Hey, humans. How's it going? Susan Ruth here. Thanks for listening to another episode of Hey, human podcast. This is episode 461, and my guest is Andrea Lieb. Her memoir, Such a Pretty Picture, powerfully narrates her life and offers an honest insight into a survivor's journey. I read the book and before I spoke with Andrea, and it is superbly written. It's easy to read. It flows really quickly. It is intense. I got mad. I got sad. I felt triumph for her.
It's it's really something. And you can preorder it now. It's available on all the places you get books. Highly, highly, highly recommend. Trigger warning, incest, sexual assault. This is a big episode as far as, the things that it might stir up in you listeners, and I just I wanna make sure that you are prepared and take care of yourselves, and, you know, self practice self care. Andrea is also a retired lawyer. She's a former nurse and has written for numerous
literary journals. She also advocates for survivors of sexual assault, volunteering at the UCLA Rape Treatment Center and Stewart House, and mentoring young women from post conflict and climate challenged countries. She's a badass. If you or anyone you know is experiencing incest or sexual assault, please contact the National Sexual Assault Hotline. It's +1 806564673. You can reach out to rainn.org. That's rainn.0rg. If you're living overseas, you can call RAINN at +1 (202) 501-4444.
Talk to somebody you trust. Tell a teacher or a safe parent or a safe family member and there's help out there. General stuff. Check out heyhumanpodcast.com for links and to learn more about my guests and the show. Check out susanruth.com to learn more about me and my other artistic endeavors. Please follow Susan Ruthism on social media. Find my music on Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon Music, or wherever you get your music.
Rate, review, and subscribe to Hey Human Podcast on iTunes or wherever you get your podcast, Spotify, iHeart, it's all over the place. And thank you for listening. Be kind, be well, be loved, and take care of yourself. Here we go. Andrea Lieb, welcome to Hey Human. Thank you. I'm really excited to be here. Yeah. I read your book last night. Oh, wow. Okay. It's, it's heavy, but also, triumphant.
Yeah. I think so. I I mean, I think one reviewer said it's a moving memoir of trauma with an uplifting conclusion. So It's incredibly well written as well. I have to say, having read a bazillion books, what I really appreciated was how it's written in such a a well well receiving way. Then you could consume it at a at a rapid pace. It felt very much like I was there. I got mad. I got upset. I wanted to just rush in and take you out of there. You know, it brought up a lot of stuff.
I had a, a childhood that was abusive. So, you know, the the little girl in me wanted to go and get the little girl in you and protect her. Thank you. I that means a lot to me. I mean, it really means a lot to me. You know, as a I've been a writer a long time. I didn't just one day wake up and say, oh, I'm gonna write a book. I I've been working you know, I've been writing most of my life. This book was a really hard choice to write for and I really worked hard to make it consumable. I
guess that would be a word. You know, make it easy for people because I knew the subject is, you know, I was I spare nothing in the subject. I made it really raw. I chose to do that as a deliberate choice because I wanted people to experience what to the best that I could, what what childhood victims go through. And, and I wanted them to feel what
I felt. But at the same time, I wanted to make sure the writing was kind of fast paced enough and quick enough so that people I knew that the subject would be somewhat overwhelming at times, so I wanted the writing to be easier. So I really I really worked on that, you know, to to make it simple, easy for people to read. For such a heavy subject, incredibly digestible. Even the way you set up the chapters, they they moved I write script. Right? So it moves like a script.
I think I I'm a visual thinker, so that's probably part of it is I visualize things. So it might be part of my writing style anyway, but, again, that was really deliberate. And, yeah, digestible was more consumable. I mean, I feel like that's the same thing. Such a Pretty Picture is the name of the memoir. Before we dive into just where you are now, let's go back. You grew up in New York just without I want people to read the book, so clearly we've intimated what is going on in
the book. But can you give just an overview of childhood? I'll I'll start with just the beginning because it's it's easy, and it's on the back of the book, so it's not a big spoiler alert. I was four and a half when the first time my father gave me a bath. And it's an early, early memory. Truthfully, it's my clearest first memory. And my I knew when he was bathing me, he asked me to let him wash me with his hand. And I could tell from his his breathing and all I was really young,
but I knew there was something wrong. He scared me. And when my mother walked in to check on us, she saw what was going on. And, you know, I it was, you know, in retrospect now as an older as an adult, I realized my father was masturbating. As a child, I wouldn't have known what masturbation was. She screamed, fell to the floor. And when she woke up, she was blind. My father caught her and she was blind and it was something
called hysterical blindness. And I write that my mother stayed hysterically blind for a month and she was, you know, remained emotionally blind for decades. So the story is about my surviving a long term childhood, sexual abuse and other abuse and about my and also about realizing I kept it very, very much a secret for a long time and realizing that, you know, holding the secret was as almost as destructive as the abuse itself. So that's what
the book is about. You know, my hope here is to raise awareness on childhood sexual abuse, incest in particular, as well as to give other people who are still suffering or or not speaking, maybe the courage to speak to somebody, a therapist, a trusted friend, and also to give them a glimmer of hope that healing is possible. Because the fact that I wrote the book, I obviously shows that I've healed, but I have. So And I saw that you give some of the proceeds to RAIN, which is extraordinary.
Yeah. I'm actually giving all the proceeds away. I'm I'm really lucky that I, you know, I worked as an attorney for a long time, and my husband and I talked about it when I wrote the book. And this is, this is the book unexpectedly turned into an advocacy and a life of I'm really realized that what, where I am in my life right now, I'm no longer practicing law and I am really fully dedicating myself to advocacy
on this issue. I just recently was asked to join the advisory board for UCLA rape treatment center and Stewart House, and I volunteer at Stewart House once a week. I'm getting involved in other organizations. So I'm giving all the rest of the proceeds 25% to RAIN. They they run a hotline, which is national, and the rest to local organizations. If I'm speaking, I have some book events scheduled.
And if I'm speaking in a community, then I'm looking up the local rape treatment center, and I'm gonna be giving anything that comes from that bookstore or that event also to that local center. It's more of a, you know, authors don't make a lot of money. This is symbolic as much as anything. Let's be real. But I really want to make this, it's a passion now. Strange. I did not expect that to happen, but I've become incredibly public about this. So
That's healing though. Yeah. It's a new I I call it, you know, I I thought I was healed when I started writing the book and I was to a large extent. And, you know, I couldn't have excavated these memories and put this on paper without a lot of therapy and a lot of healing. But it gave me another layer of healing.
And to be honest, I went back into therapy when I was writing the book because I, I really felt the need to be in therapy again to to really it was comp it's complicated, you know, and you're you're you're telling not only your secret, but the secret of your family. And I know it's gonna sound really counterintuitive. Well, my father, I really didn't I I can't really say I loved him. I was relieved when he died, but my mother, regardless of her failure to protect me, I I really loved her.
I did. Some people might disagree with that choice, but I loved her, and I kept her in my life. And it felt a little odd, you know, kind of not that she has a legacy, but ruining her legacy. You know? It's kind of like the author. My mother's not the author Alice Munro, but I don't know if you're familiar with that, but she, you know, her legacy was, you know, her daughter, who's also named Andrea, wrote about being abused by her stepfather, and it's really changed the way people look at
Alice. And, you know, it probably will change the way people look at my mother. She's passed on now, so it's a little easier. I think when you are someone who has suffered complex trauma, for people that haven't experienced that, they don't quite maybe understand how convoluted the feelings of love and devotion. And even though you you low key hate this person, but you also love them, you want their attention, you want them to love you back, and it gets so confusing and so convoluted.
And people say, well, why didn't you tell someone or why don't you run away or why don't you and it's because you're also protecting your abuser. Yes. And and I was and in the book I write about, you know, as a young, I write about being an adolescent and a pre adolescent and wanting my father's attention. And at the same time, hating my father's attention and feeling responsible
for the family. And, and for my mother, you know, the blindness was a really, you know, seeing that happen at that moment in time, I internalized it. I mean, my father didn't help by telling me it was my fault, but I internalized it for a long time. I really viewed myself as responsible for my mother's protection and happiness. And your mother's violence towards you was, you know, her internalized rage that she couldn't touch.
Right. And yeah, my mother was violent toward me for a couple of years when I was a child. And, and I write about that too. It was as if she changed turned her rage at my father in outward toward me. And, you know, I can't speak to why my mother stayed with my father. I I wasn't I'm not in her skin, but, you know, people ask me all the time whether I think she was abused. And I I just don't know the answer. I mean, this kind of child abuse is generational. This
kind of trauma is generational. So if I were a, a guesser, I would say somewhere in her family history, there was some kind of of of sort of sexual abuse. I I would guess that. But I at far be my mother kept everything closed. Yeah. Well, it's definitely generally generational. And statistically speaking, it's more likely, yes, that that's true. Yeah. I would encourage that. Do you think you would have written the book had your parents still been living? Well, my mom was alive when I wrote
the book. She Oh, I thought she had passed already. Passed at when I wrote the epilogue. Ah, yes. This is Pam Houston, my, mentor, one of my men writing mentors said, you are not gonna completely finish this book. So she wrote she was alive through many drafts of this book. My father was dead. I probably couldn't have written it if my father was alive. It would have taken a little bit more my mother.
I kept a relationship with my father, for better or worse, because I kept the relationship with my mother and that he was a nonnegotiable deal. And what that relationship looked like, it wasn't your typical father daughter relationship, obviously. My mother was still alive and I was actually taking care of her on and off while I was writing it. She kind of knew I was writing the book. My mother was always the biggest supporter of my writer. I have writing.
I have an MFA in creative writing. And when I went back for it and, you know, I had this night once through the new fiction series where actors read my work, my short stories, and my mother flew out and She was so proud of me. And everything I ever published, she wanted to read. And not that I published a great deal, but I published. And, she knew I was writing this, but she she said, I know you're writing a book, and I know it's about your father, and I don't wanna talk about it.
So I don't know if I could have published it. I think the the universe I I, if she was still alive, it would be a lot harder to be in this position. I, there's a big part of me. My mother wasn't well when I was writing it. And I, I knew it was more, not that I wished for her death because I didn't, but I knew it was more likely than not that she would be writing process takes a long time, you know, that she would be deceased by the time it came out. It did cross my minds.
But, yeah, I I yeah. That was part of why I went into therapy. For sure. Well, I would think that therapy would be important while writing this just because even if you felt like you were healed, it would still your body doesn't understand timeline. Your body is feeling in the moment of the actual moment, as much as it is in the future self writing it. When I write in the book,
healing is not linear. I mean, this is you don't walk out of, of any kind of program or have any kind of moment, even if you've had an epiphany, which, without giving away too much, I sort of had. But even if you have an epiphany of healing, you can't, you know, you can't walk out and then one day go, oh, I'm perfectly
fine. I think that, in fact, it's almost bad for people to think that way or or not healthy, not because, you know, it it puts so much pressure on you as a as a survivor, you know, to be able to you have to understand that there's steps backwards and forwards. And especially you reference CPTSD when it's this, you know, complex CPTSD. It's still with you. I mean, I still jump when somebody comes up behind me too closely. Your body, you know, your body stays.
You know, I interestingly, I found yoga, through writing this book or toward the end of this book. I was older, and I'd always run and done a lot of spinning and different activities. And I ended up finding yoga as as a rule of of this book, which has opened my body in ways that I didn't even realize. You know, I was always kind of ahead on a body. Yeah. I understand that completely.
When you move through the world, do you look around and spot kids and think, oh my God, I know something's going on. I can see it in in young women, sometimes from their posture and and sometimes from children, if I see, you know, certain ways that if a parent is yelling and I can see children shrinking into themselves.
And so it becomes more apparent. Although, you know, sometimes it's it's it's funny because, you know, doing the work at Stewart House, what Stewart House is is a treatment program that UCLA treatment center rape treatment center runs. And it's really unique because everything is at this one location and all the police, all the therapists, so the children don't have to go running all over the place. And my volunteer work is I'm the play lady. So which is the best job I've ever
had, I must admit. And the children walk in and, you know, wow. You know, the first thing is they're greeted by me or another play lady or play and they well, there's this big playroom, which is filled with donated toys and and really fun things to do. And they they're they're you know, say, hi. I'm here. I'm I'm the play lady. I'm
wondering if you'd be interested in playing. And and watching the children when they come in because they're scared that body language is that body language, that that turtled they're turtles. And when they start playing, children are still really young children particularly are still really helpful. You know, they can still
have those you see it. The joy comes quickly to them as opposed to, I think, the longer you know, by the time I was an adolescent or a pre adolescent, I was pretty hardwired to feeling bad and distrustful about the world in general. But yeah. So it's been really that's been really fun being having that opportunity to to be the play lady. That's lovely. And to how important it is to rewire the idea of play, because even in the book, that was one of the things your dad said to you. Let I
wanna play with you. Mhmm. And that how that becomes bastardized of what what real play is versus not safe play. Wow. You know, you picked up on something I wasn't even conscious of. So there you go. That that's really true. I had never even thought that till this moment, which gives me a note for therapy. But, you know, it's which is goes to the point that we're all healing and learning from this. Sometimes with the fingers put on the page, the conscious doesn't even we're not even conscious
of. But that's exactly it. I mean, I never felt like a child, like a true child. I lost my childhood before I even experienced it, it, and I lost my agency before it even developed. And I I don't think my story, unfortunately, is that unique to especially any any survivor of sexual abuse, but also, you know, children who grow up with violence, with hitting, with being screamed at constantly. And that really, you know, these household where the children turn into objects of anger.
And, you know, we lose our agency. We lose our ability to be happy. Absolutely. And I read somewhere a long time ago that physical not sexual the the punchy kind, the slappy kind, physical abuse or pinching or whatever it is, is as detrimental to a child psyche as the verbal abuse that it's as if you're being punched if you wanna, you
know, apples for apples or whatnot. And I I find it very I have to be very careful because it is no two people experience trauma alike, and it does not matter, in my opinion, what kind of trauma you experienced, you experienced trauma. And that if we try to out trauma each other, it completely loses the point and and jeopardizes the healing of it.
Correct. And I, you know, I hope my book is you know, I know it's difficult at points to read, but I hope that it would be a message for other people who've had other kinds of trauma because, you know, the the point is this, we can't out trauma each other and we can't necessarily experience it the same way. And, you know, in some ways, I was really fortunate because I grew up in a family that loved books,
and books really saved me. And the the ability to read and write really was for me, important. It allowed me some academic success and the ability to be financially independent earlier than, than a lot of people. And, you know, that's truthfully where I got a lot of people ask, were you resilient? And I said, well, that I think it's part of that. Although resilience can can have a double edged
sword too. So Sure. It makes you hyper independent, which makes it very hard to operate in the world sometimes. I do wanna the book thing really stood out to me. I'm a big reader. I was a big reader as a child. This is why it's so important not to ban books because they become a lifeline to children. Correct. And I don't think anyone you know, I read at a very young age kind of precociously. I would say very precociously. Part of it was, you know, my father, for all his bad, was a was a
professor of English literature. And my mother was a person who I write. Books were like air to her. She she she loved to read. And, you know, I started and I think it's really hard for adults to always say, well, this book is appropriate or that book's not appropriate for a child. You know, we have to let children read at the level that that they're at. I'm not saying that everybody should be reading the way that I did. Perhaps there should have been a little more monitoring,
but that's a whole different issue. I don't know the answer to that. It's easy to judge. That's how children get to experience the the world that's not their own. Yeah. It's incredibly important for escape as well if they're in situations where they don't feel like they can escape. It creeps. My other option was it was either reading or self harm. So Yeah. And and I think, you know, books are better than sticking yourself with a pen or cutting yourself. I guess it's it's a healthier option.
Do you ever get visited by your father in dreams? Not well, I'm trying to think of the last time. It's been a long time. Not not right after he died, yes. Not anymore. And I do get visited by my mother sometimes. And I've actually you know, this is gonna sound really rude, but I do a lot of yoga. And, you know, I've done some really intense meditative yoga experiences where I've seen doubt my mother come to me, but not my father. He seems gone. I I trying to think if he showed up recently.
Maybe I had one dream where we were all together, my biological family, and there was like a flood and something was going on. How did your sister receive the book? Oh, my sister is my first true love. I hope that comes across in the book. I went nervous the whole time reading because I thought, oh god, you know, please, please. It's bad enough that you're dealing with what you're dealing with. I'm she didn't have an easy time either. I mean, she she also was hit a lot by my father. She
was she read it early. I had her read it actually at first draft because I said I'm writing this. I won't write it if you're not okay with it. And she was okay, and she's read it all the way through. I I, you know, dedicate the book to her. I had her read it as I was writing it for
two reasons. One is I wanted to make sure before I published it that that it was before it got published and or started sending it out for publication that she would would sign off on it because I didn't want to go any further. And I also wanted to have her read it for I mean, it's all a historical accuracy.
Obviously, our memories are not identical on the way everything happened, but at least, you know, we moved a lot as children and just to to kind of get her take on on these on particular scenes. But she's been really supportive, and she's really excited. She's excited for me because she also knows that I've been writing a long time, and she's excited that I have a book, and she's excited about this book. She's a therapist by by training. She's just recently retired, but she she was a LCSW.
So I think she's open to the and open to the book being published. The therapists in the book, I wanted to reach through the pages and just absolutely throttle. Oh, the two. They were not good. I mean, the first one, you know, the second one, I really I don't even give the excuse of time to because it was already 1981 and, you know, the he it was out there. The first one, you know, was in the sixties. Things were
different, and there wasn't required reporting. I often wonder my sister thinks that even though I never quite told him a 100% what was going on, and you'll read the book and find out more about this, But, my sister thinks that that would have been required reporting at this point. There was really no one to rescue me, and the therapist that did finally help me was a woman. And, actually, she was an LCSW, so go figure. Yeah. Yeah. Do you have children? I do not. I do not. I did not want to
have children. And I love children, by the way. I really do. You know, I it took me a really long time to find stability. You know, I write about some of it in the book. And even after the book ends, the period after, it took me a little bit longer to find someone that I could live with. And intimacy took me a long time to to find, but I, I have a husband now for, that I've been married to for, it'll be twenty four years next month. And
we've been together for over twenty five. But by that time I was already over. I was 42 when I met him and 43 when we got married. You know, we tried, but I didn't wanna have kids until I was stable and until I found somebody who was stable enough to have kids with. And I just didn't my didn't find that before. You know, it was my opportunity to break the cycle. I completely understand that. But but I have 10 I have 10 nieces and nephews, and I have three four greats now. Two, three.
Your sister had 10 kids. They're not my sister. It's on my husband's side. Okay. I was like, wow. That's a lot. No. No judgment. Wow. I can't imagine talking to you. One kid. And my husband's got my husband's got a from a big family, but they they count. Absolutely. No. For sure. One of the things and
again, no spoilers. But one of the things that happens with any kind of abuse with children is that as they grow up, they tend to, and this is a generalization, but in my experience, this is what I've seen. They tend to get into situations where abuse continues in different forms by people outside the family because it has set up a feeling about oneself. And as you mentioned, sort of that out of body experience or being in your head and not your body.
And can you talk a little bit, especially for the listeners who maybe are experiencing that now, the journey of of getting your boundaries back and what that felt like for you and how you reclaimed that part of yourself? Well, it took a while. I mean, I when I was growing up as a teenager, I really I write that I didn't know the the difference between safety and and danger. And, you know, I interestingly enough, I actually
couldn't be intimate. And and, you know, I I got into some really dangerous positions as a teenager. As an older as I became an adult, a lot of the men that I picked weren't really abusive. I was cause I just couldn't I didn't stay very long. I just kind of picked them for to pick them. And, I mean, I think the the last relationship in the book, I don't know that he it was abusive. It it was
maybe right on the border. He he could you know, to be fair to him, I was holding secrets and not that easy to live with at that point. But I never really got into the hitting relationships. I stayed away from, I was afraid of power. I got, I was really afraid of men having power over me, but I think that it was more of a journey of of going to therapy and starting to really look at what I was looking for in a partner. You know, what would a partner that I would like
look like? And sometimes to be fair, I looked at the externalities a little too heavily, which isn't to say that my husband's not a good looking man. But I really went with, you know, I I really wrote that I was kinda just looking for somebody to sleep next to to keep away the boogeyman. And so it took a really long I had to mature. I I I don't think I became a grown woman until I was 43.
And I had to mature into being a woman and work in therapy, kind of understand, you know, what are the qualities that I think I value in myself? And those are the qualities I would value in a partner. And then how could I trust that partner to be safe, which is, you know, I really started looking at at my partner's family relationships that not not necessarily at what they did for a living, but who they were as people. Mhmm. So it was a process, though. I can't really point to any one moment in
time. I I have a moment in the book where I I talk about having a conversation relationship with somebody. I won't spoil that because it's a precious moment. Absolutely. No. It's and again, it's it's tricky sometimes in these interviews because I wanna dive in, but I also want people to read the book. I know some of them people eat, people do that. They, I feel like sometimes I'm like, I'm giving away the whole book, so
why would they buy it? But, you know, I say buying the book and reading it is a whole different experience than hearing about it in a podcast. Yeah. Also, the the thing about writing about this particular topic is you are now standing on a roof and shouting about what happened. And I think the more that happens, the more people in their own lives will feel like it's okay for them to also stand up to their abusers or speak about their abuse and get that poison out instead
of carrying the burden of it. And that's my primary you know, one of my primary messages in the book because that that's why, actually, my editor and publisher helped me find the title. I struggled with titles for a long time. But when they when we found it, I was like, yes. Because what I really believed was that if and
this is what my mother believed. If you created a pretty enough picture, if you were smart enough or, you know, externally attractive enough or just pretended something what didn't happen, you could make that to be that could be so. And what I learned is you can't hold these these things secret. You can't bury them. I mean, some people have are able to, you know, their brains allow them to, to, to bury their memories and their subconscious. I kind of wish mine had,
you know, they come out anyway. I mean, you know, and now there's all these, these newer things that are happening, books being written and and stories about people using MDMA and finding their memories. I didn't ever lose mine, but I really tried to keep them buried. For a long time, I tried, trust me, But I'm glad I didn't because, you know, it made me the person that I am today. Yeah. I mean, honestly, that could have developed into DID or any any
number of things. Yeah. And truthfully, the secrets were killing me. I I am very lucky that I didn't, you know, kill myself. You know, there were moments where I was very close without you know, to to suicide. And and I'm I I'm grateful every day that, you know, I was able to get
the help that I can, could. And I hope, which is part of the reason that I'm speaking and giving whatever money I can to to these resources is, you know, today, so many of these nonprofits are losing federal funding, but there are still it still exists that there are organizations that will help people who even people who can't afford to get therapy themselves. You know, the rape treatment center here in LA, we're very fortunate, but other places we are as well.
And the rape treatment center gives adults one year through the rape treatment center of therapy, and Stewart House allows for the children to have a year as well as the non perpetrating parent. Wow. I that's really generous, but there are other organizations that provide services as well and hopefully in more parts of the country. You know?
There's so much to the non perpetrating parent too that the the looking the other way ness of it all for so many families, for myself too, like, showing up to school, tear faced, you know, bloated, crying face with a note, and nobody's saying a thing. You know? Nobody's saying a word, and it's just the whole the whole of it, the silence culture around it all is devastating. It's devastate and I think it's you know, you're you're much younger than I am, and I you know, it still happens. And,
you know, that's the issue. When I'm at Stuart House and with the play lady, I see the moms who bring their children in and sometimes it's a dad, but sometimes it's a step father, sometimes it's an who knows? I don't find out much about the cases for a lot of different reasons, privacy, and also because, you know, for court, if they do go to court, so they don't give us that information. Our job is simply to play and, which is a great job to have, like I said. But when I watch these
moms, I go, God, you're my hero. Those are my heroes. Is the women or men, if it's the other way, the or and sometimes it's a mother and a father bringing the child in because it's someone else. The parents who bring their child to to therapy and are willing to acknowledge this This is happening by someone to their child. Those are my heroes because I know that, you know, there's there's gotta be some shame connected with it, and they're able to overcome that shame for their child's well-being.
It's amazing. I, you know, but I also want, you know, young women who, you know, there's so much of this, this is, you know, sexual abuse pervasive, you know, Rain says one in nine boys, one in nine girls and one in twenty boys are sexually abused before the age of 18. And we won't even get into the women after the age of 18. That's a whole different story. And that's just what's reported.
Right. And that's what's reported. So regardless of whether it's childhood or not childhood or you know, I think the the point of my book is that keeping these secrets to yourself isn't gonna help you. You need to get some help. And and as a society, we should be aware that this happens. Yeah. What's next for you? I I have an old novel that is not about this,
that I pulled out. And I'm that I'm I'm kind of exploring whether I want I took a little class on on character with, a a writer I know, Josh Moore, who who's like a really, really good character person and and, recently just have something to take my mind off of this. And I'm playing with that potentially. I I'm also looking at, you know, writing some more essays. I have found right now that that this process of this book is so consuming that there's not too much time for other
things. And then on a personal advocacy, I want to continue that as a trajectory. Writing, I can write something else. But I do want to continue that as, you know, I'm lucky. I call it, I'm of retirement age, but not really psychologically ready for retirement. But I'm ready to do something new. And that's what I've chosen. So I want to continue to be out in the world talking about this issue. That's what's next.
I'm curious how your relationship, if you have one, if you are an atheist, if you believe in God, how how that has changed over your lifetime. I'm kind of a person who believes in a higher power, the universe. I don't know that I and I can't the universe can be called God. I I don't have anything, you know, with that term.
I'm not a part of an organized religion, but one of the things that happened, I went through a period probably around college where I was just didn't believe in God at all, atheist. But now I believe in something bigger than me. I actually do. I meditate every day and I pray every day. And I also kind of my prayers are more about gratitude than about asking for something. So I do have a relationship with something
bigger. I just don't I don't know what that looks like, and I'm not a part of any organized religion, But I'm not opposed to other people's organized religions. Yeah. That makes sense. Tell people how they might find you. I have a website right now. It's andrealeebeauthor.com. I think we're working on maybe perhaps changing it, but it'll have a hyperlink. So it's andrealeebauthor.com, and then I have an Instagram, which is andrea lisa leeb. So that's my Instagram,
and you can follow me. And the book can be purchased. I'm gonna just give a pitch. It's my launch date my publication date is October 14, but it is available for preorder now. You can get it on the Simon and Schuster website on, or look on the Simon and Schuster and there's hyperlinks there's hyperlinks. My author website. Amazon, of course. Bookshop, of course. Barnes and Noble. So, basically, anywhere where they sell books, it's available for preorder, and the publication date is October 14.
And as I said, my royalties, I am you know, I because I have the opportunity to, I'm able to donate them to RAIN and other rape treatment organizations. So Fantastic. And as a person that as I said, I read constantly. I've this book is very well written. It's easy to read. It's an important
read. You know, people have an idea that this happens only in certain families or in in and this is not a you know, these issues, these child abuse issues are not related to socioeconomics, to race, to religion. You know, they happen in all families. So I also wanted, you know, no matter how, and my family had a pretty good, pretty picture. You know? It was a, father who was a professor, a pretty mother, and two little girls, cute little girls. How how good how how lovely is that?
Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. I wish you great success, and I think it's incredible what you do and what you have survived. And I think that it's so important that beacons exist in the world because the ocean is fucking big. Yeah. When we see a beacon of light that we can swim toward, it makes all the difference. I I think that's really true. Right? That's a good way to say it. I love that. I might steal it. Thank you so much for taking the time to be on the show. Oh my god.
Thank you. And thank you for saying the book was well written. That means the world to me. I mean, also because, you know, as a writer, you want people to like your writing. So Oh, absolutely. Yeah. It's it's it's well written. Absolutely. It's easy to read. And I don't mean that that it's pedantic. It's not that. It's I I yeah. I understand. But thank you for having me. I really appreciate the opportunity to talk with you this morning. It's been lovely.
Absolutely. And thank you for listening, everybody. Bye. Bye. Thank you. Bye. Rate, review, and subscribe to Hey Human podcast wherever you get your podcast. Thanks. Bye.