194: What if you ran but couldn't hide?
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This Is Actually Happening features real experiences that often include traumatic events. Please consult the show notes for specific content warnings on each episode and for more information about support services. I was so unsure of myself and my ability to make decisions. And it planted a seed in my mind that has never, ever gone away even now, that people might not be who they say they are. From Wondery, I'm Witt Misseldein. You're listening to This Is Actually Happening.

Episode 194. What if you ran but couldn't hide?

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My mother came from a really large family of almost all girls, and she pretty much wanted to replicate that for her own family, but she just kept having boys. So when I finally was born, it was a pretty big deal in my family. They tried to have another one give me a sister, and instead I got my little brother.

So I have four brothers, three older, one younger. And basically, after my brother was born, things started to fall apart in my family.

My parents really had no business being together. They didn't have anything in common. So while I had this really happy childhood because I had a lot of siblings and we would play together and we would do lots of things together. And my mom was a really amazing mom. She was like the Martha Stewart of moms. You know, she would hand make all my costumes. She would make dinner every night. But there was always just a lot of tension in the house because of their fighting.

I even remember when I was six years old, I wrote a letter to Santa Claus asking for them to get a divorce, which did not come until 10 years later when I was 16. It's weird because when I was a kid, I blamed everything on my mother. I thought it was all her fault that my dad was doing his best. And then as I got older, I saw that she was actually really lonely.

My dad had basically divided his time between being a dad and his career, which he was really into being a police officer. For him, it was more than a job. It was his passion. It was his calling. He wanted to move up in the ranks, and that left no time for my mother. She finally went back to work as a juvenile probation officer. So both my parents are in law enforcement.

At the house, we had free range. We could do whatever he wanted. There was only one big difference, which was that my brothers could do anything they wanted. But my parents kept a bit of a tighter leash on me. You know, even from an early age, I just felt like my parents really were telling me that I needed to be afraid all the time and that being afraid would keep me safe.

I would say I was a pretty rebellious child. I never did drugs. I was actually a really good kid. I just wanted freedom and I wanted privacy because when you have a big family, privacy is like non-existent. I rejected authority in all kinds, like from my parents to my teachers. Sometimes it didn't even feel purposeful. It felt like something that I was born with to say, like, if someone tells me what to do, my reaction is to do the opposite.

I rejected this pressure they put on me to be afraid of people. And I just always wanted to prove them wrong. You know, I would have I would make friends with people and they would tell me, like, I don't think this person is a good influence. And that would only prompt me to spend more time with this person because I wanted to prove them wrong. I wanted to say, like, look, this person is actually a really good person. You're just you know, you're being too quick to judge. And I was right a lot of the time, I think, until I was really wrong.

I had a lot of siblings, but I was alone a lot. And they were really mean to me. So I grew up thinking that men being mean to me was probably okay. I just kept finding myself gravitating towards men that were hard to get and had emotional problems because that's what I was used to with my brothers. I think that shaped a lot of how I viewed men in relationships for a really long time.

So when I was a senior in high school, I had broken up with a boyfriend that was like really abusive. And that relationship and that breakup was really, really hard for me. And I kind of stopped going to school. I skipped so much school that two weeks before graduation, they told me if I skipped another day, I wasn't going to be allowed to graduate.

So then when I graduated, I took all the money that I got from graduating and I ran away to San Francisco where two of my brothers were living and going to school and they let me sleep on their floor.

I was 18. I had almost no work experience. I had $500 and a suitcase. And I had it in my mind that I was going to live in San Francisco. I was going to get a job and get an apartment. I would never, ever go back to Arkansas. But instead of that, I was actually paralyzed with fear.

That whole thing that my parents had instilled in me when I was a kid kind of resurfaced when I was there. And I became agoraphobic, like I didn't leave my brother's apartment. And then all my money ran out and I had to call my parents to fly me back home, which was really embarrassing. And there was a college in my hometown that everyone jokes is the 13th grade of my high school because everyone just immediately goes there after high school.

I really, really didn't want to go to college there, but I wanted my parents off my back. And then the first day of class, I met Adam. We were in a German 1 class, and I didn't notice him. He wasn't anybody on my radar until the first big test came up. He reached out to me and asked if I would help him study. He said that he was struggling really hard. He knew I was doing really well in the class and that he would really appreciate my help.

I think I was just flattered by all the compliments about how good I was doing in the class. And so I agreed to meet him at the library. And I tried to get to the studying part of it. And he kept veering the conversation away from studying and wanted to know about me. And then he started telling me about who he was.

He told me that he was not from Arkansas. He was actually from Maine and that he moved down to Arkansas because he was engaged and his fiance died. And he was so grief stricken from her death that his family encouraged him to go down to Arkansas where his mom was from and stay with his grandma and just get new perspective, a new scenery, you know, not be around all these old memories of his fiance that were, you know, terrorizing him.

And that's where he was when I met him. It had been like a year since his fiance died. He was very emotional and he didn't go into any details. And I just, I felt so sorry for him. He was going to get an undergraduate in like political science. That's what he was working on. And after he graduated, he wanted to go to law school.

He was really passionate about civil rights and people less fortunate than him, and he wanted to help them. And that's who he wanted to be, this good person who helped people that needed it the most. I wasn't attracted to him physically, but the humor and the jokes, I became attracted to him because of the personality and how charming he was. And he was really interested in me. He really wanted to hear about my story and my life.

He was seven years older than me, which I was really shocked by when I met him because he didn't look that much older than me. We didn't see each other a whole lot because he lived in a town that was an hour away from the town that we went to school and where I lived and where our college was. And he would always have to say, like, after class, like, I have to go take care of my grandma.

He was really interested in the fact that I had lived in San Francisco for that summer. He wanted to hear all about San Francisco. He wanted to compare it to Portland, where he was from in Maine. He's like, yeah, you know, San Francisco and Portland both have really great food scenes. And, you know, that's so cool that you live there. And of course, I made it seem like my experience there was more than it was because I was so embarrassed by how little it actually was at the time.

Every now and then he would get in a whisper or he'd be really quiet. He would tell me, he said, my grandmother's really traditional. She's really old fashioned. And she would be really upset to know that I'm dating someone. She'd be very nosy. She'd want to know everything about it. She would be upset that you're not Baptist. You know, she wouldn't like that you're Catholic. So if I hang up on you, it's because she's walked in the room. So every now and then we would talk on the phone when he called me. And then all of a sudden it would just radio silence. He would just hang up.

This was all going on like January, February of 2009. And then in March, we had a spring break. He asked me if I wanted to go away with him on a weekend trip. You could actually get away for a couple days because somebody else was going to be with his grandma that weekend. And there was this little spa town a couple hours away. Before this, like the biggest date I'd ever been on was like maybe the movies and maybe a restaurant with an actual waiter. Yeah.

No one had ever asked me to go on a weekend trip. So I told my dad that, you know, this guy I'm dating wants to go on a weekend trip with me. And my dad got really concerned, you know, because he's Mr. Scary Cop Guy. He wanted to meet Adam. And we argued a lot about it. And finally, he settled on, OK, if you won't let me meet him, can I send one of your brothers to meet him? You know, just so we know what this guy looks like. And I finally contested. I was like, OK, fine.

He was pretty calm right before my brother arrived. But then like the moments leading up to it, he started to get really nervous and he started sweating a lot, which he did from time to time.

And I thought my brother would be really nice and it would be an easy experience. But he actually grilled at him like immediately as soon as he met him. And he was writing it all down. He wrote down his name, his birthday, the license plate to the car he drove. And I was mortified. I was absolutely mortified. I was like, I'm so sorry. My dad's a cop. He's just trying to scare you. It's not a big deal. And Adam was unraveling.

My brother said, okay, that's all. And then he left. And then we got in the car to drive to the spa town. And he was so on edge in the car. He was just freaked out. And he was like, I can't believe your brother did that. That's such an invasion of my privacy. And he made it seem like it was my fault for letting it happen. And I was like, I know that seems like a lot, but they're just trying to freak you out. Don't worry about it. So the first day on the trip, there was a horse racing track.

And we got there. He, you know, told me that he would give me money and that I could bet on any of the horses that I wanted to. And he just kept asking me if I wanted more and more money. And I was like, I don't feel comfortable taking your money. And then he was like, well, I'm going to let you in on a little secret. And I've been waiting to tell you this until I knew that I could trust you. But I actually have a lot of money.

And then he told me that he came into money because he was really big into online gambling, but he was really strategic about it. And he knew all these like algorithms and scientific approaches. And so he would win all the time. And then one time he won a lot of money and he didn't tell me the exact number, but he was like, it was I'm fine. And you can spend as much money as you want today. Don't worry about it.

When we came back from this trip, we got into a fight because I was really upset that he was always the one calling me and that I could never get a hold of him. I could never call him and he would answer. So we're arguing about it and he just blurts out to me that his fiance died because her father, who was estranged from her, murdered her and then hung himself from the shame of killing his daughter and that Adam was the one who found them.

You know, this is the reason that I'm hard to get a hold of is because I'm still dealing with this trauma. And I sometimes just deal with the PTSD from it by needing to go be by myself and not let anyone get a hold of me. I was immediately no longer mad at him. I just felt so bad for him. It was just the most horrific thing I'd ever heard someone tell me about their life. And then they also told me that I was the first woman that he had been with since his fiancee died.

I felt this responsibility to be the best girlfriend with him so that I could help heal him.

I wanted so badly for my parents to be impressed by Adam because I wasn't ready for them to meet him. So I wanted to shape the impression of them they would get before they met him. I wanted to talk him up and I wanted them to think like, aren't you proud of me for like getting this really smart, witty, charming, successful guy and that you don't have to worry about me and I make good judgment calls? Yeah.

So I came home, totally normal day. It was kind of early evening. And my dad met me at the door and he said, Hannah, I need to talk to you. And he was really serious. And I was concerned. I thought somebody was sick. And I'm asking him, like, what is this about? Like, what's going on? Is everyone okay? Is mom okay? Are my brothers okay? And he's like, everyone's fine. Everyone's fine. I just want you to sit down.

And then he offered me a glass of whiskey. And I was like, okay, sure. And then finally, after like a couple sips and me just like calming down, he hands me a book that was open. And it's a yearbook. And he points to a picture of Adam. And he's like, Hannah, is this the man that you're dating? And I was like, yes. What is going on? Like, why do you have a yearbook from Maine? Like, this is so weird.

Before I can get out of him, like what's going on before he hands me a piece of paper. And on this piece of paper is a mugshot and it's Adam. And he says, is this the man that you're dating? And at this point, I just my stomach just like dropped. I just felt so sick. Like what is going on? And I was like, yeah, this is him. And I closed the yearbook and it was a yearbook from my hometown.

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I remember being overcome with this, like, I need to throw up. And I'm like, I'm in tears. I'm like, what is going on? I don't like this theatrics, like, just get to it. And he told me that my mother and him had become suspicious about Adam and they had done a background check and that they had found out that he was not from Maine. He was from the same town.

But he had lived in Maine. He had moved to Maine after high school and he had gone to college in Maine. But he left because he had been arrested for harassment and terroristic threatening and stalking and breaking a restraining order.

My dad and my mom, when they told me all this information each separately, neither of them could go into extreme detail about that specific case in Maine. They said that there was information that they had gotten because of their professions, but they were legally not allowed to tell me. So I just had to trust them that whatever happened was really bad. And when it came time for him to be arrested for violating the restraining order, he fled immediately.

And he got out of Maine and they didn't know where he went. And so he was on Maine's top 10 most wanted at the time. He eventually was discovered staying in a cabin in Arkansas in like the woods. And when they finally found him, they went to the cabin to arrest him. And he fled barefoot into the woods. And there was like a four hour manhunt with dogs in the woods for him.

After the manhunt, they arrested him and extradited him back to Maine, where he served a few years and then, I guess, was released and moved back to Arkansas. Some other things that I found out, one, there was no money. In fact, I found out that I think he was filing for bankruptcy. So he had the opposite of a lot of money. He had no money and a lot of debt.

After this, I did some research of my own and found out that the fiancé was a real person in Portland, Maine, who had been murdered by her father. But her fiancé was a soldier who had been deployed to Afghanistan. And I just thought, like, how messed up. Like, how messed up to not only say that this is your story, but like, why? Why even do that in the first place? Like, at 19, I just couldn't understand why he would need to do this.

I actually also learned that his father was my sixth grade English teacher. His mother was a librarian at an elementary school in town. His younger brother was a year younger than me. And actually, a lot of my friends were friends with him. I mean, it was so embarrassing that this guy not only was a liar, but the truth was so close to me. It was like right under my nose. And I didn't think at all that his identity wasn't what he told me.

So I left my dad. He's like, where are you going? I was like, I need to go see my friends. I need to I need to get out of here. And as soon as I got out of the house, I called Adam, which was the one thing he told me not to do. But again, because he told me not to call him, the first thing I wanted to do when I could was call him because I just have to do what I'm not supposed to do.

So I called out him in my car and I'm just like screaming and crying. And I just remember saying like, what the fuck is the truth? Tell me the fucking truth. I just kept screaming. Tell me the truth. What is the truth?

At this point, he didn't know what I knew. And so I think he was trying really hard to not admit to things that maybe I didn't know yet. So he was being really vague and he's like, okay, well, yes, I got in trouble. Yes, you know, I had a bad breakup in Maine and I didn't take it very well. But I was a kid and I just was emotional and I learned from it. And I was like, but you're not even from Maine. And he's like, okay, yeah, I know I'm not from Maine.

He told me he was afraid that if he told me the truth from day one, that I wouldn't have been interested and that he was always planning on telling me the truth about this one incident. He just said, this is this one time thing. I was an emotional 20 something year old who didn't handle my first breakup very well. And so I was like, OK, well, I don't ever want to see you again. I don't ever want to speak to you again. And he accepted that and he didn't push anything.

That was it. It was like he was gone. And it was that way for a few months.

But my parents were still really afraid that something would happen, that he would try to go after me or retaliate against me. So I remember they got me in touch with his probation officer. He had a probation officer who called me because, you know, she wanted to know what was going on. And she told me that his probation was 10 years long, which was almost double the normal probation. And that it was partly because he was on a special list considered potentially physical.

physically threatening. She was very serious with me. She told me that we don't know what he's capable of. She told me that he had been institutionalized and that he had been diagnosed with antisocial disorder, which I didn't know what that was at the time.

She was really concerned for my safety, and I was absolutely terrified. I was really, really scared that I had summoned some kind of demon in my life that was now going to haunt me. And I took it very seriously for several months, and I didn't go anywhere by myself. I just was really embarrassed that I could be fooled so easily and that I just believed everything he said, and it never crossed my mind to question any of it.

I felt like here I was at this point in my life where I'm supposed to prove that I'm this responsible adult to my parents and I've made such a horrible mistake and I must be such a child in their eyes.

And I was scared and lonely, too, because here was this person I was spending all this time with and I was building this relationship with. And I suddenly was without them. And I didn't even have like the ability to have the memory of them because it was so tainted by the truth.

He did demand a lot of my time. And so I kind of fell out with other friends. And I not only had to go to my friends and be like, hey, I haven't seen you in a while. But also, I just had this relationship. And and here's why. And and I didn't want to tell anyone. I only told like a couple people.

I was so unsure of myself and my ability to make decisions. And it planted a seed in my mind that has never, ever got away even now that people might not be who they say they are.

I was so confident in myself up until this point because I was this rebellious creature who did things my way. And finding out the truth about Adam just pulled that confidence out from me like it was the floor beneath me. And then suddenly I'm free floating because I'm not at this college that I want to be at. I'm not in the town I want to be in. The person I was dating is not who I thought they were. I have nothing that's concrete for me to hold on to. It's just...

me in this scary world that my parents warned me about. And I had failed the moment I stepped out the door. After I told Adam that I knew the truth about him, he did back off. And the whole summer, I didn't hear from him.

So it was getting closer to fall semester and we had to start signing up for classes. And he reached out to me and he was like, hey, I know you don't ever want to speak to me again. I know you never want to talk to me again. And I respect that. And I'm going to stay away from you. But we have a problem, which is that we both need to take German too. I need this class to graduate. And I understand that we shouldn't take this class together. And what should we do about it?

I rationalized this outreach to me as like, well, of course he had to do this. Like, this is a legitimate problem that we have. So I decided, you know, because he was closer to graduating than I was, he could take the class. That way we don't have to cross each other's paths.

And then he responded and he's like, well, it's not that simple. We are going to have to cross each other's paths because we're going to be in the same building. You know, we've made some mutual friends and like, how is this going to work? You know, like we can't just cut each other out of our lives completely. And the whole time he's trying to get that door back open with me that I had closed that night that I told him that I knew the truth. Like he's trying to get me to crack it open so that he can start pulling it wider and wider. And I'm allowing it. I'm just...

I'm just making the same mistake again. And I'm just like, yeah, you're right. We're, you know, I don't know what we're going to do. And, and then he just like comes at me with this, like, I'm so sorry for what I did to you. And I'm so sorry. I lied to you. And I swear to God, it was because I really liked you. And I thought you wouldn't even talk to me if you knew the truth. And I promise I'm not the person who I used to be.

And that was working itself, just that rhetoric. But the rhetoric that really got me was when he was like, are you doing this because you really don't want to talk to me? You don't want to be friends with me even? Or are you doing this because your parents have made you and that they've made this decision? And that just immediately appealed to this intrinsic internal part of me that was like, nobody makes my decisions for me. I don't bow down to any authority, not even my parents.

It worked, basically. And he said, well, then why can't we be friends? We don't have to be together, but can't we be friends? Can I have forgiveness? So then we started emailing each other again and we started texting again. And then we weren't dating or anything like that. But it was back to it was in the beginning where we were making jokes about things in the news. And the whole time he's just like chipping away this wall that I had put up when I figured out the truth.

I wanted to make the decision about who Adam was now. I knew his past and I wanted to give him the opportunity to show me that he was redeemed and he was changed. And then I didn't want my parents to be deciding for me that this person was good or bad at that moment. I wanted to decide.

He absolutely was extremely charming. I knew some mutual friends later on, and I told them a little bit about the story. And they were completely shocked and amazed that I was talking about the person that they knew because they all thought he was just this charming, funny, class clown, smart, articulate guy.

One thing led to another and next thing I know, we're basically back where we started and we're being intimate and it's more than a friendship. And I was so seduced by this secret element that we had just added. Like it was this Romeo and Juliet. He would feel that he would talk about that we were soulmates and that we had this special connection and that we weren't like other people in this town and we needed each other because we were better than them.

Then as time progressed, his behavior started to change and he started to get really suspicious of the time when I wasn't hanging out with him and he started to get really jealous and he would accuse me of doing things behind his back or hanging out with people or dating other men because I could get away with it because nobody knew that we were together.

And I started to get this sickening feeling that I had made a terrible, terrible mistake and that something was wrong with him. He was having meltdowns and tantrums and again, was just really suspicious of anything that I was doing. He just always knew what I was doing, who I was with, even when I didn't know why. And then he would always have a story as to why that was perfectly normal. It was completely a coincidence.

And then, of course, like when I would start to pull away, when I would start to, you know, defend myself, he would throw it at me that like, well, your parents don't know what's going on. Do you really want them to find out and not trust you again? Yeah.

I couldn't let my parents know that I had been seeing him behind the backs because the whole time, the past few months, they thought that they had done their job. You know, they put the bad guy away. I was safe in their tower they built for me and that it was never going to be an issue again. And the whole time I let the monster in the back door. So I try to come up with a plan on my own to get rid of him.

So the first thing I tried to do was I tried to just behave as poorly as I could. I was just obnoxious to be around. I would complain all the time. I would be a bore, like anything I could do to try to get him to be the one to say, I don't want to see you anymore. And it didn't work.

He was still texting and calling me and I kept saying like, Adam, you need to leave me alone. I ended things like it's over. And he would say, I'll leave you alone if you just bring me back some of my stuff that you borrowed. I came over with a box of stuff and Adam said, well, let's go in the backyard. You know, let's say our goodbyes to each other.

So we were in the backyard and I was trying to maintain physical distance from him. I said, this needs to end. I don't think we're right for each other. I don't think this is a good idea. And I want you to leave me alone. You haven't stopped calling me and texting me. And I did what you asked. I brought your stuff. And now will you please leave me alone? I'm sobbing hysterically. I'm practically begging him to leave me alone. And I remember he said, I'll never leave you alone, Hannah.

I'm never going away. You're going to have to change your address. You're going to have to change your phone number. And it still won't matter. I'm never going away. And then he gets up and he starts walking over to me and I get scared. So I take off running and I run to the gate of the backyard and he catches up to me and he grabs me and he pulls me up against him and I can feel that he's erect.

He had literally been aroused by my crying and my begging that had turned him on. And I was so terrified in that moment. All these things kept racing through my mind, like, he could hurt me right now. He could kill me, and my family doesn't know that I'm even seeing him. I think I elbowed him or something like that. I got away immediately.

I just ran to a house and I started banging on the door because I was like, I have to get somebody out here to see me, to see what's going on. I need a witness. And when he saw me do this, he just turned away like nothing happened, completely casual and just started walking off. It was this crazy robotic response.

I get my car keys out and I just run to my car and I'm getting in my car. And then I hear him yell from his friend's house. And he said, I never had a grandma. I have a girlfriend. I've always had a girlfriend. You're just the mistress on the side. You always have been. And I don't even know if what he's saying is true or not. I don't really care. I just didn't like hyperventilating trying to start my car and get out of there.

I think that was the moment I realized, like, I'm putting myself in just such an unknown risk. I can't be alone with this man. And if that means telling my parents, then I'm going to do it. So I went to lunch with my mother one day and over a salad, I just broke down crying and said, I need to tell you something. She guessed before I even said it. She said, are you seeing Adam? And I was like, yeah, I am, but I'm not anymore. And you were absolutely right about him.

But I don't know how to get away and I need your help. My parents kind of did the thing I thought they were going to do. I was really hopeful that they weren't, but they did the thing that I thought they were going to do, which is they were really judgmental and they were really, they put me down about it. They made me feel so stupid, but I didn't care. And I kind of let it happen. And I didn't stand up for myself because I was like, you know what, they're right. And they get to say those things about me because they're right. That was okay because they did take care of me.

They knew exactly what I needed to do and they were trying to hold my hand through all of it. And before Adam found out that I had told my parents about what happened, he started aggressively stalking me.

This all happened at the end of that fall semester. And we were getting ready to sign up for classes for the next semester. And my college had it where you could check the class roster of everyone who had signed up for the class. And when I went to check my class rosters for the classes I had signed up for, he was in every single one. So I had to completely change my schedule and I had to do it last minute so that he couldn't change them too.

He followed me on campus. I found him hiding in a bush, watching me go to class. I remember one time I was in my room watching television and I was sitting on this couch in my room. I had this black cat and she was like sitting in my lap. And then as I was getting ready to go to bed, I got an email notification. And the name of the email was Janine Triplehorn, which is the name of the actress from Big Love. And there was a picture, a

a drawing of a girl with blonde hair sitting on a couch with a black cat. And I was convinced that he was outside my womb watching me. I found him driving past my friend's house. He drove past my parents' house. And the thing is, he probably was doing all of this even before I did things. It just wasn't on my radar.

So at this time, I was working at a daycare in the afternoon. There was a day, I think it was over the holiday break still, and I got a call at like six in the morning. It was really, really early. And a teacher had called in sick and they knew I wasn't in class and they asked if I would come in last minute. And so when I got to the daycare, Adam's car was in the parking lot and I was terrified. I was terrified. Like, how did he know that I was going to be here when this wasn't my normal work schedule? And then...

My other thought was like, I'm going to have to quit my job. Like I cannot put these children in danger because I've become a target to a madman.

I was so guilt ridden that this horrible mistake that I had made was now bleeding out into other areas of my life and other people were affected. Like he was following my friends. He was driving past their houses. And that was really painful. I could handle it being my problem. I could not handle it being a problem that I gave other people. It felt like this contagious disease that anyone who touched me could get infected.

That I was like this leper, this thing that couldn't be touched. Because if you touched me and he found out about it, you would become a target too, just because you knew me.

He always had this thing where he completely blamed everything on my mother. That my mother was the reason I found out the truth the first time. My mother was the reason that I ended it the second time. That she was this evil manipulator who'd fed me all these lies. And he needed a bad guy to make him the victim. And that became my mother. So I am really afraid for her specifically during this time.

At this point, my parents are helping me navigate through this legal system so that I can get the law on my side. So at this point, once I filed the criminal record, I got a phone call from a woman who was his new probation officer. And she had found out that I had filed a report on Adam. And so she wanted to know what was going on.

And it was completely the opposite experience as it was with the first probation officer. This woman clearly had been duped by Adam. She had fallen for his charisma and his manipulation and his lies. I told her the whole story and she was like, it sounds like you guys just had a bad breakup and you're not handling it well. And he says that, you know, you're overreacting. And I felt completely like gaslighted.

I guess, you know, she relayed to him what happened, that I had pressed charges. And then all of the physical stalking stopped. He wasn't driving past me anymore. It seems like it had completely died out. It was just this weird, eerie calm. But I guess I didn't know at the time that it was just like this eye of a hurricane. After that, he just started to stalk me online. He was getting information about me through my friends, through these fake accounts online.

Another thing that he did was he started making websites dedicated to me. And then he would send me the links and I would click on them and it would just be like weird details about me or things that I told him or he would write about fantasies he would have of us together. It was really unsettling stuff because most of it didn't make sense. It was the ramblings of a madman.

One of my friends was moving to Pennsylvania and he asked me if I would help him move. He needed to drive out there with all his stuff. So the plan was I was going to drive up to Pennsylvania with him, help him move, and then I would fly back. We didn't tell anyone about this trip. He was moving up there to live with another friend of ours who had already moved up there.

We were in Pennsylvania, was helping him get settled in his new apartment. And, you know, we started talking about Adam and his roommate who had already been living there, you know, asked me what was going on. I said, I have this stalker on Facebook all the time, making these fake accounts and messaging people in my life. And he was like, what are the names of some of these accounts? And I told him, and then he just went white as a ghost.

He was like, I friended one of those accounts. It was a woman. We've been talking for weeks. And I told them that you were going to be up here, that you were coming, that I was going to have company this weekend. Somehow Adam found out about this top secret mission to be in Pennsylvania that weekend. It made me realize how far his reach was in my life. Like he must have been contacting literally everybody he knew that had any association with me.

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And I didn't ever want to have this feeling like I didn't know the people around me. And so I started just doing this deep dive into everything I could about his background. I found out that there were at least two other people who had charges against him in our hometown for harassment. I found out that his family didn't look like had any communication with him whatsoever.

And then I found out about the girlfriend, the girlfriend that had existed the whole time. We were seeing each other and hanging out even from the day that I met him. They had been in a relationship for over a year. And I was so fascinated with her because she was a therapist. And I just couldn't believe that a therapist had made the same mistake that I did.

I was like, there's no way she knows the truth. Like she can't possibly know the truth and want to be around him. So she must be being lied to as well. And if she's being lied to and she has the professional experience and the background to know when someone's lying or to see mental illness, like then maybe something's not wrong with me.

That information helped heal this like loss of identity, but it also fueled this new addiction of like, I need to know everything about this person. You know, and that's how I found out about the bankruptcy. I went through mugshots. I went through legal documents, arrest records, articles from when he was in elementary school that were posted on the local papers website. Like everything.

Anything there was about him on the internet, I found and I've read and I've gone through and I've looked at it from every angle. I'm so obsessed at this point with knowing everything I can know because I hated the feeling of being in the dark so much. And then I would hit a wall where I couldn't get any more information about him. But that craving would still be there. And so that's when it kind of bled into other people.

I didn't want to make the same mistake again about being so wrong about somebody. And so I was never going to allow myself to be wrong about somebody else again. And the best way I could do that was to just arm myself with as much information as possible.

It was like this monster that grew. Like, you know, I would find out that somebody was getting a divorce before anyone else knew because they had already filed the paperwork for it. And I was checking everyone's name in this website. It was like a hunt. And each thing I found was a kill.

my best friends from elementary school people I knew in class my family I wanted to know what everyone in my life had done who they really were and it became a really big problem where I would meet somebody new and I would be hanging out with them and I would feel sick almost because they would be telling me stuff about their lives that I already knew but they didn't know that I knew

If my privacy has been taken away from me because I've had this man follow me and get all this information from me, then I'm entitled to it for everybody else too. And the sad reality is that nowadays, none of us really have privacy, at least not the privacy we think we do.

I became really, really obsessed with this girlfriend of his. I just wanted to know how could this girl not know the truth? And should I tell her the truth? Or am I just satisfying this appetite of just the need to know everything about somebody's life? I mean, I would stay up all night and I would just go through these rabbit holes and

But then I would be pulled out by this voice inside my head that was like, this is wrong. You don't need to know all this information about people and that now you're the thing that you don't like. You're being deceitful because you're allowing people to think that you don't have this information about them, that you don't know all this stuff. And that's wrong.

So after the time that, you know, the online stalking started and then it kind of started to wane, it started to go away. And then I found out that he moved to Portland with the girlfriend that he had had the whole time that we were seeing each other. And so I told myself that I had to keep tabs on him because if she needed to be warned, then I might be the only one who can do it.

So at this point, I had graduated college, I actually somehow managed to stick it out the whole four years. And the whole time I had a goal that I was going to go back to San Francisco. And after I graduated, I went back to San Francisco with determination that I was not going to fail this time.

I was living there and I was feeling really safe. And at this point, the amount of stalking that he did to me would just kind of come and go. I would still get weird text messages in the middle of the night from unknown numbers or emails. So I made up my mind I would never, ever respond to any of these messages. And eventually it would go away.

Some time went by and I found out that the girlfriend that had moved to Maine with him had left Maine and moved back to Arkansas. So I thought, okay, maybe she found out the truth. But then I went back to the Arkansas Freedom of Information Act website and I typed in her name. And I found out that...

I found out that she had left him, but he had followed her. And one night he broke into her house and basically held her hostage in her own house. He threatened to kill her. And I don't know the details of this, but there was some kind of sexual assault. And he stole her credit cards. And he only let her go when she promised she wouldn't tell anyone. And this was all stuff that she wrote in this testimony.

He was being charged with rape. He was being charged with kidnapping. He was being charged with theft. I mean, he had like, just from this one night, I think he had like six felonies charged against him. And I'm sitting in my apartment in San Francisco on my computer reading all this. And I immediately get that same sick feeling that I got the night that I found out the truth about him. And I just wanted to throw up.

And I thought I didn't save her. Maybe none of this would have happened if I had told this girl what I already knew. And I thought everything that I went through with him was bad. But what she went through, I can't even imagine. I was lucky I had parents who protected me. And I got out that night in the backyard. But she was stuck at this house with him. And he did all those things to her. I don't know. I just, I wish I would have said something.

And so I finally did reach out to her and I said, I don't know if you know who I am, but we have something in common, which is Adam. I just want you to know that I've been through something similar with him. You're not the only one. It seemed like she was relieved to have me to talk to. You know, we made this pact that if we ever found out anything about Adam, that we would give each other that information immediately.

But then she blocked me. A few days later, she blocks me. And I don't know why.

I felt so much guilt about not telling her, but I thought there was maybe something I could still do. So I called the prosecutor and I got a hold of them and I said, listen, you have a case right now against a man and I want you to know that he doesn't have just one victim. There's multiple people. I can give you their names. I can give you my name. I can give you my story. And if it helps put him away for good, then I want to do it. You know, they were really excited about

You can come in and testify at his sentencing and help the judge see that he's a repeat offender. We need to get him off the street. And I said that I would be happy to do that. And so I was gone for five months. I did this round the world trip. When I got back from being gone, I went to go check on the case and it had been dismissed. They threw it out and I don't know why.

All I knew is that I had to walk away from what I was doing and how deeply embedded I had gotten into this world that I didn't need to be a part of. And I had to change this desire and this compulsion to know everything about him because all I had done was bring me hope and then pain and then sadness.

About two years ago, I'd gotten a message from him. It was something about my mother. It was just like, your mom needs to keep my name out of her mouth. And I was like, what? I don't. She's not talked about him in 10 years. I don't know what this guy is, you know? And so I did a search and that's when I found out that he was back in Maine with a new woman and she had married him.

And she had an 11-year-old daughter. And I suddenly felt all these feelings again of like, do I save this woman? I couldn't save the other one. I couldn't. I didn't do anything. And then she had this horrific thing happen to her. And to make matters worse is I found out all this because she had a GoFundMe for her cancer treatment. She had been diagnosed with breast cancer.

What if this woman doesn't make it and Adam gets custody of this little girl? Like, I'm a mother now. I have a daughter. I don't even know this woman, but I can't let anything happen. And so I don't do anything at first. But then I found out that he was driving for Uber. And I did contact Uber. And I told them that they needed to do a background check on him. They never got back to me. I don't think they cared at all. So all this is happening right when COVID started.

So I reached out to her and I said basically the same thing I said to the first woman, which is we have something in common. It's Adam. And if there's something you need to know about him, I think I can help you because he's a predator and he's a liar and I want to help you. And she never responded to me. That's pretty much leads us up to today. And I got a message from him last week. Again, something about my mother. And I was like, are we going to be tethered to each other for the rest of our lives?

Has this one bad mistake that I made at 19 suddenly going to be a part of my life forever until one of us dies? Is it ever going to end? In the beginning, I used to have those dreams where I can run, but I can't hide. And I had those dreams a lot. And then they stopped. But then they changed. And now there's something almost worse.

We'll all be having a dream and it's a normal dream. I'm at a restaurant with friends and then all of a sudden somebody in my dream, somebody that I've been talking to, all of a sudden reveals themselves to be Adam. And it's the most terrifying feeling because it goes back to that I've been manipulated again, that I've let my guard down again. It is my biggest fear in life that the person I'm closest to will hurt me.

And I'm obsessed with knowing about other people that it happens to because I'm trying to see the red flags they missed so that I won't miss them.

It's one thing not to trust strangers. It's one thing to say, I don't know this person. They haven't earned my trust. It's another to say that the people you've known for years you don't trust and for no good reason other than that they might do something. It drives a person mad. You're always looking for signs or possibilities that they're going to act out of the character that you know them to be. And sometimes you think you could be setting them up for failure doing this. And I wonder, am I the person that I'm presenting myself? Like, why?

Like, we all have multiple sides of ourselves. And I worry about who is going to get hurt next. That's been one of the hardest things. It's like, I don't know who else has been hurt after me. And I don't know who's going to be hurt in the future. But as far as I know, he's out there living his life somewhere in Maine. And if something ever does stop him and put him away, it could be something really bad.

When the first probation officer told me that Adam was diagnosed with antisocial disorder, I just could not wrap my head around this concept that this diagnosis was giving me, which is that somebody has no empathy. They don't care about other human life. They don't have the same moral compass.

I knew people did bad things to people all the time, but the idea that somebody could do something bad and not feel bad or I could not for the life of me understand that.

You know, I thought that everyone was wired the same. We're all humans. But then there are people, for reasons we don't know, because I don't think Adam had a traumatic childhood. I mean, his father, I had him as a teacher. He was a lovely man. His mom was a librarian. He had a good family. His siblings were well-known, well-liked, functioning members of society. So the only thing I could think was he was just born this way. And of all the emotions that I felt about Adam...

anger, fear. At the end of the day, I always come back to the feeling of pity because even though it's easy to be angry with him for being a bad person or being angry with other people, I just feel sorry that he doesn't get to know what it feels like to love other people.

In my adult life, I've overcome a lot of, I think, the damage that this whole incident has played into my life. But the thing that doesn't seem to get better, the thing that doesn't seem to heal is trusting other people. And even now, I question, what is the benefit to trusting people?

There are some people in your life that are worthy of trusting and there are some people that you shouldn't give it to. Knowing who is who is not always easy. And I wish there was like a clear cut way to navigate that and like a rule book or a handbook, but there's not.

And the people in your life that you love and that love you, they might actually have your best interest at heart. And then if I had listened to my family from the beginning and trusted them and not immediately rebelled because I wanted to reject their authority, then maybe none of this would have happened. Yeah.

My partner, who I've been with for five years now, he's a very private person. Because of his occupation, he's in cybersecurity. He's not put himself in vulnerable positions online like most of us have. Like, he doesn't have a social media. He saw the dangers of that way before everyone else did. And so he was the first person in my life that I dated that I could not get all the information I wanted out.

about him just by googling him like I could find out some things but like I couldn't get this like deep dive exploration and so if I wanted to be with him I had to trust him I had to trust that he was a good person

We've been living together for three years. We have a child together. So there are times in my life where I've been thrusted into being trusting, even when I don't know if I was ready. But, you know, I had to say, like, I'm going to sleep under the same roof as this person every single night. And I've got to trust that they're not going to hurt me when I'm being my most vulnerable. And I've

I had a child with this person, so I have to trust that they're going to take care of me and they're going to take care of our child and that I have to trust myself that I chose the right person for all of this. That yes, I've made mistakes in the past when I was 19, but I'm older now and I've learned a lot and maybe it's okay to trust myself now.

Today's episode featured Hannah. Hannah is a writer living in California. If you'd like to reach out, you can email her at hannahwrites08 at gmail.com. That's h-a-n-n-a-h-w-r-i-t-e-s-0-8 at gmail.com.

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Hey, I'm Mike Corey, the host of Wondery's podcast, Against the Odds. In each episode, we share thrilling true stories of survival, putting you in the shoes of the people who live to tell the tale. In our next season, it's July 6th, 1988, and workers are settling into the night shift aboard Piper Alpha, the world's largest offshore oil rig.

Home to 226 men, the rig is stationed in the stormy North Sea off the coast of Scotland. At around 10 p.m., workers accidentally trigger a gas leak that leads to an explosion and a fire. As they wait to be rescued, the workers soon realize that Piper Alpha has transformed into a death trap. Follow Against the Odds wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen ad-free on Amazon Music or the Wondery app.