Alex Earle (7:28)
And I've been trying to lay off coffee because my anxiety is like, it hasn't been great and it's honestly been an escalation. I'll say from like November, but I am pretty good. If you guys like have ever listened to my anxiety episode, you'll know a lot more backstory on this. If you haven't listened to it, then maybe go listen if you're dealing with anxiety. But I basically like used to be bedridden when I had bad anxiety when I was 14 years old. It's like I would wake up and first thing I would do is get sick and then I just wouldn't really want to leave my bed. Like anytime I left my bed I just felt anxious. And I mean I was anxious in my bed, but it was my safe place, I guess. And I mean going out to eat, having sleepovers with my friends, like I just always felt anxious and like I wanted to get out of there. And one thing in that, that was a problem for me was restaurants. And that hasn't been a problem for me in a while. But recently, and I don't know why it's coming back, I have just been getting this like overwhelming feeling when I'm at restaurants where I just feel like I need to Leave. Like, the second I sit down, I'm like, oh, like, I need to get out of here. Like, I need to go sit in the car. Like, I just need to take a lap. Like, I'm waiting for the bill to come. And I don't know why that happens at restaurants. And maybe that's something I should, like, work out in therapy, but. But it's been a little bit worse than usual, and I feel like just needing to, like, take some time this week to chill, get my mental health in order. And I'm trying to lay off coffee as a subset of this because I realized the other day that I had a cup of coffee, and then I just felt like my heart was pounding and I didn't feel good. So I was like, all right, maybe we need to lay off the caffeine. And I was talking to a friend, and she stopped drinking coffee and she switched to Matcha, which stars caffeine in it, but less, I think. I don't know. She said it really helped her with anxiety. So I stopped drinking coffee for this week. I will let you guys know how that goes, because I do really rely on coffee, but I've also been sick, so I haven't been really craving coffee. So I guess. I guess we'll see. But definitely want to get my anxiety in order a little bit because it's just been all over the place. And, you know, we had a big party weekend last weekend, which is great, but I'm feeling so excited to stay in bed this weekend and do nothing. And that's kind of what I wanted to talk about in this episode a little bit, was the balance of going out and staying in and taking care of yourself and going out, having a drink with your friends. And then I guess my relationship with alcohol, because I just see so much online, and it's fair. People are allowed to say whatever they want, but a lot of things can be misconstrued. And I think because I post a lot about me going out and doesn't mean I'm going out all the time. Granted, there are some times where I'm on the go a lot, but just because I'm going out doesn't mean that I'm drinking and ripping shots or just because I'm posting a lot that I'm going out doesn't mean I'm out every waking second. It's just there's so much more to post about when I am going out, if that makes sense. Because it's like, you have the hair, the makeup, you have the outfit, videos So I wanted to chat with you guys about all of that today. And it reminded me one of the big events of the year coming up is spring break. And living in Miami, I'm no stranger to a spring break. I mean, I went on spring break all four years of my college, and I don't know, spring break is just so. It's kind of annoying. It's kind of the worst. And it's always built up, and it's held to such a high standard, and I don't know if it ever lives up to it. Like, spring break is just always such a shit show. And also, living in Miami, where it's a spring break destination, is pretty chaotic. And Miami has started to, like, shut down everything and, like, during the streets of spring break over the past few years. Cause it gets so nutty here. And I guess before we get into everything, my, like, first understanding of spring break was there was the Spring breakers movie, I believe. And I think Selena Gomez was in that, but I might be making that up. And my boyfriend, who was in college when I was in high school, and when he would go on his college spring breaks, and I remember just, like, staying up all night hoping for a text from him, he never answered me. And then I would stalk all of the sorority girls that he was friends with and every girl he would follow. And I would go to the VSCO or, like, vsco. Do you guys remember that in their bio? And I would look at the photos and see if they're, like, uploading them in real time. And I would obviously find, like, photos of him with, like, girls, and I would freak out, and it would send me on the spiral. But I always thought of spring break as just, like, the epitome of a fun party. My first spring break was not normal by any means. And okay, so college, University of Miami, spring breaks coming around. And this was right after sorority rush and. Or I guess not right after, but, you know, soon after. And I was kind of misplaced from, like, the friends I was friends with. First semester, I had made new friends, and I was going to room with the girls in my sorority at the time. So not the friends that, like, I would say I was super, super close with, but more so, like, new friends. We went to Bimini in the Bahamas. And I don't know how I feel about Bimini. Not great. Honestly. All I have is pretty terrible memories of being there. The Bahamas is great. The Bahamas is beautiful. But Bimini in particular was. And maybe this is just, like, the spring break destination, but it was just a Full on shit show. So basically there's a bunch of different, like, groups you can go with to buy tickets to go to this Bimini spring break. So one of the places that we went with you, like, buy a ticket, it includes like your hotel room, your travel costs, and then I don't really think it includes anything else. You get like a photo package at the end, which we will get to. This story, it haunts me to this day. So I decide I'm gonna room with these girls, new friends for spring break, and we're going to take the ferry to Bimini because that's how everyone gets there. It's like a. It's maybe like a two to three hour ferry from Miami to Bimini. And everyone says it's like the ferry ride's easy. Like, everyone in Miami boats over to Bahamas for the day. It's like no big deal. But the day that we decide to go to Bimini, there is a massive storm. So we get on this ferry. Imagine like every person in your school stacked on this three tier ferry. There's like a bar on each level. There's like maybe some food. And then it's just kind of like big, long bench seats. We get on this ferry, it's like a little stormy out and they're like, oh, it might be a little bumpy on the ride over. And you have the frat boys there, they have their speakers, they're blasting music. I mean, everyone's all riled because it's spring break and everyone's in a good mood. We get on this thing, we get cruising, and before we know it, we entered the deep, dark sea. Like, do you. Do you know the sea on TikTok? What. What's it. The, like, yo ho. That's. That was what this ferry ride was. We were going from side to side. There was waves crashing over the sides of this boat. Like, all. When you looked out the window, all you would see is like, down to the ocean, up to the sky, and it was so nauseating. And this one, this was straight for like two hours. So everyone on this boat from Miami to Bimini was throwing up. Like everyone was sick there. Puke bags everywhere. There was a line actually to get puke bags at the front. Everyone was just like holding on to where they were sitting. I remember sitting across from these guys and they were like, hammered, having the time of their life. They're like singing. They had no care in the world. There's people like on the back of the boat crying. It was actually the ferry ride from hell. And I was just so scared that we were going to tip over. And like a ferry's pretty big and you don't really ever feel like much rocking like that. And like we were just going from side to side. I never thought we were gonna make it there. And it was just so nauseating that I remember I curled up in my seat on the ferry and I just like tried to sleep. Cuz I was like, I just, I can't live through this right now. I need to sleep. I need to go to bed. We finally get to Bimini after our long, nauseating ferry ride for three hours. And I remember there was just these big windy lines. Like every college student has their suitcase. They're like dragging it through the gravel. And we're waiting in these lines to get on. I think we got on little golf carts to go to the hotel. And we go to the hotel, we check in, everything's like fine and normal, right? We're having to find spring break. Maybe like day one or day two that we're on this spring break. There's this thing called like coronavirus that breaks out and everyone's like, ooh, you know, this doesn't look too good. Like what's this coronavirus on the news? And everyone's trying to like figure out what's going on. Is it really bad? Does anyone here have corona? As we're on like day two or day three of this trip, it turns out that our school puts out a notice and they're like, okay, spring break is extended by like another 10 days. So everyone's like partying, having the time of their life. They think it's the best thing ever because we now have off school for another 10 days. Not knowing that like we were gonna go into a full shutdown, whatever. We were having a good spring break. I mean, it's fun, it's. It's parties and everyone gets, I feel like a little bit crazier because you're with other schools. It's like when, I don't know, your camp goes to hang out with like the other camp. You're like, you're trying to impress. You're there with new people, there's new guys there for you to meet. And it was just like a trashy shit show in the Bahamas. There were pool parties, there were night parties. It was basically just like non stop. You were going all day, all night. And I don't know, spring breaks can get a little out of hand. And I remember specifically there was this one party down at the pool deck area and they were having, like, a twerk contest up on, like, the stage. And I. I don't know. I'm just like. All of this looking back on it now makes me cringe. But in the moment, we're thinking, this is, like, the craziest party ever. And I was with my friends dancing the DJ booth. Lo and behold, we were, like, up on this platform. So we're just in, like, bikini and sneakers dancing. There's, like, a photographer coming around. And, like, when I've had a few drinks and I see a photographer, I'm like, let's go. I'm like, here I am. I'm putting on a show, and I'm just dancing, thinking nothing of this. I think that I actually ended up going somewhere with this photographer, with, like, a group of my friends to this, like, random beach to take pictures at some point on this trip. I don't know, but they had these photographers that were sent with, like, the different groups. I told you that you, like, buy tickets to go with the different groups, and you don't see these photos. So at the end of this trip, Covid ended up being an actual thing and actually very scary. And we were out of the country, so we had to get back in. And we all. Everyone ended up just, like, leaving the spring break early. It was, like, pretty hectic getting out of there just because everyone was trying to get out as fast as they could and rearrange their original travel plans. But we got home, we're in lockdown. I'm back home in New Jersey. I'm sitting in my bed. I'm reminiscing on spring break, and I get a text from my guy friends, and they're like, hey, Alex, we think you should see this. And immediately, I just know it's nothing good. So my guy friend gets on the phone, and he calls me, and he's like, I just want you to know that there's this photo of you online, and it's on the Facebook group. So remember when I told you guys, there's the different groups that you go with to the spring break? So there's say, like, 10 different colleges with this one group, and the group has a photographer, and the photographer uploads all these photos onto the Facebook group. I guess the Facebook spring break photos had just been posted, and there's this photo of me from when I was dancing up on the surface in my bikini. And it is the creepiest photo I have ever seen. This photographer was quite literally under me, like, under my legs. And this photo is very revealing. It's very close. I just remember seeing this photo and being like, oh, my God, I cannot believe this is on the Internet. Like, this photographer quite literally took a photo underneath my legs while I was in a bikini, very close up, and put it onto this Facebook group. So I immediately start freaking out. I send it to my friends, and they're like, oh, my God, this is worse than what I thought. And I'm just feeling, like, first of all, so insecure and embarrassed that, like, all these college kids are having access to this photo, and I'm freaking out. So I messaged the place that we get the tickets at for the spring break photos, and I'm like, hey, so can we take this photo of me down? Like, I really don't like this. Whatever. I feel like this is really inappropriate. And they left it up. They left me on red, and they never sent anything. I don't even know if it's, like, illegal or not, but, like, well, I didn't want to, like, tell my parents. I mean, it's like, nothing was, like, revealing, I guess. I mean, maybe revealing is not the right word. It was definitely things, like, it was just very close photo, like, right under my butt in a bikini. You know, you get the vibe. You get the gist. Things are happening, you know? So I just remember being so embarrassed and being like, oh, my God. So now I'm in lockdown. There's nothing. There's nothing for anyone to do. So all everyone's doing is looking through these photos because, like, what else are we doing? We're all screaming, scrolling on our phones. And I just remember being so embarrassed. So that was my first memory of spring break. We got sent home because of COVID and then they posted my cooch online. So I. Not a great first spring break in my book. This episode is brought to you by Tinder. It's February, and love is in the air all month long. Don't wait around for it to fall in your lap. When you've got Tinder's first impression feature, you can now send a message before you even match. Whether it's calling out their taste in music or dropping a funny line they won't forget, it's low pressure. It's a fun, easy way to put yourself out there. I feel like this is a good feature and you don't have to commit to the match yet, but it's kind of like just sliding into someone's DMs. This is your month for romance, and Tinder is the perfect place to make it happen. Explore all the Possibilities for yourself. Tinder. It starts with a swipe. Download Tinder today.
