Hi, Gephas listeners. This is a special edition of the Political Gap Fest about relationships

during the pandemic. Esther Parell, the brilliant therapist, will join us to talk about families,

our partners, the people we work with, the people we see, and the people we wish we got

to see more often. We're guessing that, like for us, nearly all of your relationships

have been transformed by this pandemic. So we decided to have a whole conversation about

that. We found it so interesting that we decided to publish it in full as its own episode.

It felt like a little bit of a tonic for the three of us to be part of it. We hope it

can help lighten the weight on your shoulders too. So here's the show.

Esther Parell is a psychotherapist, a writer, a podcaster. She wrote, of course, mating

captivity, unlocking erotic intelligence, which was a huge bestseller. She has a new book,

and also a New York Times bestseller, the state of affairs, rethinking infidelity. And of

course, she hosts the very popular podcast, where should we begin, and how also another

podcast, how's work also popular. And during the shutdown, she is doing a podcast mini-series

out of where should we begin, called Couples Under Lockdown, and also because she is

the busiest person in the world. She's also doing live video conversations on YouTube

and Facebook on Wednesdays at 3pm Eastern. Goodness. That's a lot. So Esther, the title of

your most famous book is mating captivity, and I know that's not the kind of captivity

that you were talking about when you wrote that. But based on what you're seeing so far

out of the shutdown and out of the quarantine, what are the distinct characteristics of relationships

in this lockdown? So, you know, this could be mating in captivity, the sequel, you know,

the quarantine edition. But what we see is this, in situations of acute stress, and the

stress is literally becoming gradually more acute by the week. We're going to see how

...