Intersex Joy, Activism Burnout, and Being Your Authentic Self with Intersex Educator and Creator

PIDGEON PAGONIS

0:05:00 - Danielle Bezalel

Good morning Pigeon. How's it going? It's good. How are you doing? I'm good. Welcome back to the podcast. Three years later, I can't believe that it's been that long since we last spoke. Kind of wacky. People tell us all the time that they are obsessed with your episode, which is really really nice to hear, and for folks who haven't heard that episode, definitely go back and listen after this one. But I'm wondering if you can start by introducing yourself and just telling us about your work as an intersex educator and a creator and author and many other hats that you wear. 

0:05:43 - Pidgeon Pagonis

It's funny you said creator and educator because I just changed my Instagram to say that I'm trying to be more like better at social media and it's thank you, thank you, Thank you, it's working. Yeah, I'm an intersex person. I'm a person first and foremost, but I'm intersex. I was born intersex and I, you know, dedicate my life to the working aspect of my life. I dedicate to sharing intersex information, giving lectures and workshops and keynotes and being real creative, to making films, doing photography, projects around intersex doing, you know, making clothing lines and stuff like that, like making cool intersex positive t-shirts and art. And lately I've decided I hope this doesn't conflict with the podcast, but I don't want to tell my story anymore. I want to. 

I just want to focus on intersex as a whole, like a broader stroke and the positive things going on and the successes going on, and I want to embody intersex joy for others that are intersex and I basically just want to. I want to be, I want to continue on my healing journey and be a catalyst for others to heal as well. Hopefully, they see me healing and they want to heal and I can share things along the way that I'm learning. So I think that's kind of where my focus is: what are intersex people doing? That is, what are they doing that are like successes, where are they winning around the world, what are their wins? And also, how do they do that? And then also, what does their healing journey look like? 

And yeah, I'm gonna be working on a documentary about those two themes this fall. We start filming pretty soon and just kind of you know, kind of looking at those aspects around the world, like where intersex people are having big wins or successes. And also I want to know, like, how do you take care of yourself? Because there's no way to do this work without it affecting you, which is why I was saying I don't want to tell my story anymore because it leeches so much out of you, and I've done that already you know for so long and it's in my book now and I can finally hopefully come back to this work in a different way. 

0:08:20 - Danielle Bezalel

Yeah, do you feel like the fact that you have, like this physical thing, which, by the way, congratulations on your book. It came out yesterday. I'm very happy that we were able to chat with you. There must be so many emotions and feelings and excitement and I'm just wondering, I guess, based on what you just said, do you feel like, because you have this physical thing that you're able to say, like my kind of heart, soul story is like in this thing, then it kind of relieves you from having to talk about it in the same way. 

0:08:55 - Pidgeon Pagonis

That's the goal. That's the goal. I've had this thought before. Like I made my first film called the Sun I Never had and I was like, oh, it's in the film now. Or actually, yeah, also like it's on YouTube. And I was like, oh, it's on YouTube. Or you know another film called A Normal Girl. 

My story was in there. I'm like you know what? Or like you know, I've just shared my story in so many different formats and mediums that there's been moments like this before where I'm like, oh, I'm done, I get to move on. But I think I didn't really have a full understanding of how bad I needed to separate myself from my story before. And now I do. And I think, having the book, which is the most in depth and expansive and thorough explanation of my story, now I'm like it's time and I, yeah, I think, because I have this physical book out there, I can refer people to it and and, if you know, and we could talk about other things. So it is like a path. It feels like a transition, actually like a baton, and the book is my baton to myself and I'm like okay, now I could do something else. 

Yeah, it's like a chapter, it's like a chapter closing in a new chapter opening, and it's literally a book with chapters. 

0:10:29 - Danielle Bezalel

So that's the correct, very apt metaphor. Yeah, I imagine that must feel like a lot of things at once, but primarily, I hope, like you said, very freeing, and like you're kind of able to really like to shift your energy and your attention in a different way to express yourself and relate to other people which is nice. 

0:10:50 - Pidgeon Pagonis

Yeah, that would be nice, that is nice. Yeah, that is nice yeah. 

0:10:55 - Danielle Bezalel

Well, let's talk a little bit about the wins that you were referring to. You know, like I think this is a very powerful way to think through how maybe we're not kind of like further marginalizing, like marginalized groups by only talking about trauma or pain or hardship, but also talking about how we need to champion folks and specifically intersex people. Are there any wins lately that are happening for you and your community or that are on your mind that you wanna highlight? 

0:11:28 - Pidgeon Pagonis

Well, there are so many this summer. There's my book coming out. My memoir came out yesterday. My friend Alicia's memoir is coming out next month. Intersex as well. Someone in my community named Esther had also Intersex had a memoir come out earlier this summer. People like Kimberly Zieselman had a memoir come out during maybe two a year or two two years ago. 

Wow, a lot of books. Well, there's like a lot of books. All of a sudden, Hida has one. You know there's a lot of books. There's a film that just came out this summer called Everybody. 

0:12:07 - Danielle Bezalel

Oh yeah, we're interviewing Saifa again at the end of this season, so I'm really excited to talk to him about the film. 

0:12:14 - Pidgeon Pagonis

Right, so that film is out. So these are all big wins to have so much representation in the media. And then there's like if you go back a few years, there's the win. I don't know if we talked before or after, but we had success with our campaign at Lurie Children's. Did we talk about that last time? 

0:12:40 - Danielle Bezalel

We might have, I think, like one of my questions that I have here, and this is like a perfect segue, actually, because you are a founder of the Intersex Justice Project and a co-founder, other COS as well, and it's hashtag and intersect surgery campaign in 2020. And so you know I would. I was wondering if you talk through the goal of that campaign and what you accomplished and maybe what's still left to accomplish that folks are still working on. 

0:13:12 - Pidgeon Pagonis

So the goal was to focus our efforts more narrowly. Instead of focusing on the entire country to end the surgeries, we focused on one hospital and since Saifah Saifah's the co-founder oh, and I'm no longer there, by the way, I don't know if I made that clear. I say co-founder, but it's like I don't know what the word is if you're not there anymore, but I was a past co-founder. 

0:13:45 - Danielle Bezalel

Previous co-founder. 

0:13:46 - Pidgeon Pagonis

I don't know one of the original co-founders there. 

And so Saifah doesn't live, or didn't live, in the city where his surgeries occurred, and I did. So we focused on Lurie Children's Hospital in Chicago and we wanted to get our goal to get one hospital to end the surgeries. So the campaign was called the End Intersex Surgery hashtag and we had three goals, one, to get them to end the surgeries. Two, to get them to apologize. And three, for them to set up some type of intersex reparations fund for all the people that they've harmed at their hospital, and to create some type of fund that intersex people could access to get care or things that they need, especially things that they need because of what happened to them at the hospital. So in 2020, yes, was it 2020? Yeah, it was 2020. According to my notes. 

0:14:43 - Danielle Bezalel

So it's 2020. 

0:14:45 - Pidgeon Pagonis

2020, wow, yeah, that was a year, that was a summer, really 2020, not 2022. 

0:14:54 - Danielle Bezalel

Maybe there have been multiple campaigns. 

0:14:57 - Pidgeon Pagonis

Well, the campaign went for years and years, but I'm trying to think when did Lurie apologize? Oh, I saw, a few years ago, lurie. Actually we had a success and Lurie it's in the book too, the whole campaign and all that and Lurie apologized and they became the first hospital in the country in the world to apologize to intersex people for what they did to us for some 50 plus years, and they also made a statement that they were gonna end surgeries on intersex people. They did not agree to a reparations fund, but we got the first two demands that we wanted and, yeah, that was, did you say? How did we do it? Is that what you said? 

0:15:49 - Danielle Bezalel

Yeah, or just kind of like, maybe what's still left to accomplish? Maybe do you feel like that reparations fund is kind of like a main goal, or is it also, in addition to that, equally as important to kind of do the same thing with like as many hospitals as you can? Like what's the? Yeah, what do you see as the king of the vision for something like that? 

0:16:13 - Pidgeon Pagonis

Well, I found out that I found out a few weeks ago that the surgeon that was the main surgeon doing surgeries at Lurie named Earl Chang. He's still doing surgeries. He's just not doing clitoral surgeries supposedly, and he's still doing things like vaginal surgeries and other reconstructive surgeries, not, yeah, cosmetic, plastic type, plastic surgery type things to people's vaginas. So I would say there still needs to be work done, just even at Lurie, to hold them accountable, because, at the end of the day, all they were just words on a website and there's nobody, there's nothing. Well, there are some people trying to hold them accountable on the inside, but they're not formal, there's nothing that they're really accountable to. They could do whatever they want behind closed doors. I think you know like there's no way for us to know on the outside. So there would still be work there. There's still work that needs to be done there. 

And, yeah, I would say it would be great if other people could organize their own end intersex surgery campaigns in their cities against children's hospitals. So that would be like a dream and a fantasy. Yeah, that would be great, but it's not going to be me and so I don't know who it's going to be. But there's a lot of talking about intersex, joy and wins. There's a lot of young intersex people coming up now. 

0:17:54 - Danielle Bezalel

Yeah, I was going to ask you how you feel like the space has shifted since you've been a part of it. 

0:18:00 - Pidgeon Pagonis

Yeah, it's so different. I was one of the only young people I know speaking publicly when I first started about 15 years ago, and now there's just and even back then people weren't even using their real names on things like Tumblr, where you don't even have pictures of yourselves. That's how scared everybody was to not be scared, but protective, or also maybe a little fear around certain people finding out. And today it's like people are putting intersex in all their Instagram bios. It's just like people are proudly intersex today Not everybody in the world, but there's just so much more, especially younger people that are younger and they're coming up and so now you're seeing people like I remember one of the things we did at IJP is I designed a poster that said end intersex surgery, and then I had other people design their versions and we put them on a Google folder for public use and we encouraged people to print them out and plaster them in their cities. And I just found out that somebody has been like, took that over and they organize each year for people to go to others in their cities to put those posters up, and I didn't even know. So that's amazing and that's what I want to keep. 

Happening is just we put a lot of, we put some resources out there in IJP, like we did a whole toolkit about how to do your own end intersex surgery campaign in your city, and there's like 10 steps and it's a whole Google doc and there's visuals and we put the chance in there that we used and we put the posters that I was talking about and how to strategize, how to do this, whatever. And I really hope that, like the younger people that are coming up, actually I just hope that they are happy. That's all I really care about. But if they want to do activism and advocacy work, I really hope that you know they can use some of these tools and then come up with their own. And it would be great, you know. And to end the surgeries in the whole country yeah, that would be amazing. 

0:20:15 - Danielle Bezalel

Yeah, yeah, I mean I think I do think that young people there is kind of this difference, especially with like Instagram and TikTok and with people like you said not everybody, but there is definitely a difference in people being proud about their labels and kind of really wanting to connect with people about neurodiversity and different gender expressions and just different ways of living and experiencing things. And that is definitely different from when I felt like I was growing up and, you know, didn't have access to those kinds of just visibility, just seeing other people who were proud about who they were, if they were different from the norm or whatever. 

0:21:03 - Pidgeon Pagonis

Yeah, and that's like my hope. I just saw a post about Florida instituting, prageru or Prager University videos in their schooling systems now for fourth graders, third graders, fifth graders, etc. And these videos. Prageru is like a conservative backed media company that's whole purpose is to indoctrinate people into conservative values or whatever. 

0:21:37 - Danielle Bezalel

Like a question , yeah. 

0:21:38 - Pidgeon Pagonis

Conservative. I won't even say values because they're not values. Conservative ideology, these videos there's a video they're making kids watch that says it's all about how to embrace your femininity. And it says things like you should love to stay at home, it's a privilege to stay at home and raise your kids and you should really like you should smile. And then they have a guy saying you should smile and then they say because it lights up the whole room and like you should make your house pretty. 

And then there's like ones about masculinity and it's like they literally say like masculinity won the war against Nazis and so, like, embrace your masculinity, it's not toxic. And then they have one about slavery or Christopher Columbus, and they're like they're telling, they're like they're saying that, like it wasn't that bad, because in his time slavery was just so normal. And then they have one with Frederick Douglass saying that like it's like a pot, like they're being, they're downplaying slavery, but with these figures throughout history. And so you see this, I'm just like hearing it right now. There's like this constant focus on reinforcing the gender binary and really outdated gender roles and also this, this desire to rewrite history when it comes to black people's histories, history in this country, and especially around slavery. 

There's like this weird obsession they have with trying to downplay slavery and my hope why I was saying all this is that I was. I was really alarmed. But then I was thinking a lot of these kids have access to Tik Tok and YouTube and all these other apps I probably don't even know exist and there's so much good media on there. Hopefully that they can tap into that. Hopefully that can counterbalance some of the stuff that might be enforced on them in school with these videos that are like cartoons. 

They're like. Some of them are like cartoons, some are whatever, some are people. So, yeah, the representation of different, like you said, neurodivergent or different identities, sexualities, ways of existing, and the way that some of these younger people are able to break it down in such short and accessible ways and like attention grabbing ways. I hope that that can hopefully counterbalance some of the stuff that, like, say, kids in Florida are going to be maybe indoctrinated into in their school system. 

0:24:15 - Danielle Bezalel

Yeah, that's really scary to me. I mean not like it. I'm surprised because we know the state of sex and in this country, we know how quite controversial discussing racism and sexism is in certain parts of this country. And so, yeah, I don't know. I just do that. It just makes me a little worried about young people being forced to hear these ideas. But you're right in that the hope is that, either at home and or on the internet, they're able to grasp some sort of semblance of the truth. So I do think, like algorithms and through the way in which people are fed information, it's so dependent on what they first see and what their addresses and the way that their families vote. 

There are so many things that these algorithms know about us and I do wonder if it just kind of pushes kids deeper into these holes instead of allowing them to really see the full picture. 

0:25:35 - Pidgeon Pagonis

Yeah, it's scary. 

0:25:38 - Danielle Bezalel

I mean, maybe I think this is a good opportunity actually, because you said something earlier that I wanted to highlight, which is like I hope that these kids are happy. When we were talking about you know that end intersex surgery campaigns end, and I can just sense it from you like chatting with you this time around does very much feel like a different energy. And, of course, you just finished a book. There's so much going on. I'm sure it's quite exhausting. I can't even imagine how much energy and effort has been put into this project. 

But I do think that there's this general feeling that I'm getting from you, like I've been in this work for 15 years. I've been doing this for a really long time. I need a little space or some sort of a break from talking about hardships exclusively, or like some sort of burnout. Like can you maybe talk about this a little bit for other activists who I think, like are really passionate about their work but inevitably like burnout comes really hard for most people, and how do you kind of like deal with that or what do you do to mitigate that? I think museum help is important. 

0:26:52 - Pidgeon Pagonis

to open up the issue to myself, right now, I think I grew up, especially when I went to college. Well, when I went to college, I'll say during my college years, there was a pride that I learned about, or I. There was a certain, I guess, emphasis on the person who is political which goes back in time, and we were learning about that in my education, in my classes the power of an individual's story and storytelling, subjectivity, your own subjective experience, being pushed up against mainstream narrative, dominant narratives. And for people that have experienced oppression or any injustices, sometimes all you have is your voice or your story. And so there was a pride of like, a certain pride of like. 

Okay, well, mainstream society says this about intersex people, but I'm going to share my truth, and that was a vehicle for so long for me to share my story. I probably if I can't even imagine, I've never even thought about this, but if I can count how many times I've shared my story since I found out, when I was 20, 19 or 20, it would probably be mind blowing. And there were people along the way, I think, people who were like my age at the time and already older, who were like you don't have to share your story. You don't have to do this. They would talk about burnout. They would talk about self care and taking care of yourself, and I was like not trying to hear that. 

0:28:45 - Danielle Bezalel

And I was like it'll never happen. You're like that's not me. 

0:28:47 - Pidgeon Pagonis

Yeah, I was like I'll never burn out, ever, and sharing my story does nothing to me. Like I'm fine, like I'm totally fine and like, yet, every time, especially in the beginning, I would be like I would actually always like I'm so out of it. If I give a talk, usually I would tell my story, or just to a reporter or a journalist or whatever, for the rest of the day or the next day I'd be completely, like, flattened. And yeah, I think that there was this sense that I had to share my story, that the personal is political and that this is my most powerful weapon against what is. What happened to me and what is happening to other intersex people is, I think, because early on I had this fantasy. Well, I was, at first I was in awe. I was not in awe, I was, I was, I was completely just overwhelmed by what I had found out about what they did to me, and I was completely shocked. 

And when that settled a little bit, I was like I was just so, like I'm like is this, I can't believe this is real? And I just need to tell one newspaper and then everyone will be like, oh, you're right, this is horrible. And then they're like we're going to end the surgeries. I think I like held on to that belief for a long time when it didn't happen at first, because I think one of like my first bigger interviews was like for AP and they published like an every newspaper, usually like people take their bylines and then disseminate it everywhere and it didn't do anything, like the surgeons just keep doing what they're doing. And then I would think, maybe without thinking about it, I was like, well, I just need to get a, I need to share my story to more people, or I need to go on YouTube and then let more people find out. And then there was this hamster wheel of thinking like if I can only do, if I can do more yeah it's never ending. 

If I could just give more, do more, spread the information more, create a campaign, create a co-creative, an organization with no funding called intersex justice project and and run that with my co-founders and do a campaign and then do the protests and make films and do this project and be visible on social media and talk to people in DMs and do answer emails. And if I could just and that's the trauma response, as I say, all this right now and what I've realized and this is one of the ways that I've been working on my healing right now and like my healing journey that I'm on is I go to ketamine clinic on uh used to be twice a month, I mean twice a week, now it's once a week. So what I've realized in the clinic is and I've been putting these pieces together I'm in a clinic, like a hospital clinic, when I go get ketamine to heal myself, and so there's all these triggers, like people in white lab coats, um the room, the way the room looks like, having those hospital curtains hanging from the wall between me, and like other ketamine patients, um, and what I've keep coming up with in ketamine when I'm, when I'm, when I'm, when I've, after I've administered the ketamine to myself. I keep bumping up to this child myself as a child, like, or yeah, on a hospital bed and I'm back in the surge, I'm back in the hospital and there's this realization I always have afterwards, that like I just want to protect that kid so bad, and I want to like love on them and also protect them. And I think one of the ways that I've tried to do that was like and I think, oh yeah, that's another thing I realized is that me trying to end the surgeries for everybody was also me trying to end the surgeries for me, as if I could go back in time, which I can't. So that is that sets up another hamster wheel that you're ultimately trying to seek something that you can't actually have because of the way that time works. Sadly, at least in this dimension I'm playing, um, but so I've. 

I've been realizing like damn, I just really want to like, like there was a time I was like spooning my younger self in the hospital bed and just being like I'm here, you know, like giving them that presence of me. Today and last week I had this other realization. I always feel this like rumbling when I'm there and I always assume there's something heavy upstairs that's just like rolling around and then I feel it through the floor of, and so I just never thought anything of it. But, as I said, I keep coming back to these hospital experiences when I'm under the ketamine and I think it's because I'm in a clinic and I realized this time that there is no rumbling. This is actually like you know, when you go to the movies or like a ride, and then the chair rumbles when you watch something. 

I feel like that was happening, like I was having memories of the hospital, of being in one of those hospital beds, and they're dragging me through the hallways and I'm feeling like the little rumbles from the wheels. So there was just a memory and it actually felt. It was like a feeling of memory. And so this time, when I put two and two together, like oh, there's, this is like a memory I put my hands out in my head and also like in real life and I was like just stop, you guys, like there was like people carrying me you know, I assumed and tell they're there and like you guys just chill out, like why are you doing this? Like please, like go away. Like I don't need you to bring me to the operating room or anything. 

And then I in my head again and I pulled the hospital curtains closed, closed around my bed, my hospital bed, and that I felt like a sense of relief or like autonomy and that I've never had before, even though it was so tiny. 

It was like, you know, I'm just telling people to stop moving me, and I closed these curtains to keep the doctors away from me, even though they could just open them up, you know. But it was so symbolic of me reclaiming something. And so when I was thinking about I want to take care of my younger self, and I think I was reflecting on that's probably why I've done so much of this work, because I was always trying to like go back in time, basically, and prevent what happened to me from happening, and I realized, like, well, how can I take care of like somebody, like my child's self, like that's in the past. And I realized, well, the best way I could do that is to take care of myself today. I mean the only way I can do that is to take care of myself today. 

And how can I do that? Well, I could think about what's best for my future. And if I'm thinking about the future me and then taking care of the present me, and if I'm taking care of the present me, then I'm loving the past me, the younger me. And so when I said I want people to be happy, like intersex people first and foremost, I think I said that because activism can feel or seem like a pathway to well, it gives you a purpose. So it's a very intoxicating experience because it can give you great purpose, it can give you motivation, it can give you, you know, a sense of taking control and having you know. But at the end of the day for me at least it could. It's a hamster wheel, like you said, and I had to jump off at some point and I was saying that I wanted to. 

When I said, first and foremost, I hope those kids are happy and smiling or whatever, intersex joy is intersex joy, it's because I thought that this is what intersex activism would make, would help with my healing, you know. But it doesn't Like it doesn't. You have to also be doing work on your own outside of the activism stuff you're doing, and for me it's really hard to do it simultaneously, to be constantly telling my story and still somehow, you know, and somehow healing, being on a healing journey and or doing a campaign and also really focusing on healing and but like protesting in the streets at the same time, like for some people that's very possible, but for me I'm a very like single track minded person. I tend to focus on one thing at a time, like very hyper focused on the book for a while and now it's like it's going to be the documentary or it's like other stuff, but it's like it's not. I'm not really good at spreading my focus out. So, yeah, I just want intersex people or anyone thinking about activism to just you know I know people are going to do it and they're not going to listen, just like I didn't, because you're young and you. You have energy then and you have passion and all of that. 

But I will say, the day after we won, like we had a win with our campaign, I became so depressed, I lost my purpose and that speaks to me. I need to also know what my values are, what my goals are, what my purpose is outside of an intersex campaign or outside of activism. But I didn't have any, I didn't do all that. I was just like my purpose is to end the surgeries, and we didn't think we would end them in our lifetime. And then it happened at one hospital and it was like, well, now what am I going to do? And now, who am I? And I think that is the plight of activists sometimes if you might not know who you are outside of the campaigns you're working on. 

0:39:20 - Danielle Bezalel

I think, like this, knowledge and wisdom truly only comes from doing it. For how long you've been doing it and working on this and putting your whole into it. I think that, if we're lucky, life is long and, depending on different chapters, you could tap in, tap out, depending on where you're at in your journey of how you want to live your life. It doesn't mean that just because now you're kind of, like you said, one track, mind transitioning, having this realization that doing activism wasn't healing for you, definitely healing for other people I could tell you that, which you know. But I think it's like a trade-off of when you have energy, depending on how you're doing in your life, depending on what you're seeking, what you're comfortable with, and so I'm sure that there will be maybe in three years, when you have a third episode with you, there'll be this other thing that you're working. Who knows how you can tap back into that or not. 

0:44:32 - Pidgeon Pagonis

Yeah, I have ideas. 

0:44:35 - Danielle Bezalel

Of course you do. I'm not surprised by that. 

0:44:38 - Pidgeon Pagonis

I have so many ideas all the time and I'm at a point where I think the simplest ideas are the best ideas and I'm always trying to figure out well, how do I simplify my ideas? I hope, yeah, in three years there's something figured out. But yeah, right now it's just about breathing after the book has been released. And yeah, I think there's a fear, too, around not sharing your story, especially when your whole career is called your activism. Life is centered around story-based activism, which is a word I learned late in the game and I was like, oh yeah, I think I was with Saifa when we were on a video interview and someone was like how is it doing story-based activism? And we were like I was like that's what we've been doing and it was like a light bulb moment. 

Yeah, there's this term for it where you share your story as a form of activism, and it's a lot. And I think what I was going to say is like I think there's a fear I have too, like who am I without my trauma or who am I without my story? And I think that is something that a lot of people go through, maybe when they've done this type of work is like stepping into your new self and putting yourself out there, but it's a different you and it's not steeped in your trauma and your story and then like how to keep doing the work, which is one of the things I have to figure out is like, how do I keep doing this work, but differently? 

that I don't. That doesn't drain me and make me feel burned out and make me feel depressed and scared and mad, like just, and it's really hard because there's so many intersex people that are hurt and hurting, and so to be in any type of proximity to intersex work, you're in proximity to trauma and you're in proximity to a lot of deep pain. And, yeah, I think in a few years, what I really want to happen now that I remembered is like if I had to like snap my finger and just like wave a magic wand, it would be all about intersex healing and intersex joy and it would be centered around psychedelics for intersex people and trans people. But I want to start with just intersex people keep it simple and small and it would be like like I know an intersex doctor who has completely transitioned their work to ketamine treatments for people with PTSD and depression and like it would be so cool to work with them and then have retreats or something where inters or just, yeah, like a retreat where intersex people can come and try out things like ketamine, which is kind of a psychedelic, more of like a disassociative, but it's like in that umbrella and I, you know, work with people that are like trained to sit with you during these treatments and then like help you reintegrate afterwards, like with your, what you, your experience, and I think that to me is the most exciting work that I, that I want to do is, but it's hard because you can't really talk about this stuff Like social media right, because you know anything but ketamine right now is schedule one drug so, and ketamine is only limited to like people that have tried to antidepressants and you have treatment resistant depression, and then your doctors prescribe you and you have to have insurance. The stuff is like really expensive now because they've tweaked it. Johnson and Johnson tweaked the molecule a little bit and they made it the mirror isomer and it's like so expensive so you have to have insurance to get it or you can go on your own, but that's also really expensive without insurance. It's like 1000 sessions. 

So it would be something around healing, but with the use of psychedelics and things like MDMA and what's the other one? Oh, a mushroom, psilocybin and, what's amazing especially because you said three years is within three years those should all be approved by the FDA. They're in like the late phase trials, especially MDMA and psilocybin, and I cannot wait for this world to have more, a better understanding of what psychedelics are like when they stick, when they become more destigmatized, when the FDA is not so Like. Imagine a world where everyone participated in things like psilocybin versus drinking all the time, right and so. But besides that world, like I want to create a smaller world of intersex people, trans people, where we can somehow just work with people who are trained to help people through their trauma and their PTSD with the help of things like MDMA, psychedelics et cetera. Like yeah. 

0:49:49 - Danielle Bezalel

I think, knowing what you've done and from what I know of you, you don't need a magic wand. I think if you want to do it, you're just going to do it. 

0:49:57 - Pidgeon Pagonis

Yeah, and it's funny because, as I was saying it all, I was like but I also just want to be free. It's like I also want to. Just I'm at such a crossroads Like I literally just want to be me sometimes, like, can I just be me? And what does that look like? I have so many other interests, like I have a physics club that we just started with one of my friends and we just talked about physics and like, a lot of stuff related to physics and I'm you know, I use like, but it's like I always have this pool or this gravity. Back to intersex work. It's something about, well, a, you've done this, for you've built, you've done this, you've built a foundation so strong, like, why would you leave it? And yeah, maybe it's just like guilt, like I feel like I have to show up for my community and so, yeah, I need to figure this out. This is therapy. Thank you, I'm in therapy. 

0:51:05 - Danielle Bezalel

Listen, I'm really happy to be here. 

The first session is free. No, just bringing it back to your book just to close this out really quick, because I do want people to buy it and read it and hear your story, because you know, as we mentioned in the beginning of the episode, like go back to the other intersex episode we have. Go to Pigeon's website, like do your own research and like, if you're a listener who doesn't really know what intersex means or you're not familiar with people's stories, like go check it out after this episode, because this was kind of like a 201 episode, which I think is really fantastic. 

0:51:41 - Pidgeon Pagonis

Yeah, we're not like breaking down what intersex is. It's so nice I'm not telling my story. Yeah, let's just kind of. 

0:51:47 - Danielle Bezalel

You know, I really really love this conversation and I think like one line in the description of your book that I really wanted to highlight that I was in love with is it's a celebration of the freedom and empowerment that comes from learning the truth about who you are and living it. And I think, like you're talking about exactly that of just kind of like you, having told your story over and over again, and you kind of, through writing this book and through so much of your work, you know who you are and you're ready to just live your life as who you are and be a happy person and have joy and laughter and connection and all the things that we want as people. 

And so I think, like, if you could kind of encourage folks who are listening, who are having trouble themselves in whatever identity I guess that they hold, like living their true selves, what would you, what would you say to them? 

0:52:50 - Pidgeon Pagonis

I think that for a while I was telling my friends that I feel like there's a me inside of me and then there's like the outside version of me and there's a space or a gap between those two things and it made me feel so dead and like just not me. And I was really struggling with that. Like I don't know if you've ever had like an internal dialogue with yourself and you're like like you're censoring or you're like live editing your what you say or how you react to somebody or something and you're kind of like tweaking it as you go and like you're like wait, but what is the thing I would do if I was completely unfiltered and what would just be me pure me Like, and I think that that is to figure out like who you are and to get there is. Everyone has a different way of doing that and some people just have it Like I'm around. You know, I have certain friends that are just like that. I feel, at least from my perspective, that they are just themselves through and through, no matter what company, no matter who you know, no matter where they are, what stages are on or whatever. I'm thinking of India right now. It's just she's also a big part of the book and how we ultimately had a win at that hospital. But India is just one of them. Like, they are just themselves, like through and through, no matter what, and I love that about them. And I think when I've, when you're around someone like that, you start to wonder like, how do I, how do I step into that for myself? And I think for myself. 

One day I was on ketamine at the clinic and I felt and I was like thinking about it that week a lot or talking about it like you guys, like I just feel like this, like I'm not actually able to be myself a lot of times and it was making me so frustrated and I was like who, like you know, like cause there's so much pressure to perform stuff everywhere, like online, social media, everywhere, like every venue. You know there's like this, different ways like your pressure, your family stuff, like that you know, just being in public, going to the beach can't take your shirt off. Like there's so much stuff that you're pressured, like you can't just ever be yourself, except sometimes in your bedroom. You know, like if no neighbors are there, that you can just be like buck-ass naked or do whatever the hell you want, like. 

But I was like on the ketamine and I felt like almost like I was being scanned in a scanner, like, say, like a light goes over you and it's like and it didn't hurt, I didn't feel it doesn't hurt, but it was like a slow like passing over me and, as whatever was passing over me, it was like sealing me on the outside to the the real me, what I was calling the real me on the inside and it was like like taking the air out. And then I like, when it got through my whole body, I came out of that ketamine, I don't know what to call them trips and it was like what? And I was like so smiley and I was like how did that happen? Like ketamine is amazing, like it's amazing. 

I love the podcast about ketamine. It's a big part of my life because I'm not too deep into my story, but I've had such a disc. I've been so disjointed, disconnected from my body. I've realized in ketamine that I take a shot every time I say ketamine. I've realized in those sessions that I was like I can like my vagina in that area connected to me. It was like what? And it was like I can control it, like I can connect to it. 

And I still can't really like I'm still struggling, but like I've never had a moment in my life where I thought that like after you know all the surgeries and finding things out, and like it's just become this thing that's like so far removed from me and all that to say is I'm very disconnected from my body and I think that's also what I was feeling, like I was disconnected from even my personality or like who I was. 

You know who I express myself as. And I think it's really important just to figure it out for yourself. Especially people you know who have so much trauma and PTSD or complicated PTSD. For folks like us, it's so important to figure out how you can get back into your body If that's something you want and something you need, and how can you just figure out who you are and how to be that person Like? I think there's so much joy and release that comes from just being yourself and figuring that out. And yeah, I don't know how you can do it, but I would strongly encourage psychedelics and things like that, because for people like me that were so like stripped or so disconnected from our bodies, like it's taken things like ketamine and other things to help me actually connect to my body again. Super powerful. 

0:58:30 - Danielle Bezalel

Yeah, yeah, ketamine for sure needs to be in the title of this episode like hands down. 

0:58:38 - Pidgeon Pagonis

It's. I think you know everyone I know is doing it, and not everyone, but a lot of people. 

0:58:43 - Danielle Bezalel

And if they're not, it's definitely having a moment for sure she's having her moment and she's very wonderful and helpful. I'm so glad. I mean, I think that's incredible. Before I let you go, why don't you share a little bit about where people can get your memoir Nobody Needs to Know, and where they can find you and follow your work? 

0:59:08 - Pidgeon Pagonis

You can get my memoir anywhere, not anywhere but you can get it on Amazon. I feel so bad saying that on Amazon. 

0:59:22 - Danielle Bezalel

It's a legitimate thing that people use to get items, so it's okay. 

0:59:26 - Pidgeon Pagonis

Barnes and Noble Target. I have some other bookstores on my website, like smaller bookstores that I know are carrying it. I think Blue Stockings is carrying it in New York. You know, just basically Google it and you'll find out where it's sold, I guess. And if you're in Chicago, oh no, my book is out already. So I stopped doing this, but I've been hiding them. Last week and the week before I was hiding books around the city and then going to my house. Instagram and telling people like okay, I hit a book at this intersection and then people go and find it. 

but, yeah, you can just search the, I guess, google it, whatever, and then you can find out where you can buy it. And what was the second part? Where to find me? Oh, mainly like Instagram. I wish I was doing more on other platforms, but I basically mostly exist on Instagram, so like in the internet land. So my Instagram's at pigeon, my name P-I-D-G-E-O-N, yeah, and hopefully you can find me, you know, in the multiverse, somewhere on another plane one day, yeah. 

1:00:35 - Danielle Bezalel

Very, very apt ending. Thank you so so much for being here. It was really really a privilege to chat with you and it was such a beautiful conversation, so thank you so much. 

1:00:46 - Pidgeon Pagonis

You're so welcome.