This Is Not Your Story

Last July, I received an email from a television producer based in London who was researching the Hulk Hogan v. Gawker lawsuit for a possible docuseries. She was interested in both the tawdry scandal and the broader implications on press freedom. She said it would be great to have me on board “so I can hear your story.”

This was not the first time someone had been eager to hear my story. Even though the trial wrapped in March 2016, I get several requests for it per year. In the past year alone, I've heard from a New York Post reporter, a New York Times reporter, two overeager journalism students, and, most amusingly, one former cohort of Bubba the Love Sponge, who claimed he was self-funding a documentary about the Hulk Hogan sex tape: “I would love to give you the opportunity to speak and tell your side of the story. It will be fair, this is NOT a hit piece.”

I try to be polite when I turn these down, but sometimes I'm not. And when I'm not, I feel guilty, like I'm betraying some journalistic oath, even though I don't consider myself a journalist and, also, I don't owe anyone anything. 

But the London producer was friendly, and she seemed reasonable enough to have an off-the-record conversation with.

Julieanne was inside working, so I did the call outside to avoid disturbing her. It was a brutally scorching July day, and I stood in my backyard sweating, listening to the pitch. My iPhone was so hot I thought it would leave a burn mark of a small apple in the palm of my hand.

There was a gang of finches congregating around our squirrel-damaged feeder. There were mourning doves hoovering up the spilled-over seeds on the ground. Our sprinkler system was busted, and I noticed the roses looked particularly moribund, and their beds were littered with pieces of ashy dog crap. “I should be making this backyard beautiful today instead of taking this call,” I thought. 

I swore I'd do more listening than talking, but when she asked me if I thought the case was a massive blow to the First Amendment, I got annoyed and agitated. I began to pace. A red thermometer popped up on the phone, telling me I needed to cool it down, but my voice grew louder and more unhinged. “Bah, I don't give a shit about the First Amendment.”

The finches scattered quickly. The feeder swung ominously. 

She couldn't tell if I was serious or not. “I understand this was a tough time for you, but if you change your mind, feel free to get back to me.”

I told her I had no desire to revisit that period of my life but standing outside, pacing and sweating with a hot phone in my hand—well, that was precisely what I was doing. 

In 2016, a few months after the trial, I moved to Los Angeles full-time to be with Julieanne. After a complicated history of “hanging out,” we decided to officially date. Plus, a friend of mine had given me a low-level editing gig at a magazine, and he also had a line on a sober living I could stay at until I got acclimated and could afford my own place. (I had a minor, unsatisfying relapse in July, and my new sober date was July 15, 2016.) 

That plan fell apart quickly. In August, Hulk Hogan's attorneys, blocked from collecting any real money due to Gawker's bankruptcy protection, decided to put a lien on my meager checking account for more than $200 million. My funds were cut off, but I found a way to get here and there with some borrowed credit cards and Western Unions from my friends. It was a disorienting, demoralizing time, made even worse when Gawker's attorneys dropped me altogether.

I finally made it to Los Angeles in early September, arriving with an oversized gym bag full of mildewy clothes and a laptop. I was only a few days away from receiving my 60-day chip. 

*****

Even though we had only been officially dating about a month, Julieanne let me stay with her in her small, one-bedroom apartment off of Vine Street, mainly due to my absurd and pitiful legal circumstances. Her sister, her partner, and their new baby lived above her, too. What was once a cute and cozy situation for them became crowded with my extremely bad energy.

Most of my days were spent on their shared back patio, yelling at lawyers or former Gawker colleagues. I would go from one chainsmoking conversation to the next with an obnoxious, grandiose tone.

I never once considered that I'd completely taken over their space. I thought my outsized legal predicament had granted me a hard-earned reprieve from common courtesy. 

Because I was a self-absorbed buffoon, I kept speaking to magazine and newspaper reporters and appeared on podcasts, ignoring the tremendous legal risks. I had also agreed to participate in an upcoming Gawker-inspired documentary, so I was being followed around by its director. I was eager to tell my story to everyone, so I talked to everyone, sharing my frustrations and fears with them. During those early weeks in Los Angeles, I told more strangers about my fears and frustrations than Julieanne. I thought it was best to leave her out of it.

As a result of my media blitz, I unintentionally defied a court order. I was now required to return to Florida to appear before the same judge who'd presided over the initial trial. I had hearings scheduled in Tampa on Halloween and another the week before Thanksgiving. Thankfully I got a new lawyer. His name was David Marburger, a fiery First Amendment attorney from Cleveland. But a few weeks in, he was already beleaguered by the enormous pressure Hogan's lawyers were applying. Most of our phone conversations would begin with him saying, “I've never seen anything like this.” Then he'd tell me to sit tight and try not to speak to any more press outlets before I talked to him. I didn’t listen to that advice.

This was the beginning of October, and it was warm, but it didn't feel like California to me. I'm sure it was sunny, but I was so ashamed I decided to punish myself: Only after this awful ordeal was finished would I allow myself to enjoy the weather. So the beach was off-limits to me. Going out to dinner or socializing was, too. Julieanne would invite me out with her friends, and I'd always act bewildered and annoyed. “HOW COULD YOU ASK ME SUCH A THING???” I was a terrible boyfriend.

She would go out, and I would stay at home, scrolling through the Google results of my name on my phone or straining to read legal briefs on my laptop. I would try to skim them, but I'd constantly get distracted by words like “enjoined” and snap the laptop closed.  

One night while I was zoning out, lost in the latest nightmare legal brief, I saw her enter the bathroom from the corner of my eye. A fan went on. I don't know how long she was in there, but when she came out, she told me that she'd taken a pregnancy test, which was positive. “Not to pile on,” she said.

Then she ruefully told me she didn't want me to feel trapped. But it was odd—all that pressure and bleakness had suddenly disappeared. She was on the couch, hands on her lap, and I knew I wanted to stay. “I'm in if you are,” I said. She was.

Given the state of our affairs, this was an insane choice. But we both wanted this, so we chose love over logic. 

*****

A couple of days later, I was scheduled to be in a photo shoot for Esquire in a Los Angeles county dump. It was my idea. I thought it would be funny but also poignant—me in a sharp-looking suit standing proudly amongst the stink and mess. The King of Garbage—bloodied but unbowed! The editors were into it.

I took an Uber to the photographer's house in Eagle Rock. His name was Michael, and he had a smallish place, but the walls were full of spectacular paintings and black-and-white photos. There were shelves full of vinyl and clunky art books. But what really caught my attention was a playpen set up near the front door. “I just found out I'm having a baby, too!” Michael, the photographer I’d just met, was one of the first people I shared the news with. 

He looked utterly confused, a little worried. “Aren't you involved in some big lawsuit where you owe a lot of money?” I explained to him that it was all just one big misunderstanding. “I'll probably write a book about it after it's all over.”

I couldn't stop smiling and staring at the playpen. The magazine had sent over an expensive blue suit for me to wear, and he said I could use his bathroom to change. When I came out, I asked him if I could take a picture of the playpen to send to my girlfriend. “Sure,” he said. I could tell he thought I was unstable.

We drove to the closest dump in Burbank. I assumed he'd had a plan or called ahead, but he did not. We got there, found a supervisor-looking person, then asked permission to shoot there. “Go do what you want,” said the trash captain. He said there were always artsy types doing stuff there. “Lots of pornos!” he said with a wink. “Oh no, really?” Michael said. I could tell he was deeply disturbed. The poor guy had experienced so much upsetting stuff before noon.  

He instructed me to stand in front of one of the mountainous piles of broken tables, old tires, and stained mattresses. “Don't smile,” he said. After that, he took some more photos of me, sad and dejected, sitting on a curb in front of a pawn shop, which was his idea. His editor told him that he had to take many photos of me looking destitute. After we were finished, he dropped me off at a liquor store in Los Feliz so I could buy smokes. I told him I'd grab an Uber from there. He waved and wished me good luck with everything. 

The reactions were mostly positive when I began to tell the more important people in my life about the pregnancy. My family had not met Julieanne, but they all said the right things, even if they thought otherwise. My mother and father knew we were seeing each other and were very impressed by her, mostly because she was writing for the Netflix show “Grace and Frankie.” My mom and dad had only a handful of people they were starstruck by, and it turned out that two were Lily Tomlin and Jane Fonda. My mother wanted to know all the dirt: “Is Lily Tomlin a nice person, or is she grouchy?” or “Did Jane Fonda get work done?” And most importantly—“Do they ever talk to Dolly?”

I could sense both of my parents' uneasiness about what was to come, given what appeared to be a lifetime of owing Hulk Hogan money, but they were oddly supportive of our choice. I told some of my friends, and they were shocked, too, but also moved to tears because there was finally a joyful moment for me after months of joylessness. 

Julieanne's side was not as supportive. Most of her crew were skeptical and worried about her decision. Nobody trusted me, and they pointed out that I hadn't been sober for very long. One of her most honest friends saw this ending very badly: “Julieanne, you cannot have a baby with this person.”

*****

A few weeks ago, the producer from London reached out again. Great news, they said—their Gawker project got the green light. I didn't respond. A few days later, there was a message on my phone from a different producer—an even more British-sounding man who just wanted to tell me more about their project.

I called him back and, once again, politely declined his request. But he wasn’t ready to give up. He said he'd researched my role in the case and insisted that what happened to me was a true injustice. “I'm so, so, sorry this happened to you, man. We will tell your story properly.” Again, I declined.

I told him I'd already participated in too many Gawker-Hogan projects, and they always treated me the same. “I'm either a villain or a victim, but I don't feel like either of those anymore—I'm okay.” I don't think he was capable of believing that. He didn’t want me to be okay. He wanted me angry enough to tell my story to him–for him–so he could share it with the world.

But he said he understood. “I hope you'll tell us your thoughts when our show is done.” 

I told him I'm never, ever going to watch it. 

This is not to say I'm 100 percent okay all the time. I still can get twisted when any public reckoning happens to a media person, especially to people I vaguely know, even if their behavior was atrocious. 

After he was fired from the New Yorker for masturbating on a Zoom call during a staff meeting, I contemplated reaching out to Jeffrey Toobin, who was nice to me once, to see if he'd be interested in attending a secret men's AA meeting with me. 

I know. It's a little insane. I didn't text him, though. I feel an unhealthy urge to rescue those who may feel as desperate and discarded as I once did. Two therapists told me this is common, resting squarely between solid sobriety and PTSD. 

I also can't watch legal dramas anymore. Last Christmas, my mother-in-law and Julieanne were watching “The Landscapers” on HBO, and I got up and rudely left the room during an interrogation scene without any explanation.

And I've also decided this—I will never take anyone to court. Even if I get run over by a city bus, I will never sue. It’s such a wicked and dehumanizing process, especially when it rises to the level of public spectacle. I couldn't do that to another person. 

*****

A couple of weeks ago, I spoke at an in-person AA meeting—a long 20-minute qualification—and weaved my way through the story of my early recovery, including the trial. Sometimes I leave that part out because I know I can get a little performative. (“Along with starting new relationships, moving, or any major life decisions, I’ll also add—don't get sued for millions of dollars by a former professional wrestler in your first year of sobriety, kids!”)

It always kills, though, and I hadn't qualified in a while, so I went with it. I also added the part about Julieanne becoming pregnant. And when I got to the end and shared my cash and prizes—that we were married and now had three kids, a dog, and a wonderful life, a woman in the back of the meeting audibly gasped. She came up to me afterward and explained her reaction. “I didn't expect such a happy ending,” she said. “Most stories in here usually don’t turn out that way.”