August 20, 2025 • 55 mins
Sima Gandhi's professional resume reads like a blueprint for success—but her story reveals a far more complex reality. On this episode of She Pivots, Emily speaks with the entrepreneur, lawyer, and former Plaid executive in her first public conversation about the personal journey that reshaped her life. At the height of her career—helping lead one of Silicon Valley’s most successful startups—Sima was privately navigating a painful and deeply complicated relationship with her family. Rather than break her, that experience pushed Sima to reevaluate everything: what she wanted from her life and how she defined success. In the midst of that personal upheaval, she launched her own company, channeling her energy into building something new while privately carrying the weight of her family estrangement.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Sime Gandhi (00:00):
Welcome back to She Pivots. I'm Sema Gandhi.
Emily Tisch Sussman (00:13):
Welcome back to She Pivots, the podcast where we talk
with women who dare to pivot out of one career
and into something new and explore how their personal lives
impacts these decisions. I'm your host Emily Tish Sussman. Today,
(00:33):
I'm truly honored to welcome Sema Gandhi, who is here
today to share her story publicly. For the first time.
I met Sema in my pre pivot days working on
policy in DC. It feels like a lifetime has passed,
and in some ways it has. Since then, Seema has
not only made professional pivots, but deeply personal ones, and
that's what we're going to explore today. By all accounts,
(00:56):
Sema has what many would consider alife with all the
right titles andiances. She's a stand for graduate, a lawyer,
an early stage leader at the wildly successful tech company Plaid,
a wife, mother, and founder and CEO of her own company.
But behind it all, Sema was privately struggling with her
relationship with her family. Growing up, she constantly felt like
(01:20):
she had to walk on eggshells. The smallest misstep would
result in explosive fights and manipulative behavior using her as
a pawn was a constant. You'll hear how much she
struggled with this, the confusion and guilt she carried, constantly
questioning if it was her that was misinterpreting, was it
her fault? She tried for years to maintain a healthy
(01:40):
relationship with them, even after she and her husband moved
back to live near her parents. Sema worked hard to
create clear boundaries for herself and her young baby, but
at the height of her career, while she was leading
Plaid through a major exit, her mother filed a lawsuit
against both Sema and her father. It was a devastating
and grueling experience that dragged on for years. And here's
(02:04):
the thing. Estrangement is not something we often talk about openly.
We hear about divorce, about friendships falling apart, but family
estrangement still carries a heavy stigma, even though research shows
that one in four Americans is a strange from a parent.
It's the silence that makes the experience even more isolating
for those living it. When I started the show, I
(02:26):
wanted to highlight stories that change the perception of professional
success to include our personal experiences, and SEMA's story is
exactly that that, no matter the professional highs we may reach,
the reality is that our personal lives are, without question,
part of the larger picture. I'm so grateful to Seema
for being so vulnerable and sharing her story with us.
(02:48):
So without further ado, welcome Seema.
Sime Gandhi (02:54):
My name is Sema Bondi and right now I do
a lot of different entrepreneurial type and there's no easy
answer to describe that which we'll talk about today.
Emily Tisch Sussman (03:04):
Perfect answer, perfect, Okay, great, So let's back up. We're
going to go in chronological order, as you know, so
we're going to back up. Where did you grow up?
Can you tell us about your childhood? Can tell us
about your family?
Sime Gandhi (03:15):
So I grew up in California. I grew up in
California a long time ago before I think California is
what it is today. And I say that because California
was a little bit of a weird place when I
grew up there, a little bit more offbeat culture, a
little bit more free willing. You know, my background is
India and my parents are from India. And today when
(03:37):
you look at California, especially in the Bay Area, which
is where I went to high school, you think of
a lot of Indian people there, and that wasn't necessarily
the case when we grew up. It was still pre Google.
There were orchards down the street smoke weed. But I
think the more I think, I said, the older I get,
the more appreciate how much our childhoods and our family
(03:58):
dynamics affect who we are as people. And so in
that spirit, I think as I reflect upon my childhood,
there are universal traits around growing up. Like I think
all children want the love and affection of the parents,
and I think in immigrant families my parents were immigrants
from India coming here, there's also you know, you grew
up with a sense of obligation, like we came here
(04:20):
to this country sacrifice for you so that you can
have a better life, and so you have to pay
us back by doing well in school and you get
a's and you go to a good school and you
be successful because we sacrifice that you could go do that.
And that was very much kind of a cultural conditioning
of growing up. I'm a little wary of kind of
(04:42):
talking about these things through a cultural or immigrant lens,
because I think some of my American multi generational family,
kids would say, well, my parents expected us to have
a's too, And so I don't mean to alienate that
dynamic as specifically immigrant, but I do think that there's
something a little different about having immigrant parents who are
(05:03):
also themselves trying to acclimate to a new culture and
the financial uncertainty, where maybe their definitions are a bit
more narrow and the pressure is more acute, and so
some of these come out in a more exaggerated dynamic.
And on top of that, in my family, there was
also a bit of mental illness which was undiagnosed for many,
(05:25):
many years. And again today versus the conversations happening thirty
years ago, it's very different. I think today something on
the order of one in five children are in some
type of medication. We talk about anxiety, we talk about
therapy quite fluidly, and that was not the case when
I was growing up, and in particular in our cultural
context of a family member of ours was institutionalized. I
(05:47):
remember going to see him and in a true institution,
and our family shut down, our nuclear family shut down,
and we didn't have a community to lean on that
or talk about that and understand what all of that meant,
and so I think how all of that kind of
translated into is when I look back, I think we
all want to be from happy families, and we all
(06:08):
want to think that our families are the Norman Rockwell
pictures where you know, we sit around and we celebrate
Christmas and remember the really good things. But I also
think that there were really hard things that for a
lot of years I glossed over or repressed. And I
think that, you know, our family is what we know,
and it's what we want to work. And there's that
Leon Tolstoy quote, I love all happy families are alike,
(06:30):
and each happy, each family is unhappy in its own way.
And we were very much struggling through some things as
we grew up. But you know, I think that's that's
partly what shaped me and made me who I am today.
Emily Tisch Sussman (06:42):
You've alluded to it, but are you comfortable being more
specific about what some of these behaviors were from your family,
like how the mental illness manifested itself.
Sime Gandhi (06:52):
Yeah, I have to admit it's hard, because it's so
hard for me. Don't know what sounds weird or what
sounds kind of helps people understand what that's like. If
that makes any sense. So there's you know, it's like
sometimes I'm like, oh, my mom called me a spoil
bit because I got into Stanford. I went to Stanford,
and that some people are like, oh my god, and
other people are like, okay, well, so it's hard for
(07:13):
me to really know. But there's an example where and
I look back now and I see the story through
such different eyes. But culturally again, and girls tend to
have longer hair, and that's tend to be seen as
very pretty. And I had longer hair and I did
ballet because that was very feminine, and my mom, well,
I didn't want long hair. I wanted short hair. And
maybe again this is me trying to exert my power
(07:34):
and defy stereotypes. And my dad was really adamant, like
I needed to have the long hair, and so my
mom took me to get my haircut and I was stoked,
like I got my haircut, this is what I wanted.
And my dad didn't talk to me for a week.
And it was a huge fight, huge fight at home,
the screaming, the yelling, you know, all of that, and
(07:57):
didn't I didn't really understand it at the time, but
now I under stand that was a power play, right,
like she was using us to hurt him. And it's again,
it's a stupid thing. It's a haircut, and it could
have been easily resolved through a conversation. But that's not
what we grew up with. We grew up with things
that were intended to hurt other people. She helped me
(08:17):
secretly quit ballet so that I could get at she
could get at my dad. Right. There were things like
my dad and I like to go on walks and
at some point we had we would have to sneak
out in the morning because other I she'd scream at
us for going out because she didn't want us to
be out of the house and she resented that time together.
I don't know what it was. It was a controlling thing.
(08:37):
And so in my family was always like rocking on eggshells, right,
You just never knew what could set somebody off, and
if they be set off, there's no reasoning about it.
It's just a full on screaming and it's even hard
to describe it physically. It's like you're screaming so hard
that your blood is pulsing throughout your body and your
head feels like it's going to explode, and it's this
(08:58):
whole physical sperience and it's hard, like you can't you
can't be who you are and have needs and talk
about it like you would around a normal dinner table.
I think these things are you know again, they seem small,
so it's hard to really articulate. It's like, for example,
you know, my sixteenth birthday, let's go after dinner. Where
do you want to go? Seema? I want to go
(09:18):
to this Italian restaurant. She's like, well, I want to
do Chinese? What do you do? Right? And so there's
a fight, and you know, my dad's steps in. He's like,
well it's her birthday, let's do Italian. So we do Italian.
But was out of fun dinner now right, And so
it's like these things that just rob you of joy,
of feeling loved, of feeling supported, because it's not about you,
(09:40):
and it's just it's a child of that. And I
you know, I say this with humility in some ways,
because we had food on a table, right, Like my
parents were present. You know, I was not abused physically
like and I know so many people have so much
more that they've had to deal with or didn't grow
up in a war zone. We had a pretty good
life from the but I think some of that emotional
(10:02):
nourishment and love and support that I'm sure all of
us wanted to give our kids, it was just not
something that was on our table.
Emily Tisch Sussman (10:10):
It sounds like maybe she was very explosive when you
didn't abide exactly the way that she wanted you to.
Sime Gandhi (10:17):
That's right, But it was also explosive when things were happening, right.
So I remember growing up, my dad would always as
a family, we try to go out for dinner one
night a week and go see a movie, like we'd
go to the Dollar theater. It was super exciting, right,
And again something I don't think I fully appreciated until
I became a mother. It was just the power dynamics
(10:39):
at play in our home. And I like to say
that one of the causes of evil in the world
are children who were not loved enough as when they
were when they were children. And I think my mom
had her own rough childhood, and again that's a whole story.
But when there were opportunities to exert power, she used them.
And so there were many times when we'd be ready
(10:59):
to go and she'd just be in bed and scream
at us. Right, It wasn't even an expectation of behavior
with her moment to be coddled and controlled and like,
come on, mom, please come with us, Like let's go out.
If we love you, we want you to come. And
you know, just the way she would scream the us
or treat us. And I now can't imagine doing that
(11:20):
to my own child, right, like to strip them of
that stability and security and instead use them as a
tool to manipulate. And you know, I think that was
a threat I saw throughout our childhood. But at the
end of the day, I think part of why cycles
of trauma are perpetuated is because I think there's a
very elemental desire to have parents in your life, to
(11:41):
think of yourself as being part of a unit. And so,
you know, it's quite sad, but you see children of
abused situations that still love their parents, right, and they
want to be part of that unit. And there's also
again this cultural context, Right, I grew up in this context.
Let us thicker than water. Families that stick together grow together,
and that is just the unit. And so it doesn't
(12:02):
even kind of cross my mind to think about estrangement
or separating yourself from your family or creating deliberate boundaries.
I didn't have those toolkits.
Emily Tisch Sussman (12:14):
Did you have thoughts or dreams about what a grown
up life would look like like When people ask the
question of kids, what do you want to be when
you grew up? Did you think about it?
Sime Gandhi (12:24):
Or you just It was hard in this cultural context too,
because you know, on the one hand, my dad was
a massive advocate for me, but on the other hand,
in our cultural context, women needed to smile and be supportive.
And I think that's true beyond my cultural context too,
and a lot of women. Again, this goes back to
the point made earlier, where I think a lot of women,
(12:46):
multi generation American women would feel this way, but maybe
more acutely in this cultural context. And I looked up
that the women, you know, the aunties that we grew
up with, I didn't really see strong role models. They
were always described as crazy or too emotion and so
it was almost like I needed to alienate myself from
that image because that wasn't successful. And you know, we're
about the same age growing up, you know, women, there
(13:08):
weren't a lot of female CEOs. I remember when Carly
Fiorina became CEO if you would Packard, and I was like, wow,
that's amazing, right, And she made it there from being
secretary all the way to CEO. And you know, Hillary
Clinton was this paradigm of a strong woman. She got
crucified in the media for a lot of reasons, but
I think she was also one of the first to
(13:29):
stand on her own as a strong, smart woman. And
so I really struggled to find women that I could
relate to, and I think the one that I really
did relate to was Claire Huxble. And I know the
Cosby Show has its baggage now, but I really do
love that show and it still makes me laugh out loud.
But she was She was strong, she was funny, she
had an amazing career, She didn't take anyone's crap right,
(13:53):
and she was articulate and in a lot of ways,
she was what I wanted to be. And that's a
model that I really clutched onto throughout my childhood.
Emily Tisch Sussman (14:03):
Did you choose Stanford because it was close? Did you
think about other schools? Like you were kind of staying
close to home for college when that could have been
the first opportunity to move away.
Sime Gandhi (14:13):
Honestly, I struggled with that decision, and I recognized it's
the decision of privilege. I loved Stanford. I loved the campus,
I loved the diversity. But the challenge for me was
that I was so close to home, and I was
afraid of being so close to home because here I
was trying to get out and have independence. And so
I remember really talking to my parents saying, this is
(14:35):
you can't just you have to pretend I'm far away.
You can't just show up, and you know, there's got
to be a line. And actually, my sophomore year, my
mom showed up to my dorm room and she'd made
some of my favorite foods. And on the surface level,
you'd think, oh, my gosh, that's so sweet she showed
up and she brought some some food. But on another level,
(14:56):
it so scared me because I felt like my boundary
was being violated, Like this was supposed to be my world,
and I'd made very clear that I didn't want anyone
showing up just like that, and here she was in
my dorm room, standing outside my door, with expectations of
me welcome and being her and making time for her.
And this was supposed to be my life, and I
(15:17):
really struggled with that because on the one hand, you know,
I felt like I was being selfish by not dropping
everything and being there for her. But on the other hand,
I now have the language to say that was a
self care moment where I had created boundaries to help
protect this life that I was trying to build for
myself and figure out who I was outside of the home.
And that was a very drawing experience. So I love
(15:39):
my time at Stanford. I think it helped me become
who I am. It showed me a whole different world
that I had no idea could exist. And ultimately I
decided to apply to law schools. As we mentioned, Claire
Huxtables my role model, and I only applied to schools
on the East Coast because I knew deep down that
if I didn't leave California probably never leave.
Emily Tisch Sussman (16:03):
After the break, Seema talks about how she tried to
establish distance and boundaries with her parents and what eventually
came of it all. Before the break, Seema had just
left California to go expand her horizons and create some
(16:25):
distance with her family.
Sime Gandhi (16:28):
And I wanted to go try something new and I
think again create some geographical distance, and so I ended
up in New York for law school. I loved it.
I loved New York. I loved the energy. I felt
like when I was in New York, I was plugged
into this electrical grid and everybody was running and there
was so much to learn and see, and the cultural
experience and the fashion and the food, and you could
(16:50):
express yourself in so many different ways because there were
all these people and it was amazing, and I candidly
thought I'd be in New York forever, Like I never
really felt the need to go back to California. And
it was also a lot easier to maintain this balance
between wanting to still have a family that was my
close family, and I could fly back for holidays and
(17:11):
start myself and then be out in two days. And
it was a really easy way to create the right
type of boundaries for me that let me live my
life but also let me jump back into my family
in a way that felt like I could belong and
have a loving unit.
Emily Tisch Sussman (17:25):
Yeah, and when you went back home, what was the
relationship like, Like, was there was there a jump back
into the old behaviors that were really hard for you,
Like into those old patterns or did you feel like
everyone in your mom in particular, I guess, was kind
of on their best behavior to have you there.
Sime Gandhi (17:43):
It was a mix, and I think again these universal
trades we've all probably felt this moment back in our
family's homes, were acting like children again, right, and it's like, Ah,
I'm this other person outside of the house. Why is
it then when I revert back to home all of
a sudden in order to be I feel like I
have to scream at the top of my lungs, like
I don't want to be that person. And again, I
(18:05):
don't know that I fully internalized just how toxic some
of these behaviors were, or maybe how related to mental
illness they were as well, But yeah, it was. It
was definitely difficult to be back at home, especially for
an extended period of time. And I think there was
some part of me that wanted us to all be
in our best behavior, right when you get off the
(18:25):
plane and you're waiting to be picked up, to be
picked up with joy and have that happy couple of days.
But there was another part of me that understood that
probably wasn't always going to be the case, and let
myself not get too excited because I didn't want to
be so disappointed. I knew that it was I was
not the priority, and that was always clear because again,
(18:46):
the folks with the mental illness needed the care and
the unpredictability of their emotional stability took precedence over a
visit with me, and so that was kind of the condition, right.
I could come back home and we could do our thing.
And I knew my parents we try to carve out
what they could in their own way, and to me,
that was just what that was just the deal. And
(19:06):
I remember when I met my husband and he asked
my dad for permission right to marry his daughter. My
dad said to him, well, you know, she has a temper,
and my husband, my now husband, said well, that's not
really the way these conversations are supposed to work. You're
just to make sure I'm good enough for your daughter.
But the irony of that was my parents. My family
(19:28):
unit has seen one side of me, the side of
me that I needed to manifest in order to survive
in that household. And I'm not someone who I think
would back away from a fight. But I'm also not
someone who screams at the top of my lungs, it's
not who I am. Sometimes, depending on the circumstances, we
have to flex certain behaviors in order to survive, and
(19:49):
so I tried to shed a lot of those during
those bits as home, and I think it became harder
and harder to fall back into those patterns or kind
of feel like I belonged, especially after I got married.
It would make those vis with my husband when that
became something that I really had to grapple with and
deliberately think about creating more boundaries around.
Emily Tisch Sussman (20:07):
Well, So you had found separation by going to law
school on the East coast, being on the East coast,
being in New York, but then you were eventually offered
a position as one of the first fifteen employees that PLAID,
which was back on the West Coast, near your family.
So what was that decision process like for you.
Sime Gandhi (20:25):
I was really excited about joining PLAID. I thought the
team was fantastic. I thought that problems that was interesting.
It let me leverage my time in government, It let
me leverage my technical background, it let me leverage my
experience in the financial sector, and from a career perspective,
the opportunity to be able to add value so quickly
right off the bat felt really exciting, but the fact
(20:46):
that I was in California within an hour of my
family was scary. And I remember making a list with
my husband pros and cons versus another opportunity I had
in New York where we could stay in New York,
and the pros and cons of going back out to California,
And on the con section of the plat off or
was proximity to family, and we had a real conversation
around boundaries, like do we think we can maintain our
(21:09):
boundaries with my family, Like how are we going to
prevent them from just showing up and bringing this baggage?
And again, I want to be clear, I love my family.
It's not like I was excited to go be a
strange from them. But I also was afraid of just
the black hole of toxicity. Like I escaped, I gotten out,
and I didn't want to be pulled back in. And
(21:30):
I struggle a lot with this idea of selfish versus
self care, and in a lot of ways, those are
two sides at the same coin. And I wanted to
be there for them and be able to engage, but
I was afraid of being seen as selfish by them
right or spoiled where I don't want to partake in
some of that behavior that I thought was toxic, And
ultimately we decided that we could do it. I have
to admit having my husband there by my side made
(21:52):
me feel like it was more doable. It was a
little bit of a moral compass and a pillar of stability.
But I also feel protective of that life that he
and I had built, right, like to come from an
unhappy family where I didn't really have a strong model
for what healthy relationship looks like. Again, I love the
dynamic between Claire and Bill Cosby. Again, I know there
(22:13):
are a lot of copy oats there with that show,
but that was that interplay, that marottery, that partnership. And
then I wanted to protect my family, my relationship. I've
heard hard to grow myself right, to grow out of
my toxic behaviors, to build healthy relationships with people, and
I wanted to protect my marriage, and I was I
was afraid. I was afraid of being pulled in and
what that might mean for us, And so he and
(22:34):
I had those conversations. I spoke to a therapist. That's
when I learned of the concept of deliberate boundaries, where
boundaries don't have to be raised with anger, right like
a fortress, but they can be loving, like loving boundaries like, look,
you know, Emily, I kind of need tonight for myself,
so I really appreciate the invitation. Let's reschedule and I'll
get back to you on a time that worked better
(22:54):
for us. That's a boundary that's a way of saying no,
but it's done out of love, out of self care,
not to push you away. And so that's a muscle
that I really tried to flex, where we really try
to include them in our lives in a way that
made sense on our terms, for just being sucked into
theirs on their terms.
Emily Tisch Sussman (23:12):
And around the same time you had your son, so
I'm sure that as you were trying to create these
boundaries it impacted the way you approached parenting.
Sime Gandhi (23:23):
Yeah. I mean, first, even the idea or the decision
to have a child was challenging. When my husband and
I met, both of us were on the fence, something
we discussed but neither of us really felt strongly about.
And as we grew older, and I guess the biological
clock started ticking, I decided I really wanted a child,
and I think part of it was a reaction to, honestly,
(23:47):
my own relationship with my mom. I wanted to break
the cycle. It was something that I needed to do
for myself, like I wanted to be I had a
lot of love to give and I wanted to be
able to do it in a way that maybe I
would have wanted to have it. And so, but my husband,
while I grew increasingly, pro grew increasing thing like con
and so that was its own challenge And how do
(24:09):
I express vulnerability around this is something that I need?
And that was something that was really hard for me
to say, even though I know you don't want it,
would you do this for me because you love me?
And it seems so easy to say right now, but
I swear to a year and a half of therapy
and a lot of conversations. Right, but we're business people, right.
I put together a PowerPoint deck. I was like, these
(24:29):
are all of the reasons, like your life quality will
be sustained and all of the ways we can supplement
with care and you know the task division And he's like,
I don't need a PowerPoint deck, Like I just need
you to ask me to do it. For you. And
so anyway we got through that, we had a child,
and I mean that first child that year first is
(24:51):
just hormonally crazy. Work was busy and I was super
engaged there and I was also trying to figure this out,
but like being a mo and what that relationship meant
to my child, And I remember really wanting to feel
or create a home that didn't have the stress, that
didn't have the screaming, where it was love. And I
have to say my mother in law was a phenomenal example.
(25:13):
And I think I can't underscore just examples and role
models in life because it's so hard to figure out
this out. But I remember something that she said to
me that really resonated. Every time she came over, she'd
leap at the chance of wiping a diaper. Everyone that
has kids and just listening to the snows, like that
first year, there are a lot of diapers to change,
and she would jump, I got this diaper, And it
(25:34):
really changed my framing of it because from her perspective,
You've got two minutes of unadulterated attention from this kid,
and that's going to go quickly. We all know these
kids grow so fast and even after she left. When
I looked at it that way, not just as a
chore to get done and move on to the next thing,
but as a moment where we could play and chat
(25:55):
and do that process, it really changed it. It wasn't
unlock and I I kind of really understood that what
it means to enjoy your child versus seeing them as
obligations or burdens, which is how we kind of grew
up feeling. And when it came to boundaries, you know,
one of my boundaries was I didn't want to leave
(26:15):
him alone with her, and I think on some levels
she probably picked up on that. That wasn't an explicit one.
It was an implicit one, but I was afraid of
what that interaction would look like. And so there were
definite boundaries that were set up along the way.
Emily Tisch Sussman (26:32):
Sima was running a multimillion dollar company that was poised
to sell for over five billion, yes billion. She was
a young mother, executive and simply put a human just
trying to get through it all. When we come back,
she talks us through the gruelly year that changed everything.
(27:07):
So you had some major career highs at the same
time that you were having really big personal lows. So
can you walk us through that twenty nineteen year when
Plaids sold and things really imploded with your parents.
Sime Gandhi (27:22):
Yeah, Plaid wasn't an emotion, like just an amazing career experience.
We added a billion dollars of valuation every year while
I was there, and I led the sale to Visa,
which to do a deal, a deal at that magnitude
was just it was an incredible experience. And you know,
my team was growing, the company was growing. There was,
(27:43):
as you said, just a lot of positive success on
the horizon over Plaid. And I remember this moment acutely
where my team was about to go present and in
all hands on the amazing work they were doing. I
was running all of our bank relationships in our global
policy and I got a call on my phone and
it was anonymous number and I picked it up and
(28:04):
it was a collect call from a jail and it
was my dad and something had happened and my mom
had called the police, and I just got that pit
in my stomach where I'd escaped from this and here
I was, like, my team's about to go do this thing.
I'm you know, supposed to be doing this career thing.
And some things sucked back in. I felt myself falling
into that black hole, and I had to leave work
(28:27):
and I got in my car and I went to
go deal with all of that, and I had to
go build my dad out and all of this. In
the meanwhile, that pit is growing, and you know, things
kind of cascaded from there, and I had to put
on some of that old shield that I developed. My
dad ended up moving in with us, my mom filed
for divorce, and I started compartmentalizing again all of those challenges.
(28:49):
We're trying to focus on my career, and during that
time producing thereafter, I ended up leaving Plaid and starting
my own company. So we raised twenty million dollars. We
started a fintech company focused on creators. You're a creator, Emily,
and it was amazing. I learned so much about the
creator industry and the financial underpinnings of that, and I
(29:11):
compartmentalized all of that stuff that was happening on the
personal side of my family so I could focus on
growing this company. And in twenty twenty two, sorry twenty
twenty one, got a knock on our door and this
man my husband actually answered the door service papers and
my mom suit us she'd suit us, and the feeling,
(29:34):
the shock, the devastation, I mean, without even a conversation
to go sue your own kid and make such heinous
accusations around fraud, and I mean, you name it duress.
And you know, just I knew things were ugly between
my parents, but all of a sudden, that compartment that
I built to separate all of the nastiness that was
happening then from my own life started eroding and I
(29:56):
felt just emotionally sucked into this. And for anyone that's
been through reallyation, it's awful. You spend a lot of
money on lawyers, it's super negative energy, it's a ton
of paperwork, it's emotionally got wrenching, let alone when it's
from your own mother. And then she showed us again.
A year later, my son opened the door and the
(30:17):
guy looked at us and yeah, I remember him serving
us papers and looking at me and saying I'm sorry.
And so now we were fighting litigation in both New
York State and in California. And you know, starting your
own company first of all, running a team, even at
plaid like is a lot of emotional energy. You're supporting
people emotionally and I think that part is not often
spoken about. I think for good people managers, you really
(30:39):
do have to be emotionally present for your team, because
it's not always just about the work needs. It's also
about making sure that they're growing as people and feeling
supported career wise. And I just felt my emotional resilience emptying.
And this is supposed to be the high right, just
got this amazing moment plaid started my own company and
this really interesting, amazing space, and here I was just
(31:04):
feeling sucked dry emotionally and in a way, I thought
I'd learned how to cope.
Emily Tisch Sussman (31:11):
With As your dad was living with you through this,
he must have also been going through his own journey
of being able to realize what he had lived through
being able to separate. Was that did that weigh on
you as well?
Sime Gandhi (31:27):
Yes, there was a lot of emotional sadness and energy there,
but I compartmentalized it and I put that to the
side and I focused on my career because that's what
I knew how to do. And it wasn't until I
got directly sucked in that I realized I couldn't compartmentalize anymore,
and that all of these things that I had done
(31:49):
in my younger life to survive, and that set me
up for success in Silicon Valley. Right, thick skin, Just
keep moving forward, deliver outcomes, keep your eye on the ball,
don't get distracted by emotional talk.
Emily Tisch Sussman (32:01):
Just just go right.
Sime Gandhi (32:02):
Started coming home a roost, and I couldn't compartmentalize anymore
because now I was part of this negative, negative vortex,
and I was dealing with the lawyers, and now I'm
dealing with litigation in two places. And yeah, his continued
see him suffering so much, and his inability to be
resilient from that affected me deeply. And then I did.
(32:25):
I did the thing that type a people do. I said, well,
I'm smart, I'm a lawyer. I can solve this. And
so I was joining his weekly calls with lawyers. I
was looking at the motions I was jumping in, and
I figured, if we just spent a year with all
of this energy on this thing and focused on him,
that I'm going to be able to solve this problem too.
And I can do that, and I can run this company,
(32:46):
and I can be at home and be a wife
and a mother, and you know, not surprising, only that
didn't go the way I thought it would go and
I hit a point where my husband at one point
joked where he said, you know, thirty percent of our
life right now is our conversation asians start exchanging anxiety.
Thirty percent is you know, talking logistics about our son,
thirty percent is exchanging founder anxiety, and ten percent is
(33:08):
maybe budging out watching TV. And it just degraded, and
I felt like I wasn't the mom I wanted to
be talk about cycles, and I just felt like I
was not emotionally present. I felt like I was being
suck dry on so many different fronts. And at one
point my husband said to me, like, how long are
we going to keep living like this? And you have
(33:29):
to remember this is now four years into the divorce litigation,
it's all off in two years into meeting Soup. I'm
still these both active cases still, as anyone who's been
through litigation or acrimonious litigation knows, it takes a long time.
And that was a real low point, which is, oh
my goodness, all of the things that I really prioritized
and I worked so hard to build, like a loving family,
(33:51):
a loving relationship with my husband, like this beautiful relationship
with my son, I'm underminding it all because I'm being
sucked into this vortex my family and I'm also trying
to do this company. But these are all the things
that I should be able to do. And that was
a real low point.
Emily Tisch Sussman (34:08):
How did your perspective change as a result of that
low point? And then what did you do about it?
Sime Gandhi (34:15):
I decided to prioritize what was important to me. That
was my family, right, my husband and my son, And
I think for me, professional women, we kind of define
a part of ourselves by how a career success is unfold.
It was really hard to say that maybe being CEO
of this company isn't the best thing for me right now,
(34:37):
and to even contemplate in my mind, I was like,
oh my gosh, am I giving up on this company?
Am I quitting this company? My failing people? Right? I
had female investors and that meant so much to me
because I want to perpetuate female founders and female investors.
And you know at a certain point, though, that you
can't carry the weight of the world on your back, right,
(34:58):
And maybe we put too much pressure on ourselves in
that way. And it was really a calculus where I
think everyone goes through stuff in their lives, and it's
harder for women to take pauses I'm putting that in
air quotes, or to deviate off the more commonly traveled path.
But in some ways I felt like I didn't have
(35:18):
a choice because I couldn't really be the CEO that
I wanted to be and also maintain my personal life.
And I needed to just start getting things off my
plate that weren't giving me energy because I needed to
recover and focus on being me again. And so you know,
I started thinking about ways to manage the business, and
(35:39):
we ended up selling the business, which was amazing, and
our investors were incredibly supportive through that process. But that
was hard. That was a hard conversation to have, right
because I felt like I was not living up to
the expectations of a founder that is all in and
doing what they're supposed to do to make that company
a massive success. And I started investing in myself through
(36:01):
therapy and running and trying to let go of my
anger and really process what had happened between me and
my mom and letting go of these concepts of guilt
and selfishness that I think I'd carried around for a
long time, and understanding that. You know, I think sometimes
as women, we put a lot of these burdens on
care on ourselves. Like I think the reality is reality.
(36:23):
Women tend to be caretakers more in the mails today
at least. And I had to let go of those
things that it wasn't my responsibility. And I know that
sounds simple. It's like, obviously that's not your fault, ear
Walm suit you, But you know, there was a lot
of oh my gosh, what I do to cause this right?
And I think this go back to the earlier parts
of the conversation. We're living with folks that have meant
(36:44):
to Illness can be so hard because it can also
be so manipulative and so passive, aggressive in ways that
aren't so easy to articulate or pinpoint. And these lines
can be so gray, and for a lot of years,
until she sued me, it was gray, and I still
wanted her in my life, I still wanted our family,
and so realizing that I didn't really have a choice
(37:05):
at that point and letting that go, letting the notions
of having a mother go, it's really hard. And I
think anyone who's lost a parent might relate on some
level the grief of letting that go. But for me
it was a little bit different because she wasn't dead,
she was alive. She made a choice and I felt
so alone through that process. And yet one in four
(37:25):
Americans are estranged from a close family member, but we
don't talk about it with the same precision or openness
as we do grief, right or mental illness even and
estrangement is really hard and it's isolating, and I need
to figure that out for myself as well.
Emily Tisch Sussman (37:43):
After Sima left Blaed, she took a pause, but only
a brief one. That same year, she launched her own company,
Creative Juice, which was designed to give individual creators the
tools and support needed to reach their full potential. But
the ongoing lawsuit with her mother and the pressures of
wanting to be present with her own family all became
too much, and she made the tough choice to step away.
(38:24):
When you were deciding to prioritize your personal and step
away and then eventually sell Creative Juice, did you have
an external narrative around it, like for your board, for
your investors, where you're saying, oh, you know, I'm going
to sell because I think this is the right time
in the market or how much transparency did you give
that it was for personal reasons with two of.
Sime Gandhi (38:46):
My board members, one board member, one board advisor. I
feel very fortunate that I could have an open conversation
with them and explain to them what was really going on.
It was at the point where I couldn't even talk
about it without crying. I was just so gutted, especially
in the second time getting sued. You think you come
to terms the first time, and then it happens again.
It's like I just recover from this, and you just
(39:06):
threw me another punch, and the punch is just felt
like they kept on coming. And part of it was
I wasn't able to emotionally like go of her and
that relationship and this idea of my mother doing this
to me. And I think that's part of the process
of estrangement, which can mean so many different things, But
to me, it was kind of letting go of that
emotional connection. But at that point when I was having
(39:29):
the conversations with my board, it was a real conversation,
and I can't underscore how much it meant to have
that support and that understanding and for them to see
what was happening and appreciate that I couldn't be the
CEO that I wanted to be, But at the same time,
with others outside of that close knit circle, I did
feel they need to have an external narrative. I wasn't
(39:51):
ready at the time to say, well, my mom sued
me two times and so I need to go take
her myself. I felt like a big bomb to drop
on the people, and it wasn't an answer that I
felt like I could give appropriately. And so, you know,
we were fortunate that Juice was in a healthy position
and the creator economy was hot, and we found a
(40:11):
great place for it to be, and so that was,
you know, a pretty straightforward story to understand. But there
are a lot of people that didn't understand why I'd
want to sell. The story I would say was, you know,
the business wasn't a healthy enough place where we were fortunate,
we had a great offer, and I decided that it
was the best thing for the business, and that was
(40:33):
the story. And a lot of people would leave it
at that say congrat it's awesome, and it was always like,
what are you going to do next? And you know,
I think for me, the answer I would just give us. Look,
I'm focused on the integration and wrapping that up and
I just need to take a breather. And that was
fine for most people, but they'd say, what are you
starting your X company? Let us know, right, And it
was just so interesting. There's always that expectation of what
(40:54):
are you doing next, which I had to also let
go of, and you know, writing a book and say
I'm going to go write a book that felt almost
frivolous to me. Right, It's like, what about my career,
my actual career, What am I going to do that's
actually something real like And it's just letting go of
these preconceived notions. Is still a work in progress, but
I think for I'm honestly just excited about where the
(41:18):
path takes me from here. And it's not a clear one,
but my hope is that it will help me or
that I can find meaning and satisfaction in the things
that I feel really passionately about. And also I still
have a little bit of an entrepreneurial spirit and I
don't know how it's going to manifest itself, but being
open to manifesting in different ways and trusting not to
sound too spiritual, but trusting the universe to manifest that
(41:41):
energy in a good way while I put out good
energy and live my life is something that has taken
me time to trust. But you know, I'm trying to trust.
Emily Tisch Sussman (41:50):
Were you able to find any community in people who
had gone through something similar or did you find it
somewhere else.
Sime Gandhi (41:59):
So one of the things I started doing after I
sold Joe was I started writing a book. It was
also I felt a calling to tell this story. I
felt like this crazy thing had happen to me. And
I think realizing that I needed to let go of
the traditional career pillars of success like writing my company
and doing all this and taking the time for myself
to explore this book, and these processes helped me articulate
(42:22):
these feelings of estrangement and these emotions in a way
that I didn't I couldn't do before. And I have
to say when I started telling people about the book,
and I think sometimes even now, I'm still trying to
figure this out. I think, you know, and a lot
of times we want these clean arcs of a story,
like oh, okay, and then you reach the slow point
and then it's up and everything's like wrapped in a
(42:42):
bow and solved, and the reality is I'm still figuring
out every day things happen, and I'm still trying to
be resilient and move forward. And sometimes when I tell
people I'm writing a book on estrangement, honestly, I'm not
sure what to expect. I feel shamed sometimes because I
grew up in this context, and I think a lot
of us share of strong or place a strong premium
on famie values like families, and we take care of
(43:03):
her families. And so when I say I'm a strange
from my mom, largely my brother like, it's like, oh,
what'd you do? What's wrong with you? Why do you
alienate your family? But I have to say in the
last couple of months is kind of as I've started
talking more about this, even at random cocktail parties and
trying to become more comfortable about talking about the subject,
I've been shocked by how many people have said to me,
(43:27):
did you know I'm a strange with X? In a
way that I just I would not have expected. And
just a couple of weeks ago, I was at a
cocktail party in DC, and again, this is a professional
cocktail party. You're not working, you're talking, and there's this
woman and I end up chatting with her a little bit.
She said, what are you up to? And you know
(43:48):
my answer is not clean cut. Right now, I advise companies,
I starting this coalition thing, and I'm writing a book
and it's not a clean answer with a clean title
at a company. And she said, oh, like, what's the
book about? And I told her and she said again,
this is like your archetype of a very professional woe
with the perfect blow dried hair and the right title
and the right company. She said, you know, I'm a
(44:10):
strange for my father, and let me tell you why.
And we had a twenty minute conversation at this professional context,
and it's just really struck me how much this is
a part of so many people's lives. And I'm still
struggling to figure out how to talk about it in
a way that doesn't feel sheepish. But I think the
power in that story is that these things that happen
in our personal lives also affect us professionally. And I
(44:33):
think for me, at least, compartmentalizing and suppressing all of
this personal yuckiness and messiness came home to roost in
a way where I couldn't do that anymore. It just
physically emotionally was gutted and it made me deal with it.
And now I'm doing a lot of weird stuff. I'm
doing things that bring me energy though I love what
(44:55):
I do, and it's not a clean answer, and that's scary.
People say what do you do? I can't say I'm
eas or I'm president at ex company and they're like, okay, cool,
like whatever, You're doing your thing. And not being on
that hamster wheel and not getting that external validation is
a hard thing when for so many years we've driven
for the accolades and the things that project seniority, and
(45:17):
you know, sometimes there's a part of me that thinks,
should I be still thinking about that? Should I go
for that title? Like what is my external projection there?
And that's still a work in progress. But it's just remembering,
you know, what brings me strength and working towards that.
Emily Tisch Sussman (45:35):
You've talked about feeling empowered by these decisions like the
estrangement and then also leaving your company. You can tell
us more about that empowerment that you feel now.
Sime Gandhi (45:46):
I think that I had felt so trapped by the
time I was ready to make these decisions, so forced
into doing the things that everyone expected me to do that.
To break free of that, to feel like I could
breathe and be myself felt so to say I am
not the best CEO for this company anymore, and it's
time to make a decision about that, and to receive
(46:09):
then that support through that process and then to come
out the other end and then feel like that energy
could be restored back to me, felt like I could
control my life again in a way. And there's a
lot about my life I can't control right now, this
litigation being one of them and a big part of it.
But to let go of that and focus on the
things that could bring me energy is empowering. So estrangement,
(46:31):
even I think it means so many things to different people,
And for a long time, even after my mom sued me,
there is probably a false hope of me that wanted
or thought about reconciliation and a deep sadness there around
the things that we were losing right or family traditions.
My mom is an excellent cook, and she makes things
that I loved growing up that I could never find
(46:54):
in a restaurant or somewhere else. And to know that
my son would never get to experience any of that
made me really sad. It's like, why are we? Why? Right?
For what? To know that we would never take trips
to India together as a family. I mean, me traveling
to India is probably like you traveling to India, Emily,
maybe you'd do it better than I would, actually right,
And to feel like my parents would not be able
(47:15):
to be there to pass on some of that cultural
knowledge to my son is sad. And it took a
long time. And it wasn't even really until I saw
her when she deposed me that I could really let
go of that emotional connection and then start feeling again
empowered by where we were in this relationship and me
letting go of those expectations. And I guess that's where
(47:36):
that sense of empowerment comes from. Is we can't always
control the things that happen to us, but we can
control how we respond or react to them. And that's
not an overnight process for me. I have to say,
It's been what maybe a year and a half since
I sold Juice and started making these decisions to focus
on my own self, and I'm just now starting to
(47:58):
feel more like me. So it takes time.
Emily Tisch Sussman (48:01):
I asked this question of all of my guests. But
what is something you saw as a like a negative
or a low point in your life, but now in
hindsight you see it, maybe not necessarily as a positive,
but having put you on the path to where you
are right now.
Sime Gandhi (48:17):
I mean, it's probably getting sued by my mom, right
Like at that point, I felt so victimized. I felt
so violated, right like, how could someone come in and
say all these things and cause so much pain and
drag me through this for what? For what? Right? And
(48:38):
I felt so hurt, and you know, I felt sorry
for myself, like why why do I have to go
spend money, the time, the energy into this when I
could you know, I presented some of the people that
had these loving families who were so supportive, and even
after I sold Juice, which I say partly I just
I couldn't keep going. I resented why do I have
(48:59):
to do these things to take care of myself? Like
what's the opportunity cost here? Like I should I could
be investing in my career, I could be doing all
of these things, and here I am quit at therapy
and trying to run and like manage my anger and
stop feeling sorry for myself and I just felt so
mad at my mom too. It's like why did she
It's like I survived my childhood and I made it out.
(49:20):
I created a professional success for myself. I thought I'd
stripped away all of that, and then it all came
back and like punched me in the god again and
then again because she sued me again. So I'd say
that was a real low point. And you know, my
marriage was at risk and all of these things and
forcing myself, but it forced me to have to deal
(49:41):
with it, and I'd like to think that I'm wiser
now two years later, you know, from kind of creating
a deliberate step to go invest in myself then I
was before that, and that if I hadn't had those
things happen to me, probably still be on the conventional trey.
I'd still be doing the things that people expected me
(50:02):
to do. I'd still be running a company. Maybe I'd
love it, maybe I wouldn't, but I'd still be doing
it right and right now, it's forced me to say
what do I love to do? And everything I do
today I do because I love to do it. Even
writing the book was an exercise, and oh my gosh,
I'm going to go spend all of this time doing
this thing. I could at the end of the day
(50:24):
just end up being a very long diary that my
child reads one day. Like, I don't know that it
has an outcome. I don't know that it's going to
have a success. And that is that is a new
muscle for me, and I'm still figuring it all out.
But my hope is that it helps put me on
the path to building a life like that's joyful and
full of things that I love to do. You know,
(50:45):
we ski today. I get to pick up my kid
from school. In most days, I get to do really
interesting things at work. And I may not have that fancy,
big title, people may not really understand what I do.
And being okay with all of that because I'm letting
go of that external validation is not something I would
(51:06):
have been able to do had all of this not
happened to me. And I like to say in life
that sure, you make lemonade out of lemons, but that's
your decision to take that situation and do that with
And I'd like to say that I'm doing that pretty successfully.
I still think I have a lot of work to
(51:26):
keep doing and investing myself and I constantly challenge myself
to get comfortable not knowing where this journey is going
to go. I think sometimes I look at my friends
that are now see sweet at public companies, and I
kind of know what their shock is going to be.
They're going to do that, and they're going to go
join some public company boards and then they'll probably do that,
and it's like, Okay, I get that story. I don't
know where my storyline is going to go, and I
(51:49):
sometimes I feel fomo, It's like, am I leaving the
kind of impact on the world what I want to leave?
I don't know. But I try to really root myself
in the gratitude for having such a flexible life right now.
Lets me take care of myself. Let me say have
conversations like this with you that lets me do the
work that I find impactful, and I'm excited about where
(52:10):
that goes.
Emily Tisch Sussman (52:11):
Do you think you'll pivot again?
Sime Gandhi (52:13):
I feel like, yes, I think that I don't know
where this journey is going, and I think what I
am more open to now are that pivots are natural
and that they'll work out. They feel scary, and I'm
much more open to those than I used to be.
I think before it felt like a ladder, right you
(52:35):
kind of have to climb it, and there's judgments made
on what's a vertical move and what's a lateral move.
And I've become much more accepting of the more holistic
nature of our lives and the ability to have really
impactful careers that aren't just driven by titles. Like I
used to think. I'm like, oh, sim don't talk that way.
(52:56):
That's not You're just sound like a loser. Just go
in for it, right, Like that was really the voice
inside of my head. And I think in some ways
that's so limiting, right, And I look at some of
my peers now and I feel like I've become a
little bit of a go take that risk, Go start
that law firm by yourself. Sure, are you living the
big name thing and you want to go do this
(53:16):
special type of practice and it's just going to be
you and nobody's going to understand it for five years.
But that's okay, right, find the joy and do impactful
work and don't focus so much on the hamster wheel product.
And I hope that that leads to a more joyful
and impactful career and all of that stuff will solve
for itself. But it is a scary prospect. And again,
(53:38):
I wouldn't have appreciated this pivot for what it is,
and I don't think i'd be as open to other
more quote unquote unconventional pivots had it not been for
what I did over the last year. And my hope
is that as more and more women take pivots and
do these things that are unconventional, it becomes a lot
more accepted versus feeling like we have to be trapped
(54:02):
right or on a certain type of career trajectory in
order to exert seniority.
Emily Tisch Sussman (54:09):
Seema, thank you so much. It's an incredible conversation.
Sime Gandhi (54:13):
Emily, thank you so much for having me. It's so
great to see you again. It's crazy to think that
we work together what fifteen years ago, and here we
are today. I really appreciate you taking the time to
hear the story and to have me.
Emily Tisch Sussman (54:29):
Sema now lives back on the East Coast with her
husband and son. Well, she may not have a clean
title like we all want to have, she's found peace
in her pivot. Sema doesn't have an Instagram, so follow
us to stay up to date with Sema on her
latest and her future book, Talk to you next week.
Thanks for listening to this episode of she Pivots. I
(54:51):
hope you enjoyed it, and if you did, leave us
a rating and tell your friends about us. To learn
more about our guests, follow us on Instagram she pivots
the Podcast, or sign up for our newsletter where you
can get exclusive behind the scenes content on our website
at she pivots thepodcast dot com. This episode was produced
(55:14):
and edited by Emily at Avelosk, with sound editing and
mixing from Nina Pollock. Audio production and social media by
Hannah Cousins, research by Christine Dickinson, and logistics and planning
by Emma Stopic and Kendall Krupkin. She Pivots is proud
to be a part of the iHeart Podcast Network. I
endorse t Pivots
Welcome back to She Pivots. I'm Sema Gandhi.
Emily Tisch Sussman (00:13):
Welcome back to She Pivots, the podcast where we talk
with women who dare to pivot out of one career
and into something new and explore how their personal lives
impacts these decisions. I'm your host Emily Tish Sussman. Today,
(00:33):
I'm truly honored to welcome Sema Gandhi, who is here
today to share her story publicly. For the first time.
I met Sema in my pre pivot days working on
policy in DC. It feels like a lifetime has passed,
and in some ways it has. Since then, Seema has
not only made professional pivots, but deeply personal ones, and
that's what we're going to explore today. By all accounts,
(00:56):
Sema has what many would consider alife with all the
right titles andiances. She's a stand for graduate, a lawyer,
an early stage leader at the wildly successful tech company Plaid,
a wife, mother, and founder and CEO of her own company.
But behind it all, Sema was privately struggling with her
relationship with her family. Growing up, she constantly felt like
(01:20):
she had to walk on eggshells. The smallest misstep would
result in explosive fights and manipulative behavior using her as
a pawn was a constant. You'll hear how much she
struggled with this, the confusion and guilt she carried, constantly
questioning if it was her that was misinterpreting, was it
her fault? She tried for years to maintain a healthy
(01:40):
relationship with them, even after she and her husband moved
back to live near her parents. Sema worked hard to
create clear boundaries for herself and her young baby, but
at the height of her career, while she was leading
Plaid through a major exit, her mother filed a lawsuit
against both Sema and her father. It was a devastating
and grueling experience that dragged on for years. And here's
(02:04):
the thing. Estrangement is not something we often talk about openly.
We hear about divorce, about friendships falling apart, but family
estrangement still carries a heavy stigma, even though research shows
that one in four Americans is a strange from a parent.
It's the silence that makes the experience even more isolating
for those living it. When I started the show, I
(02:26):
wanted to highlight stories that change the perception of professional
success to include our personal experiences, and SEMA's story is
exactly that that, no matter the professional highs we may reach,
the reality is that our personal lives are, without question,
part of the larger picture. I'm so grateful to Seema
for being so vulnerable and sharing her story with us.
(02:48):
So without further ado, welcome Seema.
Sime Gandhi (02:54):
My name is Sema Bondi and right now I do
a lot of different entrepreneurial type and there's no easy
answer to describe that which we'll talk about today.
Emily Tisch Sussman (03:04):
Perfect answer, perfect, Okay, great, So let's back up. We're
going to go in chronological order, as you know, so
we're going to back up. Where did you grow up?
Can you tell us about your childhood? Can tell us
about your family?
Sime Gandhi (03:15):
So I grew up in California. I grew up in
California a long time ago before I think California is
what it is today. And I say that because California
was a little bit of a weird place when I
grew up there, a little bit more offbeat culture, a
little bit more free willing. You know, my background is
India and my parents are from India. And today when
(03:37):
you look at California, especially in the Bay Area, which
is where I went to high school, you think of
a lot of Indian people there, and that wasn't necessarily
the case when we grew up. It was still pre Google.
There were orchards down the street smoke weed. But I
think the more I think, I said, the older I get,
the more appreciate how much our childhoods and our family
(03:58):
dynamics affect who we are as people. And so in
that spirit, I think as I reflect upon my childhood,
there are universal traits around growing up. Like I think
all children want the love and affection of the parents,
and I think in immigrant families my parents were immigrants
from India coming here, there's also you know, you grew
up with a sense of obligation, like we came here
(04:20):
to this country sacrifice for you so that you can
have a better life, and so you have to pay
us back by doing well in school and you get
a's and you go to a good school and you
be successful because we sacrifice that you could go do that.
And that was very much kind of a cultural conditioning
of growing up. I'm a little wary of kind of
(04:42):
talking about these things through a cultural or immigrant lens,
because I think some of my American multi generational family,
kids would say, well, my parents expected us to have
a's too, And so I don't mean to alienate that
dynamic as specifically immigrant, but I do think that there's
something a little different about having immigrant parents who are
(05:03):
also themselves trying to acclimate to a new culture and
the financial uncertainty, where maybe their definitions are a bit
more narrow and the pressure is more acute, and so
some of these come out in a more exaggerated dynamic.
And on top of that, in my family, there was
also a bit of mental illness which was undiagnosed for many,
(05:25):
many years. And again today versus the conversations happening thirty
years ago, it's very different. I think today something on
the order of one in five children are in some
type of medication. We talk about anxiety, we talk about
therapy quite fluidly, and that was not the case when
I was growing up, and in particular in our cultural
context of a family member of ours was institutionalized. I
(05:47):
remember going to see him and in a true institution,
and our family shut down, our nuclear family shut down,
and we didn't have a community to lean on that
or talk about that and understand what all of that meant,
and so I think how all of that kind of
translated into is when I look back, I think we
all want to be from happy families, and we all
(06:08):
want to think that our families are the Norman Rockwell
pictures where you know, we sit around and we celebrate
Christmas and remember the really good things. But I also
think that there were really hard things that for a
lot of years I glossed over or repressed. And I
think that, you know, our family is what we know,
and it's what we want to work. And there's that
Leon Tolstoy quote, I love all happy families are alike,
(06:30):
and each happy, each family is unhappy in its own way.
And we were very much struggling through some things as
we grew up. But you know, I think that's that's
partly what shaped me and made me who I am today.
Emily Tisch Sussman (06:42):
You've alluded to it, but are you comfortable being more
specific about what some of these behaviors were from your family,
like how the mental illness manifested itself.
Sime Gandhi (06:52):
Yeah, I have to admit it's hard, because it's so
hard for me. Don't know what sounds weird or what
sounds kind of helps people understand what that's like. If
that makes any sense. So there's you know, it's like
sometimes I'm like, oh, my mom called me a spoil
bit because I got into Stanford. I went to Stanford,
and that some people are like, oh my god, and
other people are like, okay, well, so it's hard for
(07:13):
me to really know. But there's an example where and
I look back now and I see the story through
such different eyes. But culturally again, and girls tend to
have longer hair, and that's tend to be seen as
very pretty. And I had longer hair and I did
ballet because that was very feminine, and my mom, well,
I didn't want long hair. I wanted short hair. And
maybe again this is me trying to exert my power
(07:34):
and defy stereotypes. And my dad was really adamant, like
I needed to have the long hair, and so my
mom took me to get my haircut and I was stoked,
like I got my haircut, this is what I wanted.
And my dad didn't talk to me for a week.
And it was a huge fight, huge fight at home,
the screaming, the yelling, you know, all of that, and
(07:57):
didn't I didn't really understand it at the time, but
now I under stand that was a power play, right,
like she was using us to hurt him. And it's again,
it's a stupid thing. It's a haircut, and it could
have been easily resolved through a conversation. But that's not
what we grew up with. We grew up with things
that were intended to hurt other people. She helped me
(08:17):
secretly quit ballet so that I could get at she
could get at my dad. Right. There were things like
my dad and I like to go on walks and
at some point we had we would have to sneak
out in the morning because other I she'd scream at
us for going out because she didn't want us to
be out of the house and she resented that time together.
I don't know what it was. It was a controlling thing.
(08:37):
And so in my family was always like rocking on eggshells, right,
You just never knew what could set somebody off, and
if they be set off, there's no reasoning about it.
It's just a full on screaming and it's even hard
to describe it physically. It's like you're screaming so hard
that your blood is pulsing throughout your body and your
head feels like it's going to explode, and it's this
(08:58):
whole physical sperience and it's hard, like you can't you
can't be who you are and have needs and talk
about it like you would around a normal dinner table.
I think these things are you know again, they seem small,
so it's hard to really articulate. It's like, for example,
you know, my sixteenth birthday, let's go after dinner. Where
do you want to go? Seema? I want to go
(09:18):
to this Italian restaurant. She's like, well, I want to
do Chinese? What do you do? Right? And so there's
a fight, and you know, my dad's steps in. He's like,
well it's her birthday, let's do Italian. So we do Italian.
But was out of fun dinner now right, And so
it's like these things that just rob you of joy,
of feeling loved, of feeling supported, because it's not about you,
(09:40):
and it's just it's a child of that. And I
you know, I say this with humility in some ways,
because we had food on a table, right, Like my
parents were present. You know, I was not abused physically
like and I know so many people have so much
more that they've had to deal with or didn't grow
up in a war zone. We had a pretty good
life from the but I think some of that emotional
(10:02):
nourishment and love and support that I'm sure all of
us wanted to give our kids, it was just not
something that was on our table.
Emily Tisch Sussman (10:10):
It sounds like maybe she was very explosive when you
didn't abide exactly the way that she wanted you to.
Sime Gandhi (10:17):
That's right, But it was also explosive when things were happening, right.
So I remember growing up, my dad would always as
a family, we try to go out for dinner one
night a week and go see a movie, like we'd
go to the Dollar theater. It was super exciting, right,
And again something I don't think I fully appreciated until
I became a mother. It was just the power dynamics
(10:39):
at play in our home. And I like to say
that one of the causes of evil in the world
are children who were not loved enough as when they
were when they were children. And I think my mom
had her own rough childhood, and again that's a whole story.
But when there were opportunities to exert power, she used them.
And so there were many times when we'd be ready
(10:59):
to go and she'd just be in bed and scream
at us. Right, It wasn't even an expectation of behavior
with her moment to be coddled and controlled and like,
come on, mom, please come with us, Like let's go out.
If we love you, we want you to come. And
you know, just the way she would scream the us
or treat us. And I now can't imagine doing that
(11:20):
to my own child, right, like to strip them of
that stability and security and instead use them as a
tool to manipulate. And you know, I think that was
a threat I saw throughout our childhood. But at the
end of the day, I think part of why cycles
of trauma are perpetuated is because I think there's a
very elemental desire to have parents in your life, to
(11:41):
think of yourself as being part of a unit. And so,
you know, it's quite sad, but you see children of
abused situations that still love their parents, right, and they
want to be part of that unit. And there's also
again this cultural context, Right, I grew up in this context.
Let us thicker than water. Families that stick together grow together,
and that is just the unit. And so it doesn't
(12:02):
even kind of cross my mind to think about estrangement
or separating yourself from your family or creating deliberate boundaries.
I didn't have those toolkits.
Emily Tisch Sussman (12:14):
Did you have thoughts or dreams about what a grown
up life would look like like When people ask the
question of kids, what do you want to be when
you grew up? Did you think about it?
Sime Gandhi (12:24):
Or you just It was hard in this cultural context too,
because you know, on the one hand, my dad was
a massive advocate for me, but on the other hand,
in our cultural context, women needed to smile and be supportive.
And I think that's true beyond my cultural context too,
and a lot of women. Again, this goes back to
the point made earlier, where I think a lot of women,
(12:46):
multi generation American women would feel this way, but maybe
more acutely in this cultural context. And I looked up
that the women, you know, the aunties that we grew
up with, I didn't really see strong role models. They
were always described as crazy or too emotion and so
it was almost like I needed to alienate myself from
that image because that wasn't successful. And you know, we're
about the same age growing up, you know, women, there
(13:08):
weren't a lot of female CEOs. I remember when Carly
Fiorina became CEO if you would Packard, and I was like, wow,
that's amazing, right, And she made it there from being
secretary all the way to CEO. And you know, Hillary
Clinton was this paradigm of a strong woman. She got
crucified in the media for a lot of reasons, but
I think she was also one of the first to
(13:29):
stand on her own as a strong, smart woman. And
so I really struggled to find women that I could
relate to, and I think the one that I really
did relate to was Claire Huxble. And I know the
Cosby Show has its baggage now, but I really do
love that show and it still makes me laugh out loud.
But she was She was strong, she was funny, she
had an amazing career, She didn't take anyone's crap right,
(13:53):
and she was articulate and in a lot of ways,
she was what I wanted to be. And that's a
model that I really clutched onto throughout my childhood.
Emily Tisch Sussman (14:03):
Did you choose Stanford because it was close? Did you
think about other schools? Like you were kind of staying
close to home for college when that could have been
the first opportunity to move away.
Sime Gandhi (14:13):
Honestly, I struggled with that decision, and I recognized it's
the decision of privilege. I loved Stanford. I loved the campus,
I loved the diversity. But the challenge for me was
that I was so close to home, and I was
afraid of being so close to home because here I
was trying to get out and have independence. And so
I remember really talking to my parents saying, this is
(14:35):
you can't just you have to pretend I'm far away.
You can't just show up, and you know, there's got
to be a line. And actually, my sophomore year, my
mom showed up to my dorm room and she'd made
some of my favorite foods. And on the surface level,
you'd think, oh, my gosh, that's so sweet she showed
up and she brought some some food. But on another level,
(14:56):
it so scared me because I felt like my boundary
was being violated, Like this was supposed to be my world,
and I'd made very clear that I didn't want anyone
showing up just like that, and here she was in
my dorm room, standing outside my door, with expectations of
me welcome and being her and making time for her.
And this was supposed to be my life, and I
(15:17):
really struggled with that because on the one hand, you know,
I felt like I was being selfish by not dropping
everything and being there for her. But on the other hand,
I now have the language to say that was a
self care moment where I had created boundaries to help
protect this life that I was trying to build for
myself and figure out who I was outside of the home.
And that was a very drawing experience. So I love
(15:39):
my time at Stanford. I think it helped me become
who I am. It showed me a whole different world
that I had no idea could exist. And ultimately I
decided to apply to law schools. As we mentioned, Claire
Huxtables my role model, and I only applied to schools
on the East Coast because I knew deep down that
if I didn't leave California probably never leave.
Emily Tisch Sussman (16:03):
After the break, Seema talks about how she tried to
establish distance and boundaries with her parents and what eventually
came of it all. Before the break, Seema had just
left California to go expand her horizons and create some
(16:25):
distance with her family.
Sime Gandhi (16:28):
And I wanted to go try something new and I
think again create some geographical distance, and so I ended
up in New York for law school. I loved it.
I loved New York. I loved the energy. I felt
like when I was in New York, I was plugged
into this electrical grid and everybody was running and there
was so much to learn and see, and the cultural
experience and the fashion and the food, and you could
(16:50):
express yourself in so many different ways because there were
all these people and it was amazing, and I candidly
thought I'd be in New York forever, Like I never
really felt the need to go back to California. And
it was also a lot easier to maintain this balance
between wanting to still have a family that was my
close family, and I could fly back for holidays and
(17:11):
start myself and then be out in two days. And
it was a really easy way to create the right
type of boundaries for me that let me live my
life but also let me jump back into my family
in a way that felt like I could belong and
have a loving unit.
Emily Tisch Sussman (17:25):
Yeah, and when you went back home, what was the
relationship like, Like, was there was there a jump back
into the old behaviors that were really hard for you,
Like into those old patterns or did you feel like
everyone in your mom in particular, I guess, was kind
of on their best behavior to have you there.
Sime Gandhi (17:43):
It was a mix, and I think again these universal
trades we've all probably felt this moment back in our
family's homes, were acting like children again, right, and it's like, Ah,
I'm this other person outside of the house. Why is
it then when I revert back to home all of
a sudden in order to be I feel like I
have to scream at the top of my lungs, like
I don't want to be that person. And again, I
(18:05):
don't know that I fully internalized just how toxic some
of these behaviors were, or maybe how related to mental
illness they were as well, But yeah, it was. It
was definitely difficult to be back at home, especially for
an extended period of time. And I think there was
some part of me that wanted us to all be
in our best behavior, right when you get off the
(18:25):
plane and you're waiting to be picked up, to be
picked up with joy and have that happy couple of days.
But there was another part of me that understood that
probably wasn't always going to be the case, and let
myself not get too excited because I didn't want to
be so disappointed. I knew that it was I was
not the priority, and that was always clear because again,
(18:46):
the folks with the mental illness needed the care and
the unpredictability of their emotional stability took precedence over a
visit with me, and so that was kind of the condition, right.
I could come back home and we could do our thing.
And I knew my parents we try to carve out
what they could in their own way, and to me,
that was just what that was just the deal. And
(19:06):
I remember when I met my husband and he asked
my dad for permission right to marry his daughter. My
dad said to him, well, you know, she has a temper,
and my husband, my now husband, said well, that's not
really the way these conversations are supposed to work. You're
just to make sure I'm good enough for your daughter.
But the irony of that was my parents. My family
(19:28):
unit has seen one side of me, the side of
me that I needed to manifest in order to survive
in that household. And I'm not someone who I think
would back away from a fight. But I'm also not
someone who screams at the top of my lungs, it's
not who I am. Sometimes, depending on the circumstances, we
have to flex certain behaviors in order to survive, and
(19:49):
so I tried to shed a lot of those during
those bits as home, and I think it became harder
and harder to fall back into those patterns or kind
of feel like I belonged, especially after I got married.
It would make those vis with my husband when that
became something that I really had to grapple with and
deliberately think about creating more boundaries around.
Emily Tisch Sussman (20:07):
Well, So you had found separation by going to law
school on the East coast, being on the East coast,
being in New York, but then you were eventually offered
a position as one of the first fifteen employees that PLAID,
which was back on the West Coast, near your family.
So what was that decision process like for you.
Sime Gandhi (20:25):
I was really excited about joining PLAID. I thought the
team was fantastic. I thought that problems that was interesting.
It let me leverage my time in government, It let
me leverage my technical background, it let me leverage my
experience in the financial sector, and from a career perspective,
the opportunity to be able to add value so quickly
right off the bat felt really exciting, but the fact
(20:46):
that I was in California within an hour of my
family was scary. And I remember making a list with
my husband pros and cons versus another opportunity I had
in New York where we could stay in New York,
and the pros and cons of going back out to California,
And on the con section of the plat off or
was proximity to family, and we had a real conversation
around boundaries, like do we think we can maintain our
(21:09):
boundaries with my family, Like how are we going to
prevent them from just showing up and bringing this baggage?
And again, I want to be clear, I love my family.
It's not like I was excited to go be a
strange from them. But I also was afraid of just
the black hole of toxicity. Like I escaped, I gotten out,
and I didn't want to be pulled back in. And
(21:30):
I struggle a lot with this idea of selfish versus
self care, and in a lot of ways, those are
two sides at the same coin. And I wanted to
be there for them and be able to engage, but
I was afraid of being seen as selfish by them
right or spoiled where I don't want to partake in
some of that behavior that I thought was toxic, And
ultimately we decided that we could do it. I have
to admit having my husband there by my side made
(21:52):
me feel like it was more doable. It was a
little bit of a moral compass and a pillar of stability.
But I also feel protective of that life that he
and I had built, right, like to come from an
unhappy family where I didn't really have a strong model
for what healthy relationship looks like. Again, I love the
dynamic between Claire and Bill Cosby. Again, I know there
(22:13):
are a lot of copy oats there with that show,
but that was that interplay, that marottery, that partnership. And
then I wanted to protect my family, my relationship. I've
heard hard to grow myself right, to grow out of
my toxic behaviors, to build healthy relationships with people, and
I wanted to protect my marriage, and I was I
was afraid. I was afraid of being pulled in and
what that might mean for us, And so he and
(22:34):
I had those conversations. I spoke to a therapist. That's
when I learned of the concept of deliberate boundaries, where
boundaries don't have to be raised with anger, right like
a fortress, but they can be loving, like loving boundaries like, look,
you know, Emily, I kind of need tonight for myself,
so I really appreciate the invitation. Let's reschedule and I'll
get back to you on a time that worked better
(22:54):
for us. That's a boundary that's a way of saying no,
but it's done out of love, out of self care,
not to push you away. And so that's a muscle
that I really tried to flex, where we really try
to include them in our lives in a way that
made sense on our terms, for just being sucked into
theirs on their terms.
Emily Tisch Sussman (23:12):
And around the same time you had your son, so
I'm sure that as you were trying to create these
boundaries it impacted the way you approached parenting.
Sime Gandhi (23:23):
Yeah. I mean, first, even the idea or the decision
to have a child was challenging. When my husband and
I met, both of us were on the fence, something
we discussed but neither of us really felt strongly about.
And as we grew older, and I guess the biological
clock started ticking, I decided I really wanted a child,
and I think part of it was a reaction to, honestly,
(23:47):
my own relationship with my mom. I wanted to break
the cycle. It was something that I needed to do
for myself, like I wanted to be I had a
lot of love to give and I wanted to be
able to do it in a way that maybe I
would have wanted to have it. And so, but my husband,
while I grew increasingly, pro grew increasing thing like con
and so that was its own challenge And how do
(24:09):
I express vulnerability around this is something that I need?
And that was something that was really hard for me
to say, even though I know you don't want it,
would you do this for me because you love me?
And it seems so easy to say right now, but
I swear to a year and a half of therapy
and a lot of conversations. Right, but we're business people, right.
I put together a PowerPoint deck. I was like, these
(24:29):
are all of the reasons, like your life quality will
be sustained and all of the ways we can supplement
with care and you know the task division And he's like,
I don't need a PowerPoint deck, Like I just need
you to ask me to do it. For you. And
so anyway we got through that, we had a child,
and I mean that first child that year first is
(24:51):
just hormonally crazy. Work was busy and I was super
engaged there and I was also trying to figure this out,
but like being a mo and what that relationship meant
to my child, And I remember really wanting to feel
or create a home that didn't have the stress, that
didn't have the screaming, where it was love. And I
have to say my mother in law was a phenomenal example.
(25:13):
And I think I can't underscore just examples and role
models in life because it's so hard to figure out
this out. But I remember something that she said to
me that really resonated. Every time she came over, she'd
leap at the chance of wiping a diaper. Everyone that
has kids and just listening to the snows, like that
first year, there are a lot of diapers to change,
and she would jump, I got this diaper, And it
(25:34):
really changed my framing of it because from her perspective,
You've got two minutes of unadulterated attention from this kid,
and that's going to go quickly. We all know these
kids grow so fast and even after she left. When
I looked at it that way, not just as a
chore to get done and move on to the next thing,
but as a moment where we could play and chat
(25:55):
and do that process, it really changed it. It wasn't
unlock and I I kind of really understood that what
it means to enjoy your child versus seeing them as
obligations or burdens, which is how we kind of grew
up feeling. And when it came to boundaries, you know,
one of my boundaries was I didn't want to leave
(26:15):
him alone with her, and I think on some levels
she probably picked up on that. That wasn't an explicit one.
It was an implicit one, but I was afraid of
what that interaction would look like. And so there were
definite boundaries that were set up along the way.
Emily Tisch Sussman (26:32):
Sima was running a multimillion dollar company that was poised
to sell for over five billion, yes billion. She was
a young mother, executive and simply put a human just
trying to get through it all. When we come back,
she talks us through the gruelly year that changed everything.
(27:07):
So you had some major career highs at the same
time that you were having really big personal lows. So
can you walk us through that twenty nineteen year when
Plaids sold and things really imploded with your parents.
Sime Gandhi (27:22):
Yeah, Plaid wasn't an emotion, like just an amazing career experience.
We added a billion dollars of valuation every year while
I was there, and I led the sale to Visa,
which to do a deal, a deal at that magnitude
was just it was an incredible experience. And you know,
my team was growing, the company was growing. There was,
(27:43):
as you said, just a lot of positive success on
the horizon over Plaid. And I remember this moment acutely
where my team was about to go present and in
all hands on the amazing work they were doing. I
was running all of our bank relationships in our global
policy and I got a call on my phone and
it was anonymous number and I picked it up and
(28:04):
it was a collect call from a jail and it
was my dad and something had happened and my mom
had called the police, and I just got that pit
in my stomach where I'd escaped from this and here
I was, like, my team's about to go do this thing.
I'm you know, supposed to be doing this career thing.
And some things sucked back in. I felt myself falling
into that black hole, and I had to leave work
(28:27):
and I got in my car and I went to
go deal with all of that, and I had to
go build my dad out and all of this. In
the meanwhile, that pit is growing, and you know, things
kind of cascaded from there, and I had to put
on some of that old shield that I developed. My
dad ended up moving in with us, my mom filed
for divorce, and I started compartmentalizing again all of those challenges.
(28:49):
We're trying to focus on my career, and during that
time producing thereafter, I ended up leaving Plaid and starting
my own company. So we raised twenty million dollars. We
started a fintech company focused on creators. You're a creator, Emily,
and it was amazing. I learned so much about the
creator industry and the financial underpinnings of that, and I
(29:11):
compartmentalized all of that stuff that was happening on the
personal side of my family so I could focus on
growing this company. And in twenty twenty two, sorry twenty
twenty one, got a knock on our door and this
man my husband actually answered the door service papers and
my mom suit us she'd suit us, and the feeling,
(29:34):
the shock, the devastation, I mean, without even a conversation
to go sue your own kid and make such heinous
accusations around fraud, and I mean, you name it duress.
And you know, just I knew things were ugly between
my parents, but all of a sudden, that compartment that
I built to separate all of the nastiness that was
happening then from my own life started eroding and I
(29:56):
felt just emotionally sucked into this. And for anyone that's
been through reallyation, it's awful. You spend a lot of
money on lawyers, it's super negative energy, it's a ton
of paperwork, it's emotionally got wrenching, let alone when it's
from your own mother. And then she showed us again.
A year later, my son opened the door and the
(30:17):
guy looked at us and yeah, I remember him serving
us papers and looking at me and saying I'm sorry.
And so now we were fighting litigation in both New
York State and in California. And you know, starting your
own company first of all, running a team, even at
plaid like is a lot of emotional energy. You're supporting
people emotionally and I think that part is not often
spoken about. I think for good people managers, you really
(30:39):
do have to be emotionally present for your team, because
it's not always just about the work needs. It's also
about making sure that they're growing as people and feeling
supported career wise. And I just felt my emotional resilience emptying.
And this is supposed to be the high right, just
got this amazing moment plaid started my own company and
this really interesting, amazing space, and here I was just
(31:04):
feeling sucked dry emotionally and in a way, I thought
I'd learned how to cope.
Emily Tisch Sussman (31:11):
With As your dad was living with you through this,
he must have also been going through his own journey
of being able to realize what he had lived through
being able to separate. Was that did that weigh on
you as well?
Sime Gandhi (31:27):
Yes, there was a lot of emotional sadness and energy there,
but I compartmentalized it and I put that to the
side and I focused on my career because that's what
I knew how to do. And it wasn't until I
got directly sucked in that I realized I couldn't compartmentalize anymore,
and that all of these things that I had done
(31:49):
in my younger life to survive, and that set me
up for success in Silicon Valley. Right, thick skin, Just
keep moving forward, deliver outcomes, keep your eye on the ball,
don't get distracted by emotional talk.
Emily Tisch Sussman (32:01):
Just just go right.
Sime Gandhi (32:02):
Started coming home a roost, and I couldn't compartmentalize anymore
because now I was part of this negative, negative vortex,
and I was dealing with the lawyers, and now I'm
dealing with litigation in two places. And yeah, his continued
see him suffering so much, and his inability to be
resilient from that affected me deeply. And then I did.
(32:25):
I did the thing that type a people do. I said, well,
I'm smart, I'm a lawyer. I can solve this. And
so I was joining his weekly calls with lawyers. I
was looking at the motions I was jumping in, and
I figured, if we just spent a year with all
of this energy on this thing and focused on him,
that I'm going to be able to solve this problem too.
And I can do that, and I can run this company,
(32:46):
and I can be at home and be a wife
and a mother, and you know, not surprising, only that
didn't go the way I thought it would go and
I hit a point where my husband at one point
joked where he said, you know, thirty percent of our
life right now is our conversation asians start exchanging anxiety.
Thirty percent is you know, talking logistics about our son,
thirty percent is exchanging founder anxiety, and ten percent is
(33:08):
maybe budging out watching TV. And it just degraded, and
I felt like I wasn't the mom I wanted to
be talk about cycles, and I just felt like I
was not emotionally present. I felt like I was being
suck dry on so many different fronts. And at one
point my husband said to me, like, how long are
we going to keep living like this? And you have
(33:29):
to remember this is now four years into the divorce litigation,
it's all off in two years into meeting Soup. I'm
still these both active cases still, as anyone who's been
through litigation or acrimonious litigation knows, it takes a long time.
And that was a real low point, which is, oh
my goodness, all of the things that I really prioritized
and I worked so hard to build, like a loving family,
(33:51):
a loving relationship with my husband, like this beautiful relationship
with my son, I'm underminding it all because I'm being
sucked into this vortex my family and I'm also trying
to do this company. But these are all the things
that I should be able to do. And that was
a real low point.
Emily Tisch Sussman (34:08):
How did your perspective change as a result of that
low point? And then what did you do about it?
Sime Gandhi (34:15):
I decided to prioritize what was important to me. That
was my family, right, my husband and my son, And
I think for me, professional women, we kind of define
a part of ourselves by how a career success is unfold.
It was really hard to say that maybe being CEO
of this company isn't the best thing for me right now,
(34:37):
and to even contemplate in my mind, I was like,
oh my gosh, am I giving up on this company?
Am I quitting this company? My failing people? Right? I
had female investors and that meant so much to me
because I want to perpetuate female founders and female investors.
And you know at a certain point, though, that you
can't carry the weight of the world on your back, right,
(34:58):
And maybe we put too much pressure on ourselves in
that way. And it was really a calculus where I
think everyone goes through stuff in their lives, and it's
harder for women to take pauses I'm putting that in
air quotes, or to deviate off the more commonly traveled path.
But in some ways I felt like I didn't have
(35:18):
a choice because I couldn't really be the CEO that
I wanted to be and also maintain my personal life.
And I needed to just start getting things off my
plate that weren't giving me energy because I needed to
recover and focus on being me again. And so you know,
I started thinking about ways to manage the business, and
(35:39):
we ended up selling the business, which was amazing, and
our investors were incredibly supportive through that process. But that
was hard. That was a hard conversation to have, right
because I felt like I was not living up to
the expectations of a founder that is all in and
doing what they're supposed to do to make that company
a massive success. And I started investing in myself through
(36:01):
therapy and running and trying to let go of my
anger and really process what had happened between me and
my mom and letting go of these concepts of guilt
and selfishness that I think I'd carried around for a
long time, and understanding that. You know, I think sometimes
as women, we put a lot of these burdens on
care on ourselves. Like I think the reality is reality.
(36:23):
Women tend to be caretakers more in the mails today
at least. And I had to let go of those
things that it wasn't my responsibility. And I know that
sounds simple. It's like, obviously that's not your fault, ear
Walm suit you, But you know, there was a lot
of oh my gosh, what I do to cause this right?
And I think this go back to the earlier parts
of the conversation. We're living with folks that have meant
(36:44):
to Illness can be so hard because it can also
be so manipulative and so passive, aggressive in ways that
aren't so easy to articulate or pinpoint. And these lines
can be so gray, and for a lot of years,
until she sued me, it was gray, and I still
wanted her in my life, I still wanted our family,
and so realizing that I didn't really have a choice
(37:05):
at that point and letting that go, letting the notions
of having a mother go, it's really hard. And I
think anyone who's lost a parent might relate on some
level the grief of letting that go. But for me
it was a little bit different because she wasn't dead,
she was alive. She made a choice and I felt
so alone through that process. And yet one in four
(37:25):
Americans are estranged from a close family member, but we
don't talk about it with the same precision or openness
as we do grief, right or mental illness even and
estrangement is really hard and it's isolating, and I need
to figure that out for myself as well.
Emily Tisch Sussman (37:43):
After Sima left Blaed, she took a pause, but only
a brief one. That same year, she launched her own company,
Creative Juice, which was designed to give individual creators the
tools and support needed to reach their full potential. But
the ongoing lawsuit with her mother and the pressures of
wanting to be present with her own family all became
too much, and she made the tough choice to step away.
(38:24):
When you were deciding to prioritize your personal and step
away and then eventually sell Creative Juice, did you have
an external narrative around it, like for your board, for
your investors, where you're saying, oh, you know, I'm going
to sell because I think this is the right time
in the market or how much transparency did you give
that it was for personal reasons with two of.
Sime Gandhi (38:46):
My board members, one board member, one board advisor. I
feel very fortunate that I could have an open conversation
with them and explain to them what was really going on.
It was at the point where I couldn't even talk
about it without crying. I was just so gutted, especially
in the second time getting sued. You think you come
to terms the first time, and then it happens again.
It's like I just recover from this, and you just
(39:06):
threw me another punch, and the punch is just felt
like they kept on coming. And part of it was
I wasn't able to emotionally like go of her and
that relationship and this idea of my mother doing this
to me. And I think that's part of the process
of estrangement, which can mean so many different things, But
to me, it was kind of letting go of that
emotional connection. But at that point when I was having
(39:29):
the conversations with my board, it was a real conversation,
and I can't underscore how much it meant to have
that support and that understanding and for them to see
what was happening and appreciate that I couldn't be the
CEO that I wanted to be, But at the same time,
with others outside of that close knit circle, I did
feel they need to have an external narrative. I wasn't
(39:51):
ready at the time to say, well, my mom sued
me two times and so I need to go take
her myself. I felt like a big bomb to drop
on the people, and it wasn't an answer that I
felt like I could give appropriately. And so, you know,
we were fortunate that Juice was in a healthy position
and the creator economy was hot, and we found a
(40:11):
great place for it to be, and so that was,
you know, a pretty straightforward story to understand. But there
are a lot of people that didn't understand why I'd
want to sell. The story I would say was, you know,
the business wasn't a healthy enough place where we were fortunate,
we had a great offer, and I decided that it
was the best thing for the business, and that was
(40:33):
the story. And a lot of people would leave it
at that say congrat it's awesome, and it was always like,
what are you going to do next? And you know,
I think for me, the answer I would just give us. Look,
I'm focused on the integration and wrapping that up and
I just need to take a breather. And that was
fine for most people, but they'd say, what are you
starting your X company? Let us know, right, And it
was just so interesting. There's always that expectation of what
(40:54):
are you doing next, which I had to also let
go of, and you know, writing a book and say
I'm going to go write a book that felt almost
frivolous to me. Right, It's like, what about my career,
my actual career, What am I going to do that's
actually something real like And it's just letting go of
these preconceived notions. Is still a work in progress, but
I think for I'm honestly just excited about where the
(41:18):
path takes me from here. And it's not a clear one,
but my hope is that it will help me or
that I can find meaning and satisfaction in the things
that I feel really passionately about. And also I still
have a little bit of an entrepreneurial spirit and I
don't know how it's going to manifest itself, but being
open to manifesting in different ways and trusting not to
sound too spiritual, but trusting the universe to manifest that
(41:41):
energy in a good way while I put out good
energy and live my life is something that has taken
me time to trust. But you know, I'm trying to trust.
Emily Tisch Sussman (41:50):
Were you able to find any community in people who
had gone through something similar or did you find it
somewhere else.
Sime Gandhi (41:59):
So one of the things I started doing after I
sold Joe was I started writing a book. It was
also I felt a calling to tell this story. I
felt like this crazy thing had happen to me. And
I think realizing that I needed to let go of
the traditional career pillars of success like writing my company
and doing all this and taking the time for myself
to explore this book, and these processes helped me articulate
(42:22):
these feelings of estrangement and these emotions in a way
that I didn't I couldn't do before. And I have
to say when I started telling people about the book,
and I think sometimes even now, I'm still trying to
figure this out. I think, you know, and a lot
of times we want these clean arcs of a story,
like oh, okay, and then you reach the slow point
and then it's up and everything's like wrapped in a
(42:42):
bow and solved, and the reality is I'm still figuring
out every day things happen, and I'm still trying to
be resilient and move forward. And sometimes when I tell
people I'm writing a book on estrangement, honestly, I'm not
sure what to expect. I feel shamed sometimes because I
grew up in this context, and I think a lot
of us share of strong or place a strong premium
on famie values like families, and we take care of
(43:03):
her families. And so when I say I'm a strange
from my mom, largely my brother like, it's like, oh,
what'd you do? What's wrong with you? Why do you
alienate your family? But I have to say in the
last couple of months is kind of as I've started
talking more about this, even at random cocktail parties and
trying to become more comfortable about talking about the subject,
I've been shocked by how many people have said to me,
(43:27):
did you know I'm a strange with X? In a
way that I just I would not have expected. And
just a couple of weeks ago, I was at a
cocktail party in DC, and again, this is a professional
cocktail party. You're not working, you're talking, and there's this
woman and I end up chatting with her a little bit.
She said, what are you up to? And you know
(43:48):
my answer is not clean cut. Right now, I advise companies,
I starting this coalition thing, and I'm writing a book
and it's not a clean answer with a clean title
at a company. And she said, oh, like, what's the
book about? And I told her and she said again,
this is like your archetype of a very professional woe
with the perfect blow dried hair and the right title
and the right company. She said, you know, I'm a
(44:10):
strange for my father, and let me tell you why.
And we had a twenty minute conversation at this professional context,
and it's just really struck me how much this is
a part of so many people's lives. And I'm still
struggling to figure out how to talk about it in
a way that doesn't feel sheepish. But I think the
power in that story is that these things that happen
in our personal lives also affect us professionally. And I
(44:33):
think for me, at least, compartmentalizing and suppressing all of
this personal yuckiness and messiness came home to roost in
a way where I couldn't do that anymore. It just
physically emotionally was gutted and it made me deal with it.
And now I'm doing a lot of weird stuff. I'm
doing things that bring me energy though I love what
(44:55):
I do, and it's not a clean answer, and that's scary.
People say what do you do? I can't say I'm
eas or I'm president at ex company and they're like, okay, cool,
like whatever, You're doing your thing. And not being on
that hamster wheel and not getting that external validation is
a hard thing when for so many years we've driven
for the accolades and the things that project seniority, and
(45:17):
you know, sometimes there's a part of me that thinks,
should I be still thinking about that? Should I go
for that title? Like what is my external projection there?
And that's still a work in progress. But it's just remembering,
you know, what brings me strength and working towards that.
Emily Tisch Sussman (45:35):
You've talked about feeling empowered by these decisions like the
estrangement and then also leaving your company. You can tell
us more about that empowerment that you feel now.
Sime Gandhi (45:46):
I think that I had felt so trapped by the
time I was ready to make these decisions, so forced
into doing the things that everyone expected me to do that.
To break free of that, to feel like I could
breathe and be myself felt so to say I am
not the best CEO for this company anymore, and it's
time to make a decision about that, and to receive
(46:09):
then that support through that process and then to come
out the other end and then feel like that energy
could be restored back to me, felt like I could
control my life again in a way. And there's a
lot about my life I can't control right now, this
litigation being one of them and a big part of it.
But to let go of that and focus on the
things that could bring me energy is empowering. So estrangement,
(46:31):
even I think it means so many things to different people,
And for a long time, even after my mom sued me,
there is probably a false hope of me that wanted
or thought about reconciliation and a deep sadness there around
the things that we were losing right or family traditions.
My mom is an excellent cook, and she makes things
that I loved growing up that I could never find
(46:54):
in a restaurant or somewhere else. And to know that
my son would never get to experience any of that
made me really sad. It's like, why are we? Why? Right?
For what? To know that we would never take trips
to India together as a family. I mean, me traveling
to India is probably like you traveling to India, Emily,
maybe you'd do it better than I would, actually right,
And to feel like my parents would not be able
(47:15):
to be there to pass on some of that cultural
knowledge to my son is sad. And it took a
long time. And it wasn't even really until I saw
her when she deposed me that I could really let
go of that emotional connection and then start feeling again
empowered by where we were in this relationship and me
letting go of those expectations. And I guess that's where
(47:36):
that sense of empowerment comes from. Is we can't always
control the things that happen to us, but we can
control how we respond or react to them. And that's
not an overnight process for me. I have to say,
It's been what maybe a year and a half since
I sold Juice and started making these decisions to focus
on my own self, and I'm just now starting to
(47:58):
feel more like me. So it takes time.
Emily Tisch Sussman (48:01):
I asked this question of all of my guests. But
what is something you saw as a like a negative
or a low point in your life, but now in
hindsight you see it, maybe not necessarily as a positive,
but having put you on the path to where you
are right now.
Sime Gandhi (48:17):
I mean, it's probably getting sued by my mom, right
Like at that point, I felt so victimized. I felt
so violated, right like, how could someone come in and
say all these things and cause so much pain and
drag me through this for what? For what? Right? And
(48:38):
I felt so hurt, and you know, I felt sorry
for myself, like why why do I have to go
spend money, the time, the energy into this when I
could you know, I presented some of the people that
had these loving families who were so supportive, and even
after I sold Juice, which I say partly I just
I couldn't keep going. I resented why do I have
(48:59):
to do these things to take care of myself? Like
what's the opportunity cost here? Like I should I could
be investing in my career, I could be doing all
of these things, and here I am quit at therapy
and trying to run and like manage my anger and
stop feeling sorry for myself and I just felt so
mad at my mom too. It's like why did she
It's like I survived my childhood and I made it out.
(49:20):
I created a professional success for myself. I thought I'd
stripped away all of that, and then it all came
back and like punched me in the god again and
then again because she sued me again. So I'd say
that was a real low point. And you know, my
marriage was at risk and all of these things and
forcing myself, but it forced me to have to deal
(49:41):
with it, and I'd like to think that I'm wiser
now two years later, you know, from kind of creating
a deliberate step to go invest in myself then I
was before that, and that if I hadn't had those
things happen to me, probably still be on the conventional trey.
I'd still be doing the things that people expected me
(50:02):
to do. I'd still be running a company. Maybe I'd
love it, maybe I wouldn't, but I'd still be doing
it right and right now, it's forced me to say
what do I love to do? And everything I do
today I do because I love to do it. Even
writing the book was an exercise, and oh my gosh,
I'm going to go spend all of this time doing
this thing. I could at the end of the day
(50:24):
just end up being a very long diary that my
child reads one day. Like, I don't know that it
has an outcome. I don't know that it's going to
have a success. And that is that is a new
muscle for me, and I'm still figuring it all out.
But my hope is that it helps put me on
the path to building a life like that's joyful and
full of things that I love to do. You know,
(50:45):
we ski today. I get to pick up my kid
from school. In most days, I get to do really
interesting things at work. And I may not have that fancy,
big title, people may not really understand what I do.
And being okay with all of that because I'm letting
go of that external validation is not something I would
(51:06):
have been able to do had all of this not
happened to me. And I like to say in life
that sure, you make lemonade out of lemons, but that's
your decision to take that situation and do that with
And I'd like to say that I'm doing that pretty successfully.
I still think I have a lot of work to
(51:26):
keep doing and investing myself and I constantly challenge myself
to get comfortable not knowing where this journey is going
to go. I think sometimes I look at my friends
that are now see sweet at public companies, and I
kind of know what their shock is going to be.
They're going to do that, and they're going to go
join some public company boards and then they'll probably do that,
and it's like, Okay, I get that story. I don't
know where my storyline is going to go, and I
(51:49):
sometimes I feel fomo, It's like, am I leaving the
kind of impact on the world what I want to leave?
I don't know. But I try to really root myself
in the gratitude for having such a flexible life right now.
Lets me take care of myself. Let me say have
conversations like this with you that lets me do the
work that I find impactful, and I'm excited about where
(52:10):
that goes.
Emily Tisch Sussman (52:11):
Do you think you'll pivot again?
Sime Gandhi (52:13):
I feel like, yes, I think that I don't know
where this journey is going, and I think what I
am more open to now are that pivots are natural
and that they'll work out. They feel scary, and I'm
much more open to those than I used to be.
I think before it felt like a ladder, right you
(52:35):
kind of have to climb it, and there's judgments made
on what's a vertical move and what's a lateral move.
And I've become much more accepting of the more holistic
nature of our lives and the ability to have really
impactful careers that aren't just driven by titles. Like I
used to think. I'm like, oh, sim don't talk that way.
(52:56):
That's not You're just sound like a loser. Just go
in for it, right, Like that was really the voice
inside of my head. And I think in some ways
that's so limiting, right, And I look at some of
my peers now and I feel like I've become a
little bit of a go take that risk, Go start
that law firm by yourself. Sure, are you living the
big name thing and you want to go do this
(53:16):
special type of practice and it's just going to be
you and nobody's going to understand it for five years.
But that's okay, right, find the joy and do impactful
work and don't focus so much on the hamster wheel product.
And I hope that that leads to a more joyful
and impactful career and all of that stuff will solve
for itself. But it is a scary prospect. And again,
(53:38):
I wouldn't have appreciated this pivot for what it is,
and I don't think i'd be as open to other
more quote unquote unconventional pivots had it not been for
what I did over the last year. And my hope
is that as more and more women take pivots and
do these things that are unconventional, it becomes a lot
more accepted versus feeling like we have to be trapped
(54:02):
right or on a certain type of career trajectory in
order to exert seniority.
Emily Tisch Sussman (54:09):
Seema, thank you so much. It's an incredible conversation.
Sime Gandhi (54:13):
Emily, thank you so much for having me. It's so
great to see you again. It's crazy to think that
we work together what fifteen years ago, and here we
are today. I really appreciate you taking the time to
hear the story and to have me.
Emily Tisch Sussman (54:29):
Sema now lives back on the East Coast with her
husband and son. Well, she may not have a clean
title like we all want to have, she's found peace
in her pivot. Sema doesn't have an Instagram, so follow
us to stay up to date with Sema on her
latest and her future book, Talk to you next week.
Thanks for listening to this episode of she Pivots. I
(54:51):
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Hannah Cousins, research by Christine Dickinson, and logistics and planning
by Emma Stopic and Kendall Krupkin. She Pivots is proud
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