Back on the Couch: Roxane Gay

fall never arrives all at once first the air then the light and slowly the things you love begin to find each other a jacket meets a dress a hoodie slips beneath a blazer an old cap finds a new scarf because you don't simply step into the season you create it layer by layer until it finally feels like fall find fall your way at ross like most people i'm juggling lots of responsibilities on a daily basis and let's just be real one of my favorite ways of coping with that stress is popping a little something and doom scrolling till i fall asleep sometimes it feels like self-care is just another task on our never-ending to-do list and girl i do not have the time for that but this is why i'm starting my mornings with rituals stress relief this product uses first of its kind technology to support the body's natural cortisol response so you can take on the daily juggle rituals great because it helps me feel calmer and less stressed which is something i've tried to do with journaling and meditation i've had very mixed results especially with the meditation your girl just really struggles to focus and you know turn off the brain or whatever but this is my first time trying a supplement for my wellness and ritual really appealed to me with their vegan gmo free products stress relief specifically is designed to optimize the release of ashwagandha l-theanine and saffron to help your body better manage stress we've all got stress but you don't have to just grin and bear it get stress relief from ritual and save 25 on your first month at ritual.com couch that's ritual.com couch for 25 off your first month hello all please enjoy this re-airing of my conversation with dr roxanne gay from a few months ago we're in the middle of some scheduling difficulties trying to get some things ironed out so we will be back next week with a new episode my apologies in the meantime please enjoy dr gay and thank you so much as always for listening to crystal's couch hi and welcome back to crystal's couch the show where i answer your letters for advice and talk to the most interesting people in the world today i am so honored to be joined by the incomparable roxanne gay one of the most important voices of our time she is the author of groundbreaking works like bad feminist and hunger a memoir of my body where she's redefined how we talk about feminism identity body image and the complexities of being human her work is as intellectually sharp as it is deeply personal creating space for honesty nuance and vulnerability and conversations that often lack all three through her writing commentary and cultural influence roxanne has challenged me personally to think deeper and confront uncomfortable truths with clarity and compassion i am truly honored to have her on the couch today please welcome roxanne gay to the show oh my goodness hello i'm truly honored to have you here i'm a little flummoxed actually and just so grateful because you are really one of like these writers for me and someone i've been reading casually for a long time um hunger really really made such a huge impact on me i found that that book to be just so moving and really illuminated a lot of things for me that i had not previously considered so thank you for being here thank you for insisting on audio only because although we do have a video component to this show usually i didn't even know it was audio only i i even yelled out my baby hairs they told me they were like roxanne's people asking to just be audio and i'm like absolutely i want to keep a podcast a podcast so i mean shout out podcast you literally so thank you so much again for being here i want to jump into something that i think may be a little more light-hearted or fun i know that you have a dog maximus toretto blueberry this isn't it yes he's right here maximus toretto blueberry milman gay oh and how old is maximus now max how old are you be oh what a sweetheart he just said he's five he's he's gonna be six this year oh man how has dog parenthood changed you i mean i don't like dogs and so i'm a dog person but i guess now i am or at least i'm a max person it's been so eye-opening because i had never had a dog before i grew up in a haitian household animals belong outside no pets plus my mom was a clean freak and so she always thought dogs were messy though she did love max very much um but you know it really does show you what your capacity for love is in a way that is even more that is different than from loving a human which also is a very profound experience but i know that he needs me he has to be taken care of i mean he's very independent very bright very bold he thinks he's a pit bull and i find that adorable but he weighs 10 pounds and we don't feed him and so i know that it's not parenting but i understand what it means to care for someone who needs that care regardless we'll never not need that care and it has definitely i feel like i already had a big heart but it certainly expanded my heart he's and we we got i don't know for me it's because it's my first dog i have nothing to compare it to but i feel like we got a very good dog he's just sweet he gets along with everyone he is a barker which is a lot it is he takes it upon himself we live here in new york and also in los angeles and he if you walk by our house if you think about walking by our house if you look at it if you pause too long if you pull up he has something to say and it's so funny he's so territorial and you know he's just a fascinating creature do you have a dog i do um my dog laney is one and a half so i'm deep in the puppy oh yes of course i remember laney from daycare oh you saw laney's sex tape i sure did laney was out there she was out there and she in the streets she's in them streets and i was yeah yeah she's friendly you know she's she loves other dogs she's never met anyone dog or human that she does not like she is the sweetest girl so she has really pushed me in a lot of ways um just the you know walking her multiple times a day and having to talk to other dogs and with them and she's just always auditioning for someone's love or attention but i really i really relate to what you said about this you know it isn't parenthood but it teaches you something about yourself when you are in service to this dependent being and of course dogs are different from human children in that way because kids grow up and become their own autonomous beings whereas dogs will always need us they are perpetually you know three years old so and i kind of like that in some ways you know it it just has completely also reoriented my relationship to time because we got him during the pandemic and so we were holed up in la and other than the world falling apart we had a blast the first time we were living together everyone kept calling to check in on us like are you guys okay um yeah we're okay and we just eloped we're good don't worry and we had the time of our lives and to have this little dog just sort of bouncing around he assumed that we never left the house oh right that if we did leave the house he went with him he went with us and so now you know when we leave the house he looks at us like it is the biggest trade and it's like little like watery eyes and he's especially in la he'll like when we go to the garage there's a glass door for the kitchen and he stares at us with his head sort of cocked to the left as if to say oh no you forgot something right and so now when i'm out i understand people who are always like i have to go check on the dog but now i'm like we have to go back we have a dog we can't be out like until three in the morning just right they're free yes and i also in i enjoy that aspect of you know laney will never really grow you know she won't grow up and move away from me and and break my heart in that way it'll be something yes devastating in a different way but i also found it really rewarding and validating to take care of someone who i felt really deserved it because i had been sort of taken care of since childhood taking care of adults emotional needs um with you know without really being aware of that but it it turned me into i started therapy maybe seven or eight years ago and immediately i sort of switched into this mode of oh I'm not taking care of shit I'm not taking care of anybody or anything like I deserve all my attention and so giving that now to to someone who quote unquote deserves it like a dog um has been really validating and rewarding for me so I when I know someone else has a dog I always want to talk to them about their experience of being a dog owner or pet parent however they refer to themselves because it it can really change your life it can crack your heart wide open it really can and you know my wife has had dogs before she had two dogs before we met and they died about six months before we met and they had she had had them for like 17 and 18 years so it was rough and when we met she actually said I'm not ready for another dog and I said that's great because I am never gonna have a dog I don't do that that's not for me and if you want to date me just know there will not be a dog in our future and then I noticed in the first couple years of dating that whenever we would be walking around in in the city she if she saw a dog she'd be like and it's particularly funny because she's a lifelong New Yorker like she's the kind of person who does not move from her lane when walking down the sidewalk a little terrifying and a Scorpio and so when for her to sort of shed the like stylish fancy New Yorker facade I was like oh my god I'm not ready for another dog I'm not ready for another to say doggy who is this person and so I got her the dog for her birthday it turns out that oh I'm his favorite isn't that always how it goes the person is like ambivalent about it the dog's like I'm here to teach you something yeah he's rude because when we come home like even last night we came home from an event I had to do and she opened the door and he was like I'm not ready for you ran past her he's like oh okay spare and I'm always like stop like what are you doing like how sweet I did have dogs growing up but my black American household it was very different they lived outside and and outside is where they stayed and they had kibble mixed with whatever our leftovers were that nobody was going to eat chicken drippings and things like that so it's been very different to have this New York City inside dog but a beautiful experience so thank you for sharing that with me I want to get into some of the things you've written before and maybe see how they tie into your life now or if things have changed your approach to social media and fans and what you have coming up yeah the pipeline so back in 2019 you wrote about um bad feminist and said that you didn't want to be put on a pedestal as a feminist or as anything because when you're on a pedestal you're frozen in time you're not allowed to grow or fail or move and you knew that you would inevitably disappoint anyone who I think you said saw fit to elevate me which is a beautiful way of phrasing that but um so you said of course people put me on a pedestal anyway inevitably you disappointed them you disappointed yourself do you still feel that way about not wanting to be um idolized or looked at as someone who is maybe better or should be held to higher standards than the average person absolutely now a lot of times people misinterpret that a bit and and feel like I'm trying to skirt responsibility or accountability and that's not what I'm doing I just have seen that prominent public feminists tend to be held to an unrealistic standard or a standard that they had no business they had no part in creating now you should hold me accountable for my decisions and for my values 100 but I am not positioning myself as the arbiter of who is or is not the right kind of feminist that's not my ministry right and so I want to be treated the way I treat people which is to say yes please hold me accountable I do make mistakes um but I'm not asking to be put on a pedestal or revered I'm just a writer that said I recognize that with visibility and with some success people do look up to you that's inevitable I can't change the way of the world and so I'm not ignorant of the position that I have and I'm also not unwilling to bear the responsibilities that do come with visibility and with power okay because I think that's where I I agree with that and I think that because um my when my friend and I started the read 13 years ago um and it sort of became this very quick sensation it was very challenging for me to go from regular everyday person to someone that other people paid such close attention to and it isn't it doesn't feel like a natural way of living um and at the same time the pros outweigh the cons and so trying to learn to live with that attention on me has been something that has taken up a significant amount of time in theory and so I think that's where I'm at right now I'm not trying to and and of course so much of that ties back into childhood trauma and feeling like there was a spotlight on me and all of my mistakes and so really wanting to shirk all of that in adulthood just to find myself back in a position where people are it it felt like people were ready to pounce and sometimes that feeling sticks out more than the overwhelming amount of love and support and encouragement that also comes my way it's just um a sad fact of of being human that those critical moments can really seem to stick out and and affect us the most well yes and and the the challenge and the sad thing is I hear the criticism far more than I ever hear what is disproportionately the praise or the support right but I hone in on that one person who hates me mm-hmm so much and it just hurts my soul and part of it does actually go back to childhood I was raised in a very strict household I was the oldest daughter of immigrants I did not have to do like caretaking or anything like that I will say I had emotionally mature parents and they were very active parents I did not have to parent my younger brothers I did have responsibilities toward them but it wasn't that it's that I was expected to be perfect yes I had to get straight A's and not just straight A's but like straight A pluses and A minus was not allowed and so it was a lot of pressure and in turn I learned how to put a lot of pressure on myself and I am still trying to unravel myself from all of that and to recognize that I'm allowed to be human even though quite frankly I wasn't and so when people criticize me and I take it badly they assume it's because I'm thin-skinned which maybe I am but it's also a lot deeper it has nothing to do with what you actually said and everything to do with my background and my personality and the way I am like a people pleaser I struggle to say no to my own detriment and unfortunately when you are in the public eye as a black woman and I I'm curious if you found this to be the case people expect you to be a never-ending font of giving and I'm not sure if that's the case but I'm not sure if that's the case but I'm not sure if that's the case but I'm not sure if that's the case but I'm not sure if that's the case and generosity yes they want your time they want your attention random people straight up reach out and send me the memo requests asking for money oh yes and people I've never met I'm not talking about friends I'm not talking about family I you know I'm talking about random people I will never meet and you're always in this position where you look like a bitch if you say no um or you know I get about anywhere from 10 to 40 blurb requests a week and oh yes I bet you do I can't keep up with that I because I actually do read the books I blurb my name means something to me and so I have to say no sometimes I get mentoring requests I mentor as many people as humanly possible but I also you know I have a family I have my own work I teach I have a full-time job um you know it's so hard that I can't keep up with that because I can't keep up with that because I can't keep up with people expect you to sort of be everything to be everyone and then when you say no to one person all of a sudden you are the problem you're gatekeeping the way that has been weaponized to me I'm not getting what I want is is really quite something and a choice and it's an it's unfortunate because gatekeeping does exist but you were told no once in an industry where you're all the time right that's not gatekeeping my friend and so it's a lot of pressure it's a lot of pressure and it's hard I mean don't cry for me I'll be fine but it's also no I agree I love that you said my name means something to me because if I see a Roxane Gay blurb, I'm 100% more likely to buy that book. So I understand that you take the time to actually read all of them before you give this endorsement of a writer. And there is no way you could possibly accommodate everyone who wants a piece of your energy or time. It's not possible. And also, like, I really only want to blurb books I love. And fortunately, I do get a lot of amazing books. Like, there are some really dope writers out there. And so if I endorse your work, I really do believe in it. And I really think it's wonderful. Yeah. I understand the pressure of growing up and having to be perfect. My parents were both, you know, Black Americans, like I said, who grew up in the 50s and 60s. They both have master's degrees. So they had these ventures. Very high standards for us. College was not an option. It was more of where are you going? But are you going to college was never an option. It was never a question. And I mean, I remember very vividly in the fifth grade, the first time I got an 89 on a test, I was beaten ferociously for that. Like, I was whipped for getting an 89. And I just will never forget those standards were so high for me. And so, yes, now that I'm a public figure to some degree. Having those same or what felt so much like criticisms and unfair expectations for me. Initially, I definitely I think I lashed out a lot at that, not knowing where the real pain was coming from. But now that I've been through so much therapy, I've been to grad school to get my master's in mental health counseling. I do now feel like I embrace the imperfection. Almost like I have to. I have to. For me, because there's still a part of me to some degree that believes I should be this incredibly high achieving person who doesn't ever get it wrong. And that's an impossible standard to live up to. So now it's like, yeah, I am actually going to mess up. I if I get it wrong and I truly believe that, then it's not a problem for me to acknowledge that. But that has been a very long time coming. This idea of like, you know what? Yes. Fine. Sometimes you are just not going to like me. You're not going to agree with what I said. And that is not the same as me being wrong. But also, if I am wrong, then I can be held accountable for that. I can answer for that. And so just trying to sort through all of those things and again, tying it back to where it really comes from has been pivotal for me in trying to manage this career and this sort of very large audience that I didn't necessarily ask for. I feel like I kind of stumbled into it. And now it's like, well, what are you going to do with it? And, you know, when you're kind of as a creative person dreaming about what you want for yourself, for me, I dreamt that I could write a book that people might read. That genuinely was the extent of my dream because I did not know what more to dream for. This episode of Crystal's Couch is brought to you by BetterHelp. If you go wake up tomorrow and automatically. Be better at one thing. What would that one thing be? OK, now it can be something serious or something fun and silly. For me, I would be so good at basketball that the WNBA would draft me right now. You know, never mind the fact that I'm five, three and I was born in the 1900s. They're like, wow, it's Jackie Young all over again. We need her on our team. OK, we're deep in the WNBA season right now. And I'm having so much fun at the games and watching with. Friends, things like that. So that was just, you know, like a fun little thing that I would love to do if I could. But really, better is a feeling and that feeling is defined by you. And for BetterHelp, it's a BetterHelp therapist who really gets you. It's a focus on global emotional well-being with thousands of therapists and millions of members in over 100 countries. What it really is, is progress. So sign up and get 10 percent off today at BetterHelp.com slash Crystal. That's BetterHelp.com. Like most people, I'm juggling lots of responsibilities on a daily basis. And let's just be real. One of my favorite ways of coping with that stress is popping a little something and doom scrolling till I fall asleep. Sometimes it feels like self-care is just another task on our never any to do list. And I do not have the time for that. But this is why I'm starting my mornings with rituals stress relief. This product uses first of its kind technology to support the body's natural cortisol response so you can take on the daily juggle. Ritual is great because it helps me feel calmer and less stressed, which is something I've tried to do with journaling and meditation. I've had very mixed results, especially with the meditation. Your girl just really struggles to focus and, you know, turn off the brain or whatever. But this is my first time trying a supplement for my wellness. And ritual really appealed to me with their vegan GMO free products. Stress relief. Stress relief. Stress relief specifically is designed to optimize the release of ashwagandha, L-theanine and saffron to help your body better manage stress. We've all got stress, but you don't have to just grin and bear it. Get stress relief from ritual and save 25% on your first month at ritual.com slash couch. That's ritual.com slash couch for 25% off your first month. I had no idea. I, you know, you know, again, with people online, there are a lot of like conspiracy theories. Oh, you have to know. Someone in publishing and yada, yada, yada. No, I'm a girl from the Midwest. I was just online Googling. How do I find an agent? And then I followed those instructions and got an agent. And it's in some ways it's like it's complicated, but it's also not. It's just like that's just how it is. And so I didn't have any magical connections. And while I certainly had professional parents, I did not know any writers. I didn't know anyone who knew any writers. So there was no. There was no sort of model for what to expect, what to want, et cetera. And so I just focused on, man, I hope I write something good and I hope a few people read it. And so everything that has come since has been wonderful, but a little overwhelming because I just had no idea what to ask for and what to expect. There's no roadmap for this when you don't come from a family or a community that understands writing. So it was really when they could, when an Untamed State came out and I was profiled in Time Magazine, which was still a print magazine at that time. I actually don't know if it still is, but that's when it became real to them. But also they could go to Barnes & Noble and my dad loves to like rearrange the stock in Barnes & Noble very gently, very gently, but just make sure that my books are outward facing. And so that for them made them realize, oh, she might actually make a go of this writing thing. And from then on, they've been for the past 12 years, it's been nothing but support. I love that. Wonderful. The idea of like, sure, you can write while you go do something real. That is so common for us. I feel like Black people are just like. We have this image, especially in this country, it's like you have to do something that we consider to be an actual measure of success in like a capitalist, in a capitalist sense and something that we feel like we can brag to the other family members about or something we can show off about you. And it was the same for me, creative endeavors. It was like, yes, do that. Like I was I played the piano. My parents invested in private, a private. Piano tutor for me. But that was because the piano was supposed to make me smarter. It was supposed to make my college applications look better. It wasn't because we want you to love music. And right. It wasn't about the. Right. For music. For sure. Yes. Which is always so funny. Like, OK, so you don't want me to like just develop a passion or a skill for me. No, no, no, no. Or creative and well-rounded person. No, no. You want me to. OK. got it this is going to help you in other ways right and that is what we're most concerned with so it feels good to sort of break that cycle within myself and and get into doing things just for the fun of it and allowing myself the process of growing and not automatically being good at something I don't know if you share this experience but I have definitely been the sort of person where if I don't get it right the first time or if I don't feel like I knock it out of the park then that's over oh for me it's the rap I tried like move on to the next move on to the next which is why it's weird that I'm a writer because you rarely get it right the first time as a writer oh my goodness oh the very first time I was published in oh god forgive me I don't remember if it was ebony or essence but I wrote um a short essay and I just thought before I sent this off to my editor that she was going to be like 10 out of 10 no notes when I actually went through the editing process I was like excuse me I was like but I'm good at this how can it be that and we had to I was like oh this is a collaborative process I have to work with you and you are pushing me to be a better writer and make this a better piece I thought whatever I did was whatever I wrote was perfect as soon as I wrote it like I went back through it I thought it was great what do you mean so yes yes and I wish more young writers understood that because you know I firmly believe and in my experience editors do still edit but a lot of times people's work is just passed right through or when they get edits when younger writers get edits they they do get in their feelings and then don't know what to do beyond that and I really always want to implore to them that it is a process and that you are lucky when someone takes the time to edit you and keep you from showing your ass in public and then also working with you to make the work better like it can always be made better and even though people never seem to believe this when I first share it I rarely say no to an edit I think two or three times at this point in a very long career have I said no to an edit and I was right but for the other 2,000 times I've said yes to the edits it's because it's because it really forced me to take a step back and really reconsider and ask myself okay what does the piece really need it's not about ego at that point it's it's about the work and I think those of us who have been fortunate enough to have people invested in the work with us really do get to allow our work to grow yes yes the finished product that was actually published in the and I was very grateful for that experience after I went through it but I definitely initially was like I'm not used to anyone telling me that my work needs more work like this was I it was kind of frightening at first to be challenged in that way but ultimately it made the piece much better I was I'm something I'm still proud of to this day but yeah I think you're right especially in this age of internet publishing and and internet publication and how the standards for that have shifted so much and we find more and more publications that used to feel more respected are kind of playing the social media game it feels like you know they're they're just looking for clicks and not always getting things right and of course you know you have to pay editors especially good ones and so when you can just cut that out entirely and tell somebody hey you know make it an opinion think piece with maybe a couple of facts thrown in and we'll just put it up on the website you really don't get the opportunity to to be challenged in your craft and so you don't grow in it I think and you know what's interesting is also sometimes there is a racism component to it where white editors are afraid to edit black writers because they don't want to seem racist and like they did just let the work through which does us all a disservice yes and it's hard to even talk about but at the same time it's like do your job oh yes like black people are if you think your little edits are going to derail someone who lives with racism every single day in a deeply racist world you uh really think too highly of yourself said the goddamn edits please do and you know I think for me it it made me understand that editing is not just grammar and syntax and punctuation there is a there's a another component here and it made me realize like oh I'm good for like this is a run-on sentence this is a spelling error you can say this more clearly I'm I'm not the editor who can look at your work and figure out how to make it better per se I can just do sort of the red pen correction yeah and that's fine that's I'm I'm a perfectly happy to be you know a part-time writer with a blog that I update once a year and and focus on um other things instead so um you have written so much about uh very many topics feminism and body image and trauma and sexual assault things along this nature has it been um a cost that has been paid to you or has it been a cost that has been felt at times too much emotionally or personally to be so honest in your work no but that's because I have always had firm boundaries over that honesty like I always try to protect myself by making sure I have clear boundaries and so if I'm putting something into the public sphere then I am very clear that I don't have control over it I don't have control over how other people engage with it and that's challenging but I like it can be scary it can be difficult etc but because I thought carefully about what I'm willing to subject myself to and what I'm not it's easier that makes it easier but I also have a range of coping mechanisms because it is hard and so I genuinely tell myself like girl don't worry nobody's gonna read it they're just not oh um I delude myself I was gonna say is this a delusion yeah we're just lying to ourselves now because you are absolutely absolutely I lie to myself like girl it's okay no one's gonna read it frankly sometimes that actually ends up being the case yeah but um like don't worry um nobody saw that oh man so how do you end up uh navigating different relationships friendships business relationships love community while protecting these boundaries oh a lot of therapy man oh yes this is my wheelhouse I do love therapy I honestly it takes a lot of work because I'm a people pleaser because I'm terrible at saying no and also it did take marrying someone who does not have a single problem saying no who is very protective and has helped me in ways I could have never imagined to develop stronger boundaries where sometimes she's like no you're not doing that and it's not in a way that's controlling I always recognize when it when she does that that she has my best interest at heart because she always asks me do you want to do that or do you feel obligated to and really pausing and and asking myself those questions helps but I also feel like I'm a fairly kind person and a fairly generous person and I'm actually not trying to change that and so I just try to recognize that being kind and generous does not mean that people get what they want and I'm not trying to change that I'm not trying to change that I'm not trying to to take advantage of you and it doesn't mean that you are unkind or ungenerous by telling people no sometimes and that's the thing that I really work to try and remind and it's an ongoing process but that's the thing I really have to remind myself of like first of all nobody's going to love you or really care about you because you give them what they want they're just going to recognize that they can get more and so I and that for me has been very eye-opening and very sad to realize and like the when I look at my younger self and the ways in which I have allowed myself to be used and taken advantage of like it I feel a lot of shame around it because like girl what were you doing like you're not going to find love there and and you're not going to find respect or or caring there people are not going to be like suddenly grateful because you helped them out and like what are you really trying to get? Like you're trying to clear fill some sort of deep emotional need like go fill that elsewhere um and you know again it's a work in progress i'm still it's still challenging but i the older i get the more i recognize i have every right to say no i don't have to say it to say yes to every single request if i said yes to every single request i would lose my mind right and you deserve to put yourself first you don't exist in to serve others yes and that i mean that's so hard for me to internalize but yes and and you know based off the way you've spoken about your childhood i can see why because you grow up with this idea that like you're supposed to be perfect and quite literally anything less than perfection is unacceptable so it can be very hard to break those things within ourselves but when we get to that place of learning to advocate for ourselves and i love that your wife is so supportive in this way and i love that you're so supportive in this way and i love that you're so it sounds like she's sort of really been that that aspect of your personality that you've needed help with emboldening is like yes you not only are you allowed to say no you should say no there are times that you absolutely should protect yourself and what you want or i mean sometimes it's not even that serious sometimes it's just i don't really want to do this and so i'm not going to overextend myself and that i'm really trying to like really internalize like why i sometimes find myself doing like six or seven events in a week and i just ask myself why are you running yourself ragged like this when do you plan on finishing the very very late books that you need to finish this is not going to get that work done that's like where i am right now where it's like girl if you do one more event this week like get your ass to the desk oh is someone emailing roxane gay looking for another update of a draft maybe and she has every right and reason to like the font of patience that my editor my book editors have that's how i know like i probably do sell some books because yes they are tolerating that nobody else would tolerate and i feel really bad about it but i did have some legit reasons to be very delayed with my books some very unexpected things happened in my personal life and and just completely threw me off my game for years because my whole world changed overnight and so i have been just trying to get back to some semblance of productivity and it is it's it's it's a job yes yes it is and i i think is very important to remember that when you are at the top of your game when you are a leader at what you do people have a lot more grace and patience for you when you maybe don't make deadlines because they do you're one of the greats so they know they know that when you get to the place where you're ready to be productive in that way and the drafts are coming in and the writing processes is fully underway they know that they're going to have an excellent product at the end so you know brand new writers looking to break into the industry can't play around like this but you have earned that yes i i always tell the younger writers i work with like don't don't don't don't write checks that you don't have money in the bank for that deadline does move something they do want it and they do they do yeah don't right don't play yourself yeah yes and it's very interesting to sometimes see the ways in which people can sabotage themselves a bit and um i always really want them to just not like don't don't don't do this it's not necessary it's not it is not at all just don't sabotage yourself it's okay to just not sabotage yourself well you have written um very extensively about some deeply deeply personal matters especially in relation to being able to do something that you don't want to do and i think that's a really in a larger body the way that other people treat you the way that it was a very conscious decision for you as a child to deliberately gain weight in an in an effort to protect yourself from predators and people who would mean to do you harm and just the ways that you've been treated because of the size of your body the ways that fat phobia affect us all as a society and i you know for a while i thought we were really making progress and i think that's a really big part of progress and then i don't know if it was the pandemic or what but now it seems like we are really in a backslide as far as like not even body positivity but just understanding that there are billions of humans who have existed for hundreds of thousands of years and so there is going to be variation in our bodies it's almost like that is just an unacceptable reality for so many people like we are all supposed to look one certain way um but anyway so so you know i think that's a really big part of it and i think that's a really big part of it and i my point being you've connected with countless people um by being so honest and real about fat phobia do you feel any sort of responsibility to and not just fat phobia but that's the i'm thinking of that specifically because like i said hunger was i mean i i was so profoundly moved um by that memoir so i mean it's truly incredible this is why you can take your time and miss all your deadlines because you've done bad feminists and hunger and so many other things um do you but yes i i know that there are countless people who see themselves in you do you feel any sort of responsibility to those people how do you how do you manage that i mean i feel the responsibility to continue to write well to write honestly and to do the best i can at the time with the skills that i have um but i do feel a responsibility to make sure that you know i act with integrity but i also recognize that just because someone has an emotional connection to my work does not mean that i know them or that they know me right and unfortunately with memoir not unfortunately but one of the challenges of memoir is that people do think that they know you and like they want to be your best friend and i'm like um i don't know i don't know if i'm going to be your best friend i'm a terrible communicator i don't know i will never text you back like aim higher um and so i don't especially i used to but i'm i'm getting better about it i don't feel like i have to you know they feel a bond because they've read the book but when people come up to me i don't know you at all and so what i do and i love meeting my readers they're such lovely and in general warm and generous people i am absolutely open to it i run into people i get recognized every time i leave my house which is weird as a writer it's not supposed to happen but it does and i think it's partly because i'm tall i'm fat um i have tattoos i'm easily recognizable in a way where you're not going to necessarily be like oh jonathan hi um so not that not to say i'm on his level but that's just the the sort of writer looking guy that i can imagine that you wouldn't necessarily be able to pick out of a crowd if he wasn't wearing his glasses and so um i i always try to be present when i can you know um sometimes i'm just like oh you know my wife and i are on a date so like it's really nice to meet you but i feel like i can't talk for an hour here just try to have boundaries but i always try to be receptive polite but you know that's when you write about for example sexual assault people tend to want to tell you about their own and oh yes i respect that for sure but i can't hear that all the time like especially if i'm like out and about and having fun and someone wants to be like i i've been through with what you've been through and then proceed to give me all the gory details that's a lot and you know it's important to always clarify like i'm a writer i'm not a therapist i'm not your therapist yes and and because you can do real harm there are people who do harm who do take advantage of the vulnerabilities that people are willing to share with them i'm not putting myself in that position but more importantly i'm not putting them in that position i hear that you have this emotional need i hear why you feel connected to me and i honor that but i also know that i can't heal whatever wound you that needs healing so i always try to point people in the right direction if they really do seem to need help um and i always try to listen and then i'm also try to be very clear that okay this this is great and um there's someone waiting behind you and so yes this is a book signing event and i i have the one i have the most wonderful readers i have to say i don't really run into lot of emotional vampirism. You know, I do encounter quite a lot of enthusiasm that I find very flattering and very charming. People bring me like little gifts sometimes, which is absolutely not necessary. They give me their book, which I don't mind. I can't promise I'm going to get to it, but I don't mind. I do recognize the kindness of that. And so there's a lot of responsibility and pressure there, but I'm fortunate enough to have really great readers who also, I think most of the time I've read the book. So have some sense of what the boundaries are. Like, no, I don't want hugs. Even though people do love to test that. Can I get a hug? Did you not read the chapter? Right. You know, I used to like struggle to say no, but now I'm very good at it. And like, I shake hands. Which is a really good response to that. I do shake hands. Yeah. Like, let's shake it up. Yeah. That's very generous. Cause since 2020, I'm like, I feel like no touching. Let's just not touch. Share. So many germs. It's a lot. It is a germ minefield out there, especially with someone's like packing up a lung. And I always just think, oh, it'd be like, bless your heart, dear. But it makes me feel a hundred years old. But, um, let's work on it, chef. Right. Get thee to thy bed. I experienced some of that same emotional vampirism. I love that phrase. Um, because I started being very forthcoming about, uh, my journey in therapy and some of the things I had to learn, um, growing up with two emotionally immature parents whose emotional immaturity, um, manifested in different ways through their parenting or lack thereof. And so being open about that. Yeah. About that, um, is kind of rare. I think it's becoming more popular, but talking about it freely on a large platform has really opened up. Um, and, and then going to grad school and being a student therapist. So there was like a time that I literally was somebody's therapist and helping them work through these things. And then graduating, it was like, what am I going to do with all this? Because I, it was a great concern that I would be recognized. Um, in my internship, um, because I worked almost exclusively with black women. And so I, I knew I didn't want to go into private practice, but I also knew that like what I had learned in school and in therapy was something that could benefit so many other people. And also people were constantly coming to me with like their trauma, their issues with their parents. Like, oh, my dad's an asshole too. And my mom did this and that. And so that's sort of where the idea for this show came from, which was like, Okay. Um, let me find a way to help people with the things I know while still drawing a very clear boundary of like, I am not a therapist. I'm not your therapist. I have this degree. And so I can listen to your story and give you some advice, but with the protections of these cameras, these microphones, you know, there's no expectation of, um, like a, an ongoing relationship between us. And everybody's very, very clear about what this really is. Like, this is ultimately a podcast. This is not, you know, a therapy center, but trying to find that balance in all these different ways has been, um, it's been a challenge, but one that I have embraced because it does feel like, you know, it's when I'm at a party and I've had three vodka sodas is that is really not the time to come up to me and say, my mother, was also emotionally neglectful. Like, like, babe, you know, I'm trying to party right now, but I do want to create that space where we can talk about it, uh, because people are hurting, people are in need and therapy is not accessible to everyone. Sometimes quick acts of preparation make all the difference. I've been doing this a lot lately, and it really does help to set yourself up for success. Like I leave my sunglasses right by the door so I can just grab them on my way out. I lay out the next day clothes before I go out. I go to bed at night and I've been meal prepping more regularly, but before things get even busier this fall with back to school and the holidays coming up, I want to make sure I check off one to do that can safeguard my family's future by quickly finding free life insurance quotes tailored to our needs with policy genius at policy genius. It's easy to set your family up for whatever the future may bring as we age. Of course. So do our elders. And it can be hard to have real conversations about life insurance, not to mention, how time consuming it can be to actually find a policy. Policy genius has a licensed team ready to help you get what you need quickly and find the most affordable policy for those needs. My mom is elderly and very ill. 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And so I wanted to find a way to like bring all these things together. Do something to help, but also still maintain my, my privacy and my ability to just be a person who exists in the world. Yeah. You know, therapy is probably my biggest expense other than my mortgage. Um, but I do get reimbursement from insurance. Oh, nice. For like 85% of it. Oh, nice. So, but fighting, it's a fight. Like it's a fight. It's just a fight. You know, I find what my insurance's prices are. I want my, my, um, therapist prices are eye watering. When she told me her price, I was just like, all right, cheese on your burger girl. I know that's right. But it's also the first time I've had a woman of color as a therapist. Oh, okay. I've always had white therapists before. Not by choice, just by, I guess it is a choice in a sense, but I also was living in like very rural places, et cetera. This was largely before telehealth. And so she's not black, but she is a woman of color and I would love a black therapist, but I am going to ride it out with my current therapist for now, because for the first time, and I've been in therapy off and on since I was 14 or 15, I feel like I'm not going to be able to do it. I feel like I'm not going to do it. I feel like I'm making progress. She's very matter of fact. Also, I play a little game with myself. Like, can I make her laugh? If I make her laugh, I went there before the day, which is always nice. And so I, I, I, you know, she's in great demand. She charges what she charges. You know, she's a Manhattan therapist. The prices in Manhattan are fucking extra. They just big city prices are, are real. They're real. And I mean, you can also find therapists for like $150 an hour, $100 an hour. And I think they're just as good. There's not, I don't think price is commensurate with ability. I think everyone prices themselves as they see fit and she's more established, et cetera, et cetera. It doesn't matter. I don't care about her pricing because I can afford it. And I don't take that for granted, but I do know that that one hour a week allows me to unpack my with someone who is willing to push back. You know, oftentimes when you have, when you're, I'm never smarter than a therapist, but sometimes when you're smart, you know how to like talk in therapy where you're not really getting at anything useful or important. This is the first time I've been able to get pushed back from my nonsense and my sort of rationalizing where I'm actually feeling like I'm doing real work. I would pay twice what I'm paying for that. That is a marker of a very skilled therapist. Like, she's very good. Sometimes she'll just, like, look over her little cup of tea or coffee that she's drinking that we generally meet over Zoom. And she'll just be like, mm. And I'm like, see, this is why you've got to be with a person of color. This right here. This right here. Oh, my goodness. Does she know about your little game to try to make her laugh? No. She might now, but no. I was going to say, because that does sound like a people pleaser. I can see her snickering or laughing, and I'm like, yes. All right, we can wrap this up. I did a tight five. Oh, nice. Yes, that does sound like classic people pleaser behavior. Yeah. It all tracks. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Dr. Gay. No worries, Dr. Gay. Have there been moments where you wish that you kept something for yourself that you shared with the whole world? You're like, oh, God, in hindsight, why did I do that? No. I'm terrible at boundaries in my real life. But not my real life, but my, like, day-to-day life. But in my career, at least in this sort of iteration of it in the past 15 years, the one thing I'm very proud of is that I have not said anything publicly. Oh, you know what? There is one thing I did, but it was on Twitter, so it doesn't matter. Oh, yeah, that side's dead. Yeah. But it wasn't even about me. It was a joke that I made. I made a few dumb jokes that people with bad intentions then ran with and memed for years. Oh. And so, like, I regret those sort of. Like, ha-ha, I'm just making a joke things. Like, I made a joke. I had taken my niece to McDonald's, which was my first mistake, to say out loud. But it's fine. It's like Happy Meals. And she's tiny. It's fine. Right. Gymnast. It's going to be okay. And she wanted some little toy that they were doing. And a young person at the drive-thru. Said something like, thank you, ma'am, or whatever. And I moved on and finished. But on Twitter, I made a joke about how I then proceeded to tell the young McDonald's employee about how gender is a construct. Oh, my goodness. It was funny. And he thought, they were like, this is why fast food people aren't being paid enough. You're classist. You're elitist. And it's gone on for years. Like. This has been going on now for about 14 years. From this point. And it was a joke. Like, guys, do you really think that I think that I'm going to, like, have a meaningful conversation with someone who's just trying to get through their eight-hour shift? Right. Like, probably the unhappiest place on earth. Like, the fact that people never give you the benefit of the doubt. Yes. Always assume the worst. Yes. So, that was humbling. And, like. It's like, yes, I hear all the feedback. I hear the criticism. But, like, I really. This was a joke. It really, really was a joke. Come on. And so, that is something that I can't even believe I still think about it. But the level of harassment I got for it was so profound that I was just like, that was a mistake. That was a mistake. Right. My first thought is that, you know, fat people are never allowed to even mention the fact that McDonald's exists. That was the other thing. Oh, I thought that she'd go to McDonald's. And the thing is, actually, I enjoy food. But I don't actually eat fast food. And it's not, like, a moral thing or anything. But, like, in New York, you don't need to. Like, I'm sorry, bruh, but chirping chicken is right there. Like, I don't. I mean, you'd have to go to, like, Times Square. Like, no. This is not happening. And even in L.A., like, it's just. No. There's. Tacos everywhere. I'm good. And so it made me. Like, it just made me feel so vulnerable and so, like, oh, my God, I didn't. For a moment, I forgot that I'm a big fat person. Right. How dare I talk about food? And I was like, I wasn't even there for me. I was coming with a four-piece chicken nugget. Jesus Christ. Oh, my goodness. Yes. It's like, I live in New York. My version of fast food is halal poppy. And, you know, like, I can go to the bodega and get something. I can go to the bodega and get something on a hero before I, you know. Listen, the bodega is literally 30 yards away. And the bodega around the corner is actually really cute. And you can get whatever. They have a hot-cold counter that is just really pristine. So. Yeah. It's fine. Yeah. Come on. I. Hmm. I. That's sort of, you know. Feeling like they're. Or that you're rarely extended the benefit of the doubt that people are always assuming the worst. I find that to be a key tenet of my experience with social media. And, of course, through my education and my work in therapy, I've been able to tie that back to childhood. Like, so many other things where it's like, yeah, it was always assumed that I was wrong somehow. Or, like, let's figure out what you did wrong. Let's examine how you could. Have done things differently before we can move on or discuss how maybe people are overreacting or doing too much. Like, do you find that there's any sort of loneliness associated with that? That feeling or that experience? There's a lot of loneliness there because. I first started going on social media because I was living in very rural places and I was kind of like the only black person at my institution or in my department. Both as a graduate student and as a faculty member. And that is incredibly isolating, even though I'm from Omaha, Nebraska, and I've never until my now living in L.A. and New York, this is the first time in my life, especially in L.A., where I see black people every day. And that's sad to say, but it's also like for me, it's a joy, like every day. And you see black people from every walk of life and every milieu. And that, to me, is like joy. Just like I see people who look like me. We're not all the same. We don't need to all love each other, but we get to be in community. And in L.A. in particular, it is so vibrant and so just like driving through Inglewood on a beautiful day with the windows down. Like, you see everything. I find it to be just a kick. And so I was kind of looking for that when I was on social media, looking for connections. And as a writer, I was even further isolated. And at the time, I was significantly larger, so I felt a little more physically isolated. And so being online allowed me to have the sense of socializing and like being part of the world without being part of the world. And so in many ways, I still, when I go online, I think of myself as that girl who had 200 followers and was just like talking to people. I was talking about yogurt all day. You know, and my wife often has to tell me like, Roxanne, you have hundreds of thousands of followers now. Like, you're not, it's not the same. Yeah, you have to like disassociate that. And so that has been the hardest transition is recognizing it's not the same, even though I oftentimes still interact online the same as I always did. A little sharp at times, a little punchy. But in general. In general, just sort of like, wow, life is kind of amazing. Look at that flower. And to never be given the benefit of the doubt is hard because I was never given the benefit of the doubt. Right. And so, yeah, it's very lonely. It's very lonely. And if, you know, when Twitter started decompensating and I found that my mental health was being profoundly affected. Debbie was just like, you are spending way too much time on social media. And I was like, no, I'm not. She was right, of course. But I just realized, why am I on Twitter? It makes me unhappy. People are so mean to me on this platform. Every mistake I've ever made, they send me a screenshot. And it just made me so unhappy. So I just deleted. I left the account up, but I deleted all my tweets. I just quit Twitter. I've never looked back. It was the best decision I ever made in terms of how I. Put myself out in the world because it's just too toxic. And so now I have a more of a remove. I'm still very much online, but I'm not as accessible. I'm certainly not spending nearly as much time online. And it is helpful to just realize, like, there's a whole world out there. And also, you could just read a book. All that time spent on social media is reading, but you could read a book. Yes. At the end of the day. Let's get some kind of talk back. Yes. And, you know, I think there's a big difference. difference in twitter before it was sold to who owns it now and how it is now um for me i first of all if you want the twitter experience there's blue sky there's threads there's spill you know you can get a twitter like experience oh absolutely i'm on blue sky which i enjoy and i'm on i i've been on threads but i've been act actively posting on threads now for a couple months threads is interesting well you know it's instagram's twitter so it's meta's twitter so take that with a giant grain of salt but for me i really felt like if i can just use the words that accurately represent how i feel and i communicate clearly and i make sure that i'm making an effort to do that then surely people will read the words as i've written them and they're going to be able to understand them and they're going to be able to and they won't filter them through their own experiences and judgments and whatever else they'll take it as it is because i'm i'm making the effort to communicate clearly and i tried that maybe for a couple of years and it was so frustrating to me every time i would articulate something exactly the way i meant it and people would still misunderstand it it enraged me it was like i don't understand how can i get you all to stop behaving this way and eventually i realized like oh you can do this for the rest of your life and still people are going to take what you say and and do with it whatever they want and so are you going to keep putting that effort into it or are you going to accept the fact that this is how it is and change the way you engage online so that was what really shifted my relationship i too spend much less time online than i used to but it was like this is i'm i'm i'm snapping at people you for something that is always going to happen and i just don't want to keep doing this that was one of the key things that pushed me off twitter i realized that i and i wrote about it a little bit in an essay um you know like seeing everything as a nail and being a hammer like even people who are actually engaging with me with good intentions and in good faith i was being unkind and i didn't like how mean i was becoming and how brittle i was becoming and anyone who knows me in my day-to-day life knows i'm just not mean and so i just had to ask myself like is this how you want people to know you is this how you want to know yourself because it doesn't i mean clap back clapping back it's fun yes and but not everyone deserves it right some people are just either clueless or they're not nearly as online as you or they didn't realize that you had been dealing with nonsense all day and they stepped on the wrong nerve right and so i wanted people to engage with me in good faith but i also realized i'm not engaging with anyone in good faith either it goes both ways and i was going to change faster than the internet is going to change yes oh my god yes and that's saying something because it takes me a minute to change but i had to understand that they were i was never going to get what i wanted from these people which is to like be truly understood to be listened to to have them like sort of set aside preconceived notions and like actually engage with what i'm actually saying and rather than like some weird perceptions etc etc and debbie again was like they're not your friends you have my friends why don't you reach out to jackie why don't you reach out to you know alexandra etc and she she you know she had to really help me see and i guess it takes someone who's with you day in and day out and understands you like you you know you say you're lonely but like you're lonely because you don't ever talk to anyone in your real life you're just like sitting here typing into your phone and it was like rude but you're right right it's the sort of thing where you don't realize you know turning to social media to fix loneliness is like eating skittles and cotton candy because you're starving this is maybe going to in the immediate take care of what you think the issue is but your longer term problem is going to actually be made worse yes this decision it absolutely is and and i'm still actually dealing with that i'm still trying to figure that part out and and recognizing you know because i i love my friends and i love hanging out with people but i have this and i this is like one of the top five things i work on in therapy i am afraid to reach out to people to say hey do you want to hang out because i don't want to like bother them and so i always just figure if someone wants to hang out with me then they'll reach out and so then the complaint not the complaint but i know that the frustration for my friends is like it's all one-sided but the minute they reach out like i'm right there like a little puppy like yeah let's go what are we gonna do and so i one of the things i've been working on over the past few months is trying to like reach out debbie will be like why don't you reach out to kirsten and see if she wants to do something with you like it's like why am i 51 and just now learning how to like have friends but you know we get to the we get to it when we get to it no shade and no shame but you know that that for me is challenging so like a lot of my friends think like oh she never reaches out and it's like that's not it that's not it i just have this like paralyzing fear i guess of rejection ultimately but it's rough and so like on social media at least there's just a hundred thousand strangers just sitting around waiting to shoot the shit oh yeah can't wait to hear from you specifically they just can't wait they want to hear what you have to say but yes i agree it sounds like a a deep fear of being rejected coupled with our very human need for connection and so you can really end up in a place that's very isolating and lonely when those two things are are kind of butting heads with one another okay i don't want to take up too much more of your time this has been such an incredible um conversation with you you said that your next book is coming out next year 2027 allegedly maybe allegedly i have two books coming out next year oh okay can you tell us a little about those yes what is called how to be heard it's coming out from harper it's a book of writing advice and it's partly amazing yeah i'm excited about it it's like mostly practical writing advice because one of the key things i remember when i was starting out as a writer is that i would always just like either go to the library to do research because i'm 51 or i when google came around i would google like how do i write a book review and there were rarely any answers and so i want to write a book that answers a lot of the questions i had in earlier in my writing career um because like they're the anlamats of the world who i love um i'm not that person who's going to like write some deep profound like meditation about art and writing and like this stuff i'm just like i'm going to just tell you how to do it and then also it's in part some of that more philosophical approach about how to use your voice how to be heard how to put yourself into the world and so i have to finish that up kind of like this week kind of like this week last week last year and then um another book that should come out next year is a romance novel that i am writing with a little known actor named channing tatum and um i'm screaming what yes yes it it um yeah it's a long story it's a project that's been gestating for many years again my brother died in 2018 it was very unexpected it was very unexpected and it completely blew up our family that blew up because we all actually got much closer but in the immediate he had two children oh yeah and so like there were just things that had to be handled and it just blew up our life and at the time my mom had cancer what's passed it's been a really bad time and so um and then my mom having cancer and then she died last year and so for five years i was dealing with all of this and my family fortunately i wasn't like the only one we were all in it together helping each other being there for my mom and my dad and so frankly writing was absolutely not even secondary but tertiary it was just like yes this matters this is how i make a living but like my mom is on the clock joel's gone i the kids need things so that became the focus and so now i'm finally coming up for air and able to somewhat think again also menopause don't recommend it and so i'm writing this fun sexy romance novel with my little crush i mean my first thought is like a magic mike romance not like this is probably unfair box to put channing tatum in but that was my very first thought like what are we doing here i cannot wait to see how this uh down to you and it's about two lifelong friends or adult lifelong since college who turned 40 and realized they had made a pact early in their 20s about if we're still single when we're 40 let's get married but they actually do and then they fall in love oh yeah because you always see people who make the pact but then they meet the one true right who will actually follow through on the pact okay like there's a lot of sex in it oh amazing i have to write about sex with channing tatum oh this life the burdens on my life goodness he smells like a pine forest of course he does of course he does he's um well of course i don't know him but he seems very charming and um very easy to look at so this sounds like very kind i have to say oh i love that in my experience i i you know we're not like best friends or anything but we get along quite well and with me anyway he has been incredibly generous and kind and charming so either he's just that good of an actor or he's a really he's that person yeah he really is a great person oh my goodness well i eagerly anticipate those releases i'm sure because i see you most commonly responding to writers and people who are aspiring for writing careers i am sure that this book with the practical writing advice is going to be hotly anticipated by the masses so i congratulations of course you know i just i feel the need to remind you that you are the roxanne gay i needed that reminder thank you thank you yes so yes the people are very much looking forward to them um dr gay thank you so much for sharing your time with me today can you please tell the audience where they can where they can find you as if they do not already know oh well i have a website roxanne with one n roxangey.com and um i'm on uh blue sky as roxangey and i'm on instagram slash threads as roxangey74 and um in the next couple months a film version of hunger will be on your television on lifetime so keep an eye out oh okay i will be clearing my calendar i told you hunger is that girl for me like one of my top books of all time so oh wow oh i i can't sorry i'm losing it a little bit here because i cannot wait to see that oh my goodness such a powerful work i'm i'm eager to see how that has been translated um for a film yeah i mean no i'm not gonna say me too i wrote it so i know i've seen the final cut you're like no it's good it's good don't worry it's okay i mean it was a challenging book to adapt and you know lifetime or slash a tv movie has nine acts because you have to uh create space for the commercials right and so figuring out how to divide the story into nine acts but make it feel like all part of the same story was much more challenging than i would have guessed but fall never arrives all at once first the air then the light and slowly the things you find each other a jacket meets a dress a hoodie slips beneath a blazer an old cap finds a new scarf because you don't simply step into the season you create it layer by layer until it finally feels like fall find fall your way at ross mr president my company told me of the explosion on our rig on october 2nd causing massive water displacement and triggering a tsunami they all keep the blame on me tom cruise is digger got us into this mess and digger's gonna dig us out from the director of birdman and the revenant what would happen if i stopped doing it you stole you freeze to death that's what with great power comes great deniability i'm not the first nanny digger see the trailer online only in theaters october 2nd rated r under 17.9 without parent i'm not giving up i am selling the building the final season of fx is the bear the restaurant is flooded everything's either gonna be okay or not we are outgunned and we are outmanned but we have each other fx is the bear the final season all episodes now streaming on disney plus i did the best i could with the skills i had at the time and your best and your skills are phenomenal so thank you thank you again um that is going to wrap up this week's episode of crystal's couch follow us online at crystal's couch and if you have a question for me please send me an email advice at crystal's couch.com we'll see you next week