Something Was Wrong - S15 E4: [Alice + John + Naomi] The Wheels Fall Off

Episode Date: February 23, 2023

*Content warning: Substance Use Disorder, emotional abuse, sexual assault, suicidal ideation, workplace abuse. For free and confidential resources, please visit: somethingwaswrong.com/resources S15 Artwork by the amazing Sara Stewart @GreaterThanOkay - Instagram.com/greaterthanokayTo purchase SWW merch, please visit: represent.com/store/somethingwaswrongSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Hey, prime members, you can listen to something was wrong early and add free on Amazon music. Download the app today. I'm Candace DeLong and on my new podcast, Killer Psychy Daily, I share a quick 10 minute rundown every weekday on the motivations and behaviors of the cold-butter killers you read about in the news. Listen to the Amazon Music Exclusive Podcast Killer Psychy Daily in the Amazon Music exclusive podcast killer psyche daily in the Amazon Music app. Download the app today. Something was wrong is intended for mature audiences as it discusses topics that can be upsetting such as emotional, physical, and sexual violence. Content warnings for each

episode and confidential and free resources for survivors can be found in the episode notes. Some survivor names have been changed for anonymity purposes. pseudonyms are given to minors in these stories for their privacy and protection. Testimony shared by guests on this show is their own and does not necessarily reflect the views of myself, broken cycle media, or wondering. The podcast or any linked materials should not be construed as medical advice, nor is the information a substitute for professional expertise or treatment. All persons are considered innocent and less proven guilty in a court of law.

Thank you so much for listening. You think you know me, you don't know me well, at all, at all, it comes from me I'm so anxious and like nauseous. Here I am going behind her back to her boss and Saying it doesn't add up. She would have been a Jane Doe and He was like I'm sure with her concussion the details are foggy and I was like look Steve I feel like shit going behind my friends back to you I need you to look into this for me and if you come back and you tell me that it happened. I will let it go 100%. I was like none of the people in the office know I haven't told anybody. The last thing I wanted to do was gossip around the office because everybody loved her so

much and really accepted her wholeheartedly. I felt like I could trust Steve. I said, I'm coming to you to ask you as someone who's known me as a child. I am asking you to look into this to tell me if I'm friends with a psychopath or not. He said, okay, I will look into it and I will let you know. And I said, thank you. Three weeks later, he called me. I go back to the greasy spoon because that's where I'm like undercover, an agent doing my thing. I answer the phone, I'm like, hello.

And he's like, hey, it happened. I was like, what? And he's like, everything happened. She got in the accident, it happened. In that moment, I feel like the shittiest friend of all time. If I found out that my best friend went to my boss behind my back and said to them that they thought I was lying about a major traumatic accident. Being her would be an understatement. I don't know if I could get over that.

I really after that doubled down on our friendship because I felt like I was such a bad friend. Through this time of her being off work, I'm texting her, her parents have come over to visit, she's texting me. I gotta go, my mom has me on a very strict screen time regimen. So like every couple days she would text me a bunch of updates and then be like, I got to go because my mom's taking my phone away. They're a bit harsh, but it's for my

own good and it's for my healing. And I was like, oh, good. And I remember feeling so awful about it. She was off work for about two months so we had to clear her schedule. I talked to Steve. I was like how is Karina doing? He assured me she's off and he was subsidizing her pay. He was paying what her normal salary would be so she could get by because our city is not cheap for rent. They created a back-to-work plan for her. Her parents, they fly over and they're helping her. She's going to all these doctor's appointments.

They're checking her out and I'm being as supportive as I can. I was like, hey, I can drive you. If you need and she's like, no, my parents are here. They're taking me blah, blah, blah. Alice was Karina's roommate for quite some time and when I first met Alice, Karina and her were living together. But at one point Karina was like, oh my gosh, Alice is kicking me out and I was like, why is she kicking you out? And she's like, oh, she's just this like, uppity therapist, she's so stuck up. I drink her ginger ale one day and she told me,

hey, if you take any of my things out of the fridge, I'm gonna ask you to leave because you crossed a boundary. So, ages later, she's like, Alice asked me to leave her apartment and I was like, oh my gosh. Alice is such a bitch. She's so stuck up. Why is she asking to leave for apartment. And I was like, oh my gosh, how is this such a bitch? She's so stuck up. Why is she asking to leave? And she's like, oh, it's so stupid, Naomi. I got home one night.

I was so hungry. I just saw like 10 clients in the day. It was really late. She had some cheese in the fridge and I had nothing. And I was just so exhausted. And so like I ate a piece of her cheese. and I had nothing and I was just so exhausted. And so like I ate a piece of her cheese, Alice, the next morning was like, I got you. You ate my cheese, I'm kicking you out. I remember being like, oh my gosh, you know, that is insane. Fuck her, go find your own place.

Who needs her? She seems like a weird friend anyway. But during this time, she's coming back to work. She's coming into the office. She's starting to see like one or two clients a day, and I get a weird text from Alice. And I was like, ooh, look who this is. It's Alice, Coltie, mean girl. I open it up and I read it, hey, have you heard from Kareena? I was like, no, she's recovering from that accident that she was in.

She's slowly coming back to work, but she's not here today. Why? And she was like, because she missed a meetup with friends and we're just a bit worried about her. I was like, oh, well, she has that massive head injury. She probably didn't remember or is in prioritizing socializing right now. And Alice never texted me back. That was the end of that. I'm starting to see Karina regularly now, our friendship resumes. She's back at work pretty much full time. She's trying to keep her head injury under check. Again, here I am. I feel so bad that I doubted her and went behind her back

to her boss. That is something that was really weighing on me. I was trying to be such a nice friend. We would hang out and I would see her at work. I felt bad because she would be like shaking and she just looked like she was really struggling. A few months go by and I'm moving. Me and my boyfriend were getting ready and all of a sudden Karina calls me hysterically crying. I was like, just let me know what's going on. Through the tears, she tells me they biopsyed the tissue that was removed from that keyhole surgery that was

completed about a year ago and it came back as cancerous. She said that she found out today. I was like, tell me more about that. She's crying. She's like, yeah, they biopsy did and it came back as cancerous and I got to go in on Friday for chemotherapy. In that moment, I was like, I got you bitch. I fucking got you, you're lying. So, little backstory, my husband, he's had cancer. I've gone through this process. I know this process.

I know cancer. And so, for her to be crying, sobbing, telling me she has cancer and that she has chemotherapy on Friday, I'm like, I wasn't crazy. You are such a fucking liar. And I know that you're lying. She's crying. She's like, I got chemo on Friday. I was just like, hey, you know, I've gone through this before. You know that my boyfriend has had cancer before. It's not my first rodeo. I'll help you. You have chemo on Friday. I will go to your appointment on Friday. You best believe that. And she told me I already called Steve. He was driving home with his family. Da, da, da, da-da. My boyfriend is at home and he's like,

what's happening? And I was like, I don't know. It wasn't even just anger. It was more shock confusion, a mix of emotions. And of course, I didn't realize how far spreading or how far reaching her lies were. I hung up the phone and I texted Steve. Hey, I heard you talk to Karina and he was like,

yeah, what are you thinking about this? I was like, we need to talk on the phone. And he was like, okay, I can chat tomorrow. So the next day I'm being chisly waiting. Steve calls me and he's like, how's it going? How are you feeling about that with Karina? And I was like, she's fucking lying. And he's like, how's it going? How are you feeling about that with Karina? And I was like, she's fucking lying. And he's like, chill on accusations.

She's going through a lot of motions or heightened. She's probably not processed everything. And I was like, Steve, I fucking know cancer. I know how it works. This isn't how it works. There's no way in hell some year old biopsy, or some year old skin tissue is being biopsyed, and then all of a sudden you are told you have cancer, and then on Friday you go in for chemotherapy. There's absolutely no way that happens.

When my boyfriend went in for chemotherapy and for surgery and everything that came along with it, it's actually uncomfortably slow. If anyone out there who has been diagnosed or living with somebody with cancer, you know how painfully slow the process is? Part of the discomfort and fear is like, just get it out of me now. You know where it is, that's go.

And they're like, no, we need to see your kidney function. We need to see your liver function for chemotherapy. We need to do all these different tests. We're gonna locate it. We gotta figure out what type of cancer it is. We gotta see if it's red. We gotta make sure your body can handle the treatment. For her to be diagnosed on a Tuesday and going in on a Friday for chemotherapy, she's fucking lying, Steve. I was like, Steve, you need to listen to me. Something is seriously wrong. She's not telling the truth. And you need to believe me. This whole entire time, my imposter syndrome kept me in check because I kept looking at everybody that I worked with who has master's degrees, PhDs, and I'm this girl who

almost flunked out of school and is trying to go into her undergrad. I'm seeing everybody who's so smart believe this person in this moment talking to Seva. I was not yelling, but just being like, you don't understand. You have somebody so dangerous working in your agency. You need to fucking pay attention seriously. After I explained the whole cancer thing, he started taking me seriously. He was like, okay, let me look into it. Part of me, I'm like, I've heard that before, but I was like, okay, whatever, please fucking look into it. He said, I have a couple friends who are knowledgeable in this area. I'm gonna hang up and I'm gonna consult with them. And I was like, please do. So he hangs up and I start being like,

who the fuck am I friends with? What do I need to do to figure out who this person is? Actually, at this point, I was like, okay, she lied about the cancer thing. For sure. I didn't realize what I was about time cover. For a while, I remember Naomi telling me, maybe this is me, maybe I'm a bad person

who doesn't trust people, and she questioned herself. Naomi has a great character. It's to her credit that she would do that, right? When somebody seemed to be doing strange things, especially somebody who allegedly has to have all these tragic things happen to them, she was questioning herself. So many bad things that happen, I was sort of interpreting as, well, you have faced such bad luck and hardship. My first thought, and this is in a person who presents as anxious, right? So you look at them and you'd be like, Oh, are you going to do okay with all these bad things

that have happened? These kidney problems with this falling off your bike, your father being in the hospital, all of these different things. At the time, I was sort of the lead on the team and I had to think about my human resources. Sister person gonna be able to do this job but they gonna stay. I think that's partly what was distracting me. With this cancer diagnosis after this has gotta be like four or five months later, after she started coming to work again, I was so scared that they liked her so much

that they might slip off and give away that I don't believe her. I just remember going to work the day or two after she told me she had cancer. I would remember sitting in the perception area and these people that I work with who I still love deeply to this day. They came out and I see her. I'm sure some of the listeners understand what it's like to just have surging anxiety, witnessing pure evil. This person that I've known for so many years, I'm staring at them and I do not know who they are at.

I remember watching my co-workers going up to her and they gave her a hug and she's crying and they're crying about this cancer diagnosis. She came up to me and I went, I'm so sorry and I was trying really hard to like channel this sad energy, but I was looking at a complete stranger. I didn't know how dangerous this person was. I remember giving her a hug, a adrenaline coursing through my veins feeling so nauseous. I thought in my head while we were interacting do not show how nervous you are. Do not show her that you don't believe her. I was trying to be so sympathetic but I was so scared at the same time. But I was so scared at the same time.

Hi, I'm Lindsey Graham, the host of Wondries Podcast American Scandal. We bring to life some of the biggest controversies in U.S. history, presidential lies, environmental disasters, corporate fraud. In our newest series, we look at the Kids for Cash Scandal, a story about corruption inside America's system of juvenile justice. In Northeastern Pennsylvania, residents had begun noticing an alarming trend. Children were being sent away to jail in high numbers, and often for committing only minor offenses.

The FBI began looking at two local judges, and when the full picture emerged, it made national headlines. The judges were earning a fortune, carrying out a brazen criminal scheme, one that would shatter the lives of countless children, and force a heated debate about punishment, an America's criminal justice system. Follow American scandal wherever you get your podcasts.

You can listen ad-free on the Amazon music or Wonder App. Steve checked in with his super smart people and he calls me and he's like, hey, Naomi, it is maybe not true. He had to look for some HR person to figure out what his rights were because she was working at his agency and he wanted to do everything by the book in the meantime by search up Alice on social media. I was like, hey, Alice, I just have a couple questions. I'm wondering if you would talk to me. Alice wrote back to me, she was super KG. She's like, what do you need to know?

And I was like, I'm wondering by Karina moved out of your place. Could you give me a call? She was like, yeah, okay, I'll call you tomorrow. She calls me and I answer the phone and she's super standoffish and I was like, look, why did Karina move out? And she was like, what's going on?

And she went and answered my questions. And I was like, can I tell you what Karina told me why she moved out? And Alice is like, yeah, sure. And I was like, she told me she ate your cheese. And Alice is like, what? And I was like, she told me that she drank your ginger ale one day and that a couple weeks later, she ate your cheese and you freaked out

and told her to move out. And she was like, what the fuck? No, that's not what happened. And she just unleashes this story. The memory stands out really clearly. I was in a new apartment, living by myself at this point because I clearly did not want a roommate at all. I remember she messaged me on Instagram.

She was told me that I came off as really cagey and really on edge, and honestly, I felt that way. I think at that point all I wanted was to get the fuck away from anything related to Karina and my founders were just huge. She messaged me and it's like, hey, I wanted to talk to you about her. What do you know? And I was playing this dodgy game because there's a level of confidentiality here too, right? She actually ended up calling me, which helped. We could hear each other, the tone softened, and it drew me, oh, me style. I think she just was like,

you seem really edgy. What's up? And I think that just kind of broke it. Like spilled. And then we'd started naming things. And there was always a bit of risk in unpacking this, because what if we named something that was actually true that was possibly hurtful for the other person? There was always this hesitancy around naming anything because you didn't want to send the other person or talk about something really painful, but the more we started to unpack, we both were shocked at the gravity of the web of lies and how calculated it was and how much triangulation had happened. From Karina's point of view, she had eaten my cheese. I was pissed off about that and then asked her to leave. And although I do love cheese, it definitely was way more complicated than that.

Basically, I had set some boundaries. I'd been gifted to really nice bottles of wine that you couldn't get anymore. She had drank all of them. We had talked about that. She had replaced them with something else. And then me not trusting her, I had hidden them in my room. In a very specific spot, from time to time, I would check that they were still there, because there was just such a lack of trust in our relationship. At one point, I am checking on where I've hidden these bottles. And there was two that I was checking. One was right way up, how I'd put it in there, and the other was actually flipped. It felt like basically she was saying,

I know what you're doing, fuck you, and I'm just gonna mess with you at this point. They weren't open. She was just letting me know that she knew and she was in control. Then the behavior continued. She kept on shrinking my stuff, eating my stuff. I had asked her, can you at least give me the number of your parents? So if anything happens, I know you're using. I just

need to make sure that I have people that I can call to make sure you're safe. None of that happened. So I had had enough. So it was definitely not just cheese, it was not a one time thing. And the conversation actually went really well. I was also getting guidance from my own therapist at this time and learning how to navigate this and set limits and also show compassion and empathy. She totally respected me. She moved out the next month. I gave her time to do that. On my end, I felt like we had worked through that. We kept on being friends. That's why the betrayal felt so intense because we kept on hanging out. With the group of friends, we messaged. It felt like the friendship was still intact. There was

more distance, obviously, because some huge violations had happened, but on my end, I wanted to still have some form of friendship. Me and Alice are talking on the phone and I'm starting to come to the realization that I obviously did not know the extent of the lying. I'm comparing things and Alice is comparing things. We ended up talking, these lies came out. All the lies, at least I found out that she told about me and different reasons why she had to miss work in support of me.

And I'm saying this with big air quotes. One, it was that my family was part of a cult, and there was different religious practices that my dad had died, which is not true. He's very much alive. She had to drive me to where my parents lived and support me through the funeral. And it was because we were part of this cult

that it was a drawn out day after day process. There was other lies about her involvement in my relationship. The list just went on and on and on. I think really, really to A, justify her not being at work and maybe some of the behavior that was coming up around that. And B, to really separate us from anybody in her life. I know there was a whole kind of cancer scare that she used. That didn't come into our friend group. She didn't go there, I think just because she didn't need to, she didn't live with any of us anymore.

And she could just miss work and we wouldn't even know. I know a bunch of tragedies she lied to work about in terms of her grandparents, her parents, and having to fly home and go to futiles. The list is unending. I can't even remember all of them. Do you know if her dad had any heart attacks in the last set of all, she's like, no. He hasn't had any heart attacks.

He like runs marathons. He's this finance guy. He's never had a health issue at all. He's a pinnacle of health and I was like, what? I was like, well, can you think of anything weird? And she was like, I know that time that her client took their own life. I was like, what?

And she's like a couple months ago, she had a client that took their own life. And I was like, she's never told me about that. And as somebody who sort of conceived the clients on the appointments, that's never happened. I remember her pulling up the text. And on the day that Karina sent that text message to Alice and her group of friends from grad school. She got into some minor accident.

When I checked my data back, she got into this bike accident. She sent Alice and her grad school friends a message saying, Hey girls, I'm so heartbroken and at a loss for words, I had my very first client take their own life today and I feel so lost and so empty. I just don't know what to do. And everyone's messaging her in the chat. Their condolences, they all work in mental health, they're all therapists. So they're like, that is so heartbreaking.

I'm here if you need me and to me, she's telling me, I can't come out because she was biking over this bridge and she fell off and hit her arm and the railing of the bridge. It hurt too much. She just wanted to go and chill. And that was the beginning of, oh shit, this is crazy.

For a long time, we had no idea. Near the end when it all came out, there was definitely some more questioning. There was definitely some doubt, but it was things so severe that you kind of feel like an asshole for questioning. That was always the risk, right? Am I an asshole for even doubting this for a second? I just think it was so calculated. It was so well thought out that it wasn't worth the risk because if you were wrong, the shame, or the guilt of, I can't believe I'd second-guester checked. Part of what I wrestled with, too, what if I dealt and what if I question and what if I'm right?

How can someone get to the point where they're lying about something so tragic? What does that mean about what humanity is capable of? Like, wow, this is so dark. After the conversation with Naomi, she was updating me on what Karina was doing, so there was checking in and out of the hospital happening. There was a bunch of stuff going down

or at least that's what she was being told. I don't know, it was true or not at that point. At this point in time, she's not showing up for work. Steve, through her head injury, he was paying her wage in good faith because he was kind. He consulted with an HR lawyer and they were like, okay, you have the right to not allow an employee to leave work for XYZ amounts of hours for their appointments

and she had exceeded that. And so it was like, okay, you can go to your appointments but not on company time. She one day didn't show up for work. I texted her because at this time, I'm trying to be like buddy, buddy. I was so terrified because I know this person is not who I think that they are.

I was like, what's going on? And she's like, oh, I have this appointment. And eventually Steve is putting a lot of pressure on her. She's not showing up for work. I'm practically trying to cancel plans because she's so sporadic with her attendance at the agency. I'm talking to Steve and I'm telling him like, hey, Karina didn't show up for work today. She's saying she has this appointment and she's not allowed to use company time

for the appointment. The walls were sort of closing in on her and she checked herself into a mental health facility where we live. If you check yourself into a mental health facility or emergency psychiatric care, you cannot be fired. So she checked herself into a mental health facility and in that time, Steve is no longer able to fire her because she is under medical supervision, even though we had

like all this overwhelming evidence of the time in this facility. She's calling me, updating me. I'm a lot of the time not answering your phone calls. I was too anxious. I think it was talking to Naomi in a meeting room. And the world spun for a moment when I realized what was going on. Karina eventually gave up. She was like, I can't do this anymore. I'm done.

And Karina admitted what happened. And she had to involve her parents. I think that's sort of what broke it all open. This is a tremendous aha moment where the lights come on and you're just like, this is what we've been going on for almost two years. When I lived overseas, I met this guy. And funnily enough, I came back to the States and he was living in her

home city and started dating her sister. So I had this connection to the family. I messaged him and I was like, hey, I'm super worried about Karina. What is going on? And he just messaged him and I was like, hey, I'm super worried about Karina, what is going on? And he just messaged me back, here's her dad's phone number. We didn't speak again. I'm gonna call her parents. Because at this point in time, she's not showing up for work. Fuck it. I'm calling her dad. I was at home and I doubt the number

that my friend from overseas gave me and her mom answers. I was like, hello. And she's like, hey, I was like, this might be a bit random and out of the blue, but my name's Naomi. And she's like, oh my gosh, Naomi. Of course, we know you. Karina loves you. Thank you so much for everything that you've done. And I was like, of course, she's been such a good friend to me. And I'm just calling because I'm really worried about her. And I want to check in with you because I would love to be able to support her through this process. Of course, I'm being a bit fake, but I know this family, and I know that they have lots of resources. I, of course, also do care about Karina in

my own way. I need to figure this out. Me and her mom were talking, and I was like, yeah, what can I do? When she's like, oh, you know, she's in the mental health facility. We're trying to figure it out. And I was like, would it be okay if I just asked you a couple questions? And she was like, yeah, of course. I was like, I'm so sorry if this is weird. And you don't have to answer any of them if you don't feel comfortable.

I'm just worried. And I'd love to be there for her as her friend. And she's like, yeah, please, no worries. I was like, has Karina like ever fallen off of her bike and broke her arm? Her mom's like, nope, no accidents. And I was like, oh, okay. Did you ever come and visit anytime over the couple years that she's lived in our city and she's like, no we haven't come over. And I was like, oh okay, I'm really sorry. Has she had any surgeries on her kidneys? She says, no, no surgeries. Why? And I was like, oh, I don't know. I thought she said something about a surgery, but she didn't even seem surprised.

And I said, I'm really sorry if this is triggering our overwhelming deal, but did your husband ever have a heart attack? She's like, no. He's never had a heart attack. I was like, do you know if Karina was in a pretty serious accident where she had a major concussion for a couple months? Nope. I said, hey, I am really sorry if this is triggering for you or inappropriate or overwhelming, but I have a question. And I'm asking you permission if I could ask it.

She was like, sure, go ahead. She was very nice. And I was like, did either you or your husband's parents die in a car accident? And her mom's like, what? She said that. And I was like, yeah, she did say that. They were in a car accident and they died recently.

She was like, they are all still alive. I just remember being like, oh my gosh, Karina is something else. Her mom, she wasn't even shocked. She wasn't even like, oh my gosh, wait what? I remember what she said after I asked her all these questions about everything that happened about the surgeries, the heart attacks, the deaths, about the concussions, about the multiple accidents, about just visiting, about her boyfriend. She said, you

know, the wheels fall off like this when she gets stressed. Okay, I can't even do all of it. It wasn't even like, oh my gosh, that's so crazy. She must be stressed. It was like the wheels fall off like this when she gets stressed. And it's like, okay, so this has happened again and again and again. This isn't the first time I was sitting on the other end of the phone. Think of adrenaline coursing through your veins. My eyes are like twitching and rolling to the back of my head. The wheels fall

off like this when she gets stressed. I just remember being like, is there anything else that is weird that she has told you? She's like, no. And I was like, is there anything weird that she's told you about me? Because at this point, I've heard people are like, well aren't you secretly in a lesbian relationship with her under your boyfriend's nose? And I'd heard all that stuff now. And she's like, no, I just know you guys were super close. I was like, is there anything else about her group of friends where she worked? She was like, well, I know she had that one friend, a coworker for the sake of confidentiality. I don't even want to bring up what her mom said because her mom brought up some things about our friends and a couple people that we worked with that were just so blatantly untrue. It was shocking.

Those types of things would be career ending for individuals who are so dedicated and they work so hard to provide the best quality of care for their clients. I don't even want to dignify what she said because it's just outrageous. I'm really sorry about the whole situation. It's so fucked up in so many ways. Words matter. And like you said, it sounds like

she almost enjoyed telling people these horrific stories just to see their reactions. I think she enjoys it, the chaos, and the attention. She's a good-looking girl from a decent family. No one's gonna suspect that, and it's sad that she takes advantage of others because unfortunately, the Karina is somebody who has had ample opportunity,

ample resources to get and receive help. I can remember it looking like the sympathy she was getting tasted good to her. You know, if you would say, oh, that just sounds terrible. I can't believe it. One more thing in your life, it's been so hard lately for you. And she would be like, yeah, it has been so hard for me. I'm not somebody who could diagnose exactly what is wrong with somebody like this. You would

want to take that person to a registered psychologist, a psychiatrist, you'd want to have a huge body of data and a lot of therapy. And then they could maybe say what the complicated psychology of someone like this is. But I would definitely say they did seem to really sort of thrive on the sympathy that they would get. A couple of us tried to make a report where our license is based. It's complicated, but basically we were given the feedback that we couldn't because we weren't clients.

That sucked. I felt helpless. And then I heard that she had gone to like a fancy rehab at some point. And during that period, I don't know what's true or not. There was a copy-paced message that got sent to a bunch of us. Honestly, I didn't even read it. I just didn't have space. The trust was just too broken to even take what was said

with any ounce of sincerity. It all felt like a ploy. I wasn't in a space where I could even respond to that. There's been no contact since then. I hope she got help. I wish her well. It's hard, man. But what strikes me so much about her is she's smart enough.

And she knows there were so many things that I witnessed that were unethical and she chose to do that. I remember when she was house sitting for our friend, Korra, that story is crazy. She's like, I'm looking after these cats. They're just so annoying. They're just shitting everywhere.

And I looked at her and I was like, Karina, are you cleaning the litter box? Like, that's all you gotta do. She looked at me like I was so stupid. She looked at me like, Skating being like, of course I'm cleaning the litter box. I'm not fucking stupid. And I was like, maybe they're nervous

because their owner's not there. I remember her text, Amy. And she's like, I'm literally laying in bed, reading my book. And this cat is shitting on my foot at the end of the bed. And it's so fucking gross. Her exact words. I drove back to her like rough dude.

That's tough. Maybe just check out the litter box is clean. Well, like it's gonna be fun. Sorry that you're dealing with that. They're obviously stressed. I didn't know what happened after she looked after this house. However money months later, we all got together after this kicked off

and we're like comparing stories. I remember asking Korab, Hey, so when Karina was looking after your house and she slams her hands on the table and I was like, Oh, what? Because she kept telling me that your casket's shooting at one point, they like shit on her foot. Like on your bed, she was like, I got home from three weeks vacation and there was a seven-inch the solidified concrete sludge of kitty litter. She had not changed that litter box one time, that whole entire time. That image of Karina sitting in that house and not cleaning the litter box and the cats

pooping and peeing everywhere around the house because they have nowhere else to go. And her texting me, actively texting me about how awful these cats were and how she was doing such a good job when she never did anything is actually one of the most disturbing parts of this whole experience for me. Korra told me not one piece of poop, not one puddle of pee was cleaned up. There was feces and pee everywhere. Her house wreaked like cat pee. There was candle wax, strewn all over the apartment. Her Dyson vacuum cleaner was broken in half.

There was like vomit all over the inner part of her shower. I cannot imagine that scene. I came to work one day to the agency, and Kriina comes in and walks into her office and then promptly steps out like shocked. And I looked at her because I was in the main foyer. I was like, what's up? And she was like, I think my office was broken into. And I get up, I walked over and I opened up her office door and her whole office

is completely torn apart. There's papers everywhere, everything's knocked over, it looks like a tornado was in there, but one of the main sort of things that I'll always remember is that there was marinara sauce splattered all over the walls, like paint. I was shocked, They was destroyed. I remember looking at her and she was like,

oh my gosh, I feel so violated. She was checking her filing cabinets to make sure they were still locked, which they were. But it was just like, papers everywhere and everything knocked over. And then this marinara sauce everywhere. So I helped her clean it. I thought, obviously something happened

like a window or something was left open. Someone came in and was like chilling in there at night. As we're cleaning up, we're finding alcohol bottles, wine bottles, we're cleaning and smearing off this marinara sauce. She was like, oh, I feel so violated. I think it's one of my clients. I know who it is. And she felt sure about it. I was like, oh, damn, just make sure that windows locked and closed. But if he's a widow in it to like reinforce it so nobody can get in, that's such a fluke accident. It's so good that they didn't get into the main part or they didn't get into any records. When she's in the mental facility, she would call me, I'd get a state number from the facility she was at.

And sometimes I would answer, and sometimes I wouldn't, because I was so anxious. This one time I answered, and I was like, Karina, what happened? And she's like, I was doing drugs, and I was like, what kind of drugs? And she's like, co-cumously. I was like, can I was like, what kind of drugs? And she was like, co-cumously. I was like, can I ask you a question?

You know, your office, you did that right. And she was like, yeah, I did do that. And I was like, why? Why did you do that? She was like, to be honest, I don't even know. It just trashed it. I was like, why did you blame it on a client? She was like, to be honest, I don't even know. It just trashed it. I was like, why did you blame it on a client? She was like, I was lost.

That was pretty crazy. I don't remember if Karina said my office is a mess, but we all went into the office to see and it was trashed. And there was booze in there and there was all this stuff. What we thought is a youth client who knew Karina had come in, I think there was a, well, no, that was open maybe, and busted into their office and drank in their office. This is a very strange situation, but it's in the community where the agency isn't as

certainly possible. But the office was a shambles, there were papers everywhere. Like I said, there was multiple balls of booze, and we never would have dreamed that the true story, of course, makes perfect sense. And the context of a person who'd gone there to drink, maybe to flee the roommates or something during the weekend, just to drink by themselves and trash their own office. That makes so much more sense than the story we had come up with. She was in a mental health facility and she she understood Blabberlaw, and she knew that she could not be fired. So she quit while she was there. If she didn't, Steve would have actually

been required to create a back-to-work plan for her, and scaffold her back-to-work, which was something I was terrified about. I couldn't even imagine if she had come back to the office if I ever saw her again, that was something that was so terrifying to me. She quit, and so Steve and I went into her office to clear it out.

We were going through her boxes, and there were credit card statements, and there were pretty insane charges. She was spending a lot of money and come to find out later which actually terrified me. She was forging our friends, signatures on loans,

like Quick Lones as a cosigner. So for about a year after this, I was frantically checking my credit because we were the closest friends. And if she was gonna forge anyone's signature, it's pretty easy to forge mine. Going through her office, she had hard alcohol, tequila, whiskey, leaders of wine.

She had baggies of coke, meth, crack, many, many, many little drug bags with drug residue. It was wild. It was a wild time. I'm incredibly sorry that you went through this experience and I think that the behavior is harmful, it's unacceptable, it's damaging. How do you feel like this impacted you, this level of deceit, this level of manipulation? To this day, I cannot make sense of it.

I really can't. I think I understand her personality profile and some of the things she has to be struggling with and battling with. I really don't understand. I wish I could sit here and say my heart goes out to her because she has to be battling some things. But I'm actually kind of like, fuck you. You inflicted so much hurt. I feel like I'm pretty resilient. I think if I ever am in a manager role, I think if I ever am in a manager role, you need to sit down and really contemplate the full context of someone. And if there are things that really just don't add up, and they sort of niggle at the back of your mind,

telling you this doesn't make sense, it doesn't add up. I think you should continue to be curious curious and you shouldn't hold on to your assessments of things too tightly. You should be willing to reassess things because I do feel somewhat responsible for not making sense of what was going on sooner. There's things that I take away from that. There's learnings. If you're getting a lot of odd stuff from people, you should really think about all of it all together and just see if the facts fit your assessments of things that has affected me and how I do things and how I see people. I think humans are complex beings and so it's hard to take this very specific situation and say, what can we know? But I think people who are trusting people go through a school of hard

knocks when they first meet people that can't be trusted, right? I saw this where in our agency, we would have really good people who would come into the agency and would want to help people who had a lot of complex problems. And they couldn't help but beat naive. And so I think what's important to realize is you just can't trust some people for various reasons. You should always consider the possibility and that someone's being profoundly dishonest of you. You'll sort of trust but verify at a sooner stage in your relationship and you'll be able to fix that out. I'll only speak from my experience here, but anytime we go into trying to understand other, it takes us out of our own experience and making sense of our own effect,

our own emotions, our own role in that dynamic. So for me, it's been about not actually analyzing her because who knows if it's accurate or not. Oftentimes, I think our assumptions about others are not accurate for a number of different reasons. So my process, how I've worked through this is really actually to stay with me. For me, it doesn't actually matter what her intention was, what she was getting out

of it. There was some kind of payoff, right? In the theory that I've been taught, behavior has function, and we have to sense this for a reason. And if we're controlling, it's doing something for us. We're manipulating, it's doing something for us.

But it's been about coming back to me and really working through the violation, the betrayal. Maybe reasons why I missed certain things, not to blame myself for that level of manipulation at what was going on there. I don't own that. It's really been about processing my own anger, processing my own guilt and reasserting boundaries. When I meet someone new and my alarm bells start going off, I now have this experience and I now Have to kind of be aware how that shows up anytime I meet someone new right and so for me

It's really been about staying with that and focusing on what's mine and what's in within my control The severity of what she was willing to tell people There was many nights with different groups of us where we'd sit with each other in deep grief and be shocked and be angry. And reclaimed the truth. That's what it felt like. We were digging through the nasty layers

to get down to what was true, what did she create? Where did my reality get worked? How can we help each other get back there? It was really cathartic. There was many nights where we would just go out and talk. I'm so glad I had Naomi and these other friends. It was absolutely community and support during that time and putting pieces back into place and just processing what had happened. I think those nights where we all got together really helped. I'm a strong believer in community and relationships and connection being a big part of my own healing.

There was a lot of shock initially that someone could act in those ways and just use people in that way. Shock, a lot of anger. Honestly, there wasn't a whole lot of grief and maybe that's to come. Maybe I've let the anger and the boundaries kind of just hold themselves there, but maybe the grief won't come in the severity of her being revealed in that way. It didn't feel like I was losing somebody that I actually wanted in my life or anywhere near my life. I think that helped for me. There was maybe a bit of sadness around this false image

that I had of her and the different ways that I maintained that. She manipulated me and maintaining that. I think it's really affected how I conduct myself when I'm practicing. I encourage clients to challenge me. I also work very relationally, so this might look different depending on who you are, who you're seeing. It's really changed how I show up in the room, what I encourage, what dynamic I help create in the room in regards to the power. And what I hope people get from it is that I hope they

feel capable of doing that. At the same time, not to create a bunch of doubt and distrust in people out there, because I genuinely believe that there are beautiful human beings out there that have very good intentions. Thank you so much for your time. Thanks for having me. Thank you so much for listening.

Until next time, stay safe friends. Something was wrong is a broken cycle media production, created and hosted by me, Tiffany Rees. If you'd like to support the show further, you can share episodes with your loved ones, leave a positive review, or follow something was wrong on Instagram. At something was wrong podcast. Our theme song was composed by Glad Rags. Check out their album Wonder Under. Thank you so much. Hey, prime members. You can listen to something was wrong early and add free on Amazon music. Download the app today or you can listen early and add free with Wondery Plus in Apple

podcasts. Before you go, tell us about yourself by completing a short survey at Wondery.com in Apple podcasts. Before you go, tell us about yourself by completing a short survey at Wondery.com slash survey.