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.
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. In this episode, we are going to hear a recap of some of the stories we have been hearing on Navigating Narcissism. I want to begin by thanking all of you for listening and tuning in. Now let's dive into some updates from some of our
memorable interviews on this show. I'm sure most of you know what we Work is, even if you didn't hear our episode was Ugo Umbawek, who talked about his experience working with we Work and sort of the fallout of what happened for him when everything fell apart. We Work is obviously the mastermind of someone named Adam Newman, who famously developed this company We Work from the ground up
and built it a little bit too fast. This was a company that it's heyday had a forty seven billion dollar valuation, but they kind of got ahead of themselves. The entire thing fell apart. Adam made sure he walked off with a very very healthy dose of profits, but many many others who held onto those options did not benefit in the same way. And there was a tremendous of betrayal. And how could somebody let someone run a
company like this into the ground without any oversight. In many ways, the story of We Work became a fable about corporate mismanagement and the sort of grandiosity that we were seeing in so many tech businesses that would rise out of nowhere and come crashing to the ground. So here's where this story gets really really interesting. You think, okay, Adam Newman made a mess of everything, Well, how about this, folks.
In the last few months, Adam has secured a three hundred and fifty million dollar investment from Anderson Horowitz for company called Flow, his new venture. This investment is the largest individual check Anderson Horowitz has ever written when funding a company, and it values flow at more than one billion dollars for it officially opens its doors. And this is in addition to another seventy million dollars he raised
for yet another company, a billion dollars a billion. I have trouble getting an advance on my damn credit card, and this guy who already drove one company in the ground is getting a billion dollars. When I read that news, I chuckled to myself and I thought, oh, my goodness,
we do keep enabling grandiose folks, don't we. But I also got a heaviness in me because I stopped to think about the many people who were harmed when we were crashed, people who had invested time to watch the founder who had made the mess walk away with a tremendous amount of money, and many of them left with very little after that happened. I really stopped to think
about what does this mean? And here's the thing, and this is where it gets real complicated, and why understanding these kinds of sort of grandiose, entitled folks gets very complicated in the business space. Nobody can deny that Adam Newman is a generator of fantastic ideas. His ideas are visionary and excellent. Is this guy's coming up with a better mouse trap all the time? I can't doubt it? Right?
And this is where it gets so tricky. And one thing that can make understanding charismatic, grandiose, arrogant, and egocentric personalities so complicated is this concept of how multiple truths are operating. Adam Newman has great ideas and vision, that's one truth. Adam Newman mismanaged We Work, that's another truth. Adam Newman appeared to put himself before the folks who worked at We Work and helped We Work in its ascendancy.
That appears to be a truth. Adam Newman's grandiosity got in the way of him being able to do the drudgery and discipline of running and sustaining a business. Basically, his were bigger than his stomach. His ego is bigger than his empathy. That appears to be a truth. All these things are happening at the same time. Now, what's interesting, and my read on on observing and reading everything I could on this case is that he appears to want validation, and so he may be very invested in getting it
closer to right this time. However, the people who want to work for this company need to understand what they're signing up for. Something I have said in the past is that, especially when it comes to dating, for example, there's no such thing as YELP for people. We cannot read reviews of people to find out how they've been hurt by someone. So when we meet someone new, because we often don't have access to the people in their past,
we're starting fresh. And can you imagine if you knew what their past relationships were really like the same thing happens here, except people know what this person's track record is. So anybody going into this workplace setting needs to you. So I would say, with eyes wide open, understand what they're signing up for. But the story of we work, the story of Adam Newman and the people who work there, they're a reminder as much as we want them to be,
these stories are not black and white. If people with these personalities were just simple cartoon villains, then everyone could see these things coming. The multiple simultaneous truths mean that depending on who you are in this new endeavor, this this new company, you may prosper or you may get hurt. And I'm sure some of your things wasn't that every company, Yeah, but I think the level of which one could get hurt could be more extreme when these personalities are on board.
When a person works with a visionary but undisciplined later someone like an Adam Newman, it's important to keep your eyes wide open and not get caught up in sort of the CULTI dynamics of it all. And for investors just a thought, hey, you may want to listen to our podcast episode. But for investors, I sure as hell hope that they put in sort of the grown up clauses in their deal that allow them to put the brakes on before it goes upside down or if it
goes upside down. We very much are living in the era of the cult of personality, and so multiple endeavors like this. I can see it. You read anything about this investment, and people are saying, we like to believe in founders who may have learned from their mistakes. And it's really interesting because when we reproduce that dynamic in
a relationship. I can't tell you how many times I've sat in a therapy room with someone where people are saying, well, they made a mistake, and I'd really like to think that they've learned from it. I'm sure you do. And I, as a therapist, don't get to tell someone how to live their lives, so I desperately often want to, and I have to say I'm just going to breathe and recognize that this client is going to get hurt again, and my role in their life is really to help
them through navigating those broken pieces afterwards. This bet that somebody is going to change that significantly when it comes to these kinds of personalities is often not a good beat. I only wish any venture well. I think that this venture is actually very thoughtful and it could benefit a lot of people who, especially the way the housing market is now, really deserve that benefit. So I think the idea is great. The challenges, it's basically hubris. It's Icarus
flying too close to the sun. Basically Adam has been given a new set of wings, and the question is is this time is he going to remember to not fly as close to the sun. I really really hope he does, because I can again his ideas are excellent. This new idea is actually a really good idea, and I hope again that the grown ups involved are not getting caught up in the grandiosity of it all and can look at this with a more critical lens, because I think in that way the only way something like
this is going to work. But there's also another piece of fallout here. When somebody has been sort of harmed by the decision making of someone in this case in a workplace setting and actually took financial hits from that, and then watch the person who not only prospered getting to prosper again, it can feel like a re betrayal for people in these situations. The difficult thing with difficult emotions is sometimes you just have to lean into them
and let them work their way through. You may just watch with bated breath to see if it all blows up again, or just sort of watch it and slowly learn to let it go and find your own peace and your own path in the world. But again, it is amazing to me what people are willing to look past when money is involved. I sincerely hope this dude has learned, because, like I said, his ideas are top flight, and this idea would be really good for other people
if it takes off. But unfortunately, given what I know about these personality styles, I'm not so sure that this is a horse, I would confidently bet on my recap session will continue after this break. So, Heidi Russell was a roommate story gone wrong, and this was well beyond a roommate. This was a story of someone's home and
life being fully infiltrated. She brought someone in to be a short, short, short, less than thirty day tenant, and then before she knew it, a pandemic happened, and various policies and procedures meant that Heidi lost her own home while a person who moved in and didn't pay rent got to live there rent free. You know how we often talk about how antagonistic people get to live in our minds rent free. Well, this was a case where a real person was living in her real apartment rent free.
It was a complicated story, and when we left at the end of the episode with Heidi, this person, this grifter, was still living in her apartment rent free. Heidi had to find a new place to live and ended up staying with a friend. Well, I was hoping Heidi would get a good ending on this story, and I'd say we kind of got a partial good ending. Upon hearing what the end of the story was, it was sort
of a half happy ending. So after finally getting a court order to be able to evict this person from her home, any of you listening would know this person, this grifter, did not leave easily, even with notice, even with getting a decent amount of time to leave, being told to pack, being told what the date was again
and again, she didn't. And so when that day finally came, as you can imagine, not one thing was packed up, and once again the chaos ensued, with the grifter trying to hide and get away with it, and all kinds of things had to happen to finally get the grifter out of the apartment. But it doesn't end there, because these things never do. What ended up happening then was because somebody lives in your apartment for three years, they're
going to have stuff. Heidi was left holding the bag on paying for the move, paying for storage to the tune of thousands of dollars. Heidi has already financially wiped out and now she was having to pay for a move. She finally moved out over fifty boxes full of items, and still is having to endure ongoing contact from this grifter who had taken over her life. Sadly, during that period of time, Heidi was not able to access her apartment, and in that period of time damage happened to her apartment.
So Heidi is also now having to hold the bag on repairing and fixing and trying to make her apartment habitable again, so she still doesn't have a place to live. Financially has been wiped out, is facing the cost of the repairs, is carrying the costs of the move. So Heidi will ultimately hopefully be able to return to her home. But after something like this, and when this person is still out in the world and still making contact with her,
something like this changes you. It's not likely that Heidi will really really ever feel fully safe when it comes to these kinds of situations again. She may not be able to get her financial footing in the same way again. But the real legacy of loss for someone like Heidi after something like this is a loss of trust. This was such an extreme situation, the very place that any of us consider a sanctuary our home got literally infiltrated. As Heidi moves forward, I do hope she's able to
find peace. Hers is a cautionary tale for many of us who desperately want to trust, but may find that after a narcissistic relationship, it's hard to and often have to be more discerning, because even in the episode, Heidi was honest about feeling like some things weren't right, but there were empathic parts of herselves seeing that the scripter had a child that led to Heidi really wanting to step up and do what felt like the right thing.
We have very different relationships with empathy and compassion after these relationships happen in our lives, and I have no doubt that Heidi struggles with that from time to time as well. Interestingly, Heidi not only did get her place back,
but not surprisingly, it wasn't easy. She's also now trying to work through the system to develop a roommate law that would protect people in the future who find themselves in these situations and are not able to remove a person that they may have brought in to share expenses
into their homes but cannot remove from these situations. So, Heidi, I hope that you are able before long to be back in your home, make it your own, burn some sage, Hid, and I hope that you're able to find home, not only in your physical home again, but that you're able to sort of feel comfortable back in sort of your own skin and in your own mind and in your own body, because these relationships can really really feel like
we no longer are safe anywhere anymore. I had the privilege of talking with Mark Vicente, who was featured prominently in the first season of The Vow, the HBO documentary about the Nexium Cult. It was a painful story because so many people were harmed by Nexium, and Mark had a very unique perch in all of this, a really
complicated space where he really really believed in it. He had to grapple with the moral injury of recognizing that he brought people to it, and then the fear that came from doing something about it, and doing it against an organization that had absolutely no morals or ethics in terms of how they would come at people who spoke
out against them. So you thought the story of the Vow was done, Oh no, no, there is much more, And in season two of The Vow we get to hear what happens after the Nexium cult is brought down. It wasn't as simple as there's a trial and then there's a sentence and everybody moves off into the sunset.
What we often forget is some of the greatest grief, loss, and hurt can happen after what looks like a resolution to the world, as people have to grapple with lost friendships, of seeing people who are still psychologically stuck in a space, people who are still coming at you in an angry way, and then absorbing that this was once part of your life, and even the idea that you may have brought people
into this situation that could have done them harm. As people watch season two of The Vow, feedback that Mark has been getting is that there are a lot of people who are mad at the Loyalist So like the people who still kind of are holding to the tenants of Nexium, the people who are still almost defending what folks central to this, Keith Vneery and others were doing, and they don't like that the Loyalists are getting airtime.
I found that it was so interesting that Mark is so circumspect about why it was important for those Loyalists to get that air time, because he said, that's where you can see we can speculate on cognitive dissonance, on coercive control. But he said it's fascinating to see where they're still stuck in it. Mark made such an interesting comment. He actually has a podcast where he sort of breaks down not only episodes of The Vow, but really talks
about these issues. And I highly recommend his podcast because he brings in some really unique insights of somebody who's been so close to cult like structures is he's doing these debunking episodes and he talks about it. One point that Mark makes, which is such an interesting point, is as you look at season two of The Vow, the loyalists, the people who are sort of in some way still believers, still defenders, they actually look really calm and well put together.
But the people who are devastated by this, the people who are speaking out about it, the people who recognize the abuses, the gas lighting, the manipulation, and the coercion. He's absolutely right. In season two, you can really see how raw their emotion is. You can see the harm that this has done to them. And I agree with Mark.
I'm actually really glad they portrayed it that way. People might think, like, why are you portraying the loyalist is looking well put together, because that's what cognitive dissonance does for us. When we justify a toxic situation, we can feel okay with it, like, well, of course this is right and those people are absolutely wrong and this is the truth and they have their issues, and however else
the person's rationalizing it. Any of you, any of you who are listening to this, and maybe, for example, in a toxic family system, it maybe you who recognizes how toxic it is. That you're the one who may actually look far more frazzled when you're facing down the family members who are either toxic or enabling the toxic person and have totally doubled down, unbelieving that the unhealthy dynamics
are actually healthy. It's the person who sees it more clearly that is often the one who is struggling and suffering more so, I actually thought that was really an interesting way to portray it, and I really agree with Mark's assessment of that. Mark has been doing this for years, so in many ways, even what we see in part two of The Vow is already in the past for him.
But when that story becomes public again for all of us who are watching The Vow Part two, it's it's current, it's present, and he as Mark reflects on his life and what this has been and how this is unfolded for him, He reflects on You're reminded of the loss, your remind of the lost friendships. You are being called things like disloyal simply because he spoke out and he left,
He left abuse, but he's being called disloyal. Mark reports, not surprisingly that he's having bad dreams about the experience. It's triggering, and what hurts most is watching the loyalists
literally tripling and quadrupling down on their ideology. And what's hard is, after all that's happened, when the harms have been recorded, when the depths of how abusive and how harmful what was happening in Nexium really really is that people still think that the people who come out and speak the truth about what happened, that they're the ones who are bad, that they're the ones who are corrupt, and they still hold Keith Ranieri up as this great
and knowledgeable man. Many people would think that that would leave Mark feeling angry, but the emotion that he reports feeling is sadness. However, the good thing is is that despite all of that, Mark is continuing to get really good feedback from survivors of all kinds. One way to really see where Mark is coming from in the wake of all that's happened, and even in the wake of season two of The Vow. And again, it's a real treat to listen to the podcast episodes after you watch
each episode of season two of The Vow. His new podcast is called w t F is on My Mind? Do tune in his really fascinating insights. And what's so fascinating is all these things he's saying about a cult, if you listen to them from the perspective of being in a toxic relationship or a toxic family, it all rings true the same way Nexium, the way the sentences were handed down, it's one of those few success stories of justice, it really is. I remember when I heard
Keith Ranieri's sentence. I almost fell out of my chair because I thought, for sure, either as every good cult leader does, he had tricked the jury, he had tricked his attorney, he had tricked the judge. Certainly he had tricked thousands of people before that, and so I was very, very worried that not only would there not be an appropriate sentence, that would mean that anybody who spoke against him would be living under a banner of fear for
the rest of their lives. So to see a sentence that recognizes the number of people harmed and the depth and the breath of the harm, that delivery of justice is something we so rarely see in narcissistic relationships. So I was glad to see that. But once again, remember that just because the sentence is handed down, just because people separate from a toxic system, just because they get support. As Mark says, the nightmares continue, did hurt continues, the
sadness continues, and the loss continues. Many survivors of narcissistic relationships actually walk a rather lonely walk after the relationship is done or something happens to end it. A lot of folks will say it's done, now, let it go. It's simply not that simple. That's not how our nervous systems work. We hold onto this stuff, and Mark and other survivors will have to walk this path of healing
for a very very long time. So Keith Nieri, maybe in jail, and we'll be in jail for the rest of his life, and that might be part of the past. But like any traumatizing relationship. They never fully go away, and so if you're somebody this had happened to watching season two of a show or any news reports, it's like bringing up these feelings again. Mark is having an experience that many many survivors have, which is I still
care about these people. I cared about them once. The care doesn't just go away, and a lot of people think, what's wrong with me? How can I care about people who are willing two call me names to tell me I'm terrible for merely speaking out about a truth that
people were being harmed. And as Mark goes through his process of healing, and despite how angry the Loyalists are and the terrible things that they're saying, he does recognize that he did once care about them, and it's painful to watch them just saying so allied with harmful people
and to keep doing harmful things to other people. It is very, very difficult, whether you're in a narcissistic cult, which is all cults, or you're in a narcissistic family that you cared and many times still care about those people, and it can be really really painful to watch people you care about still continuing to be harmed or doing harmful things because you want better for them. Part of the healing is grieving that and moving on from there.
We can watch salacious TV series like this, and many people have said this about Nexium in the Vow is that it's so easy to sort of write off it's a sex cult. That's not what it just was. Certainly that sells people to look at it, and it makes people pay attention to it, but it was people who actually did enroll in something because they thought it was part of their personal growth. They actually were committed to
trying to be better people. So it's really easy to turn it into sort of something to kind of poke fun at. But it's not and that salacious TV series. That's real people and real feelings. And in many ways, when we watch shows like this and let ourselves sort of be carried away by the salacious part, we run that risk of dehumanizing survivors of these stories, which then runs a risk of society at large dehumanizing the story
of survivors. And what's actually really really unsettling is that the arm of Nexium that was responsible at that time for branding these women, for bringing women in in this really coercive, unhealthy way called DOSS, that sub organization of nexium DOSS that still exists. So these toxic groups, toxic patterns, they all die hard. But I really do wish Mark
the best in all of his ventures. He has become sort of a one man narcissism wrecking machine, and I'm just really honored to join him on parts of this journey and watch him flourish in this space. We will be right back with this recap session now. I just want to offer some briefer updates on other guests that we had on navigating narcissism. Vanessa Riser, who famously ran two d and eight five miles in her wedding dress once before to spread awareness about narcissistic abuse, was back
at it again. Remember Vanessa is also a therapist and she really works not only with her individual clients, but has a public voice speaking out about narcissistic abuse. And she did another run in her wedding dress in the state of New Jersey. She did it back in September into October two and she ran from Trenton to Atlantic Highlands.
The money she raised. Because this was also a virtual run, there were people participating from all over the country, running as it were the same lengths and distances or in the same on the same days as Vanessa. As part of this of this fight against not only narcissistic abuse and recognizing these patterns relationships, but also raising awareness about domestic abuse and how narcissistic abuse and domestic abuse are
very closely allied situations. The money that was raised by her run is going to her nonprofit fit organization, tell a Therapist dot com. And the nice thing about her organization is that it provides a listing of therapists who know how to work with clients experiencing narcissistic abuse and has lists of referrals for folks all over the country.
I just think it's fantastic and as a real clincher, Vanessa also has a book deal where she'll be talking more about her knowledge and wisdom about narcissistic abuse and
parts of her own story. So congrats, Vanessa. It's been a pleasure to be in touch with you, to watch all you're doing in this area and in a very innovative and very evocative way, taking that wedding dress and instead of it being a symbol of oh my goodness, I might be getting stuck in something reminding us that we can find our voices and we can also set those boundaries and allow ourselves to thrive. So thank you, Vanessa,
and let's we visit the story of Rebecca Humphries. Rebecca Humphries is an actress and a writer based in the UK. Rebecca had one of those interesting experiences which was sort of the ultimate turning off of the gaslight, after being gaslighted for years about her concerns and her suspicions in a relationship and being told repeatedly how psychotic and she was and what's wrong with her, and slowly but surely making herself smaller and smaller to survive in the relationship.
Her story played out publicly when her suspicions were confirmed because a photograph of her partner kissing the woman that Rebecca suspected that he was having an inappropriate relationship with ended up on the cover of all of the newspapers in the UK. So it was a moment when everything she knew to be true was true, and armed with that new clarity and the strength, she really did find her voice. And rebecca story, in a very big way shows us how people flourish when they get rid of
the voices that are invalidating them and silencing them. So her career flourished, and she not only went on to a role in season four of The Crown Check her Out, she also has a hit acclaim play in London, and most importantly to me, her book is called Why Did You Stay? A memoir about self worth. It was a book where you find yourself on any given page crying because you're both laughing and sad. You feel like you're sitting with your best girlfriend just kicking it and laughing
and crying about what they went through. I can't think of a person out there who's been in a narcissistic relationship who won't see pieces of themselves in rebecca story. It is witty. I hope to goodness it gets turned
into a film because it's just really that good. But Rebecca has now not only flourishing as a creative, as a writer, as a performer, She's even spoken, as she said in front of the House of Comments, and there's no doubt that Rebecca's voice in the space is going to continue to proliferate and teach us that abuse in relationships goes beyond physical abuse, and that she is now again has worked with people at policy levels in highlighting
the insidious effect of gas lighting. So Rebecca is doing great, and stay tuned because I have a feeling we're going to see more and more of her. And when you do see her performing, you'll really see this light that came out and you feel this tremendous pride because you know what it came from and where she came from and all of that. And so I find her story inspiring and just watching her kill it ever since she
she got out of that toxic relationship. So those are the stories where we do know what has happened, and as we can see more than anything else, these are people who are not only healing themselves, but you'll notice another thing. Almost all of them have gone on to create amazing thing books, podcasts, work within the realm of policy. What we see amongst survivors is inevitably they simply want to pay it forward, and that is the work and
that is the growth. A reminder that these relationships do not steal our empathy, they do not steal our compassion. But for the first time, we sometimes allow that empathy and compassion not only do a U turn and we take a little of it in for ourselves. Survivors will continue to care about the people they left behind, even when they were hurt about them, and above all, they remain focused on paying it forward to people who are
continuing to endure these experiences. So I think it's a wake up call for all of us who have been through narcissistic relationships or are supporting people in narcissistic relationships that there is not only life after these relationships. It's a life with wings. It's a life where people thrive and grow and finally get to realize the potential that
they often silenced while they were in these relationships. We will continue to keep having these conversations with survivors of all kinds, with stories of all kinds, to remind all of us that even though the world feels like a toxic place, the survivors are the ones who keep the lights on. Thanks again, a big thank you to our executive producers Jada Pinkett Smith, Valen Jethro, Ellen Rakaton, 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 Donnaghee and Calvin Bailiff,