Speaker 1: Hey everyone, just a note before we begin. This episode
Speaker 1: discusses suicidal ideation. Please take care when listening. Betrayal Weekly
Speaker 1: is officially back. This is season three, episode one. Each
Speaker 1: episode tells a unique story of deception and broken trust,
Speaker 1: and each storyteller has found their own path forward. Whether
Speaker 1: you've been with us from the beginning or you're just
Speaker 1: tuning in, welcome, We are starting this season with Aaron's story.
Speaker 2: I'm at work, just plugging away, and I get an
Speaker 2: email notification on my smartphone. I look down and it's
Speaker 2: from the FBI ari information about Sabrina Taylor.
Speaker 1: I'm Andrea Gunning in This is Betrayal, a show about
Speaker 1: the people we trust the most and the deceptions that
Speaker 1: change everything.
Speaker 2: My name is Aaron Ward. I'm a software engineer working
Speaker 2: in video games.
Speaker 1: Aaron spent his whole career working on popular video games.
Speaker 2: I worked on Halo Infinite, I worked on Minecraft. I've
Speaker 2: worked on a bunch of little projects for Nintendo. One
Speaker 2: of my minor claims to fame is I had the
Speaker 2: number one played game on nick dot com in two
Speaker 2: thousand and eight, which was SpongeBob SquarePants Refrumble.
Speaker 1: Aarin's a third generation computer nerd. He grew up in
Speaker 1: rural Ohio with his siblings and parents who worked in
Speaker 1: computer science.
Speaker 2: My parents were what I would call upper middle class,
Speaker 2: both white collar, working professionals.
Speaker 1: Aaron's parents made enough money for their families to live comfortably,
Speaker 1: but a lot of people in their community struggled to
Speaker 1: make ends meet. His parents tried to give back wherever
Speaker 1: they could.
Speaker 2: My parents always volunteered a lot. They were very generous,
Speaker 2: and they also helped lead a lot of local fundraisers.
Speaker 1: His parents taught him to be generous with his money
Speaker 1: and his time.
Speaker 2: My parents were a lot about honesty and a lot
Speaker 2: about trying to help people that needed it.
Speaker 1: Aaron spent most of his free time playing video games
Speaker 1: or reading about them.
Speaker 2: I was a really big Nintendo fan, and I had
Speaker 2: a subscription to Nintendo Power.
Speaker 1: Nintendo Power was a magazine all about Nintendo games. It
Speaker 1: had comics, game reviews, and articles. Aaron read every issue,
Speaker 1: and when he was in fifth grade, he read an
Speaker 1: article that sparked his interest.
Speaker 2: They mentioned the opening of the digit Campus.
Speaker 1: Digitpen is a college near Seattle that specializes in video
Speaker 1: game design. Even though Erin was only in fifth grade,
Speaker 1: I knew.
Speaker 2: Very early on. That's really what I wanted to do
Speaker 2: with my life.
Speaker 1: Getting into DigiPen became Aaron's life goal.
Speaker 2: One of our freshman year activities when I was in
Speaker 2: high school was writing three things that you wanted to
Speaker 2: try to accomplish in your life. My three things were
Speaker 2: working on a triple A video game title, graduating from DigiPen,
Speaker 2: and being a Jeopardy Champion.
Speaker 1: As of this recording, Aaron is not a Jeopardy Champion yet,
Speaker 1: but he's accomplished his other two goals. His senior year
Speaker 1: in high school, he was accepted into DigiPen. He left
Speaker 1: the farms and factories of rural Ohio and jumped headfirst
Speaker 1: into a world of video games. It was exciting and
Speaker 1: Aaron learned a lot, but DigiPen had one big shortcoming.
Speaker 2: DigiPen has a ninety five to five male to female ratio,
Speaker 2: so DigiPen was four years of having almost no female socialization.
Speaker 2: As someone who had mostly female friends in high school,
Speaker 2: that was a big change for me.
Speaker 1: Aaron noticed how being in a male dominated environment was
Speaker 1: impacting the people around him, and he didn't like what
Speaker 1: he saw.
Speaker 2: I had seen a lot of my peers at DigiPen
Speaker 2: starting to go down that path of misogyny because they
Speaker 2: weren't being around women in their day to day lives,
Speaker 2: so the only women they were exposed to were actresses
Speaker 2: or people in the media.
Speaker 1: Aaron didn't want to go down that path, so he
Speaker 1: read books and worked with his therapist to learn what
Speaker 1: healthy relationships really looked like.
Speaker 2: One thing I learned is to try to not be
Speaker 2: transactional in relationships. It's not about I do this for you,
Speaker 2: do this thing for me. Relationships need to be about
Speaker 2: the broader scope of caring for each other and being
Speaker 2: there for each other when stuff is hard.
Speaker 1: After graduating from college, Aaron and some friends moved into
Speaker 1: an apartment together. He was working as a video game
Speaker 1: programmer and loved the life he'd built. He felt ready
Speaker 1: to meet someone and decided to give dating in Seattle
Speaker 1: a try.
Speaker 2: I was not super outgoing. I was not a go
Speaker 2: out to the bars and meet someone kind of person,
Speaker 2: and that's when I turned to internet dating. At the
Speaker 2: time two thousand and seven, the iPhone is barely a thing.
Speaker 2: There is no tender, so what I'm left with option
Speaker 2: wise are Craiglist personals.
Speaker 1: Craigslist personals was a subsection of Craigslist for people who
Speaker 1: were looking for relationships, romantic connections, or friendships. You could
Speaker 1: post an ad about yourself and what you were looking for.
Speaker 2: I had noticed there was a glut of men looking
Speaker 2: for women ads, so I mostly focused on responding to
Speaker 2: the few women that had posted their ads up.
Speaker 1: One day, while scrolling through Craigslist, Aaron saw an ad
Speaker 1: that caught his attention.
Speaker 2: The headline of it was about how white guys are
Speaker 2: scared to date black women, and it intrigued me enough
Speaker 2: to at least read it. In the ad, she talked
Speaker 2: about how she was a nerdy black woman who grew
Speaker 2: up in a largely white Midwestern area, and how the
Speaker 2: white men of the Seattle area had never seemed to
Speaker 2: approach her or approached her in very poor ways.
Speaker 1: Aaron responded to the ad, apologizing on behalf of the
Speaker 1: white nerdy men of Seattle. The author of the post
Speaker 1: thought his response was funny and wrote him back.
Speaker 2: I found out her name was Sabrina. We exchanged pictures
Speaker 2: over email and had a couple of email back and
Speaker 2: forth before we decided to go out on a date
Speaker 2: to the local off leash dog.
Speaker 1: Park on the day of their date, Aaron headed to
Speaker 1: the dog park feeling nervous but excited.
Speaker 2: She showed up looking just like her pictures with her
Speaker 2: pet Dalmatian Satchel, who was very sweet, and we ended
Speaker 2: up taking a nice long hour plus walk where we
Speaker 2: both went through our lives and the things we have
Speaker 2: in common. She grew up in Iowa, I grew up
Speaker 2: in Ohio, so we both grew up in the Midwest.
Speaker 1: Aaron immediately felt relaxed around Sabrina.
Speaker 2: We also talked about all of our different nerdy interests,
Speaker 2: video games, anime, television shows. We were both big Sailor
Speaker 2: Moon fans. We had both played basically every Nintendo game
Speaker 2: that had ever been made, Mario's, Zelda's Final Fantasies.
Speaker 1: After their first date, Aaron couldn't wait to see Sabrina again.
Speaker 1: He invited her to hang out with him and his
Speaker 1: friends at a pub they liked on the east side
Speaker 1: of Seattle. He was a little nervous with Sabrina click
Speaker 1: with his friends, but as soon as she showed up,
Speaker 1: his nerves melted away.
Speaker 2: She got along with basically everybody. She is magnetic and
Speaker 2: draws a lot of people around her to listen to
Speaker 2: her talk about whatever she's talking about. She's definitely the
Speaker 2: kind of person that can make friends very easily in
Speaker 2: a crowd.
Speaker 1: Aaron loved hanging out with his friends with Sabrina by
Speaker 1: his side.
Speaker 2: The fact that she was so charismatic was excreefly attractive
Speaker 2: to me. It really helped fill in some of my
Speaker 2: gaps of getting conversations started and breaking the ice socially
Speaker 2: with new people.
Speaker 1: After that night at the pub, Aaron and Sabrina had
Speaker 1: their first kiss.
Speaker 2: We had great physical chemistry as well as having a
Speaker 2: lot of things in common, so that really felt like
Speaker 2: it was kind of a meant to be situation.
Speaker 1: They started spending more and more time together. Soon they
Speaker 1: were officially boyfriend and girlfriend. They had long conversations about
Speaker 1: their backgrounds and dreams for the future.
Speaker 2: She was an intern for the Bill and Melinda Gates
Speaker 2: Foundation and she was finishing up her double bachelors in
Speaker 2: public health and women's studies, with her end goal being
Speaker 2: becoming a doctor. She had big plans for her life
Speaker 2: going forward. That was something that was attractive to me.
Speaker 2: In a possibly forever partner.
Speaker 1: With Sabrina, the world felt big.
Speaker 2: We went on a couple of little trips to the
Speaker 2: coast and being with her just really got me out
Speaker 2: of my shell and got me out of my apartment
Speaker 2: with my roommates and out doing things, even if it
Speaker 2: was just shopping or wandering around Pipe Place Market.
Speaker 1: And of course they loved playing video games together.
Speaker 2: She would have a game that she really liked the
Speaker 2: story of wasn't quite dexterous enough to beat, and so
Speaker 2: she'd get us started and I would do the later
Speaker 2: harder levels for her so we could both see the
Speaker 2: ending of the game.
Speaker 1: They were on the same team.
Speaker 2: Sabrina really made me feel seen and appreciated in a
Speaker 2: way that I hadn't been for a while. She always
Speaker 2: made me feel like I was a priority in her life,
Speaker 2: and I tried to do the same.
Speaker 1: They began to talk about their long term goals.
Speaker 2: I wanted the stereotypical white picket fence wife, two and
Speaker 2: a half kids, et cetera. She was looking toward medical school,
Speaker 2: so kids and getting married and stuff that was down
Speaker 2: the road a bit, and I was okay with that.
Speaker 2: At this point, we're still early to mid twenties, so
Speaker 2: we've got some time.
Speaker 1: Aaron and his friends moved into a new house together
Speaker 1: in Seattle's Capitol Hill neighborhood.
Speaker 2: A month after me and my roommates had moved into
Speaker 2: the house, Sabrina comes to me and says that her
Speaker 2: apartment is going condo. Obviously, she can't afford to buy it,
Speaker 2: and she's not making a lot of money as an
Speaker 2: intern at the Gates Foundation, and she's still trying to
Speaker 2: finish up that last month or two of school. She
Speaker 2: basically doesn't have anywhere to go.
Speaker 1: So Sabrina moved in with them.
Speaker 2: I was excited to move in with my girlfriend, even
Speaker 2: if it was on a slightly faster schedule than I
Speaker 2: was planning on in my head. I was happy to
Speaker 2: have her with me every day, waking up with me,
Speaker 2: going to bed with me, just beg here out all
Speaker 2: the time.
Speaker 1: In true Sabrina fashion, she made the transition easy. She
Speaker 1: brought a lot of laughter and funded the house.
Speaker 2: She got along really well with my roommates. She integrated
Speaker 2: very quickly into the friend group. It was just a
Speaker 2: lot of fun to have everybody living together. You know,
Speaker 2: we all played rock band together, and we could kind
Speaker 2: of be loud and crazy because we weren't sharing a
Speaker 2: wall with anybody, but.
Speaker 1: Living in the same house also meant seeing each other's
Speaker 1: daily struggles up close. Sabrina had been dealing with chronic
Speaker 1: back pain. Aaron saw just how much of a toll
Speaker 1: it was taking on her.
Speaker 2: It had gotten bad enough that she had to call
Speaker 2: out of work a couple of days for it. So
Speaker 2: I encouraged her to go to the doctor and, you know,
Speaker 2: kind of get this checked out.
Speaker 1: Sabrina agreed. The day of her appointment arrived, and when
Speaker 1: Aaron came home from work, he was anxious to hear
Speaker 1: how it went.
Speaker 2: I come home and she's seated on the couch, looking
Speaker 2: very defeated. So I sit down and I hold her hand,
Speaker 2: and that's when she tells me her doctor had diagnosed
Speaker 2: her as having multiple sclerosis.
Speaker 1: When Aarin and his girlfriend, Sabrina moved in together, Aaron
Speaker 1: realized how much her chronic back pain was impacting her
Speaker 1: day to day life. He encouraged her to go to
Speaker 1: the doctor's and she did. When she came back from
Speaker 1: her appointment, Erin could tell right away that something was wrong.
Speaker 2: So I sit down and I hold her hand and
Speaker 2: I asked her what happened that day, and that's when
Speaker 2: she tells me that her doctor had diagnosed her as
Speaker 2: having multiple sclerosis.
Speaker 1: Aaron held her close as Sabrina began to cry.
Speaker 2: She started talking about all the things that she might
Speaker 2: not be able to do, and I tried to come
Speaker 2: for her the best I could.
Speaker 1: Aaron was in shock. His grandfather, Harlan, had died of
Speaker 1: multiple sclerosis, so Aaron knew how difficult MS could be.
Speaker 2: I heard the horror stories from my dad about how
Speaker 2: bad it was for Harlan. I had known a couple
Speaker 2: of friends that had an MS and had their lives
Speaker 2: cut pretty short. I had a thumb in the air
Speaker 2: guess of her life expectancy being somewhere in the fifties,
Speaker 2: maybe if she was already diagnosed before we had turned thirty.
Speaker 2: I was just devastated.
Speaker 1: Their shared dreams for the future, house kids, growing old
Speaker 1: together crumbled in front of his eyes.
Speaker 2: I didn't know what to do besides just hold her
Speaker 2: and tell her. I promised to help her through whatever
Speaker 2: came up. I was going to do whatever it took.
Speaker 1: Though it only been dating a year, Aaron was committed
Speaker 1: to staying by her side whatever their future held.
Speaker 2: I never had the thought of not committing to it.
Speaker 2: It didn't scare me off. I was in for the
Speaker 2: long haul at this point. I wanted to be there
Speaker 2: for her. This is the reality now, so let's figure
Speaker 2: it out. Let's do what we can.
Speaker 1: Sabrina had an undergraduate degree in public health, so I.
Speaker 2: Kind of let her take the driver's seat as far
Speaker 2: as learning about the disease and letting me know what
Speaker 2: she needed from me to assist.
Speaker 1: Sabrina's first symptom was back pain, but over time she
Speaker 1: started experiencing other symptoms as.
Speaker 2: Well, generalized soreness and limb pain, and casual exercise from
Speaker 2: like walking the dog was starting to bother her. So
Speaker 2: walking the dog became entirely by responsibility.
Speaker 1: Then standing at all became a challenge.
Speaker 2: So I took over a larger share of the housework
Speaker 2: and basically all the cooking. It was a little exhausting.
Speaker 2: Quite frankly, it's kind of just lucky I was still
Speaker 2: in my late twenties and I kind of still had
Speaker 2: the energy to do all of that. A lot of caffeine,
Speaker 2: a lot of sugar.
Speaker 1: Aarin did everything he could to make Sabrina as happy
Speaker 1: as possible during this incredibly challenging time.
Speaker 2: I was paying for a lot of makeup a lot
Speaker 2: of clothes. She had very particular tastes. As my dad
Speaker 2: liked to say, she has champagne taste in a beer pocketbook.
Speaker 1: Sabrina was working at a nonprofit, but her symptoms quickly
Speaker 1: began interfering with her job.
Speaker 2: She's been calling out of work a couple times a
Speaker 2: month at this point. One day she calls me up
Speaker 2: and says, well, I got fired.
Speaker 1: Aaron was immediately defensive of Sabrina.
Speaker 2: What the hell happened? They can't just fire you if
Speaker 2: you're sick.
Speaker 1: Sabrina explained that she had called out of work because
Speaker 1: she was having a high pain day, but then she
Speaker 1: had to run an errand that couldn't wait, and while
Speaker 1: she was out, she ran into her boss.
Speaker 2: Her boss had seen her out shopping on a day
Speaker 2: when she was supposedly in so much pain she couldn't
Speaker 2: get out of bed.
Speaker 1: Aarin was frustrated.
Speaker 2: If you're calling out, you need to stay home.
Speaker 1: He told her to just let him handle the errand
Speaker 1: next time.
Speaker 2: After she's fired from her job, she's basically stuck at home.
Speaker 2: She talks about going back to medical school. I'm very
Speaker 2: encouraging of this because she needs to have a job.
Speaker 2: For us to function as a unit. I don't make
Speaker 2: enough money to support us both forever.
Speaker 1: Sabrina still needed a few more college credits before she
Speaker 1: could apply to medical school, so she enrolled in community
Speaker 1: college classes. Arin was now the sole per for both
Speaker 1: of them, but Sabrina's spending habits didn't slow down. Aaron
Speaker 1: was left scrambling to cover the costs.
Speaker 2: I end up getting paiday loans and spending a good
Speaker 2: chunk of every payday going to each payday loan place
Speaker 2: to pay the loan off, and then immediately loan the
Speaker 2: money again.
Speaker 1: He watched his credit card bills stack up. Sabrina was
Speaker 1: still spending money on luxury items like make up and
Speaker 1: clothes while they were struggling to make ends meet. It
Speaker 1: was unsustainable and stressful. Aaron confronted Sabrina about her spending
Speaker 1: habits a few times.
Speaker 2: It usually broke down into a lot of tears and
Speaker 2: promising to do better and saying I should be able
Speaker 2: to live comfortably.
Speaker 1: Sabrina's symptoms were progressing, and she wanted to make the
Speaker 1: most of the years where her quality of life was
Speaker 1: still relatively good. I want to experience the world and
Speaker 1: fill her days with things that brought her joy. Aaron
Speaker 1: wanted that too, but the financial pressure on him was mounting.
Speaker 1: He was also paying for all of Sabrina's medications.
Speaker 2: After losing her job with the nonprofit, Sabrina struggled to
Speaker 2: maintain insurance. She would tell me that, oh, I've got
Speaker 2: my insurance set up. It's fine, you can go in.
Speaker 2: It won't cost that much.
Speaker 1: But when Aaron went to the pharmacy and they ran
Speaker 1: Sabrina's insurance, it often didn't go through.
Speaker 2: So it goes from twenty thirty bucks to three hundred
Speaker 2: four hundred bucks. That was several hundred dollars that I
Speaker 2: usually didn't have every month. But I have to have
Speaker 2: the medication today because we're out. Medication is not something
Speaker 2: you can live without.
Speaker 1: So Aaron did whatever had to be done to make
Speaker 1: sure Sabrina got her medications on time.
Speaker 2: It often came down to borrowing money from people, or
Speaker 2: paying bills late, or the internet get shut off for
Speaker 2: a few days, having the rent check bounce, just to
Speaker 2: make sure that the medications were filled on the day
Speaker 2: they needed to be filled.
Speaker 1: As the months went on, Sabrina's MS symptoms worsened. She
Speaker 1: began using a cane for walking assistance. It was harder
Speaker 1: for her to keep her balance, and she began fainting frequently.
Speaker 1: Her soreness and limb pain became more severe.
Speaker 2: Because of all the pain, she was having a lot
Speaker 2: of trouble keeping her energy level up. Seeing her struggles
Speaker 2: with the illness was definitely a major challenge for me.
Speaker 2: I didn't want to see her in pain. I wanted
Speaker 2: to try and make her life as easy as possible,
Speaker 2: because I knew that this was going to be a
Speaker 2: pretty rough ride for her.
Speaker 1: He offered to support her by coming to doctor's appointments
Speaker 1: with her, but the scheduling never worked out. In the
Speaker 1: middle of a very challenging time, there was a bright spot.
Speaker 1: Aaron got his dream job.
Speaker 2: I got a job as a software engineer at Nintendo.
Speaker 2: This is my dream company. I got business cards that
Speaker 2: say Nintendo and my name. It's a huge deal to me.
Speaker 1: Aaron and Sabrina had moved out of the house with
Speaker 1: his friends and into an apartment of their own. On
Speaker 1: top of starting his new job, Aarin was spending hours
Speaker 1: each day taking care of Sabrina. It was difficult.
Speaker 2: By this point, We're much less romantic partners and much
Speaker 2: more caregiver and receiver. I did all the dishes, I
Speaker 2: did all the cooking. We don't really have that romantical
Speaker 2: relationship anymore. We're always broke. We're not going out on dates.
Speaker 1: Aarin was caring for Sabrina financially and handling their household
Speaker 1: tours because her MS symptoms made physical labor painful. But
Speaker 1: Sabrina's quality of life was still good enough for her
Speaker 1: to spend time with friends and have independents, and so
Speaker 1: her personal spending never slowed.
Speaker 2: She was going out with friends and often spending money
Speaker 2: we didn't have. She's buying new clothes all the time,
Speaker 2: spending one hundred plus bucks a month at the map
Speaker 2: counter and Sephora packages from different delivery companies somehow magically
Speaker 2: getting paid for. And this is on top of all
Speaker 2: the medications.
Speaker 1: Aaron felt powerless to stop Sabrina's spending. As her MS
Speaker 1: symptoms worsened, so did her mental health. She began struggling
Speaker 1: with suicidal ideation.
Speaker 2: At first, it was, well, if we can't refill my
Speaker 2: meds on time and I have to go without a
Speaker 2: couple of days, maybe I should just kill myself so
Speaker 2: I don't have to experience the pain for that week
Speaker 2: until a paycheck shows up.
Speaker 1: It felt like all of Sabrina's safety and stability rested
Speaker 1: on Aarin. He worked hard to cover all of her
Speaker 1: medication costs, but his paychecks weren't enough and he was
Speaker 1: going into debt to afford everything. Then, Sabrina began calling
Speaker 1: Aaron while he was at work. Usually there was something
Speaker 1: specific that she needed.
Speaker 2: Often it was medication related, but it started to expand
Speaker 2: beyond that. There was an occasion where suicide was threatened
Speaker 2: if I couldn't come up with five hundred dollars to
Speaker 2: buy a custom cosplay outfit for convention.
Speaker 1: Sabrina's calls began taking up more and more of his workday.
Speaker 1: She was in such a delicate mental state he felt
Speaker 1: like it was unsafe to leave her alone.
Speaker 2: All of this basically just drove me into a level
Speaker 2: of depression and exhaustion that I became unrecognizable to a
Speaker 2: lot of friends and family. I was always eating cheap garbage.
Speaker 2: There were a lot of times where I skipped lunch
Speaker 2: at work for a week or more because I didn't
Speaker 2: have the five bucks I needed to go get lunch.
Speaker 1: The cost of Sabrina's MS medications was impossible to keep
Speaker 1: up with. Aarin tried everything.
Speaker 2: I filled up several credit cards trying to cover everything.
Speaker 2: I basically sold everything I owned. I had a video
Speaker 2: game collection that in today's dollars probably would be worth
Speaker 2: twenty five to thirty thousand dollars, and I was selling
Speaker 2: it for pennies on the dollar because there was something
Speaker 2: we needed now. It was always I need a couple
Speaker 2: hundred bucks. Now, I need to buy medication tomorrow. I
Speaker 2: need to make sure the rent check doesn't bounce again.
Speaker 1: Aarin was living in a survival state, always trying to
Speaker 1: keep up with the most urgent need. Then, after Aaron
Speaker 1: had been racking up medical debt for a year, Sabrina
Speaker 1: heard about a new treatment from her doctor. It was
Speaker 1: a glimmer of hope.
Speaker 2: The experimental intervenous treatment for MS came up. The first
Speaker 2: time the medication was called interferon.
Speaker 1: It was the early two thousands and there weren't as
Speaker 1: many treatment options available for MS as there are today.
Speaker 1: For the first time in months, Sabrina seemed optimistic this
Speaker 1: treatment could be the key to getting their lives back
Speaker 1: on track. Instead of the weekly and monthly payments, this
Speaker 1: treatment lasted a few months. Her doctors were hopeful that
Speaker 1: interferon could help manage all of her symptoms instead of
Speaker 1: needing multiple prescriptions. It had the possibility to majorly improve
Speaker 1: her quality of life.
Speaker 2: If I could pay seven or eight hundred dollars every
Speaker 2: couple months, then we wouldn't need to be buying all
Speaker 2: these other medications. This experimental treatment would be able to
Speaker 2: cover everything, or at least make a significant difference in
Speaker 2: her well being, possibly to the point where she might
Speaker 2: even be able to go back to work. It felt
Speaker 2: like a god said the possibility that we could actually
Speaker 2: start moving forward as equal partners again, and instead of
Speaker 2: just me taking care for all the time.
Speaker 1: The way they were living was unsustainable, so Aarin was
Speaker 1: willing to take a risk.
Speaker 2: I decided to move forward with it. I got some
Speaker 2: help from my parents to help start the initial treatments.
Speaker 1: He kept offering to attend Sabrina's appointments with her, but
Speaker 1: it never worked out.
Speaker 2: They were always scheduled in the middle of the morning
Speaker 2: or in the middle of the afternoon on a workday.
Speaker 2: I took time off to try and join her appointment.
Speaker 2: Oh they had to cancel and reschedule.
Speaker 1: Aaron had put everything he had on the line to
Speaker 1: help Sabrina access this treatment. It was becoming more and
Speaker 1: more concerning to him that he'd never spoken to a
Speaker 1: doctor about it directly. Every medical update he heard came
Speaker 1: through Sabrina.
Speaker 2: I had been talking to my dad about it, and
Speaker 2: he told me that I should start asking for receiptet
Speaker 2: since I could never make it to an appointment.
Speaker 1: So Aaron asked Sabrina to see a receipt for one
Speaker 1: of her interfere on treatments, and when he did, something
Speaker 1: strange happened.
Speaker 2: I could kind of see panic on her face for
Speaker 2: about a half a second, but the.
Speaker 1: Panic quickly disappeared and she told him.
Speaker 2: Sure, I'll get you on. That became a week or more,
Speaker 2: and then over a month into oh, it's time for
Speaker 2: the next treatment.
Speaker 1: Aaron knew something wasn't right, but he was starting to
Speaker 1: lose the will to argue with Sabrina.
Speaker 2: I think at this point I had just been beaten
Speaker 2: down emotionally so badly that I kind of just stopped caring.
Speaker 2: I didn't even have the strength to fight and argue
Speaker 2: about just basic information.
Speaker 1: At this point, Aaron and Sabrina had been together for
Speaker 1: five years, and it had been four years since she
Speaker 1: was diagnosed with MS. Paying for her m's treatments for
Speaker 1: years had been a huge strain on Erin. He was
Speaker 1: racking up debt and his mental health was getting worse.
Speaker 1: But Erin knew that having MS was a much bigger nightmare.
Speaker 1: He had watched Sabrina suffer for years, and the idea
Speaker 1: of doubting any part of her experience made Aaron feel guilty.
Speaker 2: Who lies about being this sick?
Speaker 1: One day, Sabrina approached Arin and told him that her
Speaker 1: doctors were recommending she'd start a new version of interfere on,
Speaker 1: one that she'd only need every six to nine months.
Speaker 1: But there was a catch. It cost eight thousand dollars
Speaker 1: for each treatment. She was planning to ask a mutual
Speaker 1: friend of theirs for help. Up until now, Erin had
Speaker 1: been paying for all the interfere on treatments himself.
Speaker 2: Not having to panic about it at this point was
Speaker 2: such a priority that I agreed to go along with it.
Speaker 1: Arin and Sabrina went to their friend's house to ask
Speaker 1: for his financial support.
Speaker 2: The friend brings up, okay, so you want to borrow
Speaker 2: fifteen thousand dollars and I had to hide the shock
Speaker 2: on my face because suddenly the number had changed. I
Speaker 2: didn't want to mess it up by confronting Sabrina about
Speaker 2: it in front of him, So after we leave, I
Speaker 2: confront her in the car about what's this extra seven
Speaker 2: thousand dollars for? And she tells me, well, I want
Speaker 2: to start school up again. There's a couple thousand bucks
Speaker 2: for that. I need to replace my computer, and you
Speaker 2: know I can only take a top of the line MacBook,
Speaker 2: so that's another three or four thousand dollars.
Speaker 1: By this point, Aaron did not trust Sabrina to handle
Speaker 1: money responsibly.
Speaker 2: The first thing I told her was, I know how
Speaker 2: you are about spending money. If you're going to do this,
Speaker 2: go do the medical treatment first. Don't go buy the MacBook,
Speaker 2: don't pay for school stuff. You go do the medical
Speaker 2: treatment first. She said, yes, yes, of course, of course,
Speaker 2: I'll do the baking treatment first.
Speaker 1: But Erin didn't feel comfortable just taking Sabrina's word for it.
Speaker 1: He needed to see for himself how she was spending
Speaker 1: this money.
Speaker 2: Her computer was broken, so she had been doing some
Speaker 2: of her work on my computer. That meant that she
Speaker 2: had saved her bank log in on my computer. So
Speaker 2: after she deposited the check, I started watching the balance
Speaker 2: of the account.
Speaker 1: Every day he checked to see if she had made
Speaker 1: the eight thousand dollars payment for interfere On.
Speaker 2: And every day I would open the bank account and
Speaker 2: see a couple hundred bucks get nibbled away, and then
Speaker 2: big purchase at the max. Dore went to the mall
Speaker 2: and spent fifteen hundred dollars on clothes and makeup.
Speaker 1: Aaron watched in horror as the bank account slowly drained.
Speaker 1: There was still some part of him that expected her
Speaker 1: to pay for the treatment. For a while. Well, there
Speaker 1: was still enough in the account eight thousand dollars to
Speaker 1: afford it.
Speaker 2: It's getting smaller and smaller. I'm not seeing the big
Speaker 2: expenditure for the treatment. And then one day we've passed
Speaker 2: below the line of what the treatment costs. That was
Speaker 2: the whole reason we were supposed to borrow this money
Speaker 2: in the first place. And she's spending two hundred bucks
Speaker 2: a week on my little pony phone game micro transactions.
Speaker 2: It gets below half of what she supposedly needed for
Speaker 2: this treatment. And then it finally gets below a thousand dollars,
Speaker 2: and that was the day, I kind of snapped.
Speaker 1: Aaron had woken up before Sabrina to walk the dogs.
Speaker 2: I went in the kitchen. I grabbed a bunch of
Speaker 2: black garriage bags from under the sink. She was still
Speaker 2: in bed.
Speaker 1: He woke her up, handed her the trash bags, and
Speaker 1: told her to start packing her things.
Speaker 2: At first, she tried to deny that she had spent
Speaker 2: the money, and that's when I revealed that no, I
Speaker 2: had actually been watching her bank account. And that's when
Speaker 2: the whopper to end all whoppers comes out of her mouth.
Speaker 2: She tells me that she's been working the day shift
Speaker 2: at a strip club while I've been at work at Nintendo.
Speaker 2: She doesn't have a receipt for it, but she did
Speaker 2: get the treatment, and that's what she spent her stripper
Speaker 2: money on.
Speaker 1: Aarin wasn't buying it.
Speaker 2: Honestly, I think this was the last time I ever
Speaker 2: believed a word she said. She managed to get me
Speaker 2: to not throw her out with crocodile tears, claiming she
Speaker 2: would get me receipts.
Speaker 1: Aaron knew he should walk away from the relationship, but
Speaker 1: the reality was a lot more complicated.
Speaker 2: An emotionally abusive relationship is like a cult of two people.
Speaker 2: The cult leader no longer had control over me, but
Speaker 2: I also didn't have the emotional and financial strength to leave.
Speaker 1: At this point, Sabrina suggested opening their relationship and seeing
Speaker 1: other people. Arin agreed. In the months that followed, Sabrina
Speaker 1: was still adamant that she had paid for the interfere
Speaker 1: on treatment.
Speaker 2: I could never get documented proof of it. No receipts,
Speaker 2: no information from the doctor, no nothing.
Speaker 1: Erin was trying to find a way to leave the relationship,
Speaker 1: but he was worried about what would happen to Sabrina
Speaker 1: when he left. She had been dependent on him for
Speaker 1: six years. Now.
Speaker 2: I still believe that she had MS, but that she
Speaker 2: just wasn't nearly as bad as what she led on
Speaker 2: because I had seen enough visual indicators to convince me
Speaker 2: that she was at least impaired. Somehow, it felt like
Speaker 2: she was just taking advantage of my family's history with
Speaker 2: MS to try and squeeze as much money out of
Speaker 2: my family as possible.
Speaker 1: Since Erin and Sabrina had opened their relationship, he started
Speaker 1: seeing someone named Kia. He loved spending time with her.
Speaker 1: She was like a breath of fresh air. One night,
Speaker 1: while Aaron was out on a date with Kia. He
Speaker 1: got an alarming text from Sabrina.
Speaker 2: Sabrina had told me that she was in the bathroom,
Speaker 2: had taken a whole bottle of pills.
Speaker 1: Sabrina had made a suicide attempt. Aarin began to panic.
Speaker 1: He knew Sabrina often lied in exaggerated things, but if
Speaker 1: there was any chance at all that this was true,
Speaker 1: he had to help her.
Speaker 2: So Kia and I rushed home. We parked outside.
Speaker 1: While Aaron and Kia were still in the car, the
Speaker 1: front door of the house opened.
Speaker 2: And Sabrina walks out with two of her friends to
Speaker 2: go out to dinner.
Speaker 1: She didn't see him in the car. She walked right
Speaker 1: past him. For Aaron, that moment changed everything.
Speaker 2: This was surely a power play to try and keep
Speaker 2: my attention.
Speaker 1: Aarin was starting to realize that his girlfriend, Sabrina was
Speaker 1: lying about the severity of her MS symptoms to get
Speaker 1: financial support from him and his friends. Aaron hadn't found
Speaker 1: a way to leave the relationship. He was still worried
Speaker 1: about her physical and mental health. One night, Sabrina texted
Speaker 1: him that she had attempted suicide and locked herself in
Speaker 1: the bathroom.
Speaker 2: So Keia and I rushed home, parked outside, and while
Speaker 2: we're sitting out there, Sabrina walks out with two of
Speaker 2: her friends to go out to dinner.
Speaker 1: Aaron was scared that Sabrina's life was at risk and
Speaker 1: she needed immediate medical attention, but here she was dressed
Speaker 1: up to go out laughing with her friends.
Speaker 2: This was purely a power play to try and keep
Speaker 2: my attention. After Sabrina came home, I told her that
Speaker 2: I saw her leaving, and she tried to tell me
Speaker 2: that they were taking her to the hospital. I told
Speaker 2: her I knew that was bullshit.
Speaker 1: For the last five years of their relationship, Sabrina had
Speaker 1: been convincing erin that she was on the brink of
Speaker 1: collapse mentally and physically, and that he was the only
Speaker 1: person who could keep her safe. But now the extent
Speaker 1: of her deception was becoming clear to Aaron. This wasn't
Speaker 1: just exaggeration and bad spending habits. This was emotional and
Speaker 1: financial abuse.
Speaker 2: The following weekend, I invited one of my good friends
Speaker 2: over to kind of steal my resolve, and I sat
Speaker 2: Sabrina down on the couch in the living room and
Speaker 2: I told her we are not in a relationship anymore.
Speaker 2: I'm not paying for everything anymore. I'm done.
Speaker 1: The next weekend, while Sabrina was out of the house,
Speaker 1: Aaron's friends helped him move out.
Speaker 2: I ready a due apartment across town, where she didn't
Speaker 2: know where I lived. I think she knew it was coming.
Speaker 2: She knew she was busted for the fake suicide attempt,
Speaker 2: and she had just resigned herself to the fact that
Speaker 2: the spigot that was Aaron is turned off.
Speaker 1: Sabrina and Aaron still had a lot of mutual friends.
Speaker 1: After the breakup, Aaron distanced himself from their social group.
Speaker 2: She told a lot of people that I was physically abusive,
Speaker 2: financially abusive, that I was the one pissing away all
Speaker 2: of our money.
Speaker 1: Aaron was isolated from his community. I left to deal
Speaker 1: with the impact of years of financial and emotional abuse.
Speaker 2: I was left with significant psychological trauma that I, unfortunately
Speaker 2: didn't take the time to properly process.
Speaker 1: A few years past, Erin was trying to rebuild a
Speaker 1: base of stability in his life and pay off the
Speaker 1: debt he mounted while taking care of Sabrina. One day,
Speaker 1: Aarin was on Facebook when he saw that one of
Speaker 1: his old friends had posted a GoFundMe for Sabrina.
Speaker 2: I clicked on the link and gave it a read.
Speaker 2: She was in Japan. Someone had cleaned out her accounts
Speaker 2: while she was in Japan, and she was stuck there
Speaker 2: with no return ticket and no money. I posted a
Speaker 2: reply to the GoFundMe saying that if you're going to
Speaker 2: start raising money for Sabrina, how about you start raising
Speaker 2: money to pay all the people back that she took
Speaker 2: money from and never paid back.
Speaker 1: Organizer of the GoFundMe criticized him for calling Sabrina's character
Speaker 1: into question. His concern was shut down in the comments,
Speaker 1: but other people had started catching on to Sabrina's lies.
Speaker 1: The friends she was hanging out with in Japan. They
Speaker 1: collected evidence then posted their side of the story to Facebook.
Speaker 2: Sabrina posted that she had spent the day at the
Speaker 2: Bullet train station trying to figure out what the best
Speaker 2: time to jump in front of the train was. In reality,
Speaker 2: she had spent that day at Disneyland, Tokyo, spending hundreds
Speaker 2: or one thousands of dollars and at the same time
Speaker 2: pleading poverty on Facebook.
Speaker 1: Finally, Sabrina was exposed. The truth was out there and
Speaker 1: there was no way for her to talk her way
Speaker 1: out of it.
Speaker 2: Over the next week, I probably fielded a dozen or
Speaker 2: more apologies. Sabrina's scam worked great until people actually started
Speaker 2: talking to each other, and then it all fell apart.
Speaker 1: Other people began to come forward, sharing their own stories
Speaker 1: of Sabrina borrowing money and never paying them back.
Speaker 2: It felt gratifying to know that I wasn't the only one,
Speaker 2: and at the same time, I was racked with guilt that
Speaker 2: if I had figured some of this stuff out sooner,
Speaker 2: maybe a lot of these other people wouldn't have lost
Speaker 2: all this money.
Speaker 1: One day, something unexpected happened.
Speaker 2: I'm at work at Nintendo, just plugging away, and I
Speaker 2: get an email notification on my smartphone. I looked down
Speaker 2: and it's from the FBI ari information about Sabrina Taylor.
Speaker 1: The FBI was investigating Sabrina for fraud.
Speaker 2: I gave the agent a call and we spent about
Speaker 2: an hour going through all of the different parts of
Speaker 2: my time with Sabrina, her MS treatments, and diagnosis.
Speaker 1: The FBI kept erin up to date on Sabrina's case.
Speaker 1: She was charged with four counts of wire fraud. She
Speaker 1: appeared in court for the first time in November of
Speaker 1: twenty twenty one. After that, Erin was able to see
Speaker 1: the case the FBI had built against Sabrina.
Speaker 2: It wasn't until I saw some of the evidence that
Speaker 2: I was one hundred percent certain that she had never
Speaker 2: had MS. They had forged documents using doctor's letterheads. They
Speaker 2: had statements from multiple doctors that they'd tested her multiple
Speaker 2: times that she never had MS. One hundred percent of
Speaker 2: it was a lie.
Speaker 1: Erin had been paying for drugs like gaba penton under
Speaker 1: the impression that they were critical in managing Sabrina's MS symptoms,
Speaker 1: but gaba penton can be used to treat a variety
Speaker 1: of more mild conditions. After learning the truth about Sabrina's health,
Speaker 1: Eric did some research and learned that she was taking
Speaker 1: around three times over the maximum recommended dose of gaba pentten.
Speaker 1: We don't know what she was using it for, but
Speaker 1: the drug is often used off label for anxiety, and
Speaker 1: if misused, it can be addictive. Sabrina Taylor defrauded numerous
Speaker 1: victims out of over six hundred thousand dollars. She stole
Speaker 1: this money, not from strangers, but from people who trusted her,
Speaker 1: who were concerned about her diagnosis, and who were willing
Speaker 1: to make compromises in their own lives to help her
Speaker 1: afford treatment and care. On July one, twenty twenty two,
Speaker 1: she fled guilty to one count of wire fraud for
Speaker 1: a scheme to defraud friends and acquaintances. Her health wasn't
Speaker 1: the only thing she fabricated. Sabrina's entire identity was a lie.
Speaker 2: She never worked for the Gates Foundation, she never graduated
Speaker 2: from you dub, and she'd never even gotten close to
Speaker 2: medical school, and has mostly lived her life off the
Speaker 2: generosity of others.
Speaker 1: At this point, there was one question all of her
Speaker 1: victims wanted an answer.
Speaker 2: To where was the money going.
Speaker 1: It was the kind of thing that was impossible to
Speaker 1: understand unless you watched it up close. Like Aaron had
Speaker 1: watching Sabrina's bank account drain transaction by transaction, he knew
Speaker 1: where the money went.
Speaker 2: The truth is, the money was just going to traveling
Speaker 2: and shopping and not having to work. She was trying
Speaker 2: to live the lifestyle she thought she deserved and didn't
Speaker 2: care how many people she had to leach off of
Speaker 2: to make that lifestyle happen.
Speaker 1: When Sabrina pled guilty, the US Attorney's Office for the
Speaker 1: Western District of Washington released a statement about her crimes.
Speaker 1: We've laics actor read sections of it.
Speaker 3: Taylor engaged in a sustained and calculated course of conduct
Speaker 3: that preyed upon her victim's best emotions. Taylor used a
Speaker 3: substantial portion of the defrauded funds to pay for luxuries,
Speaker 3: such as almost sixty thousand dollars from multiple trips to
Speaker 3: Japan and Korea, nearly thirty eight thousand dollars for online
Speaker 3: purchases from Amazon and Etsy, more than twenty nine thousand
Speaker 3: for clothing, and nearly sixteen thousand dollars for makeup. Taylor
Speaker 3: met some of the people she defrauded online, using shared
Speaker 3: interests such as Japanese anime, comic books, or video games
Speaker 3: to establish a relationship.
Speaker 1: Sabrina's sentencing hearing was six months later, in January of
Speaker 1: twenty twenty three. It was the first time Aaron had
Speaker 1: seen her in over five years. He delivered a statement
Speaker 1: at the hearing.
Speaker 2: I laid out a lot of the trauma that had
Speaker 2: come with everything that you know, my dad had basically
Speaker 2: worked an extra year or two passed when he thought
Speaker 2: he was going to retire to try and cover all
Speaker 2: of my debts. Essentially, I told the judge that one
Speaker 2: of her favorite tactics was to threaten to commit suicide
Speaker 2: to get people to do what she wanted when she
Speaker 2: wanted it done. And I think because of what I said,
Speaker 2: the judge rescinded her bail and sent her into confinement
Speaker 2: immediately because he did not want her to try to
Speaker 2: repeat that pattern.
Speaker 1: Sabrina was sentenced to twenty seven months in prison. Assistant
Speaker 1: United States Attorney Joe Silvio released a sentencing memo, We've
Speaker 1: had a voice actor read part of it.
Speaker 4: Taylor carried out an extensive Frond scheme using deceit and
Speaker 4: deception that preyed upon humankind's better angels. Several of Taylor's
Speaker 4: victims suffered substantial financial hardship, some likely will never be
Speaker 4: made whole financially. Equally as important, Taylor exploited and betrayed
Speaker 4: the trust of each of her victims, and many of
Speaker 4: Taylor's victims will continue to pay an emotional toll for
Speaker 4: many years to come.
Speaker 2: I was definitely a lot less anxious during the time
Speaker 2: that I knew she was in prison. She has been
Speaker 2: returned to the Seattle area. I know she's still around here.
Speaker 2: Luckily I haven't run into her, but that's definitely something
Speaker 2: that's on the back of my mind.
Speaker 1: Even though Sabrina isn't in Aaron's life anymore, her financial
Speaker 1: abuse will affect him for a long time. It's hard
Speaker 1: to know the exact number that Aaron spent on Sabrina,
Speaker 1: but he estimates it was at least one hundred and
Speaker 1: fifty thousand dollars. His debt severely impacted his credit and
Speaker 1: he'll be paying it off for years to come.
Speaker 2: The total number I ended up owing my mom was
Speaker 2: just short of one hundred thousand dollars. I've been paying
Speaker 2: back what I could in the years since, and there
Speaker 2: is no way I'll be able to pay my mom
Speaker 2: back before she dies. I'm one of the lucky ones.
Speaker 2: I had someone that I could borrow that kind of
Speaker 2: money off of to get everything straightened out. I very
Speaker 2: easily could have had to declare bankruptcy over this.
Speaker 1: Sabrina was ordered to pay some of her victim's restitution,
Speaker 1: but Aaron's name was not included in the list because
Speaker 1: of statute of limitations to Aaron, this isn't a story
Speaker 1: about how we shouldn't trust others.
Speaker 2: She is the outlier. For every Sabrina that's out there,
Speaker 2: there are ten thousand people who actually need the help.
Speaker 1: To Aaron, this is a story about how we should
Speaker 1: trust ourselves.
Speaker 2: If you feel like you're being taken advantage of, or
Speaker 2: if you feel like you're doing everything for this other person,
Speaker 2: and I'm going to keep your head above water, start
Speaker 2: asking for proof. That was really what unraveled Sabrina's entire
Speaker 2: con was somebody asked for the receipts.
Speaker 1: The experience has given Aaron a new perspective on financial
Speaker 1: and emotional abuse.
Speaker 2: This kind of thing happens to a lot more people
Speaker 2: than anyone realizes, and it's not something you should hold
Speaker 2: against anybody when it happens to them. The same kind
Speaker 2: of thing can happen to anybody under the right circumstances.
Speaker 2: I am a lot slower to trust people than I
Speaker 2: used to be, but it hasn't kept me from trusting
Speaker 2: people at all.
Speaker 1: We end every weekly episode with the same question, why
Speaker 1: do you want to share your story?
Speaker 2: These things do happen to men, and you're not less
Speaker 2: of a man for this. Having happened to you, and
Speaker 2: I really think that we need to be just as
Speaker 2: honest as the women that are coming forward with stories
Speaker 2: like these. If this story helps one person get out
Speaker 2: or helps their friend get out of a toxic, abusive relationship,
Speaker 2: then this was all worth it.
Speaker 1: On the next episode of Betrayal Weekly.
Speaker 5: How in the world could someone stoop that low and
Speaker 5: go to that extreme? Were you too cowardly? Just tell
Speaker 5: me the truth.
Speaker 1: If you'd like to share your story on betrayal, please
Speaker 1: email Betrayalpod at gmail dot com. That is Betrayal Pod
Speaker 1: at gmail dot com. Please note that we are not
Speaker 1: a mental health organization. If you are in crisis or
Speaker 1: currently experiencing domestic violence, we encourage you to seek local
Speaker 1: help or dial nine to one one. Please contact organizations
Speaker 1: that offer immediate support. In our show notes, we've included
Speaker 1: a list of US based resources. You can follow us
Speaker 1: on Instagram at Betrayal Pod or find me at It's
Speaker 1: Andrea Gunning. To access our newsletter and additional content, and
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Speaker 1: Nancy Glass and Jennifer Fason, hosted and produced by me
Speaker 1: Andrea Gunning, written and produced by Olivia Hewitt. Our story
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