My Mane Man Chris Appleton

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Speaker 1: Hello, gorgeous, it's Lala Kent. Welcome to untraditionally, Lala. Hello, gorgeous, it is La La Kent. Welcome back to Untraditionally, Lala. We have been graced with an.

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Speaker 2: Amazing presence today.

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Speaker 3: I'm looking at you, baby, Where are you looking to look at there?

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Speaker 2: My eyes are kind of wandering. Okay, my hot pants that I wore for you I want to.

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Speaker 4: Give you will Yes, when I.

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Speaker 2: Walk, I made sure, but when I move, yes, it's just the hot pants.

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Speaker 4: You guys.

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Speaker 2: I have Chris Appleton.

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Speaker 3: Obviously, you guys know him, because none of us.

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Speaker 2: Live under a rock anymore.

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Speaker 3: A world renowned hairstylist gives being showcased on covers of major feature publications, including Vogue, Harper's Bizarre, Vanity Fair, and That's just to name a few. Celebrity clients include Jennifer Lopez, Kim Kardashian, Sophia Viagara, Ariana Grande, Katie Perry, you have two babies that are not so much babies any more. They're kind of always your babies, right yeah, Billy and Kitty Blue. I love that name with your former partner, Katie, welcome, my love, thank you, and you have a book coming out.

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Speaker 4: It's out, We're here, there, it is.

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Speaker 2: There, it is. Do you ever have a bad day as far as like your looks go?

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Speaker 4: Yeah, really, I'm literally yesterday I was doing a podcast. I was like, I don't know why I look like all of them. It's my head gingja. Like we all have those moments where you pull yourself apart. But now I just come back to myself, Well, I'm doing that thing I do. We will do it.

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Speaker 2: We all do it.

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Speaker 3: And I I love that when I was reading your book, I love that you pointed out because most people would look at you and be like, you have everything going on, like your sexy as hell, you're touching you know, the hair of these mega mega superstars.

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Speaker 2: What insecurity or problem could you ever have?

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Speaker 4: Yeah? And I have them all right, And.

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Speaker 3: I'm I'm so excited about your book and for people to fall even harder for you. I want to know, like, when did you know it was time to write a book.

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Speaker 4: I think maybe the idea of Chris Appleton as a brand, Like people perceive me from what they see on social media, which is obviously what most people do. We have a perception of someone from the small amount of information we see. So people probably know our work with celebrities. You know, life looks good, it's a then red carpets or this and that. But that's just like a really small part of my life, right and it's a really small part of what I do. And I felt like it was time to bring a book out for people that say, well, I can't have that. I don't look like Jo Lo or I can't have that I'm not like I don't look like Kim Gardishian. And I was like, well, it's actually really easy when you break it down of how to like look and fill your absolute best. There's like a formula to it. Because I've worked with celebrities what people know me as now, but I've also worked in a salon doing you know, regular clients nine toil five. I've also done models on a runway. I've also done cancer patients lost their hair, and you know, I see, I saw a formula that worked with everyone on how to make people look and feel their best, depending on what they were going through and what they wanted. But a lot of it was about alignment. It was like, when you're fully aligned on the inside is when the outside really kind of happens, and that's the superpower. And I think that's the bit that a lot of people don't know. So what the reader will find is basically tools in how to you know, look and feel their best. And it's like, all right, well you don't look like Jennifer Lopez, but this.

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Speaker 3: Is how And I love that because even Jennifer Lopez, I'm sure has her moments of going, we just ain't hitting today and like the little insecurities.

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Speaker 2: And I noticed when I started talking.

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Speaker 3: About like how I felt postpartum, which you have you have two kids. I'm sure who you were with at the time, their mother. You know, things are just different after two babies. Your hair is falling out and you really don't feel like you've so like your identity is gone totally.

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Speaker 2: And it's hard to.

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Speaker 3: Like go out and explain things to certain people because they're still fixated on like, well, you know, you're bounced back.

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Speaker 2: Imagine if you had you know it the way I had it.

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Speaker 3: But there are moments where I'm looking at myself in the mirror going like I just what is going on?

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Speaker 2: And it always for me goes back to what can we do with this hair?

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Speaker 4: Yeah, hair is so powerful, right. I mean, if you think about a lot of it's interesting to me. Some people will be like, I don't care about my hair, Like it's the last thing I care about. I just I can't be bothered. And I'm like, that also says something about you. That also says about that. That also says what you're putting out to the world, you know, And if you don't truly feel like that on the inside, yeah, and the outside is saying that, then you need you know, you're not aligned. You need to kind of get aligned with how you want to come across people, what your goals are, and work towards those things. And I think if you think about any celebrity, like hair is so fundamental, Like if I say j Lo, like you probably think like honey colored hair with a pop su blonde. Yeah, obviously the Kardashian like dark rich brunettes, Lady Garga like platinum ice blonde, like Chapel with the red head. It's so significant. I don't think about Marilyn Monroe without the platinum hair. I don't know. It's just it's such a part of identity, and I think a lot of people don't always kind of necessarily know they have a choice, because a lot of people have what they've always had because no one's really given the option to ever explore. But that is also like personal things as well, Like you were told once as a kid you were the quiet one, or you are the you know your sister's the bobby one. You're the quiet one, or you know you're the chubby one, she's the hot one. I don't know, Like I noticed that people carry these things with them their whole life, like they're put in a box. Yeah. They literally like, oh, well, I know I can't. I would sit down in the salon or in the chair and I'd be like, you know, well, have you ever thought about I don't know, you showed me a picture of blonde hair, have you ever thought about Yeah, I know I love the blonde, but I know I can't do that. And I'd be like all right, why And they're like, well, I just know that that I can't. And I'd be like, well, who told you that? I'm like, well, I don't know. And they trace it back and it's usually like once someone said to them like this is what suits you, and they kind of get it broken up into the head is this is who I am. And the idea of the book is that you stop and like actually truly look in the mirror and find out who you are, who you want to be, and know that it's possible to change, and it's like never too late to meet you come back. It's a lot of people also have a thing about age, like well over the age of twenty, I'm too old, Like it's who I am, who I am now, And it's like you can create, you come back at any age. It's never too late. And it might be as simple as like changing your hair color or your haircut, or it might be leaving a marriage, it might be changing your job, it might be getting out of the friend group that makes you miserable. But the whole thing is about coming back to yourself and you know, fully feeling comfortable. And the book was actually really different, like I wrote a very different book initially. Really Yeah, it was way more kind of like what people would probably expect, like a polish, like cute book. And I just was like, it's not really real, it's not who I am, Like I've gone through a real journey of getting to where I'm at. Yeah, where the first time in my life I'm fully comfortable with who I am, and I just wanted to share that. So I actually started and talked about a lot of the dark times in my life because I've hoped in opening up to that, it would encourage other people to feel freely to talk about theirs. Yeah, it's not about deleting it and pretending it didn't happen. It's just about making it part of your story.

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Speaker 2: And moving on from it.

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Speaker 4: So, yeah, that goes it's completely different.

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Speaker 3: Did you have the same title your Roots Don't Define You?

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Speaker 4: No, that came after the book, and I think your roots don't define you? Obviously it's you know, visually, you know, yeah, a nod towards hair, But it really is the fact that most people roots do define them. Their childhood really defined who they are, what someone once said to them, really like to find who they were, and they carried it their whole lives without even realizing. And it hopefully gives people the opportun you see, to stop look in the mirror and actually decide what their story is, decide what their image is, how they want to be perceived by the world, and you know, have the power to change it. Because it is as simple as that, and it's like really fun like techniques broken down which are easy to follow. They just make you stop and kind of for anyone that said before, is this it? Like? Is this enough? All that way and read the book?

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Speaker 2: Yeah, this is as good as it gets. Like what am I doing?

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Speaker 1: Wow?

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Speaker 3: I have to ask you a question? Yeah, and I don't even know if I want to hear the answer. What does what does my hair say to you right now?

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Speaker 4: What?

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Speaker 2: Like when you look at it, you go, she's in what era?

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Speaker 4: I just thinkure, I never your has really pray. I think it's great. I think the color is really nice. It's like a nice combination. No, it suits your skin tone. It works with your eye color. It's not too dark and harsh, but it's not like platinum blonde and you know out there like that. It kind of it works with your skin tone.

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Speaker 2: What would you do?

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Speaker 4: Maybe give it? Maybe pop it more like more of what you got, Give it a little bit more.

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Speaker 2: Like I'm oh, more sexy?

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Speaker 4: Yeah, like just pop out, like tip out some of the ends a bit more and give it a bit. But it looked great, you look you look amazing. But you know, if you were like I'm going to this event or I've got something going on. I want to feel my absolute best, Like what you've got isn't wrong, but you know, you could just spice it up, and.

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Speaker 2: I don't spice it up. Can I tell you?

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Speaker 3: I have gone from jet black to like super super blonde, and so I'm in this phase of like, let's get the hair healthy, let's like try to grow out.

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Speaker 4: And what was your best era? Did you like the black or the blonde or not.

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Speaker 2: The black was too harsh?

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Speaker 3: Honestly, I think that I'm in my best era right now, definitely where we're we're getting we're getting our sexy back.

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Speaker 2: I'm sixteen months postpartum.

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Speaker 4: And you look amazing.

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Speaker 2: Well, thank you.

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Speaker 3: And it's you know, I always know the moment my extensions are clipped into my head, I become a different persons.

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Speaker 2: I am like vavoon, right, I come alive.

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Speaker 3: But I want to be able to like feel that way without the extensions. So I'm like in this phase of like, if I'm just kicking it, we have a hair mask in we are oiled up. You could fry an egg on my face because there's oil all over that as well.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, that's great. You've got to be able to like replenish. You got to put it all back together.

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Speaker 2: Can I ask you how old you are?

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Speaker 4: Forty two?

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Speaker 2: Damn me? You look good?

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Speaker 4: Really? Yeah, thank you.

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Speaker 2: I'll be thirty six this year and I'm tweaking out over it.

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Speaker 4: I love me. I don't know. When I was turning forty, I was a little freaked out. I was like, God, I used to I was like, oh, thought, they're really old, you know. And obviously that was just a younger version of myself. But I think I'm at a place in my life I've learned so much and I have done the work. It's not like I just like, oh, I'm in a great place, like because I've had success in my life and been really miserable. So it might look great on the outside, but on the inside, I was miserable and insecure and just afraid, you know. I had a lot of shame, a lot of fear, heard that a lot of my life. But I think truly find in alignment. And the book was really helpful in that of like bringing all of my past into one place and then when it's just all part of me. Whereas I think for a long time I used to try and delete my past and kind of pretend it didn't happen.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, forget about it, because it felt.

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Speaker 4: So much shame and fear, especially like coming out later on in life at twenty six having two kids. There was some shame around that. And I think in writing the book and making it all kind of one space, it was really healing and for the first time in my life, I think I was comfortable like being on my own, having my own space. I think before I've always gone into things, had someone around, had relationships, gone into situations.

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Speaker 2: Like a codependent situation.

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Speaker 4: But if it was codependent, I think it was more it was it was better to have someone around them to be on your own, because when you're on your own, you have to That's when you're looking in the mirror. And that's what I mean, it's that thing. Write about it in the book. We'll look in the mirror maybe ten or fifteen times a day. You're brushing your teeth, You're like glancing. You see that thing. You know, you see your reflection. You just know it. But not many people really stop and look. And I realized I made a career out of doing that, making people stop and look, seeing the best version of themselves. I felt like a superpower to me making people look and feel their best. But I realized that I'd never really stopped and not to myself. That's hard to do, you know. And I think in doing that and really seeing like where you're out in your life, the changes you want to make, you know, and like I say, getting aligned internally externally was just that's like your superpower, because that's then it's you have piece. You have like an inner piece absolutely, you know, which I've never had before, and I think I have ADHD. I've always been on the move, are you know, And I've always like strived for, like to become successful because my background, like we were really poor as kids and we didn't have a lot. And I was like, well when I if I get successful, if I get financially secure, that will be you know, that looks like the goal. But I realized, oh, you get those things, and it's like yeah, but you still have to come home to you.

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Speaker 2: I still have to.

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Speaker 4: Be on you know. It doesn't matter how rich or families you are, it doesn't matter who you are, Like you're still human, Like we say, we'll have heartbreak. We still have good times, bad times, and you know, it's been able to like be okay with that and be present and you know, not be in a situation where you're trying to you know, feel the void. So right, Yeah, the book was really helpful for me to get to that point.

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Speaker 3: Well, it was probably a lot of shedding and like an elephant was off of your chest. I don't know about you, but there have been so many moments. I'm a recovering addict. I've been sober for over seven years, and there were so many times and even now being sober, I will still think back on moments in my life and feel so much guilt and shame, and I feel like, once I acknowledge that that's just a part of my journey and where I am today, and without those moments, I don't exist the way that I am exactly.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a power.

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Speaker 4: Will make you a better parent, you know, because you can speak for my experience. You know, you can help guide in a way that you know, maybe the things that you didn't have that made you lead to get into that place, you can help make sure that doesn't because you know that what you needed at that age. I don't know, you know, that's like, I mean, it's deeper, but like you're in a child work of like looking back at a younger age of you. And have you ever done that?

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Speaker 3: Oh my gosh, yes, it's very intending a lot of tears when I do that by nature, But I'm.

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Speaker 4: Not really like, I'm not like an energy. I mean, I just I don't know. I was in I was in this verypy session of my praipise was like, you know, I want you to remember when you were a kid. Yeah, we go and I was really like not feeling it. And I was like okay, and he's like, and I remember this. I was like six years old. I was standing at the window and and he's like, well, how do you how did you feel? I think I felt kind of like alone, like I wasn't really like my brothers or my sisters, and I was dyslexic. I kind of wasn't academic. I don't know, I felt different. And he's like, well, you know, if you could go back to that little cook kid, now, what do you think you needed to hear? And I was like oh, and then my shoulders kind of went down. I was thinking, well, I think you just wanted to know what's going to be okay, like and you know, I think he's just wanted to know that, like, how although I'm different, that will be like your superpower one day when you're older. It's good to be different, you know, whereas I so I just wanted to blend in and then I'm like crying hysterically and I was like, oh my god, ugly crying, and I'm like, what did you do to me? But it changed me. I felt like I couldn't not see myself. And I talk about this in the book and that the reader will obviously hear about it, about the hater, how we speak so poorly to ourselves. But it changes it because like, now I recognize that little boy, and I would never speak to anyone else like that. So I'm like, why would I speak to myself like that?

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Speaker 2: Oh my god.

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Speaker 4: So now I was still spiral. I still had triggers where you're like, oh I look older, I feel fat, or you know, I'm not fit enough, or I'm not doing well. You know, we all have these human things, whatever it is we're triggered by. But now the volume used to be at ten. Now it's at like a two, and I can actually just come back to myself and I'm like, I'm just doing that thing. I do. You know it says that boys that hater, I call it the hater, And you can kind of turn it down and come back to your adult self because really all you're doing is resulting back to that. I was resorting back to that like little kid. Yeah. So like that's very powerful and like I like sharing it. I mean for some people it might be a bit heavy, but it actually is really powerful to know.

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Speaker 2: I don't think it's heavy at all.

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Speaker 3: I mean I think that in those moments where you can sit with yourself and acknowledge, you know, go back to your inner child, that's where like the real work takes place totally.

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Speaker 4: It is brutal.

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Speaker 2: It is brutal, but there's peace at the end of the time.

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Speaker 4: What did you say to your younger self? Did you did you do this child thing? Like yes, what did you think you wanted to do as a kid?

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Speaker 2: And I and I sobbed as well.

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Speaker 3: And you know, I was a very strange child in the sense where like I would be watching like the Disney Channel, and instead of just like watching the Disney Channel, I would beat myself up over the fact that they were all actors and making money and I was just sitting watching and like I wasn't good enough and I was lazy and I'm a young child. So now I'm thirty five and I still talk to myself that way, and we've accomplished way more than I ever thought that we would totally.

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Speaker 2: And when I did this.

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Speaker 3: You know, inner child work, it was like to go back and and you just want to like cradle that person and like you said, let let that inner child know like.

00:17:37
Speaker 2: You are gonna be okay, You're good.

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Speaker 4: Enough, good enough. Yeah, I think we all want to know that, or needed to hear it more. Yeah, you know, And I think now we're so much more aware of these things. And I'm sure your parenting will be different to what you had. It's not that anyone did a bad job. It's just it's just what we knew, you know what I mean, everyone just kind of knew it used to be. Remember like these to say kids should be seen and not heard. It's like things.

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Speaker 2: Changed, everything has change, and thank god.

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Speaker 4: Yes, but you know, some of us are still dealing with what we didn't get. And it's just great to know some quick and easy techniques of being able to a not feel alone. B You know, if you do you can feel like you can relate to others and see just be able to come back to yourself even when you do have those moments.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, you said that you came out later on in life and in your book. I mean, I'm not laughing, but it is just wild because your mom said to you, and you remember this, being gay is when two men get together and there's this thing called age which makes you sick and die. How old were you when your mom said that to you.

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Speaker 4: I think I was like a maybe eleven. It was like one of those conversations where let you sit down and you talk about sex all called conversations, okay, whatever, and they it was a conversation around like gay men and you know, they have sex together, but there's this thing called HIV which at the time, because I was born in eighty three, like at that age there was people didn't really know about gay I remember being from a small town in England and back then, I remember there was like a pub that there was like on the outskirts that the gay people went to. But it was like it was like society said that was like the weird, like you know, it was the gay area. And I remember at the time around the time I don't know, or it was still just relevant. The Princess Diana like took her glove off to shake the hand of a man with HIV and it made worldwide news because people thought you could catch it like that. People thought you could catch it from the toilet or like the previously didn't know. So it wasn't that like my mum was, you know, saying anything. She didn't know. It was just as a society, that's all we at the time. It was gay men and the gay JV. It wasn't spoken about. It wasn't TikTok. There wasn't Instagram, it wasn't We weren't as knowledge. Sorry, we didn't have as much knowledge as we do now. So it was just like passing thro away information like oh, you know, gay men HIV. And I just remember from my age thinking, oh my god, I don't want that.

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Speaker 2: You know, did you did you? Did you know that age that you were attracted to boys?

00:20:24
Speaker 4: No? I didn't know. So from a young age I started doing hair. So I did my mom's hair from the age of like nine, and I remember being like, wow, I'm good at this. Because I was dyslexic at school, so I was felt a little well, I was just told I was stupid, you know, the teachers. If you didn't learn the way everyone else did, you were stupid or lazy. So I got put in the special needs class. Like the special I mean the fact I called it special needs. I mean like I carried that, you know, a special need. I felt different. I didn't feel like everyone else. But I knew I wasn't stupid because I was very articular, but that wasn't really recognized then, and I was very good at being creative, drawing, painting, but.

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Speaker 2: Again, intelligence was measured differently.

00:21:02
Speaker 4: Of course. Yeah, it was like you learn from the board, and if you don't, then you're stupid or lazy or you know, just annoying. So I felt all those things. So when I started doing hair, I was like wow. I saw my mom and she stood up taller when I did her hair because I tried to make a look more glamorous because it was far from the life we lived. And I remember being like, wow, it's just like a superpower you get to make people feel really good. I saw a stand up taller. I was like, I'm going to do this, and I'm going to do it to the best of my ability. So then I got a job at the age of like twelve thirteen, and I remember the kids found out at school. I had a job, like a Saturday job, and I did hair. But again, if you did hair, then as a man, you were gay. So all the kids were like, oh, you're gay. You're gay, you know. So that that started, and they weren't saying in a nice way. They were like, you're gay. Like again, it was like a bad thing. So I just remember thinking, no, I'm not. I hadn't even thought about sexuality. I didn't even you know, I was like young and just sort of I was just happy playing with my friends and didn't It wasn't really it was premature. So before I even kind of explored that was like, well, I'm not that for sure, not that. And I think I just got so focused on like showing everyone that I wasn't stupid and I'm not gay, and I'm not weird and I'm not special needs, like I'm gonna show up one and I just really just put my head forward. And I think, you know, your brain's really powerful. You know, you can convince yourself at things that are not actually true. And I guess Like I said, I went through most of my adult life teenage life sure, not looking in the mirror and never seeing myself. I got really good at making up with people, look doing the best for them, and making it always about everyone else. But it wasn't until like you know, I was like twenty six, twenty seven, That's when I actually stopped and looked. Because circumstances sometimes made you two. And once I saw myself, I couldn't see it. I couldn't stop it, and I couldn't understand why I couldn't get back to be. I was like, what, I wasn't hooking up with guys. I wasn't watching Gayborne, I wasn't thinking of men like I was fine until I wasn't. And it was like once I'd stepped into it, I kind of couldn't get back, and that was really hard because I was like, well, I was normal, I had a life and I loved it well, but get back to it.

00:23:05
Speaker 2: Because you had your you were very young when you became a down nineteen nineteen.

00:23:11
Speaker 3: So what was that conversation because I know in your book you said that you had like down a bottle of gin. Oh yeah, that moment of having to not having to, but being being ready and being feeling brave enough to say like, this is who I am, this is what I like, and then going to your wife.

00:23:29
Speaker 2: At the time, you guys were married.

00:23:31
Speaker 4: Right, I never married. Okay, we were together for ten years and we're best friends. We're still best friends now. But our relationship broken around, had broken down, and I think, like as a couple with you know, separated, yeah, still kind of just figure out what that meant. And yeah, it was really hot. I mean telling other people was one thing. I was also telling people, and people then go, well, you must have always known, and I was like, I didn't know, idea, I didn't, It's not as I was thinking about it, and I've always been hiding it. I was happy and selahlationship broke down, and it's like, you know, when your relationship breaks down, sometimes you do things that you don't normally do, like the revenge haircut, chop all your hair off because you just don't want to see that person anymore. Yeah, you want to cut away the pain. So I kind of just was. I remember I was out, I was in Barcelona. My job was kind of taking me away a lot more. And one night some guy tried to kiss me. It was like at the end of the night we'd all been drinking. It was always around gay guy, so I didn't really think a lot of it, and I just remember thinking, like I remember going back to my hotel and I was like brushing my teeth and brushing my tongue. I was like, oh, I was just drunk. I was just drunk. I was just like, you know, it, just drunk. Whatever. But we became friends, and he didn't live in the country, but we had like communication. We spoke on the phone a lot, and it was the first time i'd already had a gay friend, and I think I kind of like started to open up and relax and feel comfortable and like, oh, he's not weird, he's not this, he's not that. But one step forward, it was two steps back because then I was like no, no, no, no, this is wrong. So I go back to that younger self, like gays wrong, like you know, all these things, like I got really afraid of that, and I kind of try and know I'm I can be normal. I can be normal. I've always been one way, So I don't know why this started. But then once you kind of open up truly who you are once you like look at yourself and see yourself in the mirror. You can't unsee yourself, you know. But it's just the process. It doesn't just go like, oh okay, I see myself here. It takes time, and it takes time to understand how you got to that point, like why you were never actually allowed to explore that, you know, why you felt so much shame of fear, And that's like all the inner work you have to do. It doesn't it doesn't just come overnight. But I felt like I needed to share some of my moments in the book so that people reading it can maybe relate. You know, that was sexuality, but it might be, like I say, a relationship. It might be this is a job you're in and you hate. But maybe as a kid you were told you should be a doctor, or you should be a dentist, or you should work here or you know, for anyone that's ever just thought is this it, it isn't, And there is more. You just have to start, you know, change a lot of people are afraid of. They're like, how do you change? I don't even I don't know how to change. Well, change starts with just knowing that you need to change something. There's something is unhappy, something is not right, and you kind of got to figure out what that is.

00:26:15
Speaker 2: And admitting the problem is the first step.

00:26:17
Speaker 4: Totally.

00:26:18
Speaker 3: So I hate putting people in boxes. You can totally shut me down if this question is out of bounce. Yeah, do you identify as gay or by? Do you still look at chicks? Or is it just about the person? Am I allowed to ask that?

00:26:33
Speaker 4: Yeah, you can ask what you want. I'm I'm gay. I think you know if you'd have asked me when I was that age and I'm by or I don't want to be labeled. I just didn't want to see it. I wasn't ready, you know. I had to go through the process of knowing what I like because I'd spent twenty six years in my life, you know, programmed to do what society told me to do and how to be and like what was normal. So I had to figure out what that was. It was rewired, catching up, you know what I mean. Like, So, no, yeah, that I think I feel fully I'm with that confidence.

00:27:10
Speaker 2: Because you should baby.

00:27:12
Speaker 4: Yeah, No, totally. I think you know a lot of people still have questions like is he by? Because I always will.

00:27:17
Speaker 3: But I think that's all of us that are wishful thinking there ladies over here, we're like, are you sure?

00:27:24
Speaker 4: I mean, I'm sure I couldn't. I'll try it.

00:27:27
Speaker 2: Who knows, can I tell you? Give me a few podcasts.

00:27:30
Speaker 3: And we don't know what will happen, you know, really hoping for their baby.

00:27:36
Speaker 4: No.

00:27:36
Speaker 2: When I when I was a drinker, no one was safe.

00:27:40
Speaker 4: We call it, oh yeah, really, oh yeah.

00:27:42
Speaker 2: We had a heyday baby really? Oh yeah?

00:27:45
Speaker 4: What age though? How did you get?

00:27:48
Speaker 3: I got silver when it was twenty eighteen October so I had just turned twenty eight?

00:27:54
Speaker 4: Wow? Yeah cool? What was their final thing where you were like, I've got to stop, Like.

00:28:00
Speaker 3: I just I got wasted at disney World, and I remember being on a jet home and letting the kids color on my legs and do my makeup, and I got we landed, and I looked at myself and I was like trying to scrub everything off of me so that the next morning there was no remnants of like, what a horrendous nightmare the entire because everyone was having the greatest time, and I was just consumed with, like how many roadies are there in the car for me? Is there a bar when we get to Disney World. I was just inebriated and I woke up the next morning after that and I just identified as an alcoholic and said, like, we're done. I will never go back to this.

00:28:40
Speaker 4: Yeah, but it's interesting, like that's probably your looking in the mirror moment where you see yourself and you're like, I got to change something, like absolutely not where I want to be in my life. You know. Yeah, sometimes you look, and you can use tools in the book to look, but sometimes life just makes you look anyway. You know. I think you always end up coming back to yourself, but sometimes we're forced to, and sometimes you choose to make a change.

00:29:03
Speaker 2: Yeah. And I love.

00:29:08
Speaker 3: Since getting sober, and there are obviously moments that I've had that I'm not proud of, where there is guilt and shame and I've lost myself. And I love that you added that into your book about looking in the mirror, but like not just not just for like what's here, Yeah, because there are many times that I look in the mirror and I go, are we happy with what we see?

00:29:29
Speaker 2: Like beyond all of this? Yeah, do we know what we stand for?

00:29:32
Speaker 3: Do we stand behind what we say, and it's a powerful thing totally.

00:29:37
Speaker 4: It really is. It makes such a big difference to your everyday life, the decisions you make, the way you allow people to treat you, the way you treat others, like your goals and aspirations in life. It's such a small thing, but like once you see it, you can't see it, or it just stays with you, and when you become allergic to the bullshit that doesn't work for you or it's wonderful. Once you were attracted to and you know, want to see, sometimes you like can still get attracted to those things. Sometimes you can still be like, oh, I'm drawn towards I don't know if you like a drink, like oh, that looks fun. But then you very quickly can be like, yeah, but I know where that leads.

00:30:13
Speaker 2: Where's that lead that goes?

00:30:14
Speaker 4: And I'm just good. You come back to yourself. It's just fixed and everything's like kungy dor. You still get triggered, but you can come back to yourself.

00:30:22
Speaker 3: Life still happens. Yeah, do your kids live in a way yeah, I.

00:30:25
Speaker 4: Mean they have their own plays now, they've their own partners and doing their own thing. But you know, like me and Kitty are going to an event tonight. It is so fun. I'm like, oh, come to this thing and like the best day ever. It's so fun to.

00:30:36
Speaker 2: That is the best date ever.

00:30:37
Speaker 4: She knows who everyone is. I'm like, who's who? She like knows everyone.

00:30:40
Speaker 2: Oh, I know. I love that for you.

00:30:42
Speaker 4: But also how she's grown. They say the best thing you can do for your kids is let them leave the hometown that were brought up in, because you again, like start to take on the values of what especially if you're from a small town. You know that you work nine till five, you get married at the age of twenty one. You know, you have kids by the age of twenty five if you think, or by the age of thirty five forty, then you're like, oh, what's going on? You know, like being able to like travel and experience things. I remember my daughter when she first moved to la at the age of seventeen, Like she couldn't even make eye contact with the waiter and like she wouldn't look down. You know, I could see how she wasn't confident and she was and I say, hey, talk to the way to look at the waiter. And she's grown so much, like living in La Live. You know, she's worked at Kim's place, at her office when she had the skin line, and she's worked with different persons. She can now walk in a room and you know, greet people and say hi and have a conversation. And you know, I think she's grown so much. It excelled so much just being out of you know, her comfort zone was when she you know, was in our hometown, the thing to do for kids was go to the park during smoke weed. You know it, there wasn't much opportunity for her. And I think it was so good to come out your comfort zone. And I think it's really great to be able to do that and see how different people do things then like, oh, well, as a kid, I saw this dynamic, like especially with your parents, But like I see these people have a different dynamic, and they have a different dynamic. Can you realize that just because you were told something as a kid doesn't necessarily mean it was right. It just means that's what we knew, you know. So to be able to leave and have new experiences and opportunities, especially for someone younger, I think he's great and it's really powerful.

00:32:17
Speaker 3: When when did they move from the small town Telly.

00:32:22
Speaker 4: When they were seventeen and eighteen.

00:32:25
Speaker 2: So okay, so they spent quite a bit of time there.

00:32:28
Speaker 4: Yeah, definitely, Yeah, I mean.

00:32:29
Speaker 2: When did you move here?

00:32:31
Speaker 4: Ten years ago? It changed me a lot, though, it changed me a lot. I think, I think I'm still who I am, but also coming to Hollywood at a young age, I didn't realize that, like I think I sort of started my gay relationships here, my gay experiences as well. Here as like just me that didn't have like a past, you know, because I could say I'm Chris Appleton and oh, nice to meet you. That's say I'm gay, Whereas I felt like in the UK it was difficult because everyone was always like, oh, here we had a girlfriend and now he's strengthened. It was always like whispers. But then I didn't realize, like, you're in Hollywood, you know, it's the land of dreams. A lot of people come here to be someone or be something, and I didn't. I kind of just thought everyone had the same intentions I did, but they don't, you know, and like you learn, you learn, you learn the pros and cons about living everywhere.

00:33:18
Speaker 2: Yes, of course, yeah.

00:33:19
Speaker 4: But Hollywood's Hollywood. I mean I love it. I think it's a magical way.

00:33:22
Speaker 2: I love it too. And every time I'm here and I'm like, I got to get the fuck out. Why do we live here?

00:33:27
Speaker 3: Yeah, and then I go somewhere else, I'm like, oh it all makes sense.

00:33:31
Speaker 2: Get me back there.

00:33:32
Speaker 3: Yeah, what would you consider your big break?

00:33:45
Speaker 4: My big break? Yeah, it's interesting. I get asked this a lot. I don't know if there was one significant moment in my life that was It's always been like little little things, like the build that you keep building, and like, I don't know. I remember whenning British Headress of the Year. It was like a thing in the UK, and then I, oh, I did a TV show which was a bit like The Great British Bake Off, but of hair, and I won that.

00:34:10
Speaker 2: Oh sick.

00:34:11
Speaker 4: Let me just tell everyone. There's plenty of times that I didn't win, probably you know, twenty times before that I sat there and applauded the winner. But I kept going inuntil I got, you know, And I was fortunate enough to have a couple of wins, and I just used each opportunity to get to the next thing. And then one day I was just sort of started posting on social media because Instagram started. I remember saying like, how does it work, and like, well, you just get a picture and you post it, and I'm like, oh yeah, And so I just started posting my work. I started working with Rita Aura, and I was always doing something different with a hand and I just started posting it all the time. And then I had an email from Jlo's team and they were like I was in like England at the time, and they were like, oh, you know, Jennifer Lopez would love to see if you're available to do a hair for a Vega show. And I remember laughing. I just deleted the emails because you thought it was I thought it was bad. That was one of those things where it's like you've won a million dollars, just ring this number, you know what. I'm like, oh, oh cute. Oh just deleted it. And then I got another email and I remember being like, oh, maybe this is real. But then I was like, how does jaloh know who I am? Just Chris, you know, just Chris Appleton from Leicester, Like what? But then I kind of thought, all, she's obviously seen my work on social media. You know, people, your Instagram is like your portfolio. You know people look, you know. She obviously liked what I was doing, and I was like, well, maybe I could make Maybe I could go there, because my goal when I was a kid was to make my mom like a Hollywood star. Like I was always kind of fascinated by Hollywood and movies and the classics. And I was like, maybe I could do it. Maybe I could go to La and live that dream. So I moved to Hollywood. Literally, I think it was like the twenty fourth of December. We finished filming The X Factor. The last thing I did with Rita was on the twenty third. I packed two suitcases, I left my apartment, everything I just I just left and I was like, I'm going to make this work. And then they didn't do anything but like three or four moms and I spent all my money and I was like, oh, I'm going to go home. But then I got the call from Christina Aguilera's team to do a hair for a voice and I was like, Okay, I'm going to do this. It's terrified, so like felt so small, but like what am I doing here? Like and way above like my head's I don't know. I was just like syndrome to the Max and then I remember kate them over my kids, like I say, we're still best friends. I was on the phone to her and I was on the way and I was like, I'm so nervous, and she was like, Chris, if you don't make this work, like you're going to have to come home because I had two kids to provide for, you know. And I was like, you're right. So I got there and initially there was like three hours for glam and for whatever reason, I didn't go in till like the last twenty minutes before the live show to do her hair because you know, they're busy doing interviews and people are pulling them left ryan center. So anyway, I went in and I was like, she's like, what do you want to do? And I remember thinking like, I've only got twenty minutes and then you know, she needed to have a head on, so I prepped all these I was so organized, and I was like, you know, I think if we did this piece it would be good and I could like add her hair into it. And she's like, oh, I don't like wiggs and I was like, oh, yeah, of course you don't like wigs. And I was thinking, what wow would you like anything I've got to do. And I was like, she sees me, she sees Chris, she sees I'm just that little guy from Leicester, Like what what am I doing here? And I felt the fear, like in my stomach, I felt like paralyzed me, Like I felt like I couldn't move, and I was like, I'm a loser. I'm the biggest fucking loser. I'm an idiot, like you know all the things, the hater and the boys, and it was paralyzing me. I felt like I couldn't move. And then it's the only time that's ever happened in my career, but it was a lot. It was. It was honestly the moment that changed my whole life because I remember hearing Kate's voice. I remember just her saying like, if you don't make this work, you're going have to come home. Yeah, and I thought about my kids and it kind of just brought me back into my adult body. It kind of brought me back to myself of being like, look, I've been doing this for thirty years. I know what I'm doing, learn every aspect of hair. I'm so prepared. I have all these amazing pieces. I know I can do this. So I just kind of grab one of the pieces and I put it my head. I was like, you know, you've never tried one of these, let's try it. And she was like, oh, oh, I like it. And then the girl like behind me, the stylist, was like, I like it. So when I put it on and left the hairline out, and she ran off to do the show. So then it's live on the Voice and everyone has an opinion on it on social media and stuff. I was just terrified.

00:38:22
Speaker 2: I was like, oh, good, bad comment.

00:38:24
Speaker 4: And then I remember she came off and she was talking to the contestants and she saw me in the corner of her eye and she just looked over at me and she was like, everyone likes your wig, and then carried on talking to the oh my god contestant. But in that moment, I knew I'd done it. And honestly, if I had have not, if i'd have just let fear takeover, I would have done some crappy hairstyle because there was not enough time. She would have gone out. I wouldn't have made a statement with it. I wouldn't have she wouldn't booked me again. I wouldn't be here. I would have gone home. I wouldn't have written the book. I wouldn't be here now talking to you. And that was one of the honestly, such a significant moment of wow doubt, which we all have. We all have those moments, and I've had it plenty of times since. But being able to come back to yourself and like remember who you are and what your intentions are and how you got there, and put your feet back on the ground and feel your hands but your present is like really powerful. They changed my whole life.

00:39:19
Speaker 2: I freaking love that story.

00:39:21
Speaker 4: It was a second away from being a very very different outcome. Yeah, and I'm telling you, I won'n't be here. You won't know who Chris Alperton was. I want to written a book and I'd probably still be I'd still probably be living the life that people told me I should have just been drowning in shame and fear. I'd probably I don't know, I don't know what i'd be, but it won't be this.

00:39:42
Speaker 3: I love everything that you have said. I'm so excited for people to read your book. I think that is is amazing you guys. Your roots don't define you? Is out right now you can.

00:39:53
Speaker 2: Get it what you know wherever you get your books, baby.

00:39:57
Speaker 4: And its rusted. This enough for you.

00:40:00
Speaker 2: It's for you, Chris. Thank you so much for coming on my podcast.

00:40:03
Speaker 4: I appreciate it.

00:40:05
Speaker 2: You guys, I love you so much.

00:40:06
Speaker 3: Thank you for listening to another episode of Untraditionally Lala.

00:40:09
Speaker 2: I'm gonna catch you next week.

00:40:10
Speaker 4: Bye yay