What the Fuck Was That? Episode with Thaddeus Russell
From looking like a traumatized lion right after the shooting to thriving in Mexico — this is my raw, unfiltered story of healing, transformation, and rebuilding my life.
Thaddeus Russell and I go deep on:
- My first public interview after the incident in the House
- Quitting birth control after 15 years and finally hitting “puberty at 30”
- 5-MeO-DMT (the God molecule / frog medicine), trauma healing, and why I only trust two people with it
- Endometriosis, inflammation, weight training, circus arts (trapeze & hammock), and boxing
- Autism, ADHD, Pathological Demand Avoidance (PDA), and living as a superpower instead of a disorder
- The insane bond you get from combat sports and aerial arts
- Growing up rough in Ohio, family trauma, and why Mexico saved me
This one is personal as hell. Lots of laughs, real talk, and zero filter.
Thaddeus is the author of “A Renegade History of the United States” and host of Unreported.
🎙️ New episodes of What the Fuck Was That? drop regularly — raw conversations and unapologetic rants with people I actually like.
→ Watch the full Anarchapulco 2026 speech that started this podcast: https://mirandareneewebb.com/what-the-fuck-was-that-podcast-episode-1-lets-fucking-go-anarchapulco-2026/
Timestamps:
00:00 – Welcome & The Lion Story
08:45 – The Hotel Room Photo & First Meeting
18:20 – Birth Control, Weight Gain & “Puberty at 30”
29:10 – 5-MeO-DMT Experiences (the good, the bad, and the healing)
52:30 – Endometriosis Healing & Psychedelic Therapy
1:05:00 – Boxing, Circus Training & Why Everyone Should Move Their Ass
1:28:40 – Autism, ADHD & Pathological Demand Avoidance
1:45:00 – Family, Ohio, and the Long Road to Here
Hosted by Miranda Renee Webb
Podcast: What the Fuck Was That?
mirandareneewebb.com
Transcript:
Hey, everybody, welcome back to. What the fuck was that? This is Miranda, and I have a beloved friend of mine, the infamous Thaddeus Russell. Infamous? Infamous? Yes. Love him or hate him, I happen to love him. He is the author of The Renegade History of the United States, and was host of unregistered and Now unreported, which I want to talk about that in a little bit.
But I met Thaddeus after the murder. You know, everybody and their mom was emailing me, trying to interview me, and the only one that I could actually get any level of trust for. What’s that? And he was already coming to a couple, and he was the first person I spoke publicly with about what happened up there in the House that day and what led to that, and it was like an epic for our podcast that when I see clips of it, I fucking cringe because, like, I looked like, okay, so I can’t blame people because that was the big criticism and he’s laughing because he wasn’t.
A lot of people criticize me because they’re like, oh yeah, that girl’s definitely on mess. Or that girl was definitely on crack. And like, you know, I wasn’t, I promise. I know, but I don’t I don’t get mad at people because I see videos from that. And I’m just like, oh God.
Lily, Lily, Miranda. Oh the fuck your name is. Well, I mean, I’ll never forget the first time I saw you was in that hotel room with with John. No, sorry. John with his room was with his parent, with his whole family. Yeah. It felt like. It’s funny. You felt like it was there. It’s partly because, actually, there was a photo of you in that same hotel room together, just like a week or two before that, or a similar one.
We were close by. The view was almost the same because we were looking at the Anna. Yeah, that was when we were planning the fork. Oh, I thought it was almost the same balcony you guys were on that picture. It was. It was very close. It was like two buildings down. Oh, okay. Anyway, so whatever. So. But I’ll never forget it, because to me.
You looked like a lion.
That’s a kind way to say it, because I did. I felt so scary. Like that photo you’re. I’ll put that photo here. But there’s a photo from that dinner from that day, and I look scary now. You did. I said it at the time. I told people after I said she looked like a lion. The way your dreads were was actually pretty awesome and it was really fierce.
And also what you were going through in that moment and what you had been going through for two years right at that point.
Lion would go through that and no one else could really survive it. So yeah, I mean, you also looked like, you know, you’d been through it and you had been through it. So, you know, you need to gain some weight and I’m glad you did. Yeah. Yeah. As I was just telling you a minute ago, it looked much better with the weight and and most importantly, you’re like, you’re like a grown ass woman now, an adult with a full life and full and a full face and in a good way.
And what’s it been, five years? No, six, six. Seven years. Seven, seven years. That’s right. Seven years. Seven years. Yeah. So, I mean, it was a long journey. That was my speech about Andrew this year is like, how the fuck I went from like that to like where I’m at now. Right? And I’m still trying to evolve. I mentioned before this call and I’ll mention it here for the sake of transparency.
I called my dad on his birthday, and the first thing he says to me is he goes, oh, I see you’re losing weight. That’s good. And I’m like, yeah, because the first thing he said when he came to Mexico last year is, oh, you’re getting chunky. And I was like, dad, Randy, come on. Oh, gosh. You know, like I didn’t ask you that.
He’s like, oh, you got the web gut. And I’m like, oh, well, this is your fault then. All right. I’m going to yell at Randy for that. That’s right. And then he proceeds to tell me, I probably shouldn’t tell you this, but your uncle Gene, well, he messaged me and he asked me if you were pregnant, and I was just like, oh, God.
Like you weren’t that fat. You couldn’t have been that fat. No, like I, I won’t post the photos publicly, but like, I took a photo right before I got started weight training and changed my diet. And it was literally I looked like my mother did when she was nine months pregnant. It was crazy and no doubt partially endometriosis, right?
It was like it wasn’t squish. It was hard inflammation. And this was this just from tacos or what? Okay. I don’t even need tacos anymore. It was it was a combination of things. I’d been on birth control for 15 years and I quit at 30. And I like to make the joke. I hit puberty at 30 because that’s when I started to look like, oh, you know.
Yeah. You look like a woman now. Yeah. Okay. That’s it. First control. Yeah. We’ll keep you. I didn’t know that. We’ll keep you prepubescent. Well, it keeps you, like, hormonally. It makes you feel like you’re pregnant all the time, right? Yeah. And then, like, when you get off of it, like, everything just goes crazy. All the shit that was ignored goes crazy.
And that’s what happened. And like, I found out last year, I haven’t. Dimitrios and I started on, like, this path of trying to deal with that. And I think between strength training, psychedelic five Meo experiments and what was that? I don’t even know the last. What’s so you don’t know what five mode is? Oh. Oh yes I do.
Is that the frog shit? So five mo is actually the pure molecule that comes from buffalo. Buffalo is the name of the frog. Buffalo, Buffalo. Various. I’ve done that. Did that. You did that? I’ve done that. An archipelago offers these retreats because, of course, an article. But when I’m talking about. Of course you’re required to be a group.
That’s. How many times have you done it? Okay, so technically four, but I will say three correctly, because the first time I did it was Macy Tomlin and her crazy ex-husband. And it was a terrible experience. Oh, was that in this in the sweat lodge? No. The sweat lodge was before that and there were no drugs involved in that.
It was just Temescal and I baked myself. Really? That wasn’t any. I thought there was drugs there. You feel like you’re high because it like you go from hot and then you come out like, especially in the Buddha and you’re hugging palm trees and shit. It’s so I’ve had I’ve had now for friends do this DMO, whatever the fuck it’s called frog thing and describe it to me in detail.
Like they laid it out like, and and they were basically positive about the experience, but every word of their description to me was disqualifying. Like I am not. I am running as far from this drug and as fast as I can. That’s disheartening because this thing has changed. This thing has changed so much. Like for example, my last experience with it, it’s from this lovely, beautiful practitioner.
Her name is Pyasa. She’s like a mom to me. She’s like a mom and a sister and a best friend all in one. She’s amazing. And now I will preface this by saying the session that I had with her was after, you know, nearly ten years of being friends with her and of working with her on other energetic levels, and we had this whole like and she doesn’t do what she did with me, with anybody else.
It’s the first time she did that process right. But it was a focus on women’s health, well-being, pelvic floor therapy, like all these things. And like I went, we’ll put it this way. And maybe this is to my maybe it’s not. But I went into this ceremony having had a cyst on my left ovary that just throbbed 24 hours a day, pulsating, throbbing pain for 6 to 8 months.
I left that session and I was like tearing up rose petals and like, reprograming my whole body like it was. It was amazing. And then I left that session with no pain. The pain has not returned. I have this ring, this ring, con ring, and it measures sleep apnea and my sleep apnea is gone. I’ve dropped five kilos since then.
I am stronger than I was before I quit training, which I want to talk about training in a bit, because you also have a big focus on that in your life. But like so many things have changed just from that one session and it’s lasting and it you know, people keep asking me like, how are you? Okay, you know, like or people to hear about my story after knowing me for a little bit and they’re like, how do you go from that to this?
And that’s a big part of it. When did you first take it? My first time taking was in 2020, and it was like I said, it was a terrible experience. There were only two people on this planet that I trust to give that medicine. One is that was Macy. Was that with Macy? Right. Okay. So there’s two people I trust.
One is Bearheart, one is Pyasa. Nobody else is acceptable to me. Well, I’m really glad, but you’ll never get me to do it. Oh, I’m not here to push it on anybody. But I am here to say I know that it it was. They call it the God molecule for a reason, you know. Okay. All right. Well, I don’t think everybody needs it.
My boyfriend tried it. He tried very low dose of it, and he came out of it, and he was like. I was curious, but he’s not traumatized. He’s a healthy guy, you know? He doesn’t. Yeah. He’s trying. I’d be traumatized. I mean, you’d be surprised. I think I’d be traumatized. I thought, I mean, my mushroom experience, I don’t know when I was 19, I can’t do psychedelics.
Mushrooms are not my favorite. I’m microdosing. If I do anything with. Yeah, I’m macro dosed it without knowing it. The first time I ever took a second, first time I ever took a psychedelic. I’d only smoked weed a few times at that point. Oh no. So yeah, it was. It was the worst night of my life. And so I can’t, you know what I mean?
Like any psychedelics, scares me. And I know it’s like, I know exactly why it was a bad trip, but still, I’m just terrified of it. But yeah, I think I don’t think that the need for these sorts of substances is there for everybody. You know, like I think some people could really stand to, you know, get some healing.
And I think that other people are just like, it’ll be fine. You know, you don’t need. Could it be can I can I be cynical for a second about it? But but not actually disbelieving. So cynical. Well, let me put it up. What I, what I, what I wonder is going on again. I’ve never done anything except the mushrooms 40 years ago, but.
I mean, certainly I experienced it that night. And and this is a common theme I hear. And people describing their, their trips on various psychedelics is the first thing they describe happening is a, a breaking down of the ego, the self, the well and like a humbling like. And I would imagine there’s a I hear that a lot.
Maybe not you, but I hear that a lot from people and they get like this humbling feeling. And I believe that like I believe that and there is there can be value to that. I remember the day after I woke up, when I woke up from the or when the trip stopped in the next morning, I did feel all that, but it also kind of like I did see like a lot of my relationships differently.
Suddenly, just because I had gone through this incredibly traumatic, you know, like that is a traumatic experience and these traumatic. Yeah. Go. But it was it did feel like ego destroying in a way. Like I felt demolished as an ego. It and so it did sort of I felt like flattened. But there is something of value actually. When you’re flattened, you can you do see the world differently.
And I kind of changed my life in sort of small ways around it. But I did see things differently. And I’m wondering so that would be like but that is to say, it’s still useful and could have all the same effects you’re talking about, but maybe it’s just not. Maybe that’s all that it is. I mean, not not depends, you know, because like, for me specifically, when you think of like five meal, there’s two phrases that kept playing in my head the whole time that.
Kind of encapsulate what it did for me. One of them was, this is why I did all of that. This is why I did all of that, because I was having this montage of like, all of the beautiful things that exist in my life now would not be here if I didn’t go through all the ugly shit, you know?
And at the same time, enmeshed in that. There is a quote from a Brother Ali song. I quote him like he’s the Bible writer, I guess. But there’s a quote from one of his favorite, one of my favorite songs of his that says too much beauty to behold by one person. So I was just it. It drops me into my body, and I tend to do it right before an article polka, and it drops me into my body.
It reminds me why I do what I do. And Anarchapulco coincides every year with the anniversary of me being in Mexico. This year was ten years in Mexico, and there’s always that part of me that’s like, why the fuck did I do that? I’m still dealing with all my legal issues, so I’m like, what the fuck? You know?
And it reminds me why. So there’s not necessarily an ego death for me. I don’t come out of a feeling squashed. I come out of it feeling the best way I’ve described it to people. And it’s real concise is imagine you have your brain’s a library and there’s books all over the place. And imagine Buffalo as the nice librarian that’s walking through, looking at the book, putting it back in its place, walking through, looking at the book, putting it back in its place, and having a nice conversation with you while you do it.
That’s exactly what it is. Here’s what I think it is. I think I think the Buffalo shows you a world in which the library is burned down and you. And because you’re in the trip, you you believe you’re in this world. And so you see this and you see the every book is gone. And then whatever it is, 20 minutes later, you’re out of the Tribune, thank God.
Oh, Jesus Christ, I have a new appreciation for books. I’m going to go look in that library so much more carefully now, because I want to know what those other people described to you, because I’ve never I’ve never had that experience, but. Well, no, I have had that experience. That’s not true. My first experience like, oh, man, I don’t even want it.
And you did it and you did it after that. You did it again after that. So I took three years. And then I met Bert. Bert is like, he’s like the big brother I never had. Well, that’s not true. I do have a big brother, but he’s like the big, like, manly brother, you know, like he looks like you to be my brother and everything.
Like red, red beard and all that tattoos, you know, like big dude, we look related. Anyway, I told him about my experience and I said I had a lot of hope built up for that experience, and this is what I had. And he said, okay, so here’s everything that I would never do about that experience. That doesn’t make sense to me.
And if you ever want to try again, like he, you know, he comes down for Anarchapulco every year and we have the choice to or not. It’s, you know, and I was like, I do and I was with my ex at the time and my ex was like, I’m going to leave if you do that. And then we were already breaking up and I was like, oh my b, you’re saying my B yeah, yeah, yeah.
And I’m just like, you don’t fuck off, man. And I’m like, but a year later I did it. And I remember I was like in the trip and I asked doc, which is the spirit, that the name of the spirit that their heart gives to. And I was like, oh, I should have did this sooner. And Otac said, you had to learn how to receive.
You weren’t ready yet. And it showed me like the face of my boyfriend, who had like in the meantime had come down to Mexico. And as you know, he had taken me to all these places and just been an absolute angel with me and showed me, you know, how guy should treat a woman, right? And I was like, oh, okay.
And then after that it was just healed. My, my. Yeah, I mean, I also know that or I’m sure that a ton of it is who you’re with when you’re doing it, a ton of it, if not everything. Yeah, maybe. Maybe all of it. Yeah, I believe that. Yeah. Right. Yep. All of it. So like I said, I would only ever trust two people.
And when those two people pass away, maybe three because Vistara does two. But like two people, those two people are gone from this earth. So is my relationship with medicine. So the way not to do psychedelics is to go into a dark basement room with 318 year old boys, and one of them hands you in the dark so you can’t even see it.
He just says, here, take this, hold out your hand, eat it. And I was like, sure, okay. And I did, and I think it it was like a handful. So whatever that is of mushrooms, it was a handful. It depends on the variety. If it was penis envy, that’s like four handfuls of the golden teachers, you know, whatever it my brain melted for six hours or whatever that is.
I mean, yeah. Anyway, so don’t do that. Like, I don’t like I’ve had experiences with them, but I think I’m kind of over mushroom experiences because they’re difficult. Damn. So you’re really on the frog juice, Well, like, I do it once a year, you know, and that’s it, you know, once, right? Yeah. It’s it’s it’s whole thing.
Right. And I wouldn’t keep doing it if I didn’t feel.
Just so much better. You know, actually, my buddy Jason, who just got out of a three year stint for dealing ecstasy, he used to do ceremonial. He used to do that in ceremonies on a regular basis. And the Marin, Marin foothills or highlands, he would go, I don’t know. He invited me several times and never did it, but I think it was it was not what is it called, five mile DMT?
Yeah, I think it was that. And he did other other stuff too. But yeah, very hands on how you do it. And there are ways to be a medicine person without breaking the law, even in the United States. Like that’s how Burckhardt does it. You know, he he is a certified Native American medicine person because he learned everything that he knows from the Native Americans.
You know, he was raised by those people. So it’s illegal here, though, isn’t it? It is, except for certified Native American, really, medicine people especially like because it’s from the Sonoran Desert, you know, and the Sonoran Desert stretches up in Arizona and shit. So like that’s where that frog is from. And so there are certain loopholes, you know, but the majority of these people don’t do that.
And the majority of these people are just trying to get people fucked up, you know, and that’s that’s not what it’s about. And actually the magic is in the lower doses, you know. Yeah. My friend is a certified Jewish American. So I don’t think you qualified. Maybe somewhere he would. But anyway. Yeah. So you want to talk about training?
The talk about thing. The only thing better than drugs, right?
I mean, kind of. Yeah. That’s how I was. I got in a circus training, and then I realized I didn’t need weed to manage panic attacks, and it was making them worse. And then I just quit, like, four years ago. And now all I do is circus tricks. And now I lift weights, too, like, I’m pretty strong. It’s incredible.
Because again, when I met you, one of the things I also thought was you look like a lion, but also a bit like a cannabis leaf, because you had like, it seemed like you had it coming out of your pores. But I was like your hair, your hair kind of had a little, you know, cannabis leaf. Look to it a bit.
I don’t know, you’re not wrong. Johns. Definitely. Johns definitely did. He just looked like a big a weed bush, you know, but like a skinny weed. A skinny weed bush. Yeah. But yeah, you you were like, dabbing only, like exclusively dabbing. And I was dabbing 24 hours a day. Like, I would wake up at three in the morning able to sleep and go and just like, what the fuck?
Why did I think that was okay? Yeah.
And now look at you. You’re like. You look like. I mean, you look like you’re. I mean, a young mom in an Ohio suburb who’s, like, on her way back from the yoga class. Like, how did this happen? The the transformation is just remarkable. Like you could run for Congress. Now if you can’t. Looking like this, like you’re, like, all American wholesome.
You look like you never touch nails. You look like you never touched a drug. You look like you worked for some mission somewhere. You know, like you’re, like, out there converting the people here think I’m a Mennonite, right? Yeah. And I like, covered in tattoos. But a minute. Yeah, yeah. You’re like, you’re trying to. You’re out there trying to convert the finally, you know, they, they refuse to convert to all of it.
But now you’re going to get them because you’re because you look like this now you know. Right. So you said you got back into boxing after a hiatus. Mexico’s been very healthy for you actually. If you look at it, I think about it like if you think about Mexico for you, like the what is it, nine years now, ten years, ten years.
Yeah. So. Right. Wow. Right. So think about how you were physically, just physically. Because not just the way you look, but like, holy shit. Like you had. So you want to know a nerdy reason as to why it’s health problems. You want to know my suppose so friendly to me, the people, because the people are so beautiful and well, there’s a much nerdy reason than that.
Am I my. My man loves to tell everybody this, but he’s right. So first off, I’m born in you were the rooster, right? In Chinese zodiac, each sign has two friends. My friends are the ox and the snake. Mexico was founded in year of the snake. Next also begins with the capital letter M, as does my name. The city that I’m founded in was founded on the 18th of the month, as was my birthday.
Like, there’s a lot of little like numerological and astrological things that make it so. This is the best place I could have ended up, do you think Perry, Ohio and Mexico are somehow connected in the universe, their enemies? So Ohio is born, founded in year the pig. Pig? Oh, the enemies you’re talking about the state, not the town.
Yeah, but it’s a state of Ohio that’s against me. And Perry did nothing to me. You know, Perry, the county did, didn’t they? Yeah, but it’s their state charges. That’s true. Okay. You’re right, you’re right. It wasn’t the city cops who pulled you over, right? It was. And if you look at my charges, it says the state of Ohio.
You know that’s true. That’s true. I’m always I’m always pretty soft on local, especially small town cops, like, you know what I mean? Like, I just generally don’t look for as an anarchist. I don’t look at them quite as viciously as I do. State and federal. Well, you got to consider, like last time we talked, the reason I didn’t pursue the asylum process or the reason I actually didn’t pursue getting my charges dropped.
And I get this this. Yeah, I have this tattoo matching with cat. This is our wifey for leafy tattoo. When you get that 2023. Yeah. I haven’t seen that. Okay. Yeah. Sorry. It hurt. It’s probably my most painful one, especially up here. Ouch. Oh, God. Yeah. Sensitive. Sorry. You were saying. Yeah, but, but basically, it turns out that the sheriff, the deputy sheriff in that area.
Super anti-immigration of any kind. He was threatening to send immigrants to the houses of Kamala’s supporters if she won the presidency. He was threatening voters, all sorts of things like that. But like, long story short, the way that that whole local system is, is the reason why even the lead is legal in Ohio. Even though I’ve been sober for four years, as next month it’ll be four years.
Doesn’t matter, right? They’re not going to. They don’t want to work with me. They won’t be told you. I told you seven years ago. I said it’s not the weed that they’re pissed off about. It’s the it’s it’s the rejection. It’s the it’s the fleeing. It’s the rejection of the state. It’s it’s the fuck you to this state that really I that’s what I said.
I don’t think they’ll forgive that. They’ll forgive the weed but not. And I’m willing to go back and be like, guys, I fucked up. I’ll say whatever they want me to say, but they want me to tell me. They want me to say. You don’t think they’re going to force time on you if you go back? I have no idea.
Which is why I haven’t gone back. Oh, I know, but they might. They might not. Oh, God, I would imagine they would. But only like months. Not a year. But the problem is, I work six days a week. I have so many. I can’t do that. I’m not saying to do that. I’m just saying I don’t think it would be.
I think it’s so, you know, people, I think my thing, I think they would, I think they would lock you up. But as a, as a message, you know. Right. But anyway. Right. I cannot believe you’re still dealing. And then there was the sheriff.
Undercover? No, no, the main. The. Yeah, the sheriff of the county where you guys caught the charges ended up. I did the research on him. I found out he was. He was one of the cops at Kent State in the for the killing of the protesters. He was there. He was one of the. I don’t know if you shot anybody, but he was.
No, no, you’re right. He was because he just retired last year. Yeah. Whose was I was like, what a resume, dude, that you start with Kent State and you end with Lily and John. Okay, cool. Yeah. He’s a he’s just a little petty fascist. But anyway, let’s talk about good things. Let’s talk about the best thing in the world to do other than.
Well, yeah, yeah. Do drugs, training. Training. Yeah. How’s it feel getting back in a boxing after being out for a while? Yeah. So I mean, I, I started in 2008. It was the first time I’d ever put on a pair of gloves even. And I was 42 at the time. Yep. 42 and so yeah. And I trained and I a few years I was into it, but not hardcore.
But about three years into it, I got really hardcore obsessive kind of kind of your level with circus stuff. Whereas, you know, you think about it all the time, even when you’re not training, right? And you can’t wait to go to the gym and you like study it when you’re not training, that’s when you know that your hardcore is when you, like, study the thing, like you watch videos and things and just think about like, how am I going to throw that left hook next time?
And then I did, and then I got into Muay Thai very seriously too, and was sparring like 4 or 5 times a week. And I was in my 40s and I was sparring like guys in their 20s, and I just loved it and it. Anyway, so I stopped drinking then, and that was a big part of it.
I mean, it gave me another thing to do besides drinking that was more, even more exhilarating. And then I lost like 50 pounds and I kept it off for years, and I was like, in the best shape of my life when I turned 50, and I wanted to become a coach, I still do in the sport. And if I could, like, make that happen professionally, I might even consider it, because it’s just like, it’s the most rewarding thing I’ve ever done.
And then. And then the gym. I know this is part, I’m sure, part of your thing to with the circus, the gym itself and the people in it, the community is like maybe the best part of the whole thing. You know, if you find the right gym, if you have the right gym, which usually I’ve been to 20 gyms, by the way.
I’ve been, I’ve been I’ve trained at 20 gyms all around the country, and most of them are really good. And when they’re good, they’re just like, it’s incredible because you leave everything outside. Of course, the gym. I don’t even know what people’s politics are. I have no idea. And a lot of times I’m training with cops, by the way, because cops, a lot of they do a lot of martial arts and combat sports, but I don’t care.
Like and you become. And especially when there’s risk, like with what you’re doing and what I’m doing, when you’re doing a sport where there’s risk involved. I used to be a rock climber. Same thing where you’re working with partners and you depend on them for your safety, each other. That’s the kind of like bond I’ve never experienced. Like every time we spar at the end, we hug.
And it’s like, it’s so incongruous because boxing is such. People think of such like, oh, kill you warriors, primitive, savage, macho sport. Which it is sort of, but actually it’s all about taking care of each other. And so then it becomes it. So that I’ve never that’s like one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever experienced. And I heard Gina Carano, do you know her?
She’s a the movie star who’s also UFC fighter. She I just heard her describe exactly the same thing. She’s. Yeah. She said I fell in love with the sport because after we sparred, we would hug. And that moment was like that bonding with the person you were just sparring with, punching in the face, kicking in the face is like magical.
So. And yeah, so I bet you there’s a lot of that in what you’re doing. There is, there is. And like there is that sort of family quality. Now I’m in the interesting position and that I’ve kind of shifted my circus family because I had a much bigger circus family. I was taking classes 3 to 4 times a week, but after I quit birth control and I was I was chronically inflamed.
I couldn’t train in quite the same ways, like if I bent literally endometriosis, you tear lesions and you’re bleeding internally. You know, that’s literally how it works. And if I felt resistance at a certain spot the way that my teacher was, he’s very hard core. You do it because you’re in my fucking class. Well, I would I would end up in pain 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
So I kind of step back from that and I shifted to this new place. But it’s still the same, because when when you’re there with people, no matter your skill level, you’re always risking your lives, you know, like doing especially dynamics and drops and stuff. So there’s that base level of respect, right? Like your heart or I’m hardcore of trust.
Of trust also, especially when you’re doing duos like my friend Stephanie is literally. And respect and respect is crucial. Yeah, respect is crucial. Like, yeah, if you respect someone in the gym, then I’m willing to submit to them. Totally like to their authority. You know, I love that actually, when I know that a coach is good and knows what he’s talking about, I actually love even though I’m like the opposite and the rest of my life, you know, I’m very.
Yeah, I love totally submitting to authority in the gym when I respect them. I hate it when they’re dumb, but like, usually I respect them and it’s I there’s something about it’s liberating because I don’t have to think about it anymore. I don’t have to make the decision about what to do. I just do the thing. I don’t have to think, well, really.
Like in general, these sorts of physical activities, boxing is, I think, very similar to aerials. In this way, you are unable to focus on what’s in your head. When you’re doing that, you have to drop in your body or you’re fucked. You know, like if you’re too focused on what’s in your head about stupid shit, that doesn’t matter.
You’re going to hurt yourself or get hurt. I’ll bet. I don’t know the statistics, but I’ll bet you because I know statistics for sports that are similar, I’ll bet you what you’re doing is actually more dangerous, a little bit more dangerous than boxing. I’ll bet you the injury rate is higher. Well, people will fallen and died like if you fall.
Yeah, right. 20ft directly on your head. Yeah. You know. Yeah yeah yeah yeah. Like cheerleading is I know, like, there’s more deaths in cheerleading than any other sport, you know, just because of the drops. Just similar thing. So I thought I’d. So yeah. When it’s that in rock climbing, what I used to do of course is more dangerous but and similar reason.
But yeah it’s man what I got, I got once I got my life truly saved, I was rock climbing. The guy caught me six feet off the ground like I was. I fell 20ft and he caught me. And I was looking at his eyes when I. When I hit the bottom, I was looking at his eyes, laying sideways and like the bond I had ever since with Walter who caught me, is just like, intense.
Like, have I ever seen him on the street or whatever? It’s just like immediately the aerialist version of that is when we perform and we work with a rigor and the rigor, there’s two ways to get lifted up all pretty to start spinning and get lifted up. One is a machine called a wedge or a rig or something like that.
The other one is a rigger, and it’s literally a guy holding a rope that pulls the rope. And like I have worked, I’m friends with a rigor that owns the, the, the gym that I work with. And he is exceptionally good at what he does. And then I’m still to this day, I have this soul bond with the guy that lifted me repeatedly and shows I’ve done locally.
His name’s cuckoo, and there’s there’s a bond when it’s like, bro, you could have dropped me and killed me and you didn’t. So thanks, you know, and in the duo stuff, like when you’re performing and you have somebody hanging, you know, you do a wrist grab like this and that’s all you have and you have somebody kind of life.
It’s kind of a big deal when someone is keeping you from dying is protecting your actual life. Not your feelings, not not and not a minor injury either. Like they’re, you know, they’re keeping you from dying, right? Or or breaking your head or breaking your neck or, you know, like it’s it’s a huge thing. And the girl that I knew the most duos with is now my, like, assistant and partner at an archipelago, and she’s one of my best friends in this world.
Because when you can do that stuff together, you know, working together in a professional senses just it’s easy. Yeah. And you’re bonding through the sport. You trust the other person to catch you. If you if you respect their commitment to the sport basically. Right. I mean, if they’re like right. And so and so it’s like this third thing that’s binding you together, which is neither is ego.
Right. And so the thing that keeps you together is neither ego. And in fact, the thing that keeps you together requires you to subsume your ego to I mean, to a large extent, I mean, you also have to learn to communicate, you know, like if you can’t communicate with the person, like that’s where the accidents happen. You both can have drive, but if you won’t can’t talk to each other, somebody’s going to get dropped literally.
Yeah. And it’s like and it’s an intimate communication too, because you’re talking about these very intricate, tiny maneuvers with your body, each other’s body and how they’re interacting boxing the same way they’re in, how they’re interacting and animate it. Weird when you’ve got another girl’s ass in your face, you know? Yeah. That must be terrible. It’s not. It’s not especially I don’t know how it is for you, but I mean, well, you know, this is neither here nor there, but I realized sometime in the last couple of years that I really like Latinas, so I am totally fine with this.
It is all right. Wow. It’s a thing, I bet. I’m sure you’re you’re your man is happy about that. He’s just happy that he can look around in public. And I’m not going to get mad. And I’m actually the one that’s doing more looking than he is. And I’m putting people out and stuff, and he’s just like, very good, very liberated relationship.
I mean, that’s how it should be. If you make something taboo, that’s where it becomes desirable and a fetish and all the weird shit with it. Yeah, yeah. So I was out of the gym, actually. I said two years is actually three years for. Well, I got a weird injury from tie, which is I had nerve not damaged, but a horrific thing that’s just now subsiding.
But from kicking, it actually did something to a muscle inside my inside my glutes that like compresses on two major nerves and it does so spontaneously. Spontaneously. It’s a spontaneous spasm. And it’s been hard is actually when I met you in Acapulco, that was like the worst it was. I was in pain all the time in the ass.
Yeah. And yes. But also down my leg, because it was sciatica, too. And all through my midsection. Yeah. So anyway, so I had to get out. So I finally stopped going to the gym for a while. And then other stuff happened to anyway, which was terrible, terrible for your mental health. And I got back in a month ago and it was just like, wow, back in Paradise.
I just I just love it so much because I found a good gym that’s right near me. And it’s really cool in a lot of different ways. And so I’m just like, pig and shit. Of course, then I injured myself three weeks in because I was going so hard, like I screwed up my knee somehow, which I don’t even know how you do in boxing.
I was just going so hard that I just managed to tweak my knee. Anyway, who cares? I’m back in boxing. It’s awesome. Everyone should do martial arts or the circus, I think. I think everybody should just move their ass. That’s really it. Like find a way to move your ass that is fun and do it. Because man, I don’t know what I would do without.
And I and I’ve done it like I quit more or less for like 4 or 5 months while I was traveling. Last year, I went to Cancun and got stuck there for a while. It was an epic adventure, but also I didn’t do any training of any kind and I gained even more weight. That was where I realized the pregnancy looking by.
But when I got back, I realized I had a lot of work to do to regain my strength. But like, I was happy and almost in tears, like, okay, finally. And the last week I was like, okay, I’m beast mode now. Like, this is right, let’s go. I can do shit I couldn’t even do before I quit, you know?
So yeah, yeah, I know that feeling. Sometimes you gotta rest. Well, wait. What? What you do is silks right within circus. Like circus is the broader category. Or do you do more than I do? I specialize in trapeze. And the hammock, which is basically trapeze, is my favorite. Have I seen you do trapeze? No, probably it’s the bar with the two ropes.
I know what a trapeze is. Yeah, I mean, I mean, yeah, I’ll send you a last week on the trapeze. Oh, okay, I guess so. Okay. It is, it is. I’ve performed it repeatedly. Well, that’s often part of silks, right? Is a trapeze, isn’t it? These is different because silks is fabric. It’s soft, I know trapeze. They’re like rough rope in a rough bar.
You’ve done just trapeze. Oh, I love trapeze. I have a purple trapeze. I have it in my closet here. I don’t know why have I not seen that? I’ve seen. I thought I’ve seen what is miniature piece. Okay. Check it out. I’ll look again. Okay. Anyway. Well, okay. So you do trapeze silks. And what was the third one?
Hammock. But I do mostly hammock. Hammock is literally the hammock silk in. I can do the hammock. So that motherfucker never leaves a Sammy. Especially when you live in Mexico. Yeah, yeah. Hammock is described as a silk that doesn’t have the two ends flowing. It’s just like a loop and it’s very similar to a trapeze. You can do a lot of the same moves, but you don’t have this fucking bar because the bar hurts.
Like, I’m not going to lie, the bar hurts. I have bruises and burns and stuff from it, especially on, like, my hips. But, I mean, you got to be a little bit of a masochist to like this, you know, to like, oh, man, look at this bruise I have with, like, a sense of pride. Yeah. So tell me more about the problems you’ve been having with girls asses.
Being in your face is that it’s not a problem. And it doesn’t happen if I just want to hear more about it. I just want to hear more about the problem. Well, like when you are both on the same apparatus, they’re going to climb above you. They’re going to climb below you. Sometimes the legs are being wrapped around your torso and they’re hanging like it’s a thing, you know?
Like it is. Yeah. And it’s funny because I was like, coming to this as I got in a circus. Like, I went into circus, like I’m a straight girl. And then I got in a circus and I like, oh, one and then I’m staring too long and I’m like, wow. What did I just say? Everyone should do the circus.
Especially women. Apparently. It would be a wonderful thing. I mean, wow, that’s cool. It is cool. But also like, it helped me to step into my femininity, you know, like, I didn’t wear makeup. I didn’t give them a nails done. I didn’t wear dresses even really when I started getting into this. But yeah, didn’t make it didn’t make you into a dike.
It just made you appreciate women’s bodies, right? Exactly. Right. Yeah, exactly. And including my own. You know, I had a deep disconnection. I often say if I was raised as, like a kid in today’s school system, they’d have me on hormones and be telling me I’m trans because I never felt connected to being a woman until I was 30.
I didn’t feel like a boy, but I also didn’t feel feminine. You know, I didn’t have any feminine like hobbies. I didn’t yeah, I didn’t feel pretty most of the time. Well, why was that? Because you had sisters. My sister was the same way, you know, like my sister. She’s still a tomboy. I’ve talked to her about it because her daughter’s had these struggles and she’s just like, damn, I was.
I always thought, actually, for both of you. I thought that was really just a thing about toughness. And it is more than more than lack, lack of femininity. Like, I don’t see Kat as lacking, being unfeminine. You know, that’s a good point. Like, had we had different upbringings, would we have? She strikes me as as a tough but feminine woman.
Like, that’s she is, which I’m trying to bring her to Mexico in the next six months. We’ll see. Yeah. Gotcha. Has she ever been? No. Fuck, yeah. No. Do that. She got. She deserves that. Right. I’m bringing dad back for Christmas. I’m trying to bring them both once a year moving forward. Just because I’m fucking being away from them.
The same with you, too. I mean, required, obviously. I mean, I talked to you about. I talked about you being a lion. Like, it required just toughness to get through what you guys got through, like. Yeah, even even before you got to Mexico. I mean, what you all went through as kids. So that’s I always I always honestly like, read both of you in that way.
Like, I never saw you as like, Butch or whatever. I just see it as toughness. I didn’t even see it as butch. But when I look at photos of me, even from, like, you, I look like a little boy, almost, because I didn’t have nothing for curves or anything, you know, like, yeah, I was shaped a little bit like a boy.
And yeah, right now I’m just not to the point to where, like, I had a man run across a parking lot chasing after me to get back. Last week. And I was like, I’m basically married. I’m sorry. I can’t help you, right? I mean, especially with the strawberry blond hair in Mexico, I would imagine you get a little bit of attention.
The big blue eyes, you know, I bet you get a little bit of attention. Yeah, yeah, especially now that you look like a woman. Especially now that I looked like a woman. Yeah. And not not a tough, scrawny girl. Right. But yeah. Yeah yeah yeah. Hitting puberty at 30 was wild. Yeah. Right. Yeah. But I’m happy for it.
You know, like that’s part of why I’m writing the books that I’m writing and stuff like that is because I want there to be a guidebook, so to speak, on how to go through what I went through and not be traumatized. Piece of shit. You know, because so many people go through less and they use it as excuse to fall out on drugs, to engage in terrible, you know, behavior and put themselves at risk and all these other things, you know, to be shitty people.
And I just did the opposite.
I mean, it is a miracle, but the fact that, I mean, not that you came through, but that anybody would get go from there to here is a miracle. The fact that your sister to me.
Really did the same, just in a very different way. But like, she, you know, she she’s she’s through it and she’s a strong, independent person. Right? Especially now she was not independent even a year ago because she was essentially her terminal illness. I know he was responsible, but she is I know, but besides that. But the fact that she was like she was running the whole show, though, I mean, she was right, you know, she was in charge of this whole fucking thing, family that she had.
Yeah. I mean, and holding down and not not lovely job to do. So I mean, for so long and that’s tough and that’s like, takes a strong inner core. How many people from Perry, Ohio with similar backgrounds are dead now or in prison or strung out, right? I mean, I talked to a lot of my friends because I’ve, I’ve befriended a lot of people online.
I used to be friends with most of them are on antidepressants. I talked to them about my life, and they’re like, I’m jealous of you. And I’m like, you’re jealous to me. I don’t get a bank account. I don’t get a passport. Oh, charging. Jealous of you? Yeah. Are you kidding me? Of course they are. Oh, my God, I do have a cool life.
I travel around Mexico with my really fat cat and my lovely man. I mean, the only thing that’s wrong with your life, as far as I can tell, and it’s not small, is that you can’t come back to the United States. But other than that, other than that, who would not rather have your life than the life of your Ohio friends, I mean.
Right. Oh. Oh, well, I’d rather have your life than a Wall Street executives life, you know, I mean, there’s a lot of people you beat, I think. Yeah, but. Oh, I was going to say, like the fact I. So I see it this way. Although your other sibling didn’t do so well but or two of them. But, but but the fact that the two girls did I think speaks to something original in the family that was strong, you know.
Yeah, there is a strength there. But yeah, like my youngest brother, because I have three brothers, one older and he’s got some health issues and stuff like that, but he’s one of them. One of them passed. Right? Yeah. And then that’s what I’m saying. The youngest one he passed wasn’t even me, you know, I know. And he passed from drugs because he couldn’t handle.
And I talked to him once, right. I think I think I talked to him once or twice.
He’s a good kid. But then the other one and there’s one who’s gay. Yeah. That’s my older brother. Right. And he’s he’s a great person. He’s just I know he’s and maybe he’ll be pissed hearing this, but I know he’s lonely. I know that there are things he wishes were different about his life, but I’m pretty sure he’s the only one out of us that owns a house.
And he has a very stable job. And he’s also, like on the side a Haitian priest, through my understanding, and does like witchcraft for money. And it’s fucking dope. I didn’t know your brother was Haitian. He’s not. But he learned from the I know he’s not. Oh, okay. Was he still in Ohio? He’s in Texas. I want to say.
Yeah. I’ve been trying to convince him to come to Mexico. And he’s like, I’m too pretty to get sexually trafficked. And I’m like, I hear you. And. Wait a second. He has a house. He’s pretty and he’s lonely. How could that be? He is a very intense, and he’s also very independent. And he doesn’t deal with people’s bullshit.
And the reality is, the dating game in the United States is a fucking joke. Well, yeah. Yes and no. I mean, I just went through it, as you know, I mean, I, I don’t know, that’s a longer story we can talk about some other time, but unless you want to talk about it. But, anyway, I think there’s something original in your family.
It’s not just. Yeah, I mean, it is that you made a lot of right choices in the last eight years, but seven years. But there was something. Well, also, just the fact the autism. Well, I mean, yeah, it’s that single minded focus, you know, keeps you going forward. Yeah. Right.
I mean, no, I mean just literally that you survived the two years, right? From from the arrest to the shooting, literally. I mean, physically that you just physically survived that because you could have been killed in all sorts of ways or just died from starvation. Right. Which for almost or exposure, I know, or but I mean, you looked both of you looked like, but especially you looked like you had been, like living in the desert for a while.
You look like you’d been living in a cave. So and you kind of were sort of almost. But, Yeah, I mean, I don’t know, there’s something about. You made it through all that insane shit which we still need to make a movie about. I mean, I’m working on it. I don’t know if you can see there’s a comic book that’s happening.
That’s me and my dad. No cycle. That’s. No, we need. I know we got. So that’s the script or that’s the it’s the it’s that’s just one way I’m telling the story because I’m writing a book. And that’s also part of what this podcast is about is to tell the stories, you know, because like, so much is just trapped in my head, but really, like.
I think that there is some sort of higher purpose of why the fuck I was sent here to go through all this shit and to get all these various health issues and the find ways to heal them, because for the most part, like I’m healthy and the proof of it is in my skin, you know, like, I look pretty.
All right. Oh, obvious. It’s obvious. Yeah, yeah. So, like, I mean.
Some I was all this shit happen for a reason that’s still being revealed to me. I think my purpose partially is to help people, but I know I already have because I’ve had probably more than 100 people message me since the series came out and said, I didn’t kill myself because of you, because I was suicidal. I watched that series and I was like, she didn’t do it, so I don’t really have a good excuse.
That’s right. Yeah. No, there was that’s interesting. Some kind of strength, even though you weighed, what, 90 pounds? Something like that. Yeah. I mean, don’t worry that now to physically, honestly just to physically survive those two years in particular like and all the things, all the little things that happen. People don’t know about. Yeah. Right. Right. And then the.
Yeah. And then to just well and to survive your childhood. I mean, you could have been shot when you were a kid, like, you know, I told you about those letters, right? That my mom wrote to her best friend about how she had supposedly been shot at while pregnant with me, like there was a drive by me. She was in the car getting cigarettes.
And apparently now my dad claims that there was a different reason, but my mom is convinced that she was shot at and regardless of if she was or not, when you’re pregnant, I believe it. Why wouldn’t she be? Why wouldn’t you be shot at? I mean, she had enemies. She was a drug dealer. Of course she got shot at.
But also, like, my dad was married when he met my mom. So that’s the thing. Oh, and then I know that. No. And also that woman ended up becoming less in any way. Or she already was a lesbian or she was by. He said she was by, but she left him for a woman. It was a whole thing, but she was not okay with the fact that him and my mom ended up together.
And apparently they had had tried to have children and they couldn’t. And then for my mom to come in and being her fertile self immediately get knocked up and me come out, you know.
Did your mom. Did she have a name like a nickname beyond Red? Was it, was it like Perry Red or Ohio red or like Cuyahoga red? Just red. Michelle.
I mean to leave. I’m. And I mean this. I’m sure your mom really had a lot of attractive qualities, but, like to leave your wife for a major drug dealer. Your mom must have been. You know, I mean, she was, though, you know. Yeah, I but she was. I bet she was. She was something truly special. And he says they broke up before then.
Regardless, even if they did, the lady was spiteful because I met her randomly in a grocery store when I was 15, and she she just walked up to me and got in my face. My dad’s ex-wife, she got my face and she just stared at me and I was like, I don’t know who this is. And my dad walked up behind me and was like, Barry, which was her name.
And she was like, well. And she ran away. And I was like, that was Barry. And he’s like, yeah. And I was like, if she knew who the fuck I was just by a just a glance, you know, because I had my dad’s eyes and the rest of my mom. Oh, well, you know what? That’s where the toughness is from.
That you and your sister got your mom. Of course. Obviously. I mean, she was self-destructive. Ultimately, of course, but she was also, I mean, ridiculously strong to go through what she went through. Can’t even imagine. Can’t even imagine. Right. And that whole thing is developed even more because, yeah, like I was told, my grandpa was super physically abusive.
And then I’m talking to my uncle, her little brother, and I’m finding out he’s like 90% sure that my mom was being raped by her dad. And I’m like my my Uncle Shawn. My Uncle Shawn told me this and I was like, oh, I was like, fuck, you know that that might be a thing, you know, like, I because I, I mean, I’ve read an embarrassing number of memoirs and there is a certain pattern that, that that family dynamic seems to follow.
And it’s exactly what he described. Sure. Even if she had a perfect childhood, what she went through as an adult, like, required and I mean you, it was hard. What she went through was harder than what you’ve gone through because she had kids through it and and her life, I mean. Well, yeah, he probably faced about the same amount of danger.
But yeah, I mean, to do that with kids, to do that with kids. Right. Well, like really like the childhood determines what we’re willing to experience and what we go through as an adult. You know, if I didn’t have the childhood I did, I would not have had the early 20s to mid 20s life that I did, because really it was from like 18 to 26 where it was just like, I’m so impressed, I survived.
Yeah, well, not just survived but thrived. Right now. You’re not. You’re truly thriving. I mean, you even were thriving, I think within like, well, when you once you moved to Morelia, you started thriving basically as soon as you got there I think like it wasn’t perfect, but and you had issues, but you started to live and grow and and heal and.
Right. I thought as soon as you moved there and ever since, you’ve been going straight up. Right. Pretty much I know you’ve had I know you’ve had bumps, but, you know, certainly it’s been a pretty straight year and it’s never a perfect process. But like, you would feel like I’m going up if you charted the last seven years.
It’s definitely a straight up line. I mean, overall. So was I going to say, yeah, Malcolm X when he was before he was Malcolm X when he was a drug dealer in Detroit, his name or in Boston, his because he was from Detroit, his name on this, his street name was Detroit Red. So I wanted your mom to have something like that.
Like. Yeah. No, she just had red and I didn’t know that. I have a, I have Malcolm X’s biography or autobiography sitting in my audible account. I’ve been bingeing memoirs for two years. I probably have listened to 150 memoirs, just trying to figure out how to fuck. Do I write my story, you know? You know what? You should read his autobiography.
Because. Because actually, you know, there are sort of some parallels with your life. It’s not it’s not put it would be in the same way I think of like, yeah, I mean, coming from a very hard background, in fact, his was easier than yours because I think his parents were like middle solid middle class. But yeah, becoming being in crime and being in prison and being incarcerated and being on the street.
Another dealer. Another one like that, that brother Ali, I did an interview with him last year and he told me about Asada Shakur. You know about her? Well, that’s more complicated, but she. But she died a fugitive in Cuba. Yeah. I mean, there’s some shit to say about Assata Shakur, but interesting, because I’ve listened to her audiobook. I’m curious.
Well, if you I mean, so she she killed a cop, I mean, now, okay. But I mean it they chose to is very deliberate conscious thing. It was they were they were robbing a bank and they got pulled over and they were ready. They had already said before this they were willing, ready to kill cops. And they killed the cops when they got pulled over.
You know, I don’t know. It was part of the whole Black Power movement in the 60s and 70s. Well, that’s interesting because if you listen to her, it’s free. She was claimed she was a Black Panther, and she said she wasn’t actually involved in that bank robber and that they just framed her for that. So it’s bullshit. Who knows?
What’s the same with. So the thing, the funny same with Mumia Abu-Jamal. Same exact thing. He killed that cop. Like I’m 99% sure he killed the cop. How do I the funny thing is, it’s like in both cases, Mumias Black Panthers, splinter group in Philadelphia and Asada splinter group in Newark, both of them said said publicly, we want to kill cops like they were.
It was a whole campaign in the early 70s. Some of these radical black groups actually said, we’re going to go. And they did. They assassinated like a dozen cops around the country. And I’m like, okay, it’s cops. But also, what do you expect is going to happen when you kill cops? You’re going to. Right, right, right. Is it a great is it a great tactic?
I’m also really even though I hate cops generally as a class, I don’t want to kill them randomly. Like I’m not into that because they’re not all evil. It’s also not active, you know, for the same reason. It’s the opposite of effective. It’s the opposite. All you get is sympathy for the cops. Then. And then you get your ass thrown in prison forever or run out of the country.
So that’s why she went to Cuba. So, like, it’s mixed. It’s not like she killed an innocent baby on the street, but like, but like it was very counterproductive at the very. I agree with that. And there’s a lot of shit that she had to say about how the world work that I didn’t agree with. I think my favorite part of that book was a communist.
And to the communist. Exactly. That’s what I mean by that, you know? But like the end of that book, I love to because she was talking about her life in Cuba and about how she was essentially arguing with people because she’s like, I’m a black woman. And they’re like, no, you’re a mulatto. You’re brown. She’s like, no, I’m black.
And they’re like, no, you’re brown. Like, you’re physically brown. You’re not black. You’re not like, right. And she’s like, and it was interesting to hear her talk about that. Like mental disconnect there because people cultures are very descriptive. And there are a lot of black people, you know, Africans in Cuba. Right? But it’s yeah, I found that interesting.
But I was also cringing at the communist stuff. I was like, oh, I don’t agree. Like I don’t agree, you know, but she was Tupac’s aunt, I think. Right, aunt. That was a relationship. Yeah. So she’s like a and they’re both from here, from the Bay area basically. Or like they spent time here like and like I was I grew up around that.
The Black Panthers like their headquarters was near and my parents hat knew some of the Black Panthers and had them over to our house. And they gave talks and my parents groups meetings and shit. So I saw that whole thing happening of all these white leftists just fawning over all these black radicals. And then I went to high school, later went to high school and in college and looked around and and noticed that, like, seemed like half of my friends were the product of a white woman, civil rights worker and a black dude who was like part of the some black group who came, came through town and never came back like these.
I’m not exaggerating in Berkeley. No, I know what you mean. I know what you mean. It’s extremely common. Yeah, so it’s almost a meme, you know, the black guy rolls through, gets the pretty white lady pregnant, then leaves, and she’s the. That was bitter. And that was a big part of the Black Panther story, especially around here, because it was all started with the help of Berkeley, UC Berkeley students.
And my mother was one of them. And it was like there were all these coeds or all these young little white coeds and all these black cool dudes from Oakland who are revolutionaries. You think they didn’t take that advantage? Like that was a thing that Asada also actually complained about from my memory in her book is like, why are all the brothers with the white girls?
You know, you know, it’s just like, oh, and I get it. Here’s the thing. Like, I, I love African culture. I want to and I have a long list of countries in Africa I want to go to. I want to go to Gambia, I want to go to Senegal, I want to go to Nigeria. And and maybe I got a long list and I just want to say like which African cultures?
Because of course there’s very different. I mean, it sounds like more West African, more West African. Yeah. Specifically like because I, I read the book roots, of course, and I know that’s partially plagiarized and all of that, but I read that book and I was just like, oh my God. And then I mentioned it to Brother Ali and he’s like, you know, Kunta Kinte is actually the name of the oracle of the family.
And there’s still the Kinte family and The Gambia, and I know them. And if you ever want to go and listen to him tell his stories, you can. And I was just like, fucking send me. Send me. Really? Yeah. It’s really funny that you that you use the term Kunta Kinte because my son constantly makes fun of the fact that I named him Toby.
That was Kunta Kinte. A slave name? Yeah. The famous the most, most famous scene, probably in all of roots, is when he’s being whipped and being told that his name is now Toby, and he refuses and he refuses. He said, no, I’m cooking. And he keeps whipping him and whipping him, saying, no, your name is Toby. And finally he says, Toby.
So I, I, I just it was a white supremacist move on my part to name my son the slave name of Kunta Kinte. That’s terrible. You know, I hadn’t I hadn’t considered that. But it’s kind of funny. But like that book reading it, there’s like that point where he’s like, oh, and then there’s this little child. Many generations was born, this little boy, and that little boy was me.
And when, like, I listened to the audiobook and it was narrated beautifully and that happened and I was just sobbing, just like, would you be so that that book, I think, when did it come out? I think 1976, 76 or 78. So let me looking it up because. Yeah. 76. Yep. So it came out in 76. I was then when it came out I was 11 years old and I can’t find you.
There it is. Okay. I lost the window and I guess my parents must have bought it and brought it home. I read that entire what is it, 600 pages? Seven? I have no idea. I know it was a 24 hour audiobook. Yeah, it’s it’s huge. Like, I remember it being like this hardcover. I read that I read that entire book under my covers in bed in the middle of the night, on school nights with a flashlight, and I think, and I read it every single night like that until I finished it.
I mean, it was totally gripping and it was a huge, huge thing in my development. I grew up in a very integrated neighborhood, kind of half black, half white, and this Berkeley schools were really integrated. So I was always around black culture always. But there was something about that. I mean, that book galvanized and then the show came out right after that.
I mean, that galvanized all the kids at my school, like the black kids. I mean, they got way into being black then and black and all this stuff, too. I mean, and in 1976, 77, that’s also kind of like the height of soul culture. Like, I mean, the best music ever being played is like, that’s what’s on the radio then.
Yeah. My god. So yeah, that was a huge first of the hip hop era and everything that came after. And yeah, and then hip hop starts basically that same year. I mean, I think the first, the first house parties in the Bronx, I think were in 76. Yeah. Have you ever seen the movie Wild Style? Yes, a long time ago.
Yeah. I love all those hip hop movies from the 80s and 90s. Oh, man. They’re all good, man. And it’s so funny because here in Mexico, if you’re into rap, you’re called chulo. And when people ask me what I’m into, I’m just like, and not only am I in a rap like my, the autism is strong in that.
Like, I almost exclusively listen to Brother Ali because he speaks to my soul, you know, and like he explained it as the reason that I do that is because he and I are one in the same or similar people in terms of what we value, you know, the anti-government, the love, the faith, the like, overcoming hardships and all of that.
But like, I took his songwriting class and I learned a lot about the culture around it, which I think is the thing I got out of it the most. I was like, okay, I’m not here to be a hip hop, you know, performer. I’m not going to write songs, but I do have a greater respect for the entire community as a whole, you know?
And I’m just, I think, yeah. Sorry. I was just going to say, I think in a past life, and I think that’s where the fascination comes from. Oh, you got a little Whig in you, that’s for sure, you know. Isn’t that? Wait, Brother Ali, not to essentially race or anything, but I thought he was white. Or is he.
He is white. Yeah. He’s albino, he’s white. But here’s the thing. It’s like he’s he’s he’s all albino Caucasian. Right. Exactly. Yeah. Because primarily not primarily, but there’s a higher percentage of black albinos. He found solace and home in the black community in Minneapolis. And he was raised by black Muslims. And so he he says in his songs, I was taught life and manhood by black men.
So like it was very much a that is the way that he was raised. And it’s interesting there is that focus on it. And it’s funny because there are a lot of like anti-black people that listen to him because he’s the white rapper, but if they listen close enough to his lyrics, they would know he would. He’s not that big of a fan of that, but he is one of the most knowledgeable people on all of these things that I’ve ever known.
You know? Yeah, I love him. I think he’s great. What’s the what’s that one banger that I love? It was on my playlist. What’s his main hit called Uncle Sam? God damn, Uncle Sam. Oh, man. Uncle Sam. Goddamn is so. Yeah, yeah, that’s one of. That’s the first song I ever heard by him. And I was just, like, fucking bored.
Like, there’s this one. Great, great politics. Like, that’s the best politics you’ll ever hear in popular music. The crazy thing about that song is, like, he’s on FBI wanted list because of that fucking song. Because he ended up wrapping it in Iran. Well, he’s Moslem, right? Well, yeah, he’s Muslim. But even beyond that, they invited him to speak at a conference and I ran.
And then they, like, pushed him onstage and we’re like, wrap up, Sam. But he didn’t know. And they didn’t tell him that rap was illegal in that country at that time. So what he did was he rapping against the US government in Iran. Oh, really? Oh, wow. So, you know, like the lyrics to fuck This website? I’m trying to find this one specific part.
Here it is. You don’t give money to the buns on a corner would assign bleeding from their gums. Talking about you don’t support a crackhead. What? What you think happens to the money from your taxes? Should the government’s in addict with $1 billion a week kill brown people habit and even on the front line when Marshall crunch time you right back at it.
So he’s like saying that shit. And he was in death threats and everything. And he finally gets out of Iran. He gets back to the United States and they treat him like a terrorist. To this day, his children get flagged when they go back into the country. He lives in Turkey now because of that. Really? Yeah. Wow. Shit.
Okay. It’s a whole. He’s he’s probably. He’s probably a fucking around with some Islamist group or something. Not that I care, but you know what I mean. He probably has something going on with somebody politically. It’s mostly just hating on the US government. And he’s also not a fan of what’s going on in Palestine and all the other things that are going on that you get censor for that song in particular, those lyrics like, that’s as close to my politics as you’ll ever hear in pop music, ever.
Same now. I love a lot of I love a lot of the, like, anarchic, hedonistic rap stuff. Although that’s not even happen anymore. Now it’s just fuck you, a bitch pussy. But like, right until until the 2000, it was basically just hedonistic party music for the most part, with some violence in it to. But like and I actually there’s a lot in there that I, I vibe with politically but like as a statement of actual policy principles and things like that.
He’s he’s anti-war, he’s anti-imperialist and anarchist, as far as I can tell. He is. He truly is. He does lean a little on the comedy side. I’ve noticed some lyrical but like, not enough to matter to me because to me, like, I’m not afraid of communists. Like a lot of me too. Yeah, I, I’m cool with them as long as it doesn’t get to out of hand, you know?
Yeah. Just like leave me to my devices. I’ma lead you to leave you to your device. We can write. Because in the anarchist world, we’re all going to coexist together, you know? So. So I got to be at the gym. It’s pretty soon, but can I? I know it’s your interview, but can I finish by asking you two questions?
Yeah, of course. One is. Are you going exclusively by Miranda now or what? Is it, a fucking deal? Okay, so I need to say I never wanted to change my name because I loved my name. My name was unique. It was cool. I’ve always loved my name. And it fits in. In Mexico, they think I’m making up my name when I tell my name here.
So, yeah, I I’m I’m Miranda again. I don’t get mad when people call me Lily, you know, like some people call me Lily. Miranda. Some people call me Miranda Lily, and some people call me one or the other. I just I’ll respond to all of it. But my heart is Miranda. Okay, good. Good to know. Don’t. Now.
I will now change. Okay. That’s number one. Number two is. And this is a this is really the question. And it’s kind of a multi-part question. Okay, I know you’ve said this before and we talked about it, I think, before, but in this conversation, I think 3 or 4 times you referred to yourself as autistic. Yeah. And I know, I know you’ve been public about that and talked about it before.
So number one, I did you ever get diagnosed like officially. So no they don’t they didn’t even do testing on girls when I was a kid. So I was just sensitive girl. You know, my little brother, he’s officially diagnosed. But when I started looking in all this stuff because I found out I was autistic, when John was still alive, and he and I, we would have our struggles and my response would be to hit myself uncontrollably.
And I couldn’t figure out why. And I googled, why can’t I stop hitting myself? And autism came up. And so I went down a rabbit hole. And then I realized, according to the the DMs or the official criteria, right. I have all the DSM. Yes. Yeah, I have all of the criteria for autism, and even more so I have all the criteria for ADHD.
So like I’m on both of those, and I’ve had some people and I’ve distanced myself recently from some people who are vehement that I should not be labeling myself. But the reality is, this has allowed me to build my life in a way that works with the way my brain works. So I’m extremely effective. I’m happy I’m regulated.
But that doesn’t make me not autistic. That doesn’t make me not have ADHD. You know? That’s just the way it is. Okay, so let me tell you my history with that, my history with autism. How about that? My brother was and always has been. I mean, since he was five years old till to, to this day has been exclusively a hardcore gamer.
Okay. That’s number one. Okay. So that’s my childhood, right? Then as an adult, I got into politics basically. So like and for ten, 15 years I was a Marxist socialist. So those are my friends serum going with this. And then when I was in my late 30s, I switched my politics and started hanging out with libertarians. And so for the last, what has it been 15 years?
I’ve been hanging out mostly with libertarians. So like my child was hung out with where I was around gamers. Not all the time, but my brother was. So I knew them. A lot of gamers and then Marxists, intellectuals and then libertarian intellectuals. So you might imagine that I’ve known a shit ton of people who are autistic. Well, wait a minute, wait a minute.
See, that’s the thing. Miranda, formerly known as Lilly, formerly known as. What was your case number in Ohio? I don’t remember your inmate. Your inmate number.
Was I gonna say, oh, who either described themselves as autistic as you do, or other people, of course, describe them as, you know, that’s more common. So everybody says, oh, someone says, so I’ve been I’ve been fascinated by this kind of my whole life in from various angles, sometimes just like hating autistic people because my brother was my dad was probably Asperger.
He would have been, he would have been, let’s say he would have been diagnosed as Asperger’s, for sure. Let’s say that and just resenting the fuck out of being the only one in the family, or at least that part of the family. And I lived only with them because my mother left. So I was left with these two autistic dudes, you know, and me.
So I was like, the only one who could, like, carry a conversation with a stranger, you know, or like, you know, answer the door like and not and know what to say or, you know, I mean, and the only one with any emotional like acuity whatsoever. Like I knew when my dad was upset, you know, where my brother was, like, clueless.
You know, he had no idea what was going on in the house. So I for a long time, I just kind of resented every element of that type of personality. Notice my wording? I’m saying it’s type of personality. And then it’s also a culture. It’s. And it’s become a big culture. I think there is a culture that I could call an autistic kind of culture.
Yeah. And I think now I know. So now check it out. I kind of want to I’ve been wanting to do like a big pivot with my podcast or maybe, just maybe a medium pivot with it, because I’m kind of at loose ends about where to go with it. And I, I’ve wanted to go psychological inner, you could say spiritual, you know, go there and more and explore those questions more than politics and history and philosophy and blah, blah, blah, blah.
So at this, like if I and I have already made tentative plans to do this, to do interviews with psychiatrists and people who have like, expertise on autism, and I’ve been doing a little bit of research on this. Guess what, Miranda? The definition of autism has changed quite a bit. It has over the years, right? So how do you fucking know that you’re autistic when they can’t even decide what it is?
Well, here’s the thing. The root of autism, in my opinion, and this is why there are so many libertarians and anarchists and people against the system that are autistic. It’s it’s very simple. One of the biggest symptoms of autism is something called PDA pathological demand avoidance. They can’t be told what the fuck to do. If they do, they physically revolt.
Right? And that combined with a strong sense of justice, because autistic people, we love rules. And when things don’t make sense, we cannot tolerate them. And when you have the governments and the way that the world is set up, just simply not fucking making sense. That’s why you have so many people that are on the fringes that are autistic.
You know, I know I don’t believe that everybody’s autistic. Like some people say, I don’t believe that everybody, even in the community, is autistic. There is a lot of neurodiversity. There’s a lot of OCD, a lot of dyslexia, a lot of ADHD. But the reality is, like autism one, if you live a lifestyle and accordance with how your brain works, it’s not a disorder, it’s a superpower.
It’s not a reason to be disabled or to be emotionally unintelligent like I my friends know I’m autistic, so they know that if they’re mad at me, they need to tell me they’re mad at me and they need to tell me why so I can address it. They can’t just expect me to figure it out. That’s the big thing that people in my life have to do to help me with it.
Right? But that’s the reality with it, is that that, in essence, is what it is. It is a sensitivity and a really, really strong bullshit detector, a inability to tolerate inconsistencies and illogical things within their life combined with pathological demand avoidance. You cannot tell an autistic person what to do if it doesn’t make sense, they’re not doing it.
Yeah. Okay, so it’s funny that I do have to go in about ten minutes, but yeah, ten minutes, but.
Well, I’ll cut to the to the punchline here. But I do want to continue is that I want to I was thinking I’ll maybe interview you. I’m down. It’s one of my it’s one of my favorite things to talk about on on this specific. Yeah, yeah, yeah. One of my favorite things to talk about. Yeah yeah. And so yeah it’s funny another the new chapter in your life could be like autism spokesperson or whatever.
Well, that’s like what I’ve been trying to do is like, there are certain people that function the way that I do in this world, and we don’t know how to go about things. And so many people are like, let me just get that diagnosis and let me get on government welfare and all this shit. And it’s like, you don’t need all that.
You just need. Yeah, man. It’s it’s a tough one. Unpack, but.
I’m down to. Come on. Yeah. I mean, I just occurred to me it’s like, wait, we need to have someone on who’s, like, very clear that she’s autistic to talk about what it’s like, and you’re very articulate about it. But I was going to say I’ve done years of research, and that’s how I got to where I got like, yeah, but again, I think what you’re doing is you’re starting from the categories that are currently established by the medical establishment.
Right? And you’re saying, oh, they have this definition and I fit into it. Oh, there’s this definition of this. I also asked and I’ve looked in past because I got, you know, that you know, the origin. Do you know the origin of Asperger’s? It’s a fucked up guy that was trying to reprogram autistic kids, from my understanding. Yeah.
Nazi dude. He was not. Yeah. Even though he was Hitler’s doctor. And what he did was he’s weeded out kids like you and like my brother and sent them to camps. Yeah, and they were labeled as having Asperger’s. My dad and my dad, they would have been sent to camps. So. Oh, one thing you said I want to point out to me, which for me is the real crux of my problem with autism.
You said there are autistic people have sensitivities, which I know they do. But when you said that, I was like, wait a minute, they’re insensitive. But then I know they are sensitive, but they’re sensitive to particular things, right? But they also have insensitivity, right? Well, here’s the thing. It’s like when you’re so bogged down by physical sensation sensitivity, you become unable to have.
Like it’s hard to focus on the nuances of social sensitivity when, you know, a closing texture feels like las or something so loud it hurts in your head, you know, like certain sounds are physically painful, like certain textures like velvet. I can’t, I can’t, I can’t handle it, you know? And so like when you’re at physically sensitive, it really hard to notice physical sensitivities.
I know what I’ve the thing I said about my father and brother that drove me crazy was their emotional insensitivity. Or at least, I don’t know. Maybe they weren’t insensitive, but I could never. They they seemed unaware of other people’s feelings. They seemed unable to understand other people’s feelings, that other people could have feelings that are different than theirs.
It’s also a situation of, and this is a big part of what led to me switching gyms. It wasn’t just different training style, it was he would be mad. He would expect me to know why he’s mad, and then it would get worse, and then he’d start treating me badly because of it. I’m like, I don’t understand. He’s like, I shouldn’t have to tell you this.
You’re an adult. And I’m like, I hear you, and I don’t understand. I don’t see what happened here. I don’t see how this was rude. For example, you know, like, right. Like, whereas if you had seen the words written out, Lilly Miranda, that was a rude thing you said, then you would totally understand it and get it and move on, right?
It’s that it required knowledge. Extra requires extra labor. And I get that. That is a frustrating part of people who may not be autistic in my life that have to deal with me is they do have to do a little bit of extra emotional labor, but the ones that are still close to me, like my friend Stephanie, we’ve had a few days where she’s like, hey, I told you this thing, I expected you.
I expected some sort of response. Why didn’t I get a response to this thing? And then we would like, you know, go back and forth. And it was a little extra labor on her part, but it I got to where she needed me to get as her friend to support her. Right. And then and that most people just don’t realize that we do just need that little bit of kernel, like, hey, this feels weird.
I’m upset. What do you think? It’s nonverbal communication that’s the problem, right? Like tone. Like tone is hard to understand what it means for other people. Right. What a particular tone means is that right? Right. A particular tone, but for a perfect example is in class, I would be in there and I’d be watching my teacher do something and he would do something I had seen a video of on TikTok and I’d be like, oh, I saw a video of this and I get really excited about it.
And then he’d take it as she’s already seen this, she already knows what this is, and I have nothing to offer her. And so if you if you already know this, then just leave. And he would say that to me after. And I’m like, I don’t understand. I was just yeah, well don’t. And I’m like, yeah, you know, I don’t I don’t understand.
Right. Whereas yeah, it’s a pain in the ass. That is the hardest part about it is knowing. And the thing is, it’s not that autistic people don’t care. It’s actually the opposite. We can sense something. We can sense the disturbance in the force. But the fact that we can’t figure out exactly what it is until somebody is kind enough to explain it in a healthy way, well, obsess over it for ever.
We’ll make ourselves sick over it. But yeah, it takes extra labor, though on I think of it. I like to think of things generally, not in biological or medical terms. I like not to make things into like a disease or a, you know what I mean? Like, I’d prefer not to make you have not to think of you that way as having something.
You know, I think of it as a personality type. It is. And and I don’t think we can ever really explain why certain people have it. Because, like, for instance, my brother, the leading theory in the family, and I always thought this was that my mother left when he was two and so he had no mother, basically, you know, as a toddler and onward.
And he kind of that was when he started to wear a cape and become and he was like Superman, like he was a superhero every day from then on, literally wear a cape every day through his childhood. So like, as a matter, as a means of coping and escaping like it was a means of escape into this fantasy world.
But then, as I said, my father had the same personality type. I think there’s a genetic component to it very strongly. And it’s not like everybody in that family is going to have that thing. Right. But certain right? Like certain certain experience I have, some of it will flip it on, you know, you might be more than you realize.
Yeah. I was going to say, don’t you think. Don’t you think I’m at least partly autistic? At least I wasn’t going to say it, but it’s very well, here’s the thing is, like people very what? Very obvious one. It’s not very obvious what kind of. But like you have all of the like that that prior criteria I described.
You don’t like being told what to do. You don’t like following rules that don’t make sense. Yeah, but is true. But there’s levels, right? You know, like I consider myself more on the ADHD and people talk about it as line. It’s not a line, it’s a circle. And you have different things within it. Like like my boyfriend, he’s got autism and OCD and not a smidge of ADHD that that man was for four days straight, whereas I changed.
When I do every 30 minutes, you’re not all the same, right? Not all the right. And that’s that’s where that’s I think why the definition keeps changing. But specifically autism, it’s that inability to be controlled really. And I have I have more autistic characteristics than you just named. I mean, there’s a bunch of stuff. I mean, my obsessiveness, my perfectionism, your special interests of boxing and hip hop and politics.
And about that politics. Yes. I don’t know about boxing and hip hop, but, well, politics you are you are obsessed to an extent. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. That’s true. Right. And I do treated right. Well, I treat it in an autistic way because I become obsessed. I need and I’m perfectionist about it to like I need to know everything about it.
But it also feels good, right? Have you ever heard of stimming? Stimming is something that we do to stimulate our body to release that nervous energy. It’s why I love circus so much. It’s why I used to pick my skin. People thought it was drugs. No, it was just because I was an unregulated autistic person. I still get acne.
I just don’t pick at it because I have crochet and I have other things to do with my hands. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Physical activity is a stem. Yeah. That’s your dad. Do you think your dad’s autistic? Yeah, I had that talk with him in 2020 and I was explaining. I sat him down when he was here in person.
I explained it all to him and he was real stoned. And he was like. And I was like, what do you think? And he was like, I don’t know, man. He’s like, if that’s autism, I mean, I think I might be dealing with that. And I was like, well, that’s where I’m going here. He’s like, oh, I mean, so what do I do about it?
And I was like, you just be aware and that’s it. Yeah. Like, thanks for the autism dad. You know? And maybe come on my podcast and we’ll work it out and I’ll figure out how to get him on this podcast, probably when he comes to visit because he is terrible with technology. And I’ll yell at him for calling you fat when he’s on my show.
But all right, I do have to go to boxing. But this was awesome. I also got to get myself to the gym and move some heavy shit. So. Okay. All right, all right. Well, super fun it was. Let’s do this again. But also let’s do that episode you’re talking about. Because autism is my special interest, I think I think I might, I think I might, yeah.
All right. Awesome. Thank you. Miranda I got to get this, like, lasered into my brain now. It’ll take time, but eventually it’ll just flip. Okay. All right, sweetheart. Bye bye. It was good to see you. You too.