Alex Cooper

It doesn't matter if you were seeing it slightly different than maybe your father was seeing it.

That was your reality.

And so the fact that you were saying, I literally thought my mom was dead.

I had no idea where she was.

That's like your...

you're in shock and you're going through grief and all of those things at a really young age and you're just alone.

And like, it seems like you didn't really have anyone to talk to.

I just didn't have the tools to talk.

Well, I think also because like you just said, like then you just kind of go on the run and you're like, I've got to figure myself out.

I've got to get through this.

And you don't, no one has time to fucking like think about their childhood until you finally can breathe a little bit and be like, what happened back then?

Yeah.

And it's also like to your father's credit.

And I have had people in my life like this where clearly whatever happened in his life, he was able to kind of plug those wounds with being like, if I can be so successful, if I can get money and status, that will help me.

And you're like, wait, the material things don't mean anything to me.

You really do.

And I remember in one of your past interviews, you said, I didn't feel like I had the right to feel.

I didn't want to cause any more pain.

I'm like, whoa, that's a really heavy burden to carry as a child to basically force yourself not to feel.

If you look back at that time in your life, what traits or habits do you think you kind of developed in response to being like, don't feel, don't feel, don't cause anyone pain?