My Daughter Has Been Abducted for 15 Years

Summary

Podcast Summary: "My Daughter Has Been Abducted for 15 Years"

Podcast: We're All Insane
Date: November 25, 2025
Guest: Ian Bryson
Host: [Name not specified]

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Episode Overview

In this raw and deeply personal episode, Ian Bryson shares his heartbreaking journey of losing his daughter to familial abduction and the 15-year battle to reunite with her. Bryson recounts the psychological and legal challenges he faced, the family dynamics and alleged abuse that led to the abduction, his subsequent imprisonment and forced hospitalization in Poland, and the deafening silence from U.S. and international authorities. The episode is an unfiltered account of a father's desperate fight for justice, child safety, and recognition in the face of systemic failures and personal trauma.

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Major Topics & Discussion Chronology

1. The Day His Daughter Was Taken ([00:00–01:22], [11:08–18:10])

• Background: Ian’s wife, originally from Poland, had been increasingly erratic, mentioning her family being a cult in the weeks prior to the abduction. Ian believed her mental health was deteriorating and tried to seek help, both for her and their daughter.

• The Abduction: Two days after Christmas in 2010, Ian gives his daughter a hug, believing she was heading to the library with her mother. He never sees her again.

• Systemic Failures: Ian’s efforts to involve local psychologists and police in the Netherlands are ignored; he’s told the abduction would be "illegal and can’t happen" ([15:10]).

  "She convinced me she was taking her to the library and I let my guard down... watched them both go down the stairs and never saw my daughter again."
  — Ian Bryson ([17:16])

2. Early Relationship & Family Red Flags ([02:17–10:00])

• Meeting and Marriage: Ian meets his wife soon after college while she was in the U.S. on a visa. They quickly move in together and get engaged.

• Her Family: When living in Poland during the visa process, Ian encounters disturbing behaviors: severe alcoholism, inappropriate remarks by in-laws, lack of childhood memories or photos for his wife.

• Signs of Trauma: Ian documents early suspicions of borderline personality disorder and trauma in his wife, noting dissociative episodes and difficulty communicating about her past.

  "She had no memories of her childhood... her father and grandfather would say very strange things to me, like ask me how she is in bed."
  — Ian Bryson ([04:10])

3. Life Abroad & Deteriorating Dynamics ([08:09–11:06])

• Moves to the Netherlands: Seeking compromise between his wife’s pull to Poland and their family, they relocate. Frequent visits to Poland exacerbate her instability and lead to episodes where she would disappear with their daughter.

• Strain: Ian often feels isolated, not speaking Dutch or Polish, enduring cycles of “all good” and deep dysfunction.

  "We'd go to Poland and... she would say, 'When I'm here, I'm not with you. I am my dad's.' She would just disappear... I would just be like, in the apartment by myself, terrified and panicking."
  — Ian Bryson ([09:53])

4. Discovery, Desperation, and Institutional Betrayal ([18:12–34:41])

• Aftermath: Ian frantically contacts embassies, police, family, and the media. He observes signs of abuse in his daughter and links them to stories and behaviors related to his wife's family.

• Family Betrayal: Ian’s own family turns against him, staging interventions instead of helping retrieve his daughter.

• Hospitalization: His family lures him back to the U.S. under the pretense of legal help, only to have him involuntarily hospitalized and later left homeless and unsupported.

  "My family still wasn't helping me... I walked five miles through the snow to my mother's house. She gave me my car key and $20 and said, you got to go."
  — Ian Bryson ([27:32–29:20])

5. Legal Dead-Ends & The Breaking Point ([36:08–45:24])

• Hague Convention: Ian is told legal recourse could take up to two years—unacceptable for a four-year-old in a dangerous situation. Without resources, he plans to take direct action.

• Confrontation in Poland: Ian travels to Poland with intentions, not clear if to re-abduct or create official intervention. In a moment of desperation, he confronts and attacks his father-in-law, resulting in his arrest.

  "I didn't have any money, all of the Polish people in prison get a stipend... I was just there on my own."
  — Ian Bryson ([63:39])

6. Imprisonment & Psychiatric Abuse ([45:24–65:07])

• Polish Prison: Ian spends 18 months imprisoned—then forcibly committed to psychiatric hospitals for an additional two years, subjected to heavy medication, language isolation, and Kafkaesque legal proceedings.

• Denial by All Sides: Consistently, health and legal professionals conflate his concerns with delusion or madness, and he is banned from even mentioning his daughter in court.

  "They would take whatever I said and use it as evidence I was crazy. One of the psychiatrists said, 'Wouldn't it be nice if you were crazy? So then your daughter isn't being abused.'"
  — Ian Bryson ([61:14])

7. Release and Return ([65:33–70:46])

• Return to the U.S.: After release, a friend provides reprieve in Amsterdam before he returns to Connecticut, nearly 40 years old. He is still determined to keep fighting, albeit now with depleted health, resources, and support.

  "I never stopped fighting... just giving myself a mental break so I can get back to where I need to be."
  — Ian Bryson ([65:19–65:33])

8. Building a New Life, Writing the Book, and Continuing the Fight ([70:46–78:47])

• New Relationships: Ian develops a relationship with Emily, who quickly becomes an advocate and partner in his mission.

• Writing "My Daughter Has Been Abducted for 15 Years": With Emily's help, he writes a 600-page account, blending journal entries and research. The book is both a personal catharsis and a call to action about organized/ritual abuse, particularly in contexts shielded by family or border jurisdiction.

• Ongoing Attacks & Allies: After publishing, Ian faces retaliatory attacks from Poland, including false accusations and attempts to ruin his career and reputation. Yet, the survivor and abuse-awareness communities support him.

  "You can't get all of them. There's something in there that's saying, no, I'm gonna fight this, I'm gonna get away when I can."
  — Ian Bryson ([93:27])

9. Advocacy, Awareness, and Future Steps ([78:47–101:30])

• Public Awareness: Ian now speaks at conferences, participates in the survivor and ritual/organized abuse community, and is translating his book into Polish and recording an audiobook.

• Reflection: He grapples with sorrow for lost years with his daughter, the inadequate international systems for child protection, and gratitude for those who stood by him. He remains committed to never giving up hope—"just keep swinging the sledgehammer".

  "All I wanted was to be my daughter's dad... The only thing that's changed is time has gone by."
  — Ian Bryson ([35:16], [84:11])

  "It's a blessing that I'm in a position to know that other people are suffering because society refuses to look at it... despite all of the evidence that's out there."
  — Ian Bryson ([100:17])

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Notable Quotes & Moments (with Timestamps)

• On letting his guard down:
  "She convinced me that she was taking her to the library. And I let my guard down, which I hadn't for that three weeks... watched them both go down the stairs and never saw my daughter again." ([17:16])
• On systemic failures:
  "I'm alone in this foreign country, my U.S. citizen daughter is... the U.S. Government is telling me to re-abduct my daughter." ([18:10])
• On forced institutionalization:
  "My family... drove straight to a hospital. My mom sat there crying and said, I need to go in and get answers. I'm not doing well. And because of her emotional state, I was like, yes, she does need help. I walked in there, and then they trapped me." ([27:30])
• On not being believed:
  "My parents, nothing. When it first happened, I sent them a letter and said, I told you. My daughter was abducted and is being abused. Now I'm in prison, now you have to get a lawyer. And they... never responded." ([63:39])
• On relentless hope:
  "You just have to have somebody who's aware, who cares, and is aware of what we're dealing with. If you looked at it when the child was 4, it would have been simple to get to the bottom of it. Now at 18... not impossible, but tougher." ([97:22], [97:35])
• On trauma and public perception:
  "There’s a trauma wound there... I know what crazy is and what crazy isn’t. But it’s still just like, people look at you—and even my parents don’t believe me." ([99:03])
• On meaning and mission:
  "I don't wonder who I am or what I'm doing here or what my purpose is. It's right there in front of me. It's a blessing." ([100:17])
• On never giving up:
  "Just keep swinging and swinging. And then one day this stone shatters... you can't see, but little cracks are happening all along the way." ([94:48])

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Key Timestamps for Important Segments

• 00:00–04:09 – Early relationship, first signs of trouble
• 10:00–17:22 – Move to the Netherlands, family cycles, abduction event
• 18:10–23:33 – Ian’s desperate search for support and help, initial family response
• 27:30–34:41 – Forced hospitalization and abandonment by family
• 36:08–45:24 – Legal failures, Ian’s “direct action,” confrontation in Poland
• 45:24–57:39 – Imprisonment, mental health system abuses
• 65:03–70:46 – Recovery, return to U.S., beginning the book
• 73:01–75:27 – New marriage and support network
• 83:43–85:56 – Present-day advocacy, grappling with outcomes
• 92:13–98:19 – Building a new life, working with survivors, public awareness work

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Conclusion & Tone

The episode is a harrowing but resolute account of a father’s anguish, the failings of institutions on both sides of the Atlantic, and the nearly-impossible journey to have his voice—and his daughter's safety—taken seriously. Throughout, Ian’s tone is earnest, at times weary but pervaded by a quiet, enduring conviction that "good wins," that he must keep swinging the metaphorical sledgehammer, and that awareness, however hard-won, is essential for change. The host maintains a gentle, validating approach, encouraging Ian’s honesty and affirming the urgency of his message.

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Resources & Follow-Up

• Ian Bryson’s Book: [Title not specified; published May 2024]
• Contact: [e-mail]
• Submit Your Story: Google Form

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For listeners:
This episode is highly recommended for anyone interested in parental abduction, child safety, mental health, and how bureaucracy and disbelief compound trauma. Ian’s story is a call to listen to the unheard and to take allegations of abuse seriously—no matter how complex the context.

Transcript

[Ian Bryson]

My name is Ian Bryson. I live in Connecticut and I have been fighting for my daughter for. This is the 15th year now, two days after Christmas in December, in 2010, I gave her a hug, thinking she was going to the library and never saw her after that. She. I gave her a hug. She walked down the stairs. I called, I called my best friend to, to get advice because things had been crazy in my house with my first wife for the previous three weeks. She had been telling me she was taking our daughter back to Poland, that her family is a cult, and other things that just. I couldn't wrap my head around what she was telling me. I knew that there were issues in her and in her Polish family, but I, I had no frame of reference to know what it could be. So I was, I had been trying to get her to get help and begging her to get help for these three weeks, but she just kept saying, I'm taking her back to Poland, my family's a cult. And I just thought she was crazy. I thought that I had seen this before because there was a cycle of everything's good and then everything is terrible. So I saw, I'd seen it before and I just wanted to get her back to being healthy.

[Interviewer]

And so in your mind it was more like a mental illness kind of thing, maybe that you were thinking was going on?

[Ian Bryson]

I, I thought it was a mental illness. I thought it was trauma related, like. So for, for years we had been talking about it off and on and I had brought up borderline personality disorder, incest. Just trying to get in and, and understand what she, what she was dealing with. But it was, there was always a wall there. And I, I also felt weird asking her those questions. So I never pried too much. It was more. I would, I would make comments here and there and also try to get her to go to therapy for, for our entire marriage because I had, I had indications that something, something was wrong with her. Trauma related. Since the first week or two, we were, we were dating.

[Interviewer]

So how did you guys meet?

[Ian Bryson]

So I was living in Norwich, Connecticut and just graduated from college. And she came over with other Polish people on three month work visas. So they were living in an apartment down the street. She was working at a local casino. And my friend called me up and just said, come on over, there's some Polish people here. So I drove over and the moment I laid eyes on her, I, we just connected in a way that it's hard to define. You just know, like, I knew, I knew she was, she was going to be My wife, pretty much, even though she. She was. She came over from Poland with her boyfriend.

[Interviewer]

Wow.

[Ian Bryson]

So. But it was weird. Like I just. I was young and didn't care, and a couple days later I had her move in with me.

[Interviewer]

Oh my gosh.

[Ian Bryson]

And it just went from there. We. We were engaged. A couple weeks after that, she took a plastic ring off her finger and said, give it back to me and ask me to marry you. And I, I complied. And yeah, I just dove in and committed really early on. And I don't, I don't regret it.

[Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Ian Bryson]

But I was. I was a bit naive, you know, I unexperienced and just thought that this was love at first sight.

[Interviewer]

So how old were you?

[Ian Bryson]

I was, I was like 25.

[Interviewer]

Okay. Yeah. And then you guys were together how long before she got pregnant?

[Ian Bryson]

Two years.

[Interviewer]

Okay. And then did you ever meet her family in that time?

[Ian Bryson]

So they. She was over on the three month visa, and so she had to go back to Poland in order to renew her visa. She couldn't do it from here, so I. She went back to Poland and then I followed and lived with her parents and her, and we waited for a fiance visa. So then we. When we got the fiance visa, then we moved back to Connecticut.

[Interviewer]

And what did you think of her family?

[Ian Bryson]

Her family was strange and that like, right away there were. There were big red flags. Her father's severe alcoholic, like to the point where we'd go out and play basketball and instead of, instead of water, he had beer and just waking up with beer and vodka just constantly. She had no memories of her childhood, so that was weird to me. There were no pictures. She didn't have a relationship with her father. Her father and her grandfather would say very strange things to me, like ask me how she is in bed. My fiancee at the time would say, my dad says he likes young boobies. And I would just be like, what the, what the hell is going on? But I chalked it up to just cultural differences and, you know, this is her family. We'll deal with it. We're not gonna. We weren't planning on living in Poland anyways, but it was strange and I. I developed panic disorder from being in that environment and being just. It was. It was chaotic. It was weird, uncomfortable. The energy, the. The spiritual stuff going on. Like, I, I couldn't define it, but I. I was having panic attacks whenever I was in that house.

[Interviewer]

So you were there for how long, living with this?

[Ian Bryson]

A couple months.

[Interviewer]

Okay. And then you guys moved back to Connecticut?

[Ian Bryson]

Yes.

[Interviewer]

And throughout this time you said that she was kind of having these moments where she was good and then not so good.

[Ian Bryson]

Yeah.

[Interviewer]

And you just chalked it up to being like family related things.

[Ian Bryson]

I mean, in the, in my journal from the first month we were together, I, I started listing possibilities that I thought it was. And it was all trauma. Immediately I thought it was borderline personality disorder because. Well, that was the best fit at the time. But she was, she. One day she would love me, the next day she would hate me and, and believe both of those things. But at first I thought she was lying because her, everything would switch from the snap of the fingers about what she said, what she believed, what she thought. And, and I would. We had these long conversations, you know, why are you lying to me? I can deal with anything if it's true, the truth, you know, I love you. I'm not going to leave you no matter what. And it took me years to get to the fact where she really believes both of these scenarios. You know, when, when she loves me, she loves me. When she hates me, she hates me. But there were, there were other things going on. Like she would tell me stories about her childhood that were just weird and vague and like those are the only stories that she had. She would say like the night the nicest thing my dad ever did was bring me one cup of tea. That was like a recurring thing she would say to me about her dad. And I, it just blew my mind. Like, how could, how could the nicest thing he did be bring you one cup of tea? Like I brought you two cups of tea today. Yeah, you know, or what? And I would just have the, try to, try to dig in there and get, get more information and she would just repeat the same thing again. So it was very frustrating. And yeah, just, just other weird things. Like she, she would kind of go into like a trance and just start staring and I would like like playfully knock on her head as anyone there. But trying to communicate with her was, was near impossible because she didn't have, she didn't know the answers to questions. She, she didn't, she didn't have any, any answers to give me other than her like one cup of tea or. I don't know why, but I've never had a relationship with my dad and you know, or the. Yeah.

[Interviewer]

So. So then when did she start talking about her family being a cult?

[Ian Bryson]

So that, that was in the three weeks prior to.

[Interviewer]

So prior to that she never really said anything.

[Ian Bryson]

Like, she never did anything. Like in that, in that interim we live we lived in Connecticut. Our daughter was born two years after we were married. And it was still like that. That chaos up and down, black and white was happening. And as soon as our daughter was born, she wanted to be closer to her family in Poland. It was like a. This impulse she had to move to closer to Poland. So she convinced me to move to the Netherlands. It was 2008. The euro was double the dollar. My degrees in political science. So she thought, she convinced me I could get a job in a court in the Hague, and I was up for the adventure.

[Interviewer]

And how was it living over there?

[Ian Bryson]

The Netherlands is a nice place. I really. I enjoyed it. I worked for an online university. It's much more laid back. The people are just like, okay with life and okay with waiting. And it's a. I liked it. A lot of it. For. For me, the, like, after a couple years there, I wanted to move back to the US because no matter what, you're still an immigrant over there. I didn't speak Dutch, and even though they all speak English, it's still like.

[Interviewer]

You can't really disconnect.

[Ian Bryson]

Yeah. You can't fit in. You can't understand everything. So in the United States, despite the problems here, like, I know how. I know how things work. I know. I know how to navigate through this world we have here.

[Interviewer]

And during that time, were you guys visiting her family with your daughter? And how are they around her?

[Ian Bryson]

We, like, it was like she would just say, I have to go to Poland and take. Take our daughter. And it was strange. Like, her dad, like, so when we went to Poland, she would say, when I'm here, I'm not. I'm not with you. I am my dad's. And she would just disappear for. For nights, for days. Take our daughter. And I would just be like, in the apartment by myself. Couldn't speak to anybody because nobody spoke English. Just terrified and panicking and just passing the time until we could go back to the Netherlands. But yeah, she would have to go back. And it was always like, those trips would trigger. I would think she's healing in our home, and everything would be great. I thought she was the happiest woman in the world. We're doing everything as a family, dancing together, you know, focusing on our daughter. And then we'd go to Poland and she. She'd go to Poland or we'd go to Poland and that would always snap back into like, I hate you, and just weird things with her dad that I couldn't. I had no idea.

[Interviewer]

So how old was your Daughter.

[Ian Bryson]

When she took her, she was a month from four years old.

[Interviewer]

Okay, so walk me through that day. Or let's start with the three weeks prior of her saying about the cold, her family being a cold.

[Ian Bryson]

Yeah, so I'll go back a little bit further. So we. We had gone through a cycle of the I hate you and. And on that for a month or two earlier in the year after, we went through that, and we were back to. She was. I love you and everything's good. She said, I'm sorry. I'm sorry, that will never happen again. And I just. I hope not. You know, I didn't know what to think about it. I was trying to get us into counseling, but that I felt like we needed to move to the United States. She agreed. We applied for her visa. And I went back to the United States for three months by myself to work and look for a place for us to live. I sent them to Poland during this time. I had no. No fear about it. I thought, she's. She's stronger than she's ever been. Things are great. I can send them to Poland. So the three months when I'm in the United States, they're in Poland. We're communicating every day. I could see her falling apart, and I would just try to lift her up and tell her we're going to be back together soon. So we met back at our house in the Hague. I sprinted home from the. From the tram, wrote her a love letter. Like on the way back when I was on the train, just so excited to be back. I knock on my door, my wife and daughter come down the stairs. She's holding her. And I could just immediately sense that something was wrong. It was like they came down with a dark cloud. My daughter didn't look up from, you know, she was just staring off somewhere out of it. She wasn't excited at all that I was home. My wife wouldn't look at me. We walked up the stairs, and I tried to kiss my wife. And she jumped away and said, you're hurting me. I hate you. And it went from there then, I hate you. I've always hated you. I'm taking our daughter back, back to Poland. My family's a cult. I have Stockholm syndrome, she said. And I just. I. I had no idea what this even meant. So basically, I told her, like, we've seen this before. I don't know what you're talking about. I don't believe you. We need to get help. So that. That three weeks was me trying to convince her to get Help. She was mostly in bed with a migraine or just chain smoking her cigarettes and sitting in the kitchen listening to Polish radio. And I was taking care of our daughter and happily so. I hadn't seen her in three months, but I was kind of just playing, playing the long game of all right, we're back in our home, everything's safe. I'm going to get to the bottom of this and I have to make sure this doesn't happen again, whatever it is. So during the day I would go out with my daughter and in the evening, once we put her to bed, I would just try to convince her why we needed help and even like draw her maps. Logically, we know something happened in your childhood. We know that there is trauma there. We don't know the extent to which that's relevant, but we need to explore that because maybe it's, maybe it's small, maybe it's big. So I was, I was trying to convince her to get help thinking that she, you know, she loves our daughter. Of course she's going to listen to me and, and go get another opinion. And she was blowing off the psychologist that, that I was trying to have contact her and just repeating to me the same things over and over again. So I went and saw the psychologist, told him that my wife was threatening to flee with our daughter. He assured me that that was illegal and she couldn't do it. And I wasn't satisfied with that because she was adamant that that was what she was going to do. But I, then I went down. Eventually I went to the police, which I, I never do. I don't, I don't like going to the police. I don't believe in going to the police in, in cases such as marriage. And the police gave me. I said, my, my wife is saying she's leaving with our daughter to go back to Poland. She has our daughter's passport. And the police just handed me a pre printed list of family attorneys and said, we can't help you. So I went back home. Just, you know, nobody's helping me. I didn't have family in the Netherlands. I didn't have friends that were close by. So I'm just all alone trying to figure this out. Going down. I was contemplating like taking my daughter and getting her to the embassy or have, taking her to a doctor because my daughter had signs of abuse. But I, I was very tentative about betraying my wife and, and making too big of a move.

[Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Ian Bryson]

And like I, I just thought I had things under control because they were in our Home. And I thought I had time, but. Yeah, just that Christmas happened. My wife was miserable. And then she kept. Then it amped up. She started saying, I'm leaving. I'm leaving. And I said, no, you're not. Like, I'm not. Not gonna let that happen. What. You know, I don't understand what you're saying, but. But we have to figure this out. And then she did. You know, she. She convinced me that she was taking her to the library. And I let my guard down, which. Which I hadn't for. For that three weeks. I was. I was on it. I was just totally taking care of my daughter and reaching out to this psychologist and to my. To a friend who lives in Arizona, asking for help, to my mother asking for help. And I. At this time, like, she worked it so that I just completely let my guard down. I've. I felt safe. Like, I looked at her and just felt comfortable. Felt like she was coming back, you know, from wherever. Whatever dark place she was in. Watched them both go down the stairs and. And never. Never saw my daughter again.

[Interviewer]

So when did you realize that they were gone?

[Ian Bryson]

So it was probably like 15 minutes later.

[Interviewer]

Okay, you just, like. You think it was just a gut feeling, like you just knew that they weren't coming back?

[Ian Bryson]

I. I think it just. It just hit me, like. I think like, she. She. She like, put my attention somewhere else. Like, I was looking at her and thinking how beautiful she is, and this is my wife, and we're gonna. We're gonna be fine. And, like, just like when they left, I was just like, you know, just thinking about how much I love them. And just my guard was completely down. And then as soon as she left, I just. I called my friend and I said, I don't know what to do. It's happening again. And as I'm speaking to him, it's just like, oh, crap, they're gone.

[Interviewer]

So what did you do?

[Ian Bryson]

So I told my friend, I gotta go. I hung up the phone, sprinted around my house looking for signs so that I could see that they were gone, because I wasn't sure, you know, I just. I knew what she had told me, and I knew what my feeling was and that they were gone. At that point, I didn't believe they were at the library. I sprinted around my house. I saw that my. My daughter's blanket and stuffed animal wasn't there, which wouldn't go to the library, and a couple other things. So at that point, I hadn't had more evidence. Then I sprinted to the police department just Feeling like my heart was going to explode. The police department door was locked, so I pounded on it and just, just kept pounding until someone came and, and they wouldn't give me the time of day again. I said, my wife is taking our daughter to Poland. That's illegal. I need you to stop them from leaving this country and just evaluate my daughter. And they're just, what do you want us to do? Don't you think her mother should be able to take her back to Poland? I'm like, no, you're not listening to me. My daughter just came back from Poland after three months there with major signs of abuse. My wife isn't well. We need to look at this child before she goes to Poland. And they wouldn't help me. So I went back home, called my friend back, told him what was going on, called my parents. My mom got me in touch with the US Embassy and the duty officer at the US Embassy told me that it was out of their jurisdiction, that even though my daughter was born in Connecticut, they couldn't do anything about it. And he recommended that I, that I try to find out if they're still in the Netherlands and that if they are, I meet up with, meet up with them and re abduct my daughter and, and get her to the embassy where they guaranteed me she would be evaluated. So I was sitting in my apartment looking out the window just like thinking what, what kind of weird movie am I in where like I'm, I'm alone in this foreign country, my, my U. S. Citizen daughter is. They, they don't care. And this guy who works for the US Government is telling me to re abduct my daughter. And like I'm, I'm playing that scenario out of my head. Like I, I don't think that they're here because she told me they're going back to Poland. But if they are, like what, how do I, how do I take a. Almost four year old and, and get her to the embassy and like that, you know, what do I have to like take my, take my wife's phone and steal that and push her to the ground? Like, how would that look? You know? Yeah, so I know that, but that was the option that was in front of me. So I didn't cross it off the list right away, but I just kept, I kept hammering out emails to child protection agencies, to the US Embassy in Poland, Germany, the Netherlands.

[Interviewer]

Try to get help, anybody.

[Ian Bryson]

Yeah, yeah, I started writing to, to the media, you know, Dutch child protection agencies and, and also at that time, like the My blinders fell down. So all of the things that my wife had been telling me and all of the signs of abuse that were there, but I. I couldn't see them or wrap my head around them. They started to fall. So I started to see what this was and what she meant by my family as a cult. I didn't know. I didn't know what I know today, but I started. I just started to see how bad it was. And, you know, that my daughter coming back and talking about her grandfather's private parts and having bruises and vaginal pain and all of this was tied into who my wife was and what she was telling me about taking our daughter back there. And I became very terrified and very desperate and started just like, I just sat at my computer rolling, Rolling cigarettes and. And typing emails and researching and processing until. And then I would collapse and wake up and just. And get right back to the computer. And I didn't even know what day it was or what time it was. I was just doing this for a while and. Until my dad flew over to the Netherlands. I picked him up at the airport, and then he was there. He said he was going to help me, and he said that we would get an attorney. We would. We would. We would fight this and get. Get my daughter back, brought back to the country to go so we could deal with. Deal with it legally. But. And that. That's a whole nother situation. Like, my dad came over saying he's going to help me. I. I believed him, but he was. He was working behind my back, talking to my wife. And. And like. And because I. I looked like I was losing it. I looked like. Like I wasn't sleeping. I didn't care about anything else. I was just. I was frantic, begging for help. And to. To my family. It looked strange. Like, what is this odd behavior that Ian's doing? What is he talking about? Nothing's happening. And my wife had their ear, so she was. She was telling them things that made sense.

[Interviewer]

So they were in contact with your wife during this time?

[Ian Bryson]

Yes.

[Interviewer]

But you were not. You couldn't get a hold of her?

[Ian Bryson]

I was not. She sent. She sent me a couple emails. One that said, we're at a shelter. I'll contact you in two days, and we'll get together and work this out. And I responded, please, you know, like, let's. We need to do this for our. For our daughter. And just short responses back to her, trying to. Just trying to get her to talk to me or meet me, hoping that she would snap out of whatever was compelling her to go back to Poland and. And do what I believe she wants to do, which is get our daughter help and get her out of that family. But no, I. I had no communication after this.

[Interviewer]

And did your family eventually know that you were telling the truth?

[Ian Bryson]

No. So my. My dad stayed at our apartment for a week or two while helping me, like, making sure he was basically watching me.

[Interviewer]

Okay.

[Ian Bryson]

But he had, like, a psych psychiatric intervention team come over to my house. So, like, five. Five emergency psych people came up into my living room. My dad let them in my house, and they were deciding whether to involuntarily bring me to a hospital. And I just. I sat there at my computer and I was. I was. I was really upset at my dad. I was just like, my daughter was taken. I'm trying to get help. Nobody's helping me. I'm fine. Like, what.

[Interviewer]

And what did the people say?

[Ian Bryson]

They. They went and they listened to me tell them that they went and talked to each other, and then they left.

[Interviewer]

Okay.

[Ian Bryson]

And I told. I was. I was very upset with my dad. I said, don't ever do that again. Like, I should kick you out right now. How can I trust you? I just normally do straight stand up, but this is a bit different. What do you get when a true.

[Interviewer]

Crime producer walks into a comedy club? A new podcast called Wisecrack, where a.

[Ian Bryson]

Comedian finds himself at the center of a chilling true crime story. Does anyone know what show they've come to see? It's a story. It's about the scariest night of my life. This is Wisecrack, available now. Listen to Wisecrack on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. What. What do you. What. What do you think I need help for? Where is my daughter? Like, you know, that's. That's the problem. The only problem is my daughter was taken. And I'm telling you that it's not a good situation in Poland. And I'm trying to figure that out. Like, all of my. All of my psychiatric psychological distress is because of my missing daughter. You know, that's what I need help with. So he was like, oh, I'm sorry, you know, we will help you. I'm gonna fly you back to the United States and we will get a lawyer and fight this. Under the Hague Convention, which is a treaty between the United States and most European countries, it says it's illegal to take a child from one country to another. And if that happens, there's a. The remedy is this treaty which brings the child back to court in the home country. So that's what he convinced me we were going to do. So I flew back to Connecticut from the Netherlands. My mom and my aunt picked me up in Boston, and I felt great. I was like, all right, I'm back home. We're going to get a lawyer. We're going to get to the bottom of this. And my, my mother and my aunt drove all the way from Boston, Connecticut to Connecticut, talking about the lawyer, that we're going to get help. And my, drove straight to a hospital. My mom sat there crying and said, I need to go in and get, get answers. I'm, I'm not doing well. And because of her emotional state, I was like, yes, she does need help. I walked in there, and then they trapped me. They said this, you know, you're staying. And this is, this is, you need to be here.

[Interviewer]

And how long were you there for?

[Ian Bryson]

So I was, I was there overnight. Like, I, I, I initially it kind of flipped out, and I was like, what, what is, like, going on? Like, and then, then they threatened me with a halidol syringe. And I'm like, okay, you know, I give up. I talked to the psychiatrist the next day. They were going to let me go. And then my, my mother, my aunt, my dad, my cousin called and said they were worried. So they held me for about two weeks. And it, it was just, it was like being held in place while my daughter's getting further away. It was, it wasn't an issue for me other than that, because I, I knew my story. I knew, you know, like, that they had no basis to, to say that anything was going on other than a crisis happened and I'm reacting to a crisis. So they, they released me with a diagnosis of adjustment disorder, which is just an abnormal reaction to a life event, or I guess it's not necessarily abnormal. It's normal when your child's taken and you freak out, but it's not, it's not something that's sustainable. So that's what adjustment disorder is. And then, so I, my family still wasn't, wasn't helping me. They released me from this place. I walked five miles through the snow to my mother's house. She gave me my car key and $20 and said, you got to go. So I went to a building my dad owned, slept on the, on the floor with no heat, no electricity for a couple days. And then, then I moved in with my friend's widow and her daughter, and she gave me a bedroom she, she, she believed me and believed in me and I had a, she had just lost her husband, so it was great. I got to spend time with her daughter as well. And I just, for the next three months, I stayed with her and I kept writing emails. I kept just reaching out to anybody I could reach out to.

[Interviewer]

So could you have, like, did you have the resources at that time to get a lawyer to. No, no. To do that treaty thing? Okay.

[Ian Bryson]

I had no money saved up. I had a car and that's it. We were in between. I had quit my job and become a stay at home dad. She was working and then she lost her job. So I was applying to different places and we were thinking about moving to the United States or Switzerland or Austria, was looking at jobs in the United nations and courts and things. We were. Okay, like, we were surviving, paying rent, but had no money saved up. So when this happened, I was just like destitute, basically. I, I could, I couldn't get any help on my own.

[Interviewer]

And then. Okay, so that's why you needed, that's why you were relying on your family to help you at that time?

[Ian Bryson]

Yes.

[Interviewer]

And then during this, the three months that you were living with this widow, did you have any contact with your wife or she just was not responding?

[Ian Bryson]

No, not responding at all.

[Interviewer]

Okay. Do you think your family was still talking to her?

[Ian Bryson]

I think so. Well, I know she, I know now. I, I thought they were back then, but now I know that my mother has had a relationship with my first wife and our daughter for this entire time.

[Interviewer]

Do you think that her family actually is a cult?

[Ian Bryson]

Yes.

[Interviewer]

Okay.

[Ian Bryson]

Yeah. I think it's intergenerational. I, I think that it's, I don't think that it's only her family. I think that there's more.

[Interviewer]

And why do you think that your parents are not concerned?

[Ian Bryson]

That's, that's a tough question. Like, I, I, I think that they got fooled. I, I, I think that that's like, where I was at in life was just this naive, ignorant place and I was run by my emotions and by just the, the, the crisis that was in front of me. So when my first wife and her family were able to twist the narrative in such a way that made sense to my parents. You know, they talked about, you know, you know, how Ian was using drugs, you know, how he, which I wasn't at the time, but I have used drugs. So they, they use that to just make a story that would make sense to them. And I, and I then, I think so that, and it was also like a crisis situation for my parents. So that, you know, what's going on, what's going on with Ian? And, and so they made a decision to. To get me help. You know, they. By dropping me off at the hospital instead of the help that I was asking for. And it. And then I think it just. They just doubled down on it so many times that it was hard for them to backtrack and see that they had made a wrong decision. It. Yeah. So that. I think that's what happened. I kept reaching out to my mother and just saying, mom, she came back with bruises and vaginal pain and talking about her grandfather's private parts. Like, you don't have to believe me about the cult and the Stockholm syndrome and trauma based mind control. But we. Let's just keep it simple. Does my daughter need to be evaluated? Yes or no? And if it's yes, which it obviously is from the symptoms. And I had, I had other. I had my wife's journal. I had other. Other small pieces that were just like, we need to get this child evaluated. But they, they. They just wouldn't listen to me. They. They kept. They. It was very frustrating.

[Interviewer]

Do you think that your parents have visited them?

[Ian Bryson]

My mother may have. My sister has. I just found out about that. And it. So, like, my sister is a good example. My sister had no relationship with my first wife. And. And then like, none. When we're dating, when we're engaged, when we're married, we moved to the Netherlands. And then all of a sudden, my sister. A year or two ago, my sister's posting Facebook profile pictures of my first wife and saying, oh, my. My dear sister, I've always wanted a sister. Now I have a. A best friend. And it's just like, what. What do you think? You really think you have a best friend of this woman who stole my child and you have. You have no relationship with her until after that? You can't see that she's using you. But, yeah, my sister just. My sister visited Poland, did her own assessment, and just thought, oh, this family's normal. Ian's wrong.

[Interviewer]

So do you have any relationship with your family?

[Ian Bryson]

Today I'm building a relationship with my dad. My mom had. So my. My current wife and I moved into my mom's, on my mom's property. When my stepdad died a couple years ago, and she had the property in a living trust for us, we had our own separate home, separate from her home. When I published my book, my mom got a lawyer and evicted us.

[Interviewer]

Wow.

[Ian Bryson]

Yeah. She and she, and doesn't speak to me.

[Interviewer]

But your dad, is he kind of starting to listen to you more now?

[Ian Bryson]

He's, he's starting to listen to me. He's, he's read or is reading my book. I don't think he's gone all the way through it, but he, he's starting to listen to me. He still can't wrap his head around it. He, he, he doesn't, he doesn't want to go to where he needs to go to understand. He, he's, he's kind of living in a place of, I mean, don't they.

[Interviewer]

Feel any, like, bad for you at all that you have no relationship with your own child?

[Ian Bryson]

I, I don't. I think, I think my dad. Because I, I'm, I'm speaking to him now. He does a little bit. But, but it's still like just, he's, his position is more like just move on, you know. Now, now you have a second wife. What are you doing now? And for me it's like the, it hasn't changed since the moment I realized she was gone. The only thing that's changed as time has gone by.

[Interviewer]

Right.

[Ian Bryson]

I will never stop fighting for my daughter as long as there's air in my lungs.

[Interviewer]

So how old would she be now?

[Ian Bryson]

She's 18 right now. Wow. Yeah.

[Interviewer]

So from 4 to 18, you had nothing?

[Ian Bryson]

Nothing other than like, I, I did Google searches. I, I could find what school she's going to. I have photographs but no contact.

[Interviewer]

And. Okay, so for three months when you were living with the widow, you were doing emails and reaching out and trying to get help, you still didn't get any help.

[Ian Bryson]

So I didn't get any help. That's the US Embassy or the US Secretary of State. I filed the paperwork for the Hague abduction treaty and they told me it could take up to two years to get the court, get the case into a court. Um, when they told me it could take two years, I just, I just said no. You know, like I, I'm not waiting two years. This is my now four year old daughter who was taken from me. And I know it's a horrible situation. I'm not waiting two years. That was my position. So as soon as I heard that, I decided I had to do something. I didn't know, I didn't know what that was. And I didn't want to do anything impulsively or make, I didn't want to make a bad decision. But I also wasn't, wasn't concerned about myself or consequences of what I did. It was all, what do I need to do for my daughter as a dad so that I can look her in the eyes and know that I did my best. You know, that was all I was worried about. So I just, I kind of went down the line of what are my options? And the first one was what the duty officer had recommended, which is get your daughter and get her to the embassy. So I, I planned for that scenario going to Poland. I, I knew they have a, an apartment in the city and then they have a country house and so I knew they would be in one of those locations. I bought binoculars and a compass and like, I had MapQuest back then, so I had all, everything printed out. So from either location I could get to the Berlin embassy, which is about an hour away. But then as I ran through that scenario, I'm like, this is, this is very crazy. Like I'm going to go into a foreign country, take a four year old from whoever's watching her and then drive an hour across an international border. And like that's, that, that I felt like that would be the best option. But it's also like at that point I'm involving my daughter in this, in this situation by grabbing her and driving her and that's going to be traumatic. And you know, what's that going to look like? I don't, I don't know the roads, I don't, I don't speak the language. Are they going to be, are they going to chase me in a helicopter? You know that?

[Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Ian Bryson]

So that one, I said, no, I can't do that. So my next, my next one was just go over there and create a scene and be heard and like force that forced them to listen to me, force them to do a child abuse investigation, which I had worked, I worked for DCF in Connecticut for a little while and I knew that, you know, if someone alleges severe child abuse in Connecticut, they, they supposedly have to look at it. And you know, DCF in Connecticut's not perfect either, but there is like, they don't just say, oh, there's an allegation, forget about it. So I just, I thought, I'll go over there, I'll create. I didn't know the specifics of what I was going to do, but I'm going to be heard. I'm going to make them listen to me as this girl's father and they're going to have to give me a lawyer and an interpreter and therefore there's going to be a child abuse investigation. So I sold My car bought a ticket to Amsterdam, still not really knowing what I was going to do. I just knew that I had to move closer to her and that this three months was long enough. I wasn't willing to wait any longer. The widow I was staying with supported my decision and said, you have to do what you have to do. And, and I just. Which was good, you know, it was nice to have somebody that was listening and understood and you know, agreed that you have to fight for your child. So she drove me to the train station and I took the train to Boston, got on a flight, flew to Amsterdam and picked up a rental car on a prepaid visa. So there was only like $300 on there. And then I just drove across Germany to Poland and still, still didn't know exactly what I was going to do. I was just going to show up and figure it out. So I, I drove straight a 12 hour trip through Germany, got to Poland early in the morning, slept or I didn't sleep. I sat in a parking spot where my first wife and I had an apartment during when we were engaged and just waited. No. And I knew, I knew. So it just kind of just fell into place what I was going to do. I knew that my, my father in law being an alcoholic was predictable, that every morning he would come out to throw his beer cans away. So I decided that that's where I would confront him. And it really like there wasn't any, any emotion behind this other than like desperation for my daughter. I wasn't mad at him at this point other than kind of like how you get mad at a mosquito and just want him to stop, you know, sucking your blood. But it was, I was trying to be pragmatic. This, this is the, this is the perpetrator. So therefore I'm going to involve him. I'm going to draw attention to the, the situation and I'm going to be heard. So I, I parked my car out, looking at the door he's going to come out of. Oh, and I, and I also, I had a hammer. So I, as I'm driving, I stopped at a gas station and I'm like, I should, I should maybe have a weapon. I, I didn't, I didn't know if I was the case. I didn't know if I was going to kill him. Honestly, like I, I, I wasn't against it. I really didn't want to. I didn't want to. But, but like morally and ethically when I thought about it, it's like maybe I should, you know, if if an intruder comes into my house and has a knife on my daughter's neck, I'm going to shoot him. What's the difference? Three months later so, so I had gone through this, this dilemma in my head, and I wasn't against it, but I, but I just still didn't know. I was just kind of just moment by moment, just going to the next step and waiting for the path to become visible to me. So I, I looked at the knives that this gas station had knives, but the blades didn't lock. So I was like, that's not going to work. There was used hammers hanging on the shelf, so I bought one and I had no idea what to do with it. The thought of, like using it as a bludgeoning tool was, was hard. Like I, it was hard to be the person in this scenario wondering what to do about the situation with my daughter. And I, I was just doing the best I could do. So I, I, I parked, waited for him to come out, started the car, drove towards him and around him and crashed the car into a wall to block his egress back into his apartment building. And then just without thinking, reached behind me, grabbed the hammer, stepped out of the car and started chasing him down the street. And he, he squealed and ran and I like pump faked the hammer to, to make him afraid. I, I did like making him afraid, chased him. He fell. And I switched the hammer to my left hand and started punching him with my right hand. And I, I wasn't punching him to like, to try to kill him. I was just, it was, it was almost like I was watching myself from out of body, just like, this is what I'm doing because of this crazy scenario, but this is not me. And I didn't hit him that much, but he, he had his keys in his hand and I made him hit himself with his keys. So there was some blood. And then the, the city guard came, which is like the unarmed cops I submitted. They handcuffed me and I, I stood, stood tall and thought, all right, that would, that needed to happen. I'm glad it's done now. I'm going to see somebody and they're going to hear my story. So I thought, I thought like the, the next step was, or one of the next steps was going to be getting my daughter evaluated. I felt, I felt good. I felt like, you know, that things were happening as they should happen. So then they let, they, they sent me to Polish jail for two nights. And Polish jail, there, there was no toilet paper, so, so I just you just have to hold it. There's no bathroom in the cell, so you have to ask to go out. Nobody spoke English. Pretty ridiculous place. But I was just waiting to go before the judge. So they took me before the judge. And, you know, I'm still thinking, all right, I'm going to get a wise judge. He's going to just say, what's the obvious thing to do? Evaluate this man's child.

[Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Ian Bryson]

Instead he had. He did not care at all why I did what I did. He just was looking at, oh, we can get this guy for attempted murder. Even though I didn't hit him with the hammer, he said that I wanted to hit him with a hammer. And so then he, he put me in pretrial prison. Um, and that's three months at a time. So you're in pre trial prison for three months up to two years. And you know that that was the status at that point. So they drove me into prison, put me in a cell with seven Polish guys who don't speak English, 23 hour a day, lockdown, no phone. And I, and I sat there for, for 18 months.

[Interviewer]

Oh, my.

[Ian Bryson]

18 months. The US embassy visited me because they have to visit American prisoners. But they would, they gave me like a, a used pencil, some candy, like a New Testament, you know, and just said, you're in Poland. You have to go through the Polish system. And, And I was just like you, you. I'm. I'm in Poland because I need my daughter evaluated. I'm not worried. Like, I'm willing to volunteer for the electric chair. I don't care about my case other than the fact that I'm here to, to talk about what happened with my daughter. And they just, they totally just wrote me off. Said even though my daughter was born in Connecticut, that when she's in Poland, they consider her to be a Polish citizen because her mother's Polish. And as long as the Polish prison court system isn't abusing me that they can't do anything at all. So it was, it was. And I think part of that was because they had my mother in their ear.

[Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Ian Bryson]

So. Which they shouldn't have listened to my mother because I was an adult, but my mother was telling them things. And so I think they came with a preconception that I was wrong or that I was crazy or whatever it was. And I just stuck to, no, I'm here to get my daughter evaluated. They did nothing for me. The interpreter that the Polish court gave me was this young girl who didn't speak English like She. She passed the test somehow. But I would try to talk about complex trauma, and she would just translate it as rape and stuff like that, so it made me look even more ridiculous. I. I tried to tell the US Embassy, please just get me a good interpreter. They. They didn't do anything for me. So I was just in prison for. For 18 months, going back and forth to court, trying to prepare my own legal defense. And. Yeah, that's. I didn't know. I didn't know what was going to happen. I, like, when I first got to prison, I thought, they're going to let me out of here any day.

[Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Ian Bryson]

You know, like, they're going to come and say sorry, they're gonna. They're gonna pat me on the back and I'm gonna see my daughter. And there were some guards that did that, that came up to me and shook my hand and said, you know, this is. This is Poland, not usa. That's those. That was the words they gave me. And it's. Or they would. One of them would say, you're gonna do 20 years for this. And I'm like, I, I don't. I don't care. Like, that's, that's not my. That's not my concern at all.

[Interviewer]

Right. It wasn't about you.

[Ian Bryson]

Yeah, it wasn't about me.

[Interviewer]

So what happened after the.

[Ian Bryson]

18 months was up after the 18. So during that time, I was going to trial, and my background is political science, law, public law. So I was able to prepare my own case even though they gave me a public defender. The public defender was ridiculous, and she was communicating with me through this interpreter who didn't speak English, nor. She didn't speak English well. So the public defender was useless. I went in there and tried to question. Question my wife, question other. Other witnesses that they have.

[Interviewer]

Was she in there? Your wife was.

[Ian Bryson]

I saw her in there, Yeah.

[Interviewer]

W. But your daughter was not.

[Ian Bryson]

My daughter was not.

[Interviewer]

Okay.

[Ian Bryson]

So I, like, I, I had a whole plan because I. I knew my wife was running a script, and I knew that I could break that down and that she wouldn't be able to answer my questions. So they. I, I started to do that, and she started to, like, unravel. And then the judge banned me from trial. I wasn't even allowed to participate in my defense. I wasn't allowed to call witnesses on my behalf or get a second opinion from, like, another psychiatrist. This was just the court psychiatrist. And I had witnesses in the Netherlands that would have came and, and said, you know, that we were. We were in Counseling for what we thought was borderline personality disorder that I had, like my wife's psychiatric questionnaires where she's saying there's trauma and she doesn't know the extent of that, the impact on our family because of it. So I was just trying to, like, I wanted to present that case. Just like there's more going on than, than what this side of the story is telling. Like, it's, it's a he said, she said of sorts. So let's, let's look at this deeper for the child. Like, I'm, I'm absolutely not trying to defend myself. Although they're lying. But of course they're lying. That's how this thing works. So let's, let's look at what we can look at. But they, yeah, no witnesses, banned from trial. And, and I wasn't allowed to bring up my daughter in the court. It was all, you know, they turn it into. It's attempted murder. Because that's what we think you wanted to do. Even though the medical report didn't show any, you know, hammer damage. Just that's what you wanted to do. This situation looks like you came here to kill him, so we're going to get you with attempted murder. And the judge even said what you did was assault, but what you wanted to do was attempted murder. So you're looking at eight to 25 years. And I just kept going back to my daughter, my daughter, my daughter. So what happened there was they had the court psychiatrist evaluate me and I say my daughter's being abused. The, the prosecutor says they investigated and ruled out that my daughter was being abused. Of course they didn't evaluate her. Their investigation was talking to my wife. So like, so, so the prosecutor says they ruled out abuse. I say abuse. The court psychiatrist takes that and says, okay, Ian must be delusional. So I got, I got diagnosed by the court psychologist as delusional. And, you know, and I tried to, I tried to question them in court too. And just like, what. Is there any other sign of mental illness other than I say my daughter's being abused? They say, no, you know, how do you, how do you know my daughter's not being abused? Well, the prosecutor says so just like this circle of nonsense where, like, they don't have evidence to say she's not being abused, but they're stating they do. So then the psychiatrist states, takes that and says, well, he's, he's insane. He's. And so then I got sent to one of the three or four maximum security psychiatric prison hospitals Where I, I walk in and like, there's, there's a guy pretending he's John Deere tractor. There's other guys with their wrists strapped to their waist because they'll just punch people randomly, just stuff like that. And at that point, I found out I was in a trap. Like, once you're sent to this place, it's up to the psychiatrist to decide whether you get sent home. But the psychiatrist is working with the court, who doesn't want to send you home. So the initial, the first guy I talked to, the director of this hospital, he's like, I don't know why you're here. It's a mistake. But the court wants you here. And you're going to be here for at least six months. And then you have to go to medium security. Then you have to go to minimum security in order to go through the system and get out. So I, I just, I hunkered down. They were trying to force medication on me, and this was antipsychotic medication that just shuts down your thinking. So I, I, I practiced with gum, hiding the, the pill in my upper lip, and became pretty good at that. But there was also, like, this rumor going around that they'll test your blood, and if you don't have that in your system, then they'll do injections or hold you here longer. So I would take, like, a little piece here and there in case that happened. But it was, it was making it so like, it felt like I poured rubber cement in my head. I couldn't, I couldn't watch a TV show and focus on, and I couldn't read, like, you know, I couldn't pray. I had no connection to anything. So I really fought for my mind. And just every day I was under the cameras, I'm constantly being questioned by these people. And I learned that I had to put my daughter on the shelf and get out. So I met my first opinion there. He said, yeah, Ian's good. I got sent to medium security across the country. And they sent me, like, in the, shackled and handcuffed in this Plexiglas cage across the country. I get to the medium security, and it's, it's worse than maximum security. The, they were giving me a low dose of that medication at this maximum security because the director didn't, he couldn't see any issues with my mental health. But he was like, we, everyone gets, everyone gets medication because that's what the court wants. That's what he told me. So I get to meet him. Security and this doctor Says, we're going to double your medication because they weren't really treating you. I'm like, treating me for what? Like, and she doesn't have a good answer. Is treating you because the court wants you to be treated. And at this place, it was, it was literal hell. Like, there were people who were trying to escape. One guy jumped over a razor wire fence. Another guy asked me to kill him. He said, take me in the bathroom, choke me out and, and kill me. And he was serious because this was, this place was just, it was torture to be there. I would, I would sleep as much as I could to the point where I was getting bed sores. The food, you were always hungry. But that doctor that I had to deal with was absolutely just horrific. And I, at that point, I was looking at potential escape. I, I didn't ever come close to it because getting caught would have pushed me further from my daughter. And I knew that all I had to do was plod through the system and I would come out the other end. But it was, it was to the point where like, I was, this was on like the Belarus border with, with Poland. I was thinking, I was planning how I could get out, where I would go if a friend from Amsterdam could come and get me up and drive me into Belarus or Russia just to get me out of Poland. And like, I, I contemplated it because of how bad it was.

[Interviewer]

And how long were you in the medium security?

[Ian Bryson]

I think about 11 months.

[Interviewer]

Okay.

[Ian Bryson]

And it's just one of those things where you never know what, what's. What they're doing, what they're thinking. They, they, they have to send an opinion to the court every six months. But so the first opinion that she sent to the court, she said, well, I don't know you well enough, so I need you to stay longer. And so that was after six months. And it's just like, you don't know me well enough. Like, you only talk to me once or twice a month and all you say is, do you hear voices? Like, we can't even communicate because there was no interpreter there.

[Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Ian Bryson]

At that point, they're making me communicate in Polish, which I, I was learning Polish as this went on, but I couldn't communicate in Polish to express myself.

[Interviewer]

Right.

[Ian Bryson]

And so she was just like, no, we're going to hold you here. And I'm like, I was in prison for 18 months. No issues of model model prisoner, no mental health issues. I go to maximum security, no mental health issues. Model model prisoner. Now I come here after like three years and you're telling me that you don't know me and you have to hold me here longer? So it was. They're, they're like, they're not real doctors. They're. They're like psychiatrists who are wardens of the state. Yeah. But eventually I got out of there and went to minimum, and minimum was, was much better. It was, it was, it was just like a regular hospital for people with depression or suicidal ideation, stuff like that. So there were normal people off the street there. There were, there were females there. And like, it was just like night and day, but. Which was nice. But I'm still locked up.

[Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Ian Bryson]

And I was there for, for at least a year and it was the same thing, just like forced medication still. They made me go to their AA meetings and I had to say, hi, I'm Ian. I'm addicted to many substances. Or I said it in Polish and I didn't believe it because I, I wasn't taking any drugs. But their, their thing with the drugs is anything you've tried, you're addicted to. And in Poland, like, even marijuana, they look at it like heroin. Like, they gave me a. In prison, they give you this pamphlet and they have marijuana on a spoon and, you know, that's where they were at. And so I had, I had no chance because I, I did dabble in a lot of things in college. I was one of those people that like to try things. So one, I had to say, I'm in. I'm addicted to many things and go through that. I had to. I wrote a letter to my father in law apologizing and had them send it. Just trying to, like, I made a mistake, I made a mistake. You know, just kept saying that over again. I was wrong. I, I'm. I'm mentally ill and I'm gonna have to take these drugs for the rest of my life. Because of that. I had to parrot what they wanted to get out of there so they could. Yeah. So they would have no, no reason legally to hold me and that, like I did. I didn't want to lie either. Like, that's when I first got there. That was one reason why I told them everything. I told them my whole drug history. I told them everything about me the same as I do in the book and because I just thought, you know, like, I am who I am. I'm not perfect. I, I'm unique in a lot of ways and especially in Poland. There's not a lot of people like me in Poland, but the truth is the truth. And like that's the, that's the, that's what I've done and what I am now. Let's jump onto this other subject of my daughter. They didn't care. They just used everything I said as evidence to prove their point. The confirmation bias, you know, like, oh, Ian does drugs. That means that whatever he thinks can't be trusted. You know that. That's their logic. One of the psychiatrists said, wouldn't it be nice if you were crazy? It's like that's, it's a mind bending thing. Wouldn't it be nice if you're crazy so then your daughter isn't being abused? I just look at him like, I guess that would be great, but that's.

[Interviewer]

Not the reality of the situation.

[Ian Bryson]

Yeah. And it's weird to say that to someone who you think is crazy, but that's, that's what I was dealing with was just people who were unwilling or unable to step outside of their, their blinders and look at it any differently. And people who were taking a past pass down from someone else and their job wasn't to re evaluate, it was just to treat based on what was said in court. So I, I had a lot of people who, who, who believed me as, as I went through the system, people did believe me. There were, there were therapists and psychologists who would tell me they believe me, who would, you know, bring me, bring me things that I, that I needed. Or this one therapist, I would go in her office and we would have, we would have coffee and just chat and she would, you know, she introduced me to her husband. She brought this other friend in that she wanted to like, match me with. And so like there, that kind of thing was, was gold. Like just real people who could see beyond the.

[Interviewer]

Made you probably feel normal again.

[Ian Bryson]

Yeah, it made me a little. Yeah, it made me feel normal. It made me, yeah, just feel like I was connected to something real. Because this whole experience and the system was just, it was horrible. And I was, and I was all alone going through this, like, yeah, didn't.

[Interviewer]

Even have your family.

[Ian Bryson]

I didn't have my family. I had, I had one friend in Amsterdam who, who was sending me some money so I could, I could buy, buy what I needed. But because I didn't have any money, all of the Polish people in prison get like a stipend so they can buy extra food. I was just there on my own. But people, people would help me along the way. And this friend in Amsterdam would send me money. The guy in Arizona who I was talking to when I figured out this was happening. Sent me packages, but, yeah, my. My parents, nothing. And, like, when it first happened, I sent them a letter and said, I told you. I told you. My daughter was abducted and is being abused. Now I'm in prison now. You have to get a lawyer. And they. They just did not. Never responded. So it was just. I was very alone and very isolated from everything and just trying to get out.

[Interviewer]

Yeah, that. Just.

[Ian Bryson]

Just get out.

[Interviewer]

When you got out of the minimum, did you come back to the U.S.

[Ian Bryson]

I went to Amsterdam for a couple months.

[Interviewer]

Okay.

[Ian Bryson]

And my friend in Amsterdam gave me. Gave me a room and a bed, and I just rode my bike around. Got used to being able to close my door and just get back to life. Get back to life. Get. Get my head back. Because I was. I was in a survival mode for so long, in a mode, like, where I had to be on point. I couldn't ever be emotionally dysregulated. I couldn't scream. I couldn't. I couldn't be angry about anything. I had. Everything's great. I'm doing wonderful. Thank you for your help. When do I get to go home like that? That was my spiel for the. The whole four years I was locked up. So it was. It was a process to. To come back and feel like I was myself again. And that space in Amsterdam allowed me to do that. And I just ride my bike around the city and talk to people and sleep in and just get used to the fact that I don't have to go talk to anybody and explain myself. And so, yeah, he provided a really nice space for that. And then. Then I did go back to Connecticut after. After spending a couple months there.

[Interviewer]

And how old were you at this point? Were you in your 30s now?

[Ian Bryson]

I was in my late 30s.

[Interviewer]

Okay.

[Ian Bryson]

Yeah, close to 40, but, yeah, like, probably 37, 38.

[Interviewer]

Okay. And when you came back to the U.S. were you in your mind? Were you like, okay, I'm going to start fighting again?

[Ian Bryson]

Oh, yeah.

[Interviewer]

Okay.

[Ian Bryson]

I never. I never, like, I only stopped fighting.

[Interviewer]

I don't think you ever really stopped. It's more like just like giving. Like you said, giving yourself that mental break so that you can get back to where you need to be mentally.

[Ian Bryson]

Yes. And also realizing that the people I'm talking to aren't listening and care. Right. So, like, I was wasting my breath and digging myself into a hole by trying to get help from. From this judge, then this judge, the prosecutor, my own attorney, all of the child protective services in Poland, all of the media In Poland, all the government, like, so I was just, I was blasting it out and once I realized, no, but nobody's going to do anything, I had to shelf it so that I could get out. Yeah, I was still, I was still writing letters to, to people like child abuse agencies.

[Interviewer]

Were they responding?

[Ian Bryson]

Yeah, some of them were responding. There was one in the uk I got her on the phone when a maximum security, there was a pay phone. So she called me, I got her on the phone and she just said, Ian, you have, you have to do what you have to do. Get out. Like stop talking about it. Realize they don't believe you and they're not going to believe you. That's not their job. And most of the world doesn't want to believe this type of stuff is happening.

[Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Ian Bryson]

And so her advice was just shut up and get out. And that's what I did. But, but getting, getting a phone call and spending time with her on the phone was helpful. There's a psychiat, a child psychologist in California who deals with complex trauma and organized abuse. And she's written books and stuff. So I wrote to her. She sent me like, she sent me, overnighted me to Poland. Like an article that she thought would help with dealing with the court psychiatrists about like, how about ritual abuse and trauma based mind control to try to educate them. I didn't give it to them because I realized like they're, they're not here, they're not going to help me. Anything that I give them, they're going to use as evidence that you're crazy. Yeah, exactly. So. But I still have a relationship with that woman. And, and another, another guy who's, he's a professor in California, sent me his book to Poland. And so there were, there were people and I was, I was getting more connected in, in the abuse survivor community just learning how prevalent this is. And there, there's people around the world fighting this battle and realizing that I'm just another person in this. Right. Like I, my daughter was taken by a terrible family and now I've got to deal with that. And there's others like me that people don't listen to, that people don't listen to.

[Interviewer]

Yeah, I feel like it's easier not to believe someone. And I think what makes it obviously even more challenging is the distance and the fact that another country is involved because there's just such a disconnect with that. And you know, I feel like it's so easy for people to be like, oh, it's out of our jurisdiction. We can't help, you know, and. And I think the easier thing to do is brush it under the rug and not believe these. More issues, you could say taboo subjects when it comes to family. And people are very quick to say cults aren't real or, you know, especially when it's a family and things like that. And I think in some situations, you know, it's great that people want to take the mother's side, but. But at the same time, that doesn't mean you. You don't look into it.

[Ian Bryson]

Right.

[Interviewer]

You know, it's like, at the very least you would think that they'd be like, let's just shut this guy up and look, you know, and they couldn't even do that.

[Ian Bryson]

Yeah. Like.

[Interviewer]

Like why. Why even worry about you or the wife or the family? Like, worry about the child, the innocent child. Like the worst case scenario, you guys wasted your time and the child's okay. Best case scenario, actually.

[Ian Bryson]

Yep.

[Interviewer]

But not even to Jack is. Is insane to me.

[Ian Bryson]

Yes. And that's.

[Interviewer]

It shows how broken everything is, really.

[Ian Bryson]

I. I wrote new letters to the Secretary of State, to all the embassies again. And I put them in my book because this. This was like, recently in the big scheme of things. Just. This is what I've been dealing with. This is what's happened. I still need help from my daughter.

[Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Ian Bryson]

And they shut me down again.

[Interviewer]

When did you start writing your book?

[Ian Bryson]

I mean, I. So some of it's like journal entries and emails from. From when it all started before I even knew this was happening. So, like, I was writing. Writing it unknowingly for my entire marriage. And then when I was locked up, I was journaling, knowing that I was gonna write.

[Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Ian Bryson]

But I. I didn't do any serious writing until I was back in Connecticut. Got it from Amsterdam. I moved to Connecticut on. My dad has a farm. And he just said, here's your room. Here's your. He bought me a car and said, use the space to do what you need to do. Which was wonderful. Even though he still didn't know what I was talking about or. Believe me, he just. He just gave me that space. And so I put my office together and started researching and writing and just figuring out what I was going to do with that because I. I didn't. I didn't know exactly what. What to write or how to write it.

[Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Ian Bryson]

There was. There's so many different ways that I.

[Interviewer]

And aspects to it too.

[Ian Bryson]

So many. And it's 600 pages, so that's one.

[Interviewer]

Right.

[Ian Bryson]

Like and I cut out a lot.

[Interviewer]

I'm sure right there is. No, that's the thing too, is I feel like there's never enough pages that you can write. There's always little things that you'll remember, little details that it's very hard to decipher. What is important. I mean, it's all important, but it's like, what do I need to put in there? What's the things that people need to hear?

[Ian Bryson]

Yep. And. And like. And there was a. So also, like, I. I went through a phase of, like, realizing that I couldn't rely on, like, myself. Like, it was. It was. The situation was too strong. The. The people and the systems I'm up against are way too strong with me. So I wanted answers from God. And I didn't even know what that meant. I just knew that I needed something stronger than me. So through that process, I took all of my journals, huge stacks of them from my entire prison time because I wrote constantly, and I threw them in the fire. And that was like, I was trying to, like, relieve myself of, I'm going to write this book and change everything. Because that was the same error. I saw it as the same error as me going to Poland and gonna do this, and then they're gonna do a child abuse investigation. So, like, I. I burned all that. And it was like I. I wanted to know exactly what story I was, I needed to tell and how to tell it. And once I got rid of that stuff, it just. It came to me. It started to. I started to feel good about, okay, I'm gonna do this, this, this way and this, this way, and started to map out the book. And. And. And it just became clear once. Once I released it, then it came back and I knew what I was going to write. And I just started writing and just kind of without a plan, just writing, jumping around to different parts and chapters as it came up to me.

[Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Ian Bryson]

And then, like, I. I met my current wife in 2018.

[Interviewer]

Okay.

[Ian Bryson]

So I was home for about three years. She. She. We live on a. We were living on a lake, like a big pond really, but she was living at the other side. She kayaked down. And, like, it was kind of the same thing as with my first wife. I looked at her and I. It wasn't. It wasn't like an attraction, per se. It was like just this. This human is special. Right? Like, there's something about them that I know I need to talk to her more. So I. I talked to her. We introduced ourselves. She disappeared for a month. Or so. And then one day I saw her walking down the road again. I opened the door and I was like, emily. And she's like, ian. And it's like we just both knew that we had something to do together.

[Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Ian Bryson]

So we. I went. We went in the barn and I just told her my whole story.

[Interviewer]

Wow.

[Ian Bryson]

And. And she just. She. She cried and basically said, what do we need to do now?

[Interviewer]

Yeah. I was gonna say she was probably blown away.

[Ian Bryson]

Yeah.

[Interviewer]

Like, what is going on?

[Ian Bryson]

She. She was. She had never heard of it. She. She just. Yeah, she. She started researching on her own. She started looking closer at what I was saying. And. And we just started spending all of our time together. And we were. We were running a big garden at the time on my dad's farm. Because I didn't have, like, a real job. I didn't want a real job. I don't. I didn't. I didn't.

[Interviewer]

How are you supposed to focus? You know?

[Ian Bryson]

It's like, I don't want a career. I don't want money, you know, except for the purpose of getting my daughter.

[Interviewer]

Exactly.

[Ian Bryson]

So, yeah, it was. We. We started just gardening and selling. Selling vegetables, doing small landscaping jobs and writing my book. And she's. She types 90 words a minute, and she's an excellent editor, very sharp. And it was just like, we're meant to do this together. Yeah. So we. We worked on it for a couple years at least a couple years, I think more just like every day amongst the other things we had to do to live. But. But knowing this, this is what it's not. Not the be all, end all. I don't. I don't know what it's going to do, but it's a step I need to take.

[Interviewer]

So how long ago did you publish your book?

[Ian Bryson]

May, 2024.

[Interviewer]

Okay, so only like a year ago?

[Ian Bryson]

About. Only a year ago.

[Interviewer]

Okay. And what has the response been?

[Ian Bryson]

It's been mixed.

[Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Ian Bryson]

Like the community. Like the survivor community, people who are dealing with organized in ritual abuse, they. They totally support me.

[Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Ian Bryson]

But the. The world still isn't really paying attention. The, like.

[Interviewer]

Right. There's nothing being actually done.

[Ian Bryson]

Nothing being actually done. No.

[Interviewer]

So what is your next steps now? Is it just really just spreading awareness and getting the traction on your story?

[Ian Bryson]

It's. It is spreading awareness. I. I think just. It continues to be. Just doing my best with like. I don't. I don't know where we're going exactly. I don't know. I don't. I don't know what the next what's around the corner, but I'm just gonna keep, keep, keep going, you know?

[Interviewer]

And what's so heartbreaking is that you don't know what they've been putting in your daughter's head for this many years. You know, it's like this brainwash.

[Ian Bryson]

Well, I know, I know that she hates me. Right?

[Interviewer]

Right.

[Ian Bryson]

Because when I, when I published my book, I, I sent copies of it to everybody, or not everybody, everybody that my father in law works with, but also the city, city president, the president of Poland, the Polish FBI, the Polish national police, Polish news agencies. I sent, I sent it out and then I got, I got attacked. A letter came back from Poland to, to my place of employment and to the church we go to. Just like Ian, like, saying things like Ian would keep his daughter in the room and make her go to the bathroom on the floor. Like, it's like that doesn't make any, like you're saying that I'm doing what I'm saying you're doing when all I've been saying is my daughter's being abused. We need to get her evaluated. It's, it's not logically sound to say that I'm screaming for an evaluation and I'm like this, this perpetrator that you've never even said that before. Now you're trying to twist it all back on me and just say, say things that people can't, people can't decipher between the truth and they're just gonna, just becomes a muddle. So what? I lost my job. The people in our church were fine because they know me and they have my book.

[Interviewer]

They know your story.

[Ian Bryson]

I'm a small group leader. I'm a Bible study leader. So, like, they're, they're not concerned about me, but they, they made it so that I couldn't lead my youth group anymore because of the optics of the matter and they don't want to deal with, with parents saying, oh, what about Ian? He was in prison.

[Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Ian Bryson]

So, like, I had my youth group taken away from me. I lost my job. I have a better job now. But it's still just like, just getting hammered.

[Interviewer]

Right. For something that you didn't even do.

[Ian Bryson]

And, and I, Yeah, for something I didn't do. But yeah, I, I, I was glad, though, because it meant I was hitting a pressure point. Yeah. Like if something's happening, if they're attacking me, then something's happening. Yeah.

[Interviewer]

Right.

[Ian Bryson]

They're trying to cover their tracks. They're trying to keep the focus on me and off of Them.

[Interviewer]

So I know that you mentioned that you know more now about the family being a cult. How did you figure out more information about them?

[Ian Bryson]

So I, I don't, I don't have specific information about the family other than my experiences with them and my, my father in law and then my, my grandfather in law, I guess. Like, so I, I, I believe based on my experiences and what my first wife told me, that they are, they are perpetrators. I don't, I don't know how far it extends beyond that. So the, when I say I know more now, it's just, it's like bird watching. You know, you look at a bird and you're trying to figure out what kind of bird it is. So you look at all of the attributes and eventually you can identify that bird. So in the, in this case, it's just what my wife told me about Colt Stockholm Syndrome and then what happened. In my experience with what happened and it all coming back on me. Oh, that was the reason the red herrings on the COVID is because she said, my dad created a red herring. Your drug, psychological and criminal histories will be used against you. You're never going to see your daughter again. And when she was telling me that, I'm just like, what, what are you talking about? Like, that's, that's crazy. Let's go, let's go right now and have them look at everything, because I know that's not going to happen. But that's exactly what happened. As they just, they say, Ian's Ian. Seen a psychologist, Ian smoked marijuana, Ian has been arrested, Ian's the bad guy. And that's how they were able to frame it. But yeah, that's, it's just been constantly like, like that, me trying to fend off her. I'm not even trying to fend it off. Like, yeah, I saw a psychologist, I diagnosed with adhd, diagnosed with depression, diagnosed with panic disorder. What does that.

[Interviewer]

Understandably.

[Ian Bryson]

So what does that have to do with anything?

[Interviewer]

Yeah, right. It has nothing to do with the situation.

[Ian Bryson]

But they would try to say, like, like with the marijuana, they would say, oh, you moved to the Netherlands so you could have greater access to marijuana. I'm just like, there's plenty of marijuana in Connecticut.

[Interviewer]

I just think it's interesting too, because if roles were reversed, I, I don't think it would have happened this way. Like, if you were the one to take your daughter.

[Ian Bryson]

Oh, no way.

[Interviewer]

Right. It's just like, and which is crazy because you really never know what's going on, you know, like, and it goes beyond just your first wife. You know, she obviously was a victim as well and is so brainwashed. But just because she's the mother of the child does not mean that she has more rights than you do, in my opinion, at all.

[Ian Bryson]

Yeah. And that in the United States, it's getting a little bit better.

[Interviewer]

Like I said, at the very least, there should just be more research being done.

[Ian Bryson]

Yeah.

[Interviewer]

Because of the case and because of the situation. It's like why somebody shouldn't be allowed to just up and go without somebody investigating it.

[Ian Bryson]

I agree.

[Interviewer]

It's like, at the very least, just look into it. And I think that's all you wanted.

[Ian Bryson]

That's all I wanted.

[Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Ian Bryson]

That was what. What I. That was what was reasonable for me to ask for the rest of it. Go, go. Let's figure it out. Right. Like, I. I realize that they have allegations. I have allegations, but why would you just. Why would you just believe that side and not look at my side at all?

[Interviewer]

So besides your book, when did you start really speaking out publicly about your story?

[Ian Bryson]

Shortly before my book came out. I made a couple videos.

[Interviewer]

Okay.

[Ian Bryson]

And then after my book came out, there were people that were waiting to interview me. So I did. I did a couple interviews with those people. It started. I started looking for other channels that I could speak to.

[Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Ian Bryson]

And I got more involved with. With the survivor community. My. My wife got involved with the survivor community. She counsels two or three survivors doing parts work and deprogramming and spiritual work with these people who are similar situations. So we're. And we. We just. We just bought a house. We want to. We want to start a nonprofit to. To help survivors. And we. I don't know the. The details of what we're going to do, but we know that we have to do something in this area like this. The fact that this is on our plate means we have to do something.

[Interviewer]

And it's so interesting because while it's been so many years since they left this, I feel like this specific chapter is very, very new and fresh, you know, like actually being able to tell your story and not feel like you have to hold back in any way and have people that actually want to listen and want to help you and get it out there. I feel like that's what you've been waiting for.

[Ian Bryson]

It's what I've been waiting for. And I've got. I'm speaking at two conferences in September.

[Interviewer]

It's amazing.

[Ian Bryson]

So that the International Human Trafficking and Social Justice Conference, which is out of the University of Toledo, and It's a. It's a big conference, and I, I attended it last year and just maintained contact with one of the coordinators and sent in my proposal and they accepted it. So that's going to be September. I'm going to Daytona beach in September for another, Another conference. And it's all about this.

[Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Ian Bryson]

So, yeah, things are happening and I know, I know they're going to continue to happen, but I, I don't know. Like, it's still. It's still hard for me day to day because all I wanted was to be my daughter's dad. All I wanted was her childhood. Now she's 18, and so that's gone.

[Interviewer]

There's just so many different layers to it. It's like when it first started, you're worried about her safety. Now it's almost like you don't even know what's been put into her brain. You don't know what she's gone through. And it's like there's so many different layers in the sense that in the grand scheme of things, you just want to be her dad. But then you also were trying to protect her, and no one allowed that.

[Ian Bryson]

Yep, no one allowed it. So now, now it's like it's about protecting her. I. It's also her mother. Like, I, I love her mother, and I. And I believe that her mother told me she did what she could do.

[Interviewer]

She.

[Ian Bryson]

She told, she. She told me her family's a cult. She told me what was going to happen. I don't, I don't think she had any control over what she did. She was being cultural coerced through trauma to, to carry out the plan of these perpetrators. And she, she set me up so that I wasn't totally destroyed, so that I could. I could come back and write a book. And I, I believe that they. They want out of this, that my first wife wants out of this cult system. But that's. That's something else that other people have a hard time understanding or, or now that my daughter's 18, they'll just say she's going to come see you. And it's like, you don't understand. Her mother took her from me. It wasn't because of domestic issues. It was because of her, her father.

[Interviewer]

And did she ever. Did your first wife ever respond to you releasing the book or you haven't heard anything?

[Ian Bryson]

Well, she. She was supposedly the author of that email that went to my church and place of work, but the email is so ridiculous and so poorly written that I don't. I Don't think it was her or. I think that she was just being told what to write because her English is. Is perfect. And it's just the. The way it was said and what was said, you know, Ian kept her in the. In the bedroom that made her go to the bathroom on the floor. Like, I had never heard that before.

[Interviewer]

Yeah, just bizarre things.

[Ian Bryson]

It was just like the. The accusations against me were vague.

[Interviewer]

Okay.

[Ian Bryson]

It. It was. We escaped in fear of our lives. And then that's all I knew about the accusations for the entire time I was locked up. And I would just say that's. That's not what happened. She told me for three weeks she was leaving. So how was it an escape? She had the. She had the passport. She told me she was leaving. I was trying to get help. I still want to get help, like, to. Like. I've never had Child services or the police in my life. I didn't. I didn't know. I. Like, I had no idea what the allegations could be against me because I had never. Never dealt with it. It wasn't. None of it's true, you know, other than I've. I've said things to her that. That I wouldn't say now, but. But that's not what they're. That's not what they're claiming. They're claiming that they feel feared for their lives.

[Interviewer]

Right.

[Ian Bryson]

It's just. It's just so. So bogus. But people. People just take it and run with it. And it does come back to just. Just look at the child. And now she's 18, so it's. Now people think, oh, well, she's. She's free. She's her own. Her own person. It's like.

[Interviewer]

But your first. Your wife wasn't even.

[Ian Bryson]

Exactly. Yeah, that's. That's. They. They. They're able to maintain. Maintain control through trauma over. Over the course of a life.

[Interviewer]

And in a way, you know, people don't realize when it's all. You know, which I feel like that was all she. She knew, so she's just kind of following along with it, and maybe she's scared. You know, you just. You. You never know the depth of something.

[Ian Bryson]

Yeah. Yeah. I. I don't know. I mean, I. I know. I know the family is not a good family.

[Interviewer]

Right.

[Ian Bryson]

I know. I know that my. My first wife didn't take her because of me. And I. And I believe that she was like. I. I thought she was possessed when this was happening. I. I had uncontrollable diarrhea. I was sweating and Having to put towels down on the sheets because I was so terrified of what was happening in my home. And I would like, I, I, I told her, I wouldn't be surprised if your head started spinning around. I, I pulled up Henry Rollins's liar video where he's like, dressed in a devil costume and saying, I'm a liar. I'm a liar. And I was like, this is what I see when I look at you. Can we please get help?

[Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Ian Bryson]

Just like I, you were scared. I was, I was terrified. And it, yeah. And she, she was under compulsion from outside forces from, from whatever she said. Mind control. And that's ultimately what it is, is trauma based mind control matched with hypnosis and, and other programming that.

[Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Ian Bryson]

Through trauma they can do this. And I didn't even know they could do it.

[Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Ian Bryson]

And so you asked me before about how I identified what it was, and I was doing the bird analogy with you see a bird and you try to identify it. So it was just a process of like, what did she tell me? What did I see? What's happened? What could it be? And really what it comes down to is what this thing is, is, is referred to as organized abuse or ritual abuse or satanic ritual abuse. There's no, there's no other bird that it could be.

[Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Ian Bryson]

So that, that's how I identified what it was. And then that's a whole nother topic with lots of literature, lots of research, lots of survivors with similar stories.

[Interviewer]

So right now, you said you and your current wife, you guys work on this and then do you guys still do the garden business or you're doing something different?

[Ian Bryson]

We're doing something different.

[Interviewer]

Okay. She works with survivors.

[Ian Bryson]

She, she works with survivors. And now she works at a, a school for troubled youth.

[Interviewer]

Okay.

[Ian Bryson]

With behavior problems and complex trauma in their history there. Most of them don't have families. They're under the care of Department of Children and Families.

[Interviewer]

Okay.

[Ian Bryson]

So she, she just got a job. She was a teacher. She was doing like long term substituting and tutoring, and she just got this new job as like a counselor, residential counselor. So it's mostly like transporting and safety and stuff like that and teaching some educational or recreational groups. But she's only been doing that for like two weeks.

[Interviewer]

Okay.

[Ian Bryson]

Last year I started working. There's a state domestic violence program that people are ordered to take domestic violence classes from the court. I'm a group facilitator for that. And then I'm a program manager at a residential treatment facility.

[Interviewer]

I just think it's so incredible that you literally stumbled upon somebody that not only is, like, you got that feeling again of that connection, but then somebody that believes you and is helping you.

[Ian Bryson]

She believes me. She's helping me. She's not threatened by the fact that I. I love my first wife and I'm fighting for her as well as our daughter. Yeah, she. She loves my first wife and our daughter. She. She's put everything else aside because this issue is bigger than anything she's ever seen.

[Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Ian Bryson]

And absolutely amazing. Yeah. Like, I. I don't. I don't believe in random, but. But I. Yeah, I'm. I'm. I'm blown away and blessed to have her in my life and to be doing this with her.

[Interviewer]

It's incredible.

[Ian Bryson]

And. And she's. She's an amazing person. The work that she does with survivors, I. I don't. I don't do that work, that type of work, but, like, she's. She's meeting with people and helping them heal, and. And she put that together all on her own, basically just from educating herself and in a desire to help.

[Interviewer]

Yeah. And, you know, I really do hope that not only. I mean, I know that over time, you know, your story will reach the right people, and it's only going to keep growing from here, especially now with the way social media is.

[Ian Bryson]

Yep.

[Interviewer]

But I do hope that, you know, with time, you're like, your daughter somehow can just break that cycle and hear you out, you know, like, even if it's reading your book in her own time or something, or just listening, and maybe there's something that just. It clicks, you know, and. And it's hard because, like we were saying, you. You don't know what's being put into her head, but hopefully there's. I'm very big on intuition and your gut instincts, and hopefully, you know, there's something within her that just is, like. Can escape on her own and get out of it and wants to get to know you on her own.

[Ian Bryson]

I think, like, no matter how. How evil. Evil gets or how much somebody tries to control somebody, you can't get all of them. Like, there's still something in there that's saying, no, I'm gonna fight this. I'm gonna get. Get away when I can.

[Interviewer]

Yeah. That's like, all you can hope. All you can do is, like you said, never stop fighting and believe and hope for the best.

[Ian Bryson]

You know, I used to push her on the swing and just say, never. Don't let go. Never let go. And I, like, that was for the swing. But I feel like it's just for life too. Just. Yeah, I didn't know what I was dealing with or what was coming up next. Just don't let go. Just, you know. And there was this that, the psychologist that I was trying to get my wife, my first wife help from, when I was telling him she was taking our, our daughter to Poland, and he was saying, that's illegal. She can't do that. He was like, just go back and, and just do what you do and she'll come around again. And he told me this parable of. So there's a man swinging a sledgehammer at this big stone, and he keeps swinging and swinging. And everyone looks at him and thinks he's crazy because nothing's happening. And he just keeps swinging and swinging. And then one day this stone shatters. Because what everyone can't see is that there are little cracks happening all along the way.

[Interviewer]

Absolutely.

[Ian Bryson]

That's, that's what I believe is happening. I, I, I believe good wins. I, I believe that things happen for a reason. And I had, I, I had this experience, which is not an experience I would have signed up for. And I lost the most important thing to me as a result of this experience. But it's also put me on a track where I, I see something that I wouldn't have seen. I, I want to fight for my daughter, first wife, and everyone else who's in this situation. It's not, it's, it's become bigger than just just my daughter, just my daughter. Like, I've, my eyes have been open to this in the world. It's not okay with me.

[Interviewer]

Right.

[Ian Bryson]

So I'm willing to be used or.

[Interviewer]

To spread that awareness.

[Ian Bryson]

Whatever, whatever it needs to be talked about. Yeah, Whatever I can do, I'm willing to do. And yeah, I'm going to make an audiobook.

[Interviewer]

Good.

[Ian Bryson]

This, hopefully this year I'll finish that. I'm working with a Polish person to have it translated into Polish.

[Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Ian Bryson]

And just, just keep going with.

[Interviewer]

Yeah, do not never stop. I know I don't have to tell you that, but.

[Ian Bryson]

No, I won't ever.

[Interviewer]

Yeah, no, I'm. And like I said, really, the way that you tell your story, it's, it's incredible. And you've been through, obviously, losing your wife and your daughter is heartbreaking and horrible on its own. But then everything that you went through after and having to basically lose yourself in a sense along the way, like having to lie to get out of things for years and having to say a lie over and over, that you know, isn't true. That's a different type of torture.

[Ian Bryson]

Yes, it is.

[Interviewer]

And mental pain. And I feel like you've just been through so much. And like I said, it's incredible because I feel like this is only the beginning of this chapter of everything. And it is crazy because I feel like it started there, but now it is something that's so much bigger and it's going to bring a lot of knowledge and awareness to something that isn't talked about enough and something that I think it's easier for a lot of people to not look at and to brush under the rug because it's scary, it's uncomfortable, or people just don't believe it's happening when it is. And I think the, one of the main, one of the easiest solutions is to just investigate, just check it out. You know, it doesn't have to be some big long thing. It can just be making sure a child or a person is safe.

[Ian Bryson]

Yep. So, yeah, it's, it's, it doesn't have to be tricky. It's. You just have to have somebody who's aware of the, who cares and who is aware of, like, what we're dealing with.

[Interviewer]

Right.

[Ian Bryson]

Like, so if, if you looked at it when the child was 4, it would have been simple to, to get to the bottom of it. Now at 18, it's, it's tougher because of, know she has legal rights as an adult and she might, she might decline help.

[Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Ian Bryson]

But it's, it's still like not, it's not this big impossible situation that we can't penetrate. It's if, if, if you know what you're dealing with, you, you know, what signs to look for, you know, how to question somebody, you know, all it's, it, it blows my mind that nobody has helped, you know.

[Interviewer]

Yeah. It's gotten this far or it's had to go this far.

[Ian Bryson]

Yeah. My, my recent communications with the US Secretary, Secretary of State again in the embassy. I sent my book to the CIA.

[Interviewer]

Good for you.

[Ian Bryson]

I don't care.

[Interviewer]

You shouldn't know. And, and what you're doing is incredible, honestly. And like I said, the way that you tell your story is amazing. And I think it's so good that you're going to be, you know, continuing to tell it and speak at conferences and you should do every interview that you can.

[Ian Bryson]

Yeah.

[Interviewer]

Honestly speak about it whenever you get the opportunity to because it is your life and you deserve to. I feel like you were silenced for so many years and told you were crazy. So now it's like, now it's time to use your voice and not be told to shut up, basically, or that you're nuts because you're not.

[Ian Bryson]

Yep. Yeah, it's, it's still like that. That whole period of being told you're crazy and having to act that part, it's still like there's a, there's like a trauma wound there.

[Interviewer]

Oh, for sure.

[Ian Bryson]

Like, I, I, I don't care what people think. I don't, I know who I am and I, I know what crazy is and what crazy isn't. But it's still just like, you know, people look at you and even my parents don't believe me, still or not. My dad doesn't fully believe me, and it's tough to tell where, exactly where he's at other than he, he doesn't really want to think about it.

[Interviewer]

Right.

[Ian Bryson]

You know, the past is the past. Your daughter will come find you. That's what all of them do, you know, and he keeps it simple. And I think most people who this isn't thrust upon. Yeah, they, they, they don't have the time or the energy to really look that close. You know, even, even my best friends, they're, they're dealing with their own lives, their own children, their own jobs.

[Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Ian Bryson]

They, they, they don't have the opportunity to, to, to look into it as closely as I have. Right. And they care. But what are you going to do about it? And like, I've been on this road where, like, I care and I have to find something to do about it because I won't let up. I won't give up. But everyone else, you know, they have their simple solutions, and then it's like, oh, I'm done thinking about that. I have to go back to work.

[Interviewer]

Right.

[Ian Bryson]

To their reality, which is understandable. And also, I don't, I think if it wasn't my daughter, I wouldn't want to look at it either. So that's, that goes back to. Part of it is a blessing. Like, I don't wonder who I am or what I'm doing here or what my purpose is. Like, it's, it's right there in front of me. So that, that's, like, that's, that's a blessing. It's a blessing that I'm in a position to know that other people are also suffering and suffering because of what they're enduring and suffering because of the public and society refuses to look at it.

[Interviewer]

Yeah.

[Ian Bryson]

Despite all of the evidence that's out there now and all of the survivor testimonies it just hasn't, hasn't hit the radar.

[Interviewer]

Well, I'm so glad that you were able to come and share. You really did an incredible job. And any besides your book, obviously, if there's any personal links or resources that you want me to share and post in the description, send them over so that people can kind of follow along and keep up and whatever else. So was there, of course, was there anything else you wanted to touch on or include? Do you think you got it all?

[Ian Bryson]

I think, I think we got it all.

[Interviewer]

All right. You did it. Seriously, you did an incredible job.

[Ian Bryson]

Thank you.

[Interviewer]

Of course.