Joe Rogan - Nikki Glaser "Standup Gave Me a Reason to Live"

I get really, really depressed in a dangerous way where I'm like, I gotta watch it. Like, I gotta be vigilant about meditating every day to keep my depression at bay because... So what do you think that is? Do you think that's a genetic thing? Do you think it runs in your family? I think it must run in my family. I think we have stuff that I haven't even like found out. Like, there's some suspicious deaths in my family that I'm like, was that... Suicide? Yeah. You know where I'm like, I think it's... Describe how it feels. Like, what does your depression feel like? It feels like... Honestly, I get suicidal thoughts. Not like, I should kill myself. It's like, kill yourself. It would be fun to kill yourself. It would be fun. Literally soothing. It soothes me to think about killing myself when I'm in my worst depressive stages. And it is... I compare it to like, sniffles when you're getting a cold. Like, I have a little thought that will go, oh, shoot yourself in the head. It literally comes into my head like a sniffle where you're like, oh, god, I'm getting sick again. Okay, I gotta meditate now. And then I'll be fine. Like, literally, it's like that. What's before the, shoot yourself? Nothing? Nothing. And that's the problem is like, it just is... You know what can be... It may be it's circumstantial a little bit. Like, maybe I'm feeling lonely that day. I didn't get a thing that I wanted. Or I... But I really do think it's like the weather. Like, I just can't even describe it. I remember Sarah Silverman talking about her depression. Like, it's like just a cloud comes over you and you're just like, oh, well, here it comes. And that's kind of how it feels. And I totally have it under control when I'm meditating every day. I don't get a single one of those thoughts. But like, if I skip a day, if I don't do TM one day, those thoughts keep, they come in. And then if you get into a real bad spot, those thoughts start... And I've never even so much as made an attempt or even planned to make an attempt. Like, it's never gotten to that even close to that for me. But I realized that these are the same kind of thoughts that people that end up doing this start with. Like, there's some kind of like... People who love me and care about me get so upset when I talk about this. But I think that more people struggle with these thoughts than talk about. So I'm eager to share it because I don't think I'm ever going to kill myself. And I don't think that that's... But I think that, like a lot of people, I'm at risk. And I don't think that people talk about that enough. Because I do have these thoughts. And it's not even like I go, what can I do to make myself feel better? Oh, I could kill myself. And literally, it's like kill yourself. It's like a little voice or something. And I've struggled with mental illness before. I mean, I had anorexia where it was like, don't eat. And you're like, where's that? Who's that? But it's a voice. Did you have don't eat because you thought you were overweight or don't eat because you thought you'd be more attractive if you looked like a rail? I mean, it starts... Was it vague? Was the direction vague or was it just like an obsession? It started out like, you know, high school, I should be skinny. Everyone should be skinny. I like wanted to be famous someday. And I looked at my... I idolized everyone in the magazines. The whole classic thing of like looking literally in magazines and being, I want to look like that. I hate myself pinching my sides being like, if I'm not like that, then I'm worthless. Having a mom who constantly hated her body was skinnier than me and constantly said she was fat and things like that. Like where you just, you have things modeled for you. So I grew up thinking skinny equals more lovable. And then I lost weight just because my senior year I lost weight because a boy liked me that I liked who I liked back. And I was like very nervous about it. Like, you know, when you just get nervous, you don't eat that day. And I had a date with this guy. It was my first date ever. And I just that day I didn't eat because I was just nervous. And then the next day it showed up on me because someone goes, you look great. What's going on? And I was like, oh, I just didn't eat yesterday. Like, I can do that again. So it's basically the same thing as saying you're really funny. You got a talent for that. You're open to suggestion. I'm really good. Dude, I know. I'm scared of it. The thing is, I am open to suggestion, but the thing is I am good at losing weight. I can, I can stick to a diet and I can black and white things. I can say I'm not drinking for seven. I can, I can quit things. I can quit eating and I have good will. It's like willpower. And I learned that like, oh, for the first time, like I could do this. And so I just stopped eating. And then for a while you get like super hot. Like I was very popular for a couple weeks and then for a hot second, I was hot for a second. And then I got so scary, skinny. And then I couldn't stop. You're, you were just like, I go, I, well, I don't, everyone's like, Hey, you looked great. Like a week ago, like right now it's like kind of of concern. And I'm like, well, I don't know what to do because if I eat, I'll just get fat again. And so I just, this is all I know now. And then it becomes, if you eat, you're weak and then it becomes obsessive compulsive. And then it's not even about being thin anymore because you look in the mirror and I would look in the mirror and go like, you're disgusting. Like I looked like I, I look like Holocaust pictures. Like that's how bad I looked. Do you have photos of yourself from back then? Yeah. You keep to make sure that you don't ever get back to that spot again. I won't ever get back to that spot again because I'm too vain to do that now. And I know like when I see it coming, it's the same way of like pot. When I see it starting to interfere with my life, I go, okay, you need to stop drinking and smoking pot. And when I see myself get too skinny now, I'm like, okay, you need to stop working out. You're like chaos, but you kind of have a handle on it. No, I totally have a handle on it. I won't ever be anorexic or die of depression. Like all these things, I won't like, I'll go a different way, but like those things aren't going to get me because they almost got me before. I mean, anorexia, I should have died. I was going to die from it and I planned on dying from it. You planned on dying from it. Yeah, because Joe, I was starving. It sucks to be starving. Yeah, because I wanted to die. I was like some, it was a slow suicide. Uh, 18, 19, 20, 21. I was like, I stopped weighing myself because it was so dangerous to get attached to a number. But the last time I remember weighing myself, I was 98 pounds. That was when I was like admitted to a psych ward when I was 18. And how tall are you? I'm five nine. And what do you weigh now? I'm 135 now and I'm skinny now. So yeah, you're not, you're not heavy by any stretch of your imagination. Right now, you were 35 pounds lighter than this plus. Yeah. Yeah. More. That's crazy. I was so thin. I was so like, that's crazy. Everywhere I went, people would point and whisper and talk. It was one of those things where it was like, you know, you've seen girls out and about like that. There was a lady that used to go to my yoga class that was terrifying. Yeah. She was so scary. She looked like, I mean, she was a small person too. She was only like five one or five two. And she looked like she probably weighed 80 pounds. Yeah. It was awful. It's and that's the way people and I see girls like that now. And I, I do the same thing that people used to say to me, which is like, just eat a sandwich, bitch. Like what are you doing? Like, I know you can't say that, but I don't even relate to the person I was when I wasn't eating because the only way I can say is like, I could not eat. I could not do it. It was almost like if you were to like, if protein shake, it was like drinking poison. Like I'm going to die if I drink this. It was that hard to eat. How'd you get out of it? I, um, first of all, I was admitted to a hospital because I was going away to school. Um, I lost all this weight in like a couple months. Like it went away quickly for me and it got scary fast. The school called my parents. My parents were in denial because they didn't want to believe that their daughter was like dying. So they were, they were concerned. And, but like, I was lying to them about, oh, I'm going out to eat. I'm not going to be here for dinner tonight. Just lying, lying, lying. I went to the doctor to get a physical cause I was going away to school in this fall. This was July. I went to go get a physical and my pulse, I have like a low pulse anyway. Like I have Brady Cardia. I have, I think it's 37 to 42 resting. You have an issue. What is it called? Brady? It's called Brady Cardia. It's just like a low resting pulse rate. I don't know. And you don't exercise. No, I exercise a lot. But even when I don't exercise a lot, I still just have a low do you do a lot of cardio? I do a lot of cardio now. Yeah. But I have really like, this is like elite athlete resting heart rate. It's like Lance Armstrong. I'm really proud of it, but I do nothing to support it. Like I run every day, but not like enough to boast that, but it saved my life because I didn't know I had a low pulse rate. But when I went in for this thing, that this physical, you know, the doctor clearly could see I was anorexic because they looked at me and weighed me, but they didn't have any kind of like data to keep me. But until they took my pulse and they were like, if you leave, you're going to die and you're going to be a liability to us because we know so you can't leave. You're going to you a 5150 or whatever it is where you're committed to a psych ward. So I went in for a checkup was taken on a golf court, a golf court to the other side of the hospital where I was checked into a psych ward. And my mom's like, no, she's not. And they're like, yes, she is. And so I was admitted there and I had to stay there for a couple weeks, I think. And then I lied to get out of it because I ate just enough to get out. And then I went to school, I convinced my parents I was okay to go away to school, which I wasn't nearly died there just starving myself and exercising too much. And that but that that is how I got out of it was that so I wanted to die because I was hungry all the time being hungry sucks. And I couldn't eat. I didn't know how to eat. I didn't know even know how to begin to eat. So I was like, every night I would just pray that I wouldn't wake up because I would go to bed freezing cold because you have no fat. So you're cold. You have to wake up. I was going to school in Colorado. I was ill prepared for the weather. And also I had no fat on my body was it was an awful existence. And then I did stand up comedy for the first time because as an anorexic. Yeah, because when I went to school my freshman year, I was so crazy looking like I was I was like a I was like the nightmare before Christmas jack. Yeah, that is what I looked like. I was I look at pictures. I'm like, how did you have friends, bitch? But I did because I became really funny, because I wanted people to go look over here. Don't look at me. So I just right. I was a shy kid in high school when I was not anorexic. But then when I needed to make friends, because I was went to school alone, I was like, Oh, I'll just develop this really over the top personality. So people don't notice that I'm so thin. So that's when I became funny. Really funny. You know, I was always like dormitley funny. But that's why I became like outwardly funny. People started telling me I should be a comedian my freshman year, I tried it, I did it one time. And then I was like, Oh, I have a reason to live now. Like I have a purpose. And I that sounds so stupid, like cliche to say like, Oh, gave me comedy gave me a reason to live. But it really did because I didn't know what that I was like, if I'm gonna, what am I gonna become a teacher? I don't care. I'm not passionate about that. But this I was like, Okay, so then I was like, I got I have to gain some weight if I'm gonna now have a career. So then I started I found a therapist, I was like, I gotta beat this. I started reading books, I found a therapist, and I found this one therapist, who told me the thing that really broke through, which was like, when you're the anorexia, everyone's like, just eat something, why aren't you eat something? And you feel very in control of it. And you feel like you're the one to blame for it. Because you're the one that's choosing not to eat. And you're the one that's choosing to exercise. And, and, and so I felt all the shame about like, why can't I cure myself? Why am I giving myself this thing that's ruining my life? And then this therapist was like, Think of it as like cancer, like you got you got sick, like something invaded your life. And there is a demon inside you telling you don't eat. And it's not you. It's not you. So don't listen to that voice. And then as soon as I was able to like, disassociate my illness from like, it's my choice. It's my doing I'm not eating. And I was like, able to see it as like, the exorcist like that little girl has like a demon insider that's like, don't eat bitch. Don't eat if you eat your week. As soon as I was able to go shut up voice, then I was able to eat again. It was like one nugget of one way of perceiving my illness that was able for me to like crack it. And then it took many years to like, and I'm still struggle with, you know, control issues over food, but I'll never be in our exit again.