Sunday Sermons & Saturday Heists

Summary

Podcast Summary: The Dating Detectives – "Sunday Sermons & Saturday Heists" (April 28, 2025)

In this compelling episode of "The Dating Detectives," hosts Mackenzie Fultz and Hannah Anderson celebrate their podcast's two-year anniversary while delving into a deeply personal and heart-wrenching story shared by their guest, Gabby. The episode explores themes of trust, mental illness, and the unraveling of a seemingly perfect marriage.

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1. Celebrating Two Years of The Dating Detectives

Timestamps: [00:47 – 06:43]

The episode begins with Mackenzie and Hannah expressing gratitude to their listeners for supporting their podcast over the past two years. They reflect on the organic growth of the show, highlighting the strong sense of community that has developed among their audience. Gabby, another host, shares her excitement about the milestone and emphasizes the importance of listener support for both the hosts and their guests.

Notable Quote:

Hannah [01:00]: "We were just with Molly, our producer, we're like, I can't believe it's two years. It’s flown by."

2. Defining "Dogfish" and Introducing "Femtuition"

Timestamps: [02:26 – 05:58]

Mackenzie and Hannah introduce key terms central to their podcast’s theme:

• Dogfish: Unlike catfish, who use fake photos or identities, dogfish are real people who lie about certain aspects of their lives. These lies can range from fabricated personal stories to concealing significant details, making it harder to detect their deceit.

  Gabby [03:31]: "They’re lying about maybe having another family or being some kind of crazy maniac."

• Femtuition: A portmanteau of "feminine intuition," this term describes the specific gut feelings that women experience, especially in safeguarding themselves against manipulation and deceit in relationships.

  Hannah [04:02]: "Femme tuition is that kind of specific intuition that comes up in relationships that is really hard to trust."

These concepts set the stage for the episode’s exploration of Gabby’s story, emphasizing the importance of intuition and awareness in the complex landscape of modern dating.

3. Gabby's Story: A Journey Through Trust and Betrayal

Timestamps: [06:45 – 113:18]

a. Background and Marriage

Gabby shares her early life challenges, including her strained relationship with her drug-addicted father and her mother's struggle with paranoid schizophrenia. These formative experiences left Gabby with low self-esteem and a longing for stability.

Gabby [09:00]: "It’s very sad, like, no way around it."

She enters into a long-term relationship with Emmett, a charismatic and well-respected therapist. Their marriage initially appears strong, characterized by mutual faith, community involvement, and the birth of their children.

Gabby [25:08]: "We finally got married after six and a half years."

b. Emmett's Descent into Chaos

Over the years, Emmett begins exhibiting erratic behavior:

• Addictive Tendencies: Emmett's involvement in day trading leads to reckless spending and financial instability.

  Gabby [35:56]: "He would just get fixated on something until he bought it."

• Emotional Instability: Emmett suffers from what Gabby describes as "male PMS," displaying irritability and snapping at their children.

  Gabby [35:58]: "He would have these reckless spending habits that happens during the fall."

c. The Arrest and Aftermath

Emmett's financial mismanagement culminates in a bank robbery, shocking Gabby and their community. The incident leaves Gabby grappling with the sudden loss of stability and facing severe financial and emotional turmoil.

Gabby [47:22]: "He was arrested for stealing."

d. Coping and Community Support

In the wake of Emmett’s actions, Gabby takes charge of her family's survival. She navigates homelessness, secures financial assistance, and leans on her community for support. Despite the chaos, Gabby maintains a sense of humor, using it as a coping mechanism.

Gabby [65:20]: "I have to schedule my breakdowns."

4. Hosts' Discussion: Mental Illness vs. Deception

Timestamps: [93:36 – 99:07]

Mackenzie and Hannah engage in a thoughtful discussion about the overlap between mental illness and deceptive behavior, using Gabby’s story as a case study.

Mackenzie [93:34]: "He wasn't who you thought he was."

They explore the complexities of identifying mental health issues in loved ones and the challenges of maintaining trust when the person you rely on begins to behave unpredictably. The hosts emphasize the importance of recognizing red flags, such as impulsive spending and emotional instability, and how these can signal deeper issues like bipolar disorder.

Hannah [96:05]: "He wanted to start more than one [sober living home], but he was going to be the in-house counselor."

Gabby [97:18]: "He was a therapist. He can actually diagnose stuff."

5. Community Support and Resilience

Timestamps: [66:32 – 91:07]

Gabby recounts how her community rallied to support her and her children during their crisis. From financial assistance to emotional support, the community’s response underscores the podcast’s message about the importance of building strong, supportive relationships.

Gabby [66:50]: "They gave me dinners. They gave me certificates to places to have food."

The hosts highlight the significance of community involvement and empathy, encouraging listeners to foster supportive networks to help others in need.

6. Reflections and Listener Engagement

Timestamps: [101:02 – 114:30]

Mackenzie, Hannah, and Gabby reflect on the aftermath of Gabby’s story, discussing the emotional toll and the healing process. They emphasize the importance of mental health awareness, financial transparency in relationships, and the resilience required to overcome betrayal and loss.

Hannah [106:22]: "Finances is so hard, but it's so important."

The hosts urge listeners to share their own stories, seek support when needed, and engage with the community to build a network of trust and assistance. They also recommend mental health resources and encourage proactive communication in relationships to prevent similar tragedies.

Hannah [110:46]: "If anything comes out of this story, let it be to get involved in your community."

7. Conclusion: Embracing Empathy and Moving Forward

Timestamps: [114:36 – End]

In the closing segments, Gabby announces a surprise guest who overcame similar challenges, adding a hopeful note to the episode. The hosts reiterate their appreciation for Gabby’s vulnerability and commend her strength in sharing her story. They encourage ongoing listener engagement through story submissions, reviews, and community support, reinforcing the podcast’s mission to uncover and learn from the darker sides of dating.

Gabby [102:56]: "I really, really hope that somehow it helps somebody."

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Key Takeaways:

• Recognizing Red Flags: Understanding the subtle signs of deceit and mental illness can help prevent falling victim to manipulative individuals.
• Importance of Community: Building and maintaining a supportive network is crucial during personal crises.
• Mental Health Awareness: Acknowledging and addressing mental health issues can save relationships and lives.
• Financial Transparency: Open communication about finances is essential for trust and stability in relationships.
• Personal Resilience: Overcoming betrayal and loss requires immense strength, support, and self-care.

Recommended Resources:

• National Domestic Violence Hotline: [phone]
• Suicide Crisis Lifeline (US): 988
• findahelpline.com: Access helplines based on your country

Engage with The Dating Detectives:

• Submit Your Story: Email your experiences to [e-mail] with a brief description in the subject line.
• Leave a Review: Support the podcast by leaving a five-star review on your favorite platform.
• Follow on Social Media: Share your stories and engage with the community to foster a network of support and awareness.

This episode serves as a poignant reminder of the complexities of human relationships and the profound impact of mental health on our lives. Through Gabby’s harrowing journey, listeners gain invaluable insights into the red flags to watch for and the importance of community and self-reliance in navigating the tumultuous waters of love and trust.

Transcript

[Mackenzie]

The following program contains names, places and events that have been anonymized or fictionalized for the purposes of protection and safety.

[Hannah]

The following program is provided for entertainment purposes only, and any commentary from the hosts are strictly conjecture and should not.

[Mackenzie]

Be held as making any definitive statements.

[Hannah]

About the truth or identity of any.

[Mackenzie]

Particular individuals or circumstances. If you or a loved one are.

[Hannah]

Involved in an abusive relationship, please call the National Domestic violence hotline at 1-800-799-777, 233 for support.

[Gabby]

Happy Dating Detectives Monday. I said that so fast.

[Mark]

Hi.

[Gabby]

Hi, Hannah. Hi, everybody. Happy Dating Detectives Monday.

[Hannah]

We have a. An amazing guest, a really big story. Before we get into it, though, there's some exciting news today. Guess what today is?

[Gabby]

It's our two year podcast, Diversary.

[Mackenzie]

Yay.

[Hannah]

This is so crazy. We were just with Molly, our producer, we're like, I can't believe it's two years. It's flown by.

[Gabby]

Yeah. It has gone by so fast. And we cannot thank you enough for all of the support that you've given to us and to all the support you've shown to our guests. It's kind of exciting to me how much support everybody has just poured into these people that are sharing their stories and the sense of community you guys have created for one another and for us. And we just think it's been amazing. So thank you.

[Hannah]

That's the driving force of the whole show. Yeah, I. I'm pinching myself. Do you remember our first episode? It was so different than what we do now. We weren't sure what the show was gonna look like.

[Gabby]

Yeah. We didn't know what kind of. We were kind of winging it. We were kind of flying by the seat of our pants with the format. And so we were just like, we don't really know. And then little by little, it just. It was so organic, though, which is what I love about it, is that everything just kind of fell supernatural and organic and we grew together. And Hannah and I didn't know each other before the podcast, so I think that was really all. We didn't know each other, so we've grown together, and I think that's really cool.

[Hannah]

This is an opportunity. I think I was thinking about this in the shower yesterday. It's fine. That's where you do your best work, you know?

[Gabby]

Yeah.

[Hannah]

And I was like, oh, we should reintroduce, like, the definition of dogfish femtuition. Just like a quick little hi. If you're new to us, if you're. If you're here, we're two years old, so we're just in our terrible two. So you're catching on at a good time.

[Mackenzie]

We.

[Hannah]

I'm Hannah. I am a writer and comedian and an armchair sleuth, and Mackenzie, and we're not really sure.

[Gabby]

We don't know what's going on.

[Hannah]

And, yeah, MacKenzie's a PI which is badass and a makeup artist and a cool girl, but literally, like, the best PI in the world. And.

[Gabby]

Thank you.

[Hannah]

This show is about dogfish, which. Would you like to tell people what dogfish are in case they're new?

[Gabby]

Yeah. So dogfish, if you're new here, that we. We coined the term dogfish to kind of describe someone who they really are, who they say they are. They're probably using their real name, real picture, if you're meeting them online. So these are real people, but the story that they're telling you about themselves or something that they have going on in their life is usually a lie. So that's what we kind of like catfish, where they're using a fake picture or they're pretending to be someone else or a super old picture from 10 years ago or whatever. A dogfish is like, all right, this is this guy, but. Or this is this. But they're lying about maybe having another family or being some kind of crazy maniac.

[Hannah]

Yeah.

[Gabby]

That they. They don't disclose it.

[Hannah]

Think of, like, when people go on the Bachelor, and then they say, like, I don't think they're here for the right reasons. It's someone who's not there for the right reasons or why they said they were there. Maybe they're trying to get money from you. It could be any scam, liar, cheater. And we don't stand for that.

[Gabby]

Yeah, definitely not. Definitely not.

[Hannah]

And we also made up femtuition, which is pretty much.

[Gabby]

Yeah, that's another one of ours. Yes.

[Hannah]

It's kind of the. That intuition that comes specifically, I think, from, like, a largely feminine experience. It's not just the girls. It's kind of that specific intuition that comes from having to watch your back if you're some kind of, like, minority. Like, women have to often speak a different language in terms of intuition because it's so much easier to be preyed upon. And that. Yeah, like I said, doesn't just go for women. But femme tuition is that kind of specific intuition that comes up in relationships that is really hard to trust. So we. We. We are the voices in your head telling you to trust your femme tuition.

[Gabby]

Yeah. And I think a lot of people don't realize how much femme tuition you actually have. And yes, guys can have femme tuition, too, for sure. We. We're going to call it femme tuition because we're girls and that's what we call it. But it's like, it could be a man tuition, whatever. But anyways, it's. It's this intuition.

[Hannah]

Femme tuition, them tuition, men tuition.

[Mackenzie]

You can.

[Hannah]

You can cater it to whatever you want, but the vibe is still the same and it's cute. Okay. We copyrighted it, so.

[Gabby]

Yeah.

[Hannah]

And speaking of that, okay, we're almost getting to the story. Femme tuition, we love it. If you want it on a T shirt, guess what? We're opening our merch store again.

[Gabby]

You're welcome. We had such high demand for the mer. People were like, we, you have to give us more. And so we opened the merch store again. So you're welcome. Thank you guys for being so supportive and, like, everybody was going nuts for it. So I think that's really cool. So thank you so much.

[Hannah]

If you missed it, it's a limited merch drop, so there's hats, mugs, sweatshirts, T shirts, sweatpants, and a safety alarm that says, trust your femme tuition. So you can put it on your keychain. And if you need it. Hopefully you don't. But if you need it, even if you're hesitating about needing it, there's a little reminder.

[Gabby]

Oh, yeah. Trust that feeling. It's only going to be available for what, like, what do we do? It's for a week, right?

[Hannah]

Yeah, I think so. We'll post on social media.

[Gabby]

Yeah. So make sure you grab it. We. We were. We opened it again for. For a week. So we hope that you grab some and thank you so much for your support. It just means the world to us. You're. By the way, when you. When you're a Patreon or which. The patreon is only $5 a month and you get two bonus episodes. And we do, like, book club and all these live, like, events and things like that. And anyway, so when you're a Patreon or when you buy our merch, you're contributing to our show financially, which helps us with manpower and things that we can do to provide you with more episodes and more quality episodes and editing and all of that stuff. So it's not going to nothing. So we just appreciate all the support you show. Like, it really, it means a lot to us and to the show. So thank you so, so much. We know that. We know that.

[Mackenzie]

We love you, Sleuthies.

[Gabby]

Yeah, we love you.

[Hannah]

Shall we get into Gabby's story?

[Gabby]

Yeah.

[Hannah]

So this is an interesting one, especially if you are newer to us, because I don't think we've ever had a story quite like it. There are definitely some trigger warnings because it's a really tough story. It's very sad, like, no way around it. I. I wrote some down. Let me know if I miss any. But she talks about addiction, mental illness. There's talk of suicide, a car accident, and some dark humor which I'm putting on here because I know it's not for everybody, but we love it. So she has a sense of humor throughout, despite the difficulty.

[Gabby]

And sometimes, I know for me, like, humor is how I cope with things sometimes.

[Hannah]

Totally, totally. So just be prepared. She's wonderful. I love her.

[Gabby]

But it's also like the. The whole story is like, wait, what? And you're like, what the crap? Like, it's. It's very like you're. You. You'll find yourself really just questioning that, like, what in the world? And so I. I know that you'll really love Gabby a lot and hearing her story, it's a little bit different, but you'll. You'll see. And, hey, you know, is this a dogfish situation?

[Hannah]

Yeah. We want you to weigh in, and either way, it's important. So we're excited to bring her. Her story to you. Not excited. You know what I mean?

[Gabby]

We always say excited because, like, we. We want to connect you together, but we're never excited for, like, the, The. The story itself. So, yeah, we are eager to share Gabby's story with you, or we are eager to allow Gabby to share her story with you. So we're just grateful that she's here. So let's get into it without further ado.

[Hannah]

Hi, Gabby.

[Mackenzie]

Thank you for being here.

[Gabby]

Hi, Gabby. Marcel. I am. I always say I'm excited. I need to stop saying I'm not excited to hear your story because you're here.

[Mackenzie]

I'm nervous to hear your story.

[Gabby]

Yeah. But will you please take it away? You have the floor. Start from the ground up, girl.

[Mark]

Okay, so this one's a little bit different. When I emailed Molly, I said, I won't be offended if you don't use it because it's so different, but just you tell me. And she, I guess, thought it was okay.

[Mackenzie]

She told you? Yeah.

[Mark]

So just to give you an idea of where my head was at when I met my person, I had daddy issues, self esteem issues, self esteem issues, and no close family. I only saw my father A handful of times in my life and I didn't know why. So, you know, kids will kind of blame themselves. I found out later that it's because he was a drug addict and he had done drugs in front of me. But that was like when I was a teenager. I found that out. Self esteem issues I had because when I was in junior high, I got socially bullied, like ostracized. And I had no idea why. Obviously I was weird. I was. Something was wrong with me. I found out when I was in my 30s, it was because my mom was gay and I thought I was in the closet. But they figured it out.

[Gabby]

Oh my gosh.

[Mark]

I was dumb for not figuring out why they were doing, you know, why I was on the outs. And this was in the 80s, so.

[Mackenzie]

This is in the 80s.

[Mark]

Yeah. So the whole gay thing was just very. My mom told me to basically not tell anybody.

[Mackenzie]

Right.

[Mark]

It was different back then. And I was very unmoored. Like I didn't have a support system, structure, family, because I'm an only child. Obviously I didn't have my father. I had grown up mostly with my mom and her partner. And when I was like 16, almost 17, the partner left us. And the reason why is because my mom tried to kill them. And it was because she was having delusions. It was the beginning of her paranoid schizophrenic breakdown.

[Mackenzie]

Oh, so you're how old when this happens?

[Mark]

I was just barely 17. And that was the beginning. It took two years to fully, completely get to where she was completely, totally schizophrenic. So I went through a year and a half of college at a university. And then I was to the point. I just could not stand to see her be a different person, but still be there. And I will tell you from experience that grieving somebody who's alive and there and a different person is worse than grieving somebody that passed away and then, you know, I have no parents, I have no siblings, I have no close family. So I was reaching for, like, stability and a safety net. And I had kind of figured out in college that I wanted to be an artist. But I was afraid because if I was a starving artist on the street with no home, I had no home to go to. You know, go back to mom's house. So anyway, that's where I was at. Not in a good place. And I kind of did this serial monogamy thing. That's what they call it. I would have a boyfriend for almost two years. Two years? Something like that. And then break up with them. And not too long after, I would get another jump into it the next day with them for two years.

[Gabby]

And I think a lot of us can relate to that.

[Mackenzie]

Yeah.

[Mark]

So they were okay at first, but then they started getting worse. Like, I dated this guy that was like a pothead, and he just kind of moved himself into my apartment. And then after him, I dated a more serious addict. So it was just escalating with every guy getting, like, worse and worse. So there was this program that they advertised a lot on the radio that was inpatient drug and alcohol treatment center, and that's what they specialized in. And I said, I'm going to take you there. And he's like, yes, I definitely want to go. So I took him there, and they did this intake, asked him all these questions, and they were going to admit him. And then they looked at me and said, what about you? I'm like, I don't do drugs and alcohol.

[Gabby]

I do not require your services.

[Mark]

Yeah. And they're like, no. Do you need therapy? Do you want therapist? Oh, I can't afford it. I don't. And they're like, no, we have resources. We can refer you to somebody that takes a sliding scale that you can afford. And I was like, okay, I'll try it out. I mean, that sounds.

[Hannah]

That's great.

[Mark]

That sounds good to me. So they admitted him, and I was calling around to find a therapist, and I found this agency that had very affordable therapists, but they were interns. So in order to get your license, you have to have so many thousands of hours of intern, but it's supervised, and you've already been through all the education. And it's like, I don't. Like a doctor has to do their intern hours or whatever. So I went to see the therapist, and he was this geeky guy. I was a little bit hesitant to go in because he was an intern, but he seemed very good at it and just very kind. And I hadn't been getting a lot of that in my relationship, so it was really good to have. So I saw him a few times. And then my biggest issue, of course, in my life was my boyfriend that was a drug addict. So he said, well, why don't you bring him in for a joint session? I'm like, okay, sounds fine. If I can convince him, I don't know. So I brought him in and we had the session. And as we're leaving, driving home, my boyfriend says, that guy just wanted to fuck you. Oh, he just wanted you. He was staring at your legs. Just Screaming about it. And I was like, oh, what? No, I didn't notice that. I didn't see that. I don't know what you're talking about. But basically he told me he did not want me to see him anymore. And I was being the people pleaser and the codependent said, okay, I will stop seeing him. And then about a year went by. He got in the hospital again. He would like drink or do and, or do drugs. And then this time he got arrested because he almost beat somebody to death in a bar fight. What then I'm freaking out. But I thought when I first got together with him that nobody had ever stuck by him and loved him enough and they all just couldn't handle it. And that's why he was still the way he was. And I could probably fix him by staying with him and being his person, you know, I thought I could fix him and if I give up, then he's not going to get better. But I was at the end of my rope by then. And so I needed to talk to somebody. I think that, not real consciously, but I think subconsciously a little bit, I wanted somebody to give me that last push. Yes, of course. Okay. For you to break up with them. It's okay. So I called up that old therapist intern and I'm like, I need to talk to somebody. I don't know what to do. I really need to talk to somebody. Well, between that conversation and the other sessions, we had figured out that we both lived really close to each other in the cities that were like right next door. And we both worked pretty far away so it made sense to meet near where we both lived. But it was surprising because I, you know, I expected to make an appointment and go into an office. So we met in a coffee house and we talked about it and I was like, okay, okay, I can do this, I think I can do this. And he suggested when I talked to him about it, that I have a nurse present so that I would have another person there so I wouldn't feel so scared. I was anticipating this big crazy anger blow up thing and I was like, okay, okay, that's a good idea. So then, you know, we talked. I was feeling better about it and he walked me out to my car. It was dark. And we stood there talking about everything, religion, politics, family, till 2am you know how it goes.

[Mackenzie]

Uh huh. You're like, oh, what is this feeling?

[Mark]

Yeah, yeah. So it took me a couple days. I finally went in and broke up with them with the nurse in the room and he totally took it like, oh, yeah, I knew it was coming. Whenever. I'm surprised to take you this long.

[Gabby]

Oh, okay.

[Mark]

So I went home and I called up the therapist guy to update him. I did it, you know, and we got to talking a lot and I had missed a TV show and he had taped it on his vcr. Yeah. So he's like, can I bring over the tape for you? We can watch it. And I'm like, okay.

[Hannah]

So.

[Mark]

So he rings over the tape.

[Mackenzie]

What do you. Can I ask what you're thinking? Cause I'm just curious what that felt like, to cross that boundary.

[Mark]

I was like, well, we. When we met last time, it wasn't in his office and it was casual and it seems like we've become really good friends outside of the office. Kind of like, not just client. In fact, I asked him, I said, is it okay if we're just friends? And he said, in terms of what? And I said, instead of therapist client. And he's like, oh, yeah, yeah, oh, yeah, of course.

[Mackenzie]

So you kind of had said, we're not gonna see each other as therapist client anymore. That's what we're gonna.

[Mark]

Right. Like, can we just friends and hang out and not be therapist client anymore and all that? And turns out he was worried that I. You thought you're friends owning him Friends. Yes. He thought I was friend zoning. But then I said instead of client. And he's like, oh, okay, good. We're sitting there watching this show and he leans over and kisses me. And I'm like, oh. Like just. It was the person. It wasn't, you know, the. The looks and the.

[Gabby]

Yeah, yeah, exactly.

[Mark]

I mean, this guy was 15 years older than me. He didn't look it, but he was, he was interesting. Totally politically opposite of me.

[Gabby]

That can be troublesome sometimes.

[Mark]

Yeah. He grew up in a very, very conservative old fashioned. And this guy, he's 15 years older than me. He was still a boomer. I looked it up like, he's so qualified as a. That's not even my generation.

[Gabby]

No, legit.

[Mackenzie]

He was just finishing his hours. Had he had a previous career? Like, what was his life before?

[Mark]

Yeah, yeah, he had had a whole career before, actually. He graduated from a good university and he went to work in the aerospace industry. Oh. And it was a really. Yeah, it was a really good job back then. And they paid for him to go to extra education and that's how he got his master's degree to. To be able to be a therapist. So he had finished all his education and was Doing his intern hour. There are a lot of intern hours. And then after you do all of those hours and you turn them in, then you have to take a written test.

[Mackenzie]

I wonder if there's a question on there. Did you make out with any of your clients? Clients?

[Mark]

Okay, here's the thing. I had to lie about it, how we met to everybody for my whole relationship.

[Gabby]

Like, oh, yeah, okay.

[Mark]

Because they wouldn't have given him a license. And after he was licensed, if they found out, they would take it away.

[Mackenzie]

Right.

[Mark]

So that was, you know, we made.

[Mackenzie]

Up a story and you're a lot younger and he's kind of in a position of power. Yeah, that's tricky.

[Hannah]

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[Mark]

Eventually, we moved in together. This all happened pretty quick, but I felt like when you know somebody so well that you stay up till 2am just on your first conversation about how you feel, like you know them really well. Yeah, yeah. So we were just together. That was just it. There wasn't even any conversation about, okay, where do we stand? Yeah, are we exclusive now? He was the kind of guy that never just came up to somebody and asked them out. It had to be like, oh, I knew them already. They were friends. Somebody introduced something like that. Like he was too, I don't know, maybe scared or whatever to just pick up on somebody in a bar kind of thing. Plus he didn't go to bars because he was, like I said, very old fashioned. Very, very, very conservative.

[Mackenzie]

I feel like that makes sense going from your last boyfriend to somebody like him. You were probably so.

[Mark]

Yeah.

[Mackenzie]

Comforted by stability.

[Mark]

Yeah. And it moved pretty fast, but it just made sense, I think, because those feelings of, oh, he's so nice. Oh, he's, you know, just. It's, it feels so good to be just treated really nicely and have somebody care about you not about how you affect them and stable and kind and like he's older and he's wiser and he's very smart and he had more life experience and I knew that he was somebody that you could depend on. Be the stableness that I was looking for. Let me tell you, this dude never got drunk in his life, never smoked anything.

[Gabby]

Wow.

[Mark]

Never did any illegal drug ever.

[Mackenzie]

So this is complete opposite.

[Mark]

Almost, almost never swore. Very old fashioned, kind of sexist. Like he wanted a housewife, basically mom to kids, blah, blah, blah. But the one important thing that we did have was we were both Christian and that was just so important. Like, I think if you didn't have one major thing like that in common, that would be really, really hard.

[Mackenzie]

But yeah, for sure you could align on that. And then.

[Mark]

Yeah.

[Hannah]

Through the other stuff.

[Gabby]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Mark]

We both wanted to move out of the big city and to a smaller town. I mean, not like teeny tiny, but a nicer, smaller, like settle down, raise kids kind of.

[Gabby]

Yeah, yeah.

[Mark]

And he wants to do it before he gets established with a private practice and all that. So we were talking about different places. And he's like, have you ever heard of Carmel? Have you ever been there? And I'm like, I've never really been there before. And he's like, I have a friend that lives there. We could go and just check it out and you could see how you like it. And this is still within a year, this is a few months. And we went and checked it out and I fell in love and I was beautiful.

[Mackenzie]

Right?

[Mark]

Love this area. This is just the right size. So we moved and we found a church that we really loved. And I started to feel like I had close friends, friends and people and just felt more stable. And he finally, finally finishes his hours and he goes and takes his written exam and he passed. And so when you get your license, it still takes two years of being licensed for the insurance companies to actually put you on their panel as a provider and pay you. So that was another two years, you know, of. I'm like, we've been together years now. Where's the ring? You know?

[Mackenzie]

Right.

[Gabby]

Time's a ticking, fella. Time's a ticking.

[Mark]

And I'm like, I know we can't really afford a lot, but we're at least stable now, you know, and there's potential and. Yeah, yeah. And he waited basically until he felt that he was so financially stable that he could pay for a stay at home mom and kids.

[Gabby]

Because he wanted that traditional home life of. Yeah, okay.

[Mark]

It kind of pissed me off because I was like, no, whoever can make the money makes the money. And whoever can watch kids, watches the kids. And we both are in it together.

[Gabby]

And if that's me fella, then guess what? You get to be big stay at home daddy.

[Mark]

So we finally got married after six and a half years.

[Gabby]

Wow.

[Mark]

Yeah. And we had these friends that we had met at another friend's party. She had like all these dinner parties, and we were like, hey, we get along. We should hang out, whatever. And then we saw each other again, another party, and we're like, hey, we're engaged. Yay. And they're like, oh, congrats. You know? And then the next party, they're like, hey, we're engaged. Oh, you know, Yay.

[Gabby]

Okay.

[Mark]

Yeah, it was kind of cool. So they were a young couple and they were both attorneys. She was a personal injury attorney, and he was a defense attorney and a public defender. And they became pretty close friends. So six days before our one year anniversary, we had a baby girl. Oh, yay. How cute, gorgeous and super easy baby. And that was in May. And then the next May they had a baby girl. And then two years after that, we are walking on Wednesday nights. We had this kind of regular thing where we go walk down to the ice cream parlor and we'd have ice cream with our little girls and just hang out and you know, all that. And so we're walking and I'm like, so guess what, I'm pregnant. And she goes, guess what, so am.

[Gabby]

I. I love this.

[Mark]

Wow. So our baby boys were born 13 days apart.

[Gabby]

Wow.

[Mackenzie]

They're all like cousins, like chosen family. For sure.

[Mark]

Yeah. And we would have sleepovers. You take the boys, I'll take the girls. Da da da. Like they all got along and they were our best friends. We were their best friends. And the husband was named Mark. So just remember that because he'll come back up later. So time goes by and my husband Emmett has established himself as a therapist in the area. Now he has this stay at home mom, two young kids. He's like, this is what I want. And he becomes this like, I don't know, community leader type. People actually called him that. He would be involved in chamber of commerce and networking groups and he, he knew the all the people in city government and he hung out with the radio host of the local radio show and I think he even guest hosted it a couple times.

[Mackenzie]

He was like Mr. Carmel.

[Mark]

Yeah. He was president of the Rotary for a while and he would be the coach of every single of our kids. Soccer games and whatever. All the things go to every single award ceremony. Was very involved with the kids. Yeah. And he had a lot of clients that I wasn't allowed to know about, but a lot of clients that he helped a lot. And so he just knew so many people in the area. He was well known. Meanwhile, I'm not really a great housewife, like with the cleaning and the cooking and stuff.

[Gabby]

Well, didn't you tell him you didn't want to do that?

[Mackenzie]

But you said.

[Mark]

But after a while we were like, well, we can hire a housekeeper, you know.

[Gabby]

Yeah.

[Mark]

Not good at cleaning. But I did other things. So I ran a successful Internet business for a while selling baby hats after I had the first baby. And then I started being a manager and eventually was the person in charge of a local mom support group for moms of young children. So I got to be known in that.

[Mackenzie]

Yeah, you guys were like running this community. It sounds beautiful.

[Mark]

So then a few years go by and it was like seven years in marriage. Ish.

[Mackenzie]

So you have a six year old and a five year old, four year old.

[Mark]

Yeah. That would Be right. And, and when I started dating him, and especially after we got married, I got close with his family because I had no family. I loved, loved, loved his mom, and we would go to his sister's house and stay with her family. She had three kids and husband, and we would do Thanksgiving and Christmas, and they were, you know, like my new family. It was nice. So seven years into our marriage, his.

[Gabby]

Parents pass away at the same time.

[Mark]

Well, within a couple months.

[Gabby]

Oh, that's hard.

[Mark]

Yeah. And at that time, he became the trustee, which. It's like being the executor of a will, except it's a trust. So that means he was in charge of the trust. And this is because the oldest was a boy, but he was mentally disabled. He had had encephalitis as a child, and he just wasn't able to be that kind of position. And there was quite a bit of money in the trust, and there was also the house, and they each got a quarter of the house, and he was in charge of taking care of all the accounts that they had and putting together money and distributing money and all that. So he distributed like, I think it was a hundred thousand to each kid, including himself. And his older brothers went and stayed in the trust because he couldn't do it himself. And then there was some more money, and I didn't know how much because I was like, I don't want to have anything to do with this accounting stuff. I didn't have anything to do with the money at all. He made the money. What was his was ours, and what was mine was mine, money wise. That's how it was. And he was cool with that. I, I, oh, I also was a face painter, so I had a little bit of extra money, like, you know, just for me and whatever.

[Hannah]

Yeah.

[Mark]

So he, of course, was happy to get this money and started spending. And sometime after he got that payment, he, he was a big news radio listener, and he had heard this advertisement over and over about this program that teaches you how to make tons of money.

[Gabby]

Oh, no.

[Mark]

By being a day trader.

[Gabby]

Oh, no.

[Mark]

And yeah, so he got into that program that was $30,000.

[Gabby]

Oh, my gosh.

[Mark]

And he pretty much told me that he wanted to do that, period. He didn't really ask. He kind of told me he was gonna do that. I'm like, do you really, really, really think that's a good idea? I was like, I don't know about that. And with finances in general, every once in a while, how's it going? What's happening? Because when you do something like private practice thing, you would know the income is like a lot or a little or like it's not steady. It's just when it comes and when it doesn't and you have to start jobs over here for it to come out over there later. And, you know, that's how it works. So I would check in on him and he would just be irritable and mean after that for days. And I was like, I'm going to stop asking about money because it's just not good. He also, most of the time, he was great, but he also had moments. Ever since I met him. He would have what I called male pms. He would just get irritable every now and then and just like, kind of like grumpy. Yeah, yeah. And a little bit of taking it out on other people and then he'd be better and then he'd apologize or whatever.

[Hannah]

It was just irritation.

[Mackenzie]

It wasn't anything beyond.

[Mark]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And he would get on these kicks about stuff like the motorcycle. I have to buy a certain motorcycle or I have to buy a camper van and spend all of our savings on it. And he would just get fixated on the thing until he bought it.

[Mackenzie]

Try Simply Pop. I already loved Simply products. You've seen them, like the lemonade. They're so good. Simply has launched a new prebiotic soda, Simply Pop, the new juicy soda. They've got five flavors. Pineapple, mango, lime, strawberry, citrus punch, and fruit punch. Pineapple mango is my favorite, but I really like them all, and you have to see what the fizz is all about. Okay. Simply Pop is the juicy new soda that happens when you combine delicious, real fruit flavors of simply with 6 grams of prebiotic fiber to support gut health. It also has vitamin C and zinc, so that supports your immune function. And it tastes really good. So I love that because sometimes I like a little fun, special drink to feel like I'm drinking something fun. There's no added sugar, which you just can't beat.

[Hannah]

You have to try it.

[Mackenzie]

Simply Pop's really good. So go to coqurl.com simplypop to find out where you can try Simply Pop.

[Mark]

And then a little while after that, his best friend from college, he found out that he had committed suicide.

[Gabby]

Oh.

[Mark]

He lived in Colorado. So my husband, Emmett, flew to Colorado and spent time with the family and blah, blah, blah, and came back. And after that, it was like things started to change. There was more of that buying thing, obsessiveness. There was no libido at all. I would be the only one who initiated ever. And even though I told him I wanted him to initiate, he still didn't. So that was really hard on me. And he was having more of that PMS stuff and he was more distant and he would go off and say he was doing paperwork and then like fall asleep in his office. And his sleeping habits were being weird. And he would make up these lists of stuff and he was in these Facebook groups that were like, political. And he would stay up all night and make a big long ranting post about some topic like global warming or whatever and post it. And they'd be like, what the heck is wrong with you?

[Mackenzie]

But I'm mad.

[Mark]

Yeah. And I wasn't sure about his sleeping exactly because he would have to get up early for the day trading thing. And 6am is like the middle of the night for me.

[Gabby]

Right. Yeah, same. It's the middle of the night, so.

[Mackenzie]

He'S like not sleeping though it sounds.

[Mark]

Like it's off and on. Sometimes it's a lot and sometimes it's not at all. And he was starting to buy things, like randomly. He bought exercise equipment. Some of it was still in the box months later, and some of it he would literally. He turned our garage into like a man cave. And he put a TV in. And I have a picture of him in front of the TV asleep on the exercise equipment.

[Gabby]

Oh my gosh.

[Mark]

So yeah, he was buying stuff and he was just. I don't know, he was acting weird. And as far as being a dad, he'd get that male PMS thing more often. And so he'd be kind of like. I don't know how to say it, not yelling, but just kind of snapping at the kids. And then he would apologize and say, I should never talk to you like that, blah, blah, blah. Because he was still the therapist, you know, and he's still really, really great dad. And this change was super gradual. So it kind of snuck up on me. Like it wasn't like all of a sudden he was being super different. It was really slow. And so I honestly didn't think too much of it until it was like hindsight, you know. So we have a 9 year old and a 6 year old, and 10 years from when we got married, he decided that we absolutely had to have a second honeymoon. So we went away to Hawaii again, because our honeymoon was in Hawaii for like two weeks. And this is when some animosity started happening between the friends, the couple, wife and him, because he's the one that asked them to watch the Kids and their kids went to different schools than our kids. So it was a lot pain. It was a lot to ask. And he said, oh, one more thing. Could you do this while I'm gone? Could you do that? Can you buy the soccer equipment, the uniform, and here's a check for it? And he wrote it, and it was a check that was from one of the trust accounts. And they were like, oh, no, this is not good. This is bad. Something bad's happening. I'm going to talk to him, have conversation with him. Eventually, when we got back, the friend Mark's like, I. I want to have a conversation with you about this because I think that things are going badly. And he's like, no, don't worry about it. It's fine. I have multiple accounts for different things. Some of it's my trust money, some of it's trust, trust money. So, you know, don't worry about it. It's fine.

[Mackenzie]

And you didn't think anything of it because he told you also, there was nothing to worry about.

[Mark]

Yeah. Yeah. So that was maybe. And then November, mid November, I wake up and I come downstairs and the kids are jumping on the couch, watching cartoons. And I go into the man cave where he always is, almost always, and he's not there. And I'm like, where is he? Hey, kids, have you seen Daddy? And they're like, he's in the man cave. I'm like, no, he's not. And so I searched the house, and I'm texting him, and I'm kind of mad. I'm like, I told you to please leave me a note or text me when you leave early in the morning so I know where you are and what the plan is. So I text him, when do you think you'll be home? Don't hear from him for a while. Day goes on. Take my daughter to dance class, come back home. And then I'm calling because I haven't heard anything, texting. I did the find my phone thing, and his phone was in his office. Oh, man. The idiot left his phone in his office, forgot it, went off and did some errands.

[Mackenzie]

That's where he was.

[Mark]

No, his phone was still in the office. It was just like he was being an idiot. And he forgot his phone and he went off to do something. And I was kind of mad because he didn't get a hold of me and let me know what was going on. So by the time it started to get to be like, I need to start thinking about dinner. You know, I need to cook Something. When the hell are you going to get home? Like I need to know. And then I'm like, it's. He's usually home by now, so I start getting worried. I called his sister. I said, he didn't go over there because it was like two and a half hour drive and do something, did he? You haven't seen him? No. And I was like, I don't know, maybe I should start calling around. But I'm like, I can't make these phone calls in front of my kids. They might go, why are you calling? To find out if dad's in the hospital, you know?

[Mackenzie]

Totally.

[Mark]

So I called my best friend and I said, hey, can you make these phone calls? Because I'm afraid the kids are. No, no. She's like, yeah, sure, definitely. So a little bit of time goes by. She calls me back and she says, what's your. What's the license plate of his car? I'm like, I don't know, I'll have to look it up. She's on the phone and I hear ding dong, the doorbell. So I go to the door, open the door, and there are police there. I was a little bit distracted when the doorbell rang because I was on the phone with my friend. And then when I opened the door, at first it was just like, what? For just an instant? And then it was like, oh, my God, they're here to tell me that he, you know, there was a big accident or whatever. And, well, they must have read the look on my face because they're like, he's okay.

[Mackenzie]

Oh, thank goodness.

[Gabby]

Yeah.

[Mark]

And if I had been thinking, I would have noticed there were like, way more cops than they would have had for that. And it's like, oh, I see you have your kids here. Okay, can I come outside so I can talk to you? Blah, blah, blah. And they go, you're going to have a hard time believing this, but your husband has been arrested for stealing. I'm like, what? Like, you have the wrong. This is a mistake, dude. This guy, no, he. I'm thinking he got involved in something with his clients because some of his clients were kind of seedy, you know, and they thought that he was doing something he wasn't doing, you know, like, there's no way in hell. So I tell my friend, she goes, I'm coming right over. She comes over, I'm still talking with the police outside. She comes, takes my kids, brings them across the street to our friend's house, throws chicken nuggets at him and says, this is for their dinner. Comes Back. Meanwhile, the cops are telling me we have a warrant to search your house. Here it is. What? Feel free to read it. So we want to come in, but we don't want to do this with your kids. So that. That's good that they're not here. So. Okay. They were really, really nice, actually. And from the point where he said, you're going to have a hard time believing this, but he was arrested for stealing. I was just like, no, this is a mistake. And then that started to go away bit by bit as he was talking and asking me questions. And it was just stunned, like, to the point where it was like, I feel like an animal that you scared to death. And they just freeze, you know? So he takes me aside while they're searching the house, and they were taking and searching for all of the laptops and guns. And he was. Gun. He had a lot of guns. They were almost all in a big safe in the garage, just all locked up and ammo and whatever they could find that's like, that kind of thing. And they knew where to look for stuff. And I said, oh, yeah, there's one in this little safe. It's hidden. And you. It just holds one. And they're like, oh, no, we. We got that one. We know about that one. And I was like, that's weird. I mean, I just. It was. Just went through my head just for a second. That's kind of weird that it wasn't there. They didn't even look. They had already talked about it with him. Like, that was just strange. So I'm talking to the detective in charge, and he says he had committed armed robbery at a bank.

[Gabby]

What?

[Mark]

That morning.

[Gabby]

At a bank?

[Mark]

Yes. He went into a bank with a gun and robbed them.

[Mackenzie]

Oh, my God.

[Mark]

I was stunned. At first, I didn't believe it, but then once it started to sink in, I still can't believe it. But it was starting to dawn on me the ramifications of this. Like, oh, my gosh, he's in jail right now, so now what do I do? So then I started crying because I was like, I don't even know how you go forward from this. So he asked me all these questions. He asked me, is there anything different? Well, so this was like, two weeks after Halloween, and I'm like, well, he did spend a lot of time where I thought he should be seeing more clients, but I didn't really think much of it. Doing the Halloween decoration thing, like, all day, and he's like, okay, speaking of that, do you have a skull mask? Like a mask with skull. And I'm like, no, I haven't seen one wearing something like that. I'm like, what? I was.

[Mackenzie]

He like, this is like.

[Mark]

And they're like, have you had money problems? I'm like, not that I know of. But I don't know. I. You know, I don't. Oh, no, I have no idea. So they finished doing their search, and then I was like, how come I never heard from him? Doesn't he at least get one phone call? Like, because this happened in the morning apparently. And he said they don't allow them to make the phone call until after they've served the warrant because they don't make sense.

[Gabby]

Okay.

[Mark]

Yeah.

[Gabby]

They don't want you, like, go hide everything. Be like, hey, go hide this stuff. It's in the floorboards.

[Mark]

Right? Right. So then I'm waiting around for this phone call. So my husband calls me, and I'm like, what the hell? And he's like, I can't talk about anything. They're monitoring all these calls. But he needs me to do him a favor.

[Gabby]

Oh. Oh.

[Mark]

All of my contacts, everybody I need to talk to, it's all in my phone. So I need you to get my phone for me, because I need those contacts. I'm like, okay, where's your. Well, your phone's in your office. And he said, I need you to go to. Down to the city that. That he had been in. That he had robbed the bank in. Go to the office that I used to share with this other friend. Go get the keys from the key. We have this, like, key bucket. Figure out which key it is. One of those will open the door. Go inside the. In the bathroom, under the sink. There's my shoes, my wallet, and my keys.

[Hannah]

Okay, wait, what?

[Mark]

Yeah. Then come back with the keys that I got from under the sink. Go to my office. Open up my office. And that's where my phone is.

[Gabby]

Yeah.

[Mark]

Okay. All right. What's okay? And at that point, I call that friend Mark, who is the defense attorney, and he's like, oh, my gosh. Okay, I will be there. It's late. I just got home. Sorry. But I will come and talk to you in the morning. I'm like, okay. So I looked at my friend, and I said, road trip. We're gonna go get the keys and get the phone. And then she's like, okay.

[Mackenzie]

So the phone. He meant the phone was still at, like, your house, in his office. But it was locked. No, his phone was at his work office.

[Hannah]

Work.

[Mark]

Yeah. He had a separate private Practice. Nice little. Yeah, office over the ocean. Kind of like. Yeah. So we go, we do find a key that opens. We do find the shoes and the wallet and the keys. And then we're going to go back to towards home and go to the office and get the phone. And she goes, you know what? It might be a good idea if you, like, take all of his ATM cards and get all the cash you can out of it, because you don't know if they're gonna, like, freeze the account.

[Gabby]

Yeah, take it all.

[Mark]

He had a bunch of ATM cards for all these different accounts. So I tried them all. I got a total of $20 out.

[Gabby]

Oh, my God. He had taken all the monies, all.

[Mark]

Of the accounts, including the trust account.

[Gabby]

Oh, no.

[Mark]

I was still in shock. I still not even thinking clearly. So I was like, this is bad.

[Gabby]

But I very much bad.

[Mark]

This is put together all, everything. So we went and we got the phone.

[Hannah]

My sleep has never been better ever since I got a Helix mattress. I feel like I've talked about it before, but I used to have some sleep issues with my shoulder. I would switch out the pillows. I tried the tempur Pedic pillow. It just wasn't. I would wake up with the weirdest pains. And this mattress solved it. And it's kind of insane. My mom also got a Helix mattress and she has talked to, I recommended it and she texts me, like randomly sometimes. And like, this is like, this is the best mattress ever. And it's kind of cute. But I was thrilled to introduce it to her and I'm very excited to partner with them for you guys right now until the end of April. There is a spring savings event. It's 20% off site wide. And what I love about Helix is that you take and you talk about your sleep needs. If you like it firm, if you like it soft, if you like it medium, if you sleep really hot or cold, you know, they have all the details and questions that you don't even think about. And then they recommend the mattress that is right for you. I love helix. Go to helixleep.com Dating Detectives for 20 off site wide. That's helixsleep.com Dating Detectives for 20 Off Site Sitewide. Helixsleep.com Dating Detectives and this spring savings event looks like it's till the end of April. So I would go right now.

[Mark]

Now I have the phone and I have the contacts, and later on I did give them the contact information. But the shoes and the wallet and the keys were in this paper bag and they were up On a shelf. And then all of a sudden she goes, oh, my God, we need to get that to the police. That's like evidence. And I'm like, I hadn't thought of that. Yeah, well, what are we gonna do? She's like, you have to go, like, right now. I'm like, okay, I don't think we have to go right now. Like, it's not gonna.

[Gabby]

Like, it's fine.

[Mackenzie]

Like, talk to the lawyer first.

[Mark]

I'll ask my lawyer friend in the morning. And she said, okay.

[Mackenzie]

So at this point, are you like, I need to get him out and defend him no matter what, or are you like, this guy messed up?

[Mark]

I was more like the second and still kind of like, what the fuck?

[Gabby]

I bet you were.

[Mark]

This is very surreal. Like, this is so weird. I can't even believe it, really. I mean, I can, but I can't. You know, it was just shock. I was in shock. I don't think I was capable of putting any pieces together. I was just mostly just going, what? Why? What? What the heck? How? How does this happen? Why would this happen? And so in the morning, the friend Mark comes over and he actually sits the kids down and tells them about the robbery. And he had a sister in law that was a child psychologist. So he asked her, like, how do I do this? And she said, just make sure they know that they're loved and they feel safe and all before you actually tell them the thing. Yeah, that's what happened. And I'm just sitting there, thank you for telling my children because I had no idea how to do this, you know? And he also said, I will go visit him in prison on Monday. Monday morning. And he, since he's an attorney, can talk to him without being monitored. I'm like, thank God. Okay.

[Mackenzie]

And did he seem like he was like, we can get him out of this? Did he have some kind of optimism or was he like, this is what it is?

[Mark]

Not really. Like, I'm gonna.

[Mackenzie]

I mean, if you get caught with a gun and a mask in a bank.

[Mark]

Yes. And in California, if you use a gun, whether it's loaded or not, which it wasn't, big trouble.

[Mackenzie]

Interesting.

[Mark]

Big trouble. So, okay, he's going on Monday. Good. I'm gonna finally get some answers. So Monday morning rolls along and the kids have school. I'm like, okay, this has been a big deal. Maybe more for me than the kids because they don't really get what's going on. But still, they might be affected. They might be acting weird. I don't know. So I'm going to go talk to their teachers. I'm just going to say we had a big family drama and they might be acting weird today, might be under a little stress. I take my daughter into her third grade class and I. And that her regular teacher isn't there. And I love her regular teacher. She's great. Sweet. Yeah, it's a substitute. And he was just kind of glassy eyed when I said, I have to talk to you about something. And kids, can you please go outside and play because I need to talk to him alone. And I just said the thing that I was going to say, family. And he was just like, okay. And so then I walked my little son to his first grade class. And this is another teacher that I love and know her well. She was the teacher of my daughter when she was in first grade, all that stuff. So I open the door and I hear, that's her. I'm like, oh, oh no. So I see one of my friends from the mom's group that I, you know, so when my daughter was little, when I was right doing the mom support group, the teacher and then another mom that I didn't know, obviously they were talking about it. Yeah. So the teacher comes up to me and goes, hey, let's go on a walk. And she puts her arm around me and we go outside and she's like, are you okay? Don't worry about anything. We're here for you. If there's anything you can do. Blah, blah, blah. And I'm catching on. Oh, everybody knows.

[Hannah]

Exactly.

[Mark]

Everybody knows. And her being nice to me was starting to break me down. Like I, I'm. I'm holding it together. I'm not crying, not upset. But being nice to me, like, gets me to like.

[Gabby]

Yes, I get that.

[Mark]

Okay, I gotta go. I see the principal walking by when I was walking to the office and he's like, how are you doing? Are you okay? If anybody says anything to your kids, you let me know and I will take care of it. I was like, okay. He knows two. Everybody knows, the whole staff, parents, you know. Okay, thank you. Do you need anything? And I'm like, I think I might need to fill out that free lunch form.

[Mackenzie]

Oh my gosh.

[Gabby]

Oh my God.

[Mark]

So I drove home thinking, oh, shit, it must have been all over the news. So I go in the house, I go upstairs, and I was just sitting there and crying and thinking how weird this is. And I get a phone call. It's my neighbor from across the street. And she goes, don't answer the door. I'm like, what? Don't answer. Ding dong. Like, what? What's going on? It's the news.

[Mackenzie]

Oh, no.

[Gabby]

Oh, my God.

[Mark]

They're knocking and they're saying, this is your chance to say something. We just want to talk to you and ask you questions. You can tell everybody how you feel and blah, blah, blah. They were not going home until they talked to me. That's what they said.

[Mackenzie]

Oh, that's horrible.

[Mark]

And they're on my front lawn, on my porch, knocking on the door, telling me they want to interview me. And I'm like, oh, I'm in a freaking Lifetime movie of the week. This is not real. This is like those scenes you see on TV where the news cameras and.

[Mackenzie]

The flash are outside the house and they're behind us. I was like, normal family. Oh, I can't imagine.

[Gabby]

Oh, my God.

[Mark]

Eventually, one of my neighbors is big, huge dude. Big, bald, huge dude. And he comes up and towers over one of them and goes, I think it's time for you to leave now.

[Gabby]

Oh.

[Mackenzie]

And then finally got rid of them, thank goodness.

[Mark]

And then I thought, oh, my gosh, my car is parked and has one of those student of the month, you know, whatever student at the school. I'm like, what if they go to the school and I'm calling the secretary and she's like, that they wouldn't do that. It's. That's not a. But I don't know. I'm just freaking out.

[Mackenzie]

No, I would have thought similarly I'd be scared.

[Mark]

I was like, I can't believe it. What are they going to do? Like, are they going to accost me if I'm out grocery store and try to get an interview? They're like, they were acting kind of crazy. So the lawyer goes and sees him and then comes back that evening and tells me, well, all the money from the trust is gone. He hasn't had very many clients, new clients coming in and lost some clients when you guys left on vacation for two weeks. Hasn't been doing anything to get more. And you know, you have no money. And he took the money from the trust and I guess. And his.

[Gabby]

How much was it?

[Mark]

I put together that his. His sister had been nagging him for the accounting for that account for where the money was, and he panicked. I had no idea how much money it was. Later I found out that what he had taken out was about $120,000.

[Gabby]

Wow, that's a lot of dough.

[Mark]

Yeah.

[Mackenzie]

And that's his oldest brother's portion as well.

[Mark]

Yes.

[Mackenzie]

The one that was kept in it for him.

[Mark]

Yes, he believed, and I honestly think that he did honestly think that he was going to be able to make a whole bunch of money from this day trading and pay it all back and more. You know, I really do think that he thought that he was a little delusional about that. Bless it to me, that still wasn't really quite an answer. Like, okay, you, you don't have much money, but why did it get to this point? Why the hell would you go do that? Like if you were having trouble, how come you didn't say something sooner? Like I could have gone out and gotten a job and we could have said, you know, there could have been stuff that I would have done, but you didn't trust me to enough to tell me about that and let me help. So at that point I just went fully into survival mode. So I'm thinking I have this nice house that I'm renting and I can't afford the rent. I have a little bit of money from my side job stuff, but I have no income. I have like an AA degree which means nothing. It's like having a high school diploma and he had a master's degree and a license and he was making decent money. And I cannot afford to even pay rent. I don't know what I'm gonna do and I can't go out and get a good paying job. I mean, I hadn't worked for somebody else in a long time. For 10 years. Over 10 years.

[Mackenzie]

And partially because of what he asked you to do, like he wanted that dynamic, right?

[Mark]

Right. Yeah.

[Mackenzie]

Had that not happened, you might have been working.

[Mark]

So yeah, so I'm like, I don't know what to do. And luckily the friend, the attorney friend, had talked to him about what steps we need to take and he had said, okay, we need to get him to sign over any of the vehicles that are in his name and not yours. We need to get him to do this and that and the other. He agreed to do all that and to sign over his quarter of the house to his brother and to sign over the trusteeship, so running of that whole thing to his sister, the one that we were close to. And he was giving me some advice to. And my friends eventually gave me some advice to like, okay, you need to move because you can't afford the rent. Some of them were saying, well, it takes a long time for them to kick you out, by the way, so you could stay and not pay rent for a little while. And I'm like, I really don't want to do that if I don't have to. And then they're like, you need to sell everything. You need to sell the. The motorcycle and everything you can is clothes, everything. Have garage sales, you know, sell everything you can. Find a place to live, find a job, blah, blah, blah. And I'm like, okay, okay, Steps. These are the steps I have to take. And they would remind me of this stuff because I was just, like, still in shock. I mean, still pretty messed up and scared and everything. And I had been poor before. I had been through tough times before. But I think the biggest thing was that now not only do I have to figure out how to survive, but I have to take care of these kids. That was a huge difference. It's kind of like I experienced a lot of earthquakes as a kid, and so they were no big deal. But the one time there was an earthquake in this area, I was pregnant for the first time. And I freaked out. Like, not freak out in earthquakes at all, but I freaked out because, oh, my God, this. This baby. I mean, I have to protect the baby. It wasn't just like, how do I survive? It was like, how do I make it as easy as possible? And how do I explain to them what's going on? I told my kids, listen, we're not going to starve to death. You're safe. Worse comes to worst, there's an RV that we have that we can live in. Or even worse than that, we could sleep in the minivan. But I know where all the food banks are. Don't worry. Everything's going to be fine.

[Gabby]

Yeah.

[Mark]

And I decided I was going to try and keep their lives as consistent as possible. We were going to have to move, and we were going to have to start living on nothing. But I wanted to keep her in her dance lessons that she was taking several of a week, and I wanted to stay close by, keep them in their school, you know, as stable as possible. Eventually, a friend of my husband's paid for her dance lessons. That was nice.

[Gabby]

Oh, that's so nice.

[Mark]

And the whole community came together and helped me out. Not only did they not judge us, but they started to gofundme and gave me checks and, you know, collections they took up at their church. And they gave me.

[Gabby]

That is so kind.

[Mark]

Yeah, they brought me dinners. They gave me.

[Gabby]

That's incredible.

[Mark]

Certificates to places to have food. And just. They were so great. They made sure that my kids had Christmas presents. It was amazing. And I had a little bit of a hard time accepting this, like, of course, because I was the person that did charity for others. Like I'm the one that organizes.

[Mackenzie]

But that's why you do it. Not only why, but because you, when you're up, you never know when you're gonna be down. Like you can never.

[Mark]

Yeah. So he was in, in prison for about a month when he asked me to sign the papers to do bail for him. He had found bail money from a couple of friends, old friends, for the. Like, there's a down payment and then there's a monthly payment. Is. It was quite a bit of bail. I didn't know it, but he had. You have to sign over something as collateral. And so he had used the fact that he was in charge of the trust at the time to use the family house as collateral.

[Gabby]

No.

[Mark]

Yeah, I didn't know that at the time. I found that out later. And all of my friends and his friends and everybody, they're like, you know what? We gave you money in the GoFundMe and it's not for that. You better not use that for, for bail. I, we shouldn't let him get out on bail. I don't think he needs to be. But when I would talk to him, he was like, listen, I have, I have this friend here and I talk to him all about this plan. There are these halfway houses for people that are getting out of really high priced rehab facilities. And before they go home, they have these sober living homes they're called. And when you have a sober living home, drug and alcohol counseling, you don't need to be licensed as a therapist because he had lost his license of course, when he got arrested. And I'm going to make a ton of money off of this and I'm going to. Yeah, I'm going to.

[Mackenzie]

He wanted to work on one or start one.

[Mark]

He wanted to start more than one, but he was going to be the in house counselor because you don't need to be licensed for that.

[Mackenzie]

And he's going to do this while he's out on bail.

[Mark]

He's gonna. Yeah. And then later he's gonna make so much money he's gonna hire a defense attorney and get very little time and he's going to pay back the trust and he's going to take care of his wife and kids financially with all this. And I'm like, yeah, I'm not going to count on that.

[Gabby]

Yeah, hold my breath.

[Mark]

Yeah. So you can try. But I'm gonna take care of me and guaranteed.

[Mackenzie]

What was he like emotionally when he.

[Hannah]

Would talk to you?

[Mark]

He was Flat. Flat affect, they call. Just like. He said he can't feel anything. He said he. He's sorry that he did it, but when he got out, I expected crying and sorry and I shouldn't have done this and big mistake and all that. And he was like, yeah, I made a big mistake. It's. It's really awful. But he could not feel emotion, so there was something wrong. I'm like, are you sure that you don't have some sort of psychological problem here? I mean, he's a therapist. He can actually diagnose stuff.

[Gabby]

Yeah.

[Mark]

He's like, I don't know. I know I'm not bipolar. Definitely not. And I just don't know what it is. And I was like, okay. Well, some stuff did not make sense. I found out piecing together later what he had done is he had gone. Driven there to the bank. Well, apparently he changed his shoes, left as well, you know, over there at the office at. No, at the. It was an old office that he had that he used to share with a friend.

[Mackenzie]

Okay.

[Mark]

That was right next to the mall across the street from the bank.

[Mackenzie]

So it was like his home base.

[Mark]

Yeah, yeah. I mean, he had the car there, he did the shoes and the wallet and stuff. And then he went over to the bank. So there's the bank, there's a pretty big street. Then there's a parking lot connected to the mall that also has the offices. And then there was another street, and then there was the police station. Oh, it was practically across the street. Well thought out right there. So all the government stuff, the courts, the police station, all that stuff was right there.

[Gabby]

Wow.

[Mackenzie]

Yeah, well, you know, everybody makes mistakes the first time they rob a bank.

[Mark]

That. Right.

[Mackenzie]

You gotta practice now.

[Mark]

Yeah. So he did that wild. He. He had come to the bank, had posted signs in English and Spanish that said, the bank is closed temporarily. And he went in with his mask and gloves and gun and robbed the place. And then he pulled off his mask as he left. He's running down the street. He hears what turns out to be a officer who's off duty. He hears freeze. He stumbles, drops the bag of money, drops the gun, picks up the gun, turns around, points it at the officer. No, you freeze.

[Gabby]

Oh, no.

[Mark]

Did he shoot him?

[Gabby]

What happened?

[Mark]

The police did not shoot him because there were lots of bystanders, lots of people around. It was a very populated area.

[Gabby]

Oh, he is a lucky.

[Mark]

It was literally a miracle that he did not get killed. So then he runs, leaves the bag of money that he had dropped, runs across the street towards his car. And then by then, the police are surrounding him because they were right there.

[Mackenzie]

Right.

[Mark]

And so he just got down on the ground and put his hands behind his head and let them take him away. So he convinced me to go ahead and sign the papers and get him out on bail because he wasn't going to be able to do anything with any way to make money if he was in jail. And I'm like, okay, and was he.

[Mackenzie]

Going to come back and live with you? Like, how did that feel?

[Gabby]

That's.

[Mark]

I was like, yeah, no, yeah, it's.

[Gabby]

Not going to work out. It's not going to work out, Bella.

[Mark]

Yeah. So he ended up living in our rv. At first it was parked in front of our house, but eventually he parked it on some land of a friend of ours. Yeah. So I was trying to take care of every off business. I ended up getting some money that I borrowed from an aunt and uncle for the last month's rent, which is December. And then I talked to the landlords and they said that they would give us a discount on that last month. And we agreed to move out in January. I had to take care of his office stuff, like move out the furniture and stuff. So I got people to help me do that. I sold off as much furniture as I could. I was packing. I had people helping me pack. I had people who drove hours, my good, good friends who drove hours to help me, to come and help me with the garage sales and the packing and all that. So I found a friend who was going to let me live in a room, me and the kids, for free. But then that didn't work out. And so by now he's out on bail. He sent out an email to everyone in his email list. And my wife and kids need a place to stay for free. And one of the parents of the soccer team that he had coached earlier in the year, so we knew them a little, said that they were renting a house nearby, very close, that had the house, but then in the front yard, detached from the regular house was what they called the casita. And it was a bedroom with a closet and a bathroom. That's it. Queen size bed. That's it. And we could live there for free. So that's where we were going. We were not homeless. We were just close.

[Gabby]

Very, very close.

[Mark]

So we had to share, the three of us, a queen size bed, which didn't work out because you know how kids like do that.

[Gabby]

The kicking in your back thing.

[Mark]

Yes, yes. And taking up all the space.

[Gabby]

They are fast asleep and they're ninjas.

[Mark]

Yes, yes. So I worked it out so that we rotate in on who slept on the floor on a mattress pad every night because they both, of course, wanted to sleep in the bed with me.

[Gabby]

Of course.

[Mackenzie]

Right.

[Mark]

So I worked that out. The best sleep I got was when it was me on the floor without any kids next to me. That's so my routine from then on was I was in survival mode. So my routine was I would get up, take the kids to school, do whatever it was I needed to survive, which is like going to social services and getting every single service I could get on food stamps and unemployment and welfare to work and all that. Whatever I could get. I went to homeless services. There's an organization that has a homeless services division. And they would assign you to a caseworker and the caseworker would help you find someplace. And they gave us like a Walmart gift certificate and gift certificate to a thrift store so I could get work clothes, like work interview clothes. I didn't have work interview clothes. I didn't have work clothes. And then I would get the kids from school, keep on whatever, surviving, going to dance classes or whatever, put the kids down to bed in whichever configuration we had that night. And then I would wait till they get to sleep and then I would go in the closet, was a small walk in closet, shut the door and ugly cry in my dirty laundry. Because I figured all the snot and tears and all that would go on laundry I was going to wash anyway. And it muffled the sound. I did not want the kids to hear me wailing, you know, And I just had to. I had to schedule my breakdowns. I would do that for a while and then go to bed and get up and do the thing the next day. People ask me, what are you going to do with your husband? Are you going to divorce him? When are you going to divorce him? Are you going to take the kids to see him? Are you going to. What are you going to do? I'm like, I do not have the emotional energy to even think about how I feel about him.

[Gabby]

I'd be like, how are you going? Are you offering to help? Like, what are you doing?

[Mackenzie]

Yeah, let's make sure we know where we're living and right meals from before we.

[Mark]

Exactly. And how do we go forward? I don't have much earning potential and I don't have a job. And, you know, and it was like, I. I'm not sure I really know this person because the person I know would Never would never do that. And when he did get out, I kind of decided, all right, you put us in this position. And so now I'm in charge. I'm in charge of who the kids go with, what they do, where and when. And we got into an argument, actually, and he said, you mean, if I want to see my kids, I have to ask you? And I said, yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm in charge now. And he's like, well, maybe you should thank me for finding you a place to live for free. Because it would. It came from his email, and I was like, we wouldn't be here if it weren't for you. So you did this thing. And that means I am now in charge because I'm the only trustworthy one. And I just had to take charge. He did actually go to some special therapist that specialized in that kind of weird behavior. And he went to the therapist and he told him, I know I'm not bipolar, because blah, blah, blah, blah. And that therapist couldn't come up with anything either. But he was trying to. I could find something to give to the court to say, this is why I did this, because it was so out of character. I mean, that's why it was on the news, because it was so out of character. And it's so weird that this established professional community leader dude who volunteered and was in a band and did all this charity work and coached and all that stuff. It was just weird that he would.

[Gabby]

Yeah.

[Mark]

So these court cases, they take a long time. They have a hearing, and then they wait, and they were here. So about a month, he's in jail. Then he gets out on bail. It's about a month later, we're living in the casita. I. I did get services. I did call a temp agency that I had worked for before. We were. Before we had kids and got a job right away. It was not quite full time. It was like 35 hours a week. I think it was kind of a long drive. So there was gas and time involved, and it was like minimum wage, but at least it was something. And I was just really concentrating on what do I have to do next. Get by day to day and try to figure out what to do in the future. So we're in the casita one day about a month after he gets out, and he said, hey, I'm going up to another nice place to see if I can find a place to do this sober living home thing. I'm gonna shop for places to put it. And I'm like, that's Kind of far, but okay, whatever. And he had left the dog with friends that had the house that he was staying on. And he had just gone on this trip, and he posted something about the prices of gas on his way home to the area. And then Sunday came around, and I was not thinking anything about him at all. And then I got a text that said, hey, the police came by your house. It was my neighbor and where you were. And I'm like, you can tell them where I am. You can give my phone number, whatever. And then some more time went by, and then my friend, whose house he was staying at, calls me and says, I'm having a Super bowl party because it was Super Bowl Sunday and he was supposed to come. And I've been texting him and texting him and calling, and he's not answering. Have you heard from him? And I'm like, no, not at all. Just a. Just a post on Facebook. And she says, well, I'm really worried now because my dad just came and he saw on the news that there was this crash where an RV went over a cliff, and they haven't figured out who it is yet. And I haven't heard from Emmett. And I was like, maybe that's why the police came to my old house. And I started getting upset, and I texted my attorney friend, and apparently he was at a Super bowl party, too, so he didn't get it right away. But then I got a phone call, and I believe I was on the phone when the friend came over because the police were trying to ask me where my kids were. I'm like, what, are you calling to tell me that it was him? And they're like, oh, no, that's not what I'm calling for. I just wanted to make sure that where your kids are. And I said, well, they're not with me. They're on play dates. And I was like, is. Is it him starting to get upset? And he kind of hinted at, no, I just wanted to check that your kids weren't with him on his trip, and I can't say anything else. And then people online were also putting things together because it was on the news that there was this crash. And then the police came, and they said, yes, I'm here to inform you that it was him. He was in the rv, driving on a windy road in the rain and the wind. And there was a mountain on one side and a cliff and then the ocean and rocks on the other side. And he went over the cliff, and it was a really remote area. We had to rappel down to get the body. And we had been afraid that your kids might be there too, but I'm. They're okay. And then he asked me some questions and stuff. And of course I'm bawling. I was just like hysterical. And I'm getting a little.

[Mackenzie]

No, I mean, so. I'm so sorry.

[Mark]

Yeah. So it turns out, and this. I found out later that my best friend Sydney, the one that was there, her ex husband, was a firefighter. And he was one of the people who came to the scene, identified him and found some little, like, I think they were Swiss army knives with my kids names in it. And that's why he thought maybe the kids were there. And that's why they called me to see where the kids were, see if they had to go look for those bodies too. So in the morning, the kids got up and they're like, so what happened? What happened this time? Like, so my friend says the same thing that he did before. Like, you know, you have a lot of people who love you and you're safe and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Well, your. Your dad was in an accident last night. And my son looks up at me and goes, is he dead? And he didn't, he didn't want to say the word. And I just nodded and I said, yeah. And then we all cried.

[Gabby]

Oh my God.

[Mark]

And that was the hardest part of the whole thing was telling your children that their dad is gone. And I went to grief group and it was just like when you lose somebody that close to you, it's like you'll be bopping along, doing shopping or whatever, and then you'll just, boom. Hits you with sadness and you just want to fall on the ground and cry because one stupid little thing reminded you. But I was still a little bit in survival mode. So I found out later that he had gotten some life insurance, but it wasn't regular life insurance. It was accidental death. So he had quite a substantial amount for us. And then he had 250,000 for his sister, the one that he had signed the trust over to. That was family. And then he had another 250,000 to his brother.

[Mackenzie]

Oh my gosh.

[Mark]

Yeah. So I was like, well, geez, I'm okay. Like I'm going to be okay. And they were implying, and everybody thought that he did it on purpose. Which of course, if he had done it on purpose, they wouldn't have paid. Right? But the investigator, the one who had called me originally to see where my kids were, called me and asked me some questions. And he ended up ruling that it was an accident. I did tell him the truth, that he had a habit of driving tired, thinking that he could and he would swerve and stuff. But I asked him, I said, were there, did he break, were there skid marks? No. Breaking just right off actually traumatized the guy who was driving behind him because he saw it happen. So I was just continuing to work and it takes quite a while before that all goes through. You have to file the claim, you have to do all this stuff. And I was going through that process and just kind of trying to. Still in survival mode, trying to get everything done. And I was helping my sister in law with her claims. One of the companies, the one that had the, the policy for the brother was not wanting to pay. And so I helped get that situation fixed. And then later that company happened to have a. Their attorney happened to live in our area and so had seen the news and so sued so that they wouldn't have to pay, saying that he did it on purpose.

[Mackenzie]

Oh my goodness.

[Mark]

Yeah. But they did end up getting 90,000 after they went and saw a. Like it was in court. But then they went to a meteor. So I get the money and I find a place to live and I get settled and I'm like, thank God, a real house, three bedrooms. So now I feel like, okay, I'm finally getting back on my feet. I'm okay. And then my sister in law comes over and she says, okay. So we added it up and it's $120,000 that we want you to put back in the trust. Because she knew I got more than she did and I had life insurance money. She got $250,000. Granted. Some of that would pay for the attorney that had to take over the trust.

[Mackenzie]

Of course.

[Gabby]

Yeah.

[Mark]

But she's asking for what he took out, which was 120. She got 250. And the brother got. Ended up with.

[Mackenzie]

Yeah. So it's like paid way more back in a weird twisted way.

[Mark]

Yeah.

[Mackenzie]

Oh my gosh.

[Mark]

I think morally it was that was paying back that money. Why do you think he had the insurance policy to you? Yeah, why do you think he had one at all for his sister? Like who gets out an insurance, life insurance for their sister? It's because she's the one that had the trust, but she still wanted to get that money from me. And I'm like, this is for me and the kids to live off of.

[Mackenzie]

Literally. He took everything because of this.

[Mark]

Yeah. And I don't have that kind of earning potential at All. And I, you know, I'm trying to survive. I feel like I just got on my feet and she came and kicked me back down on the ground. And she said stuff like, well, you're an intelligent woman. You must have known what was going on.

[Gabby]

Oh, okay. Got it. Okay. Oh, my God.

[Mark]

So I said, you think I'm lying when I said I didn't know anything about it. First of all, if I had known anything about it, it wouldn't have happened. If it did happen, I would have planned it much better than that. From a police station. Come on. Like this? Really?

[Mackenzie]

That's horrible.

[Mark]

You think I would go along with all of this? I didn't know. I thought we were doing well.

[Mackenzie]

Yeah, you would.

[Hannah]

Yeah.

[Mackenzie]

Because you trust that he will tell you the truth.

[Gabby]

Yeah.

[Mark]

Oh, yeah. And I trusted that he would handle the money. And I trust, you know, like, it's your husband, you. And this is like, stand up guy.

[Gabby]

Yeah.

[Mark]

But the thing that hurt me the most about that was that she had been my family.

[Gabby]

Yep.

[Mark]

And all the family that I had. And that, to me, was saying, no, you're not.

[Gabby]

Mm.

[Mark]

So that really hurt. And I sent her a letter, and I said, this is how it feels. And I can't believe the way you're treating me. So I ended up settling with her later for 50,000. And I'm like, I still feel like this is stupid. Yes. And the only reason I. That is because I figured it would cost me that much in lawyer fees anyway if I went in. And technically, legally, the money that we had from the life insurance had nothing to do with the money that was taken from the trust. And it was my husband. So am I half responsible for that? And, you know, who knows? So it probably would have gone on in court a long, long time. Yeah. And my kids were. When we moved into the house after the casita was the day that my son turned seven. And then my daughter was nine. So that's timing wise. What happened?

[Mackenzie]

So now, how long ago was all of this? Yeah.

[Mark]

Well, now she's 20, almost one. Wow.

[Gabby]

Okay.

[Mark]

And he's 18 in high school, about ready to graduate. Wow. And so when I said, it's not exactly a dogfish story, that's what I mean. But he wasn't.

[Mackenzie]

Yeah. I want to talk about. About that. Because he wasn't who you thought he.

[Gabby]

Wasn'T who you thought he was, period.

[Mark]

Right. He wasn't who he thought he was.

[Gabby]

Yeah.

[Mackenzie]

Well. Yeah. So did you ever come to any conclusion about why you think he started acting so differently? I mean, because as you were talking, I was thinking like, bipolar, from what I know about. And I'm not an expert nor am I qualified.

[Mark]

Yep.

[Mackenzie]

He was saying he wasn't.

[Mark]

He was saying he wasn't. But that's. There is a reason why they don't have self diagnosis from therapists or doctors or whatever.

[Mackenzie]

Yeah.

[Mark]

After he passed, I got the kids into therapy and saw psychiatrists and blah, blah, blah. And they did a lot of interviewing with me asking about the parents, the father, me, whatever, to see what might be genetic or whatever. And he was asking me all these questions like, did he ever not sleep all night? Did he? Yeah, he would not sleep and he would make up these big long lists of things or like what a Christian dad needs to teach his son or a political post. That was well read.

[Mackenzie]

Yeah, that part, it was very intense. Like he would get really sucked in.

[Mark]

And another thing is just kind of reckless spending. And looking back, I realized that throughout the years that I knew him, he would tend to have these reckless spending habits happen during the fall. And this happened during the fall. There was once a time where he insistent on buying a camper van. And that was right before Thanksgiving, I remember. And then the, the motorcycle was right at Halloween. And then this happened in mid November, different year. So I told my therapist about that and he. And she said, often with my clients I find that they have manic episodes in the fall. I'm like, I didn't know that. I've never heard of that. She said, I found that with my clients. And I'm like, I didn't know that was a thing, but that totally tracks. Also, he had told me when he was in college he took off a semester, and I believe it was fall semester, and spent every day, all day in the arcade playing pinball and eating gummy bears.

[Mackenzie]

Oh, wow.

[Mark]

If that's not a manic episode, I know what is. So I think that he had high functioning bipolar and then it really got kicked in when he was desperate and didn't have any money and you know, it just came to a head and.

[Mackenzie]

I mean, the day trading seems like a trap for somebody that could have those tendencies because it's like, that's a.

[Gabby]

Really good point reward.

[Mark]

Yeah. And having grandiose thinking like, yeah, plans that you're gonna make all this money or you're gonna be saving the world or whatever it is. That's very typical as well. There were times when he saw a therapist for depression sometimes. So I know there was that going on too. I didn't See a lot of the signs of it, but I know that that happened. And then there's just all these weird things that I put together and I'm like, oh, my God. He didn't know it. He. He probably did not want to think that he was bipolar, but I do think that he was. I mean, I can't. Obviously, you can't diagnose, of course, but.

[Mackenzie]

Still, obviously with this situation, I'm sure you did. But in general, do you think you trusted him more because he was a therapist?

[Mark]

Probably, yeah. I think also he was my therapist.

[Gabby]

Yeah.

[Mark]

And he was older than me and I mean, daddy issues much. And he was like spiritual leader. Like, he would do the sermon sometimes when the pastor was out of town. Wow. His major in for undergrad was religious studies. So he was also very, like. I don't know, just. He was.

[Mackenzie]

He sounds powerful.

[Gabby]

Yeah.

[Mackenzie]

Like, very charismatic and.

[Mark]

Very charismatic.

[Mackenzie]

Someone you want to follow.

[Mark]

He was very personable. Everybody liked him. Everybody met him and then told me later, oh, he seemed like such a nice guy. Like, I always hear that. Nice guy. And Molly said. I was like, this isn't exactly a dog fish. And she's like, yeah, but we hadn't talked about, like, mental illness can be a dogfish itself.

[Gabby]

This guy robbed a bank. Like, who? And you're like.

[Mackenzie]

And you had no. That was out of character for the person you knew and loved.

[Mark]

Like an unintentional dogfish. I think that the mental illness is just a big part of, like, that's the culprit, you know?

[Mackenzie]

Yeah. I asked him in grieving somebody who also turned out to be not who you thought that they were in a way that you obviously have a lot of empathy for what he was maybe struggling with, even if it might be painful and make you angry.

[Hannah]

I don't know.

[Mackenzie]

I just can't imagine having to grieve somebody, grieve a relationship and then also grieve the idea of the person.

[Mark]

Yeah. And I have felt like I should probably be angrier than I have ever been with. I never had a lot of anger. Sometimes I feel sad because I think he was very. I think at the very end he was sad. And I remember talking to him right before he left on the trip, and he was just kind of lowering his head, hanging his head, and he just seemed very sad and sorry. And I've gone through times where I thought, you know, this whole thing is because he didn't want anybody to know that he wasn't this well off, professional person. You know, the head of the Household with perfect kids and perfect stay at home, mom, wife, and all of that. He wanted to be this Persona, and that's why he wouldn't tell anybody, not even me, what was going on when he got in trouble with money. So I go through times where I'm pissed off at him about that or sometimes I feel sad about it and feel a little bit sorry for him. And it really did change, I think a lot when I realized that it was most likely bipolar. For a long time I didn't think it could be because he being somebody that could diagnose that said it wasn't. And so everybody just believed him. But then I was talking to a psychiatrist and he was asking me questions. It all started making sense and falling into place. And I was like, well, on the other hand, you know, part of that is chemical and genetic and not something you can help, but part of it was also pride and wanting to look like he was this well off, just perfect person. So there's no one set answer for that question.

[Mackenzie]

Yeah. I don't know what to think. This is just really heartbreaking. And I will say I think your kids are really lucky to have you.

[Mark]

Thank you.

[Mackenzie]

Sounds like you handled an impossible situation. We always, I feel like, need the updates, the happy updates, if we can.

[Mark]

I have kind of a surprise for you. I did meet a new guy.

[Gabby]

Is he here?

[Mackenzie]

What?

[Mark]

No. But he agreed to come on.

[Gabby]

Oh, yay.

[Mark]

And talk about his ex wife.

[Gabby]

Oh, yay.

[Mackenzie]

So you guys had some stuff to talk about on those first few dates.

[Gabby]

Yeah, they did. Yeah, they did, buddy.

[Mark]

Yeah.

[Mackenzie]

Wait, he's gonna come talk to us?

[Mark]

Yeah. I don't want to. Spoiler alert. I won't tell you.

[Gabby]

No, don't tell us nothing.

[Mackenzie]

Well, I can't wait to meet him. And as much as I'm sad he has a story.

[Mark]

Yeah. So.

[Mackenzie]

Wow. Wow.

[Gabby]

Thank you for sharing your story. Thank you so much for sharing with us and your willingness to be so vulnerable. And I just, I think so many people are just not going to believe like, holy crap.

[Mackenzie]

Yeah.

[Mark]

I still feel that way about it. Holy crap.

[Mackenzie]

Well, you have a sense of humor throughout, which is amazing.

[Gabby]

Yeah.

[Mackenzie]

I. I admire you a lot.

[Mark]

I think that humor, especially dark humor.

[Gabby]

Is necessary for healing sometimes 100,000 million percent.

[Mackenzie]

Yeah.

[Gabby]

Thank you again for sharing your story.

[Mark]

I really, really hope that somehow it helps somebody.

[Gabby]

It's. It will. It does every time. And you never know.

[Mackenzie]

And so many people deal with mental health in relationships.

[Mark]

Yes, that's. Yeah, that's something that.

[Mackenzie]

And we need to Talk about.

[Gabby]

And it gets overlooked a lot for sure.

[Mark]

I mean, not that I think that there's going to be somebody whose husband wants a big.

[Gabby]

You never know that. First time having a bank robbery on the, on the show, that's crazy.

[Hannah]

That's really heartbreaking.

[Gabby]

There's so many different things going on here. I, I really want to know, I really want you guys to weigh in whenever hear this. Like, I want to know, what are your thoughts? Is this, is this dogfish territory? What is this to you? And let's talk about. First of all, I think very important mental illness. Like, yeah, we, I think it's so important to know more about mental illness and educate ourselves. And that's another reason I love our podcast and I love everybody that shares because you don't realize that a lot of the stuff that goes on is, you know, could be stemming from mental illness. So it's important to pay attention to the signs of that and talk about it more. But yeah, like, like the impulsive shopping, for instance, that could be something so deep, you know.

[Hannah]

Well, yeah, so I do want to say we are obviously not licensed psychologists, psychiatrists, any like thing like that. So we are not going to, we don't know anything. We're not going to label this mental illness. We have our, you know, suspicions. And I'm sure you do, too. And she shared what she thinks in hindsight, he was navigating, but we're not going to name anything in terms of a diagnosis, but we can talk about, of course, those sides. And yeah, I think it's interesting to have mental illness be the driving force behind what could be described as dogfish behavior. Like he was doing things that she did not know about and he was dealing with things that she did not know about and had a quote, unquote, secret life in terms of money and robbing a bank. Like, whatever it was that he was navigating was behind closed doors and totally blindsided her. And that's like a different, different kind of mourning to be, you know, a victim of that without it being malicious.

[Gabby]

And what do you think about not knowing what's going on with your money? Like a lot of wives, a lot of this is, it's kind of common. Right.

[Hannah]

It also goes both ways. I was talking, I told, I often call my mom after we record and tell her about what we just through because it's heavy for us. And I usually am like, I need to kind of come down. And I'm sure a lot of you feel the same way. And she, I think it's okay to share. It was like, yeah, your father and I, he didn't know what I was doing with budgeting and, like, our budgets, but he was making the money, but we didn't work together enough. And, like, so I think it just is the. The fact of being out of the loop of either part of your finances as a couple can be dangerous, and there's no shade because it is very common. And it's also very hard. Like, finances is so hard, but it's so important. And I was going to recommend, which I'm sure I've mentioned before, I've truly benefited from some podcasts that help people gain control of their finances.

[Gabby]

Oh, yeah, you said you have a favorite finance podcast.

[Hannah]

I do. Well, my favorite is called Money for Couples, and that is literally couples coming on and talking to a financial advisor, and he talks through their issues that are finance on the top. But then usually there's, like, more going on underneath. Like, this could be a couple that could have gone on there and talked about, like, I got us into. Like, sometimes it's couples that come on and it's like, I day traded. I lost a lot of our money. We have three kids. This. We don't have savings. What do we do? And what I like about the podcast is that he's never like, you're screwed. It's the end. He's like, there's always a plan. Let's talk about it. And then he also gets to the root of the problem. So that's a really interesting one.

[Gabby]

I think a lot of people could benefit from that.

[Hannah]

Oh, my God, it's so good. And it's also just so interesting because you learn from couples. Sometimes couples come on that are like, super, super rich, and you're like, I'm not having that problem, but I like to hear what your problems are.

[Mark]

Yeah.

[Hannah]

And then there's another one called her first 100k, which is specifically focused on women taking ownership of their finances. So that's, like, a really good one, too. She talks about having her words, not mine, a fuck you fund.

[Gabby]

Oh, I like that.

[Hannah]

I know.

[Gabby]

I always wonder why more like, more people say the reason that women. It's. I'm sure it's men, too, but mostly women, they come on and they say, I couldn't leave him even though he was abusive. Where was I gonna go? I don't make the money. I stay home. Like, I don't have any money.

[Hannah]

Well, women couldn't even have a credit card until, like, the 70s without their husband's approval. So it's. It's not. We're still very much in the early stages of being able to have money that is only ours.

[Gabby]

Yeah. Set stuff aside for sure.

[Hannah]

Yeah. And I. I really think it's important. I obviously, I know sometimes it's like. Seems impossible to get ahead of savings, but focusing on having money that's just yours in case, like, in this case, he wasn't a bad guy. Like, he loved her. He wanted to be a good father and husband. And this was like, how he. I mean, obviously there were things going on that he couldn't maybe control. So it doesn't necessarily mean we think your husband's gonna cheat on you and have a secret family. It's just like, you never know what's gonna happen. And you should always try to prepare yourself for the worst, Hope for the best, prepare for the worst. So everybody go think about. Think about that and maybe check in with a partner if you guys realize you're in a position where you maybe don't have open communication about your finances. And I think the signs, like you mentioned at the beginning, we can talk a little more about some of the signs leading up to it, like the mania, not sleeping, impulsiveness. And it was interesting that he was a therapist. And that, I think, is so hard because a lot of these things, when you're going through them, you don't know you're going through them. So even if you are a therapist or somebody who seems like they're on top of their game, and I don't. I don't know.

[Gabby]

We had an. And we had an episode where our dogfish was a therapist. And it's like, you. He. It was like he. He knew what to say and how to manipulate her and how to manipulate his words. And so I feel like that could be common. But also, if someone's a therapist, you're like, oh, I trust what they say. They know what they're doing. Like, you want to trust a doctor because they went to school. You know what I mean? But it's. Sometimes it's difficult to realize that maybe this person that you trusted, you shouldn't have trusted or what. But you don't know that until you. You know what I mean? You don't know what you don't know.

[Hannah]

It really broke my heart, especially, like, obviously we don't know what was going on in his head, and. But I can't imagine that it was easy. And I did want to note. So we always, at the beginning of our shows, talk about the domestic violence hotline. But there's also in the US the Suicide Crisis Lifeline. It's 988. And if you're not in the US there's a website that I didn't know about. It's called findahelpline.com and you can put your country in and what you need. And it has a lot of different helplines. So if you're. If anything has brought up anything for you or if you feel hopeless, like even if you're not dealing with mental illness but you have financial problems. I know it's very common to.

[Gabby]

And things. Things can seem really hopeless sometimes. And then the next day you're like, oh, that wasn't so bad. But when you are having those really hopeless times, there is support for you. You're never alone, especially with the dating detectives will be.

[Hannah]

You're never alone. I can't imagine having to mourn someone when you find out that they have been someone you didn't think they were.

[Gabby]

You know, there's. Speaking of that, I want to pop into book club real quick because we talked about the Perfect Marriage on the Patreon Book Club and I just read the Perfect Divorce and that just goes to show you that you kind of sometimes don't know who you're dealing with. But now I'm reading a book called Pretty Girls. You will need therapy after you read this book.

[Hannah]

Oh no, wait, I'm writing it down.

[Gabby]

It is not for the faint of heart, like trigger warning. Insane. Like it's bad and it's, it's.

[Hannah]

But is it a good book? Like, do you recommend it?

[Gabby]

It's good. Well, and it goes to show you, like, basically this woman's married to this guy for like 20 years. So like more than half her life. And then she finds out that he is not who. And then it goes back to all the way. It goes back to the beginning and he. Anyways, it's a crazy book. But you just, it just goes to show you, like, you don't realize like people are sometimes. Often times maybe not who they say they are. And that sucks.

[Hannah]

And in the case where. Yeah. And if they die, like in this case, I just don't. I just have a lot of. I want to give her a hug for everything she's been through. And as a mother, as a mama.

[Gabby]

Oh man, your heart, it just, just. Oh, your heart is crushed.

[Hannah]

I also will say her community.

[Gabby]

Yes, yes.

[Hannah]

Was brilliant. And I loved. I expected her to say that people blamed her. And that did happen a bit where some people were like, oh, you must have Known or how could you be married to somebody who did that? But it seemed like most people recognized that she could be separate from him and be somebody who deserved support. Like, or even if she. I don't know. Like, there was just, like, a selflessness in the way that this community was dropping everything. The school, the kids. They put the kids first, it seemed like. And that's what I want out of everybody. It doesn't matter most.

[Gabby]

I. I find that most people do put the kids first, but there's a situation where there. It's very. It's not very selfless at all. Like, it's really. It's really. The. The kids just don't. They're not the first thought. And that's. That's horrible to. To. I can't even imagine. Oh, my gosh.

[Hannah]

Well, Karma's real. And she put out really beautiful Karma into that community. Literally. I just saw in my note, I wrote down, karma, go do something for somebody.

[Mackenzie]

Like, if this.

[Hannah]

If anything comes out of this story, let it be to get involved in your community, because you never know when you're going to be on top. You never know when you're going to be on the bottom in need or able to help somebody else. And truly, I'm, like, not just saying this. I want everybody to go think about something they can do. It can be as simple as saying hi to a neighbor you don't usually talk to. And then I want you to comment and tell us what you did or DM us. I want action because we need to do this because this is always what it comes back to.

[Gabby]

Yes, I try to use my social media platform. Like, I tell my audience. I'm like, just whatever you do, if you're out today, just smile at someone. Like, just. Just smile. That's it. Like, you don't. You don't have to buy them a house or you get a car. You get a car. Like, get whatever. Just smile at people. And you never know how that can really change someone's day or even their life, change everything.

[Hannah]

No, I really. I want to hear what everybody does and make it, like, a goal.

[Gabby]

Let's be your Monday motivation to be kind and go like, yeah, positive somebody's life. Gabby, we're so. We love you so much for sharing your story. Thank you so much. We just. Oh, my. You guys keep the support coming. I love when you guys, when you share your thoughts and your support on the social media, and we do get that over to our guests so they can feel your love and support. So thank you. So much.

[Mark]

We.

[Gabby]

We literally have the kindest audience. Like, everybody is so sweet to one another, and even if people disagree with each other, you guys do it in such a respectful way that it's like a. It's a friendly debate. It's not so much an argument. It's just like different perspectives. And I. I think that's kind of. That's hard to do. And you guys do a great job with it.

[Hannah]

It is hard to do. And to each their own. Everybody has a different relationship. We're never prescribing a one size fits all. And like, even the way they met, like, I'm sure some people have bad things come out of that. I mean, I think she acknowledged, you know, he was older. There was a power dynamic. Was that necessarily healthy? Not necessarily. Did it result in beautiful kids in a family that worked for a long time? Great. But I know that will bring stuff up for people. I think, like all of those topics, we're never here to tell anyone what to do. We're just here to. Here to talk about the stories and what can we learn for ourselves, which is individual to everybody. So we appreciate everything you take away from it. Absolutely want all your thoughts and we want your stories.

[Gabby]

We've been. Y'all been setting up for two years. For two years. Keep the stories coming. You guys have been sending us stories and we've been able to connect with so many people and gosh, I can't believe it's been two years. That's so cool. Thank you, guys.

[Hannah]

I know. And you know the email so well. It's not even like a fun running gag anymore.

[Gabby]

Yeah. Now I. So email. Email us us at Investigate. I almost had to forget. I almost had to think about it. Investigate at the dating detectives podcast.com Email your story to us and put something in the subject line so we know what we're getting into.

[Hannah]

Yes. Put a little blurb of what it's about and it can be anything. Like, she said she wasn't sure if she even wanted to submit the story because she listens to us, which. Thank you, Gabby. We love that people have been with us a while and she knew hers was different, but it's relatable. And it doesn't matter if you think it's worth hearing or not, because we think it's worth hearing.

[Gabby]

Absolutely.

[Hannah]

Promise. Even if we don't get back right away, sometimes we're just busy. But we will. We will get to you. Okay.

[Gabby]

Yeah. And please, if you have an opportunity to leave our podcast a review or give us five stars. We would really appreciate that, too. So thank you for contributing in that way. Leaving reviews and stuff like that is really helpful. So we just appreciate it. And those things have really helped us grow. So we appreciate, like, seeing you guys share our stuff on your socials. And it helps that when you share it, it really helps us connect with other people too, that they're like, oh, my gosh, so somebody shared this and I saw your podcast and oh, my gosh, I have the story for you. And then they connect with somebody else and it changes their life and you just have no idea. So it means a lot to us and to our community.

[Hannah]

So thank you and get merch if you want.

[Mark]

Yeah.

[Hannah]

This week up.

[Gabby]

Okay. Happy two years.

[Mark]

Okay.

[Gabby]

We love you guys. And as always, trust your fetion. Sa.