February 25, 2020 • 59 mins
Today Laura invites you into her private book club and introduces her favorite new authors, victim’s rights attorney Carrie Goldbert who wrote “Nobody’s Victim: Fighting Psychos, Stalkers, Pervs and Trolls” and recently-divorced co-parents Benjamin Heldfond and Nikki DeBartolo, authors of “Our Happy Divorce."
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hi there, It's me Laura Wasser, the divorce attorney and
the founder of It's over Easy, the online divorce service.
I've been practicing family law for over twenty years and
I've worked on thousands of divorces, shepherding people through what
may be one of the most terrifying times in their lives.
(00:20):
Along the way, I often have to remind people to
lower their expectations when dealing with matters of the heart.
Rules simply don't apply. Because all's fair in love and war.
So welcome to the All's Fair Podcasts. Fasten your seatbelts,
and let's go. All's fair in Love and War is
a sixteenth century proverb attributed to John Lilly, English writer, poet, dramatist,
(00:45):
and courtier, best known during his lifetime for his books
You Fuies The Anatomy of Wit. We named this podcast
All's Fair to explore all matters of the heart and
the body because we believe that today's modern families and
the evolution of roman antic and sexual relationships are right
for interesting discussions. They also make good reading, and I
(01:05):
love to read. I am a voracious reader. So next
to hosting this podcast, reading books with my book Club
is one of my top five most favorite activities today.
My gift to you is a mash up of both.
Consider this an invitation to my book club and joining
the club today is my first guest, who wrote the
first book we're going to discuss, called Nobody's Victim, which
Esquire magazine called one of the best books of last summer.
(01:28):
It's a shocker of a page turner, equal parts memoir,
true crime, and manifesto. This must read for anybody with
an Internet connection, written by a Brooklyn based victims rights
attorney whose law firm specializes in representing victims of and
I like this psychos, stalkers, purvs, and trolls. Welcome to
All's Fair, Carrie Goldberg, Thank you. I'm so happy to
(01:49):
be here. So tell us a little bit. I mean,
I've read the book Nobody's Victim, But tell us how
you got started in this. You had your own kind
of horrific experience. Correct, Oh, oh my god. It was
not a voluntary education into this line of work. I've
been a lawyer for about six years, but working with
(02:11):
like elderly people who were being exploited and who needed
guardianships or in California's conservatorships, and I was recently divorced
and dating for the first time in a decade in
New York City. And like so many of my client stories,
mine started with, you know, meeting somebody on the internet
(02:32):
through a dating app, and we had this kind of
whirlwind relationship. And after about six weeks or so, it
became like really really controlling and scary, and he was
really jealous. And when we broke up or months and
(02:52):
he told me that he was going to spend the
rest of his life destroying mine. And he proceeded to
send me text messages saying that there was no hole
deep enough that I could dig to escape him. He
sent emails and Facebook messages to my friends, my family,
my co workers, saying that I was a whore, that
(03:14):
I had STDs, that I was pregnant, none of which
was true. And he also started finding false police reports
about me. But one of the things that was kind
of the most pernicious was that he would send me
emails with pictures that I had consensually sent him in
videos um sexual ones, and then tell me that he
(03:37):
had blind copied judges and attorneys that I was up
against in my professional life. I mean, I was I
was horrified. I was humiliated. I was scared for my life.
He was making physical threats to me as well. He
had tried to break into my apartment. It was I
had lived a very normal life and I'd never been
(03:58):
fearful of my own safety, and my entire life was
just was turned upside down. I I moved, I was
arrested because of these like completely bogus charges, And when
I tried to get restraining order against him, the judge
told me that he had a First Amendment right to
(04:19):
be expressing himself this way, and I was like, what,
what the fun? Okay? I was I was like, what
the fuck? Like, it's his right to free speech to
express himself like through pictures of my genitals and sending
those around. Because I wanted a restraining order that not
only protected me from him physically, but also would stop
(04:42):
him from harassing my friends and family, spreading these lies
on the internet and distributing these these pictures. So the
judge said no, like he couldn't stop him from expressing
himself this way. And when I did a little research,
I realized that there were no no law is protecting me.
Like at the time, there were only like three states
(05:03):
that had criminal what we now call revenge porn laws.
What would tell me what that is? What are revenge
porn laws? Give me an example, so it's they're basically
laws that criminalize the non consensual distribution of sexually graphic
pictures and images. So, just as my ex had done
to me, a lot of my clients received threats from
(05:26):
from their exes that they're gonna send their their naked
pictures to everybody in their life if they don't do
X y Z, if they don't come back to them,
if they don't have sex with them, or sometimes they
actually you know, make good on those threats and post
them on the internet. There used to be a lot
of revenge porn sites, but still just general social media
sites like Facebook and Twitter and Instagram. Offenders will sometimes
(05:51):
you know, post these the most intimate images of of
a person, pictures that they received consensually but are distributing
non consensual. And over the last like four years or so,
we went from having three states with these laws to
having forty six and New York just became the forty
six state. And by the time we got a law
(06:12):
passed in New York, California was already on its third
version of it. But at the time I was going
through this, like I didn't know anything about this universe.
I couldn't find a lawyer who kind of was at
that intersection of intimate partner violence and internet law and
first Amendet law and criminal law. So when I finally
(06:34):
got through my ordeal, which took six months before I
got my final order of protection, I got the charges
against me dropped. He played guilty, and I basically just,
you know, decided that I was going to stop everything
in my life and try to start a law firm
and become the lawyer that I needed. And so that's
(06:57):
sort of a summary of how I got into this.
And so I started a law firm and it was
just me for a couple of years, and you can
probably relate to this just the the roller coaster ride
of starting a law firm and building a law firm
is is pretty intense, and and that never eases up.
(07:19):
It turned out that there were a lot of other
people that also needed this kind of help, and within
just five years we've grown to thirteen employees female. We
just hired our our second man, and but yeah, ninetent
(07:39):
female clients, female staff, but just so it's clear to
our listeners this happens to guys too, correct, I mean
this is not only a kind of female victim situation.
Oh absolutely. And the revenge point that we talked about happens,
you know, across all cultures, genders, gender identities, financial brackets, religions, races.
(08:06):
It's we've seen everybody, you know, from thirteen year olds
to seventy two year olds that have become victims. But
also my my firm is is more expansive than that,
where we're dealing with people who've you been horrifically stalked,
not just with naked pictures, but in one of our
most high profile cases, our our client Matthew, he was impersonated.
(08:28):
This is the grinder case on grinder case. Okay, tell
us about that one. Okay, get ready, Okay, So our clients,
like in late a man visited my office. His name
is Matthew, thirty three years old. He was a waiter,
slash model, slash former reality star, really you know, handsome,
(08:51):
built man and he was at his just wits end
because he'd broken up with somebody and after a year
and a half relationship, and that man he'd broken up
with his ex boyfriend decided that he, like my ex boyfriend,
was going to spend the rest of his life destroying Matthews.
And he created fake profiles on Grinder, the gay dating app,
(09:17):
and would direct strangers to Matthew's dogs at a restaurant
and to his home. And this was in person. So
a lot of people talk about, you know, cyberstalking and
stuff as if it's like a computer crime. These are
not computer crimes. He's happened to real people in real life.
And in this case, Matthew was visited by strangers who
(09:38):
thought he wanted to have sex with them over twelve
times over a several month period. As many as twenty
three people would come in person a day, you know,
knock on his door or follow him into the bathroom
at the restaurant where he worked, thinking that he had
set up the date. And sometimes his boyfriend would say
(10:01):
that it would direct message with the strangers and say, oh,
you know, I've got this rape fantasy. So even if
I tell you to go, god like, don't It was
like a sort of a life and death situation, right,
not sort of, it actually was, because sometimes the X
would say that Matthew had crystal meth to share, or
or he would say super like racist or homophobic things
(10:27):
to incite violence so that when these guys came to
his home they would be all ready to beat him up.
There were a couple of incidents where he and his
roommate were attacked. They had to call the police over
and over again. It was like there was nothing about
his life that was normal. It was completely overrun by
these constant visitors, and he didn't know who would come next.
(10:49):
He didn't know if the next person would have a
gun or would actually you know, force their way into
his home to to to rape him. I mean so
rather than just going after the X though, you guys
and after Grinder correct, well, first he did everything in
his power to go after the X. He got a
restraining order, he reported it to the police ten times.
(11:11):
The guy would just keep violating their restraining order, and
our prosecutors were doing nothing to help. And so when
he finally came to us, all of this had already happened,
and he was like, what else is there to do?
I just I feel like I just want to kill myself.
And at the time, I had worked with a lot
(11:31):
of tech companies helping to get revenge porn bands on
on their platform. So I was like in this like
super like cocky arrogant mode where I was like, oh,
I'll just call this general council. I got this. I
am You're like night in shining armor, no problem. And
so I tried to do that and they ignored me.
(11:54):
I wrote them letters. They ignored that, and so then
I was like, Okay, Matthew, we're in this together. Because
a gland close fatal attraction. I will not be ignored.
I will not be ignored. It so true. And so
I was like, what if we got a restraining order
against Grinder and you know, got a judge to say
that this this guy could not use their platform, and
(12:17):
you know usually you get restraining orders against people, but whatever,
we'll try it and goond behold the judge grunted us
this this order that required that Grinder discontinued this guy
from using their platform. And that was amazing to us.
And we served it on Grinder and they ignored it
and more men kept coming. And what was their reasoning,
(12:38):
if you know, for ignoring it? Because we know other
dating websites and other apps that have very willingly blocked
people that have caused problems in the past, Um explained,
I mean, even what's that one, sugar daddies, If you
actually are really like a hooker, that you can't be
on it, right, So what was their reasoning? They just
had so much great, you know business from this guy
(13:00):
or what? Yeah, well, I mean obviously they you know,
like ultimately is a good customer was a customer. I mean,
these free dating apps, what are they actually? They're they're
advertising companies there, you know, like every time somebody uses
their u they're they're like looking at the advertising and
it's more revenue for the company. So this guy was
an amazing customer, but I don't think that was really
(13:22):
what was causing them to ignore it. When we finally
got them to show up in federal court, Grinders lawyers
said that they didn't have to respond to Matthew because
they were protected by this federal law that went into
effect called the Communications Decency Act, which basically says that
tech companies cannot be held liable for the content their
(13:48):
users contribute. And we were like, no, Grinder, listen, you
saw our complaint. We were really really careful. We knew
about this law. We did not sue you for any
of the content, you know, provided by the ex boyfriend.
We didn't sue you for defamation or or for obscenity
(14:08):
or anything related to the words that this guy used.
We're suing you, you know, for being negligent and for
not enforcing your own terms of service. That's say that
you will exclude a user. And Grinder said, well, not
only are we protected by this this federal law that
immunizes all tech companies for their users content, but we
(14:29):
also don't have the technical ability to exclude a user.
And I was like, righte, my cocost sol and I
are like, who woa, who wo? You have a dating app.
The main feature you've patented this feature where you actually
can gel locate where people live. I mean, that's ultra hazardous.
(14:50):
And it's an absolute arithmetic certainty that if you have
a dating app with geolocating technology, it will sometimes be
abused by stoppers, by predators, by child molusters. And if
you've not designed into your product a way to exclude
abuse of users, then you've released into the stream of
commerce a dangerous product. And so we ran back to
(15:11):
my office and we amended the complaint and we made
this into a product liability case, and it was a
rather novel approach, and the judge told us we were
full of ship and dismissed the entire case, and we
appealed it to the Second Circuit and they told us
we were also full of ship, and we ultimately petitioned
to the Supreme Court of the US because this was
(15:33):
a pretty novel case and for the Court to dismiss it,
I mean, we're getting I don't want to get too
far into the weeds, but the Supreme Court has never
ruled on this particular law, which basically is what protects
all of our tech companies and it's why they've all
grown into these behemoths that they have, because we individuals
don't have the right to hold them liable, and therefore
(15:56):
they don't have any of the market forces on them
to have to allops like safe products you know that
that actually like take care of their users. But the
Supreme Court ultimately two weeks ago told us that they
weren't going to be reviewing the case, and so we're
now in a deadlock. We're the issue is now coming
up in Congress and we're testifying there. But the Grinder case, Okay,
(16:21):
I like, I like the grinder case. I like that
you're doing this. Let's back up a little bit because
I want to talk for a moment about your book.
I know we talked about your situation and it's not
hard for me to believe, but I don't know that
the listeners will really understand beyond you and Matthew, how
unbelievably common this is to happen to people, in terms
(16:41):
of anybody who's online for any period of time or anything.
Tell us about why you decided to write the book
and a little bit what it's about, because it's in
this day and age when people are so nuts, Like
I mean, I couldn't help thinking to myself, well, what
did you dated this guy for six weeks? What did
you do that set off such a re action in
the psycho? Or would that have happened to anybody that
(17:03):
he dated because he is just so mentally ill? Yeah,
it definitely wasn't because I was so amazing. It was
because it's a character trait that we see over and
over and over again, which is, Laura, exactly why I
wrote my book, because you know, at this point, we've
seen hundreds of different victims of predators, and all of
(17:24):
our clients. I mean, the two things that all of
our clients have in common is that they either are
currently under attack or they've been attacked. And there's almost
always a component of of violence or sexual violence or
gender gender based violence in these cases. And but we
realized in my office that we were seeing the same
patterns over and over and over again, as if there
(17:46):
was a playbook. And so part of the reason I
wanted to write the book was to taxonomyize the kinds
of offenders that we kept seeing, and we ultimately categorize
them into four different groups uh psychos as, holes, pervs,
and trolls. And the book has it takes, you know,
some of our our cases to kind of show tell
(18:09):
the story of the quintessential cases in those categories. But also,
I mean, I want to be able to demystify for
people what these types of attacks look like, so that
if they or their friend is ever on the wrong
side of one of these assholes, that you know that
they'll know what to expect. They'll be able to see
(18:31):
the patterns, because if you're being stalked or harassed, it's
like you're always waiting for the next shoe to drop,
and it's a constant stay of anxiety. You don't know,
you know, like a lot of these people are a
very creative. You know. I've had clients who, you know,
(18:51):
they're impersonated and their their ex boyfriends sends bomb threats
to Jewish community centers all over the place, or impersonates
them and sends child pornography in their names, or or
somehow hacks into the the dog walking app where they're
you know, making part time money and you know, tells
(19:12):
one of their clients that they just killed the cat.
You know, there's like but horrible, but a stream of obsessiveness. Yeah, often,
I mean one of the other things that I think
people naturally think. My dad when I was growing up,
basically had two pieces of advice that he like hammered
into me from my entire childhood life. One was don't
pack it if you can't carry it, meaning like, don't
(19:34):
I'm not carrying your luggage for you. And the other
is more importantly, don't let anyone take naked pictures of you.
No naked pictures. So like, even in my longest term,
you know, six year relationship, no naked pictures. But even
if I'm sitting here thinking this, when you're talking about
revenge on they'll just take a picture, a naked picture
of someone else and say it's you. I mean, there's
no way around this kind of a sick fuck mine. Correct. Yeah.
(19:59):
And it's not enough to say don't take naked pictures
because I mean there's nothing at this in this day
and age where our phones are, you know, with not
just within alum's reach, but like usually in our hands.
It's like, that's not really like it's it's not perverse
behavior to to express yourself that way. But the thing
is that even if you've not like I have clients
(20:20):
who yeah, who as you said, are like their head
is photoshopped onto a porn star's body or deep face
is now a thing where people are using machine learning
and artificial intelligence to get a computer to learn your
face so that it can even more persuasively look like
like that porn is real. Um. And we've also had,
(20:41):
you know, really sad cases where clients were photoed without
their consent or knowledge, as well as sexually assaulted and
photographed or videoed without their consent knowledge, and those went virals.
So the problem is more widespread than than just the
the act of taking taking the picture right, you said
(21:03):
you were going to break it down and demystify it.
So I want the folks listening to really kind of
because you are, without question, the expert on this and it's,
I think, for better or worse, something that you don't
think about until it's happening to you. So yeah, So
I want to tell you about the four categories of
offenders that we see over and over again at my firm, Psychos, Assholes, pervs,
(21:25):
con Trolls. So, starting with the psycho, that is the
situation where an offender, usually it's an X, has just
given up everything in their life to destroy their targets.
And usually these people don't have jobs, they don't have
meaningful relationships with family members, they don't really have anything
(21:49):
that's anchoring them to society, and so they don't necessarily
feel like they have anything to lose. They're not worried
about breaking the law. They're so kind of far gone
and ill with their obsession and their need to kind
of balance the scales and punish the victim for whatever
they've done, which usually is just breaking up with them,
(22:12):
that they just become help and and obsessive with destroying
the other person's life and So examples of that are
like what I described with with Matthew's case, where his
offender after their relationship ended, was just like, Okay, well
you've left me. I'm now I've now got nothing, and
I'm going to just spend hours a day creating these
(22:35):
fake profiles on Grinder and sending people to your home
to hopefully rape you. And that takes dedication, it takes focus,
it takes tenacity, commitment. These are takes commitment. And this
was over a six month period of time, and he
knew it was illegal, he had restraining orders against him,
and it just didn't matter. And so these are the
(22:58):
The psyco was somebody who just has lost all perspective.
And how is that different from an asshole? So the
asshole is perspective they have. They're all the same, clearly, right,
they have some perspective and they're not going to this.
They're not. They're just on the other end of the spectrum.
(23:18):
They're more moderate, so they'll do something, they'll do a
horrible act of revenge, porn or you know, sometimes in
some of our cases we have schools that are assholes
where they get a report that you know, one of
our clients was sexually assaulted and they behave unethically and
and you know, accuse our client of of consensually having
(23:42):
sex at school something like that. These are the Title
nine violations. These are the yeah, like you know client,
so so sometimes administrations are assholes, but basically it's when
there's an act that's kind of singular and a bad
act that's sink or that that's our asshole. And then
pervs pers there. Pervs clearly perhaps yeah, perps or purse
(24:06):
pervs are they're the ones who are doing sex stortion.
Usually there's there's some sort of offline sexual motivation, gratification,
power and balance. They are the Harvey Weinstein's the sex predators.
We have a lot of cases that do involve computers
where offenders will impersonate a kid and then seduce a kid.
(24:32):
You know, maybe they meet like playing online games or
in a chat room and the trust of the of
the target over a period of time and then ultimately
get them to share naked image and and then blackmail
them with the image and you know, you appliance in
these cases are sometimes like thirteen, fourteen, fifteen years old
(24:54):
and they're being blackmailed by an adult who basically uses
the threat of distributing the single image to coerce them
into sharing more and more and more images, and they
get progressively more graphic and the demands are raised. And
(25:15):
that's different from a troll. How it's much sicker than
our typical troll. That's sex dortion. It's it's such an
incredibly gruesome situation where you're making a kid become like
a sex life. So moving over to troll, that's somebody
who's usually also acting anonymously, usually through the the Internet
(25:37):
and sometimes in mobs. So usually it's in more of
a public platform like on Twitter, where suddenly there's just
a mob of people going after somebody, usually for ideological reasons.
You've said something that the far right hates, You've said
something horrible about Trump, You've say like Kathy Griffin, you know,
with her bloody head, with it with the head. You know,
(26:00):
she then was was the target of of all you know, trolls.
They were doc in her, they were you know, threatening her,
all anonymously. And the issue with trolls is that because
they're anonymous, and because they they act in in mobs,
it's really really difficult to get any action against them,
because you can't really go to law enforcers and say, hey,
(26:23):
there are a thousand anonymous people that are threatening to
behead me and say they know where I live. You know,
Can you get the social media channels though to do anything. Well,
that's exactly what the best solution is, because I mean,
law enforcements gonna be like, listen, we don't want to
(26:43):
be investigating people that might be on the other side
of the world. And even if we get you know,
criminal charges against one person who's threatening to kill you,
what about the other So really the platforms are the
best place and the only place really to get action.
But in as we talked about with the ground your case,
there's absolutely no liability if the platforms don't help. You're
(27:08):
going to change that. I have a feeling you're going
to change that, I hope. So at least, you know,
at least, there needs to be injunctive relief where people
should be able to say, listen, these people are destroying
my life. They're sending my naked pictures, they're threatening my kids,
my family, and they're showing up at my doorstep. At
the very least, I need you to say that they
(27:31):
can't use your your platform anyway to do this because
these platforms are monetizing every single user. Well, and that's
what What's one of the great things about your book
is that it really is like Laura always says, knowledge
is power. You're arming people with knowledge so that they
know what they can do to avoid the situation and
bringing something that I think, like I said, as with divorce,
(27:52):
until it's happening to you, you probably don't think about
it very often. And what I loved about what you
said earlier carry is you became m the lawyer that
you needed when this happened to you. And that's awesome,
it really is. And I do think that you will
change the way people approach this. I know things are
going on in Congress right now. I we wish you
the best of luck in getting this done and tell
(28:14):
our listeners, in addition to purchasing Nobody's Victim, how they
can reach you. Please find me on Twitter see and
Goldberg Law, and my website is CIA Goldberg Law dot com.
Got it all right? Thank you so much for joining
us today. I'm gonna look you up next time I'm
in Brooklyn and keep up the great, great work. Thank you.
(28:36):
It's I'm so excited to be here. I'm Laura Waser
and this is the All's Fair Podcast. On today's show,
we're flipping through the pages of some of my favorite
reads this month, including Nobody's Victim, the part memoir, part
true crime, part manifesto written by victims rights attorney Carrie Goldberg.
I also want to recommend have you seen Luis Vellez
(28:58):
by Catherine ryan Hyde, The Dutch House by Ann Patchett,
The Dream Daughter by Diane Chamberlain, and Jitterbug Perfume, one
of my oldest, longest favorites by Tom Robbins. And my
next guests have written an aspirational and inspirational piece of
nonfiction that is very close to my heart called Our
Happy Divorce, which is a true life embodiment of what
(29:18):
we talk about when we refer to the evolution of dissolution.
Is my sincere hope that listeners considering a divorce, if
you have kids or not, you'll take a page from
this book literally and figuratively, absorb and practice a new
and better approach to divorce. So, without much further ado,
allow me to introduce you to my guest Nikki Di
Bartolo and Benjamin hell Fun. Welcome guys, we are very
(29:42):
psyched to have you here. On All's fair. Your book
is pretty much what I practice in my family law
practice in creating it's over easy, trying to educate and
then allow people to emulate couples like you who have
gone through a divorce but chosen to remain a family,
(30:02):
chosen to know amicably co parent, and chosen to remain
friends and partners in other things, even if you're not
going to bed together every night. So yeah, thank God
for that exactly, which again makes you appreciate the other
stuff too. It really wasn't that exciting to begin with.
Here we go. So you guys are based in Tampa
(30:25):
and you flew to l A to do press to
promote the book. So you've just come from kt l A.
We did awesome. How is that painless? They were easy
on us? So good? Okay, Well get ready, So NICKI
tell us a little bit about you. Well, I am
divorce from Ben, as you know, I am remarried to
(30:45):
the sheriff of our town, which is a really interesting thing.
We went from night and day here the outlaw. Okay,
I only have one child, Asher, who is my child
with Ben, sixteen years old and the most wonderful child.
But yeah, it's me in a nutshell cool and actually,
just so that you guys know, Asher wrote an article
(31:08):
for the It's Over Easy blog. It will be posting
right around the time that we are um going to
be dropping this episode of All's Fair and it has
a child's perspective of parents going through divorce in a
much much better way. But still what he's what he
went through? Ben, tell us about you? Uh, well, I
am relatively decent human being. I was born and raised
(31:31):
in San Francisco, and I moved out to Tampa with
Nikki Um and her family. Um, and it didn't work out.
We got divorced. Um. I am remarried to my wife, Nadia.
We have two other kids, and so Asher sort of
has the best of both worlds here. He can be
at my house and have brothers and sisters and it's
Mayhem and then you can go for the little r
(31:52):
and art Nikki's where he's the only child. Um. We
live five houses down from each other. UM, so Asher
has the freedom we the streets names Longfellow. We call
him the Longfellow creeper because he walks between houses and
fishes the docks and at night and all of a sudden,
I'll be watching TV and he'll just pop in at
eleven o'clock at night, and that's and that's good, like that,
(32:14):
like that. So you went to cal that's my alma mater,
and you had Do you have a degree in African
American history? What made you decide to pursue that, because
we're fascinating. Yes, well it's it was a history major.
And it was one of those things where when I
got to school, I was majoring in classes that started
after twelve pm, right, and so instead of the class,
(32:36):
I look at what time it started. Um. And eventually,
by my junior year, the councilor, my councilor said it's
time to declare major. And so I looked at all
of the classes and what was the clearest path to
uh to graduation. Eight years later, I graduated with a
degree in African American history. So I had some time
(32:56):
off for bad behavior, uh and and and get myself
so overre but besides that, yeah, so I graduated with that,
and I'm really happy that I did. It help It's
helped me in business, it's helping histories, and it helped me,
you know, actually in the divorce because history has a
tendency to repeat itself and if nothing changes, nothing changes.
And he learned from it, and I learned from it.
I think that was being sober that helps you in
(33:17):
our well yeah, but but but you know, my parents
divorce was not a happy divorce, and it was the
war the roses, and and that we were used as blocking,
blocking and tackling tools and and so on so forth.
So when it came time from my own divorce, it
took a while to get there, but I realized what
I didn't want to do, and I didn't want to
repeat history, right, I mean, it's so interesting why, as
(33:39):
you guys know, I love the study of human nature,
which is why I do what I do for a
living and why I do this podcast. And I see
people who's either parents have gone through miserable divorces saying,
I just I'm not going to repeat that. I'm not
going to do what they did to me. I'm not
going to repeat those mistakes or making exactly the same things.
Like they say the chill don't of abusers or either
(34:01):
abuse their kids or be hyper aware of anything that
could be abusive or perceived that way. So you took
a different path, which is amazing, and I love that
you were conscious enough to realize that that was going on.
I wish I could say that it was from the beginning,
because it wasn't. You know, at the end of you
guys have to I was ready to put my boxing
(34:22):
gloves on. Yeah, I mean we had the boxing gloves on, literally, uh.
And I had hired a lawyer to look at the
pre nup and he came up with an action plan.
I looked at it as how to destroy Nikki and
how to make this thing messy and how to bring
it into the public arena because of our family, and um,
I was just so blinded. And I think that happens
(34:43):
a lot. At least it happened for me, and it
will also help me look at my parents that they
didn't intentionally do it. But I think we get so
blinded by these negative resentment, fear, anger that we don't
really see the consequences of those behaviors. And I was
headed down that route. And it wasn't until I started
reading this thing and I got two were three pages
into this action plan, and that's when my parents hit me.
(35:04):
And that's when that's when everything turned uh it. It
took I mean it took some time. I had to
go and actually take uh um an inventory myself and
take I called Nikki after that plane, right, I said,
I just need some time to work on myself and
to find um, I've been blessed enough to to be sober,
(35:25):
clean and sober. I think it was probably fifteen years
at the time. Sixteen years and so I had a
foundation of what to do. And I knew that in
every relationship where I have a resentment, I have a pardon.
And so I called Nikki and I said, I need
some time. I need to take a step back. I
need to start getting back to basics. And one of
those basics was taking an inventory. So I took an inventory.
(35:46):
And it wasn't when I worked with this guy. It
wasn't any time I started talking about Nikki, be goes, No,
this isn't what this is about. This is about you
and your behavior. Um and anyways, make a long story,
stort too late, but I ready too. I read the
part of its reading the invatory to them, and as
I was reading in it, as I got done, I
realized that, you know what, I wouldn't want to be
(36:07):
married to me either I was a miserable person, and
so that the turning point was then I called nick
and I asked her to coffee, and I at first
told her that I loved her and that I was
sorry for my part and in the relationship, and then
she in turned apologized to me, and which we've never
(36:27):
the first time and the last time so very special.
But but so the foundation of what we did was,
you know, and Nikki had um done some works. She
had been through therapy too at that time, and so,
you know, I think the turning points when we both
realized we had an equal part in ending the relationship
(36:48):
and that we need to put the pass behind us
and forgive each other and forgive not only I forgave Nikki,
but I forgive myself, because there's a there's a shame
went in any marriage. And Nikki, you know, you talked
about that a lot. I talked about that a lot
because my parents have been married for fifty two years. Right.
That's another thing when people come and they their parents
are still married, so you don't have really any experience
(37:09):
with divorce, and you are afraid you're letting them down,
and why couldn't you do what they've done, taking complete
no consideration of whether they actually are happy, not happy whatever.
So did your did you lawyer up? Right from the beginning,
I had friends that were lawyers, which kind of helped
guide me. And I mean I kind of knew the
direction he was going because hearsay told me the direction
(37:33):
he was going, right, So I was going to be
ready for this, I mean, and you know, my dad's
one of those people that wants to try to fix everything,
wants to try to make everything better. So and being
the youngest of three girls, he was and still is
most protective over me, I can say that, right, So,
(37:55):
I mean he was going to do everything in his
power to help me, like make sure I got through this, okay, right,
whatever that meant, whatever that meant, well, even killing that
was on the table, I'm sure. But but they're where,
let's go to Las Vegas or something, And this is
I think so difficult and you can tell if I'm wrong.
But they're both fixers, Nikki. You know, immediate reaction to
(38:17):
anything is to fix it, and your dad's the same way.
And so when the marriage, you know, I had made
the decision to end the marriage, her immediate response was,
let's fix it like, what can we do to make
this better? But in the back of my head, I
was like, there's no way I really want to be
married to no offense, but there's But as a young woman,
(38:43):
I was more so petrified and also when you realized,
but I was petrified too, you know, break up my
marriage and do that to my child. But at the
same time be a single mom. Even though I was
I knew somehow I was capable of doing it, but
I was still petrified. And I think that's every girls,
like I think every girl gets afraid of guys too,
(39:06):
Which are can I do this? Will I be able
to see my kids? You know? How is this going
to work? Who's going to take care of me? You
know they say men are much more likely to remarry
sooner or thereafter than women. So I think the fear
and the transition period are the things that and the shame,
as you said, keep us away from it. So so
when he came to and said I'm sorry, you must
(39:26):
have been taken aback for a moment at that point,
did you in either one of you when you said, well,
this is this is a side of him slash her
I haven't seen before. Did you think then like maybe
we should get back together or was it I'm sorry
I was that way, but let's take a different path
towards our divorce. This wasn't a reconciliation. This was let's
be friends and do it a different way. Yes, yes,
(39:46):
it was like, let's let's take a look at what
we've been doing and let's figure out how we can
get to a better point of us. I mean we started.
It was the same thing that all couples, that a
lot of couples go through, where you're dropping the child off,
where don't look at each other, you don't talk to
each other. So we're like, we can't continue to do this. Okay.
So I think that's really important to hear those listeners
(40:07):
because I think sometimes we present these things as a
fatal complete No, it wasn't always this good. They weren't
sitting there writing our happy divorce and flying around the
new stations at the beginning. No, this is this takes
a little bit of time. But I do say to
people when they're in my office and when I'm speaking,
you know, two large groups that are going through this.
(40:28):
You will be in a different place a year from
now whatever that different places, But it better be a
different place. You cannot still be in this anger, fear, whatever,
you have to have moved on, and generally you will
be able to make eye contact curbside or even walk
up to the door, or even come in and have
a coffee or whatever it is. Because one interesting thing,
(40:49):
and I'm sure I'm not telling you guys anything you
don't know, is you guys have something in common that
is the most important being in the world to each
of you. And nobody else has that, you know, except
parents maybe a little bit, but nobody else feels that
strongly about asher besides the to you, no childcare provide
or no teacher, nobody right, and you know what we
were doing or what what the plan? You know? The
(41:11):
the the other path that I was going down that
I see so much, and it happened to my parents,
and I see it with everybody is the parents. And
I don't mean to be dramatic, but it is because
I've been in that situation. Is where you're feeding your
kids poison hoping the other one dies, you know, or
lighting yourself on fire hoping the other one dies to
smoke in relation or however you want to put it.
(41:32):
But but the but the the the point of that
you made is so important that this was not you know,
that coffee shop. We cleared up the wreckage. All good,
let's go to Africa together, Let's go on family vacations again. No,
it took years, I mean, and then you throw in
new relationships, new partners, and then you get you know,
(41:55):
the the ego of of another man being around yourself
and ask about that. So, so did everyone go to
Africa last summer or just the three of you? Just
the three of us? Now, how does that know? And
people will ask me because I've traveled with my exes,
but I definitely would have a difficult time, I think
now explaining to my current partner that I was going
to be going on vacation with one of my exes.
(42:17):
So how does that work for your wife and your husband?
So when and this is the thing is are guiding light,
our our principal or north star in this whole thing.
We decided that coffee shop was every decision we're gonna
make is what's best for Ashure. It wasn't what's best
for Nikki, it wasn't what's best for Ben. We didn't
have and I hate to say this, but there's no
(42:38):
social media back when we get divorced. You know, it
was only twelve years ago, but there was no so
they're not the resources that there was. So we sort
of just figured this out ourselves. So we got we
you know, kiss, keep it simple, stupid, what's best for
Ashure and so that included bringing new people into our lives.
Is that they had to my wife, I can almost,
(42:59):
you know, with certainty, and I don't know that sort
of a xmoron, but say that she would not be
in my life if she didn't commit to what we
were trying to do. So when I went to her,
and obviously they weren't fighted. We didn't like, say we're
going to go to but and they said no, we're
going to hang back. You're the sheriff, and your wife
with the two other kids, were like, no, you go
(43:20):
have a good time in Africa. Well it was logistic thing.
So he's the sheriff. Obviously taking two you know, over
two weeks off as a big straight to hell everywhere
the streets would have been crazy. But and my wife,
you know, raising two small kids. Uh, she's going back
into therapy or being a therapist. She's not going back
in the she's gonna need to go back, but she's
(43:43):
married to me, so eventually she'll be on the couch.
But but so she's starting her practice. And so when
I told her, it wasn't oh, hell no, you're not
going to Africa with your ex wife for you f
and out of your mind, it was Asher will love that.
So so they have bought and and I hate to
use the word buying because it sounds so apathetic, but
committed committed that they're committed to it, that they have
(44:07):
put themselves Asher before themselves too, and in front of
their egoes, in front of their like even questioning whether
Nick and I would be frolicking in the bush and
Africa ACA, nothing happened in the bush. So so that
you know they are committed, Uh, they are true. Have
(44:28):
developed into this and and it's one of those things again,
like you said, it developed like you know, it wasn't numbered.
I knew Chad. He was a friend every time I
got pulled over. You no, but he you know, we
knew him when we were married, so you know, and
then you know, he comes into Nikki's life and first,
you know, like I said, in the beginning, it was like, oh,
(44:49):
my god, this guy like he's around my son, he's
he's you know, I just didn't wait for the body
to get cold before he moved in. But analogy, right,
And then so we were we were at Asher's baseball
games and I was coaching. We walk off and Ashwood
run over to chat and give him a hug, and
my insides are tearing each other apart, and I'm like this,
(45:13):
you know, just everything. But I'm literally saying myself, what's
best fresh? And if I look at it through ego
list lens, he's a good guy. Asher loves him. Nikki
and him are definitely in love and meant to be together.
So that's the lens I need to look through. If
I look through the other lens, you know, it's all negative,
it's all whatever. So look, he's a great guy. Nikki
(45:35):
and Nadia we're best friends. We really are. And it's
I mean, it's nice. I mean it took us a
little bit to get there because I had to go
through the mommy thing, where who's this woman that's putting
my son to bed at night? Who's But there's a
there's a good story about as I called him, he
was probably four or five. I called him to say
a night to him. He's in my house and I
had not met Nadia yet. But Asher knew this woman
(45:59):
who has been hanging out at the house hanging out
with him, and so I'm saying good night to him,
and he said, hey, mom, do you know Nadia? And
I said, I know who she is, but I have
not met her yet. He goes, hold on a second,
you need to talk to her, and that was his
way of going, Hey, listen, I need you to be
okay with this. Figure this out. Like it's smart enough
(46:20):
to know this, so it's time for you too to
be friends. As sounds like a rock style. So when
people say to you, and I'm sure they do, well,
if you care so much about your kid, why didn't
you just stay together because that would ruin our kid
even more? They're smart, right, right, They're smart. They know
they realize when there is tension. And I do believe
(46:42):
that kids would rather see a happy parent, even if
that parents alone or with somebody else, than a miserable
parent married to their other parents. And I think that's
really true. Part of my inventory, too, was around me
as a father, and I always thought that I was
this great father, but part of that inventory was I
really wasn't that good of a father. I was just
(47:04):
playing one on TV, you know, and showing up and
putting most responsibility on Nikki and you know whomever was
babysitting them. So at the end of the divorce and
I was living on my own, it sort of forced
me into being a better dad, a better father. I
find that that happens a lot with parents, particularly the guys.
I think that when they when you're all living together
(47:25):
under one roof, mom kind of becomes the care provider,
And if dads are left on their own, they actually
do step up and do the care providing that they
maybe weren't doing when the relationship was in a different format.
What made you guys, all these years later, decided to
write the book? Well, it's taken us what four years
(47:48):
to write this book. Has told him to stick it
up his ass a few times during the process. But
were getting a fight. I mean we argue that all
the time. We argue like brother and sister, not right,
and so she were getting a fight. She said, I'm
not doing your effing book. You can shove it up.
(48:10):
You're aware. So then we wouldn't talk for a while.
And and so you know, doing your all right, collaborating
with your wife to ex wife rather to do a
book is an interesting process. Um. But but we uh
had just been social media came and we would you know,
share story. We put out a Christmas card every year together.
(48:30):
We started doing that about four years ago, um as
our modern family. Um. And so everybody, everybody, I like that.
That's like, that's what my Thanksgiving looks like. Right, and
that's so everything gets a bigger house, you know, and
the advent of social media, so we put it out
there and not to show off anything, but just this
is our life and this is how it looks. This
is what our family looks like to us. Right. And
(48:51):
at the beginning, like the first one that went out,
people were like, excuse me, what is this like some
freaky Yeah, this is just like everybody just test to
get on board. Let me ask you a question, Nikki,
So your your family so high profile? Can you say
who they are? My father used to on the forty niners, right,
so they're pretty well known family and they're also really
(49:13):
conservative or traditionalism a better word, not conservative. So how
did they react to that Christmas card question? Well? I
think that they all took a little, like it took
everybody a little getting used to, because I think people
even like, you know, your mom and dad were sort
of like, what is this? Like? Why why is why
are they still coming over for Thanksgiving? And why are
(49:33):
you trying to have Christmas? Like why are you? Like?
What is this like? If you didn't work meant to
be married, why are you still together? But they've all
sort of I mean, I actually think my parents really
like this guy, so like they're they're happy because they
see the way Asher is like flourishing having this kind
of relationship. Yeah, and in the beginning, it's weird. They
(49:54):
like him way more than they like either one of us.
There was a little new um to to everybody. So
that's how you know, on social media people say like,
you guys have such a great story you have you know,
you need to get this out there. And and like
I talked about in my recovery, I've made the biggest
changes in my life through relatedness and the power of relatedness.
(50:14):
And you know, I went to many people with a
lot of initials behind their name that told me I
had a trouble. I troubled drugs and alcohol. But it
wasn't until I spoke with another alcoholic or another addict
who I knew had been to hell, Um was I
willing to take a look at it. So this is
just our story, right and and and everybody I'm sure
who've gone through the divorce can relate to some of
those feelings, some of that stuff we're going through. So
(50:37):
it's just how we did it, you know, it's just
our story. Um. People do differently, as you know, Laura,
I mean there there's this is just our way of
doing it. And the net result is a happy divorce, right.
And I think that's important for people to keep in mind,
which is this is their story. You have your own story.
Take pieces from this story, use it if it works
for you. If it doesn't, don't use those pieces, take
(50:59):
up their pieces. But I do I think that creating
what our families are going to look like. And again,
we talked about this all the time on this podcast,
having a tribe, having a support group, it takes a village,
that whole idea, and most importantly, more people to love
my kid. It must be nice to know that Nadia
is there if you've got to be somewhere else, because
he's got another person there that loves him. What the
(51:21):
hell could possibly be wrong with that? Nothing? My ego
got over it. I'm like, you know what, this is
a great thing. That the most uh, the moment where
I sort of knew for me that this thing was
working was, um, Chad asked me to coffee one day, um,
And we went to coffee, actually the same coffee shop
(51:43):
where Nicky and I had sort of made amends and
not only at that, but we had worked out our
whole divorce at that coffee shop and then gave it
to the lawyers and said, draw this up. We've come
to this conclusion after you know, six or seven meetings.
But anyways, he asked me to coffee and he said,
you know, first of all, he made him ends for
you know, any illusion that he was you know, moved
(52:03):
in or had any you know, while we were married,
at any sort of you know, feelings towards Nikki, and
it just sort of happened. But then he said, I
want to ask her to marry me, and I watch
your permission, and uh, he said, well, I said what
I said, Are you sure? Because I can tell you
some stories, but not at all. She's an angel. Yeah,
(52:29):
gorgeous right, except she got her hair horns are So
what did he say? So? Were you taken it back? Um? No,
because immediately I thought to myself, this is the guy
I want to him right for having the balls and
(52:50):
the lack of ego to come to you and ask you.
And you didn't know. I didn't know, okay, And so
look if I had said no, he still was going
to do right. But at that point, like this is
the best thing that a guy comes into my ex
wife's life, loves her, going to make her happy. But
more importantly, my son loves him. He's good to my kid,
(53:12):
He's a good man. What basis do I have to
hate this right? Except for ego? Right, and that's the
only thing that could get in the way. So I
I thanked him, uh and instead of course you know,
I think you know, I did say thank you. Um. Now,
how at this point, how long have you guys been divorced?
(53:32):
H I'm going to be married ten years? So four years?
For years? Okay? So you know again, guys, it doesn't
happen immediately. It's an evolution. What happens in each of
your homes? I guess if it has to do with asher,
I mean these are things that I think about. So
if Asher has some kind of a disciplinary issue, something happens,
(53:53):
it's cool or whatever. I can't imagine that would happened
with a sixteen year old fellow. So so, but he
lives in each of your homes. Does that necessitate that
all four adults have to be on the same page?
You guys obviously set the stage. But what happens, For example,
if Nadia says, I got two little kids here, I
can't have vaping. You guys may handle this in a
(54:14):
different way, but I'm not okay with it, Like, how
do you deal with that kind of conflict when it
happens and he's in between your two homes and maybe
you two feel differently about it than your new spouses.
I would say, if it's a big ticket ITEA, yes,
it's usually what we say goes. But I mean, for
the most part, things like things with him growing up,
(54:36):
we all sort of feel the same way, which is
it's been that part of it's been really easy. Yeah.
Co parenting is interesting because we make sure that we
I mean, even if we parent a little differently, we
make sure the rules are basically the same a book,
and that's one thing that, you know, co parenting. Whether
Nicki and I were married or divorced, we were going
(54:58):
to have different views I think on raising our kids
or different right, so the different views doesn't change. And
but the big like Nikki said, I love that big
ticket items we talk because we have a great relationship,
would communicate and we come to a decision, and sometimes
Nicki and Chad are involved in that decision. We've had
(55:18):
family NA do that all the time, I'm sure you know.
And that's the other thing. She's never gotten mad at
me once about it, and I do it all the time.
But um, we we've had meetings, family meetings with Chad, Nadia,
Nikki and me and talking about something maybe happened at
school or whatever, and we come to consensus. But you
(55:39):
guys do it together, yes, and you respect your new
partners spouses. Okay. I think that's important for people to
know that this isn't easy, guys, but it's so much better.
There's no question that this is a better outcome. And
and and just so the difference I can tell you
from when my parents were divorced, they didn't talk right
(55:59):
and being sort of a criminal mind that I was
very early yea. I quickly went from this is the
worst feeling. You know, this is awful, this is terrible,
to this is really good. Right, how does this work
for me? Exactly? So when you know they were I
figured out pretty quickly they weren't parenting for Parent of
the Year. They were parenting from a place of favorite
(56:20):
parent or trying to get the favorite parent. So it's
really hard disciplinary speaking because if you're the one that
says that's letting them stay out later or being on
their device or whatever it is, they want to be
at your house more often. But this is where group
texting comes in very handy. Yes, now we're like, listen,
here's the text message. We're all on it. We all
need to know where you're going, when you're going, and
(56:41):
who you're going with. Now now, yeah, like this is
the way it works. So now more people also to
answer to for your teenagers. Yeah, exactly. All right, Nikki
and Benn, thank you so much for making your time
in your schedule to stop by. All's fair to tell
us about our happy divorce. You guys can get it
where Amazon, Amazon, anywhere books are sold. There's a great
quote from a very powerful woman on the back of
(57:02):
the book too. I did endorse it. I love this book.
I think it's really an important piece of whatever you
might be going through in your separation and leading to
your next chapter. It's called again Our Happy Divorce, how
ending our marriage brought us together? And when you get
back to Florida. Please thank ash Or for the article
that he shares with us on the It's Over Easy
(57:22):
Insit's blog called it Gets Better. Many thanks also to
Carry Goldberg, who joined us earlier. She's the author of
Nobody's Victim, Fighting Psychos, Stalkers, pervs, and Trolls. Both of
them are available on Amazon. Nobody's Victim is also available
on Audible, and Our Happy Divorce is available on Google Books.
Nikki and Ben tell people where they can find you
online and on the radio. As it pertains to you.
(57:44):
Ben everything at Our Happy Divorce Um social media. Uh
I do do a radio show on the weekend. It's
terrestrial radio. It's set thing if you don't know, it's
a thing between in your car with with with the
knobs you know with those knobs that that's a FM
and M It's actually an FM talk formatted station. It's
(58:04):
called the MiGs and Swig Show. I mean he talks
a lot. Did I tell you I see as a
radio show, it makes sense. That's why I like these
much better than those TV things where they give you
four minutes to try to get your message clear. So
it's called the Migsan Swig Show, okay, and it's on
one or two point five or one oh seven point seven,
(58:25):
which is two one or two point five two point
five in Tampa and Tampa com. You will not find
me on a radio station in Tampa. You will find
me at Our Happy Divorce and at Nikki Tuartalo. Okay.
I'm Laura Wasser, attorney and host of the All's Fair podcast.
You know I'm into next chapters and I'd love to
hear what you think I should read next. To leave
(58:45):
a review on iTunes and tell me what you suggest.
Thank you for listening. Let's speak next week.
Hi there, It's me Laura Wasser, the divorce attorney and
the founder of It's over Easy, the online divorce service.
I've been practicing family law for over twenty years and
I've worked on thousands of divorces, shepherding people through what
may be one of the most terrifying times in their lives.
(00:20):
Along the way, I often have to remind people to
lower their expectations when dealing with matters of the heart.
Rules simply don't apply. Because all's fair in love and war.
So welcome to the All's Fair Podcasts. Fasten your seatbelts,
and let's go. All's fair in Love and War is
a sixteenth century proverb attributed to John Lilly, English writer, poet, dramatist,
(00:45):
and courtier, best known during his lifetime for his books
You Fuies The Anatomy of Wit. We named this podcast
All's Fair to explore all matters of the heart and
the body because we believe that today's modern families and
the evolution of roman antic and sexual relationships are right
for interesting discussions. They also make good reading, and I
(01:05):
love to read. I am a voracious reader. So next
to hosting this podcast, reading books with my book Club
is one of my top five most favorite activities today.
My gift to you is a mash up of both.
Consider this an invitation to my book club and joining
the club today is my first guest, who wrote the
first book we're going to discuss, called Nobody's Victim, which
Esquire magazine called one of the best books of last summer.
(01:28):
It's a shocker of a page turner, equal parts memoir,
true crime, and manifesto. This must read for anybody with
an Internet connection, written by a Brooklyn based victims rights
attorney whose law firm specializes in representing victims of and
I like this psychos, stalkers, purvs, and trolls. Welcome to
All's Fair, Carrie Goldberg, Thank you. I'm so happy to
(01:49):
be here. So tell us a little bit. I mean,
I've read the book Nobody's Victim, But tell us how
you got started in this. You had your own kind
of horrific experience. Correct, Oh, oh my god. It was
not a voluntary education into this line of work. I've
been a lawyer for about six years, but working with
(02:11):
like elderly people who were being exploited and who needed
guardianships or in California's conservatorships, and I was recently divorced
and dating for the first time in a decade in
New York City. And like so many of my client stories,
mine started with, you know, meeting somebody on the internet
(02:32):
through a dating app, and we had this kind of
whirlwind relationship. And after about six weeks or so, it
became like really really controlling and scary, and he was
really jealous. And when we broke up or months and
(02:52):
he told me that he was going to spend the
rest of his life destroying mine. And he proceeded to
send me text messages saying that there was no hole
deep enough that I could dig to escape him. He
sent emails and Facebook messages to my friends, my family,
my co workers, saying that I was a whore, that
(03:14):
I had STDs, that I was pregnant, none of which
was true. And he also started finding false police reports
about me. But one of the things that was kind
of the most pernicious was that he would send me
emails with pictures that I had consensually sent him in
videos um sexual ones, and then tell me that he
(03:37):
had blind copied judges and attorneys that I was up
against in my professional life. I mean, I was I
was horrified. I was humiliated. I was scared for my life.
He was making physical threats to me as well. He
had tried to break into my apartment. It was I
had lived a very normal life and I'd never been
(03:58):
fearful of my own safety, and my entire life was
just was turned upside down. I I moved, I was
arrested because of these like completely bogus charges, And when
I tried to get restraining order against him, the judge
told me that he had a First Amendment right to
(04:19):
be expressing himself this way, and I was like, what,
what the fun? Okay? I was I was like, what
the fuck? Like, it's his right to free speech to
express himself like through pictures of my genitals and sending
those around. Because I wanted a restraining order that not
only protected me from him physically, but also would stop
(04:42):
him from harassing my friends and family, spreading these lies
on the internet and distributing these these pictures. So the
judge said no, like he couldn't stop him from expressing
himself this way. And when I did a little research,
I realized that there were no no law is protecting me.
Like at the time, there were only like three states
(05:03):
that had criminal what we now call revenge porn laws.
What would tell me what that is? What are revenge
porn laws? Give me an example, so it's they're basically
laws that criminalize the non consensual distribution of sexually graphic
pictures and images. So, just as my ex had done
to me, a lot of my clients received threats from
(05:26):
from their exes that they're gonna send their their naked
pictures to everybody in their life if they don't do
X y Z, if they don't come back to them,
if they don't have sex with them, or sometimes they
actually you know, make good on those threats and post
them on the internet. There used to be a lot
of revenge porn sites, but still just general social media
sites like Facebook and Twitter and Instagram. Offenders will sometimes
(05:51):
you know, post these the most intimate images of of
a person, pictures that they received consensually but are distributing
non consensual. And over the last like four years or so,
we went from having three states with these laws to
having forty six and New York just became the forty
six state. And by the time we got a law
(06:12):
passed in New York, California was already on its third
version of it. But at the time I was going
through this, like I didn't know anything about this universe.
I couldn't find a lawyer who kind of was at
that intersection of intimate partner violence and internet law and
first Amendet law and criminal law. So when I finally
(06:34):
got through my ordeal, which took six months before I
got my final order of protection, I got the charges
against me dropped. He played guilty, and I basically just,
you know, decided that I was going to stop everything
in my life and try to start a law firm
and become the lawyer that I needed. And so that's
(06:57):
sort of a summary of how I got into this.
And so I started a law firm and it was
just me for a couple of years, and you can
probably relate to this just the the roller coaster ride
of starting a law firm and building a law firm
is is pretty intense, and and that never eases up.
(07:19):
It turned out that there were a lot of other
people that also needed this kind of help, and within
just five years we've grown to thirteen employees female. We
just hired our our second man, and but yeah, ninetent
(07:39):
female clients, female staff, but just so it's clear to
our listeners this happens to guys too, correct, I mean
this is not only a kind of female victim situation.
Oh absolutely. And the revenge point that we talked about happens,
you know, across all cultures, genders, gender identities, financial brackets, religions, races.
(08:06):
It's we've seen everybody, you know, from thirteen year olds
to seventy two year olds that have become victims. But
also my my firm is is more expansive than that,
where we're dealing with people who've you been horrifically stalked,
not just with naked pictures, but in one of our
most high profile cases, our our client Matthew, he was impersonated.
(08:28):
This is the grinder case on grinder case. Okay, tell
us about that one. Okay, get ready, Okay, So our clients,
like in late a man visited my office. His name
is Matthew, thirty three years old. He was a waiter,
slash model, slash former reality star, really you know, handsome,
(08:51):
built man and he was at his just wits end
because he'd broken up with somebody and after a year
and a half relationship, and that man he'd broken up
with his ex boyfriend decided that he, like my ex boyfriend,
was going to spend the rest of his life destroying Matthews.
And he created fake profiles on Grinder, the gay dating app,
(09:17):
and would direct strangers to Matthew's dogs at a restaurant
and to his home. And this was in person. So
a lot of people talk about, you know, cyberstalking and
stuff as if it's like a computer crime. These are
not computer crimes. He's happened to real people in real life.
And in this case, Matthew was visited by strangers who
(09:38):
thought he wanted to have sex with them over twelve
times over a several month period. As many as twenty
three people would come in person a day, you know,
knock on his door or follow him into the bathroom
at the restaurant where he worked, thinking that he had
set up the date. And sometimes his boyfriend would say
(10:01):
that it would direct message with the strangers and say, oh,
you know, I've got this rape fantasy. So even if
I tell you to go, god like, don't It was
like a sort of a life and death situation, right,
not sort of, it actually was, because sometimes the X
would say that Matthew had crystal meth to share, or
or he would say super like racist or homophobic things
(10:27):
to incite violence so that when these guys came to
his home they would be all ready to beat him up.
There were a couple of incidents where he and his
roommate were attacked. They had to call the police over
and over again. It was like there was nothing about
his life that was normal. It was completely overrun by
these constant visitors, and he didn't know who would come next.
(10:49):
He didn't know if the next person would have a
gun or would actually you know, force their way into
his home to to to rape him. I mean so
rather than just going after the X though, you guys
and after Grinder correct, well, first he did everything in
his power to go after the X. He got a
restraining order, he reported it to the police ten times.
(11:11):
The guy would just keep violating their restraining order, and
our prosecutors were doing nothing to help. And so when
he finally came to us, all of this had already happened,
and he was like, what else is there to do?
I just I feel like I just want to kill myself.
And at the time, I had worked with a lot
(11:31):
of tech companies helping to get revenge porn bands on
on their platform. So I was like in this like
super like cocky arrogant mode where I was like, oh,
I'll just call this general council. I got this. I
am You're like night in shining armor, no problem. And
so I tried to do that and they ignored me.
(11:54):
I wrote them letters. They ignored that, and so then
I was like, Okay, Matthew, we're in this together. Because
a gland close fatal attraction. I will not be ignored.
I will not be ignored. It so true. And so
I was like, what if we got a restraining order
against Grinder and you know, got a judge to say
that this this guy could not use their platform, and
(12:17):
you know usually you get restraining orders against people, but whatever,
we'll try it and goond behold the judge grunted us
this this order that required that Grinder discontinued this guy
from using their platform. And that was amazing to us.
And we served it on Grinder and they ignored it
and more men kept coming. And what was their reasoning,
(12:38):
if you know, for ignoring it? Because we know other
dating websites and other apps that have very willingly blocked
people that have caused problems in the past, Um explained,
I mean, even what's that one, sugar daddies, If you
actually are really like a hooker, that you can't be
on it, right, So what was their reasoning? They just
had so much great, you know business from this guy
(13:00):
or what? Yeah, well, I mean obviously they you know,
like ultimately is a good customer was a customer. I mean,
these free dating apps, what are they actually? They're they're
advertising companies there, you know, like every time somebody uses
their u they're they're like looking at the advertising and
it's more revenue for the company. So this guy was
an amazing customer, but I don't think that was really
(13:22):
what was causing them to ignore it. When we finally
got them to show up in federal court, Grinders lawyers
said that they didn't have to respond to Matthew because
they were protected by this federal law that went into
effect called the Communications Decency Act, which basically says that
tech companies cannot be held liable for the content their
(13:48):
users contribute. And we were like, no, Grinder, listen, you
saw our complaint. We were really really careful. We knew
about this law. We did not sue you for any
of the content, you know, provided by the ex boyfriend.
We didn't sue you for defamation or or for obscenity
(14:08):
or anything related to the words that this guy used.
We're suing you, you know, for being negligent and for
not enforcing your own terms of service. That's say that
you will exclude a user. And Grinder said, well, not
only are we protected by this this federal law that
immunizes all tech companies for their users content, but we
(14:29):
also don't have the technical ability to exclude a user.
And I was like, righte, my cocost sol and I
are like, who woa, who wo? You have a dating app.
The main feature you've patented this feature where you actually
can gel locate where people live. I mean, that's ultra hazardous.
(14:50):
And it's an absolute arithmetic certainty that if you have
a dating app with geolocating technology, it will sometimes be
abused by stoppers, by predators, by child molusters. And if
you've not designed into your product a way to exclude
abuse of users, then you've released into the stream of
commerce a dangerous product. And so we ran back to
(15:11):
my office and we amended the complaint and we made
this into a product liability case, and it was a
rather novel approach, and the judge told us we were
full of ship and dismissed the entire case, and we
appealed it to the Second Circuit and they told us
we were also full of ship, and we ultimately petitioned
to the Supreme Court of the US because this was
(15:33):
a pretty novel case and for the Court to dismiss it,
I mean, we're getting I don't want to get too
far into the weeds, but the Supreme Court has never
ruled on this particular law, which basically is what protects
all of our tech companies and it's why they've all
grown into these behemoths that they have, because we individuals
don't have the right to hold them liable, and therefore
(15:56):
they don't have any of the market forces on them
to have to allops like safe products you know that
that actually like take care of their users. But the
Supreme Court ultimately two weeks ago told us that they
weren't going to be reviewing the case, and so we're
now in a deadlock. We're the issue is now coming
up in Congress and we're testifying there. But the Grinder case, Okay,
(16:21):
I like, I like the grinder case. I like that
you're doing this. Let's back up a little bit because
I want to talk for a moment about your book.
I know we talked about your situation and it's not
hard for me to believe, but I don't know that
the listeners will really understand beyond you and Matthew, how
unbelievably common this is to happen to people, in terms
(16:41):
of anybody who's online for any period of time or anything.
Tell us about why you decided to write the book
and a little bit what it's about, because it's in
this day and age when people are so nuts, Like
I mean, I couldn't help thinking to myself, well, what
did you dated this guy for six weeks? What did
you do that set off such a re action in
the psycho? Or would that have happened to anybody that
(17:03):
he dated because he is just so mentally ill? Yeah,
it definitely wasn't because I was so amazing. It was
because it's a character trait that we see over and
over and over again, which is, Laura, exactly why I
wrote my book, because you know, at this point, we've
seen hundreds of different victims of predators, and all of
(17:24):
our clients. I mean, the two things that all of
our clients have in common is that they either are
currently under attack or they've been attacked. And there's almost
always a component of of violence or sexual violence or
gender gender based violence in these cases. And but we
realized in my office that we were seeing the same
patterns over and over and over again, as if there
(17:46):
was a playbook. And so part of the reason I
wanted to write the book was to taxonomyize the kinds
of offenders that we kept seeing, and we ultimately categorize
them into four different groups uh psychos as, holes, pervs,
and trolls. And the book has it takes, you know,
some of our our cases to kind of show tell
(18:09):
the story of the quintessential cases in those categories. But also,
I mean, I want to be able to demystify for
people what these types of attacks look like, so that
if they or their friend is ever on the wrong
side of one of these assholes, that you know that
they'll know what to expect. They'll be able to see
(18:31):
the patterns, because if you're being stalked or harassed, it's
like you're always waiting for the next shoe to drop,
and it's a constant stay of anxiety. You don't know,
you know, like a lot of these people are a
very creative. You know. I've had clients who, you know,
(18:51):
they're impersonated and their their ex boyfriends sends bomb threats
to Jewish community centers all over the place, or impersonates
them and sends child pornography in their names, or or
somehow hacks into the the dog walking app where they're
you know, making part time money and you know, tells
(19:12):
one of their clients that they just killed the cat.
You know, there's like but horrible, but a stream of obsessiveness. Yeah, often,
I mean one of the other things that I think
people naturally think. My dad when I was growing up,
basically had two pieces of advice that he like hammered
into me from my entire childhood life. One was don't
pack it if you can't carry it, meaning like, don't
(19:34):
I'm not carrying your luggage for you. And the other
is more importantly, don't let anyone take naked pictures of you.
No naked pictures. So like, even in my longest term,
you know, six year relationship, no naked pictures. But even
if I'm sitting here thinking this, when you're talking about
revenge on they'll just take a picture, a naked picture
of someone else and say it's you. I mean, there's
no way around this kind of a sick fuck mine. Correct. Yeah.
(19:59):
And it's not enough to say don't take naked pictures
because I mean there's nothing at this in this day
and age where our phones are, you know, with not
just within alum's reach, but like usually in our hands.
It's like, that's not really like it's it's not perverse
behavior to to express yourself that way. But the thing
is that even if you've not like I have clients
(20:20):
who yeah, who as you said, are like their head
is photoshopped onto a porn star's body or deep face
is now a thing where people are using machine learning
and artificial intelligence to get a computer to learn your
face so that it can even more persuasively look like
like that porn is real. Um. And we've also had,
(20:41):
you know, really sad cases where clients were photoed without
their consent or knowledge, as well as sexually assaulted and
photographed or videoed without their consent knowledge, and those went virals.
So the problem is more widespread than than just the
the act of taking taking the picture right, you said
(21:03):
you were going to break it down and demystify it.
So I want the folks listening to really kind of
because you are, without question, the expert on this and it's,
I think, for better or worse, something that you don't
think about until it's happening to you. So yeah, So
I want to tell you about the four categories of
offenders that we see over and over again at my firm, Psychos, Assholes, pervs,
(21:25):
con Trolls. So, starting with the psycho, that is the
situation where an offender, usually it's an X, has just
given up everything in their life to destroy their targets.
And usually these people don't have jobs, they don't have
meaningful relationships with family members, they don't really have anything
(21:49):
that's anchoring them to society, and so they don't necessarily
feel like they have anything to lose. They're not worried
about breaking the law. They're so kind of far gone
and ill with their obsession and their need to kind
of balance the scales and punish the victim for whatever
they've done, which usually is just breaking up with them,
(22:12):
that they just become help and and obsessive with destroying
the other person's life and So examples of that are
like what I described with with Matthew's case, where his
offender after their relationship ended, was just like, Okay, well
you've left me. I'm now I've now got nothing, and
I'm going to just spend hours a day creating these
(22:35):
fake profiles on Grinder and sending people to your home
to hopefully rape you. And that takes dedication, it takes focus,
it takes tenacity, commitment. These are takes commitment. And this
was over a six month period of time, and he
knew it was illegal, he had restraining orders against him,
and it just didn't matter. And so these are the
(22:58):
The psyco was somebody who just has lost all perspective.
And how is that different from an asshole? So the
asshole is perspective they have. They're all the same, clearly, right,
they have some perspective and they're not going to this.
They're not. They're just on the other end of the spectrum.
(23:18):
They're more moderate, so they'll do something, they'll do a
horrible act of revenge, porn or you know, sometimes in
some of our cases we have schools that are assholes
where they get a report that you know, one of
our clients was sexually assaulted and they behave unethically and
and you know, accuse our client of of consensually having
(23:42):
sex at school something like that. These are the Title
nine violations. These are the yeah, like you know client,
so so sometimes administrations are assholes, but basically it's when
there's an act that's kind of singular and a bad
act that's sink or that that's our asshole. And then
pervs pers there. Pervs clearly perhaps yeah, perps or purse
(24:06):
pervs are they're the ones who are doing sex stortion.
Usually there's there's some sort of offline sexual motivation, gratification,
power and balance. They are the Harvey Weinstein's the sex predators.
We have a lot of cases that do involve computers
where offenders will impersonate a kid and then seduce a kid.
(24:32):
You know, maybe they meet like playing online games or
in a chat room and the trust of the of
the target over a period of time and then ultimately
get them to share naked image and and then blackmail
them with the image and you know, you appliance in
these cases are sometimes like thirteen, fourteen, fifteen years old
(24:54):
and they're being blackmailed by an adult who basically uses
the threat of distributing the single image to coerce them
into sharing more and more and more images, and they
get progressively more graphic and the demands are raised. And
(25:15):
that's different from a troll. How it's much sicker than
our typical troll. That's sex dortion. It's it's such an
incredibly gruesome situation where you're making a kid become like
a sex life. So moving over to troll, that's somebody
who's usually also acting anonymously, usually through the the Internet
(25:37):
and sometimes in mobs. So usually it's in more of
a public platform like on Twitter, where suddenly there's just
a mob of people going after somebody, usually for ideological reasons.
You've said something that the far right hates, You've said
something horrible about Trump, You've say like Kathy Griffin, you know,
with her bloody head, with it with the head. You know,
(26:00):
she then was was the target of of all you know, trolls.
They were doc in her, they were you know, threatening her,
all anonymously. And the issue with trolls is that because
they're anonymous, and because they they act in in mobs,
it's really really difficult to get any action against them,
because you can't really go to law enforcers and say, hey,
(26:23):
there are a thousand anonymous people that are threatening to
behead me and say they know where I live. You know,
Can you get the social media channels though to do anything. Well,
that's exactly what the best solution is, because I mean,
law enforcements gonna be like, listen, we don't want to
(26:43):
be investigating people that might be on the other side
of the world. And even if we get you know,
criminal charges against one person who's threatening to kill you,
what about the other So really the platforms are the
best place and the only place really to get action.
But in as we talked about with the ground your case,
there's absolutely no liability if the platforms don't help. You're
(27:08):
going to change that. I have a feeling you're going
to change that, I hope. So at least, you know,
at least, there needs to be injunctive relief where people
should be able to say, listen, these people are destroying
my life. They're sending my naked pictures, they're threatening my kids,
my family, and they're showing up at my doorstep. At
the very least, I need you to say that they
(27:31):
can't use your your platform anyway to do this because
these platforms are monetizing every single user. Well, and that's
what What's one of the great things about your book
is that it really is like Laura always says, knowledge
is power. You're arming people with knowledge so that they
know what they can do to avoid the situation and
bringing something that I think, like I said, as with divorce,
(27:52):
until it's happening to you, you probably don't think about
it very often. And what I loved about what you
said earlier carry is you became m the lawyer that
you needed when this happened to you. And that's awesome,
it really is. And I do think that you will
change the way people approach this. I know things are
going on in Congress right now. I we wish you
the best of luck in getting this done and tell
(28:14):
our listeners, in addition to purchasing Nobody's Victim, how they
can reach you. Please find me on Twitter see and
Goldberg Law, and my website is CIA Goldberg Law dot com.
Got it all right? Thank you so much for joining
us today. I'm gonna look you up next time I'm
in Brooklyn and keep up the great, great work. Thank you.
(28:36):
It's I'm so excited to be here. I'm Laura Waser
and this is the All's Fair Podcast. On today's show,
we're flipping through the pages of some of my favorite
reads this month, including Nobody's Victim, the part memoir, part
true crime, part manifesto written by victims rights attorney Carrie Goldberg.
I also want to recommend have you seen Luis Vellez
(28:58):
by Catherine ryan Hyde, The Dutch House by Ann Patchett,
The Dream Daughter by Diane Chamberlain, and Jitterbug Perfume, one
of my oldest, longest favorites by Tom Robbins. And my
next guests have written an aspirational and inspirational piece of
nonfiction that is very close to my heart called Our
Happy Divorce, which is a true life embodiment of what
(29:18):
we talk about when we refer to the evolution of dissolution.
Is my sincere hope that listeners considering a divorce, if
you have kids or not, you'll take a page from
this book literally and figuratively, absorb and practice a new
and better approach to divorce. So, without much further ado,
allow me to introduce you to my guest Nikki Di
Bartolo and Benjamin hell Fun. Welcome guys, we are very
(29:42):
psyched to have you here. On All's fair. Your book
is pretty much what I practice in my family law
practice in creating it's over easy, trying to educate and
then allow people to emulate couples like you who have
gone through a divorce but chosen to remain a family,
(30:02):
chosen to know amicably co parent, and chosen to remain
friends and partners in other things, even if you're not
going to bed together every night. So yeah, thank God
for that exactly, which again makes you appreciate the other
stuff too. It really wasn't that exciting to begin with.
Here we go. So you guys are based in Tampa
(30:25):
and you flew to l A to do press to
promote the book. So you've just come from kt l A.
We did awesome. How is that painless? They were easy
on us? So good? Okay, Well get ready, So NICKI
tell us a little bit about you. Well, I am
divorce from Ben, as you know, I am remarried to
(30:45):
the sheriff of our town, which is a really interesting thing.
We went from night and day here the outlaw. Okay,
I only have one child, Asher, who is my child
with Ben, sixteen years old and the most wonderful child.
But yeah, it's me in a nutshell cool and actually,
just so that you guys know, Asher wrote an article
(31:08):
for the It's Over Easy blog. It will be posting
right around the time that we are um going to
be dropping this episode of All's Fair and it has
a child's perspective of parents going through divorce in a
much much better way. But still what he's what he
went through? Ben, tell us about you? Uh, well, I
am relatively decent human being. I was born and raised
(31:31):
in San Francisco, and I moved out to Tampa with
Nikki Um and her family. Um, and it didn't work out.
We got divorced. Um. I am remarried to my wife, Nadia.
We have two other kids, and so Asher sort of
has the best of both worlds here. He can be
at my house and have brothers and sisters and it's
Mayhem and then you can go for the little r
(31:52):
and art Nikki's where he's the only child. Um. We
live five houses down from each other. UM, so Asher
has the freedom we the streets names Longfellow. We call
him the Longfellow creeper because he walks between houses and
fishes the docks and at night and all of a sudden,
I'll be watching TV and he'll just pop in at
eleven o'clock at night, and that's and that's good, like that,
(32:14):
like that. So you went to cal that's my alma mater,
and you had Do you have a degree in African
American history? What made you decide to pursue that, because
we're fascinating. Yes, well it's it was a history major.
And it was one of those things where when I
got to school, I was majoring in classes that started
after twelve pm, right, and so instead of the class,
(32:36):
I look at what time it started. Um. And eventually,
by my junior year, the councilor, my councilor said it's
time to declare major. And so I looked at all
of the classes and what was the clearest path to
uh to graduation. Eight years later, I graduated with a
degree in African American history. So I had some time
(32:56):
off for bad behavior, uh and and and get myself
so overre but besides that, yeah, so I graduated with that,
and I'm really happy that I did. It help It's
helped me in business, it's helping histories, and it helped me,
you know, actually in the divorce because history has a
tendency to repeat itself and if nothing changes, nothing changes.
And he learned from it, and I learned from it.
I think that was being sober that helps you in
(33:17):
our well yeah, but but but you know, my parents
divorce was not a happy divorce, and it was the
war the roses, and and that we were used as blocking,
blocking and tackling tools and and so on so forth.
So when it came time from my own divorce, it
took a while to get there, but I realized what
I didn't want to do, and I didn't want to
repeat history, right, I mean, it's so interesting why, as
(33:39):
you guys know, I love the study of human nature,
which is why I do what I do for a
living and why I do this podcast. And I see
people who's either parents have gone through miserable divorces saying,
I just I'm not going to repeat that. I'm not
going to do what they did to me. I'm not
going to repeat those mistakes or making exactly the same things.
Like they say the chill don't of abusers or either
(34:01):
abuse their kids or be hyper aware of anything that
could be abusive or perceived that way. So you took
a different path, which is amazing, and I love that
you were conscious enough to realize that that was going on.
I wish I could say that it was from the beginning,
because it wasn't. You know, at the end of you
guys have to I was ready to put my boxing
(34:22):
gloves on. Yeah, I mean we had the boxing gloves on, literally, uh.
And I had hired a lawyer to look at the
pre nup and he came up with an action plan.
I looked at it as how to destroy Nikki and
how to make this thing messy and how to bring
it into the public arena because of our family, and um,
I was just so blinded. And I think that happens
(34:43):
a lot. At least it happened for me, and it
will also help me look at my parents that they
didn't intentionally do it. But I think we get so
blinded by these negative resentment, fear, anger that we don't
really see the consequences of those behaviors. And I was
headed down that route. And it wasn't until I started
reading this thing and I got two were three pages
into this action plan, and that's when my parents hit me.
(35:04):
And that's when that's when everything turned uh it. It
took I mean it took some time. I had to
go and actually take uh um an inventory myself and
take I called Nikki after that plane, right, I said,
I just need some time to work on myself and
to find um, I've been blessed enough to to be sober,
(35:25):
clean and sober. I think it was probably fifteen years
at the time. Sixteen years and so I had a
foundation of what to do. And I knew that in
every relationship where I have a resentment, I have a pardon.
And so I called Nikki and I said, I need
some time. I need to take a step back. I
need to start getting back to basics. And one of
those basics was taking an inventory. So I took an inventory.
(35:46):
And it wasn't when I worked with this guy. It
wasn't any time I started talking about Nikki, be goes, No,
this isn't what this is about. This is about you
and your behavior. Um and anyways, make a long story,
stort too late, but I ready too. I read the
part of its reading the invatory to them, and as
I was reading in it, as I got done, I
realized that, you know what, I wouldn't want to be
(36:07):
married to me either I was a miserable person, and
so that the turning point was then I called nick
and I asked her to coffee, and I at first
told her that I loved her and that I was
sorry for my part and in the relationship, and then
she in turned apologized to me, and which we've never
(36:27):
the first time and the last time so very special.
But but so the foundation of what we did was,
you know, and Nikki had um done some works. She
had been through therapy too at that time, and so,
you know, I think the turning points when we both
realized we had an equal part in ending the relationship
(36:48):
and that we need to put the pass behind us
and forgive each other and forgive not only I forgave Nikki,
but I forgive myself, because there's a there's a shame
went in any marriage. And Nikki, you know, you talked
about that a lot. I talked about that a lot
because my parents have been married for fifty two years. Right.
That's another thing when people come and they their parents
are still married, so you don't have really any experience
(37:09):
with divorce, and you are afraid you're letting them down,
and why couldn't you do what they've done, taking complete
no consideration of whether they actually are happy, not happy whatever.
So did your did you lawyer up? Right from the beginning,
I had friends that were lawyers, which kind of helped
guide me. And I mean I kind of knew the
direction he was going because hearsay told me the direction
(37:33):
he was going, right, So I was going to be
ready for this, I mean, and you know, my dad's
one of those people that wants to try to fix everything,
wants to try to make everything better. So and being
the youngest of three girls, he was and still is
most protective over me, I can say that, right, So,
(37:55):
I mean he was going to do everything in his
power to help me, like make sure I got through this, okay, right,
whatever that meant, whatever that meant, well, even killing that
was on the table, I'm sure. But but they're where,
let's go to Las Vegas or something, And this is
I think so difficult and you can tell if I'm wrong.
But they're both fixers, Nikki. You know, immediate reaction to
(38:17):
anything is to fix it, and your dad's the same way.
And so when the marriage, you know, I had made
the decision to end the marriage, her immediate response was,
let's fix it like, what can we do to make
this better? But in the back of my head, I
was like, there's no way I really want to be
married to no offense, but there's But as a young woman,
(38:43):
I was more so petrified and also when you realized,
but I was petrified too, you know, break up my
marriage and do that to my child. But at the
same time be a single mom. Even though I was
I knew somehow I was capable of doing it, but
I was still petrified. And I think that's every girls,
like I think every girl gets afraid of guys too,
(39:06):
Which are can I do this? Will I be able
to see my kids? You know? How is this going
to work? Who's going to take care of me? You
know they say men are much more likely to remarry
sooner or thereafter than women. So I think the fear
and the transition period are the things that and the shame,
as you said, keep us away from it. So so
when he came to and said I'm sorry, you must
(39:26):
have been taken aback for a moment at that point,
did you in either one of you when you said, well,
this is this is a side of him slash her
I haven't seen before. Did you think then like maybe
we should get back together or was it I'm sorry
I was that way, but let's take a different path
towards our divorce. This wasn't a reconciliation. This was let's
be friends and do it a different way. Yes, yes,
(39:46):
it was like, let's let's take a look at what
we've been doing and let's figure out how we can
get to a better point of us. I mean we started.
It was the same thing that all couples, that a
lot of couples go through, where you're dropping the child off,
where don't look at each other, you don't talk to
each other. So we're like, we can't continue to do this. Okay.
So I think that's really important to hear those listeners
(40:07):
because I think sometimes we present these things as a
fatal complete No, it wasn't always this good. They weren't
sitting there writing our happy divorce and flying around the
new stations at the beginning. No, this is this takes
a little bit of time. But I do say to
people when they're in my office and when I'm speaking,
you know, two large groups that are going through this.
(40:28):
You will be in a different place a year from
now whatever that different places, But it better be a
different place. You cannot still be in this anger, fear, whatever,
you have to have moved on, and generally you will
be able to make eye contact curbside or even walk
up to the door, or even come in and have
a coffee or whatever it is. Because one interesting thing,
(40:49):
and I'm sure I'm not telling you guys anything you
don't know, is you guys have something in common that
is the most important being in the world to each
of you. And nobody else has that, you know, except
parents maybe a little bit, but nobody else feels that
strongly about asher besides the to you, no childcare provide
or no teacher, nobody right, and you know what we
were doing or what what the plan? You know? The
(41:11):
the the other path that I was going down that
I see so much, and it happened to my parents,
and I see it with everybody is the parents. And
I don't mean to be dramatic, but it is because
I've been in that situation. Is where you're feeding your
kids poison hoping the other one dies, you know, or
lighting yourself on fire hoping the other one dies to
smoke in relation or however you want to put it.
(41:32):
But but the but the the the point of that
you made is so important that this was not you know,
that coffee shop. We cleared up the wreckage. All good,
let's go to Africa together, Let's go on family vacations again. No,
it took years, I mean, and then you throw in
new relationships, new partners, and then you get you know,
(41:55):
the the ego of of another man being around yourself
and ask about that. So, so did everyone go to
Africa last summer or just the three of you? Just
the three of us? Now, how does that know? And
people will ask me because I've traveled with my exes,
but I definitely would have a difficult time, I think
now explaining to my current partner that I was going
to be going on vacation with one of my exes.
(42:17):
So how does that work for your wife and your husband?
So when and this is the thing is are guiding light,
our our principal or north star in this whole thing.
We decided that coffee shop was every decision we're gonna
make is what's best for Ashure. It wasn't what's best
for Nikki, it wasn't what's best for Ben. We didn't
have and I hate to say this, but there's no
(42:38):
social media back when we get divorced. You know, it
was only twelve years ago, but there was no so
they're not the resources that there was. So we sort
of just figured this out ourselves. So we got we
you know, kiss, keep it simple, stupid, what's best for
Ashure and so that included bringing new people into our lives.
Is that they had to my wife, I can almost,
(42:59):
you know, with certainty, and I don't know that sort
of a xmoron, but say that she would not be
in my life if she didn't commit to what we
were trying to do. So when I went to her,
and obviously they weren't fighted. We didn't like, say we're
going to go to but and they said no, we're
going to hang back. You're the sheriff, and your wife
with the two other kids, were like, no, you go
(43:20):
have a good time in Africa. Well it was logistic thing.
So he's the sheriff. Obviously taking two you know, over
two weeks off as a big straight to hell everywhere
the streets would have been crazy. But and my wife,
you know, raising two small kids. Uh, she's going back
into therapy or being a therapist. She's not going back
in the she's gonna need to go back, but she's
(43:43):
married to me, so eventually she'll be on the couch.
But but so she's starting her practice. And so when
I told her, it wasn't oh, hell no, you're not
going to Africa with your ex wife for you f
and out of your mind, it was Asher will love that.
So so they have bought and and I hate to
use the word buying because it sounds so apathetic, but
committed committed that they're committed to it, that they have
(44:07):
put themselves Asher before themselves too, and in front of
their egoes, in front of their like even questioning whether
Nick and I would be frolicking in the bush and
Africa ACA, nothing happened in the bush. So so that
you know they are committed, Uh, they are true. Have
(44:28):
developed into this and and it's one of those things again,
like you said, it developed like you know, it wasn't numbered.
I knew Chad. He was a friend every time I
got pulled over. You no, but he you know, we
knew him when we were married, so you know, and
then you know, he comes into Nikki's life and first,
you know, like I said, in the beginning, it was like, oh,
(44:49):
my god, this guy like he's around my son, he's
he's you know, I just didn't wait for the body
to get cold before he moved in. But analogy, right,
And then so we were we were at Asher's baseball
games and I was coaching. We walk off and Ashwood
run over to chat and give him a hug, and
my insides are tearing each other apart, and I'm like this,
(45:13):
you know, just everything. But I'm literally saying myself, what's
best fresh? And if I look at it through ego
list lens, he's a good guy. Asher loves him. Nikki
and him are definitely in love and meant to be together.
So that's the lens I need to look through. If
I look through the other lens, you know, it's all negative,
it's all whatever. So look, he's a great guy. Nikki
(45:35):
and Nadia we're best friends. We really are. And it's
I mean, it's nice. I mean it took us a
little bit to get there because I had to go
through the mommy thing, where who's this woman that's putting
my son to bed at night? Who's But there's a
there's a good story about as I called him, he
was probably four or five. I called him to say
a night to him. He's in my house and I
had not met Nadia yet. But Asher knew this woman
(45:59):
who has been hanging out at the house hanging out
with him, and so I'm saying good night to him,
and he said, hey, mom, do you know Nadia? And
I said, I know who she is, but I have
not met her yet. He goes, hold on a second,
you need to talk to her, and that was his
way of going, Hey, listen, I need you to be
okay with this. Figure this out. Like it's smart enough
(46:20):
to know this, so it's time for you too to
be friends. As sounds like a rock style. So when
people say to you, and I'm sure they do, well,
if you care so much about your kid, why didn't
you just stay together because that would ruin our kid
even more? They're smart, right, right, They're smart. They know
they realize when there is tension. And I do believe
(46:42):
that kids would rather see a happy parent, even if
that parents alone or with somebody else, than a miserable
parent married to their other parents. And I think that's
really true. Part of my inventory, too, was around me
as a father, and I always thought that I was
this great father, but part of that inventory was I
really wasn't that good of a father. I was just
(47:04):
playing one on TV, you know, and showing up and
putting most responsibility on Nikki and you know whomever was
babysitting them. So at the end of the divorce and
I was living on my own, it sort of forced
me into being a better dad, a better father. I
find that that happens a lot with parents, particularly the guys.
I think that when they when you're all living together
(47:25):
under one roof, mom kind of becomes the care provider,
And if dads are left on their own, they actually
do step up and do the care providing that they
maybe weren't doing when the relationship was in a different format.
What made you guys, all these years later, decided to
write the book? Well, it's taken us what four years
(47:48):
to write this book. Has told him to stick it
up his ass a few times during the process. But
were getting a fight. I mean we argue that all
the time. We argue like brother and sister, not right,
and so she were getting a fight. She said, I'm
not doing your effing book. You can shove it up.
(48:10):
You're aware. So then we wouldn't talk for a while.
And and so you know, doing your all right, collaborating
with your wife to ex wife rather to do a
book is an interesting process. Um. But but we uh
had just been social media came and we would you know,
share story. We put out a Christmas card every year together.
(48:30):
We started doing that about four years ago, um as
our modern family. Um. And so everybody, everybody, I like that.
That's like, that's what my Thanksgiving looks like. Right, and
that's so everything gets a bigger house, you know, and
the advent of social media, so we put it out
there and not to show off anything, but just this
is our life and this is how it looks. This
is what our family looks like to us. Right. And
(48:51):
at the beginning, like the first one that went out,
people were like, excuse me, what is this like some
freaky Yeah, this is just like everybody just test to
get on board. Let me ask you a question, Nikki,
So your your family so high profile? Can you say
who they are? My father used to on the forty niners, right,
so they're pretty well known family and they're also really
(49:13):
conservative or traditionalism a better word, not conservative. So how
did they react to that Christmas card question? Well? I
think that they all took a little, like it took
everybody a little getting used to, because I think people
even like, you know, your mom and dad were sort
of like, what is this? Like? Why why is why
are they still coming over for Thanksgiving? And why are
(49:33):
you trying to have Christmas? Like why are you? Like?
What is this like? If you didn't work meant to
be married, why are you still together? But they've all
sort of I mean, I actually think my parents really
like this guy, so like they're they're happy because they
see the way Asher is like flourishing having this kind
of relationship. Yeah, and in the beginning, it's weird. They
(49:54):
like him way more than they like either one of us.
There was a little new um to to everybody. So
that's how you know, on social media people say like,
you guys have such a great story you have you know,
you need to get this out there. And and like
I talked about in my recovery, I've made the biggest
changes in my life through relatedness and the power of relatedness.
(50:14):
And you know, I went to many people with a
lot of initials behind their name that told me I
had a trouble. I troubled drugs and alcohol. But it
wasn't until I spoke with another alcoholic or another addict
who I knew had been to hell, Um was I
willing to take a look at it. So this is
just our story, right and and and everybody I'm sure
who've gone through the divorce can relate to some of
those feelings, some of that stuff we're going through. So
(50:37):
it's just how we did it, you know, it's just
our story. Um. People do differently, as you know, Laura,
I mean there there's this is just our way of
doing it. And the net result is a happy divorce, right.
And I think that's important for people to keep in mind,
which is this is their story. You have your own story.
Take pieces from this story, use it if it works
for you. If it doesn't, don't use those pieces, take
(50:59):
up their pieces. But I do I think that creating
what our families are going to look like. And again,
we talked about this all the time on this podcast,
having a tribe, having a support group, it takes a village,
that whole idea, and most importantly, more people to love
my kid. It must be nice to know that Nadia
is there if you've got to be somewhere else, because
he's got another person there that loves him. What the
(51:21):
hell could possibly be wrong with that? Nothing? My ego
got over it. I'm like, you know what, this is
a great thing. That the most uh, the moment where
I sort of knew for me that this thing was
working was, um, Chad asked me to coffee one day, um,
And we went to coffee, actually the same coffee shop
(51:43):
where Nicky and I had sort of made amends and
not only at that, but we had worked out our
whole divorce at that coffee shop and then gave it
to the lawyers and said, draw this up. We've come
to this conclusion after you know, six or seven meetings.
But anyways, he asked me to coffee and he said,
you know, first of all, he made him ends for
you know, any illusion that he was you know, moved
(52:03):
in or had any you know, while we were married,
at any sort of you know, feelings towards Nikki, and
it just sort of happened. But then he said, I
want to ask her to marry me, and I watch
your permission, and uh, he said, well, I said what
I said, Are you sure? Because I can tell you
some stories, but not at all. She's an angel. Yeah,
(52:29):
gorgeous right, except she got her hair horns are So
what did he say? So? Were you taken it back? Um? No,
because immediately I thought to myself, this is the guy
I want to him right for having the balls and
(52:50):
the lack of ego to come to you and ask you.
And you didn't know. I didn't know, okay, And so
look if I had said no, he still was going
to do right. But at that point, like this is
the best thing that a guy comes into my ex
wife's life, loves her, going to make her happy. But
more importantly, my son loves him. He's good to my kid,
(53:12):
He's a good man. What basis do I have to
hate this right? Except for ego? Right, and that's the
only thing that could get in the way. So I
I thanked him, uh and instead of course you know,
I think you know, I did say thank you. Um. Now,
how at this point, how long have you guys been divorced?
(53:32):
H I'm going to be married ten years? So four years?
For years? Okay? So you know again, guys, it doesn't
happen immediately. It's an evolution. What happens in each of
your homes? I guess if it has to do with asher,
I mean these are things that I think about. So
if Asher has some kind of a disciplinary issue, something happens,
(53:53):
it's cool or whatever. I can't imagine that would happened
with a sixteen year old fellow. So so, but he
lives in each of your homes. Does that necessitate that
all four adults have to be on the same page?
You guys obviously set the stage. But what happens, For example,
if Nadia says, I got two little kids here, I
can't have vaping. You guys may handle this in a
(54:14):
different way, but I'm not okay with it, Like, how
do you deal with that kind of conflict when it
happens and he's in between your two homes and maybe
you two feel differently about it than your new spouses.
I would say, if it's a big ticket ITEA, yes,
it's usually what we say goes. But I mean, for
the most part, things like things with him growing up,
(54:36):
we all sort of feel the same way, which is
it's been that part of it's been really easy. Yeah.
Co parenting is interesting because we make sure that we
I mean, even if we parent a little differently, we
make sure the rules are basically the same a book,
and that's one thing that, you know, co parenting. Whether
Nicki and I were married or divorced, we were going
(54:58):
to have different views I think on raising our kids
or different right, so the different views doesn't change. And
but the big like Nikki said, I love that big
ticket items we talk because we have a great relationship,
would communicate and we come to a decision, and sometimes
Nicki and Chad are involved in that decision. We've had
(55:18):
family NA do that all the time, I'm sure you know.
And that's the other thing. She's never gotten mad at
me once about it, and I do it all the time.
But um, we we've had meetings, family meetings with Chad, Nadia,
Nikki and me and talking about something maybe happened at
school or whatever, and we come to consensus. But you
(55:39):
guys do it together, yes, and you respect your new
partners spouses. Okay. I think that's important for people to
know that this isn't easy, guys, but it's so much better.
There's no question that this is a better outcome. And
and and just so the difference I can tell you
from when my parents were divorced, they didn't talk right
(55:59):
and being sort of a criminal mind that I was
very early yea. I quickly went from this is the
worst feeling. You know, this is awful, this is terrible,
to this is really good. Right, how does this work
for me? Exactly? So when you know they were I
figured out pretty quickly they weren't parenting for Parent of
the Year. They were parenting from a place of favorite
(56:20):
parent or trying to get the favorite parent. So it's
really hard disciplinary speaking because if you're the one that
says that's letting them stay out later or being on
their device or whatever it is, they want to be
at your house more often. But this is where group
texting comes in very handy. Yes, now we're like, listen,
here's the text message. We're all on it. We all
need to know where you're going, when you're going, and
(56:41):
who you're going with. Now now, yeah, like this is
the way it works. So now more people also to
answer to for your teenagers. Yeah, exactly. All right, Nikki
and Benn, thank you so much for making your time
in your schedule to stop by. All's fair to tell
us about our happy divorce. You guys can get it
where Amazon, Amazon, anywhere books are sold. There's a great
quote from a very powerful woman on the back of
(57:02):
the book too. I did endorse it. I love this book.
I think it's really an important piece of whatever you
might be going through in your separation and leading to
your next chapter. It's called again Our Happy Divorce, how
ending our marriage brought us together? And when you get
back to Florida. Please thank ash Or for the article
that he shares with us on the It's Over Easy
(57:22):
Insit's blog called it Gets Better. Many thanks also to
Carry Goldberg, who joined us earlier. She's the author of
Nobody's Victim, Fighting Psychos, Stalkers, pervs, and Trolls. Both of
them are available on Amazon. Nobody's Victim is also available
on Audible, and Our Happy Divorce is available on Google Books.
Nikki and Ben tell people where they can find you
online and on the radio. As it pertains to you.
(57:44):
Ben everything at Our Happy Divorce Um social media. Uh
I do do a radio show on the weekend. It's
terrestrial radio. It's set thing if you don't know, it's
a thing between in your car with with with the
knobs you know with those knobs that that's a FM
and M It's actually an FM talk formatted station. It's
(58:04):
called the MiGs and Swig Show. I mean he talks
a lot. Did I tell you I see as a
radio show, it makes sense. That's why I like these
much better than those TV things where they give you
four minutes to try to get your message clear. So
it's called the Migsan Swig Show, okay, and it's on
one or two point five or one oh seven point seven,
(58:25):
which is two one or two point five two point
five in Tampa and Tampa com. You will not find
me on a radio station in Tampa. You will find
me at Our Happy Divorce and at Nikki Tuartalo. Okay.
I'm Laura Wasser, attorney and host of the All's Fair podcast.
You know I'm into next chapters and I'd love to
hear what you think I should read next. To leave
(58:45):
a review on iTunes and tell me what you suggest.
Thank you for listening. Let's speak next week.
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