How does selling sexy online affect your offline relationship with sex and your body? Anita poses that question to two creators: Paris Bush, who in four years on Only Fans has become one of the site’s top earners, and Maxim Lupin, who says that online sex work is the profession that best supports his mental and physical health. 

Meet the guests:

- Paris Bush creates content that runs the gamut from nude and spicy to spoofy and comical

- Maxim Lupin creates content that focuses on kink and sex ed

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It's been half a century since the psychedelic era, but some baby boomers are returning to the drugs of their youth — not for rock and roll, but to confront aging. Writer Abbie Rosner re-experienced mushrooms in her 60s, and she tells Anita about her subsequent investigation into why other boomers are taking psychedelics to grapple with aging. Plus, a medical professional shares what it’s like to facilitate these experiences for her peers.

Meet the guests:

- Abbie Rosner is a writer who shares her own experience and the stories of other baby boomers, which she plans to publish in a book called “ELDEREVOLUTION: Psychedelics and the New Counterculture of Aging”

- Dr. Crystal Dawn is a physician who's board-certified in family medicine and provides ketamine-assisted therapy

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There are few things that are certain about 2025, but one of them is that at some point, you’ll be called upon for advice. Anita talks to Meghan Keane, the founder of NPR's Life Kit and author of “Party of One,” about how to give good advice. Meghan shares her personal journey to striking the balance between overthinking, venting and actually getting to the root of a problem. Plus, she sits in the hot seat to answer some big questions from our listeners.

Meet the guest:

- Meghan Keane is the author of "Party of One: Be Your Own Best Life Partner" and the founder and managing editor of NPR's Life Kit

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As a child of two immigrants, Anita has a tumultuous relationship with the question: "Where are you from?" So, too, do many third culture kids — people who spend a significant number of their developmental years living in places that are not their parents' homelands. She talks with two third culture kids — one 35 and one 12 — and their moms about growing up between cultures and how they’ve built identity and relationships along the way.

Meet the Guests:

- Rayla Heide, a senior narrative designer at Blizzard Entertainment, talks about establishing cultural identity as a third culture kid and the grief and joy involved in moving around in childhood

- Madeleine Maceda Heide, an international school leader and modern elder as well as Rayla's mother, shares the advantages of being a third culture kid and the ways she helped their family feel at home wherever they lived

- Phuong Tran, and international journalist and communications consultant for overseas non-profit organizations, talks about her and her son's recent move from Thailand to North Carolina, and what they gained and lost in making that transition

- Kaden Tran, a middle school student, talks about why moving to the US didn't meet up with his expectations and how its impacted his friendships

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Please note: This episode originally published November 10, 2023.

Update: Rayla Heide is now the Franchise Narrative Director on a new game in development at Scopely.

Anita hands over the mic to Embodied’s intern, Nina Scott. After listening to our episode about food and cultural identity from a couple of weeks ago, Nina started talking to her friends about how their family recipes help them feel connected to their heritage. She shares some of those conversations and reflections. 

Meet the guests:

- Sari Ghirmay-Morgan, Nina’s friend who is of Ethiopian and Eritrean heritage

- Rebecca Wu, Nina’s friend who is of Chinese and Taiwanese heritage

- Britney Watson, Nina’s friend who is Caribbean heritage

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Anita has heard one resounding truth from her friends who lost a parent in early adulthood: That death was the biggest thing that has ever happened to them. She meets two people who've built specific communities around their grief on the internet and a writer who experienced losing his dad twice. 

Meet the guests:

- Liz Zorn, photographer and model, talks about the sudden loss of her father and how it's changed her views on the afterlife 

- Naomi Edmondson, grief educator and space holder, shares how the experience of losing two mother figures in her 20s inspired her to create a community group for Black folks who are grieving 

- Jeff Dingler, author and journalist, explains how he lost his father twice: first to mental illness when he was 14 and then to death when he was in his 20s 

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Please note: This episode originally published September 8, 2023.

Dig deeper:

Tough Times Guide

Naomi’s grief resources

Liz’s YouTube video, “What no one tells you about losing a parent”

Jeff’s Insider piece

Jeff’s piece about his mom

Like the majority of American men over 35, Anita's partner is balding...and they're both a little distressed about it. But why? She brings her questions to two men who've interrogated baldness from all angles: race, sexuality, science, media, culture and lived experience. They'll explore where this fear comes from and how many other men feel this way.

Meet the guests:

- E. Patrick Johnson is dean of the School of Communication and Annenberg University Professor at Northwestern University and the author of “Scatter the Pigeons,” an essay on baldness, masculinity and Blackness

- Glen Jankowski is an assistant professor in the School of Psychology at University College Dublin whose research includes the medicalization of baldness and the history of marketing anti-baldness products

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Anita's been reckoning with what it means to stay connected to cultural identity as a mixed-race adult. And in pursuit of what things to prioritize, she's turning her focus to food. She talks to mixed-race foodie and writer Raj Tawney, whose hours in the kitchen with his mom and grandma have grounded his search for belonging. Then, she picks up the phone and calls the primary chef in the Rao family: her mom, Sheila.

Meet the guests:

- Raj Tawney is a writer, foodie and the author of “Colorful Palate: A Flavorful Journey Through a Mixed American Experience”

- Sheila Rao is Anita's mom 

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A growing number of American adults have the same feeling about romantic partnerships: They don’t want one. Anita meets three people who have chosen singlehood: a scholar who examines the double standard of relationship status, a single mother of two by choice and a man shedding toxic masculinity to build a deliberately single life.

Meet the guests:

- Dr. Kris Marsh, associate professor at the University of Maryland and author of “The Love Jones Cohort: Single and Living Alone in the Black Middle Class,” brings us into her research on single, Black Americans and some of the larger structural forces that shape an individual's choice to be single — and how that work has informed her own embrace of singlehood

- Aisha Jenkins, a single mother by choice and the host and creator of the "Start to Finish Motherhood" podcast and blog, shares her journey to becoming a parent and the key relationships that have supported her along the way

- Lucas Bradley, author of "A Single Point of Light" Substack newsletter, explains what he has put into place to create a fulfilling life for himself as a deliberately single man

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This episode originally aired June 2, 2023.

The option to end one's own life through prescribed, lethal medication is legal in 10 states and in Washington D.C. Guest host Anisa Khalifa talks to two researchers about what the assisted death debate illuminates about dying in the United States. 

Meet the guests:

- Mara Buchbinder, a medical anthropologist and the author of "Scripting Death: Stories of Assisted Dying in America," shares her research into how patients, doctors and caregivers interpreted assisted death law in Vermont

- Harold Braswell, associate professor in health care ethics at St. Louis University, talks about disability rights and how assisted death fits into the larger end-of-life care landscape in the U.S.

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