Podcast 217: Melissa @YourBishTherapist joins us for gossip with a side of psychology

In episode 217 of Cocktails and Gossip, therapist Melissa from @YourBishTherapist joins Amanda and B to break down the psychology behind our favorite Bravo moments. They analyze Kenny and Lindsay from In the City through a clinical lens, explore how parental wounds shape cast behavior, and do a full psychology breakdown of the Summer House cast.

Topics Discussed

• Amanda's Apology — Amanda addresses and clarifies a statement she made on last week's podcast
• In the City Through a Therapist's Lens — Melissa analyzes Kenny and Lindsay's dynamic and parental wounds that contribute to their behavior
• Parental Wounds — How parental wounds manifest in everyday behavior and relationships
• Summer House Psychology — Breaking down the Summer House cast's behavior patterns with a therapist
• Toxic Behavior on Reality TV — Analyzing toxic patterns we see play out on Bravo shows

Mentioned in This Episode

Melissa (@YourBishTherapist), Kenny Akers, Lindsay Hubbard, Summer House cast

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Frequently Asked Questions

Triangulation is essentially when you bring in a third party or more. It doesn't just have to be one person. But when you bring in other people in a conflict to manipulate. The goal is always manipulation. It's always to get someone to be on your side. And Kyle and Amanda, I argue their entire relationship was sustained because of reality TV and was brought to you by triangulation and manipulation.

Welcome to Cocktails and Gossip, the podcast where we drink cocktails, but you better believe we're gonna spill the tea. We chat reality TV, celebrity blinds, and the hottest tea from bravoandcocktails.com. And as always, it's all alleged and just for fun. We do not verify our blinds. I'm B. And I'm Amanda. Let's get into this week's tea.

Amanda's Apology and Clarification

What's up, Cocktailers and Amanda? And we have a very special guest today. Hi, Cocktailers. Hi, B. We are very excited because you guys know we don't have guests very often, but this is a guest that we always get such great feedback about. We have our friend Melissa from the incredible Instagram account @YourBishTherapist here. She also hosts a podcast, a YouTube channel, and a Patreon by the same name. So if you're not already following her, you really must. She breaks down her thoughts on all of our favorite Bravo shows, but from a therapist's, and a very empathetic, I would say, therapist perspective. Hi, ladies. Hi, Melissa. Thank you so much for having me back. I adore you both. I love the Cocktailers. This is such a great time.

Before we get into it today, guys, I just wanted to take a second to talk about something that I mentioned last week. We received some DMs from our listeners, and so I wanted to address it. So I talked about Amira from Next Gen NYC and her rib remodeling surgery, and I said she looks great, because I think she does, and I stand by that. But I left out some context that I really should have included. Amira is trans, and rib remodeling surgery is a gender-affirming procedure. That matters, and by skipping over it, my comment landed the wrong way for some of you. And I really do appreciate that you guys spoke up and said something in the DMs, because without the context, that came off, for some people, as a triggering statement. And I personally am a person who has struggled with the way I feel about my own body, and I did not mean to make a triggering statement. So I just want to apologize for not giving that context. It was never my intention ever to offend anyone. I should have given the full picture because the context is actually the whole point. I wholeheartedly agree with Amanda, and thank you to our Cocktailers listeners who reached out and pointed that out to us, because context matters.

In the City: Kenny and Lindsay Through a Therapist's Lens

Melissa, we have so many Bravoleb situations we need to talk about, so I'm just gonna start spitting them off. So you're watching In The City. Sure am. And we're seeing both Lindsay and Kenny open up about parental abandonment. Lindsay experienced this with her mother. Kenny experienced this with his father. Kenny very vulnerably shared his reconnection with his dad after 25 years, just a few months to a year after losing his mom. Lindsay has spoken about her abandonment issues with her mother. She has not spoken to her in 10 years. So, just wanting to speak to how parental abandonment may impact adults in their romantic relationships, and really even in their friendships.

The fact of the matter is, there are only really two people in this world who are supposed to love us unconditionally, and those are our parents. And when we don't get that unconditional love that we need, it is always going to affect us. The question is just how, in what ways will that show up. But it will definitely show up in our adult relationships, because whether we like it or not, our parents are our guides. And parents are humans, and so they don't get a guide either, and usually with these families, there's a lot of generational trauma that happens. And so what happens is that children end up feeling inherently unlovable or not worth anything, and they internalize that. And one thing I know for sure is that in our adult relationships, our trauma is going to show up in relational patterns that we're not aware of and aren't actively changing. So Lindsay kinda comes off, I just did a post about this, and yesterday was a crazy day for me. Lindsay Hubbard came into my post with some prayer hands, meaning that I think she appreciated what I posted on this topic. But Andrea also followed me, and Liz from Rhode Island started following me, and I went, "No. I'm in danger."

So what I had posted that Lindsay responded to was just that I believe that Lindsay comes off as very harsh, but it's when she's feeling misunderstood or mischaracterized. So trauma survivors tend to have a really strong sense of justice seeking when they've been done wrong by people. And sometimes becoming a parent will trigger those parent wounds. So what we're seeing is two examples of people who are struggling in their adult relationships because of their abandonment wounds. And one thing that Lindsay said that was so fascinating to me is she acknowledges that she keeps choosing people who will abandon her. And so that is what I mean by when we aren't aware of how our trauma impacts us, we will repeat those patterns that end up becoming our worst fears.

I agree with what you said about Lindsay coming off as harsh. First of all, Lindsay's evolved incredibly over the 10 years we've known her. But I've also, seeing her in a host of different situations, I better understand her. So if you're a new viewer and you just put on In the City and you see her reactions without the context, which the theme of this podcast is context because it is so important, you might be like, "Wow, she's rough." But because we know Lindsay now and because we've seen her show up for other people, she is very harsh, but she's also very loving and passionate. So when you have a strong personality like Lindsay's, you take the good with the bad. But her personality, I believe, is brought to you by mother wounds and abandonment issues. I've worked with trauma survivors, and the harsher you see somebody's facade, that usually means they had to protect themselves, or they were the only one responsible for standing up for themselves. And so on the surface, this is why context does matter, is that she can appear really harsh. But the beautiful part about what I do is that I do try to have a lot of empathy and understanding because when you understand where behaviors come from, it's usually wounds. And it's like how can you not have empathy for that? But sometimes the behaviors don't look deserving of empathy, and it's coming from a place of trauma. I've seen some women who have really strong personalities, they have a sharp tongue because that's how they protected themselves. They didn't have a mom, a dad, someone to do that, so their tongue kept people away.

And we even see Lindsay talk about it with Kenny, how she can't picture doing that to Gemma. And I can tell you, as a daughter of a mother who was very present, and as a mom myself, it almost seems unnatural to many women. I hate to say it, it's almost more normalized for a man. Of course, not that it's okay. But when a man abandons his family, it's more common. A mother abandoning her child is not something you often hear. And to your point, what happens is, if you were abandoned by your parents, you will inherently believe that you're unlovable and you're the problem until you have a child of your own and you see their sweet little face and how helpless they are. It breaks through what's called a cognitive dissonance, where sometimes when we have trauma to manage, we have to compartmentalize things. And when you have a child and you see the innocence and what they deserve, it breaks through that cognitive dissonance. I mean, parenting with parent wounds is not for the faint of heart. It's going to trigger a whole host of stuff that people didn't even know was there. Now the good thing about this is it gives us an opportunity for growth, but it is very scary and very challenging.

I give Lindsay a lot of respect for being so self-aware about this, and for consciously trying to break the cycle, and acknowledging that she doesn't have it all figured out, but that she's letting her love for her daughter lead the way. None of us have it figured out with parenting. I'm constantly second-guessing myself. So leading with love and trying to lead with what's best for your child is always the best way when you can't figure out how to do something. And it also will slap you right in the face to think, "Why didn't I get to receive this?" for those who didn't. There's a lot of beauty in it. There's a lot of pain, but I'm a believer that growth can't come without upset and pain. Everyone parenting out there, I give y'all so much credit because it's the toughest work you're gonna do, teaching little humans how to understand emotions. Emotions are like a language that we have to learn, and a lot of us didn't learn it, and now we're relearning it. So the good news is that no matter what your upbringing, it's never too late to grow, to become the person that you wanna be, to get the love that you deserve.

Based on what you were saying about parental wounds, I am kind of just ticking through a list in my head of so many of the most entertaining reality stars. And so many of them seem to have parent wounds. Yeah, look at even Kyle Richards, right? She's got a big one, without her dad, and her mom was an unconventional mother. But she has done a wonderful job of not letting that parent wound affect how she parents. She seems to have very tight relationships with all of her girls, so I think that's commendable. I agree, but then you see how that shows up in her relationships with the cast and with other women. So some of the most iconic Bravolebs are probably brought to you by unresolved trauma, which is kind of why I like what I do, because when we understand where behaviors come from, it gives a richer context into who we're watching. And reality TV is our love language, but let's face it, it's also trash in a lot of ways. And so for me, if we can get something out of it, which is what is our reaction to these things? That can actually teach us something about ourselves, and we can use that to better our lives.

Parental Wounds and How They Shape Behavior

Thank you for elevating our chosen form of entertainment. Listen, I love it as much as everybody. But the therapist perspective is so important because let's face it, people who enjoy reality TV are people who at the core enjoy sociology, psychology. We enjoy people. I was a psych sociology major. From when I was eight years old and the first Real World popped on my screen, I've been interested in people and their stories and their backstories and their culture. So your perspective after the shows, I sometimes almost DM you to be like, "Where's the follow-up? That was a deep episode." You're so sweet. I've been in the weeds with some medical stuff, and I've been grieving. I appreciate that people are interested in what I have to say. I had no idea that people were gonna care about the things that I say, and I'm just so appreciative.

Summer House Cast Psychology Breakdown

So you mentioned Wes and Amanda, and we have kind of run that scandal into the ground here on Cocktails and Gossip. But on In The City, we're seeing a different lens on the demise of Kyle and Amanda's marriage. So what are some of the things that you're picking up on as you're watching this from a therapist perspective? Okay. So one of the things that I picked up on got me a lot of attention. I was all over Summer House Reddits, not in a good way, because normally people really get very mad at me. If you have an opinion, people are gonna disagree with it, and my thing is I love having different opinions from people, and I love a good debate, but some people can't have a different opinion without making you the enemy. Right, but also because having the title therapist, people think therapists aren't supposed to be humans with their own personalities. I'm funny and sarcastic. People think I should be this robot. And that wouldn't be me.

Back to the Amanda and Wes situation. What I notice is that Amanda and Kyle, putting West aside for a second, are so good at manipulation that they have gotten two different casts along two different franchises to fight their battles for them while they get up and walk away into the sunset separately. Time and time again, and that is called triangulation. I loved this. I learned this from you. I mention it here a million times. I'm like, "And Melissa @YourBishTherapist refers to that as triangulation." So triangulation is essentially when you bring in a third party or more in a conflict to manipulate. The goal is always to get someone to be on your side, and Kyle and Amanda, I argue their entire relationship was sustained because of reality TV and was brought to you by triangulation and manipulation. Every season, every summer, what did they do? They didn't talk about things off camera. They didn't resolve any of their issues privately, they made it the Summer House storyline. And then they had everyone in the house fight about it for them and repeat for the last five years. And to me, when I started seeing that in The City too, that's how I knew it was a pattern. Which is also, I understand a lot of people are really upset with Amanda, but the thing that I wanna point out is that Kyle and Amanda both participated in this. It may not be equal parts, but they both have these really problematic personality styles where they don't talk about things in ways that are actually helpful. Talking with a camera pointed on you in a group of people and not in therapy or to your partner, that's just a setup for failure.

So they're both saying they're working on their relationship. They're currently living apart. They're attending therapy. They're both saying they want to find a way to fall back in love, and I'm not seeing two people working on a marriage. Can you break down for us what you're seeing from Kyle, what you're seeing from Amanda, and do you think, we now know they are obviously split, but was this in any way salvageable if they had put the work in? Well, I truly believe if people put the work in, yes, anything is salvageable. However, they didn't put the work in, and even if you put the work in but you do it too late, sometimes you miss a window. I've had people in couples counseling come to me, and there is so much resentment and anger, brushing things under a rug, and then the rug is up to the ceiling. If two people in a relationship are committed to doing better individually and as a couple, I've seen people overcome anything. Humans are amazing creatures. We can change and grow, but the only requirements is you have to be aware and you have to have motivation. And so going back to Kyle and Amanda, they both have these qualities where they don't know how to talk to each other. When Amanda kept talking about her and West having these conversations, I was like, "I would die to be a fly on the wall to hear what these conversations actually are," because I don't think Amanda knows really how to talk to people. She doesn't know how to talk to friends when she's having conflict. She's just an avoider. Amanda is really one of those people who puts her head in the sand. So I think that Kyle and Amanda let everybody hash out their relationship for them, and by the time they went to couples therapy it was performative. Sometimes people come to therapy as the last gasp to look to themselves like, "Oh, look, we tried." But make no mistake, Amanda and Kyle didn't try anything.

We always say, and we don't know what her motivation was, but women decide well before the divorce is filed that the relationship is over. And I think that's really what we're seeing, especially from Amanda. Because Kyle's really the one who seems to express sadness about where their relationship is and wanting to fix it, but also not seeming willing to change. But Amanda, she got upset in the last episode and had to get up and leave the table, but I think that was more 'cause she was being called out for lack of effort than it was about her being sad about her marriage. I fully agree with that. I do try to have empathy for everyone, Amanda included. But I definitely think that Amanda has some personality characteristics that if left unchecked will create problems for her in all of her relationships, and the fact that she chose West tells me that something has happened where she has chosen a worse version of Kyle. Because with Kyle, at least he's having an emotion about it. He's not West where the lights are on and nobody's home. Kyle will cry and say, "It wasn't all bad," where West is just... The most alarming thing that stood out to me from the reunions is his lack of awareness and emotional understanding about what's going on, and that you can't really fix. A cocktailer DM'd me right after the reunion, and I made a meme to this effect, and it says, "Watching West at the reunion was like watching a criminal be read back the crimes," just that lack of emotion. Which granted, he's not a murderer. It's just betrayal and nefarious cheating. And I know they were on whatever, Xanax or whatever. Can I talk about that for a second? Yes, please.

As a practitioner, I understand Xanax is a benzodiazepine. Not only was I a therapist, I lost my ability to practice due to health issues, and I manage PTSD and major depressive disorder. And for PTSD, I am prescribed Xanax PRN, meaning that when I'm having a panic issue, I will take it. But I've also treated people who, doctors sometimes will prescribe Xanax every day, and what happens is people's bodies get accustomed to it, and then you need more and more to get the same result. So I understand it from all sides of the medication. And what I promise you is that Xanax, no matter how much you take, it is not going to remove your empathy. Period. I could be on so much Xanax that I'm drooling, and I would still have my empathy. So I do think it can explain maybe why they were disconnected, but nothing explains the lack of empathy, and true concern and apology is seen in our behaviors. You can't just say, "I'm sorry, and I understand I hurt you." It's seen in how we behave. And the scary thing is that psychologically speaking, the only thing that you really can't change is lack of empathy. It's kinda like you have it or you don't, but there's a spectrum. Clinically, I look at all things on a spectrum. So some people, I think I came out with all the empathy, and the humans around me got none. So it's not like you have it or you don't, but either way, in therapy you can't grow empathy.

So help us understand, because this is something that I have really struggled with about Wes. As you just said, he showed no empathy at the reunion. But he seems to have an empathy mask that he can put on. And he tends to be one of the first people to pick up on non-verbal cues, like when he was supporting KJ this season with KJ's anxiety and he kept checking in on him. Can he have empathy, or was that a mask and he felt it would make him look good on camera? I don't know West, but one thing I can tell you is I'm well-acquainted with these issues. I worked in an inpatient rehab center with antisocial men. So I don't wanna project my own experiences onto West, but my gut tells me that he and people like him are really great at reading the room and scanning people and understanding how to manipulate. I view it less as a caring action and more as impression management. People who have these antisocial personality disorders do something called impression management, and it's exactly what it sounds like. You are trying to manage the impressions that people have of you, and that is their primary driver. So with West, I believe his primary driver is to look like the good guy while behaving like the bad guy. I don't believe that any of his behaviors that seem like caring are actually caring, they're more impression management. And especially appeasing the audience. So the audience is gonna look at it like, wow, yes, West is a jerk to girls, but look what a great friend he is. Look how he showed up for Jesse when he had a cancer scare. Look how he showed up for KJ with his anxiety. And so he does these things in a self-serving way because it does make us all look at the good side of him versus who he really is. How you treat people is who you really are. And here's how I know West is full of it with KJ. Because he's checking in about his anxiety, and then do you remember that one episode where Dara was out back and West was literally hitting on her? That's how you know West doesn't give a shit about anyone but himself. You're gonna talk to your buddy who has anxiety, and you're gonna hit on his girlfriend? What does that tell you about West?

So on The Valley, another marriage we saw, Michelle and Jesse. When The Valley first came out, they were married, obviously struggling. Cameras picked up, and they were both dating other people, Michelle on camera, and Lacy was not yet on camera. And it was a very contentious split. This season we've seen the financial contentiousness, the introducing their daughter to their new partners too soon. And a lot of that with Michelle and Jesse has been uncomfortable to watch. This season we do see some progress. Last night, I was surprised by Michelle, who maybe as a result of getting used to being a reality television star, has shown herself in a more vulnerable way. And she opened up to Lacy and was very honest, and she said, "It's not personal to you, Lacy, but I'm not in love with Jesse any longer. But for years, I begged Jesse to show up for me in the way I'm having to witness him show up for you." And I thought that Lacy showed a lot of compassion to Michelle in that moment. I was disappointed when Lacy went to speak to Jesse to say, "Listen, we could be kinder about this," and Jesse's reaction was, he was a jerk about it. So what do you have to say about that? We know under normal circumstances, Jesse and Michelle would co-parent and not hang out together, but because they need the check from the show, here we are.

That context matters. I think Michelle from last season to this season, I'm like, "Who are you? And I love whoever this is." She's got a lightness, a brightness. She was also in her grief last season, which we're learning now her mother was actively dying. And it's such a good point because as someone navigating a lot of grief myself, when you lose a parent, the world gets thrown off its axis. So the thing that bothers me about Jesse is he'll have these glimmers of, oh, are you a good regular person? And then most of the time it's just like, if you wanna go through Danny, you're gonna have to go through my ugly linen pantsuit, and it's like, Jesse, fuck off. I feel the same way with Jesse. I'm always on a seesaw with him because there's something about him inherently I like and I see the good, and then he just goes to the other side. Well, Jesse has that thing that West and so many of these Bravo guys have, which is superficial charm, which is another way that men like this get away with things. But I empathize a lot with what Michelle's saying, because last season she was grieving her mom, but she was also going through the grief with her divorce and her relationship ending. And so for a lot of folks, these feelings, they're not on a timer. So I think that's what I heard from Michelle. Aaron broke up with her, who she thought was gonna be her person, and now I just think she's reeling, and that's very human.

I was very impressed with Lacy's level of compassion. She heard her. She listened. She validated. And then she went to Jesse and she was like, "Listen, I think we could do some things different." And Jesse said something nasty and she goes, "Don't ever talk like that in front of me again." And I was like, ooh Lacy. She's a girl's girl. There is this weird dichotomy where it's like, so you're super emotionally aware, you're emotionally healthy, but you're with Jesse. Make that make sense for me. Well, Tracy and I got to meet them both at a Hulu event. And meeting her in person, she really changed my mind about her. She's very likable. They're actually a really cute couple. They seem like they're very in step. Again, we see Jesse have his moments of assholeness. And I always defer to when you meet someone in person, that gives you more information. And honestly, one thing I would say is that Lacy has to be careful not to parent Jesse, because men like Jesse, sometimes what they're looking for is a leader, a parent, and he needs to be an adult. But it seems like she has really good boundaries around that too. She's so different from Michelle. Michelle was like, "You do whatever," and Lacy's like, "Oh, no, we're not gonna do that." So I could see why it works, and I'm just glad that they're happy.

I also think with reality shows in general, there is an ally system, because we did see Jesse blindly stick up for Danny. And I did not appreciate that. But if we're looking at context, Lala, if we're being honest, is poking the situation, is looking for airtime. She's a professional. And I'm not saying I agree with what Lala's saying, but is it her place to say it? Probably not. So in that moment, Jesse is aligned with Danny because they're friends, because when people are friends on a show, it is a known thing, I'll stick up for you, you stick up for me. But when Janet then says to Jesse, without explaining her sexual assault, but kind of clues him in, Jesse does say, "Well, I wasn't aware of that." And then you see that side of Jesse that we like. Here's why that pissed me off. Women who have been sexually assaulted, they shouldn't have to be the perfect victim or tell the perfect story or give everybody all the context for why their abuse was valid. And that's what bothered me about Jesse, because the words are right in terms of he's like, "Oh, I understand this better now." But you shouldn't need Janet to walk you through this to understand to not support, I don't care if it's your best friend, your husband, your brother. If someone puts their hands on someone in a sexual manner without consent, and you are defending that person, that's a real problem for me.

Which brings us to Nia. Who is seemingly so sweet and so overwhelmed by her life choices. It's hard because Nia is so seemingly nice and sweet, I think it gives us all pause. But the reality is she chose to marry Danny. She never really dealt with, or maybe they did privately, his action towards Jasmine's now wife, Melissa, and she's just in a constant state of parenting him. So where does that bring us with Nia? Okay, so what's happening with Nia, I believe, is it's called the fawn response. Nia grew up in very challenging circumstances. She and her mother were unhoused, living in cars. They were really struggling with money and food insecurity. And so when a child has scarcity trauma, that's what it's called when food is scarce or you're unhoused, that makes Nia the perfect accidental fit for Danny because she's just so grateful to have a family and a house in Santa Clarita that she will spend the rest of her life trying to parent this man and think that's marriage, and it's not. So the fawn response is a trauma response where when someone gets upset, you try to use really soft tones and rationalize and help them so that they don't overreact, to try to keep the situation safe. So every response that we see of Nia to Danny is this fawn trauma response, where she's talking to him like she's talking to a toddler using those soft tones. And when she doesn't, he says, "Don't use that tone with me. You know you're gonna set me off." So he also will only allow her to speak with him in a certain way. Lots of red flags. When he said on the episode about, "Don't elevate me," whoever told that man that was an acceptable thing to say should be fired. Because adults, we are responsible for our own emotions. So for him to put that on Nia and for her to be like, "Oh yeah, I'm sorry," I'm like, who is helping you two that you think this is appropriate?

Do you think that the two biggest issues that continue to be the storyline are the way that he, without permission, touched Jasmine and Melissa, as well as the fact that Danny seems to get angry when he drinks. We're seeing him hide alcohol or lie about having been drinking. How does all of this fit together, and how Nia is reacting? So I think Nia's reacting the way she's reacting because she's terrified because of her scarcity trauma. She's terrified about Danny losing his job, about her losing her job on the show, about them losing their ability to have their house and pay for their kids. I think Nia is covering things up and defends Danny when he doesn't deserve being defended because she's terrified of losing the life as she knows it. And that's deserving of empathy, but at the same time, that's Nia's stuff that she has to work on. What is frustrating me so much is that people are more upset about what Janet said Danny did than what Danny did. But speaking to the alcohol piece, because I did work in inpatient drug and alcohol treatment, I will say that I don't know Danny. I can never judge if someone's an alcoholic, nor should I. But what I can tell you as someone who understands addiction is that there's a spectrum, where when alcohol use starts to cause problems in every area of your life, with your work, with your friends, with your relationships, that's how we know that it's a problem. So what I can confidently say is that when Danny drinks, he behaves badly, he gets emotionally elevated, he gets aggressive, and he is unable to be reasoned with. There's something called King Baby Syndrome. That comes from the program of AA, which Lala, I appreciate that she's working a program, because you can tell when people are working on themselves. So Danny, when he drinks, engages in bad behavior, and instead of stopping drinking, Michelle and others have said to him, "Well, why don't you just stop drinking?" And he says, "I do, I am," while he's holding a drink. That's red flag number one. Red flag number two is with anything, if you are hiding that and lying about it, those are automatic problems. Secrets keep us sick. So to me, Danny has every single red flag around alcohol. Plus, going back to the King Baby thing, in the program they talk about people who over-utilize substances, and they behave like the world revolves around them. Do you remember when Danny told Nia, "Send them to their rooms"? That was a petulant King Baby moment, because you have to have such ego and such narcissism to believe that everyone should bend to your will.

Analyzing Toxic Behavior on Reality TV

He grates my nerves. And I get DMs from viewers, and they're like, "But they're making such a big deal of Danny." Yes, because it is a big deal. And I also think it is horrific when you look at the fact that Jasmine and Melissa are in a social setting where they can't say anything, and you just see their discomfort. If you ever look at the scenes, they're always a few steps back from Danny. I see Nia as a victim too, although I do find myself becoming frustrated with her. She's yelling at Lala, but whether Nia doesn't like their delivery or feels it's not their place to say, the fact remains they are discussing a behavior Danny committed. They haven't fabricated anything. That's right, and this is how you know Nia has gone from being a victim to being a part of the problem. When she is yelling at these women and saying, "It's your fault," when it's something her husband did, that is how you know Nia is uplifting the patriarchy and trying to make the women here a problem, which is part of rape culture. Rape culture talks about the specific sociological culture where women tear down other women. So we're more mad about what Janet said than about what Danny did. And when Nia and Danny exile anyone who talks badly about them, first it was Janet, then Brittany, now Lala, and Jasmine's just trying not to get exiled. And then at the end of the episode, Nia's like, "These are all terrible people." And it's like, ma'am, excuse me? Get away from these toxic people.

So I wanna get this last piece in, moving away from Danny. We're looking at a very vulnerable Kristen Doute who we've known for over a decade. She has given it her all, and she is battling postpartum. We are watching her be completely transparent, almost talking about it as it's happening, without even a full understanding of it herself. And she's working with a therapist, and she's got a four-month-old baby, and her partner, Luke, is zero support, and is just worried if she can get drunk enough that night to fuck him. And I just can't. Yeah, no one should accept that ever. And now this week he's holding their marriage over her head. Which by the way, he talked to someone else about it before he talked to Kristen. He talked to Jesse about it before he talked to Kristen. Who he then made Jesse the bad guy for bringing it up. And Kristen has been honest with the audience about her fears of abandonment, of feeling unlovable. And what does he do when his partner, who he proposed to in a hugely romantic public gesture last season, after a couple of years of infertility and them trying to have this baby that they both wanted so badly, and he's watching her struggle with postpartum, which is a chemical depression that women experience after childbirth. What does he do? Threaten to not marry her. Which triggers her abandonment.

I do wanna ask, though, because I have a little empathy for Luke because Kristen is directing some things at him that feel unfair to me. She's saying things like, "You never help." And I guess what I am wondering, because I struggled a little bit with postpartum, when you have your first child, the world has literally turned upside down. Things that used to feel so simple, like taking a shower, feel like I can't even be away from my baby for 20 minutes. And I'm looking at Kristen clearly very much struggling. But I think Luke seems to need somebody to help recognize that this is starting to look like postpartum. This is not them fighting. I have a little bit of empathy for him because Kristen is saying some things that don't seem fair either, when he seems to be a very devoted and present dad, at least from what we're seeing on cameras. And I mean, I think it's great to have empathy for everybody because the fact is that Luke is human and so is Kristen. They're both needing and deserving of support. By the way, I'm glad that you're talking about the postpartum issues. If anyone's interested, I did a full podcast about postpartum, about mental health and postpartum. That's a mental health crisis and situation, and deserves as much attention and treatment as cancer or anything else. And so my frustration with Luke is that he's being told by Brittany, "This is postpartum," and then he's talking to Jesse about, "I don't think we can get married." So Kristen and Luke, like all couples, we all mess up. Is Kristen acting out and saying and doing some things that are inappropriate? Yes. Is it because of what she's dealing with? Yes. So Luke and Kristen both have things to work on. And I also think that Luke agreed to have a baby and live there until the child is school-aged and then they will move. But when you compromise with a partner and then continue to weaponize it as a reason that you're unhappy, that's a real problem for me too with Luke. Also, side note, what does Luke do for a living other than earn the reality check that Kristen's providing? Like, you can't move because you're unemployed and your wife is a television star and her show is based in Los Angeles. Luke deserves support. He's just not gonna get it from me. When he told Janet that what Danny did was alleged, I was like, "Bro, we're done here." Trying to take what Danny already said he did and apologized for and then turn it into something alleged, that's a real problem.

Melissa, I could do this all day with you. This has been honestly a pleasure. Guys, everybody go follow Melissa @YourBishTherapist, B-I-S-H, and tune into her podcast by the same name, and she has a Patreon. Thank you so much for having me. This has been a delight. Adore you. Adore the Cocktailers. Talk to you soon.

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