S15 E8: [Lex Fitzgerald] Actively Seeking to Cause Us Harm

[0] Wondry Plus subscribers can listen to something was wrong early and ad -free right now.

[1] Join Wondry Plus in the Wondry app or on Apple Podcasts.

[2] I'm Dan Tversky.

[3] In 2011, something strange began to happen at a high school in upstate New York.

[4] A mystery illness, bizarre symptoms, and spreading fast.

[5] What's the answer?

[6] And what do you do if they tell you it's all in your head?

[7] Hysterical.

[8] A new podcast from Wondry and Pineapple Street Studios.

[9] Binge all episodes of hysterical early and ad -free on Wondery Plus.

[10] Something Was Wrong is intended for mature audiences, as it discusses topics that can be upsetting, such as emotional, physical, and sexual violence.

[11] Content warnings for each episode and confidential and free resources for survivors can be found in the episode notes.

[12] Some survivor names have been changed for anonymity purposes.

[13] pseudonyms are given to minors in these stories for their privacy and protection.

[14] Testimony shared by guests on this show is their own and does not necessarily reflect the views of myself, broken cycle media, or wondering.

[15] The podcast or any linked materials should not be construed as medical advice, nor is the information a substitute for professional expertise or treatment.

[16] All persons are considered innocent and less proven guilty in a court of law.

[17] Thank you so much for listening.

[18] Hi, my name is Lex.

[19] I'm 32 and a mom to four little ones.

[20] I have a six -year -old, a four -year -old, a two -year -old, and a seven -month -old.

[21] My husband and I, we met in 2011 and got married in the spring of 2015.

[22] We currently live in Fort Worth, Texas, but we were both born and raised in New York.

[23] We knew that we always wanted to have a big family, so later that we that year we began trying for our first baby.

[24] It was during this time, I became familiar with YouTube.

[25] I had always thought it was for things like funny cat videos.

[26] I was unaware that there was so much information available on YouTube.

[27] My mom was living in South Africa.

[28] That's where she's from.

[29] So I began posting my pregnancy updates for my family to watch.

[30] And that's sort of how I became introduced to YouTube.

[31] I had had zero interest in becoming a YouTuber.

[32] Back then, I wasn't even really tech savvy enough to know what that would entail.

[33] It just wasn't as big of a thing as it is now.

[34] I would say the biggest misconception of content creation is that it's easy.

[35] When I first started out creating videos on YouTube, I wasn't making anything, literally zero dollars.

[36] As I began to continue making videos, I started to make pennies here or there, and it was hours of work, hours.

[37] Still to this day, I probably put in 50 hours a week working with my talent agency, creating content for other brands, creating content for my own socials, engaging with our community, answering emails, etc. Also, content creation.

[38] and social media marketing is so new that it's not really seen as an actual means of income or, quote, unquote, a real job.

[39] But in reality, it's a full -time career.

[40] When we had our baby, I continued to document our days as new parents.

[41] It was a lot of work, and we made no money, but it was a therapeutic outlet for me, and I really enjoyed it.

[42] I would be engaging with other new moms and felt like I was being supported even by people that I had never met before, never really spoken with in such a new time in my life as a mom, I felt like I was being seen.

[43] I had other people who were going through what I was going through that I could bounce ideas off of.

[44] From there, my socials gradually grew, and even though we were making pennies per video, I had stuck with it.

[45] knowing that one day our kids would be old enough to watch these videos themselves.

[46] Now, when one of my little ones asks how one of our vacations went, we can pull up those videos and we can watch them together and they can see what it was like life back then for us.

[47] It's just a really cool concept of social media creation in general that I really love.

[48] Time went on, I began making more revenue and eventually we had signed with a talent agency, all of that hard work, late nights, it all translated into pretty much a full income.

[49] That is when we decided to form our LLC.

[50] I also was contractually obligated to create content with my agency.

[51] Through this, I was able to work with some of the largest companies in the world, and it's been so much fun to do that.

[52] I was able to stay home with my babies, make my own hours, create supple income for my family, and my children got to have me home with them.

[53] And that is the absolute most incredible blessing that I could have ever asked for.

[54] It's such a wonderful creative outlet, too.

[55] Over the years, I have made lifelong friends navigating the same stages of life as me. They have leaned on me at times of need, and I've leaned on them through all of the hardships of motherhood.

[56] I'm really grateful that this is where our lives led.

[57] With so much sadness and hardship on the internet, I wanted to create a space where we could laugh and not feel so isolated.

[58] At the end of 2019, that is when, unfortunately, everything changed.

[59] I started to notice a trend among some comments I'd received.

[60] In the beginning, every once in a while, you get somebody who had an opposing opinion or they disliked something that you chose to do or not to do.

[61] And like, totally fine, right?

[62] We're all different people.

[63] We're all individuals.

[64] But I started to notice a trend of similar things being stated and it was coming from accounts that didn't necessarily seem to be legitimate.

[65] They would be coming from newly made accounts with no followers and no profile picture.

[66] I figured my socials were starting to grow to the point where we would be getting some negative feedback.

[67] At first, I began to just brush it off.

[68] This began earlier in 2019, but it really was at the end of 2019.

[69] I started to actually be suspicious that something bigger was going on.

[70] I would delete the comments, block the account, and carry on protecting the overall piece of my socials.

[71] What I wanted, the most is to give parents, anyone, a place to go where they feel a little bit lighter.

[72] Forget me. I don't care.

[73] I have thicker skin.

[74] I didn't want people to start reading comments and read something negative.

[75] So I would just delete, block, and carry on.

[76] It wasn't that I was ever trying to hide anything.

[77] I just didn't want anyone to feel like they needed to defend me or themselves.

[78] I've always thought it's just not worth the time or energy to try to change someone's opinion, especially when it's coming from an account that really was only created to be hateful.

[79] The direct messages and comments all had a very similar tone to them, stating that I was irrational or delusional or that I had a nasty attitude.

[80] The messages would come from accounts like A, B, C, X, Y, Z, Z, or OK, Karen, one, two, three, four.

[81] So all of these counts are clearly troll accounts.

[82] One time, they had even stated in my direct messages that they had unfollowed me months ago because you have a nasty attitude and referenced the fact that I had originally blocked them on their main account for disagreeing with them.

[83] It was at this point that I realized that someone was making an effort to connect with me even though they had been blocked once before.

[84] Then one day, it was brought to my attention that a hate account had been made on Instagram targeting me. This was my first experience having a Instagram account dedicated to disproving of me as a person.

[85] It was called Lex Fitzgerald blocked me. In the bio of this account, it had said, a meeting ground for former subscribers of the Fitzgeralds, who were blocked or berated for changing the narrative, share your personal experience.

[86] They were literally taking time out of their day to create charts and clip art as to why I was a bad person.

[87] My brain has struggled to comprehend being annoyed by somebody this much to spend this amount of their free time creating these posts.

[88] I struggle to understand it all.

[89] But the direct messages and comments continued throughout the year, as well as the posts to this specific Instagram account.

[90] At that point, I thought it was someone I had annoyed by blocking them and that they would eventually lose interest.

[91] But time went on and it still continued.

[92] I'd block them and lo and behold, a new account would appear.

[93] I truly thought, okay, here we go.

[94] I've gotten to the point where my socials have reached enough people to where this is now going to be a normal occurrence.

[95] It did concern me slightly that it was all the same narrative.

[96] While I couldn't confirm that it was all one person, in my gut, that's what made me a little nervous.

[97] Imagine somebody sitting there on their computer putting together these intricate photos.

[98] I didn't personally feel attacked or hurt by it.

[99] I was just slightly concerned by the amount of effort.

[100] That was what stayed in the back of my mind.

[101] But as far as what they were saying, I'm comfortable in who I am as a person.

[102] I like who I am as a person.

[103] When things are stated about me that are just so incorrect, I almost feel like it's not really worth it to engage.

[104] Unfortunately, throughout me sharing this experience, you're going to notice a pattern of me being naive and thinking that this would have stop.

[105] They would get bored, but that's not what happened.

[106] At this point, I think I was still blissfully unaware of what was going to be taking place.

[107] People who are dedicating this amount of time to creating accounts or groups, there's so many other ways to connect with people and build community in your life outside of being hateful on the internet.

[108] It's baffling to me. These people could be working whole ass part -time jobs instead of these things that they're doing.

[109] You can get work from home jobs instead of being a hater.

[110] You could be building yourself.

[111] You could be building your future.

[112] I agree.

[113] October 24th, 2020, I had given birth to my third baby.

[114] Because of COVID, no family was allowed to visit in the hospital.

[115] So we wanted to wait until we were home and our family could meet our baby before sharing him with the world.

[116] His middle name was actually a family name.

[117] And so we were very excited to surprise our in -laws.

[118] When we introduced him to them, I knew that my mother -in -law would be so happy.

[119] After sharing his photo with our immediate family, his name and his stats, we gave permission to our family to post to their private social media accounts.

[120] Did we want to be the first to share him with our community online?

[121] Sure.

[122] But we've never allowed social media to take away from our family.

[123] family members.

[124] We wanted them to still be able to share their new grandchild like any grandparents would be excited to do.

[125] My mom, she had made a post on Facebook, not knowing that prior to this, she had actually accepted a friend request from somebody who was harassing us.

[126] They saw the post, took a screenshot, and then they got to work.

[127] We at this point had not publicly shared our baby.

[128] We're talking like the same day that I gave birth.

[129] We were still in newborn bliss taking in that quality time together.

[130] While we were doing that, this person took my baby's name and they made an actual Instagram account with it.

[131] Then they posted our baby's info, photo, and name to the account and began tagging people in the post.

[132] Then they went onto my account and began replying to people to people It was all really intrusive.

[133] It was upsetting that they took that special moment away from us.

[134] There's no reason to do something like that except to hurt us.

[135] This was the first time that we reached out to our local police department to ask if there was anything we could do to document the harassment.

[136] We felt maybe we had enough to where we could have our police department be on the lookout for us.

[137] God forbid anybody shows up at our home or anything along those lines.

[138] It would be wise to have our local police department be aware of what was going on.

[139] If they were beginning to make contact with our family, we wanted to make sure that this was all being recorded and documented.

[140] They told us, unless they were in front of our home, there isn't much that they could do.

[141] It was discouraging.

[142] The harassment continued.

[143] Anytime I would say I was having a good day or I was happy about something, they would make contact with me in some way.

[144] I had posted a photo of my best friend meeting our baby for the first time, and they'd be all over it.

[145] They had written, keep drinking the Kool -Age, she'll turn on you eventually.

[146] There would be a bunch of fake accounts being made, and once one got blocked, another would be created.

[147] A few months after having my baby, I started having some odd symptoms.

[148] I went to the doctor for some blood work, and one of my blood work came back elevated, showing signs of an autoimmune disease.

[149] It's not something.

[150] I spoke about the possibility of it being rheumatoid arthritis or lupus.

[151] I was so petrified to even mention because I've always had health anxiety and then to be postpartum and then to also be going through the possibility of being diagnosed with something pretty scary.

[152] I shared it, and then I shut down a little bit about it.

[153] I was showing elevations for scleroderma, which I was not expecting, and it scared me a lot when I had looked up the symptoms and spoke to my doctor about it.

[154] My stress was through the roof during this time.

[155] It was just a lot to take in all at once.

[156] My milk supply, I was breastfeeding at the time.

[157] It felt like it essentially disappeared overnight.

[158] I had reached out to my local Facebook group asking if anybody had a electric pump that I could borrow or I could purchase off of them.

[159] and somebody had reached back out to me and said that they were a teacher and because of COVID, they're working from home and they actually didn't need their breast milk.

[160] After going through the steps of making sure that the breast milk would be suited for my baby and seeing certain blood tests that she had, I felt comfortable enough.

[161] I was like, okay, I would love to have this breast milk.

[162] Some moms choose to have their breast milk donated.

[163] And I was really grateful to this mom who stepped up and helped me, you know, the, saying it takes a village.

[164] I just felt supported by this mom and really grateful to her.

[165] In the same post, someone had also told me about a local group that helps people connect for donated breast milk.

[166] And before I had confirmed anything with this other mom, I had another mother reach out to me and say that she had milk available.

[167] So at this point, I had two people offer me breast milk.

[168] This is an important detail.

[169] I went and I picked up the milk from the first mom and told the second mom that I had picked up one donation, was working on my supply, and that I was going to pass on her offer, even though I was very grateful.

[170] I didn't feel right in my heart to take more than I thought that I needed at that time.

[171] I was still very hopeful that I would try to get my supply back up to where I needed it to be.

[172] The one mom that I picked up this milk from, she had written a little note on the bag to my son.

[173] When I tell you that I broke down in tears.

[174] Once again, I felt so supported and it felt like a hug from afar.

[175] I took a photo of the bag of the milk and I posted it and I wrote a little message from my heart, encouraging people that you can make your own community and how grateful I was.

[176] The post ended up going viral.

[177] A lot of the very big over a million follower accounts on social media within the motherhood lifestyle genre had heard of my story and they were resharing it.

[178] It was posted to a lot of different parenting pages and overall was a really positive look into moms being there for each other in times of need.

[179] All of a sudden, more new accounts began popping up and commenting on the posts saying how I was lying about needing the breast milk.

[180] It felt like every time that I I had something that I was grateful for in my life or felt positively about, they would appear.

[181] They would sit there and respond to positive comments that people were stating.

[182] They would be like, I need mental help and I was a fraud, a liar, that I wrote that on the bag myself, like the message to my baby.

[183] While this was going on, a new Facebook account with the name Barb Stevens, it had no photo or posts, found my post in my private Facebook group for my town, and began replying to the comments saying that I was a fraud and needed mental help more than breast milk help.

[184] So not only is this affecting my life in the world of social media, now this person on Facebook was messaging people directly in my community about me. They sent members in that Facebook group private messages about me telling people I needed mental help and to give their milk to babies who actually needed it.

[185] Meanwhile, I'm going through this health scare, stressing over my milk supply, and having my other children at home and still needing to navigate life.

[186] It was a really, really hard point in my life.

[187] I started to get anxiety any time that I would go to share something positive because it was like, well, what are they going to do in this situation?

[188] Who are they going to find next?

[189] And then this experience gets so much worse.

[190] It was this situation where I had that first realization that for somebody to access my local Facebook group, they know where I live.

[191] When we had moved from New York to Connecticut in 2019, we had a conversation, my husband and I, and we said, let's not say that we're moving into Connecticut.

[192] We'll not really mention it, but if it does come up, we'll imply that we're still living in New York.

[193] And it gave us a little extra added protection.

[194] But knowing that this person had now infiltrated my local Facebook group was an awakening.

[195] and that was probably the scariest part of all of this.

[196] It felt like such an invasion.

[197] Now it really started to feel like harassment.

[198] Even the person who had donated the milk to me confirmed multiple times that she was the one who wrote the message on the bag.

[199] They just did not care.

[200] So I knew that this wasn't a misunderstanding.

[201] This was somebody who was actively seeking to cause us harm.

[202] Once again, I went about it, blocking and deleting.

[203] I was still hoping that they would get bored with me. I don't know if this fueled them more.

[204] Maybe they continued to feel more silenced, or maybe they saw it as an omission of guilt in a way.

[205] What am I supposed to do?

[206] Am I supposed to sit there and message them back and be like, hey, no, I didn't write this on the bag.

[207] It feels so excessive to me. I knew I was dealing with somebody who so many times before his made such an effort to get in contact with me. I almost was scared to give them that attention.

[208] I didn't want to fuel that fire.

[209] But then one of the troll accounts, they posted a reel of a still of my handwriting from a completely random video from years ago, and then the photo of the bag with the handwriting on it.

[210] They must have combed through hundreds of videos trying to find a sample of my handwriting.

[211] And in that video, they tagged myself along with big breastfeeding accounts.

[212] They even tagged Ziploc because it was on a Ziploc bag.

[213] It seemed like so much effort.

[214] It was the effort that was the scariest part for me. A account called Katarina's Meow reached out to the person who had donated the milk to me, and said, Oh, M .G, I'm so sorry to see your post.

[215] Alexa, which is my full name, she is a compulsive, user, and liar.

[216] Please be careful.

[217] She went on to say, she latches onto people for plot lines.

[218] Certainly, she'd never do anything to harm anyone intentionally.

[219] She's not malicious.

[220] But she's a classic Westchester girl.

[221] I say that because I grew up as one too.

[222] Westchester County, New York is where both my husband and I grew up.

[223] This account wasn't this person's main account.

[224] It was actually just an account for her only fans page.

[225] I had no idea at the time that this person behind this account was a dangerous person and someone who would pretty much change my life forever.

[226] When this happened, we reached out to our local police department for the second time and still they said they would only help us if they were trying to gain access to our property.

[227] We were feeling fed up.

[228] We were not feeling safe anymore in our home.

[229] We were not feeling supported by our local law enforcement.

[230] It was going to be hard, but we knew that we could likely travel full time with the income that I was getting from social media.

[231] We were like, okay, well, we have little ones.

[232] Is this something that we could do?

[233] we had gotten in contact with our little ones preschool and their teachers who we really trusted and we loved so much and we asked them how do they think it would go for a family with children our age to travel in this capacity and they were so excited for us they were pushing us to do it said that it would be such a wonderful experience we ended up deciding that we were going to do it if there was any a point in our lives that we would get to travel and like for our honeymoon we went for a few month long road trip.

[234] And so my husband and I, that was part of who we were as people going on road trips, exploring, experiencing.

[235] We were always bringing our kids' places anyway.

[236] So we decided to just do it.

[237] We ended up booking rentals for about a month at a time in different states.

[238] That was it.

[239] We began our family's greatest adventure.

[240] We decided we were going to purposely really delay our posting to YouTube as another safety measure.

[241] On May 22, 2021, an account, it was Tinley 4132, made contact with one of my friends on social media.

[242] We were visiting them on the first leg of our trip.

[243] It was the first time that her and I were officially meeting, but we had been talking for years.

[244] We were so excited to meet one another officially.

[245] They messaged this person stating, I highly recommend joining the snark discord before you trust Lex Fitzgerald inside.

[246] your home in any way, shape, or form.

[247] They also gave the link to the discord.

[248] And of course, my friend already knowing everything we had been experiencing, she told me instantly, I blocked the account.

[249] And I would have my husband block it from his socials.

[250] When they realized that they couldn't see my account anymore, they suspected that my friend had gone and told me about it.

[251] They once again reached back out to her and said, I see you told Lex on me with a crying, laughing emoji.

[252] And it said, enjoy your ride to the racist Trump worshiping thinking mothers who have miscarriages are inferior shit show.

[253] So that's what this person wrote to her.

[254] I feel like it's important for me to mention my socials are about motherhood.

[255] And I try to be as positive and lighthearted and funny as I can be.

[256] I don't discuss religion or politics, social issues.

[257] That's my personal decision.

[258] That's a decision that I have the right to make.

[259] Because of that, I also don't bother defending myself when things like this are said about me. The worst part about this all is that I have shared my own struggles with having reoccurrent miscarriages.

[260] For that to be said about me is hurtful.

[261] I don't want anyone to ever think that I think that way about people and losses that they've experienced.

[262] But knowing who this is coming from, that this is likely the person who's been harassing us, how would I even go about defending myself?

[263] I would have to directly communicate with that person who clearly will never change their viewpoint of me or publicly post their message.

[264] And then I'm giving them a voice on my platform, which goes against everything I'm trying to create.

[265] Most importantly, the last thing I want to do is give them attention.

[266] So when these things are said, I just try to put my faith in people and those around me will know me well enough to make their own decisions about me. But the reason this specific DM is so important is because this is the first time that I was made aware of something called the Discord.

[267] A Discord is a group chat forum that is on an invite -only server.

[268] To access that forum, you need an invite from one of the members.

[269] So this was the first time that I was made aware that there was something like this out there.

[270] On June 9th, 2021, I receive another direct message from a newly made Instagram account.

[271] It was like Lou, Lou, Lou, Lou, Lou, Lou, 2001, with no profile photo, no followers, not following anybody else.

[272] And the message was long.

[273] It said, yeah, someone has to make some sacrifices for this once -in -a -lifetime experience road trip, your kids.

[274] What have you done so far that's made this an experience of a lifetime for them?

[275] A rodeo, Target, donuts.

[276] You sold basically everything they consider to be home, house bed toys.

[277] You're leaving them alone and Airbnb while you work out and drink beer.

[278] When your four -year -old wants to go home back to the house with horses, it's because you made him think that this was home.

[279] He has no concept of what it means when you'll say you'll stay for a month and then keep traveling.

[280] When he's excited about the next place, it's because he thinks he'll get to stay.

[281] You really think that a year of this will be good for them, but hey, you posted 69 stories and eight hours on IG today.

[282] You'll probably cherish that memory.

[283] The wildest part about this whole experience, too, is that this person is only seeing what we post on social media.

[284] They literally do not know us.

[285] They have never met us, and they can only go by what we choose to share.

[286] So think about when you're sharing to social media how much information is just completely missing.

[287] We all know things are not real on social media.

[288] That's what they say.

[289] And so while we've always...

[290] try to be honest and open and share things.

[291] There are private things, whether consciously or subconsciously, that we are choosing not to share.

[292] They're referencing us working out in the gym because they saw a room in our Airbnb and then they saw a gym.

[293] But what they missed was that it literally was in our Airbnb.

[294] While we keep getting harassed, we start realizing that it's not like they're seeking clarification because of a misunderstanding, we were beginning to notice a pattern that they were only trying to cause our family harm.

[295] The following day was a lot for me. It was the beginning of this getting so much worse.

[296] The following day was June 10th, 2021, and as I'm on a walk with my kids to see the horses that were on our property that we were staying at, I get a text message from an unknown number.

[297] My skin began to crawl as I read this message because once again this means that they have broken another layer of intrusion.

[298] They had gotten my phone number and now they're texting me. And this was the moment things took a turn.

[299] I'm Dan Tiberski.

[300] In 2011, something strange began to happen at the high school in Leroy, New York.

[301] I was like at my locker and she came up to me and she was like stuttering super bad.

[302] I'm like, stop fucking around.

[303] She's like, I can't.

[304] A mystery illness, bizarre symptoms and spreading fast.

[305] It's like doubling and tripling and it's all these girls.

[306] With a diagnosis, the state tried to keep on the down low.

[307] Everybody thought I was holding something back.

[308] Well, you were holding something back.

[309] Intentionally.

[310] Yeah, yeah.

[311] No, it's hysteria.

[312] It's all in your head.

[313] It's not physical.

[314] Oh my gosh, you're exaggerating.

[315] Is this the largest mass hysteria?

[316] since the Witches of Salem?

[317] Or is it something else entirely?

[318] Something's wrong here.

[319] Something's not right.

[320] Leroy was the new date line and everyone was trying to solve the murder.

[321] A new limited series from Wondery and Pineapple Street Studios, Hysterical.

[322] Follow Hysterical on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts.

[323] You can binge all episodes of hysterical early and ad free right now by joining Wondry Plus.

[324] Scammers are best known for living the high life until they're forced to trade it all in.

[325] for handcuffs and an orange jumpsuit once they're finally caught.

[326] I'm Sachi Cole.

[327] And I'm Sarah Haggy.

[328] And we're the host of scam influencers, a weekly podcast from Wondery that takes you along the twists and turns of some of the most infamous scams of all time, the impact on victims and what's left once the facade falls away.

[329] We've covered stories like a Shark Tank certified entrepreneur who left the show with an investment, but soon faced mounting bills, an active lawsuit followed by Larry King, and no real product to push.

[330] He then began to prey on vulnerable.

[331] women instead, selling the idea of a future together while stealing from them behind their backs.

[332] To the infamous scams of Real Housewives stars like Teresa Judice, what should have proven to be a major downfall only seemed to solidify her place in the Real Housewives Hall of Fame.

[333] Follow Scam influencers on the Wondry app or wherever you get your podcasts.

[334] You can listen to scamfluencers early and ad free right now on Wondry Plus.

[335] Because initially I was able to exit social media and not have to deal with their harassment, but now they are going one step further to make contact with me. I had gotten three missed calls from a no -caller ID, and then a text message.

[336] It said, so, air quotes, Lex, with an eye roll emoji, let's talk about what a liar you are.

[337] For the last two years, you led your followers to believe that you were living in New York, even went so far as to gift to creators a basket of New York items when they visited you, when in reality you've been living in a rinky -dink little two -family home in Ridgefield, Connecticut.

[338] I saw you and your family leaving the holiday in in Culpepper and wanted to say hi.

[339] I didn't want to seem like a creep, but I'm glad I didn't because no one wants to be associated with a liar.

[340] and a fraud.

[341] Thousands upon thousands of mamas trust you and you've been lying this entire time.

[342] So let's just unpack this for a second.

[343] First off, my skin was crawling because it felt like such an invasion of privacy.

[344] This person was even going out of their way to not only call me three times, but to then send me a text message.

[345] She's referencing me as a liar.

[346] One, because my full name is Alexa, but I go by the nickname Lex.

[347] I'm also a liar because we had moved a half hour over the border to Connecticut from New York, but chose out of safety not to share that detail publicly online.

[348] It's not like we did a cross -country move.

[349] You're born and raised New Yorkers.

[350] Both of you.

[351] New Yorkers are always New Yorkers no matter where they live.

[352] That's a fact, right?

[353] Right.

[354] That is valid.

[355] That is true.

[356] Can't take the New Yorker out of us.

[357] And it's one of those details that doesn't harm anybody to not share.

[358] We do reserve the right to choose what we share on social media, even if some people feel that that's not the case.

[359] Also, a big thing is that this person followed us to a hotel where we were staying at, saw our family, and was going to approach us, but said that they chose not to because that would make them be associated with a liar and a fraud.

[360] I've had a lot of people ask me, why do I think that they're doing this or what do you think the reasoning is behind it?

[361] It was at this moment in time, even though things at this point weren't nearly as bad as they were about to get.

[362] I started realizing that we weren't dealing with behavior of a safe person.

[363] This wasn't somebody who just had a difference of opinion or someone who was just really angry with me, it seemed to go far beyond that into this really scary realm of truly not knowing how far they were willing to go, especially since we weren't having any type of help with law enforcement.

[364] It seemed like the train, so to speak, had already left the station.

[365] There was no backtracking with this person or this experience.

[366] It was nerve -wracking and very uncomfortable for us.

[367] We were acknowledging the fact that this was feeling really icky and that this felt like stalking and harassment.

[368] But any time you reach out to law enforcement, they're so confused.

[369] Cyber security, I feel like it's so new.

[370] And social media and technology are moving at such rapid rates that it almost feels like our laws and law enforcement don't know how to keep up.

[371] when you are calling up and asking to file a police report about somebody who's harassing you online, and the first thing they say to you is, well, have they come to you in person?

[372] And you say, no, they say, okay, well, when they come to you in person, then you can file a claim.

[373] Or you say, like, I'm scared, and I have somebody who's harassing me online, and they say, well, just stop posting.

[374] You're hearing that from law enforcement.

[375] that is really degrading and hurtful and makes you feel like you are making a bigger deal of something than you should be.

[376] After seeking legal advice the following day on June 11th, I was instructed to send this person a formal response.

[377] They told me to tell this person to basically stop all forms of contact with me. I was very emotionless and straightforward about exactly what I expect.

[378] from them.

[379] I included all of the places they potentially could make direct or indirect contact with me, and it ended with do not respond.

[380] And they didn't, or at least I thought that they didn't.

[381] On June 12th, 2021, the next day, we were out having a wonderful day in Gatlinburg, which is a very, like, touristy area of Tennessee, and we were enjoying ourselves.

[382] We get this call from our Airbnb owner stating that CPS was at her door and wanted to talk to us.

[383] Thankfully, she was so understanding.

[384] We had been there for a little while, so we were able to establish a relationship with her, and she saw how we navigated our lives with our children and whatnot.

[385] But it still was just like, oh, my goodness, my heart sank.

[386] We had to drive 40 minutes back to our Airbnb, not knowing what was going to happen.

[387] And the state of Tennessee Department of Children's Services came to our Airbnb after a anonymous complaint was made against our family.

[388] It was 24 hours later at this point after I told this person to stop all forms of contact with me. And the first time that I really had stood up for my family and told them what I expected of them to do, it felt like that.

[389] was their response to us, was then making this anonymous complaint.

[390] Thankfully, our caseworker that we had for this experience was incredible, and she actually began the conversation letting us know she suspected that this complaint was made to harass our family.

[391] It was one of the hardest days of my life, honestly, because if there is one thing that I was put on this earth to do, it is to be the mother of my children, there is just nothing that I love more than being a mom to be faced with somebody coming to where we were living at the time and have the ability to potentially take my kids from me was so overwhelming to me. Like I said, our caseworker, she was incredible.

[392] As she began to read each complaint, it became more and more clear how intense this person was.

[393] and the lengths that she was willing to go to try to harm us, as well as how much she felt about us was wrong.

[394] This person stated in the complaint, they said this person deserves to have her children taken away from her because she just goes to Target and spends her husband's money, and her children don't have food because of that.

[395] And then another complaint was the leave our kids alone, to go work out.

[396] Another one was that we had our baby sleeping in a basket on the stairs.

[397] The caseworker came into our Airbnb, checked all the necessary things that needed to be checked, spoke with our children, and that was it.

[398] She was on her way.

[399] Having said that, it was very upsetting and overwhelming to me to experience this.

[400] But my husband and I, we did do a really good job as parents, not allowing it to affect our kids.

[401] Nothing about the situation's funny, but it did sort of make a smile because my son was actually sad that the caseworker had to leave because he was enjoying walking the property with us and with her.

[402] He was actually vocal about the fact that he wanted her to stay and hang out with us.

[403] Being a mom, I swear, children are blessings.

[404] It just made me smile during a situation that was so hard for me to navigate.

[405] Majority of the time, our caseworker was actually talking to us.

[406] She was helping us understand how we would go about seeking criminal charges against the person who made the complaint.

[407] I'm not exactly sure on the specific law, but I do know that it is against the law to make a complaint with the intent to harass.

[408] She also shared with us how shocked she was that someone who had never met us would go to this length to harass our family.

[409] So there's a few really important things here.

[410] The person who made the complaint did not know the exact address of our Airbnb, but had to have combed through every single listing in Tennessee.

[411] And then once they found a match, they didn't have access to the address unless they booked the same Airbnb.

[412] So they only had the general location for the report for CPS, not the actual location.

[413] address.

[414] This person spent who knows how long trying to figure out where our listing was, eventually found it, but only was able to give a generalized area.

[415] I still don't think that I have recovered from what I experienced that day.

[416] There are still times in my life where I will look and there will be toys on the ground.

[417] And my first instinct is, what if CPS?

[418] shows up right now, will they think that our home is messy?

[419] I live with this fear.

[420] What if somebody gets it wrong the next time?

[421] What if a caseworker is having a bad day?

[422] There are so many what ifs.

[423] Oh my gosh, my heart, I get so scared.

[424] I get so scared.

[425] Also, there's this whole component where this person is sitting here with me, talking to me, where my children are safe and have a comfortable place to sleep at night and are loved, supported, and have food, are clean and have clean clothes.

[426] And there are children out there who need this caseworker.

[427] And instead of being with them, they're here.

[428] On top of that, I knew that they could do this every single Airbnb that we stayed at.

[429] They could continue every new place we went.

[430] They figure it out.

[431] They call CPS.

[432] They make a claim, and that's it.

[433] We have to deal with this every single place that we go.

[434] The trip, I did my best to enjoy it and be in the moment and make it incredible for my children, but I feel like it was truly taken from me because of what we had experienced while we were traveling.

[435] I think the only reason why we had such a positive experience with CPS is because they had linked our YouTube channel in the report as proof of neglect.

[436] And so they were able to see who we were.

[437] Unfortunately, that was not our last run -in with CPS.

[438] On July 12, 2021, I received another call and text from a different phone number.

[439] The text stated, I want to help you, Lex, with a post that came from a website called YouTube Mama Drama, which is utilized to say negative and hurtful things about moms that are in the YouTube space.

[440] It stated, I stumbled across this board and holy hell the reading material is fire, though I realize she's not worth much effort.

[441] I'm actually, wait, what is the word she used, devastated, that this has fizzled and no one is talking about the grand trip.

[442] How freaking weird.

[443] Dan, who's my husband, definitely cheated.

[444] I can say with 100 % certainty because I've slept with him.

[445] Judge me, I don't care.

[446] He's better looking in person.

[447] He's better looking in person.

[448] and quite, shall we say, gifted.

[449] Of course, I didn't know he was married at the time.

[450] I must say, they use my daughter's name, is getting cuter and her features are becoming more defined as she gets older, but still pretty plain old Jane.

[451] I hope Lex gets her shit together for her children's sake.

[452] She needs heavy psychiatric treatment and a serious bracing reality check.

[453] Instead of responding, I changed my phone number, and that was the first time out of three times that I, I've had to change my phone number since this all began.

[454] But I changed my phone number that I had had since I was 14 and began the process of updating all of my friend's family in accounts of my number change.

[455] On July 16th, that account, Katerina's meow, they actually direct message me on Instagram.

[456] This is the same person who had reached out to the person who had donated the breast milk to me. She says, oh, honey, you don't get to hide behind cycle babble.

[457] when you post your entire life on the internet for anyone who wants to see.

[458] You lie about everything.

[459] Twins, pre -me, autoimmune, homeownership, six -figure income, copyright infringement from Dan's Etsy store.

[460] I did go to BHS, which is the high school that I went to.

[461] And I really wish you would stop embarrassing your alma mater.

[462] You're giving us all shitty freaking names, and it's embarrassing.

[463] I'm so glad you're getting out of here and going down south because you don't belong here.

[464] You don't fit in.

[465] That's what she wrote me. I had no idea who she was.

[466] A post was made on the YouTube Mama Drama forum by the username Lisa Lee 90, and it stated, does anyone else absolutely cringe when she posts videos or stories of her kids talking?

[467] She goes on and on about how smart these kids.

[468] are.

[469] Meanwhile, C and W, my middle child, my second oldest, both literally sound like they're retarded.

[470] It hurts my ears.

[471] I roll emoji, crying, laughing emoji.

[472] That's what this person wrote.

[473] It hurts my heart because I don't think that that word should be used in anybody's vocabulary.

[474] And then to hear them talking about little kids, babies, practically speaking about them that way.

[475] It just goes to show there's no point in me ever responding or ever engaging because this person is not somebody who is a safe person.

[476] A few days later, another newly made account called Some Dummy 123 sends me a direct message stating she doesn't even want to see the family she already has and yet she's trying to bring more people into the world and deleting comments suggesting she seek therapy.

[477] That's because you know good luck, sweetie.

[478] When I went to go look at this account to see if it was like a fake account, I realized they had already made seven posts that were screenshots of things I had posted.

[479] So it was another hate account.

[480] Two days later, on July 30th, I noticed another new Instagram account with no followers and no profile photo had posted two posts in an attempt to harass and defame me as well.

[481] She struck him with her motor vehicle.

[482] She had been under the influence and she left him there.

[483] In January 2022, local woman Karen Reed was implicated in the mysterious death of her boyfriend, Boston police officer John O 'Keefe.

[484] It was alleged that after an innocent night out for drinks with friends, Karen and John got into a lover's quarrel en route to the next location.

[485] What happens next?

[486] Depends on who you ask.

[487] Was it a crime of passion?

[488] If you believe the prosecution, it's because the, The evidence was so compelling.

[489] This was clearly an intentional act.

[490] And his cause of death was blunt force trauma with hypothermia.

[491] Or a corrupt police cover -up.

[492] If you believe the defense theory, however, this was all a cover -up to prevent one of their own from going down.

[493] Everyone had an opinion.

[494] And after the 10 -week trial, the jury could not come to a unanimous decision.

[495] To end in a mistrial, it's just a confirmation of just how complicated this case is.

[496] Law and Crime presents the most in -depth analysis to date of the sensational case in Karen.

[497] You can listen to Karen exclusively with Wondry Plus.

[498] Join Wondry Plus in the Wondry app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify.

[499] This account, it was like Julie Elizabeth 1017 or something.

[500] They were very much irritated at the fact that I did not pick up my phone or camera to record my newborn in respiratory distress.

[501] I had posted my birth vlog from the year prior to my Instagram account and I had talked about in the caption of that video how I had gone to breastfeed my son for the first time and we had to press the call button because he started choking and seemed like he was going into respiratory distress and they took him from me and they gave him oxygen because I didn't have footage of that happening because I would never have my first thought be picking up my phone or my camera to record that.

[502] I was being called a liar.

[503] The caption of the photo that they had posted to this Instagram account says this doesn't match the video Lex Fitzgerald posted at all.

[504] Is she lying about respiratory distress?

[505] If so, what else is she lying about with all of our names and our children's names hashtagged?

[506] This person began commenting on my video, where's the respiratory distress, hun?

[507] If I have to explain to somebody that my last thought was to pick up my phone during that, it's just not worth engaging with.

[508] So I decided, especially after having legal counsel to not respond to them, I was like, block, delete, block delete.

[509] We're just not going to even allow this to be on my socials.

[510] A few minutes later, a new account pops up.

[511] And she comments, where's the respiratory distress?

[512] Once again, a fake account.

[513] I block and I delete.

[514] A few minutes later, another account.

[515] And this one was called, oh, this is going to be good.

[516] That's the name of the account that they made.

[517] Once again, had no followers, no profile photo.

[518] And they comment, where's the respiratory distress, hun?

[519] Anytime I posted anything, it was just harassment.

[520] Even if I wasn't posting, they would figure out some way.

[521] to make themselves known in my life, whether it was through phone or email or public forums, anything along those lines.

[522] I had stopped posting, gave myself a break on social media, and they still managed to text me multiple times or reach out via email.

[523] They would not stop, regardless of whether I was present on social media.

[524] But our only income was from social media.

[525] and it was this very income that was allowing my children to experience both of their parents' home with them.

[526] When I would put my phone down, we could spend uninterrupted time with them knowing that I was so, so blessed to be able to give them that.

[527] At this rate, even though it had gotten pretty bad, I was still trying to push through and hope that they would still lose interest.

[528] I also had a talent agency that was representing me. I had commitments that I had to see through with that agency.

[529] Social media marketing and content creation isn't just a hobby or like a fad for a lot of the people who do it.

[530] It's a very real career.

[531] One thing that we noticed about the harassment is that it usually appeared on important days as well.

[532] For example, on Dan's birthday, I received a private message from another new account.

[533] And the account was diss your girl, one, two, two, four, five.

[534] It's almost felt like they were mocking us at this point with the accounts that they would make.

[535] But it said, oh my gosh, you look so pretty here.

[536] And attached a screenshot of me before a playboy shoot that I had done in my early 20s.

[537] I had posed for Playboy, and it's something that I have spoken about across all my social media platforms.

[538] It's not something that I have ever hidden in any way.

[539] I'm a mom to four kids.

[540] I love my body, and it gave me four gorgeous children, but I don't have the same body that I had before having kids.

[541] So I think they found that information and then ran with it.

[542] Even though everyone in my personal life knows about that experience, I actually did a total of about five shoots.

[543] It was a wild experience for sure, but I've always said that I will happily be that great grandma who's old and weathered, telling her adult grandchildren about how once she was in a nudie magazine.

[544] But this account had messaged me about this, wanting me to know that they knew about it.

[545] They expected me to like panic about it or be stressed about it or worried.

[546] But every single thing that I've experienced in my life has led me to this exact moment in time.

[547] And I'm okay with that and growing as an individual.

[548] They seemed to make their lives dedicated to my life and to trying to harm my life.

[549] They were just so dedicated at this point.

[550] I knew that this person was doing this to take my kids away from me. They wanted me miserable and for me to lose my time with my children.

[551] If I stopped completely posting or dissolved our LLC and stopped being in social media, not only did I feel like they would continue and find other means, but they would take that away from my kids, the ability for us to be together.

[552] I refused to let them win that.

[553] So I carried on.

[554] And even though I was pulling away naturally from sharing as much on social media, I was still showing up enough to support my family and to nurture the friendships that I had made online in our little community.

[555] But on July 30th, 2021, after blocking probably over 100 accounts, we decided it was time again to reach out to the police.

[556] This time it went very differently.

[557] Cyber harassment and stalking is in fact a crime.

[558] And although the laws haven't caught up with technology, it was time to really fight for law enforcement to help us.

[559] Finally, a police officer took us seriously, and on July 30th we filed an official police report with the local police department in the town that we were staying in.

[560] The intake officer spoke to me for over an hour, and he was so kind to us.

[561] Oh, my goodness, I'll never forget him.

[562] He could have brushed me off like everyone else, but he did not.

[563] He listened and he gave us our first glimmer of hope after going through everything that we went through.

[564] August 3rd is when we also met the second person who gave us a big glimmer of hope.

[565] We went on to hire a private detective.

[566] He specialized in cyber harassment and stalking.

[567] At this point, there were hundreds of fake accounts being made with the sole purpose of trying to harass us.

[568] It was time to see who was actually putting this much effort into causing us harm.

[569] We figured if we knew who the person was, then that was a safety measure in and of itself.

[570] So we now had law enforcement as well as having a private detective who was helping us.

[571] And oh my gosh, did they uncover more than I ever thought that they were.

[572] would.

[573] That's next time on Something Was Wrong.

[574] Thank you so much for listening.

[575] Until next time, stay safe, friends.

[576] Something Was Wrong is a broken cycle media production, created and hosted by me, Tiffany Reese.

[577] If you'd like to support the show further, you can share episodes with your loved ones, leave a positive review, or follow Something Was Wrong on Instagram at something was wrong podcast.

[578] song was composed by Gladrags.

[579] Check out their album, Wonder Under.

[580] Thank you so much.

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