This podcast should not be used as a substitute for medical or mental health advice. Individuals are advised to seek independent medical advice, counseling, and or therapy from a healthcare professional with respect to any medical condition, mental health issue, or health inquiry, including matters discussed on this podcast. This episode discusses abuse, which may be triggering to some people. This episode also contains a graphic description of physical violence.
Listener discretion is advised. The views and opinions expressed are solely those of the podcast author or individuals participating in the podcast, and do not represent the opinions of Red Table Talk productions, I Heart Media, or their employees. I kept repeating myself, and I said, that's my stepdad. He tried to kill me. Um, that's my stepdad. He tried to kill me. That's my stepdad. He tried to kill me. And I kept repeating that, so that well, when no,
don't go near him. Also, I'm not the killer, but I technically defended myself and handle that. So I just tried to give people as little information as possible, but not to where they would stay away and also not think I was the person that like intended to do this. Being a survivor of a violent crime, whether because it happened to you or because it happened to someone you love and you were nearby when it happens, is a defining traumatic experience. This can be magnified if it is
something that happens within your family. We are joined here on Navigating Narcissism by two survivors who experience life changing experiences and who have joined together on their new podcast, Survivor Squad, to share stories of survival from their unique perspective. Terr Renewal is the daughter of Deborahnewell, whose relationship with John Bahan the Dirty John's story we have talked about
on this podcast. Collier Landry is executive producer of A Murder in Mansfield, a documentary about his journey of grief, understanding, and resolve in the wake of his father's murder of his mother over twenty years ago. We are fortunate in these next two episodes to hear about their stories and what they have learned, not only about themselves, but about
these kinds of toxic personalities. We have already heard the story of Dirty John, a story of a toxic relationship between Deborahnewell and John Mehan, which has become the blueprint from manipulative toxic relationships and has inspired podcasts, TV shows, and books. However, the end of the story with John's death reminds us that these aren't stories in which just the person in the relationship is affected. Terror Knewell, Deborah's daughter,
recognized that John's behavior was toxic. She shared her concerns with her mother, and, like a psychopathic person would, John recognized it and attempted to drive a wedge between Terra and her mother. After John and Deborah's relationship ended, John continued to stalk and menace Deborah and her children. This culminated in a fateful night when John showed up to
the parking lot of Terra's apartment building. Today we hear Terror Story, a story that reminds us that narcissistic and psychopathic and toxic relationships of any kind are never just about the two people in it, but about the many people around the relationship who may see the red flags and who may represent a threat to the toxic person. What happened that day and in the months and years after is a reminder that the harm of these relationships
don't just end when the relationship ends. I'd like to start with how did the two of you meet and get connected? Because I got to say, your stories are so unique. Well, i'll let call your start because I was actually on his podcast, Moving Past Murder, and that's when we first connected. And then for me, it was just really great to your someone that took their own narrative and made a documentary about it and whatnot. And so that's at least like how I started connecting through
call here. Yeah, so I had Terror as a guest and her mother, Debrah on Moving Past Murder, which is another podcast I do, and I was like, Wow, we have this kindred spirit that not a lot of people. It's it's you know, as we say in Survivors Squad, it's a club that we all don't really want to be a part of it. We just happened to be a part of that, right and we just started vibing a head her on a couple of times and we
just became friends. And you said something so important, Caller, there's not a lot of folks like us out there, and they're must in some ways. And I many trauma survivors will echo this. A loneliness being a trauma survivor, but even a multiplied loneliness when it's what the two of you experience in your case homicide callers, in your case self defense terra which involved a lot of media attention. That's a very unique place and again for many people,
it starts to feel like a really lonely place. So to have each other to talk to and have those places where you can share what that feels like that other people may be able to offer empathy. This is a different level of empathy that you can give to each other, and today I think also bring an empathy to the survivor experience of many people who have experienced these kinds of toxic relationships. So not maybe not at the level you did obviously, but in some ways the
themes are the same. So thank you, We thank you for having us. Yeah, and it was both by John's too, and what was a doctor and one was pretending to be a doctor, and some very odd parallels to our stories. She has a Mansfield connection. It's just it's like after we started to comparing notes, it just got weirder. That's fascinating.
You know. The doctor part's not lost on me though, because I think certain professions hiding psychopathy behind those professions, because being a doctor is considered such a venerable, safe profession that it's actually a great place for a psychopath to hide. You know. It's like a plain sight kind of a thing, because I think that the profession holds that.
So I'm going to start with you, Tara. As you know, we have had your mom, Deborah come on the show, and the world has finally heard your mother, Debra Newell's story of the side of the story once and for all. She's now written her book. She's sharing her side of the story. We know the stories that were told before that we're a bit of a distortion and didn't give the sort of the full truth. However, and this is
always something that's been there for me. You're such a major part of the story, intopend pendant of your mother's story. So I am so glad to be able to speak with you because you bring an experience not only in it, but then obviously in the aftermath of it too. One thing to me to her that's so interesting about your story is that you were not actually really able to
tell your own story right. It was told through television, It was told to the l a time story can you give us a sense of what they got right and what they didn't get right. So I want to start with the show first because it's more, well, I want to say, it's newer in a sense. So the show started off with having Julia Gardner play me, and I wasn't really seen in the show. It was just basically a secondary character. But at the end, this thing happens to her and you don't get to know her personality.
You think that she's okay, like a fun loving girl, like sweet, nice and stuff, but you don't get to know the depth of her character. And I understand up because also I didn't get to meet Julia Gardner before I ended up meeting her. She's also a really big actress that's working all the time and stuff, so she's traveling back and forth. So it wasn't the lack of
that she didn't want to meet me. The producers, the stunt coordinator, and the director they met with me, and the one part that they really did get right was my attack, and I was so grateful for that because that was the one thing that needed to be viewed through my eyes. And there's like one thing that she did differently, which she put her back back up. I actually put my purse under my heart to protect my heart.
The scene was exactly like that, just the purse was in a different spot, and then my mom didn't help him get better from drugs. The scene for Thanksgiving was a lot different because I got into an argument with John and my mom the night before Thanksgiving. And I am the youngest, I am more similar to my mom in ways of appeasing, and I really have learned her dynamic and relationships and have repeated that dynamic in my relationships.
I like to say I worked on it now, but that has been a past pattern of mine, So I really I was really able to see the dynamics and stuff. But it was just interesting because it's for show on the TV show, and I think that the podcast really did get the dynamic of generational trauma. I appreciate that. I don't think my mom appreciated at the time, because it's so hard to be told your family is messed up in a sense and by all these people, and
then all these people are nitpicking. If you're not aware of your generational trauma and people are telling and you, you're going to have to have shields up to protect yourself because you're not ready and all these people are coming at you, so that feels like a threat to the nervous system. So you know you've got to be on guard. And then it takes a while, like I feel like years later, to realize, oh wow, generational trauma is a thing exactly in our family. It really is.
So we always again, this story has always been told from your mother's perspective. I'd like to hear from you. What were your first impressions of John Meehan. My first impressions of him was I honestly wanted to appease to my mom. I wanted to like this guy. My sister was so angry that this guy was in the picture. She didn't like him. My sister is also more activated in her fight response, and so she's going to be
more vocal about things. She's going to put her foot down, she's going to create a scene more where I I'm like, Okay, I want to get to know him. I want to see if he's really the guy that my sister says he is, or is he the guy that my mom says he is. And I really truly wanted him to be this guy that my mom says he was, But there was little things I would ask him questions. He would give me one worded answers where I wasn't able
to elaborate. But knowing me, I just like, Okay, you give me that one word, I'll ask like ten more questions, you know. And I really want to get to know people because I think that people are so interesting, they're so a lot of times they're beautiful with their minds and stuff. Where John was just not giving me that energy. But he knew a lot about my medical problems because I was actually having stomach ulcer issues. I was having thyroid issues also, and it was off the charts because
I was in a relationship. That relationship was coming to an end, and so like my cortisol levels were super high. I was just on edge all the time. And John told me that it might be overari insist. So I
was like, oh, okay, like that sounds normal. So I actually went to a O. B G. Y N. I got my levels tested and I found out a bunch of stuff there and this doctor didn't want me to go to another place because she saw that it was just stress causiness and it was the stress from my mom and these unhealthy dynamics with my relationship, and I mean, my medical problems got worse as John was in our lives because I ended up getting in a fight with my mom then day before Thanksgiving. I ended up just
asking her like, why is John using your car? Why is he doing this? He seems hyped up on drugs. Because I also had friends that were frequent flyers, and one of the things was they would say their arm with her all the time, and John was like, oh, my arm hurt. So I went to the hospital and I was like, hmm, that's an addict thing. M that's interesting.
One thing I remember about the story was that your mother had been with John for a little while before you actually met him in person, because you were living in another city. Yes, and so your sister's impression was made pretty early on. She met him very early in your mom's relationship, and then you met him later. Well, it was so interesting about something you just said, Terry. She's like, my mom had her experience and she liked him, and I was hoping to sort of meet her where
she was at. My sister had one experience and it wasn't very good. But what you weren't doing actually was holding space for the idea that Tera is going to have her own experience. In many ways, you felt like I've either got to make my sister's experience or my mother's experience work. And that's a real manifestation also of how that family system worked. It's not like I don't get my own independent assessment. I'm gonna have to make one of these two impressions fit. Oh wow, that's a
really big realization there. You know that there was no space for terror to say what do I think of this guy? Like, Okay, you have your experience, but let me see how I feel. And that though terror is not unusual for a person who's been around high conflict personalities, like you said, intergenerationally, in a way, there's no space for our own subjective reality when we've been through those cycles. It's as though, I mean, I have to pick from the shelf of opinions that's been given to me, but
I don't get to shape my own. And over time you did, you did shape your own. I think it took a while, even after I was attacked and everything, to realize I had a voice and to realize that I could trust me intuition, because that is something that saved me. And you know, when you're around all these narcissists, these psychopaths, these sociopaths, these interesting figures. Like my whole life has been around you know, my mom had has been with many of these interesting people. Even my family
members have been these interesting people. And I want to say, like my brother's not, but there's been other people in my family that have these traits. I think I think there's somebody and just about everybody's family that has these traits, and the fortunate ones don't have many of them. But I don't know if many. I guess the people who don't have these traits and family I never made them. So I think that's really what it is. As you got to know John, there were things that were unsettling
you about him, beyond just the one word answers. What were some of the patterns you were seeing in him that maybe now you'd identify as being consistent with psychopathy or narcissism, but at the time you just felt, this is not cool, like this doesn't feel good. What were some of those early patterns. There was this one time where we went out to dinner. It was before I had this confrontation with my mom and John, and we
were in the car. I was with my boyfriend at the time and then my best friend and we were all on the back and I tried to get out of the car. The child lock was on the car, and so I asked on I'm like, hey, can you please let me out? He didn't hear me, or thought he didn't hear me, and then so I say a little bit louder, and I'm soft spoken, so this could go either way, So I say a little bit louder.
He literally gets out of the car, goes upstairs and doesn't let me out, and I'm like, did I just like, did I just see that right? Did I hear that right? And then I look at my friends and we're like, maybe he didn't hear us. But for him, it was like, oh, I don't need to do this. This is the first step of isolating them. So it was like you didn't exist.
He was literally not responding to and so you didn't exist, which is a form of gas lighting, because you do exist, and so just negating your exist stance by literally not responding and then storming off, it's as though your very existence was aggravating him. So he was going to storm away from that. Yeah, And I don't get why because I feel like I'm trying to be nice and cooperative, but you know, I'm the one that's gonna take the money from her. I'm the one that's going to buzz
into her here. And so I'm the first one that he needs to get rid of other than Jacqueline. Well, Jacqueline was the first one, because Jacqueline was the one starting problems from the beginning. But then I was the second one because oh, I'm taking her resources, I'm taking her time, and I'm going to be the one to be the voice of reason. And it's so interesting you just said something tera that I heard was that she was the one causing problem. Jacqueline, your sister, She was
the one causing problems in the beginning. Jacqueline actually wasn't causing problems. Jacqueline was actually seeing the situation clearly. But it speaks to how much John brainwashed the situation because it really was being painted as Jacqueline was causing problems. But what Jacqueline wasn't doing was going along with the
status quo of someone who's making her uncomfortable. And so that was you just being a troublemaker, and anyone who's a truth teller in these kinds of narcissistic systems almost immediately gets painted as a problem. That identity of being the problem the person causing trouble is what gets internalized, and even going into the future, when that person sees a situation that doesn't feel cool and they're like, well, I'm no troublemaker, And my thought is, you ain't no troublemaker.
You're just calling this stuff out straight. But we tend that that tendency to be pathologized for seeing something clearly, that language still persists. That's the kind of thing that's saying that Jacqueline saw it clearly seems to be closer to the truth. I'm sure your mother didn't like it at the time. Well, and Jacqueline is very reactive, and when someone yelling at you, you're actually not able to hear that octave and here and listening perfectly, so you're
not receiving that information. Shan where when I was able to say certain things, it was able to penetrate my mom's thoughts a little bit more, but I still was going to take away her happiness and gonna take away her oxytocin gonna take away this guy from her life when she's so physically connected to him right now? Yeah, No, I mean it's it is so interesting that caregiving was
in a way not speaking truth. You know. I think that once a person's really been through it, in any form of narcissistic, psychopathic, sociopathic relationship, the hope is the win is that you become discerning. I mean, Tara, and I've said this. I said it when I talked with your mom. I've said it when I've spoken about this situation before. Had John not died, okay, had and had
you not defended yourself and his life ended it? On that day, someone in your family, most likely you, but someone in your family was going to be harmed or killed. Right that that's the end of the story. That level of tragedy almost becomes a sort of rock bottom. Now you're seeing these patterns, right, You're trying to be protective
of mom. You're also hearing Jacqueline's reactions. How did you start to express your concerns to your mother about patterns you were seeing that we're making you uncomfortable again, Terry, you didn't have the vocabulary of narcissism or narcissistic abuse or psychopathy. When you were seeing all these signs and signals but something didn't feel right, you were sensing it, How did you communicate that with her? Or did you so? I would just say, Hey, Mom, don't you think it's weird?
They all his cars got stolen and he has a couple of different stories for the situation. Don't you think it's weird that he's a doctor and he doesn't have a car. Isn't that weird that the insurance haven't cleared it up by now? Because the insurance with this one situation with my car cleared it up within a week, Like, this is crazy? And I just started asking her logical questions. How did you respond to that? Oh, Tara, Like he's a doctor, Like he's just like busy all the time. Oh,
he knows what he's doing. Oh like it's still being investigated. Yeah, that's making trouble. It's interesting you hit her with logic because basically what you were doing is you're sort of poking holes in a psycho psychopaths ground game, right, because they're all about lies to seeds, aliases, cover stories. They're really remarkably good at lying and keeping their lies straight. That's actually a real sort of signature move of psychopathy, whereas the rest of us we just get really confused
if we start lying. Right that said, you were hitting her with logic. Did you at any point say to your mother something here just doesn't feel right to me. I'm uncomfortable. He's doing these things that made me feel uncomfortable. No, because the second I started to have those logical questions was the minute that he picked a fight with me.
I got kicked out of the house that they were living in two months they moved in together, and then I like, I did all the grassery shopping for Thanksgiving and I wasn't able to go to Thanksgiving the next day because of him. He made sure that that didn't happen. Yeah, so it was all the isolation dynamic, which again, is that kind of toxic relationship. One oh one, take away anyone, because in a way, what you could have been to her, Terra,
was the anti gaslight. Right. The gas lighting doesn't work if you have one solid person in your life who's saying, oh no, no, this is the reality. Oh no, no, you didn't remember it wrong, this is what happened. Can't gaslight someone if they've got that support. So the only way a gaslighter can play their game is to remove any other influences that will counter them and only keep people around that are on the gaslighters team. And he didn't really have a team, which is interesting. So he
just had to get rid of all of you. He had no one. He had no one, which is all the more remarkable for how much he was able to isolate her, Because sometimes you'll have people in your corner, right, other family members or friends that you know are going to be your yes people. But in your family's case, he could sense. I mean, and it's not like it's logical, like, Okay, got to get rid of the people who can stop
me from gas lighting. But as soon as they sense that someone has someone's ear, they get him out of the way. And so as soon as you started raising these concerns, he saw you as a menace, yeah, and really wanted you out of the picture. Do you think he saw you as more of a menso, Jackline, I think he saw us both. But I think he saw me as the more like one that liked to plan and the one that had more logic. I actually cut off contact from my mom because I wanted to prove
to her that I don't want your money. All I want is you to be my mom and how quality time with you? And so I started to separate from them to show that. And then there was just more stuff that happened here and there, and now I'm like, trauma brain, I lost your question. You know what, It's funny. I could see you losing my question, and that's I mean, don't pathologize yourself. Remember what every trauma survivor needs to remember.
Instead of us viewing the traumatized parts of the way the nervous system responds as it letting us down, view it is protecting you. For a minute, you're being pulled out of this conversation because it didn't feel okay. It was a way to feel safe. It's really quite remarkable how we protect ourselves, but we don't do it well, Like we don't realize that. We have a lot of negative self talk. So be kind yourself. I saw it literally happening in real time. So you're good. And like
I said, trauma brain is protective brain. I always call it a sort of an overactive security guard. Like, okay, we're good. What is it like the hippocampus shut up. Well, it's what you got is this whole system of the amygdala, the hippocampus, and how that works with the frontal lobes of the brain. It's like this sort of fear network
that plays and how we process information. That is, especially when we're talking about that event, we almost go right back to it because it's so encoded somatically for us, and so we're having these strong reactions that feel really overwhelming, of course, like the body actually does it a little b her and the mind is like a bussy gas light or like stop that, and the body's like no, no, somebody doesn't feel right here. And you're talking about this.
That's what we would expect before it all culminated. And when John attacked you, did you ever directly confront John about his behavior, about his conduct or even that you were onto him. No. You want to know what I said, And this is what everyone should say if they're working with or want to try to prove so and wrong. I used reverse to ecology. I was like, mom, I would love to talk to him, I would love to
work things out. Please let him know that. And I kept reiterating that, and I think she went back to him and it was like tears, wanting to work things out, and he was just like, now, well, I never heard about his responses, but I'm assuming they weren't. So what's interesting is in that you actually, really we're saying, okay, I'm gonna extend in olive branch. It was actually a really it was a clever move because his goal was to isolate. There was no point in making you into
an ally. And in a way, you almost made yourself a little more dangerous, right because then he recognized that he no longer has the defense of Look, Tara doesn't like me. She's trying to come between us. So you
took away that defense for him. But what another thing you may not recognize how wise it was was to not directly confront him that you saw him and you got him, because if you had done that, you would have just been pushing fast forward on the button that would have led to the inevitable attempt to harm you. There's nothing a narcissist, psychopath or sociopath hates more than somebody saying I know what you're about. They really want to think they're the most clever person in the room.
And if you're going to be the one to pull off the mask. It's going to be swift justice from them. And so you really, without knowing it, did the right things. Well, I knew what I was doing. When I was doing I was like, this is going to throw a wrench in his land. Absolutely goodness for a wrench. But even then not calling him out, like a lot of people will say, I get what you are. You're a money grubbing la la la. You know that that kind of reactive response is what people tend to do. It's also
what they want, yes, because it can control you. Barkie dogs don't bite no, exactly right, that's right. Well I did that when I confronted my mom about Thanksgiving that day before and whatnot, and he started screaming at me and he was like, you just want your mom's money, you want this, and I was like, no, John, that's what you want. And I also threw a lot of
efforts at him and whatnot. And then my mom even asked my boyfriend at the time because he was in the room with us when this is happening, and she's like, what is your opinion? And he was just like, well, you know, I agree with terror these are questionable things. My session with Tera and Collier will continue after this break. So Tara walk us through what led up to the attack by John. My mom had left him for the second time. She moved out all of her stuff out
of the Vegas house that they got together. During this time, John was coming to California and stalking my family and I and we wouldn't know this because his dog would always get out. The neighbors would put the dog back. He would literally leave the dog with a big bull of food and water and then leave the door open and the dog would get out because the dog was lonely, and she ended up in the pound one day because she was wondering the streets and they were calling John.
We didn't want to get involved. We didn't want to piss him off. At this time, John also ran the car that my mom got him into a gate. I think he was on drugs and just ran it into the gate and then ran away from the car. So we actually got that cart back because it was impounded and it was in my mom's name. And then during this time also lit my mom's jag on fire in
California and the police had that case. And then John ended up coming after me, but my sister saw him and chased him down because he was stalking my mom at her apartment complex, and then he got on the freeway and that's where my sister lost him. My sister came to my house, but I had work at seven am the next day, so she wasn't going to wake me up. She walked by my door she heard my cat,
so she was like, okay, Terrace sounds okay. She sent me a text message, but that day was actually going to the Jason Aldane concert, so I was very preoccupied. I didn't bring my knife with me that I would normally bring, because I also taped up knives everywhere around my house because well, I had a dream that I actually stabbed him before this all happened when I was living in Vegas, and I have dreams that come true sometimes, so I had this fear that John was going to
come after me and try to kill me. I also wrote my ex a letter saying the dog's years and wanting everything to be in order because I had this fillion of death. So I went to work that morning, and then I got off a little bit early because John actually called to make a fake appointment for dogs that day, and he missed that appointment, so I was actually able to go home. I got ready and I came back to work, and because I came back to
work early, I was able to get off early. Probably left like sixteen at work, and then I do the drive that takes me around LinkedIn nine minutes. I got to my parking garage and I pulled up. The gate was broken, and I saw this guy who was backed up into a parking space and he was fiddling with a tire iron and my dog started barking at him. I told my dog, did knock it off. My dog did because he was a good dog, and stopped. And I just thought that that guy looked like he was homeless.
I didn't connect the dots that it was John, but my dog did. So I parked there, got out of the car. Then John grabbed me by the waist, looked me in the eyes and said do you remember me? And I immediately went into fleamon tried to run away
from him. I was unable to disconnect. He covered my mouth and I bit down as hard as I could on his hand, and then he started to punch me what I thought was punching before this, actually brought up my purse to protect my heart, and I had a nice leather clutch, so I thought he was punching me,
but he was actually stabbing me. So I was stabbed once in my forearm at this time, and then I believed I was stabbed in the chest at this point too, but the knife literally went through my purse and barely got my chest, and then I was unable to disconnect from him. My dog was attacking his ankles at the time, and I dropped my dog's leash because I didn't want my dog to be in this fight with me. I wanted him to go run away, but he was fighting and he tore up John's ankles pretty good too, So
I fell on my back. I scraped my shoulders pretty badly, and John was on his knees, and at this time the knife was out of the Dell Taco bag and I realized that, oh, this is a knife attack. I was actually wearing rain boots because I worked out a dog kennel. This actually helped me in my attack because I had more mass to cover when I was kicking him, so I would kick his forearms and my dog was attacking his ankles at the same time, I actually kicked the knife out of his forearm and it landed on
my right hand side. I'm right hand in It landed in the ice picked position, which is the perfect position for picking up a knife, and I picked it up, and just like my guides God whoever like, told me, it's just like a now or never basically, and so I picked it up. I still can't connect the dots and see where I stabbed him, so I felt like I was stabbing him in the front of his chest, but I was actually stabbing him in the back of
his shoulders. And then he fell down, he gasped on me, and then I was holding his head so he wouldn't bite me like a zombie. And then I actually stabbed him in his forehead. And then the last one was to the eye, because that's the softest point of entry to the brain. And that's when I know he wouldn't freddie cougar me and get up and be able to
because of that. So I did the last two and thought And that's why I really remember those ones, because I gave thought to those ones, because if I didn't do those, he would get up and he would kill me. And then I took the knife. I tossed it away from the body and then I started to scoot away.
I started to assess the situation. I realized that I was bleeding on my forearm, so I started to apply pressure to that, and then I looked around saw my dog was eating del taco and I told him to knock it off because I thought it could be poison. He knocked it off, and then this lady came up with a yellow lamb and she just asked me what I needed help with. I asked her to please grab my dog because I already took care of my wound
on my forearm and I was good with that. And then more people started coming up at this time, like this guy with the bike. He came up asked me if I was okay, and then Skyler, the fourteen year old lifeguard, she showed up and then she told me, Hi, I'm Skylar. I'm trained for this type of situation. What's your name, what's your age? When's your birthday? Started asking me questions to get my mind back to awareness and
not moment, and I kept repeating myself. Was also careful what I said because I didn't want to go to jail and be a killer. So I kept repeating myself and I said, that's my stepdad. He tried to kill me. That's my stepdad. He tried to kill me. And I kept repeating that so that people wouldn't know, don't go near him. Also, I'm not the killer, but I technically
defended myself and handled that. So I just tried to give people as little information as possible, but enough to where they would stay away and also not think I was the person that like intended to do this. You know, hearing this story from I've read it, I've heard it, but sitting with you in this room and hearing it, the profundity I mean it is. I I need a minute, you know, to to just the the clarity you had. It goes back to a caller was saying I can
promise you this. I would have gone into a helplessness mode of assuming this person could overpower me. I don't know, I've never been in this situation, but it feels like there was a clarity of how do I stop this, how do I end this? I'm going to enter through the eye. I need to get away from this. My
dog can't eat that food. It could be poison. There was a clarity to your thought that was and we hear this of stories from wartime, from people who are in some of the most horrific circumstances, that this almost preternatural clarity comes in and you go that you were saying before a full on survival mode, that the instinct and you to survive overpowered any other instinct you had
at that point, which is remarkable. Thank you. I think it also has to do with I've been through a lot of childhood trauma my whole life, and then I went through a situation where one of my ex boyfriends hit me with a car. Yeah, so I think my system was already ready to fight and be activated. But if it was someone that I was in love with, I think that would have been different. Oh that's very interesting.
So you think you would have had a different approach because at some level, Terra, there was like you said, you were having the nightmares, your knives taped around the house, you were living in a defensive posture. So he's almost his physical queue immediately went to danger. There was no confusion there. It was just that this person represents danger. It's almost like a loaded gun. There was no ambiguity there. Yeah, I knew when he said, oh do you remember me?
If that was not like, oh hey, how's it going, it's no, You're gonna try to kill me and put me in the back of your trunk, because he was trying to push me towards his trunk. I found out later that he had something ridiculous like eleven or thirty knives in his trunk. At the point that incident happened in the garage, before that, how many weeks or months had it been since you'd last spoken to him? Even years years, so years had gone by, you had no
contact with him. The stalk behavior was apparent, which, by the way, is its own form of trauma. If it was only the stalking terra, that would have been a horrifying enough way to live, so in a way that I think that a person even going through the stalking element of this would found themselves stretched to the limit. And yet you lived like that. And for many people, stalking is this sort of menace that doesn't always realize into the feared behavior, but you have to change your
life around the stocking. So you were living for a long time with this person lurking in the shadows and just not knowing how it would finally manifest. Yeah, and I also think I took a yoga class like a week beforehand, and so like I also had breath control then, and so I think that there was a lot of things that just aligned with me being here. And I'm also a major manifest or where anything like I'm manifested just comes true. Like the universe just really has my back.
It's amazing thing you could say that, though, that the universe has my back, because until that attack was done, your body, mind, and soul were living fully in the idea that you might very well have been about to die. So ultimately the universe had your back. But the universe pushed you through a lot. I mean it did. But I'm so blessed to be here. And it made me deal with everything that I hadn't deal with before, where I literally I was so reactive too, I didn't know
how to cope. I would have panic attacks all the time. I was also a child of molestation and stuff, so my nervous system has always been jacked up. It got me to learn about it. It got me to learn about other people, other brains. It just really put me down. This amazing path of healing and understanding, and that right there is the is the highest calling of healing when we go through the most horrific of human experiences, and as we heal, we find meaning and purpose of some
kind in it. Whether that means paying it forward, whether this's and how we love other people, whether it's how we pursue creative pursuits, whether that storytelling or art or however we do what we do, but in a way that in essence is focused on paying it forward. That's a big destination. And it sounds like you got there, which is really quite remarkable. Let me ask you this as a question. Obviously harmedics must have come taken you
taken him. What was it like in those early hours after you were now in I imagine in an emergency room. So they put me in the ambulance. I told them, you can't put Ivy and me at all. I'm really stubborn sometime, and I hate doctor. I get that girl. I was so I told you can't touch me unless I have my dog here. And I felt the need to protect myself after everything that happened. So I was like, you're not putting a needle in me. You're not hurting me.
You're not poking me, you're not touching me until I have my dog here, because I'll let you do anything to me with my dog here. So they were like okay, and then they went and got my dog for my mom, and then my dog just literally sat on my lap and then I was like, okay, you can't do whatever. And then I also asked them, I'm like, so do you think I'll be able to make it to the Jason Aldon concert tonight? Do you think I'll get out of here in time? I get it though, that craving
for normal. For you paid for the concert tickets, concert tickets for a hundred dollars lawn seats, and I was like, a hundred dollars for lawn seats is so expensive. So I like, I like the practicality as as you went into that. And so you're in the hospital and you are now you're getting treated. So they like wrapped up my wound, but then I wasn't able to get stitches. I wasn't able to get any medical attention really until they questioned me. Yeah. Yeah, So they questioned me. They
took pictures of everything. So they unwrapped my wounds at times too, So I was literally sitting there with a like a wound open for like an hour, and then I kept asking, when can I see my family? When can I see them? Blah blah blah. I wasn't able to see my mom, and I told them, well, I want my mom here for stitches and stuff because I've never had stitches in my life, so I was like,
I need her here. And then I was able to see my sister Nicole first because my sister Jacqueline was fighting with the police Jaqueline reactive Jacqueline, And so I saw my sister Nicole and she came up and I was so happy to see her. And this is like the part that probably bugs me the most about my trauma, because I went in, they brought me in the stretch shirt and then they were touching me everywhere for stab wounds, and then they were poking me, just not asking for permission,
just doing whatever. And I was like being poked and prodded, and I saw my mom and I was just screaming at the top of my lungs and being like Mom, and I could see her looking at me and she wanted to be with me, but they were just like no, you can't go in there, and so I was literally like screaming this whole time, just looking at my mom.
I'm so sorry, Tera, And it just was so hard because after this attack happened, I literally don't have cont roll over my body now and then, so they did all that stuff to me, and I basically told him, I'm like, for me to be here, you have to give me some you have to give me anxiety meds because I'm not going to be able to be here, and they gave me a bunch of like other stuff.
That sense of no consent after the history you've had with trauma throughout your life, you said, sexual abuse and physical abuse and all of that, that idea of consent becomes, especially at such an exquisitely painful time of your life. It really speaks to the need for that trauma informed care in those emergency settings. So that would have gone You were already so terrified. You've been through so much that something like that small things go a very long way.
So I'm so sorry. My session with Terra and Collier will continue after this break. We forget it's how important it, especially those early hours right after that level of trauma, how a person experiences. Those systems and the people in those systems can be a game changer in terms of
how a person heals. Another question I do have is how soon were you because you're coping with fear and your own body having to be explored and acted on medically, and you don't have the support you have you initially you couldn't even see your mother any of that, how soon did you find out what the outcome was for John? And how did you feel about that? So it's a little hazy because I feel like in the hospital I found out that they sent John to another hospital right away.
They told me they revived him, and so I was like, okay, I mean that's actually something in my favor too, because if I would have been charged with it, it would have been attempted murder instead of murder, you know. But in my head, I was like, it's self defense. There was no question of it turning out that way. And I get questions all the time now where people are like, oh, why did you dispose all that information? Why did you like?
And I was like, because I was innocent. This goes to something that you know for me, is it never cees. This amaze me. The Internet's a cruel place. But you have been criticized in online spaces. Here you're saying that day people, why did you share the information just on
that day? Here you are in a state of shock and you are actually quite controlled, you know, in terms of what you were saying, and you were getting criticism since then, and I think this has been both of you have to share your stories and you've been criticized. I've got to tell you, there's a rage that comes up in me that actually freezes me for a minute.
I have to put the stuff down when I see the criticism folks like you and people who share their stories, because it's to sharing the stories that actually is what has to happen. That you're standing, that you're doing, that you're living, that you're thriving, and yet you are you are, You've vote, both been changed, you vote, both been changing, criticizing. It's interesting and it was talking to tire about this
the other day. It's people are so quick to excoriate you in these circumstances, but I feel that it's a defense mechanism for them because it is so hard to wrap your head around something like this happening to an individual, whether it's a five year old woman, a twelve year old child. What have you that their rationalogists blame the victim and just okay, you shouldn't have done this. It's almost angered that if people have had or criticism that
they've had of both of you for sharing your story. So, yeah, how has that affected you? I've called out a few people too, And something that I realized is it's either this person that hasn't been through the situation at all, has had a sheltered life, or it is this person that's actually in this situation now and it's making excuses, or it's the psychopath, or you know, how did it affect you when you are putting yourselves in such a
vulnerable state of sharing? Just again, Terra, I am in such a gratitude and humbled by your willingness to share your story here. It is humble. It's the only word that comes to me right now. And the vulnerability that brings out for you and call your I've heard you share your story and the humility and vulnerability there. How does that affect you when all you're doing is sharing? That not the why. I don't care about the why of the trolls. I haven't. I don't. That's the that's there.
But how did it affect you? How has it affected your healing and your mental health? So going back to the stocking, it feels triggering because of that, Like there's people that call me killers, and then I'm like, I did have to take a life and that's that's so hard, But I'm here because of it, and I have empowered so many other people to fight back or get out of a toxic relationship. So there's really like a purpose.
There's this is my dharma, you know you absolutely Also you've also protected his next victim because there was going to be somebody else, you know that. They mean that's that that was it was a given. And in fact, why have you even have been called since the Hiven years that the grooming of that next victim may have already started at that point, but still there was this vindictiveness towards you. So just as a last question, then then you did find out John had died. What was
that moment like for you? You know what's weird. I was happy because it meant my mom was safe. I think that's weird at all. And it didn't have to do with me not living in fear from him anymore.
It was me really happy that he wouldn't be able to hurt anyone else, But I was worried about his daughter's I was worried about his immediate family because I understand that everyone has to warn yes, and I'm going to be I didn't really understand how anyone may have felt until like my abuser died, and then I was like, that was like a range of processing, But I was so relieved. I was like, I don't have to live in fear for anymore. I don't have to check my
back as my and I'm just so happy. I'm so glad you shared it as replaced a relief, because I think that's always the pain in these relationships, is that this idea of equating relief with someone's passing, which is something we're told is never to be the case, right, And that you went to a place of empathy. I've felt for the other people who had to go to an experience of grief, but there's absolutely nothing weird about it.
And I want to say again thank you Tara for sharing your story, for rounding out a story that in many ways was framed as relationship story and a red flag story and what happens when a bad guy's in a relationship and then oh and then her daughter killed him, and then it was done right, and it was very different. And I think that this idea of that it was your mom and him were only together a short period of time. You did weigh in this was not a
bunch of people naively being played. But how it affected you, how it continues to affect you, but also how it's also galvanized you in your own life to again derive meeting and purpose from is really extraordinary. But also acknowledging that trauma has it affects a person every single day, and even today right here in the studio, there were moments when you could feel that happening to you and
recognizing that's part of your journey. So I can't thank you enough, And do you have questions for me before we transition over to call your story? Well, first, thank you so much and thank you for having me on today. I love to ask this question because a lot of people ask me what is the difference between a psychopath and a sociopath. It's an interesting question and I'm going to try not to get to pedantic and professory with it, She said pedantic, Yes, I did see. Yeah, so somebody
you gotta fit pedantic into every conversation. Right. So here's the thing. Psychopathy and sociopathy neither of them are actually straight up clinical terms. The diagnostic term for psychopathy is something we call anti social personality disorder. It's a terribly named disorder, but it captures clinically and diagnostically this thing
that actually ascribes to the personality model of called psychopathy. Okay, so with psychopathy, you have a lot of the things you'd see in narcissism, lack of empathy, entitlement, grandiosity, but there's a chronic coldness, aloofness, callousness, exploitativeness, manipulativeness. They a psychopath has no capacity for intimacy, empathy, or depth of human relationship, none whatsoever. They have no remorse for their
bad behavior. That's different than narcissism. Narcissistic people actually do feel remorse. They know how to work systems. They stay very cool, actually at times when you would think other people would be quite explosive. We'll talk about the sociopaths in a moment. They can actually be typically but not always cool, calm and collected because they don't experience anxiety.
It's really believed to be that the anxiety systems, the autonomic nervous system activation, and a psychopath is dialed down, which is why in some ways they're kind of your person. If you need someone who's going to stay totally cool, like in a situation of combat or a really difficult business decision, or even a patient bleeding all over an operating table, they will actually stay quite cool. That protection against anxiety, as it were, usually doesn't do them any favors,
certainly doesn't do other people favors. And that's why you see like psychopaths and CEO positions and leadership positions, because they're able to destroy anyone they need to get to the top and seem very cool and put together. They tend to be quite parasitic in their lifestyle. So we see aliases, we see deceit, lies, and an unbelievable capacity
to lie to someone's face. And whereas the rest of us, if there was a lie detector on us, it would look like, you know, like a person having a heart attack on an e k G. They stay pretty calm. So that and for example, a lie detector type test is actually not useful with a psychopathic person. That's a psychopath calm, cool, collected, callous and different, unempathic, no capacity for intimacy, and they're motivated only by power, pleasure, and profit.
And people will serve one or all of these functions to them. But that's it now. Sociopathy is not a clinical term at all. It's a term that comes actually more from the sociological and criminological kind of literature, sort of reflects reflects a style more than even psychopathy. It's not as well articulated as a theory. It doesn't hang together as much. A psychopathic person almost doesn't understand and
rules and regulations. If they don't work for them, they may be surprised and say there's a rule against that, Well, that doesn't make sense. For a sociopathic person, they know there's a rule and they break it. They understand the rule, but for reasons such as entitlement, they don't believe the rule should apply to them. Sociopaths also tend to be a bit more reactive. We tend to be more disregulated,
They tend to be messy. There are two parts of the story you shared about John that almost struck me as more sociopathic than traditionally psychopathic, and that was the driving the car into the gate and setting fire to the car. That's a little bit more reactive then we would typically see in psychopathy. But psychopathy sociopathy both there's a really strong, focused, unvindictive nous. They're almost paranoid in the sense of everyone's out to get me, I've got
a target on my back. They're the people who have someone taste their food or something like that. There's that kind of again, it feels like a low grade paranoia, whereas the psychopath and will notice like somebody's looking at me, and then they will create a plan to get revenge on that person to sociopathal punch him in the face right in the moment. There's that's the difference, and so it's socio sociopathy is messier, more combative psychopathy. There's a
planned fulness, almost a premeditated nature to their rage. Okay, so I also wonder if maybe John was more reactive in those moments because he would also shoot himself up with testosterone. So testosteron is a funny one, and there's an interesting literature even on what that use of testosterone does. The answer is it's not good, you know, and I think, unfortunately there are some people out there who are just
handing it out and should not be. And if you go to a legitimate physician, a true trained and ethical endocrinologist, they would be taking a very different stance on that. You even see it in a narcissistic kind of play, that they're so angry for a psychopath. That might tend to be more messy. But if he was doing it, let's say he set the car on fire to send
her a message your next kind of thing, that's more psychopathic. Okay, yeah, no, that was a message where share, So that feels more psychopathy. I've never met John. I don't know who he is, I thank goodness, and never sat in a room with him. But based if I was, like I always say, if I was a graduate student taking my clinical exam and all the facts of this case and everything I've learned of John over the years was put in front of me,
I would put my good money on psychopathy. It just was the alias is over time, the shape shifting, the identities, the numerous people left in his wake, the short of shady life history, all of it adds up much more because it's so historic, and he was even sound like he was not a good kid. What we look for in psychopathy is the childhood stuff, so theopathy not as much. But in psychopathy you need that prior to age fifteen, even prior to age twelve, acting out violence against each other,
against others, harming animals, setting fires, theft, truancy, bullying. You tend to see that in psychopathy, not necessarily the case in sociopathy. So I hope that clarifies. Definitely, Okay, So there's the difference. It's a lot of it has to do with theoretical stuff. Psychopathy is a very well articulated theory. Sociopathy is still a little bit more of a hazy theory and a terminology used more by criminologists and sociology. Yeah, me an examine that later, the professor and me will
never die. So so thank you again. These are my takeaways from Terra's story. Terror story reminds us that we have the right to feel the way we feel about someone knew, we meet and who is part of the life of someone in our life, such as the new partner of a family member or a friend. Terror recalled that she felt that the way she felt either had to be in line with her sister's opinion or with
her mother's experience. Something that we can all strive toward is to understand that we have the right and frankly, the responsibility to allow ourselves to have our own experience of an other person. By doing this, we are able to become more honest with ourselves, set better boundaries, and be more discerning in our next takeaway. One thing that Terra's story reminds us of and that repeats in these stories is the role of isolation in maintaining toxic relationships.
It is a key dynamic in relationships with narcissistic or psychopathic people. As Terra's clarity and even simply her presence in her mother's life became clear, his goal was to isolate her. For people who may sense that this is happening to them, finding ways to remain in touch with the person in the relationship in any way you can is really important. However, also to recognize the limitations you may be facing and to also protect yourself. It's not
an easy balancing act. Tera attempted to find that balance and even tried paradoxical approaches like letting her mother know she was willing to get to know John. In my next takeaway, one thing that jumped out about terror story is the need for trauma informed care in all settings. After experiencing a violent assault, Terror felt as though she
wasn't able to set a boundary for herself. It's a wake up call for anyone in health or human services of any kind to always check in with the person we are helping and simply ask for permission and honor how important it is for a person who has endured trauma to have that sense of control over themselves and their bodies. In my next takeaway, the after effects of
trauma don't just spontaneously dissipate. Healing from trauma requires self compassion, access to mental health services, patients from of people around the survivor, and an awareness of how trauma impacts the mind and the body. If you are a supporter of someone enduring trauma or have experienced trauma yourself, be patient, educate yourself, and recognize that our bodies and minds hold trauma and that therapy is a necessary tool to recover.
In our next episode, we will be hearing Collier stories his story of trauma and having to navigate a lifetime of loss as a result of the toxic patterns of behavior in his father. Their stories are so different, and yet they are linked. Both are the difficult and confusing experiences of having to make sense of personality styles and related behavior that magnified the harms of what they had already experienced. Stay tuned because if you aren't familiar with
his story, it is powerful and devastating. A big thank you to our executive producers Jada Pinkett Smith, Valen Jethrow, Ellen Rakitin, and Dr Rominey de Vassila. And thank you to our producer Matthew Jones, associate producer Mara Dela Rosa, and consultant Kelly Ebling. And finally, thank you to our editors and sound engineers Devin Donnaghe and Calvin Bailiff.