I sincerely believed acting was something I wanted to do, because my mother manipulated and gaslighted me my entire childhood. I was completely brainwashed. By the time I was old enough to realize that not only was it not my idea, but that I didn’t have to be an actor any more if I didn’t want to, I was terrified I would be the huge failure my abusive father always made me believe I was, so I kept trying to be an actor well into my 30s.
In my 40s, I decided to retire from acting on-camera, and use what I’d learned over the years to work as a voice actor, audiobook narrator, and writer. I’m a New York Times bestselling author! And number on audiobook narrator!
I just turned 50 in July. I’m still doing the performing and entertaining work I’m pretty good at, but I’m only doing it on my terms. My favorite thing I’m doing right now is hosting The Ready Room, the official online destination for all things Star Trek universe.
I’m the happiest I’ve ever been in my life. I’m truly thriving. I’ve been married for almost 24 years, I have two wonderful children and a daughter-in-law I love like my own. It’s a really good life, but I’m not going to lie: I had to crawl through a LOT of shit to get here.
Marian Martin played a dancer named ‘Pinky Lee’ in the 1943 film, ‘Lady of Burlesque’ which was based on the novel ‘The G-String Murders’ written by strip tease queen Gypsy Rose Lee. Marian Martin herself was not a burlesque performer.
For things to really change, you will also have to start to let go of wanting their approval so badly. I know it can sound weird to think strategically like this with family, but if they can tell you’re really hungry for it, you give them a pretty easy in to control or manipulate you. Caring less about our parents approval is part of our development into adults, but that doesn’t mean it happens automatically or easily. This is just another one of these things, like setting boundaries, where you start working on it, and it will become easier over time.
I’d also try and remember that approval and support aren’t the same thing. If all we’ve ever gotten is approval or disapproval, we may have approval confused with support (or go for approval because we feel that’s the only way we’ll get something resembling support), but I assure, you, they’re very different. Support feels better and is more substantial and meaningful than approval. Support also tends to come with far fewer conditions than approval. Often, when we want approval very badly, what we actually want is support, which can happen with or without approval, and is a lot more emotionally nourishing than approval can ever be. Odd as it may sound, when we let go of seeking approval with people, that’s usually how we find out who really is or isn’t going to give us support.
