Podcast Summary: The Red Weather

Podcast: The Red Weather
Host: Ryder Strong
Episode: 7 | "lost cause"
Date: February 18, 2026
Produced by iHeartPodcasts

Overview

In this episode, Ryder Strong delves deeper into the disappearance of Anna Trainor, confronting painful history and personal responsibility. He travels to Colorado to meet Anna’s mother, Lainey, who claims to hold crucial, overlooked evidence in Anna's case. The visit becomes a reckoning with the intertwined fates of Anna, her sister Willow, and the adults whose actions have left lasting wounds. The conversation explores the darkness in their Northern California community, bringing together possible new suspects and motives.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Revisiting the Past & Setting the Stage

• After investigating Anna’s 1995 disappearance and the subsequent unraveling of Willow’s life, Ryder receives a call from Lainey, Anna’s mother, agreeing to meet with him in Denver and share new evidence.
• Ryder’s own past—especially his complicated relationship with Willow—reemerges, especially after re-examining their last road trip together.
• (05:53) [Ryder] "The central trauma of Willow's life had to do with her sister, Anna...I started this podcast because Anna's sister Willow sent me a letter before she killed herself."

2. The Willow Roadtrip: Misunderstandings and Hidden Pain

• Previously unspoken truths surface: Ryder recalls his road trip with Willow, believing they were taking a break from life, not realizing Willow was supposed to be heading to rehab.
  • (13:15) [Lainey] "It was rehab, Ryder."
  • (14:37) [Lainey] "For three weeks, I didn't know where my daughter was. My moonbeam. I thought I had lost her. It was Anna all over again."
• The revelation that Willow was pregnant on that trip, and planned an abortion, devastates Lainey, who didn't know any of this before.

3. The Burden of Guilt and Memory

• Ryder wrestles with unresolved guilt for leaving Willow alone during her abortion and for possibly becoming another adult who let the Trainor girls down.
  • (20:56) [Ryder] "I could tell Laney didn't believe me. And I couldn't blame her, because no matter how I described it...I did leave Willow."

4. Life at the Tender Hearts Commune

• Lainey reflects on their alternative, nature-based upbringing and the eventual strain as children grew older and sought more conventional lives.
  • (22:09) [Lainey] "Oh, yeah, man, we were gonna change the world...Let the woods be school."
  • (23:24) [Lainey] "Anna hated it. She wanted Diet Coke and Cheetos...Pom poms and the Sadie Hawkins dance."
• Lainey confesses her own trauma as a motivation for protecting her daughters.
  • (23:26) [Lainey] "I was raped when I was 14...Cooper Davis."

5. Anna’s Stalker & the Overlooked Evidence

• Lainey is convinced Anna’s stalker was central to her disappearance, but police, she says, wrote her off as a “hysterical” mother.
  • (25:19) [Lainey] "She goes off for the all American life and what did it get her? ...A boyfriend who thinks he owns her and some other guy. She won't say who it is...just constantly bugging her."
  • (26:21) [Lainey] "If you care about that...you want to actually do the work, well, then I'm a crazy lady, right? ...Let the men work."

6. Inside Lainey’s House: The Artifacts of Loss

• Ryder and Lainey sift through Anna’s keepsakes—homemade trinkets, books, and annotated notebooks.
• Notably, both Anna and Willow’s copies of certain books have mysterious margin notes, like “lost cause”—possibly from the same “Mr. Wrong” figure who haunted Willow’s life.
  • (29:35) [Lainey] "Burn here. No, burn here. Burn here. Willow started that fire, but there were—there was spirit guiding it. Spirit stopping it."

7. Spiritual Evidence & Skepticism

• Lainey insists she found breakthroughs via a psychic named Marianne, while Ryder struggles to take this line of inquiry seriously.
  • (30:23) [Ryder] "I'm an atheist. And I'm, you know, die hard skeptic."
  • (30:38) [Lainey] "I had a series of experiences."

8. The Mr. Wrong Connection: A Frightening Pattern

• Ryder hypothesizes that Anna’s stalker and Willow’s “Mr. Wrong”—the older man who impregnated her—could be the same person.
• Evidence emerges pointing to a possible teacher, and connections are made to the novel Damage by Josephine Hart (about an older man and a younger woman named Anna).
  • (38:29) [Lainey] "Van Gogh suffered from severe emotional and psychological problems and died in France at the age of 37. 37."
  • (38:37) [Ryder] "That makes me think that he was 37. Or I don't like about to turn 37. And maybe he's married. Maybe he would lose his job. Maybe he's a teacher."
• The group zeroes in on Jacob Wyman, a former English teacher known for his close student relationships and controversial reading lists.
  • (39:52) [Ryder, paraphrased] "Damage by Josephine Hart is a psychological thriller centered on...a destructive affair with...Anna."

9. Cliffhanger: Police at Ryder’s Childhood Home

• As Ryder prepares to present his findings to the authorities, he receives a call that police are searching his parents' house for guns, hinting at escalating stakes and potential new troubles for him.
  • (43:36) [Ryder] "I got a call from my brother...They have a warrant and they're searching the house...They're looking for guns."

Notable Quotes and Moments with Timestamps

• Lainey’s Pain and Rage at Institutions:
  • (26:21) [Lainey] "You lose your daughter, you know, but if you care...then I'm a crazy lady, right? ...Let the men do their thing."
• Intimate Details about the Trainor Sisters:
  • (28:02) [Lainey] "Purple and white. My stardust child. Willow was my moonbeam. But Anna was all stardust."
• Possible Suspect Identification:
  • (40:19) [Ryder] "Do you remember Jacob Wyman? ...He was a teacher at Annalee. Did he ever come up?"
• The Thread Between Anna and Willow’s Fates:
  • (38:45) [Ryder] "It's a pattern, right? If this guy's got a thing for grooming young girls, what are the chances he would do it more than once?"
• Ryder’s Own Reckoning:
  • (20:56) [Ryder] "And I honestly can't remember how it went down exactly...Was I respecting her wishes? Or was I hurt and pissed off?"

Important Segment Timestamps

• [03:07] Ryder learns Lainey will finally talk
• [09:58] Ryder arrives at Lainey's house in Colorado
• [13:15] Revelation: Willow was supposed to go to rehab, not on an adventure
• [14:37] Lainey confesses her devastation over not knowing Willow’s whereabouts
• [21:45] Lainey decides to share her evidence
• [29:29] Lainey discusses spiritual signs—constellation Pleiades, energies around the fire
• [30:57] Ryder investigates the meaning of marginalia in Anna and Willow's books
• [38:29] “Operation Van Gogh” – theorizing about Anna’s plan and the identity of "Mr. Wrong"
• [43:36] Cliffhanger: The police search Ryder’s parents’ home

Tone and Style

The episode is heavy, introspective, and confessional, marked by moments of raw grief and regret. Both Ryder and Lainey vacillate between skepticism and desperate hope, seeking threads of truth in trauma’s aftermath. The dialogue is candid, troubled, and haunted, with flashes of mordant humor that sharpen the edge of the pain:

• Lainey, dryly: (10:02) "You look like a middle aged rider. That's—"
• Ryder, self-effacing: (19:03) “Oof, Ryder. Strong. More like writer. Weak.”

Summary

In this emotionally wrenching installment, Ryder’s investigation circles back to not just Anna’s disappearance, but the cascading failures of the adults in her life. The theory that the same older man—possibly a teacher—preyed upon both sisters sharpens, connecting predatory patterns, authority, and communal willful blindness. As old secrets surface and the investigation provokes unintended pain, the question lingers: how many truths do victims—and their families—carry alone? The episode closes with Ryder himself suddenly in the crosshairs of law enforcement, raising the stakes and the emotional toll of his quest for justice.