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The Truth About Addiction
Dr. Samantha Harte is a speaker, best selling author, coach and sober mom of two. She is here to tell the truth about her life, which requires telling the truth about her addiction: how it presents, how it manifests, and how it shows up again and again in her recovery. This podcast is one giant deep dive into the truth about ALL TYPES OF addiction (and living sober) to dispel the myths, expose the truths, and create a community experience of worthiness, understanding and compassion.
If you are a mompreneur and are looking for a community of like-minded women who are breaking all cycles of dysfunction and thriving in business, family, body image and spiritual well-being, join the waitlist below!
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The Truth About Addiction
From Reality TV to Real Identity: Romi Marie's Path to Authenticity
What happens when you build your entire identity on who others expect you to be – then finally find the courage to live as your authentic self? In this extraordinarily vulnerable conversation, I speak with Romy Marie – certified identity coach, mother, entrepreneur, and former cast member of Showtime's "The Real L Word" – though we'd never met before hitting record.
Romi takes us through her journey that began with childhood survival, where she learned that creating drama and "being sick" would earn her the attention she desperately craved from her busy single mother and absent father. This pattern followed her into adolescence, where mental health diagnoses became part of an identity that eventually led to substance abuse as a means of numbing her inner turmoil.
The conversation reaches profound depths when Romi courageously discusses how her sexuality became intertwined with her search for validation and attention. After years in the public eye as a lesbian reality TV star, therapy helped her question whether this identity had been another survival mechanism – a realization that challenged everything about how she'd presented herself to the world.
"I don't need the attention. For the first time in my life, it's so relaxing and quiet and calm," Romi shares, describing her current life that prioritizes peace, motherhood, and spiritual connection over external validation. She reveals how sobriety, faith, and radical honesty with herself have created a contentment she never thought possible.
This conversation isn't just about addiction recovery – it's about the universal human struggle to separate who we truly are from the identities we construct to survive. Whether you're navigating sobriety, questioning aspects of your identity, or simply feeling exhausted by performing for others, Romi's journey offers hope that returning home to your authentic self is not only possible – it's the gateway to the peace you've been seeking all along.
Ready to explore your own authentic identity? Connect with Romi at MadreRomi.com to book a discovery call and see if working with her might support your journey.
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Welcome back everybody to the truth about addiction. Today's guest and I have actually never met in person, and this interview was our first time ever talking. We were introduced by our speaker management team and we trusted them that their desire to put us together meant that we were going to have a deep connection, and so, instead of having a call and wishing we would have captured the call and the content, we just dove right in and recorded it. So you guys are listening to a conversation that was happening for the first time in real time, and it was really tender and fascinating. This woman is somebody you might know. Her name is Romy Marie. She's a certified identity coach, a mother, latina, entrepreneur and former public figure who has built a life rooted in resilience, purpose and faith, especially in the past two years. And when she coaches other women, she supports them in all walks of life how they navigate sobriety and recovery, how they establish sustainable nutrition habits, how they create fitness routines that support mind-body wellness, how they set and achieve meaningful goals, build healthier relationships, address addiction and emotional habits and reclaim time and energy for personal growth. Now, you might know her from three seasons of the Real L Word on Showtime, but what you're going to discover about her is very different than what you might have seen on TV or when she was in the public eye. And I love these conversations because we dive into a person's humanity, who they really are, who they've been at different points in their life, and what it takes to have the courage to continue to refine and redefine the meaning they've made of their lives so they can step into their authenticity and their true essence. Enjoy this conversation, leave a comment, share it with somebody who might benefit. Contact Romy. She's amazing. I loved getting to know her and a brand new friendship has been born.
Speaker 1:Welcome back everybody to the truth about addiction. Okay, you guys need to be let in right now on this secret, which is that this is the very first time this guest and I are ever speaking ever. I, in preparation for this call, was like what are we doing? We need to record, know the person that put us together Together for a reason, because we have so much that we're probably going to have in common and obviously contextually very different, and the meaning we've made of our stories and the purpose we've excavated from our pain Different but also brought us together in a very parallel track. And so I'm like why would we waste a conversation that we could capture and share with other people and, obviously, repurpose? This is the world we're in in 2025, you know content.
Speaker 1:So this woman who's here, her name is Marie and all I can tell you is that the reason we're put together that I that I can only speak of, uh, strategically right now, because spiritually I don't know yet why we're being put together I'm sure that's going to be revealed is that I just very excitedly got representation by speaker management company, which is so interesting, and Romy is on the roster, yes, and Amy the manager was like I think the two of you should meet, yes, and I'm like all right. So then, of course, I proceeded to stalk her on Instagram and I'm like who is this gorgeous woman who was on Showtime and has all these tattoos and looks like she's 25, but she's in her 40s, clearly had stepped into her own aura and essence and I wonder what it took for her to get there and so many things like I have so many fins and adorations already for you. I'm so glad to have you here, romy, marie, thank you, thank you, thank you for coming on this blind date with me.
Speaker 3:Yes, Thank you for being on this blind date and what an introduction. And just a shout out to loud management and Amy, who is my heart. Like she said the same thing. She's like you two need to connect. She's on with us. Like you guys need to chat. I went to your page as well. I was like, oh yeah, 100%, Like this was a perfect match, Right? So thank you for having me, Thanks for saying that I look 25. God bless you. But also no, but also thank you for saying you were curious about you know what got me here? Because I think that was the biggest part of it is like that journey to where I am now. It has been as most of us, right.
Speaker 4:Yep.
Speaker 1:It's been a long one. It's been a long one, it's been a long one. Well, yeah, I mean, and you don't, you don't command that kind of, that kind of energy unless you've earned it.
Speaker 4:Oh, and I can feel it, you know feel it yeah.
Speaker 1:You take up space, but it's earned, thank you.
Speaker 3:I mean 100%, it's earned. Where I am at now, I think, for all of us right like, I think there's a confidence one. I am in my 40s, I'm not in my 20s, right, I'm in my 40s. There's a difference once you hit 40s, right, there's just my life changed for so much of the better, right, I like so much of the better, right, I like so much of the better. And and just the journey through motherhood and television and publicly putting put out there. You know, I know it's like we'll get into it, but just my addiction, my mental health, it's been a public journey and yet a very private one, you know, but it got me here.
Speaker 1:So yeah, yeah, we made it, we made it.
Speaker 3:So this, yeah, Not only did we make it, but like life is good. You know what I mean. Like not only did we make it, but like life is like good it's. It's like we really made it, cause I don't feel like I'm like. I mean, parts of me on days are like Ooh, it's been a hard one, like Lord, give me, give me a minute, right. But for the most part I'm walking around today kind of like man. It's like it's good.
Speaker 1:It's good.
Speaker 3:on this side it can be good.
Speaker 1:Yes, I love that you, that you made a distinction, because I, on Mondays, this has been a pretty recent thing, but I go to a rehab and I facilitate a 90 minute workshop.
Speaker 1:Now, this rehab and I facilitate a 90 minute workshop, now this is not work I ever, ever thought I would be doing, but it is now. And so I have this background in physical therapy. So I take the clients through a workout which is really interesting because they're they're in early recovery, so their energy, their vibration, is very low, right, they're still coming to and if they're present, not always, but a lot of the time they still have an aura of shame and so it's heavy. So I work them out to kind of shake down the energy and shift their nervous system. And then we get into this heart-centered conversation and I talk about the book I wrote and why I wrote it, and what does it mean to live inside of a spiritual framework that's trauma-informed and it definitely doesn't just mean abstinence and that there are people who just coast. And recovery is not the abstaining of substance, it's the returning home to your true essence so that you can live joyfully and have peace of mind and uncertainty, which is kind of what I think you just said right.
Speaker 3:It's like yeah, no, I love that. I love that you said like return home. You know, like that part, that part hits because it's I think that is what happens, like through my sobriety over the last few years. I I, I talk so much, like right now, about like tapping back into, like who I remember myself being right when I was younger, like those dreams, that girl, like that inner child work that we do right, like I get to tap in and like help her grow up, and that's been really awesome. And that's where it's like a return home, right, and that's been because of just the removal of alcohol, right, that allows me to like go there. But it is so much more than just not drinking. Yep, it's so much more of a journey that happens, right, it's just removing. For me it was removing what was blocking everything. Right, what was like blocking my life?
Speaker 1:I? I'm thinking of two different things. I want to ask you and one's going to take us back in time much more, but yeah, so I'll start with that which is, if you had to describe your childhood in one word, what would it be? I know one word, and we're going to elaborate quite a bit on whatever the word is.
Speaker 3:Yeah, the first word that comes to mind is survival, right, Survival. I feel like I had to survive my childhood right and I remember it from a very young age, my one age. That's always been my like key. Go back to when I think of childhood, when I started my therapy and when I started doing all the work I did over the last few years, it's always like the six-year-old me and from six on that has been where I remember and it just went into. I was when my parents got divorced right, it just went into complete survival mode. Why?
Speaker 3:From then on you know, my, my, my parents, my father was not a traditional father, right, like he was a hit man, he was a drug dealer. He was this macho, masculine Mexican man who just was very unconventional, right, my mom was this like young single mom we had. I had two special needs brothers, so she had them and me and so that was already I was in her survival, right. So like I was the oldest daughter that was caught up in like this 20 year old's like survival of of of us and my dad being kind of like not the traditional husband or man. So you know you, you take on your mom, you take on that.
Speaker 3:So when my dad left, it just immediately put a six year old girl right into. These are your brothers that need to be taken care of. Your mom needs to be in college and go to school. She's on welfare. She needs to like survive. Dad is not paying child support and gone and immediately for a six-year-old. I'm a mom to a nine-year-old I. I can see that now it's like immediately you take on the responsibility of like you gotta take care of yourself, but you also have to take care of your brothers and you also kind of have to take care of your mom because she kind of needs you to do right now. You know it's survival, yep.
Speaker 1:So tell me how that played out for you, right? Because I have such a similar situation. Not, not the hitman part. I mean, my dad, in his right, was the family drug dealer, but it was. You know. You're under the veil of it's prescription, even though it's not prescribed to you or your sister or your mother or me, like. So it's white collar crime, right? It's not, you know, right? So so I think part of that was like so confusing for a long time, like this isn't this, isn't that. So it's normal, right, and everyone's co-signing this. So it's normal, right.
Speaker 1:But my mom was bipolar, self-medicating, like her mood was so volatile and she was the the anchor. Despite that Cause, my dad was just so emotionally absent that I'm like if mom is not okay, I am not okay. So what do I need to do and who do I need to do and who do I need to become to make sure she stops crying? Yeah, so this feeling of hyper vigilance was so deeply ingrained and I have so many stories way before overdosing on cocaine, and then the stories that played out after that of how that hypervigilance, that perfectionism for me because that's that was my survival skill was perfectionism played out. Can you take me into a story of your life where you look back now and you didn't know it at the time. But you look back now and you're like, oh my god, that was me completely in survival mode, which is what I learned as a girl to keep me safe, and I can see in hindsight now how destructive it actually was.
Speaker 3:Yeah, you know, what's interesting is that like, first of all, like a few things, like I think everybody came from a pretty can I cuss on here? Oh yeah, okay, I think I think everybody, I think everybody came from a pretty fucked up childhood for the most part, I mean, I think, for the like, I think for a long time I thought this is my story and, yes, my story. All of our stories right, are, are, are wild, and whether it be a loud one, like my crazy dad or mom, or it be a quiet one, right Of sweet little Susie, homemaker, throwing up in the bathroom while the sweet has been cheats, like we all had something right. When looking back and I think as a child you don't know that you think that your story is it. You're the weirdo, you're the one with the crazy home, you're the one with the parents and all the fucked upness, but like you're not old enough to be aware that, like everyone on the damn street, the entire world is fucked up right, like every individual, even pta mom, she's fucked up, right, right. So you create your story right. You create the story that you stick to Right, and I stuck to my story like my brothers, my dad, my mom. Even when I share it with you now, it's me repeating a story that I've told myself for many years, right. And so that story then becomes the identity, right, because this is your identity.
Speaker 3:Now, like poor me, and I didn't go into like let me take care of my mom, because I went into let me take care of my dad, right. Which then led to a lot of the issues when it comes to my sexuality, is that I went to how do I nurture him? Right, he needs me, he needs to be loved, he needs to be unconditionally loved. My mom was very strong, independent, going to figure it out. I don't fucking need you, I can handle this, I can go to school, I can get welfare, I'm going to raise my kids. Like. She was hyper-independent, right.
Speaker 3:Where dad was, he needed the love, right, and so that's what I took to, that's where I went. So the survival part of like me looking back, I think, was more of me than trying to get attention at a very young age, because everybody was so occupied by my special needs brothers who needed attention. My mom was very busy trying to make sure she could, like, get her life together and be a mom and my dad needed me Right. So somewhere in that mix, instead of like real survival which this would, I guess, be that I went into it started to happen slowly, right. I like 11, 12, where I went into like somebody just fucking pay attention to me and then I found out if I was sick I would get my attention Right, and that's where a lot of my mental health stuff came from.
Speaker 1:Oh my God, say more about that.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's, it was, I think looking back on it now, like it's how do you admit that, right? How do you admit, like, was I really sick? You know, was I really? Maybe I don't know. I don't know, I'm still figuring that out, but I think some of the truth I have found out is that, like I wanted people to care about me, right. I wanted people to care about me, right. I wanted so badly for a mom and dad, right, to come home and care about my homework or about my school or about my life. I wanted so badly for somebody in the home to be really engaged with.
Speaker 3:Like me as a little girl growing up, ask me a question, and because it didn't happen, I created, like drama. You know, I created drama that then would create some reaction, right. And then, you know, the story goes on to where my mother ended up marrying a really wealthy, successful producer. I felt like the fresh Prince of Bel-Air. So I went from being on welfare poor to, overnight, she married a woman, a masculine woman, who identified more masculine, and we moved to Pasadena and we were in the Hollywood industry overnight, right. So I went from this like relationship with money, identity, this white, rich world. I was this Mexican on welfare one moment. And now I'm right. Now I'm on in a limo on the way to the Grammys and these are my parents.
Speaker 3:And so, as all this was happening because mom was surviving, mom had found her, her golden ticket Do I blame her? Now I'm a mom? No, I get it. You needed to do what you needed to do. You did it. You gave us 14 years of a life that was very cush, right? Um, I get it. But in the midst of all of that, when I started to hit 13 or 12, that was when I started to get really depressed, ended up going into a hospital for the first time at 13,. The depression, all of that started to kick in. And that's when, right before high school, I started to use alcohol as like my coping mechanism. And when I say like I started to need it, I the pit. My parents were fighting and my brothers were sick. My mom was miserable. The whole experience I'm sure for many of us was I'm going to be sick now, like I'm going to be mentally ill now and you're all going to have to take care of me.
Speaker 1:Yep, yep.
Speaker 3:Yep, and I don't think a lot of people even want to admit. Right, there's probably a borderline part that was sick. Right, you got to be a little bit sick to go there. Right, to use that as your coping mechanism. But also, how much of it did I just like play into because I'm a kid of the 90s? Right, it's what we grew up on, it's what we saw. Yeah, I don't know. You know, I don't know. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:I mean, what's what's? There's so many things, but what's interesting now and this is so much of the work I do is I have a doctorate in physical therapy but but now I treat the spirit and I like to do them at the same time, and there's so much research thank God, that's coming out now about the intersection of those two things. And so you know, I don't even there isn't even like a percentage of me that's going. Was she really sick? Like no, first of all, if, if we are spiritually sick, everything in our system and our body suffers, and so period. End of statement. So so would a kid in your position. And again, this is.
Speaker 1:There's two parts to this conversation and we're going to get to the second part, but we're in the I'm learning about you, you're learning about me, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:And the the having compassionate curiosity around what happened and why, so that we can land in a place where we're like and then we took radical responsibility for our lives. And here's what happened amen, amen, yeah, I say when I tell this not to belabor yeah, I'm apart or to make us seem any any more special or different than the person listening who's also had their fair share of trauma. But yeah, if I'm imagining, you know, young romi, your heart would be broken in so many ways as you're trying to form an identity and you're like, who am I if I become invisible? Unless, unless I'm sick, unless I cry wolf, unless, like, if you don't, if you don't exist to the people who are loving and caring for you and basically keeping you alive, then you have to figure something out, and that is a crisis. Call it whatever you fucking want. Call it like I don't know. To me I'm like yep, sounds about right. Like you literally were such a crafty kid that you did, yeah, needed to do, to survive, yeah.
Speaker 3:That dynamic, right, and well, that's where you said survival. When you said what was your, you know what was your earliest memory of survival, you just said it. That was what it was, is I? But I didn't know it then. Right, it took me, like us fast forwarding to now, for me to actually admit things, comprehend things and like look at myself and go like, okay, right, like you did this, you did this, you brought this on. But why? Why did you bring it on?
Speaker 3:And how many people out there might like a lot of what I'm going to share or if we get into it in terms of sexuality, in terms of my mental health, in terms of my drinking, I'm going to be honest, it doesn't sit well with many. I never have sat well with many in terms of like I do call bullshit on a lot of my own stuff, Right, and that sometimes can, like piss people off and, sorry, my dog is like snoring next to me. That can, um, that can make people feel like I'm not validating mental health or I'm not validating sexuality, right, or I'm not standing up for how serious it is, and that is not true at all. This is just, and I've said this even through the show and I'm going to just say that here. This is my story, this is just my personal journey and so for me to share hey, maybe it was mental health, maybe it is mental health or maybe it was a survival technique, right.
Speaker 3:That does not negate somebody who's is real, Yep. So I just need to put that out there, Cause oftentimes when I speak, people are like you know, she doesn't understand how serious this is. I do. I'm just saying for me and maybe some people you may get to a place where you go. How much of that was, like you know, made up in your head yeah, and, and, and.
Speaker 1:It brings up a really interesting point, right, which is this is you know, my book is a modern reinvention of the 12 steps, because if I give you a visual, it's almost like the 12 step. You a visual. It's almost like the 12 step if you take an accordion and you squish it together. They're all in there, but they're rigid and they were written a long time ago by a bunch of white men, right, and so as we stumble into that framework, the people who are exposed to them, a lot of people recoil and it doesn't, they don't feel safe inside of it, and I was one of those, right. So I'm taking that accordion and I'm pulling it apart and I saying I think all of us can fit inside of this, actually, if we just freshen up the language.
Speaker 1:And I say that as an analogy because I think mental health is very, very similar, like autism, there is a giant spectrum and so, yes, on one end of the spectrum is the very dire nature of acute schizophrenia, acute mania in bipolar disorder and everything in between, right, acute psychosis, narcissism, sociopathic behavior, and that stuff is like sos calling the troops. We need a team team. We need integrative care, medication, some therapy, everything whatever.
Speaker 3:And then there's, and then there's the smaller right, like where somebody like me is making shit up and I'm not well like there is a great Right and so, but.
Speaker 1:But then what's the definition of mental health?
Speaker 1:Right, it gets to be really interesting because it's why do we need to? It's like labeling sexuality, like, why do we need to fit inside of a framework If, if I'm a young kid and I'm experiencing sort of an absence of my needs being met repetitively and I'm like, oh my God, I'm in this big scary world by myself, I'm going to like I ha, I. I literally feel like I am not safe, I could die, even, whatever it is like because of this lack of care that I'm sensing from the world around me. That is, of course, going to affect a child's mental health and so then, in response to that, they're going to do whatever they. So at what point is that not mental health? And the question is, where on the spectrum does it live Right? So it's almost like because we live in such a binary time where it's like you're either this or you're that and I feel like we've lost the ability to be both and like I was both suffering mentally and potentially didn't actually have a mental health diagnosis.
Speaker 3:That yeah, that sounds like the most. So they diagnosed me bipolar when I went into the hospital Right which at the time, at this age, they were like we're all in therapy, you know Adderall was big pros. I was in that that era when like docs were just like handing stuff out Everybody's bipolar, everybody's ADD, right and so my mom jumped on it. She was like, yeah, okay, that's what it is. I mean, they put me on lithium depakote. I was like in high school right On some serious drugs that I drank on Right, which we all know is just like a disaster.
Speaker 3:So the whole thing was a mess. But fast forward to years later. I get you know I find a great therapist who's like no, you were misdiagnosed, right. But here's the thing about identity and I do a lot of identity work. If you're told that you're that, even if it was a misdiagnosis, you now identify as that. Right now, you like, now you think you are.
Speaker 3:If they tell you you're sick, well then I'm sick. That's my identity. I'm bipolar, right, like this, like you, you're too young. You attach to it and not saying that people don't have it. I don't think that's something that I struggle with, even though it's been something that I've, maybe I do, maybe I don't, I really don't care. It's not something I've been treated for in years, and I would say that I think more of me bought into it, right.
Speaker 3:And then I think once I started to play sick and then once I started to believe sick, like I just got weirder and weirder down the sick hole, right, like I just found my escape from a hard reality. I was a different kid Right, I've always been different. Like I. My brain is weird, right, like I would just go to weird spaces and I would have a hard time being in reality. And I've dealt with my spiritual journey, like with my Christianity and my faith and God and Jesus, since I was a little girl. I grew up in it, and so I've just always needed more, wanted more answers.
Speaker 3:I was one of those kids, right, like I. Just I had to go down every rabbit hole as to our existence, right, and when I couldn't find it, I just wanted to kill myself. Like it was just. Like I just couldn't like go to school. I just we're going to learn and we're going to join the team and we're all going to be the girls and we're going to like I just couldn't do it. I couldn't do it Like I didn't care. I needed to know if God was watching us. Was I going to heaven? Right, we're aliens out there, like I is. Does my family care? I just couldn't be. So, as you know, like the brain is going insane, right, in terms of all these thoughts that I'm now in, like can't sleep at night, right. And then I'm a kid of the nineties, like consuming all of these TV shows and movies and I'm cutting up my magazines and making collages all over my my, my brain was like what is it that? That that book? Like brain on fire?
Speaker 3:Right, like my mind was like on fire, right, I was just like turn it off. I do turn it like, just go to class and like smile with the other girls and like be normal. And I couldn't, I just couldn't do it. I couldn't do it to save my life. So I was like I'm fucking crazy, right, I'm fucking crazy, that's it. And then you say it enough. And I tell people like I'm a huge Joe, joe Disponza, like you know, fan, but like you say it enough, you become it. I wasn't telling myself like you're normal, these are normal. Questions Like these are.
Speaker 3:Everyone has these thoughts. Like you know, it's okay to want attention, it's okay to need your parents' love, it's okay to be afraid, it's okay to be. I wasn't, I didn't have that around me. So I created this crazy identity, right, that then became, I became famous for on a level right, like it just became this, like it went too far. It went too far. So, yeah, there's a level, like you said, on the spectrum of like how much of that is mental health right To be able to even get lost in this type of headspace and how much of it wasn't? And what does it even matter at this point? Like you know, like the journey was my journey and I'm aware of it. But that's where, you know, the addiction part came in, because I had to turn that shit off. I had to like check. I didn't know how to sit with myself. For the most part, I did not know how to like. It was too, whether it was real or not real. It was just too much yeah.
Speaker 1:You know. Take me into the part of your story where the mental health component intersects with sexuality and how you identified that's been I'm so sorry my dog is literally out um, that's been like the biggest.
Speaker 3:So for those of you when you'd said, like been on Showtime, I was on Showtime's the Real L Word, right, um, it was one of the biggest like lesbian shows that had come out during the time that reality shows were just starting to kind of blow up, right, and so it was on Showtime and it was done by Eileen Shakin, who did the L word, which is like a huge series and every, everyone knows the L word, right, so they had created the real L word. I had come from being raised by two moms, right, so I grew up with my mom being married to this woman. We were in the industry. Everybody we had over at our house growing up was was gay, like I was at pride at a very young age, it was just I was thrown into a very open, liberal, gay home. We were also Christian, right so, like, we also went to church every Sunday we went to an accepting church. My faith is a huge part of my life to this day. I just I don't fit in any box here, right. So this was my life.
Speaker 3:So at a young age, sexually, I'm being raised watching two women. My dad is there but not really there. He's not really raising me right, I'm seeing him here and there, but he's gone, he's not there. So I'm watching a woman identify as a man and she's the masculine energy in the home, and this is now my idea of relationship. I'm watching my mom. I'm going to basically, yes, loves her, but use her Right, and so that type of nurturing or relationship that I'm supposed to like emulate or learn from is just a fucking disaster. Right, like, it's just very confusing for a girl to try to like go, ok, these are my. You know, it didn't feel real. It just felt like we were this setup and it was a transaction that went on for a very long time, right and, and we kind of came with, we were the package deal, we were the kids that came with her. Right, and it put me into a ton of identity stuff and it started with money. Do I deserve this money? Am I worthy of this money? Right, all of my friends are loaded, I'm playing rich, but this isn't my money. I know I'm a poor kid from Anaheim. Like, even though I'm sitting here with all of you, I'm still identifying as her. Right, I know I'm Mexican, I know none of you guys are right, I'm still identifying as her. So I'm all like confused and at a young age at 13, 12, you're just stepping into like who you are. And then I'm the only girl at school with like two moms, right, like everyone knew I was a girl with a lesbian parents and so I started to explore with my sexuality at a young age, you know, having my girl crushes and kind of like figuring out that that was. It was always an option, right, because how could it not be? That's what I grew up in.
Speaker 3:And I ended up I didn't have great relationships with men my whole life, right, typical shit, right, I didn't have it. I didn't know what to look for, I didn't know how to handle it, I didn't know how to be in one. I had no father figure and I don't care what anyone says, it's fucking important to have one, okay, like they play a massive role in a daughter's life and I don't care if that pisses people off. Like I needed a dad, I needed a masculine energy, I needed a father figure and you know, I needed to see how a man treats a woman and how a woman treats him. And I didn't, right, so, for the love of God, whatever I was trying to figure out was just a goddamn mess, right. And so I found myself with women, after a lot of pain and a lot of hurt from men, and I found myself. Women were more attracted to me, they were softer with me, they came to me.
Speaker 3:I got a lot of attention, right, like I got the attention that I just never got from men in the way that I wanted. I always got physical attention from men, right, but I never got like I was special, I was just like pretty Right, and I never got it from my family. So, yeah, this comes back to. It's interesting even just sharing it like this, but it comes back to I think, okay, now I'm getting the attention I've wanted. These people really like me, they really care about me, they really think I'm great, I'm going to stay here, this feels good, you know.
Speaker 3:And then I landed on a show about it. So that was now my identity. Now I'm Romy from the Real L Word. Right Now I'm gay and I'm getting all the attention, more attention than I would have ever imagined right, I'm on buses and I'm on tv and I'm traveling the world and doing for this particular reason now was I famous and I say famous like on d-list, like reality type people knew my name. That's what I mean like was that because I was showing me and and people saw me and they got to love me?
Speaker 3:For me, fuck, no, no right, it was the most transactional and I drank heavily during that time. Heavily, so much so that my first season a lot of bad things happened, a lot of regrets happened, a lot of things happened while I was intoxicated with a camera on me. So now you've taken this girl right myself that has like been numbing herself and and makes good. Right Now we're going to record you, you know, and and blast this for the world to judge. Well, I'm blacked out. I mean, it does not get any worse.
Speaker 3:How old were you? I was in my thirties. I was 29 when I started season one. I was turned 30. I remember filming my 30th birthday and for 30, for me that seems like a baby. Right To me, turning 30 feels like a fucking baby. I look at her and I'm like she did not know shit about shit. And I have been recovering and dealing with the fact you know I'm a mother now that there is stuff out there in the world that like I can't. You know it's different. People have a lot of demons and things that they go through and bad things that happen when they're using. It's different to have a camera crew literally follow you around and blast it forever on television. You can't hide from it and you can't defend yourself and it's edited. Yeah, you gotta you know you gotta figure shit out pretty fast once that gets out there.
Speaker 1:So then, was this what came before rock bottom? Because I'm imagining this storm of events. And so now you are still seeking attention, like you did when you were six, in whatever ways you could, but you're also anesthetizing all of your pain. You're confused about your identity. Take me, take me into, like face down, pit of despair. I cannot fucking live like this anymore.
Speaker 3:It's hard to even like think about all of this stuff. I mean, after the first season it was pretty like once they aired that stuff it was, it was traumatizing, right. Like my family had to see stuff, I had to see stuff. I couldn't. They send you the episode a week before it airs so you get to see it edited before it goes on. So I remember receiving the tape and just being like, oh my fucking god, like, oh my, like, how is this even legal, right? Um, and then they had asked me to come back for season two.
Speaker 3:At this point, this is now my identity. I've spent the year traveling, I'm doing the dinosaurs, I'm doing all the things. This is who I am. This is what they want. This is what has given me any kind of value in my life. I have no value at all. I'm not. I don't think I'm smart. I don't think I'm not. I don't think I'm smart. I don't think that I'm capable of anything. I still think I'm a poor Mexican girl that just got lucky somehow in this like Hollywood, like I don't know that I have any value, right. So now my only value is well, you're gay and they love you for being gay, right, and you're kind of wild and they love you for being wild. So you need to be wild and you need to be gay, okay, and there's your value in the world. And so I went to season two. They brought me back as a main character.
Speaker 3:Um, I never auditioned for the show. I ended up landing on it by you know, just being in the scene. On season one. I made a big enough of an impression through the season one that I took. I ended up being in all the episodes that they brought me back as a main character for the second season and then the third season, and so it was the third.
Speaker 3:So the second season, I got sober on television and the deal was in order to keep me on the show through all the like getting ready for it, basically I had to be sober. So the storyline had to turn into my sobriety, right. So I ended up getting sober. That second season did not want to be drunk on television, right Went through the journey of getting sober on television and then I ended up doing all of the appearance flying around the world, doing all the stuff sober, completely sober, right. So my entire experience I was showing up to countries by myself, to a gay bar to party for these people, completely sober Right For like the next few years, and I'm grateful for that Right. I'm grateful that I can like remember this character building time in my life and that I was able to like handle, I think, what was happening in my life very different, because I was sober, you know, and then I did really well. I did a jewelry line and people loved it and people were responding to my sobriety journey and people were inspired by me and I was starting to feel now this value in my sobriety right now. I'm known for the girl that got sober on the show and all these girls are reaching out to me about their struggles and their and I'm like, oh, I have a purpose right. Like I, they can relate, I can help them like this feels even better because this actually feels real right. This actually feels in in line with like who I am, as I'm somebody struggling who's getting sober. This is real life Right, and so that was amazing.
Speaker 3:You asked me about my sexuality. So come back to season three. I had been kind of dating a guy on and off when cameras were off. Season three came, I came back and I said, okay, I'm seeing a guy. I don't know if I'm going to be right for the season three. Of course they were like you're perfect for this, right, we want that. And so I think that's where the sexual kind of um, fluid, fluid part they were like we need that, so come on and let's like share this part. So I did and I I wasn't received.
Speaker 3:Well, it's, that was a big part of my journey, but it did not go over well, right, people did not like that I was with a man. They did not think I was gay enough. They didn't want to see that. That was not what they were tuning in to see. And my whole attitude, like I said earlier, is I'm not here to show you what you want to see.
Speaker 3:Like this is my journey and this is very real.
Speaker 3:And most of these lesbians that I know that are on here are sleeping with men and have issues with men, and no one's talking about it. So I am but like, let's wake up. A lot of us here have a lot of issues with men not all of us, right, but a lot of us and a lot of these women on here are also fucking dudes. So like I'm now casted out because I'm the only one that's like being honest about it. Being honest about it that like, hey, guess what? This might be a journey for me and a struggle for me, right, and I might not really know what the fuck I'm doing right now in terms of my sexuality.
Speaker 3:I don't know how I landed here. I don't know what's real or not real, even for myself. Am I gay? Am I not gay? Am I bi? Am I not bi? For me, it was just, it has. You know, where I've landed today is very different and you know we'll we'll tap on that. But like I think that has been one of the biggest parts of my journey. I don't even like want to say story anymore because I'm like so over owning my story. I really am, but like I think my journey was exploring what is real and not real and what is what is serving me, because it serves the attention that I just never got and that pisses a lot of people off.
Speaker 1:Yeah, when you say what is real and what is not real, do you mean what is actually in alignment with my true essence?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think. So I started like EMG therapy like two and a half years ago. I got out of something really really hard, right, and I needed to. I think it was three years, actually three years ago I got that was my rock bottom, okay. So a lot has happened since then. I mean, my life is there's a lot, okay, but divorce my daughter. I'm in Texas now.
Speaker 3:I get into a relationship and it it was not healthy, right, it was not healthy, um, and I found myself just like one I'm a mom, right, two like I can't why, why, why, right, just like why. And so I had gotten sober, um, with like the within the last like four years. I was like sober for like two and a half three years, right, and then that that relationship ended and I started drinking again, right, and I didn't drink long, but just enough to like no. That this is a no, this is this is not serving me. I cannot go back, right, I cannot touch this shit. Um, and I got into therapy and once I got into therapy with a man who I didn't think I could really do the work with if it was a man, I've always had a female therapist, right, and I always thought that that was what I needed. It ended up my father, by the way, it's passed away when I was in my twenties, so he, he died. It was a very hard death, and so when I talk about like being a little girl who wanted to take care of him and lost him, and then I get into my twenties and he dies on me Right, and then I'm just left here as this girl who's now gay and it's women, women, women, and this is like my like. It just had been a very long journey of like not having the masculinity that I needed in my life, right, any security around that.
Speaker 3:So finding this therapist was really healing on many levels. I got so safe in there and I got so ready to do the work and once I did, there was a moment where we did some work and I came out of it and he I mean, I can't, I've never even said this publicly, so I'm like, um, you know we did the work and he, he was just like I. He was like you know are, are you even like, are you even gay? If we had to sit here and like say this are you even? And? And it's like hard, it's hard for me, like it was. I just haven't done any interviews, like for a very long time about this stuff. So, um, I just like I was in a session and I'd like it came out of it and I was just like.
Speaker 3:I don't think that I am and I don't know how to say that, because I'm from the L word, like I'm, you know, and he was just like. Like was just like. Like. I want you to say it, I want you to say it really loud, I want you to like, own it and like in this space. Just like, and I did, and I think even saying it now it's hard because it's such a part of my identity, like it's such a huge part of my journey, my life, I mean I just it's been my whole life Like it doesn't.
Speaker 3:Can I have a relationship with a woman? Have I had many like? Yeah, that's where I felt most safe, right, that is where I rested and that's where I identified in for so long. So here I am in my forties, just finally, like being able to breathe. I'm sober right now for, like, I think it's been two years again and done this work and I've been able to just kind of go, like to say that out loud, you know, and to admit that it took a long time and a lot of work to get to a place, and this isn't for everyone.
Speaker 3:And again, I say this because I think women feel like me, saying that it means that bisexuality or fluids, that doesn't exist, and that I'm like saying people have always had this reaction that I'm trying to say that, like you know, gay women or bi women are just, they have issues, so that's why they're this way, right. And I'm not saying that, I'm not saying that at all, I'm saying for me, just for me. I had issues and therefore sexuality found its way as a survival thing for me, yeah, as a survival thing for me.
Speaker 1:I'm so well very proud of you for talking about this and and also really looking forward to you being able to say all of that with zero feeling, I know.
Speaker 3:I've never said it like ever since, since going through it in therapy, like in a public place, like you don't ever have to defend yourself.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, and that's I mean saying it and putting it out there is the reality of like you're going to have your feelings about it, you're going to say stuff about it, but like I'm 43 years old, I'm happy, I'm doing my life. I'm not on a show anymore. I don't owe anyone but myself an explanation, right, and so the explanation has been my journey of breath, work, my, my, my relationship back to God, right. Like me coaching my clients right and being able to offer value. That is so much of what who I am right Of, of what I do offer, and it's not based on my sexuality, right, and it's not based on a TV. It's just me having space with humans Right and and time with people and like my faith, and just being like present. You know, like that takes a lot of work. It took. It took me a lot, a lot of work, so yeah.
Speaker 1:I want to share something with you and then piggyback a question off of it, which is yeah, you know, when I, when I overdosed on cocaine, I knew one person who was sober, and so I called him because I was terrified, not because I was ready. Yeah, 12 set meeting and I was like no fucking way and didn't go back for a year and a half. And then the guy I was dating found this prescription pill bottle that my dad was giving me and was definitely looking at me like he was going to leave, and I'm like.
Speaker 1:Oh no, if he leaves, I'm nothing and I'm no one. And so got to call that guy again, right. And so I have this experience of this man taking me through the steps and he was like the only person I believe. But I really wasn't ready or willing at all and so wrapped around the coping mechanisms that kept me safe when I was young. So I I worked the steps as best I could without a god, because I grew up the opposite, like if you believe in God you're an absolute fool and the only person you have is yourself. So I'm like, yeah, I have a drug problem, but like this God thing, you guys, it's for the fucking birds. Yeah. And this man relapses and he had 22 years sober from heroin addiction and he was before he was my sponsor and then he killed himself.
Speaker 3:Oh, my God.
Speaker 1:So my entry into recovery is like you're the only person that makes this possible. And you, now you're dead, right. And so here I am. I'm like getting my doctorate, I'm like coming to, I've got a year. I don't want to die, but I know that this shit will kill me if I touch it very fucking clear now that he's dead and I don't feel safe inside the 12-step container. So, like, what do I do? And I'm like, yeah, you know, you just fucking do what you've always done. You just white knuckle it. And so white knuckling it for me was like how successfully can I perfect, manage and manipulate the world around me and the people in it so that I'm okay? Yeah, and it worked really well until a marital crisis.
Speaker 1:And then I you know I'm in a flying in fits of rage because my husband's pulling away from me and leaving on trips, leaving his ring, not having sex with me. I'm just, I'm losing my mind, losing my mind and I end up couch surfing for many, many months until I get this lease and I'm in this apartment and this is where, like, my actual spiritual rock bottom takes place, because I didn't want to die but I couldn't go on living the way I'd been living. I was like I got nothing. Now I got nothing.
Speaker 1:And this woman from a 12 step meeting said why don't we do the steps on your marriage? And that was really interesting to me, cause I'm like what do you mean, right? So then we start to repurpose the language instead of it being so focused on my addiction. It was like what if you're powerless over him, over the fact that you cheated on the front end of the relationship, that he hasn't forgiven you yet? You're powerless over whether he is cheating on you. You're asking him, he's saying no, but it feels like he's saying yes. You're powerless over the fact that you can't see your way forward, that your okayness is contingent on whether he's emotionally available to you or not and everything else in between, and when you try to exert power over him, your life becomes unmanageable in the following ways. And I could see I mean, the unmanageability was really clear.
Speaker 1:So then we start to go steps like this and we get to the ninth step. Now, remember, I'm I'm five years sober and I'm godless, godless, so I'm spiritually bankrupt. And she turns to me and she's like I'm dreading having to make an amends again. I'm just thinking, like, how many fucking times do I have to be sorry to this man for what I did? He's like no, no, no, I'm wondering if you've ever made an amends to yourself. And I'm like what?
Speaker 4:like, yeah what are you?
Speaker 1:talking about, you know. And so the reason I bring this up is because, for me, what that did in that moment and I didn't realize for years that that was actually really trauma informed the whole way she took me through it was trauma informed and I needed that because I was so yeah With that part of me that had to be perfect. It was like we were the same human. So there was no channel to God, there was no connection back home to my true essence, to my intuition, like I. She was gone and now I had this permission slip to go. Wait, if I'm over here and this is really me, and the real me made a thousand bad choices, but as a really good person, then who the fuck is this over here?
Speaker 3:Yes.
Speaker 1:Yes, yes. How do I stop believing everything she says and how do I stop numbing her Like what? What is the way to get to know why she's here, when she shows up, what she's trying to tell me and then redirect the course of my life? When she shows up, what she's trying to tell me and then redirect the course of my life, my decision-making, my thinking, so that this part of me is driving the bus, and that was when the breakthrough began to happen. So I had a way to clear my shame, and then I could hear the whisper of God and every good thing.
Speaker 1:Now I haven't always listened to the whisper, but in that healing period there were so many tiny whispers, and then slightly louder ones, that turned my life in this new direction where I was like, oh, if I honor the call of this part of me, miracles start to happen. This is who I am. These other parts are just parts of me. They're, they're protecting me and they're there. I understand why they're there, but they don't have to keep running my fucking life into the ground. And so that was.
Speaker 1:That was how I found my beginning of how I found my way back home, to me and to the part of God that I believe lives inside of me and in all of us, and so I'm like thinking about your story and that you know, on the one hand, you grew up with God, but you were so not integrated with God, right Cause you were like chasing down this external love and validation.
Speaker 1:And then I'll go on this show. You get sober which, by the way, how the fuck did you do that when you had so much externally validating you? Like, how did you even not anesthetize those parts of you that were like that you grew up with, that were like this is everything I'm finally loved and revered, like, yes, you had the support from the sidelines of she's sober. We support her as long as she's gay, because that's only the reason we support her. Right, like you, there was a self-worth maybe that was coming in, but it was still from other people, but you were able to be sober. Now, obviously, you didn't stay the course, so there wasn't enough, maybe, of a spiritual framework or a closeness to God. Otherwise you wouldn't have been like I think I can drink again, but I'm just like how on earth, yeah.
Speaker 3:But I'm just like. How on earth have you reconciled and integrated your relationship with God?
Speaker 1:I'm so glad that you're talking about this.
Speaker 3:How have you come over to this time and where you are today? Yeah, I mean, my relationship with God is it's been a very long journey. You know, I grew up with my grandmother who was like a nun. We had holy water, we went, you know, catholic, very Catholic. And then my mom married Tina, my stepmom, and she was from the South, and so we grew up in an Episcopal church right, that was affirming. But we went to Sunday school, we read the Bible, we had Christian.
Speaker 3:I went to a private school where I was in religion, right, and so all the foundation was there, right, like it had been presented to me. And you can understand the Bible, you can understand the concept of God, right, but it's so much of what you said where it's like was I aligned, was I home with it? Was I living with God within me? Right, no, cause I just didn't understand that. I understood, I didn't understand faith and I didn't understand the Holy spirit. And I say this to anyone who's not even Christian, who doesn't believe in Jesus, like, whatever religion you want to be in in terms of God and like the spirit, right, like I didn't understand that at all. I just knew the Bible and I knew I had God Right and what happened?
Speaker 3:Which is interesting is that before the show I had hit a rock bottom on drugs. Right, I was doing, I had I've had a really wild life but I took off. One summer I sold my car to a drug dealer. I ended up in New York with a girl, I ended up somewhere and I ended up doing way too many drugs one summer and I I was going down a very bad path right, and I flew home and I found church and it saved my life, right, it saved my life. I got really involved. I started doing missionary work and I was like hosting churches and I was going to the. I mean, I was reborn in my twenties Like I did the whole thing.
Speaker 3:And when I say I found God, like that time I found God, like I was you could have seen me speaking in tongues kind of found God, like I had gone real Christian because now I had found the identity around my faith and now for the first time, I had found this value in me from God and I had felt this like unconditional love that I didn't have from my father and my mother which is why we have God Right and I had felt this like unconditional love that I didn't have from my father and my mother, which is why we have God, right, and I'm reading and learning that there's this spiritualness in me and there's this God that loves me for exactly who I am, who forgives me Right, and that helped me forgive me. We need someone to tell us we're forgiven because we don't know how to forgive ourselves. Right, we don't know how, and it's that shame and that dialogue of that we that beats us up and numbs us out as addicts, right, and so I need. I think that's why God is such a huge part of, like recovery. I needed someone big enough to forgive me, for me to forgive myself, and I found it through my faith, right, my Christian faith. So I had gone completely the opposite way than I had been in Right, it saved my life, and for what?
Speaker 3:And then I ended up on the show after that, but like that period, never, like I could never not know that part of me that touched that relationship. It was now forever going to be a part of me, whether I numbed it out and got drunk and was on the show and did all that. Fine, I numbed it out and got drunk and was on the show and did all that, fine, but when I was not drunk and not entertaining and not acting, that was my core right Like that, what I already knew it existed. Whether I was shutting it out, ignoring it, you know fine, but faith has been a big part of my life. And when I told you I was a young girl questioning everything, it was a young girl because I needed answers, because I needed God. I just needed some, something. I needed something bigger than this world to give me peace Cause if I searched for it out in this world and the people around me, I was going to be disappointed every fucking day of my life and I was. Everyone let me down, right, that was the reality. So once I found God, it was like oh, you're not letting, you're just loving me, you just want me, you just want me to be good, you just want me to like have faith, you just love me.
Speaker 3:And they talk about, like some people might have the vision of God being a female right Like. Whatever it may be for me. I think there is the idea that they say God is like a father when we worship him as a father. Because that's what I fucking needed was a father, right, like. So here's my father right, giving me that unconditional love that I've wanted since I was a little girl to like come home to. So when you talk about coming home, that is coming home when I became a mother. That is when my life changed. So when I gave birth to my daughter forever.
Speaker 3:Since then, anyone who knows me, I have never been the same like ever, because now I'm no longer selfish and consumed in my own fucking story and dialogue and attention. And me, me, me, me, me. I've been my whole life. Now I'm raising a kid, I'm responsible. God has given me this child. I went through making a human right right.
Speaker 3:People talk about how, like moms say this all the time. It's fucking real. You know I, now I have to take care of her and now I want to be this mom for her. I want to be this woman for her. I want to do we everyone shares this who becomes? I want to be everything that I didn't have right for her and that's exactly what I've dedicated. And and I went right back into my faith the minute I became a mom like not drinking full on mom, back to my faith.
Speaker 3:And she's raised in a Christian school. We go to church on Sundays, like we very much have a relationship together, her and I and God and I think of, we pray together every night. We go to church every Sunday and like whether my daughter falls away from it like I did for years, or decide she's not a believer one day, I don't care. I care that I at least gave her the option to know it exists and it's available to her Right, so that when she goes into this fucking crazy world that we live in, she can somewhere remember that piece that she had as a little girl that came from her relationship with God. Again, I don't care if it's the Christian God or the Bible God, it's just God like some spiritual piece that, as a girl going, she's going to want to have at some point in her journey and as her mother, I've provided the foundation that it exists there for her Right, because, because it saved my life, it saved my life Right now, today, after this shit I've gone through, I'm not disappointed anymore with, like the world constantly.
Speaker 3:I'm not disappointed. I'm not my expectations of people, my expectations of myself, right. Like you said, like I forgave myself, I forgive myself Like I do I. I, I have grace for myself. Right, I am not the many versions that I was, and I have this ability which I will say and I even know with some of my clients, like, they'll come to me and say this, and it is one of my strengths, but I have this ability to like, if I need to reinvent myself or re identify as something, then then I'm going to do that and I really don't want anybody telling me that I can't write, that I'm not able to identify as this because I was this or because I did this.
Speaker 3:Right, and so there's power in going. I'm going to wake up today and this is who I'm going to be and I'm going to sit in that reality and I'm just going to be that and I'm going to pray and I'm going to be spiritually connected and I'm going to figure out where I'm aligned. But if I'm not aligned with my story anymore, then I don't want to live with it. I with my story anymore, then I don't want to live with it. I don't want to wake up with it. I don't want it to be this thing that I take with me. Right, like it's there, it's beautiful, it's hard, it's been a lot at the end of the day, right.
Speaker 3:If, like, it's just none of it is, it's not currently happening, it's right now, it's tomorrow, it's the next day day, it's in the moment, and I want people in my life who meet me today, who meet with me today right, who are present with me today and who were not sitting there holding scorecards, right of like. It's like the friends that want to like come around and like remind you of all the things you did. It's like that's cool and that's cute. I'm not trying to relive that like let's. If you need to identify me as that because somewhere along your journey it fits for you, you can release me, which is why I don't have any friends, because I'm just like bye, I just don't care, I just don't care.
Speaker 1:I just don't care.
Speaker 3:The moment of levity right there. I don't like everyone's, like you don't see anyone or do anything, and I'm like because everybody like I'm finally okay being the weirdo, I'm finally okay. Like not needing the, I don't need the attention. Let me say that for the first time in my life not needing the, I don't need the attention. Let me say that for the first time in my life, the first time in my life, and it's so relaxing and quiet and calm.
Speaker 3:I don't need you to give me the attention Like I don't, I don't, it's not going to complete me.
Speaker 1:If that makes sense, if that makes sense absolutely.
Speaker 1:And yeah, that's just by way of the tenderness and vulnerability around you sharing, you know, your, your own insight into where you are and who you truly feel. Like you are with sexuality, which again pulls back to identity, which is like, oh, they love me when I'm like this and you know the little girl who's like who do I need to become and how sick do I need to be to be loved like this right, that right that it feels like you're just exhausted from splitting yourself into parts and right, and so it's like the. The return to the older versions of you is, in some ways, a painful reminder, especially when people meet you back there and judge and question it like triggers your own shit around and you're, you're just entering this phase of like releasing all of it and not like not having that touch or affect you. But it's new, so it's probably easier for you to just be right here, right now. Right, even when we started this conversation, it was like where do I start, right? And it's like as your identity.
Speaker 3:I think that's why it was so emotional to even share it, because I just haven't been in it, I haven't been living in that. You know what I mean. So I think that's why I got so vulnerable with you, because it was just a minute for me to even like I just not there. I'm new in the stage that you have definitely acknowledged. So for me to like talk about some things, I was just like oh, this is just not a part of what I'm like even you know.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, I mean, it's so, it's so beautiful and and I love that we like got all the way to where it's at because you know an hour for an entire lifetime is not long at all and where you started in the conversation, which was sort of like a okay, but like this is my story. It's crazy, but everyone's got great. Like there was a. There was a little bit of a resistance of like I know we need to do this because we don't know each other, but like do we need to do this? And is it like how long is this going to be relevant? Because that's not me anymore. That's not me.
Speaker 3:Right.
Speaker 1:Now I understand, based on why that's such a strong feeling. What a beautiful place to be when, when you, you know, when you are so comfortable in chaos for so long, which I was to get to a place where, like, boredom is the new dopamine 100%.
Speaker 3:100% of that because yeah it.
Speaker 1:It feels like a death sentence until you're healed. And then you're like I've been waiting for this my whole life, this peace and contentment, and bring little life of like what am I going to make my kids for dinner? I've been waiting for this my fucking life.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, I mean, you nailed it, yes, and I think that, like, historically, I've done a lot of interviews, right, I've done a lot of podcasts.
Speaker 3:I've talked about my life, you know, through the years and normally I'm like I can like get it and I'm just like you know, I know that, I know the drill, I know we're going to know what we're going to do and like it is, I think there is a part of me that was like I love Amy, I love what you do and I love talking about this stuff because I am working with clients who struggle with this stuff.
Speaker 3:So, opening up about my journey right, only I pray only helps like people understand me and helps them understand, maybe, parts of themselves, right, because that's what I get when I listen to people on podcasts, right, I learned something about myself a lot of times and so I believe God does have me doing whatever work I need to do right with with my story. But it is hard to do that because I am in this very new, new space and it's it's like a baby to me, right, it's a rebirth in me. So I'm just very like protective right now Of what I'm speaking on, what I'm consuming, what I'm receiving. You know what I'm eating, physically, spiritually, what they say, that whole cliche like. I'm very protective of what I'm allowing in, because this very boring yet very peaceful place I have never been in in my entire life place.
Speaker 3:I have never been in my entire life, I think, saying that I'm just like, it's like I didn't think, I don't think I recognized it as much, until you, like put it into words, but I'm like, yeah, I can't. I don't think I can remember a time ever me neither from six right from six till 43 that I was ever able to.
Speaker 3:Just, you know, and things aren't going great in my life. Things are good, but like, I've got a lot of things that are hard right now and it's the first time that my response and my reaction to it is just like God's got me, I don't know how, but like God's got me, I don't know how, but like God's got me. Like this I say all the time, and I think that's what I learned Our response and our reaction to life is the most important part, I think, of all of it, because it's the only thing we have control over. How are we going to respond? How are we going to react? And we do have control over it. We have control over it. We have control over it. We have more control over ourselves than we like to give ourselves credit for. We love to blame. I got I don't like victims, right. It's just a turnoff for me. I'm not a victim, right? I'm not. Oh my God, this happened to me. I'm.
Speaker 3:When did you learn how to react better and take responsibility and do the work to find your own peace? Yeah, a lot of shit happened to everyone. At what point do you take responsibility, do some work and figure out how to respond differently, because it's going to be shit all the time. All the time shit happens that you're like how God, are you fucking kidding me? Me, but it can't spiral me, right, it can't shake me, and then it can't then cause me to be this high energy OCD response, like all the things that we do, right, like that person is a trauma response to just knowing how to like calm a nervous system because she's never been in like a calm environment, right, so I'm relearning how to create that for myself and for my daughter because, like you, to me chaos was love and home, like that is where that's, that was home, right, that's. That meant passion, that meant you cared, right. So to to relearn that. No, you can actually just be super chill and not fight and argue the entire world and your entire life and you're going to be okay. And it slows the brain down, right, it slows the brain down.
Speaker 3:And so, like for me, with, like, with, like my sobriety, like it's never been, like I've never been someone who has struggled with like I got to have a drink, I got to have a drink, I got to have a drink. That's just never been my journey. Right, mine was always I got to shut out, I got to numb out, I got to just, I can't. Or social anxiety, right, I got to show up, I got to entertain and I, because I'm not being authentic to who I am, I'm just going to drink through this process.
Speaker 3:Well, now, because I am authentic to who I am, I'm not putting myself in situations where I need to, like, do the tap dance for anyone. There's no need for alcohol. It doesn't serve a, it doesn't serve a place in my life, like at all. You know, because I'm not the monkey tap dancing for the world. I'm just like at home baking my damn cookies, obsessed with my boyfriend, you know. Like. Like you know, wanting to see my kid come home, like it's. So. My friends are just like who are you? And I'm like this is where I'm at. It makes me happy.
Speaker 1:Who am I? I'm. This is the healed version who am?
Speaker 3:I I'm. This is the healed version. Yeah, yeah, 100% yeah. And so I'm excited, right, I'm excited to see what, like this next like chapter of life right in the 40s, like this next seasons of life look like as I continue to work in this type of space. Right, that's exciting, because I don't know what it, I don't know what any of it looks like. I've never touched it, been around it. I don't know, any of it, but it feels good.
Speaker 1:Does it make more sense now why we're connecting?
Speaker 3:Oh yeah, a hundred percent. I mean, first of all, there's so much, yeah, there's so much that I got out of this conversation, thank you. There's so much that I got out of this conversation, thank you. There's so much that I know I haven't been able to tap my finger on in terms of even what's happening to me. And that's where I think, like God works in crazy ways and brings people together Right, and conversations happen. Because this, definitely I will leave this conversation with kind of a better awareness about even where I'm at, because I'm not talking to anyone, I'm not having conversations with anyone, you know. So, like this really helped me, like act, and that's what I think coaching and therapy and sessions do, right, is you talk and by the end of it, you've figured out where you're at because somebody powerful like yourself has held the space for it, exactly, yeah.
Speaker 1:So thank you, yeah, yeah, I mean I always feel like I have monthly events in LA and people often cry at and I don't go in thinking that, but when it happens I love it so much, right, just because whatever level of vulnerability that a person taps into for that to happen is is such an important, necessary, long overdue usually really mine was yeah, mine's definitely long overdue right now so yeah so I.
Speaker 1:It makes me so happy that we got to the point where you were having your own realization of like, wow, like this, this is literally where I'm at and I feel brave enough to say it. Yeah, yeah, and, by the way, like there isn't going to be, like I don't know who am I to say if there's backlash or not, but it's I. I talk about everything with everyone and I don't judge any of it, and my whole, like one of the biggest drivers of having these conversations on anything whatsoever is back to what I said is to be able to precisely have, like this, intellectual intercourse, opinions and and just listen and learn and keep our hearts open and and hold space for each other. Like we're missing the ability to do that and it's so dangerous to our.
Speaker 3:I think it's so apparent, too, that we are missing that Right. I think, like right now more than ever, to slow down and share these types of like connections right With a stranger I've never met, where we can connect and like learn something about ourselves or like get vulnerable with somebody. Like there there was a lot of beauty. I think once upon a time, right, that we're all like seeking to have that again because, right, we can go on. That's a whole nother thing about like the world that we live in today and social media and all the things, but like, we do miss that type of like safety right when it's where I think coaching like what I do and like what you do comes into being something really beautiful.
Speaker 3:Right, like I'll get on a call with a stranger that I've never met from across the world. We'll do an hour session and we start to become a part of each other's lives. Right, they start to let me in to these parts of themselves and to these parts of themselves and I just think it's so beautiful Right. And then I watched them through conversation, right Through like those conversations, and start to change their life and like I had a client like say to me like I think a week ago she was doing something. She's like, oh, you helped me get here and I was like, no, like you got yourself there, you showed up for the call, you booked a call, you got real on the call.
Speaker 3:Like you did all that right to be vulnerable and show up for people and to like show up for these spaces. We do that for ourselves, right. So, like me getting what I got out of this, like you held a space for it, but I also like allowed myself to go there with you, right. And so I think a lot of times we're just we're all so afraid to like, you know, know, we just put on, we put on our our act. Like I could have gone on here and just been like yeah, I'm crazy From that word, like let's go down my wild path, but like it just doesn't, it doesn't fit, right.
Speaker 1:So about you and I mean I could seriously talk to. I have like there's so I love what I heard about you and I mean I could seriously talk to. I have like there's so many. So I think it begs you know a potential part two.
Speaker 3:Yeah, oh, I mean, I would love to come back on. There is. There are so many, so many things I'm sure we could talk about, and so many different things and, like you said, I can't get into everything in an hour conversation, right, like, I think it's more of the what is it like the, the cliff notes, or, like you know, like the, the dummy book of, just like basic things. Yeah, so, anytime you want to have a conversation about anything, right, um, I'm always, I'm always open to it. I loved having this conversation so well.
Speaker 1:I loved getting to know you and I, if you, if a client hears this a potential client, human yes, I'm totally struggling in the ways that she has struggled and I need to reach out to her. Where should they contact you?
Speaker 3:Yeah, they can go to Madre Romy, which is M-A-D-R-E. Romy right Dot com and you can book with me on there. I do like a 30 minute call with people just to see if we're even like a good fit, right, and so we, we get on a call, we talk, we figure out if it's for you. I'm not a traditional like coach, right, I'm it's. It's a different, it's a lax environment. I think a lot of people who either follow me sometimes they get like nervous to call or get on a call Don't be nervous. You know, like I'm like don't be nervous, like just get on a call with me, like let's just talk, cause I get that a lot and and once we get past that, it's like there's a lot of good work that can be done if I'm the right, if I'm the right person and if you did, you know, and thank you for saying that like and putting that out there Like I would love to.
Speaker 1:It's the most fulfilling thing I've done. Yeah, me too. Yeah, well, I love talking to you, and I'll just consider this the first of of several yes yes, absolutely yes, have.
Speaker 3:I would love to come back on my phone, literally just started dying so I was like that was perfect.
Speaker 1:I was like that's perfect timing. I'm going to go get my little kiddos. Oh good, we go mom hard and be bored to tears and love it.
Speaker 3:I have a date night. I'm surprising my boyfriend with cause I'm kid free tonight. So love it All right, have fun. Thank you so much. You're welcome. So love it All right, have fun. Thank you so much.
Speaker 2:I'm welcome. Bye. I turn my back and hit my head against the wall. To meet a crucifix, to take me to my knees, whipping my mistakes. To jump over the grief. Breaking the circuit, making it worth it. Oh, sick and tired of the voice inside my head Never good enough, it's leaving me for dead. But perfection's just a game of make-believe. Hey Gotta break the pattern, find a new reprieve.
Speaker 4:Breaking the circuit, making it worth it. Oh, I am ready to make a change. I am big. There's my pain. There's no deep inside. I got left aside. I can be.
Speaker 2:There's no deep inside. I gotta let this slide. I can be brave and afraid at the same time. Practice self compassion starts to calm my mind, taking tiny steps to loving all of me. Just the process, cause it's gonna set me free, breaking the circuit.
Speaker 4:Making it worth it. Oh, I am ready To make a change. I am bigger Than my pain. There's no deep inside. I got the the life. Gotta gotta gotta break it or fake it till we make it. Gotta gotta gotta break it. Come on one, two, three. I am ready to make a change. I am bigger than my pain. There's no deep inside. I got left this life. I am ready to make a change. I am bigger than my pain. There's a note deep inside I got left this life.