Amanda Uhle (on hoarding)

Summary

Armchair Expert with Dax Shepard

Episode: Amanda Uhle (on hoarding)
Date: August 27, 2025
Main Theme:
This episode features Amanda Uhle, a journalist and executive director at McSweeney’s, discussing her memoir Destroy This House about growing up with a mother who struggled with hoarding and a charismatic, risk-taking father. The conversation dives into family dysfunction, the psychology of hoarding, cycles of reinvention, financial chaos, shame, and reconciling with the messiness of one’s origins.

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1. Episode Overview

Amanda Uhle joins Dax Shepard and Monica Padman to discuss her complex upbringing shaped by parental hoarding, erratic financial swings, and unconventional family dynamics. Centered on her memoir, Destroy This House, Amanda’s story delves into how childhood chaos manifests into adulthood and how understanding and acceptance can be forged from pain and disorder.

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2. Key Discussion Points & Insights

a. Amanda’s Background and McSweeney’s (03:28 – 07:14)

• Amanda’s role at McSweeney’s: Publisher & executive director, having worked with Dave Eggers for 20 years.
• Gifting Dax and Monica the McSweeney’s “author trading cards,” which sparks a playful discussion about collecting, favorite writers, and literary geekery.
• Notable moment:
  “We published every one of [John Brandon’s] novels… and the greatest.” – Amanda (06:03)
• Discussion of McSweeney’s unique publishing style and author card collectibles, with Monica and Dax joking about making an “Armchair Deck” for the podcast’s guests.

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b. Family Portrait: Parents’ Histories and the Seeds of Hoarding (07:25 – 11:16)

• Amanda’s mother: former fashion design student at Pratt, became an IBM engineer (the only female engineer in Indiana in the mid-1970s), and a compulsive shopper with a creative bent.
• Amanda’s father: Charismatic, athletic, serial entrepreneur, with frequent job changes and the tendency to exaggerate.
• Family’s financial life: Big wins and catastrophic losses—her father made the equivalent of nearly $800,000 in a single year (1986), but instability and poor financial planning led to bankruptcy.
• On her mother’s shopping as creative expression:
  • “Her interest in fashion and clothes was coming out not as her designing and making her own things, but as her… collectively accumulating, curating a collection, having a lot of fabric that was one day going to be something.” – Amanda (09:06)
• Monica and Dax empathize with the compulsion and “rush” of shopping, noting how mundane “beautiful bandanas” become irresistible.

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c. Manifestations of Hoarding and Household Impact (16:41 – 19:55)

• Moving into a 6,800 sq. ft. mansion after a windfall; mother’s shopping scales up, house fills with furniture, clothes, unopened groceries, and neglected food.
• Amanda’s growing awareness: Realizing the abnormality of their home by visiting others, being unable to have friends over, and picking up on her parents’ deep shame.
• On the discomfort:
  • “It became a harder and harder place to live and just relax at home. Because there’s stuff everywhere. Even in this huge house. … It seemed odder and odder the more I went to other people’s houses.” – Amanda (18:25)
• Hoarding never spoken of; was just “messiness” and a source of silent familial shame.

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d. Financial Chaos and Emotional Bargains (19:55 – 21:57)

• Parents’ unspoken “tit for tat” arrangement: her father’s financial recklessness balanced by tolerance of her mother’s hoarding.
• “They were just Bonnie and Clyde of the Midwest. They did their stuff together and they tolerated each other.” – Amanda (19:57)
• Downward spiral: Father’s optimism, risky inventions (including a valve for liquid soap), and ill-fated MLM schemes (Success Motivation Institute)—losses totaling $10-20k.
• Resulted in bankruptcy, loss of the mansion, and degrading home conditions (overgrown lawns, holes patched with plywood).

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e. Coping, Control, and the Psychology of Hoarding (26:21 – 29:34)

• Amanda’s childhood: “Uncomfortable.” Elaborate systems to hide the house’s state, making up stories to avoid bringing friends over, and feeling isolated.
• Hoarding symptoms: Piles of unopened groceries, dozens of shampoo bottles, decaying food—leading to embarrassment and secrecy.
• Amanda’s recurring childhood dream:
  • “I had this dream where I would just destroy my whole house… I had it all planned out… I could just dump everything out and throw stuff out the window.” – Amanda (27:23)
• Hoarding’s roots: Emotional pain, desire for safety and control. Amanda speculates her mother’s sadness and insecurity were at its core, masked by activity and shopping.

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f. Parents’ Constant Reinvention & Parenting Styles (34:13 – 42:57)

• Her parents’ penchant for reinvention: father becomes a pastor in his 40s; mother becomes an RN (after being an engineer, fashion student).
• 1980s/’90s “benign neglect” parenting—Amanda and her brother left alone or at the library for hours.
• The identity of a “pastor’s kid” (PK): new social expectations, stigma, and feeling “different.”
• Her mother’s odd sexual advice (e.g., “hand jobs are crucial; remain a virgin”), gifting a vibrator for Christmas, and the push-pull between unconventional openness and longing for normalcy.
• Amanda’s adolescent nonconformity: vintage clothes, disdain for Friends, and frustration at her parents’ desire for her to be “normal.”

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g. Adult Perspective, Acceptance, and the Book’s Creation (47:06 – 64:22)

• Amanda’s escape to college: a chance at comfort, independence, and self-actualization.
• Living “neat but not extreme”—she is wary of clutter but not a minimalist.
• Reflection on parental legacy: intense love mixed with hurt, confusion, and the eventual acceptance that her parents did their best, even if it was “wild.”
• After her parents’ death (within 18 months of each other), the trauma and logistical nightmare of cleaning their hoarded home and storage units:
  • “Since I was 8, I was worried about the stuff in our house… Oh my God, who’s going to deal with all this?” – Amanda (55:35)
  • Found $4,000 her mother had hidden in cash among belongings.
• On coming to peace with her parents:
  • “I’m totally at peace with my parents, although I’m not really interested in hanging with them … I just don’t feel that. They did what they did. I think they did their best. I think their best is wild.” – Amanda (64:00)
• Dax reflects on his own father: moving from anger to acceptance and mourning the impossibility of enjoying him simply as a flawed human.

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3. Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Dax on his fascination with hoarding:
  “We're pretty horny for hoarding.” (01:12)
• Amanda, connecting her childhood dream to her book’s title:
  “This dream just came back to me over and over. And I would have it five or six nights a week. I had it all planned out… That’s where the title comes from.” (27:23)
• Monica’s empathy:
  “But did any of your friends say, like, can I come over? And you had to, like, lie?” (26:14)
• Amanda’s harsh honesty about her parents:
  • On their divorce/financial split:
    “She told me the pin for her bank account and I was never to tell anyone, especially dad.” (41:03)
  • On her complicated feelings:
    “I just don’t feel that [hate]. They did what they did. I think they did their best. I think their best is wild.” (64:00)
• Dax’s observation on trauma’s common endpoint:
  “It’s funny, too, how all these diseases do bring everyone to the same place… isolation… ultimately you’ll be in your closet smoking crack on day three all by yourself. … And this thing, like, even if you started as social, you can never host anyone. You’re embarrassed by where you live. … It’s heartbreaking.” (108:08)

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4. Important Timestamps

• 03:28 – 07:14: McSweeney’s “author trading cards,” Amanda’s publishing work
• 08:34 – 11:16: Family background: mother’s engineering career, father’s charisma
• 16:41 – 18:25: Move to mansion; hoarding escalates
• 19:55 – 21:57: Parental “arrangement” regarding each other’s chaos
• 26:21 – 29:34: Childhood discomfort; societal shame and secrecy around hoarding
• 34:13 – 42:57: Parental reinvention; odd sexual/social dynamics; Amanda’s self-concept
• 47:06 – 48:52: Leaving home; adulthood and comfort
• 55:35 – 64:00: Death, estate cleanout, and emotional reckoning
• 64:00 – 64:22: Amanda on peace with her parents
• 108:08: Dax on the isolating outcome of addiction and hoarding

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5. Tone & Style

• Conversational, confessional, and thoughtful.
• Amanda’s tone is measured and sometimes wistful, oscillating between dark humor and deep empathy.
• Dax and Monica balance curiosity, comedic asides, and sincere vulnerability regarding their own family histories.
• The episode maintains a steady rhythm of anecdote, self-examination, and philosophical musing.

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6. Takeaways for Listeners

• Hoarding is rarely about laziness or simple disorganization; it’s often rooted in deeper pain, unresolved trauma, or the desire for control.
• Children in chaotic or dysfunctional homes can internalize shame and secrecy, which impacts relationships and self-worth into adulthood.
• Coming to terms with a complicated family may involve years of anger, grief, investigation, and, ultimately, a peace that coexists with the recognition of one’s parents’ limits and love.
• Material accumulation and the avoidance of “dealing with stuff” can have profound psychological and practical ramifications—both in life and, acutely, at death.
• Amanda Uhle’s Destroy This House is recommended as an honest, beautiful memoir for those interested in the intersections of mental health, family, and resilience.

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Closing Recommendation:
Dax, Monica, and Amanda thank each other for the candid discussion, urging listeners to check out Destroy This House to explore Amanda’s journey in greater depth.

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[End of Summary]

Transcript

[Dax Shepard]

Wondry plus subscribers can listen to Armchair Expert early and ad free right now. Join Wondry plus in the Wondry app or on Apple Podcasts or you can listen for free wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome, welcome, welcome to Armchair Expert. Experts on Expert Today we have Amanda Yulian.

[Monica Padman]

Yes.

[Dax Shepard]

Who's a journalist and a non fiction writer. She is the executive director and publisher of McSweenies. She's been published in all kinds of very reputable publications.

[Monica Padman]

Fun stuff.

[Dax Shepard]

She's a successful writer.

[Monica Padman]

Yes.

[Dax Shepard]

But she has an incredible memoir called Destroy this House.

[Monica Padman]

For people who say it a different, some say correct way, memoir.

[Dax Shepard]

Great. That's what I think I said, but clearly I didn't or you wouldn't be correcting me. But her story is an incredible one. Her mother was a hoarder and her father was this incredibly charismatic guy who had fortunes won and lost. And it's a. It's a riveting tale.

[Monica Padman]

It's a tale of dysfunction.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

And it's wild. It's a wild ride. And we were really interested in the whole thing, but the hoarding is.

[Dax Shepard]

We're pretty horny for hoarding.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, we like that.

[Dax Shepard]

We like to talk about hoarding. Please enjoy. Amanda Yuli we are supported by Nordic Naturals. Did you know that only 20% of Americans get enough Omega 3s from their diet? Join the 20% and discover the power of Omega 3 with Nordic Naturals. Nordic Naturals is the number one selling Omega 3 brand in the US with products formulated to support your whole family, including kids and pets. You know, I was heavily recommended to up my Omega 3 and I was recommended by my doctor to get Nordic Naturals. And I've been on it long before they were a sponsor. And by the way, my Omega 3 levels are Dr. Dynamite now.

[Monica Padman]

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[Dax Shepard]

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[Monica Padman]

Mmm. Sounds delicious.

[Dax Shepard]

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[Amanda Yulian]

He's an up transfer.

[Monica Padman]

He's an option expert.

[Dax Shepard]

He's an obsessor. Dave Eggers wrote what is the what?

[Amanda Yulian]

Yes, yes. So I work with Dave, and I heard yesterday that you're a fan of what is the what? I don't know how I didn't know that.

[Monica Padman]

I know Dave Eggers and we got this really cool magazine. See the Lunchbox? It's a magazine.

[Amanda Yulian]

I brought you a copy of a McSweeney's issue. You know what McSweeney's is, so I.

[Dax Shepard]

Know McSweeney's, but I don't. Right. So I'm like, oh, I know McSweeney's. You hear McSweeney's, do you know McSweeney?

[Monica Padman]

I didn't, but Amanda.

[Dax Shepard]

But I know it. And then I was reading about it and you and Dave co founded that.

[Amanda Yulian]

Dave is the founder.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, he's the founder.

[Amanda Yulian]

Yeah, he started it in 98. I started working with Dave 20 years ago.

[Dax Shepard]

I want to get to that chronologically speaking.

[Monica Padman]

But look how cool that is.

[Dax Shepard]

Wait, I need to find out. Did you bring this?

[Amanda Yulian]

I brought it. And I brought you author baseball cards too. You can open it.

[Dax Shepard]

The 74 issue of McSweeney's. Because you guys do a quarterly. It has a fun name. Quarterly.

[Amanda Yulian]

Timothy McSweeney's quarterly. Concern concern.

[Monica Padman]

I love that.

[Dax Shepard]

It's a journal.

[Amanda Yulian]

It's a journal. So everyone is different. I think about a year ago, we published this one, our 74th. And inside there's some literature. Right? There's new fiction in a paperback, but we did author cards.

[Dax Shepard]

And who designed this? Clever.

[Amanda Yulian]

That's Art Spiegelman on that one.

[Dax Shepard]

We're going to learn a lot today.

[Amanda Yulian]

I know. I'm so. Let's talk.

[Dax Shepard]

Please remove this cardboard spacer. No, I don't do what I'm told.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, my gosh.

[Dax Shepard]

Get rid of it if you can.

[Monica Padman]

Ooh.

[Dax Shepard]

Author trading cards.

[Monica Padman]

So cute. We got some more, too, over there.

[Amanda Yulian]

Yeah. Okay, so we published this last year, and people loved the cards so much that we started just printing more so we can collect them all.

[Monica Padman]

Ah, I love collecting.

[Amanda Yulian]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Have you done Tobias Wolf? Does he have a card?

[Amanda Yulian]

I love Tobias Wolf's books, but thank you for reminding me that he does not have a card. Okay, so that's on my list.

[Dax Shepard]

And then the other one you just got me.

[Monica Padman]

Raymond Carver.

[Dax Shepard]

Raymond Carver. She got me an original.

[Amanda Yulian]

Gosh, I love Raymond Carver, too.

[Dax Shepard]

Signed, original press. Raymond Carver. Does he have a Carver?

[Amanda Yulian]

I'm so sorry, we have missed both.

[Dax Shepard]

I'm gonna assume, for obvious reasons, Bukowski doesn't have a card.

[Amanda Yulian]

Don't have Bukowski there yet.

[Monica Padman]

No. I want to guess.

[Amanda Yulian]

But wait, I don't necessarily have all of them memorized, so you will catch me at some point.

[Dax Shepard]

Can I? Yeah. John Brandon, Handsome, Tall, Literate, is one of our favorites.

[Amanda Yulian]

We've published every one of his novels. I think we've published seven of John's books.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, really? He's prolific.

[Amanda Yulian]

He's prolific. And the greatest. What does it say about him? So author stats, how many pages they've published.

[Monica Padman]

This is so cool. I love this.

[Dax Shepard]

I love this idea. I want to steal it for something.

[Monica Padman]

Well, yeah. Like, we could do this here.

[Dax Shepard]

Miranda July. You love Miranda.

[Amanda Yulian]

Has she been on her.

[Monica Padman]

No. We almost had her before all fours, but then it didn't work out. And then she got very busy.

[Amanda Yulian]

She's a busy person.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Amanda Yulian]

So we published one of her books, possibly her first book. At McSweeney's, we publish, like, 10 books a year. We do this magazine and we have two other magazines, and then we have humoursite. Nice. A lot of people know us that.

[Dax Shepard]

Way through the humor site, right? Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

So cool. Do you think that you guys could publish an armchair deck? And it's to all of our guests.

[Amanda Yulian]

Oh, yes.

[Monica Padman]

We're coming up on a thousand.

[Dax Shepard]

You're just kind of delegating logistical duties because you would have to, like, give her all the guests details.

[Monica Padman]

Well, I'm gonna let her find the details.

[Amanda Yulian]

Oh, God. You're gonna do all the work? Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

But you guys do such a good job. Why would I try to copy that?

[Dax Shepard]

Well, this is adorable.

[Monica Padman]

I really.

[Amanda Yulian]

I hope you like it. I Think you can throw away the spacer as well? You can keep it in there or whatever you want to do.

[Dax Shepard]

It's a good exercise for me to follow directions, which I'm bad at.

[Monica Padman]

We'll put it up here and we'll display it.

[Dax Shepard]

I'm wondering if throughout this interview, I'll remind you of your father at all.

[Amanda Yulian]

If you will remind me of my father.

[Dax Shepard]

He was tall, right?

[Amanda Yulian]

He's very tall. He played college sports. Ooh. He played football for the Florida Gators.

[Monica Padman]

Oh. Oh.

[Amanda Yulian]

And in high school in Miami, he did basketball and football. He was a big athlete.

[Dax Shepard]

He was charismatic.

[Amanda Yulian]

Very much as.

[Dax Shepard]

Are you obsessed with the dollar?

[Amanda Yulian]

As am I. Oh, boy. Money's a big part of the book. Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Very big part of the book. Book. You know, I couldn't help but think, yeah, if I don't choose this, I'm probably just also this figure that's wandering around Michigan with too big of a personality could have easily gone in this direction.

[Amanda Yulian]

I feel like, yeah, in some ways, my dad could easily have gotten that big break and been someone else. He was trying things.

[Dax Shepard]

We're going to talk about your book, Destroy this House. I guess the headline description of your book that I read that got me interested in having you on was that your mother was a hoarder. And I think I have great interest in how that presents itself. How does it evolve? What is it like to live with it? What's the psychology behind it? That's all very interesting to me. Okay. Your book starts with, describe mom and dad when you're born. They've been together a few years. When you're born.

[Amanda Yulian]

They were together a few years. They got together, I think, in 75, and I was born in 78. We're about the same age.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. I'm three years older than you. So mom and dad have been together for three years. What do mom and dad want to do at that point?

[Amanda Yulian]

That's such a great question. A question I've never even asked myself. My mom really did want to have a family, but she had started out interested in fashion design, which itself was such an inspired and almost strange choice. She grew up in a very tiny town in rural Indiana, and in 1969, just decided fashion was her thing. Applied and got into Pratt in Brooklyn.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, wow. Yeah.

[Amanda Yulian]

And just, like, went to New York. Kind of a badass thing to do. So she's really creative. By the time I was born, her interest in fashion and clothes was coming out not as her designing and making her own things, but as her Shopping, kind of collectively accumulating, curating a collection, having a lot of fabric that was one day going to be something.

[Monica Padman]

Gosh, I can so relate.

[Amanda Yulian]

It is relatable.

[Dax Shepard]

You're right. There's almost an angst that you're not a designer and that your next best thing is to appreciate it also.

[Monica Padman]

Just if you're shopping and you see something that you think is beautiful. I was at a store and there are these bandanas, and they were so pretty. And I was like, I don't need this at all. I don't wear bandanas.

[Amanda Yulian]

You're not a bandana person.

[Dax Shepard]

You're not a cowboy.

[Monica Padman]

There's absolutely no reason for me to have this, but I have to check out with these two things in my hand. I have to have.

[Amanda Yulian]

These are coming home with me.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. And I did think, what is going on? That I absolutely have to have these things that I know are useless to me. And then I did give them to your kids, actually.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, okay.

[Monica Padman]

So now, because they're bandana girls.

[Amanda Yulian]

Okay.

[Dax Shepard]

They are cowboys.

[Amanda Yulian]

So in that case.

[Monica Padman]

So I found a way.

[Amanda Yulian]

But it's a little rush, the shopping, big tone. This is a thing. I can buy this, and I can be different once I have it or once I buy it. So I think that that was going on with my mom, but she was.

[Dax Shepard]

Somehow an engineer at IBM.

[Amanda Yulian]

Oh, before then. Yes, she was.

[Dax Shepard]

This is the most fascinating, I think, because she was quite a rare offering for a female IBM engineer.

[Amanda Yulian]

Only woman engineer in the state of Indiana. This is 1974ish when she got this job, didn't work out in fashion school in Brooklyn. So she came back to Indiana and got this job, and she was like, I don't want to be a secretary. I don't want to type. I want to fix typewriters. And she learned how to do it, and she was their person. There were a lot of men doing that job.

[Dax Shepard]

People would stand around and watch her repair these things because it was such a novelty that this woman was so mechanical.

[Amanda Yulian]

And she had a pager. I remember her describing this. And they would page her around Indianapolis and she'd go to an office and fix their typewriters. Wow.

[Dax Shepard]

She was doing so well that they moved everyone. Right.

[Amanda Yulian]

IBM moved my mom with her job to West Virginia. I guess they needed more engineers, maybe more women engineers.

[Dax Shepard]

And at that point, mom was the breadwinner, obviously, because dad at that time was selling books door to door.

[Amanda Yulian]

He had at that time. And this is so wonderful because my book is published By Simon and Schuster. My dad sold Simon and Schuster paperbacks at gas stations. You know, like in the. They had these spinning racks of books.

[Dax Shepard]

Yes.

[Amanda Yulian]

My dad would go. And he was so good at talking to people. He could sell you and me and everyone anything. And he kept doing that his whole life.

[Dax Shepard]

But then you guys got to West Virginia, and this is no slight on West Virginians. Those carousels at gas stations didn't really.

[Amanda Yulian]

Exist less so in West Virginia. Fewer readers of fiction and novels.

[Dax Shepard]

At least in 1970.

[Monica Padman]

So he was a football player before?

[Amanda Yulian]

You said before. Yeah. He didn't finish college, so he did some football, did lots of things, dropped out of college. And at the time he was in Miami. He worked at a nightclub, he was booking bands. I haven't counted how many jobs my father had. My mom did too, but my dad had so many.

[Dax Shepard]

I almost think there's a predictable pattern. For people who are quite good at things really quickly. They never get great at anything. They don't master anything, but they get good enough to get the recognition of. And then they get bored really easy and they gotta switch it up and go get some more recognition for some other thing.

[Amanda Yulian]

He was never afraid to try things, so he would just jump in. And he was selling hotel rooms and then he was selling books. When he ended up in Indianapolis. At first he was totally homeless. When he and my mom met, he had nowhere to live. Everything he owned was in a Tom McCann shoebox. And they met at a party and he came home with his shoebox. And that was.

[Dax Shepard]

And he never. He left one couch to her.

[Monica Padman]

No. Is your mom someone who like, really wants to take care of people? Because that's a big thing to take in. A guy with a shoebox.

[Amanda Yulian]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Come living, you know, that's a person.

[Dax Shepard]

Unless he's tall and gregarious in a blast. And it's literally not even till months later where you realize, oh, wow, he came over and never left and now he's still here. This guy's amazing. He's incredible. Wait, where was he living before? And where's the rest of his stuff? Maybe you're a little deep.

[Monica Padman]

Okay.

[Amanda Yulian]

Yeah, I think you're channeling my dad in a few misses here.

[Dax Shepard]

Now, how does he get into janitorial supplies? Liquid soap dispensers. Because he's also like an armchair inventor. Idea guy.

[Amanda Yulian]

Always inventing, always starting new things. So they eventually moved. They were in Philadelphia, which is where I was born. And then my dad got this job at Johnson Wax. And this is classic my parents behavior he gets the job in New Jersey. They start looking for houses. They don't like it near this town in New Jersey where the place is. So they start looking further and further out. And they go so far out, they're beyond New York City and they're into Long Island. And so we buy a house that causes my dad to commute through New York City in the morning and then back out it in the evening. No one does that.

[Dax Shepard]

No. It's almost like there's something wrong with his frontal lobe at that point. He's like, I like that I want to sleep there and I want to work there. And I'm not going to do any of the math.

[Monica Padman]

I'm not going to let anything get in the way of that.

[Amanda Yulian]

And they wanted a bigger house. So I think that they were like, we don't like the houses right around here and we don't want to live in an apartment. We want to live in house.

[Dax Shepard]

So he got a job there at Johnson Wax. How does it evolve into his role in Sweden?

[Amanda Yulian]

Part of what he was doing there was selling to institutions, selling soap and things. And he and another partner, they invented some sort of valve for soap. So their whole thing was hand soap. This is the early 80s, and I don't know if you remember, I barely do, but sometimes you'd go into a public bathroom in the 80s and there'd be like a sliver of bar soap that everybody would have to share.

[Dax Shepard]

The big tub of borax kind of powder. And then it had this really rudimentary little valve you would open and it would just dump powder on your hands. That was also in the mix.

[Amanda Yulian]

That's another old time thing. My dad was part of thinking, there's a better way. He invented this thing and it was like, what if we had liquid soap? He wasn't the inventor of liquid soap by any means, but he was part of that. Like, let's make it work for people worked on this valve. He never wanted to have a job. He never wanted to work for somebody and be accountable like that. He wanted to do his own thing. So he found these Swedish janitorial people that were interested and he sold them the valve. And then he sold some people in Hong Kong the valve. In the 80s we were doing well on the valve.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, yeah?

[Amanda Yulian]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

So they had kind of like overnight riches. There's no numbers in here. What do we think your dad was bringing in?

[Amanda Yulian]

I do have some numbers.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, you do?

[Amanda Yulian]

I don't have all the numbers. One of the things about the book is My dad was such an exaggerator always that what I wanted to do is pin it down. I wanted to figure out the facts that I could. So I found out my dad in 1986, he made $265,000 in 86. That's a lot of money in 1986.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, that's like a couple million dollars a year.

[Amanda Yulian]

Yeah, that's wild.

[Dax Shepard]

Major.

[Amanda Yulian]

And based on that, which was the good year, I think other people would say, well, this is an unusually great year. I'll suck some of this away so that we can live differently and I can keep experimenting and doing wild things.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay, so you guys move at that point to Indiana and get a mansion?

[Amanda Yulian]

Yes, in 1986.

[Monica Padman]

And so you were like, eight?

[Amanda Yulian]

I was eight.

[Monica Padman]

Okay, you were eight. Thank you. I'm not very good at math, so I'm proud of myself.

[Amanda Yulian]

Really nice. It was right after I turned eight.

[Monica Padman]

And were you like, yes, I'm in a mansion.

[Amanda Yulian]

I never thought. To think that we lost all of our friends. When you're a kid, those are the important things. It was kind of cool. I was like, we'll try it. When my brother was three and I was eight, so we just sort of went along with it. It fulfilled for my mom this great thing where she loves shopping. And so you have to fill. The house was 6,800 square feet, six.

[Dax Shepard]

And a half bathrooms, six bedrooms.

[Monica Padman]

She got to decorate the whole house and then some.

[Amanda Yulian]

She was buying furniture in North Carolina a lot. Paging through these catalogs, dog earing them, circling things. Then she'd be on the phone ordering. She was in it. We had $265,000 to spend. We didn't really. So the house was purchased. All this stuff in it was purchased. My dad then was working in Hong Kong a lot, and he just orders an insane amount of Hong Kong furniture in 1986. 87. And it's shipped. What would that cost to ship?

[Dax Shepard]

It's got to cross the Pacific, then across the whole country.

[Amanda Yulian]

Oh, yeah. So this mansion house, in many of our houses after that was this mix of Asian influence. Black lacquer, gold trim. We had little cork dioramas of scenes from agrarian China. You know, we had that kind of stuff. And it's mixed with, like, the Midwest geese with bows on their necks. Kind of like country 80s, kind of.

[Dax Shepard]

East meets west, agrarian sort of aurora.

[Monica Padman]

That sounds so chaotic.

[Dax Shepard]

It was chaotic. There's a lot of confusing things happening. And if I were you, I'm sure I would credit some things erroneously, but does Mom's shopping raise a flag at this point, does it seem odd or do you need to go to a lot of other people's houses to realize that? Like, where's your own awareness of this?

[Amanda Yulian]

I would say it seems uncomfortable. It became a harder and harder place to live and just relax at home. Because there's stuff everywhere. Even in this huge house. There's like grocery bags of food that were never unpacked, Bags of clothes tucked here, there, and everywhere. It seemed odder and odder the more I went to other people's houses.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Amanda Yulian]

And when I noticed that we never had people in our house, they were.

[Monica Padman]

Aware enough to know, like, don't come over.

[Amanda Yulian]

It was shameful to my parents, but we would never speak of it. It was that kind of shameful, where it was like, you're not going to discuss this?

[Dax Shepard]

Would you have a sides with dad ever? Did dad ever explicitly say, like, just let your mom do. Don't give her any grief about it?

[Amanda Yulian]

If I expressed that discomfort that I was feeling as a little kid, he would be like, we love your mother. We had to tolerate it. That was our job, was to be loving and to not make it a problem.

[Dax Shepard]

What's your explanation for that? In my mind, a lot of times couples enter into this tit for tat for vice. Almost like, I'm gonna overlook this thing. Cause I have my own thing that I'd appreciate you overlooking. Was it that arrangement? A little bit of that.

[Amanda Yulian]

I think he was straying here and there.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay.

[Amanda Yulian]

In different ways. And I don't want to say too much about that because I actually don't have too much proof of that. I have some. And you know, he was getting us into trouble all the time with money and he would never pay a bill. So obviously he was like, okay, I'm going to look the other way on all this craziness.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, I'm making our life financially chaotic.

[Amanda Yulian]

And then I'll do the chaos over here. And so they were just Bonnie and Clyde of the Midwest. They did their stuff together and they tolerated each other.

[Dax Shepard]

Now, another unique part of your father's personality is he was also obsessed with Martin Luther and Protestantism and the Lutheran Church. So during this whole period where he's making a ton of money and going to Hong Kong and Sweden, you get to go to Sweden twice as a kid.

[Amanda Yulian]

Went to Sweden twice.

[Dax Shepard]

That's so cool. It's a party. Like, it's on, but it's a party.

[Monica Padman]

But it's like a lot.

[Amanda Yulian]

So I had a fun childhood in A lot of ways it was challenging, it was uncomfortable. There were problems that I recognized more and more as I grew up. But we had fun. We were indulged.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Amanda Yulian]

Took some trips.

[Dax Shepard]

It also makes you think of, like, what modern young people's bar is for a partner. This is the reality of what marriage looked like all through my childhood. The parents were pretty fucked up in their own ways. We're like, yeah, let's be fucked up together. No one's really got to be perfect. That also feels kind of era specific.

[Amanda Yulian]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay, so when do things start to fall apart on the liquid soap? Why does that go awry?

[Amanda Yulian]

My dad was just optimistic. He was optimistic about everything he did. And so his math. Later in his life, I would see him do this math. He'd literally get an envelope. Back of the envelope. He'd write figures that had no basis in reality. Like, here's how we're gonna do the mortgage. I think he just thought those valves which he was at one point using for ice cream, he invented kind of like a flurry, like ice cream drink, same technology, but you would put a little flavored syrup in your ice cream.

[Dax Shepard]

He could build out that valve in a bunch of different domains.

[Amanda Yulian]

Yeah, he thought so and he didn't.

[Dax Shepard]

He's also getting ensnared with pyramid schemes and stuff. Or does that come after?

[Amanda Yulian]

Once we moved to the mansion in rural Indiana, it was really clear really quickly that that money that he thought came in really great in 1986 wouldn't be continuing. He started trying things. And one of the things he tried was he basically got wrapped up in a multi level marketing scheme.

[Dax Shepard]

What is it called?

[Amanda Yulian]

Smi. Success Motivation Institute. Sort of Christian business people. Cassette tapes to motivate you.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, yeah, cassette tapes.

[Amanda Yulian]

Cassette tapes.

[Dax Shepard]

And he invested thousands into that.

[Amanda Yulian]

He lost some money. I tried to figure out exactly how much. I have an estimate.

[Dax Shepard]

And you found out people in that time that were investing in SMI were losing 10 to $20,000 on average.

[Amanda Yulian]

Lots of money.

[Dax Shepard]

We just had an MLM expert on.

[Monica Padman]

It's so interesting.

[Amanda Yulian]

It is interesting. MLMs are known to dupe the people that are part of it. But I think my dad, who was selling them, he was so all in. Stars in his eyes. I remember him telling us, this is going to help people have better marriages.

[Monica Padman]

But that's why it's so horrible. Your dad was preyed upon.

[Amanda Yulian]

My dad was preyed upon. And so were all the people that he was.

[Monica Padman]

Exactly. It's just this, like, cascade.

[Amanda Yulian]

Nobody wins in that one.

[Dax Shepard]

Well, that's the complex nature of the MLMs is for many people it'll have been the best time of their life. Even though they lost money because it gave them community.

[Amanda Yulian]

Gave them community parties.

[Dax Shepard]

And so it's complicated.

[Amanda Yulian]

I remember going with him, I was probably 10, and he would rent out this hotel conference room in our little town and he'd put a sign up, we're going to talk motivation. It was fun for him, you know, and people would come and they would listen to him because he was so charismatic.

[Monica Padman]

Right.

[Amanda Yulian]

But they didn't end up buying the cassette tapes. So, yeah, it was tough.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, no.

[Amanda Yulian]

So we just went broke. Basically. We couldn't afford the house and the house started just crumbling around us. This is a big kind of estate with huge lawn in the back and in the front. And we never were able to afford the mowing. My dad never mowed the lawn. There were things they did. There were things they did.

[Dax Shepard]

That wasn't his specialty.

[Amanda Yulian]

It wasn't his thing. So the grass is like up to my waist and the front door is crumbling off. I don't know how this happened.

[Dax Shepard]

Big hole in it with plywood over it.

[Amanda Yulian]

Plywood over it.

[Dax Shepard]

It's really funny to think of a mansion neighborhood, but there is a white trash family living in that's not mowing their grass. And the people going like, how did this happen?

[Amanda Yulian]

What are these people doing? So we were those people. And it was so funny because our house looked like hell. I mean, it was so bad toward the end of this time. But my dad would always pick on me for like leaving my bike in the yard. And it's. But wait.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, the homeowners association was yelling at him about mowing the grass.

[Amanda Yulian]

Yep.

[Dax Shepard]

So another thing, he was a visionary in a sense.

[Amanda Yulian]

He was.

[Dax Shepard]

He rented out this chunk of a strip mall that was built. This was his next big breakthrough. And he realized, I'm going to subdivide this into different desks. And professionals that don't want the overhead of an office space can come in here. We'll have a common receptionist. Like, we work.

[Monica Padman]

It was like a we work.

[Amanda Yulian]

It was like we work. But it was 1988 and he did it.

[Dax Shepard]

But he couldn't get anyone to come in and rent these desks. So he gave the lawn service guys free desks so they'd mow this five foot tall grass and get it.

[Monica Padman]

Okay, so a little horse trading. Yeah.

[Amanda Yulian]

He was a trader. My dad's most famous barter. And this is going ahead in time, but he bartered for my Dental surgery when I was 18.

[Dax Shepard]

Please.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, tell me.

[Amanda Yulian]

May I tell you about it?

[Dax Shepard]

Yes, please. Yeah. Actually, no, I don't want you to tell it because we gotta learn something.

[Amanda Yulian]

We're doing chronology. Okay, okay, we'll do it that way.

[Dax Shepard]

But we'll get there. Cause that's wonderful. So when you go broke, you then move again.

[Amanda Yulian]

You move to Fort Wayne Lutheran Seminary there. And so at this point, my dad is like, I'm gonna just try what has always been in my heart, which.

[Dax Shepard]

Is to be a pastor at 46 or something. Right?

[Amanda Yulian]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

So do you feel like things are normal or are you, like, life chaotic? Are you mad at them? What are you in this?

[Amanda Yulian]

The best word for it is uncomfortable. Like, I just didn't know, because when you're a kid, you actually think that the way your household operates is kind of standard. I knew that our house was messy, and we never used the word hoarding. Never in my mom's life. She died 10 years ago. That word was never used. It was messy, but it was like, what else is weird about our house? I didn't really know.

[Dax Shepard]

And what about friendships and bringing people to the house or having to make up excuses? Were you dealing with all that kind of stuff?

[Amanda Yulian]

Yeah, we just never had people over. It was clear that my parents didn't want anybody over, so I would go to other people's houses. I mean, we had elaborate systems where, like, if I was getting, say, picked up for something at school, like, another family was picking up, and nobody had a cell phone. Of course, it's still in the 80s. I'd have to, like, go outside and wait. The door closed behind me, because you couldn't risk somebody coming to the door and the door opening and other people seeing what it was like inside. It was too much, you know? So I knew that.

[Monica Padman]

But did any of your friends say, like, can I come over? And you had to, like, lie?

[Amanda Yulian]

Yeah, I would say, well, let's do it at your house, or let's do something else. It would have been so mortifying to me. When I talk about the hoarding, there were things that were, like, paper bags of canned goods, things like that. It's a little relatable. Didn't have time to put the groceries away, but it was so much. And, like, our bathrooms had shampoo bottles. And you can imagine a normal house might have a few extra. In the closet, we would have 48 bottles of shampoo, and they'd be on the floor. It's embarrassing, right?

[Dax Shepard]

It just takes over every space.

[Amanda Yulian]

It took over and then there was, like, the gross aspect, which is that food was part of the thing that my mom was hoarding. And so it wasn't just canned goods. She would buy chicken and cottage cheese and things like that and leave them out. And so there was, like, stinky. It was tough, you know, you couldn't bring people over.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, no.

[Amanda Yulian]

When you're 12, what would I do?

[Monica Padman]

I guess I'd be like, I'm putting these in the fridge.

[Dax Shepard]

Well, there's no place the fridge. Is the fridge away? Nothing can be put away. Cause every inch of the house has been already occupied.

[Monica Padman]

This is really stressful, isn't it?

[Dax Shepard]

So stressful.

[Amanda Yulian]

It was stressful. It came out for me in this dream that I. Around the time I was 8ish. Around the time we moved to this big mansion. But I had this dream where I would just destroy my whole house. And that's where the title comes from. This dream just came back to me over and over. And I would have it five or six nights a week. I had it all planned out. There's another house. That's fine. And my parents cannot be mad at me because I haven't touched this house. But then here's this replica, and I could just dump everything out and throw stuff out the window. Seems very twisted now.

[Dax Shepard]

Do you see anything that was correlated for your mother emotionally that led to this?

[Amanda Yulian]

Like, why she did it?

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Like there was a period, obviously. Maybe you were too young to remember, but was she doing it back in Long Island?

[Amanda Yulian]

It picked up over the years. It got worse and worse and worse. And I think that that's true of most people that struggle with hoarding. But I remember my dad saying that when he came into her apartment with the shoebox, it looked like maybe she'd been robbed is what he said, because it was a big mess. She was always kind of messy, but.

[Dax Shepard]

She knew where everything was.

[Amanda Yulian]

Oh, yeah. And you could never, like, clean it up because she knew she wouldn't want you to move.

[Dax Shepard]

It was moved.

[Amanda Yulian]

Oh, no, you would never.

[Monica Padman]

So there's this weird illusion of control. Like I know where everything is, even though no one else does. And it's a mess, but I have control over it. Maybe there's a real control element to it.

[Dax Shepard]

Of all the isms, it's the one I can't really get there mentally with the hoarding. Yeah, I can. With, like, every other ism, almost. I'm an addict. I understand that. I can easily imagine being addicted to any number of things because I know what it's like to be addicted. I have stolen, I've been a criminal. There's a lot of things I can comprehend, but that whole mindset I can't even find purchase in.

[Amanda Yulian]

I feel like it's the same because it's self destructive. You know you shouldn't, right? When you're talking about those behaviors, right? You're not supposed to do that and you shouldn't, but you still do it. And I feel like my mom, she knew every time she went to Kohl's, bought a bunch of stuff or Joann fabrics or Kroger, I mean all the places that she would go and just amass all this stuff we didn't need, we had nowhere to store. She, she definitely knew.

[Dax Shepard]

Stay tuned for more armchair expert if you dare. We are supported by Squarespace. Whether you're just starting out or scaling your business, Squarespace gives you everything you need to create a professional website, grow your brand and get paid all in one place. Our website functions beautifully, so seamless, like a Swiss made timepiece. And it was all designed on Squarespace by Wabi Wob and it was easy. The cutting edge design tools on Squarespace are a game changer. With Blueprint AI, their AI enhanced website builder, you can create a fully custom site in just a few steps. It generates premium content and personalized design. Recommended recommendations based on your brand and goals. Plus their intuitive drag and drop editor makes it easy to fine tune everything to your liking. But Squarespace isn't just about looks. Their integrated SEO tools help you get discovered faster online. Every Squarespace site is optimized with meta descriptions, an auto generated sitemap and more, so you show up more often in search results and attract your ideal customers. Ready to claim your corner of the Internet? Go to squarespace.com for a free trial and when you're ready to launch, use offer code DAX to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. That's squarespace.com and promo code DAX to get started today.

[Amanda Yulian]

Hi, I'm Monica Lewinsky.

[Monica Padman]

Welcome to Reclaiming. I would define reclaiming as to take.

[Amanda Yulian]

Back what was yours.

[Monica Padman]

Something you possess is lost or stolen.

[Amanda Yulian]

And ultimately you triumph in finding it again. Miley Cyrus welcome to reclaiming.

[Monica Padman]

My 2013 is your 1998. I lost everything during that time in my personal life because of the choices I was making professionally.

[Amanda Yulian]

Chelsea Handler, welcome to Reclaiming.

[Monica Padman]

I did have a teacher who instilled in me that I was going to do something special and she was like, you're going to have an impact.

[Amanda Yulian]

Sophia Bush welcome to reclaiming.

[Monica Padman]

You went all the way you committed and if it wasn't for you, you have the courage to tell the truth and get out. And I had to say that to.

[Amanda Yulian]

Women in my life and I had to learn how to say it in a mirror to myself. This, this last decade for me has.

[Monica Padman]

Really been what I consider my own reclaiming, my own journey, my own reclaiming story is in the bones of this show. Please listen to Reclaiming on the Wondery.

[Amanda Yulian]

App or wherever you get your podcasts.

[Monica Padman]

The town of AGDA in France is famous for sun, sand, sea and sex. But lately, life on the coast has taken a strange turn.

[Amanda Yulian]

The town's mayor, a respected pillar of.

[Monica Padman]

The community, has been arrested for corruption. His wife claims he's been bewitched by a beautiful clairvoyant. Then there's the mysterious phone calls that.

[Amanda Yulian]

Local people have been getting.

[Dax Shepard]

I am the Archangel Michael.

[Monica Padman]

The whole town has been thrown into.

[Dax Shepard]

Chaos as the mayor is unable to.

[Amanda Yulian]

Carry out his duties.

[Dax Shepard]

I would like to address you. All legal proceedings have been initiated.

[Monica Padman]

Join me, Anna Richardson and journalist Leo Chic for the mystic and the Mayor as we investigate a story of power, corruption and magic. Binge all episodes of the mystic and the Mayor exclusively and ad free right now on Wondery.

[Dax Shepard]

Start your free trial in Apple podcasts.

[Monica Padman]

Spotify or the Wondery app.

[Amanda Yulian]

It's your man, Nick Cannon, and I'm.

[Dax Shepard]

Here to bring you my new podcast, Nick Cannon at Night. I've heard y' all been needing some advice in the love department, so who better to help than yours truly? Nah, I'm serious.

[Amanda Yulian]

Every week I'm bringing out some of.

[Dax Shepard]

My celebrity friends and the best experts in the business to answer your most intimate relationship questions. Having problems with your man?

[Amanda Yulian]

We got you catching feelings for your sneaky link. Let's make sure it's the real deal first.

[Dax Shepard]

Ready to bring toys into the bedroom? Let's talk about it. Consider this a non judgment zone to ask your questions when it comes to sex and modern dating in relationships, friendships, situationships and everything in between, it's gonna.

[Amanda Yulian]

Be sexy, freaky, messy. And you know what?

[Dax Shepard]

You'll just have to watch the show. So don't be shy, join the conversation and head over to YouTube to watch Nick Cannon at Night or subscribe on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcast. Wanna watch episodes early and ad free? Join Wondery plus.

[Monica Padman]

Was she sad? Does she have like a sadness around her? What was her personality like?

[Amanda Yulian]

I think that sadness was at the core of this. You know, I think she Felt bad about herself in some way. This was a way to not feel so bad. But she didn't act sad.

[Monica Padman]

Okay, interesting.

[Dax Shepard]

So she, too, around this Fort Wayne time, she decides she wants to become a nurse.

[Amanda Yulian]

She does. Reinventing themselves constantly.

[Monica Padman]

Yes.

[Dax Shepard]

So all of it, to me, is kind of eccentric and a bit charming and a colorful childhood. When they start both leaving to go to night school, and you're 10 and your brother's 5, and they're driving into the city at night and they're gone for a long time, I start to think, well, no, they're kind of neglectful. Yeah. You know, like they're both so consumed with their own thing again. I'm looking from the outside, just making judgments, I guess. But it also seems like they had some weird fun dance where, like, they were both living their own lives.

[Amanda Yulian]

Yeah. They did their own thing. Don't you think? A little bit. This was the era parents did not dote on their kids the way I feel like I'm doting on mine. It was very different. And it was like, you're kind of on your own. My mom used to take me. I wonder if you think this is neglectful, but when I was maybe 11, she would take me to the library during summer days just because I didn't have anything else. So she just dropped me off with, like, four quarters because. Vending machine. I could get something. I'd be there for like, seven, eight hours.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Just kind of unimaginable for us. Right.

[Amanda Yulian]

It doesn't seem like something I would do, but, I mean, it was the library. I mean, you know, it wasn't the worst thing, but I think it might have felt standard or felt okay then.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay, now, just quick on Fort Wayne. Did you ever go to Sturgis, Michigan?

[Amanda Yulian]

Yeah. My husband's from Coldwater.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, he is?

[Amanda Yulian]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, I know Coldwater well.

[Amanda Yulian]

You do?

[Dax Shepard]

My grandparents owned a little roadside motel in Sturgis, and I spent a lot of summers there. And then I detasseled corn in the summer.

[Amanda Yulian]

Oh, detasseling corn. That's. I know about it.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Amanda Yulian]

I've never done it, but it was a big deal. All the places I lived, all the.

[Dax Shepard]

Boys kind of had to do it, right?

[Amanda Yulian]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

There were only a couple gals on our picking crew, and they were tough gals, let's just say.

[Amanda Yulian]

I bet they were.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Amanda Yulian]

Yeah. That's tough work. It's really hard work.

[Dax Shepard]

It's brutal.

[Amanda Yulian]

I know that area really well. So we lived in Fort Wayne, and then my husband was growing up in Coldwater.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Where Dan Severin's from, the UFC fighter. There's so few famous people from Coldwater. Also, the actor you're now obsessed with from Girls.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, Adam Driver.

[Dax Shepard]

I think Adam Driver's from Coldwater. Or Kalamazoo. One of the two. Yeah.

[Amanda Yulian]

Love Kalamazoo.

[Dax Shepard]

All right, so you were in Fort Wayne for five years.

[Amanda Yulian]

Yes.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay. Now, what's interesting, too, is I want you to tell me a lot about this, because this feels very unique, which is, even though he wasn't yet a pastor, he would call you guys pastor kids and pastor wife, and then the teachers would even call you PK.

[Amanda Yulian]

It's a subculture.

[Dax Shepard]

Tell me about PK.

[Amanda Yulian]

PK is Pastor's kids. So I'm, I guess, 11 when we moved. And, you know, we had a whole childhood where we were just like the kid of an entrepreneur, a business person or whatever. My mom was. PK is like this group when your parent. Most cases. In this case, my father is going into the clergy. You're different. In Fort Wayne, there were many PKs because there was a seminary. So there were lots of Lutheran pastors in training. Lots of them were kind of midlife or had kids.

[Dax Shepard]

Did the teachers give you, like, preferential treatment?

[Amanda Yulian]

I would say a little preferential treatment and a little higher expectation. It was like, oh, you're a pk. How could you? You wouldn't be doing that at recess as a pk. It was little judgment. It felt like I suddenly was different. I got this label, like, oh, you're part of these people. You know, we wear the gold cross around our necks. And it wasn't that we were not Lutheran before, because we were. But it was like, suddenly we were a clergy family.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. You were handed an identity.

[Amanda Yulian]

Yeah. And, you know, when you're middle school, big thing to figure out.

[Dax Shepard]

And again, not to judge your father too harshly, but to me, it also looks like, okay, so he wanted status as a rich guy. That's a way to get status in this country, get money. When that was taken, I was like, he kind of figured out another way to have status, but without that requirement.

[Amanda Yulian]

I agree. He was doing that for sure. And I will say this thing about my dad. He fumbled a lot. Like, he tried things. He didn't quite work out all through his career. And when he hit on this, I think it was the most genuine and the most real thing in his whole life.

[Dax Shepard]

He really did love it.

[Amanda Yulian]

Loved it. And there's a way you can sort of tell the story about this is that my parents went bankrupt in the late 80s. And then my dad was like, got nothing else to do. I'm gonna be a Lutheran pastor. They'll take me in. Like, that's a story. I believe it. It's true. There's also a story that this was in his heart his whole life, and it was the best thing for him. I don't think there was anything fake about that part of his life and career, really. He was good at it.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay, so this now takes you up to Michigan.

[Amanda Yulian]

Yes.

[Dax Shepard]

And do you know that the rest of Michigan that we called Taylor. Taylor Tuckey.

[Amanda Yulian]

Of course. Okay. That was one of the first terms that I learned when we moved to Taylor Tuckey. Yes. Monica looks like she doesn't know what that is. And it's kind of mean to Kentucky because Kentucky's a nice place.

[Dax Shepard]

Absolutely. And my whole family's from there. And I love Kentucky. But Alaska? We were young, and we did call Taylor Taylor Tucky. Does that make sense to you, Monica?

[Monica Padman]

No.

[Dax Shepard]

If you're in Michigan, you're calling something Kentucky. You're shitting on it.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, okay. So the area was called Taylor, the little town.

[Amanda Yulian]

And it was part of a group of little towns called Downriver.

[Monica Padman]

Got it.

[Dax Shepard]

So you arrive there and dad gets a post as a pastor at a church. You get church housing.

[Amanda Yulian]

Nothing my dad loved more than a free house.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

And he was in a standoff with the church because he said they owned it. So I'm not doing any repairs. So again, this. The window was broken in the kitchen.

[Monica Padman]

And you had no money.

[Amanda Yulian]

No, we lived in that house with a broken kitchen window. Big hole in it. I used to say it's a hole the size of a slice of pizza. Like, that big of a hole for, like, years.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

And with the AC blasting, didn't care because he wasn't paying the electric bill, I presume.

[Amanda Yulian]

No, he was paying the electric bill.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, he was.

[Amanda Yulian]

Or sometimes he was, sometimes he wasn't. They didn't connect. Things and consequences.

[Dax Shepard]

The fact that these two in their 40s, completely change courses and your mom becomes an RN and your dad becomes a pastor.

[Monica Padman]

She's been so many things. An engineer, fashion designer.

[Dax Shepard]

And so she starts working around the clock. And now, this is interesting because it doesn't seem like it was this way before. This is when they completely split their finances.

[Amanda Yulian]

Right.

[Dax Shepard]

So mom has her own bank account at a different bank than dad.

[Amanda Yulian]

Yes.

[Dax Shepard]

They've divvied up who's paying for what.

[Amanda Yulian]

In their own chaotic way. The line is very interesting about who pays for what.

[Dax Shepard]

Who Is paying for what?

[Amanda Yulian]

Anything that was like a shopping thing my mom did. Clothes, food. That was all my mom. But anything that was a bill, the electric bill or anything like that, the car insurance, my father was paying.

[Monica Padman]

And why did they decide to do this? Just because they were, like, fighting about money.

[Amanda Yulian]

I think it's because my mom got a job. Being a nurse is a fairly well paid job, especially compared to the other jobs that they had had. And so I think my mom was kind of protective of her money and wanted to be able to spend her money.

[Dax Shepard]

And she was, at this point, making more than doubt.

[Amanda Yulian]

Yeah. Oh, no. She told me the pin for her bank account and I was never to tell anyone, especially dad.

[Dax Shepard]

That's a weird dynamic.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, it is.

[Amanda Yulian]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

You were making money, you were working, and dad was, like, borrowing money off you for pizza some time.

[Amanda Yulian]

Oh, he was always borrowing money. Cause I worked at the coffee house. It was very 90s. I worked at Java Joe's and Wyandotte. I was making money and I was saving it up because I wanted a car. I got a big Chevy Impala around that time. And, you know, I had to pay for my gas and I had to pay for all my shows I was going to at St. Andrews and wherever. So that was my money. But, yeah, my dad needed it sometimes.

[Dax Shepard]

Last thing I want to flag about high school is that we share this in common. We both outwardly hated Friends.

[Amanda Yulian]

Oh, my gosh.

[Monica Padman]

Friends, the show.

[Amanda Yulian]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

And we had never seen get out of Here and we had never seen it.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Amanda Yulian]

It just wasn't for me. It was very clear in the 90s. It wasn't for me.

[Dax Shepard]

Monica's favorite show ever is Friends.

[Monica Padman]

It, like, defined my life.

[Amanda Yulian]

However. You watched it in reruns, right?

[Monica Padman]

No. By the time I caught up, it was probably because it started in 94. So I would have been.

[Amanda Yulian]

Oh, it ran forever. I forgot about that.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. Ten years. So by the end, I was definitely watching it as it aired.

[Amanda Yulian]

Okay. Happiness.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

She got to school and everyone was talking about it.

[Monica Padman]

Of course, it was the best show.

[Amanda Yulian]

And it was like, the next day because everyone watched it. I think it was, like, when? Thursday night.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Amanda Yulian]

So Fridays it was. Everybody really had to talk about it.

[Dax Shepard]

And just for fun, I found this funny. Your mother is saying stuff to you pretty regularly. Like, listen, hand jobs are crucial. You cannot leave a boy.

[Amanda Yulian]

I thought you were gonna get into this.

[Dax Shepard]

I love this. I think it's very telling of. She also was cool. I guess she's not afraid to talk to you.

[Monica Padman]

No is an interesting.

[Dax Shepard]

Well, when you have a dad that's a pastor and you think about growing up as a pk, I'm thinking of very sheltered, afraid of sex, puritanical. Mom's saying, no, you gotta give hand jobs. That's interesting.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. But again, that's like what to me feels chaotic. That's a through line here. Everything's chaotic. Like, there's this and then there's this and it's all meshed together. That's complicated for a kid to grow up in.

[Amanda Yulian]

Oh, yeah, there were rules, but they were so weird that I had to figure them out all the time. Because remaining a virgin was a big deal. You had to do that in my house.

[Dax Shepard]

Like, that was a non negotiable but unlimited hand jobs.

[Amanda Yulian]

And, you know, but it was like there was this thing in my mom about pleasing men. It's of her era. You can't be unpopular. You can't risk getting turned down.

[Dax Shepard]

She was very concerned. You weren't dating?

[Amanda Yulian]

I wasn't dating really in high school. Not to say anything about the boys I went to high school with, but I wasn't seeing quite what I wanted. And I felt like I was, you know, into books and I was into music and super into weird clothes. Like, I loved the Value Village was my place where I was buying vintage things. I'm still wearing vintage things into my 40s, but I was, like, wearing kind of old man clothes.

[Dax Shepard]

Hence was the look for gals in the punk rock scene in Detroit.

[Amanda Yulian]

Yeah, I liked my life.

[Monica Padman]

I liked. You were also trying to, like, get through high school so I can leave this house.

[Amanda Yulian]

I did just want to leave. I couldn't bring boys over.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Amanda Yulian]

No.

[Dax Shepard]

Although the mom brought a boy over blindly from church for a date for her.

[Amanda Yulian]

I was dropped off at his house.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, you were dropped off at his house too?

[Amanda Yulian]

Because of the thing about you can't go in our house.

[Monica Padman]

Right.

[Amanda Yulian]

And he took me for root beer, which, like, then and don't, like now. It was tough. Yeah. I liked A and W. I wasn't dating that much. And it was really stressful for my mom especially. Oh, no, is anyone gonna like her. They thought I was a feminist. And that was really weird. I mean, it was a feminist. It wasn't really weird, but that's what I was. My dad was into Rush Limbaugh. He was worried I was a feminazi, you know? Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Wow.

[Amanda Yulian]

It was just troubling for them. They were always seeking to be conventional, normal, American, like on TV kind of family. That's just what they wanted, and I was not what they wanted.

[Dax Shepard]

What did they want for you?

[Amanda Yulian]

They wanted me to be a little more prim and wear a little nicer clothes and maybe watch Friends and maybe be a little bit more of a conventional teenage girl and have, like, a boyfriend that I held hands with, and hopefully he was on a team of some kind.

[Monica Padman]

But how could you possibly be that?

[Dax Shepard]

Coming from that environment? Yes.

[Monica Padman]

Like, there's literally no cookie cutter. There's no way.

[Amanda Yulian]

I was definitely not that. It was really clear, you know, I felt like I was disappointing my parents.

[Dax Shepard]

Did they say what they wanted you to do professionally?

[Amanda Yulian]

This sounds so mean, but I think they wanted me to get married and have some kids. I think that they wouldn't have felt really good just saying that. They would have said, you can do whatever you want for four years or two and a half or three years.

[Dax Shepard]

Until you find a man.

[Amanda Yulian]

That was very clear.

[Dax Shepard]

She also got you a vibrator for Christmas.

[Amanda Yulian]

She did. This is so confusing.

[Dax Shepard]

I knew that might confuse you.

[Monica Padman]

So confusing. I'm so confused.

[Dax Shepard]

And then come chat with me if you need to know how to use it.

[Amanda Yulian]

I was in high school, and I think I was 17. I barely knew what it was, to be honest with you. And My brother is 12, and my dad. And they open this thing, and I'm like, oh. I mean, it was just horrifying. They were just inappropriate. They really were. They didn't have. I don't know why. Because they were so obsessed with being conventional, but they didn't catch on to boundaries and some of the normal things that you would hope in your parents.

[Monica Padman]

Almost like they're aliens trying to be human.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. American.

[Monica Padman]

And they couldn't do it, but they were trying. And growing up in. That sounds so hard.

[Amanda Yulian]

Yes, it was hard. It was also kind of fun. I hope that it feels, to readers not oppressive.

[Dax Shepard]

It feels fun and colorful. Dad's likable as hell. Right. We're kind of listing this stuff. But he's not fulfilling these roles because he's not really fun and probably charismatic and likable.

[Amanda Yulian]

Weirdly, I have many good memories of my parents, both of them individually and together. I, you know, have some other ones, too. And it got. As they got older and as some of their financial problems got worse, their health problems. They took care of their health. About the way they took care of their money, which is. They didn't.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

So you go away to college.

[Amanda Yulian]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

When you get out of that house, is that like a rumspringer for you do you remember just being so delighted?

[Amanda Yulian]

So I went to a Lutheran college in Chicago because that was a path. It was easy for them to see where I was going. And Chicago is far enough from our Detroit suburbs home that it just felt new. And I really say to this moment, my college was the city of Chicago. I just was out. I felt like school was pretty easy and I just did whatever I had to for school. You know, a lot of the Lutheran kids at the school were doing pretty boring weekend stuff. They'd take their sleeping bags and watch a movie in the gym kind of a thing. And I was out in the city and I just was only there to sleep. It was great. I learned so much from the art museums, from all the cafes in Chicago. Wicker park was where I went most. It was beautiful time in my life. It's very independent. I just felt so different.

[Monica Padman]

Are you very neat?

[Amanda Yulian]

I'm pretty neat, but I'm not extreme.

[Dax Shepard]

Actually.

[Amanda Yulian]

People often have been asking me if I've gone to like a Marie Kondo sort of situation. No, I have a lot of stuff. I have a lot of books at home. I love vintage clothes. I have my stuff. My husband's a big record collector. We have a lot of records at home. Way more maybe than I'm even comfortable with. But I don't live in in a spartan way. But that comfort thing is what I'm focused on. I was so uncomfortable at home as a kid. You couldn't sit on a couch because it was full of stuff.

[Dax Shepard]

But you described trying to eat like Thanksgiving dinner in the house. It's like almost impossible. There's food on the floor under the dining room table.

[Amanda Yulian]

It's like stacked with plastic bags full of things my mom bought at Target. So you don't even have room for your legs. So I do not live like that at all. Anything approaching that kind of like unput away stuff, that's pretty uncomfortable for me.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

I just got the idea for a retail, retail store. If you guys want to be partners on it. Here's how it works. It's like a Target. You go and you do all your shopping, you pay for it. And then on the way out they say, would you like this to ship this to your house so you don't have to carry it home? And you go, yes. And you hand it all to them.

[Amanda Yulian]

Okay.

[Dax Shepard]

And then they refund 95 of it.

[Monica Padman]

Oh.

[Dax Shepard]

And then it just goes back on the shelves.

[Amanda Yulian]

Thank you.

[Dax Shepard]

And then that person gets that delight of picking the things out, paying for it because it doesn't sound like she wants any of it. Yeah, she's getting home and not even pulling it out of the bag. Just shoving the bag under the table. Clearly the thing, the event she was after was the purchasing of it. Why don't we build a little center.

[Monica Padman]

For People lie when they say we'll ship it to your house.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, but they say it's so politely and invitingly and you're excited to not deal with it going to your car. You go for it and people just can shop all day long.

[Monica Padman]

I don't know if that's 5%. I think they like knowing it's there. Maybe not unpacking it or whatever. But the stuff I got is here. I think so much of it because I have a little bit of this where if I'm starting to feel anxious or my life is feeling out of control, I will look around my space and figure out how to buy something or arrange something. So I have control over my life. I have control over my space. So I think it's like I have it here. I feel safe that this is here. I don't need to unpack it, but it's here.

[Dax Shepard]

I do need it here.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. So I don't know about your store.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay. Okay. You're not going to invest. Angel investor. Those pay off the biggest.

[Monica Padman]

Usually I need to know percentage of hoarders in America before I get to angel investor.

[Dax Shepard]

I bet it's worse than you think.

[Amanda Yulian]

Not maybe to the level that my mom was doing it, but I think a number of people have this sort of tendency to accumulate.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay, so you get out of college and you become a writer.

[Amanda Yulian]

Kind of. I was interested in writing always, but I kind of wasn't sure that it was a career. How do you make money as a writer? Like I didn't know about that. And I went into art, I went into other things. I worked at a women's college and Milwaukee where I moved lots of Midwest cities. And I did a number of other things in kind of non profits. But I was interested in books and writing forever.

[Dax Shepard]

How did you meet Dave Eggers?

[Amanda Yulian]

So in about 2005, I started at 826 Michigan. 826 is this network of youth writing centers that Dave founded with Nineveh Caligari. It started at 826 Valencia street in San Francisco and that's why it has the name 826. By the time I got involved, there were probably eight youth writing centers, free programs, tutoring and writing, open to all kids.

[Monica Padman]

That's awesome.

[Amanda Yulian]

And it really Relies on this model of adult volunteers being involved. So that's really what the organization is. Adults in the community want to give back. 826 kind of finds a spot for them and runs these programs. And it's beautiful. That program publishes youth writing, too, so you can come in and have your writing in a book. So I got involved in that, and that's how I met David.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay, so who got sick first, your mom or your dad?

[Amanda Yulian]

Well, they were both ill in different ways, but my dad was sicker first. He had two terrible events. He had a nervous breakdown, basically when he was in the pulpit preaching in the middle of. Preaching in the middle of a Sunday service. He just said, I can't do this anymore. And he turned around and he left. And my mom picked him up and they drove around, and he basically had a real mental health event. Looking back on it, just if I were to analyze it at all, I think it was all the years of the exaggerations and the not quite doing things on the level, and it just kind of caught up with him in some way. Just all that stress. You can imagine all the stress that he must have been under.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Do you think it was like a bottom for an alcoholic where he kind of maybe admitted, oh, my God, I'm full of shit?

[Monica Padman]

And here I am standing in front of all these people Sunday morning.

[Amanda Yulian]

Everyone's looking at me for the answers. I don't have the answers.

[Dax Shepard]

Did he ever return?

[Amanda Yulian]

In a way. So he did other things. He took on a little church in the Pontiac area, so we moved around a little bit more. I was out of the house by then, but they moved to Pontiac, and he had a small church that was just starting there that also was kind of tough. He was different then. And then started being a Lutheran councilor. So he went back to school again when he was in his 60s. This is so much like the New York City commute story. He decided to get his other degree in counseling in Windsor, Ontario, which, you know, you just go right across the bridge. No big deal. But it was an international commute.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, my God.

[Amanda Yulian]

He was always doing the same things, the patterns. So all of that was transpiring. And then, unfortunately, he had a terrible stroke a few years after that. So those last years of his life were really hard. He was pretty much in a wheelchair at that point.

[Dax Shepard]

And they were financially pretty rough.

[Amanda Yulian]

Oh, yeah. They weren't paying their bills in the 70s, and they just, like, kept doing that. So by 2007, big trouble.

[Dax Shepard]

I sometimes marvel at the amount of stress People who live like that, with debt nonstop, what it's like, or are they able to compartmentalize it in a way that doesn't affect them? But yeah, my dad, too, he owed everyone money and filed bankruptcy a few times. And he was in this house that he couldn't afford, and it was like, how long could he before they kicked him out? And I just thought, like, how are you enjoying any of this? This would just be so stressful for me.

[Amanda Yulian]

It's so stressful. It affected their health a lot, just their physical and their mental health.

[Dax Shepard]

And explain how your mom was always ready to die.

[Amanda Yulian]

I mean, she would never stop talking about it. And I don't think she was suicidal, but she became a hospice nurse eventually in her nursing career. And really, I mean, what a noble thing, right?

[Monica Padman]

It is.

[Amanda Yulian]

Being a hospice nurse is an incredible service to everyone. So she got into it. If I can just be so crass. She just felt like it was such a. Being able to shepherd people into their next life and care for people and care for families that way. So she just thought it was a very noble thing. She, like, looked up to people who were in this death and dying business. It's about comfort, which is such a beautiful thing, right? It's really. I mean, I'm a fan of hospice, too, but, yeah, for my mom, I think she was so stressed and tired herself, exhausted from these lives that they'd lived, that she was kind of looking forward to the moment where her whole life would be about that kind of comfort.

[Dax Shepard]

So she had cancer.

[Amanda Yulian]

My mom had kidney disease. My dad ended up having cancer, too. So my dad had the stroke and then lots of other problems and developed skin cancer. Because he grew up in Miami. No sunblock. In those 40s and 50s when he was growing up.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, when she was getting. Towards the end, you were now consumed with. With the bigger issue was having to deal with everything that she was leaving behind than the actual death.

[Amanda Yulian]

Since I was 8, I was worried about the stuff in our house, right? Like this dream I had and this incredible kind of oppressive force of all that stuff. I thought about it when I was a kid. Oh, my God, who's going to deal with all this? And even, like, when I moved to Chicago, some part of me, I remember thinking, oh, I'll live in another state. And then whatever happens to them and their stuff, like, maybe it's not my problem. Like, that was always in my life. I was worried about whose responsibility it might be when they passed.

[Dax Shepard]

And you have a younger brother, he's.

[Amanda Yulian]

Five years I do, yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

So what happened when she passed? What was that process like?

[Amanda Yulian]

I wasn't eager for her to pass exactly. But I was so stressed about all the stuff to do and all the units doing of all these things that they had. They had this apartment in Milford, actually.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, that's where I grew up, I think.

[Amanda Yulian]

It's not named in the book. And that's where these storage units were of theirs, which is at the end of the book. So they had this stuffed apartment, and they had two full storage units of stuff. When I knew it was the very end of her life, I had to hire some people to help me clean out the apartment. It was not in any way something that I could physically or mentally handle. It was so much. And it was so gross. Gross.

[Monica Padman]

Well, you kind of like, I just want to fucking light this thing on fire. Oh, yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

I feel guilty now, but not terribly guilty. So, yeah, my dad, he was not a hoarder, and yet he hoarded some stuff. And as he got more broke, his obsession with that kind of intensified. But he had the downstairs of this house and the woman who owned it. Her house was getting foreclosed on, and she just left to another state. When he died, I was like, I'm just gonna leave everything. I'm just gonna pretend it's not my issue, and the house itself's gonna get repossessed. I don't know. So I just didn't deal with it.

[Amanda Yulian]

You didn't do anything?

[Dax Shepard]

I. And I was like, do I want anything? I took his sobriety coins, and that was it. And then my brother came a few days later. Maybe he took some stuff. But all in all, I was really overwhelmed.

[Amanda Yulian]

It's so overwhelming.

[Dax Shepard]

It's overwhelming, and it's dirty and it's gross. I had this moment where I'm like, oh, yeah, stuff. No one's here to care about this anymore. So it's now has zero value. And just the realization, like, oh, you add the value to these objects.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

I don't know. It's a very profound moment, I think, to stand in someone's house who's died, and you realize all this crap they cared about.

[Amanda Yulian]

That's incredible. And what does it mean at the end? It means so little.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Amanda Yulian]

In my mom's case, she had been hinting for a while that she had hidden money in her stuff. So it was a little treasure hunt that I went on, and I did find quite a bit of cash.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, you did?

[Amanda Yulian]

Actually, this was, like, her savings account, because all of her accounts were always overdrawn. But I did find about $4,000 that.

[Dax Shepard]

She squirreled away and hid from your dad.

[Amanda Yulian]

She'd been hiding it for a long time.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, my God.

[Amanda Yulian]

So I hired some folks, and they usually do crime scenes, the crime scene.

[Dax Shepard]

People, to clean up when the whole episode. Cause they die, what, within a year and a half of each other?

[Amanda Yulian]

Within a year and a half, yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

So when that whole chapter's closed and then you have a child, how does it reframe how you looked at them? Process that whole experience? What has it done?

[Amanda Yulian]

I will say their whole lives. I was 37 when my mom died, and she died second. That whole time, I didn't know what to make of them. I knew certain things. I knew they were just exceptional people. Like, really unusual in some really good ways and some really troubling ones. You know, I didn't know what to make of it. They said and did some things that were really hurtful to me, both really actively and passively, just by who they were. But I did love them, and I know they loved me. I mean, that's absolutely the clearest thing to me ever. But I didn't really know what to make of them. And so for me, some time passed. They've been gone 10 years now. My dad, longer than that. I kind of wanted to know what really happened with my parents. My dad was lying about everything, always. And they were so mysterious. So I, years later, decided to kind of investigate them and just look at them like a journalist would.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. It makes me think of, like, when you're in elementary school and there's a kid next to you, you just have no clue what environment he or she's in.

[Monica Padman]

We don't know anything about how people have grown up. Their experience on Earth could be so different from ours. What about their parents?

[Amanda Yulian]

We were estranged from them.

[Monica Padman]

You were both?

[Amanda Yulian]

Yeah. We had a brief period in Indiana where we were connected with my mom. Mom and her stepdad. We lived there for three years, Our three rich years. We were only really rich for one of those three years, but we were pretending to be rich for the last two. So her mom, my grandma, was kind of around. She was older. She was beginning to fail at that point. And actually, my mom, I always find this so devastating. But my mom found out that her mom died because she got a news clipping in the mail maybe two months after her mom died.

[Dax Shepard]

That's how she found out.

[Amanda Yulian]

That's how she found out. Which is a really stark difference between the end of my mom's life and, I mean, I was in it. And that's the whole end of the book is this process of figuring out what to do with her stuff and what to do with my life and how things end for her. So they were just really estranged from their families.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. It also makes you think people are way weirder than, you know.

[Monica Padman]

Well, my parents say that all the time. I'd be like, why can't we have something like this? They'd always just be like, you have no idea what's going on in people's homes. You see this thing, but you have no idea idea.

[Dax Shepard]

Well, especially in this case, where he was certainly a trusted pastor who you would go to for advice. And now your wisdom teeth. You didn't have any insurance. You need to get your wisdom teeth out.

[Amanda Yulian]

My dad, in our Detroit suburbs days, he made friends with a dentist who he would, like, play golf with. I think the dentist needed some, like, counseling help or something. Popped into my dad's church. They strike up a friendship. The dentist offers to pay my dad for the counseling, and my dad says, well, well, I'll trade you. How about I come get my teeth cleaned and we'll just do it that way? So this was this kind of goofy dentist that my dad was friends with. And it was unusual. My dad really didn't have friends that much. So many people looked up to him, but he was never a peer socially with people, this guy. He was. And it was a couple years, my dad and my brother were getting their teeth cleaned. Basic dental stuff. And then When I was 18, I was about to go to college and I needed my wisdom teeth out, and my dad arranged it for free with this guy, and long story, he messed up. He wasn't an oral surgeon. He was just. Just a dentist.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, God.

[Dax Shepard]

He sewed her cheek to her gums.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, that sort of happened to me. Not my cheek, but the back two were kind of connected.

[Amanda Yulian]

Oh, no.

[Monica Padman]

It could only open my mouth.

[Dax Shepard]

So your gums together, like.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. The top gum to the bottom.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Amanda Yulian]

Did that hurt?

[Dax Shepard]

Hurt?

[Monica Padman]

I remember being like, why can't I open my mouth yet? It's been a lot of days. And so I went back in and they cut it. Maybe my parents also bartered.

[Amanda Yulian]

Yeah, no, it hurt a lot. As a kid, I was like, I've never had my wisdom teeth out. Maybe it just, like, hurts a lot. And my dad was so sweet. I have these memories because I was taking quite a bit of Vicodin because it kept hurting and it couldn't eat. It was problematic. And my dad was just Sitting with me. He kept offering to make me Cream of Wheat. He was so nice. I was a mess. And we went in and the nurses were like, oh my God, your whole.

[Dax Shepard]

Mouth sewn up here. We gotta cut some of this.

[Monica Padman]

I'm impressed that you don't hate them.

[Amanda Yulian]

You know, hate isn't the word.

[Monica Padman]

I know that's like a really mean, harsh thing to say, but people are mad at their parents for a lot less.

[Amanda Yulian]

I know that I have been very unhappy with them many times, in many ways, time has passed.

[Dax Shepard]

Well, this is what I was wondering when I asked how having a kid impacted this. So my dad died 13 years ago. And I feel like over those 13 years, I've a come to fully accept who he was in a way that I never did. I see him as a human. He sees being this role of my dad and I see him as a human. Then I start to see like all these wonderful things about him. Now I just have this kind of deep sadness that I can't just be around him in full acceptance of him, no expectations of what he's supposed to be and just maybe enjoy him. And then I can't. So that's been my interesting kind of journey with it.

[Amanda Yulian]

I'm totally at peace with my parents, although I'm not really interested in hanging with them. I was trying to think about, how do I say this? I spent my time with them and it was the time that it was. But I'm totally at peace. I'm not angry the word hate, it's just not there. I just don't feel that they did what they did. I think they did their best. I think their best is wild. It's very few others best.

[Dax Shepard]

Well, it's just beautifully written. Destroy this house in the 26th. It'll be out. So I hope everyone checks it out.

[Amanda Yulian]

Thank you.

[Dax Shepard]

It's a very, very honest and beautiful story. I think you should feel quite proud of it.

[Amanda Yulian]

Thanks for letting me talk about it with you too.

[Dax Shepard]

Absolutely.

[Monica Padman]

Thanks for coming.

[Dax Shepard]

Stay tuned for more Armchair Expert if you dare.

[Monica Padman]

Stay tuned for the fact check. It's where the party's at. You have powder? Yeah, right around here.

[Dax Shepard]

I just did a ton of cocaine of 3 grams. $180.

[Monica Padman]

You forgot how to do it.

[Dax Shepard]

It's been a while. 21 years and next week and. Yeah, I've forgotten how.

[Monica Padman]

21 years. Wow.

[Dax Shepard]

21 years.

[Monica Padman]

That's a long time.

[Dax Shepard]

That's too long.

[Monica Padman]

Ironically, that's when people can start drinking.

[Dax Shepard]

That is iron. So, yeah, 21 years since I've done coke and I just got it all over my face because I don't know what I'm doing.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, exactly.

[Dax Shepard]

For the listener and viewer. I put powder on my face before these. Now that we're on video.

[Monica Padman]

It's shocking.

[Dax Shepard]

And I came in and I was pretty much covered in powder.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, White powder. But I wasn't scared.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, I wasn't scared at all. Have you been crying?

[Dax Shepard]

No. Does it also look like I was crying?

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Wow. I'm a real mess. I thought I was doing great. I worked out, had a fun chat on the phone.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, maybe, maybe your workout caused you to cry a little.

[Dax Shepard]

So do I look puffy or my eyes look irritated?

[Monica Padman]

They just look a little red. Oh, but in a sad way, like you cried.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, no, no, no. I didn't cry today. Yeah. Although I could have cried this morning.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, maybe you didn't. You forgot.

[Dax Shepard]

They're doing an insane instruction construction project in front of the house. Like a city.

[Monica Padman]

It's so annoying.

[Dax Shepard]

Tearing up sidewalks and drilling into the. The pavement. And the house is shaking starting at A about 6:37am and start shaking to the degree I'm shocked. It hasn't shut off the gas yet because the gas has an earthquake emergency shut off valve on it. It's gone off before. Whiskey's going berserk. He does not understand it's a construction project. He thinks the house is going to fall down.

[Monica Padman]

And that Whiskey, the dog with three legs.

[Dax Shepard]

Whiskey, the dog with three eggs. So he, you know, he already, he's got his whole routine on trying to meditate and trying to journal and he, he barks. So I put him on the bed. That's normally okay. And then I put him on and then he chills. But now his move is I put him on the bed. He's there for 20 seconds. There's an earthquake. He jumps off, he runs in a circle. Then he comes back to the bed and starts barking. I pick him up, I put him back on. He stays for 12 seconds. And this was going on. I mean this was madness. It was madness.

[Monica Padman]

And you wanted to cry.

[Dax Shepard]

Well, you know what I thought. And it's a testament to pause when agitated, as they say in the program.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, pwa.

[Dax Shepard]

Actually, I'm still, I'm not sure where this. I'm like I'm. I'm moving downstairs. It's time forever. Because the girls are also coming in and out of the bedroom to do they. They love using our bathroom. I don't know why. They have a beautiful bathroom they will not use it.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, boy. Okay.

[Dax Shepard]

And every time. So at some point, I had to put whiskey in the hallway. I couldn't do anything. And then every time they come in, I'm trying to shut the door. They don't shut the door. Whiskey's back. You do the whole circle. And then I. At some point, I was like, I'm gonna. I'm moving downstairs into the downstairs bedroom.

[Monica Padman]

Okay.

[Dax Shepard]

That's. We're gonna be where I live now.

[Monica Padman]

Okay.

[Dax Shepard]

TBD Still.

[Monica Padman]

It's still.

[Dax Shepard]

You haven't the pause when Agitated was. I was gonna announce that, which is. I'm glad I didn't announce that, because also now, a couple hours later, I don't feel as resolute about moving downstairs.

[Monica Padman]

Okay.

[Dax Shepard]

And I was like, good thing I didn't announce that. They could have caused everyone to, you know.

[Monica Padman]

Okay.

[Dax Shepard]

So actually both girls were mad at me know, because I'm like, sounds like.

[Monica Padman]

I really nailed it that I was crying. Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. And then I did cocaine in response.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. I think I am very intuitive. I know I am very intuitive.

[Dax Shepard]

What if I tried to call? Like, obviously I would have no clue where to get that drug anymore. What if I called the dealer from 21 years ago? I was like, hey, Hi. Hey, remember? Remember?

[Monica Padman]

Oh, my God.

[Dax Shepard]

And then that person was like, hey, man, I've. Obviously, I don't still do this. I would have been in prison or quit or dead.

[Monica Padman]

You're supposed to delete that from your phone, right?

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. I don't even know. Yeah, that was also, like, 25 phones ago.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, that's true. Please don't do cocaine this weekend because it's my birthday. Weekend has started.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. I'm not and I ever going to do cocaine again.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, but just like. Like, especially not this weekend.

[Dax Shepard]

Maybe on my deathbed.

[Monica Padman]

No, no, you won't even have. You won't even be able to.

[Dax Shepard]

No. I'll have to have my family put it in my nose. Is that how you want to spend it?

[Monica Padman]

No. You want to spend it touching. Touching everyone and holding everyone, saying, oh.

[Dax Shepard]

I'll still be doing that.

[Monica Padman]

You won't be present.

[Dax Shepard]

I will be ultra present.

[Monica Padman]

No. No. Fine. I can't tell you what to do on your deathbed. I'm just asking you not to do it this weekend.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, I'm not going to. No, won't do it.

[Monica Padman]

My birthday look has started.

[Dax Shepard]

Why does your hair look so nice?

[Monica Padman]

Wow, that was a great setup.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay.

[Monica Padman]

I wasn't sure, you know, you were.

[Dax Shepard]

Nervous to brag about it.

[Monica Padman]

Well, sometimes we talk about products, sometimes we don't. Whatever. But I use rose hair products. They're incredible hair products, Roz.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay.

[Monica Padman]

Okay. They really are. Shampoo, conditioner. There's a oil and a lubricant.

[Dax Shepard]

I use it too.

[Monica Padman]

You do?

[Dax Shepard]

As a conditioner.

[Monica Padman]

Great conditioner.

[Dax Shepard]

I have to use a savior hair shampoo.

[Monica Padman]

Right.

[Dax Shepard]

Of course. But then I. With the conditioner. I do. Roz.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, it's a. It's a great brand owned by Mara Rosak, who is a celebrity hair stylist. She does Emma Stone and lots of amazing people and she's the sweetest lady.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, perfect.

[Monica Padman]

Anyway, I love that hairline. And then they sent me. They did a collab with the great. An incredible clothing company. But they did this collab where they made a hair. A towel. A hair towel. A hair towel that, you know, you. You know how you like.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Turn your head down, you wrap your hair and you. You pull it up.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

But it's a mix. It's like terry cloth mixed with like sweatshirt material.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, okay.

[Monica Padman]

And. And it like sticks itself in this little strap and whatever. It's comfortable. And when I use that thing, my hair looks so good the next day.

[Dax Shepard]

So do you sleep in it?

[Monica Padman]

No, I just keep it on for post.

[Dax Shepard]

Shower for an hour.

[Monica Padman]

Uh huh. For as long until bed. And then I go to bed.

[Dax Shepard]

And then you wake up and you're back in their Herbal Essence commercial.

[Monica Padman]

And I. Mermaid.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Yeah. It looks great.

[Monica Padman]

Thank you. You. So shout out to all those products.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. And folks. And folks, I sure hope you're getting paid on the side. I'm not.

[Monica Padman]

I am really not. I would love to. If they're going to do a campaign, I think I'd be a great candidate. I have experience with Herbal Essence, how I got my start and they're.

[Dax Shepard]

They're thriving.

[Monica Padman]

You know, I was at mahjong with. I guess I'll throw them under the bus. Anthony and Rachel. And I forget who else was there. My mahjong is beautiful as we get.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Yeah. I would have guessed that people who.

[Monica Padman]

Play mahjong will understand this. The winds have mermaids on them, which is why I was drawn to this in the first place. I'm very drawn to mermaids, even though I don't like the sea. This part. That part we don't talk about.

[Dax Shepard]

So I was like, when they come to shore.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. When they're sitting on their rock. But I said that the Herbal Essence commercial. God, how did I phrase it? I should check with Anthony, but I think I said like, that's the best thing that's ever happened to me. And he could not. He was like, no.

[Dax Shepard]

Why did you. Why do you say claim lamp?

[Monica Padman]

Because.

[Dax Shepard]

Did you get your SAG card or something from it?

[Monica Padman]

I don't remember. I might have already had it. I don't remember about that. But I got paid double scale.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay.

[Monica Padman]

At that time. Time. That is. So for people who don't know, scale is the lowest amount you can get paid on a project negotiated by the union. Sag. Yes. It's the lowest you can get paid. And most commercials, you get paid scale.

[Dax Shepard]

Yep.

[Monica Padman]

And this commercial was double scale. It. It was because you were in swimwear.

[Dax Shepard]

Why. Why was it double?

[Monica Padman]

No, why?

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, wow.

[Monica Padman]

But, I mean, it was a really grueling shoot, so maybe. But it was double scale.

[Dax Shepard]

Partial nudity.

[Monica Padman]

It was partial nude. And. And you had to swim. And I, like, lied.

[Dax Shepard]

So stunt pay. Maybe I lied well.

[Monica Padman]

And then it was really bad when I had to do it. Like, I couldn't really do it.

[Dax Shepard]

Really?

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. Like, I. I could.

[Dax Shepard]

But you didn't look elegant.

[Monica Padman]

I didn't look good.

[Dax Shepard]

You didn't look like a mermaid.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. And I couldn't get under deep enough.

[Dax Shepard]

So anyway, look more like a chimpanzee trying to swim.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. Or like dog. You know the dog.

[Dax Shepard]

Well, they can swim pretty good.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. But that's how I kind of am. Like, I'm like a half above water.

[Dax Shepard]

Doggy paddle. Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

So anyway, it was a huge commercial to get. Every girl auditioned for that commercial.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Confidence builder.

[Monica Padman]

It was a huge confidence builder. And I, like, I can be in a pretty.

[Dax Shepard]

I could be in a commercial with pretty people being a mermaid.

[Monica Padman]

It wasn't even about pretty people. It was just like, I just got validation that I can be here.

[Dax Shepard]

Yes.

[Monica Padman]

It was the first. It was my first real commercial.

[Dax Shepard]

National.

[Monica Padman]

National commercial. Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

And. And everyone auditioned. So, of course, when I first got there, I was like, oh, my God, I'm never getting this.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

And then when I did, it was. It was just, like, beautiful confirmation that I belonged.

[Dax Shepard]

Yes.

[Monica Padman]

And it was enough. It was enough to keep me in the game.

[Dax Shepard]

Yep.

[Monica Padman]

So I think that's the best thing that ever happened to me. But Anthony did not like that. He didn't like it, and I thought he would like it because it's like.

[Dax Shepard]

I mean. And similarly, punk's the best thing that ever happened to me.

[Monica Padman]

Right.

[Dax Shepard]

He started the entire thing without that show.

[Monica Padman]

That's a bigger deal than my commercial. Like, he.

[Dax Shepard]

But I couldn't book commercials, so Punk'd was my herbalist lessons. I booked two commercials in eight years.

[Monica Padman]

I know. But for him, he'd be like, punk is. You're showing your real talent.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay.

[Monica Padman]

It's.

[Dax Shepard]

So are you now I'm doing.

[Monica Padman]

Now I'm having to be him. Yeah. And this is the commercial that I got my ring.

[Dax Shepard]

Right.

[Monica Padman]

My special ring that did lose us the election. But that's okay.

[Dax Shepard]

But now it's back.

[Monica Padman]

It's back. So. Yeah. He didn't like that at all. But I stand by it.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. I, I, I'll co sign on that.

[Monica Padman]

I might not be here if it wasn't for that.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

So I have to when a move back to. I might have, I might have been like, I this I can't.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

It's so grueling.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. So thank you, Herbal Essence.

[Dax Shepard]

Herbal Essence.

[Monica Padman]

I think. But sometimes is it plural? That's the confusion. Anyway, my birthday look has started. I was able to turn left out of my apartment today.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay. Can you not always do that?

[Monica Padman]

Very rare.

[Dax Shepard]

Really?

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, because it's. I live off of a very populous.

[Dax Shepard]

Why don't you just wait for the light to turn on?

[Monica Padman]

No, because I get stressed. I get stressed.

[Dax Shepard]

That's what I do when I have to turn left or anything is wait for that light to turn and then I turn into the left turn lane which is always open. And then I go to the thing and I bang a left and then I bang a right on, frankly.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, I know. But I, I, It's a good route. In the barn at this time. Yeah, there's. It's pretty heavy traffic.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay.

[Monica Padman]

There's a buildup and even when, even. Listen, I do this every day, so sometimes I'm able to turn left because I'm catching it at the exact right moment.

[Dax Shepard]

Right.

[Monica Padman]

And mostly I don't, I can't. But today I did and it was a good sign.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Good birthday juju. Yeah. And you got a present. Do you want to dare open it?

[Monica Padman]

Yes. So somebody sent a present to Titi. Yes, to me. Via Carly.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

And I haven't opened yet, so I have no idea what it is. But Carly opens the things first. And she texted and said it's not a bomb. Yeah. Yeah. She said someone sent you a really cool gift I think you'll want.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh yeah.

[Monica Padman]

So I'm going to open it.

[Dax Shepard]

Put it on that.

[Monica Padman]

That.

[Dax Shepard]

There we go. And now you can open it presentation style.

[Monica Padman]

Now it has a photo.

[Dax Shepard]

You know, when I would see people at cpk, I was required to say, would you like to sit in front of our exhibition style kitchen.

[Monica Padman]

You said that?

[Dax Shepard]

I had to.

[Monica Padman]

I'm shocked.

[Dax Shepard]

I had to say. I already familiar with the menu. I had to say what my favorite app was. You know, there was a whole playbook.

[Monica Padman]

What was your favorite app?

[Dax Shepard]

The spinach Articiada Choke dip. Duh.

[Monica Padman]

Duh.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. This was before I was calorie conscious.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. Oh, spinach Artichoked it, but there's nothing better. Okay. Hi, Monica. We're big fans of the pod at Heritage Gear and thought you like one of our UGA bags. Go Bulldogs.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, my Lord.

[Monica Padman]

All our best. Dan and Brian. Oh, my.

[Dax Shepard]

Dan, Brian, Brian. Whoa, Whoa. This just feels couture.

[Monica Padman]

It does. Was.

[Dax Shepard]

Is this an atelier luxury?

[Monica Padman]

Oh, wow.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, what a good beach bag for you.

[Monica Padman]

This is beautiful.

[Dax Shepard]

You're always at the beach.

[Monica Padman]

I love the beach.

[Dax Shepard]

Can't keep you away from, well, mermaids. Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Okay. This is beautiful. Thank you. Dan and Brian.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, my goodness.

[Monica Padman]

Lovely bag. Really well constructed. Leather. We've got like a nice soft.

[Dax Shepard]

You might be able to wrap your hair in that at night. It looks like it's kind of the material you were describing.

[Monica Padman]

Wow, how cool. This is great.

[Dax Shepard]

That is wonderful. Wonderful.

[Monica Padman]

Thank you. How sweet. Yes.

[Dax Shepard]

That's really a nice gift.

[Monica Padman]

Now every time someone says, like Roll Tide or whatever, you can hit them with that bag.

[Dax Shepard]

You should fill that bag with bars of soap in marbles. So it really packs a wall up when you connect.

[Monica Padman]

Wow. Oh, my God. This is the row.

[Dax Shepard]

Wow. Oh, great segue. Okay, I read in comments, someone wanted me to tell you that the row has a playlist. Did you already know this?

[Monica Padman]

Of course.

[Dax Shepard]

How did you know this? How'd you know what I was say?

[Monica Padman]

Because so many people have been telling you. Okay, I don't mean to be this girl.

[Dax Shepard]

Don't go any further.

[Monica Padman]

I'm gone. I'm gonna. You guys. You think? I don't know. I mean, I also like that people are looking out for me. That's so sweet. But I got multiple times.

[Dax Shepard]

You get offended that people think you're not in the know?

[Monica Padman]

No, but I feel. I feel conflicted because I want to just be like, oh, my gosh. Thanks. But also the truth is, I've known about these playlists for years.

[Dax Shepard]

What kind of music's on the playlist playlist?

[Monica Padman]

All kinds. It is vibey. It's a good playlist. But I've known about this for quite a long time because I get emails from the row.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, okay. Because you're all dialed in with their Circulars.

[Monica Padman]

And for some reason this did like hit all of a sudden. I don't know if it was on Tick Tock or something.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Where everyone was texting about this on the same day. So they must have their marketing on this.

[Dax Shepard]

Right? Yeah, that makes sense.

[Monica Padman]

Which is interesting.

[Dax Shepard]

It's in the zeitgeist.

[Monica Padman]

Speaking of the row, let's talk about Halloween.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh okay.

[Monica Padman]

So you. We were at the Richardsons for Eric's birthday. You and your birthday.

[Dax Shepard]

Eric.

[Monica Padman]

Happy birthday. It's my birthday now, so. Okay. And so you were in the sauna.

[Dax Shepard]

What do we say for girls like boys have sausage parties.

[Monica Padman]

I know.

[Dax Shepard]

Clam. Clam bake.

[Monica Padman]

Ew. No. That's disgusting.

[Dax Shepard]

Is that a thing or did we just make that up? Because that's pretty funny. I feel like I saw it on a TV show recently where they were talking about that's disgusting. Was it a sausage party or a clam bake? Oh, I really like clam bake. I'm gonna. I think I'm gonna try to incorporate that more often.

[Monica Padman]

Okay, great. So the girls were talking about Halloween.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

And as you said, I think you brought this up the other day but I think we are kind of moving forward.

[Dax Shepard]

I'm pretty sure with the pun costumes.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. Which puns isn't. It's like it's a mash.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay. Yeah, that's a better description.

[Monica Padman]

So you have a linking word. Exactly.

[Dax Shepard]

Like a linked concept Burt Reynolds wrap.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. Which is great. So I've decided I'm gonna be the Row Row Row youw Boat.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay.

[Monica Padman]

So I'll be an opportunity to shop and then I'll carry some sort of oar or have a boat around me.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay. Hay. That's g. That sounds very cumbersome. Why like are you going to take this on the. On the hay ride and then for trick or treating or just at the house for the pre party.

[Monica Padman]

I mean I'll probably need to carry.

[Dax Shepard]

If you have a kayak around you or something.

[Monica Padman]

Maybe I'll just go or.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay. Great.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, that's great. But I'm excited. Yeah, I'm excited to go shopping. What are you going to be?

[Dax Shepard]

I was trying to make up one with Ferrari so that I had an excuse to buy a Ferrari. You can Ferrari leaf Ferrariana.

[Monica Padman]

How Ariana Ferrariana or Ferrariana Grande.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh my God. Ferrariana Grande. Now I'm into the concept cuz I like Ariana Grande.

[Amanda Yulian]

Of course.

[Dax Shepard]

A lot. And I like Ferraris even more.

[Monica Padman]

I understand.

[Dax Shepard]

But I wouldn't ever own one. You need a Big one.

[Amanda Yulian]

A grande one.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh well that's right. So the SUV's that they've. Well they're not SUV. The FF. I'm not going to bore you with the bigger Ferraris.

[Monica Padman]

Thank you. This is my birthday.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Oh you could even do. There's a lot. Because you could do a grande coffee cup.

[Dax Shepard]

Ferrari. Oh but yeah, leave Ferrari out of it. Just stick with Ariana grande latte. Ariana grande latte.

[Monica Padman]

Ferrari Ona grande latte is like you'd have to wear a. A blonde wig.

[Dax Shepard]

Three things going.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, blonde wig, like some Ferrari. You're in like a Ferrari F1 costume or whatever costume, you know, uniform.

[Dax Shepard]

What do they call it?

[Monica Padman]

Race suit. Okay, yeah. Blonde hair. And then you're holding a grande coffee cup.

[Dax Shepard]

That's great. That's right. How do I do? Ariana, it's the blonde hair. Or I'll be singing Wicked the whole night. Maybe both. Yeah, both. That okay. I guess we found mine.

[Monica Padman]

So that's great.

[Dax Shepard]

Rob, you got one up.

[Monica Padman]

Who do you want to be?

[Dax Shepard]

I don't have one.

[Monica Padman]

What do you want to buy?

[Dax Shepard]

Yours would be so easy because you have so many bands you like. Like.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, that's true.

[Dax Shepard]

I mean no one will know what his is cuz he. He refuses to like a band that anyone knows.

[Monica Padman]

I think people are not going to know a lot of them. We're going to have to wear tags.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay, okay. All right. But isn't the fun of it staring at someone trying to figure out what it is? But what I'm saying is Rob won't. He's going to pick a band like Phoebe Bridger Flappers. Phoebe Bridgers.

[Monica Padman]

I love. Everyone knows Phoebe Bridgers. That's a great one.

[Dax Shepard]

Phoebe Bridges over Madison County.

[Monica Padman]

But it's Bridgers.

[Dax Shepard]

Phoebe Bridgerton.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, I have another update.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay, great. You're on fire, cuz. Yesterday. Well I guess it was. It was two days ago. You were struggling.

[Monica Padman]

I know, and I actually have an update on that too. Okay, I think I am wrong. I think I was wrong. I think I was further along in my PM mess than I anticipated. I think I am about to start my period. Which you. You did.

[Dax Shepard]

I mansplain to you, man. Unfortunately, sometimes us men are right.

[Monica Padman]

No, no, sometimes we are.

[Dax Shepard]

Listen, we're going to get it right every now and then.

[Monica Padman]

This is what happened.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay.

[Monica Padman]

I actually was some days late last month.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, and then you reset your thing. But it's. It adhered to.

[Monica Padman]

To the previous rhythm, so I think so.

[Dax Shepard]

I mean the backwards shirt, the Hurting back the every. I won't add some of the other symptoms you shared with me.

[Monica Padman]

My stomach hurt.

[Dax Shepard]

You thought you had that. Honest.

[Monica Padman]

Well, I. I felt like I should have it, but I wasn't.

[Dax Shepard]

Right.

[Monica Padman]

Which is cramps.

[Dax Shepard]

Which is pretty telltale signs.

[Monica Padman]

Straightforward cramps. Yeah. So I think it's coming. Which I am worried. Period pool party.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, but you can go to a pool party on. On your.

[Monica Padman]

No one wants to have a pool party on their period.

[Dax Shepard]

They don't?

[Monica Padman]

No. It sucks because you're, like, bloated. You have to wear a tampon and. Or period underwear. But I'll probably wear it now.

[Dax Shepard]

We might wear a tampon at a pool party. This. There's a lot of things going my way right now.

[Monica Padman]

No, they're not.

[Dax Shepard]

There are.

[Monica Padman]

You're making everything so you like.

[Dax Shepard]

We had a fight that. You swear you don't ever wear a tamp at the pool.

[Monica Padman]

I do.

[Dax Shepard]

Just hold on. So you never had a tampon and now you're wearing a tampon now your period's actually here.

[Monica Padman]

Stop using the word never. That's not fair or accurate.

[Dax Shepard]

You recently told me there's a community no longer like that I didn't like. Things are really. Things are really going my way this week. And I'm not even pushing. I'm just, like, gently hanging out. And I do admire your integrity for reporting me. It's admirable.

[Monica Padman]

The.

[Dax Shepard]

The You. You were incentivized to just keep this period thing a secret.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, I was.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

So I. I admire you.

[Monica Padman]

I brought that to you. I. And I agree you were right about it. But maybe we'll see when the period.

[Dax Shepard]

We'll see.

[Monica Padman]

Okay. But also, you're not right about the tampon.

[Dax Shepard]

Tbp.

[Monica Padman]

You are not right about that. I have. I. If I am in a pool situation and I'm on my period, I have to wear a tampon.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay.

[Monica Padman]

I've never said otherwise. You were right about another person too, but I'm going to leave it at that.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay. Okay. We'll leave it.

[Monica Padman]

Okay. Now. Now.

[Dax Shepard]

I'm just going to humbly now take. I'm not going to glow. And I'm going to just say thank you for your integrity. And it's really. It's really brave and admirable.

[Amanda Yulian]

Thank you.

[Monica Padman]

Thank you. You're welcome.

[Dax Shepard]

You guys are talking about Ike Barinholtz.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, Rob.

[Dax Shepard]

Ike Baronzolz. I was just on the phone phone talking about Ike Barinholtz.

[Monica Padman]

He's the best.

[Dax Shepard]

Second before I walked in here, we.

[Monica Padman]

Just love him so much.

[Dax Shepard]

I was talking to Joy. Joy's going to Burning Man.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, yes.

[Dax Shepard]

She was talking for the first time about a second time.

[Monica Padman]

Okay. She's a burner. I would not.

[Dax Shepard]

Yes. And she was breaking it down for me. I'm like, yeah, I think you gotta experience that thing before you leave planet Earth. For sure.

[Monica Padman]

I'm good.

[Dax Shepard]

You're good.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. But I'm happy for Joy. Joy's.

[Dax Shepard]

You know me. I want to dance and watch a fire and the art and the people. Maybe get an electric bicycle and. Oh, man. Maybe I'll paint myself.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, wow.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

That's fun. You should go with her.

[Dax Shepard]

I'm putting it on my. I said I'm. This is my 2026 New Year's resolution.

[Monica Padman]

Because we have.

[Dax Shepard]

It's Labor Day, is the problem.

[Monica Padman]

Oh.

[Dax Shepard]

Like, I got half of mine to just go now. But we're going to. Going to Nashville for Labor Day.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. You can't go.

[Dax Shepard]

Can't do it. So it's gonna have to be a 2026 resolution.

[Monica Padman]

Speaking of Nashville, I'm all over the place.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

I was at Cara the other day, and a very nice man came up to me. He's in a band that plays there sometimes. He's introduced himself before. He's very, very nice. And he's an armchair.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, this was on Wednesday, because it was the day that Nancy Siegel, the twin expert, came out.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. This is when you were struggling, too, but it was two Wednesday.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. And he came up and he was like, twin expert. Oh, my God. Like, he loved it.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

He was talking about that. And then he said, this is not. I don't want you to get defensive.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay.

[Monica Padman]

Okay.

[Dax Shepard]

Probably go to now I know something. Negatives coming.

[Monica Padman]

No, it was like. It was a.

[Dax Shepard]

No one's ever said, like, I don't want you to get defensive. She said, you're hot. A compliment's never following. I hope you don't get.

[Monica Padman]

I know. I'm just. You're right. It. It's not. It wasn't a negative towards you. It was a positive towards me.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, how. That's not negative towards me?

[Monica Padman]

Well, you're involved. So he. He. He said, I want to thank you for defending Los Angeles so much.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, yeah.

[Monica Padman]

And I was like, oh, that's nice.

[Dax Shepard]

I wonder if people start throwing eggs at me in Los Angeles now that I've been vocally.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, you've been really hard on it for no reason whatsoever. And he was like, look, I get it, but he's from Texas and he's a musician, so he's like. Spent a lot of time in Nashville and he's like, it's great. He's like. But I like.

[Dax Shepard]

He likes it here.

[Monica Padman]

Place is special.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. And hugely special.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

And my issues with it. This is a very special, wonderful city. I'd argue it's in the top five cities in America, but we're very densely populated. Driving around as a beat down. The place is burning down. It has its challenges, and I've just enjoyed kind of.

[Monica Padman]

It's just when we say the place is burning down like that unfortunately. Feels like you weren't saying that when that was happening, but now you're saying because you spent time somewhere else. Like, you were actually. You hated when people were saying that. You were like, people are overreacting and saying, like, the air or the this.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, yeah. But that. No, no, no, no, no, no. Yes. I wasn't like all spun out about it, but I'm saying we have fires every year.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Bel Air catches on fire every year. It's a stressful place there, you know, that's also a reality. I love it here. I mean, the same can be said about anyone in the hurricane zones.

[Monica Padman]

That's what I mean. There's just things happening everywhere. No. You're not going to live anywhere without. When I was in Georgia last, there was an earthquake, quake.

[Dax Shepard]

I know.

[Monica Padman]

You do? I already talked about it.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. You told me.

[Monica Padman]

Anyway, so. Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

No, I love Los Angeles.

[Monica Padman]

Okay. I'm just. He was. He was happy to have his city defended.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

And. And I was happy to do it.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Good for the both of you.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. Anyhow.

[Dax Shepard]

And I love it here.

[Monica Padman]

Good. I'm glad to hear that.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Now back.

[Dax Shepard]

It's not a bad place.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

It's far preferable to so many places. Places.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. Lots of dreams.

[Dax Shepard]

And also, I really like being in nature with less people and less traffic and people more concerned about their families than their careers. That was fun. I enjoyed that.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. I understand. Okay. Now my story. I feel like maybe my cleaner, who is my CEO, who I love deeply, late lady, she might think I'm like.

[Dax Shepard]

A drug addict because of your GLP1.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

I have the same thought with. I have the same thought because the needle.

[Monica Padman]

I collect the needles in a water bottle.

[Dax Shepard]

Yes, yes.

[Monica Padman]

And then she has to see this collection of needles.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. She probably thinks you're diabetic.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, yeah. No, I think she thinks the percentage.

[Dax Shepard]

Of diabetics is much higher than the percentage of junk junkies.

[Monica Padman]

But now they have things for diabetes. You can like hook on to yourself and stuff.

[Dax Shepard]

The pump.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, yeah, the pump. And she, she is probably in a moral dilemma because she's like, I care about Monica and she's falling into this like very dark place, this drug addled place. And yeah, she's sick, but she pays me well and if I address this, this, she might stop.

[Dax Shepard]

Now you find yourself at the crossroads. A lot of representatives do in this town, which is they have a client who is a cash cow and they're killing themselves.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Not. Well, you don't find yourself. Lady finds herself in this situation. Yeah. And she'll probably not bring it up. Like most representatives don't bring it up.

[Monica Padman]

I don't blame her.

[Dax Shepard]

I have a funny. I won't name any names. So I don't think I'm throwing anyone in the bus but my business manager who is like really my favorite person. Yeah, yeah. I've just been with him for 30 or whatever. It's been 23 years or something. I love him, but he was a part of an intervention a long time ago.

[Monica Padman]

He was?

[Dax Shepard]

Yes, with a client that he shared with a lot of different people and agent.

[Monica Padman]

Not on you.

[Dax Shepard]

No, no, no.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, okay.

[Dax Shepard]

No, I came to him about to be sober for good. Yeah. Anyways, it was an intervention with, with like the manager, the lawyer, the agent.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, wow.

[Dax Shepard]

And the business manager. And they all said like, you gotta go to treatment or we're all gonna fire you. And then the actor didn't go to treatment and he was the only one. Oh, he did. Yes, yes, yes.

[Monica Padman]

I love him so much.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, he is so funny.

[Monica Padman]

I wish that person had gone back.

[Dax Shepard]

Yes.

[Monica Padman]

After sobriety.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. If they got sober.

[Monica Padman]

Because the business manager deserves that.

[Dax Shepard]

Did the right thing.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, he did the right thing. He's. I love him.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, me too.

[Monica Padman]

Okay, so I'm not doing heroin.

[Dax Shepard]

No. And if she doesn't listen, she doesn't listen.

[Monica Padman]

But I hope it gets back to her.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay.

[Monica Padman]

Do you have any stories?

[Dax Shepard]

Just what a bounce back. I just am happy to be here. Let's do some facts.

[Monica Padman]

Okay.

[Dax Shepard]

Stay tuned for more Armchair Expert if you dare.

[Monica Padman]

Facts. What a story.

[Dax Shepard]

What a story.

[Monica Padman]

Sometimes we have people on who just have incredible stories. They've just lived lives that are. That seem extreme, but I think. What? A lot of people can actually relate to them.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. I think as we discussed in the episode, everyone's got a lot more going on than you think.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. It kind of reminded me a tiny bit of gin. Jeanette McCurdy's memoir.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, my God.

[Monica Padman]

Great book. Great.

[Dax Shepard]

Kill My Mom. I want to kill my mom.

[Monica Padman]

No, I Wish My mom was dead. Wish My Mom Was Dead, I think is what it's called. I think they're doing a show.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, they are.

[Monica Padman]

And I think Jennifer Aniston is producing it, if I'm correct.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay. Yep.

[Monica Padman]

Really cool.

[Amanda Yulian]

I'm glad my mom died.

[Dax Shepard]

I'm glad my mom died.

[Monica Padman]

Anyway, this is sort of similar to that. So she gave us a really cool present. It was a lunchbox, which is. Is this a version of the magazine? They put out a quarterly magazine, but it always like, is a little different and cool. And one of them was a lunch box.

[Dax Shepard]

Yes.

[Monica Padman]

And then it had author cards in it.

[Dax Shepard]

Yes.

[Monica Padman]

Like playing cards. Collectible playing cards. I wanted to go through some. Now you pick. Which one do you want?

[Dax Shepard]

I want one of those chrome ones.

[Monica Padman]

Okay. Chrome.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, chrome.

[Monica Padman]

It says collect them all. And I'm inclined to too.

[Dax Shepard]

Of course. You love collecting.

[Monica Padman]

I love collecting.

[Dax Shepard]

You're.

[Monica Padman]

Ding, ding, ding.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. I was going to say in the episode. The only thing that prevents you from being a hoarder is you are good at throwing stuff away or giving stuff.

[Monica Padman]

I am very good at throwing stuff.

[Dax Shepard]

Man, at the rate you collect things, you could get buried really quick.

[Monica Padman]

I also have great. I have a great design aesthetic and I think that inhibits.

[Dax Shepard]

You had five bureaus. What do you call them?

[Monica Padman]

Armors. That's. I live in a tiny apartment and have. Need storage.

[Dax Shepard]

It's a lot of armoires for a one bedroom apartment.

[Monica Padman]

Actually, when I posted the picture, not Architectural Digest.

[Dax Shepard]

Monica was in Architectural Digest. Her apartment's so cute, it made it to Architectural Digest.

[Monica Padman]

That's not what happened. But I. There are some really beautiful pictures of my apartment that are on my Instagram if you want to check it out.

[Dax Shepard]

You want to see how Monica lives.

[Monica Padman]

And some people said, like, I expected more armoires, so.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, okay.

[Monica Padman]

Looks like it could take even a couple more.

[Dax Shepard]

I guess so. I wouldn't mind seeing that.

[Monica Padman]

Okay, let's see who we have. Oh, W, E B. Dubois. I know him.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Famous black writer.

[Monica Padman]

Yep, exactly. This is so cute. And it has the awards, it has the titles and the years. It has page average. Wow, there's a Joan Didian. I like this one. Joan didion. Page average, 236.3. Cool. Dennis Johnson. I'm gonna read 100.

[Amanda Yulian]

Oh.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, boy.

[Monica Padman]

Kurt Vonnegut.

[Dax Shepard]

Slaughterhouse.

[Monica Padman]

Who did we have on Chuck? Chuck Palahniuk.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

I wonder if he's in here. We should okay, we should go through these, who we've had on, and have.

[Dax Shepard]

A little board where we pin those on.

[Monica Padman]

Exactly.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, That's a good idea.

[Monica Padman]

Okay, so far, we haven't had any.

[Dax Shepard]

No. Oops.

[Monica Padman]

Great. Anyway, those are cool.

[Dax Shepard]

Kurt Vonnegut, you know, I get. We both get asked this a bunch, and I never have a good answer for it, which is like, who would you want to interview, alive or dead?

[Monica Padman]

And Kurt Vonnegut is.

[Dax Shepard]

He's definitely one of them. He's one of the funkiest to ever live.

[Monica Padman]

Wow, that's surprising. I've never heard you speak of him.

[Dax Shepard]

Did you read Slaughterhouse Five, I think in school, or.

[Monica Padman]

He's 84. He's still with us.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, he is?

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

No, he died in 2007.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, I'm sorry.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay.

[Monica Padman]

He died.

[Dax Shepard]

He was 84.

[Monica Padman]

But. He was 84.

[Dax Shepard]

He's been 84 for 18 years.

[Monica Padman]

You want to have him over J.D. salinger?

[Dax Shepard]

Probably. I. I mean, I have such revery for Salinger and Catcher in the Ride, but Vonnegut is, like, almost like a Hunter S. Thompson figure. He's like. He has this ultra ego alter ego, Kilgore Trout, who's in all these books, and there's all these weird. It's very trippy. He. He's just so creative. He's like. Like he is on acid, as his homeostasis is, like, on acid trip.

[Monica Padman]

But what would you ask him?

[Dax Shepard]

I just think he'd be so colorful as a character and interesting and playful. Yeah, he's a rascal, right? Yeah. Well, he'd be in that list.

[Monica Padman]

Once we do the ghost podcast, we can try to get him.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, we have a medium come in and try to communicate with.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. Okay. Who is the inventor of Liquid Soap? William Shepherd.

[Dax Shepard]

My uncle William.

[Monica Padman]

No, because it's spelled S, H E P P H A R, D. That's.

[Dax Shepard]

Before we dropped the P and the H because so many people would come over and ask us for Liquid soap, they thought we had an unlimited supply. Being related to Matthew William. William. His umbrella. His full name is William Matthew. She. It's actually Matthew William shepherd, but he went by William. Anyways, you don't need to look further into that.

[Monica Padman]

Okay.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, that's a ding, ding, ding. So we're watching Friday Night Lights last night. We're really getting close to the end. We're in season five. I'm a little panicked.

[Monica Padman]

I am.

[Dax Shepard]

And Coach Taylor. Eric Taylor is the character's name, played by Kyle Chandler, Kyle Candler. And boy, Lincoln was quick on the Draw, man. He was wearing a hat scene. He took his hat off, and then they're talking. Then he goes and puts his baseball hat back on. She's like, go back. His real initials are in the. In the baseball cap.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, cool.

[Dax Shepard]

So we went frame by frame, and sure enough, you look inside here, and it's KC kmc. That's what made me think as Michaels. We're assuming his middle name is Michael.

[Monica Padman]

Wow.

[Dax Shepard]

It was a good get. Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

That's great. Okay. That was in 1865. Liquid soap.

[Dax Shepard]

Liquid soap. 1865.

[Amanda Yulian]

Okay.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay.

[Monica Padman]

It says Walla's invention was a significant step. It wasn't until later that liquid soap became a widely used product for domestic purposes.

[Dax Shepard]

Until. Until Mr. Y invented a valve that could dispense the soap.

[Monica Padman]

It helped.

[Dax Shepard]

I'm split on liquid soap. Like, when I'm in a bathroom at a hotel, I want the bar of soap. I want to wash my hands with a bar of soap. And when I get in the thing. I don't like shower gel.

[Monica Padman]

I don't like shower gel.

[Dax Shepard]

I feel like it's so wasteful. Like, I put, like, 3 ounces to clean my asshole. Because I'm thinking about how much I. I always much on my hand before I clean my. So I'm like, yeah, we need a lot. And then afterwards, I'm like, I just used, like, a tenth of a bottle.

[Monica Padman]

For shower gel or for bar?

[Dax Shepard]

No, the bar. You can't take a tenth of it off. You got to rub your.

[Monica Padman]

Do you rub. Do you put the bar.

[Dax Shepard]

We've already talked about whatever. You want to keep shaming me for this?

[Monica Padman]

No, I.

[Dax Shepard]

You. You think it's disgusting.

[Monica Padman]

Listen to me.

[Dax Shepard]

Do you use a washcloth?

[Monica Padman]

Listen to me.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay.

[Monica Padman]

Do you put it directly on the butt?

[Dax Shepard]

Here's what I do, and this is true. I take a bunch of sudsy lather.

[Monica Padman]

On your hands.

[Dax Shepard]

On my hands. I take the bar of soap and I get so much soap on it, I put it back on the holder.

[Monica Padman]

Yes.

[Dax Shepard]

Then I wash my butthole.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Then I rinse it.

[Monica Padman]

Right.

[Dax Shepard]

Then I take the bar. Now I've gotten like.

[Monica Padman]

I do that.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, you do?

[Monica Padman]

Okay, great. Yeah, I do that.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay, great. I thought you were very judgmental that I put the bar on my ankles.

[Monica Padman]

No, no, no.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay, okay. But yes, there is. There is one round first with just the hands.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

In the suds. And then the bar goes in the liquid shower gel.

[Monica Padman]

I agree. Is not for me. If I forget my bar soap, if I'm, like, at a hotel or something. I'm pissed cuz they normally have a shower gel option and I don't. It's like, it's also slimy. Like it's not coming off.

[Dax Shepard]

It doesn't suds as much as a bar.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

But for hand, unless we get a.

[Dax Shepard]

Sponsor that's a liquid, then I'll say it's great.

[Monica Padman]

No, for hand washing I'm liquid.

[Dax Shepard]

Oh.

[Monica Padman]

Even though actually currently at my house it's a bar. But it's because the bar is really cute. It's in a circle shape.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay. So that's why you're using it, because it's a cute shape. Yeah, Yeah. I like a thing that I'm rubbing, you know, But a size solid chunk.

[Monica Padman]

But what you don't like is something that you guys, that you guys have in your bath in your downstairs bathroom. But I also have it too.

[Dax Shepard]

Hate it.

[Monica Padman]

You shouldn't say you hate it because what if they sponsor it and we both have it and like I think it's cool.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay.

[Monica Padman]

I almost give it as a white elephant. It's a soap that's like a bar soap but it has these like mountains.

[Dax Shepard]

It looks like a candle that has been carved out on top to have a bunch of dish shapes. Shapes in it.

[Monica Padman]

Right. And no wicks and no wick.

[Dax Shepard]

Right. But it's like soap. It's a big base of soap with these weird shapes cut into the top.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

And you're supposed to just rub your hands on it.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah.

[Dax Shepard]

And wash your hands. And I hate it because a, you're dripping the stuff over as you do it. Then it gets wet. If you go in there and someone just did it, it feels gross to touch that wet thing. It's a pass. If you live by yourself, maybe it's fine.

[Monica Padman]

Right. I agree that. Okay. So I, I like it. I think it's cool and, and cool looking. But I do have skepticism that it's clean.

[Dax Shepard]

Right.

[Monica Padman]

Like I don't, I, I worry even though soap is self cleaning.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Also you just, you get this big trail between the sink and that thing.

[Monica Padman]

I've never noticed that.

[Dax Shepard]

Well, if you like when we have company over and I go in there, I'm like, look at this. There's like soap drizzles all over this thing sucks. And that's what I say.

[Amanda Yulian]

Okay.

[Dax Shepard]

Then I go, I hate it.

[Monica Padman]

But what's the difference between the bar being wet though? The, the same. If it's a bar soap. If it's wet because somebody just used it, it's wet because somebody just used It.

[Dax Shepard]

But here's what I tell myself. Like, when I use the soap, I also then rinse the bar of soap off so it doesn't have a bunch of suds all over it when I put it there.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, I don't.

[Dax Shepard]

But there's no way to gr. You're not going to grab that whole base and rinse off. Everyone's got. Which is tough touching it. Whereas the bar of soap. I do think people naturally just rinse it off when they're done to put it back.

[Monica Padman]

Really?

[Dax Shepard]

I. I do.

[Monica Padman]

No. Okay. So I. Pulling it.

[Dax Shepard]

You put a big sudsy bar on the thing. You know, that would make a mess.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, yeah. I put it back and then I rinse my hands. You rinse your hands with the soap?

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Like before I put it back. I would never put a big bubbly bar of soap down on the rack.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, it dries just fine.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah, I can see that. The bubbles popped and. Yeah, I want it smooth.

[Monica Padman]

Okay. Okay. How much is 200? So $265,000 in 1986 is what today?

[Dax Shepard]

I said 2 million.

[Monica Padman]

It's $776,000. 487. It's less than I thought.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

So there's that. Does hoarding get worse over time? Yeah, it does. It does. Hoarding disorder is an ongoing difficulty throwing away or parting with possessions because you believe that you need to save them. Obviously, we know that you may experience distress at the thought of getting rid of the items. You gradually keep or gather a huge number of items, regardless of their actual value. Ranges from mild to severe. Okay. First. Symptoms of hoarding disorder often appear during the teenage to early adult years. You may get and save too many items, gradually build up clutter and living spaces, and have difficulty getting rid of things. As you grow older, you may continually. You may continue getting and holding on to things that you may never use and don't have space to for. By middle age, the clutter can become overwhelming as symptoms become more severe and increasingly difficult to treat.

[Dax Shepard]

I just wonder for someone who suffers from this when they leave their completely packed house and there's like, no room for. Do you have bags all over the floor? Do you say as you're walking out the door, where am I going to put this stuff? Or you don't. You've blocked that completely out. You compartmentalize. You go, I'm just. I need to go get the thing. That's all I'm thinking about. I guess that's me and drugs, like.

[Monica Padman]

Right.

[Dax Shepard]

I just gotta go get those drugs. And then everything else will sort itself out.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. So this is. You feel emotionally connected to items that remind you of happier times or represent beloved people or pets.

[Dax Shepard]

That's sad.

[Monica Padman]

I know. You feel safe and comforted when surrounded by things. You don't want to waste anything. That's a way. I'm not a hoarder. I'm fine with waste. You believe these items are unique or that you'll need them at some point in the future.

[Amanda Yulian]

Future.

[Monica Padman]

It's a hard disease.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

I have a lot of sympathy.

[Dax Shepard]

It's funny, too, how all these diseases do bring everyone to the same place. Interestingly, it's just like different mechanisms to get to total isolation. Like every addict will tell you, you start by relapsing at a bar with friends, and maybe you get coke, but ultimately you'll be in your closet smoking crack on day three all by yourself. And then you will not want to see anyone. And that's all. All you'll want to do. And this thing, like, even if you started as social, you can never host anyone. You're embarrassed by where you live. It's easier to not have friends.

[Monica Padman]

I know. It's.

[Dax Shepard]

It's heartbreaking.

[Monica Padman]

Okay. Looked at percentage of people who have It In America, 2% to 6% of Americans are estimated to have hoarding disorder, according to the Mayo Clinic trusted brand.

[Dax Shepard]

Mayo. Do you think they were called Mayo Clinic before the product mayonnaise existed?

[Monica Padman]

Let's see when man mayonnaise was invented. Okay. Mayonnaise is thought to have been invented in 1756.

[Dax Shepard]

That's going to be before the Mayo Clinic.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. Okay. Mayo Clinic, 1889. Still early.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Okay. But we got a hundred years difference. Although I want to go back to Mayo because maybe, like, mayonnaise.

[Dax Shepard]

That's a weird name. Is. That's got to be French.

[Monica Padman]

With the most common origin story linking it to a French victory celebration in Menorca, Spain. During the Seven Years War, French forces captured Port Mahon. Port Mahon. And lacking cream for a celebratory sauce, a chef reportedly substituted oil and eggs, creating mahomes. So, wow. Okay. Great.

[Dax Shepard]

Great unexpected fact.

[Monica Padman]

Great unexpected fact. And that concludes the facts.

[Amanda Yulian]

Okay.

[Dax Shepard]

That's a lot of people. 2 to 6%.

[Monica Padman]

I know.

[Dax Shepard]

So on the low end, we're saying 30 divided by 5, 6 million people. And on the high end, 18 million people.

[Amanda Yulian]

That's a lot.

[Monica Padman]

But it does. Scale is wide of. Of intensity of disease.

[Dax Shepard]

I know it's hard to, like where you draw the line. Yeah, I mean, like, because I'm in people's apartments. I'm like, there's too much stuff in here.

[Monica Padman]

Right. But that's like stuff they don't need.

[Dax Shepard]

If your items can't fit in cabinets or cupboards and they have to be out in the living space, that's too much stuff. Just technically that's too much stuff for your place.

[Monica Padman]

For your place, but not for your living. Like you could have a teeny tiny place in New York and it just won't fit anything. But you still need stuff.

[Dax Shepard]

But like Brie and I had a rule, right? We lived together for, I don't know, nine years in that one bedroom apartment. And we had a rule which is like if you're going to go buy a garment, any kind of clothing item and you're going to put it in that closet, you have to pull something out. Like it's a one in, one out. Cuz there's no. What are we going to put clothes on the floor?

[Monica Padman]

Armoire.

[Dax Shepard]

There was no room in our spot for an armoire.

[Monica Padman]

Okay, then you put them on the floor.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. And that's when you're technically, you have more stuff than you can handle.

[Monica Padman]

Interesting.

[Dax Shepard]

You don't like. Like that.

[Monica Padman]

I don't know if I agree. I got a munch on that.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay, but like you don't buy too much food to fit in your fridge because it has to go in your fridge or pantry. Well, no, if it's is a fridge, items that need refrigeration.

[Monica Padman]

No, that's true.

[Dax Shepard]

You can't just buy it and leave it on your counter. You're like, it's got to go in the fridge. And you have to have that same policy about everything. Like the clothes got to go in where they hold the clothes and the toiletries got to go where that's.

[Monica Padman]

I buy o. I buy bottled water. I'm not really supposed to, but I do.

[Dax Shepard]

You buy what?

[Monica Padman]

Bottled water.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay.

[Monica Padman]

Badly about that. But I do do it. Okay.

[Dax Shepard]

And you're a bad person.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. And I will buy a bunch. I get big ones. Exhibit A. Can you show it to the camera?

[Dax Shepard]

Oh, I think that everyone can see this. It's not an extreme.

[Monica Padman]

If you show it and they're big and so I get like five cases. Cases. And that's not fitting anywhere. So I have to put it in the long laundry room.

[Dax Shepard]

But your laundry room is fine. That's a. That's your shed. You have a shed off your kitchen where your hot water heater is. It's not like anyone's going to be hanging out Next to your hot water heater.

[Monica Padman]

Right?

[Dax Shepard]

That's fine.

[Monica Padman]

Okay.

[Dax Shepard]

Living space. You can't stack. If you need to stack up five cases of water in your living room, I'm sorry, but you're gonna have to get one case at a time.

[Monica Padman]

No, that's not.

[Dax Shepard]

You can't live with people stack.

[Monica Padman]

Why?

[Dax Shepard]

This is an episode about hoarding. You don't understand why you keep things stacked up.

[Monica Padman]

No. So that. That there is a difference here. Hoarding is items that aren't used aren't gonna be used. It's like, in the future, I may need this. I'm gonna have it, or I feel safe if it's here every two days. To get water is not efficient for anyone's life.

[Dax Shepard]

First of all, you're forgetting I know you. You barely drink water. You are not drinking a case of water every two days. Okay, let's start there. Secondly, it's not true. Surplus is part of hoarding. That's was her. Her bathroom. Her shower was full of 50 shampoo bottles.

[Monica Padman]

I know.

[Dax Shepard]

So it is part of it. The stockpiling is. Is an asshole.

[Monica Padman]

50 is different than like. Also, that's different. Shampoo bottles, you do take a while to get through. So, yes, you can do one at a time or two. Spe. Also, you're someone who has a ton of surplus.

[Dax Shepard]

Yes, but I stockpile within the confines of my storage space. I don't exceed that. That has to be a rule we agree on.

[Monica Padman]

That feels interesting and tricky though, because it's like your space is big, so you're allowed to have surplus, but if your space is small, you don't.

[Dax Shepard]

Yes, I lived in a small space and I couldn't have 15 extra toothpaste, but now I can. The rule is you have to live within the limits of your environment. Environment. It's good policy. Monica, I don't know why you're pushing against.

[Monica Padman]

I am pushing against it because I don't. I don't know that I think it's fair that, like you, the reason you have a surplus is because it makes you feel safe. It makes you feel safe to have that. That's literally the exact same thing as a hoarder. No, they just don't have a big house.

[Dax Shepard]

No, no. Here's the line. It's so clear. I would have also felt safe to have more of those products when I lived in a one bedroom apartment. But I could have not because I live by the premise I can't have stacked up in my living space. So I played by the exact rule I'm still playing by.

[Monica Padman]

No, I know, but I'm saying by definition hoarding, what we just read is it makes people feel safe to have those items. So that's like part of the psychology behind hoarding. So if that person has just a toothpaste on the ground because. Because they feel safe, I can't be like, well, that's bad. But yours isn't bad because you have the big house. Do you see them? The confliction.

[Dax Shepard]

If I had only lived in a big house and I had this premise, yes, I would be hypocritical. But I lived for a decade in a one bedroom apartment and I live by the policy I'm suggesting.

[Monica Padman]

But I guess my point.

[Dax Shepard]

So I've already proven that I walked the walk.

[Monica Padman]

I'm suggesting. But why, why can't now, like, you're like, I feel safe having these toothpaste. And you see this other guy who has toothpaste on his floor just like four and. And why can't you just be like, yeah, he feels safer. That's fine.

[Dax Shepard]

Because he has products invading his living space. And that's where it becomes to all hoarders.

[Monica Padman]

He's having you over, though, so he's not embarrassed.

[Dax Shepard]

He should be. If he's got toothpaste laying all over his living room floor, he. You should be. I'm sorry. That should be something that you.

[Monica Padman]

Oh, my God, the judgment. Wow.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. Yeah. You gotta. Sorry. You can't spend more than you make. There's some rules. You can't spend more than you make. You can't buy more shit than your place can hold.

[Monica Padman]

That's. No.

[Dax Shepard]

Yes.

[Monica Padman]

Then your place can hold. Is different than in this corner. I have stuff stacked. To you that's bad, but to somebody else that's not bad. That's just the way. Way they're doing their life. Like they have stuff.

[Dax Shepard]

Well, let me be honest. It's happening in my bedroom and I hate it, but I hate it. You understand there's like stuff.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, you're.

[Dax Shepard]

And I don't like it.

[Monica Padman]

That's fine. You don't have. Also you don't have to like it. But I think, I think it's. It would be. I'd be surprised. I'm surprised to hear that you're so judgmental of people who like have. Have a stacked area of extra stuff because they don't have a closet for it, but they like having extra stuff. I understand with the. What Amanda's mom having chickens out rotting and stuff, obviously that's not good.

[Dax Shepard]

But listen, you can have a principle and not be judgmental of people who don't apply to the principle.

[Monica Padman]

Well, you are judgmental.

[Dax Shepard]

This is Marcus Aurelius. This is be hard on yourself in forgiving of others. And I subscribe to that. So for me, I'm just saying as an ethic, I can't have more stuff than I can put away. I can't spend more money than I make.

[Monica Padman]

I hear about you. But you said they should be embarrassed.

[Dax Shepard]

Okay, what I should say is I'd be embarrassed.

[Monica Padman]

Okay, great. Yeah, that's fine.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

And.

[Dax Shepard]

And yeah, I'd be very embarrassed if I had toothpaste and sundries stacked up all over my living room.

[Monica Padman]

What about just a corner?

[Dax Shepard]

But if someone else says I don't actually care because I don't live there, that's my.

[Monica Padman]

That's exactly my point. Like, we are not l there. So.

[Dax Shepard]

And I might not want to be in there cuz it's like we're on this spectrum. So. Yeah, you would admit you don't want to sit in a. In a living room where you have to clear the couch off to sit down and there's chicken under the thing. So. Great. And we can work backwards from there. And there's probably a lot of. I don't want to be in a place with stacks of newspapers everywhere. Feels dirty and gross. I personally don't want to be in there.

[Monica Padman]

Okay.

[Dax Shepard]

Someone loves living with all those newspapers and kitty litter all over. Who care? That's for them.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah, that's for them.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah. But I don't enjoy that.

[Monica Padman]

I understand. Understand.

[Dax Shepard]

Yeah.

[Monica Padman]

Yeah. All right, well, that's it.

[Dax Shepard]

I love you.

[Monica Padman]

Love you.

[Dax Shepard]

Follow Armchair Expert on the Wonry app, Amazon Music, or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to every episode of Armchair Expert early and ad free right now by joining Wondery plus in the Wonder Wondry app or on Apple Podcasts. Before you go, tell us about yourself by completing a short survey at wondry. Com Survey.