Introducing: CRIMES OF REDDIT, Sabrina’s new show with Alexis Linkletter

Reddit is an endless archive of humanity’s most disturbing, bizarre, and deeply human stories. If you love Two Girls One Ghost, you are going to love CRIMES OF REDDIT with Sabrina and Alexis Linkletter from The First Degree podcast. Every Tuesday, one host brings a set of true-crime stories while the other reacts in real time with no prep, no spoilers asking the questions on everyone’s mind. They swap roles each week, pulling at every thread until the whole twisted picture comes into view. It’s dark, it’s messy, and the scariest part is simple: THESE ARE STORIES POSTED BY REAL PEOPLE. Follow CRIMES OF REDDIT for a new episode every Tuesday. Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube CRIMES OF REDDIT is a Crime House original powered by PAVE Studios. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

  This episode is brought to you by Americans United for Separation of Church and State. Hey, everyone. This is Jonathan Van Ness from Getting Better. You know what you believe. Maybe your faith is at the center of your life. Maybe you're still figuring it out. Maybe religion just isn't your thing. Those choices are personal, and in America, they should stay personal. That's why Americans United for Separation of Church and State is fighting for something that affects all of us: the freedom to live as yourself and believe as you choose, so long as you don't harm others. Because religious freedom isn't just about protecting your right to practice or not, and it surely isn't about having one forced, government-sanctioned religion. It's about protecting your right to say, "This is what I believe,"

• 0:43Speaker 00

  while your neighbor says, "I believe something completely different." And honestly, that's the whole point. If that sounds like the kind of America you want, learn more at au.org/gettingbetter. Because your beliefs are yours, and theirs are theirs.

• 1:01Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Hey, everyone. It's Sabrina. And as you may know, Corinne and I hosted Crimes of Together. Corinne has decided to step away from the show, and we will miss her. But, as promised, Crimes of continues with an exciting new name and chapter I cannot wait to share: Crimes of Reddit. And joining me is my new co-host, true crime journalist and host of The First Degree: Alexis Linkletter. On Reddit, true crime doesn't come from journalists. It comes from the victims, the witnesses, and sometimes the suspects themselves. Every week on Crimes of Reddit, one of us is going to bring a set of true crime stories, while the other goes in completely blind, reacting in real time. And then we swap. We're gonna pull at every thread until the whole twisted picture comes into view.

• 1:45Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And I've got an episode for you to listen to right now. So if you love it, please follow Crimes of Reddit on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, or wherever you listen for a new episode every Tuesday. Subscribe on YouTube at Crimes of Reddit Pod for video episodes.

• 2:09Speaker 02

  This is Crime House.

• 2:13Speaker 03

  I, 24, female, found hundreds of pictures of my brother, 20, male, on my boyfriend's 24-male laptop. Can anyone please explain to me what's going on?

• 2:25Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Okay.

• 2:26Speaker 03

  Have you ever dealt with anything like this?

• 2:28Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  No, thank goodness. Have you?

• 2:30Speaker 03

  No.

• 2:43Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I'm Sabrina Diannaroga, writer, storyteller, and co-host of Two Girls, One Ghost.

• 2:48Speaker 03

  My name is Alexis Linkletter. I am the host of The First Degree and Unraveled, and I've been investigating cases like the Long Island serial killer case for the better part of 10 years.

• 3:00Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Between us, we've spent years telling true crime stories, the haunted...

• 3:05Speaker 03

  The unsolved, and the ones that stay with you. But now we're teaming up for Crimes of Reddit, a Crime House original powered by Pave Studios. Each week, one of us brings the most unhinged stories that the internet has to offer.

• 3:17Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And the other goes in completely blind. No prep.

• 3:20Speaker 03

  No spoilers, and reacts in real time, same as you.

• 3:24Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And we pull every thread until the whole twisted picture comes into view.

• 3:28Speaker 03

  It's dark. It's messy.

• 3:30Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  It's so much fun.

• 3:32Speaker 03

  Make sure to tune into Crimes of Reddit every Tuesday, and go down the rabbit hole with us wherever you get your podcasts. And to share your own stories or flag a post you want us to cover, follow us on social media @CrimesOfPod on Instagram, and join our subreddit.

• 3:56Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  What's the theme for this week?

• 3:57Speaker 03

  We've got family stories.

• 4:00Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Ooh, I feel like, and we were talking in our lunch break today about our own families, and I feel like this is gonna bring up some, um, some fun conversations about our own lives.

• 4:10Speaker 03

  Everyone, at least at one point, had a family. Or started with a family, or built their own family. The idea of someone being extremely close to you, I think we can all relate to that to some degree. So the stories we're covering today, pretty mind-blowing, deeply uncomfortable, and I'm excited to hear your perspectives on just what you would do in some of these situations.

• 4:31Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Okay. I'm excited.

• 4:32Speaker 03

  Yeah, me too.

• 4:33Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I'm so excited. We also want to hear from all of you what you would do in these situations, or if you have your own crimes of family situations that you want to share with us, which you can do in the comments or on the Crimes of Reddit subreddit, which is r backslash Crimes of Pod. And we'll probably read some of your stories if you put them on there, so.

• 4:56Speaker 03

  We want them.

• 4:56Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Go do that.

• 4:57Speaker 03

  Bring them on.

• 4:58Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Share your secrets. Tell us everything. Show us your toes. I don't know.

• 5:03Speaker 03

  Whatever you do on Reddit.

• 5:04Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Maybe don't do that. I don't think I, yeah. That's a different subreddit, not ours.

• 5:07Speaker 03

  Totally.

• 5:09Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Have you ever had someone ask for feet pics?

• 5:11Speaker 03

  No.

• 5:12Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Um, not yet.

• 5:14Speaker 03

  Well, I don't really wear sandals. Like, I feel like that happens, like, it happens to friends of mine who wear a lot of sandals. And once they see the feet on Instagram or something, then people get...

• 5:24Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  But they're getting it for free.

• 5:25Speaker 03

  I know, but they want a more high-def look.

• 5:28Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Interesting.

• 5:29Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 5:30Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I've had a lot of people... But it's also because I've joked about starting a business, because I think I could make a lot of money.

• 5:35Speaker 03

  Probably.

• 5:36Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And so I've had people DM me. I've yet to give in, because I was told by my manager that at the slippery slope, you start with your toes, and then you go to your vulva.

• 5:44Speaker 03

  It could happen fast.

• 5:45Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  It could happen fast. Anyway, we're not here for feet. We're here for Reddit.

• 5:50Speaker 03

  That's right. Should we dig in to the first story?

• 5:53Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yes. I'm gonna close my laptop.

• 5:55Speaker 03

  Because you want to lock in.

• 5:56Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I'm gonna hold on to it like my emotional support.

• 5:58Speaker 03

  Security laptop. Great. Got it. So, here's where we're starting.

• 6:02Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Mm-hmm.

• 6:03Speaker 03

  "My estranged family revealed that my loving, family-oriented dad was actually a monster."

• 6:09Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Ah, okay.

• 6:10Speaker 03

  "So, growing up, my friends would always say that my brother and I had the coolest parents. They were the laid-back, but still-involved mom and dad parents. I was especially close to my dad and thought he was the best dad ever. He made a Hot Wheels dollhouse by hand for my birthday, to give you an example."

• 6:28Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Wait, like a dollhouse made out of Hot Wheels? I have, I want pictures.

• 6:32Speaker 03

  We can only imagine.

• 6:33Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 6:34Speaker 03

  Then she goes on, "When I wanted to be Supergirl, my mom hand-sewed me a costume for Halloween. My parents are a physically affectionate couple, too, and my brother and I thought it was gross when we were kids, but now I realize that being in your 40s and still in love is a miracle."

• 6:49Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Mm-hmm.

• 6:49Speaker 03

  Kind of depressing, but sure.

• 6:51Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 6:52Speaker 03

  So she continues, "My parents are immigrants, and because of that, we were never really close to their families, who lived in their home country. But recently, my brother and I got in touch with some cousins on my mom's side, on our own, and got to know them. They were awesome and really chill. My aunts and uncles and grandparents were a little stiff, but they were nice. They only wanted to hear about what us and our mom were up to, and not my dad. So I got kind of frustrated and kept mentioning my dad anyway. Finally, my cousin said if we didn't stop talking about our dad, their parents wouldn't let them talk to us anymore."

• 7:30Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I, like, knowing the subject line of this post, I, like, my mind is going to all crazy facets. I can't wait to hear what actually...

• 7:39Speaker 03

  Brace yourself.

• 7:40Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Okay.

• 7:41Speaker 03

  "None of our cousins knew what was going on either, or why they hated our dad so much. So they all started asking around and digging into family stuff. I thought it was going to be something stupid, like class differences, or my grandparents not approving of my dad for some reason. But we found out the truth, and it was a lot worse than we imagined. My cousins found a single, short newspaper article from a digital archive about it. Turns out, when my dad was young, he kidnapped a university student and kept her for a bit."

• 8:12Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  A bit? How long is a bit?

• 8:14Speaker 03

  I had questions about a bit, too.

• 8:15Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Because a bit could be a couple minutes, a couple hours, a week, a month.

• 8:20Speaker 03

  I mean, a bit in a life could be a year.

• 8:22Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 8:22Speaker 03

  So who's to say? But not elaborating yet.

• 8:25Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Okay.

• 8:26Speaker 03

  But we'll see if we get to it. So she continues. "He was a minor at the time this happened, so he didn't get named, or get a real punishment, or anything like that on his record."

• 8:37Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Okay.

• 8:39Speaker 03

  So I can't look at my dad the same way again, or my mom. Why would my mom marry someone who literally kidnapped and hurt a person? My parents have noticed something off with us, but I don't even know how to bring it up.

• 8:54Speaker 03

  So the question here is, what would you do if you found out this information about your own dad? Or mom, would you confront your parents?

• 9:02Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I have found out information like this about my dad.

• 9:05Speaker 03

  Like this?

• 9:06Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Worse.

• 9:08Speaker 03

  I'm listening.

• 9:09Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I don't know if I should talk about it on here, but I was told, so my, my dad might have been involved in a like deadly crime when growing up.

• 9:17Speaker 03

  This is fascinating. So it can be so destabilizing to learn something about your parents. And there's no age for the redditor here who posted this, but it's like, especially when you're young, you have like adults on a pedestal and think that like they're different than how you feel.

• 9:33Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Right. And that they're perfect.

• 9:35Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 9:35Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And they have it all figured out.

• 9:36Speaker 03

  Right.

• 9:37Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And that they didn't have a life before you.

• 9:39Speaker 03

  Right. And they have tangled secrets, just like.

• 9:42Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 9:43Speaker 03

  Anyone else.

• 9:44Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And like, cause I, from my own experience, when I learned that, I wasn't all that surprised, given what I know about my dad, because he is a very complicated figure. And I'm like, oh, this lore actually makes me understand him a little bit better. Or, but it sounds like in this situation, it was so disorienting and didn't align at all with the man that she knows.

• 10:07Speaker 03

  Yeah. And I think, you know, that's in her setup, just her dad was the best. This was a huge shock. So some of the comments here, one of them says this, I'm sorry, that's a terrible thing to find out about someone you love, but since you do love your dad and he has loved you all these years, tell him what you found and give him a chance to tell you what happened. Maybe he had a mental illness that's under control now, or he was under the influence of drugs or bad people or voices in his head. Maybe he was just a bad person. I don't know. And neither will you until you find the courage to ask him. Good luck. I'll be hoping things work out for you and your family.

• 10:43Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Good advice. Would you ask?

• 10:47Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 10:47Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Okay.

• 10:48Speaker 03

  I have no self-control and those people who can like harbor.

• 10:52Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  No.

• 10:53Speaker 03

  I'm like heart on sleeve, no control.

• 10:55Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Oh, in a second I have one drink.

• 10:57Speaker 03

  It's over.

• 10:57Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 10:57Speaker 03

  It's over. So the original poster replied to this comment and said, thanks for the advice. It's hard. I don't know how I'll even ask him about this. This isn't the dad I know at all.

• 11:07Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Mm hmm.

• 11:08Speaker 03

  Now, whatever you're thinking this is, it's about to get so much crazier.

• 11:12Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Was it the mom?

• 11:12Speaker 03

  We'll see.

• 11:13Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Oh, my God. Okay.

• 11:14Speaker 03

  So another commenter said this, maybe you and your brother can ask together to be there to support each other. It won't be easy, but it might help save your relationship with your father and mother, depending on what you find out. So at this point, per what we're reading, the original poster's disgusted with her mom for knowing this about the dad. So very interesting. So later in this thread, the original poster provides more additional context. Here's what they say.

• 11:41Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Okay.

• 11:41Speaker 03

  It's okay if you don't believe me. It's kind of an unbelievable, horrible thing to happen. So my cousins know more about this stuff than me or my brother, since they actually speak the language and talk to my aunts and uncles about all this. One of my aunts made a few kind of vague statements about what happened, like about him being bad as a teen. And my cousin searched for what she talked about and they found the article and asked her about it. And she basically confirmed it because she said that's why they don't talk about my dad. I don't know if it's why he did what he did. I don't, the article was really short, only a few lines in their native language, just saying he kidnapped a university student and kept her, basically.

• 12:19Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Interesting.

• 12:20Speaker 03

  That he was a minor and went to the equivalent of juvie for a few months. I don't know how to explain it, but their country has conservative values, but not that conservative. Like they're pretty modern. The victim was a student out of university, so she had to be at least 19 or 20 from what my cousin said. So she was a woman, not like a girl. I don't know what to think. My cousins don't know much more than me, since the older generation have kept it hush, hush. So original poster has more updates.

• 12:48Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Okay.

• 12:49Speaker 03

  So I tried to bring it up to my dad, but I couldn't. I would really hurt to accuse him of being a monster if he had literally done nothing wrong, because it meant that I actually thought he could be capable of doing something horrible like this. So I decided to talk to my mom. I told my mom everything and she kind of started to justify it, saying that my dad was young, stupid, in love and mentally all over the place. Then she slipped up and said, he didn't hurt me.

• 13:15Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Ah.

• 13:16Speaker 03

  Okay. So I dug deeper into the thread.

• 13:20Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 13:20Speaker 03

  And the original poster added more that at the time, so apparently she clocked, based on this mom's admission, that it was actually the mom.

• 13:30Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Who was kidnapped by her.

• 13:31Speaker 03

  Abducted by the dad. Okay. So the mom added more context, said this, they didn't know each other before the abduction. My mom thought it was safe to accept.

• 13:40Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Didn't know each other before?

• 13:41Speaker 03

  No. So it was a stranger abduction.

• 13:44Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Okay.

• 13:45Speaker 03

  So my mom thought it was safe to accept a ride for my dad because he was young and harmless and he was wearing a school uniform. She said my mom was 20 and my dad was 16, but I think she's mixing that up. And then another question from a user was, was your dad's family aware of the kidnapping? Was he living with anyone? Did he have any family? Apparently he lived with my grandpa and my great grandpa, who was always out of the country. My dad said of the family was pretty well off. No one was home at the time of the kidnapping because of the holidays. The maid came in in the morning to either pick stuff up or drop it off. And that's when my mom crawled out of the window, twisted her ankle and ran to the maid and asked to go to the police.

• 14:22Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  So like at least overnight?

• 14:25Speaker 03

  She didn't say.

• 14:26Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Oh, my gosh.

• 14:28Speaker 03

  Yeah. So something happened here where the mom was abducted in a stranger abduction and somehow ended up marrying.

• 14:37Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And we don't know like how their relationship progressed after that?

• 14:40Speaker 03

  No. But another commenter said this, that they had heard something similar in their native country, which was the Philippines.

• 14:51Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Okay.

• 14:51Speaker 03

  And said it was in the seventies and said that a family member of theirs got abducted in the seventies in the Philippines and by the chauffeur, by a driver.

• 15:00Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 15:01Speaker 03

  And apparently the scandal of disappearing with this man for days was so scandalous and like reputation ruining, that she decided to just marry the guy because of that. Cause culturally that was basically like, you're damaged good now, goods now.

• 15:19Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  So.

• 15:19Speaker 03

  You're damaged goods now. So if you don't marry this guy, no one's going to marry you in like the way the society.

• 15:24Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Devastating.

• 15:25Speaker 03

  I know.

• 15:25Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 15:26Speaker 03

  So people in the comments in this post were asking if that could be the case.

• 15:31Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Right.

• 15:31Speaker 03

  You know?

• 15:32Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  It's kind of a little bit like Stockholm syndrome too.

• 15:34Speaker 03

  Yeah. And so, you know, the original poster is here and saying, I kept asking my dad, you know, they obviously have this confrontation eventually with both of them, the mom and the dad. And she kept asking, I kept asking my dad why he would do this. And he was just being stupid and selfish and didn't realize that it was scary to her. And my mom said, what's done is done and they got over it. And now my mom and dad are in love and happy and that we could go to individual therapy to deal with it further if we needed to.

• 16:05Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I do appreciate that as a response.

• 16:07Speaker 03

  I guess.

• 16:10Speaker 03

  My brother said it didn't matter anymore and he wishes we didn't know at all. And original poster says, I can't look at my parents the same way again. And honestly, I agree with my brother. I regret talking with my cousins and I think my strange family has a right to avoid my family for what my dad did.

• 16:24Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I feel really sad for the original poster.

• 16:27Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 16:28Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Cause it's like, that is life shattering a little bit.

• 16:31Speaker 03

  Yeah. And I think for me, what I would be most worried about, I don't know about her age, but looking at this now at my age, I'm like, growing up in a family system that dysfunctional is terrifying. And I wonder what the other implications are.

• 16:44Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Well, and also is the mom actually willingly? And, or has she convinced herself that she's in this relationship willingly on her own terms? Or has she been manipulated so much over the years that she doesn't even know?

• 16:57Speaker 03

  Yeah. I mean, you mentioned the Stockholm syndrome. It's like, well, how long was a bit? I need to know that. Cause if it was like a week.

• 17:03Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  What happened?

• 17:04Speaker 03

  Exactly.

• 17:05Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Uh.

• 17:06Speaker 03

  Yeah. Also.

• 17:07Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Out of curiosity, I know we don't have this answer, but like, you know, growing up, I would ask my parents all the time. Like, how did you guys meet? I want to know your love story. What did the poster's parents say?

• 17:18Speaker 03

  They probably said university.

• 17:20Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  School. But what they really meant is, oh, I kidnapped your mom.

• 17:23Speaker 03

  From school.

• 17:23Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  For a bit.

• 17:24Speaker 03

  Yeah. And some of the people in the comments are like, there's more to this. There must be something missing between your mom forgiving him for the abduction of her and her family hating him. And people want to know again, which country this is. And another commenter said, well, if you did nothing, why run away to the US? Like, there's got to be more to this story, but I don't think I'd want to find out if I was, if this was my parents.

• 17:49Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I guess here's the one thing that I, that not, doesn't make it better necessarily, but at least it's not an unknown woman that he kidnapped, that like, we don't know where she is or how she's doing. Like it's horrible. Don't kidnap anyone, but.

• 18:06Speaker 03

  The mom survives.

• 18:07Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  She's okay.

• 18:07Speaker 03

  Physically.

• 18:08Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Physically.

• 18:09Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 18:10Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And seems to be a good mom.

• 18:11Speaker 03

  Yeah. And original poster leaves us with this, my dad did kidnap her, even though my mom insists that he didn't hurt her. And she was fine, but she admitted she was terrified when she was in his house because she had no idea what he would do to her. So he definitely did bad things, even if he regrets it. Kidnapping is a horrible crime.

• 18:30Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  My first thought would be like, did he do this to anyone else?

• 18:33Speaker 03

  Anyone who's capable of this, who's willing to let like someone be afraid, you know? And then further, like now, the way she's describing her life now, the mom being essentially like removed from her family because they all hate.

• 18:47Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Him.

• 18:47Speaker 03

  The abductor husband.

• 18:49Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 18:50Speaker 03

  I mean, it sounds pretty bad.

• 18:51Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I think it's always a red flag if your family doesn't like a partner.

• 18:55Speaker 03

  A hundred percent.

• 18:56Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah. Damn.

• 18:58Speaker 03

  And it only gets worse from here.

• 19:00Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Oh, great. Fantastic.

• 19:03Speaker 03

  You ready for number two?

• 19:03Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah, let's do it.

• 19:07Speaker 00

  This episode is brought to you by Americans United for Separation of Church and State. Hey, everyone. This is Jonathan Van Ness from Getting Better. You know what you believe. Maybe your faith is at the center of your life. Maybe you're still figuring it out. Maybe religion just isn't your thing. Those choices are personal, and in America, they should stay personal. That's why Americans United for Separation of Church and State is fighting for something that affects all of us. The freedom to live as yourself and believe as you choose, so long as you don't harm others. Because religious freedom isn't just about protecting your right to practice or not. And it surely isn't about having one forced government sanctioned religion. It's about protecting your right to say, this is what I believe, while your neighbor says,

• 19:52Speaker 00

  I believe something completely different. And honestly, that's the whole point. If that sounds like the kind of America you want, learn more at au.org/gettingbetter. Because your beliefs are yours, and theirs are theirs.

• 20:09Speaker 04

  Whenever fall comes back around, it always feels like a fresh start. This year, I've been layering in some styles from the new Lululemon fall drop, because the weather is shifting and I find I have to be ready for the entire day and not just one part of it. Lululemon's fall line has some really versatile transitional pieces, so I can just wake up, throw on a matching set, add a jacket or a fleece, and head out, knowing that I'll feel comfortable enough to go wherever the day takes me. Check out the new fall arrivals in store and online now at lululemon.com.

• 20:39Speaker 03

  I, 24, female, found hundreds of pictures of my brother, 20, male, on my boyfriend's 24 male laptop. Can anyone please explain to me what's going on?

• 20:51Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Okay.

• 20:52Speaker 03

  Have you ever dealt with anything like this?

• 20:54Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  No, thank goodness. Have you?

• 20:56Speaker 03

  No.

• 20:57Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I did in high school. When I first went to my high school, everyone was like, oh, my God, you're Lex. My sister's name is also Alexis. So it was like, oh, you're Lexi's sister. Like, she's so hot. So I dealt with all the boys wanting my sister.

• 21:11Speaker 03

  Right.

• 21:11Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  But I've never had to deal with finding photos of her on a boyfriend's phone.

• 21:17Speaker 03

  Yeah. So.

• 21:18Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Okay.

• 21:19Speaker 03

  I've been with my boyfriend for a year. Our relationship is/was great, and we honestly never had any serious problems. We both have full-time jobs and live together. He's good friends with my younger brother as well, mainly because of their shared interest in fitness, workouts, etc. They hang out a good amount and go to the gym together. In hindsight, the fact that they're good friends makes it all the more creepier. Yesterday, I was home alone and my boyfriend was at work. I needed to print something out, but my laptop wasn't working at all. My boyfriend has several laptops, and there's one in particular he never uses. At least, I've never seen him use it.

• 21:55Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  That's weird. That in itself is an odd thing.

• 21:59Speaker 03

  Unless you have a production company, do you need many laptops?

• 22:02Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  No. Like, I have a bunch of, like, broken laptops that I haven't done anything with.

• 22:07Speaker 03

  Well, because what do you do with them?

• 22:08Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 22:09Speaker 03

  So I get that, but like, having a bunch around.

• 22:12Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Like functioning ones?

• 22:13Speaker 03

  Yeah, maybe not. So anyways, I thought this laptop was some dusty old thing. I grabbed it, and it was not shut down properly. When I opened it, it took me straight to the photo albums, and there were hundreds of pictures of my brother saved.

• 22:28Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Also, if it took her right to it, that means that that's what that computer is for.

• 22:34Speaker 03

  It's the last thing he was doing before he closed it.

• 22:37Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Okay.

• 22:38Speaker 03

  So most of these pictures were pulled from his social media accounts, but there were also pics of him from his rugby team's website, WTF? Question mark.

• 22:47Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Okay. So they're not nudes?

• 22:51Speaker 03

  No.

• 22:52Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  It could be a physique situation. Body envy?

• 22:57Speaker 03

  I don't know. Get men's subscription to Men's Journal or something.

• 23:01Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I'm trying to make it less worse.

• 23:02Speaker 03

  Yeah. This isn't even the worst.

• 23:05Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Okay, great.

• 23:06Speaker 03

  There was an album that only consisted of creep shots and videos, pics of him sleeping, and even videos of him getting changed.

• 23:13Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Oh, no.

• 23:14Speaker 03

  You could clearly see in the vids that he wasn't aware of being recorded. What the fucking fuck, she says.

• 23:20Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Are you agreed? What the fucking fuck?

• 23:22Speaker 03

  Do you have any thoughts yet?

• 23:23Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Oh, I hate it.

• 23:25Speaker 03

  So the last pic he uploaded was literally last week. This is so creepy. I don't even know what to say. There were also pics of someone's gym clothes, and I'm assuming they're also my brother's. I'm confused, disgusted, and shocked. What the hell is going on? When he came back from work, I just went straight to sleep. I couldn't even face him. I honestly can't think of a good reason he would do this. I mean, straight guys don't usually do this, right? I don't know if I should even confront him about it. Should I ask what this whole thing is about?

• 23:55Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Well, also how violating for her brother.

• 23:58Speaker 03

  Mm-hmm.

• 23:58Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Because it's not like, oh, maybe they're having a secret affair and he's sending her boyfriend photos. No, he's being stalked.

• 24:06Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 24:07Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And all of his privacy is being invaded by someone he trusts.

• 24:11Speaker 03

  Mm-hmm. Yeah. So why do you think the boyfriend's doing this to the brother?

• 24:17Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Either romantic interest or obsession. I mean, whatever it is, it's not, not great.

• 24:25Speaker 03

  Would you confront your boyfriend?

• 24:27Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  This is a really tough situation, because it feels a little bit more nuanced, where it's someone you know. Like, I almost immediate jumped into concern for the brother. How do I protect my brother? Because it's so violating. But then, yeah, like, that's your partner. I don't know. I don't know. Would you?

• 24:49Speaker 03

  I would not.

• 24:51Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Because he feels unsafe.

• 24:52Speaker 03

  Yes. I would not, because there are so many true crime cases.

• 24:57Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 24:57Speaker 03

  Where somebody's busted. Like, there's been situations, it's different than this, but where like, the husband's faking that he got into medical school, and they're like moving to the city to go to medical school. And then the wife finds out he's not even, he never got in, and the guy freaks out and kills his whole family. Like, once the veneer, like, we've seen this in cases like, you know, like the Scott Peterson case. There's like elements of this. Like, if you catch someone in a lie, sometimes like, they freak out and burn it all to the ground.

• 25:28Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Everything to.

• 25:29Speaker 03

  Yeah. So I think something like this, with how sensitive the situation is, because if you confront the brother, if you confront the boyfriend, he's going to be afraid that you're going to tell the brother. The second you know you're a liability to whatever this obsession is.

• 25:42Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 25:43Speaker 03

  I would not. I would end the relationship and tell the brother.

• 25:46Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah. But then it's like, it's such a hard one, because the not knowing what the reasoning, I think, would also bother me. But I agree, I wouldn't want to confront him directly.

• 25:59Speaker 03

  No. So some of the comments weigh in on this. So one user says, he's clearly got a thing for your brother. It's not a healthy way of expressing it, creepy if anything, but it's quite obvious. Confront him. Tell him how uncomfortable it makes you feel. Be prepared to break it off with him. Sorry you're having to deal with this. The original poster replies, it's weird because I've never even suspected that he had a thing for my brother. I would have noticed something like that. I honestly can't believe it. Another user says, it's not just that your boyfriend is sexually attracted to your brother, but that he's clearly obsessive.

• 26:30Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 26:30Speaker 03

  I'm a single guy, and I will look at Facebook pictures of my crush, but I don't save them in my computer. That's super creepy.

• 26:36Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And then go out of your way to take surveillance footage, basically.

• 26:41Speaker 03

  Sleep stuff?

• 26:41Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah, the sleep stuff is really creepy.

• 26:43Speaker 03

  And one user says this, you know, it's a lot worse than your boyfriend being secretly gay. Because I agree. Being secretly gay has nothing to do with violating people.

• 26:50Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  No. Yeah.

• 26:51Speaker 03

  You know? I would take the laptop and show my brother, then go to the police and report it. And another user said.

• 26:57Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  What can police do?

• 26:59Speaker 03

  You know, I hoped you said that. I hoped you would ask that, because like.

• 27:03Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  You're welcome.

• 27:04Speaker 03

  They have a lot of, like, a lot of users say this, like, don't confront him alone, go to the police. And it's like, the police? There's no crime committed until your brother complains.

• 27:13Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 27:13Speaker 03

  Or until your brother pieces together that these were taken with secret cameras. Like, you going to the police with a computer isn't, they're just pictures.

• 27:22Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  They're just pictures.

• 27:23Speaker 03

  Without context, you know?

• 27:25Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Uh, it's so tricky. Because then also, I mean, I feel like the right move is break up with him. Tell your brother, but then it's this awkward, like, is he so obsessed with your brother now that your brother is in danger? Physically?

• 27:41Speaker 03

  Right. And you know, one user said, I don't recommend confronting him alone. This is some very unhealthy stuff. And I feel like if you corner someone with this sort of thing, he may react in a way that puts you in danger. Don't do that.

• 27:51Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Which is what you said. Yeah.

• 27:52Speaker 03

  Even if you crave the dramatic airing, which I would.

• 27:56Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Are you one for a dramatic airing?

• 27:58Speaker 03

  I think there's something really cathartic about confronting someone. Because I think what you said, like, I'd always be afraid, like, what if there was an explanation? Like, I think that's a valid fear.

• 28:06Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 28:07Speaker 03

  But I think your gut would know there's something so wrong about this. But a lot of people would be like, I can't just end a relationship without talking about this. But a younger version of myself might not be able to hold it in. If this happened now, I'd realize how dangerous this is.

• 28:22Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 28:23Speaker 03

  You know?

• 28:23Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah. Because I've confronted men in my past who have like been looking at other women and stuff, but it's not someone I know and it's not taken to the level of obsession and stalking.

• 28:34Speaker 03

  Yeah. This dangerous stuff.

• 28:35Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 28:37Speaker 03

  So there's an update.

• 28:37Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Okay.

• 28:39Speaker 03

  Sorry to disappoint, but this isn't a positive update.

• 28:42Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Oh, no.

• 28:42Speaker 03

  I'm still trying to mentally process it all. Hence, the delayed post. So I grabbed my laptop to take pics of the photo albums. I found way more stuff than I originally stumbled upon. A lot of commenters in the original post said that he probably used me to get closer to my brother. I didn't quite believe it at first, but they were right.

• 29:04Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Like, it predates their relationship situation?

• 29:06Speaker 03

  Yeah. So while I was taking pics of the photo albums, I found more folders. He began saving these pictures four or five months before we even started dating. And my brother didn't even know him at that time.

• 29:17Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Okay. So yeah, this is a very dangerous man.

• 29:19Speaker 03

  Mm hmm. That realization sent chills down my spine. You're not alone in that, sister.

• 29:24Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  No, yeah.

• 29:25Speaker 03

  I also went on the internet, the bookmarks, his browsing history. It was all horrific. I'm not going to elaborate because it's honestly sickening. It's clear that he has an obsession with my brother and extremely violent and disturbing fantasies about him.

• 29:39Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Oh, like she found like searches?

• 29:41Speaker 03

  Yeah. And when you say violent and disturbing fantasies, that's like, really just scary.

• 29:47Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 29:48Speaker 03

  Yeah. I mean, it's the kind of stuff you see in evidence against serial killers. I mean, that's literally in like Rex Huerman, the Long Island serial killer. They presented that kind of evidence of his digital searches, like violent, disgusting, predatory.

• 30:02Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Fantasizing.

• 30:03Speaker 03

  Yeah. And it's like, clearly, that's what she's inferring here about her brother, which is so scary.

• 30:09Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  So scary.

• 30:09Speaker 03

  So she continues, this was absolutely messed up, scary stuff. I cannot believe that I was so clueless about everything. I went over to my brother's place and explained everything, showing him proof on the actual laptop. He was shocked and creeped out, of course, but didn't believe that my ex was behind this for different reasons. But he's not gay. He wouldn't do something like this, etc. I wanted to go to the police, but he completely refused.

• 30:36Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  It also doesn't even have to be a gay thing. It could be like a murder thing. It truly could be fantasizing about killing someone.

• 30:43Speaker 03

  Yeah. You hear this about, you know, there are a few cases that I've seen about like female friendships that escalate to some, one of them has some fixation and it's like, there's obviously something really strange here, but you can see why he doesn't want to go to the police. It's the same reason victims of sexual assault who are boys and men don't want to go to the police. Because they immediately will say like, the police will suspect I'm, I'm gay when I'm not.

• 31:08Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Right.

• 31:09Speaker 03

  Not that there's obviously anything wrong with that, but like, they don't even want to go there.

• 31:13Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 31:14Speaker 03

  Which is sad.

• 31:14Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  It's so sad.

• 31:16Speaker 03

  And why so many male victims like keep it buried inside and end up victimizing other people, frankly? Because they don't deal with any of it.

• 31:23Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 31:24Speaker 03

  So, brother didn't want to go to the police. She continues, my plan was actually to confront my ex in public, but my brother just straight away texted him to come over. When my ex came, I showed him the laptop and asked him to explain. The entire situation was so bizarre. While I was talking, he seemed incredibly angry. I've never seen such a look on his face before.

• 31:45Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Man, that's so scary.

• 31:46Speaker 03

  But when he calmed down, he casually confessed to everything when he calmed down. He said that it was just a bad habit he got into and that he's truly sorry.

• 31:55Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah, just like, you know, picking your nails.

• 31:58Speaker 03

  Yeah. It's like so chilling. And at that point, my brother said that this probably is a prank. It just wasn't funny, etc. I started crying a little and he rolled his eyes and told me to stop crying. He was so nonchalant and cold. I didn't even recognize him anymore. Then he said that he would immediately stop doing this if we kept this to ourselves. I think my brother finally believed him then because he was absolutely dumbstruck.

• 32:30Speaker 03

  It's worse. My ex then said he'd take down the cameras too.

• 32:34Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Shut up.

• 32:34Speaker 03

  And that we shouldn't make a big deal out of it. I asked him where the cameras were and he proceeded to show us. He probably thought he was a good guy for cooperating with us and that it would make the situation less creepy.

• 32:46Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Oh, so like, why would you trust that he shows you all the cameras?

• 32:49Speaker 03

  Well, and you know what? I mean, that's a manipulation tactic.

• 32:51Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 32:52Speaker 03

  People who are liars and manipulators will admit to one thing and be like, look, I'm being a total open book. I'm not lying. See, I'm, I'm confessing to everything. And then the worst thing is still buried. So this isn't even the worst thing. So then he says, turns out there was a camera in the shower as well. It was nauseating. The conversation that followed was extremely uncomfortable and my ex said some very provocative, inappropriate things.

• 33:18Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  This is way worse than I ever would have imagined.

• 33:20Speaker 03

  No. It's, it's traumatizing for

• 33:24Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  For everyone.

• 33:25Speaker 03

  The brother and sister.

• 33:25Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 33:26Speaker 03

  And like pinning a wedge between them, like, there's so much wrong with this. They ended up having a huge argument about the stolen clothes amongst other topics. And the rest was pretty awful. I eventually went to stay at a friend's place. I'd already packed my stuff. Anyway, there's another pair of gas.

• 33:42Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I was gonna say, I need, I, I, I hope there's more because I need to know more.

• 33:45Speaker 03

  Later that night, my ex texted me that I'm a bad person for invading his privacy and that I'm selfish, narcissistic, a bad human being, etc. He said that he's willing to forgive me, though. Yeah, he really said that.

• 33:57Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Great guy. Great guy.

• 33:59Speaker 03

  With the gaslighting.

• 33:59Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 34:00Speaker 03

  The Darvo.

• 34:01Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 34:01Speaker 03

  Right. I blocked his number on everything. A day later, he came to me at work and I told him to stay away from me. He did that every day for one week at different locations until I seriously threatened him. He said that he never cared about me anyway and wished me luck for my future relationships.

• 34:16Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  What a horrible, horrible man.

• 34:18Speaker 03

  So there's another ending with how the brother, how that played out. A couple of days ago, my brother texted me. We haven't spoken at all since that day. And he apologized, but he still refuses to address the elephant in the room. He's just pretending it never happened. I told him that my ex is clearly not stable. Why would you not notify the police? And I honestly don't know what to do. And, oh, by the way, it was his 21st birthday yesterday and I called him in the morning. He told me that he got a present from an unknown sender.

• 34:49Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  What was it? Do we know?

• 34:51Speaker 03

  No, but the poster, the original poster said this. I said that the sender is probably not unknown to us. Like, this is 100% my psycho ex. I just know it. And as I said, this isn't a positive update. A lot of people seem to be concerned and that's the only reason I posted this. I just hope things don't get worse.

• 35:11Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  How long ago is this posted? Like, I just

• 35:15Speaker 03

  This post was in 2018.

• 35:19Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I mean, I'm sure there've been updates since then, like this guy was obsessive and clearly a bad person. But I'm also concerned of how many other people he has in the past done this to and will continue to do this to. Because when there are no punishments for someone like this, they have no reason to stop.

• 35:38Speaker 03

  Yeah. And he's, I mean, he's only 24. Like, think about all the time left in life he has to like, terrorize and torment people and invade people's privacy.

• 35:47Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Hate people?

• 35:48Speaker 03

  Yeah, I do.

• 35:49Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  They're the worst.

• 35:50Speaker 03

  Well, and like, again, it's just like, the entitlement of feeling entitled to someone's privacy and stealing his clothes, like, there's so much of that in like criminal minds. Like, you see it in killers. That's how they start. They start by like burglarizing and stealing people's underwear.

• 36:10Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Like smaller crimes.

• 36:11Speaker 03

  Yeah. So, and especially

• 36:14Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  So sad.

• 36:15Speaker 03

  Yeah. And the searches she was talking about. Like, no good can come from this.

• 36:19Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah, I feel like that's gonna escalate. And then it's gonna be one of those situations where it escalates to an extreme, like, knock on wood, hopefully no one gets murdered. But like, if something like that does happen, it's gonna be one of those cases where you look back and this is one of the stories that you hear about. And it's like, oh, all the signs were there.

• 36:37Speaker 03

  Yeah. And sending the gift after, you know,

• 36:40Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 36:41Speaker 03

  supposedly everything was gonna be cut off.

• 36:42Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  But I also understand from the brother's perspective, why you wouldn't want to go to the police. Like, that's his decision to make, I guess, in a way. But you were even pointing out like, it, I don't know, I feel like it makes it more real.

• 36:55Speaker 03

  Yeah. You'd want to downplay it and make it like not a bigger thing. And it's, maybe it's a, you know, a defense mechanism too. Like, if there's worse on his computer, I don't want to know. You know, it's already messing with his

• 37:07Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Life.

• 37:07Speaker 03

  Psyche.

• 37:08Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  His reality.

• 37:09Speaker 03

  Totally.

• 37:10Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Geez. Well, that's a grim.

• 37:12Speaker 03

  I know. Well,

• 37:14Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Is it gonna get worse?

• 37:15Speaker 03

  It's gonna get different. And I think this will be, I mean, you have a brother. So this is not, that last story was not relatable to me in any way. I don't have brothers. I always wondered what it would be like because I think that's such an interesting dynamic.

• 37:30Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I technically have three brothers, but I only have one that like I'm really close with.

• 37:34Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 37:34Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 37:35Speaker 03

  That's many brothers.

• 37:36Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I, I feel like I've dabbled in how complicated my dad is, but he's a complicated man, has lots of kids.

• 37:41Speaker 03

  Many, okay. So you really understand the brother of it all?

• 37:44Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I, yeah, especially with my younger brother who's, well, they're all younger, but of my like core family. He's 28 and I feel like I helped raise him too. So I feel so protective of him.

• 37:56Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 37:56Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  That if someone were to fuck with him, I think I would become more protective of someone trying to fuck with my family or my brother or my sister than I would if someone was trying to fuck with me.

• 38:05Speaker 03

  Oh, yeah. I've just let people walk all over me unintentionally. But yeah, no, 100%.

• 38:10Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah. Are we ready for the next one?

• 38:12Speaker 03

  Let's do it.

• 38:15Speaker 00

  This episode is brought to you by Americans United for Separation of Church and State. Hey, everyone. This is Jonathan Van Ness from Getting Better. You know what you believe. Maybe your faith is at the center of your life. Maybe you're still figuring it out. Maybe religion just isn't your thing. Those choices are personal, and in America, they should stay personal. That's why Americans United for Separation of Church and State is fighting for something that affects all of us. The freedom to live as yourself and believe as you choose, so long as you don't harm others. Because religious freedom isn't just about protecting your right to practice or not. And it surely isn't about having one forced government sanctioned religion. It's about protecting your right to say, this is what I believe, while your neighbor says,

• 39:00Speaker 00

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• 39:47Speaker 03

  My mother-in-law suddenly passed away in a car accident last month. At the same time, my stalker disappeared.

• 39:55Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Coincidence? Probably not.

• 39:57Speaker 03

  Probably not.

• 39:58Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Oh, that's so sad.

• 40:00Speaker 03

  Messed up. So my mother-in-law and I have never had a good relationship. She has tried to sabotage my relationship with my husband since the day she met me. I wasn't good enough for her handsome and successful boy.

• 40:13Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Which is a crime on its own, of like, women protecting their sons like this and being obsessive with their children.

• 40:18Speaker 03

  My handsome, successful boy. Give me a break. Anyways, so.

• 40:23Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  You can think your child is successful without being obsessed with them.

• 40:26Speaker 03

  And you can think they're handsome without babying an adult man.

• 40:29Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 40:30Speaker 03

  I contemplated ending, I contemplated ending my relationship several times, but my husband always showed that he is on my side and I love him.

• 40:37Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Okay, that's good.

• 40:38Speaker 03

  A few years ago, I started getting very threatening and scary emails and texts from a Pax. So Pax is the name of the texter emailer. This Pax knew everything about me. It didn't matter how many emails and phone numbers I changed. They or he always found me. I made several reports, but nothing happened. My husband tried everything to trace these emails. Nothing came out of it.

• 41:04Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Okay, so this is going in the direction of, what's that documentary where like the mom was?

• 41:09Speaker 03

  That documentary, Unknown Number. Yeah.

• 41:12Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Okay, so this is the direction it's going in, because I, when you read that, like subreddit, or the title of the, the post, I thought it was gonna be like, the stalker accidentally killed the mother-in-law. But now we're like, oh, okay, okay.

• 41:27Speaker 03

  Well, yeah, and to torment your own high school daughter is so deranged. It's like, that is a dangerous, dangerous woman. And we'll talk about how tangled relationships are when you even find out your parent is doing something like this, how hard it would be to accept.

• 41:47Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 41:48Speaker 03

  But the husband in this situation was really helpful in trying to get to the bottom.

• 41:53Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Which I appreciate. Great, great husband. Green flag there.

• 41:57Speaker 03

  Totally. So no matter what, Pax always found her. And she was under the impression that Pax was a guy, based on the language that was being used. And the original poster says, I made several reports, but nothing happened. And this past year, I basically never left the apartment alone. So saying that she got so scared of this, that it was, she was afraid to leave the house.

• 42:22Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  To be alone, yeah.

• 42:23Speaker 03

  So she says, I haven't received a single threatening text or email from Pax in a month. After a few days, I wasn't surprised. I felt like I always knew it was my mother-in-law deep down. My husband hasn't reacted yet. He's consumed with his grief and I don't want to bother him. Especially when he bitterly told me, you must be very pleased now, when we heard the news and I tried to comfort him. He apologized later and said he was just feeling guilty that he loved and chose me more than he loved her.

• 42:54Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Oh, that's so complicated.

• 42:56Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 42:56Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  That's so complicated. And also, it's, it would be one thing to find out your mom was this like Pax person while she's still alive. But to be dealing with the grief of losing your mom, regardless of how complicated your relationship is, like you could hate your parent, and if they die, people still have so much grief and that like feeling of loss.

• 43:21Speaker 03

  It's primal. I mean, they're the most foundational relationships human beings can have. I mean, they mold who we are and we feel totally intertwined with them. So it makes total sense, like it's impossible to let go.

• 43:35Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  That's so sad.

• 43:36Speaker 03

  So she continues.

• 43:37Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Okay.

• 43:38Speaker 03

  Now I'm waiting for my husband to connect the dots. Will he get it? If he does, will he talk to me about it? I don't know if I will ever bring it up to him. Also, I won't relax and go back to my normal life just yet. But I know in my heart that it's over and I can't be happier about my life.

• 43:54Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Well, yeah, you're, and she's entitled to feel that relief, because she was being tormented by this woman. Also, I'm curious if, and maybe this will be in updates, but when like you lose someone and you like start to go through their things, do they find anything that proves?

• 44:15Speaker 03

  I've actually heard a lot of stories like that.

• 44:17Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 44:17Speaker 03

  Where, you know, one story I heard was this woman was dealing with like constant, people stealing her identity constantly and like basically her financial life was in ruins. And when her mom died, she found all the documents that it was her mom. And then it's like, you can't do anything with the anger.

• 44:32Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 44:32Speaker 03

  Because they're gone.

• 44:33Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 44:34Speaker 03

  Crazy.

• 44:35Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Oh.

• 44:35Speaker 03

  So what, do you think you'd tell the husband, or do you think you'd wait?

• 44:39Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I would wait, because I, I would empathize so much with their processing the grief. And then like I would be able to like sit with my relief of it being over. But I wouldn't want to throw that on them.

• 44:50Speaker 03

  Right.

• 44:50Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  What about you?

• 44:51Speaker 03

  I think I would have started accusing the mother-in-law the second I suspected it. Unfortunately, I don't have that kind of like.

• 44:59Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 44:59Speaker 03

  I'm not, I can't be calculating like that.

• 45:01Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 45:01Speaker 03

  So my husband, at the time of her death, would have already known that I thought it was her.

• 45:05Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I do agree with that, but I think if you didn't put it together until after, I wouldn't.

• 45:10Speaker 03

  Yes. Choose then.

• 45:11Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah, I wouldn't.

• 45:11Speaker 03

  To bring it up for the first time.

• 45:13Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 45:13Speaker 03

  Totally. So some comments here. You know, there are a lot of cases where people had tons of threatening letters and phone calls, and many, they never found out who did it. And most people assumed it was some random psycho. But I wonder how many were close to them instead. There was an episode of This American Life about a woman who was continuously the victim of identity theft. And these bank accounts, no, I heard of a different story, but bank accounts kept getting hit despite changing cards, banks, everything. Turns out she was living with a thief. Another comment, my stalker was a high school classmate. I think most people know or assume their stalker is someone they know.

• 45:47Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 45:47Speaker 03

  Because it's far more rare to be stalked by someone you've never interacted before. People agree, you should let him connect the dots on his own. I wouldn't even drop hints.

• 45:57Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I would be like, we should go look through your mom's phone.

• 46:00Speaker 03

  Yeah, like where, where is it?

• 46:02Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Lead him to water.

• 46:04Speaker 03

  Totally. So are we ready for the update?

• 46:06Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yes.

• 46:07Speaker 03

  I was here maybe a month ago, talking about me suspecting that my mother-in-law was my stalker who tormented me for years. I was trying to get advice about whether or not to tell my husband who was mourning her. I decided to wait a little, but after venting here, I was sure she was my stalker. I started living like I never had before, with 10-minute walks alone, then 15, then a half hour, and then so on. At first, my husband didn't notice my freedom, or maybe he did, but he was processing it himself. Last Friday, I told him that I was going out with the girls. Alone? Yes. Want me to drive you there? No need. Aren't you, are you not afraid anymore? No, my stalker won't bother me again. He kissed me and wished me a nice evening. When I came home around midnight, he was still up and he said he wanted to talk.

• 46:51Speaker 03

  He asked me, was my mother your stalker? Yes. He broke down crying.

• 46:57Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Oh.

• 46:57Speaker 03

  He said he has always suspected her and even talked to her a couple of times about it. And she made him so guilty by accusing her that she accused him of being whipped by me.

• 47:08Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Oh, this poor man.

• 47:10Speaker 03

  You know why it's so messed up? Because if you look at it at its surface, it's, it's like, okay, the mother-in-law is tormenting the daughter-in-law. But she's also tormenting her own son.

• 47:21Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  100%.

• 47:22Speaker 03

  Because now there's a frantic, upset woman in his life, who he's having to spend time and energy trying to get to the bottom of who's doing this. It's creating chaos in their nuclear family.

• 47:36Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 47:36Speaker 03

  So she's also tormenting her own son in a weird way.

• 47:39Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And then she's like victimizing herself when he brings it to her, and then makes him almost coddle her more and be like, oh, how dare, like, I'm so sorry, you're right, how could I accuse you? Like, you love me, you wouldn't do that to me.

• 47:52Speaker 03

  Yeah, like you're choosing your wife over your mother and accusing me, that's deranged. And he's like, oh my God, I'm so terrible. And she's manipulating him and messing with his emotions.

• 48:02Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I mean, listen, I have very low standards for men, based on my track record.

• 48:06Speaker 03

  The bar is low.

• 48:06Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  But like, and I don't know much more about this man, but I gotta give praise for him turning out into like the type of man that he is, given the situation that we're hearing about with his mom.

• 48:15Speaker 03

  Yeah, absolutely. And the original poster said, he apologized for never discussing it with me and never protected me from his family, even though he had suspicions. Honestly, I'm not even mad or disappointed. If the police couldn't help me, I don't know how much my husband could have done. And I just want to move on and leave this behind. We're gonna start couples therapy and my husband's planning to tell his family that my mother-in-law was my stalker. He's adamant about it, and honestly, I think it's a good idea. My husband has also decided to not attend the headstone setting on his mother's grave.

• 48:49Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Oh, man, that's tough.

• 48:51Speaker 03

  Well, I think he has the insight to be like, oh my God, the lies, the betrayal.

• 48:57Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  She wasn't who she said she was, or who I thought she was.

• 49:00Speaker 03

  100%.

• 49:01Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Gosh.

• 49:02Speaker 03

  Yeah. And there are a couple other comments. The love and mutual respect you two share shows so clearly through your story. You had the grace to give him time to come to the realization on his own. He had the grace to recognize how your struggling coincided with his mother's presence in your lives. It's a beautiful outcome to a deeply troubling experience.

• 49:21Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Also, what a beautiful comment on Reddit.

• 49:22Speaker 03

  The most insightful, articulate comment maybe that's ever been on Reddit.

• 49:27Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I appreciate it.

• 49:28Speaker 03

  Y'all must be two very strong people who have found each other and made the decision to navigate this world as partners. Here's to a lifetime of love and understanding. And the original poster replied to this, "I wanted so many times to leave the relationship because I couldn't take the stalking any longer, but he has been nothing but supportive and kind to me, and I love him so much. I'm glad we stuck together." A happy ending?

• 49:52Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Wow. Do I believe in love again?

• 49:53Speaker 03

  Maybe. And like, happy endings on Reddit?

• 49:56Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I know.

• 49:56Speaker 03

  Unexpected.

• 49:58Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Wow.

• 49:58Speaker 03

  The plot twist I didn't see coming.

• 50:00Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And to not have let the mother-in-law win.

• 50:03Speaker 03

  Right. And you know, confronting people when they're alive, like, that could have blown up the entire extended family. Like, really, it could have been an all-out war.

• 50:12Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 50:12Speaker 03

  And she could have gaslit a million other people to take her side. It's almost better that they found out when she was already gone.

• 50:20Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And I do agree, like, that he was given the time and space to, like, come to it on his own, I think, makes the situation, like, that's why they were able to have such a healthy...

• 50:31Speaker 03

  Oh, imagine-

• 50:32Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Dealing with it.

• 50:33Speaker 03

  Imagine he confronted her, how, like, how manipulative and crazy-making she would have been.

• 50:38Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 50:39Speaker 03

  It would have been a disaster. So-

• 50:41Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Damn.

• 50:41Speaker 03

  Happy ending for a Reddit couple.

• 50:43Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Have you ever found, like, any secrets about your family?

• 50:47Speaker 03

  Yes. So many secrets.

• 50:48Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Oh, my gosh.

• 50:50Speaker 03

  Well, I do have a funny story about... So my dad, I got him, like, 23andMe for, like, Father's Day a long time ago. And he told me he signed up for it, and he opted in to, like, let family find you. And he got a hit for having a son. And then-

• 51:07Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  So you do have a brother?

• 51:10Speaker 03

  So he found a hit for a son. And it turns out, my dad is an identical twin. And-

• 51:15Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  No way.

• 51:16Speaker 03

  My, so my cousins are technically my, genetically half siblings.

• 51:19Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Oh.

• 51:19Speaker 03

  So my male cousin had joined 23andMe, and it was him.

• 51:23Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Oh, okay.

• 51:23Speaker 03

  So it was a fake, it was a fake surprise. But no, there's a lot of secrets in my family. I don't even know how to start airing them out.

• 51:31Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Well, I think, also, I think that could be said about all families, right? There's secrets in every family. There's just different, like, varying levels of horrific secrets. Some are not terrible, and some are that you kidnapped your mother.

• 51:46Speaker 03

  Yeah. Kidnapped your mother, or-

• 51:49Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Or maybe-

• 51:50Speaker 03

  Was involved in a crime-

• 51:52Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  In Pakistan, um, or have many kids. I don't know. I feel like the kids one is a very commonly spoken about one. And especially with 23andMe, I feel like-

• 52:05Speaker 03

  Well, people didn't even know.

• 52:07Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  The amount of people who found out they had other kids or other siblings.

• 52:10Speaker 03

  Men have the privilege of not even knowing whether they do, which is also terrifying-

• 52:14Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 52:14Speaker 03

  Um, for men. But, yeah, crazy.

• 52:17Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  So crazy. Well, now, offline, we'll have to unpack all your family secrets.

• 52:21Speaker 03

  Yes, we will.

• 52:22Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Where there's more to learn in future episodes of Crimes of Reddit. But if you have, uh, family secrets that you want to share with us, you can add them in the comments, or you can go over to our subreddit, Crimes of Pod. Anonymously reveal those secrets.

• 52:38Speaker 03

  Or not.

• 52:39Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah, you don't have to be anonymous.

• 52:41Speaker 03

  Make your Reddit handle your real name. Don't be a coward.

• 52:44Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Don't be a coward. Mine is definitely not my real name.

• 52:47Speaker 03

  No. Uh-

• 52:50Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Is it? Or how many do you have?

• 52:52Speaker 03

  I had one, and now I have, that I don't use.

• 52:55Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Okay.

• 52:55Speaker 03

  I have one at a time.

• 52:56Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Okay.

• 52:57Speaker 03

  I think now it's my real name.

• 52:58Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Okay.

• 52:59Speaker 03

  Because I'm not a coward.

• 53:00Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  You don't hide behind a fake name.

• 53:02Speaker 03

  Well, I don't really participate. I lurk.

• 53:03Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I'm such a lurker.

• 53:04Speaker 03

  I don't ever, may, uh, maybe, like, in the Bachelor subreddit once or twice, but I really don't, like, I'm not in the weeds.

• 53:12Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah, no. Oh, so Corinne, what, this, because I feel like most of my friends I thought were lurkers, and then all of a sudden, there was, like, a post that came up, and I saw Corinne had commented, and I was like, "Excuse you? Since when are you a commenter?" Because it was, like, on, like, a random post, and I was very concerned. So I appreciate that you're a lurker.

• 53:32Speaker 03

  I've definitely, like, popped in when there's misinformation about me on there.

• 53:37Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  That's fair.

• 53:39Speaker 03

  But I also, I'm like, after I do it, I'm so mad. I'm like, you're supposed to be above all this. You're not even supposed to bother with defending, like, don't-

• 53:46Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  But see, that's allowed.

• 53:47Speaker 03

  Validate it.

• 53:47Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I feel like if I found out someone I knew was adding to, like, the negativity online, that would change how I view them. But if you're just, like, correcting misinformation, or being like, "Ooh, this is pretty."

• 53:59Speaker 03

  I just should really stay away when I've, like, had a margarita and feeling spicy, because then I do insane things.

• 54:05Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And after this, we should go get a margarita.

• 54:06Speaker 03

  We will. We'll unpack all of it. Thanks for joining us for Crimes of Reddit, a Crime House original.

• 54:12Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Here at Crime House, we want to thank each and every one of you for your support. If you like what you heard today, reach out on all social media at @CrimeHouse. And don't forget to rate, review, and follow Crimes of Reddit wherever you get your podcasts. Your feedback truly makes a difference.

• 54:27Speaker 03

  And if you find a Reddit story that you want us to cover, leave a comment, and maybe we'll feature it in a future episode.

• 54:34Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  We'll see you next week.

• 54:35Speaker 03

  Bye.

• 54:36Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Bye.

• 54:39Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I hope you guys loved that episode as much as I did. Thank you so much for listening to Crimes of Reddit. If you want more, follow Crimes of Reddit on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, or wherever you listen for a new episode every Tuesday. Subscribe on YouTube at Crimes of Reddit Pod for video episodes.

• 54:56Speaker 05

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