After publishing the story of a woman trapped in a marriage with a narcissist, I wasn't sure how it would land. It wasn’t flashy. It didn’t end in violence or arrest. But the response was overwhelming. Listeners wrote in to say, “That was me.” Some still carry the trauma years later. Others are just now realizing what they went through was abuse.

In this episode, we hear from listeners who saw their own relationships reflected in Ashley’s story. We also speak with criminal behavior analyst Laura Richards to understand how abuse often hides in plain sight—through gaslighting, coercive control, and emotional manipulation. And we ask: what happens when the narcissist isn’t a partner—but a parent? Or when the survivor is a man?

This bonus episode is about the quiet kind of abuse—the kind people are afraid to talk about but desperately need to hear.

🔊 Featuring: Laura Richards and listeners who bravely shared their experiences

⚠️ Trigger warning: discussions of abuse, addiction, and coercive control

🛑 Warning Signs of Narcissistic Abuse:

• Love-bombing followed by emotional withdrawal or cruelty
• Gaslighting: making you doubt your memory, emotions, or reality
• Blaming you for their self-harm threats or emotional instability
• Constant criticism or belittling over mundane issues
• Financial control or sabotage
• Isolating you from family or friends
• Guilt-tripping, triangulation, or passive-aggressive threats
• Refusing accountability or twisting facts during arguments

📌 If you’re in a similar situation, here are resources that can help:

• National Domestic Violence Hotline (U.S.): 800-799-7233 or thehotline.org — 24/7, free, confidential
• Psychology Today Therapist Finder: psychologytoday.com
• SAMHSA National Helpline: 1-800-662-HELP (4357) – for substance abuse and mental health support
• Domestic Shelters: domesticshelters.org – helps identify resources near you
• One Mom’s Battle: onemomsbattle.com – for navigating high-conflict custody and divorce
• Love is Respect: loveisrespect.org – support for young people in abusive relationships

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In this episode of PRETEND, we meet “Ashley”—not her real name—who recorded hours of arguments with her husband in an effort to understand what was happening inside her marriage. From the outside, it looked like petty spats over groceries or laundry. But when you hear the audio, you realize this was something darker.

Ashley’s husband was emotionally abusive, manipulative, and battling addiction. It wasn’t until COVID lockdowns that his mask slipped and she could see who he really was. He used suicide threats to control her, drained her financially, and isolated her from support. And yet, as is often the case with narcissists, everyone else thought he was the victim.

This is not one of the most outrageous stories we’ve told on PRETEND—but it’s one of the most common. It’s a story many people quietly live through and struggle to name. This is what emotional abuse sounds like.

🛑 Warning Signs of Narcissistic Abuse:

• Constant criticism or belittling (often about “small” things like chores or tone of voice)
• Love-bombing followed by extreme withdrawal or cruelty
• Gaslighting: making you question your memory, reality, or emotions
• Isolation from friends, family, or support systems
• Walking on eggshells to avoid setting them off
• Financial control or sabotage
• Using guilt, blame, or self-harm threats to manipulate behavior
• Alternating between praise and punishment
• Jealousy of your attention—especially toward children

📌 If you’re in a similar situation, here are resources that can help:

• National Domestic Violence Hotline (U.S.): 800-799-7233 or thehotline.org — Free, confidential, 24/7
• Psychology Today Therapist Finder: psychologytoday.com
• Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services (SAMHSA) Helpline: 1-800-662-HELP (4357)
• Narcissist Abuse Recovery Support: DomesticShelters.org – Includes emotional abuse filters
• One Mom’s Battle: onemomsbattle.com – Focused on divorcing narcissists and protecting children
• Love is Respect (for younger listeners): loveisrespect.org

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It started with a missing breast milk keepsake. But when Cheyna Lee joined an online group of frustrated customers, she uncovered something much bigger—hundreds of victims, stolen mementos, and a scam artist hiding in plain sight. This is the story of Destiny Magoon, a small business owner who promised sentimental jewelry made from ashes, hair, and even breast milk—but left heartbreak in her wake. What followed was an online investigation that played out like a true crime documentary, exposing fraud, deception, and a woman willing to do anything to cover her tracks.

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Episode Summary:

While working on the new season of Pretend, I wanted to bring back an episode from 2018 that’s worth another listen. It’s the story of Art Schlichter, a former Ohio State football star whose gambling addiction wrecked his life—and the lives of others. One of those people was Anita Barney, the widow of a Wendy’s CEO, who lost everything after trusting the wrong person.

This isn’t just a story about gambling. It’s about how someone can slowly gain control over another person’s life and bank account, one small ask at a time.

Topics Covered:

✔ How Art Schlichter went from an NFL draft pick to a convicted con artist

✔ The way he pulled Anita Barney into his schemes

✔ How quickly financial fraud can spiral out of control

Resources & Links:

📖 Quarterback Sneak – Anita Barney’s book about what happened

📌 Follow Pretend on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/pretendpod/

📌 Join our Facebook group

Have a Story to Share?

If someone you trusted took advantage of you, I’d like to hear your story. Send a voice memo to Javier@pretendradio.org.

💡 Rate & Review! If you liked this episode, leave a review and share Pretend with a friend.

🎧 Subscribe & Stay Tuned – More episodes coming soon.

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n part two of Licensed to Kill, we continue the shocking investigation into doctors who exploit their patients for profit. This episode follows Patty Hester, a fitness instructor who was misdiagnosed with a rare blood cancer and nearly subjected to years of unnecessary chemotherapy—all at the hands of Dr. Farid Fata, a Michigan oncologist who built his fortune by treating healthy patients for diseases they never had.

But Fata isn’t alone. Across the country, doctors like Thomas Weiner, Ian Paterson, and Javaid Perwaiz have betrayed their patients, mutilated bodies, and destroyed lives—all under the guise of medical care.

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What if your doctor wasn’t trying to save you, but trying to cash in on you?

In this episode of Pretend, we uncover the shocking case of Dr. Thomas Weiner, an oncologist accused of prescribing years of brutal chemotherapy treatments to patients who may not have even had cancer.

We follow the story of Scott Warwick, a man who was told he had stage 4 lung cancer and endured 11 years of toxic treatments—only to later learn there was no biopsy confirming his diagnosis. When Dr. Randy Sasich, a pulmonary critical care specialist, began questioning Weiner’s practices, he faced pushback, intimidation, and threats.

But Weiner’s case isn’t unique. Across the country, doctors like Farid Fata, Jorge Zamora-Quezada, and Michael Swango have been caught exploiting patients for profit, exposing just how broken the U.S. healthcare system truly is.

In this episode, we dive into:

✔️ How financial incentives reward doctors for prescribing unnecessary treatments

✔️ The loopholes in insurance billing that allow fraud to go undetected for years

✔️ The whistleblower who risked everything to expose the truth

✔️ The cult-like following that still defends Dr. Weiner

🔍 Sources & Additional Reading:

• ProPublica’s Investigative Report: "Eat What You Kill" :

https://www.propublica.org/article/thomas-weiner-montana-st-peters-hospital-oncology

🎧 Next Time on Pretend:

Meet a patient who underwent three years of cancer treatments—for cancer she never had.

🔔 Subscribe on Patreon or Pretend Plus for early access to Part 2:

Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/pretendradio

PRETEND+ on Apple Podcast:

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/channel/pretend/id6443456985

📢 Follow us: @PretendPod on Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, Twitter, and Facebook

💬 Have thoughts on this episode? Leave a review or send us a message—we’d love to hear from you!

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A group of women, all with eerily similar stories, say they were deceived—emotionally and financially—by the same man: William Sullivan. But instead of staying silent, they took matters into their own hands. They formed Operation Cock Block, a coordinated effort to expose what they claim were Sullivan’s deceptive tactics and warn others before they fell victim.

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Facilitated Communication is marketed as a miraculous tool for non-speaking autistic children. But what happens when this controversial method leads to devastating consequences? In this episode, we hear from Kevin Plantin, a father who was falsely accused of assault based solely on messages typed with the help of a facilitator.

Despite the evidence, some courts and institutions still give FC credibility—with tragic consequences.

In this episode, Kevin Plantan recounts how a letter typed via FC led to his wrongful imprisonment for 10 months on charges of sexual assault. We also revisit the story of Janyce Boynton, a former FC facilitator who now warns against the practice after witnessing its harmful effects firsthand.

Featured guests in this episode:

Kevin Plantin: Sharing his personal story of wrongful imprisonment.

Janyce Boynton: Former FC facilitator and advocate against the practice.

Additional Resources:

• Learn more about Facilitated Communication: https://www.facilitatedcommunication.org/
• Read about Syracuse University's involvement with FC: https://dailyorange.com/2024/02/mixed-messages-how-facilitated-communication-persists-at-su/
• Prisoners of Silence documentary: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OMn_sDCFAuI

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A mother kills her autistic son. Why? Because he asked her to.

The mother claims he used facilitated communication to ask her to help him die. This case is just one of many tied to the controversial method that claims to give a voice to non-speaking autistic individuals. But what if the voice wasn’t theirs at all?

Share Your Thoughts:

Have you listened to The Telepathy Tapes? What do you think about the claims it makes? We want to hear from you! Send a voice memo with your thoughts to javier@pretendradio.org, and your message might be featured in an upcoming episode.

Resources Mentioned:

➜    Learn more about Amy Lutz’s work and her book Chasing the Intact Mind.

https://amzn.to/4gg9Mbe

➜    Read Zaid Jilani’s articles on Facilitated Communication and The Telepathy Tapes on his Substack, The American Saga.

https://www.theamericansaga.com/

 ➜   Explore the history of Facilitated Communication in the documentary Tell Them You Love Me (available on U.S. Netflix).

https://www.netflix.com/title/81783064

Stay Connected:

Follow PRETEND on social media and subscribe to the podcast for more stories exploring deception and the human condition.

➜ BlueSky: https://bsky.app/profile/pretendpod.bsky.social

➜ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/pretendpod/

➜ TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@pretendpod

➜ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@pretendpod

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The Telepathy Tapes podcast shot to the top of the charts, making bold claims about telepathic abilities in non-verbal autistic children. But are the claims rooted in science—or something else entirely? In this episode of PRETEND, we take a closer look at the phenomenon, the controversies, and the skepticism surrounding these extraordinary claims.

We’ll discuss:

➜ The premise of The Telepathy Tapes and the experiments it presents.

➜ Scientific skepticism surrounding telepathy claims.

➜ Ethical concerns, including the history of Facilitated Communication and its controversies.

➜ Voices from parents, experts, and critics, including Zaid Jilani and Amy Lutz.

Resources Mentioned:

   Learn more about Amy Lutz’s work and her book Chasing the Intact Mind.

https://amzn.to/4gg9Mbe

   Read Zaid Jilani’s articles on Facilitated Communication and The Telepathy Tapes on his Substack, The American Saga.

https://www.theamericansaga.com/

   Explore the history of Facilitated Communication in the documentary Tell Them You Love Me (available on U.S. Netflix).

https://www.netflix.com/title/81783064

Share Your Thoughts:

Have you listened to The Telepathy Tapes? What do you think about the claims it makes? We want to hear from you! Send a voice memo with your thoughts to javier@pretendradio.org, and your message might be featured in an upcoming episode.

Stay Connected:

Follow PRETEND on social media and subscribe to the podcast for more stories exploring deception and the human condition.

➜ BlueSky: https://bsky.app/profile/pretendpod.bsky.social

➜ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/pretendpod/

➜ TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@pretendpod

➜ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@pretendpod

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Hello PRETENDERS! I'm excited to announce that the new season of my other podcast, Criminal Conduct Season, is here! To listen to the rest of the story, search for Criminal Conduct and subscribe.

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Buffalo Jim Barrier was a wrestling promoter, mechanic, and Las Vegas icon. He faced off against Rick Rizzolo, a powerful strip club owner with alleged mob ties. Their feud lasted decades. Days after Rizzolo’s release from house release, Buffalo Jim was found dead under mysterious circumstances in a motel room. Evidence is missing, and there are anonymous threats. Questions remain unanswered. Criminal Conduct Season 5 unravels a story of corruption, crime, and one man’s fight for justice.

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