#342 - Netflix Doc Target BREAKS SILENCE on Childhood Trauma & Autism | Sarma Melngailis

Summary

Julian Dorey Podcast #342

Netflix Doc Target BREAKS SILENCE on Childhood Trauma & Autism | Sarma Melngailis

Date: October 3, 2025
Guest: Sarma Melngailis
Host: Julian Dorey

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Overview

This episode welcomes Sarma Melngailis, the former restaurateur and central subject of the Netflix documentary Bad Vegan. The conversation dives deeply into Sarma’s experiences with psychological manipulation, her complex childhood, coping with trauma, undiagnosed autism, and how all these facets intersected in her adult life — culminating in her high-profile legal troubles. Listeners get a candid, introspective, and often raw look at how her past shaped her choices, as well as broader lessons about cult dynamics, relationships, and resilience.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Reality of Psychological Manipulation & Cult Dynamics

• Manipulation is Real and Personal: Sarma recounts how the psychological abuse she endured wasn’t at the hands of some “fictional sociopathic character” but “a real person. He’s still out there” [00:00]. She explicitly notes her experience was “identical to being in a cult,” but one-on-one rather than in a group.
• Cults & Individual Abuse Parallel: Sarma draws comparisons between her abuser and notorious cult leaders like Keith Raniere (Nexium) and Larry Ray, highlighting how such individuals “study you, figure out your personal biggest nightmare…and then make it come true” [00:49, 05:20].
• Victim-Blaming & Public Perception: She clarifies that as much as public narratives (like in Bad Vegan) focus on crime and spectacle, the realities are much more psychologically nuanced, and public misunderstanding can add insult to injury.

Quote:

“My experience on so many levels was identical to being in a cult. It’s just that it was one-on-one... There are certain types of people who will study you, figure out your biggest nightmare… and now I’m going to make it come true.”
— Sarma [00:00–01:00, recurring theme]

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2. Life in Prison & Social Adaptability

• Sarma discusses adjusting to life in Rikers Island, her unexpectedly calm experience among inmates, and people’s misperceptions about her.
• She reflects on how quickly people adapt to new realities, drawing a comparison with society’s reaction to the pandemic lockdown: “You realize, oh shit, all right, I gotta go in here... Then that just becomes your reality.” [02:41]

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3. Childhood, Family Dynamics, and Early Trauma

• Background: Raised in Newton, Massachusetts. Parents divorced at age 10; both remarried quickly, with her mother’s new husband bringing six older children into the family, creating chaos and lack of supervision [08:07–09:31].
• Father’s Influence: Her father, a Latvian immigrant and MIT physicist, didn’t push academic achievement onto Sarma — something she misinterpreted as indifference until much later [10:06–12:12].
• Sense of Self: Sarma attributes her independence and self-motivation partly to this family dynamic. However, the lack of boundaries and supervision facilitated early exposure to older social circles and risky behaviors.

Quote:

“There wasn’t a lot of supervision and a lot of older siblings… I had a pretty independent high school.”
— Sarma [09:31]

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4. Autism Diagnosis and Reframing the Past

• Post-Documentary Revelation: After Bad Vegan, Sarma received copious messages suggesting she might be on the spectrum. A thorough evaluation confirmed adult-diagnosed autism, which “reframed everything about my childhood and my whole past experiences” [14:19–15:45].
• Sensory Processing Issues: Diagnosis also included sensory processing disorder, helping explain lifelong quirks — like hypersensitivity to sound and smell [18:15–19:47].
• Reactions to Diagnosis: Sarma expresses relief rather than shame, feeling validated and better able to contextualize past relationship struggles and feelings of not fitting in.

Quote:

“A lot of things now make a lot more sense in that framework.”
— Sarma [15:45]

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5. Vulnerability, Predation, and Female Experience on the Spectrum

• Predatory Dynamics: Sarma openly discusses becoming involved with much older men as a young teenager (dating a 23-year-old at 15, losing her virginity to a 21-year-old at 14), and how her inability to read intentions or set boundaries made her susceptible [34:24–44:11].
• Attachment vs. Love: She distinguishes her later attachment to her abuser (“a sort of sickening attachment”) from genuine love. This insight is informed by other survivors of cults and psychological abuse [55:01–60:17].
• Shame & Lasting Impact: The absence of meaningful intervention, either from adults or female peers, and ongoing exploitation, resulted in long-term issues with self-worth and boundaries.

Quote:

“I just never learned boundaries… There was nobody looking after me in that way.”
— Sarma [34:24–36:12]

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6. Adult Relationships, Trust, and Seeking Safety

• Patterns: Sarma describes a pattern of alternating between genuinely good partners and highly toxic, exploitative ones. After chaos, she’d seek “no drama”—such as her positive, healthy relationship with Tobin (much younger, stable, non-jealous) [70:07–70:31, 120:01–121:02].
• Animal Rescue & Attachment: She notices a strong correlation between women who have experienced abuse and deep attachment to rescue animals: “You kind of want to be saved yourself” [49:27–50:47].

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7. Female Friendships, Isolation, and the Downside of Independence

• Lack of Female Support: Sarma’s enduring friendships are mostly with men. She admits, “I don’t have the lifelong BFF girlfriend…that makes it easier for these people to do what they do” [122:57–123:47].
• Obligation and Anxiety: She often avoids forming close friendships for fear of disappointing people or being a ‘burden’; she relates friendships to romantic relationships in their emotional ‘cost’ [126:09–126:40].

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8. Achievement, Career, and Creative Fulfillment

• Stellar Academic Record: Despite chaos, Sarma excelled, self-motivated to get straight A’s. She shares her journey to Penn and ultimately the Wharton School [93:08–95:22].
• Early Career: She worked grueling, high-pressure jobs in investment banking (Bear Stearns, Bain Capital, High Yield Funds) before recognizing a disconnect between financial success and personal fulfillment [95:38–103:55].
• Pursuit of Passion: Eventually, with support from her then-husband, she left banking for culinary school, pursuing her true passion for food—a thread going back to childhood [139:07–140:14].

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9. Broad Reflections on Sociopathy and Manipulation

• “Confessions of a Sociopath”: Sarma commends this book for its firsthand insight into the sociopathic mind, emphasizing that such people exist and “feel nothing and never will” [74:18–77:54].
• Hard Lessons: Multiple experiences with manipulative people forced her to “remind myself to keep looking for red flags,” likening it to her friend Matt Cox’s struggle to continually resist old tendencies [81:51–83:42].
• Advice & Warnings: The responsibility ultimately falls on us to recognize red flags, nurture outside perspectives, and protect against isolation.

Quote:

“There are a certain type of people out there that will study you, figure out, like, what’s your personal worst nightmare... and now I’m gonna make it come true. And that’s what they do. And then when they’re done with you and you’re totally fucked over... they’re on to the next person.”
— Sarma [74:31–76:53]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

| Timestamp | Speaker | Quote | |-----------|---------|-------| | 00:00 | Sarma | “This isn’t like a novel or a story about a fictional, sociopathic, diabolical character. This is a real person. He’s still out there.” | | 05:18 | Sarma | “[Keith Raniere] was sentenced to 125 years…my experience...was identical to being in a cult. It’s just that it was one-on-one.” | | 14:19 | Sarma | Speaking about public feedback: “Have you ever been diagnosed for autism or Asperger’s? I think you’re on the spectrum.” | | 15:45 | Sarma | “It reframed everything about my childhood and my whole past experiences where a lot of things now make a lot more sense in that framework.” | | 34:24 | Sarma | “Girls who would get this diagnosis of being on the spectrum, it’s almost inevitable that you’re going to get taken advantage of.” | | 49:27 | Sarma | “There’s something about specifically being drawn to animals and shelters and rescue animals and wanting to save them with something where, like, you kind of want to be saved yourself.” | | 55:01 | Julian | “Do you ever feel like people have loved you in your life, for real?” | | 58:14 | Sarma | “Love and attachment can sometimes get conflated…there’s a more pure kind of love where what you feel for someone has nothing to do with what they do for you…it’s just a deep love you have for that person.” | | 74:31 | Sarma | “There are a certain type of people out there that will study you, figure out your biggest nightmare...and now I’m gonna make it come true. And that’s what they do.” | | 122:57 | Sarma | “I don’t have…the lifelong BFF girlfriend who’s all up in my business…makes it that much easier for those people to do what they do.” | | 129:00 | Sarma | “…the TISM diagnosis actually helps a lot for that because it’s like, look, this is who I am—there’s a name for it.” |

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Timestamps & Important Segments

• 00:00–01:00 – Sarma outlines the psychological realities of her abuse: "This is a real person."
• 05:00–06:15 – Parallels between cults (Nexium, Sarah Lawrence) and her own experience.
• 14:17–18:15 – Discovery and impact of her autism diagnosis.
• 34:24–44:11 – Candid discussion of predation, lack of boundaries, and early sexual trauma.
• 49:27–50:47 – Animal rescue as a metaphor for self-rescue among survivors.
• 55:01–60:17 – Deep dive into distinctions between love, attachment, and psychological predation.
• 74:31–76:53 – The chilling intentionality of sociopaths and survival strategies.
• 81:51–83:42 – The struggle to develop and maintain boundaries after abuse.
• 120:01–121:02 – The on-off cycle between stable and chaotic relationships.
• 139:07–140:14 – Transition from banking to culinary school; following creative passion.

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Tone & Language

The episode maintains a deeply personal, introspective, and sometimes darkly humorous tone. Sarma is frank about her self-doubt, trauma, and flaws, while Julian matches her candor with direct and thoughtful questioning. There is no sugarcoating of abuse; instead, there is emotional honesty and a focus on hard-won insights, delivered in accessible language.

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Conclusion: Takeaways

• Psychological manipulation is deeply personal and can happen in intimate, one-on-one contexts that mimic cult dynamics.
• Undiagnosed neurodivergence (like autism) can help explain a lifetime of feeling 'out of place' and can dramatically impact vulnerability in relationships.
• Trauma, especially when compounded by lack of boundaries and supportive friendships, creates long-term challenges with self-worth and trust.
• Genuine recovery and resilience often involve reframing childhood experiences, seeking labels that clarify (not stigmatize), and developing new strategies to spot red flags and cultivate genuine relationships.
• Stories like Sarma’s are a vital warning, not just about "bad people," but about the ordinary ways predation can infiltrate our lives when we aren’t equipped or supported.

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For those interested in exploring these topics further, Sarma recommends "Confessions of a Sociopath" for understanding the mind of manipulators, and reflects on the value of both professional and peer support in long-term healing.

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Transcript

[Saraya]

This isn't like a novel or a story about a fictional, sociopathic, diabolical character. This is a real person. He's still out there. When I was in a relationship with Matthew, that was my first time with a person who doesn't exhibit empathy. This Mr. Fox guy, this guy is one of them. He had a whole restaurant. I was hired to be the recipe tester and help write the book. And I had, like, about a quarter million dollars. About a year and a half into the relationship, I was in debt by the same amount. My experience on so many levels was identical to being in a cult. It's just that it was one on one. There are certain type of people out there that will study you, figure out what would be your personal biggest nightmare. And now I'm gonna make it come true. And I remember thinking, okay, this is really up. It got weirder and weird and sort of as if he had these special powers. And the more confused I got, the easier it became for him to mess with my head. And so.

[Julian]

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.

[Saraya]

You.

[Julian]

Get any tattoos in Rikers?

[Saraya]

I did not. But you can imagine how intimidated people were right. By the duck.

[Julian]

The duck is definitely like.

[Saraya]

They were like, we better stay away from her.

[Julian]

That's right. That's like it. I feel like that could be like. It could pass for a certain gang affiliation. You just make up a gang name and.

[Saraya]

Right. Yeah. Now, after I was there for a while, this thing happened where this woman approached me and wanted to know what I'd done, because she was. She noticed that. She said, everybody leaves you alone. You must have done something really badass. And so I was in a dorm of. Of There are up to 50 women in the dorm at the same time, so I was never in a cell. And she. So there's a lot to observe. And she just thought that I must have done something really horrendous, that everybody kind of left me alone. I didn't know nobody was giving me a hard time. And I just thought that was kind of hilarious because, yeah, no, clearly I hadn't murdered a bunch of people or whatnot. I just had a very. I think I had a very kind of Zen way about being there, that after a while, nobody gave me a hard time.

[Julian]

And, yeah, it's strange. Like, I can't relate because I haven't been in prison. But you do notice how, like, when you look at Covid One day everyone was going about their lives, and the next day everyone said, stay inside. And everyone did. And so people adapted so fast. And I gotta think it's probably a pretty similar thing. Like, you realize, oh, shit, all right, I gotta go in here. I got X amount of time to do. Here we go. And then that just becomes your reality.

[Saraya]

I had exactly that thought when I was there that just how adaptable we are. You know, all of a sudden your life is completely different. And so, you know, you just adjust to the new normal of where you are.

[Julian]

Yeah. Now we got connected through Sarah Edmondson, who's going to be coming on my podcast. She was going to come on earlier this summer, and then we had a scheduling conflict, so I'm excited to do that one. But obviously she could relate to some of the things you went through as well because of her own story. So we'll save that for Sarah's podcast. But there was a documentary on Netflix. I guess this is a few years ago now. Came out.

[Saraya]

Yeah, it came out 2022.

[Julian]

Okay. It's called Bad Vegan, and it covers this whole story and we'll go through it today. But there's a lot going on here because there's like a crime at the end that ends up being prosecuted in court. You get caught up in that and do some prison time. But it was your husband. And I almost want to call him, like, technical husband because it's a strange.

[Saraya]

Thank you. I appreciate that because every time people referred to him as my husband, then, even then, even during that time when somebody refer to him as my husband or he would refer to me as his wife, I always sort of cringed. And. And then sometimes now somebody will refer to him as my ex husband. And it's like, it doesn't. I. It's like I cringe. It's like that. That's. Yeah. So I appreciate that technically he was my husband, but I. There was nothing normal about that.

[Julian]

You are. You are definitely psychologically fascinating to me because there's a. There's a lot going on from your entire life and, like, how it got here. That's why I was curious to. Because, you know, I like looking at stories that are like 12 dimensional.

[Saraya]

Yeah, I appreciate that because I find the psychological side of it really fascinating. And that was something that was completely left out of. Of Bad Vegan is any exploration of that. And the reason why Sarah Edmondson and I relate is she, you know, she's known for having gone through the Nexium culture situation and being one of the whistleblowers on that and the experience that she and other people, that Mark Vicente is somebody that also went through that. And I relate to them and they relate to me because my experience on so many levels was identical to being in a cult. It's just that it was one on one versus being in a group. But so many things about that guy, Keith Ranieri, who's. Who was sentenced to, I think, 125 years.

[Julian]

The Nexium cult leader.

[Saraya]

Yeah, he's. He's locked away. So many things about him and other people, you know, other cult leaders. And I don't know if you're familiar with the story of the Sarah Lauren students and this guy named Larry Ray. It's fascinating. There's a. There's a docu series on Hulu called. I'm forgetting it with the name of it.

[Julian]

We can look it up. Docu series.

[Saraya]

Yeah, it's like about to pop out of my brain.

[Julian]

Okay.

[Saraya]

But anyway, the guy in that, he. He does what he does to a small group of students and his psychology, I think, is very similar to the guy in my story, Stolen Youth. Yeah, perfect. And so it's just. It's a very. A very, very, very similar dynamic as what happened with me. It's just with me there was one of me, or I guess this guy does it kind of one person at a time.

[Julian]

Yes.

[Saraya]

Versus a group of people.

[Julian]

Yeah. There were aspects of him that Matt Cox, in his old days, pre reformed days, was coming to mind. And then I would say, referring to your ex husband. But I would also say there was. There was an even an added element there just with like how he would. I mean, we'll get into it, but how he would tie in, like promises that could never be kept that, you know, like he was a God.

[Saraya]

And. Yeah, it got really weird. And over time it got weirder and weird and sort of a, you know, as if he had these special powers. And the more confused I got, you know, the easier it became for him to. To mess with my head.

[Julian]

Yeah. All right, so we'll go through it. I want to start at the beginning. I kind of want to go through some of your childhood and, and really do it the chronological way. But I will say I. I listened to the whole documentary and you and I were talking right before. I understand why there's some things that you felt weren't covered and we can get into that and how you felt that was going to be covered or not covered. But I can understand how there were some things that you wish were in There or were stated a different way. And I also know you're at the middle of the story, so it's extremely personal to you. It involves reputation and stuff like that. I can imagine how much, like, on pins and needles I would be as well. What I will say is that I don't think it made you look as bad as. As you seem to think. I. I actually felt like, you know, if I were an outsider looking at this, I'm like, if I were grading it, they probably got 80% of the stuff in there that was really important. That, like, the average person, if they're thinking about it, could be like, oh, something's. Something's wrong here. Like this. This is off. And that was probably the most important takeaway. But let's, let's. Let's start with your childhood and everything. Where. Where did you grow up?

[Saraya]

Outside of Boston. The suburb. Newton, Massachusetts.

[Julian]

Siblings? Mom and dad together.

[Saraya]

Sister. Parents divorced when I was 10.

[Julian]

I think it's a tough age.

[Saraya]

Yeah, it's one of those things where I always would forget. Like, I wouldn't remember how old I was, but it wasn't. It wasn't messy. They weren't. I don't have any memories of them fighting or whatnot. It was just one of those things where. Where, you know, they got divorced for whatever reason. And my father always lived nearby, so I was able to. My sister and I saw him periodically. And then both my parents remarried pretty quickly, so my mom remarried a much older guy who had six kids already. They were all older, so that was a bit chaotic. That definitely, I think, had an impact in that, you know, I was the youngest of everybody, and there was a lot of changes. And their mother had a stroke, and then it took six months, and she passed away. While, you know, he and my. He and my mother were together, and so they sort of partially moved into my house, and there was all this chaos. And so, you know, and then just going later on in my junior high and high school years, there wasn't a lot of supervision and a lot of older siblings. So I, you know, I. I had a pretty independent high school.

[Julian]

Yeah, that's. That's different. I haven't heard one like that in a while. So how much. How much older are we talking the other six kids? Like, 10 years.

[Saraya]

The. The youngest one was a year and a half older than me.

[Julian]

Okay.

[Saraya]

And then the rest of them were all older. So when I first met them, some of them were already in college. Graduated from college.

[Julian]

Got it. I mean, that's a huge. That's a huge change, for sure. We're. Prior to your parents divorcing, were you close with both them, or were you closer with one of them than the other?

[Saraya]

I think probably the same.

[Julian]

Okay.

[Saraya]

Yeah.

[Julian]

And what. What was your dad's background? What did he do?

[Saraya]

My dad was at MIT as a. I always say my dad's a physicist, but he worked in electrical engineering and. And physics and was at MIT the whole time growing up.

[Julian]

Dumb guy, huh?

[Saraya]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Julian]

Were you ever into, what, your dad's line of work, like, fascinated by that stuff, like, the science side?

[Saraya]

No, I mean, I. I did. I did very well in school, but for some reason, like, physics was not my thing. I liked math, but I didn't. That wasn't really my thing either. But it's funny, I only just learned my dad, you know, he's. He's 86 now, and sometimes he just kind of spills out some stuff where I'm like, wait, what? And he said something how, you know, he was an immigrant. He. He was born in Latvia, and then they. They fled, and he was in a refugee camp for a while in Germany, and then they moved to the United States. And there was so much pressure on him and his brother to do well in school and get scholarships and, like, full rides and scholarships and get their PhDs and whatnot. And I think he felt so much intense pressure to do well academically that he didn't want to put that pressure on my sister and I. And so he didn't, but I think just didn't. When he. He said that I had. I thought, you know, I'm. All this time, I interpreted that a bit as a sort of indifference, you know, like, I'm getting straight A's. Why is nobody impressed? Why does nobody care? And I interpret it as a bit of indifference. And it's only now, I just turned 53 yesterday. Like, now I realized that. That all that time he was actually wanting to shield me from the pressure that he had felt.

[Julian]

Oh, that's interesting. So you're taking it in some ways that could feel back then, like it's almost like, am I being neglected? Like, this is what I'm supposed to do.

[Saraya]

Yeah.

[Julian]

But in reality, he was trying to do the opposite. And it just. It's like the wires got crossed.

[Saraya]

Yeah. I. Or I. I just never. I didn't. I didn't know that. Yeah. But either way, I. In some ways, I. I did appreciate that there wasn't a bunch of pressure on me to do well, because I think that made it. I was motivated to do well for myself.

[Julian]

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[Saraya]

She's four years older than me.

[Julian]

Okay.

[Saraya]

So yeah, I think my sister. I don't know what I mean. One of the things I learned on the other side of, of this whole situation and bad vegan coming out and is that after bad vegan came out, there's like a fire hose in my face of, of comments and people coming at me with stuff and in the middle of all the, the comments, some of it really sympathetic and kind, some of it attacking me and calling me a criminal and saying and. But there Was a trickle of people in there saying, have you ever been diagnosed for autism or Asperger's? I think you're on the spectrum. And I got so much of that coming at me that I thought, that's interesting. Why are all these people saying that? And they were saying that these are people who had themselves been diagnosed, so they weren't saying it in, like a. In a negative way. And I thought that was interesting. And I eventually was able to go for a very thorough evaluation, like the kind where you're there all day and you're like, doing stuff with shapes and all kinds of tests and. And then they come back a few weeks later with this very extensive report and gave me a diagnosis of autism. One, which I feel like there's a lot of people out there that would get a diagnosis of being somewhere on that spectrum. But it reframed everything about my childhood and my whole past experiences where a lot of things now make a lot more sense in that framework.

[Julian]

I'm glad you said it, because it was the first thing I thought.

[Saraya]

Oh, interesting. Yeah. I mean, it's funny, because people seem. And when people would reach out to me so often, they were worried that they were offending me by asking me the question or pointing it out. And I wasn't offended at all because the. The. The one sort of really nice, healthy relationship I had after all of this happened was with a guy who I got to know in the context of his work. And he was such an oddball. And I tend to like oddballs and really, really, really smart. And that's like my type, you know, super smart oddballs. And. But his behavior was sort of weird and maddening, but there was a lot about us. There was a lot about us that was compatible. And he seemed like one of those people that needs a lot of alone time and kind of doesn't fit in. And I felt my whole life like I don't really fit in anywhere. Like, something's weird about me and I don't really understand. And. And then one day he said something to me like, I think, you know, oh, I think we'd been talking about Elon Musk. And he said something about Asperger's. And. And he said, yeah, I think I might have, like, I might be like, oh, a notch on that.

[Julian]

Got struck by the tis.

[Saraya]

Wait a minute. And I went home and did all this research about men with Asperger's and. Which now they call it autism one for some, I guess the Asperger's dude was like a Nazi So let's change the name. But, but I did all this research on men with autism, which, With Asperger's, which I'm gonna keep calling it Asperger's. And it made so many things make sense. And, and I, and I really appreciate all of these. Those qualities.

[Julian]

What do you mean?

[Saraya]

But it had never anything. It made a lot of things about him make sense.

[Julian]

Right.

[Saraya]

That I couldn't really understand, like, why is he. Why is he giving me mixed signals and. Or like, why does he talk about, you know, his special interest? Or, like, why does he talk about this thing for hours anyway. But I found myself extremely compatible with him and I really appreciate it. But what's funny is it not once did it ever occur to me that I might also have that. Like, it never occurred to me until Bad Vegan came out. And all these people are coming at me. And there were people that made, you know, there's people that made videos, like these TikTok thing reels and videos on, on YouTube analyzing me and making the argument as to why they think I'm on the spectrum. And I'm watching it. Like, this is interesting.

[Julian]

Yeah.

[Saraya]

So anyway, I finally did go for the official diagnosis and, and got that as well as. She also diagnosed me with some kind of a sensory processing disorder. Sensory process and like a, Like a depression, which is kind of, you know, whatever. Lots of us have that. But sensory processing disorder, which. It's funny, I haven't really looked into it that much, but I think, I think some of it comes along with. There's something called being a highly sensitive person, like hsp. And you can look online and there's quizzes. Are you a highly sensitive person? And, you know, however many questions there are, I think if I go through and answer those questions, I'm like a hell yes on pretty much all of them or most of them. And so, you know, there's certain things that I'm highly sensitive to, like sounds. Certain. Like if there was a clicking, well, there wouldn't be in here because of the sound. But if there was a ticking clock, like, if I go somewhere and there's a ticking clock, that I can hear it.

[Julian]

Yeah.

[Saraya]

I have to. I'm like, can I, can I take that off the wall? Like, I can't. I can't. Like, it's going to drive me nuts. It's going to make me angry. And so I'm a bit sensitive to sounds and very sensitive to smells. So in my apartment, like, when somebody walks by in the hallway wearing too much perfume or cologne. All of a sudden like all. I didn't open the door, I didn't go near the door. I'll be sitting in my apartment, whatever, and I. And it's like, it's as if it's under my nose. The cologne and the perfume.

[Julian]

Yeah. Sorry about the water main break in Hoboken today because that's not helping. The smells around here. I don't always. Or anywhere.

[Saraya]

Yeah, it's fine. It's. But the smells that seem to irritate me are, are like artificial smells, you know, like cleaning harsh cleaning products and things like that.

[Julian]

Gotcha. I'm gonna get the Febreze then. That's. No, that's, that's interesting that, you know, you didn't, you didn't test that until even like after the documentary came out when this is not something you looked at when you were a kid or when you were a young adult or anything. And then some things start to make sense because also with autism, it is such a wide spectrum.

[Saraya]

Yeah.

[Julian]

You know, and we, and we actually, we did a podcast with the father of one girl who's, who's non verbal autistic. And they thought that, that her whole life that that meant that, you know, she wasn't all there and everything. And it turned out to be the total opposite.

[Saraya]

She was more than there. Yeah. Did you, did you listen to the telepathy tapes?

[Julian]

That's who it was. It was a father.

[Saraya]

Oh, I, that, that show was absolutely fascinating. And I have had an experience with somebody who read my thoughts to such a degree that it blew me away what happened there. And it was the younger sister of my, my boyfriend that. The one that they refer to in Bad Vegan, who was the much younger guy. They. I tend to have had all of my best relationships with much younger guys and. And we had a really, again, like, beautiful, lovely, good soul, good person, old soul. And we would go to visit with his family in Colorado and his younger sister, I'll just say, is different, but in a way that she. I noticed very quickly that she seemed very intuitive and seemed to know what I was feeling. And she really liked me a lot and I really liked her. And we sort of felt. Had this connection and she would very often know what I was feeling or she would sit down and say something to me and it's like she knew exactly what I was feeling. And I just thought, well, that's very intuitive. But there was a time where she said something so very specific. And we had been in this barn and my boyfriend and his Band were playing music. And she got up to go into the house. It's kind of a ways away. And I was like, as soon as she got up and left, I thought, I wish I'd asked her to get my sweatshirt. It's like in the room behind the thing on the show, on the hook, whatever. And for some reason I was really thinking hard about it because I was just annoyed. I was like, oh, like I don't want to get up and go all the way into the house myself, but I'm kind of cold. And I wish I'd got. Asked her to go get my sweatshirt. And it's in the room and it's just there and. And she came back and was like, here you go. And it just, I just thought, whoa.

[Julian]

Yeah.

[Saraya]

And just something that always. It made an impression on me. And I also thought of her as being, you know, people in society look at people who are a certain way as if they have a disability or a dysfunction or that there's something wrong with them or they're somehow deficient, whereas I feel like it tends to be the opposite. They are actually much more elevated in all these ways. It's just not recognized. And so I felt like she somehow had this elevated sense that she was able to understand what I was thinking all the time. And I just wondered about that. I just thought that was fascinating. And it wasn't until the top the tapes came out that I. I mean when it came out, I think I was very open to what that series talks about and shows. Whereas a lot of people, if I bring it up to people just because of the name, they discount it. Oh, that's.

[Julian]

Yeah, it's. I mean it sound. It sounds crazy when you hear it. But then when you listen to it and then you see like the videos of how they did some of these tests and like who was involved and then what these kids could do. It's like, all right, maybe one of them, you could find a way to like fake it a little bit when you do this like a whole bunch of times across like around the world with different, with, with all different kids and they have this. And they're, they were all non verbal on the same area. Ish of the spectrum. That's where it suddenly becomes like, listen, I don't know if it's pure telepathy or something like that. I'm certainly not the guy to judge that. But there, there's a. There, there, there's something.

[Saraya]

And then the other thing about how you know those are there, there is the fact that then. It was a while ago that I listened to it. But you know how they talk about how certain academics or anybody that was looking into it or wanted to look into it more that would get shot down or fired or discredited. Whenever that happens, it's like, oh, wait, why are there people who specifically do not want this explored?

[Julian]

Yeah, it's like we accept the science that there's such thing as savants, meaning some kid can just walk up to a piano and never seen the thing in his life and play Beethoven.

[Saraya]

Right.

[Julian]

But, like, that's just accepted.

[Saraya]

Right.

[Julian]

Because that's a part of scientific doctrine. So I'm all for disproving things. Like, if this turned out to not be real, great, but, like, put it through the same process. Don't be like, this is below us to talk, and that's how they act.

[Saraya]

The fact that it's. It seems like there are people that want it to just go away seems a little.

[Julian]

It's definitely. It's definitely suspect. And I think there's also, you know, the. The. The just the in general autism topic and everything is so talked about now because of a lot of other things going on in society that I think people are also figuring out in addition to, all right, why are we getting so much of this? There's also, like, the. Why also is so much of this undiagn diagnosed, by the way, for a lot of people's lives? Like, what is a better system here? What does it mean? We still don't understand the full. At all. The full elements of the spectrum or, like, what that's even tied to it. It's a very. For lack of a better word, it's a very deep rabbit hole. And I think now is like, the reason the telepathy tapes really comes through is because people are at least now asking questions, no matter how not some of them seem to be. It's like, maybe it's not, you know, like. And you should. You should do that. So that was cool to see that come out. And it's interesting that you had at least some sort of micro experience that was like, that's kind of similar, you know?

[Saraya]

Yeah, yeah. No, I found that. I found that really fascinating.

[Julian]

Yeah, you felt like. And you had said this in the documentary, like, there was so much about you that made sense. And this also helps. It all makes sense too, by the way. But, you know, when you were a teenager, which now just putting together your timeline, that's also. In this period after, like, your parents divorce and they both remarry and you got a whole bunch of new siblings around the house. Also, as someone with autism, you didn't know it at the time. That's also, like, probably extra strange having all kinds of new relationships all around you.

[Saraya]

Right. And it was overwhelming.

[Julian]

Yes.

[Saraya]

Yeah.

[Julian]

Okay. So you have all that going on, and you kind of went through, you know, a phase a lot of us can relate to, like that awkward loner phase or whatever. But is it safe to say that was kind of like your high school years?

[Saraya]

Yeah. I mean, I. It seems weird that I tried to figure out why, you know, I ended up coloring my hair. I mean, now it's much more common. But back then, like everybody in my town, I was known as a girl with blue hair because I shaved my head and colored it blue and green. And she joined.

[Julian]

She joined Antifa, too.

[Saraya]

And I. When I was writing my memoir, I was trying to think of, like, why did I. It seemed so weird because I didn't. I wasn't an extroverted person. I didn't. I wasn't trying to bring attention to myself, but there was nothing I could do that would bring more attention to myself than coloring my hair bright blue and green when I was young. So why did I do that? And I think that I felt. I think that in some way, not consciously, I felt so out of place that doing that to my outsides made. Made more sense because then it made my outsides match my insides, if that makes any sense.

[Julian]

That totally makes sense.

[Saraya]

Yeah.

[Julian]

Did you feel like some of those, like, personal identity, you know, coming of age struggles, you couldn't talk with people about that. Be your parents or people close to you is the kind of thing you had to keep to yourself.

[Saraya]

Yeah, I didn't really talk to people a whole lot. I mean, I had a. I had a best friend, but I didn't. Yeah, I didn't talk to my parents about stuff they didn't really know what was going on with. You know, I mean, I was doing all kinds of. I did LSD when I was very young. I was 13, I think.

[Julian]

13?

[Saraya]

I know it seems weird.

[Julian]

All right. How do you get LSD at 13? Normal.

[Saraya]

At the time, I hung out with all these older people and then I was totally unsupervised. So I would go to, like, Harvard Square and hung out with all the skate skaters. And I was. I was strangely responsible about it because I did continue to get straight A's. And, you know, I wasn't like, skipping school all the time. Maybe once in a while, if I had classes, I Could blow off. But if I. On the flip side, you know, if I wasn't feeling well, but I had a calculus test, I would go to school. So getting good grades was really important to me. But at the same time, I did all this rather reckless stuff. I just. I just got most of it out of my system when I was younger. So when I went to college, I was pretty tame, comparatively.

[Julian]

Right. Like, I've seen it all.

[Saraya]

Yeah. I'm like, I've been there, done that. I don't need to. I need to, like, get drunk and throw up everywhere.

[Julian]

Yeah. Did you feel like. I mean, I've talked to. I've had friends before who were also, like. I don't know, to use your word, like, kind of, like, unsupervised when they were very young and got.

[Saraya]

Which was much more common. I mean, I. I. You know, I think I've got a few years on you guys.

[Julian]

Yeah.

[Saraya]

And it was much more common then.

[Julian]

That, you know, LSD at 13 was more common.

[Saraya]

Well, no, but the. The idea that, you know, parents just kind of, you know, sure, go off and do whatever, and hopefully you come back.

[Julian]

But did that. The reason I bring up, like, other people is, is because I know some of my friends I'm thinking of who had, you know, something similar, maybe not LSD at 13, but also were, like, kind of unsupervised and did whatever. They ended up kind of resenting their parents for that because they. They felt like that was like their parents neglecting to parent them. Obviously, they're not thinking that at the time. Right. When they get a little older, they're like, what the. Did you ever think that as well, or.

[Saraya]

Yeah, I think there was, of course, my brain. I'm, like, thinking, like, is my mom gonna listen to this? Probably not. Yeah. I think there was some element of this sort of confused feeling when I was younger, being aware of the fact that, of course, when you're that age and when you're 15 and 16, it's, like, great. My parents are gone every weekend and, like, they're not here. And they go to, you know, my mom and my stepfather once. I remember they went to Europe for two weeks, and I was basically home alone. And when I was in high school, I think I was 15 or 16. Okay. And, you know, that's great. When you're that age, it's like, of course. That's great. But there was some part of me that also was aware of feeling like, really? Like, really?

[Julian]

Did you throw a banger while they were away?

[Saraya]

I Did. Oh, you did.

[Julian]

Okay.

[Saraya]

I did. Of course I did. And. But I was pretty responsible about it. But I. I did. And I. I had. I think I had five nights in a row of parties at my house.

[Julian]

Five nights in a row?

[Saraya]

Yeah.

[Julian]

Did they ever find out about this?

[Saraya]

No, not that one. But. Although, see, the thing is, I think there were clues, and they would ignore it because I think they didn't want to know. And one of the clues. This is the weirdest thing. I can't believe I'm telling the story is one of the toilets was clogged, and this guy who was like, our handyman came to fix it and pulled out of the toilet. I don't understand how this happened, but a potato that had. Somebody had carved my name into it. I don't understand.

[Julian]

But you could still see the carving on it.

[Saraya]

Somebody had carved. Yeah, it was like, the weirdest thing. Like what that was in the toilet. And I think the handyman guy was like, yeah, I. I don't even want to know. I don't even want to know what happened here last week, you know? And then I think, like. I think that, like, the cap of a tequila bottle or something was under a couch that my mom might have found. I was like, what's this? And I'm like, I don't know.

[Julian]

Never seen in my life.

[Saraya]

And so, yeah, so I think sometimes there were clues, and. And they may have just been like, whatever, but I remember, too, once, my mom once buying a keg. God, I'm like, saying all this stuff.

[Julian]

Mom buying a keg. How old was. How old were you?

[Saraya]

That. That. Right. I mean, yeah, there are some parents where. I mean, also I grew up part of this Latvian community where occasionally, sometimes there were events and things that I would go to when I was young with my dad and my family, and we. And I would drink beer, and I was 12, and that was normal. And so.

[Julian]

Ye.

[Saraya]

I was just. Things were very loose back then. Yeah, but I know what you mean. It's like, at the same time that I. I was, you know, I appreciated having all this freedom. Part of me was a little bit, like, really aware that I certainly could get into. Get myself into some trouble. And I think, in retrospect, I was. I got very lucky that nothing tragic ever happened to me when I was, you know, in Harvard Square at one in the morning on lsd, you know, in some. You know, could have gotten myself in some pretty compromising situations, and I came out of it relatively okay.

[Julian]

Glad you did. But, yeah, I mean, that's that's like a lot to, to see. To see at a young age. And then, you know, like we were saying, you're kind of going. You're also going through that phase too. Like the angsty, I don't know, teenager years. Yeah, something like that. What was, what was dating like in high school or boys? Was that a thing?

[Saraya]

Yeah, and it's something that I. I really want to write a second book because there were so many things that I didn't have room to write about in my first book and I really wanted to write about. And I think, especially because I think that from the research that I've done, that especially girls who would get this diagnosis of being on the spectrum, it's almost inevitable that you're going to get taken advantage of because you just. There's something about not being able to read people's intentions that you can kind of more easily walk into situations. And I think that I certainly never learned boundaries. So there were just a lot of things that happened that I would go along with and.

[Julian]

What kinds of things? Because this is your young. You're in high school. So what kinds of things would these be?

[Saraya]

I mean, I think I would like, end up hooking up with guys when I didn't necessarily want to because, I don't know, I would feel like I'm supposed to or stuff like that. Like, there was nobody. I. I ended up always wishing that I had an older brother who would sort of look out for me and scrutinize my dates and be like, where, where's this guy taking you? And I just sort of felt like nobody was really looking after me in that way.

[Julian]

So your dad wasn't paying attention to the guys you were dating?

[Saraya]

No, I mean, I think because also I wasn't living with my dad. I only went there once or twice a week for dinner or Sunday brunch or something. And so he wasn't around all that much. But I think they just. There was a lot. I think there's a lot of assuming that I was fine and not really asking. But I remember When I was 15, my boyfriend for a while was. He was 23.

[Julian]

You were dating a 23 year old?

[Saraya]

All this stuff just seemed normal. Yeah, he was a graduate. Graduate student. Student at Harvard.

[Julian]

You were dating a graduate student at Harvard when you were a freshman in high school?

[Saraya]

I was 15, so I might have been a sophomore.

[Julian]

Either way, I mean, that's.

[Saraya]

I know it seems weird now, especially.

[Julian]

It's not weird. I mean, that's, that's. That's the class a felony in 50 states and Puerto Rico.

[Saraya]

Right. He. But he was. It's funny because I'm still like, we're like Instagram friends. We were. We. We ended up. When we ended up breaking up, it was like we just decided we were better off friends.

[Julian]

Oh, God.

[Saraya]

But okay, all right.

[Julian]

It's clocking to me. It's clocking to me. So, all right, so you're not. You're not having trouble getting guys. You're just getting different guys than other people get at this time. And you're getting. So at age 15, you are dating someone who's an adult who even looking back on. And I don't even know if you possibly could. I. I mean, I wasn't used, so I can't put myself there. But there could be things that, like, he's instilling in you about what a relationship dynamic is supposed to be like. That is not what it's like at all. That then becomes your norm, because that's what you know.

[Saraya]

Yeah. I mean, I think overall I just. There was a. There was a real. I just never. I never learned. I never learned boundaries. But again, as I say, I got lucky in these various situations because, you know, that that guy was like a nice dude. He wasn't. I know it sounds weird, but. And then also when we ended up sort of breaking up, we just, like. I think he knew. He certainly. I mean, I remember one time we were going to meet his parents and he was basically was like, oh, you got to tell them you're like a student at Harvard. I was like, I can't do that. I can't lie and say I'm like a student at Harvard.

[Julian]

This should have been in the Bad Vegan documentary. I am. I am going to say that they had a real miss on this one, but please continue.

[Saraya]

I think because all my. My siblings were older and I was friends with all of my sister's friends, that the fact that I was hanging around with him so much. Oh, they knew about it. Didn't seem weird to my parents. Yeah.

[Julian]

Wait, your parents knew you were dating.

[Saraya]

A 23 year old? I don't really know what they knew, but I know he came to my 16th birthday dinner at my dad's house.

[Julian]

Oh, my God.

[Saraya]

I know.

[Julian]

How'd you introduce him? This is my friend in the senior class. Don't ask which senior.

[Saraya]

I don't know. They were. You know, I had another friend who I'm still actually good friends with now, who was a lot older, and we were. We were good Friends, which was weird. A dude who actually, he's the, he's the one who took this photograph on the back of my book, and we're still friends. It was like a weird friendship. I don't know. I just, I, all of my, I was just around a lot of older people because my sister was older.

[Julian]

And besides actually just the proximity of who you're hanging around, which certainly, that plays a huge role. You're 100% right about that. What drew you to that guy? Like, was this your first boyfriend, by the way? No, no, my first veteran at 15. Huh?

[Saraya]

Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. No, my first boyfriend was a guy, a boy named Jason Penny, who was a really cute skateboarding shout out, Jason, I've got a, I've got a thing for still, like, to this day, if I hear a skateboard on the street, I'm like, ooh, cute boy. So, yeah, he was a skateboarder, and he, he was my first boyfriend.

[Julian]

How old were you?

[Saraya]

I don't remember. Probably 13. 13, okay.

[Julian]

Was this, like a real, you know, like, I had a girlfriend when I was nine, but, you know, it wasn't real. You know what I mean? Was this real or was it, you know, just like, oh, this is my friend?

[Saraya]

No, I mean, I, I, I think my very young self was if you could be in, in love at that age, you know, I really, I was really, I liked him a lot, but. Yeah. And then after that, I did. I mean, I, I didn't talk about, I don't think I talked about this. I think I wrote this whole story in my original draft, but I cut it out because of space. But I did, I did. I lost my virginity. Not in, like, a very wholesome way. It was, I didn't realize it was going to happen. And I was 14, and it was a guy who was much older.

[Julian]

How much older?

[Saraya]

I think he was 21. And. Yeah, and I wasn't expecting it to happen, and then it did. And. Yeah, and I did the whole, like, spent a long time in the shower when I got home.

[Julian]

But wait, wait. If. And if I ask questions that you don't want to go into, you can totally stop. There's just a lot of psychological things here that I think are important. Do you mind telling that story, like, how that, how that occurred?

[Saraya]

I think, I think by that time I was used to, you know, being with guys in a certain way. And when you're young, I mean, I don't know, you remember the whole, like, first base, second base, third base. So I'm pretty Sure.

[Julian]

I got all those bases in one shot for the first time. It was like, you know, there was a long build up to that, but.

[Saraya]

Yeah, yeah. So I think I had been exposed to various bases and just wasn't really prepared for that last one coming through. And. And maybe that's part of just getting myself into that situation. Maybe that's related to why people who have that diagnosis, females, tend to end up in these situations where it's like, I'm just not reading the situation right. And. And I did, you know, I did tell him to stop and then he did, but it was like. Yeah, wasn't expecting that.

[Julian]

So wait, you told him to stop? So he was. He had already begun, but he didn't.

[Saraya]

Yeah. I mean, this was such a long time ago, but weird part of the story is this is an older guy. He. He'd been in the Marines and he was like a skinhead guy. Still follows. Follows me on Instagram and I, I still know who. Know who he is and where he is, but he had this teddy bear on his bed, which was just weird. He's this dude in the marines and.

[Julian]

Skinhead with teddy bear.

[Saraya]

Skinhead. He had this teddy bear and I really liked it. And so the next day he left it at my house for me. And then I had that teddy bear for like, I still would have it if I hadn't lost all my belongings in this whole. Right situation. But I, for some reason, I had that teddy bear for a really long time.

[Julian]

And that's not the 21 year old who you lost your virginity to. That's a different guy or same guy?

[Saraya]

No, no, he's the one who gave me the teddy bear.

[Julian]

Oh, that's the same guy.

[Saraya]

Yeah.

[Julian]

So I was a Marine.

[Saraya]

Yeah. And I wasn't like, I wasn't mad. That's the thing. I just, I just, you know, I. I wasn't angry at him. But. Yeah, so that's my story. Yeah. Here. Heard it here first, but you told.

[Julian]

So. Yeah. It seems like you're just like a lot of that's bottled up. You told him to stop and then he did stop.

[Saraya]

Yeah.

[Julian]

So you don't, do you?

[Saraya]

Like a lot of these situations, I think we end up accepting all the responsibility because I hadn't objected early enough or I hadn't objected. You know, it's not like today when there's so much conversation now around consent and about talking about stuff ahead of time and that just wasn't a thing back then, so.

[Julian]

Yeah, but you're not like 90 years old I mean, right. You know, this isn't that long ago.

[Saraya]

Right.

[Julian]

And like, either way, whether or not, whether or not the, the semantics of, like, it happened, and you were like, oh, I don't want this. And then he stopped. It's not even relevant because he's 21 and you were 14. That's right.

[Saraya]

No, I'm very aware that nowadays it would be very, very different.

[Julian]

I would love to check it back in the early 90s, late 80s, make sure that was a law. But I'm pretty sure that was even a law back then in most states. I mean, you weren't in Alabama, but. Sorry, Alabama. But, you know, it's like that there's a lot of things that can happen in someone's life where it doesn't feel like something at the time, and then that bottles up and manifests in a lot of other ways. And so you, at these years you're talking about, which are all basically 13, 14, 15, 16, you are, you're doing LSD, you're having boyfriends who aren't boyfriends, they're legally pedophiles, and that's what's normal to you. They obviously, your brain is not fully developed yet at all. Theirs is at least mostly developed and legally developed. They're holding some sort of power over you. There's some sort of whatever that. It's like whatever that is there as well. And this is, this is when you're going through puberty and accepting how things are around you. And so you start to formulate how the world works. And to you, this is perfectly normal. And even now, hearing you talk about it, you don't taught like, you know, it's not normal, but you're not talking about it in a way like, holy. You're more like, yeah, this happened. It's up. And, you know, but I got past it. And it's like that, that's not. That's so far beyond the bounds. I. I don't even know how to put myself in those kinds of shoes. I'm also a guy too, so I'm already operating at a loss here, trying to figure out the other dynamic from the other side of the gender divide here. But you know what I mean? Like, that's, that's a big. Those are some big steps that you were forced to take early that no one should have to take.

[Saraya]

Yeah, I think that's why I wanted to write a lot about. I wanted to write a lot more about this stuff in a. Some sort of a subsequent book. Because you know what I think what happens is I didn't, I didn't grow up. I didn't have a lot of boundaries. And then when you carry that forward, it ends up being carried forward as a lot of shame and feeling bad about yourself a lot of the time. And, and so later on it just, it made it probably a lot easier for people to get to me and get what they want from me.

[Julian]

And also like there's, there's these little symbols as well that make a ton of sense. Like you mentioned the teddy bear. For a second, I thought that was, I thought you were going to another guy for a minute there, but now it makes way more sense that it was the same exact guy you were talking about. So I didn't think the 21 year old would possibly be the Marine, but apparently he was. But like you, that's like a childlike thing.

[Saraya]

Yeah.

[Julian]

And you see like, you see innocence and a teddy bear and you're holding on to that.

[Saraya]

If I showed you a picture of what my bed looks like at home, like whenever, if like the somebody comes in to fix something in my apartment right now, I always think, oh God. They probably think there's like a five year old lives here because I've got these two giant rabbits, a huge octopus. Like, you know, I've got all these stuffed animals and, and, and yeah. And I just, I'm 53. But I did see somewhere some interesting study that correlated adults who sleep with stuffed animals with something positive. And now I can't remember what it was, but I was like, I felt validated.

[Julian]

No, I, I don't, I don't think, I don't think you should feel in any way strange about that at all. I think, I think it has to do with like the way that you. I don't know, the way that you persevered, the way that you compartmentalize things. And I think that was part of it. Like there was some innocence in that. And it also makes a lot of sense too that you were like so close with your dog during all these years when this stuff ended up happening.

[Saraya]

Yeah.

[Julian]

As well. And like that was like the love of your life and everything because you probably. I don't know, I'm getting really beyond my pay grade of like psychology here, but I, I might imagine there's some sort of connection between, you know, the safe stuffed teddy bear.

[Saraya]

Yeah.

[Julian]

And then the dog that's actually alive and can feel things and stuff, which is nice. There's some sort of safety valve that you invented for yourself there.

[Saraya]

Yeah. And I think, you know, this guy who came into my life later, which I call in my book, I call him Mr. Fox just because it's easier, because he changed the name. Even though he was younger in years than me, he treated me very much like a child. And. And I'm sure there was something there too, that's like above both our pay grades here. But that's. I think that's some related to how he got into my head. And another thing is that having been exposed now to so many people, women and some men who've been on the other side of kind of a horrendous upending your whole life mind, psychological manipulation, because it happens to men too, but I think more often women. What's so common is having rescue dogs and even like rescue pits, but rescue dogs. And there's just a super strong correlation there. So there. I think there's something about specifically being drawn to animals and shelters and rescue animals and wanting to save them with something where, like, you kind of want to be saved yourself.

[Julian]

Exactly.

[Saraya]

Yeah.

[Julian]

That makes so much sense.

[Saraya]

So then makes you that much more vulnerable when somebody can sniff that out, which is what these people do. They're incredibly good at sniffing that out. And then they come in and they're like, I'm gonna save you.

[Julian]

Yeah. I was. I was. I was thinking about this shortly before you came here today because, like, some of the conversations about really looking into how things went wrong involve, like. I mean, it's uncomfortable some of the subject matter, and obviously we've gotten into that. But that is exactly what I was thinking was, so. And we'll get to it with all the context. But, you know, there were videos and recordings that you would do when things were going really south with Anthony or husband, that we talked about here, where that's exactly how he would talk to you. He'd talk to you like you were a little girl, and you would talk back to him like you were a little girl too.

[Saraya]

Yeah, I didn't see any of those. I didn't know those existed. I didn't know he was recording me until after my entire criminal case was over. Which kind of is another thing that blows my mind that the prosecutors saw all of those and, you know, still prosecuted me primarily. And the. There were more of those videos, and they were. They were sort of worse in total, but they did show little clips of some of them in Bad Vegan, because I had recovered them after the criminal case. But it is. I. And I think he was making those recordings. It's weird because this happens a lot where Keith Rayner did this with nxivm. It's like they, they end up being the people that gather and hold on to the evidence that ultimately works against them. And it seems weird, like, why did he make these videos of so distraught and like completely miserable and up and seemed like clear evidence that he is manipulating me. And. But I think that he was doing that to somehow gather evidence that I was like unstable or I'd lost my mind or something. But yeah, in those videos, he, he is talking to me like I'm a child.

[Julian]

Yeah. And, and it felt like. Well, actually, I, I don't. Do you think that when all your formative relationships, not just your literal physical relationships with guys, but also like your friendships and who you're around, when all your formative relationships are around older people.

[Saraya]

Yeah.

[Julian]

Men, women, indifferent. And these are the years you're coming of age and that's what you get used to. Do you think that you, in a weird way became drawn to the idea that you, like, between the fact that you were hanging around them and your parents were kind of like not paying attention to stuff you did? Did you, did you, did you seek out people who would tell you what to do, like tell you what to do in your life? Be like, you need to do this. Go do it.

[Saraya]

That's interesting. I don't think so. And no, I don't think so. But what's also interesting, I was thinking about this because I haven't, I mean the stuff we're talking about, I haven't really thought about it in the context of how it relates to what happened. But in more recent years, I've found myself drawn to always younger guys. And I think in part because I never wanted, I never wanted kids. So I was never one of those women that like, really, you know, I was looking for the husband to have kids by a certain date and tick tock, tick, tock. I wasn't that person. I didn't want kids.

[Julian]

So how young did you know you didn't want kids?

[Saraya]

I just, I think for a while I thought, like, maybe it's gonna, it's gonna hit me that I'm gonna want kids. Because I would see everybody else, other people wanting kids and especially the older I got and into my 30s. But I'm like, yeah, no, it's just never, I never wanted kids. Which again, I think is another, is another thing that can be correlated with having this personality type that I have because I think there's something about it that would be way too overwhelming in.

[Julian]

A way that's why do you ever. Do you feel like in your life there's two layers of this? Let's start with the base layer. Do you ever feel like people have loved you in your life for real, like, actually loved you? And how would you define love?

[Saraya]

I. I would say yes. And I don't know that I'm able to define love. That's a very difficult thing. I mean, it depends, you know, I do. I do think. I do feel that my parents loved me. I never felt like they didn't love me. It's easier now as an adult to. To accept certain things and have compassion. And as an adult, you know, imagine, like, if I had had kids. I do feel like they, you know, they loved me. So there's. There's that sort of love. And I've had some very healthy relationships where I feel like there was love there. But. Yeah, I mean, I think love is one of those things that I don't. I don't know how anybody defines it. And maybe it's different for everybody and it's different in various different contexts.

[Julian]

I think I agree with you. I think it is more of a personal thing. The way I've always looked at it, like two ways. Right. So there's two layers to it. And you tell me if. If this fits anything or if not, but at the base layer, there's something that I just call love, which is this strange thing that happens where if I could relate it to, like, you know, a woman or something like that, rather than, you know, with your mom or dad. It's like when you don't really know someone enough yet, but you just kind of have that moment where you can't explain it, but, you know, 100%, you would jump in front of a bus for that girl, no questions asked, and be. Do it with a smile on your face and leave this earth. But then there's a second layer, and this is the more special layer, which is in love, which is when, to me, you have that same exact feeling. But you've at least. Even if it's just like a long day spent talking with someone when the clock doesn't even matter, where you really understand who someone is as a person and you feel some sort of soulful connection with them. Like, it's almost like things are lined up for the two you to be in this spot, in this. On this little rock in the middle of the universe at the same time for this exact reason. Right. And that. That's the visual I would put on it. I agree with you that it's probably different for everyone in, in some aspects, and it's also not, it's something that's very hard to put into words. But my first question was, did you ever feel love? I don't know if my explanation there can help. Do you think you were ever in love in any of your relationships?

[Saraya]

Yeah, definitely. And I think that, I think also that in trying to define it, I think it's, I think that love and attachment can sometimes get conflated.

[Julian]

Oh, yeah, right.

[Saraya]

Where people can feel attached to somebody and then you think it's love or it feels like love or you don't know what to call it, so you call it love. And, and then there's, and then there's a more, a more pure kind of love where what you feel for somebody has nothing to do with. It's like, independent of how they interact with you, it's just for them and you want the best for them, whether or not they're with you or not. So it's, it's not about an attachment or what they do for you or how they make you feel about yourself. It's just a deep love you have for that person. And so I think certainly what I stepped into later and one of the things that was always hard for me to figure out on the other side of this whole Anthony Mr. Fox situation was I was like, people would say, oh, well, you were in love with him. So. And it's like, no, no, I was never in love with him. But what was that? And it really, it was like a sort of a sickening attachment.

[Julian]

Yes.

[Saraya]

And the person who explained it the best, where I finally went, oh, now it makes sense, is Mark Vicente, who was also in the Nexium cult and knows Sarah Edmondson very well. And he explained how, you know, what these people do is they, they, they understand deeply what your deepest hopes and, yes, dreams are. And they sort of project that and mirror back to you and then set things up in a way where, like, the, they're the route through which you can attain that.

[Julian]

Yes.

[Saraya]

And so you, and this, so you become attached to that and, and that's that strong feeling that, you know when he would say, you love me, and I'd be like, okay, I love. You know, it can maybe feel like it's love, but it's not. It's just, it's like an attachment.

[Julian]

Yeah, I, I, I think you explained that really well. It's fears and dreams. They play on your fears and they sell you the dreams that sound really good. And you have to live under the threat of those fears in order to attain those dreams, which usually, if you're dealing with someone who's strictly a sociopathic abuser, those dreams are never real or they're. They'll never be real.

[Saraya]

Right. Exactly. Yeah. And, and, and, you know, con. Contrast that with, you know, I've been in other relationships where I, I felt there was more of a purity there and why, even the one that I was referring to, where I met him in the context of his work and I, as we got to know each other, I knew that he had always wanted to move to Alaska, and that was kind of a life goal of his. And so you would think that getting into a relationship, I would want to prevent him from going to Alaska. Right. But I didn't. I wanted him to go to Alaska because that's what he wants, you know, and so when you love somebody in that way where you want them to realize their highest potential, even if it means that you're going to be left behind. Right. So I was encouraging of him to go to Alaska, and also, you know, I was going to move back to New York and, And, you know, it's kind of clear we have very different lives. But, yeah, it's like you want the best for that person. It's not about how that person makes me feel or what I'm going to get out of it.

[Julian]

So that, yeah, that might have been something pretty real there because that's, that's right in line, like, where you're. Even when you know that what they really want means that you can't be a part of them, but you still want that more for them. There's a real sacrifice there. I don't think that. I'm not really sure how you can fake that.

[Saraya]

Yeah. And, and you get actual, you know, you feel actual. I don't know what it is, like a joy that he did accomplish what he wanted to do and that he did move to Alaska and that he does get to go, you know, like. And we're, you know, we're still in touch and I, so I, I get the photos of him.

[Julian]

You seem to keep in touch with a lot of people. That's.

[Saraya]

I do. Except for the, you know, except for the psychos and sociopaths. Yeah. Maybe I don't keep in touch with them.

[Julian]

Maybe we can cut the pedos, too. We'll work on that. But, you know.

[Saraya]

Yeah, but I mean, I, I, Unless people were psychos or sociopaths, I tend to have a good, positive relationship with people from my past.

[Julian]

Yeah.

[Saraya]

And.

[Julian]

And the other thing is, like, so a lot of people listening right now are fortunate enough that they probably haven't had to deal with a situation. And I'm sure there are some people who have, but they haven't had to deal with a situation where they're literally with a sociopath or having their whole life taken over and stuff like that. But everyone out there listening, males, females, we've all had relationships. We're all in relationships and stuff. And I think a lot of people can relate to the idea. You keep talking about this attachment thing.

[Saraya]

Yeah.

[Julian]

A lot of people. I've seen this, I don't think it's an exaggeration to say hundreds of times before across, like, friends and acquaintances when I watch this, but a lot of people mistake falling in love with. Falling in love with the idea of somebody.

[Saraya]

Yeah. And then they project what they want and they don't see the negative things. That happens all the time.

[Julian]

Exactly. And they also don't think about the social implications. Meaning they worry about. It's a fear of loss thing. Right. Like, oh, well, if I weren't with this person, how would that look to everyone else? And what am I losing? Would I get something that good again? Or whatever. And they're thinking about it more on, like, what. What does this person look like when you walk past the windows of the store and it says, you know, 99.99 on it, versus what does this person look closed doors with? Me actually spending time with them and how I really feel about them. And that's always a very tough thing to watch. Doesn't matter whether it's a male going after a female or a female going after a male. I've seen it in every direction. And I think that on a much lower level than what you've dealt with, that's a similar psychology as well, where you kind of have to, as best you can, try to step out and say, all right, am I telling myself I feel these ways or do I feel these ways and that, you know, I can't speak for everyone's gut. I can only speak for my own, because that's the only one I've ever felt. But, like, you got. Tends to be very honest in those situations. It's just a lot of us don't go to it. You know, we don't step out and go to it.

[Saraya]

Yeah. Even with. Even with this guy who moved to Alaska in the beginning. I remember early on thinking, okay, am I. Am I so drawn to him? Because. And I. I mean, I've become Now one of those people that's hyper aware and analyzing everything and have done so much inner work and noticed the obvious things. I just noticed that it. It was a little bit obvious in a lot of ways how this guy had a lot of things in common with my dad in certain ways, like his vibe and certain things about his personality. And. And so in my head I'm thinking, is this. Am I so drawn to this guy? Do I have, like, such a massive crush on him because he reminds me of my dad? And so it's some sort of psychological thing going on where I want to, like, get him to love me, but like, once I get him to love me, if I finally get him, then I'm going to be like, yeah, I'm not interested anymore. So I really looked at that hard and thought about that because I didn't want to do that to somebody. And I. And I understood clearly, like, okay, that's not, that's not what I'm doing here. So it's not. I didn't. It's not like he's gonna. If I finally. Because I. How do I say this? I was kind of weird, like. And this is very common for a lot of females. You're not used to having to go after a guy very often. They're like, coming to you.

[Julian]

But this guy, when you look like you.

[Saraya]

But this guy was a bit of an oddball and kind of quirky and weird and. And I would see him a lot because he worked in the building where I lived. And so I was very aware of, like, am I more interested in him because he seems very aloof towards me and is that making me more interested in him or is it really just that I admire and respect and love. You know, I'm growing to be falling in love with who he is. So I was very deliberate about. Yes, it is who he is. Which I think the fact that we're still, you know, that we're still in touch and. And, you know, and then we did stay together for quite a while until he moved. How long ago was this, by the way? It was when Bad Vegan came out. So he was with me when I watched it for the first time. So, yeah, it was sort of those years, the 2020 Kobe. It was around.

[Julian]

Yeah, 21, 22. Somewhere in there.

[Saraya]

Yeah.

[Julian]

And was this another one of the younger guys kind of deal?

[Saraya]

Yes, he is 14 years younger than me, so he's 39.

[Julian]

Yeah. You had said this a while ago, but I want to come back to this just because it's it's, it's an interesting pattern. So you would have this thing as well, where then you would go for younger guys, almost like in a mental way maybe to, like, offset some of these other dynamics. But then you would want them to treat you. I, I, I don't remember how you said it, so I want to put words in your mouth, but you're like, you would, you would want them to treat you like a little girl.

[Saraya]

No, I, well, I, certainly not consciously, but there was something about the time in my life and what was going on when that guy, Mr. Fox, came into my life, and he had such a dominant, like a dominating personality that normally I would have been very turned off by. And that wasn't my history.

[Julian]

Guys like that who are dominating personalities. That wasn't your history?

[Saraya]

No.

[Julian]

I don't know if I believe you on that. I mean, the, the, I believe that you think that, but.

[Saraya]

Right.

[Julian]

You know, 23 and 15, 21 and 14.

[Saraya]

Yeah, but then Anthony Strange didn't have, like, that sort of, you know, you, like, somebody walks into a room and they have, like, a very dominating personality, like boisterous.

[Julian]

Yes, yes, I under, I understand what you mean. So they, they're not necessarily. You're not saying that you were drawn to people who were outward alpha. Hello, I'm here about it. But they might have that more under the surface, and especially when you get behind closed doors, it might turn into that.

[Saraya]

Yeah, maybe. Okay, I can see that. My, but my best relationships were, you know, were these sort of younger guys who were not, not like that at all. And, and I certainly was never drawn towards the type of guy that would get really jealous and angry, like. No, no.

[Julian]

What turned you off about them?

[Saraya]

Weirdly enough, it's like the controlling aspect of it. Like, you know, I don't, if somebody would try to control me or tell me what to do, I would be like, no, you. And so a lot of my healthier relationships, you know, they were very, you know, that guy Tobin that I had been in a relationship with right before this guy, it was such a lovely. We lived together for four years. There was no drama. You know, there was no fighting. There was no drama. I was running the restaurant, and very often I would stay there late or, you know, I'd have these meetings with, like, male potential investors. And he never got bent out of shape and jealous, and he was in a band and sometimes went out with his friends, and there were probably young girls there that were younger than me, and I didn't get bent out of shape and Jealous. And we were both very, like, healthy. Yeah, it was very, very healthy. And I think because there was so much kind of mutual respect in that way. Like I wasn't gonna cheat on him or be with another guy. Like, I, I. There was just a lot of mutual respect. And so I think I've had, I mean, I'd never, I'd never been drawn to the type of a guy that would be angry and jealous. And I think what can happen is maybe what I, what I was somehow drawn to with this guy, the Mr. Fox guy, is that that is the element of his personality that was like that, that felt protective, you know, and so sometimes guys will act like they're being very protective, but they're being jealous.

[Julian]

That's right.

[Saraya]

Dicks.

[Julian]

That's right.

[Saraya]

And so it's a fine line between being genuinely protective and, like, possessive.

[Julian]

You guys are pretty good at picking up that. By you guys, I mean, women are pretty good at picking up on that, though, because, like, they're like jealousy and anger and like, that is massive insecurity. Whereas protectiveness is, when used correctly, is in control of the situation. Security in yourself and the security. And security in your ability to solve whatever problems in front of you.

[Saraya]

Yeah. Or just somebody being genuinely worried about your.

[Julian]

Right.

[Saraya]

Safety.

[Julian]

Exactly.

[Saraya]

Physical safety.

[Julian]

Exactly. There's a huge, huge difference there. And like, that's the thing about con men and stuff. They can be really, really good at putting that on because they're so into themselves that a lot of, like, the jealousy and stuff like that, they even got time for that. So the rest of it feels like it's just pure protection. I mean, we were talking off camera about my friend Matt Cox. It was, you know, he's reformed, but, you know, was. It was a total con man. And a lot of the patterns that I saw with your ex were very similar to patterns he would have. He didn't go as far as your ex did, to be fair.

[Saraya]

Right. Because I think, like, I'm, I'm fascinated by him, by your friend. Because the idea of somebody like that being reformed is so out there. Like, yes, there's a lot of these people are this way to such a degree that there's no reforming them ever. Like none. And this guy is one of them. I mean, if somebody who is a full blown sociopath or a malignant narcissist, there's no reforming them.

[Julian]

So here's what I, here's what I say about Matt, because righteously so, some people, every time I said that are like, are you who watch Matt and like enjoyment are like, are you crazy? Like Matt, I'll defraud you in five seconds. Matt has forced himself to be so hyper self aware of what he is, not who he is what he is, that like there is no one who is more like he has ripped off the band aid and gone so hard the other way that he has like a self loathing of himself. I would describe it as that sometimes when I'm talking with Matt I have to say, hey, you don't have to say that like that to yourself or whatever. But then I understand. I'm like, he's just trying to protect himself against himself. So I agree with you. I'm not sure you can ever fully. Yeah, de download that. I'm very glad I can't, you know, relate to that or understand what that would feel like.

[Saraya]

It's fascinating. I'm. I find that fascinating.

[Julian]

It's very fascinating.

[Saraya]

There's a book that I learned the most from and I, I end up bringing it up on like almost every podcast I do because I found it so fascinating and useful called Confessions of a Sociopath, written by a woman.

[Julian]

Okay.

[Saraya]

But it, I think reading a book like that has so much more impact than a lot of the academic and psychologist written books about sociopathy. Because there's one thing when somebody's describing something in a clinical way, but when you're reading a first hand account of it and it's the person's words, it really hits. It hits. And like Mark Vicente is coming out with a film about, called the Narcissist Narcissists Playbook I think is what it'll be called. But I was able to see a preview and that's, that's like a film version that I can't wait for it to come out because I think that, I think that part of the way that these people are able to get into people's lives and do so much destruction is that there's a lot of us walking around where we cannot even fathom that there are human beings that are capable of such diabolical behavior that we don't see it coming or we'll believe all the other stories because it couldn't possibly be true. That somebody couldn't possibly be that diabolically cruel. I mean, the first, the opening paragraph in my book is something about sort of outlining that there are a certain type of people out there that will study you, figure out, like, what's your personal worst nightmare? Like what would be your personal biggest nightmare. And now I'm gonna make it come true. And that's what they do. And then like when they're done with you and you're totally fucked over and possibly facing criminal charges, they're like on to the next person. And that's what they, they feel nothing and they never will. And so I think it's really hard for people to comprehend. And that's part of why so much, you know, like classic victim blaming exists because people kind of don't want to accept that that's possible and that that could happen to them. So it's easier for them to be like, well, what did you do? Or how did you make that happen? Or how was it your fault? Because it's easier to make it my fault. But yeah, I think it's, it's so, you know, books like Confessions of a Sociopath, it really, it hits home more that people like this really exist. And it's part of what I hope people will get out of my book too, is that this isn't, you know, this isn't like a novel or a story about a fictional, sociopathic, dark, diabolical character. It's like this is a real person. You're still out there.

[Julian]

That book you just mentioned, Confessions as a Sociopath, that sounds. I, I definitely want to read that. That's, that's fast.

[Saraya]

It's really good. I mean, it's really well written. It's really chilling. I, I just, I recommend it all the time.

[Julian]

So what's her takeaway at the end like? Oh, I'm still a sociopath, so don't ever talk to me.

[Saraya]

I mean, I've read it twice and so long ago now that I don't really. It's just that you come away with it and it really sinks in like on a visceral level that these people exist. And she's, you know, she writes it in a very self reflective, exploratory way and kind of asks and answers a lot of questions and explores a lot of things. Like, you know, if there was a way for us in society to know who is a sociopath, what would we do and how would we handle it? Because there don't again, there's no reforming them. It's not like you're going to get them to suddenly have empathy.

[Julian]

But like you said, it's also, we believe what we want to believe and when we haven't encountered certain things, we, we assume that can't possibly be the case. Which is what I found with a lot of your story too. And, and like, I'm sure everyone out there listening in some context understands exactly what we're talking about there, where it's just like you kind of, and, and you hope it's not life altering, but you kind of have to be kicked in the ass once with the, hey, this person was not at all what they said they were. Yeah, I mean, know what that is?

[Saraya]

I, I hear it all the time and it feels unfortunately, very true. And that unless you've been through something like this, it's almost impossible to understand. And that's why, you know, probably Even in the YouTube, in the comments to this, people will be like, ah, she's making herself the victim. Like, just. People say that all the time.

[Julian]

Listen, people are gonna cut because they don't.

[Saraya]

They just can't fathom. They can't fathom how this happens. But if you've been manipulated or duped in some way or, or been through a relationship with a somebody, either an extreme malignant narcissist or even like narcissist light, then you get it and you understand that this can happen.

[Julian]

Yeah. What's even more interesting to me than like a, A book like that woman wrote, where it's literally called that and you know that when you're reading it. What's more interesting to me is when I'll read a book written by someone and it's clear that they're a sociopath and they don't realize that they just wrote it in all their own words because to them they're so crazy that they think it sounds right. And I've, I'm not going to name names, but I've encountered that a couple times and it's so fascinating.

[Saraya]

Oh, I'm curious.

[Julian]

I'm like, you read this back and you thought that you were, that you're, that this makes you sound like the good guy.

[Saraya]

Yeah.

[Julian]

Like, it's just so textbook. It's very interesting what people will reveal about themselves. And even sometimes I haven't really. I can't think of examples where on that level I've experienced that with someone in here. I mean, I see everyone's good and flaws in here, we're all people. But not on. Never on that level where it was revealed and the person like didn't realize it. But I've listened to other podcasts before, long form podcasts where I'm like, this person would listen to this back and think that this sounds normal. And they just told me everything I need to know about them. And then I go look at the comment sections and I see I ain't the only one that that had that takeaway, you know what I mean? Like people can pick up on it when you see it for long enough, but it's a whole different thing to be on the outside of the aquarium looking in versus being one of the fish swimming in there.

[Saraya]

Oh yeah. It's a lot harder to see it and spot it when you're. When you're in the middle of it. And it now, I mean, I see it all the time now and other people too, but just from having been.

[Julian]

Through it, do you ever worry, I mean, I wouldn't blame you actually for having this bias on it, but do you ever worry that now you're someone who immediately looks for all the wrong in people, assuming it could go that route just because of what you've been through versus like, you know what I mean? Like maybe overjudging people sometimes?

[Saraya]

No, no. I think I. I think I have to constantly remind myself to keep looking for red flags because just my nature is such that. I mean, this happened to me multiple times. It they. I think originally they had more about my prior relationship with this guy Matthew, and Bad vegan, they cut it out. But I put a few chapters in my book. I mean, I was in a relationship with a guy. Was that the chef? Yeah, yeah. And. And he certainly is an extreme version of that type of personality. I'm very cautious about what I say about people because he's kind of a litigious little fuck. So I don't want to call him certain things.

[Julian]

Allegedly, allegedly. He's allegedly just allegedly.

[Saraya]

But. And I even come after me. Yeah, I was a bit more bold in like earlier versions of my draft. And then I just took stuff out and I was like, you know what? I'm just going to put the stories of what happened in there. And people can make their own judgments about his psychology and personality recall. But because I've stepped into that and then it happened again in like a much more extreme way. And then even since then, I stepped into after that, where it's like, holy, how does this keep happening to me? I. And then I noticed in all of my conversations and exposure to other people's stories and other people who've been through this, it's very common for it to happen again and again. So now I'm hyper aware that, you know, I am wired in a way and my nature is such that I will tend to give somebody the benefit of the doubt. You know, I will rationalize their shitty behavior or I will have a tendency to rationalize their shitty behavior. So I'm I have to remind myself, well, the same way your friend Matt has to remind himself to sort of be a certain way and maybe overcompensate, I have to keep reminding myself to go, wait a minute, is this behavior acceptable? Is this. You know, and stop and really evaluate stuff and be like. And I've done it recently with potential business partners and stuff where I'm like, yeah, this guy's an asshole. And like, I'm not going to rationalize behavior and this is not somebody that I want to be in a partnership with and work with. So I'm going to walk away. Whereas. And being very aware that my. An earlier version of myself probably would have been like, oh, well, oh, they're just having a bad day. Or, you know, like, I'd find some way to rationalize it and then maybe get stuck in some kind of a. And then later on there would be some. I would have gotten myself embroiled in some kind of a challenging business relationship that for sure. That I didn't have to get out of. Yeah, for sure.

[Julian]

Also, like, when in any time you're like, connecting with people, it helps to kind of have that second look from the outside, like. Like, we're in here, right? So, you know, deep. We were talking with default camera. But while you and I are doing this for hours on end, for the most part, he gets to be here and produce and kind of take everything in. He's also really good with people. Alessi, who sat there before him, same thing. So, like, in my job, when I relate to people on such a level, regardless of who it is, what the topic is or whatever, has always been really helpful afterwards to go to those two guys and be like, ah, what were you seeing there? You know, because yes, I can pick up on so many little things that maybe they can't because I'm in the conversation. But it works the other way around too, where there's little things that they can pick up on that I can't.

[Saraya]

Yes, I have. I. And I'm hyper aware that going forward it's good for me to have other people in my life that would be able to give me that second opinion. One of my best friends is this guy Jesse, who's like, you know, he's on the other end of the spectrum, meaning he. And he will say this about himself. He's like, I walk into a room, I walk into every situation and I think, how is this person trying to me over? Whereas, you know, so he's got to.

[Julian]

Talk about another spectrum. But.

[Saraya]

But yeah, so, so he's somebody that. And even in some of my business situations, he would say to me, like, these people are. They're trying to. You over. I'm like, no, no, no. So it's good for me to have people around who could meet people that I might get into business with. And lately, the idea of being in a relationship is so off the table for me that I don't even think about it.

[Julian]

But when's the last time you were in a relationship? How long ago?

[Saraya]

The guy who moved to Alaska.

[Julian]

So how long ago did you break up with him? A couple years.

[Saraya]

He moved November. I know. He moved in the summer of. I think that. I think it was the summer after Bad Vegan came out.

[Julian]

So 23.

[Saraya]

Yeah. Or 22? 23. 22.

[Julian]

So it's been a couple years, at least.

[Saraya]

Yeah. And I've seen him a couple times when he's. He's flown through. I've seen him twice. So that's basically the only, like, the only action I've gotten in a number of years. And so we're, like, officially broken up, but we still talk, and neither of us has seen anybody else, so we're like. But anyway. But I've. So my point is that right now I don't need. I don't need, like, a screener for relationships because I'm just not. Not. Like, I'm not date. I'm not interested in dating. I'm not dating. I'm not looking for a relationship. I'm not. I don't have time for it. I don't want any. I got you kind of off the table for a while.

[Julian]

That was. That was something I was gonna ask, like, just in general, because I don't. You know, it's all vague which years are which and whatever, but you got into unhealthy relationships at such a young age. And then as a young adult, you were dating the chef, what was the litigious. Allegedly guy.

[Saraya]

Matthew.

[Julian]

Matthew. So you're dating Matthew. It seems like you were almost never single for a lot of years there, including the years with Anthony where you're married to him. Like, you were always with someone, I guess, until recently. Am I right about that, or were there gaps in there?

[Saraya]

No, there were gaps. I mean, after. After I was with that guy Matthew, there was some time. And then I eventually met this. This guy Tobin, the much younger guy. And then. And I was married, too, after, when I was doing the whole Wall street thing. And then I moved back to New York and I married a guy for a little while. But then, and then I, after that, I was with Matthew, so there were. And then after I broke up with Tobin, I was single for about six months before I met this Mr. Fox guy.

[Julian]

Right.

[Saraya]

But I hadn't had any. There were never any, like, long stretches of being, being single. Even though it's strange, because I'm one of those people that I, I never felt like I needed to be in a relationship. I mean, I'm certainly not like that now. And I've always had a little bit of a challenge with relationships because I am one of those people that wants a lot of alone time. You know, even when I was married the first time, or even when I was with Tobin, who I was completely in love with the first, if he was going on a trip or going away for a while, I would feel a little bit. I mean, a lot of people like this, where you're like, ooh, I get to be alone for a while.

[Julian]

And there's a balance. Yeah, yeah, for sure.

[Saraya]

Yeah. But for now, I'm like, I'm just, for whatever reason, I just can't even imagine getting into a relationship, I think, because so much of my life right now is up in the air and I have no idea what I'm going to do. And I'm sort of focused on, you know, what I'm going to do next, business wise and wanting to find the right relationships in that context, that a personal relationship would be, like, a weird distraction.

[Julian]

All right, I could, I could go into that for a while. I'm sure it'll come up at some point, but I want to go back a little bit here as well so we can get it through your story so people can understand what went down here. But one thing you keep referring to, we were talking off camera before, and then it's come up throughout this conversation is that, you know, you're, you're an avid reader, and it seems like that's something you've been all your life. Would, Would you say, like, even, like, that was, that was a way you entertained yourself growing up, spending a long time.

[Saraya]

I did, but I, if I could go back in time, I would be, I would, I would have my younger self read a lot more versus what I did to kind of numb out a bit is. I mean, I, I, MTV became a thing when I was. It, like, I forget what year MTV came out, but I was like, right when my parents got remarried and whatever, and I watched a lot of TV when I was younger, so I would come home from high school when I was junior high in high school, I didn't do any sports or any activities because to me, I think now I realize. I think that school and being around so many people and being in that context was so overwhelming in a way that I just needed to go home and, like, zone out.

[Julian]

Yeah.

[Saraya]

And I would probably be a. I'd probably be an even better writer and have a better vocabulary if I had immersed myself in books the way a lot of young people do. I did read a fair amount, probably certainly more than a lot of kids read nowadays. But I also came home from school and, like, zoned out and watched General Hospital and then, you know, Oprah and Phil Diner.

[Julian]

Hey, Oprah was the goat. She was awesome.

[Saraya]

Yeah. And then. And then we would sit there and, like, watch MTV and back when that was a thing, and music videos and, you know, cable TV was new back then, so HBO and all these. All these channels that you could watch movies, and that was all new back then, so there was a lot of content to watch on tv and. And I did a lot of that. But I. I've always really liked reading a lot. And it's funny, the place. The thing that really got me back into realizing how much I love to read is when I was at Rikers, because I had so much time, and then people sent me a lot of books, and so I. I read a lot of books while I was there.

[Julian]

So that is more. I'm wrong about that. That's more of a newer phenomenon. It's something you really been sinking your teeth into.

[Saraya]

Yeah. If I could go back, I. I would have. I mean, I did read. I remember reading Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas when I was 13. It's a good. It's a good book. Yeah.

[Julian]

It's a hell of a read at 13, though.

[Saraya]

Yeah. Yeah. And so I did read, like, I.

[Julian]

Did it at nine.

[Saraya]

And when I was in college, the. You know, again, I didn't do a lot of, like, extracurricular stuff. And they're always really fascinating. And I didn't go to, like. I never went to a football game in college when I was in college and the dorm would clear up.

[Julian]

Do they even have a football team there? Like, come on.

[Saraya]

See, I don't care.

[Julian]

Like, I'm sorry, Pen. People.

[Saraya]

I don't care at all, because I didn't ever go to a football game for me, when I was in a dorm freshman year, and then the idea of, like, everybody clearing out of the dorm and going to a football game and me being able to be alone in the dorm Was loved the days where there were football games. So you never thought you had the tism Never occurred to me. Nobody ever talked about it. Like I remember loving football, gay football game days because everybody, I just would have the whole dorm to myself and it was amazing. It was amazing. So yeah, but I, I, I, I guess having that time at Rikers, I did sure remember how much I really like to read books. And I like actual books too. I mean I have probably over 600 books in my apartment and I'm like, I, I, I like the paper version. I underline throughout the books and I like to hold on to them and I feel like there's something comforting about, you know, I like my favorite thing about my space and my, my apartment in my living room and I like having books all around and something feels comforting about it. It's like other people's stories.

[Julian]

Yeah, yeah. Something other perspectives to have way to kind of escape out of the moment too. I, I like it a lot too. You say I don't know, I'm 600 out there, but I like my Kindle. So you know, we roll in there. But you, you know, as I just mentioned, you end up at Penny like you're an extremely intelligent individual and knowing like what was happening during your teenage years and everything. The idea that despite everything going on and your whole social life and, and that like you were still in a position where you're obviously getting damn near straight A's and clearly doing well in school and doing that self motivated because as you said your parents didn't really seem to care one way or the other. You end up at Penn. That's, that's kind of amazing, you know, like to, to, to get there despite all that. I'm sure you didn't feel that way at the time, but like I can imagine the compartmentalization of all the things you went through that clearly are felonies that happen to you by the way. You know, to still be in that position kind of on your own two feet and get there is, is an incredible, incredible accomplishments. So did when, when, when you went to college, did you know what you wanted to study or have any. I have a dream of what you wanted to do in, in the real world.

[Saraya]

No, I didn't. And I, I got there in sort of the regular like college of Arts and Sciences and sort of process of elimination. I started focusing on economics and then realized maybe I should do like maybe I should go into law. Maybe I should do the pre law track. And the Wharton School is also part of The University of Pennsylvania. And I realized, oh, I think I want to go to the Wharton School too. But if I had you apply to that to get in. And I had applied to the College of Art and Sciences, so I had to then sort of get admitted into the Wharton School. And I did a dual degree. So I got a degree of the College of Arts Sciences. And then I got a degree at the Wharton School. School. And so that's why. Because I made that decision after my sophomore year. I ended up spending one summer just to take a couple of extra classes because I had to take about.

[Julian]

Oh yeah.

[Saraya]

Credits. And that's when I did. I lived in a fraternity house that summer.

[Julian]

You lived in a fraternity house?

[Saraya]

I did. Like most of them are gone for a lot of that time, but they were all my friends. I tended to have a lot of guy friends.

[Julian]

Yeah, it does. I don't even know. I think you've named one female friend the whole time.

[Saraya]

Autism. I just.

[Julian]

No, no, I don't think that's. That's not where I was.

[Saraya]

I like related more. I got along well with guys. And I think. Okay, I think because there's something a little bit more complicated about female relationships that I didn't know how to navigate. Like what guys are much more straightforward. That guys are less tend to. There are a lot of dudes that can be passive aggressive and whatnot. But I think that guy friendships and relationship with a guy tends to be much more straightforward. What you see is what you get. You know, if. If I had a. I had a guy roommate, my friend Marcus was my roommate after sophomore year. And you know, we would like, you know, I'd be like, marcus, fuck off. You didn't clean up this. Or whatever. But when I had female roommates, it was, it was like they would just like slam the dishes a little harder instead, you know, And I couldn't stand that. I cannot, I cannot stand.

[Julian]

You have aggressive.

[Saraya]

Yeah, I can't stand. I'd so much rather people are just straightforward. And so I, I just found it easier to be friends with guys. And so when I was staying that summer, the, the. I was friends with all these guys in the PICA fraternity and they. Because some are. Most of them are going back and so there are going to be all these empty rooms in their house or a lot of empty rooms in their house. So I just stayed there for the summer.

[Julian]

What were your relationships like in college?

[Saraya]

I actually didn't have a boyfriend in college, so I never had. When I went to college, I had this boyfriend Leo, who of course I'm still friends with.

[Julian]

How old was he?

[Saraya]

Leo was four years older than me.

[Julian]

All right, all right. You're doing a little better. So 1822, that's legal.

[Saraya]

Yeah.

[Julian]

He's given these. Sign of approval.

[Saraya]

I was 16 when he was my boyfriend.

[Julian]

Jesus Christ, Stop trying to help.

[Saraya]

But. And so we were. He was officially my boyfriend when I went to Penn, but then we ended up breaking up. But I never had like a. I don't think the entire time I had. I was at Penn. I don't think there was anybody there that I ever called my boyfriend. And I dated guys and I hooked up with guys probably more than I should have or wanted to, but I didn't. I never had like a boyfriend. And I'm thinking all of a sudden I'm like, did I? And now that person's going to be offended that I forgot.

[Julian]

Yeah.

[Saraya]

So it's going through my mind right now. But I didn't have. I wasn't like in a relationship. And also, you know, I took. A lot of people go to college and they just like party and classes are kind of an afterthought. But for me, it was important to me to do well in my classes. And yeah, that was kind of my focus.

[Julian]

Yeah, obviously you had had that importance before you even got there. So that makes sense that, that that would fall over. And also, like, you're going to Wharton. It's the best business school maybe in the world. You know, it's pretty good.

[Saraya]

Yeah, I know. And then, so from there it was like when I was a, When I was at Wharton, everybody, everybody's kind of. What is everybody else shooting for? They're all aiming to work at one of the investment, you know, to go into investment banking. If not investment banking, consulting, if not consulting, accounting. This is what, late 90s, I graduated in 94.

[Julian]

Okay. So, yeah, anywhere in the 90s that makes sense.

[Saraya]

You know, I just submitted my resume, did the whole thing, ended up working at Bear Stearns out of college now.

[Julian]

So you're on the investment banking side. Were you doing like underwriting for M and A's? What, what was, what job? Did you come.

[Saraya]

Yeah, I ended up doing a lot of M and A deals. I ended up. You get hired as a group of analysts and so you're, you're working on whatever deals they give you. And I ended up in the. Over time, ended up working on deals in the technology group. And, and I, I was a hard worker. And so very often I ended up getting staffed on some of the more difficult deals because I think they could see that I had a lot of stamina and so I'm. I'm like the person that's not going to break at 3 o' clock in the morning or pulling all nighters working on these models and getting this done.

[Julian]

So yeah, I imagine you're constantly doing like in that job it's 16 hour days all the time, right?

[Saraya]

Oh yeah. My first week was 111 hours and I. Twice I did two. I mean all nighters was normal, but twice I did dual all nighters. So twice I did more than 50 hours in a row like without sleeping. Wow. Yeah. Could not not do that now. I mean it's. But when you're young, when you're. That when you're young. And I was able to, you know, take me harder to figure out like equations and excel and building the models or whatever, but I could power through.

[Julian]

Are you getting any chemical or powdery help with that or.

[Saraya]

No. It's funny, I never did cocaine ever. Of all the weird that I did, I never did cocaine. I drank when I was a bear, I drank. I mean right now I drink. Drank way too much. Diet Coke. That was my. That's what kept me awake.

[Julian]

Yeah, that's.

[Saraya]

But. And there was Diet Coke. Nobody was doing Adderall and Vyvanse. None of that stuff was around.

[Julian]

Yeah, it wasn't around then. They were just on the white stuff at that point.

[Saraya]

Yeah. Which I never did cocaine. Nobody ever offered it to me. I never saw it. I mean, I'm sure lots of people were doing that stuff, but I believe you.

[Julian]

I do. I think sometimes that's actually because like the other thing is when people say Wall street, It can mean 40 million different things. Yeah. People were always asking me that. I'm like, first of all, on that side of the business, that was where it was more prevalent. Secondly, I got there way after like the good times were around or whatever. It was like just such a ass backwards bank at that point. But thirdly, even on like the IB side and stuff like that, like we joke about it and certainly that that stuff exists but I, when I would meet some of those guys and be around them, sometimes I'd be like, oh yeah, that guy's pumping Adderall every two seconds.

[Saraya]

But a lot of times like, you.

[Julian]

Know, it wouldn't be that way and it would, it would just be some dudes just working in spreadsheets and gets his shit done. And you know, I guess the. I don't know how many of Those guys I met who really love their job, but they worked on serious deals and they got compensated very, very well.

[Saraya]

Yeah. That's what I started to notice is that, first of all, I noticed that people there all looked way older than they are. Like, the people that were more senior. Because time and time again, I would find out how old somebody was, and I would be like, phil is, you know, 35. Oh, my God, I thought he was 50.

[Julian]

I said that to his face over and over again.

[Saraya]

No, I mean, I wasn't that kind of tisum. Where I'd blurt out. Where I'd blurt out. I mean, occasionally I would. I've definitely put my foot in my mouth a bunch of times, but I'm not. I'm not. I'm not that. Women are apparently much better at the whole sort of, like, social behavior and masking. So I wasn't blurting that stuff out to their face, but I was noticing, and I just was noticing that everybody looked miserable.

[Julian]

Yeah.

[Saraya]

And I wasn't really. You know, I'm like, I don't get the whole, like, having a house in the Hamptons and wearing expensive clothes, and I don't, like. I don't really. What am I doing here? So. And then I went from Bear Stearns to Bain Capital, for which I moved to Boston because they didn't have New York offices at the time. And I didn't want to leave New York, but Bain Capital was like, yeah, you know, it's such a big deal. It's like, if you got a job offer, there you go. So. And Mitt Romney was there at the time.

[Julian]

I was like, who's saying no to Mitt Romney?

[Saraya]

Right.

[Julian]

Warm milk after work. Like, let's go.

[Saraya]

He was a genuinely, really, really nice, nice dude and. And treated people really well and was a kind person. I will say that I didn't vote for him, but he was kind person and. And people are definitely much happier there. But also. Yeah, I didn't. I didn't, like, get off on the thrill of the deal, and I. I just didn't feel, like, passion.

[Julian]

Right.

[Saraya]

And when I. And. But I really wanted to move back to New York, and I missed New York a lot. I felt like we were at home.

[Julian]

When you moved back?

[Saraya]

Well, I didn't know there was gonna be math. No, I was. I mean, I was in my 20s, so I was 20 when I moved back to New York. I think I was 26. I bought an apartment, and then when I left Bain Capital, moved back to New York, bought an apartment on Avenue A, which back then was like, sketchy neighborhood. And. And then I. I ended up working at a high yield fund. But when I was moving back that one of the guys at Bain who I. We'd worked on a couple deals together, and he was like, why are you gonna go work at A. Because I said, I'm gonna work at a hedge funder. I moved back to New York and. And then I got a job, but I knew with my resume, I would be able to get a job at, like, a hedge fund or something. I wasn't worried about that. So when he said, what are you going to do? And I said, oh, I'll work for a hedge fund. And he was like, why? And he had noticed that I always talked about food and restaurants, and so, you know, like, if we were going to travel on a deal, or I was always talking about where we're going to eat or some new restaurants in the area and. Or what I was going to cook, book that weekend or something. So he said, how come you don't work? Go work in the food business in some capacity. And it was this weird moment where I knew he was right, but I had this thought of, like. Because he said, you don't seem to really love this work. And I was like, do you. Wait, do you, like, does anybody. So. But I had bought that apartment on Avenue A, and I had to pay for it and all that. And so I did go work at a High yield fund for a while, and then eventually I left and went to college. Culinary school.

[Julian]

At what point did you have that quick marriage you were talking about?

[Saraya]

I was 27 when I got married.

[Julian]

So you met him in New York?

[Saraya]

Yes. He worked for Highbridge Capital, a big hedge fund. And I had interviewed there and then went to work somewhere else. And when I took a different job somewhere else, he, like a gentleman, waited until I took another job and then asked me out on a date.

[Julian]

And then he didn't want the lawsuit while you were still there. I respect that. That's a good move.

[Saraya]

Yes. It's funny now, the stuff that, like, the stuff that wouldn't be remotely acceptable nowadays. So much inappropriate happened back in the day. Like, so much.

[Julian]

Yeah.

[Saraya]

And, I mean, a lot of it was fine. Like, when I worked at Bain Capital, I. I worked with mostly dudes, and we would joke around and say inappropriate, and it was all funny and hilarious, but you couldn't say, get away with that stuff now.

[Julian]

Oh, yeah. And that was also. That particular part was notoriously such a male business.

[Saraya]

Yeah, sure. Which Was fine for me because again, I was just used to having a lot of guy friends. So, you know, it's not like you're gonna offend me easily at all.

[Julian]

Before you got married, like after college, while you're working sometimes 100 hour weeks and stuff like that, are you, you getting into any relationships or is there no time for that?

[Saraya]

There was really no time for that. I mean, I got myself into some interesting situations, but define interesting situation. There's no time for relationships.

[Julian]

Can we define? And there, there's always a curveball with you. So what do you mean interesting situations?

[Saraya]

So I had a couple funny situations with, you know, people in, in the, in the context of work, I mean, there was some really inappropriate, like dudes that would, you know, married dudes that are hitting on you and you're like, what? But I, I didn't have any relationships, but I had a very brief thing with. It's funny because you're getting all these stories out of me that I want to put in like a subsequent book. I will read that book with, with a, with a. This senior managing director that if I told people that I worked with around that time that I like hooked up with that dude, they would be like, what him? Like, he. There was something about him that everybody was. See, now you can like, I'll tell you the story and then you can psychoanalyze me.

[Julian]

He.

[Saraya]

Everybody was afraid of him. And he was this quirky, weird dude that looked like. He looked like he was very small, like physically small and had like a big nose. Like, not an attractive dude by any normal standards. But there was something I found attractive about him because he was kind of like, he was kind of really scary or people were afraid of him. And I never worked on any deals with him, but he, his office was down the hall from where I was and I just noticed that people were afraid of him. There's something about me where it's like, if something seems like a bit of a dare, it makes me interested and intrigued. And so he had this pinstripe suit he wore sometimes. It made him look like a total gangster. And so I complimented him on, on it one day in the hallway and he was kind of like, like, why is this young analyst speaking to me? You know? And then sometimes working late, I would pop my head into his office, ask if he wanted food. Like, I'm ordering food, you want some? You know? But it became almost this funny challenge. And then eventually he asked me out to dinner and I had a little thing with him, which is weird. And funny, but. So I had the occasional, like, random situation, but there was definitely no time for relationships. I did meet some guy once who, like, wanted to get into a relationship. I was like, dude, I don't have time. Yeah, there was no time for relationships.

[Julian]

So you come back to New York At 26, 27, you get the apartment on Avenue A, you're working at the High Yield Fund, you end up meeting the guy who interviewed you at one of these places, but then you worked at the other place. Yeah, right, right. And how, how long were you guys dating before you married him?

[Saraya]

I think we got engaged. We were together for a year and a half, got married, we're married for a year and a half, and then, and then split up.

[Julian]

Why did you had you. Like, because you said earlier you never wanted to have kids or anything. A lot of times, like, that's a part of why people got. It's not the entire people get married, but that's a part of reason. People get married. What, like, did you want, did you see yourself getting married? Did you want to get married?

[Saraya]

I was really surprised and people that knew me were surprised because I didn't. I, I just wasn't the type that people didn't look at me and think I was gonna get married and settle down. So I guess I still had a bit of a. Whatever it was about me that people were surprised that I settled down. So. But I seem to like, do things that would surprise people. So even getting married at that young. Now getting married at 27 is kind of young. Yeah. But that it was surprising to people and you know, a really good dude and certainly especially on paper, like went to Brown, he had gone to Wharton Graduate School. He was, I think he was six years older than me and, you know, had gone to like, Dalton High School in New York. Captain of the baseball, basketball and football team. And like, really, his name.

[Julian]

Winthorpe?

[Saraya]

No, no, but really good guy. And I would have been like, set for life because, you know, he was farther ahead of me. Was just at that point where you're starting to make a lot of money. But yeah, getting married was not the right thing for me. And, and I. The whole sort of role of being in a. Being a wife and, you know, I had to like a. What seemed like a very big diamond ring that always felt awkward to me and I didn't really want that. And so anyway, we divorced and what did.

[Julian]

Did you. I mean, we kind of talked about this a little earlier in, in generalities, but like in the build up to before, I Guess it gets weird when you get married and you didn't want to play that role. Like, was it more, hey, I'm at that point in life where I'm meeting someone, he's got a good thing going. I got a good thing going. I'm coming of age. Like, this is when you get married. Or was it more like. Or settle down, I should say. Or was it more like, hey, I actually really like this guy? Like, there's something that. That. Not just the idea of him, but you were actually drawn to him.

[Saraya]

Him. No, I think I was definitely in love with him and certainly thought, I'm going to marry this guy, and, you know, yay, no more dating, and we're going to be together, and this is great. And then, you know, there's probably a reason why people should be together longer before they make that decision, because then at some point you realize, wait a minute, this wasn't quite right. And, you know, and. And he also wasn't quite forthright with me. And. And when we. When we divorced, he said. I just remember being like, what? He said, by the way, I can't wait to have kids. I just said I didn't want to have kids because you said you don't want to have kids. I'm like, that's kind of a pretty fundamental. Like, you should be thanking me for wanting to not be in this marriage, because now you can go forth in life and have kids.

[Julian]

You would before you guys got married, even before I was very open about.

[Saraya]

The fact that I didn't want to have kids. And he was like, oh, yeah, me neither. And I'm like, all right, cool. So, I mean, that right there tells you.

[Julian]

Yeah, huge difference.

[Saraya]

Like, you don't tell. You don't lie.

[Julian]

Yeah. So did it just, like, when you got. Did you have a big wedding when.

[Saraya]

You did it or my 140 people.

[Julian]

All right, so, yeah, regular wedding, families all involved, everything. Did it just, like. I mean, I've talked to people before where it's like this. It can go either way. It's either great or not great. Right. But you get married, you got the ring on your finger. You were talking about the literal physical look of it, but ignoring that. Like, it just changes. Like, the whole dynamic changes to where you're like, oh, this is, like, legal now, and it puts this thing on it. Was that a part of it? Because, you know, you were only married a year and a half, and it sounds like you were the one who said, I can't do this anymore. Did it just like Overnight kind of suddenly be like, like, nah, this is different now.

[Saraya]

I don't want. No, it wasn't overnight. It took a while for issues to develop and it didn't really have anything to do with, I think the fact that we had taken the step to get married. Other than it creates this weird extra layer of you feel almost guilty or bad getting divorced so quickly because you're like, oh, those people that like flew out for my wedding and gave us wedding presents and they were all there and witnessed it and now it's like, ah, never mind. It just feels weird. Like there's all this added pressure of how it looks when you get divorced after a large wedding. So that. Yeah, but, but I don't think it was the fact that we got married that made the dynamics of it necessarily change. But it did, certainly. I mean, I feel like, like, especially because I was somebody that didn't want to have kids, it's like why I wouldn't feel the need to ever marry somebody again.

[Julian]

Right.

[Saraya]

Or I, I can see why a lot of long term relationships, you know, like there's some Hollywood relationships where they never got married. Or like Kurt Russell and Goldie Hawn, like a lot of the ones that have lasted throughout the years are like Sting and Trudy Styler. I think they eventually got married, but like not that way later. It's sort of like, why? What's, what's the point?

[Julian]

Yeah, I think with them there's also the dynamic of being, you know, the, the proverbial animals in the zoo where everyone's just poking on the cage all the time and you can't get privacy. And especially when you're both like actors or something, one's flying to this part of the world for six months to film the other ones, you know what I mean? Like, it's a, there's a whole nother dynamic there. But when you did make the decision to be like, okay, this isn't working, I'm leaving. Were you, were you sad? Was there like a. Or were you just very resolute about it?

[Saraya]

I mean, I was sad and it was heartbreaking in a way because it's not like I didn't care for him suddenly. And it's not like he behaved like a monster or anything like that. So I was very sad and it was painful and, and, and it was very difficult knowing that I was causing him a lot of pain too. That was really hard.

[Julian]

It sounds like this guy, your first husband, breaks a lot of the patterns of some of the other people you were with. Though it sounds like he wasn't this, like, controlling guy or anything like that. Like, you speak of him like he's a pretty good guy, and it just didn't work for you. Do you. Do you ever wonder if that's, like, part of it? If, like, you're drawn to the tragedy a little bit or drawn to the chaos? I should say.

[Saraya]

I. I don't think I'm drawn to the chaos. I think that. I mean, one thing I noticed that I became very aware of is that it seemed like I would go from good, decent human being, because then after that, I ended up with Matthew. So it's like. And then after Matthew, it was Tobin who was like, the really, really good, like, pure, good soul, good person, and then, like, sociopath. So I had this sort of, like, on and off, hot, cold thing where. And so probably having been with, you know, super good dude who's now in Alaska, maybe that's part of why I'm like, no, because I don't want to repeat that pattern of, like, ending up with the psycho again. I don't know. Or I'm just like, yeah, I don't know.

[Julian]

I think sometimes these things get oversimplified a little too much, personally. Sometimes there are pat. Like, both males and females have some just, like, almost evolutionary slight weaknesses and how they go into relationships. Right. We have. We have different ones with women, you'll find it to. I mean, to make it really A and B. Like, they'll go for the bad boy, but not the nice guy. Right. Like, I. Even in my life, when I think about it, when I'm very like, hey, you gotta come get me with women, easy. They're there when I'm not. Couldn't. Couldn't get a pardon with a fistful of them in a woman's foot. I mean, it's like. It's crazy. You know what I mean? So there is a dynamic there. But then when you add on top of that, that, like, you also have all these underlying, like, experiences that shaped a warped view of how you look at a man. The whole, like, hot, cold pattern relationship to relationship makes a ton of sense because it's like, you almost. It's hard for you to even understand what you want because you're not sure what normal. What normal is. I don't know if you ever thought of it that way, but I. That's how it's coming across to me.

[Saraya]

Yeah. Or. I know. It just occurred to me. It's sort of like the way our elections sometimes work, where it's like, we string. We. We swing from, like, one extreme all the way to the other. And then everybody's like, oh, my God, we can't have this. Now let's vote. Now let's go all the way left. Now let's go all the way right.

[Julian]

That's right.

[Saraya]

So I don't. I mean, certainly I'm not doing any of this consciously, but, yes, I think I certainly have because of everything that I've been through. And even after just that one relationship that became so chaotic and destabilizing and messed up with Matthew, I think after that I craved no drama. Like, no drama whatsoever. And so with that guy Tobin, he was very, very easygoing, like, from Colorado, had that very, very laid back vibe and, you know, and it felt very safe and comforting and no drama. So I don't think that I've ever necessarily been drawn to that. I mean, I don't even like it. Like, the whole fighting thing, I don't understand fighting in relationships where people fight all the time. Like, I get up now I get upset when I just hear somebody.

[Julian]

Yeah.

[Saraya]

Fighting and. Or even just bickering, like, really upsets me.

[Julian]

Had you, did you get in. In your earliest relationships, the ones in high school, did you get into fights with your boyfriends?

[Saraya]

Did that ever happen? When I was married, we got into fights sometimes because. And. Which was, like, exasperating to me because. And he would get a bit jealous and I was like, what did I do wrong? I don't understand. I didn't do anything wrong.

[Julian]

Jealous of what?

[Saraya]

Jealous of, like, because I had a lot of guy friends and I was still in touch with some people and, you know, would sometimes, like, like, hang out with other, like, like a guy friend. Like, I wasn't doing anything wrong. In my head, I'm like, I don't understand. I'm not. I'm not doing anything wrong. Why is he so freaked out? And then I would get mad, and then he would get mad, and then we get a whole fight about it. And that's part of what it was like, yeah, this isn't going to work for me.

[Julian]

Like, did you have. These are kind of exact questions, but I'm just trying to get, like, a picture. Are you the type that, when that actually does go down, like, you are yelling and you raise your voice, or you kind of shut down, down and they're raising their voice?

[Saraya]

I think in the past I would, if I got frustrated enough, I would raise my voice. But. But I, I certainly wasn't quick to. It's like you'd have to push me pretty far, and then I'll raise my voice, but it's not like I'm. I. I do that by default at all.

[Julian]

And, you know, I mean, we. We talked about this earlier with your earliest relationships, but you never, like, had people you felt like you could go talk to about this stuff. Like, you kind of kept. At least it seems like. I don't know if this was still this way when you were an adult, but, like, when it came to your relationships, you kind of kept that thing compartmentalized with yourself. Was that still the case at this point? Or, you know, are you going to your mom talking about, like, how do you be married? Or things?

[Saraya]

Oh, no, I never like relationship advice. I never went to my parents.

[Julian]

What about your sister?

[Saraya]

Not really my sister either. I don't know who I went to. I probably didn't seek out advice enough, which, you know, led to me maybe not making the greatest decision sometimes. And I think in terms of being somebody that is easy is a good target for what ended up happening to me in some of these relationships. Part of what made me a good target is the fact that I am a bit of a loner in a lot of ways and introverted and. And I don't have, you know, sort of like the lifelong BFF girlfriend who's all up in my business and knows everything and. Or like a bunch of girlfriends that I hang out with all the time who are going to be scrutinizing the next guy that I'm dating. And because I don't have that, and I'm not not talking to somebody all the time about everything, it makes it that much easier for those people to do what they do.

[Julian]

See, here's the thing that gets demonized a lot now about, like, these girl groups and the gossiping and how they'll shut down things before they can start. And it creates a mess for some guys. And I get that. And like, I've encountered that guys out there have encountered that. It's very annoying. But I do think the alternative of, like, not having strong women friends around. Yeah, a woman can be way worse on the downside, and I think you're a really good example of that because you only ever really had guy friends who can't talk to you on that level, can't relate to you from that side of the relationship, certainly don't realize, like, formatively what happened to you to get to these points in your life and how you look at relationships. So it would have helped you a lot. To your point if you did have, have some sort of strong female presence around you to, you know, at least try to swat things out from the outside or see some things where, where they, where they could be going wrong, and you still don't have that today. Is, is that fair to say? You don't really have, like, hardcore female friendships to this day?

[Saraya]

I have female friendships, but what's interesting is that they're more recent. So it's just the people that I'm still friends with, but I knew from a really long time ago are mostly guy friends. But I don't have. The female friends I have now are sort of more recent female friends. So. Yeah, and I get, I think, because a lot of, I think I get, I think I feel wary that I'm gonna disappoint people because I'm just not that I'm not that female that's gonna get excited to go to somebody's like, baby shower or wedding shower or like, girls night out or, like, I'm just not that person. I don't want to do any of those things. And so I don't want to, you know, I don't, I don't want to disappoint somebody in the context of a friendship. So I get very, like, worried that I'm going to disappoint somebody. And so it's hard for me to get close to people in a friendship context because it's like, to me, it's like a relationship, you know, it's like, I don't want to get into a relationship with a guy because.

[Julian]

Exactly.

[Saraya]

I'm, you know, I have a lot of stuff to figure out. My life. I, I don't like, I don't want to give all of that of myself to you. And it's a similar thing with, with basically friendships where it's like, oh, but now it's like, now, now I'm obligated to spend time with you. And to a certain degree or whatever, it just, it's, it's a little bit of that same dynamic where I, I, I don't want to disappoint somebody and I don't want to feel like I'm in a relationship.

[Julian]

No, I totally. That, that's, that makes a ton of sense because it's not gender specific is the point. But the one big difference between the two genders is that there is an element of, of potential romantic relationships. When you're talking about males versus with females, there's not that. But if you're treating it the same way where it's like you're putting a lot of pressure in yourself, on yourself as you're just describing it, to have to, you know, live up to whatever you think that standard is.

[Saraya]

Right.

[Julian]

And you're afraid of disappointing people. That goes back to the beginning of your formative psychology to where it's like you were kind of, you were constantly put in a lower position from your earliest relationships and stuff and you felt like you had to play up to people and it probably, I'm guessing, affected your self worth and that has manifested in how you make friendships.

[Saraya]

Yeah, yeah, no, I've definitely had issues with self worth. That then translated into me getting into a lot of situations that if I had had higher sense of self and been able to protect myself better, I would have. But I had like pretty crappy self esteem and yeah, probably still do, but, and, and yeah, as far as non romantic relationships, you know, I'm that friend where like, if you need something from me or if you're having a problem or, or want to talk to me and you need help or a solution or you want like I'm really good in a crisis or if you need something or if you need help with something, like, like, I'll be there but, but like I really don't want to just kind of, I'm not that good at like the casual hanging out. Yeah. Because especially right now in my life because it's like, well, I got like, I gotta get done. I'm not trying to hang out, but if you need something, I'm there.

[Julian]

Right. Have you been like open about these, I guess, like anxieties you have with some of the, the women that you're making friends with now more recently, like where you kind of tell them these things and get the reassurance from them that like that's okay to some extent.

[Saraya]

Yeah. And actually the, the TISM diagnosis actually helps a lot for that because it's like, look, this is who I am.

[Julian]

I'm sorry.

[Saraya]

There's a name for it. Exactly. Like there's a name for it. And I, I, I'm, I'm able to, you know, some of the people that I'm friends with, I suspect if they went through the whole process the same thing as I did, they would probably also get a diagnosis, which then makes it a lot easier.

[Julian]

Ah, okay. So you find some of your own kind too.

[Saraya]

It helps a lot. And I mean, and that's probably why the situation with the guy in Alaska worked so well, is because he also, you know, didn't want to hang out all the Time when we were officially in a relationship, it was like, like we would see each other a couple of times a week and that's fine.

[Julian]

Yeah.

[Saraya]

You know, and we didn't need to like hang out all the time. And, and I wasn't asking him to, you know, come to some family events or dragging him to all these places that I knew he probably wouldn't want to go. And like, we were just very similar in that way. So it does help to have other friends who are similar in this way.

[Julian]

When you're not doing things alone for fun and you actually are with other people, regardless of who it is. What types of things do you like to do for fun? Like, all right, you're not someone who's like in the baby showers or like going on the girls night on Tuesday or whatever, but like, you know, do you like going to a nice restaurant or something like that with other people? What kinds of things are you into?

[Saraya]

Yeah, I mean I love restaurants. Whether I'm. I mean, I don't go to them by myself. I only go if somebody else is taking me. Just. Good, that's how things are right now.

[Julian]

Good.

[Saraya]

But, but if I had the money to, I would probably go to nice restaurants a lot more often just because to me that's like, like, like one thing I can't stand doing is Broadway shows or theater stuff like that. I just don't, I'm not into that. I don't like Broadway shows.

[Julian]

Stuff like, they don't strike me as that type.

[Saraya]

No. But I love restaurants and to me, restaurants, like a whole experience, it's like theater and I like going to a restaurant that I haven't been to before and you know, and I'll notice all the details and it's really fun to go if there's somebody else who's also interested in that stuff because you can talk about it. So I love really nice restaurants and, and yeah, I mean I'm kind of like, I'm, I'm just easy. I like having really interesting conversations with interesting people and, and time more like one on one time and having more in depth conversations versus going to a party and like having a whole bunch of small talk type like that. That's exhausting.

[Julian]

What, what are, what are your, what are your main love languages? Are you aware of that?

[Saraya]

Oh, acts of service. Like if you come fix something for me that. So the, the guy who moved to Alaska was worked in maintenance, so he fixed things. But I admire that also.

[Julian]

Remember the plumber that took out the potato from the toilet? Sounds like, you were into that.

[Saraya]

No. If you could see that guy. Oh, my God. No, no. But I do. Like, I definitely. I definitely find it attractive when people are good at. I mean, I'm very good at fixing things myself. Like, I can fix things in my house. I can install shelves and things and whatnot. But I really like people who can, like, build and. And fix things. And. Yeah, I. The opposite of my love language is gifts. Like, I get really annoyed when somebody gives me something impractical because I'm like, well, I don't want that. I could just sell that and get. I don't want.

[Julian]

Give me the receipt.

[Saraya]

Can I have the receipt? Like, I actually have at this moment, I have these earrings and a necklace that this dude gave me. Me a few years ago. And I'm like, it's time. It's time to finally sell them. Like, I want. I want to sell them. But if you give me something practical, I will appreciate that. Like, something useful.

[Julian]

Yeah.

[Saraya]

And. Yeah. And so especially if somebody notices something very useful that I might need, I. I appreciate that. So I like practical things. And. Yeah, no, it makes sense. Acts of service. That means a lot to me, especially if it's something that that is noticed, because I'm really bad at asking for help or asking for anything. Super bad at that. Which, again, another thing that probably helped get me into some not good situations because, yeah, I'm, like, afraid to go ask for help. So if somebody comes and they're like, I'll do this for you. I'll. I'll sort of fall for that.

[Julian]

Was that something your whole life, like, even as a little girl, you just, for whatever reason, didn't want to do that? Like, what do you think that comes from not wanting to ask for help?

[Saraya]

As if there's some shame in being a burden. And actually, this is. I just remember, even in the moment, I remember thinking about how unusual it was and sort of sad that when I was in that. When I stayed in that fraternity house that summer and I was moving into this friend of mine's room, and I'd gotten an ac, and I, not surprisingly, couldn't lift the giant AC myself into the window because it's kind of not an easy thing to do. It's a big heavy. I'm pretty strong. I'm stronger than I look, but I couldn't lift the AC into the window myself. And I had to go to another floor and ask some of those dudes there, like, hey, can you help me move this AC into the window? And for some reason, I didn't want to ask for help so badly that I remember I started to cry in my room, and I remember thinking, okay, this is really fucked up that I'm this upset about not wanting to go ask for help, because I somehow just feel like they're gonna be like, you know, and that's mortifying to me.

[Julian]

You disappoint them.

[Saraya]

I don't want to be a burden.

[Julian]

Yeah.

[Saraya]

Yeah.

[Julian]

Wow.

[Saraya]

So it's. It's really hard to ask for help.

[Julian]

It makes sense because I was. I always try to with people because you can learn a lot about everyone, regardless of who it is. Like, try to figure out what makes them tick. And, like, the love languages are such a brilliant, like, invention. Like, how that really does clock to us. I'm like, all right, there's no way that she's gifts. There's no way she's quality time. We know that. And probably not physical touch. So the only things we're looking at here are service and affirmation, I would say. I would guess that there's probably. Because usually people have at least two dominant ones. There's one that's the most dominant. So Access. Service makes 100 sense. But I. I would guess also the fact that it righteously so kind of bothered you that, you know, you would do the right things and your parents wouldn't give you credit on that, and obviously you found out later it wasn't for the wrong reasons.

[Saraya]

Yeah.

[Julian]

You know, there's probably some sense of wanting to be told, like, you're doing a good job on some things or, you know, not being told, like. Like, hey, especially given, like, how some of your story was put out there. You don't like being told you did a bad job on something, like, if you didn't. So maybe. Maybe that one would make sense too.

[Saraya]

Yeah, I. One of my. Yeah. I have a female friend who is always constantly telling me she's proud of me.

[Julian]

Yeah.

[Saraya]

And it. And I'm like, you know, it helps. It helps a lot. And. Yeah, it helps a lot. I mean, even. Even I get affirmation from strangers and DMs. Somebody in my DMs had finished reading my book and wrote some really nice feedback to me and. And was like, you know, I just. I hope you know it wasn't your fault. And I'm like. And then she. But she repeated it a bunch of times, and I, of course, read it and then burst into tears like Matt Damon and Goodwill hunting, you know, okay. Being told it's not your fault.

[Julian]

Yeah, it.

[Saraya]

It Even from somebody I don't know through my DMs, just meant so much to me to hear that.

[Julian]

I think we hit a bingo there for sure. What, what, what point. Where did you actually make the move and leave investment banking to go to culinary school? Were you. Was that when you were leaving that marriage or were you still in that marriage?

[Saraya]

No, it was before.

[Julian]

It was before.

[Saraya]

So I, I went from Bear Stearns. So I did my two years at Bear Stearns, then I went to Bain Capital. I was there for about two. A year and a half, I think almost a year and a half. I moved back to New York, bought that apartment on Avenue A, got a job at a High Yield Fund, and was. That's when I realized, like, this work is not for me. Because there's something about the adrenaline and the pressure of working on these deals and being so consumed in the, like, you don't have time to think about it. It. You know, there's a bit of something that you're. You're getting from the urgency of those. That type of a work where, you know, you're pulling all nighters and you're, like, just always getting shit done that you're not stopping to think about. Hey, do I really like this? There's no time to stop and think about that stuff. But at the High Yield Fund, it was a much looser schedule. And then that market sort of came apart around that time, and there wasn't a lot of. There weren't a lot of deals to look at. And I remember this guy was like, all right, you know, here's a bunch of research reports on, like, oil and gas industry. You can be there. Oil and gas industry expert. And I'm like, like, I. What am I doing here? Like, I don't. And I. And I just felt like I didn't have a lot in common with people in that world. And so. And I was engaged and gonna get married. And then that's when we had these conversations where he was like, well, you know, why would you. Well, then don't. I mean, I was miserable in that job. Not because anybody. They were all very nice people, but it just was like, I. I don't like this at all. Yeah. And especially because that market had dried up, so there wasn't any urgency. There wasn't a lot of stuff to get done. And I'm like, what am I doing here? So that's when I made the decision to go to culinary school.

[Julian]

So you had always had something with food. Like you were saying, the guy at Bain was even telling you, like, oh, you seem to be so.

[Saraya]

Yeah, my mom was a chef and then. And so when I was young, I grew up like watching Julia Child and there was no Food Network, but I watched a lot of cooking shows. And another clue was that when I. Even throughout college, I got subscriptions to Food and Wine and Gourmet magazine and I loved those magazines. Like, got excited when they arrived and I'm. That's what I'm reading and excited about. Whereas, you know, some of the people in my classes had their, like Wall Street Journal.

[Julian]

Right.

[Saraya]

Subscriptions and they're all into business and finance news. And I'm like, I didn't care about that. So that, that was a clue also.

[Julian]

It's also it. And by the way, it's like something. Culinary arts is a creative kind of thing. You were coming from like a purely, you know, analytical. And you were good at it. That's perfectly possible. But yeah, you know, like, if your brain is more wired this way towards the creative side, even if you're really good at something analytically, it's not going to do it for you. I've seen that story so many. I mean, I'm certainly a part of that story.

[Saraya]

Yeah.

[Julian]

Like, I didn't like banking. I was like, I like writing and talking to people, you know, but also, not for nothing, cooking for people and serving food is like the ultimate act of, act of service as well. So it's kind of like in line.

[Saraya]

Yeah.

[Julian]

As well. So obviously sounds like your husband was supportive of that. Which, that, that part's pretty cool.

[Saraya]

Yeah.

[Julian]

And then you go after that. But were you always. This was the other part, like, when did you become vegan and when was. When was that a thing for you? Did that develop later or was that something you had had practice for years at this point?

[Saraya]

No, it was much later. I, it had never occurred to me that I would, that I would be vegan. It like just never occurred to me. And when I was, I was in a relationship with that guy Matthew. And so he had a whole restaurant background and restaurant company. I met him because I started working on. He was doing a second cookbook. So I was hired to be basically be the recipe tester and help write the book. And. And then I started getting involved in his restaurant business and then we ended up in a relationship. And so. And then a lot of stuff happened that I cover in my book. But he was my first situation where when I got into that relationship, I'd had a decent amount of money for somebody my age because I'd had. When I worked at Bain Capital, we co invested in deals, and so those would then turn around even years later. And then I had bought and sold that apartment on Avenue A. When I left that marriage, I didn't want alimony or any kind of a big settlement. I just. I could have. He made a lot of more money than I did. He was older. I could have gotten money out of that. When I got divorced from him, I could have gotten more money out of it or. Or some kind of an alimony or something, but I didn't want. I didn't want that. I just sort of wanted what I came in with. But anyway, when I was in the relationship with Matthew, I had, like, about a quarter million dollars in assets and money and accounts on my own from my work and. And from a lot of these deals turning around in a big way. And about a year and a half into the relationship, I was in debt by the same amount from putting money into his businesses, which, of course, all went down the tubes. So, yeah, he was my first. I like to say sociopath rodeo, but, you know, allegedly. I don't want to make any judgments about him, but that was my first time having something like that happen with a person who doesn't exhibit empathy.

[Julian]

All right, real quick, I gotta take a quick break. Just go to the bathroom.

[Saraya]

Yeah, me too.

[Julian]

All right, cool. So perfect timing, Joe. What are we, like, 2 hours and 20 some minutes in? All right, so we'll come back. And now we're going to go through kind of the whole story and what happened here in the business you built and then, you know, marrying Anthony and everything that happened there. It's a. It's a wild story, and I want to get your perspective on that. So this might be a second podcast just based on the time we've been going for people out there. If not, you'll keep listening right now. If so, you'll see that second episode sometime soon. So we'll be right back. Thank you guys for watching the episode. If you haven't already, please hit that subscribe button and smash that, like, button on the video. They're both a huge, huge help. And if you would like to follow me on Instagram and X, those links are in my description below.