificity Skills are not enough. It's how you use them. It's how you plan to take the opportunities when they come. I've always loved the phrase that luck is when preparation meets opportunity. I just love that phrase and if people hadn't heard that before, I just wanted to add that to their repertoire of things to think about.
Speaker 1:So Allison gets into UCSB, uc Santa Barbara, and she writes I glance over at the mirrored closet door and there I am. I can't escape, I don't want to. I want to see myself, not the strategic bits and pieces. And there I am. What a funny thing Mirrors reflecting you back at yourself when you look in them. Are you looking inward or outward? What pose do you take to reveal your truth. She writes about looking at her features, her face, her smile. She writes there is the hair, but I don't want to focus on that. I want to acknowledge it but not make it my sole center of attention, because there is more. I'm ready to begin my life. I am ready to begin, and so she feels like this is really a big step forward for her, leaving her toxic relationship with her mother. Bill's still there. Father situation. She's kind of getting out Before Allison has her new beginning.
Speaker 1:Her friend Missy has a heart to heart with her and she writes you need help. Missy says no reason to be ashamed, I'm not Lie, lie. She pulls me into a hug. She doesn't hug often, but when she does, you remember it. She releases me and we sit in silence for a moment. You've got to kick ass. You've got to be strong. You've got to do for yourself what needs to be done. You've got to go to a doctor. I know it's hard for you to talk about this. Yeah, I say, it's all I can say right now. My teeth are gritted, my nails digging into my palms. If I open my hands, there will be a line of half moons in my skin, hot pink and burning. I love that. Missy tells her this isn't your fault, there's no need to be ashamed If you go to a doctor, maybe they can help. Allison isn't quite ready to believe that herself. People can tell you things all day, but until you really believe it or you're ready to hear it, it's not going to make a difference. She gets to UCSB, she writes.
Speaker 1:Yesterday my mother dropped me off and drove away, tears streaking her makeup into mush. I hadn't expected the display of emotion and it felt strong in all directions the pain of watching her suffer, but also the pleasure of watching her realize what's been lost. I made a vow to myself I will never go home again. I will find my way in this midway place. I will make myself a home. I love that idea of making yourself a home wherever you are. You see her gaining confidence in her ability to exist in the world.
Speaker 2:I mean, it's kind of a sink or swim situation. You just have to figure it out. I mean, everybody approaches it differently, but most people figure it out and it either works for them or it doesn't.
Speaker 1:I do feel like that's life, you know. It's kind of one of those things where you just you either keep moving forward or you will just be stuck. It doesn't quite go as well for her. As quickly as she thought at UCSB she writes about not fitting into the desks in one of the lecture halls. She has a roommate who seems lovely and she's nervous about having to shave in front of her and figure all that out. But a few weeks into the semester her roommate says she's going to move in with someone else and Allison feels relief and rejection in equal parts. But she does meet a couple of new friends. You find your people, or your people find you, and like it just makes your world right.
Speaker 1:She meets her friend Carol, who sits down next to her in class and asks do you feel like a freak? And Allison writes the question is not accusatory or cruel. It's asking for confirmation of her own feelings. When don't I? Allison responds Did you ever feel like a freak or an outsider growing up?
Speaker 2:Like I said, I was not a cool person or popular. I didn't have a clique of friends that were like my clique, like I didn't go to school every year knowing what lunch table I was going to sit at. So the first day of school anxiety for me was always who am I going to eat lunch with? Because I don't have that set group of friends and so I don't know that. I ever felt like an outsider, as more of like an in-betweener I don't think I would use the word freak but I didn't have a definition of who I was.
Speaker 2:And you know, in our high school we had volleyball players, soccer players, band members and those were like built-in groups of friends that you did things with and I was not in any of those. So I just kind of had to make my own group of friends. I just never felt I don't know like I had this defined identity of who I was. Yeah, thankfully I did have, towards latter high school years, a safe group of friends that were my people and I kind of grew into my people, my friends and things like that. But again, we weren't a clique, we were very inclusive. I've always tried to be very inclusive on inviting people to things. I would never want someone to feel like I had felt excluded or not invited to something.
Speaker 1:Yeah, luckily, when you find your group of good people who just have the same values as you and who see the world the same way, it's really helpful. And so I'm so glad that Allison had that with Tina and Missy and she continues to be close with them throughout her life. But then she finds it with Carol and then Carol's roommate Sandy, and they become really good friends. Okay, so she's actually grocery shopping with Carol at one point I believe it's during her sophomore year and she's just standing in an aisle and this woman approaches her and just hands her a card and Allison's like okay, and then she looks at it and it's a card for electrolysis. Carol grabs the card out of her hand and tears it up and is basically like you know, fuck that person.
Speaker 1:And so it's interesting too to see her friends different approaches. You know, like Missy, it feels like Missy would have used it as an opportunity to be like you want to talk about this. But Carol's also a newer friend, and so it's this great balance of people in her life being like fuck what other people think you do you, and then her older friends kind of saying I've seen the way that you hide in your own life. How can we help you so that you can shine bright? I think it's good to have the differing thing so that you can take what you need when you need it.
Speaker 2:And obviously both of her friends think that they're doing the right thing by their friend. They're not being malicious Like in the grocery. Her friend is not trying to say, you know?
Speaker 1:I don't see your facial hair.
Speaker 2:Yeah Right, she thinks that she's maybe defending her emotions and she doesn't want her to be upset about someone doing that. But the person who handed her that also probably thought that they had good intentions of. You know, I'm a stranger, you don't have to feel ashamed because you don't know me and I'm giving you this. In certain situations that may be like a less like. Maybe it's more awkward for her if her best friend is telling her hey, you need to shave, versus someone that she doesn't have to face ever again.
Speaker 1:Yes, and I will say I think that this moment is the beginning of something for Allison, because she will eventually try laser hair removal and we'll talk about that. But I think there's a reason she put it in her memoir because I think it was something that just planted the seed. And then later her mom comes and visits and she actually ends up leaving Allison with a check, because I think it's sort of like reparation situation. Their relationship did not necessarily end well before college. Basically, her mom had tried to kick her out of the house and then allowed her to stay but she couldn't look at Bill. It was a situation that when you read the book it goes into a lot more detail but we just don't have time to get into it today. But her mom leaves her this blank check and Allison's not really sure what to do with it. But she keeps it because she has enough financial aid and grants and scholarship money to pay for school. So she doesn't need it to pay for school and she'll come back to it later.
Speaker 1:The next year at school she joins the newspaper and she's figuring out kind of what she wants to do. She's really getting into journalism, kind of seeing that as a career path. She's working on a story about raising tuition and she's interviewing someone when they say quote education without funding is like a woman with a beard. It just doesn't make sense. Allison is like of all the damn metaphors she writes, I am but one part of this world. I am a woman with a beard and I make no sense. That's so sad, I know. It's like. Really of all of the metaphors for this guy to use, this was the absolute most heartbreaking one that she could have heard, even when she finds her footing in something that she likes, that she feels she's good at. Here comes the world being like but you have facial hair and you're a woman, don't forget.
Speaker 2:But isn't that kind of true of anything? I mean, no matter what you do, no matter if you love your job or you love your spouse or your family, you're always going to have reminders of hardships and things that you have to overcome.
Speaker 1:So, while it is very direct to her, it is kind of crazy, though, like I've never heard that expression said to me once in my life, and so, for the fact that it is a woman with a beard, you're just like what the hell? That's crazy.
Speaker 2:But maybe it was meant to speak to her because I think from there she has some different decisions that she makes and life changes that she makes. That's true, so maybe it was prophetic in a way.
Speaker 1:Maybe it was. You're right. Sometimes the universe gives us exactly what we need, even if it's not what we want. But before we get to that because you're right, we're right there. Before we get to that, because you're right, we're right there. Before we get to it, allison has her first kiss. That same year. She is 20 years old and this also leads to her first sexual experience. It all happens the same night.
Speaker 1:Reading it, the guy is so kind and seems incredibly into Allison and make sure that she is experiencing pleasure, which I feel like is a very mature approach from a boy at that age. Of all these experiences that we've been talking about, alison, you know her body being seen for the first time by a man and the electrolysis lady handing her the business card that Alison says okay, I'm going to finally use my mom's check and I'm going to go to the doctor. I'm going to go back to the doctor, which she had been really, really nervous about because her first experience, so many years ago, was not a good one. And so she writes he starts at the top and works his way down. He looks everywhere. Being seen is like getting a massage from a blowtorch. Being touched is worse. She is diagnosed by this doctor as an extreme case, but he has a concoction of medicine that he puts her on and she's hopeful for the first time. She writes.
Speaker 1:A year, two years, a decade from now, I will sit in a booth with a paramour, a boyfriend, a husband. He will stroke my smooth chin. I will smile and cross my slim legs at the knee. My body will be just that a body, a tool, not an enemy, which I know. Have you ever felt like your body was the enemy?
Speaker 2:Yes, when we went through infertility, no matter what I did, no matter what vitamins I took, no matter what health regimen I was on, I could not force my body to produce eggs or have a period. Even. And when something that's happening to you is so out of your control, I didn't know whether to obsess over it, which I did at first, or just let it go and see what happens. I've never felt like that before in my life. I've never had an experience like that. I've never had an illness. Fortunately, I've never had an illness. In this day and age, where you can literally control almost everything, when something like that happens, it's really, really eye-opening.
Speaker 1:What was your relationship with hope like at that time? Did you allow yourself to be hopeful, did you allow yourself to imagine being pregnant and having a child, or were you just like, no, don't think about that stuff.
Speaker 2:Phases. Obviously, at first, when you're doing all the initial testing, you're like nothing's going to be wrong with me, I'm overreacting.
Speaker 2:We haven't been timing it right or whatever it may be right, like I'm doing something wrong that I can control. Then, when you get to a point where, in our particular situation, we went through an egg retrieval, we only had one egg. It was not usable, and then I did get pregnant and had a miscarriage. You go through this of like well, there was hope, but now I have no hope because I had this horrible thing happen. So it's not one way or the other. It's almost like a daily shift back and forth of I want to have hope because I want to believe, and I believe in miracles and believe in the power of prayer and the things that can happen Miracles can happen but then I also didn't want to have my hopes so high that it was just a disappointment to me and everyone around me.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm so sorry that you had to go through that.
Speaker 2:It was really transformational to my marriage because Mark also had no control and no matter what Mark did for me or how he supported me or how he treated me or what he did, he had no impact on test results or anything like that, and so that also creates like a strengthening bond. I mean you can either let something like that develop and nurture your relationship or you can let it destroy your relationship. And we went into it promising each other and talking about it. We knew that it was going to be high stress, but being very conscious of that, we didn't want to let it become something that ruined our marriage and the relationship that we had. Yeah, even though it was a really like up and down traumatic thing to go through I mean everything that happened to us I wouldn't take that out of my relationship.
Speaker 2:Yeah, because here you are now, well, and the appreciation that we have for everything that happened. I don't know that I ever truly understood, appreciated and was in awe how a baby is conceived and what a woman's body goes through. It's one of the most amazing things that happens in the world. Yeah, it really is. I can 100% say that I did not have that appreciation when we started this years ago. Yeah, I just viewed the world differently and viewed the specialness of having a baby differently.
Speaker 1:I love hearing about the strengthening of your relationship with your husband, and I think that's such a beautiful thing, and I can't wait to tell you about Allison's husband when we get there too From what I read.
Speaker 2:It did strengthen their relationship and she had to have like a new level of trust with this person and had to overcome a lot of things to get to where she gets to at the end of the end of her not end of her life, but the end of her story that she's writing. They had to cultivate their relationship and work through her self-conscious thoughts.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Okay, Well, let's try to get to that. So she's on these different medications and she continues to do well in school. Then it's graduation day. Her father, Tina and Missy have all shown up to support her, but her mother can't make it. She calls her and she said she's blown a tire on the way and she's just going to turn back around. Of course it's very disappointing just going to turn back around. Of course it's very disappointing. And her dad asks her what she's going to do with her life now. And now that she's graduated college with this journalism degree and Allison's like, I'll figure it out. But there's definitely such like a moment where you're like, oh my God, school is over, I've got this degree I'm supposed to do something with. I'm supposed to be this baby bird that leaves the nest, you know, and you're just like, okay, here's life.
Speaker 2:This is exactly how I was in college. It's like here's your diploma, go do something, yeah, and you're just like okay, great Thanks.
Speaker 1:She's scared and she's unsure and she does not feel ready. But sink or swim time. She ends up getting a job in Nebraska which is way out of her comfort zone. She writes I think about the medication that I take every morning. Would be, I think about the medication that I take every morning Would-be magic pills at the tip of my tongue. They tamed my numbers, but not what really matters. How would a bearded lady play in the Midwest? I'm irritated with myself. Why does it always come down to this? But I can understand myself too.
Speaker 1:Life comes down to the pinpoint of what consumes you most. We all see life through the lens of our own worries. I feel like that goes. You just see the world differently after challenges, and I can completely understand why. This would be the main arrow that points her in whatever direction she needs to go. I mean, that would be so tough to go to a brand new place and start all over, knowing no one, having no one in your corner. And she's taking the medication but she still has the hair. They're like her blood work is looking better, but they haven't. That hasn't translated to hair loss.
Speaker 2:I think a little bit of that is what you allow to dictate and guide your life. I think that, because of the experiences that she's had, it's really become tunnel vision.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:And the center of her thoughts.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but how could it not be? Is my like? I get it so much.
Speaker 2:You have to be very proactive to avoid thoughts like that and letting things like that consume your world and take over your thoughts. And this has just been good. I mean, she's what? 21, 22 at this point, I mean, and it's been a struggle since she was nine. It's like being in two different countries, like she's going from California to the Midwest. It's very different.
Speaker 1:Yep and just isolating, it's just when you're just by yourself.
Speaker 1:She doesn't last very long. It's like the weather the people are nice Honestly it wasn't about that but she just very quickly decides that this was not the right move for her. During this time, she also decides to stop taking the pills. They're not doing the thing that she so desperately wants them to do make her hair disappear. So she's kind of like F it. She writes no more refills, no more money thrown into that body of water called hope. She feels guilt that she's leaving and weak that she can't see it through. She writes I do feel sorry. I'm sorry that I couldn't start something and stick with it. I'm sorry that I couldn't step beyond my comfort zone. I'm sorry I couldn't go on a leap of faith and trust that things would be okay. She tried and it just didn't work out, but at least she tried. You know, and you're not a failure if you discover that something isn't for you, how else are you supposed to discover it unless you try things and find out that they're not for you?
Speaker 2:And everyone has a threshold for that too, and the trials and tribulations that they're willing to go through for X amount of time. For you it might be six months, and for me I may only have a threshold of 90 days until I'm just like I'm out, and so you know. I think it's good that she's aware of like what her expectation was and she just it's not happening for her so she just, seemingly, is going to move on from this.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and all of this was on top of these pills not working and, and her hope in that being dashed, I imagine she's not in the best place mentally either. Yeah, so on the way back to California she stops at a motel and there's a woman there who who's working, and she has a beard, a full beard that covers her chin, goes all the way down to her neck, and Alison just thinks she's so brave and it makes her reflect on her, her inability to be okay with her body, hair, and she writes I flip on the television there. That is what I want to be thin, smooth. I'm not sure if it's because society told me that or I told myself, does it matter? And I thought that was such an interesting question to ask.
Speaker 2:It's almost like it was set up for her so that, even though she was trying to back out of this situation and stop the pills and everything, she's caught in this moment, just like the card thing in the grocery, where she has to reflect again on this thing that she's trying to block out of her mind. I do think, though, that a lot of your self-image comes from within. You have all these external things that tell you what's beautiful or what you should do, or what you should wear, how you should look, but, at the end of the day, you have to love yourself and accept yourself, and accept yourself for the way you are or make changes. You know, everybody has, again, a different threshold on what they're willing to do, what they're willing to change, and that's a personal choice that you make.
Speaker 1:Yeah, beauty standards are also kind of constantly changing and you're constantly chasing something and you're so right Like you're the one who ends up looking in the mirror most often, like you see yourself and you're the one living your life. You deserve to go through it feeling beautiful.
Speaker 2:And every person is beautiful in their own way, and the negative feelings and comments are usually from within, even though she's had an extraordinary situation where people have said horrible things to her about her appearance.
Speaker 1:You know she has yeah, but see I would argue that those internal voices are actually the voices of, like her mother and her parents. I think about my daughter. I don't think it occurs to her to not think she's pretty or beautiful until somebody else makes fun of her, as that Allison wants so desperately to be able to accept herself, to just look in the mirror and feel beautiful, regardless of how much hair is on her body, and she can't. And I think this questioning of why can't I do that, is it them, is it me? Is it all of the above, is just her trying so desperately to get to that place so that she knows which voices to switch off or what not to pay attention to.
Speaker 2:You can't help but think almost if she was raised by a mother that told her that was beautiful, would the story be completely different and would it be something that she's proud of, that's encouraging to someone else that's going through this, versus this shame that she's carried for two decades.
Speaker 1:Yeah, though she will pose an interesting question and that we'll get to at the very end. So she writes I've never thought to accept it, to stride into the world with everything unshaven. I've never considered throwing away razors, letting it grow, putting aside concerns about what others think. Confidence enviable concept, assurance, freedom from doubt, the ability to move through the world in harmony with oneself, without stumbling. I'm not entirely lacking it. I have confidence in my writing, my friendships. I believe I'm smart, sassy, aware I'm 22 years old and I'm excited about my future.
Speaker 1:Yes, the woman downstairs has something I don't. She moves in harmony not only with her mind but her body. She may wake up and worry, but not about the follicles on her face. She lets them grow without abandon. For all I know, she smiles in the mirror at her own reflection. I hope she does so. I love that section because I don't want our listeners to think that, like Alison is just this woman who doesn't recognize any of her incredible qualities. It's really just this that she struggles with so much. Okay, so she has a new job at the Daily Republic. She's in Berkeley, so back on the West coast, and she writes I've hit my stride, yet Sometimes I feel as though I'm stumbling, which is just life Allison Like I love that because you know, we all have those moments where we're just feeling like, okay, I'm getting so many things figured out, and then you know something happens and you're like, all right, I'm still figured out, but I'm moving forward.
Speaker 2:Of course, of course.
Speaker 1:I think yeah, I don't think that you ever grow out of that or evolve out of that or mature out of that. Yeah, there's this really poignant part in the book where she's at this woman's house to interview her first story and this woman is physically beautiful and so put together, and while Allison is in her bathroom she does a little snooping in her medicine cabinet. Have you ever done that, by the way, snooped in somebody's medicine cabinet at a stranger's house?
Speaker 2:I would be mortified if that sneaked in yours. No, if I was doing that and somehow said something about something in the medicine cabinet and they're like oh my gosh, you went. I don't open people's drawers, I don't go, I'm just like I can't do it.
Speaker 1:I've never done that at like a person's house that I'm visiting, but I've definitely at Airbnbs. I will like open everything and be like what surprise are they leaving me in here? But yeah, when Alison wrote about this I was like Alison, oh my gosh, that's so naughty. Anyway, she finds prescription antidepressants and anti-anxiety pills in this woman's medicine cabinet and she kind of has this light bulb moment where she's like oh right, people deal with things. I'm dealing with a physical thing. This woman's dealing with an internal, mental, emotional thing, and she writes where to wear one's flaws on your face, where they can never be concealed, or inside a mirrored bathroom cabinet, where they grow more shameful with each hidden moment? Where to handle those flaws in the light of day or in the gauzy dimness of a feminine bathroom? What to do with the burden of being human, which I love, oh God, that phrase, the burden of being human. I've heard it also said, the weight of being human, which burden definitely has a negative connotation. But you know what? Being human isn't easy. Being a parent isn't easy.
Speaker 2:Existing is not easy. Everyone has a thorn in their side. I mean, I can't think of one person that I mean. Sure, you see people and you're like oh, alex seemingly has it together and leads this perfect life with these perfect instagrammable moments. But everyone has something at some point that they struggle with and they're never handled the same. They're handled differently for every person. But such is life.
Speaker 1:But it's a good reminder, because I think you're right, especially with the Instagrammable people. They can seem so, or even just like your neighbors can like, seem like it has it all together, but what is it? Comparison is the death of joy. Once you start comparing yourself to other people, you stop falling in love with your life. The moment you stop being present. It's just just try not to do it, you know it's hard.
Speaker 2:sometimes I mean it's well, yeah, it's hard. I think it's almost natural competition or something like yeah you may not do it intentionally, but it's, I don't know. It's like a competitive nature that some people unconsciously have. And yeah, you see your neighbor's car and you want to keep up with the Joneses. I mean, how old is that saying keeping up with the Joneses? It's almost nice that she saw this, because it's like she lost sight that other people have problems that may not be physically visible to her, but they exist, yeah.
Speaker 1:And I think she needed to see a quote unquote in her opinion. Beautiful person have a problem like this Because, like her friends can tell her this and she's like whatever. But this woman, objectively to Allison, was beautiful, had physical features that Allison wanted. Okay. So at this new job she also meets this handsome man named Matt. He's kind to her, they become really good friends and she falls in love with him. He never stares or comments on her stubble. At one point he moves to Barcelona for a stint to teach English and he invites her to visit him and she gets this urge to go and tell him how she feels. But before she goes she decides to try laser hair removal on her face, part of her attempt to get rid of the hair so that she can be and feel quote-unquote worthy for Matt.
Speaker 1:She writes Laser hair removal. It has a zing and a zap to it, a sharpness at the consonants. There's a precision to its flow, a painful, angry coherence. I like how it sounds. The self-help books would say this is a step on the right path. Confront your troubles, approach them head on, with your chin held high. I never lift my chin. She continues. It's an affordable, intelligent option. I read aloud. Change your life forever. Change your life forever. Change yourself. Who am I without the hair? And this is another thing that's kind of being promised to be this magic eraser for her body hair.
Speaker 1:She has a consultation where she's told that it'll take six sessions at least and Allison decides to go for it. This is a quick reminder that this is happening in 1999. So it's not the laser hair removal of today. It's expensive and the lasers are bulky and it's different. She writes it is not quick, it takes an hour and that is bearable only by a break. Halfway through, my hands dig into the crinkly white paper beneath me, I feel one of my fingernails pierce the surface and it's almost like permission to scream. I moan. Instead, it feels like someone scraped my face with the blunt, rusty side of an ax and sprayed it with lemon juice. And I have had laser hair removal and it hurts, but not like that. I mean, I don't think. I don't know if I would have gone back.
Speaker 1:So after her laser hair removal session, she's really excited. Her skin is inflamed, but the hairs are already falling out. So she's like ah, yes, finally the thing. Unfortunately, she writes, blisters emerge within hours, huge, hot and painful under my hand. My skin feels volcanic, capable of eruption. She was not told to expect anything like this. And she looks it up and discovers that she has, quote, folliculitis, an inflammation of the hair follicles. It causes small crops of pustules and a reddening of the skin, and boy does it hurt.
Speaker 1:Also, her trip to see Matt in Europe is the next day. She gets on the plane. She has no choice. She is actually going to Italy first, where her friend Tina is also doing a stint there. So she's going to. The plan is to stay with Tina and then they were going to meet up with Matt for New Year's Eve. So she gets there and Tina's like, oh my gosh, kind of what have you done? And Allison, very much in character, just tries to ignore it, tries to downplay it, but it just gets to the point where she can't anymore and so she calls the clinic and kind of tells them what has happened. And they call in this prescription and she's able to get this prescription, cream and subdue the situation. And she writes and the drama is done. Sometimes it happens just like that. I smooth it on and it works. Within a day I can now shave without losing half the blood on my body. I'm back to where I started, but somehow it feels like a victory.
Speaker 1:So again another another attempted step forward, more steps back. She tries to gather the courage to tell Matt how she feels. She writes. My fear, I realize, is simple and stark I will never be loved. A lifetime locked apart from existence, nose pressed against that glass.
Speaker 1:Watching this isn't just missing out on the positives holding hands over dinner, embracing in a hotel room, laughing together. It's also the screaming matches, the awkward silences, the pockets of boredom, any of it, all of it. It's missing out on the brawling and banal, the commitment that lies light, one moment stifling the next. It's remaining frigid, frozen. It's the life of the forgotten. She's not trying to promise herself that love is butterflies and candy hearts all the time, that it's difficult and it's hard, but she just wants the opportunity to have that with someone too.
Speaker 1:Matt calls and it's like oh, by the way, I have a friend with me and she just realizes he will never see her the way that she sees him or the way that she wants to be seen by him. Of course her first instinct is to think because of my body, hair, and so she tells him basically, we're not coming, I don't really ever want to see you again. And he kind of is like are you high, like what's happening? And she writes maybe I've been high for a long time, maybe I'm just now sobering up, so you see her just honestly depleting. It's just sinking more and more and more into this rock bottom. Yes, I've tried. I tried the pills not working. I tried laser hair removal not working. I came to Europe to tell a guy that I loved him. And what am I doing? It's not working.
Speaker 1:She writes I know there are lessons to be taken from knowing him and the eventual rejection. I just can't formulate them right now, but I will. As she realizes this, she smiles. So she's not lost all hope. This is just another challenge that she'll overcome somehow, someway, somewhere. And there's such a maturity to her I really felt as I was reading it. There's such the ability to keep looking forward and to keep going forward that I really admired. She's not okay right now, but she has the confidence that she will be, and it can be so hard to see the light at the end of the tunnel, but she really does.
Speaker 2:And I think her story shows a lot of perseverance. Yes, and that does have a lot to do. She may not have inner self-confidence or self-image about her physical, but she definitely has internal strength. Yes, she's tough, very tough, and she has the ability to persevere over all of these challenges that she's been through. You know, people struggle with perseverance and getting over things and emotional intelligence, and I think she's pretty, pretty cool, pretty amazing that she just has this ability to keep going at any point.
Speaker 1:She just wants to feel fucking pretty man. Like she just wants that and like I get it, and everyone deserves to feel beautiful, and so she's like I'm going to try all these fucking things to figure it out. Then she meets Adam.
Speaker 1:Adam he's her new coworker, a quick new friend to Allison, and it's interesting because she notices that he has kind of like an unusually high feminine voice in her opinion. She wonders if he's embarrassed by this, but at one point he tells her that embarrassment is quote too much effort. Too much effort. I never thought about that. It always seemed an effort not to care. Shows you the different way that people can approach life, because I'm with Allison but it's an interesting perspective from him, because she has literally lived her whole life opposite.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and it was so different too of somebody telling her not to care because it's him being like eh, it's too much effort for me to care about. Like, who do I care of? That random dude that'll never see again, things that have a feminine voice. But sometimes you're just like, wow, this thing that seems so simple, because somebody is not forcing you to feel that way. You just can, can be inspired and in awe of how somebody else leads their life, and it can inspire you and make you reflect on things differently. That if somebody tries to be like well, you shouldn't care about this, because then a part of you is like well, I do, okay, so now what you know, like, at least me.
Speaker 2:I could defend that. I'm like. You're telling me not to care, I'm going to care even more. That's like telling your friend that's in a bad relationship that they should break up with someone, like you can't tell someone they have to have that own self-realization, isn't?
Speaker 1:that true. She writes how do I explain that? He's the first person who has opened my eyes to a possibility that I'd never imagined. He doesn't care what other people think. It's a genuine, seemingly effortless thing in that way that, you know, took years of work. I feel my perception of him changing, shifting. It's that shift that comes when someone pulls back a curtain, shows you something you hadn't previously imagined. Call it a magic trick, call it alchemy, call it what you will. It's that moment when your vision of someone doesn't so much as change as deepen, when your understanding of them expands.
Speaker 1:Some say it's the beginning of love. I feel like she just wrote that so beautifully. He falls in love with her too. She's scared of this love, but she gives herself over to it and she trusts Adam with her heart and with the condition she writes I don't know how long I talk. I only know that when I run out of words. He is holding my hand, he's facing me, his hand is on my face, his gaze is moving closer. When we kiss it's as if I've learned a new language that is instantly familiar. It is not perfect, it is not magic, it is love.
Speaker 2:It's so beautiful. He loves her as she is physically.
Speaker 1:Yes, he falls in love with the Allison that he knows, but he's supportive and encouraging to her. Later, when she comes to him and she says I want to try laser hair removal again, I want to go back to the doctor, like I want to get this under control because she's still like she has this love and this partnership that she's dreamed of, but she still, like, goes to weddings and she's like I hope my five o'clock shadow doesn't show up in the picture Like she just doesn't want to feel that way about herself anymore, right? And so she does go back to the doctor and she goes on medication again. Adam tells her that he's really proud of her for facing the stuff that she didn't want to deal with, and he tells her that he loves her and that she's hot and he makes her feel beautiful. She'd never really had that from the type of person that she needed it from, from anyone. It honestly doesn't even write that her friends would ever be like oh no, you're beautiful. They would just kind of be like oh, do you want to talk to me about your hair?
Speaker 1:You know, right, her doctor says taking the medicine that will help the laser hair removal stick and when she tries it again, it's years later she goes to a different place and she does not have the same reaction. And she writes it will not come quickly, nor will it come easily. It's just a beginning because she's fighting against the hair growth. On a medical level, the cosmetic treatments will be more effective. And she writes I wish I had realized that before. But it really is better late than never. And she really is very strong in her conviction that, like she's doing this for herself, not because society says that she's more beautiful without body hair, she wants her readers to know I am doing this for me because I don't want body hair and I want to be in control of my condition. And she has the ability to so, like she does.
Speaker 2:And it's almost like she was right there the whole time. She was taking the pills but not doing it with the laser hair removal. Then she was doing the laser hair removal but not the pills. It's almost like a movie where eventually everything starts to come together and she has this confidence with this new person. You have to struggle sometimes to get to that end point.
Speaker 2:Who knows what slight changes have happened in the years in between her figuring this out and if she had met Adam in Nebraska or whatever, or a different time, different place, like it may have not worked out.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Sometimes life is just about the timing and like you have to be patient and it's hard. She writes what if you would want to change? All along, I wanted to change from the moment nails first twisted a tap and brought forth the steaming water meant to soften my facial hair. I have known I didn't want to look as I do. I want it because I want it, not because society tells me it should be so. I want it because it's what I've always wanted for myself. And so I think she just makes that argument that like, if you want to change something about yourself because you want to and you've really done the thinking and been like no, this is coming from me internally. This isn't a societal pressure, which, again, it can be tricky, because where do our internal thoughts come from? If you come to the conclusion that you want to change something about yourself, do it.
Speaker 2:Allow yourself to be happy if that will make you happy. Life is ever changing, and there's not like one end point that people are working towards, and so we're talking about physical looks, but that's pretty much applicable to everything. You have to constantly evolve and change to know what you like and don't like, as you are constantly evolving and changing.
Speaker 1:I love everything that you just said, and there's one more quote that I want to read that kind of talks about that. But I do want to say that she and Adam end up getting married and they have children, and so she does have this. I'm not gonna say perfectly ever after, but she finds her next chapter with this wonderful man and they create a beautiful family and then. So there is just one quote that I wanted to read. She writes start at the beginning. Easy to say, but what the fuck does it mean?
Speaker 1:I picture the beginning as the starting line at a race short clad runners jockeying for space and waiting, nerves twinging for the gun to go off. But there are no fingers on triggers here, no flags waiting to be waved, there's only me. But what if the beginning is now? And I feel like that's kind of exactly what you're saying. Every day is a chance for a new beginning and you should just ask yourself am I happy? And if the answer is no, can I do something about it? And also, I do think it's important to just reflect and maybe try to get down to the root of why you feel the way that you do, because you know we can like impulsively try to make ourselves happy with like band-aids, but that doesn't fix the wound. If you're constantly chasing something because you don't know why you're running, you're never going to get to where you want to go.
Speaker 2:And also know that it's not always going to be just happy. What makes you happy? Sometimes you have to suffer well through things to come out the other side, you know, as a changed person. I mean, nobody's going to have rainbows and butterflies every day, completely agree.
Speaker 1:I think, in closing, you know my biggest takeaway from Alison's memoir is that you can still find your value and your worth and want to change things about yourself, like they're not mutually exclusive. You don't have to accept every single part of your physical appearance or personality, even characteristics. I just think that gets really muddy really quickly, and I love that she advocated for herself in this way. She told her story, she worked through the shame, showed so much resilience and at the end of the day, she wanted the hair gone and so she did the things that she needed to do so that it would be gone and she would feel good about herself. I love this memoir. I thought it was heartfelt and vulnerable and funny and witty and I just couldn't recommend it more. I hope everybody picks it up and reads it for themselves. It's okay if you want to change something about yourself, yeah.
Speaker 2:I'm sorry I don't read the books. I feel like it could be more in-depth if I did.
Speaker 1:I just enjoy the conversation, I enjoy the conversation too, it's so fun, it's great and, you know, not all of the listeners get a chance to read the book before listening to the episode, so it's perfect and I just I love having these chats with you. Thank you so much for bringing your heart and your thoughts and your misty-isms all of our conversations.
Speaker 2:I'm here for it. Thanks for including me. It's been really enjoyable.
Speaker 1:I love you very much. Thank you, I love you too. Bye, bye.
