EPISODE 37: SALVATION
Dylan: Did you ever really feel that you hated the other?
Cody: Me personally, I hated her.
Janna: Yeah. I hated you for thinking that you were someone else.
[Instrumental of ‘These Dark Times’ by Caged Animals begins to play.]
Dylan [VOICEOVER INTRODUCTION]: Hey, and welcome to Conversations with People Who Hate Me. I’m your host Dylan Marron, back from an almost two-year hiatus. I gotta say: I’ve really missed you.
If you’re a longtime listener, I’m so glad to have you back. And if you’re just tuning in for the first time, I’m thrilled to have you here.
To explain the show’s long absence from your feed: there was, for one thing, a global pandemic, (I’m sure you’re aware) but there was something else: I wrote a book. A book that is actually also called Conversations with People Who Hate Me, because it is all about this very podcast. In this book I retrace my steps through years of making this show, the hundreds of strangers I’ve corresponded with behind the scenes, the dozens of conversations I’ve hosted publicly, and distilled all of that down to twelve things I’ve learned from this project.
And while the book tells the story of my process, the mistakes I’ve made along the way, and the unlikely connections I’ve made in spite of them… it’s meant to be a road map for you on how to have difficult conversations of your own. Not just with internet strangers. But family members, estranged friends, similarly-minded folks who you spar with for one reason or another, or anyone who sees the world very differently from you.
Glennon Doyle, the bestselling author of Untamed and of whom I am a huge fan, said this book helped her believe again in the potential goodness of the internet. Please don’t judge me for relaying a compliment about my own book. Or do, you’re your own person you can think whatever you want about me.
Conversations with People Who Hate Me: The Book comes out on March 29, 2022 and I am so so excited to finally share it with you. It’s available for presale now and you can either follow the link in the description of this episode or.... well I trust you know how to use search engines.
Okay that’s a lot about the book, we’re here for the podcast.
If you know this show, you know that in most episodes I either speak to one of my own online detractors or I’ll host a conversation between strangers who got into some digital friction of their own. You would also know that contrary to the title, this isn’t a hateful show. It’s actually quite the opposite and all about getting to know the human on the other side of the screen.
But today I’m hosting a conversation between two people who didn’t intersect online. There were no hateful DMs, no acidic tweets… not even a nasty email. Today I’m hosting a conversation between a mother and son.
Cody is a teenager who came out as trans in early high school. Janna is his mom, and she had quite a hard time accepting her son’s true identity.
This episode is called “salvation” which refers to the quote “preservation or deliverance from harm, ruin, or loss.” This episode is about what we can lose on that righteous path to salvation, and who we can hurt in our quest for it.
A word of warning: this episode talks about suicide attempts and ideation. If that’s not something you want to hear right now, I totally get it. If you’re struggling and need help please call the National Suicide Prevention Hotline at 1-800-273-8255. And specifically for trans listeners, you might also want to check out translifeline dot org for more resources.
Alright. Let’s begin. So first, I’ll speak one-on-one with Cody, then his mom Janna, and finally I’m going to connect them to each other. So, here we go.
[Music fades. Conversation begins.]
Dylan: Cody I'm just going to start recording right now. Are you comfortable with that?
Cody: Awesome, yes.
Dylan: Have you started recording?
Cody: Not yet.
Dylan: Okay just hit that record button.
Cody: All right, awesome.
Dylan: Okay so Cody, hi, we can actually talk as human beings now. (laughs)
Cody: Hi.
Dylan: How is your day going so far?
Cody: Good. Pretty good.
Dylan: Good. What's going on?
Cody: Not much, just cleaned my room, did some organizing stuff.
Dylan: And you have a day off today.
Cody: Yes.
Dylan: Where do you work?
Cody: I work at a pizza place right down the street from my house.
Dylan: Okay.
Cody: And I just started managing a couple weeks ago.
Dylan: So do you like doing that stuff? Do you want to work in customer service long term?
Cody: No, my dream is to pursue a psychology career. I'm hoping to get a raise soon, I'm just going to keep working there and maybe get a second job just while I go through college.
Dylan: Oh my God! This is big!
Cody: Yeah.
Dylan: Holy moly. Okay well, I feel like I'm catching you at such a crucial and amazing time in your life. So what an honor for me. (Cody laughs) I guess let's start with a very LGBTQ, queer question. But when did you come at out?
Cody: I actually came out a few times...
Dylan: Okay!
Cody: ... but I would say the first time I came out was— I was thirteen and I came out as bisexual, and I had a girlfriend. But I didn't tell my mom that I had a girlfriend I just came out as bisexual. But I do remember that she did end up finding that I had a girlfriend and she basically forced us to stop talking and break up.
Dylan: Whoa.
Cody: Yeah.
Dylan: How did you feel about your mom making you break up? Like, it's clearly something you went through with.
Cody: I felt like it was very unfair but I didn't really have a choice because, obviously I was thirteen so she had access to my phone, she could check it whenever she wanted, which is fair. But I did feel pretty attacked and it did very much seem like it was mostly because she didn't think I knew what I wanted yet at that age.
Dylan: That was the first time you came out, you said?
Cody: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Dylan: And then what was the second time?
Cody: The second time I was fourteen and I just came out as a lesbian because at that point I was still identifying as female. And I like women and I see myself as a man sometimes so I must be, like, a butch lesbian or something. So I came out at fourteen as a lesbian and my mom basically, the vibe I got was like, "You don't know what you really want." "This isn't what God wants for you." "How are you going to get to heaven?" "You're too young to really know what you want." That kind of stuff.
Dylan: So that was the second coming out?
Cody: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Dylan: And that was this coming out as a lesbian.
Cody: Yep.
Dylan: Take me there to the third coming out.
Cody: (Laughs) So third coming out, this sounds so awful.
Dylan: No, I love this! This feels like a gay amusement park ride.
Cody: (Laughing) I know, it really felt like that too.
Dylan: Okay, The Life of Cody! We're seeing him young! We're seeing him older!
Cody: Yeah, it definitely felt like that. I would say around fourteen, fifteen getting into high school, I came out as pansexual. My mom began to be kind of quiet, didn't really say much about my identity. It wasn't really a big deal at that point. We didn't have a very strong relationship and-
Dylan: But you were living together?
Cody: Yeah. I was living week on with my mom and week on with my dad so every Friday I would switch houses.
Dylan: So third coming out is pansexual, and then fourth coming out...
Cody: A little bit into my freshman year of high school is when I came out as trans.
Dylan: And did this coming out feel different?
Cody: Yes, it felt very different. I had been sitting on it for a lot longer than I'd ever sat on any of my other sexualities or anything that I was questioning. And I had talked to friends about it before I actually came out. And I really hid it for a while because I didn't want to disappoint my mom and I didn't want to go against anybody's wishes. And my dad had always wanted me to be a daddy's girl and I didn't want to throw any of that away. In like my eighth grade period I was wearing a lot of dresses, a lot of makeup, to try to push that away. So then when I came out as trans it felt a lot more concrete because I was like, I've thought about this for a while. Anyway, I had a lot of support from my friends. When I came out they all started calling me the right name and pronouns right away, and I had started with they/them pronouns and that lasted probably about a week or two and I was like, let's, let's try he/him pronouns and then that just stuck.
Dylan: Let's just go for it.
Cody: Yeah. And the first name I ever chose was Cody.
Dylan: Nice!
Cody: And I remember I was staying up, it was really, really late at night and I had actually made a Google doc, and shared it with my best friend and we just like put a bunch of names on there that we were thinking about.
Dylan: Whoa!
Cody: And we were either on a phone call, or Skype, or something as we wrote these down. And I remember reading the Skype messages and saying goodnight to him after we had hung up or whatever. And I remember him saying, "Well goodnight Cody." And he had texted that out and it really hit me like, wow, this feels right.
Dylan: Oh my God!
Cody: Yeah.
Dylan: That's really cool!
Cody: It was.
Dylan: I also think that the sharing new chosen names on Google docs is like modern queer teenagedom.
Cody: (laughing) Oh yeah.
Dylan: It's very like our queer ancestors-
Cody: It definitely was.
Dylan: ... could never have imagined that we would be writing our chosen names on Google docs but here you are. Or here you were. So it seems like you have a lot of support from your friends, how did your mom take it?
Cody: Well I actually didn't come out to her as close to coming to everybody else. I came out to literally everybody but her. And then I came out to her very last.
Dylan: Why did you consciously wait to tell your mom?
Cody: Mostly because of how I knew she had reacted to me coming out previously, and I knew she already didn't approve of that quote-unquote "lifestyle". (Dylan & Cody laugh) And then I also knew that I had come out multiple times before and that that didn't help me very much. (laughing)
Dylan: In your relationship with her?
Cody: Yeah. So she probably just wouldn't believe me again. And then with her beliefs and stuff, I didn't want to tell her at all.
Dylan: So how did you end up coming out to your mom? Walk me through how that goes.
Cody: This I vividly remember because I was so nervous and we, at this point, were not getting along very well. We barely talked, I was in my room a lot. So I remember sitting down in the living room and she was in her La-Z-Boy chair and I had sat on the couch, which is next to her. And I was just staring at the wall and she was like, "Hey, what's up? What are you thinking about?" And I was like, I'm just trying to think of how to tell you what I'm trying to tell you.
Dylan: Whoa.
Cody: And she was like, "What do you want to tell me? What do you want to talk to me about?" And after that, all of the words that I said are completely gone from my brain.
Dylan: (laughs) Total blackout.
Cody: Yeah, it was a total blackout because she was not happy. But I basically remembered just at some point getting to the fact like I'm trans. I'm a boy. And she, from what I remember, did her usual spiel of like, "You don't know what you want." "This isn't what God wants for you." "I want you to go to heaven."
Dylan: Got it.
Cody: It could be just a phase.
Dylan: "That's not how God made to you." That kind of thing.
Cody: Yeah. She would say that. And she would always say, "I love you anyway," but it felt kind of conditional because she would say, "I love you, but this isn't what God wants for you."
Dylan: Yeah. And "I love you anyway" feels like "I love you" with an asterisk.
Cody: Yeah.
Dylan: It's like, "yeah, I love you in spite of this horrible thing about you."
Cody: Yeah, right. Exactly. So soon after that I stayed with my dad because I felt very unsafe around her, not physically, but mentally, emotionally.
Dylan: Would she continue trying to save you, convince you, talk to you about her understanding of God?
Cody: Constantly. Yeah she was always trying, I wouldn't say trying to convert me point blank, but that did feel like that was what she was doing, trying to save me from the devil and all those kinds of things. "I want you to get to heaven, I want you to have salvation." And I can definitely say that definitely ruined any relationship I could have had with religion.
Dylan: (laughing) Right, right, right. Yeah kind of wild that you don't want to sign up for a religion that you are being sold to as a way to change who you are.
Cody: Yeah it's crazy.
Dylan: It's nuts that you did that. How was your mental health at this time? What-
Cody: Terrible.
Dylan: ... is going on? Okay. (laughs)
Cody: (Laughs) There's really no other way to put it. Through my freshman year and a little into my sophomore year I was put into a mental hospital, inpatient four times.
Dylan: Whoa.
Cody: Because of suicidal ideation and all that kind of stuff.
Dylan: Got you.
Cody: And the very last time was for an attempt.
Dylan: Just confirming that you feel safe and comfortable talking about this.
Cody: Yeah.
Dylan: Okay. Great. So suicidal ideation, suicide attempts.
Cody: Yeah.
Dylan: And then what was your relationship with your mom like in those early visits to the hospital? The first three visits.
Cody: Well for the early parts of it was when I wasn't living with her. So she didn't have much connection with me.
Dylan: And you guys weren't talking?
Cody: Nope, I told her to not talk to me because I didn't want to talk to her at all, I didn't want to hear from her because I felt very hurt and attacked, and very unseen and unheard. So I definitely did not like her at all at that point.
Dylan: And then there was a fourth hospital visit.
Cody: Yeah. My third hospital stay I was there for 17 days, and the very last day I had told them, I am not ready to go home, I will hurt myself, especially if you send me home with my mother, I will do something. I'm not ready to go home. I still feel the same as I did when first came.
Dylan: So you are sent home?
Cody: Yes I was sent home. Five days later after I was sent home, I was at my dad's house and I was like, here we go. This isn't worth it, I don't want to be here.
Dylan [VOICEOVER]: At this point Cody details how he attempted suicide— details I’ll be skipping over. So let’s fast forward to the aftermath.
Cody: ... I did it and then my stepmom came into my room because she cuts hair and she had a client at the house, and she was checking up on me. And then she just kind of looked at me and she was like, "You did not."
Dylan: Whoa.
Cody: And so they called 911 and the ambulance came. And the ambulance got there, they had opened the doors and I saw my mom and I saw my dad, and I just remember hearing my mom yelling, quite literally screaming at my dad like, "Why weren't you watching her? Why was she alone?" All these things.
Dylan: Misgendering you.
Cody: Yeah, yeah. They always were. I never tried near this time all. And she just kept throwing accusations at him and I believe it was the ambulance drivers that told them to knock it off, "we have to get this-"
Dylan: Save this person's life.
Cody: "... we have to get this kid upstairs and into a room" or whatever. And then I was sent to my fourth hospital, so it was five days later after my third stay.
Dylan: Oh my God.
Cody: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Dylan: At this time, is there a question you had for your mom that you just couldn't ask her?
Cody: Yeah. I guess if I did have a question it would have just been like, why? Why do you care so much? It's not your job to police my religion and why do you care so much about what I quote-unquote "want to be" or actually am? Like, why? Why do you care?
[Solo Conversation with Cody ends]
Dylan [VOICEOVER]: Soon after I chat with Cody, I get set up for another conversation…
Janna: Oh, I need to click continue. Standby.
Dylan: Have you hit record?
Janna: I have not yet. Shall I?
Dylan: Let's do it.
Janna: Okay.
Janna: (Now on a clearer microphone, in a sing-songy voice) I'm recording!
Dylan [VOICEOVER]: … one with his mom, Janna.
(Janna laughs)
Dylan: Okay, you're recording. You just had a hair appointment.
Janna: I did!
Dylan: Okay just so I can get your levels, I want to hear how your hair appointment was.
Janna: (Laughs) Well, I love my stylist, she's amazing. She owns the salon so she knows what she's doing. And so she's done a lot of in between stuff for me, I absolutely love her. I love her.
Dylan: Okay, great. So Janna just so we can get to know you a little, what do you do for work?
Janna: I am a sign language interpreter.
Dylan: Okay!
Janna: Yes. I'm a sign language interpreter. I've been nationally certified with credentials now for twenty five years.
Dylan: Oh my God.
Janna: And yeah-
Dylan: Look at you.
Janna: ... that's pretty much what I do.
Dylan: And you are also a mom.
Janna: I am.
Dylan: I would just like to hear about early motherhood for you. You had Cody, what was that like?
Janna: I was pregnant for Cody when I was thirty. And five months into it, it was gender reveal on the ultrasound and-
Dylan: You did a gender reveal before the gender reveals were big.
Janna: Well not really a "reveal" necessarily, it was in the doctor's office where they tell you what you're having.
Dylan: The like old—old school gender reveal.
Janna: (jokingly offended) Thanks. Thanks. Thanks, Dylan.
Dylan: (laughing) No the new school!
Janna: Pretty much.
Dylan: The new! Current! Hip! Contemporary!
Janna: It's okay. It was back in 2002, you're fine. I get it. (Dylan laughs) So we go in for the five month ultrasound and the whole way there I'm like, please Lord, give me a boy. Please give me a boy. Please give me a boy because I want GI Joe's and boy stuff because I'm a tomboy. I don't want to deal with tampons, boyfriends, fingernail polish, bras, all this stuff. (Dylan laughs) I'm not about it, give me a boy. So they do the ultrasound: "it's a girl!" "Ugh." So I cried all the way home. I didn't have any names picked out and I was like, ugh.
Janna: But it grew on me, it grew on me and that kid was the most beautiful baby I've ever seen. And not just because he was mine. I just remember the feeling of his warmth on me and just the feeling of, I don't even know, it's like this electrical impulse that goes through you from the gut all the way up and you're just like, wow.
Dylan: And then early years for Cody....
Janna: Yeah. Early years for Cody were your typical thing that we do with most kids that are whatever gender they're assigned at birth, I did all the princess— he had princess parties, he wore princess crowns, he had the dresses and, when he was really young like three, two and three, he would wear super cute little blue jeans skirts and sweaters and he loved Taylor Swift. So he had to look like Taylor, the high boots and he'd strut around the house.
Dylan: Wow.
Janna: But then once he got into school, school age, I started noticing he liked the sweatpants and T-shirts more.
Dylan: Interesting.
Janna: He didn't really want to do the girly stuff anymore.
Dylan: So it's a good segue. The first time Cody came out to you was around 2016, I understand.
Janna: Yes.
Dylan: Separate from Cody, I want to hear who were you in 2016? Give us a full picture.
Janna: In 2016 I was die hard, conservative, Jesus-following person. And I was very conservative-
Dylan: Were you politically involved or in so much as you-
Janna: No, not at all. No. I just knew that, and again, this is where the church influences a lot of things that it should not. The church influences your political stance. Everybody who's a Christian has to be Republican so I was Republican. Heaven forbid you be a Democrat and still love Jesus at the same time because you can't do that. (Dylan laughs) Can't do that.
Dylan: So you belonged to a church?
Janna: Yeah, yeah. I belonged to a church in my town and I had been saved at the age of twenty three, a fully baptized, under the water, and that was a really cool experience for me, that was way back in 1996. So it had been a while since that I'd been going to the church and I was under that impression of "hate the sin, love the sinner." You know, "Being gay is just bad" and "you're just going to go to hell, but you love them anyway." And "but we're going to pray the gay out of them!" And that's kind of where my mentality was in 2016.
Dylan: You said you were saved when you were twenty three?
Janna: Yeah.
Dylan: "Saved," am I using the right terminology?
Janna: Yeah. Yep.
Dylan: What was your relationship with faith before that? Because that's typically older than the beginning of a faith journey.
Janna: Yeah. So when I was young, I was eight, I had an older sister who was ten. We were walking home from school and a car hit her in the middle of the street and killed her in the street. And so I had to run home, I had to be the one run home and tell mom, "Alexandra's in the middle of the street." That's the last thing I remember. I don't remember them telling me she died, I don't remember her funeral. The only thing I remember after all of that happening was my parents were never the same. My mom couldn't function rightfully so. My dad's a 24-hour on-and-off firefighter so he's not home. So I had to grow up really fast, and become the older sister. And like I was now ten years old babysitting my two younger siblings who were— my younger sister was one when it happened and my brother was five and I was eight. My parents were Catholic and this is where this plays in. So my parents were Catholic and so survivors' guilt was huge for me. And I was like, God, why did you leave me here to clean this mess? Why didn't you take me with her? Why is it that I grabbed her hand that day and the car took her away literally, and she was gone? Why didn't you take me? So anyway this plays along because when I was eighteen, I was like, I'm done with this whole religion thing. Because if this was really real, God would not have left me behind, He would have taken me up there. So it wasn't clicking. And I started working somewhere and there's a couple people that work there that were Christians. They never really said anything about God but I knew they were different. I knew something was different about them and I couldn't figure out what it was. Well we became friends, they invited me to one of their youth group bonfires on a Friday night. I'm expecting a doobie to be passed around. (Dylan laughs) I'm expecting a little bit of drink in, there's no beer, there's no pot, what are we doing? This is weird. I couldn't figure it out. Long story longer, that's how I learned who Jesus was and what a relationship with Jesus was all about.
Dylan: Got it.
Janna: Because I was using the F bomb like crazy. I grew up with parents that were partiers— but these friends, the whole point to my story is, these friends never ever ever tried telling me that I was speaking the wrong way, that I was acting the wrong way, that I was doing anything wrong, they just loved me where I was. And so for me that was a huge thing so I started getting more curious about this whole God thing. And that's kind of where my relationship with God started was that point because I had this, I'm done, why didn't you take me with her? To, okay that Catholic part, that's the religious part, this is different. I want to know more about this part of it so that's where that whole thing started.
Dylan: Not to pathologize this for you, and please tell me if I'm out of line, or incorrect. But what it sounds like is that you experienced this incredibly traumatic thing in childhood, and then you were looking for, not only a community that would hold you and keep you, but also a way to make sense of this world and a closer relationship to God, in a way that would then make sense of what you experienced when you were a kid.
Janna: Absolutely.
Dylan: Does that feel right? Yeah.
Janna: Absolutely. And I think to this day, I'm forty eight and I still feel like— I'm still a strong Christian and I feel that same way still. Everything that happens to us is for his good. He uses everything, every situation happens to us for a reason, hence I'm being here today.
Dylan: So you're saved when you're 23, you are then more involved in this church. Now again-
Janna: I am, yeah.
Dylan: This is why this is always complicated to talk about because, it's not like people just decide to join churches that believe in hateful things—
Janna: Right.
Dylan: ... they want to belong to something. And so then they belong to a thing. But then you get certain lessons, (laughs) you get certain cues.
Janna: I could not have said it better,
Dylan: But you didn't know this in 2016.
Janna: No. My whole thought was, I figured this is the only way it is. And it wasn't that I was necessarily sheltered at the church, but when that's— when you go in and you fall in love with Jesus and you start to meet other Christians who have fallen in love with Jesus too, and you have this— you know, you can connect with other people on the same belief system that you're on. What you hear from a pastor is what you automatically accept. You take it.
Dylan: Totally. So you're deeply involved in the church at this time, and then Cody comes out to you for the first time.
Janna: Yeah.
Cody: What's your reaction? How do you take it?
Janna: Without even thinking I said to him, this is not what God wants for you. This is not how he created you to be. And when I die and I go to heaven, my job as a mom is to get you there. My job is your salvation. God gave you to me with the promise that I was going to bring you up in the Lord and have salvation. And what you are doing is not going to get you there.
Dylan: To be fair, I know that the best version of it is "you're not going to go to heaven," but what that also implies is—
Janna: You're going to hell.
Dylan: Yeah.
Janna: Yeah.
Dylan: Then there were a few more coming outs for Cody. He came out as bi, he came out as pan.
Janna: He did.
Dylan: And how did you take those coming outs?
Janna: The same way. Again, (in a severe, shaming tone) this isn't how God made you. And then I said, why are you labeling yourself? Why do you got to keep coming up with new names for yourself? Why are you doing that? In this tone.
Dylan: I understand that the fear was about Cody being saved, but was there any part of you that was like, "I'm going to be excommunicated from this community, that means so much to me"?
Janna: Absolutely. I was very much on the track of, what is my church going to say? What is my friends going to say? How am I going to bring my gay kid into my church? How am I going to do that without looking like an idiot? That's where I was. Yeah, for sure, fore sure.
Dylan: And again, please correct if I'm wrong, but there was also a sense of self-preservation for it.
Janna: Yeah self-preservation is a really good word for it because it's like, how can I still have the religious reputation that I have with a gay kid at the same time? How do I do that? How do I do that?
Dylan: In a sense you felt pure and so this was something that made you impure.
Janna: Yes, absolutely. I felt stained for sure. For sure.
Dylan: So then Cody's forth coming out, Cody comes out as trans.
Janna: By now I'm sick of it. Now I'm like, okay, what label are we using this week? Because clearly this is getting to be really dumb. What am I going to do now? Now I got to tell everybody my kid's a boy. It was bad. Yeah.
Dylan: And so I take it you were not using he/him pronouns at the time. (laughs)
Janna: (laughs) No. My whole thought to this whole thing was, huge, refusal, denial, whatever you want to call it.
Dylan: So what does that do to your relationship with each other?
Janna: It completely wrecked it, completely wrecked our relationship. Now he'd already been in the hospital a couple times, self-harm, stuff like that. And when he came out as trans, I told him his birth name was his birth name. I told him I was going to call him she pronouns, I said, this is not happening. It's not happening. Well every time I did that, it invalidated him more.
Dylan: But you didn't know that at the time?
Janna: Uh-huh (affirmative) I didn't know. I'm like, I'm doing what's right. I'm a mom, doing what God is telling me to do by telling you you're sinning, so all this stuff you're hearing from me, too bad, you'll get over it. You'll look back someday and thank me.
Dylan: And so that was after like three visits to the hospitals?
Janna: Yeah. Yep.
Dylan: And then there was a fourth visit.
Janna: There was a fourth visit. And I still get choked up by this one. So before this fourth visit, Cody and I were kind of sort of getting along, but I was tolerating it. I was tolerating his transgender stuff. Pronouns were not being used, name wasn't being used, I was tolerating it. So long story short, so his dad calls me crying and says, "He just tried killing himself, he's on the way in an ambulance." And I drive up to the hospital as the ambulance is pulling in. And (begins to choke up) he comes in on this ambulance, he comes in this ambulance wanting to die. Wanting to die. And it still, at that point, didn't click why, it didn't click that I was probably the reason, it didn't click. I just figured he still can't figure out that he's a girl. I still was-
Dylan: That's what it was in your head.
Janna: Yeah. And I was leaning more towards, maybe it's real, maybe he really is trans at that point but I wasn't ready to totally jump in head-first yet. But seeing your kid come in on a stretcher because they didn't think they were worthy enough to live, they didn't want to exist anymore, I knew then I had to do something. I knew what I was doing was not working. I didn't know what I needed to do, but I knew if I kept doing what I was doing he was going to succeed, and I was going to have a kid in a grave, and I was going to have to deal with that every week. I was going to have to deal with what my mom dealt with and go and visit my kid in a grave. And then I would have to deal with the fact that it would be my fault, the rest of my life. Can you imagine feeling the guilt of all of that? Anyway, so he goes into the hospital and I had my Bible.
Dylan: You brought it?
Janna: No, when I got home from the hospital it was here.
Dylan: Got it.
Janna: And I had it in my hands and I was walking around my apartment and I went into Cody's room and I prayed over his doorframe. And I prayed over everything in his room, and I prayed for everything he touched, and everything he loved in his room (begins to cry) that he would come back. That he would able to come back and be in my presence again. So, at that point I was like, I can't pray this gay away, it's not going to go away. I need to pray for his life. I need to pray that he loves himself enough to want to exist. Finally it was like this, okay maybe God did make him this way because no one's going to choose to live this kind of life. If it's a phase, kids go through the phase of being goth, or being punk rock or whatever in high school, but it doesn't last long. This was not a phase, we're going on year number three now, two, whatever it was. So then I get the call from the therapist and I'm still— the therapist calls me to talk about what's going on with him and the therapist says, "You have got to start using his pronouns and his name or I can't guarantee what's going to happen. The rates of the suicide rates of transgender kids is huge, this is a real thing. Studies have been done, transgender is a thing, please just open your eyes and mind to what's going on, whatever." So I said, fine, I'll call him Cody, just put him on the phone, whatever. So Cody gets on the phone and I said, "Okay, you want me to call you Cody? I'll call you Cody." I'm rolling my eyes this whole time. I didn't get it. But the minute I did that, the peace that my kid had was like no other. So I picked up my phone, I hit contacts, typed his name went up and I will never forget touching the word "edit" on my phone. Tapping on that name and backspacing it. So I type it and I hit save, that's all she wrote. And that's where, Cody's attempted suicide, that was the turning point for me to get it together.
Dylan: Yeah. Wow. (Janna sniffles) So the last question I have for you, and it's a short one but, is there something that you want to tell Cody or ask Cody that you have never asked or told him?
Janna: I guess the one thing that I would tell him is, (begins to cry) I'm so sorry for that. I think he knows that because I will say to him now, I can't believe I did that or wow, that was really dumb or whatever. But I've never sat down, and I don't know why, there's no reason I didn't. But I've never really sat down and just said, I am sorry for causing all of this pain and not affirming who you are, and not supporting you in your journey, and not realizing that it's not just my side, but you have a side in this too. And so I think for me, it's just that whole asking forgiveness and just, I'm sorry that I didn't know. And it's not that I'm sorry for being mean or for being purposefully a bad person, it's, I'm sorry that I didn't know any better. I'm sorry that it took you to try to take your life for me to realize. I'm sorry it went to that extreme. I'm sorry that you had the pain of going through this first part of your journey alone. I'm sorry I didn't get to help you pick your name. I'm sorry I didn't see your first haircut. I'm sorry I didn't meet your significant others. I'm sorry I didn't— I'm sorry I wasn't there for all the things that I would've been if you presented female at the age of thirteen, fourteen. I think that's the biggest thing for me is that.
Dylan: (heavy inhale)
Janna: Yeah. It still gets to me, it still gets to me. It does. My hope is that a parent will hear this broadcast and not do what I did. I missed out on so many firsts because of that. So yeah, for sure.
[Solo conversation with Janna ends]
Dylan [VOICEOVER]: Up next, I talk to Cody & Janna together. But before that, a quick break.
[BREAK]
Dylan [VOICEOVER]: All right. We’re back. Now, you may have caught that both Janna and Cody told their story in the past tense. And that’s because some things have changed.
Cody: Hi.
Dylan: Hi, can you guys hear me?
Cody & Janna: (simultaneously) Yes. (Janna and Cody’s chatter fades down in volume)
Dylan [VOICEOVER]: … a lot of things have changed. They live together now and have a totally different relationship.
Janna: (Janna’s voice fades up) Airplane mode, do not disturb is on and we are recording.
Dylan: So first of all, hi!
Cody & Janna: (simultaneously) Hi!
Dylan: Now I have to say that this is typically the point in the podcast episode where I either introduce people to each other, or reconnect people after a long time of distance. That is not the case now, you live together.
Cody: Yes.
Janna: We do.
Dylan: Okay. So last we left off, things were just starting to change between you two. How did we get from after Cody's hospital visit to now? So I say, just go for it.
Cody: I would say it started changing during my last hospital visit. My social worker at that last hospital had had a talk with her for, like, forty five-ish minutes.
Janna: Yep.
Cody: Obviously it wasn't a smooth transition, but after that she definitely immediately started trying to address me correctly.
Janna: I think for me, I think it was like, when a therapist had said to me, "You need to start calling him he and using Cody." And I kept rolling my eyes like, this is stupid, but okay, fine, whatever. But I will never forget, Cody, when the therapist was done talking to me and she put you on the phone, do you remember that conversation? And I was like, Hey Cody. And you were like, "What?" In a good way. It was like a, "oh, you have my attention, you're calling me my name." That's kind of where it started for me, I think too.
Cody: Yeah, for sure. Definitely that's when things started to turn around.
Janna: Yep.
Dylan: No. Like a big thing I always find it really important to focus on, especially with this podcast, is that I really try to show people that change takes time—
Cody: Oh yeah.
Janna: Yeah.
Dylan: ... and it's not this sudden, immediate thing. So I understand that in the narration there was this heroic social worker who said this amazing thing to you, but also like, yes if we were doing the movie of your lives, that is the change, right?
Janna: Yeah I would say so.
Dylan: But I do think it's also important to highlight the, like, rough parts afterwards. I want to hear from each of you what the rough parts were like.
Janna: I think for me, and this is something I told Cody from the beginning was, I felt like he was demanding, "I am now your son, my name is Cody, this is the way it's going to be period." And that's what it felt like on my end. And so for me, I had to come back with, okay, wait a minute. You've known in your heart and in your mind for a while that you were a boy. You've known this for a while, I haven't. So the thing I told him was, you had your time to process, give me my time.
Dylan: Cody how did that feel for you?
Cody: I guess I was in a rush because I was like, I'm finally correct in my identity, and I finally feel like myself when I hadn't known myself almost my whole life. And I had been out for a year, a little over a year so I felt like, how much time do you need?
Janna: And I remember we went down to get his top surgery and we were at a rest area, I remember that, and walked into the rest area and this guy held the door open for us, "Ladies first." Finally I got it now, my heart sunk for my kid like, ugh! They said he's a girl. Ugh! And I cannot believe how much I've changed in a year from that whole perspective but. So then Cody looked at me and I looked at him and I said, are you okay? And he's like, (uneasy) "mmm." But it's that whole thing and mama bear comes out and I'm like, are you safe? Do you want me to wait? Are we going to wait? What are we going to do? Like, I'm trying to— He was just about eighteen a month shy from eighteen, trying to let him figure some things out, but also I told him when he was little kid I was going to fight for him the rest of his life. And I'm always going to fight for my kid. What does that look like when he's eighteen and can do things on his own?
Dylan: It's an interesting thing I'm just recognizing, seeing that it's like the mama bear mentality, the mama bear mindset, has been present throughout.
Janna: Yes.
Dylan: One mama bear mindset was changing Cody and then the other mama bear mindset was just being like, "okay, Cody is who he is-"
Janna: Changing everybody else.
Dylan: Yeah.
Cody: Yeah for sure.
Dylan: And Cody how has that change registered for you? Or how do you feel about it?
Cody: It was really weird at first just because I had been used to years and years of like, "this isn't what God wants for you" and "I'm worried about your salvation." So we went from that to walking in the grocery store and she's like, "Well, my kid uses he pronouns," to strangers. (Dylan laughs).
Janna: Yeah (laughing)
Cody: So it was a pretty dramatic shift, and obviously I was grateful, so for that shift, but it was weird to get used to. And, like, talking to my friends, like, and especially within the last probably six months, talking about her TikTok and they're like, "Well what kind of videos does she make?" (Janna laughs) And I'm like, she literally just talks about me. (laughs) So it was definitely a dramatic shift.
Dylan: You have a very big presence on TikTok.
Janna: I do. I started TikTok because I had four months off of work, and then one day I was out for one of my many ten mile walks and I was out walking. And I was like walking and talking in a video and I just started talking about him and people just ... I mean I was getting messages like, "oh, my son is trans!" And then I was like, I'm not the only one. Because I'd never shared my story with anybody. I never talked to another parent who had a trans kid, ever. Ever. And to be able to be there for someone is such a gift. Such a gift to be able to do that.
Cody: Like, even before she'd even gained any traction I was like, she's taking time out of her day to spread what she learned and what she went through, and accepted the fact and shared with people, and still shares with people that she didn't respond correctly in the beginning, and that, in a weird way, meant a lot to me even though it was just on a random social media platform but it kind of resurfaced those feelings of like, yeah I'm okay with this.
Janna: And along with that, we just had this talk last week, I think it was. And Cody kind of said it and I agreed that, I feel like part of me, subconsciously, is making up for all the that I did by helping out somebody else who's going through it. And so I feel like if I can get on this platform and hopefully be with other kids, because I know what I did to him was not okay. And so maybe it's just making up for it, that's not really why I'm doing it, but I think that's part of it maybe.
Cody: I don't want to put feelings in your mouth but to me it kind of seems like repaying your debt almost.
Janna: Yeah. For sure, I would agree with that.
Cody: And to me, I don't hold any resentment and I'm actually grateful because not only are you quote-unquote "repaying your debt", but also you're being there for kids who, if they didn't have you, they would have nothing. And while I virtually had nothing, aside from friends, I'm okay now and we fixed our relationship now, so you're using your education and your growth to spread the positivity that I wasn't able to have at that point to me, but also to other kids who don't have that.
Dylan: Cody I don't want to like put words in your mouth or make you manufacture a feeling that you didn't have, so just answer this as honestly as possible, but was there a like— as your mom was going through this transformation of being a better mom to a trans son, was there also a kind of process that you had to go through to forgive her?
Cody: Oh yeah, definitely.100%. Obviously I was so grateful that she educated herself and changed her mind and everything, but there was a kind of resentment like, where was all of this a year ago or two years ago?
Janna: Yeah, for sure.
Cody: Where was all of this when I was thirteen and coming of age and had a girlfriend? Where was all of this support back then? Maybe if I had the support I wouldn't have gone to four mental hospitals.
Janna: Absolutely.
Cody: So there was a healing process for me telling myself that, I can't change what happened and she can't change what happened, and that I did forgive her. And that she was always just trying to do what was best for me. And she did end up doing the right thing so that's what matters.
Janna: And I'll tell you this is really interesting, sitting here this close, dialoguing this well when two years ago I was every rotten name in the book. I was completely hated. He didn't want to be in the same room with me at all. And that's something I caused, it's not him, it's me. So it's cool to hear this in a different, we're in a different time of life now where we can hear this stuff and go, "Ah! Got it! Okay."
Cody: Yeah and I think about that a lot. Like two or three years ago I was literally afraid of this woman. Like afraid of what she thought of me, afraid of disappointing her, afraid of being who she wanted me to be. Afraid of our relationship not existing for the near future and now here I am getting into a car with an ally sticker on it, (Dylan laughs) she always has her ally necklace on. And it's just crazy to think about how I'm sitting to this person who loves me with all of her heart, and always has, but that I used to be afraid of.
Dylan: Yeah. You brought up the word of the show, which is the word hate. So did you ever really feel that you hated the other? Or did you feel that the other hated you?
Cody: Me personally, I hated her. And I will own that. I literally hated her because, in my eyes I felt like I just want to be free, and you're trying to mold me into this person that I keep telling you that I'm not. And I—
Janna: That's accurate.
Cody: I didn't think I was ever going to turn sixteen.
Janna: Me either.
Cody: And so I held a lot of resentment toward her because I didn't feel loved. I felt like she only loved who I used to be and who she wanted me to be. So I can say, in that moment I did hate her and I never felt like she hated me as a person, but I definitely felt like she hated who I was becoming and who I wanted to be, but I never felt hated by my mom.
Janna: I would say that's pretty accurate. I think I hated the LGBTQ community, I don't know if I've ever told you that story, but-
Cody: Yeah, you did.
Janna: The minute you came out, everybody's sending me all kinds of stuff on Facebook. (in a mocking voice) "Oh, gay pride!" "Free mom hugs!" I'm like, your stupid community took my kid from me and so now I got to deal with a shit afterwards. That's just where I was.
Dylan: "Your stupid community" meaning the LGBT...
Janna: Yeah. Yeah, for sure. For sure. Because (mockingly preachy tone) "they coerced you," that's just where my mentality was. And so, I would have never kicked him out, I would have never left him homeless on the street, none of that stuff would have ever happened. I didn't go to that extreme, but I hated you for thinking that you were someone else.
Dylan: Yeah. But then there's that also kind of confusing thing that, Janna, the messages you were getting from your faith community were that actually, this is love.
Janna: For sure.
Dylan: So religion and faith, or specifically a specific interpretation of religion (laughs) was a significant factor-
Janna: Absolutely.
Dylan: ... in the rift between you, is that fair to say?
Janna: Absolutely.
Cody: I would dare say it is specifically-
Janna: Agreed.
Cody: ... it wasn't just something that played a part, it was what drove us apart.
Janna: Yep, absolutely agree. Because I think if I was not a Christian and wasn't involved in a church, I wouldn't have cared.
Cody: Yeah. Because the key phrase that I always heard in our years of struggling was, "What about your salvation? Don't you want to get to heaven? I want to see you in heaven. This isn't what God wants for you, this isn't how God made you." I never got like you, "eww that's gross" or "eww that's wrong" or that kind of stuff, it was only religious based.
Janna: Absolutely.
Cody: So I do believe if she was just never a Christian, which I don't want because that's a big part of who she is, and it's amazing now, but, religion was definitely the key component in what happened.
Dylan: Yeah. And this is the part where we, of course, have to acknowledge that religion and the religious community is not a monolith.
Janna: Sure.
Dylan: There are so many different interpretations of God and how people relate to their God. So, I think, while I fully understand why we are talking about religion in this way, specifically the role it had, I think that there are people who are exposed in their lives to a much more open, accepting, affirming religious identity, but that's not what everyone gets.
Janna: Right.
Dylan: So I'm curious, you are both and together in such different places than you were. But even still, throughout all this time, is there anything that you're like, "oh, it never occurred to me to say this." "It never occurred to me to ask this?" Cody you can go first
Cody: Honestly, no, in my solo interview you had asked me, was there something I would've asked her or said to her back then? And I had said like, "why?"
Dylan: "Why," yeah.
Cody: "Why would you do this?" And "why do you feel the need?" But, I think it's no longer a question I would need to ask.
Dylan: Yeah. Yeah. Janna what about you? Either a question or something you haven't told Cody?
Janna: Nothing. After our interview last week, a few days ago, I had said to Cody that I was sorry because I hadn't said that before. I mean I had thought about it and I kind of sort of said it by changing who I am, but we had had a big, long hug and cry out about that because I'm like, I feel terrible, I never really said the words I'm sorry. So that was a big one.
Dylan: So that all happened off-mic is what I'm hearing?
Janna: Yeah.
Dylan: Okay, great. No, I'm glad I didn't get the exclusive, but it's good! (Laughs) It's better for the health of your family.
Janna: Yeah. But it was just interesting because when you and I had the interview and I told you that, because you had asked me if there's something you could say to him and I said, I would tell him I'm sorry. And I'd cried about it when I talked to you and then we got done, I was telling him about the interview and I just said, I'm sorry. I feel terrible. And Cody was like, "It's okay." And it wasn't that I never ... It's not that I was too proud to say, I'm sorry, I just never realized I had to say it. And to have to hear him say back, "It's okay." And to hug me back and say, "It's okay mom." That's huge.
Dylan: Well I'm really glad that moment happened.
Janna: I am too and I didn't realize it was supposed to happen until the interview with you and I was like, this is something I need to do. I need to do this. I need to do that.
Dylan: Wow. Well, look at us.
Janna: I know.
Dylan: So we know that there are a lot of families who are blessed with trans kids and they might not see that as a blessing right now. Which is to say, there are a lot of families like you were years ago.
Janna: Absolutely. Yeah.
Dylan: I want to hear what you'd say to them.
Janna: I would say to parents that it's going to be okay. That's the biggest thing that I can say is, it's going to be okay. Find a support group, find a connection with somebody that's going through the same things. Your child is still your child. You can not understand it, but support them and love them. Or, as we know the rates of suicide are high with trans kids, 40% attempt, you can go visit them at the grave. Those are your options. And it's not a phase. 1% of kids change their mind. It's not a phase. You have to let your kid lead the direction with that. If you're noticing traits at four and five and six years old, if your biological son's saying he's a girl. "Oh! Well tell me about that! Okay!" Don't put labels on them, but let them lead that process because then you're encouraging them to be who they want to be. And they're not going to be ashamed and feel like Cody had to feel when he first came out. My biggest thing for parents is just love, love your kids. Just love them. Love them. Tell them every day that you love them and show it by trying to learn who they are. Yeah. That's my big ones.
Dylan: Everything you just said is so beautiful, but it's kind of hard to put into action for parents who are really in the thick— Like, if you had heard that at just now, and I don't mean to correct-
Janna: No, please. Yeah.
Dylan: ... this beautiful thing you just said but, if you had heard what you just said four years ago, you would've been like, "okay lady..."
Janna: Yeah.
Dylan: "... I love my kid. I love my kid so much and I want to protect him." You wouldn't have used that correct pronoun (Janna laughs), but you would have been like, "I want to protect my kid and that's just what I want to do." And this is a complicated thing to ask or morally complicated, but with love to Janna from four years ago. How would you even get through to her? How would you get through to her now?
Janna: We both know a parent who's doing this to their kid right now, and they're in the midst of it. And yeah, it's a big mess. So I picture them when I say this. I would probably knock on their door and say, let's go for a walk. Tell me what you're feeling right now. Are you mad? Are you anxious? Where is your emotion coming from? Because I think a lot of parents' emotion is coming from, "what is everybody going to say?" And "how do I keep my kids safe?" I think mostly that's what it is. And so that's, I think, where I would start and just let them lead the way of what they're thinking and how they're feeling. Just tell me where you are right now in this moment. You're scared? That is okay. You're mad? That is okay. You're not understanding why your kid "thinks" —with air quotes— that they are another gender? That is okay. Those feelings are all valid feelings, those are all very, very valid. It's how we react to those feelings that's not okay.
Dylan: And then in terms of the education, specifically, what does "getting educated" look like? Because again, it's this thing that we say on Twitter all the time, but it's like, you know, how?
Janna: Yeah. Getting educated for me meant doing a lot of, which I don't know if I ever told you this, but a lot of late night Googling, "what is trans?" "What is a person who's asexual? What does that mean?" "What does this mean when you think your pan?" "What is a top surgery? What does that look like?" Just learning about who they are. Okay you're pansexual, what does that mean for me? Let me look up what Google has to say, and you look as many articles as you can. I was looking at, you didn't know this either, but looking at a lot of YouTube trans people talking about who they are and what it meant. "Oh." So for me it's just educating myself, meant looking at as many resources as I possibly could, and then using your child as a resource and saying, what does that mean? Because I still ask you stuff. What does that mean? Can I use this word? "Nope, that's only for the gay community, use this word." (Dylan laughs) I don't know what I don't know, and so how do we educate? We ask. We look up things. We've got the internet in our hands all day, on our phone. Look up stuff, ask people, look for support groups. Because the more you educate yourself, the more your kid is going to feel connected to you and you're going to want to be a part of their life as well when they know, "okay mom is trying."
Dylan: Yeah, yeah. Yeah that's perfect. Cody, what would you say to a young trans person who was where you were four years ago? Three years ago? Maybe even two years ago? What would you say?
Cody: I would say just hold on as hard as you can, just don't let go because I really wanted to. I really didn't see myself living after sixteen. I didn't see myself hitting my sixteenth birthday, I really didn't. Like, point blank, I really didn't. I didn't see myself having a future, I didn't see myself getting married. I didn't see myself getting a house, nothing, it just didn't matter to me because I didn't feel like my parents loved me, and wanted to support me, and go with me on my journey. I didn't feel like I had much worth left and I know that's a common feeling. But I would just tell them just to hold on and to remind themselves that they do have worth. Because if you have a body, no matter what that body looks like, no matter what your brain looks like, no matter what your brain thinks, you have worth. If you take up space in this world, that is okay and you have worth and that eventually it does get better no matter what that getting better looks like. Because your parent may change their mind and educate themselves like my mom did, and your life will change dramatically and you'll finally be happy for once in your life. And you will feel right, and you will feel good taking up space in the world. And then if your parent doesn't end up coming around, then it will get better because life changes. And while you hate it right now, and you don't see a point in carrying out right now, it does get better and it does change, and it is worthwhile. Because I'm the happiest I have ever been in my life.
Dylan: Janna how are you feeling right now?
Janna: (crying) Well, you go from a kid who wants to die to, saying everybody has worth. And I was trying to tell him that when he was younger. You're amazing, you're fine. And, "No, I'm not, no, I'm not." Well I was not realizing that I was the one telling him that he wasn't. So hearing him say, "Hold on," and "I didn't think I was going to make it," that's powerful stuff.
Dylan: Wow.
Janna: Yeah.
Dylan: I really just want to say thank you so much for just even doing this. I really hope and think that this could be a huge resource to— maybe even not directly. Maybe it's not even A Trans Boy Who Is Trying To Come Out To His Resistant Mom. (Janna laughs) I think there are parallels. I think there are all sorts of ways we don't understand each other, all sorts of ways that we think we're loving someone when actually that love is the opposite.
Janna: Yeah.
Dylan: And I think that it's really helpful to hear this stuff from people who made it through to the other side.
Janna: Yeah. I think if it plants a seed for some parent, who's got a two, three, four year old who they're noticing, "Ah. They're a boy but they like to paint their nails." Nothing wrong with masculine men painting their nails, by the way, just saying. If that turns into, they want to wear dresses. They say they're a girl, I would love for somebody to be able to hear this podcast before that. So then when they hear it, they have the tools ready and available and they can go, I've heard somebody talk about this and they know what to do. For me I had nothing, I had nobody to tell me anything. I did this all on my own that's why I screwed it up so bad. Because I didn't have anybody in the beginning to say, "Whoa, whoa, whoa, here's what's really going on." So my hope is that somebody, that's why I got a hold of you in the first place was, that's why I do TikTok, if I can get to people out there and they can hear this before it happens, then they have the right tools. So when my kid came to me at thirteen and said, "I think I'm a lesbian." I would've said, tell me about that. Really? What's her name? Who do you like? Really? That would've been really cool. So if I can get someone else to that point, that's the whole reason I'm doing it.
Dylan: Well it's also about modeling.
Cody: Mmm-hmm (affirmative). Mmm-hmmm.
Dylan: While I do think it's definitely important to take accountability of the pain we cause other people, something I always try to focus on is like, Janna you did not invent transphobia.
Janna: (laughs) Yeah.
Janna: You were getting transphobic messages over and over and over again. And even those people, Janna, who were giving you those messages, they did not invent that either.
Janna: No.
Dylan: And that's hard to hear. It's something that I always struggled with early on in the podcast when I was speaking one-on-one to my own detractors exclusively it's like, oh yeah, it was on the phone that I was like, this person is not homophobia. (laughs) They are not The Thing.
Janna: Yeah, for sure.
Dylan: They're a tiny, infinitesimal part of that Big Thing.
Janna: Exactly.
Dylan: And then individually they're this whole realized person that's like this balance back and forth between macro and this micro, and the big and the small, over and over again.
Janna: Yes, absolutely.
Dylan: And that's what this is all about, it's like understanding those big things through these small conversations, through individual people, which is what creates those big things. It's this back and forth, constant back and forth.
Janna: Yeah. And I think, and again, just from my relationship with God standpoint is, I feel like he uses everything for his good and as wrong as it was for me to treat Cody the way that I did, this is, the good part of this is, one of me doing something wrong can get to a lot of people so they do it right.
Dylan: Yeah. That's like I think the best consequence of media and social media too.
Janna: Absolutely.
Dylan: Thank you both so much for doing this, I-
Janna: Yeah, thank you.
Dylan: ... love this conversation.
Cody: Yeah.
Janna: Yeah this has been neat to be able to hear it sitting next to him like this.
Cody: Yeah.
Janna: It's been really, nothing was said that I didn't know already, but it was still neat to hear it in this context.
Dylan: Well, I think that wraps it up for today. So I just want to say Janna and Cody, thank you so much for opening up about all this stuff and coming on with me here today.
Cody: Yeah.
Janna: Thank you it's been nothing short of a pleasure.
Cody: Yeah, it was awesome.
Janna: Yeah, for sure.
Dylan: Amazing. Okay. Well, bye guys.
Cody: Bye
Janna: Bye.
[Conversation ends with a hang up sound. The drumbeat from ‘These Dark Times’ by Caged Animals kicks in.]
Dylan [VOICEOVER CLOSING CREDITS]: If you have an idea for a conversation for this show, head on over to www dot conversationswithpeoplewhohateme dot com and fill out the brief submission form.
Conversations with People Who Hate Me is part of the TED Audio Collective.
This episode was mixed by Vincent Cacchione, the theme song is “These Dark Times” by Caged Animals,nthe logo was designed by Philip Blackowl with a photo by Mindy Tucker, and this show is made by me, Dylan Marron.
You can preorder Conversations with People Who Hate Me the book by following the link in the description of this episode, or buying it wherever you buy books.
Thanks so much for listening. We’re weekly now! So stay tuned next week for a brand new conversation and until then, remember: there’s a human on the other side of the screen.
[Chorus of ‘These Dark Times’ by Caged Animals plays.]