June 24, 2021
Polyamory, Coming Out & Emotional Consent
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Sydney Rae Chin joins us to share her personal experience as a closeted queer woman who grew up Chinese-American-Catholic. She shares some really valuable advice on how to navigate emotional consent and leaves us with tools for navigating boundaries and honouring our own values.
They dive deep into conversation around polyamory, monogamy, and coming out to their family answering these questions and more!
- Can you have monogamous relationships as a polyamorous person?
- Can polyamory & monogamy co-exist in a relationship?
- How do you cultivate emotional consent and communicate emotional boundaries?
- How do you come out to family — as polyamorous or queer?
- How do culture and gender intersect with experiences of polyamory?
To stay up to date with Sydney, check out her website and follow her on Instagram.
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Rough Transcript:
This is a computer-generated rough transcript, so please excuse any typos. This podcast is an informational conversation and is not a substitute for medical, health or other professional advice, diagnosis or treatment. Always seek the services of an appropriate professional should you have individual questions or concerns.
Episode 219: Polyamory, Coming Out & Emotional Consent
(00:05):
You’re listening to the Sex with Dr. Jess podcast. Sex and relationship advice you can use tonight.
Brandon (00:17):
Welcome to the Sex With Dr. Jess podcast, I’m your co host Brandon Ware here with my always lovely other half, Dr Jess, who is currently squeezing my nipple.
Dr. Jess (00:26):
I just wanted to see if he could keep going, and he did.
Brandon (00:28):
I did, I threw you a curve ball by telling everybody what you were doing at the beginning.
Dr. Jess (00:34):
How you doing today babe?
Brandon (00:36):
I’m great my nipples little sore. But otherwise I’m great. Thanks for asking, how are you?
Dr. Jess (00:41):
I’m good. I feel like your nipples have played a prominent role in the podcast the last few weeks. Because you were talking about I don’t know, pinching nipples on my instagram and people were having a good time with that. I think my family unfollowed us, but we’re okay with that. And I don’t know, I feel like things are going really well right now because life is getting back to normal here in Canada. They’re opening up some restrictions. Or I guess they’re loosening the restrictions around travel. We are fully vaccinated, you and me. I got a pinch in my vaccination. The pharmacist pinched my arm and said “I like to pinch,” then she pinched my arm and then she gave me the jab. And I’m unclear as to whether or not she liked to pinch for the sake of the vaccine or she just generally liked to pinch and took the opportunity to pinch me, but either way I’m happy because I’m vaxxed.
Brandon (01:29):
Got my jabs in, and it feels so good.
Dr. Jess (01:34):
Anyhow, lots going on, just wanted to mention that my new show on CityTV presented by TSC is still running Friday nights here in Canada at midnight on CityTV. And it’s called Intimately You With Dr. Jess and we’re already, I don’t know almost two thirds through the season. We’re at least halfway through season one and it’s going pretty cool. I think it’s so much fun to get to hawk sex toys on national TV. And I’ve got honestly, we have the coolest guest tonight. We’re joined by Shanae Adams, who is going to be giving a lesson in queer language and pride history. And next week, we’re joined by Dr. Jessica Shepherd, who’s talking to us about orgasm and bodily function. Luna Matatas is on there all the time with me, last week we were talking anal play. I can’t believe how much they let us talk about butt play on regular network television, so I don’t know the world it is a changing. So definitely check that out. Please do tune in Friday nights, CityTV. Or check it out at http://www.tsc.ca/intimatelyyou.
Brandon (02:35):
I like that Luna Matatas called it the crotch cafe.
Dr. Jess (02:40):
I know they let her run with crotch cafe on the oral sex episode. And I I don’t know, I don’t know what the CRTC, that’s like our governing body that I guess people put complaints into, but we’re doing all right. I don’t know. I haven’t heard anything so. Also before we dive into today’s topic, want to shout out our sponsor http://www.adamandeve.com. They are offering a wicked deal. Fifty percent off almost any single item plus free shipping and a whole bunch of free goodies with code DRJESS, again at http://www.adamandeve.com, and as usual, the discount code is DRJESS. So go get shopping. Now today, we are talking polyamory. We’re going to chat about the Asian American Catholic experience. We’re going to be talking about coming out, and much, much, more with our guest Sydney. Sydney Rae Chin is a queer, intuitive, sex guide, and much more. She joins us now. Thanks so much for being here.
Sydney Rae Chin (03:39):
Thank you so much for inviting me, especially like, I know this is taking a long time to like put together, so I’m excited to be here.
Dr. Jess (03:47):
Overdue, overdue. I’m glad we’re doing it. Now, you describe yourself as both a survivor and a closeted queer woman who grew up Chinese Catholic. I grew up Chinese Jamaican Catholic, which is a slightly different thing. But you talk about feeling soaked in shame for so many years. So I’d love to talk to you about your process for overcoming shame and what that has looked like.
Sydney Rae Chin (04:10):
For me it’s taken many years and a lot of therapy to overcome shame around my queerness. And it’s still something that I’m like trying to undo for myself. Because there’s so much, especially growing up Chinese Catholic, like there’s so much heteronormativity in the church. There’s so much anti queer-phobia and homophobia in the church, that like I internalized for so many years as a bisexual or queer bisexual Chinese American woman. And I think it’s taken a lot of being in the right places at the right time. So like when I got to college I met a bunch of other queer woman of colour in this arts collective that I was a part of. Then I started to realize, “Oh this could be me” like I see these people living their best lives as their whole selves. It just kind of made me realize that like “oh this is making me unhappy, living in this shame.” I was like eighteen, nineteen at that time because it was sophomore year or end of freshman year. And it was my best friend, who I’m still best friends with to this day. She was the one who made me realize that I was queer, or that I’m a queer person/bisexual person. Because she was like, “yeah you know straight people don’t try to kiss their best friends.” And I was like “oh, I see.” And I think having her deep friendship but I still have, made me realize that this wasn’t something that I’m supposed to be ashamed of. Also in the past, I’ve mostly dated men and and that made me realize, “oh my bisexuality is still valid.” Even though I’ve dated mostly men.
Dr. Jess (05:45):
Now, that’s an interesting conversation because there is so much bi erasure within the queer community. There is so much focus on defining a person by a given moment in time or defining your identity by averages right? If I’ve dated eight men and two cis women, what does that mean? Can I really say I’m bi? I look back to when I was young, I never used the word bi because it just didn’t sit with me. And then new language kind of came about, and queer is a word I’ve always used, but pansexual kind of better described how I identify, but that pressure to prove that you’re bi or prove that you’re not straight, when you maybe don’t have experience with both genders, or all genders, can be a lot to take on, in addition to overcoming shame, more generally. So when you talk about your upbringing, how much of a role did that play? You know, being Chinese Catholic and loading the shame on you, or did you face challenges around coming out with your family?
Sydney Rae Chin (06:46):
So like, we were the family to go to church every week, and I went to Sunday school, I grew up going to Sunday school from like age 5 or age 6, kindergarten to like 13, 14. And my parents really wanted me to join the youth group. But like I have reservations around that, ’cause at the time I considered myself an ally to the queer and LGBTQ+ community. I just didn’t like how much homophobia was in the church, like “I’m not gonna go to church, like this is not for me.” Without even realizing that I was bisexual at the time. I just knew that, oh the church is, like this is not okay, how are you gonna say you love all people and then be homophobic? Or queer phobic. And coming out to my family, I feel like it’s still an everyday process. So I live with them right now, and to get my parents to understand bisexuality, it’s been like, it’s still a journey. And I think that they’re always going to have to learn something, because I think that’s something that’s been indoctrinated in society, and also disliked from the Chinese Catholic Church that they go to, and they’re definitely devout Chinese Catholics. I think it’s hard for some people, especially who grew up in that environment, to see me as bisexual or queer. Because again, dating history, my first love was a man, so he was the person that I brought home, like three years ago. So there was that assumption that I’m straight, because I’m dating a man, despite my ex/first love also being bi, and also being Asian. But it was a race in that relationship because it was seen as a straight relationship by our families.
Dr. Jess (08:37):
Right, now you know coming out every day and for me, that sounds really exhausting. What does that entail in, you’re living with your family. What does that entail coming out every day, and how do you feel about that, how are you managing?
Sydney Rae Chin (08:49):
For me, it’s just like giving them little tidbits of information that I have like capacity for, in terms of like having them understand bisexuality. And I know that they might not ever get it, and that’s just something that I have to accept, because maybe that’s something that I have to give myself. Therapists have said that they may never get this and you might have to give it to yourself. I think it’s also having chosen family with other like queer people of colour, queer friends of colour that I met in college. Those have always been the people that have been affirming my queerness and my bisexuality. Even when my parents don’t completely get it, like they get that I’m bisexual, but they don’t necessarily understand how I see bisexuality, and how that correlates, or doesn’t correlate to dating. ‘Cause for me, it doesn’t necessarily correlate to dating history all the time.
Dr. Jess (09:38):
And in and of itself can be exhausting to have to educate, when you’re just looking for support from folks that you love or who love you. And that’s why chosen family becomes so important right, the extended family. It doesn’t have to just be bloodlines. Now, on top of coming out as queer, you’re also polyamorous, so that’s why we’re here. We want to talk about a little bit about polyamory. And we talk about coming out as a process around sexual orientation, but not necessarily around relationship related identities. So what was your journey to discovering that you’re polyamorous?
Sydney Rae Chin (10:13):
I was in a lot of relationships that have been monogamous minded. The one that I was in three years ago, was definitely monogamous minded and so was the one that I was in like a week ago. I guess for me, I just thought that, or I indoctrinated myself again, this relates to growing up Chinese Catholic, that you’re supposed to be with one person for the rest of your life. So I always thought that was what I’d do. And I guess in college, I thought there was, I guess in the back of my head subconsciously, I thought that there’s something wrong with me, that I wanna be with more than one person. Because I’ve had this realization in the last week, two, or three that like I can’t just give my love to one person, like it makes me happier when I’m able to share love with multiple people. I think that it’s taken me a long time. So it took me like my first big break up with my first love to realize, “Oh I’m polyamorous” cause we tried to be friends for a year, and we were in this weird, quasi relationship for a year, but we didn’t call it a relationship. We said we were friends. But I’m like, you don’t say, I mean yes you can say, “I love you” to your friend, but like there’s context behind. And also like, he was giving me like pet names, and I’m like “you don’t do that with someone who’s just your friend.” We had this big fight, it was like last year or like mid last year, something we had a big fight around like, “Oh I wanna get back together. Let’s try to make this work.” And he’s like “no, you’re polyamorous and I’m monogamous minded.” And then it hit me, that “oh wait, he knew before.” And that’s the reason that made me realize, “Oh yeah I am polyamorous, this is why this doesn’t work.” Because then it hit me recently that it didn’t work, because literally the relationship structures and styles were just completely different with him, to me and that’s why we don’t talk anymore. It would just never work to be honest, as much as we would want it to work.
Dr. Jess (12:09):
So can I ask why your most recent relationship, you’re talking about a relationship that you had up until a week ago, why it was monogamous focused, if there is fluidity there, where you can identify as polyamorous but also be in a monogamous relationship?
Sydney Rae Chin (12:22):
I think it was partly because of the pandemic to be honest. I’m scared about like giving people COVID or getting COVID. So part of it was that, because again the subconscious though of “I only need to be in a monogamous minded relationship.” Cause this what society has taught me as right, whatever is considered right, or like just and wait, what was the second half of the question?
Dr. Jess (12:44):
I thought, I’m curious, if you think you can be polyamorous as part of your identity but also be in a monogamous relationship?
Sydney Rae Chin (12:50):
I think so, personally, ’cause I’ve been in those situations, but I’m not sure, for me it wasn’t fulfilling. I wasn’t able to fully express myself, but for some people it may work.
Dr. Jess (13:02):
So in your experience, what works for you around polyamory? Why is it that you desire polyamorous relationships?
Sydney Rae Chin (13:10):
Because I just can’t just love one person, or just like be with one person. I remember the most liberated, like summer that I had, which I just thought was “oh, this is just part of college, sleeping around and everything and hookup culture.” The most liberated I felt was three years ago, this one summer, I had multiple friends with benefits. And I was also like still sleeping with other people that summer. And I just remember feeling so liberated. So being in relationship with multiple people at the same time, and having very deep friendships, is also part of my own polyamory.
Dr. Jess (13:45):
And what you find people get wrong about polyamory?
Sydney Rae Chin (13:49):
That they equated to polygamy. Which I’m like, “no, no, no, no.” It is nothing like polygamy. There’s communication, there’s consent, there’s a shitload of communication and boundaries. It’s so different from polygamy, they’re two different things, stop equating them with each other.
Dr. Jess (14:08):
How do you define that difference?
Sydney Rae Chin (14:10):
I think the main difference is that polygamy is rooted in this very religious, Christian tradition was polyamory is rooted in liberation. At least in my opinion, in my experience. That polyamorous is more about liberation, rather than something that’s rooted in such like religious values. And there’s supposed to be a certain way about doing it and whatnot. And it’s like also, I feel like the big difference in polygamy, from what I’ve seen from the media and like interviews that I’ve seen on youtube of ex cult members, that like it’s about producing as many children as possible or whatever, because of christianity. Where as polyamory is not even about that.
Dr. Jess (14:50):
Interesting. So polyamory being rooted in liberation. I think about sexual liberation and racial liberation going hand in hand. Definitely when we think about poly, so many of us, we think about it as being something for white people. So I’ve heard friends say, “oh no that’s white people shit.” So I’m curious how navigating polyamory as an Asian woman is different, like are there specific challenges you face?
Sydney Rae Chin (15:15):
I think it’s more so like on the family front, of people just not understanding what it is, and then equating it with something that’s completely different sometimes. I mean, I haven’t really dated in poly-amorous way in a long time, but I think with dating in general, I feel like as an Asian woman, there’s always those stereotypes that are gonna come up. And on top of that, being a sexuality professional, people make a lot of assumptions about like, “oh can you teach me about sex?” And like no. I don’t even, that’s not even my work. My work is something completely different from that.
Dr. Jess (15:49):
How do you define your work?
Sydney Rae Chin (15:51):
I define my work by, its aiding and empowering survivors of sexual and intimate partner violence, to reclaim their wholeness and sensuality. Whereas a lot of people just think a sexuality professional is like you teach people about sex positions and you do sex towards. I mean, there’s some of us that do that. I just personally don’t do that. That’s just not the work that makes me the most joyful.
Dr. Jess (16:15):
So what does that work look like, in terms of supporting survivors?
Sydney Rae Chin (16:21):
So a lot of it is around consent and boundaries beyond sex. ‘Cause that’s like one of my favourite workshops to give. I think a lot of like consent and boundaries talk are usually so rooted in sex. Like I just remember freshman year of college we had an old white woman teach us about boundaries and stuff and I’m like, “well why can’t you get someone who’s like closer to my age and who can relate to situations I’ve been in?” So a lot about teaching around that. And then also I’ve had lived experience with the title nine system which is the reporting system in American colleges and also American education here in the States. So I do some work around that. I’m going to be doing a workshop with an Asian American organization later this month. So I’m excited about that.
Dr. Jess (17:08):
Is that available online?
Sydney Rae Chin (17:10):
It’s not public so it won’t be available online. But if you wanna book me for that at their institution. They can definitely do that. Because I love that.
Dr. Jess (17:19):
You talk about in these workshops, so if it’s not just about sexual consent, what are the nuances, what are the scenarios that you work through?
Sydney Rae Chin (17:24):
Like emotional consent is something that I heard two years ago from my therapist. And that’s something that I talk about because a lot of people don’t talk about that and don’t talk about like how mental capacity goes into consent with conversations. And then also think about consent and boundaries with like family because that’s something that we don’t really think about. I mean growing up as a Chinese American, I didn’t grow up knowing any of this stuff until literally two years ago in therapy.
Dr. Jess (17:52):
And so how do you define that, emotional consent? How you describe it, you don’t have to define it.
Sydney Rae Chin (17:58):
So like an example would be like say, I wanted to talk to a friend about something heavy, so like gun violence or something as an example. So I would ask them, “Hey do you have capacity to talk about gun violence” like do they have time and energy? And they can say no or yes. That’s an example of emotional consent.
Dr. Jess (18:18):
I really appreciate that you know, I think anyone who’s in a helping field, anybody working in the sexuality field, anyone who’s just I guess the type of person where friends, family, strangers, co-workers, come to them. I don’t think we were taught that we could say, “I don’t have space for this.” I don’t think we were taught that we could be both empathetic and a kind person, but also say, “you know what, this isn’t something I can handle today.” And it’s interesting when we think about consent, because I can say that I would have no problem saying physically no to somebody. I would have no problem. And I have had no problem saying, “get your effing hands off my ass.” No problem with that, but with these emotional boundaries, I really struggle. And it’s also very new to me and I am certain that that is a reflection of both my gender and my cultural background that I I don’t feel, I don’t feel entitled to say, “you know what, I can’t take this on right now.” And sometimes at the end of the day I find myself on empty because I say yes to everyone, I say yes to everything, I I would never even consider asking them to ask me. And we don’t live in a culture where we do those check ins, like that language that you offered is so important. “Do you have the capacity for this right now? Are you open to this conversation? Can we talk about this today or do you honestly just wanna talk about the weather?” right? Especially among friends. Some of you just want to decompress. And you don’t, and I think sometimes we describe it as drama, like people are bringing drama. But it’s not necessarily drama. It’s about the fact that we don’t discuss emotional consent. So I’m really curious how you parse this out in a workshop and I really obviously think people will be interested to book you and learn more. How do you parse that out? So you gave that example. Do they do role plays? Are you like playing games or doing activities? What does that look?
Sydney Rae Chin (20:13):
Like for me in the workshop that I created, it’s about giving people questions and making them think about it, and like journal about it, because this was something that I wish I had as like a thirteen/fourteen year old or like fifteen year old, people asking me these questions. But I’ve seen in like I guess, typical sex ed in schools, it’s always about STIs, which I’m like okay, that’s valid. But also you’re teaching us to be scared of STIs. I went to a private Quaker school, which I was very lucky to go to. And even then, we didn’t even talk about consent in any sex ed class. We did not talk about any of this stuff. And so just asking people these questions, to have them think about it and then converse with anyone who’s in the workshop. I think it offers a lot of space for people to think until really like, put on their noggin, so to speak to just think about like, “Oh maybe I haven’t had this in my life before. And maybe this is something that could be beneficial.”
Dr. Jess (21:06):
I think it can be life changing when we think about emotional consent. You’ve given us that one example of asking for whether or not you have capacity. What if you’re on the receiving end, so question for myself, when people don’t check in to see whether or not we have the capacity. Do you have any suggestion for language we can use to set those boundaries for me?
Sydney Rae Chin (21:28):
I always use like “hey, I don’t have the spoons,” Cause I have ptsd. So I go by spoon theory, which I forgot who created it, but I don’t have the capacity to talk about XYZ. Something that comes up for me, and I can’t talk about a lot, is politics, and when people talk to me about it too much I’m just like, this is too much for my brain to handle. Like “hey, I enjoyed this conversation. But right now I don’t have the capacity. I don’t have the time and energy to give towards this conversation so that we can have a really fruitful conversation.”
Dr. Jess (22:00):
So spoon theory is Christine Miserandino right? Can you give us a synopsis of it?
Sydney Rae Chin (22:06):
So from my understanding of it, it’s like how many, like for example, you might have five spoons in a day. And then so doing laundry takes you one and a half spoon. So then you have what three and a half spoons left. And then okay, you wanna go out and socialize. That might take two spoons. So then you have one and a half spoons. It’s really like about energy levels. But what I’ve learned from the disability justice it’s about, it correlates to energy levels and also just like, i don’t know, for me, it helps to think of my energy visually as a visual person. I mean I went to film school, so I like to think about everything in visuals.
Dr. Jess (22:47):
Yes the opposite of me. I like it in numbers. But I think they work well together in terms of, it’s a metaphor for resources. And I know that I for example, would benefit from one of your workshops in terms of just practicing using that language and setting those boundaries. So this is all really helpful to leave folks with something to either reflect upon or journal upon or journal about. Do you have something we can think about around our own emotional boundaries or emotional consent? Like is there a question we can use or a prompt we can use today? I love to leave listeners with something they can go try today to feel better about themselves or ensure that we are setting boundaries and getting more of what we need and not draining ourselves emotionally?
Sydney Rae Chin (23:28):
So I think the best question from this workshop or like a paraphrase of it is, “How can you honour yourself knowing the societal expectations that you face?” And something I talk about in the workshop, is gendered and cultural expectations. Because that’s something I grew up with as a Chinese American woman. That within Chinese American culture, there’s like this expectation. And I’m supposed to do the emotional labor for men in the community in particular, and also do emotional labor outside of that for like white people and it’s specifically like white women I’ve interacted with. And then there’s that gendered again, that combines gendered and societal expectations around like what you’re supposed to do versus, what really does honour you as an individual.
Dr. Jess (24:14):
So I see that setup as things, I see two columns, just the way I would visualize it. Like, what I can do to honour myself and then what are the expectations around all these different identities that intersect and how I would look at like finding common ground. So that’s how I find that useful. Babe. Do you have anything to add? I know it’s definitely different as straight white dude.
Brandon (24:33):
I mean as a straight white guy, I mean I think all privileges are stacked up and given to us. So you don’t often think about how, I mean even that comment about, “Are you aware of what you’re saying? Does that person that you’re conversing with have the capacity to have that conversation right now?” Like Sydney made reference to politics. It’s something that, I might just jump right into because it’s something easy to talk about, without realizing that might be something that is one of your spoons of energy, or something that you just don’t even want to discuss because you know, it’s just something that triggers. So I think that that’s really really helpful. And you know even going back to your comment, I guess it’s been making me think about how people who are in monogamous relationships, Sydney, your first relationship where you said that your partner said you’re poly, or you seem to be poly. And I could be wrong what I’m saying here, but you’re poly and then you realize “Oh yeah you know. I I feel like I am.” I wonder how do people in monogamous relationships right now, begin to have those conversations when poly might be something that they want to explore or discuss or even begin to examine.
Dr. Jess (25:47):
Yeah, and we’ve talked about that differential between one partner who is monogamous minded, and the other who identifies polyamorous. In your experience Sydney, and I will let you go, is that something that is surmountable or what was your experience? Can you make things work, when one person is monogamous minded, and not only monogamous for themselves, but wants their partner to be monogamous, and the other partner identifies as polyamorous.
Sydney Rae Chin (26:11):
I think that it’s really hard in my experiences that I’ve had with monogamous minded people. Because they have this one view of life. At least with like my first love, there was this one view of like, “okay, we’re going to get engaged.“ Oh my god. I almost got engaged at twenty two. That’s always a fun story. And like he wanted this very, what I would consider like traditional nuclear family type of thing which is fine. Hey that’s him. But for me now looking back I realize that I wasn’t happy in that relationship. And I think that it’s hard, if you both aren’t feeling happy and you’re both in this like, “okay we’re salvaging parts of ourselves.” And I think that was the problem in that relationship, that we were salvaging parts of ourselves to be together and we weren’t our whole selves, which is really, I don’t think that’s liberating for anyone. And it wasn’t liberating for me. It didn’t make me happy. And I think that’s also why, ’cause his idea of monogamy was very different from what I thought the relationship could be, which was like more monogam-ish. Which is I think, part of polyamory. And I think that it’s connected to polyamory. And it was like that for a little bit, but when we got more serious it felt like, “okay, that whole monogam-ish aspect of the relationship went away, that it’s more like, “okay, we’re gonna move in together. ‘Cause you’re going to grad school and I’ll be doing working in a nine to five.” Which is again, I feel like it connects to nuclear family. And then also like working, and shared finances, which can obviously be different in polyamorous relationships. But like this was more in, I don’t know how to explain how it was monogamous minded, but there was just this like underlying subconscious thing that like, “Oh, a way that we’re going to share finances is monogamous minded. And also I’m gonna give you a ring. ‘Cause I want to be engaged to you and I wanna marry you.”
Dr. Jess (28:03):
Wow. Bringing up money, that must be, that’s a conversation we’ve never had on the podcast. On how how do you manage finances. Which again speaks to the reality, that many of these options are more accessible with every layer of privilege right? If you, if money isn’t as tense, if money isn’t as much of a concern, it may potentially lead to less tension. So that’s a whole other conversation. It brings me back just to close out to your question, about how do I honour myself? And when you talk about your experience, feeling not liberated, feeling limited, feeling as though you’re like bargaining away pieces of yourself, or salvaging just pieces of yourself. That’s a big question not only around setting boundaries in emotional consent, but also really important question around relationships right? How am I honouring myself in this relationship? And of course honouring your partner. Not in the old testament kinda way, but showing love and respect and really talking things through. So thank you so much. Thank you for sharing all of these concepts. I’m going to be definitely thinking about how I honour myself. For me, I’ll just tell folks, my challenge is professionally setting boundaries, more so than with like a partner or friends. Sometimes I struggle with friends, but more, it’s professionally. How do I say, “listen, I can’t take this on,” you know? And I don’t want to discourage people from contacting me, it’s just, I get a lot of you know, DMs and emails. And I wanna help people right? But then I have difficulty setting those boundaries. So I’m going to start thinking about what that looks like and where those expectations come from. So thank you so much, and I imagine that you, I’m certainly confident that you’re workshops on emotional consent are really invaluable to institutions and individuals. So folks can learn more at http://www.syneyraechin.com, but we will also link your instagram and your email in the show notes. Thanks so much for joining us today.
Sydney Rae Chin (29:55):
Thank you so much for having me, this is great. And now I’m thinking about like, oh all these questions. And now I’m like, something with money and it’s something that I have to think on more because I didn’t even realize that I made that comment, and I’m like wait, we don’t really talk about that.
Dr. Jess (30:08):
Yeah I’m curious who’s talking about money in the polyamorous communities, so if folks have a resource they can recommend, I’d love to have somebody come in and talk about that either from a personal or expert perspective. So thank you again.
Sydney Rae Chin (30:20):
Thank you.
Dr. Jess (30:22):
And thank you so much for listening, tuning in. Don’t forget to check out http://www.adamandeve.com, use code DRJESS for fifty percents off almost any item, plus free shipping and a whole bunch of goodies. We love hearing from you, so keep the questions coming. Next week we’re gonna answer some questions, I promise. Wherever you’re at have a great one.
(30:41):
You’re listening to the Sex With Dr. Jess podcast. Improve your sex life, improve your life.
