Locked In with Ian Bick - Bad Vegan: Sarma Melngailis Breaks Silence on Fraud, Prison & Netflix Scandal

Episode Date: August 25, 2025

Sarma Melngailis seemed destined for success. A brilliant student who started her career in finance, she later pursued her passion for food and co-founded Pure Food and Wine, one of New York City’s hottest vegan restaurants that attracted stars like Alec Baldwin. But Sarma’s life took a shocking turn when she fell under the influence of a controlling con man who manipulated her into a web of lies, fraud, and destruction. Once the celebrated “vegan queen” of NYC, she became a fugitive, was arrested for fraud, and ended up behind bars at Rikers Island. Sarma’s story of love, betrayal, and downfall captivated the world and was chronicled in Netflix’s hit documentary Bad Vegan. In this episode, she opens up about her childhood, career, and what really happened behind the scenes of one of the most infamous scandals in the restaurant world. #BadVegan #SarmaMelngailis #TrueCrime #PrisonStories #NetflixDocumentary #RestaurantScandal #LockedInPodcast #Fraud Connect with Sarma Melngailis: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sarmamelngailis Buy her book: https://amzn.to/45x4Awo Hosted, Executive Produced & Edited By Ian Bick: https://www.instagram.com/ian_bick/?hl=en https://ianbick.com/ Presented by Tyson 2.0 & Wooooo Energy: https://tyson20.com/ https://woooooenergy.com/ Use code LOCKEDIN for 20% OFF Wooooo Energy Buy Merch: http://www.ianbick.com/shop Timestamps: 00:00 Arrest and Introduction 01:56 Sarma’s Background & Pure Food and Wine 10:08 Growing Up, Independence, and Early Influences 20:28 Career in Finance and Transition to Culinary 29:19 Opening Pure Food and Wine 36:46 The Rise of Pure Food and Wine & One Lucky Duck 42:00 Business Philosophy and Brand Growth 48:46 Personal Relationships & Vulnerability 54:46 First Encounters With the Conman 01:01:01 How the Manipulation Began 01:07:07 Financial Spiral and Isolation 01:16:16 Collapse and Confusion 01:25:01 The Arrest, Jail, and Coming to Terms 01:39:00 Prosecution, Sentencing, and Restitution 01:58:02 Reflection and the Future 02:00:33 Lessons Learned & Moving Forward 02:12:23 Ending and Book Discussion Powered by: Just Media House : https://www.justmediahouse.com/ Creative direction, design, assets, support by FWRD: https://www.fwrd.co Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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finance and later the visionary behind pure food and wine, the celebrity favorite vegan restaurant that drew stars like Alec Baldwin in New York City. But Sarma's dream life quickly spiraled into a nightmare when she fell under the control of a manipulative con man. What began as a thriving culinary empire turned into scandal, fraud, and ultimately a shocking arrest that landed her in Rikers Island. Her unbelievable downfall was later told in the hit Netflix documentary, Bad Vegan. Sarma, welcome to Lockton. Thank you. Thanks so much to Nippy and Sarah for connecting us a few months ago.

And then I left for the Mr. Beast video, and now we were able to do this. Yeah, I'm excited. And it's perfect timing because your book just got published. My book just dropped. And, yeah, I brought, this is actually a copy for you. Awesome. With stickers. So.

The girl with the duck tattoo. Yeah, sort of a play on the girl with a dragon tattoo, which is a, you know, very is a novel but has some similar vibes i actually just read it during the mr bees video oh really yeah and then i saw the movie and the movie just didn't live up to the book but the book was really good yeah it was really good but your cover looks really great too oh thank you yeah i i'm like a book person i love i have so many books in my apartment and um i just noticed that there aren't a lot of green books so i wanted like a green book spine did you design it yourself i didn't design it Myself, there was a really good cover designer who did it, but the photograph is actually a still from a docu-series, another docu-series that I'm working on now.

And that just, it's like a photograph of me looking out over the city, and it's from a video. So we just grabbed the still and made it to a photograph. And then the back has, this is my favorite, the back has sort of a silhouette picture of me and my dog, Leon, who was a big part of my story. so yeah, I put that on the back. And ducks are a big part of it too, right? See the duck tattoo? The duck tattoo, yeah. Well, it was the name of my brand, one lucky duck, which I hope to bring back.

And yeah, I mean, the duck has a lot of significance for me and the tattoo, and it's my one and only tattoo. I don't have a whole bunch of them. I think I grew up always thinking I was going to get a tattoo at some point, but I didn't want to just get like, I don't know, anything. So when I had the logo developed for the company, and I looked at it and I realized, oh, that's the, I'm getting a tattoo of that. And I'm going to literally brand myself with the brand. I put the logo for my old club tuxedoes on my body, too. Oh, nice. It's not around anymore, obviously.

But the tattoo will always live with me, which is cool. Symbolic. I want to get the Mr. Beast tattoo on me, like the logo, too, just as a symbol for what I did. and accomplished in that video too. So it's cool those symbolic tattoos. Yeah. So where'd you grow up? Where are you from?

Outside of Boston and Massachusetts. So, you know, went to public school. Similar to you, I had a lot of independence growing up. So didn't, you know, didn't have a curfew or anybody really watching over. So I was pretty independent and I did a lot of things. I got a lot out of my system when I was. young, meaning, you know, I drank. I did some experimental drugs, stuff like that when I was very, very young. And I didn't look the way I did. I shaved most of my hair, colored it blue and

green, which was strange because I was very shy by nature. I was always very shy and quiet. And so it seemed pretty incongruous that I would do something that would bring so much attention. to me. So I don't, anyway, but I ended up kind of going back to normal colored hair and whatnot when I was about 15. So, and all that time I got really good grades. I mean, I got straight A's when I was younger. So I think in part because I was performing well in school, you know, there was sort of no my parents were like, whatever. And then they divorced when I was, I think, 10. And my stepfather had six kids. They were all older.

So there was sort of a lot of chaos going on. So I don't know. In a similar way, I had a lot of, probably way too much independence when I was young. What did your parents do for work? My dad was at MIT as a physicist and research scientist there. And my mom was a chef. and she had early on worked in restaurants, but that doesn't really work well when you have young kids to work sort of nighttime. So she ended up working as a chef at a corporate, a big company as sort of the executive dining room chef or whatnot.

And then the CEO of that company was my stepfather. She ended up after she and my father divorced. She married him. But she was a chef. And then I ended up learning a lot through her. Just she had these amazing dinner parties. And I was always like her little sous chef. So I learned a lot from her.

No, it's actually so funny because my dad's a chef. Yeah. And it was in the catering world or still is and did private chef. And that's how I got passionate about food and working in that environment. Yeah. And I remember I think you said that like you almost don't realize how much you know and you just step in and you could kind of do it all. But you're not really aware. that you had learned it all until you go and just do it.

So did your passion for food come from her, or did you have that on your own before she exposed you to that? I think I just always loved food and restaurants. My father was really into eating well and naturally and, you know, hated, like, junk food. So, and I think my mother loved food. And I grew up watching probably because she watched cooking shows, so I watched them with her.

this was back in the day. There was no food network. This was, there was like Julia Child, and then maybe this guy, Jacques Papin, you know, it was just on PBS, public television. But I love those shows, and my mom subscribed to the food magazines, and I would always read them. So it was something that I always loved to do. And after, you know, when I went to college, I ended up going to undergrad business school. And from there, I just kind of followed the herd, and I ended up in investment banking. in New York. So I'm doing like the Wall Street thing. But all the while I continued, even in college, I had my subscriptions to food and wine and gourmet magazine, which doesn't exist anymore. And that's what I love to read and do in any of my spare time. So it might have been a clue that

later on I would end up wanting to go back into food. Why do you think you didn't go into food for college? I think I, you know, that question about what do you want to be when you grew up, I never had an answer for that, but I had this sense that it would somehow be in business. I just didn't know in what way. And so when you think about being in a business, you think about, you know, so I end up going to undergrad business school. And at Wharton, everybody's, like, everybody's goal is to try to get into investment banking or, you know, maybe consulting or. So I just sort of ended up following that herd, not really knowing what I wanted to do specifically. But New York had always appealed to me, and it brought me to New York.

And then I ended up working for, I actually left and went back to Boston for a bit to work for Bain Capital, which I didn't want to leave New York, but Bain Capital was one of the biggest private equity firms in the country. At the time, it was run by Mitt Romney, who's a really nice guy. I didn't vote for him, but really nice guy. And, and, but I really missed New York. So I ended up leaving Bain, which not many people do, and came back to New York and worked at a high yield fund. But, and I thought working less hours, I would, I would be happier because I worked Bear Stearns. I talk about my background a bit in my book, but my first week at Bear Stearns was 111 hours. That's what I clocked, which is a lot in one week. 111 hours. So it was two years of like this very brutal schedule and I worked my ass off because that's that's sort of how I'm built, right? It's like I'll get the job done. I'll work the long hours. I'll all, you know, they would always, they would end up staffing me on these really

difficult grueling deals because they knew I would do it. They knew I wouldn't come apart. They knew I'd stay up all night and, you know, get all the spreadsheets and the models built and all that. So I thought, well, maybe when I'm working less, a more normal schedule, I'll be happier. But it was kind of the other way around when I worked a more normal schedule. I realized how little I cared about, you know, these high yield bond deals and looking at these various companies. And there was nothing in it that I felt passionate about. So I eventually left and then went to culinary school and then ended up in the restaurant, business. us after that. Do you think that there's a big misconception of you that you weren't a hard worker? Because I know in a lot of these stories like yours and mine, people don't see that kind of grind or backstory of us and how we got to the things that would later happen to us. Yeah. I mean, I'm not, I don't know. I don't really know what people think about that. But I do recognize that that quality of being a really hard worker and being really determined to

you know, so the type of person that just doesn't give up easily. And that's one of the things that was later exploited. I mean, similar to people that are pulled into cults. They want people who are going to work hard and never give up. And I certainly had all those qualities. So that was later, I think, exploited. But yeah, I mean, I've always been a hard worker. Or just somebody that, like, you don't ever want to let anybody down.

How much of it impacted you do you think your upbringing had on the direction you chose in life? Well, I think I always wanted to be, I mean, it's funny because I always really wanted to be financially independent and I got a job when I was very young. I think I was, I think I was 13 and I think I lied and said I was 15. and I worked at this frame store, you know, they frame pictures. Because I had bright blue and green hair. I couldn't work at like I wouldn't get hired, you know, scooping ice cream or working at something where you're dealing with a ton of customers like that. I did deal with customers, but it was an art gallery,

so I fit in almost like part of the art. But I worked, so I started there, I think, when I was 13. And, you know, I could have, my stepfather, had some money. I didn't, I had an allowance, like I didn't need to get a job, but I wanted to. And so, you know, I wanted to earn my own money and be independent. So I did. And I always worked since then. But I think that, I mean, it's funny because what I really, I've always wanted to be financially independent and to not have to rely on other people. And then what ends up happening is I, after making money on those Wall Street jobs and having done well for myself,

when I was younger, I stepped into something with a guy. This is before bad vegan, before that whole story. I stepped into a situation with a kind of a celebrity chef, up and coming guy and got, you know, when I met him, I had about a quarter of a million dollars in, you know, money and assets. And I was pretty young. I was under 30. And about a year and a half or less than two years into our relationship. I was in debt by that amount because I ended up just putting it all into his business and more and more and more and more. And yeah. And then, you know, so when I finally was out of that relationship, I was left with a lot of debt. And you'd think I would have, that would have led me to be far more careful in the future. But I sort of ended up stepping into a much bigger disaster after that.

That was right after you left finance for culinary? Yes, after culinary school, I ended up working with a chef on his cookbook. His name is Matthew Kenny. And ended up, you know, that ended up turning into a personal relationship. And so we were together as a couple for four years. And but pretty quickly on, he sort of pulled me into working on. He had 11 restaurants, I think at the time when I met him. And then they all sort of came tumbling apart.

But I put so much money into all of that. And without realizing it. at the time, you know, he moved into my apartment. I was paying the rent. So I was covering a lot of expenses as well. And really, you know, I thought I was helping him and I thought we were sort of in this together. And I just trusted him. And I put all this money and then I had really good credit. So then I was taking loans and put myself into a pretty bad situation. But from that, you know, he he's the one that I opened the restaurant with. So we opened this restaurant called Pure Food and Wine together in 2004. And, you know, at the time especially, nobody had done a restaurant like that in

New York, certainly. There had been one other restaurant that opened as a raw vegan restaurant, which sounds like I'm so aware of how not appealing that sounds. But our food was really good and people loved it. And we had all these, you know, they're always really interesting, famous people coming in and that were regulars and people would come in and come back. And what I loved about it is that it wasn't, you know, our crowd on any given night, they weren't all vegan people. And I never really identified with that label anyway. Not that I wasn't, but I just don't like the idea of having to label it or, you know, having to be a certain way 100 percent. Or I just don't like the idea of like rules in general. So I never applied that label to myself necessarily. But

what I loved is that the restaurant was full of, you know, we had people that came all the time and they were not remotely vegan at all. But they just liked to come there for the atmosphere and the food and appreciated it in the same way that, you know, you're not like a Mexican foodist and all you eat is Mexican food every time. You know, so people came there the same way. They might go to a Japanese restaurant another night and the sushi restaurant, you know, a Mexican restaurant and Italian and even a steakhouse. There are plenty of people that did and would also come to my restaurant regularly. So Matthew and I opened that restaurant together, and we actually co-authored the first cookbook that I did.

But we had split up personally, and everything kind of exploded in that first year. And so he ended up leaving, and I stayed to run the restaurant on my own. And then I had also developed the One Lucky Duck brand, which I knew the One Lucky Duck brand was, that's what could get that that's what could scale and really go big and we had started making these packaged products and I realized I recognized that it needed its own brand name and I started a website where people could buy those products and also buy a bunch of ingredients and things and sort of I could see in my head that there was the opportunity here for what people call like a lifestyle brand and so I was on my way to building that and without even trying we ended up

in over 30 whole food stores with the product, which, you know, people hear that. They're like, oh, how did you get into Whole Foods? I'm like, I don't, it just happened. The first store came to us. And so I saw, I knew there was so much potential there to scale that. And, you know, later on, part of what kind of kept me somewhat isolated is I, you know, I was sort of always looking for the right business partner, the right person to help expand it. but I was very wary of a certain type of partner and I was very wary of a certain type of investor.

You know, I didn't want to do the, I didn't want to sell out to, you know, like a private equity or VC or something where I, where I know that they're going to take control and they're going to want to expand it very quickly. And they're going to have, you know, so many brands you see start out at these really cool brands that people love. And then you see the money comes in and then they're all over the place. And they're not what they used to be. They sort of feel like even if it's not fast food, they sort of have that vibe where it's sort of, it's like it loses all its initial personality and all the things that people really loved about it. And then they end up very often, you know, going out of business, so many brands that that's happened to. So I didn't want that to happen. So I was always wary of the wrong partners.

And I almost stepped into a couple situations with wrong partners. And so later on. And also, like, I still, I had never been able to work my way out of that debt that I was left in from that guy, Matthew. So, you know, I was always sort of undercapitalized. But at the same time, you know, we were doing really well. You know, we got through 2008 when a lot of, there was a big financial downturn, ton of New York City restaurants closed. And we got through that fine because I think we had a very unique product in a restaurant that. people loved. So we got through that. And then by 2012, we're doing really, really well and had a lot

of money in the bank. And I, you know, I didn't pay myself more. I didn't take any of that. I reinvested it, opened a production facility for our products in Brooklyn, and was kind of very well poised at that time to really, I mean, if I could go back in time, that would have been the right time to proactively seek out the right partner to expand. But that's also right around the time that this guy who I call Mr. Fox in my, throughout my book, that's around the time that he found me and came into my life and then things unraveled, spiral. How long did it take to go from culinary school to opening up pure food and wine? I went to culinary school in 1999. I didn't do like one of those two-year programs. I went to, it was at the time called the French Culinary

Institute in Manhattan, and it was a six-month program. Also, because I'd already, you know, I'd already been to undergraduate business school and I already knew a lot about cooking through my mom. So a six-month program was felt right. So that was in 1999. And then I had linked up with Matthew working on his cookbook and then I got involved in his businesses. And then we opened Pure Food and Wine in 2004. No, he's the same person where those other restaurants fell into debt. Yes. And then Pure Food and Wine was a successful one out of those? Well, no. Basically, basically his entire empire ended up, like every restaurant ended up closing. And we were still together. And, you know, when you're financially in debt and with somebody, there's kind of

nowhere to go. You know, like, you almost can't afford to split up. But, you know, I was still committed to the relationship. We were still working on various projects together. We were doing consulting projects, restaurant consulting projects, and then ended up opening pure food and wine together. But, you know, the relationship deteriorated. And I write about it in the book. I tried to condense it, but I write about that story and how that relationship came apart. And but at least on the other side of that, you know, I had the restaurant and I felt like, The restaurant and the brand was like, you know, it's like if people marry a sociopath, but they have a beautiful child. Like I went through that terrible relationship with him, but ended up with this what felt like a beautiful child of a business that was my whole future.

So, you know, even though I still carried a lot of debt, I felt like I came out of it with that potential business there. Did you learn about the restaurant business through him? I learned a lot about what not to do. through him. I mean, I did learn a lot from him in terms of, you know, he was definitely the far more experienced one. But, you know, I learned more about kitchen stuff. I learned expediting, which I loved. It's like when you're in the kitchen and you're the one sort of directing all the orders. But I also learned a lot about what not to do because he was not good on the business front and, you know, we just do dumb things like spend way too much money on, you know,

furniture that was nicer than it needed to be for a restaurant. And then he was like that in his personal life, too. I mean, he spent, he wore really fancy clothes and expensive things. And I've never was like that in the past. I still am not like that. And if in the future I make a bunch of money, I probably will still wear thrift store. I was in. I just, like, that stuff isn't a priority to me. But it was really infuriating when he was, you know, he would continue to spend money on himself when I was in all of this debt because of his businesses. You know, I, I borrowed money to help keep him afloat as long as I could. And I, you know, I mean, I was later accused of not paying my employees in the whole bad vegan scandal or whatnot. But part of the

money that I put into his business was paying his employees when his company didn't have money to make payroll. And I was helping to run the businesses with him. So I would cash their checks. And so I ended up spending over $100,000 cashing employee checks. And, yeah. I mean, but he just, that wasn't, he and I were just wired very differently. So he didn't care about things for the same reasons that I did. With those other restaurants tanking, how are you guys able to build pure food and wine? He, it was sort of a weird set of circumstances. He ended up one of his restaurants that was going out of business was called Commune, but it was in this really good space on 22nd Street.

And this restaurateur, Jeffrey Chaturro, was doing a TV show with Mark Burnett and this other chef, Rocco de Spirido, and they needed a space, and they wanted to use that space. So somehow Matthew and Jeffrey worked something out where Jeffrey would take over that space, and then he would back us to open a new restaurant. So we had been working on a concept. We were actually going to open a place called Burger Bar. We were going to open like a, back then, the whole farm to table thing was really very brand new, kind of just early days of that kind of a concept.

And so we had had the thought of doing like a really cool, high-end burger place, but with really good ingredients, you know, really high-quality, you know, grass-fed meat and these artisanal cheeses and really high-end in a high-end way. And it was a really, it was a cool idea. But then we were introduced to raw vegan food, and it had made such a big impact on us and on me as well personally and changed the way I permanently changed the way that I eat and the way that I think about food.

And so we pivoted to wanting to do sort of a high-end raw food concept Because still, most places that are vegan are not, I mean, it's very different now than it used to be back then. But especially back then, if you said to somebody like, we're going to a vegan restaurant, you get in your mind like a sort of curry, patchouli, garlic-y, earthy, you know, people wearing hemp and Birkenstocks five. And that's, you know, we were very different from that. You know, the restaurant was dark. There was a lot of red. It was kind of a very cool, sexy vibe. And it was a really cozy, comfortable, cool looking restaurant.

I mean, people would walk in there off the street and have no idea that it was vegan. You know, it wasn't green and earth-toned. And there weren't pictures of fruits and vegetables on the wall. And so it was very important. And then importantly, I was the one who wanted to put wine in the name of the restaurant because I wanted it to be very clear that this is. a more high-end place where you can come on a date and there's an extensive wine list and cocktails and that it's more of an elegant place than sort of a beak.

Crack a Cayman Jack Margarita and taste your escape. It's America's number one for a reason. Cayman Jack is a premium malt beverage with flavors. Please drink responsibly. Camin Jack beverage company, Chicago, Illinois. I don't know, casual spot. Were there a lot of vegan restaurants in the area? because I know vegan didn't really kind of blow up and become more mainstream until way later.

Yeah, there were not a lot of vegan restaurants. And again, most of the vegan restaurants that existed were much more like these little cafes. And part of the idea of what was cool about that space is that there was around the entrance around the corner but connected through the back was a we had a juice bar and a takeaway space. So we could have that more at a slightly lower price point or just an ability for people come and get the food to go. So we had this juice bar takeaway that was around the corner that was also really helpful for sales because out of a smaller square footage area, we could do a lot of sales. And that one lucky duck juice and takeaway, again, was a much easier concept to replicate. So I had opened another one lucky duck across town. And the idea was to expand that.

Because as anybody in the restaurant business knows, your upside is limited because there's only so many seats you can fill, right? I mean, you could fill every seat every night and do maximum turns. But how are you going to grow beyond that? There's not really economies of scale. But with a brand that you not only have a juice bar, takeaway location, but also a whole product line. and we were selling the products online, and I had taken them out of the stores because I realized it was way more profitable to sell them direct to customers. So that was also a growing business, selling to people directly online. So that's a much more scalable side of the business.

How long did it take to attract the celebrities that would end up coming? They came very quickly. I think we got a fair amount of press early on because it was such a new concept. And, you know, Matthew had, even though all of his other businesses had gone under, he was, you know, known as a kind of among the, he wasn't like Bobby Flay. He wasn't a TV celebrity chef. He'd been on TV shows, but it's not like he was one of those shows that, like Emerald that had a big show and everybody knew their name. But he was known, he was well known in the city. So his opening a raw food vegan restaurant was pressworthy. And we got good reviews. And, you know, there are a lot of famous people who are vegan. So those people certainly came in. And then I don't know.

I mean, I think we just had a really good vibe there, too, where we were very protective of a lot of the famous people that came in. So we weren't, like, calling page six and making a big deal out of it. And I was very careful to be very protective of the famous people who came in where, sometimes I would see somebody from another table sort of angling to get up and go approach them. And I would kind of glide in front. And we were just very, you know, we would put some famous people. We would give them a table in this back room in the corner. And I don't know, for whatever reason, we got a lot of really interesting people that came in and out of there.

Do you think that celebrity aspect is what would make your story so kind of sensational years later? Yeah. I mean, it was definitely part of what made it like a tabloid-worthy story is that the place was known for having a lot of famous people come in. I guess also the involvement. Like, Alec Baldwin was involved in my story because it was my friendship with him that ended up sort of leading me to meeting this guy on Twitter, what was then called Twitter. And Alec and this guy had had a back-and-forth banter on Twitter, and they communicated it a lot. And then Alec also met his current wife from, he met her at my restaurant. So he's kind of part of the story in a way.

And, you know, and I guess, as you know, it's like when people have this perception of you as being very successful, even though behind the scenes, you know, I still carried all this debt. And it's not like I was living this lavish lifestyle. And I was, I didn't think of myself as a huge success. But outwardly, you know, I published another cookbook. on my own. You know, the restaurant was growing, the brand was growing. I had a big following. And as you know, it's like I think the press, when they see somebody who seems to be, you know, at the top of their game, I think there's nothing juicier than seeing that person fall and then, you know, kind of leaping on that story and sort of kind of reveling in this fall. How are you living?

I know you said you weren't in a designer clothes, but, you know, were you guys going out, trips, apartments? What was that like? I lived really modestly. I mean, you know, Matthew and I split in the first year of the restaurant, but the restaurant was open for 11 years. So I was running it on my own for a really long time. And I lived, when Matthew and I split, I moved into a, I sublet a room in some guy's apartment nearby because I just wanted to be as close as possible to the. restaurant. And then I rented a studio across the street, but like a very small studio. Like, it was not that much bigger than this studio we're in right now, the whole apartment. And, um, but it was right

across the street from the restaurant. So what mattered to me is proximity to that space. And then from there, I went to like a one bedroom in the same building. And then eventually I moved, I had an office for the one lucky talk business down the street. And I moved, um, I moved the office and my, apartment into the same place a couple blocks away. But, you know, I never lived extravagantly. I wasn't like, I mean, it's funny because sometimes I'd get, there was this fascination with, particularly press in Japan, but a lot of international press would interview me. And, you know, they wanted to know, like, what spas I go to and where my favorite vacation destinations and where I go for facials. And I'm thinking, like, I haven't had a facial in a decade. And I don't have designer

clothes in my closet. So I don't know. That's just kind of me. It's like I'm not, I'm one of those people that even if I had a lot of money, like I would never, I don't, I don't know.

I don't understand the appeal of like handbags that cost a lot of money. Like why? Like, why would you buy a chintel? I don't, not to, like, I just don't get it. I would rather do something more practical or, you know, or like invest in, if anything, I'd be one of those people that would spend money

on some sort of like cool health thing, you know, or like having a cold plunge. I don't, I mean, I don't, something like that. That's where I would like spend money. Where was the restaurant? And how big was it just so the audience has a perspective? So it was located right by a block away from Union Square, which is great. So it was a block away from the Union Square Green Market, which is kind of where we would get a bunch of our ingredients as well. And it's just a great location in Manhattan because it's very central.

You know, Union Square is a big central hub train station. But Irving Place, the street the restaurant was on, is an oddly quiet street. It's sort of in this Gramercy Park area. And it's not – Irving Place is short. So there's not a lot of ton of traffic. So it feels kind of very quaint. And then it was on the bottom level of a brownstone. And so you walk in and it was about 70, something.

something seats inside. There was a bar. And then in the back, another really unique thing about that restaurant space is that we had a huge garden in the back. So we could seat over 70 people in the garden. And it was surrounded by buildings. So it was really quiet. And you just, you would go back there and not feel like you were in Manhattan. And there was, you know, trees hanging over and we strung lights in there. And we built it out really beautifully with this dark kind of Ipe wood around the perimeter and these dark bank hats and burgundy cushions and wood tabletops and the folding chairs all had these red cushions on it so it felt really comfortable and beautiful out there and then we had an outdoor bar too and that outdoor that garden was just beautiful i mean that was a draw in

itself so that also helped to bring in customers who weren't coming because they were seeking out vegan food they were coming because they wanted good food but also they wanted to sit in that really beautiful garden space. And then that space also had a little, the takeaway that was connected through the kitchen that had an entrance around the corner. So it was a really great space. Tell us about this guy that comes in your life, where things start to take a turn. So I had, after Matthew, the next relationship I entered into was a much younger guy. He was, I think, 14 years younger than me. When we met, I was 34, I guess 13. He was 21 and I was 34. And we just like fell into this relationship that was one of the best relationships of my life. I mean, it was very, he was kind of an old soul. But it was a very easy, no drama relationship. I mean, such a good dude. And really supportive of what I was doing. He never, he was in a band. He was a really good musician. He just, he, he was. He just, he, he, he, he, he was. He, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he just, he. He just, he. He just, he. He was. He just, he. He was. He was. He was. He

worked at like a beer store in Brooklyn. And initially he had worked at my takeaway. And then I was like, we were like, no, you can't, you can't work here. So I hired his best friend Jonathan, who's great. I'm still friendly with him. And it was just an amazing relationship. But I knew, I knew it would, I knew it wasn't forever because I don't know. You know what I mean? Like, let's face it. He was 21 when we met. I'm 34. Eventually, he might want to go have more of a life. He might want to have kids or do something other than, so I knew it was going to end eventually. But it's, so when we broke up, I was heartbroken for the first time in my life, like really heartbroken. And I had just adopted my dog, Leon. And I think I, I might have, like anything,

you can kind of sense when something might be coming to a close. And so Leon really helped me get through that heartbreak. And oddly enough, I ended up, I had no intention of adopting a dog. but I was trying to convince Alec to adopt a dog. And so I was regularly like finding photos online of these adoptable dogs and sending them to him and being like, this is the dog. You got to get this dog. And he wasn't, he didn't really want to adopt a dog. So he would sort of, yeah, yeah, that's great. But one of the dogs I sent to him, I was like, this is, oh my God, look how cute this dog is.

You have to get this dog. It's in Brooklyn. And I got strangely obsessed with this one dog. like in a way that's really hard to explain. Like I just got fixated on this dog. Like it hurt my heart in some way. And I thought, like, well, I can't adopt a dog. Like I'm way too busy.

I live in my office. Like a pit bull mix. That would be insane. But it was somehow, it was like I didn't have a choice. Like something propelled me. And I was like, well, I'm just going to go see him. And then Tobin, my boyfriend, had gone to back to see his family in Colorado, and I went to the place in Brooklyn, and I met him, the dog, Leon, or I named him Leon. And I just, it's hard to explain, but I was completely, like, attached. I don't know. I had to get him. If he wasn't available, like, I was not going to get any other dog. So I adopted this dog and then named him Leon after a character in my favorite film.

And so having Leon really helped me when I split up with Tobin. And I was in that sort of heartbroken state. And as anybody who's been either pulled into a cult or a hyper-manipulative relationship like this will say is that usually it happens when you're at a low point. So like maybe you've just lost your job or you just got divorced or you just lost a loved one. So usually they are able to target people when they're in a very vulnerable state. And I was heartbroken for the first time and I was really overworked and just exhausted. One thing I think that the press sort of portrayed me as somebody that led this glamorous lifestyle and was like hobnobbing with celebrities at my restaurant. And that wasn't me at all.

I mean, I like to meet people and I became friends with some people there. but that whole thing of like schmoozing with guests was really exhausting like I'm one to you know by nature and just way more comfortable you know at home and PJs and so all of that was really draining to me like really draining and so I was exhausted I think just almost like I was just so exhausted and I yet really ambitious and I knew how much potential the business had like we were doing really well. But I knew it could grow into something really, really, really, really big. And I really needed the right partner. And I was just exhausted. And this guy kind of threw Alec. This guy was very funny, as these people tend to be very charming and very funny, or can be very funny. But this

kind of mysterious guy on Twitter was bantering back and forth with Alec. And Alec had just joined Twitter. So I think what happened, like, I just assumed that they were somehow friends in real life. But I think what happened is Alec joined Twitter and probably in that sort of very early time as he's probably quickly building a following. This guy must have followed him and was funny and witty. And so for whatever reason, Alec followed him back and continued this back and forth banter with him. But meanwhile, I saw that and I thought that they must know each other somehow. So that just gave him a little bit of legitimacy that he might sort of any rando on Twitter might otherwise not have had. So I started, you know, I followed him.

He followed me back and forth. And then it turned into DMs. And then we used to chat and like words with friends. And then it kind of went from there. And, you know, I was in this very lonely period after that breakup. And it was like six months later, I think. and just found him very appealing. I had also written a blog, which I've reposted some of what I've written on my current website,

but I had written these very personal blog posts, like some pretty lengthy, very personal blog posts, because I just tend to be very open and forthright. So what I know now is that he clearly would have read those, and one post in particular, it's like a roadmap of here's my, ambitions, my insecurities. If you want to manipulate somebody, like, it's all there. All of the things that I'm going to be particularly sensitive about, a lot about my personality. You know, the people who get pulled into cults very often will say that the cult leader will study them and learn

what it is, like what buttons they can push where this person's vulnerabilities are. And so that was all laid out there. So, you know, he knew what things to sort of, what things to play up on and how to pull me in and get me intrigued. And he did that. And he took his time. So it was about a month or six weeks before I actually met him in person. But by that time, he'd done a number on me and got me attached to him. And also, I think one of the most dangerous things about meeting somebody online in that way before you meet them in person is you're, you're, you're, you're, you're going by what information they're feeding you, especially because he's not somebody that I could look up on. He didn't have a LinkedIn profile. He didn't have an Instagram or a whole sort of online presence that I could investigate and learn about him through.

So what I learned about him was just what he told me. And I'm wired in a way where I don't assume people are lying. Like I know that I should be much more skeptical in life, generally. and now I am a lot more careful. But my default is to assume somebody's being straightforward because the way my brain works is like, why would somebody lie? So I believed him with a lot of the things that he was telling me and he had this very mysterious persona.

So he really reeled me in before I ever met him. And I know now how dangerous that can be to get attached to something in that way. Did you think to ask Alec, like, hey, who is this guy? Are you guys friends? Is this someone I want to be with? By then, I mean, they continued, like, bantering back and forth, and they would DM each other. And so, but by then, you know, Alec had met Alaria. And so he was kind of off on his relationship with Alaria. And so Alec and I didn't communicate that much directly anymore. So I didn't, yeah, I mean, I ought to have. I don't know if by then, I guess if I had said to him like, hey, what do you know about this guy? He probably would have said, oh, I don't really know him. He's just a funny guy.

And then maybe that would have given me a bit more hesitation, but maybe it would have already been too late. What was that first meeting like? Did it live up to your expectations? No, no. And again, that should have been the, You know, there were a lot of red flags, but that should have been a big waving, waving, flaming on fire, red flag. And in fact, after that first time I met him in person, I thought, all right, well, that's that. Like, there goes that fantasy.

Yeah, I'm probably, I'm not going to see him again. You know, that didn't really feel right. But the problem is I stayed in touch with him. And so he kind of was able to hook back into those same things or whatever. He was able to find a way to come back again because he didn't live in New York. He lived in Massachusetts, you know, which is where I'm from. So he was able to figure out a way to come back again. And, you know, and then he started sort of promising that he could help me and knew what to tap into to kind of get me attached.

Did he look the way you expected him to look? No. No, he didn't. So it was like a catfish type of thing? I mean, it wasn't a complete, like the pictures that he posted and that he sent me were actual photos of him. But he knew how to get the right angle. And the photos, a lot of the photos of him online, he's very large, right? He's just very large. And when I met him, he was not like that at all.

but over the course of my being in that relationship with him, he gained a lot of weight. So when I first met him, the way I describe it in the book is that he looked more like one of those defensive football players that has some extra padding. And in fact, he made it, he'd told me that he'd had some kind of an injury and that, you know, he wasn't in as good as shape as he normally is. and I, you know, I don't, I'm not like one of those, I'm not like shallow. I don't, I think that sort of played on my, you know, like I'm not shallow or judgy. So if he was injured and he's not in great shape, like that's not, I wouldn't necessarily care about that so much. But over the course of my time with him, he just got, he got bigger and bigger and bigger. And, he's sort of built with a wide torso. So, like, him gaining weight, he just looks even big. He probably should have played defensive football because he's just wide. And I noticed that when I met his father the first time, his father's built the same way.

So, like, even if he lost a lot of weight, he'd always have a sort of wide torso. But, yeah, he became very, very large. How did he present himself to you as someone that's, is it like? like a ball or rich type of person? Or what did he come off as? He was very mysterious. And again, I mean, it's embarrassing. But like, yeah, major red flag.

If somebody's, of course, it's the perfect cover story for somebody to say that they work in some sort of a, like a black ops or some sort of, you know, people saying that they work for the CIA is another typical story. And but I mean it makes me sound really naive and I guess I just was really naive and I it doesn't occur to me that somebody's would completely fabricate a story like that. I mean it should have now it does all the time. But you know he he like one time he sent me this article about some black ops situation. So I'm like, I well it's a real thing. There are people who work for these organizations. like why wouldn't he be one of them, you know? But it's a very, obviously, it's a very convenient backstory for somebody who's a con artist because it's not like they would have a LinkedIn profile that says that that's what they do. So you meet him, you're still running the restaurant. How does a relationship evolve? And what's kind of like the time frame on everything?

Well, yeah. And the way it was portrayed and bad vegan made it seem like it was a much shorter relationship, but it was a long, it was a, the process by which he ended up sort of taking control of my brain in a way, it was like he hijacked my psyche was a much more drawn out process, something. Because, I mean, there are multiple times down the road where I was like, all right, I'm, I can't deal with this guy. I'm never going to see him again. even after, so what happened was he started to borrow money for me. And that just started this whole, you know, what ended up being a massive, fiery train wreck. But he borrowed money from me. And it was, it was like this urgent matter. Like, oh, my God, I'm in a situation. I need to borrow this money really quick. And he made it seem like this, like, crazy life or death thing. And so I was like, oh, okay. And I don't remember how much. it was, maybe it was $10,000 or something. Like, I had access to that money through my business,

so I loaned it to him. And that was a tether, right? Because once somebody, once you loaned somebody money, it's a lot harder to cut them off. So down the road, when I was, when I wanted to cut him off, he would come back and say, oh, hey, I got some, I got money to bring back. So I'm thinking, all right, well, I want my money. Okay, well, sure, I'll let him come back. And then somehow that would turn into something where, you know, by the end of the weekend, I'd loaned him more money, you know, and I don't, I can't explain how we did that because I don't really, I don't, I don't really know. I mean, I think he, now I realize he probably was doing a lot of, you know, what's called neurolinguistic programming and there's kind of this whole, there's a bunch of people online that talk about

like behavioral influence and how to kind of get people. people to do what you want. And I think he was able to use a lot of those tactics. I mean, Keith Raineri from the nexium cult that Nippy and Sarah were part of. He was known for using an LP. And so, yeah, it's like being sort of hypnotized and manipulated in a way that obviously you don't understand what's going on. So, you know, he would leave and it would be like, wait, how did that happen? You know, and anyway, and so basically it turned into this long destructive thing where he just got a it got worse and worse and worse and the more money I loaned him the more the more I wanted it back the more I couldn't cut ties with him and and then it just spiraled and ended up putting my business in jeopardy and it got

worse and all all along he's promising it's all what's hard to explain and why my book ended up being as long as it is is that you know, it turned into this crazy delusion that he's spinning, that he would really be able to kind of deliver me the independence to grow and build my business and also somehow convinced me that, you know, he would regularly tell me, like, you're, you know, you really are meant to change the world and your business is, like, you don't even have it, you have no idea how big it's going to be and it's going to change the world and you're going to change the way everybody eats and it's like almost as if like I'm going to save the planet but he just played on all

these kind of insecurities that I had and you know I had this very and I still have this core belief in myself but sort of layered over with all of these insecurities and doubts and fears and he played on that and and and got me trapped into the situation where then he layered on fear where if I didn't do what he said that my whole life would be a disaster. And, you know, it's the same thing that cults do. It's the same thing that cults do. And the way that people are pulled into cults and the tactics that they use to keep you there and scare you and keep you tired and overwhelmed and confused is another big thing. so they're constantly like, I mean, the farther I got into it with him, he kept me in a state of just constantly being tired, exhausted on edge, not understanding what's going on, which makes it that much easier to manipulate somebody. So it just spiraled out of control. And ultimately, I lost, you know, everything was destroyed. Everything I'd built was destroyed. And, you know, worse than that, all these other people were hurt as well. And worse of all my employees, because it really was as cliche as it sounds that,

place was like a family and they you know I was like the mom and so from their perspective it's like mom had this disgusting boyfriend that they all hated not all of them he was able to manipulate some of them too but you know it was like as if mom was with this evil abusive stepdad who kind of who ruined everything and they didn't understand what was going on or how I could have put the business in jeopardy because their history with me was that business was everything to me. And, you know, we got through like the 2008 downturn and I didn't pay myself during that time and it was, things were really tight, but I always made payroll and I was there all a time and they knew how much that business meant to me. So for things to have gone south,

the way that they did didn't make sense to any of them. But I was just, you know, I was just, just the whole time trying to get out of the situation and the situation that was created was one where I didn't see any other way out. So, I mean, I think you might relate to some of this where like he had me borrowing money from all these people. So I'm like, well, I have to pay them back, right? So the only way out is to keep going. And that's how he certainly framed it to me. And so people would say to me like, well, how come you didn't come to me for help? It's like, well, I didn't know what was going on because, again, in my case, there's this whole, you know, manipulative guy and every who's spun this whole delusion and taken control of things. But I didn't see any other way out.

And also if I psychologically, if I allowed myself to accept the truth that this guy must be a con artist and he must be full of shit. which was hard for me to imagine because I couldn't wrap my brain around the idea that somebody would be that diabolically cruel. So that couldn't be true. Therefore, whatever he's saying must be true. And then also he, you know, he outright told me and in writing many times, which I include in my book, that, you know, I'm going to lose everything and be like destroying really. for life if I don't kind of keep going. So, and also with him, it was like always about to be over. And so every time he got money from me, it was like, oh, this is the last time.

It's about to be over. And so if he's dangling that relief, it's like the gambler who just thinks, all right, well, if I just keep going, I'll win. Even though in that situation, I really, I mean, I didn't, it's not like I feel. felt like I had no choice. I didn't see that I had a choice. So yeah. And then and then one of the lines and a line in my book is that it took getting arrested to set me free. So I feel actually very warmly towards the detective who arrested me because he happened, he happened to be a really good dude and he could see that there was, he could see that I wasn't a criminal and that I was in a bad situation, unlike the prosecutors who also kind of came for me

in this way where it didn't matter what my intentions were. None of that mattered. They were just, you know, gunning to get me. But he wasn't like that at all. He was a detective in Tennessee, which is where we were arrested and could see that something really messed up was going on. And I imagine doing what he does had seen this type of con artist's personality and recognized him as being that type of person.

So, but there's another docu-series on Netflix that came out a while before Bad Vegan called The Puppet Master. In it, it's sort of a similar story. It takes place in the UK. And in it, this one woman who's pulled away and taken away from her family and taken away from her whole life in the way that this guy ultimately took me away from everything, like physically took me away. She's gone for 10 years, spoiler alert. I mean, she doesn't end up getting found and rescued for 10 years. And I feel like if I hadn't been arrested, I don't, who knows how long I would have been gone. So, I mean, I feel warmly towards those detectives, towards the detective who arrested me because they really pulled me out of the situation.

Now, of course, then I got put in jail and then extradited to Rikers and then prosecuted by New York. in a way that was baffling to me because I didn't like I'm not a criminal I'm not afraid of getting in trouble I mean I was even though I had blue hair when I was younger I never got in trouble I got straight A's

I never had detention in my entire life like I just was I'm one of those people that's just afraid of getting in trouble and so the idea that I would commit all these crimes seemed crazy to me and I really thought I mean I was coming

out of a situation that the whole thing was extremely surreal. But I thought all along, like, well, surely when they see what really happened, they'll just drop the charges or they'll, or maybe if they can't drop the charges because I was financially the responsible party, they'll see that I never would have intended this because logically it didn't make any sense either. And I, my brain is kind of very logical. I just thought, all right, well, if anything, like, they'll just, I'll have to give me probation or something, but why would they want to punish me when I, you know, I've been through hell and I never would have intended for all of this stuff. And, you know, it was like my, you know, it was like my biggest nightmare come true and all these other people were hurt too, which again is

that was the worst part, right, is feeling like all these other people got hurt and it's my fault and they don't understand what happened. So, you know, that left me with all this shame to carry. and I thought my story was going to get told through bad vegan. And, I mean, in some ways it was, and in many ways it was totally misleading and didn't explain anything. So that's, you know, I knew. USAA knows dynamic duos can save the day like superheroes and sidekicks or auto and home insurance. With USAA, you can bundle your auto and home and save up to 10%. Tap the banner to learn more and get a quote at usa.com slash bundle.

Restrictions apply. Well, the long I was going to write a book, but that's why I had to put my full story in a book. What were you expecting this guy to bring to the table for the restaurant? You had mentioned a couple times that you were hoping he'd help grow it and build it. What was he saying to you? He, you know, he never told me anything clearly. Like, every question I asked him, I would never get a direct answer. But he made it seem like he could effectively empower me to grow the business however I want.

right? So initially it was this like story that he had access to all this money. And so I wouldn't have to go to investors. I wouldn't have to answer to because I'd been through situations where either actual investors or people pretending to be investors or, because I was running the business on my own. So people would come to me and they'd kind of tell, you know, they'd want to be partners and maybe it turns out they were sort of slimy or didn't have the right intentions. I didn't like being in that position of needing a partner or having to answer to somebody or maybe having to compromise myself in some way. So the idea of being empowered to grow the business the way that I wanted to was very appealing. And so he made it seem like he had access to all this money and he could make this happen. And that was basically not that he was going to kind of logistically come in and help me as a partner. because I didn't, early on, I didn't bring him to the restaurant. I sort of kept him hidden. And that was part of what got me into trouble is that when I had that boyfriend, Tobin, I brought him to events.

He came to, he was friends with everybody at the restaurant. He was very much a part of my life openly. But this guy was, you know, I wasn't comfortable with him in public. I didn't, I wasn't comfortable with him overall. And it's very bizarre because, of course, he ended up convincing me to marry him, which I didn't want to do. But he, like, twisted my arm. I mean, it's really hard to explain when you've not been manipulated. And I have so many conversations now with people. A lot of podcasts that I do are people who are in, you know, narcissistic abuse relationships or podcasts like Sarah and Nippe's a little bit culty or Mark Vesente where people have been through that type of a situation where it's really hard to explain. how you were manipulated because, of course, at the time, you didn't know it was happening. So to say that, I mean, it looks terrible that I married him because people think I must have been in love with him. And why would I marry somebody if I didn't want to? I didn't want to marry him.

I mean, when we were at City Hall getting the license, I'm like, oh, God, I hope we don't run into somebody I know. And that's not how you normally marry somebody at all. But, Yeah, I mean, he knew what he was doing. He was really good at what he did. No, you had already experienced success before you met him in the restaurant and was growing. Why do you think you needed those words of affirmation from him that you really hooked on to? I think he just got me at a vulnerable time. Because of the breakup with the first guy? Yeah, and because I just was exhausted from, you know, a lot of people came to me.

Oh, I want to grow this business. oh, you should expand here, you should expand there, you should do this, you should do that. And I just was overwhelmed and exhausted. And so I just was in a sort of a weakened state. You know, I mean, I knew I had all this potential. And yeah, of course, if I could go back knowing what I know now, I mean, I would have told my younger self, yeah, like, do not trust this weird buffoon who might be really funny. and just, you know, go out and proactively find that right partner. But it's a lot of work to find the right business partner.

And that's a big relationship. So here's somebody that comes along who figured out what my hopes and dreams were probably better than I even consciously was aware of and tapped into that. Now, what's he saying he needs some money for? Because I can never imagine asking like a girlfriend or a girlfriend. a wife for $10,000. Right. But you're not a sociopath. Like they can do all of these things easily. Like they're just not wired the way that most people are.

So they're able to walk into a room and pretend to be somebody they're not and say crazy things with full confidence. And probably because they're able to do that and in a way where they almost believe their own lies, that they don't give off the same weird. Like if I walked into a room and I told you a bunch of lies, I'd probably all of these things would be going, like my eyes, the way that my face is moving. There's all these things that probably would allow you to suspect that I'm lying because I would just naturally, like, I'm nervous.

It's like a lie detector test, right? So I think that people like him could probably pass lie detector tests because they're not giving off those tells. So, like, I don't even remember what reason he gave me if he gave me one at all for why he needed the money the first time. And then later on, it all, you know, was spun into this bizarre, weird, dark story that, like, I'm being tested and that the money was part of the test. And him gaining all this weight was part of the test. And I just had to pass the tests to get through all this stuff. And then there will be a relief on the other side.

How much money did you end up giving them over the course of this whole thing? I think it was over $2 million. Now, tell us how this goes from you being the victim giving him money to then you becoming the suspect. Prosecuted? Yeah, prosecuted. Well, because, you know, along the way, very often what he would do is he would get money from me and promise that he was going to give it all back to me. And then I'd be in a pinch and I wouldn't have money for payroll. and like, oh my God, I have to make payroll, so I have to borrow money for payroll. And so over time, I was borrowing more and more money. And, you know, I knew I had this really valuable business. So if people are either investing or, you know, borrowing money from me, I'm like, well, I have this asset. I have this business. I'm going to be able to pay them back. And he's promising me this money back and then some. And he was always, you know, when he was a

that I was, when I was borrowing money from people, he would always say, like, you're going to be able to, you know, you're going to be able to money whip everybody on the other side of this, meaning I'd be able to just come back and be like, you know, oh, you want your $100,000 back, here's $300 back. So, you know, which feels like that would be amazing. I would love to do that. And it gets really weird and sort of supernatural. And I go into that a lot more on my book.

It's really hard to explain that he might have, because they, you know, in bad vegan, they talk about how he made me believe my dog would be immortal. And some dog people have said like, okay, well, that would be pretty appealing. So I could see falling for that. But it's not that he made me actually believe that, but all of the weird shit that he said was all stuff that I could never disprove, right? It's like believing in God. You can't disprove it. You can't prove that God doesn't exist and loads of people. You know, so he would spin these weird stories that I couldn't prove weren't true. So it always kept me wondering. So I kind of got into this increasingly, you know, very confused state where I didn't know what was true, didn't know what to believe, but I was also terrified. And then over time more and more dissociated and sort of frozen and scared. And so I just wanted out. I just wanted it to be over.

I just wanted the situation to be over. I wanted the relief. I needed to pay everybody back. And so I kept going. Who are you borrowing from banks or just friends, famous people from the restaurant? And what are you telling these individuals? Because you have a successful restaurant. Yeah.

I mean, there were, each situation was unique. But what ended up happening eventually is at one point, he sent me away to Florida and told me to stay off comms. So like he told me not to look at my phone and not to look at email. And he was basically got me to believe that this was all over. Like, all right, it's all going to work out. All the money is going to get paid back. And instead what ended up happening is the restaurant closed while I was gone because payroll wasn't made.

And that was. that was the hardest part to write about in my book. I mean, there's some other gross stuff that happened that I write about that everybody would assume would be the hardest part to write about. But the hardest part to write about was when the restaurant closed. I mean, that was devastating. And I feel like that was a moment where I was already in this strange, like, Dululu dissociated state. But that was, like, next level. And I don't remember getting from Florida.

Florida, back to New York. I remember walking back into the restaurant for the first time, and I knew either I had to get the restaurant back open or like I was going to kill myself. Like, those were my two options because I couldn't. That was it. I had to get the restaurant back open. And, I mean, just it also just didn't make sense that it closed. I mean, I just thought that place was going to be there forever. Like, this is going to be a brand that's big that outlasts me.

Everybody loves it. There's so much good energy around this brand and what we were building that how could it be gone? Like, it didn't compute. So I was just, I had to get it reopen. So then I raised a bunch of money to get it reopened. And that part, what was so painful, I mean, there was so much that was painful about that period of time. But what was so painful is not being able to tell anybody what really happened. What am I going to tell them that I believe to this guy?

I gave him all this money and like how do I explain that? I couldn't explain that. And so, you know, I kind of had to always, like I hate lying. I'm a terrible liar. It makes me queasy. But I had to kind of just be very vague about how we got into trouble. And that was really, really, really hard. But I was able to raise a lot of money and get the restaurant reopened. And so I think this happened with you as well where because that money never got paid back. if you read the indictment, you'd think that I raised, you know, $800,000 and ran off with it, right? But I didn't. I raised over $800,000 or over a million dollars.

The vast majority of that went to pay the rent that was owed on the restaurant, some sales tax that was owed or a payment towards sales tax, paying back the employees, what they were owed, vendors, like, and then all the expenses to get it back open. and then, like, I don't even know what he had or had taken when he took me away, but it was like, I don't know, 50 grand, 100, I don't, less than 100 grand of that money that was raised, the vast majority of it went to reopen the restaurant, and the restaurant did reopen. But if you read the indictment or if you read the tabloids, it made it seem as if I raised all this money and then ran off with it and him and, like, we were like living large with, bags of cash, which wasn't the case at all.

They never get the timelines right. They never get the timelines right. They don't get the, you know, some of the numbers are correct, but again, it made it seem like we ran off with all that money. Like, no, all that investor money went to reopen the restaurant, and the restaurant reopened. And when he eventually took me away, again, they made it seem like we ran off, like we're co-conspirators and we fled. No, he took me away. he might as well have put a bag over my head and dragged me away is the way that it was. But, you know, and like the last thing I would have done is abandoned that restaurant.

You know, if I had known, like, I would have crawled over broken glass for that restaurant. And in getting it reopened, I kind of did. I mean, it was really what I went through to get it reopened while that guy is torturing me. I mean, that guy was putting me through fucking hell. And in fact, the fact that this room is all dark and, you know, black walls, it reminds me of this apartment because he moved me out of my own apartment into another apartment that he rented, which was another way of isolating me. So what these people do is they isolate you from your friends and family and they isolate you from, and they put you in a different environment. And they do as much possible to destabilize you as they can. And so he did all those things.

And then while I'm working to raise money and so under so much. pressure to get the restaurant reopened and so stressed out, I'm coming back to this apartment, and he's sitting in this big, dark, like, lazy boy chair, playing Call of Duty and, like, as if he's God in this chair, and then he would berate me and yell at me and set it all up as if it was this test that he was putting me through, and I had to get through this. And so he's yelling at me. He's taking my phone, going through my phone, yelling at me, who are you texting? and I'm the type of person where like if a guy did that to me, I would no, hell no. Nobody's ever looking at my phone.

I would never do that to somebody else. But he spun it as if this was all a test and that he's putting me through a test. And am I going to give up? Oh, are you going to quit now? And I mean, like we talked earlier, I'm like, I'm that person that's not going to quit, right? So I'm going to keep going. And so I put up with what he was putting me through. Because what choice did I have at that point?

And he, you know, he was like torturing me. And I was exhausted. And then he did even worse, creepy torture. But I managed to get the restaurant open, even under all of those circumstances. And then when I was at the restaurant, I was among my people. And I think he started to get worried that I might pull away. And so he had to kind of ramp the whole thing up. And then he ended up taking me away and, like, drove me across the country.

We landed in Vegas. I mean, it was this whole crazy road trip from hell where I was completely dissociated. And you abandoned the restaurant. I didn't know that's, like, I never would have abandoned the restaurant. It was like the opposite of what I would have done. But it's what happened. But it's what happened. And the entire time we were away, I,

was so I was in such a compromised state. Like I had I ended up getting he he got me a new phone because he took my phone and all my electronics. So I, I was cut off from everything. But eventually he gave me an iPad, almost like a child, right? He needed to keep me occupied. So he gave me an iPad. I watched all this stuff on Netflix and I was playing online games. So I had access to the internet. I could have Googled myself. And if I had Googled myself, I would have seen that I was, like, they were, that I was wanted or I had no idea. And I didn't know if the restaurant had even closed or not, because for all I knew, maybe the investors stepped in and they all took over. Why wouldn't they?

Why wouldn't? They might have stepped in and taken over and the, and the, with the employees, we're running the business. And, I mean, I, but I just, so the fact that I, all that time, I never Googled myself is, I mean, that speaks to kind of the level of numb and weird and frozen that things were and how I was. I was just completely like numb and delusional. And what's weird now is that when he took me away, the way that he explained it, which was really weird at the time. but what's weird is that now it's very mainstream on Instagram or and because I look at that stuff now, it's in my feed all the time. But people are constantly saying now that, you know, time isn't what we think it is and there's multiple realities happening at the same time.

I mean, this has become very mainstream. And he was saying that, that, you know, things aren't what you think they are. And, you know, so just think of it as like putting your life on hold and we have to say, step into this other reality for a while. And I was so broken and fucked up that it was like, uh, okay, like what? But I wasn't, you know, people ask me all the time, well, what were you thinking? What were you feeling when XYZ? And it's like, I wasn't thinking or feeling or your thinking and your feeling are very detached. So, you know, I didn't cry a lot because I was numb. I was sort of frozen. I wasn't really thinking or feeling and there's a lot that I don't

remember, which is typical of dissociation and this type of trauma that isn't the trauma of like a 9-11 or some sort of one-time horrendous violent thing or an isolated traumatic incident, but an ongoing trauma and being in an ongoing state of fear can have a that effect that creates dissociation and then later PTSD and all of those things. So essentially the crime was you raised that money left, kind of abandoned it or it got abandoned in the process and that was the fraud aspect of it? Right. I was always confused because I thought like, well, wouldn't that just be, like, wouldn't what

happened be a civil thing where, sure, if investors wanted to sue me because they invested and I disappeared. There was something wrong with that, of course. But I never intended to defraud anybody. And the way that things happened, you know, again, I was taken away. I would say I was taken away against my will. But, you know, in so many of these situations where people feel trapped, there wasn't a lock on the door.

I could have run away from him. But I felt trapped. So I didn't, at no point in time did I consider having, I didn't feel like I'd committed crimes. So when I was, when the arrest happened and I started to kind of slowly make my way out of this world where coming to the realization that he was a complete con artist, total fraud, there was no moment that happened. It was like a slow realization over time, but really sickening. Because it was the worst, worst, it was the biggest nightmare. It was that thing that I was constantly running from that got me to believe him. Because to not believe him would have been so painful.

And of course, what ended up happening is that pain that just was so bad. Because, yeah, he was a total fraud and a con artist and potentially delusional himself, but probably a sociopath. And I'd been put through the situation that is so hard for most people to understand. How do I explain what I don't even understand? And then all of these people being hurt and feeling like it was my fault, you know, I mean, yeah, it's like I wanted to die. Like, I just, it was horrendously painful to come out of that. And then also be facing all these criminal charges. And the detective explained to me that the charges, you know, I could face up to 15 years.

And I was like completely, I mean, I know you know that it seems so strange when people say that. But at the same time, you think like, well, but I wasn't trying to defraud anybody. And surely once they see what really happened and once I get to explain like what really happened, they'll go, oh, okay, well, she didn't mean to do this. He's the criminal. He has a criminal record. She doesn't. And even logically, it didn't make sense. Like, logically, why would I have destroyed my own business with all this potential to, like, run off with this monster? It didn't make sense logically. So I just naively thought that it would work itself out. They'll see what really happened. And like I said before, you know, maybe worst case I have to just because of the logistics of how things happened and because I was the one responsible for the company that I would have to plead guilty to something and maybe I'd get probation. And even morally I felt like I would want to repay all that money because even if it wasn't what I intended and he's the criminal, it happened because of me.

I was responsible. So I would want to find a way to repay everybody whether I was ordered to or not. was sort of a given to me, but I never imagined that I would do jail time. Tell us about the arrest and what you actually got charged with. So I was arrested in a hotel in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, which is the most surreal place. It is such a bizarre town. It is so bizarre and crazy. And the jail there, so what I can't quite figure out is I have a feeling he knew we were going to get arrested.

and I almost have a feeling he did it on purpose, but that's something I explore in the book. But I heard this, we had two separate hotel rooms because he really, like, I, there was no, like, the idea that there was any affection between us is icky. There was a weird, sickening attachment where it's like a trauma bond because I became, I was so afraid that I was afraid that, like, he's the, only one who can get me out of this. So it creates this weird bond. But anyway, we had separate hotel

rooms and I heard this commotion. And he had gotten Leon back for me. So Leon was with me at that time. When he first took me away, he took me away from Leon too, which is another thing that would support the fact that I didn't go willingly. But eventually he got Leon back and kept telling me this is all going to be over soon. This is all going to be over. And so I was. with Leon in my room and there was some commotion in the hallway and Leon started barking like crazy. And so I go to open the door and see what's going on and I see these officers and a detective. And I'm not like inherently afraid of the police. So I was like, hey, can I help you? Like what's going on? And at first they were like, no, ma'am, go back in your room. And then I think they realized who I was.

And I didn't know this now, but they had already arrested him downstairs. So then they came into my room and I think the detective showed me a picture of me on his phone, like almost like a wanted sign, which was very bizarre and surreal. And then he explained to me that I was going to be arrested. And they were very kind. Again, I think because I was sort of, because I was so stunned and wasn't resisting and I probably looked really confused and freaked out. And he said to me at one point, he said, it's okay. It's all over now. So the way he treated me was like as if I'd been, as if I was being rescued. Because I think he knew that that's what was really happening. So, you know, you don't say to some criminal that you're arresting like, it's okay. It's over now. But he said that, I think just intuitively knowing the situation.

So. But and then in that moment, I very quickly became absolutely terrified and preoccupied with what was going to happen to my dog. because we're in this, you know, small town, Tennessee. And they said, well, ma'am, we'll take him to the pound until somebody can come get him. And that's when I started crying. I was like, he's a rescue dog. He can't, please don't take him to the pound. He can't go to the pound.

Like, I'm thinking about him going to doggie jail, right? Going to a cage. And that was devastating to me. That was so devastating. And they, my dog is super friendly. and dudes always really liked him because he's like a pit bull mix and super friendly and super cute. And they were like, okay, okay. Well, you know, Kevin here will take him home.

He loves dogs. We'll take him home until somebody can come get him. And I was like, oh, thank you so much. Oh, my God. Like, I wanted to hug them. I was like, oh, thank you so much. And then it was starting to sink in that I'm going to a jail. And I had no experience with what it was like to be arrested.

it and going to jail. So they advised me to change into jeans and something warmer because it was May. It was very warm in Tennessee. So they allowed me to change. They never, I think they put cuffs on me downstairs. But so I was taken to this jail in Tennessee. And when we were outside in the parking lot before they put me in the back of the cop car, they said, do you want to, you can go, your husband, which even saying that word husband, I'm like, but they were like, oh, you can go say goodbye to him if you want, or, and I was like, do I have to? Like, I don't want to. And I think that also clued them in. I was like, no, I don't, I don't want to see him. So they took me to the jail in Tennessee. And I was, that experience was interesting. Like, the holding cell where I ended up

staying for six days. And you're supposed to stay in a holding cell for 24 hours or less. Now I was in there for six days. And at times it was packed. And it was like a giant bathroom. It was just one square concrete room with no windows. And it wasn't even barred in the front. It was a door with like a little plexiglass window. And there's just that metal toilet in the corner with a little sink in there. So I was in there for six days with at times a lot of women where it was crowded. And you're like trying to get a space to sleep on the floor. and my book opens, I'm throwing up in the toilet because, so I know you know this too, jail and it's full of people coming off of hard drugs.

So everybody's like in withdrawal and they're all in pain. I got really sick and I got the worst migraine where I'm nauseous and I'm throwing up in the toilet because of caffeine withdrawal. So I was at the hotel, I was drinking coffee in the morning. I'd have a coffee in the afternoon, maybe another coffee, probably three cups of coffee a day, but I'm pretty sensitive. And I know I'm one of those people where if I stop drinking coffee, I will get like the worst migraine ever. So that's what I was coming down from.

And they were all like, what are you coming off of? I'm like, coffee? Oh, that was miserable. That was so miserable. And eventually I was moved into a dorm and then eventually. extradited to New York. The detective came back to see me a couple times. He was very nice. I still was kind of, I still was very numb. I didn't understand the charges. I was charged with, I can't even rattle off the charges to you because I think I just have a, like a, like I don't

want to remember what they were, but, you know, words like grand larceny and some various degrees and fraud and, um, tax fraud, which didn't, I didn't, that confused me because I'm one of those people where I reported everything. Nothing was under the table. All my employees were on the books. Like, we always filed sales tax. Everything was like above board. But one of the things that happens with probably most businesses, especially restaurants, is when they start running low on cash is you'll pay your employees, you'll pay your vendors, but you can get away with not paying sales tax. But we were filing it. And then I think at some point maybe we stopped, I don't know, Anyway, but from my perspective, it's not like I reported the wrong numbers or underreported or I hadn't falsified anything.

So I just thought, well, yeah, I owe money, but that's not fraud. But apparently, anyway. Yeah, you use a sales tax money to float your business as cash flow. Yeah, so I was charged with all these terrifying sounding things. And again, I'm still thinking that, all right, it'll somehow get sorted out. But kind of at every step of the way, it was like, this realization of, oh, wait, no, this isn't going to, like, oh, wait, they really are going to charge me. And so, yeah, it was a long process.

But a lot of your story resonated with me because there's that period of time where you think, like, well, surely once they see I'm not a criminal, this will all get worked out. Yeah, you're trying to do the right thing, but it just digs you into a bigger hole. Yeah. And also, I think that the way that I'm wired, I mean, I'm, I mean, I'm. I know I'm much wiser now about the criminal justice system and the system in general, but you would think that prosecutors are all good people and that they just want justice and that they're going to go after the criminals. And if they realize that you're not a criminal, well, they'll shift their focus to the actual

criminal who had bad intentions and who harmed people, including me and my mother and all these people. But that never happened. And the assistant DA who was prosecuting me, like clearly did not give a shit about any of the evidence. Because at one point, they had recovered a journal of mine, which I thought had been like thrown away. I thought this guy, Mr. Fox, one time saw me writing in a journal and was like, what are you doing? You shouldn't be writing shit down. And he took it from me.

And I just assumed he probably burned it or threw it down the trash shoot. but for some weird reason, I can't explain. And this is a pattern I've noticed with a lot of these types of criminals or even serial killers or people like Keith Rainary of Nexium. A lot of the evidence that does them in, they were the ones that held on to it or they filmed themselves or they made recordings. And in this case, too, this guy, Mr. Fox, recorded me in all of these situations I didn't know about and I didn't even find all of those recordings until much later. But he recorded me crying, like completely broken down. And I think he was gathering evidence to show that maybe I was unstable. But that ought to have worked in my favor.

Like, clearly I'm not living the high life with this guy and I'm miserable and out of it and devastated and in distress over and over and over again. And so for whatever reason, he kept this journal. And so the DA or whoever they found it among his things. And when I eventually got a copy of it, my biggest concern, I wasn't even concerned. I was glad. But part of me was like, oh, my God, how embarrassing. Like my journal, I'm probably, there's probably all this, like, embarrassing stuff in there just about, like, you know, me worried about. I don't know what.

Anyway, so when I got the, my attorney at the time sent me a PDF of the journal and I'm reading it. And I start crying because I'm like, oh, this is it. like nobody could read this and think I'm a criminal. Throughout the whole journal over and over again, I write about how I'm confused, what's going on. Like, I'm terrified of him. I'm afraid of him. There's just every single thing in the journal was supportive of what was really going on.

And so I thought, okay, surely the prosecutors having read this are going to think, oh, that poor woman, like, okay, well, let's go after the real criminal here. No, no, didn't move the needle at all. The entire time they were pushing for the same sentence for me and him the entire time. So they never thought he should get more jail time than me. So the entire time they're pushing for the same. So eventually it was like, okay, if you plead guilty, it'll be one to three years. And I'm like, again, this still doesn't make any sense to me. What's weird in my case is that it was never presented to me as an option to not plead guilty. It was like you're pleading guilty. It was like you're pleading. guilty no matter what, which, I mean, going through a trial would, I didn't, you know, I didn't have money for a lawyer. Everything was gone. I didn't have, you know, my home was, I had nothing when I came back to New York. My apartment, like every, all of my stuff, everything was gone. A little bit of my stuff I was able to recover, but like most of my belongings, you know, the business, of course, I learned was gone. You know, all of this debt.

Like I had nothing. So how am I going to hire an attorney to go through this whole? And I at least knew enough to know that going to trial would be very scary because there might be a lot of stuff that's not admissible. I could see how they could spin it a certain way. And even just the risk that it could go awry and then I could be sentenced to a longer time was scary enough. It got to the point where eventually I realized that the worst I would get would be six months. So I'd rather take that than go through a trial, which would have been grueling and take even longer and painful and humiliating. And with all of that risk, I think you understand too, living with that unknown of what am I going to be sentenced to and which way is it going to go is a kind of punishing torture in itself. So, yeah, I understand now why people plead guilty all the time. time, even if they didn't do the stuff or don't think that it's the just outcome. I can see how people plead guilty all the time because what else are you going to do? And people very often, of course, get coerced and intimidated into pleading guilty. But, you know, that part was really painful because when you plead guilty, you have to stand up and say, basically, that, like, yes,

I did these things. And that was really painful. That was really painful. But at least I got lucky, at least that the judge, even though he didn't understand my situation because it was very confusing and the judge was probably looking at it like, yeah, what the hell happened here? But my, I had switched attorneys, so I had a second attorney who had a forensic psychological evaluation done of me, which basically concluded that, like, yes, she was grossly manipulated and would never have done these things. And then I had all these letters from people, including former employees, who had lost money and some who hadn't.

And one or two of the investors, one in particular who lost the most money, who wrote in these letters to the judge that, like, I'm, the crime doesn't even make sense logically. It doesn't make sense that I would have done this, that, you know, I shouldn't get jail time. And that's the person who lost the most money. So, again, you would think that like the person

who arguably is the largest victim, at least financially, is saying, I'm not a criminal. And he was, you know, like a savvy investor. It's not like he was a family member or a friend. You would think that would have also moved the needle. But I think the judge just felt like he sort of was obligated to sentence me into something. And he did say that because the amount of money was so large, one thing he said at my, when I pled guilty, is he said, and it was reported in one of the tabloids, he said that it seems, or that there was a lot of evidence that it seemed clear that I tried to run my business in good faith. And when he said that, it meant so much to me because I felt like, fine, if I have to go do some time, whatever.

but him acknowledging that I had tried to run my business in faith, that meant everything to me. And that actually made it much more bearable to go away because at least he saw and kind of stated for the record that like I'm not. Wishing you could be there live for the big game, soaking up the atmosphere in the crowd. But too often, life gets busy.

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So I realize that four months is not a lot of time. So it was four months, but minus the couple of weeks I'd already served when I was before I got out on bail. because what happened was I was extradited to from Tennessee to Rikers. As you described, like, with the shackles and everything, which is such a weird experience. It's so weird. It's all so weird. And flown that way on an airplane, you know, with marshals on either side of me. And it feels really weird.

Like, they spend all this money and, like, they're making such a big deal out of this. And then. I was at Rikers for about a week before I got out on bail and then was out on bail for a year. And again, when I got out on bail, I never imagined I was going back. I just thought, again, that surely they would sort of see what really happened. But yeah, so but I went back. And because it's less than a year, you stay at Rikers. So I was at Rikers the whole time.

I didn't go to, I wasn't sent off to one of the other prisons. So I went back and did, you know, know, four months minus the two weeks, the summer of 2017. And I also was given time between when I was sentenced to when I had to report, when I had to go do the time. So I had a couple of weeks to get stuff in order and get myself prepared. How much time did he get? So they ended up, so, oh, this was gross. So he never got out on bail because nobody's going to, who's going to put, the bail was huge.

So, I mean, I don't, my, my mother was financially devastated because of this. My stepfather was long gone. He died a long time ago. And my father is not a wealthy man, but had, you know, there's ways to put a lot of bail up. So I think my bail was $350,000, which was like mind boggling to me. The prosecutor had asked for a million. So it took them a while to get it together, you know, whatever triple mortgages or bonds, however they do it. So I was out on bail while we had these trial, not the trial, but while you go through these hearings. And then it's an month or two, and then there's another hearing. He stayed in jail that whole time. So he ended up being sentenced to a year, but he was released before I went in. So he's getting out and free and clear, you know, he's on probation, but he's getting out free in the world. And I'm about to be locked up for, you know, the four months, minus three, two weeks. And my biggest fear that he was going to come after my dog, I was absolutely terrified. Because by that And I obviously realized that and had done a lot of research and understood better the type of personality that does what he does.

And that he's part of what he was. It's not like this was a purely financial thing because if it was, he would have just taken the money and run off. It's a bizarre, sickening kind of destruction of me. Like he somehow was like getting off on destroying me. Like that's what gets him, I was going to say gets him hard, but that's a gross thing to say. Gets them off. That's what gets these, I mean, yeah, that's what kind of gets these people excited is to destroy somebody. That's what gives their life meaning or gets them excited.

So I had lost everything. Everything's destroyed. So I'm thinking what's another way that he could really ruin me is to take. or harm the one thing I had left, which was my dog, Leon. So I was absolutely afraid that he was going to go after Leon, who was going to be living with my mom in New Hampshire. So for reasons that it takes a long time to explain, but that's why I ended up being in touch with him again. I mean, I had assumed I'd never speak to him again. Like, he's a monster.

But when he got out, I still had a couple of weeks before I had to go into Rikers. and I'm terrified he's going to go after Leon. And he was very well acquainted with my mother's house. It would have been very easy for him to go there and, you know, wait for her to let him out to pee or do his business and get him. So I'm petrified and he starts tweeting immediately after he gets out on jail. He's back on Twitter. I mean, he loved it there. That was his happy place.

He was tweeting a bunch of nonsense. So he's on Twitter immediately, and he starts posting things that were like little inside things or referencing my favorite flower or referencing some place or something that only I would know. So I realized he was trying to kind of reach out to me. And I had unfollowed him on Twitter. I still had my Twitter account. And I had unfollowed him. But Leon, my dog, he was at one lucky puppy on Twitter. and he had an account that still followed him.

So eventually I realized he's trying to get me to kind of reach out to him. And so through Leon's account, I finally reached out. And I made this very, very conscious decision, knowing that everybody who's supporting me, my family, and people that are in my orbit, my attorneys, if they knew that I made contact with him, they would all be complete. I couldn't tell anybody.

I could not tell anybody. But I knew that the safer option would be to allow him to think that he might still have his hooks in me in some way. And also the idea that maybe he's not going to hurt Leon. So I opened that channel of communication with him. And he realized he was still kind of spinning this delusion. Don't worry, baby. You're just going to have to go do some time. You're going to get it all back. And I'm like, okay, I know he's full of shit.

But, and it's not, I didn't pretend necessarily to believe him. I just, I kind of did. But I did it knowing that, that now I can go do my time, knowing that he's not going to hurt Leon and like, oh, okay. Leon's going to be fine. And I could, I mean, I mean, I'm good enough at now. By now, I'm very good at dissociation, so I could kind of put myself in this dissociated state enough to communicate with him, knowing too that he's, his psychology is something I can't

understand and is clearly very fucked up. So me freaking out and saying, how could you have done that to me? And you destroyed my business. Like, that's not, none of that's going to register to him. And it might even be gratifying to him. So there's no point in doing it. So it was pure. a strategic move. And then that's how I ended up later being able to get him on tape for Bad Vegan, which of course they used in a way against me. But I'm just getting him on tape so I can get his voice so we can have him saying weird things or whatnot on audio recording, which they used to. But that's how I got those recordings. And then shortly after I made those recordings for Bad Vegan, then I did actually lose my shit. He called me

once when I wasn't expecting it. I mean, I didn't have, it's not like I talked to him a lot. It was very loose, but meaning like only every once in a while would he reach out to me and text me. And I didn't like communicating with him. I didn't want to communicate with him. But I had kept that channel open for those reasons and because I wanted to be able to record him for that show. And I knew too as soon as the bad vegan trailer came out or one way or another, he was going to get word that it was being made. It was kind of scary because I thought, right now now he might want to come after me again so it was it was really scary but I did there was one final phone call where I did kind of I did lose my shit and start yelling at him which was

totally unsatisfying because he probably got off on it in some way but that was the last time I ever spoke to him so did you ever find out what happened or what his past was because you had mentioned that he had other criminal charges too did you find out his true identity yeah I found out his true identity along the way, which, again, you would think I would have turned around and bolted at that point. But I didn't. I let him explain and concoct some excuse and weave his story about why he was using a false name and why he had this arrest record in Florida. But I was told that he had a lengthy criminal record after the fact. And he's... gone on to

manipulate and defraud and in a sort of gross way torture a lot of other people since me, some of which some I know about because like in one case somebody reached out to me thankfully I think in one of those situations it was bad vegan coming out that exposed him

because they saw the trailer and the advertisements you know they promoted that show hard it was big on right when it came out on Netflix and most of the promotion, I would say, used my face in a way, which is a bit frustrating because they promoted in a way that made me look like, you know, an Anadelvie made me look like a criminal. There was like a billboard where I'm eating. They took a picture of me, one of my, it was a picture from my second cookbook where I'm

sitting in the garden of the restaurant eating a salad. And they took that photo and made the salad into a pile of cash and then made billboards out of that. So there's billboards in L.A. where I'm, and I look like an evil villain with the title, Bad Vegan, Fame, Fraud, Fugitives. That was frustrating. But your question was about, so they, so my point is when Bad Vegan came out and I think it was widely enough viewed in the, and maybe even the trailer that he was outed and then had to leave this one family's house he was living in where he'd been living during COVID. But I was in touch. I've been in touch with somebody from that. that house. And then there was a show called Toxic on Discovery, HBO, Max, whatever it's called now, where the show, each episode follows a horrendous story of some kind of abuse. Most of them violent, but the episode five and six are about, they focus on him. Anthony, his real name was Anthony Strangers. He since married somebody and told him.

her name and legally changed his name to Anthony Knight, K-N-I-N-G-H-T. So, you know, I think he clearly doesn't want to be identified or found and doesn't, you know, he's not, he doesn't want to be in the public eye or recognizable. So this show, they wanted me to participate. I didn't want to participate. I ended up, once I realized they were trying to track him down and expose him. I was like, all right, well, I'll help you. So it turns out I'm in that show quite a bit.

But she does, the show was made by this woman Elizabeth Chambers who, she was married to Army Hammer. Oh, that's how the name sounds for me. Yeah, she was a journalist. And anyway, she's behind making this show and tracks him down. And unbelievably, they end up finding him through a private detective. And she, I still, mad respect for her, there's this stakeout. And they find him and confront him on camera. and she's running after him.

And he's huge as ever. Like, huge. And she is very petite and thin. And she's running after him. And he's yelling at her. He's like, get out of here. And I don't know. I always tell her she's got like balls of steel for doing that.

So at least they exposed him again. And I think he, I hope that somehow or other that situation ended up allowing the woman that he was with as of the time that they filmed that to realize what's going on and get out of it. But who knows. But at the time he was with some woman and, you know, doing who knows what more of the same. Did you guys have restitution? Yes. And joint restitution, which means it's not like he has to pay half and I have to pay half.

It's just whoever's going to pay it. And obviously he's never going to pay any of it. So obviously I eventually will. But there's no clear schedule for it. So you probably had this experience where you would think going through the criminal justice system that stuff is very clear. But what I found is a lot of times stuff is very unclear. So you're trying to get answers to questions. Like, well, what is, you know, when do I have to pay this and how?

And it's all very unclear. So it's, it's, there's restitution on record, but there's no schedule or nobody's. breathing down my neck, but I still have to pay. I was able to pay my employees what they were owed from when I disappeared. And again, I didn't even know whether the restaurant had closed or what was happening. But that was the smallest part of what was owed, but weighed by far the heaviest on me. Because, you know, thinking about like the dishwasher is not getting paid is heartbreaking. And I felt responsible. And so the restitution, they were going to get paid, I think three times what they had lost out, fine with me. And when I agreed to do what ended up being titled Bad Began,

I didn't know that was going to be the title. And it wasn't with Netflix at the outside. It was just the producer and the director. I had said that I badly wanted to get my employees paid. I wanted to get that part of the restitution paid ASAP. So they agreed to pay me that amount of money, which was like just under 75K. So I got 75K. That went straight to the attorney that was handling it for them, so they all got paid. But beyond that, I didn't make anything from participating in that show, but the director and producer did really well. How much is the restitution? Beyond the, so the employees were paid, that was less than 75, the part that's, the restitution

is over 800,000, 800 something,000. And whether or not I was ordered. to pay that, I would want to pay that eventually. And there's other, there were other smaller investors. There were other loans that I'd taken out. There's other people that I, even my, my, my, what my mom lost, even though I, he got that from her. And like, I, I'm just that person where I just feel responsible where I want to repay everybody eventually. And, but I, things have been rough the last few years. So it's not like I'm earning money and able to repay people yet but I feel like eventually I will I feel like that's the hardest part about it because so like there's my restitution which was like the $500,000 and then there's stuff outside of that yeah that are just like

you don't technically oh legally but people lost money and it's it's all kind of and but then there's also the fact that okay some of it was business and the business genuinely lost money and it just all kind of crumpled together and then when you start making money. it's hard because it weighs on you because it's like, well, you have now expenses for that. I guess the point is it's hard to, and this is what I learned when I was running tuxedo's why it was never profitable because you're taking good money and you're mixing it with bad money. And it's hard to keep on top of your current bills without sacrificing. Like if you're paying the past, you're sacrificing the current.

So what are you really winning in the end? It's just hard, you know, it's hard on you mentally. Right. I mean, I'm glad I'm able to make big strides towards mine. but there's just like, it's like where do you even, you know, start and where do you, how do you fix everything? But also the flip side is time heals everything too. So two or $3,000 lost 15 years ago is a lot different than two or $3,000 lost yesterday. Right. And every, this is probably with the same with you too, is every situation is different. I mean, one, that one person I mentioned who had lost the

most. I spoke to him at one point. And I said, you know, I'm moving. back. I'm working with these people. I'm going to reopen the restaurant. I'm going to relaunch the business. And I just, you know, I want you to know that my intention is, is that through my equity and whatever I earn from, from that business is to repay everybody and you include it. And he said, oh, no, don't worry about me. Now, this dude has a lot of money. But to say that about the amount of money he's owed was like, and so there, in my mind, I would, there's probably some people, smaller investors who lost money where to them it's more meaningful to be repaid. And those are the ones that I would want to prioritize. Actually, even some of those aren't part of the restitution.

They're outside of that. But if I could, I mean, I would want to prioritize those because they're people for whom it's like a much more meaningful amount of money. But I don't, again, there's no, there's no clear guidance on, it's not like somebody saying, oh, whatever you earn, you have to give this percent or this is how it works or it's on this. There's nothing. Even when I was repaying the employees, like I didn't go through the court system or whatever. I just contacted the attorney that I knew was representing them, had the money wired to them, had him clear the judgment. Yeah.

So it's not very clear how it works. And also, I couldn't come out of this and just sort of lay low. and I don't know, take a consulting job or something because I'd never, it would take, I would die before I made enough money to repay everybody if I took sort of a regular type of a job. And I've always wanted to relaunch the whole business and, you know, something that has all of that, not only because there's restitution, even if all that was somehow magically wiped out, I would still want to rebuild it because I just think it's not, it was such a beautiful, thing that we had that business was beloved and I still hear from people every single day in messages and DMs like oh my god you have to reopen and there's still nothing like it and I still dream about that restaurant and those cookies and that I just hear it all the time which is amazingly heartwarming but I felt like I still feel the same as I did day one about very

intuitively in my core about that brand's potential. And now even more, there's more of a focus now on eating clean ingredients. And I think what distinguished us from a lot of other vegan places is there was no, this wasn't like vegan junk food. It was probably the healthiest food you could eat. And yes, it was all plant-based. But we didn't use, it was also kind of keto before anybody even, nobody talked about keto back then. But we didn't. use bread and pasta and we weren't cooking things. So it was incredibly healthy food. It was pure nutrition. And the most surprising thing that people came away with very often was that you feel really full and satisfied. Because you're eating nutritionally dense food. Like if you

went out and you ate donuts and a plate of pasta, you're not getting all the vitamins and nutrients. Your body is still going to be hungry. Our food was the opposite. It was like maximally nutritionally dense. So you don't have to eat that much. You get very, you feel very satisfied very quickly. And I think there's sort of even a bigger market for that really hyper clean, you know, all of its organic, very clean ingredients. On top of now there's, you know, I guess I have more followers on Instagram than I did before. You know what I mean? Like, so there is even just the notoriety of the story. I think there's a lot. of people that would be interested whether or not they watch that show and think I'm a good person or a criminal,

there's some interest in the story and potential interest for that reason, too. Tell us about your time at Rikers. Oh, so I want to write a fault. My book is long because, and I'm very gratified that people, the one comment I hear over and over again is people say, oh, my God, like, I can't put it down. I stayed up all night reading. You know, I can't put it down. And also, even people who have a hard time with, a lot of people don't read books anymore.

It's like an attention thing. But it's very, there are short chapters and it moves really fast. But to bring it back to Rikers, I write about when I was arrested. I write about when I was in Rikers before I got out on bail. So there's some stories there, including like my jail nickname. see. But I don't write about the, when I went back for the three and a half months, because I just, I don't get there. The book sort of ends when I'm arrested and it kind of comes full circle. So I start with being in the jail cell. Then I go back in time and then I tell a whole story and you kind of come back around to the beginning at the end. I want to write a follow up because I want to, I have all these stories as you probably did too, just sort of really fucked up. shit happens that you're like, is this even real? Are we? Is life really a simulation? And somebody in the casting department went overboard because it's too, like sometimes it's just

these characters that are so, it feels almost surreal. So I have a lot of those stories to write. And then I, you know, I stepped into some other situations. I have a lot, a lot of crap happened even after this that I want to write about because I think it's important and I have a lot more to say. So I'll write about those stories. But Rikers was the whole time I was in the dorms. And I also was never moved out. So at Rikers, you're there in transition, right? So either people are waiting, they haven't been convicted.

They're waiting for, they're going to court or they just can't get out on bail, which is a whole fucked up thing. Like the whole bail system is just on its face unjust. Not for me. But the people who are there because of $500 bail or $1,000 bail and they otherwise would be able to get out for stupid stuff is messed up. But if you're sentenced to more than a year, they ship you off to one of the prisons. If you're sentenced to less than a year, you end up on another floor in a different color uniform or whatever the word would be. but my sentence was weird. I don't know how to explain it,

but for whatever reason, because of the way I was, I was like officially sentenced when I got out. It's weird. So the effect of that was that I stayed the entire time in that area where people are coming in and out, and most of the other people haven't been sentenced. The sentence people are in another floor

or they're getting shipped out. So there's a constant flow of people coming in and out, and it was this open format. dorm with 50 beds. So there was no privacy, no, I never was in a cell ever. I mean, there was the holding cells downstairs, but I definitely could relate to it when you described your whole experience, like every step of the way when you're getting transported and here, and there's so much waiting, like long hours. You never know, there's no, you don't know what time it is when stuff is going to happen and you just sort of get used to that. And then also just fights

breaking out over like, you know, somebody took somebody's grape jelly and so now they're going to fight to the death. Like, really? Okay. Okay. And then I think I handled it fine. I mean, obviously it sucks to go in there. I, for me, it wasn't that long. You know, it's not that long for me. It's a season. It was the summer. I spent the summer at Rikers. So, you know, I was aware that it wasn't like a tragically long amount of time. People, I got a lot of mail. What was funny, what I was not expecting is I ended up getting, right after I got there, I got a bunch of mail from the letters from the mail side, guys from Rikers who, I didn't realize.

So when I was, there were tabloid stories in the New York Post when I went into, when I went into jail and there were pictures of me like with the handcuffs behind my back in the courtroom going off to jail. And I wasn't aware of any of this, but that was in the post. And so they take those stories out. You don't see them on the women's side because sometimes there are copies of newspapers floating around, but they cut all that out. But those must have been seen by people on the guys side. Because I didn't understand. I'm like, why am I getting mail from M-A-I-L from M-A-L-E inmates, which was kind of.

hilarious, but some of them are very sweet. So I got a lot of letters and then I got a lot of books sent to me. So I had over 250 books sent to me. So I, and I can, I mean, I read 50 books, which is a lot in, I think it was 13 weeks. So I had a lot of books and most of my time I spent reading. I had a, I had a job. You don't have to get a job, but I did, I mopped the floors out in the hallway early in the morning. So I mopped every morning. And, you know, I ended up sort of kept migrating, but I ended up taking the bed that was closest to the correction officer's desk in the front. Unfortunately, it was also right near the bathroom, but it was right near the front, so it felt like the safest place to be. And people tried to give me a hard time sometimes.

You know, people tried to start fights with me, but I was pretty chill. And so, and the over time, this might have happened with you too. Like, I was very deferential and respectful. And I would always say, please and thank you and very polite with the officers. And also, I think other people there learned that, you know, I'm chill. I keep to myself, I'm just the lady that sits there reading her books. I had pictures of Leon around my bed. So everybody was always stopping.

and talking about, oh, my God, your dog is so cute. I love your dog. He's so. So I didn't have too many problems, and I, you know, made some friends. But, yeah, a couple times people tried to start fights with me, and I didn't, I just wasn't reacting. Was it nice to reunite with Leon after when you got out of prison? Oh, yeah. That reuniting with Leon was the best.

And I had a one-bedroom apartment in Harlem Harlem, which I loved. And so I can't remember who. I think my father picked me up when I got released. And then my mother came with Leon and met us. So I just remember being back in my apartment with my mom and my dad and Leon. And I remember feeling bad because they were like, what do you want to do? Do you want to go out to eat? Like, what do you want to?

And I was like, I kind of was like, can you guys just leave? because I just want to cuddle. I just want to spoon Leon and lay under the covers. I had friends in Harlem that knew I was going away, and that neighborhood was so comforting and welcoming to me, and everybody in the neighborhood knew Leon. So I felt really at home there. And, yeah, I mean, I think aside from reuniting with him,

I was really excited to eat fresh food, because I'm used to eating really healthy and really clean. I live near the green market now. So I hardly ever eat out. I make all my own food. I eat really clean. I eat a lot of fresh fruits and vegetables. So, yeah, I was like give me watermelon, salad, greens, green juice, coconut water, all that stuff.

And then I don't really drink anymore, but I sometimes do. But, yeah, I really wanted like a cold beer or two. Are you bitter about everything that's happened? Do you hold resentment and grudges towards it, or do you think you've been able to overcome it and use it as a kind of a base to build your next act in life? Well, so I've gotten past being angry at him because the way I think about it, it's like if you were bit by a snake and, I don't know, it poisoned your leg and you had to have your leg, like are you going to walk around in life being angry at the snake like you're not you're just

not that's what snakes do so that's how I think about him right like I don't hold a grudge because it would be like holding a grudge against the snake that bit you like it sucks it sucks that I didn't realize that's what was happening or that I stepped in its path or that the snake came after me but that's what people like him do so I don't I mean I I don't like being reminded of him. I don't, sometimes I see people that look like him and it freaks me out and I still feel fear. But it's,

I don't feel anger at him. I feel, I have a harder time. I have a harder time with the anger. I feel towards the director of bad vegan and the producer and that situation and some stuff that's happened since then where I feel like people, saw that I was in a compromised position and they could take advantage of it and tried to take advantage of me. And I feel a lot angry about that because those are people who arguably are not

sociopaths, just fucking shit fucks who like think that they could see an opportunity. And, yeah, that makes me more angry. That's harder to deal with. What do you think you've learned throughout this whole journey? A lot of self-awareness and the importance of, of taking the time to spend time on your own. I mean, I came out of this with no resources. I still don't have resources, so I don't go to a therapist.

I don't have a therapist right now. But I've done enough reading and self-work and self-investigation that it's become a practice on my own. So I usually don't schedule stuff in the morning, and every morning I wake up and I do my whole little routine with like meditation and journaling and all types of work that is the type of work that you might do with a therapist. I'm just doing it on my own because I have to. But I think what I tell people who are coming out of something like this is how important it is to take the time to heal

and to take the time to understand how this happened. And not to, you know, there's a fine line between you don't want to victim blame, but at the same time acknowledge that there are characteristics about me that made me particularly susceptible to people like him. The classic, you know, around the literature about these types of situations, there's the idea of the malignant narcissist or the sociopath and the empath. And the empath is a perfect target for the malignant narcissist slash sociopath. And we're like a perfect match. So what is it about me that makes me beyond just the circumstances of being maybe heartbroken or whatever it was?

What is it about me that made me susceptible to somebody like him? Because if you don't figure it out, it's a pattern that repeats as it did with me. Because what happened with that guy Matthew was very similar. He saw in me somebody that he was going to be able to extract a lot from. I mean, I worked my ass off. Not only did I give him all that money, I was working my ass off for his business. and trying to keep his company afloat and working in the kitchens. And I was a workhorse.

And cults exploit people in the same way. They get people who don't back down and who are determined and who are smart and capable and they'll keep going. And they'll give it their all and they'll be fully committed. So taking the time to understand yourself and importantly understand all that stuff about your childhood and what are your weak spots. you know, the healing, the inner child. Like, all of that is really important. Because unless you understand that stuff, even if you don't heal it, the first step is at least being aware of it. So right now, even now, sometimes somebody will say something to me.

And I think that's something my former self, my less aware self, completely would have gotten sucked in by. But I'm not now. Like, for example, if some guy came around, and I haven't been, I'm like off, I don't date. I don't not. I'm just, no. But if somebody came around and sort of acted like they might protect me and I'm a little, because I feel, I think I feel a little bit like I was very unprotected when I was younger. You know, I was given way too much freedom. And some bad things happened to me, but a lot of bad things could have happened to me that I got really lucky they didn't when I was younger. So I think that's very appealing to me. And in fact, when that guy, Mr. Fox came around, he seemed like this guy that. could take charge and just take care of me and he was this big strong guy and um that at that time was very appealing to me and and it was also kind of the polar opposite of of Tobin the younger guy who was like an old soul and very never you know he never got jealous about anything he was the opposite a complete opposite of controlling and possessive and take charge you know I I sort of was the one who

took care of a lot of things in that relationship, but it was a beautiful, healthy relationship. And this guy came, and I'm heartbroken over that, so it kind of makes sense I would be attracted to the opposite. So I think taking a lot of as much time as possible to sit with yourself and your feelings, and it took me a long time to learn to meditate. You know, I used to be one of those people where I thought, oh, I can't sit still in my brain, my mind's, it takes time to practice. And then in those quiet moments is when I have realizations. Or I've become very sensitive to if something irritates me or somebody does or says something and I get mad, you know, I get triggered, as they say, immediately I stop and think, okay, wait, what's going on

here? Like, why did this make me really mad? Or why did this seemingly innocuous comment feel like a dig. There's something there. What is it about that? And I'll investigate and take the time to think about it. And very often it comes back to something related to your childhood or one of your parents. And so it's this sort of sensitive thing that you have. And so you kind of want to address that. And I think that's the most important thing is having that self-awareness and learning to trust your intuition again. Because on the other side of shit like this, when you've been manipulated, you come out and you feel completely fucked up. I don't know how to trust myself. I don't, how did I believe him? How did that happen? And then also usually having the awareness that there were moments when you felt something

was off, but you overrode that intuition. So learning to really trust your intuition more where you know, something feels off. If you meet somebody and you just get like a funny vibe, you know, maybe like their quote resume looks good or, but you just feel. You'll, like, just all that, trust that. That's another thing that I learned. And, yeah, I think a lot of people come out of these things and you end up finding a lot of benefits and a lot of value from it. And then you want to make your story useful.

So not only do I want to rebuild the business and the brand, but writing the book and doing podcasts and talking about this, I, for better or worse, and I mean, for better, because I'm glad for it. I feel like because people want me to do podcasts or speak out and I have a bit of a platform, I can speak on behalf of a lot of people who've been through this and they don't have a platform and their family doesn't understand. Their friends don't understand. Their coworkers don't understand. So the more I can speak out about it as being a thing that happens way more often than people realize. I mean, I had no idea that I would be bombarded with people. too, and men are even more quiet about it, being grotesquely manipulated, because there's a lot of, there's female sociopaths out there, too, of course, that are manipulative, that have these qualities of being able to mesmerize people. You know, there's Elizabeth Holmes and the Theranos thing that happened, and people wonder, like, how did all these really brilliant, smart people invest money with her?

And you hear other people say that when she was doing meetings, it was like other people. It was like she put people under a spell. You hear that about Jeffrey Epstein and all these sociopathic manipulative people, they have that power. And it's really hard to explain unless you experience it. But so I feel like going forward being able to speak out on behalf of a lot of these people in a way that I hope is useful for them and also makes them feel less alone. Because it's very isolating on the other side of this when people don't understand what happens. happen to you and they're all quietly or not so quietly judging you. And in my case, you know, this big show comes out on Netflix, which I'm thinking is going to be an honest story, ends up not being an honest story. And then further makes me look like I'm a criminal and I'm like still in debt and now getting called a criminal and having to almost go out and defend myself, which is really painful. So I just, you know, I just want to help. And I think the criminal justice system also doesn't understand the whole concept of whatever you want to call it.

Brainwashing, manipulation, what happens in cults, what happens in one-on-one relationships. The family court needs to understand it a lot better because it's very common. I mean, heartbreaking when people are involved with somebody who you would call a sociopath or a narcissist and they end up in family court and there's kids involved and the kids are weaponized and the judges don't understand. And these people are really good at what they do. they're really good at playing people. I mean, this guy in my story, Mr. Fox, he seems like this total buffoon and why would I believe him?

But he had us, he took me to Barclays. He had a, he fooled this fancy high-end broker who coincidentally had sold Alec Baldwin his house as well, which I thought was another weird coincidence. But, and also probably maybe Mr. Fox knowing, quote, knowing Alec gave him some credibility with this guy. but this high-end broker was allowed himself to be wrapped around Mr. Fox's fat finger. Like just, he was like a puppy dog around him and would come running for meetings, whatever time. And so he convinced the broker and me that we were going to buy this big townhouse right near the restaurant. And the guy arranged meetings for us at Barclays. So we went to Barclays Bank and they like metaphorically rolled out the red carpet for us.

And that's one of those situations where I would. if I was bullshitting people, I would come apart. I would break. I couldn't do that. But he comes like, he convinces all these people. We had a meeting with Barbara Corcoran's accountant through this broker. And then the broker was like, oh, yeah, Barbara wants to meet you too. And I'm like, how, you know, how does he convince all these people that he is legit?

Because he has that weird thing that these people have. They're very magnetic and something about their presence. presence is very intoxicating and in a way that, again, is very hard to explain. It's like you, they can somehow control you. I mean, there's this guy, Darren Brown, that I quote a lot in my book from his appearances on other podcasts where he talks about, do you know who he is? He has all these specials on Netflix. I guess he would be called like a mentalist or an illusionist, but he's able to convince people to basically hypnotize them into doing bonkers things. and what's different about him is he ends up sort of explaining how he does it.

But, you know, whatever he does, I feel like is Mr. Fox and these people are doing a variation of that. So, you know, the people who are in those specials with Darren Brown, they probably come out of it and can't explain how they did what they did because they don't understand. And in the same way, it's hard, it's difficult for me to explain how I went along with him or how I agreed to give him more money when I'd already give him. him so much money and like it seemed so irrational but it's it's hard to explain yeah well sarma thank you so much for coming on the show today yeah thank you so much and this is yeah this is for you thank you so i know you read a lot when you were in the clink as they say i did and i was just reading again a book a day during the beast video um so i went through a lot of books oh no that's like my favorite nerdy topic to talk about is like books yeah yeah after this i'm going to ask you like

what your favorite books are. And also about you writing a book, too, because it's a crazy process. It really is. I love John Grissom. And who is the other one? James Patterson, those types of books. It's funny. I don't like, I shy away from those types of books that keep you on the edge of your seat, so to speak, because I don't like being, the whole sort of suspenseful danger thing. I don't like that feeling. I get, I feel sort of. I don't like feeling fear or anxiety or even afraid for characters or sometimes I'll ask now chat GPT if something tragic happens. You know, it's kind of like, does the dog die? Because I don't want to read it if the dog dies. They just read like movies, you know, especially when you're in something where you don't have a phone.

Like the beast video where it was like it just really locks you in. So it was good. I like those. But I also like memoirs. I love memoirs. I love a good memoir. But yeah, well, I have to link to your book in the district. description this episode. Yeah. No, it's putting it out as a crazy process because you feel

super naked and vulnerable and promoting it. I love doing podcasts, but, you know, I'm not, I didn't publish it in the traditional way. I'm not doing like a big book tour. I do, I'm doing an event in Vermont on September 27th in Manchester because it's near where my sister lives, but, um, and maybe I'll do some more events, but it's, um, yeah, you'll, you'll probably go through this when you write it yourself, you feel very, yeah, it's like you feel like you're running outside naked in a way, because I just, I was very open and honest in my book. And I'm glad that it's being received really well. But yeah, it's a nerve-wracking process. So I'll be glad to talk all, all things related to books reading and publishing after this. Sounds great. Well, thanks again and see if travels back.

Thank you so much.