Not Skinny But Not Fat - Julia Haart Is Unorthodox!

Episode Date: September 12, 2023

TW: This episode contains descriptions of suicidal ideation.Julia Haart showed the world what it's like to go from religious Jewish family to a modern, secular family with a reality tv show. The now-Haarts left Monsey and the Hasidic community behind and started a new life, though not without drama. I ask Julia how all of this happened: how did she go from being not being allowed to read to being the CEO of a billion dollar company? What happened with her marriage to Silvio and what's her current venture all about? This is a MUST LISTEN!Produced by Dear MediaThis episode may contain paid endorsements and advertisements for products and services. Individuals on the show may have a direct, or indirect financial interest in products, or services referred to in this episode.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

The following podcast is a dear media production. Hi, I'm Caroline Stamberry, and I am Divorced, Not Dead. Fresh off the back of my divorce, I'm bringing real stories, real life, real talk on all things that aren't said. Why do we put so much pressure on ourselves for the happily ever after? Does our love story really have to be one great lengthy novel, or can we be happy with a book of short but exciting love stories? I guess we'll find out on Divorce Not Dead, and lucky me, you'll be joining me for the

journey, so buckle up. This is Amanda Hirsch from the Not Skinny but Not Fat podcast. You might know me from Not Skinny Bonifut on Instagram where I spend my time talking about reality TV, celebrities, everything happening, and pop culture. I also talk to some of our favorite celebs and reality TV stars. We talk about what's going on. Tune in every Tuesday and just feel like you're talking. with your best friends in your living room.

Here we are today. Julia Hart is on the pod. I'm so excited. I wanted you come on for a while and then some things happen. Yes. A few, a few little, a few little bumps, a little tiny bumps. But from the beginning, I was like, like, I want to talk to her.

Like, what an interesting woman you are and what an interesting story. Thank you. And people have questions. Good. You know what I mean? Yeah. Like, you're an enigma a little bit. Oh, I like it.

I like it. I'll take it. So let's start from the very beginning. First of all, if you guys haven't watched my unorthodox life on Netflix, do you speak Hebrew? That's how. Or do you speak like just the things you learned in the Torah? I used to teach in Hebrew. You used to teach in Hebrew.

Damn. We'll get to that. Okay. So we first met you on my unorthodox life on Netflix, which I loved it right away. I'm Jewish. So for me, it's like, oh, getting a look into a Jewish family's life in New York City. Yours is unorthodox. It certainly is indeed. It's unorthodox. How did that even happen? The show? Which part of the show? Basically, I didn't have an agent. I didn't have any representation. I found a producer and we went to Netflix and we said, here's our story. Would you like to make a show out of it? And they did. So it was your idea? Yeah. You were like, I have a crazy family. I have a crazy story. Well, actually, the funny thing is it actually came funnily enough through EWG because my, at that

point, at that time, husband had wanted a show about the company. And I had started off by starting to sell that. And then everyone just got fascinated with my story. And so it just morphed into my life. Like they didn't care as much about here's this modeling agency. Right. They cared more about my story and what I'd been through. So it kind of morphed into this kind of mix between a docu series and an ocu series because a large part of it is what I do at work, right?

It's a big piece of it is what I'm doing and what I do is work all day. So that's a big chunk of it. But then you also got to see the backstory. What I always say is the show is my present defined by my past. Was everyone, because the way reality TV works like everyone has to be down for it, right? Everyone in your household. Yeah. So when you brought it to your kids.

They were ecstatic. Yeah. I mean, I didn't know how they would take it honestly, but they were so gung-ho. They really wanted to do it. And I thought Aron, my youngest, would be totally not interested. I didn't even put his name in. But he called me and he's like, how come I'm not in it? I was like, oh, I just didn't want to.

Oh, Aron was into it. That is surprising. I was so surprised. So when he said he wanted to do it, I said, okay, then you do it. And Robert, obviously. Oh, yeah. I could imagine him being down. Yeah.

And Bot was already kind of doing it. She's already an influencer. And, you know, none of us are shy in my house. So, yeah. And we all had a reason and a purpose for doing it. We understood that our story, or we hoped that our story could help inspire others, make others realize that it doesn't matter if you're 40 or 50 or if you don't have an education or if life has knocked you sideways, it's never too late to change.

And so that was the reason we told our story. And I think everyone got on board with that for that reason. How long at that point were you out of Muncie? When I filmed, we filmed in 2020, so three years ago. So I was out of Muncie at the time a smidge, around seven years. Okay. So it wasn't new. Not very long.

Right, but it wasn't super new. No, it wasn't like six months ago. Yeah, yeah. And you just got out. So let's talk about how that happened because you were born actually in Russia, well, like the Soviet in Moscow. In Moscow. And you came to the United States to Texas.

Yep. And grew up in the Jewish community. Yep. But not a, you know, my parents, my parents are what was called Refusinix. My father was arrested for practicing Judaism. And he was, my family and I were traded for grain on the Jackson-Bannock bill. Basically, it's very similar to what is it called the Magnitsky bill or something like that that that they have now where it's sanctions against Russia for civil rights violations. So the Jackson-Bannockville was exactly the same.

It was sanctions against Russia. grain embargo against Russia for all their civil violations against Jews. And so basically they traded Jews for grain. And so my family and I were traded for grain. That's how he came to this country. Oh my God. Wait, so who got the

grain? Russia. Russia got the grain. America got us. That's how it worked. Jews for grain. I hope it was a lot of grain. Like, it loads of grain. That is wild. Yeah. Okay. So you came to the U.S. and then your family got a little bit more More and more religious. You know, they have been practicing what they knew about Judaism back then because they were such avid anti-Semites.

So my parents were what they knew to be religious in Russia, but it was very, very modern Orthodox, as you can imagine. Then they come to Texas and they meet a Hasidic sect of Jews called Lubavich. And Lubavich, they kind of not convert them because my parents were obviously Jewish, but they proselytize them back into being religious. and then we move to Rockland County, and that's when it comes really crazy and we go all the way. You know, my parents don't eat strawberries because there may be hidden microscopic bugs in there.

They won't eat broccoli. They don't eat artichokes. I mean, the rules just never end. You know, it's really extreme. Do you remember questioning all that at a young age, too? At a young age, I was told, this is what God wants, and I was like, oh, okay, and that was it.

Yeah. This is what God wants, who might argue with God. So you don't remember having, like any. No, I remember not having it. Not having. I mean, I didn't, it didn't occur to me to question. It really didn't. This is what my parents told me God wanted. And who doesn't want to please God? I wanted to please God. Yeah. This is what God wanted. So it's what I did. And how many siblings do you have? Seven. So you're eight total? Oh my God. And I'm the eldest. You're the oldest. And then there's 10 years of no babies in between. And then seven more

siblings. So my sister after me is 10 years younger than I am. And my youngest brother is younger than my eldest daughter. So my brother Shlomo, I have a son Shlomo, but I also have a brother Shlomo. My brother Shlomo is 29. My daughter is 30. Go figure that one. Mind fuck. Yeah. Exactly. And you want to get real, you want to hear a real mind fuck? I nursed my brother. My mother's like, oh, you're already nursing your daughter. Take this one too. And so I ended up nursing my brother and daughter. Yeah. Now, that's a mind park. For him, I'm sure. I know for him. I don't think you remember. I mean, does he know now?

I'm sure he does not. Wait, but do, do religious Jews do that? Nurse? No, no, like let other people nurse their babies? Of course, like you have, you know, go back a couple hundred years. Everyone had a wet nurse, right? You didn't nurse your own baby. If you had money. Okay, a hundred years, but we're not talking about. Well, we are. Oh, we are. That's the community I lived and I lived in the 1800s. I always tell people, I'm a time traveler. If you want to understand the world, I lived in, go back to the 1800s, that's it. I lived in 18th century existence. So when did you start questioning it? Well, you know, I've been questioning it my entire life silently inside. But they had

convinced me that I was somehow inherently flawed for not being okay with the system. Like, all the other women are fine to be silent. All the other women are okay to sit and eat in the kitchen. All the other women are okay to do this, all the other women. And so it was what's wrong with you that you're not okay with the system. And then when my daughter, Miriam, the one who just graduated Stanford, she's 23 years old right now. She's a genius. She is a genius. And when she started questioning things, no one could convince me that she was somehow flawed because she was five. You know, and they had convinced me that something was wrong with me for questioning. But when she started questioning it, That's when I realized it's not me.

It's the system and the system is not okay. So Miriam is kind of the one that brought... Miriam is the beginning and end of my ex-of-the-story. I would not be alive today if not from you. 100%. I am such a bar girl, you guys. Like I always have a bar in my bag and my purse because I'm always hungry and I always need something on the go.

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your hair got long. I was like, hello, a man is noticing this and like, what? So this is for real. And I was like, oh my God, Nutraful seriously works. So Nutriful has hair supplements. I'm sure you heard about them because I did. And I feel like I heard about them first through different influencers that I follow that were using it and talking about it. And I even like slid into their DM as being like, you guys, but does it really work? And each and every one of them told me, Yes, Amanda. Saved my hair, made it so much thicker. You got me. You got me. So if you're one of those people, if your hair is thinning, Nutrafol is here to help. If, you know, you got some shedding. Shetting is such a weird word. I feel like a dog. After giving birth, Nutrafol is here to help.

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the guy that I was forced to marry is a much nice of a person, the man I chose. Go figure that one out. Wait, so that was a she-do. Great job, Julia Hart. So you're, you and Yossi were a she-doch. Yeah. Which, for people that don't know, it's like, you're set up. That's right. By a rabbi? It was a matchmaker, a Shadhan. How old were you when they say you up? 19. And he was? 26. Did you like him, though? Like, were you like, oh, he's seen it.

You know, I broke the engagement, but then my parents told me I can't. And then I I ran away a couple of times and my parents told me, you know, we're going to ring, you know, I didn't know anyone in the outside world. I didn't know anywhere to run too. I would just go back to my parents and my parents just told me, well, you can't stay here. You have a husband, go back to him. Not that he did anything bad. He wasn't.

He was a lovely man. And I always say, there are no villains in my story. There's only victims. He's as much a victim of the system as I was. It was as wrong of a marriage for him as it was for me. Like, it's not him that made the marriage terrible. It's that we shouldn't have been married in the first place. And the roles we were given in the marriage, I was supposed to be obedient, subservient, silent, respectful.

Your husband in my community is God on earth for you. Yeah. Okay. So I was supposed to treat him like my God. Did you for a time? Fuck, no. I don't know how to do that. That's my problem.

And then he was supposed to be. He expected it. So there was constant friction. between what I was supposed to be doing as a wife and what I just couldn't do as a human. I couldn't be subservient. I couldn't stop reading or educating myself. I couldn't stop arguing when someone said something that made no sense to me. I just couldn't do it. You had four babies. Four babies. I was pregnant 10 times. I could have had 10 children. I just happened to have had six miscarriages. Oh, wow. In between the kids. Oh, wow.

So theoretically, I could be a mother of 10 right now. Actually, 11 because Miriam was born a twin and her... Were all these babies you were trying to have them? I'm sorry, you said Miriam was born a twin and what? And then the twin passed away. Oh, my God. Yeah, yeah. I'm so sorry.

So I really could have actually had 11 children if I didn't have seven miscarriages. And so, you know, it's in that world, that's what you do. You have babies until you can't have babies anymore. And then you take care of your grandchildren. and then you die. And that's it. Yeah. That's your life.

What I always found, like, a question that I wanted to ask you is, like, how do we separate? Like, we see Yosef, your ex. He seems like a little teddy bear, so kind, so nice, a good dad, all that. Yet you describe your time as, like, being oppressed and, like. Because that was the system, not the person. Not him. That's what I'm saying. Like, I'm very careful to make that distinction because he's a really lovely person.

Yeah. But for example, when I first got married, he told me that I have to sleep with my hair covered. Okay, now you try sleeping with a kerchief on your head with metal clips to keep it there so when you move, it doesn't fall off your head. I'm an insomniac altogether. Sleeping with metal clips in my head, having to be worried that if a piece of my hair comes out, I'm not going to have righteous children, it was too much for me. And it's not the law. It's what's called a chummer. It's like an additional spiritual thing that you do that's not law, but if you do it, great things will happen. So, for example, you're not allowed to uncover your hair outside of

your home. That's the law. Right. If you don't uncover your hair inside the home, you'll be granted righteous children. Oh, so like... So it's like an add-on. It's an additive restriction. That's what it is. An additive restriction that you don't have to do, but you are strenuously suggested to do it. So, you know, he made me sleep with this thing. And then finally, after two weeks, I couldn't take it anymore. why I couldn't sleep at all. I was not sleeping. And so I told him, look, I can't do it. I can't cover my hair. It's one thing outside of my house, but in my house, I need to be able to uncover my own hair. And you said, well, all the other wives do it and all my friends' wives do it and why can't you do it? And so what I ended up doing is I said, okay, well, if the hair

on my head is so objectionable to my walls, then my walls aren't going to be able to see my face either. And I walked around for a good two weeks with my kerchief over my entire head, like a giant sock. I was like, you're going to be talking to a sock for the rest of your life unless you let me uncover my hair. And after two weeks, he finally gave in and let me do it. So, but that's, that's what it was like. I had no autonomy. I had no decision making. He was my commander. If, you know, when I started watching TV, you know, first I just watched like 50s and 60s shows, like, leave it to beaver and daddy knows best, like things that are literally like, you know, they're not, they're G or they're,

G-plus, like they're not even P-G. Because that's what you're allowed to kind of watch? Well, no, I wasn't allowed to watch anything, but I managed to sneak through a little, you know, whatever. Long story, you got to read the book. But anyway, point being when I first started watching, I was watching very, very kosher television where they slept in separate beds and daddy was the boss. Yeah. You know, or I Love Lucy, where she couldn't work and couldn't do anything and was so stupid and the man was the breadwinner and all that stuff. So, and I would get asked permission to watch.

And if there was a show that Yosef didn't want me to watch, I wasn't allowed to watch it. When I read books that I wasn't supposed to read, then argued with rabbis, I would get called to the rabbi's office and the rabbi, Big Julia, you're not supposed to be reading these books. You're not supposed to be educating yourself like this. But he wouldn't just call me and he would call him my husband and see he would say, control your woman. Just like neither of us belonged into the roles we were forced to live. Is the marriage he's in now, like is the woman?

Very different. She's modern orthodox. She doesn't cover her hair. She went to college. How is he more? Oh, he's no more, he doesn't wear a black hat anymore. He's not a fundamentalist anymore. He took it off.

He's a modern orthodox genome. Do you think he told me, like you and the kids influenced him? Oh, no, I don't think. He told me. They called me from Puerto Rico where they got engaged. Yeah. And he's like, Julia, thank you for making my life better. Oh, my God. Yeah.

Yeah. So as I'm saying, it has nothing to do with him. Yeah. But it was the role he was forced to inhabit was my jailer. My God. you know so he got out of it too that's probably better for the kids too so they're for everybody what about our own yeah our own is still my fundamentalist hold out but you know I have faith I've got hope seeing you navigate that on the show it's hard is is it's hard to

watch too because like on one hand you're taught like your kid makes a decision about themselves you want to respect it you want to accept your kid whatever they do right and you do that with miriam with everybody but with our own and also you're taking the responsibility on this show of telling people about, you know, this hardcore Judaism while, are you like, you're not trying to say Hasidic Jews are

bad or being religious is bad. Like, how do you? So, it's, I'm very glad you brought that up. And that's why I'm so careful. If you've seen the show, I show is celebrating holidays. I show all so much that's beautiful about Judaism. I talk about how modern orthodoxy, they're perfectly

normal parts of, you know, modern society that go to college. They have television, so forth and so on. I'm always very, very cautious and careful to specify it to this small group of people and to point out that it is nothing to do with Judaism. It's fundamentalism. And fundamentalist is the same, whether it's Islam, Judaism, Mormonism, Christianity, Mennonites, you name it. When you have a fundamentalist culture, the rules for women are all the same. But what do they call themselves? You call them fundamentalists. They call themselves, yeshivish or Karady or Black Hat or, you know.

Yeah. But that's why I'm very careful to delineate that it is a very small sect of people. And I always say, again, there are no villains. There are just victims. They're victims of the laws. Yeah. Until the laws change, nothing will ever change there. You've got to change the laws.

Wait, what laws can be changed? Oh, all the laws. I mean, think about, I mean, we don't need to change all the laws, but the laws referring to women need to change. Oh, and, you mean, not the laws. laws, the religious laws. The religious laws that these communities live by need to change. Do you see that happening? Well, a year ago I would have told you never. However, something happened last November, so like, I guess what, nine months ago, 10 months ago. Yeah. That really gave me tremendous hope. So I was celebrating Kathy Hokel's victory, the day that she

was announced that she was governor. And there was a great. group of chasidim, they're also, you know, supporting and representing the Hasidic community. And they saw me. And I was like, oh, no, here we go. And I see them coming towards me. I'm like, oh, my God, they're going to yell at me and tell me what a monster I am. And blah, blah, blah, blah. And how can I tell people what's going on in the community? Da, da, da, da, da. And I'm like, stealing myself for the attack. And as they're walking towards me, I recognize the, like, the main guy. He's probably one of the most famous. people in my world. He comes with an entourage with a posse, like he's a big, big person in my

community. And he walks over to me. And I'm literally, like my hands are like fists. Like I'm just stealing myself for the attack. And he looks down, a very tall guy. And he says, Ms. Hutt, my wife and my daughters, thank you. And walked away. Whoa. Yeah. So I came home and I probably cried that entire night. And I just said to myself, change is possible. change is possible. Just got to be so loud and so persistent and so consistent and not give up that change, because if women, if all the women in my community would stand up and say, I'm not okay with this anymore, what could they do? They're not arresting them. They're not throwing them in jail. The pressures are all societal, right? They're all about who your child is

going to marry, what school they get into again, like the 1800s, like think Bridgeton, right? so if all the women in that community would get up and say no more no more it would stop and that's what's got to happen we've got to change the rules just like we changed rules in this country women couldn't vote yeah they vote now women weren't allowed to wear pants here either they wear them now it's time for my community to let women wear pants you said you were already with fists like ready to fight is it because you got a lot of shit from people oh yeah I mean I get attacked all the time yeah what do they say to you I shouldn't talk about what's in the community. It should be quiet and it's out. It's nobody's business and we'll solve our own problems and, you know, just keep your mouth shut. If you had to like to say, did you get more positive responses or negative responses? Like when the first season came out, for example.

I mean, it's really a mix. The negative responses came openly and all the positive came through DMs and privately. Right. Because the people who supported me in those communities were afraid. Like one of my friends who supported me, Her kids almost got kicked out of school because someone saw that she liked a post or something. Oh, my God. So being my friend is dangerous in that world.

So all the thank you's and the you've changed my life, that all comes silently and all the attacks come publicly, right? Right, because they're scared to. Well, also because they get, if you attack me, then you go to synagogue and people will pat you on the back, right? Do you think they talk about you there? Oh, 100%. Oh, 100%. I have 1,000%. What would you think, like, the rabbis say?

Look at what happens when a woman is educated. This is what happens. Julie is what happens. So when they say educated, what do they mean? Educated, meaning an educated woman is a dangerous one. In the Gamara and the Talmud, right? Which is where the oral tour is written. It says, a man who educates his daughter is teaching her prostitution.

Did you go to college? No. So what do you mean by educated? Educating mean, not only wasn't I allowed to read secular books. Yeah. I wasn't even allowed to read Judea books because a woman's mind is not. not capable of grasping deep in esoteric subjects. You didn't know that? So they meant educated that you were like reading and interested in the world and stuff like that.

Just that I had, and I'm not even talking about secular education. I'm talking about religious education. I had bookshelves of religious books. I was not allowed to read. So how were you teaching? Because I did it anyway. I'm a stubborn one. But they allowed you to teach? Well, no. In high school, you teach. But like, for example, depending on which high school I taught in this high school called base Rahal. And based Rauchel, not only don't they learn the Talmud or the Gamara, they don't even study the Torah properly. They study this thing called Enochov, which is like the stories. It's like basically dumbed down Bible stories. Yeah. So I taught, depending on the school, what I was allowed to teach. And then I threw in a bunch of stuff I wasn't allowed to be teaching and got in trouble all the time,

all the time. I just always got in trouble. I was, I would say from the time I was 30 until I walked out the door. For the last 12 years, probably, of living that world, I don't think a week went by when a rabbi didn't yell at me. It's always in the principal's office in my 30s. Were they ever, like, more than yelling? Were they ever, no, no, never, never, never. I have another question, because you were saying before Miriam is kind of the one that brought things up. What was she saying as a five-year-old? So Miriam, in addition to being incredibly brilliant, is also very active and very athletic, and we're very competitive humans. We like winning. so Miriam wanted to play soccer

girls in my community do not play soccer they play jump rope again go backwards back in time girls didn't play soccer and basketball and baseball and so my husband told her that she's not allowed to

and when she asked why and we're talking to she was somewhere between three and five years old I can't remember exactly what year but she was like a like a nugget she was a you know at the very old eldest she was five okay Yeah.

And he says to her, you can. She's asked why. And he said, well, you know you're not allowed to wear pants, which means you're going to have to play soccer in a skirt. You play soccer in a skirt and you kick the ball. Your skirt might lift up. A man walking by the field may see your knees and have inappropriate thoughts about it. Now, let's not talk about what kind of man gets turned on by a five-year-old's knees.

Let's just leave that alone for a minute. But my little daughter looks at my husband. and says, okay, so if I'm responsible for his sins and his actions, is he responsible for mine? Just that very simple, logical question. And that's all it took. Hearing what I'd been thinking my entire life, coming out of the mouth of a five-year-old, showed me that it wasn't me, that this system is ridiculous.

Why are women responsible for men's behavior? Why can't men be responsible for their own behavior? And if I'm responsible for a man's behavior, why isn't he responsible for mine? So did that propel everything? That just, that, she gave me permission to question. So how long did it take until he started making moves? Well, no, I started making moves literally the next day. I started educating myself.

I would walk with her and her little carriage to the Barnes & Noble in Atlanta. And I would just sit all day and just read. Oh, you were living in Atlanta at the time? At the time I was living in Atlanta, Maryam was born in Atlanta. So at the time I was living in Atlanta and I would just wheel her to Barnes and and then spend the day reading and then we'd walk back and make dinner and take care of everybody

and that was it. So when did you move to New York? Well, we lived in New York most of my life and we moved to Atlanta for nine years and we came back in the early 2000s. And when you came back to New York, was it Muncie and then the city? It was no, it's Muncie. And then I didn't do the city until I walked out the door.

So what, what courage did that take? Like the final funnel? Again, Miriam. As I said, Miriam is the beginning and end of my exes. What would you do? So I had done all this educating. You know, I'd read thousands of books, thousands and thousands of books. I'd, you know, Voltaire, Descartes, Cicero, Euripides, Spinoza, you name it.

I've read it. And I had made money. I figured out a way to make some money on the side. So I had the money and had as much education as I could possibly get without actually living in the outside world. But then I was too scared to do it. It is actually time travel. You're not, you have lived.

Just imagine if you're living in the 1800s, And then you wake up one morning and you're in 2023. That's what it feels like. You don't know anything about the outside world. And I always tell people, they're like, oh, but you did read books and you did watch movies when you were there. Yeah, the last eight years, I read books, I watched movies, I watched television. I tried to educate myself as much as possible.

Did you have to hide from Yosef or did he kind of? Well, yes and no. It depends. But the main thing is that I always tell people, it's like, imagine if you read 20,000 books on deep sea diving. And then you watch 20,000 movies on deep sea diving. Does that make you a deep sea diver? Do you know how to deep sea dive? No, you got to get into the water. You've got to practice. You've got to try it. That's what it was like. Like I seen deep sea diving. I'd read about it, but I'd never done it. And so it felt like literally traveling in time to Mars. To come to the

city. To come to be part of the 21st Central Girl. And so I, I, just, I couldn't, I was too scared. I just couldn't do it. And then, basically, my plan became to commit suicide. And I thought that would be easier than leaving, because leaving just seemed impossible. But then I was down, I don't even want to say how little I weighed. I was, I was probably two months away from death, like literally. That's how, I mean, imagine this body minus 20 a somewhat happens. No. I mean, I was, I was. Because you weren't eating. No, no, I purposely starved myself to up because my idea was, if I'm going to commit suicide, I have to do it in a way that no one realizes it's suicide because if I commit suicide, my children will never get married, right?

And that's all that matters in that world. Again, think 1800. It's the match, the marriage match. That's all that matters. So who's going to marry my daughters if their mother committed suicide? I figured if I commit suicide through starvation, people will just think I have an eating disorder. And eating disorders, they're not so bad. That means when your daughter-in-law has her 12th baby, she's still going to be skinning.

So, like, eating disorders, nobody cares about. So people just thought I had an eating disorder. But meanwhile, I was purposefully starving myself to that. And I got, I was a few, literally, I probably six pounds away from, from. And then. That's like a slow, painful. Yeah, I mean, it was, but it felt, it felt less frightening to die than to walk out the door. If you can imagine such a thing.

Were your kids like, what's up, mom? Because I see they worry about you on the show. I've always been very thin. So, like, I've been this weight that I am now since 10th grade. I haven't grown any inches and I haven't, you know, I've been the same weight in most of my life, except for, you know, the two times of my life that were just insanely traumatic. But she saved me because she comes home one day crying hysterically, and this is, she's not a crier. And she was crying because her teacher accused her of cheating because it wasn't possible. for a girl to come up with such good answers.

And she had worked hard and she had done it. It was her work. And to be failed and called a cheater because your work was too good. The next morning, I packed my shit and we walked out the door. She saved my life. Her pain made me realize that if I die, how does that help my children? And so I realized she's going to be me in 20 years if I don't walk out the door. What was your plan, though?

Like, how are you going to get an apartment for four kids and all the shit? Well, I mean, I had made some money on the side. What did you do? I sold life insurance. Yeah, I worked for MetLife. And I, you know, started a shoe brand. And in nine months, we made our first million. And so it was just like, how did you go from selling insurance to?

Oh, gosh. I mean, you don't have it. It's definitely not enough for an hour. And we only have like 20 minutes left. You were interested in fashion. Always. I've been drawing and designing since I'm old enough to have a memory. So you started your own shoe brand when you moved to New York.

And then La Perla happened. That's right. How did that happen? It was a co-branding between Julia Hart shoes and La Perla. I made shoes for La Perla. And then is, can you make handbags? Can you make this? Can you make that?

And all of a sudden, I find myself designing everything. I'm like, guys, if I'm designing everything for you, you should give me the title. And so that's what happened. Sylvia was the owner of the La Perla at the time? That's right. So when did you guys become romantic? Well, we only met once before I was hired for 45 minutes.

So as much as he would like to make that into, Oh, he's trying to make it seem like... Fantastic seduction. I'm sorry. I don't think anyone is good enough to seduce another human being in 45 minutes with other people in the room

because that's the only time I met him. I met the man for 45 minutes before I was hired. But once I was working there, probably within the next year, so at first we had a very contentious relationship. We fought about everything. And then I would say probably,

I don't know, a year into it when we started dating. And then I became creative director and then blah, blah, blah, the rest of his history. Was that frowned upon in the, like, Like, was it weird for people that the founder was in?

I mean, it's pretty normal in fashion. Yeah. You know, most fashion houses, the business and the creative are usually married. Yeah. You know, you know, think of any of those, you know, Dior, Cavali. I mean, you go through them. It's very often, Dulcane, Gabana, it's partners, you know, because you have to have such a strong level of trust. But obviously, I picked the wrong person.

So how many years were you there at La Perla? Two years. And then he took you with him to EWG. Well, no, actually. I had started working on this shapewear brand that I just launched now. But EWG was in trouble. He needed someone to run it who could move it into the future. And so at first I said no a bunch of times.

And then finally, literally finally I gave in. I was like, okay, but we're going to do it my way. And we're going to change it from the modeling agency into a media conglomerate, which is what I did in two and a half years through COVID without a dollar of outside investment. I took a company that was valued at $70 million. And Jeffries gave us a $1.1 billion dollar valuation in September of 2021. In two years, from $70 million to a billion. Not too shabby.

I don't say so myself. That's amazing. Yeah, I think so. Have you ever been at a hotel or somewhere and you're like, oh, my God, we forgot to stop at the store and get a bottle of wine or tequila or whatever? I have. and you know what I used. I use Drizley.

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Retailers, Code aspires on 106.23, 1159 p.m. ESA. All this is happening. Some of it we see on the show. The first season of the show, Sylvia looks like a great husband. You look like a great couple. You're into each other. But I think you also see the issues. Like you see that he's very jealous of my time. With the kids.

That was my whole problem is I only had to pay attention to him. Anything that took me away from him was back. My children, work. So I was supposed to work because I had to make money for us to live on, but I was also supposed to be super attentive and be with him 24-7. So it was the- And we found out in the second season, like he wasn't really interested in being around your kid so much. How were you with someone then that wasn't?

Well, I asked for a divorce nine months after we got married. It was terrible. And I kept on, yeah, I mean, I tried. I did everything I could to explain to him, but you married a family. You didn't marry a woman. You married a woman with four children. She's a packaged deal. that's how it works.

Did the kids ever come to you and say, like, we're not into him? Well, no, I mean, all the time, he was so, you know, he just wouldn't talk to them. He wouldn't give them a key to the house. We had separate dinners. I would eat downstairs dinner with my kids upstairs. Oh, no. It was bad. It was really bad.

So when you asked for a divorce, is it true that that day was the day you got fired? Well, I asked for a divorce in April of 2021 originally. And then we kept, he kept on saying, well, let's wait until this and let's wait till this. and then the plan was to have this amicable divorce and to announce it on Valentine's Day to say like, hey, we're not married, we're going to get a divorce, but we still love each other as partners

and we respect each other and nothing's going to change because we didn't want it to impact the going public that we were working on for EWG. And you believe that that would happen. Well, we got an offer at $500 million. No, like you would believe that the amicable, everything would be good.

I mean, it was logical that it would. But then the day before, I got fired. So the Thursday, I get fired on Monday. The Thursday four I got fired. I found out that he'd been siphoning money out of freedom holding. They'd taken a company of his, which surprise, surprise is now closed and shut down, SHS, his latest company to fail, just failed this year, that he'd been taking out millions to fund this company SHS and that he pulled SHS out of our holding company. When I found that, I was like, I'm done. I don't want to be your business partner. I don't want to have anything to do with you. Let's just go.

separate ways. Thursday and five, he tries to change my mind. When he sees that I'm adamant, I don't want to be his partner anymore. Monday, I'm a thief and I'm a liar and I'm fired and I'm this and I'm that. Literally, within a 24-hour period. Did you see- And you can tell that because otherwise, why would he come on the show episode one? Why would he say all those lovely things episode one? Because until I'm the one who said, I don't- It was a very, it was the next day. It was a very weird. The reason is, is because the only thing that happened in between is that I had the gall, the chutzpah, the temerity to say, I don't want to be a partner anymore. When I said that, it was death to Joel.

Were you not afraid that that would happen? Do you think he wasn't, did you think he wasn't capable of it? Honestly, I thought he would be intelligent enough to understand that attacking me damages the company and that we're about to go public and make something great out of it. I thought he would be fine to have his good life and I would have my good life and we'd just be rational humans. men's egos and rational human beings don't necessarily jive together. Didn't he flip the script on you and said that you embezzled money?

Yeah. Like all the things that he had done, meaning he created the system where we got something called a management fee where we didn't get a salary, but the company paid for all these other things. He created the system. I would send in my paperwork and he would decide where it went and how it was managed and what it was termed as. And then all of a sudden he took the very system he set up that he's still huge. by the way, this past year, as you know, the whistleblower comes out and says,

hey, he spent $25.8 million of EWG money in the last 10 months alone on yachts and first-class flights and everything was paid through the company. So she's like, and I spent six months trying to find one thing that Julia took without permission, and I couldn't find a thing. Everything was documented. Everything was sent to 20 people in the company. Everything was open and above board. Everything was approved. You lied about it. her. And that's why she came forward because she realized that he was trying to destroy an innocent person. So how did he think it was going to stick? Was he going to make it up? He just thought that I wouldn't last this long. And that's what the whistleblower told me that they would constantly sit down

and be like, how is she still alive? How is she still managing? How is she still surviving? Because what they thought is, he's cutting me off from all my money from the company that I built into a billion dollar business from everything I owned because everything was in freedom holding. And he's going to just literally starve me out. He thought, that I would die, like that I wouldn't be able to handle the onslaught of lies about me, all of the accusations, in addition to seeing everything that I built and worked for taken away from me and being accused of all this craziness and not having anywhere with all to support myself.

So he never thought I'd make it. He should have known me better. Say you're a survivor. I'm not just a survivor. I'm a fighter. Yeah. And especially when I think something is unjust and wrong, I'm not going to, stop until I see justice served, and I won't. I don't care how long it takes until the truth

comes out and people see who he really is. I'm not going to stop. Are you shocked at yourself that you didn't see this all along that he was doing this? I'm so angry at myself, but yeah. The one grace that I will give me is that I was really two years old when I met him. I met him in 2015. I left at the end of 20, I left November 2012. So I was literally two and a half years old. I was so naive. I'd never gone on a date. I'd never been to a bar. I hadn't been to a club. I didn't have my first love. I didn't, I mean, I didn't live a 21st century life. I didn't know nothing about guys. I never talked to them. I didn't go to school with them. I didn't have any interaction with men in my community. So I was really foolishly, ridiculous. Did he like sweep you off your feet

when you met him? Oh, okay. Because otherwise I was like, wouldn't you want to live a little more? He was charming and elegant and brilliant and all the places I'd read about. He'd been to. and he seemed so kind. Oh, my God, I'm telling you. As much as I know in business, I have gotten a long way to go when it comes to personal relationships, apparently.

So what's happening now, though, with UWG? It's just waiting for me to come back. But you're not back? Not yet. We're hopefully soon this will be over, and once it's over, it'll settle itself out. Oh, you think that you see a world in which... Well, I mean, I have 49.99% of the company, right?

So once that's ratified by a court and the judge has already basically said, you know, I don't, I find, you know, the reasons that he's giving for why I don't have it not very reasonable. So I do think in the next few months I will get my 499 back. And once I do and I'm back to owning half of the company, I'm pretty sure things will. But then you're going to somehow work with him, no? No, I think, you know, well, we'll see what happens. Let's, let's take one step. Maybe it'll be phased out. Let's take one step at a time. So when all this was happening on the show, this falling out, I mean, it was probably great for producers of the show

because it kind of happened, right? Well, I don't know if it was great for them. It was, you know, everything got totally destroyed, meaning we were just, you know, there was no planning, there was no nothing. You never knew what the next day was going to bring. So it was, I mean, your house was like a...

Literally, it was the most unscripted reality show of all time because everything that was going on was so crazy. All we had to, like, all they had to do is just document the craziness that was my life. And your kids, like Miriam was really supportive. All of them. You had a little thing with bot at that time. In the very beginning, but she's been, she's been a goddess, like an absolute goddess.

I'm, I don't, I would not have survived this without my kids, really. They are my everything. They're my everything. How are, are both of you single together now? Yes, we are. Going on double dates. We have, we actually did go on one double date. You did?

Accidentally. What? Yeah, so she was out with a guy and she took him to Zero Bond to the white party. Mm-hmm. And I was at. with a guy and I took him to Zirvon to the white party. And then we all meet each other and I were like, okay, it's stupid to pretend we don't know who we are.

So we ended up just having a double date. Wait, tell me about this new shapewear. First of all, you and shapewear. Yes, man. How does that go together? Well, my thing has always been tackling women's issues that nobody's addressing. Like when I was in Lapearlah, I created stretch levers lace so that lingerie could not only be beautiful, but it could feel beautiful.

And you had a thong and didn't sit like a poker up your, So when I made my shoes, I chained the arch and a two-millimeter alteration in the arch so that the pressure points were evenly distributed across the entire foot, alleviating the pain of wearing a high-old shoe. When I took over a UWG, it was taking them from standing in a line, trying to get picked for one way, and building them into their own brands and businesses, utilizing their social media, to create them into their own networks and creating longevity in their careers. So everything I've always done, it's always about freeing women from something.

And this is freeing women from this stigma and embarrassment of wearing shapewear. $8 billion worth of women wear shapewear. $8 billion worth of women don't want anyone to know they're wearing shapewear because it's ugly. And nobody on earth wants to get undressed. It doesn't matter if you're undressing in front of a man or a woman or anything or anyone or whatever sexual orientation you have. nobody wants to be caught dead in granny panties. They're just ugly.

Yeah. And it's basically a sign waving, you waving a sign saying, hey, I don't like the way I look or, hey, I'm hiding who I am. And I hate that because, you know, a lot of women, for women, shapewear is something that gives them confidence, that makes them feel more comfortable, that gives them freedom to not think about their body and go about their day. And there's no reason they should be embarrassed.

And so I had to figure out a way to create the first ever, shapeware that it was so beautiful that you wouldn't know it was shapeware. And in order to do that, the reason that shapewear is so ugly, beige, white and black, right, is because shapewear is a compression garment. A compression garment is one of the most highly elasticized fabrics in the world. Now, when you dye something, when you dye something and you stretch it, and you dye something in the jacket you're wearing, if you dye that jacket and then you try to stretch it if it had elastin in it, what's going to happen? You're going to get those nasty white, lines in between. The pattern distorts, the color distorts. It looks terrible, which is why when

someone's wearing something that's a size too small on them, you get those stretch marks and they look really ugly, right? Well, shapewear is meant to stretch. It comes this big in the box and then it's supposed to stretch out on your body. Well, the minute it does that, you're going to get the lines. That's like beige, white and black, white. You stretch it, it just looks white. Beige, just looks beige, But you take a red or a blue or a design or a pattern. Forget it. It's horrible looking. So we had to create a different way of putting color into material.

So we don't dye our fabric. We heat fuse them. And that heat fusion process, when it colors the clothing, it doesn't budge. It's like elastic girl. I mean, I don't know if you've seen it. Like I've been on television. It's called Plus Body, right? Plus Body by Julie Hart.

And online, it's just body by dress. Julia Hart because it was too long to write less than what she'll be. It's Body by Julia Heart online, body by Juliaheart.com. And you'll see it. It looks like a body suit. You'd never know it was Shaper. And I've had women literally do the test with me where they take one in and I take the other. And stretch it. Nothing moves. It doesn't budge. So for the first time, you could wear it in, you could wear it out. And then once I did that, I realized, okay, well, if I'm going to go and fix all the problems that Shepler has, I should fix all the problems. So I looked at all the other problems that they had, for example, shapewear is thick. Again, it's compression.

When you add an extra layer of clothing to you, you're widening your body. Right. So women have had to make this choice between being smoother and flatter but wider or lumpier and narrower. So I realized, well, if I can heat fuse color into fabric, can I take all those layers of compression and fuse them into one layer? And we did. So I Our layer, our shaper is as thin as a piece of paper. It doesn't add an iota to your girth. So for the first time, you don't have to make a choice between wide but, you know, sucked in or narrow but lumpy.

You get narrow and smooth. I'm sold. And then the other things that we did is all shapewear in the world is sold by dress size, small, medium, large, extra, extra large, whatever. Ours is the only one that is sold by dress size and cup size. So you could buy a size large double D or a size large A or a size large F

because normal shapewear it treats the breasts in one of two ways because there are no cups there are no actual bras built in ours is a bra built into your shapework so because they don't have that if they have it up here it creates what they call pancake boobs

you know where your boobs are flat and smush or they have that thing where they make a hole and you have to put on a bra. So now, you're wearing a bra and shaper and four straps and two straps back here. Right. So uncomfortable and so unwieldly. While with ours, it's made to your body. So it's a bra built into the shaper.

And we made it with a very deep V so that you could wear it under the most low-cut thing and have full support with even F-cups and nobody would be. Amazing. First of all, you're the best saleswoman in the world because I want to. Thank you. But, I mean, it is an incredible product. It really is an exciting thing. Well, it's amazing, though, that you took your story and you're trying to now tunnel that to other communities.

That's what keeps me alive, is that I have a purpose in my life. My life is to create an army of independent women. I want an army. When I leave this earth, I want to know that I left an army of women behind. You never have to ask permission. That's the goal. Thank you, Julia. Thank you so much for having me.

I'm with you. I'm in the army. Good. I'm in the army. I'm in the army. Thank you guys so much for listening to this episode. not skinny but not fat. Follow me on Instagram at not skinny but not fat. Subscribe to the podcast so you don't miss any episodes. Rate the podcast that you love so much

on Apple Podcasts and write a little review. If you tell me you did, I'll give you a big virtual smoocharoo. Thank you guys so much for listening and I'll see you next Tuesday. endorsements and advertisements for products and services. Individuals on the show may have a direct or indirect financial interest in products or services referred to in this episode.