Speaker 1: Good morning everyone, and welcome back to Sugar Mamma's Fireplay,
Speaker 1: the podcast that ignites your financial journey with inspiring stories
Speaker 1: and innovative strategies. I am your host, financial planner, Canna Campbell.
Speaker 1: Now today we have a I guess you could say
Speaker 1: financial fraud, financial abuse, financial disaster if I say this
Speaker 1: with so much compassion to what you've gone through. We
Speaker 1: are joined today with Tracy Hall. Now, I actually interviewed
Speaker 1: Tracy Hall four years ago on my YouTube channel and
Speaker 1: she shared her story about a serial con man who
Speaker 1: swindled more than seventy million dollars out of innocent, everyday people.
Speaker 1: Among those people included herself, who is actually in a
Speaker 1: relationship with him at the time, using a fake name
Speaker 1: of Max Tavita. Now, if this is sounding very familiar
Speaker 1: apart from my YouTube channel, you may have actually listened
Speaker 1: to the podcast series Who the Hell Is Hamish? Well,
Speaker 1: Tracy Hall has just published her first book about this
Speaker 1: experience sin it's called The Last Victim, and she is
Speaker 1: here with us this morning to share her story, her insights,
Speaker 1: and her important message for every single person to protect
Speaker 1: themselves from this listening to them.
Speaker 2: Tracy, thank you so much.
Speaker 1: For continuity in today, Can you please share with us
Speaker 1: your experience with I guess the true name will call
Speaker 1: them Hamish McLaren, and how you became victim to his scheme.
Speaker 2: Yeah, sure, thanks for having me.
Speaker 3: By the way, I first met a man on a
Speaker 3: dating app in twenty sixteen, a man called Max Tavita.
Speaker 3: I swiped right and we dated for nearly eighteen months
Speaker 3: and it wasn't until he was arrested in twenty seventeen
Speaker 3: that I found out his true identity. He told me
Speaker 3: he was a chief financial officer for a family office.
Speaker 3: And we spent you know, eighteen months together in a
Speaker 3: serious relationship, taking holidays, spending weekends, going for dinners, all
Speaker 3: the things you do in a kind of a mid
Speaker 3: forties relationship. And yeah, I woke up to some video
Speaker 3: footage of him being arrested outside of his apartment in Sydney.
Speaker 2: On the news, wasn't it. Yeah, it was a crime
Speaker 2: Stoppers video.
Speaker 3: It was just an online news article, and I, you know,
Speaker 3: obviously got in contact with the police and they said, yeah,
Speaker 3: his name is not Max. His name is Hamish McLaren
Speaker 3: and he's one of Austrai's most notorious common.
Speaker 1: I have goosebumps like running through my body. Even though
Speaker 1: I know this story so well and you know, from
Speaker 1: four years ago, still like shakes me up listening to it.
Speaker 1: So I can only imagine what you're going through. Can
Speaker 1: we go to the red flags? Like, did ever something think,
Speaker 1: oh that doesn't sound right or feel right? Like was
Speaker 1: there ever something in your gut that the does stack
Speaker 1: up correctly at the time?
Speaker 3: No, I mean he was quirky, he had quirks, for sure,
Speaker 3: but he doesn't he doesn't have quirks. Are all a
Speaker 3: bit weird, right, And I think there, you know, there's
Speaker 3: a great quote in my book which says, you know,
Speaker 3: we can only connect the dots in reverse, and it's
Speaker 3: not until we look backwards that we start to go.
Speaker 2: Oh, yeah that was a bit weird, or yeah, that's true.
Speaker 2: They're so the dots.
Speaker 3: You're connecting the dots in reverse, and hindsight such a
Speaker 3: beautiful thing.
Speaker 2: And Rihanns never made a bad decision in his life.
Speaker 3: And I think the other thing too is, you know,
Speaker 3: when you're in a relationship and you're in love, you know,
Speaker 3: and you're wearing your rose colored glasses, all the red
Speaker 3: flags are just flags. Yeah, and I do explore that
Speaker 3: a lot in detail in my book is going through
Speaker 3: the stories and the detail of how he kind of
Speaker 3: weaseled his way into my life very deeply, but taking
Speaker 3: a moment within the book to kind of pull out
Speaker 3: the red flags which I could only see in in retrospect.
Speaker 1: Weasel is the perfect term, like he really is an
Speaker 1: absolute toxic parasite. When it could go back to how
Speaker 1: he gained your trust initially, like were there any you know,
Speaker 1: swami tactics that he used now that you've got, you know,
Speaker 1: the benefit of hindsight now to help, I guess, solidify
Speaker 1: your trust even further.
Speaker 3: I think the thing to say about Hamish is that
Speaker 3: he was a professional, so he has never had a
Speaker 3: job other than being a con man. He's done this
Speaker 3: for decades, so he's very very good at what he does.
Speaker 3: I think in retrospect, what I know about him is
Speaker 3: that he spent a lot of time with me and
Speaker 3: doing things to gain my trust.
Speaker 2: So he listened.
Speaker 3: He was a phenomenal listener it so all he had
Speaker 3: to do was listen to what I say and repeat
Speaker 3: or actually create that within himself and represent back to
Speaker 3: me for me to fall in love with him. So
Speaker 3: he was fantastic at mirroring, and most of us as
Speaker 3: humans have a similarity bias, which means, if you look
Speaker 3: like me, if you sound like me, if you like
Speaker 3: the same things as me, if your values are the same,
Speaker 3: I'm going to naturally trust and love you because you know,
Speaker 3: it's a reflection of yourself, really, And so that's what
Speaker 3: he did. He presented himself in a way mirrored back
Speaker 3: to me, knowing that if he just did the things
Speaker 3: that I wanted or that I said I wanted in
Speaker 3: my life, that I would fall in love with him.
Speaker 3: And one hundred percent I did and I trusted him,
Speaker 3: and so they were a couple of the tactics he used.
Speaker 3: He was very slow in his approach. You know, it
Speaker 3: wasn't like he knocked on my door one day and
Speaker 3: you know I said give me all your money, pulled
Speaker 3: a fast one and left.
Speaker 2: You know, this was an eighteen month relationship.
Speaker 1: Well, this is like any form of abuse. He just
Speaker 1: doesn't suddenly start happening. It's you know, a push he
Speaker 1: or a shove there, a pinch or you know, saying
Speaker 1: something that's a bit mean and nasty, and it getting
Speaker 1: increasingly aggressive and psychologically damaging. It deepens over time, but
Speaker 1: to the point where you've lost yourself completely and kinda
Speaker 1: she even identify exactly.
Speaker 2: What's going on.
Speaker 1: Yeah, can we go back to the moment where you
Speaker 1: realize that you were actually a victim yourself, not just
Speaker 1: in a relationship wise, but also financially. What was running
Speaker 1: through your mind at the time.
Speaker 3: I think when I first saw the video of him
Speaker 3: being arrested and knowing it was him, knowing it was
Speaker 3: my boyfriend being arrested, the first feeling was disbelief because
Speaker 3: this was a man I loved that, you know, we
Speaker 3: were building a future together. And I was watching him
Speaker 3: being arrested with you know, a headline of him swindling
Speaker 3: people out of money, and I thought there must be
Speaker 3: a mistake. And it wasn't until I spoke to the
Speaker 3: head detective Tom Zadrevic, that, you know, I realized very
Speaker 3: quickly what I was dealing with, and I was a
Speaker 3: victim and I needed to spend some time with the
Speaker 3: police to unravel the previous eighteen months of my life.
Speaker 3: I felt, you know, I felt physically ill. I felt
Speaker 3: so betrayed. I you know, I was in disbelief that
Speaker 3: something like this could happen to me. And I think
Speaker 3: we all think that, you know, you see these stories
Speaker 3: on the news and you know, on a current affairs
Speaker 3: shows and things like that, and you think, God, that
Speaker 3: will never happen to me.
Speaker 2: I'm better than that.
Speaker 3: I'm smarter, I've you know, I'm well educated, I've traveled
Speaker 3: the world, I've got a great intuition. And yet here
Speaker 3: I am. I lost my life savings to a con man.
Speaker 3: So disbelieve betrayal, deep, deep betrayal. And then I think
Speaker 3: it just went into sadness, depression, you know, and then
Speaker 3: having to realize that I had to rebuild my life.
Speaker 3: The grief, ye, the grief it was there was You're right,
Speaker 3: there's a lot of grief because I was I thought
Speaker 3: that I'd met my match. I was building a relationship
Speaker 3: with this man, and I believe that he had the best,
Speaker 3: you know, my best interests at heart, and so I
Speaker 3: was grieving a relationship. But that that grief had hit
Speaker 3: me very very quickly. It was like it was like
Speaker 3: a death of a person, because in fact, Max Tavita
Speaker 3: never existed, so within sort of you know, it took
Speaker 3: me eighteen months to fall in love with him, but
Speaker 3: twenty four hours and I had to fall out.
Speaker 2: Of love with him very very quickly. So that was hard.
Speaker 3: And then I went into the very pragmatic and rational
Speaker 3: exercise of untangling the financial situation I found myself in.
Speaker 3: Dealing with the ATO, dealing with a non compliance superannuation
Speaker 3: fund which he had convinced me to set up a
Speaker 3: self managed super fund and that's where most of my
Speaker 3: money went, dealing with a potential dodgy tax return that
Speaker 3: he had helped me with. There was so much to untangle,
Speaker 3: and at the same time, you know, making a police
Speaker 3: statement and at the same time being a single mom
Speaker 3: and working a really huge job and trying not to
Speaker 3: lose my job at the same time as it was
Speaker 3: the on income I had.
Speaker 1: Wow, there is so much to deal with. You've got
Speaker 1: to using your brain's got to be switched on on sharp,
Speaker 1: going through the intricacies of fixing tax trends, dealing with
Speaker 1: the obviously filing very detailed reports with the police and
Speaker 1: working with them and helping them as much as you can.
Speaker 1: Plus the emotional vulnerability in going through all of that,
Speaker 1: and complicated grief and all the emotions that come with that,
Speaker 1: and also the twists and turns. You think you're through something,
Speaker 1: and then something will happen and then you're back again.
Speaker 1: Like it's it's not like we just gradually moved through grief.
Speaker 1: We can very easily be triggered back again. I can't
Speaker 1: even imagine, like what you've gone through. But how much
Speaker 1: did you lose financially?
Speaker 2: In total?
Speaker 3: I lost three hundred and seventeen thousand dollars, which was
Speaker 3: my entire career supernuation and some savings and then some
Speaker 3: shares that I vested through my you know, through my
Speaker 3: career in tech marketing.
Speaker 1: How have you rebuilt yourself emotionally from here and financially?
Speaker 1: I guess there's two questions the loading you up, Let's
Speaker 1: go with the emotional side fights.
Speaker 2: Like how have you moved from on from this?
Speaker 3: Like, yeah, so I'm not going to lie. It was
Speaker 3: really hard. It's seven years now. So one of the
Speaker 3: beautiful things about life is time does heal well wounds.
Speaker 2: I think, and.
Speaker 3: Sometimes it just takes time to look back on a
Speaker 3: situation with perspective and grace and you know, but the
Speaker 3: first few years I was so hard, you know, in
Speaker 3: sort of one part of my brain, I had this
Speaker 3: really huge job and I couldn't lose it. So going
Speaker 3: to work every day and working fourteen sixteen hour days
Speaker 3: was such a blessing.
Speaker 2: Like how did you do that? And you're like it
Speaker 2: was a blessing. I'm like, oh my god, it was
Speaker 2: a blessing.
Speaker 1: Because trade at work, there was that in your head.
Speaker 1: I guess it was escaping.
Speaker 3: It was escaping, it was compartmentalizing. When I was at work,
Speaker 3: I was running a big team. I was, you know,
Speaker 3: delivering campaigns. I was delivering my KPIs. It was busy
Speaker 3: and it was full on. So I didn't have a
Speaker 3: lot of time to sit in naval gaze and really
Speaker 3: be concerned about what was happening because I was just
Speaker 3: so scared of losing my job, to be honest, because
Speaker 3: I just had to keep performing.
Speaker 2: So that was a blessing.
Speaker 3: I have a beautiful daughter who you know, was quite
Speaker 3: young at the time, six and a half seven years old,
Speaker 3: and I made a decision very early on that there
Speaker 3: would be no tears at the dinner table, so we
Speaker 3: didn't discuss this at home. I didn't want to worry her.
Speaker 3: I knew that I had to keep going, and you know,
Speaker 3: having someone else in your life that's a bigger than you,
Speaker 3: that needs you, helps you get out of bed every day.
Speaker 2: So I'm so blessed that I had her.
Speaker 3: You know, I had to make her lunch every day,
Speaker 3: get her to school, get her to activities. So that
Speaker 3: was another thing that was really helpful. And then I
Speaker 3: would just cry at nighttime, basically, and I got a
Speaker 3: lot of therapy, and I pulled my world in quite small.
Speaker 3: I didn't trust anybody. There weren't many people that knew
Speaker 3: what had happened very early on, because I think it
Speaker 3: was just so overwhelming for me. I was embarrassed, I
Speaker 3: was ashamed. I couldn't believe that this had happened to me.
Speaker 3: I didn't know if I was going to get my
Speaker 3: money back, I didn't know.
Speaker 2: What was going on. Happened.
Speaker 3: No one would talk to me about who Hamish really was,
Speaker 3: and so I pulled my world in pretty small, got
Speaker 3: a lot of therapy. I ended up on antidepressants on
Speaker 3: the advice of my psychologist and my GP, because you know,
Speaker 3: crying for a few days or a few weeks is okay.
Speaker 3: But I had been crying every day for four months,
Speaker 3: and you know, someone had to say to me, that's
Speaker 3: not okay, that's not normal, it's not sustainable. So that
Speaker 3: was something I did do for a period of time
Speaker 3: that helped me out of that. I love exercising. That
Speaker 3: such a solace for me. You know, they were just
Speaker 3: the basic things. I concentrated on my sleep because I
Speaker 3: knew that without sleep, I'm not a very great human.
Speaker 2: Sleep is a form of medicine, it is.
Speaker 3: And so like you know, some people self care and
Speaker 3: journal for three hours in the morning into yoga and
Speaker 3: have their beautiful cacal ceremonies, which I don't have the
Speaker 3: lottery of doing because I'm a single mum and working
Speaker 3: full time. But for me, my self care was going
Speaker 3: to bed early and saying no to the invitation or
Speaker 3: whatever it might be. So I think there was a
Speaker 3: bunch of things that I did to get through emotionally,
Speaker 3: and then just with time and with support and with
Speaker 3: the right structures around me, I've just you know, I've
Speaker 3: built myself up. And then of course during the podcast
Speaker 3: with The Australian and Greg Barrup was incredibly healing journey
Speaker 3: for me because I found out all the things I
Speaker 3: needed to know to put the puzzle together in my
Speaker 3: mind in the correct way. That helped me cope with
Speaker 3: with what had actually happened.
Speaker 2: Wow, that was a very long end.
Speaker 1: No, it was, but like it is full of so
Speaker 1: many nuggets of gold and so much wonderful advice. You know,
Speaker 1: whether you're going through just a simple breakup, or whether
Speaker 1: you're going through a financial loss or you know, a
Speaker 1: aning type of loss. You know, I think there's so
Speaker 1: much in that, and you know, I can relate for
Speaker 1: all you're saying about, you know, needing to get professional help,
Speaker 1: you know, needing to go to get on medication, needing
Speaker 1: to go to bed early, prioritizing sleep, and bringing your
Speaker 1: circle in tight, you know, really retreating and keeping the
Speaker 1: people who are important to you close to you because
Speaker 1: they're a form of oxygen to help keep you going.
Speaker 1: Can we move on to the financial part of your journey.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's a lot of money to lose. I
Speaker 1: mean that's a significant percentage I imagine of your wealth.
Speaker 2: It was everything, like let's call it one hundred percent. Yeah, okay,
Speaker 2: all right. How have you recovered?
Speaker 1: I mean we're seven years on now, Like, how have
Speaker 1: you managed to find the energy to get back on
Speaker 1: your feet again? What have you done and what has
Speaker 1: helped the most in your recovery? And have you got
Speaker 1: any of this money back?
Speaker 3: None of the money has come back. None of the
Speaker 3: victims have received any money back. According to the police
Speaker 3: in the case, in the investigation that was done, there
Speaker 3: is no money anywhere.
Speaker 2: So that's that.
Speaker 3: And I guess accepting that and focusing my energy on
Speaker 3: myself and my own financial recovery has been key for me.
Speaker 3: So very early on, I went found to find itcial advisor,
Speaker 3: and that was such a hard thing for me to do,
Speaker 3: to trust someone else with money. And you know, I
Speaker 3: guess it's not lost on me that I had a
Speaker 3: really good job and I've always worked.
Speaker 2: And you're a hard worker, I know, and you know
Speaker 2: I love work. I love what I do.
Speaker 3: And but for me, holding onto job even through pregnancy
Speaker 3: and babies and all of that stuff is just so
Speaker 3: important for me because it allowed me, you know, even
Speaker 3: with the financial flat And then I experienced st affter Haymi.
Speaker 3: She gave me choices, and choices are important for everyone,
Speaker 3: but they're especially important for women, I think. And so
Speaker 3: I had a job and what I did was I
Speaker 3: I was recommended three financial advisors. I researched all of them,
Speaker 3: I met all three of them. I did reference texts
Speaker 3: on all of them. I went deep on you.
Speaker 1: I went deep, can so should? I mean, I think
Speaker 1: you know everyone should be doing?
Speaker 3: Yeah, register sure, they had their AFSL, a strong financial
Speaker 3: services license. What they were able to advise me on.
Speaker 3: I did all the things that I should have done
Speaker 3: previously with Amish, and I met the most wonderful woman
Speaker 3: and she sat with me and she asked me all
Speaker 3: the right questions. She was so compassionate, she was so empathetic,
Speaker 3: and I just cried a lot, and she said, you're
Speaker 3: going to be okay. We're going to put a plan
Speaker 3: in place. You you know, it's not a secret that
Speaker 3: you're not going to retire with as much superannuation and
Speaker 3: wealth as you thought you would based on losing your
Speaker 3: twenty year career savings. But we're going to do some
Speaker 3: other things and if you follow the plan, you're going
Speaker 3: to be fine. I'm very disciplined, So I did what
Speaker 3: she said. I put one hundred percent of my trust
Speaker 3: into her, and she's still my financial planner today. We
Speaker 3: still work on strategies to build my wealth, manage my budget,
Speaker 3: manage my life, and you know that that's been a
Speaker 3: one of full support for me. I have a pretty
Speaker 3: contained life. I spend my money on experiences in travel.
Speaker 3: I don't you know, I don't live in a big place.
Speaker 3: I you know, I have a fully paid off car.
Speaker 3: I don't have any debt other than my you know
Speaker 3: where I live and you know, so things are pretty
Speaker 3: simple for me and I love to travel and that's
Speaker 3: what that's what I try and do. So everything's planned,
Speaker 3: everything's disciplined, and over time it's you know, I have
Speaker 3: got back on my feet and I have found the
Speaker 3: ways to you know, have an incredible life.
Speaker 2: And yeah, I'm so grateful for that.
Speaker 1: Knowing you personally and we have a few mutual friends,
Speaker 1: I have no doubt you will make back that money
Speaker 1: because you're such a hard worker. You see great opportunities,
Speaker 1: and you're incredibly intelligent. So I feel like you've got
Speaker 1: a great financial plan behind you and she's going to
Speaker 1: get you the best place she can. I don't underestimate
Speaker 1: what you can actually do to leap from and see
Speaker 1: your expectations.
Speaker 2: So definitely manifesting that for myself, that's what I like that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, miracles happen as well. Are you in
Speaker 1: contact with any of the victims still, because there's a
Speaker 1: long list of victims.
Speaker 2: There's a long list of victims.
Speaker 3: I met the majority of them through the case in Australia,
Speaker 3: So the case that where he was prosecuted in Australia
Speaker 3: fifteen victims, seven point six six million dollars, but we
Speaker 3: do know globally it's closer to seventy eighty one hundred
Speaker 3: million dollars. I did meet a lot of the victims
Speaker 3: through that process, which and also through the podcast. They
Speaker 3: are the Samish, So that was an incredible opportunity for healing,
Speaker 3: I think for all of us, because when you meet
Speaker 3: other people and you realize that you're not alone in
Speaker 3: any situation in life that has flattened you, that is
Speaker 3: a blessing because you know, feeling alone in that grief
Speaker 3: and that shame was horrible. And then when I met
Speaker 3: some of the other victims and became friends with them,
Speaker 3: shared stories and heard really the extent of his criminal past,
Speaker 3: that made me feel I don't know, it just gave
Speaker 3: me a lot of comfort. So yeah, I am still
Speaker 3: in contact with a bunch of them. They're all at
Speaker 3: different stages in their journeys, and that's what it is.
Speaker 1: Now you've just written your first book. I want to
Speaker 1: hear about what inspired you to actually write this book
Speaker 1: up everything you've gone through.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so the inspiration behind the book came. I've done
Speaker 3: a lot of talking about what happened with Hamish and
Speaker 3: through the podcast, through media interviews, and what I've realized
Speaker 3: is that it's very hard to explain the insidious nature
Speaker 3: of intimate fraud in a two minute interview or in
Speaker 3: fact even a twenty minute podcast. You know, there's so
Speaker 3: much that happens, and there's so much detail, and there's
Speaker 3: so much coercion that happened in the reliefationship that I
Speaker 3: needed seventy five thousand words to explain that. And the
Speaker 3: other thing about the book is it's broken into three parts,
Speaker 3: so this before, during, and after Hamish. So a lot
Speaker 3: of people know what happened during the Hamish era. Yeah,
Speaker 3: you know, that's been well recorded. But what I really
Speaker 3: wanted to explain was my life before I met Hamish,
Speaker 3: and a whole bunch of things that happened to me
Speaker 3: in my life before Hamish, which I believe set me
Speaker 3: up in a way that gave me a level of
Speaker 3: resilience to weather the storm when Hamish hit. So I
Speaker 3: go into detail about that. So, my father died when
Speaker 3: I was young, when I was about twenty six, of Lakemia.
Speaker 3: Very suddenly, my mum got breast cancer and my marriage
Speaker 3: broke down. My best friend's husband died, I had a miscarriage.
Speaker 2: You know, there was a lot. A lot has happened.
Speaker 3: Yeah, a lot has happened before I even came across
Speaker 3: Hamish in my forties. And then I also wanted to
Speaker 3: show that no matter what happened, you don't have to
Speaker 3: be financially flattened by a man to go through a
Speaker 3: really tough time. And I wanted to show that rebuilding
Speaker 3: a life is possible and there is hope and with
Speaker 3: time and the right support structures and the right mindset
Speaker 3: and things like that, that you can, you know, life
Speaker 3: can be great afterwards. And I think, you know, grief
Speaker 3: and sadness can also coexist with joy and empowerment and
Speaker 3: things like that. And I wanted to explain that because
Speaker 3: after the podcast, it kind of the story went away
Speaker 3: and a lot of people say, oh, well, then what
Speaker 3: happened and did you get the money back? And how
Speaker 3: did you rebuild? And there's a lot of those questions.
Speaker 3: So I wanted to explain in detail the full story
Speaker 3: that couldn't be grabbed in a two minute interview with
Speaker 3: a you know, a salacious headline like you know, vulnerable divorce,
Speaker 3: a Fuld's victim to a love rat. You know, like
Speaker 3: all the clickbaity stuff that's out there, which makes for interesting,
Speaker 3: you know story, but.
Speaker 1: It's only touching the surface of what really has gone
Speaker 1: on it and doesn't put it in context, and it doesn't educate.
Speaker 3: And you hear those stories, isn't like we were saying
Speaker 3: at the beginning. You hear those sort of those headlining
Speaker 3: clickbaity things and you go that that's not me, that
Speaker 3: would never happen to me. But you read a story
Speaker 3: of more detail and it helps educate people that it
Speaker 3: really can happen to anyone.
Speaker 1: Did you find that as you were writing it was
Speaker 1: healing your heart?
Speaker 3: Yeah, in a way that the stuff about Hamish I
Speaker 3: feel so fine with now. You know, I've done a
Speaker 3: lot of media. There's been a lot of talk about it.
Speaker 3: The podcast, of course. I think the parts that were
Speaker 3: the most healing and the most cathartic were talking about
Speaker 3: all of the things that happened in my life before
Speaker 3: Hamish even came on the scene, which I probably, if
Speaker 3: I'm really honest, haven't done as much work on personally,
Speaker 3: and so to go through those were really sort of
Speaker 3: deep emotional reflections and you know, going through my journals
Speaker 3: of when I lived in India and you know, really
Speaker 3: delving deep into that time in my life when I
Speaker 3: was experience it's in kind of you know, grief of
Speaker 3: a different kind. And then at the other end of
Speaker 3: the book, really reflecting on, you know, just how how
Speaker 3: far I've come and feeling really proud of the journey
Speaker 3: that I've been on and actually, you know, really having
Speaker 3: to think about what were the things that I did,
Speaker 3: because I think when you're in it, you're just getting through.
Speaker 2: Each day survival.
Speaker 3: It's survival. It's every moment. It's every day. It's like
Speaker 3: getting out of better, making a cup of day. Okay,
Speaker 3: I've done that. Now I've got to pack the lunches,
Speaker 3: do that, get on the bus and go to work.
Speaker 3: It is literally moment by moment. But then looking back,
Speaker 3: I think, oh, wow, you know I got I made it.
Speaker 2: You know I made it through. I'm okay, like life
Speaker 2: is okay.
Speaker 1: When you were going through the writing stage, did you
Speaker 1: discover new things about him? Were there any more like
Speaker 1: dirty surprises?
Speaker 2: You had everything.
Speaker 3: I think a lot of it had already been discovered
Speaker 3: through the court process. I mean, I think the thing is,
Speaker 3: nothing surprises me about the story or homish or you know,
Speaker 3: the extent of his lies, the people he has you know,
Speaker 3: taken money from. It does feel like, you know, at
Speaker 3: the time, it felt like every other day something new
Speaker 3: was coming up. In writing the book seven years on,
Speaker 3: every now and again, a piece of information pops up
Speaker 3: that I think, wow, okay, you know, or someone will
Speaker 3: reach out to me and say, oh, I went to
Speaker 3: school with him, or you know. But to be honest,
Speaker 3: the stories are all the same. They're just lies and
Speaker 3: fanciful incarnations of what never happened.
Speaker 1: So wow, what would you say is that was the
Speaker 1: most challenging part. Then when it came to sitting down
Speaker 1: and writing this book, what was the hardest I guess
Speaker 1: block or part to sort of push through growth?
Speaker 2: Right, Probably a bit of way over.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think it was earlier on in my life,
Speaker 3: to be honest, talking about the death of my father
Speaker 3: and how my parents' marriage. You know, they were married
Speaker 3: for thirty two years when dad died, and watching my
Speaker 3: mum have to deal with that, that was, you know,
Speaker 3: and that pro process. At the time, I was really young.
Speaker 3: It was twenty six, twenty seven. I was working for
Speaker 3: a hedge fund and I went back to work really quickly.
Speaker 3: And I think back then, mental health and you know,
Speaker 3: the conversation around these things wasn't as open. I just
Speaker 3: got back into work and just started putting my head
Speaker 3: down and my bum up and trying to push through,
Speaker 3: just push through and get on with life. And I
Speaker 3: don't think you know, and I think this is true
Speaker 3: for a lot of Western cultures, is that we're not
Speaker 3: taught how to grieve.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's so true.
Speaker 3: And how do you know how to grieve when you
Speaker 3: don't see it around you? You just sort of, you know,
Speaker 3: it's a bit like the you know, the stiff upper lip,
Speaker 3: and we just keep going.
Speaker 2: We just push on.
Speaker 3: And I hate, I know, but you know, you're at
Speaker 3: work and it's not okay just to burst into tears
Speaker 3: and have a meltdown when you've got to deliver some
Speaker 3: of the campaign or something, you know. So I used
Speaker 3: to walk around the city back in those days, and
Speaker 3: I just have tears streaming down my face and I'd
Speaker 3: have my sunglasses on, and I think, where do all
Speaker 3: the people who are grieving go during the day, you know,
Speaker 3: why aren't they grieving rooms?
Speaker 2: Why aren't their places you can go? And I didn't.
Speaker 3: I didn't have a therapist at that time, probably couldn't
Speaker 3: afford it. You know, I was a lot younger. I
Speaker 3: didn't really understand the need to piece everything together and
Speaker 3: really support myself in that way. So going back to
Speaker 3: that time and thinking about how I dealt with that,
Speaker 3: and well, how I didn't deal with it, and how
Speaker 3: those emotions just you know, they catch up with you
Speaker 3: at some point, and I think this was the moment
Speaker 3: where they caught up with me. So writing those chapters
Speaker 3: and then rereading them, and you know, I couldn't. There
Speaker 3: are some chapters in the book that I can't read
Speaker 3: without crying, you know, because it brings back so many memories.
Speaker 2: So for me, that was the hardest thing.
Speaker 3: But what it does, I think is provide readers with
Speaker 3: real insight into who I am as a person and
Speaker 3: what I've been through and why I was able to
Speaker 3: weather the storm. I think having a co author as
Speaker 3: well is an incredible privilege. Summer Land, who wrote the
Speaker 3: book with me. You know, there's this beautiful saying is
Speaker 3: that you can't read the label when you're inside the jar.
Speaker 3: And she saw things in me and things that i'd
Speaker 3: been through that I probably would have just brushed over
Speaker 3: and said, you know, they're not that important whatever, you know,
Speaker 3: and she go, hey, on, how talk me through that?
Speaker 3: How are you feeling what was happening? An next minut
Speaker 3: would be a chapter, Wow, and an incredible chapter. And
Speaker 3: I think that was a really surprising part of writing
Speaker 3: the book as well.
Speaker 2: Do you feel a sense of closure now? Yeah, I do.
Speaker 3: I mean, this experience will be a part of me
Speaker 3: for the rest of my life. It's not something you
Speaker 3: just get over. It's not something you leave behind. It's
Speaker 3: a part of me. For me, it's been really interesting
Speaker 3: that this has fueled something inside me that is making
Speaker 3: me come and talk to people like you, like I
Speaker 3: want everyone to be fully aware and educated on these things.
Speaker 3: And what I'd say is you don't have to be
Speaker 3: swindled by a comment to be financially vulnerable. You know,
Speaker 3: you can have a serious illness, you can be financially
Speaker 3: vulnerable through divorce or death. And what this has shown
Speaker 3: me is that we have to take a lot more
Speaker 3: agency over our finances, especially as women, because you know,
Speaker 3: it's our future, it's our security. It gives us choices,
Speaker 3: and you know, there is closure in the sense of
Speaker 3: this happened and we're moving on and we're rebuilding and
Speaker 3: we've got a good life now, but you know, a
Speaker 3: real sort of fuel to continue talking about it, to
Speaker 3: educate people and help people be more financially resilient.
Speaker 1: I suppose what are you hoping that the readers will
Speaker 1: gain from reading your story.
Speaker 3: I'm hoping that they will, you know, really understand that
Speaker 3: this can happen to anyone. I'm hoping that they can
Speaker 3: see some of the signs that I didn't see, and,
Speaker 3: if not in their own lives, in people close to them,
Speaker 3: because sometimes the people close to you can see what's
Speaker 3: happening that you can't. So opening up a conversation around that,
Speaker 3: and I think regardless of you know, financial trauma or
Speaker 3: any type of thing that someone goes through, I really
Speaker 3: want people to feel like there's hope, like there is
Speaker 3: there is a life after, and it can be great
Speaker 3: life after and I'm hoping that I can just act
Speaker 3: as that beacon of hope for anyone going through a
Speaker 3: challenging time.
Speaker 1: Absolutely, now Hamish was about to call him, Bax is
Speaker 1: going to be released and listen two.
Speaker 2: Years about two years? Yeah, twenty twenty six. How do
Speaker 2: you feel about that? And if you.
Speaker 1: Were to see him, what would you say to him?
Speaker 3: I feel like no sentence would have been long enough
Speaker 3: to you know, take away the pain that he's caused
Speaker 3: so many people. But the law is the law, so
Speaker 3: he'll be released potentially on parole in July twenty twenty six. Like,
Speaker 3: if I'm really honest, I try not to give it
Speaker 3: too much thought. I've just I want to spend my
Speaker 3: energy on me and making my life better. And you
Speaker 3: know his surf to a sentence, We hope that you
Speaker 3: know there's some lessons being learned. But again, I just
Speaker 3: I really try and focus on me and what my
Speaker 3: life is going to look like moving forward, and I
Speaker 3: feel like that's the best use of my energy.
Speaker 2: I completely agree.
Speaker 1: Well, your book The Last Victim, when does it hit
Speaker 1: the bookshelves.
Speaker 3: It's hit the bookshelves on the first of May, and
Speaker 3: it's available in all good bookstores online, there's an audio
Speaker 3: version and yeah, well.
Speaker 1: I cannot wait to start reading your book. And I
Speaker 1: think this is so important for everyone. You know, people
Speaker 1: go to a self protection mode where they think, oh,
Speaker 1: that wouldn't happen to me, But it's that's the way
Speaker 1: that they think until it actually happens to them. And
Speaker 1: it is so important to be aware of all the
Speaker 1: signs the warnings, listen to your gut, as you said,
Speaker 1: having those open conversations with people that you know and
Speaker 1: trust about what's going on, so that they can potentially
Speaker 1: shed some light and I'll give you an different opinion,
Speaker 1: or even give you a resource to go and check
Speaker 1: someone out, like on the ACID register and checking their
Speaker 1: license details and asking additional questions and gauging someone's feedback
Speaker 1: or their answers when they're asked these probing questions, which
Speaker 1: is so incredibly important.
Speaker 3: I do have a resource list on my website if
Speaker 3: people want to go there and download it, and it's
Speaker 3: a whole bunch of kind of ideas and websites to
Speaker 3: go to to just double check everything if you're unsure.
Speaker 3: So there's some really good ideas in there so you
Speaker 3: don't have to do research yourself.
Speaker 1: Well, Tracy, thank you so much, and I really hope
Speaker 1: everyone takes some time to go and read your book
Speaker 1: and take in this wise wisdom and share the wisdom
Speaker 1: as well well other people through these conversations, so that
Speaker 1: we can create a strong awareness and knowledge around these
Speaker 1: I guess creatures and.
Speaker 2: Characters and parasites.
Speaker 1: That's all say, so that we protect ourselves and that
Speaker 1: this does not ever happen again. Well, look, thank you
Speaker 1: so much. Last Victim is on the bookshelves shortly, and
Speaker 1: if you need any details from Tracy, please head to
Speaker 1: her website those free resources.
Speaker 2: Tracy, thank you so much for coming.
Speaker 1: Thanks Canna, thank you now, Thank you everyone for listening
Speaker 1: to Sugar Mamma's fireplay. Until next Monday morning, stay motivated, empowered,
Speaker 1: and never stop seeking new ways to achieve or in
Speaker 1: Tracy's face.
Speaker 2: Catch up on her and your financial goals and dreams.
Speaker 2: This is Sugar Mama's fare