Narrator (4:46)

Extra Risk.

Kevin Allison (5:35)

Hello kids, this is Extra Risk where we give you just a little bit more of the show where people tell true stories they never thought they'd dare to share. I'm Kevin Allison and this is the city champs behind me. Now it's making me all nostalgic because we featured them on some of our very earliest episodes. Speaking of which, I have gotten your emails and we know that iTunes is now not allowing people to access some of our earliest episodes because we're over the hundred episode limit. You can find our earliest stuff@risk show.com Listen now. We are calling today's episode In My Own Skin. I always find that phrase so poignant when people say that. People say things like I didn't feel comfortable in my own skin. Well, today we have two stories by two wonderful gentlemen, both of whom they've been through a lot with their bodies and those bodies and the men who inhabit them deserve TLC if you ask me. We're going to start with a man named Andrew Solmson, new friend of ours. We met him at the LA Pod Fest last fall. He walked right up to me at the festival and said, hey, I'm a friend of Jackie Cation's. I said, well, any friend of Jackie Cations is A friend of mine, and he said, well, I think I have a story I might like to share with you. And that is the story that we're about to share with you. So let's give a listen to this now. Friends, this is Andrew Solmson with a story we call let somebody love you.

Andrew Solmson (8:00)

Hi, I'm Andrew and I'm an IT nerd. I love being a nerd. The other day I was at a show that a friend of mine puts on, and he likes people to come up and do unusual things. And it's called Crapshoot. It's a lot of fun. And he put my name in the hat. And what he wanted me to do was to come up and yell at everybody to back up their hard drives. And I can do that. It's something that matters to me. Back up your shit. My refrigerator is covered with magnets out of dead hard drives, and each one of them is somebody's baby pictures or unfinished script. And now they decorate my refrigerator. So for Christ's sake, back up your shit. Anyway, I did that. I yelled at the crowd for three or four minutes, and they liked it, and it was very funny. And after the show, I was sitting in the lobby and there was a girl who came up to me and she started talking to me about Harlan Ellison. I may not know a lot about women, but when a woman is broadcasting on all frequencies, when she is talking to me about the man who wrote Repent, Harlequin said, the TikTok man, or City on the edge of Forever, which is, in my opinion, the best episode of Star Trek ever made, that's a girl I can talk to. And we did talk, and very intensely for quite a while. She was beautifully put together. She was wearing a kind of almost Mad Men kind of outfit. It was fairly obvious that she was heavier than she'd ever been and that she was not comfortable with that. And I'm a big fat guy and I'm comfortable with that. I get up on stage, but I'm also not comfortable with it at all. I'm £475. There's not a lot I can be happy about with that. I look down and I'm reminded of every bad decision I've ever made. Every late night Jack in the box run, every. Every time that I've chosen an immediate satisfaction over everything else I want in my life. You know, whether it's. It's, you know, intimacy with women or, you know, the ability to go on a hike. I can't stand up for more than 10 or 15 minutes. It's a very limiting life I've chosen for myself here, and I get very mad at myself about it. And at the same time, 2:00 in the morning rolls around and I've gotten done with a show and I'm in my car and I've got a podcast playing sometimes Risk. And I've gotten into this rhythm lately where I just drive around aimlessly listening to podcasts and hitting fast food shops. And, you know, food is a soothing thing. There's a thing, and I know exactly where it comes from. My mother was always heavy and went on diets all the time. And so food was this medicine. It's so easy. It's so easy. I'm by and large very happy with my life. I was at a karaoke party the other day, and karaoke is usually miserable, but all the people I'm around are so talented and it was so fun to watch. And these are the people I'm around, and I'm so happy about that. And yet there's this side of my life that is just so desperate and awful. Everybody says, go get bariatric surgery. Go get a, you know, a bypass or whatever. And I just am convinced that what's wrong with me is not in my stomach. And maybe that's just denial. Maybe that's just keeping somebody from doing something that's going to help me because I don't want to give up my drug. It's filling in all senses of that word for a little while, and then it's over, and you immediately hate yourself. And that was something I reacted to with her, I think, because there were so many little. You know, people talk about red flags or warning signs, but I read people pretty well, and there were a lot of signs with her. She, you know, it sounded like she had a kind of a hoarding situation going on at her house and just not happy. And I can talk about that with somebody. And so we did. We talked very intensely for almost an hour. And then we decided to go to a party. And we went to this party, and we were sitting there alone in the living room. After about 15 minutes of more incredibly intense conversation, she grabbed my head and started kissing. I may not know a lot about women, but I read the signs. We came into my place, we sat down, we had a few glasses of wine. One thing kind of led to another, and we found ourselves in the bedroom, lying down in bed. And from her side of the bed, I hear her say, does this mean we're boyfriend and girlfriend now? Just kidding. And she wasn't kidding. I thought for a minute. Oi. And then I realized I'd kind of be okay with that. She was really interesting. She was funny and smart, and she had a lot to say about a lot of things, and I liked being with her. So I walked her to her car, and during our conversation, we had, of course, pulled out our smartphones and become Facebook friends. So the next day, I messaged her on Facebook and I said what a wonderful time I'd had and how much I'd enjoyed meeting her and that I hoped we could see each other again. And after a couple of days, I got a message back. She said that she was embarrassed by what had happened, that she wasn't usually so impulsive, that she thought she might need to get her medication checked. I was struck. I was a little hurt. But I thought about it for a while and I thought to myself, you know, whatever you need. I just wanted her to be happy. She was so unhappy. And so I wrote back to her and I said, look, that's fine. Whatever you need to be happy, that's great. But just know that I found you funny, smart, beautiful, and charming. Be well. Be kind to yourself and let others be kind to you. It's hard. Lord, I know it's hard. But in the end, it's the only thing that ever matters. Best, Andrew. And then she blocked me on Facebook. Oh, God. We'll be right back.

Narrator (16:08)

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Kevin Allison (17:08)

Hey folks, I want to tell you about a new podcast called Reflektor. If you love Risk, you love true stories, right? And on each episode of Reflector, they really dive into some of the thorniest, messiest, issues facing our society today, from addiction to election denial to what inspires people to commit violence. And they weave together a story that highlights the nuances and idiosyncrasies of our human nature. On a recent episode, I was so excited to see that they have my friend Mike Pesca come on to talk about how and why politicians lie well, some more than others. So you can find this new podcast by searching for Reflektor right now on whatever app you're using to listen to Risk.

Narrator (18:03)

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Narrator (18:33)

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Kevin Allison (19:21)

This is Risk music by David Crabb behind me now.

Kevin Allison (19:26)

Hey folks, this is Kevin in 2024 coming in here to tell you something about this next story you're about to hear. As I said in the beginning, there's a sexual assault in this story, but also the storyteller Lee Harrington wrote to us about his feelings nowadays about this story, so I want to read you what he wrote. Lee said when first sharing this incredibly intimate tale, it was an opportunity to explore my emotions and experiences around the topic. However, I did not get explicit permission from the other person who was a part of this tale, and their experience was not a perfect match of my own. It's important to know that though this is my truth, different individuals will have different experiences. Please listen to this story, understanding that in any life experience you have, there is your story, their story, and some flavor of truth in between. I'm grateful for having the opportunity to learn the other side of the story, but even in learning, I have filtered it through my own lived experience. Love, Lee. Beautifully Said. So, without further ado, back to the episode.

Kevin Allison (20:48)

Our next story comes to us from someone who I have not known very long, but I'll tell you, I have the greatest admiration and affection for him. Lee Harrington is one of the most well known sex educators and just kinkster extraordinaires in the country today. If you are at all interested in the realm of kink and bdsm, the book that Lee wrote with the wonderful Melina Williams called Playing well with Others, you gotta go get it. It's the perfect introduction to embarking on a more adventurous sexual path, if you so desire. Other than that, he is just a beautiful soul. And so, without further ado, Here he is, Mr. Lee Harrington, with a little something we call the other side of the story.

Narrator (22:03)

When I was in high school, I was raped. I went over to my friend Connor's house, which is not his name, but it's his name for the story. We were part of the same Dungeons and Dragons group. Like, we were both just uber nerds. And we were playing Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, the computer game, and playing other Nintendo adventures. And in the middle of it, and this is back when I was female, expressing in the middle of it, he forced me down on the ground and used my holes in various ways, shape and form, and left the room. And I ran home in the middle of the the afternoon. I remember trying to pull back on my underwear and skirts clinging to my thigh and running and then finally stopping and just sitting down because I didn't know how to process the whole experience. And it was really interesting to me because there was no logic to it. It was one of the things that really struck me about the whole experience. A, the fact that he wore a condom during it, but B, it's not like he had been flirting with me. It's not that anything in that direction had possibly happened. It just was so incongruous. We knew each other, but it wasn't like we were best friends. It wasn't like there was any sexual history. It was just strange. Later that year, my parents got divorced and I moved to a different city. And I just tried to move on with my life. And I did so fairly well. Flash forward about 14 years. I'm at a BDSM club in Seattle and I'm sitting there in the food area hanging out with friends and talking and all that kind of stuff. And I go for a wander, you know, because when you're at a kinky sex space, it's like, okay, what else is happening? In here. Let's look at all the different adventures. Let's see what's going on. So I pass the spanky spanky scene, you know, walk past the people who are having sex, and I walk past the people who are doing midair crazy ropes suspensions. And then I wander past this room where a guy is on his back getting fucked from one end by a guy and being fucked from the other end by a guy, and there's a chocolate cake on his stomach. And I'm like, oh, that's interesting. And I continue past to go out to the smoking area, and I realized that the guy who had the chocolate cake on his stomach was my rapist. And so my brain stopped because, I mean, what do you do with that information? So I left the smoking area and I sat down the social space and drank a lot of Dr. Pepper and ate a lot of Red Vines, because what else are you going to do? And, you know, half hour hour passes and he wanders by me, still covered in chocolate cake, because you have to go through the social area to get to the showers. And so he goes to the shower and he comes back out and he pauses at the table I'm sitting at and says, this is going to sound really weird, but do I know you? And at this point, I'm male presenting. I'm going by the name Lee. I look like a dude. But he's like, do I know you? And I said, yeah, but when you knew me, you knew me under the name Bridget. And his jaw dropped and he stopped for a period of time that I have no idea how long it was. And he said, this is going to sound really presumptuous, but would you be open to having a conversation this evening? And I thought about it. I said, yeah, actually. Yeah, actually, I am. And so he's like, because I've got to go check in with my tops. I don't want to abandon them. But yeah, I'm like, yeah. And so he wanders off and goes check in with his tops. He comes back a little while later and tentatively sits down. He's not sure what to do because I'm not sure what to do. And it's just one of those weird moments. And he said, would you be open to me sharing my story of what happened that day? And I said, yeah, actually, that would help a lot. He's like, this is gonna be really weird. Where I'm like, actually, I did a lot of therapy about you and about our encounter, and I've worked through a lot of my demons around It. And right now, no, it's just really interesting to see you again. I said, okay. And he told the following story. When he and I knew each other, he was 16 years old and I was 14. When he was 15, his parents found out that he was gay, and they sent him, as good Mormons, to a reprogramming camp in Utah. And he endured restriction of food, restriction of sleep, electroshock therapy and other treatments. And he was there for most of the summer. And it was horrible and excruciating and heartbreaking. And he came back, and his mother said, oh, yay, you're going to be a normal teenage boy. This is fantastic. And a year had passed the day before I came over to play video games, when his mother said to him, I guess the programming didn't work. I think we're going to have to send you back. And so the next day, he went and hung out with his only female friend. And he thought about it and thought about it and went to the bathroom and put on a condom and came out and used me and took the condom upstairs and threw it at his mother's bedroom door and said, fuck you. I can fuck girls if I want to. And a year later, he ran away from home. Now he's a gay activist in the Northwest. And I remember that he couldn't make eye contact with me for most of the conversation. That it was him looking off to one side as if watching a television set and transcribing it for me. I got a view into his brain instead of him and I going back in time together. And I think that made the story safer, because if he'd been looking at me, I might have seen him who he was before. And neither of us were who we were before. You know, I wasn't the busty girl who played video games. He wasn't the nerdy boy with way too many pimples and fear in his heart. We weren't those people anymore. We were. We were adults who had each lived really rich and crazy and fantastic and horrible and heartbreaking lives. And we were in a different place. And if I had run into him six years earlier, I would have punched him in the face. I had had so much anger and resentment and trauma. And I said, would you be open to me telling my version of the story? And he said, yeah, yeah, I'd really like to. And so I talked to him about running home and stopping and how I'd written volumes and volumes of poetry about him and about that skirt that I was trying to pull back on. And I told him that I had really intense fantasies now about being held down and used because I had my first orgasm with him. And he stopped and he thought about that. And then he looked at me and said, can I ask a question? Okay. He's like, so you've transitioned. You're a dude now. And I said, yeah. And he said, I don't mean to laugh, but does that mean that I've never had sex with a woman? It was so absolutely absurd that here we were as a pair of guys talking about when he'd raped me, when I was a woman, or a girl, more accurately. And we fell over laughing, and we looked at each other and said, this is stupid and we shouldn't be laughing about it because it's wrong, but we're both laughing. And we hung out and talked and talked and spent time together and caught up on each other's lives. And I had a realization that at least in my reality, there's nothing that doesn't happen for a reason. That I endured this really traumatic moment in my life and in doing so, got to help save someone else's. And I wouldn't change a single thing because I got to save Connor's life. And that's. That's worth it. We still talk on Facebook. And what's really weird is that since we're both gay men now, there's a part of me that's debated flirting with him, and that's kind of broken and fucked up, but kind of beautiful and sweet at the same time. And I haven't gone there, but there's a little piece of me every once in a while when he makes a post or whatever that goes, huh, he's actually not that bad of a human being. He was just in a really, really hard place. And his hard place took me into a hard place for the next six or seven years. It's something that transformed both of our lives. But we never said that sentence to each other because I don't think it needed said. It was what it was, and now we're who we are, and I'm okay with that.

Kevin Allison (32:09)

That is all for this week, folks. This is Shogu Tokamaru behind me now with a song called Lovely Alan. And Mr. Tokyo. Kamaru seems to know a thing or two about loveliness. We'll be back with a regular full length episode of Risk next week. Don't forget to follow us on Twitter and Facebook at riskshow. Comment on us at itunes. @riskdashshow.com we teach storytelling as well. Go to thestorystudio.org to find out about our workshops in New York City or online via Skype or Google. If you think you have a story that you might like to share with us, go to the submissions page@risk-show.com we're always interested in hearing your stories, folks. Today's the day. Take a risk.

Andrew Solmson (33:53)

One thing kind of led to another. We went in the bedroom and we broke the bed. The whole thing just collapsed underneath us.

Narrator (34:17)

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Kevin Allison (34:34)

So much more of Risk in the holiday season. Risk is always publishing new episodes and new stories as well as holiday favorites. This holiday season, don't forget, click on Risk.