Why Jordan Belfort HATES This Version of His Story | Nadine Macaluso

Hey guys, if you're not following me on Spotify, please hit that follow button and leave a five star review. They're both a huge, huge help. Thank you. Then he got arrested and I just was like, that's it. I'm done. I'm done. You filed for divorce right away. I didn't file for divorce right away, but I told him I can't do this anymore because also in the, before he got arrested, when I was talking to him about it and I was like, this was really hard. Your drug addiction, your abuse. He was like, it wasn't that bad. Oh, he said that? Yeah, he said that to me. And I was, remember, I was getting sushi and I'll never forget it. And I didn't know the word callousness. Now, maybe he didn't want to admit how bad it was for fear that I would leave him. I, you know, I don't know what his reasoning was, but that really, the lack of remorse was really the knife in my heart. Probably in his mind. I mean, I don't know if you can correct me if I'm wrong here based on what you think, but he probably just looked at it. Transactionally. Like, ah, I gave you all these things. Probably, yeah. You have everything you want. Like, you can't deal with a little bullshit. Yeah, probably. I mean, I don't know, but that could be a take on it. But for me, that was, that was not correct. Yeah. Yeah. And so then he went to our Southampton house and I stayed in our Brookville house. And that was my beginning of liberation. And he's under indictment, like talking to prosecutors about a deal. So, you know, he's going to jail. Yeah. Yeah, too. Yeah. And you know that that, like you said, like, you now have the leverage, like he's going to be going away. You can take care of yourself, do what you got to do. What was the money situation like, though? Did you just assume everything was going to be taken or? Yeah, I drove to the courthouse with a million dollars worth of my jewelry and I gave it up and they took it all. And I was like, take it. Oh, for his bail? Yeah. $10 million in bail. Oh, so you still, you were giving it yourself. Yeah. You didn't want to bail him. Yeah. Yeah. I'm not going to abandon him like that on the court. I'm not going to do that. I'm not going to be like, I'm taking the jewelry. I'm out. I might have been like, bye-bye. No, no. I'm not that type of person. No. And so we gave up everything we owned and I was happy because it was blood money and I didn't want it. Blood money. That's how you looked at it. Yeah. I didn't want it. So you thought he was guilty of sin for sure. Yeah. I was like, I don't want this. If they're getting 11 counts of whatever they are, money laundering, I'm like, I don't want it. And the money was a trap. Yeah. The money didn't buy me happiness. The money did not give me any protection or safety, which I thought it would. Right? So all the things that you think that money's going to give you, zero. So I just was so, I just wanted to be free and calm and drama-free and peaceful. That was worth a billion to me. That's well put. Really well put. Yeah. I mean, people have like the quote, like, money can't buy you happiness. But it can help. If it's not, if all those other variables are given up, I don't think it really helps at all. No. No. I mean, I'm living proof that it's, that it wasn't, it didn't, it didn't make me feel any of those things that I thought it would make me feel. What did the therapist say at this point? Like once he's, like, she's like, I knew this all along. Yeah. She was like, she, I don't really remember, but you know, again, she was always there for me. And, um, and it was at that point that Jordan, because Jordan was sober and his sponsor says, calls me up and says, Nadine, I don't care what you're going to do, you're going to leave him, you want to date, but if you don't go to this place, you're going to marry the same exact type of guy or meet the same exact type of guy. Like it was a psychological center. And I was like, no way. I called them up that day, checked myself in, and I went to a place called the Karen Foundation. Wait, you checked your, like a rehab? No, it's like an emotional, um, it's kind of, it's really for people, I guess, who were dealing with addicts, right? Yeah. And so it's like a five-day intensive, psychological intensive to, to heal. Wow. I don't think I've ever heard, that's kind of a cool resource. Yeah, it's called Breakthrough at Karen. It's still there. Yeah. It's, Karen Foundation is an amazing, amazing addiction center. They're all over the country now. The one I went to was in Pennsylvania. And it's just five days? Yeah, five days. Wow. So is this like just an intense? Intensive, like getting to the core of, you need to recognize what happened here? Yeah, like I didn't, I didn't know that I could say no. I didn't know that, I didn't know about boundaries back then. Nobody was really talking about boundaries. Now it's, you know, everybody talks about boundaries. It's like every other word. But so I learned all these things. I learned about my family of origin. I learned about. Your family of origin? Meaning like, you know, my mother had just survived and I was just surviving. I wasn't really thriving. Like today I'm thriving. Yeah. Right. Just learned about how to not, my, my, I think my, the thing that they made my sentence be, my caretaking made my life chaotic. Like my over caretaking. And so then I just really worked on that. And all the strings that went along with it. And they did family role playing. It was an amazing, amazing place. Wow. I'm sure it's even more incredible today. But that was the beginning of my new life. Yeah. So you, but that's like, that's almost like an intensive, what's the word I'm looking for? Not therapy session. I mean, that's what you're doing. Yeah. Yeah. It's obviously therapy, but there's another term I'm looking for. It's like an intensive retreat in a way where you got to be like, hey, we're going to get to your reality. You're going to go home a new person. Yeah. But like, this is not two months or three months or something. No. It's like five days. It's literally from six in the morning to 11 at night. They break you down and they put you into two different groups. And it was the best thing I ever did. Now, is that what real, I mean, you were working with a therapist this whole time. So obviously like that interest is there for a long time, getting internal and stuff. But is this a real turning point in where you get, what's the word I'm looking for? Like completely self-reflective as far as like recognizing all of the psychological patterns that had gotten the relationship to this point? Yeah. Yes. Yes. It's the beginning of it. You know, they were like, you're codependent and he's an addict. You know, now in my research and studies, I don't necessarily just agree with that. I think there was a lot more going on, but that was a really great starting point for me to really start to heal. And because remember when I'm in therapy with him, I'm just managing. Yeah. There's no healing going on. So it was a great starting point for me to heal. That's a good way to put it. Managing. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It was just managing. And so now I just am like, okay, never going to do that again. Now, what else though did you think it was? You said you just used the terms, you're codependent and he's an addict. What were the other variables? Well, now I know we were in the quintessential trauma bond. You know, I had no idea again about narcissism or this coercive control or intermittent reinforcement or these- Intermittent reinforcement? Yeah. That's where 70% of the time they're cruel, controlling, abusive, and then 30% of the time they're nice, kind, and generous, and helpful. Okay. And that's actually what creates the bond. So I didn't know about all of these things back then, but it was a good start and a good foundation for me to start to get my power back. Do you think he was also bipolar too? Because like these patterns, I'm not a psychiatrist, obviously. Yes. Yes. But these patterns are, as you- You describe them are reflective of like hot and cold, nice and mean, not really a lot of 50%. It's zero or a hundred. Not a lot of 50%. Not a lot of 50%. I mean, probably, you know, I don't, I would hate to diagnose him. Even today? Even today. Good for you. Yeah. But he, so this like kind of starts your new life. Yeah. You get your kids. Is this when you start like divorce proceedings because he's going to jail? Yeah. I just say to him, I want to get divorced. He moves to one house. I'm in the other house. He's busy with the FBI doing whatever he's doing. And I had, I had had a little company. I had a maternity company. A maternity company. Yeah. I made maternity clothing for women. Cause remember I'm pregnant. So I hate all the maternity clothing. And so I have a website, a catalog and a store. So I have my own little business and I was dating. I was like dating Michael Bolton. You dated Michael Bolton? I did. Wait, so you rebounded with Michael Bolton? No, just for fun. Just for a few weeks. Yeah. So you rebounded with Michael fucking Bolton. A lot, a lot, a lot, a lot, a lot of men. I think a golf pro, the guy that owns theory. Yeah. I was having fun. And then. Is that weird dating though? Like right away after being in such a long relationship? No, I was, I was, look, we have to remember I'm 32. I know. Yeah. I'm ready to date. I'm ready to date. I haven't felt like I've been loved in years. You took a five day retreat and you're like, let's go. - Let's go. do it um and so i was dating and working really hard and raising my kids and it was a happy very happy time and then about a year and a half later i met my current husband and what how did you meet him first of all on a blind date another kind of blind yep another blind date which is kind of crazy that i did that again right yeah i mean the last one you knew the guy though coming so it's like what but how did who said yeah my old business partner and he had given my husband current husband is amazing dancer and he had given this girl's brother bought dance lessons for his bat mitzvah or something so he knew her for like 40 years and so he was living in california and he was in the garment business too and i said i'll go out with anybody once all right let's give it a whirl and then that was it very nice man even before you got there i want to come back yeah go ahead but like when you're starting to date these other guys which i mean that's a michael bolton for a few weeks that's a flex but you know like are you very suspicious of these people when you're starting to date them because you're like yes now i don't trust anybody so now i went from being the most trusting person in the universe to not trusting yes and that's going to be hard to develop anything when you're like it is it is hard but now you have to remember it's also not so much about trusting other people it's also about trusting yourself because now i've gotten educated i'm understanding myself more i'm understanding relational dynamics a little bit better i mean i compared to where i am today i'm still green as hell but i'm i'm feeling you know i love relationships i love love so i'm i'm ready to fall in love but i want to i'm ready to fall in love yeah i'm very weary of falling in love but i'm not against it okay yeah i'm not against it so it's not out out of the question but you're like what could go wrong yeah well yeah well now i don't trust people yeah okay so you meet your now current husband you've been married i guess for what like 20 years something like that so this one 23 years this one is a successful man 23 years yeah okay so what what about him made you trust him and how how long did that take it's you know what made me trust him was when we've had our first fight uh he said to me oh yeah i get that i hear you and i was like what that's never happened before i was like you hear me you're willing to collaborate you're willing to cooperate i couldn't believe it what was the fight over something like i don't even remember but it was something stupid it was like where to go for dinner or something i don't know um but it was yeah and i and i have a saying if somebody can't hear you they can't love you well i might use that that's pretty good that's good yeah i'll give you some creds okay okay someone can't hear you they can't love you yeah so you never felt like jordan actually listened to you you felt like he listened to respond yes rather than understand yes that's a good way to say okay so your new husband when you're dating him you felt like he actually saw you understood you yes yes that's interesting yes that's usually like you know when you break down anything in the world not even just romantic relationships any type of relationship it never ceases to blow my mind how much the very first thing to go down in many cases is just communication right and then everyone else's flaws get exacerbated by that if they have them that's right but like god it seems so simple but you get those wires cross even once with somebody and it just i know yeah yeah no communications everything and you have to be able we have a collaborative part of the brain and for some people it's just not activated and for his it was and he's very caretaking he would like bring me tea right there's my acts of service right right there he's italian he's a great chef he makes homemade pizza i love pizza i'm from brooklyn and so we just and he had three kids i had two kids we were all the same age my favorite show growing up was the brady bunch i was like here we go and um and he said to me i live in california why don't you move to california how long did that take like how you said you were ready to fall in love but you were like weary of it so how what was the timeline two years okay two years yeah so you're feeling it out for a while yeah and then eventually just feel safe and then it feels safe and um my and then jordan was wearing his ankle bracelet and decided to take a helicopter to atlantic city so he i was actually able to move wait what yeah i i'm so confused okay so i'm dating john yeah what year are we in oh five yeah no no no no we're we're like in two thousand no no no we're in two thousand maybe nine yeah so jordan's not in prison yet jordan's just going to go to prison for six seven years he doesn't get sentenced for six seven years yeah i didn't know that yeah so but he's out with his ankle bracelet and uh he he's but he does this stupid thing and takes a helicopter to new jersey with an ankle brace you can't do that and so my attorney says to me uh i know you want to go to california you can probably go now what why couldn't you go because because he's sad yeah because i'd be taking the kids yeah and i'm not i was never looking to take his kids ever but if he's gonna be in jail or before he's sentencing which is really what happened then the judge was like tell her to go and then we will we left and we rebuilt our life did he like did jordan have access to really any like he's taking a helicopter to ac did he have access to money at the time i don't know because remember i'm not with him so i have no idea what he's doing here no evil see no yeah and i don't know why he would do honestly because we weren't talking yeah i was like he did that all right was he getting jealous at all that you were out there again you know what my husband was really good he said to me i'm gonna call jordan and i'm gonna take him for breakfast i was like really okay and he did and he said i'm gonna be around your kids and i know what it's like to have somebody around my kids and i want to meet you and did they get along they got along right from the gecko wow i think jordan really respected that now you go to california though was jordan because it's several years before he even goes to prison was he able to see his kids yeah yeah yeah yeah i would send them back for the summers and then he moved to california were you ever worried about that though like obviously he loves his kids but he's his own worst enemy he's going through a crazy time you know what at that point he was really humble he was very sober he was humble he was he was define humble he was different there wasn't that that grandiosity he just he was into the simple things he was into the simple things he'd bake cookies with them he'd cook with them he actually was with them doing things with them and uh no he was sober and i always know how much he loves his children that that's that's a fact 100 150 and my sister was there had a lot of friends in long island and i'm the type of mother that you know i have children with this man i have to respect that as long as he's a good dad and they're being safe with him um it's not for me to play god you know and be like you get to see your kids like this or yeah that's not cool i agree but yeah if there were ever a time where people would be understanding yes they would be but he but he demonstrated all uh he was just really being a great dad it's it's kind of crazy though like how crammed this timeline is though for you to get to this zen because in a way like dealing with a progressively deteriorating marriage for what seven eight years something like that he's a drug addict that makes it ten times worse yes he then gets sober but it's miserable for a year he then gets a he gets under federal indictment he's facing 40 years in prison if things go wrong and like you divorce him you start dating you find a man you love he does something stupid you move to california like this is all happening like that part the end yeah happens so fast and yet you're able to get yourself to a place where a you can fall in love with it again but also be like you can have the zen to step back and be like you know what he actually you know i i hated this guy in a lot of ways yeah based on where it got to but he does really care about his kids my kids with him yeah and he's a good like you use the words like he's a good dad at that time yeah yeah yeah he was a great dad so and i'm just not i don't know again if i thought they were unsafe if i thought he was still doing drugs but he was really a perfect citizen except for the atlantic city thing you know for that little moment but because he's being watched yeah right so he's he's very calm and you weren't worried about him going back to drugs though i really wasn't because he's that type of person you know wouldn't you like once he makes his mind up he's in it um yeah he's he's he's really like that and if i saw any signs of that then that wouldn't be the case but then he moved to california two years later to be with them yeah to be with them all before prison so they let him move to california they did yeah how'd that work i don't know i don't know how he did that by a judge i know i don't know maybe i really no i don't really know honestly i don't know but i just know he he did he moved to california and it was probably nice for him too yeah it was really nice for all of us just to start over yeah yeah now how how close was he to you out in california 10 minutes away oh that's dangerously close yeah he was close he was close you handled this so well i'd be like freaking out like all right maybe an hour that'd be good yeah no uh it was okay you know i knew listen i know how much i love my kids and i know how important they are to me one of if not the most common dms i get on instagram are many of you asking me what my favorite books are well today's your lucky day because if you use the link in my description below to join my newsletter i'm going to give you my top 10 book recommendations right now also if you'd like to join my clipping community for a chance to make money producing content from the show you can do so via the discord link in my description below and finally you can join my patreon for early uncensored releases of the full episodes via the patreon link in my description below as always please take one second to subscribe and i'll see you in the next one subscribe button if you haven't already i really appreciate that also the like button's a big help and you can join my newsletter via the link in the description below so he did that and i'm sure he wants to start over too yeah you know not be where everybody's talking about you and because california new york's pretty far yes yeah it's very far a few miles there yeah and it's a totally different lifestyle totally different way of being and um nobody knew like when i moved nobody knew about any of it right i was like brought it up right but it's not like if i lived on long island where everybody be talking about it when you were like called the duchess like he would refer to that movie and stuff were you ever because of his high profile rich guy running around new york doing some crazy shit once in a while was that like a public thing too where you were referred that way when he was arrested so that's just like a that was like an inside yeah yeah yeah yeah so you're totally anonymous yes out there yeah there's no movie there's no book right there's nothing nobody knows anything yeah so it was great yeah so he didn't go to prison till like oh five something like that yeah maybe oh five oh six i don't know remember exactly but it was it was a few years later yeah probably oh five and what did he do like three four years 22 months okay so a little less than two years but he had been with his kids as they're growing up before that so how did you guys handle like oh well now he's yeah he's gone for a little bit we told the kids we told the kids together i don't even remember that i think my kids probably remember it more than i do but we did we told them and they visited him with my uncle and my aunt would take them um i think twice you didn't take him to do it definitely not okay yeah not your scene no no and that wasn't my place that was in my place but yeah so and then i restarted my life were you thinking at this time like you wanted to take your personal trauma and like actually make this into something where you could use as an expertise was that a really a thought no it was never a thought never it was not a thought i actually just decided around 38 that i was going to go back to school to become a therapist because i believe therapy had saved my life right okay so maybe i asked that wrong that's kind of what i'm thinking yeah but it wasn't like i wanted to help this population oh which is that happens much later on for me i just want to be a therapist to everybody i'm not like oh i want to help women i'm like i want to help people with personality disorders couples anxiety depression and so i go back to school and that's when he starts to write the book or he had written the book i don't remember he might have written the book by then wasn't it like tommy chung yeah i told him to do it yeah because he did it in jail so it had to be like 2005 2006 right i go back to school i think 2007 okay and um i got my master's and then you have to do 3 000 hours to be a licensed clinician 3 000 hours of face-to-face therapy okay to get trained wait that's a lot of hours that's a lot of hours yeah that's a good thing though yes absolutely yeah and then i sound like oh my god i have to do this i might as well just stay in and get my doctorate while i'm doing the hours and then i did that and then that's um when yeah i think it was like the movie came out in 2013 i finished my doctor in 2015 now he writes the book you had said this earlier in our conversation he's like i did it for us and you're like no no the fuck you didn't yeah but it comes out i believe like it did pretty well like yes before the movie it was a bestseller yeah it was very good so you read it like you said it's comedic there's things that are certainly remembered differently but how how quickly after being published did he first say to you hey they're looking at making a movie about this you know he always said it i think all along but i really didn't pay attention to it i was like it'll never be a movie yeah i'm like it's gonna be a movie it's not gonna be a movie but i should have known i should have known i should have known i should have known to believe him when you should have known to believe him yeah because when he said he would do something yeah then he's gonna do it yeah he's gonna do it yeah he's actually i have to say this this is really bad to say now but it's been a while since i worked on wall street when we were training to do our jobs yeah someone got a hold of the stratton oakmont sales manual oh my god and i will admit we did read that cover to cover yeah i hope no one in the office saw that but he was uncanny yeah at being able to sell people like we haven't really addressed that today like yes yes he's love bombing you he's doing oh but he's selling me oh yeah yeah there's nobody like him to sell like like he could sell sand to someone in saudi arabia it's unbelievable it's true to this day yeah did you ever see because he he did i don't know if he did an episode this had to be like five six years ago with grant cardone did you ever see this or hear about i think i've heard about it but i don't i've not seen it i've never seen his podcast grant cardone some psycho-scientologist like claims to be all about sales and jordan it's really hard to watch that and not think jordan's a hundred percent right because you can say what you want about jordan with the fraud and all that like yeah he knows how to sell he knows how to sell this guy doesn't know sales at all like he doesn't know sales at all like you're sitting here telling him to sell and he doesn't know how to sell and he doesn't know how to sell and he doesn't know how to sell and he doesn't know how to sell and he doesn't know how to sell and you're like watching it and you're like holy shit because he's just picking it apart and he can smell it yeah he's smart he's got the skill in both directions which has got to be tough because then he can use you know in the wrong ways he can use that as a manipulation tactic because he knows when he's getting sold or when someone's trying to pull one around him that's right yeah yeah no he's a great great great seller yeah now when when did you uh find out it was gonna be scorsese was that not until the call about can you know i knew about that i knew that it was scorsese and leonardo i was like okay here we go yeah the hits just keep on coming with jb that's just what happens he's the gift that keeps on giving yeah yeah and um so no and then i was just like okay you know and and it just again it was bigger than me there was nothing i could do about it and so at some point i was like i'm just gonna surrender you because there's just there was nothing i can do like when you can't control a situation am i going to ruminate about it am i going to fret about it constantly i'm like no i got to focus on my life my kids and it ended up turning out very well for me yeah yeah and you didn't talk for years after this came out you didn't open up a tiktok till like a few years ago i think till 2022 what made you because again like it ended up being iconic everyone can think of these scenes right here obviously margo did a hell of a job yeah making this iconic but you know what made you suddenly you know 10 years later nine years later whatever it was be like all right you know i'll i'll come out and talk now well one of my young patients because i had social i had my instagram since 2017 and one of my young patients says you have to go on tiktok i'm like i'm not going on tiktok i'm like i'm a 54 year old woman i'm not filming myself every day that is not what i'm doing i'm not filming myself every day that is that's ridiculous she was like nadine you need to go on tiktok shout out to alex and so i called one of my friends and i'm like can you come film me you know so we do some films we do some videos but i'm doing it mostly about psychology so then she comes over my my friend to film me again and i said you know there's this there's this youtube um video on tiktok i mean on there's this youtube video that has a million views of me she was like what i said yeah it's me with my uh father-in-law max she goes are you serious and i said yeah she goes we're gonna start to film about the wolf of wall street and as soon as she said that i started to shake 25 years later i started to shake why'd you shake because i was like because that's scared like my body just my body remembers your body keeps the score the body holds the trauma and she was like you can do it it's time for you to tell your story and i was just like well you know there are a lot of women in my office coming in abused still i'm like this is ridiculous and so now i'm starting to think to write my book right i might have been writing my book at that point i think i might have been writing my book and so i did like a few videos and they went viral yeah right away of course and i and they were like more and more we want to understand more we want to know more duchess we love you you know and i was like wow it's amazing though that that would make you shake 25 years later it would make you shake 25 years later it when you think about that 15 years into that-- - Yeah. like i know that would make you shit even if it's not all true and they change some things yeah concept of like reliving that to billions of people seeing it but it wasn't me telling it yes you actually it's not me right so and i am i am a naturally i'm an introvert even though it doesn't seem like it but i really i could see that recharged by writing and doing things like that and so i was freaked out to do it but i knew i could take this insanely popular movie and exploit it to help women everywhere and so because that was what my book was about what what did back back to when it came out though like what did your now husband think about it again like he was cool he was cool about it he just was like okay here we go it's like i'm married to a badass yeah oh then you know what happened he'd go on the golf course and the guys would be like you know you i saw your wife naked in that movie he's like it's not my wife i mean it was symbolically yeah yes yes so he's he's very cool about it he's great he didn't actually reenact anything no he didn't he's just a great guy so he was very supportive of the whole thing what about your step kids too because like they're like you know they weren't around for any of this yeah that you know i don't know everybody was you know i think and when you when you're parents the fish stinks from the head if the parents are cool the kids are cool yeah you know we weren't like oh my god could you i mean i actually had jordan over the day the movie came out you had him over yeah yeah to like talk about it no because i have it's came out christmas day and i have my kids in the morning and he takes him in the afternoon right and i could tell when i spoke to him he was nervous and i think my son had gotten like a weird phone call and i said you know what instead of going out why don't you bring why don't you just come here like i have leftover prime rib and potatoes and he did for old time's sake yeah with his with his fiance and my husband and we watched old movies of the kids and yeah so i had him over the day this is the modern family show we need right here this is way i like this plot line better you like it better yeah that's cool it's it's just really cool that you guys all had like such clarity on it you know yeah it it blew up it's a cultural phenomenon like we'll be talking about it 40 years from now just you had the greatest director the greatest actor of the era and then everyone else in it was incredible it's funny as well like can you laugh at it like obviously you have your own personal whatever yes yes i can i can laugh at it you know um and i think it's important that i do get to tell my narrative now yeah right and so that is the beauty of tiktok and because i'm not a tiktok fan you know i did suffer a lot right so so but i can hold both two things can be true i was very traumatizing and it's funny and i get to use it and to me that's the best part now jordan was not so thrilled once i started to use it oh he wasn't no nope you get a phone call about that uh kind of yeah yeah what do you what he said he just was like your mom i can't believe she's doing this to me and i'm like jordan i can't believe you're doing this to me and i'm like jordan i can't believe jordan's my victim now is he she was on the other foot i just said your dad made a movie and wrote a book i'm always going to be respectful about it i can do a three minute fucking tiktok yes yeah he didn't consult you on writing the book and consult you on right right on the movie right right even though he kind of says he did but no and i just said i'm not i'm not doing this to i'm not going to say anything about your dad that he hasn't said already 10 times worse right right so i'm just going to tell my narrative and i'm doing it to help women and the train has left the station i'm doing it outside of some of the things they changed in the story or the timeline or little scenes that didn't happen what do you think was the biggest thing about you particularly that i don't know was misrepresented in there hmm i mean honestly they portrayed her as a young girl who's madly in love who loves her kids who's trying to like chase this guy's coattails right and keep up with him so i mean they just miss the depth of my character i mean clearly who i am really in my authenticity and i think that they they showed me very getting very jealous all the time about women and we fought all the time about women we really never fought about women we fought about his drugs right but that probably wouldn't have been as funny yeah to tell the story i get it you know because it's a lot sadder it's a lot sadder yeah it's a lot it's a lot darker and you know terry winter writes jordan in a way that's the way he wrote tony soprano yes that's exactly right i love terry yeah the very likable you know he writes about a very complex character yeah like you knew tony soprano was this narcissistic philandering psychopath yeah murderer yeah but you're rooted for him but you're rooted for him right right so terry winter has a knack for doing that so have you ever talked with him about that i met terry once i met terry once that's where the scene uh with the straw with the wine comes from wait that was real yeah that was real do you still do that no okay that's good it's kind of funny it was a phase yeah but did you talk to him about that like you know you're making him lovable or you didn't really know at that time if you're just discussing no but i know i loved the sopranos and i knew that about yeah uh tony soprano god rest game james gansalafini was incredible incredible actor so good um so i know that that's i didn't know i know that that's the way he wrote the character so i'm not surprised at the way jordan came across i think part of it is though like not all women but there's a pattern where women at a high level fall in love with two phases of the man right they fall in love with the man and you can think the more you know usual traits ambition provider protector a lot of things you didn't get by the way right you know as it would turn out but they fall in love with that and then they fall in love with the other side of the personality where he shows like the little boy sometimes yes that's a very good point how do you know that you're so i've thought about this you're so psychological yes that's a very important point because often when i was with jordan i would have a lot of empathy for his little boy there you go yeah because that's the thing tony soprano episode one yeah look at the ducks yes you know what i mean like he's like he's like a fucking kid and shit yeah yeah and there's there was this thing where he could turn on this and jim obviously did an amazing job showing this but he could turn on this rage and this nastiness and this murderous whatever and then the next minute you know want to hand you a few hundred dollar bills and you know go make some hot dogs or play with the ducks and then you're like oh my god i'm gonna be like oh my god i'm gonna be like oh my god and with jordan it's kind of like the way they show it in the movie and i don't know if maybe it even if you look back on it if some of this actually felt this way while you're going through it it's like he's this crazy psycho macho man but then and and he's got these horrible traits and addicted to drugs and whatever but then he'll do some shit where you're like you're like a little kid and you almost want to take care of him yeah yeah exactly exactly that's that's what creates the bond because these abusers aren't bad all the time yeah they're just not that's the tricky part that's the tricky part because they show you the humanity yeah because if they were you wouldn't be with them and especially for somebody like me i mean clearly i'm highly empathetic that's why i'm a therapist right or i'd have no patience if i wasn't yeah and i have a lot and so but unfortunately that empathy gets weaponized yeah you know you say you're an introvert by the way like i'd be surprised about that i'm not because to do your job in a way right you have to be the kind of person that was always kind of watching other people rather than yeah making yourself the middle of things and you come across that way like there's some times today where yeah i gotta probe a little more than you would expect you know to get you to yes kind of go there but that's a really good for what you do that's an amazing trait to have i think yeah yeah yeah and i'm and i love people and i believe you know even after everything i've been through and after all the stories i hear all day long from women which are atrocious yeah all these dirty john guys that are just abusing and betraying and financial abuse and sexual addiction and yeah if i sat here one day just invite me to come tell the stories you'll have the best podcast on the planet because the stories that i hear all day long are atrocious and what people can do to each other in love in love yeah supposedly right when they're in love right air quotes yeah is uh is can be very very disturbing and yet i'm still an optimist because i know that people can heal people can heal do you think they can change i think they can change to a point i do to a point yeah to a point yeah yeah what do you think of jordan today today um him and i really don't have much contact i mean i saw him actually two days ago because he was with my daughter so i bumped into him much contact no i don't but and i like he we were just happened to be at a restaurant in in westport together and i just quickly said hello to him and walked away because you know i don't really have that much to say to him you know I just don't I mean he's a great dad he's there for my kids we get along you know when we see each other but we're not connected in any way like we used to I think me talking about it really created that separation yeah because he didn't like that yeah do you think like I would say when I hear something like the fact that he freaked out on you for you know being able to actually tell your side of the story after he put everything public that there are aspects of him that certainly have not changed. Right. But do you think there are other aspects of him that maybe have for the better? Yes, for sure. For sure, yes. Yeah, yeah. He's happily married to a lovely young woman. He's, like I said, he's great with his kids. But here's the thing. It's like, you know, these sorts of very toxic relationships, and they happen all the time, and all we have to do is turn on the news. Yeah. I mean, we see them all the time. They're very hard to endure. But for me, it made me really look deep inside of myself. And I took it as an opportunity. Sometimes I say the wolf was my Buddha. Because if he hadn't cracked me open like that, and I'm not giving him credit for who I am today, but that experience forced me to be deeply reflective and really grow. And so from that, now I have a career where I help hundreds of women every single day get out of these. And it's beyond fulfilling. So when you asked me, you know, did I think I was going to help, you know, do this for a living in this capacity? I wish I could tell you I had some grand scheme. Like I was this genius that thought up this Machiavellian plan. But I didn't. And I offer that to your listeners to kind of trust the process of life too. Yes. And it just all emerged. I went through that. I moved. The book got written. I went back to school. The movie got made. Like you said, I was silent forever. You know, but then something in me was like, it's time. And it happened to also probably because we were hearing about narcissism so much in the zeitgeist. And then I wrote my book, Run Like Hell. And so you just never know where life is going to take you. Yeah, it seems like you are somebody who you, you never had a grand scheme on stuff. Otherwise, maybe you wouldn't have gotten into some of these situations. Correct. Not that I think it's a good thing to have a grand scheme on anything. No, but you're right. But you're right. Yeah. Like you, but what I'm saying, I mean, this is a compliment. It's like you let life happen to you and then you're learning from things. And then through that, creating new opportunities that then puts you in a position for things you never expected to happen to happen. It's like, I think that's like kind of the beauty of life. Like people will overuse this phrase where they're like, I don't regret it. I don't regret anything I've ever done because it made me who I am today. You can abuse that phrase, right? Sure. Because there's things you probably would want to take back and things like that. But you can't change the things you've done or the experiences you've had. You can only then try to use the fuel of learning from them and maybe you turn, you know, turning lemons into lemonade. That's right. Kind of like you did. Yeah. Yeah. And it wasn't always easy and a lot of very tough moments, a lot of tears. And, you know, I lost my mother to cancer. I'm a cancer survivor. Oh, I'm sorry to hear that. Yeah. So, you know, life- When did you have cancer? I had cancer when I was 39. Oh, wow. Yeah. And then I've had like some bouts of it. I've had it more than once. So I've- In the middle of all this. In the middle of all this. Yeah. So- You're a strong lady. I'm a strong lady. No doubt about that. I'm a strong lady. So, you know, life is not easy, but that's why I believe in therapy. If you keep working on yourself, you can build resilience and resources because life is always going to throw stuff at us, no matter who we are. It just, you could walk out of here and get in a car accident. I mean, it's, that's just the way life is, but my name actually means hope. Yep. So I'm just a hopeful person. That's amazing. Yeah. What's that like though? I mean, you're young, you're 39, you get diagnosed with cancer. Like, I can't even fathom that. It was, it was not, it sucked. I mean, I was really- It was really, really hard, but again, I had a lot of support. I caught it very early. You're like, I'm going to be good. That optimism kind of comes in. Yeah. It was scary. It was scary. Yeah. It was scary. But, you know, I've learned that where there's fear, there's transformation. Where there's fear, there's transformation. That's another bar. Yeah. We got a few bars today. Yeah. Yeah. That's the truth. And so we can't hide from life. We have to approach it. And I think I was lucky. I was lucky enough to have a good enough beginning to give me that solid foundation. Yeah. A lot of people don't have that. A lot of people don't. How much do you think, that's one of my favorite topics. I think about this all the time because I'm in a different way than you with different life experiences. I like to think like I'm a very empathetic person as well, but I don't like to use that to excuse acts. Right? Yes. So I'm like an extreme example. I apologize with a terrorist for blowing up a building for 100 people. Correct. But what I do try to empathize with is how did they get there? Where were they from? What was their environment? How did that happen? Right. As a therapist and someone who works with people psychologically, how much do you think, you don't have to put a percentage on, I don't want to make it weird, but how much do you think it's people are based on their environment molding them versus the free will of their decisions to get them to where they are? Yeah. nature versus nurture right so uh 60 40 you know but did you see the new show adolescence i've heard about it i haven't seen you'll like it you'll like it you know the kids a 13 year old psychopath his parents are very normal so you know i think that you like biologically you could be born you know and then you mix it with a family and then a culture right so it's always multiple causality it's just not one clear linear thing it's tough though too because i agree it's it's multiple but it's like you know people overuse the line i say this all the time where they're like if i were blank then i would blank okay you don't know you don't in most scenarios you don't know how you would handle something it's very easy to like from your glass house be like i would definitely be like this oh yeah no you don't know shit you don't know until you're in it but like I when I see some of some of these kids who grow up with nothing and then there's literally no opportunity and then they get taken in and let's call it what it is like groomed this is an extreme example but it happens all the time in this country too yeah yeah they get groomed at age nine or ten or eleven when that kid's you know riding around with a glock at 16 and and shooting indiscriminately out the window again I'm not empathizing with the act but like statistically I'm like how the fuck was it not gonna get there like what did you expect of course right there's that saying hurt people hurt people yes why and that's why i do what i do and that's why i even come on the podcast these podcasts because i believe education is what's going to heal us yeah right education about psychology education about relationships it's the only weapon we really have because when i go to my house my daughter's house now and i see her with her lovely husband oh they're 50 50 partners and they have a beautiful boy and a baby on the way we broke generational trauma jordan yeah it's amazing right and that's what it's about and they have a good relationship with both of you yes yes which is like yes that's amazing it's amazing so that's what it's about right she's a more evolved version of me her child will hopefully be a more evolved version of her if this world makes it at the rate that it's going but yeah that's what we're here for i think i guess when you were when you were doing your phd you said you went back at like i went 38 yeah so you were doing your phd like while you were battling cancer too i think it was right after yeah wow yeah it was right when i went to my master's i just i'd had cancer and then i got my master's yeah that's amazing you did that but so you got you got into becoming a therapist and you just said a few minutes ago alluded to it so i wanted to go there like the women you ended up helping are women that sometimes have patterns that are very similar to things you went through, but then there's also all these unique situations and everything. Did you continue to learn a lot more about yourself in the past through these women? Of course. Yeah. I mean, when I wrote my book, Run Like Hell, A Therapist's Guide to Recognizing, Escaping, and Healing from Trauma Bonds. Link in description. Yeah. That was, I learned so much more. I learned about psychopathy, Machiavellianism. I learned about the dark tetrad. Okay. Let's break these down. Psychopathy. Let's start there. Yeah. So there's a term called the dark tetrad, and it came out in 2002. And so it describes a person that has psychopathy, Machiavellianism, sadism, and narcissism, right? Great traits. All great traits. Yeah. And so we've seen these individuals. We've seen them with Jeffrey Epstein, right? They are in the zeitgeist, P. Diddy, Puff Daddy, what do we call him? Whatever. And so they have psychopathy, meaning they're beyond exploitative, highly callous, will just use and abuse anybody. They have high stress immunity, like nothing stresses them out, right? They can tolerate anything that you or I couldn't deal with. Then there's narcissism, which is, you know, you're self-absorbed, you're too conservative. exploit people, but it's more about admiration and your image. And you can be very grandiose or you can be a vulnerable narcissist and be more neurotic. And then there's Machiavellianism, which nobody really talks about. And that's when these people are highly strategic, highly manipulative. Consciously? Consciously. They're planning, right? There's a plan there to, but they have bad intentions. And then sadism is the worst because that's a person who literally gets pleasure out of seeing the people that they know hurt and suffer. Do you think Jordan had that? Did he get pleasure out of making, I was going to say, I don't, I didn't see that. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. So, so, but there are people running around in the world, right? Like your shoemaker down the street and your baker. Or dark tetrad. And they can hide in plain sight. They can put on another, it's their multiple personality. Yeah. They wear the mask of sanity, which was a book by Henry Cleckley, I think the expert on, on psychopathy. Yeah. They wear a mask of sanity. And so, so what happens is that these people end up in homes with children and wives and, and that's what I deal with. Helping women. I educate them about it. So you're coming across a lot of different clients who have literally dealt with dark tetrad. Yes. Yeah. Dark tetrad. Yes. And you're able to see like, oh my God, very clearly your husband or boyfriend has all these traits. Yes. Yes. Yes. Now, how hard is it? I mean, I know it's very person to person, everyone's different, but how hard is it to not necessarily get them to see what that means, but to get them to see that they are literally experiencing that? Usually by the time they've gotten to me, they've found me on social, social media and they're like, she gets it. Somebody I, cause usually these women feel very crazy and invalidated because that pathological partner is gaslighting them. Yeah. I didn't do that. You didn't see that. That, that didn't happen. You know? And then, so they're, they're just totally feel crazy because they've been invalidated and they've been gaslit and they've been lied to and betrayed and manipulated. And I tell them, no, that did happen. And it's very painful when it's from somebody that you thought was a bad person. And I tell them, no, that did was going to love you. Do you come across people sometimes though that you work with where it's like maybe some things are just going wrong and they're thinking the worst, but it turns out to be like, oh no, you're not married to a sadist or something. It's just, you don't come across that. I don't come across that. Cause like I said, by the time. That was a quick no. No, by the time they get to me, they've, they know that that's this. Cause if you like, if you go on my Instagram, I talk about Dr. Tedrad all the time. I talk about all these concepts cause I'm constantly educating people. That's Jordan's wife. What are you looking at over here? She's like nice. Yeah, no, but, um, so I talk about it all day long on there, you know, and I'm really educating all the people. Um, yeah, there's, now it helps also that you've been made into such a public, I mean, obviously you've now started to come out yourself, but your figure, who you are is such a public domain kind of thing. Exactly. Exactly. So people are like, oh, she didn't just get educated about it. She's lived through this. So I have street cred and professional. Yeah. And, and like, I imagine you got to have the conversation where you're like, well, a lot of the themes are right, but also here's other things that were. Happening that the movie doesn't show or the book doesn't talk about. So you have to understand, like, I'm a, I'm a person outside of that. I'm a person outside of that. But yeah, so they, and they trust me and they know that I have their best interests at heart and I've been through it and I get it. There's nothing like experience. Experience is the greatest teacher on the planet. A hundred percent. Yeah. So I've lived it. I get it. And I empathize with them. And I understand that coercive control is real. Do you think in any of like those dark tetras, you're like, I'm a person outside of that. I'm a person outside Let's start with the most, the worst kind of thing. Like, do you think in any of those relationships, there actually is any love, but the person is sick. So obviously like it doesn't manifest, right. But they actually do love them. They could think that they love them. Yeah. They can think that they love them. But the way I describe this person is that they will, I call them a pathological lover in my book. Pathological means mentally unwell. And I say, this person will use harm, exploit and betray you to get their needs met for money, power, pleasure, and status. That's simple. And that's not right. Because that's about intention. Yes. I mean, that's like my biggest thing with people. I don't, I don't use this to explain away things that people do when it's bad or whatever. Like there has to be a medium there. But my number one thing with people is what are your intentions, right? If you have good intentions and you just like, really fucked up, like, all right, well, if this happens seven times, we got a problem. Right. If it's a pattern. Right. Right. But people, we all make mistakes. Of course. Yeah. Because that's one thing about the social media era, especially, I feel like is so unfortunate. We assume worst intentions at all times on everything with people. Yes. And I don't think that's fair. Like I watch people in my business get taken out of context on 20 second clips every day. It happens to me too. It does. And like, you know, smaller, but I ignore it. I wonder if I were like the size of Joe Rogan or something, if I could ignore all this. Cause like, you'll see, like, like they, they didn't say that. Like I actually saw one today with Michelle Obama. So like, there's this fucking stupid internet thing where people are like, Oh, she's a man. So she literally, so she's talking to another man on a podcast and he's a, and he's a black guy. And she goes, so as a black man, you know, how does it feel to, I don't even remember what they were talking about, but people then took that clip and they're like, Oh, she's admitting she's a man. And it's like, you know, it's so stupid. That's cool. Yeah. That's really, really cruel. I know. Well, social media is the wild west, you know, and you have to have thick skin for it. And luckily I don't give a shit what anybody thinks about me and I'm older, you know, I'm 57. So I have a developed sense of self and, and when I get a troll, which I really, really don't. And the only ones I get are, you know, probably the guys that left Jordan. They're like, you just left it when he lost all his money. And I'm like, I'm not going to explain to this guy my whole history. I'm just like, I heart it or I just block and delete. There you go. You know, it's not worth it. And then I looked, they have one follower and they've never posted. Jordan might be buying Qatari bot farms. You got to check that out or something from the Philippines. Maybe he's doing that. You know, so it's like, so it's, I think if you're going to put yourself out there, unfortunately in this world, I don't agree with it. Cause that's the last thing I would ever do to somebody. But I don't know. The world is just getting meaner and meaner, unfortunately. Yeah. I mean, and, and you had kids who grew up as, as like I did say, I guess they're similar ages to me. We're like, they grew up in the start to become a major thing and now it is the thing. And now they're having kids. So your grandkids can't even imagine growing up in the world with this and the screen everywhere. Like, how do you think like as a parent or just in general, like how, how you can raise kids properly who are growing up with social media is like, and the internet and constant over-transparency is the norm. Like as, as a therapist, like how do you even go approaching that? I think what you have to do is you have to realize it's here. It's never going away and you have to really teach them how to deal with it. You know, who to respond to, who not to respond to, what age you're going to be. And I think that's, I think that's a really important thing. I think that's a I mean, there should be lessons in school now about social media, right? And how, and how do we deal with it? It's not going away, you know, I mean, AI too, right? But listen, when you think about it, the radio, the TV, the computer, we're like, these things are going to destroy the world. You know, we're still here. I think, you know, I think we have to also just learn how to deal with these mediums. I mean, I use Claude, which is my chat GPT person. I use Claude, which is my person nonstop. You called him a person. Oh yeah. I'm always like, thank you so much, Claude. You're the best. You see, that's using like millions of dollars of computational, like saying please and thank you. Now they're like, don't do that. Oh really? Oh yeah. Sam Altman came out the other day. Thank you. So I won't do that. Yeah. I just think I'm being nice. Well, my son told me to do it because one day they're going to take over. Be very nice. Don't forget about it. It's like, it's like when you look at the kid and you're making my best friend, make the AI your best friend. That's right. You make the AI your best friend. But yeah, I just think you have to educate. I think you have to educate these kids about how to use it. It's hard though, because you can't helicopter kids at all times. You don't know what they're clicking. You don't know. And that's where you have to have a really great relationship with your children. Yeah. That they're going to come to you when things go bad because they have to have their own experiences in the real world. That's how they're going to learn. Right. And as a parent, you can't freak out, you know, when they learn the hard way because we have to give our children the chance to have optimal frustration. everybody wants to like dive in and save them don't do that they've agreed on that yeah dive in and save them you can't dive in and save them it's just they're dealing with stakes like we have more resources now than we did 40 years ago right so it should be easier to parent but in a lot of ways with the resources we have the price we pay is that there's a constant you know influx of things yeah that aren't you that aren't that aren't that aren't them yeah thank you guys for checking out this clip if you haven't already subscribed please subscribe and hit the like button on this video it is a huge huge help and if you'd like to check out this clip's full podcast episode that link is in the description below or right here and finally you can follow me on instagram and x by using the links in my description below