Transcripts:
daddy gang picture this you just got one of the most prestigious internships in the country and you feel like your career is about to take off you're so excited to be working alongside your boss who is without a doubt the most important person and everyone loves and admires this man one day he starts to show you attention he even begins to flirt with you and one thing leads to another and you guys end up in a full-blown secret relationship for a while everything's great he's giving you gifts he's making
you feel special and you confide in your coworker telling her everything about the relationship but then one day you're at the mall and the FBI surrounds you they know about you and your boss's relationship because your coworker secretly recorded your conversations and turned them over to the FBI they tell you if you don't cooperate you will go to jail suddenly every explicit detail of you and your married boss's relationship is released to the public next thing you know your face is on the cover of every
newspaper and every news channel is talking about you they call you a [ __ ] and a [ __ ] they criticize your body and they embarrass you every single day for decades to come you're not allowed to talk to your friends about it you can barely leave your house your name and reputation are completely ruined and your life crumbles before your eyes daddy Gang This is a true story this is Monica Lewinsky's story when Monica Lewinsky was 22 years old she was an intern at the White House and she ended up in a 2year relationship with her boss the president of the
United States Bill Clinton their relationship was exposed to the public after Linda trip a woman Monica trusted as a close friend secretly recorded their phone calls and handed them over to the FBI after that moment Monica's life was changed forever she became the sole focus of a massive investigation that resulted in Bill Clinton's impeachment and her very public downfall despite and I want to emphasize this despite the 27-year age Gap and a clear abuse of power from the president Monica was the one who was ripped apart in the media her name became synonymous with
[ __ ] and she was relentlessly [ __ ] shamed bodyshamed and publicly humiliated for years daddy gang unfortunately as women we are way too familiar with the double standards of how men get treated in this world vers how women get treated while Bill Clinton still gets to embrace and enjoy his life in the public eye Monica has spent years working through the lasting effects of this trauma so now it is Monica's turn to reclaim her name and share her side of the [Music] story what is up daddy gang it is your Founding Father Alex Cooper with call
her daddy Monica Lewinsky welcome to call her Daddy thank you thanks Alex I am so happy we're finally meeting it's been a long time coming I've been looking forward to this conversation for a very very long time I think there's so much that we're going to talk about today that a lot of the women that listen to my show will be able to resonate with and also learn from so thank you for taking the time um how are you doing uh I'm good I'm a little nervous I still get nervous with these kinds of things but in general I'm good I'm excited it's a um it's a very busy it's a time as you
know launching a podcast it's it's a lot more than I ever could have imagined that's what I was going to say congratulations thank you you are launching this podcast obviously first you survived being the face of a global Scandal when you were 24 years old now you're launching this podcast called reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky and basically you discussing what it means to take back your name yeah why did you want to do this now well it felt um it kind of felt for me like it was the next step for my own
claiming and my own experiences of having lost my narrative almost my life at at 24 and what that Journey or process has been like to come back that in many ways that's in the bones of the show I think this idea of um losing something and getting it back let's talk about it your life completely changed once the news broke of your relationship with President Clinton can you take me to the day yeah the world finds out about this you find out that the world knows where were you and how did you find out so just to to reel it back a few days I I found out about the
investigation several days before the rest of the world did there was a um a sting operation that happened at a shopping mall um and then I was up in a there was a Ritz Carlton attached to the shopping mall and and I was in the hotel room really realizing that what felt like my life was over um certainly my life was going to change and that I was threatened with jail and um essentially told if I didn't cooperate and wear a wire that I would go to jail for 27 years so um oh my God and so I kind of saw this train starting
to barrel down the tracks and I really felt like the 21st January 21st opening the door I was living in the Watergate apartment complex with my mom and so I remember opening the door and these were in the days where people would get a newspaper delivered and in DC it was always several like the post and the New York Times and and so and I remember seeing my name above the fold and the um in the investigation and um looking down the hall and seeing the exact same newspaper outside everybody else's door and it was um it was shocking it was
terrifying and um I didn't I didn't actually know how to process anything and and really it was a moment where life as I knew it was over call her D is brought to you by T mobile when it's time for a big juicy gossip session with one of my friends I need a reliable way to get all the tea and by tea I mean T-Mobile okay having more 5G coverage means getting 5G signal more often and as someone who is constantly on the go it is so nice to have a reliable Network that I can count on being a T-Mobile customer also means that I have access to a ton of perks
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taken care of check out the VIP treatment at tmobile.com benefits one my heart just breaks for you because I'm thinking about myself when I was 24 and I'm thinking about all the women that are watching when you're 24 years old like your frontal lobe is still not fully developed 100% you in a situation that like how would you know how to respond that you're saying they're coming to you and saying if you don't wear this wire you're going to go to jail like were you able to confide in at least like your mom like did you have to hold all of this by yourself in that moment well I I think
the moment in the um Hotel so in the hotel room they wouldn't let me call anybody at first so um and I had a a pager so my mom kept paging me and um eventually they I said I was like look if you don't let me call my mom she's going to really start to worry so they finally you know they all huddled there were a whole bunch of them and they were in this connecting room to the hotel and the my the room I was in the connecting hotel room had a whole bunch of other FBI agents in it and um lawyers from the
Independent council's office and so um the they finally said okay you can call your mom and these are in the days of you know a a handheld phone so I'm I'm holding the phone and the agent had his finger over the hangup button and so it was this you know you just begin to understand um subtly maybe not so subtle but the kind of non-verbal ways that you're starting to understand how much trouble you're in when I had to go to the bathroom they went in cuz there was a phone in the bathroom they took the receiver out of the wall so it was um but eventually I
was uh allowed to go ask for ask for my mom because they wouldn't there was a a point where they all came in the room this had been a few hours and I had kind of refused to cooperate still at that point and um they had really they sort of sent in the heavy and at that point it was um the kind of the pressure tactics and so I basically said I I can't make a decision unless I talk to my mom so they let me finally let me call my mom and um and then she came down from New York and um and was so I was waiting for her to
come down and then she called my dad who was at a medical conference and with his best friend who was a who was a malpractice attorney which is how I ended up with a malpractice attorney as my first attorney there's a level of like we can't fathom what as a young woman you were feeling in that like pretty terrifying experience of all these people telling you what you needed to do you don't have a chance to think for yourself you call a lawyer I had asked to call a lawyer so from moment one because I think we all um you know we all know from TV and the movies right like when it happens in in TV and the
movies the the usually a man comes and flashes their badge you're like I'm not talking to you without my lawyer and they said well that's fine but you won't be able to get as much information and help yourself as much and so and then I was actively discouraged from getting a lawyer and um and I I mean I remember very distinctly the moment of of it sinking in about what it would mean for this to come out and impact my family you know so I had a younger brother in college my dad was upstanding doctor in the community you know my my mom is um has
her own world too and my stepmom and um and so that and the and the kind of Shame and knowing that I had I had felt very responsible in that point too uh because I knew I had talked about things that um it was expected I would not have talked about them so the media attention there's Paparazzi outside at all times like what were you doing every day like were you going stir crazy oh yeah I mean it was I was well first I was obsessed with the case um I think to just just to paint a little bit of a landscape of what the media you know what the media life was like because we have a sense of
how things are today with the um how how we can get get inundated with a story online with social media now they're eight bajillion Outlets but what it meant back then was this story was actually instead of a a story having legs for a week which is considered a long time in today's world I mean it was a year you know it was a year of coverage in the first 10 days of the investigation The Washington Post alone had published 127 articles so that's like 12 articles a day on just this story so it was and that was one news outlet and this was Global can you
explain initially once this all broke how right off the bat was the media portraying you oh I think for 5 seconds it was sympathetic and maybe after about a week once the White House got in gear um I was I I was very quickly painted as a um a stalker um a [ __ ] uh mentally unstable a bimbo um both the pursuer in this and also not attractive enough to to be pursued um and and really there was a a creation of a version of me that I didn't recognize and my friends and family didn't recognize um and that's that's what
happens when you have a power imbalance in a a story a story where media is um so integral to to it unfolding I can't imagine the feeling of like for a second being like well that's yeah I guess that's what H oh my God wait that that's not me how are they how are they why are they calling me a horror why are they calling me a slider how am I the pursuer like I what can you explain how your the name calling and the [ __ ] shaming slowly started to chip away at the way you felt about yourself yeah well I I think um I can't say this for you know for
everybody who gets involved in a relationship with um someone who's I'm trying to think of the right way to say it but it's like I think not everybody who has an affair feels this way but I think a lot of people especially young women who get involved in Affairs um it already starts with a lack of selfesteem and self-worth so I already had issues it was this um I it's kind of your worst nightmare of like all the all the worst things that you think about yourself and say to yourself you then start to have reflected and Amplified by the whole
world um and so it was if it hadn't been for my family continuing to remind me of of my true self um and then eventually when I was able to have my friends come in I I don't think I would have been able to make it through I think there were really sort of two parts of me there was um both this more damaged younger part of me who was soaking up all the negativity and it was um like a tsunami and just making a bad situation worse and then there was a you know maybe a future version of me or a um like a a higher self or whatever who who was angry who started to get angry
so it was there were times that I was angry or frustrated I was so humiliated once you got out of this isolation essentially I guess we could call it right how did people in your life treat you and did you see a difference in the way that like men verse women treated you like was there a difference I I think what was interesting that I I started to see um in the public Arena was that it very sadly it was a lot of women who said worse things about me than the men um the men told a lot of jokes right so the late night host um I think when
Jay Leno retired uh some media um Boop debop whatever organization um had done a study and listed the top 10 targets his top 10 targets of his late night show and I was on that list and so and I was the only only person who wasn't a public figure in this you know these are um so it was I think the men told the jokes the women sort of eviscerated me and um and look Also let's let's recognize that while there were so many ways that um I think Bill's Behavior was more reprehensible than mine I I did make mistakes so I I you know um I think
we see it very differently now and even through that lens I still made mistakes I still I still did things that were wrong I think I've recognized and I think a lot of women can experience too especially with media now it's like which we'll get to about the double standard because yes you made the mistake but I feel like there's also a conversation online of just like but the person within the marriage is the one that truly has the right and the is supposed to be the lawy and we are always crucifying the woman and then there's a level of complexity
of there is a power in balance of you are 22 and this man is 49 so there's so much complexity of it makes me sad for you that women tearing you down I get it with an affair I think it's a trigger point for a lot of women yeah the way that they could identify whether they had been cheated on by their husbands you know what I mean there's everyone's coming at it from the angle that they can personally relate to or their fears or their insecurities but the outbreak essentially from all these women towards you in my opinion like it's devastating because now I think
hopefully like do you feel a difference when women talk to you about it today versus back then my gosh absolutely well I mean it was I think that it it really was the younger generation when when I wrote my first person essay for Vanity Fair in 2014 it was you know your generation and the younger Generations that really insisted on re-evaluating this story because you were all coming to it with just the facts not having gone through the brainwashing or Liv through that media lens and bringing different perspectives that happen throughout Generations right um from generations and so it was really
interesting to have this front row seat to observe in the very beginning of the article coming out it was sort of the same voices saying the same thing oh you know go away you had your 15 minutes and then it was the younger generation the younger journalists the younger women journalists who were starting to say hold up you know all the things that that you just said about the power differentials on on both from age and within the resources resources of both money and power and um kind of I know people who work for you who are able to disseminate information I had to you
know hire lawyers I never done any of those things call her daddy is brought to you by the original peacock film Bridget Jones mad about the boy you heard that right daddy gang our girl Bridget is back for one last chapter Renee zel wigger returns to her role as the iconic romcom heroine that defined a genre now juggling two kids going back to work and the world of online dating Bridget is just as endearing and hilarious as ever also back are fan favorites like her best friend Shazer Dr Rawlings and yes Hugh Grant as the
Charming yet devious Daniel Cleaver of course Bridget wouldn't be Bridget if she weren't once again caught between two hot love interests played by Leo Woodle and Chella geop for so pour yourself a drink don't forget the tissues and make it a move movie night with Bridget Jones mad about the boy streaming only on peacock the White House basically left you out to dry after the president made a public statement claiming he never had sexual relations with you how did you feel having to watch that and hear him
say that you know in the moment I was split because I felt so guilty um I felt so guilty for everything I I felt like this having become public was my fault that I had because I had confided in Linda and so if I had not confided in her I felt as if this wouldn't have become public and um so there was an enormous amount of guilt I didn't want him to lose his job so there was a part of me that felt good deny it this is what you should do you know that sort of a thing and then there was a part of me that um was so
humiliated and um to kind of have the most powerful man in the world saying that um you know basically your damag goods like is uh not something not something you want as a 51-year-old woman and not something you want as a 24 year old woman the white house like you referenced earlier tried to frame you as this like unstable stalker but what the evidence then went on to reveal was the president called you often gave you gifts how did you at the end of the day during all this reconcile what people were saying about your relationship and then what you knew to be true and what
you lived with this person it was well it was gaslighting you know so I um um you know I I I think that was what I experienced on um on a pretty large scale and it was uh it was devastating you know it was devastating at the time and I think what you know what we see now in today's world and as as a grown woman I hate to break it to any 24 year olds listening to this because I know from 21 to 20 like 25 you think you know everything you're like I'm a [ __ ] adult now I know everything I'm so sorry to tell you you will look back on this time if be
like oh little 20-year-old me girl he yeah no so I you know I thought it was something it wasn't and um I my feelings were real uh and it um it was very frustrating and painful um to to have people talking about this um in a way that was untrue in the midst of all of this we're talking about how you're reading things online about yourself you're watching the news they're calling you a [ __ ] and they're [ __ ] shaming you and they're calling you un and mentally unstable and you're you're seeing all of this did you ever
have a moment during all of this where you started to doubt yourself and you started to feel like you were going a little crazy sure oh 100% I think that there were um you know right that's the whole the whole goal of gaslighting right so I mean I don't think the White House's intention was to Gaslight me I think the intention was to stay in power and to get out of legal Jeopardy but that's you know I I think that is the core of being gaset is you do start to doubt yourself I also think what I want to get into talking about too is like as a young person when
you're going through something traumatic your understanding of it in the moment is that and then you're also somewhat in fight ORF flight and you're like trying to digest it in any capacity you can and then as time goes on you're able to with time in a beautiful Way start to actually look at it a little bit more objectively as time goes on because you're farther away from it so I can imagine like the way that you felt about it in the moment you now have different perspectives and that's okay and I think
there's like a lot of Shame of people who go through these traumatic moments in their life where they people are like well how did you feel in that exact moment you're like I don't know I need to process it I need I need time to think and I can imagine people asking you questions Paparazzi being outside it's like oh yeah being up on a stand it's like you didn't you knew the truth but you also had to protect your like mental sanity of like I need time to heal and to digest the fact that I thought I was in this relationship now it's out to the world what is happening right like it's a lot yeah um what was
your Rock Bottom moment in all of this oh my gosh there were many um it's interesting in the moment the The Rock Bottom moment was probably um it was several months into the investigation and I guess whatever the layering of whatever had come out in the news that day whatever it was I it was just too much and I I had remembered thinking okay I I was able to the first two weeks of the investigation I didn't have a therapist I couldn't go on medication um and eventually I was able to get a therapist who had to be a forensic psychologist who was amazing Dr Susan um
I'm still grateful to her today and um I remember thinking okay I'm going to call her and if she answers then I'm staying and if she doesn't I'm out um so I think for me that was rock bottom and and that that again just kind of um this the the the mailstrom of of media and 24-hour news in the internet you know this this the report coming out was the first time that you missed history being made if you didn't have access to the internet like Google had just launched web traffic doubled overnight like it's just this is those are the
kinds of things that we just can't even fathom now right I mean and and this was all pre-social media but you know all the news outlets had um had like www representation and comment sections and um things like that so that was you know that was a moment where I think I don't know sorry I'm babbling a bit but you're doing great I don't you know I don't know if you ever had anything like this when you were growing up but I had a couple of different moments in grade school where it was like I I did something embarrassing and that that feeling like I don't want to go to school the whole
class knows the whole grade knows everybody's going to this and that and so that's one level of what we experience or if I'm at a dinner party and I knock over I don't drink anymore but if I knocked over a glass of red wine on the white tablecloth you know you're you're mortified in front of this group and you you you're able to draw a mental perimeter around that and what I experienced and now what why I care so much about anti-bulling with young people because I understand what this is online and with social media there is no border and you literally it literally
feels like the entire world is laughing at you and it is devastating I appreciate you explaining it like that cuz I never thought about it like when you're in that restaurant and you Spill the Wine you go home that night and you envision those exact faces at that table and you're like oh my God I hope they forget this I hope they like but you have a visual right and what you're describing if anything yeah you have like the most real horrific lived experience of what now so many kids are living online which is this like
unseen Beast out there that is talking about you that is taunting you that is speaking about you and they've never met you they don't know you they don't know your character they're just taking what they've seen glimpses online like didn't they even just like use your passport photo when they oh my God my work passport photo Jesus it was the worst it's all manipulated right like who wants their passport but it's all but that's so media of to train someone to believe something about yourself in those Rock Bottom moments that you just shared with me
like having the weight of truly the world on you of people talking about you and you were contemplating is it easier to just m not be here what kept you going I I call them moments of Grace and so I think if you have that moment of grace and the I don't know that beauty is the right word but the beauty of having one moment of Grace is that somewhere lodged in the back of your mind will always be that experience of having had that Grace you get through the moment and things get better it doesn't always just continue better and better for the rest of your life but once you've you know and that's it's
especially why I worry so much about young people because they haven't had enough life experience to like now at 51 when something you know bad happens and feels devastating I have a whole folder of times that I've had [ __ ] up thing happen I'm devastated da d da whatever it is and then it got better you know and now I I panic even less and less which is amazing I'm so grateful for that um so yeah don't don't let young people listening don't let anybody tell you it is not great to get older because your 50s are [ __ ] amazing yeah you
have a long long time to get there girl but it's amazing to feel so comfortable with yourself right and to know what to expect know how you react know what upsets you know what you can get through like your threshold you start to learn more and more well I think you I think really and and maybe women of older Generations weren't able to do this but at least how I feel is I've I know the operating manual to me you know and that is that is one of the most empowering things I think anybody can have but especially a woman it is so heartbreaking because you weren't the
only one that participated in this relationship and yet you were the one who objectively took the hardest hit yeah did you ever enter the anger stage where you were like [ __ ] this yeah it it um it took me a really long time um and like I was not until 20 10 so this 1998 to 2010 there were I was I would have moments of of being angry but it I didn't realize how much I had lost until I came out of graduate school and I couldn't get a job and that and and also I think at the point where I was because I
was um in my early 30s so now all of my friends have gotten married most of them have kids some of them are even like going on to their second marriages you know second and third kids and I'm still I have nothing you know or that feeling of nothing and um you know it's it very much was um that was the point when I realized how much had been taken from me to also be fair and I think that's like a very normal answer that anyone who has experienced a form of trauma would be like there's the I'm not going to say like dissociating but in some capacity
you have to dissociate to keep moving and then one day it just kind of hits you of your reality cuz you've gone through enough to get yourself back on your feet and like you said you graduate and then you're like okay I'm going to go get a job this is normal and then it's like no you can't get a job when you say that though Monica like what do you mean like people were literally turning you down in job interviews oh yeah I mean it was it was everything from I I wasn't even allowed to go interview certain places like a place
would say no we don't we you can't can't even come interview even though I was qualified to um because it was 2007 when I was job hunting I um was and and then um Hillary was running in 2008 so there was this High likelihood that she would become president or you know or could get the nomination so I think at that point she was expected to to get the nomination but of course Barack Obama did so at this period of time when I'm job hunting people were saying well could you get a letter of indemn I can never say this I had Belle's pausy a few
years ago yeah so sometimes some words are still a little hard for me but indemn ask me if I could get a letter of indemnification um if they hired me because they relied on grants and so they were worried that they would lose all their funding um so it was uh it it was there were a couple places that um you know were interested to hire me but would' be like well you'd be interacting with the media so I mean it's just you know was there ever a point that you not that you should but was there ever a point that you or anyone in your family
thought of changing your name or your last name at all yeah I mean I think that there there was definitely a period of time that I contemplated it except given the world we lived in I couldn't even see a reality of that right like how is that really going to work right I'm going to walk down the street in La where I was raised and run into someone and they'll say Monica and I'll you know oh my name is Rebecca now I mean like it just I didn't even know how that would how that would work or people had suggested to me well you could put a different name on your CV and I thought about that but
then you know when you play that forward you just so what I'm going to walk into a a job interview the person in their head is like that girl looks a lot like mon Lewinsky and you know and they're looking at me and I'm looking at them and you know it's just and then you're also starting out you know it's sort of like part of why I haven't online dated is that that whole thing of if you if you you know don't want to use your name you're you're starting something out with a lie you know so that doesn't that doesn't totally feel right to me either
so I but but really more than just the practicality I think as time went on I I also came to feel very strongly that I didn't want to change my name why should I have to change my name you know I I bet nobody has asked Bill if he needed you know did he ever think about changing his okay I get I get because he was most famous person in the world at A Moment Like and president Etc but just even the idea would never cross someone's mind to a man you know and and also too I'm you know I regret a lot of different decisions I've made both prior to 98 Post 98 like I'm a human being but
I'm not ashamed of who I am and so I think that that that was a really important important thing and I and I hope you know in me asking that like I don't think you should change your name but I hearing what you went through I understand like there there may be people around you being like Monica like to get a job maybe change last name like that is I I interviewed Amanda Knox at one point right and it's like there is this horrible reality that you have to which we're going to get to eventually of like you have to decide how you're going to live your life and you can't
just keep letting other people dictate it even though it's pretty [ __ ] hard because you're saying I'm walking in places and no one will hire me and it's like like it's like if in the grand scheme mhm how are you not getting a [ __ ] job you know what I mean like you're qualified and I I was really I was I was so lucky that I came from an upper middle class family that could help support me because I couldn't earn an income but you really you know when you're sitting inside a scandal like this you really come to understand why a lot of times women make the choices they
do because those are the only [ __ ] options they have is to maybe post nude in a magazine because you will get money and you can pay rent and put food on the table you know and so it's um a great point it is it you really come to understand choices people make and how hard it can be I I often think about that we don't examine and judge people by the things they don't do or the things they turn down you know so so true I mean yeah to add color for my audience I just want to like read this you were 22 years old he
was 49 you were an intern he was the president of the United States there is a clear power imbalance that they never focused on in the media when all this was coming out how aware were you of this power and balance I don't think that was something we talked about you know very much back then in the same way that we didn't have words like [ __ ] shaming and fat shaming you know um I think the this story became it it felt very bifurcated it was like most Democrats whether they believed him or not were supportive most Republicans whether they you know were
opposed and um it's uh that wasn't something that we talked about a lot and I think that it was really in the wake of um me to 2.0 that we really started to look at Power and balances Under the Umbrella of abuse of power yeah in 2014 you said the relationship was consensual in 2018 you said you were just re-evaluating how power dynamics impact consent now today where do you stand call her Dy is brought to you by Tinder dating app culture has gotten so complicated I feel like every week I hear about a new app with new rules it's time to just go back to Our Roots you
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this sense of I'm very clear this was not sexual assault um um and therefore there's a level of consensuality that was there and at the same time because of the power dynamics and the and the power differential I never should have [ __ ] been in that position and so that's where you just can't even I think that you can't even understand what you're walking into and that's where it's the responsibility of the person with more power and that power can be age it can be their job it can be their financial resour ources it can there
could be Myriad reasons that they have that the Tilt towards the power that way no and I appreciate you saying that because the reality is when you're even when I'm going back and reading these headlines it's like gosh the chaos of like that people believed even the the people writing it that like you were this person coming like he's the president of the United [ __ ] States like their secret service like you can't sing through the halls and you're like going after him like it's so it doesn't work that way you know what I mean so
that again Monica and why I appreciate you talking with me about this is I see it every day still in media in different corners of social media even where a woman is being pinned as something and when you are a woman that's had any form of what you're discussing and what I'm discussing of the [ __ ] shaming or the Judgment or the it's obvious as a woman where I'm like there's just no [ __ ] like hold on hold on he the president and she's and I think in a gorgeous way I hope that we're making some progress I think we
have I I I think I don't so I don't know that it would be as different as people think it would be if it were you know with a young charismatic Democratic president um but I think we have I think we have made some strides just even in in the fact that we have um language you know that we now have no en clature for these kinds of things that allow for more nuanced conversations that's a good point when you look back once the news broke and how everything was handled by media and the White House how do you think it should have been handled have you thought about that oh my gosh um I I think
that I think that he should have said um I'm like now thinking this through I don't think I've answered this question before um but good question I haven't been asked that before so uh I think that the right way to handle a situation like that would have been to probably say it was you know nobody's business and to resign you know or to find a way to find a way of staying in office that was not lying and not throwing a young person who was just starting out in the world under the bus and at the same time I'm hearing myself say that and it's
like okay but we're we're also talking about the the most powerful office in the world you know so I I don't I don't want to be naive either you know but I love that answer cuz you're being honest you're like as a human being if we take a step back that I agree with you that is exactly how it should have been handled it's the least they could have done for you right and not even for you just for like for anybody right it was the truth right but then we're talking about the white house and I think this is where it gets complicated because
like at what cost are you just kind of thrown to the Wolves to protect something larger I I don't know I know we both don't have answer I think it's okay it's complicated you know it's really complicated because you're you are talking about issues and and situations where so many people are impacted you know so I I don't you know and maybe this is a reflection of my generation or my age but I don't I don't know the right I don't know where the right balance is you know because there's there's there was damage no matter what I think there was so much collateral damage for women of of my generation to
watch a young woman to be pillared on the world stage to be torn apart you know for my sexuality for my mistakes for my everything what you're saying though is I hear what you're saying it's like this was such a large statement to the world about the way and I get what you're saying at the time there wasn't this language but the double standard here's the [ __ ] example right here yeah right what we're talking about yeah look what came from all of this for you and for them the other party it's just it's not the consequences were just nowhere you know I I lost my future so I mean that was um
that that really was I I was lucky enough to hold on to a strand of my true self yeah um but I lost my future yeah and so I'm so grateful for how my life has changed in the last 10 years yeah um but it it wasn't um that certainly was not a given you know you made public apologies have you ever received one in return I have had a handful of people who were involved at the time um that I've run into in different ways who have acknowledged that they wish they had made different choices none of the people who were you know sort of the above the fold names involved in the
investigation and I'm really grateful that I'm at a place where I need it anymore was there ever a time where you felt like you did oh sure yeah oh sure well I think that's you know and that this is sort of something I don't I don't know that I fully unpacked it yet for myself you know I I think um a lot of times with the writing I do it's like I have an idea for something and I sort of plant the seed and just let it I'm like okay and some version of me it's figuring it it's like figuring itself out to worm it its way out onto onto a page but I think that a lot of that has
to do with this um the intersection of as my life changed as people saw me more and more as my true self as I was able to have more agency um that those things became less important because I was been able to even though I will always be defined in some way by my history I am also defined by my present and that's it's important it's beautiful because I can imagine like the way that you're talking about being isolated and being trapped and not being able to speak to people for eight months and the emotional trauma that can do to a human
being like you said you weren't prepared for any of this and it hit you in the face and you had to just run with it because you had no other option to survive and then you come out of this and it's like how many times did you think like wow this there is a potential this will stay with me for the rest of my life well I had a whole I call it my dark decade I mean it was a whole period of floundering and having no purpose I mean I'm always lucky my family's always been amazing I've always had friends thank God you stepped away for about 10 years that was the time yeah did you
date at all yeah yeah okay so I I have always dat dated not very like not always successfully dated um and I was somebody who had wanted to get married and have kids and um I'm sort of past that point of having kids naturally um so that I think that was a focus for a long time but it was definitely um my you know my dating life has has been um complicated I think at times you know in dating when you were trying to get back to some form of normaly like did you find in moments that like men were kind of in it for the
wrong reason I've had a couple instances like that I mean it's sort of this wide spectrum of um I think my [ __ ] detector for someone who was there for the wrong reason was has been pretty strong luckily um but then there had been you know there's a wide spectrum of like how intimacy goes after something like this and it's you know it's like I mean thankfully no one's ever asked me to wear a beret in the bedroom but you know I mean there there have been you know it it's complicated look I think um I think our comfort level and and it might be
generational but I think Comfort level of um really feeling like you can own your own sexuality fully um is can be one layer that many of us go through when you add on the way I was sexualized and humiliated around sex um you know it it makes it more complicated you know so I appreciate you sharing that though because like I couldn't help but think you know there was this massive focus on your sex life and your 20s and I've even talked about it in the beginning days of my show it was way more sexual and it was fun but
then I would go on dates and I was like wait no like I think you have the idea or that's one part of me I know I mean it's funny because what what's what was amazing to me I was thinking about coming and S and sitting down with you and it was like oh you know thanks to your I think it was episode three I'm like you took the mantle of flowjob Queen I cannot thank you enough you know so it was you know what was it the GG 9000 Gluck luck 9000 girl but it's I I'm obsessed that you just said that but that itself is like there's the reclaiming of as women to be like I'm
going to own it first before you can own it but then you talking about you know being [ __ ] shamed like how did you start yeah to trust people again like getting into a relationship with a man or going into a bedroom with a man that you think you trust it's um you know I think that those uh I think that the first the first handful of years I was very self-conscious um because of how I'd been sexualized and and because as we were talking before of of having the most powerful man you know wag their finger and say I didn't have sex with that woman and um
George LOF like wrote this essay where he was talking about how I I wrote about this a little in one of my articles but um how how we see because we haven't had a [ __ ] woman president yet but we see we see the male president as a father figure this idea of the father of the country saying you know and so I had concerns about that and I think that there again as as because of my own self-esteem issues already I think that it um it impacted things and um I don't drink anymore I mean I have champagne on like rare I'm not I'm not sober I just don't drink so I'm you know but I think
that helped for a while and then you know I mean I joke now like if I were still drinking I'd probably have a lot more sex but you know because the sort of the moment in the night you know the moment in the night was like or I should say more casual sex but that moment in the night where you're sort of going to like lean into this thing like you just you start to get more self-conscious you know yes and you start to get more self-conscious and then you get in your head and I get what you're saying like having a glass of wine it relaxes you
but I I see what you're saying it's like this is this again the smaller version of what you experienced when I think so many women can relate to whether it's middle school or high school or college and a guy runs around saying something about a hookup with you whether it was true or a lie I've had that happen to me where you're like that's not true like and you're so embarrassed yeah and a lot of those moments like I then would like replay my exchanges with that person and I don't know if you had this where you're like self-consciously
being made fun of so then you're like well what did I like do you know do do I make sense a little bit here you're just like replaying like what did I do and what was I like and as a woman like so much of our worth people put on us is our sexuality so then to be publicly put down you're like oh my God and as a 24-year-old woman then it's like what am I worth and of course you're worth everything more than that but at the time your selfworth is like well and I had I had had a lot of um I had had some
sexual Trauma from when I was younger that you know we didn't even have again didn't have language for the kinds of things that you know that happened and so you you don't even know that you're acting out you know you don't even know you can't even piece those things together so it's um it it is but I you know I've also been really lucky in I haven't been super successful at a you know at a relationship I haven't been successful at all at a relationship that goes the full distance um but I have been really lucky and dated some amazing men and and those those men each
in their own way have help helped me find a piece of myself again you know shame oh can we talk about that for all the young women listening yeah you have tackled it head on quite literally and it is something that I think every woman in our lifetime we experience it in a way that men just will not understand can you talk a little bit if you have any advice on how to overcome shame as a woman when someone is putting you down again sexually um for not being enough right um whatever it be um I guess my brain's going in a few places but I guess the kind of good news
and bad news is the good news is that those moments will dissipate like that shame spear that that stabs you that wound will heal the bad news is that we're we like keep dealing with shame in in different ways throughout life um and I think for me the the thing that is I think of Shame almost being like a um bacteria in a Petri dish that it's like when you put it into this Petry dish and it's all by itself it just grows but it's still alone and that's the thing to know the most is that almost everything anybody might feel shame about somebody else is feeling the
same thing like it is not it doesn't necessarily mean there's you're not going to feel some shame but for it to lessen a bit um in some ways and it it is I wish I wish wish wish you know we get to a place in our world where women can just sort of like Sher the shame you know know and just you can't even be shamed yeah because that's what we see with some men in the world um who were Shameless and that's um It's Complicated it is it's something I still deal with you know so lesson less I want to just kind of conclude on the double standards okay any advice for women when it comes
to navigating double standards in how we are treated verse men I can only imagine the amount of women listening that have a workplace Dynamic with a boss or a relationship or like you said some a financial situation like do you have any advice I don't know how successful I have been in trying to navigate the double standards I think in some ways my own reclaiming is um trying to has been trying to open a path or continue a path um that not a lot of women had been able to go through before which is to be a Fallen woman and to rise and
so letting many other women know it doesn't I'm not the one to say this this is like a well-known quote of just you know it doesn't matter how many times you fall down it matters how many you get up and so I think that's that's the most important thing so I'm sorry I don't have a better answer for you on that Monica it's the most honest answer you can give because I have sat with so many people I literally call my mom about it in moments where I'm frustrated if I see something online or in my real personal life like I grapple with it constantly because I start conversations
like this like what do we do Monica like you experienced something on the biggest platform in the world how do we change this because as much as I would like to say it wouldn't happen to another woman again I do think it could happen to another woman again looking at like what's going on in our world and so I do think the reality as upsetting as it is is to say is like I don't think there is a solution yet yeah because but we're working you know and I think the thing that is so important about change and it's one of the things I I admire about you and I'm so excited
for you and grateful to you is that you are you are pushing forward in a path in in business in podcasts as a young woman right up there right up there with these men who are you know who are valuing what their contribution is in their podcast and they're being they're having that reflected to them and what they've sold them for and you have done that Alex like I hope you take that in every day because of you other women are going to be able to have successful podcasts that they then move on to other places for for I you know what I mean no I can't
first of all I can't thank you enough for saying that but I hope you know I feel the same way about you the fact that you have chosen to sit here and continue to sit in front of cameras and speak about your experience it like makes me emotional it's like there are so many women that look at you and it's like if she can get through that then I can get through this and I it's not that it should be your job to make people feel more seen and more hopeful but it is so incredible that you haven't given up and that you didn't just go away and just decide to like pull back like you kept your [ __ ] name Monica Lewinsky
and you're not going anywhere and that's why I'm so excited for you podcasting is so incredible it's so hard it's so hard but it's so hard so much harder than I thought everyone will give you Grace in the fact that you are going onto this new Venture okay I am so excited for you I am going to give you my personal number and I'm here if you need any advice okay okay last question okay if you could go back yeah and talk to your 22-year-old self MH what would you tell her do not go to Washington Monica thank you so much for cut me on caller Daddy thank you Alex
this was so lovely [Music]