Now this is the FCB podcast network. This is Fascist Fast. Hi everyone, it's Victoria Elizabeth here from backstage pass on iHeartRadio. Many of you that listen to this podcast know me as just the host of the show, but as some of you probably also know, I was on cycle nineteen of the reality show America's Next Top Model. So at its peak, you know, America's Next Top Model had hundreds of millions of viewers. It was just truly a cultural phenomenon and it was something that love it or hate it was very a transformative force, if you will, in the industry of modeling and you know, getting plucking girls from relative obscurity and giving them a platform. America's Next Top. Model, even though you know it officially went off air several years ago. There was some legal stuff going on and kind of a switchover with the judges, and that was a whole lot of drama. But there's still such an appetite for America's Next Top Model content. This was made very clear when they did the America's Next Top Model Reality Check documentary, which was to give an inside look at America's Next Top Model as we saw it, but also as we didn't see it. The nefarious acts, the dark underbelly of the show. So I know a lot of people, including myself, were very eager to see some some tea get spilt. For lack of a better term, I had, I had my trepidations. I kind of had my misgivings about this whole thing because you know, Tyra Banks was very involved in the documentary, and you know, there were some very good, award winning journalists. That were a part of it. But I think a lot of people were frustrated, especially a lot of people such as myself that were a part of the show that saw that experienced the show from a totally different perspective. There seemed to be. A lot of dodging of accountability across the board. You know, nobody was well Tyra Banks, I wasn't involved in production. Well, honestly, Tyra, you on. Your Tyra Show, you talked a lot about you edited episodes yourself. You were involved in every single element, from securing sponsorships to selecting wardrobe for the girls too. You know, very hands on, which is quite admirable for a show runner. But then to come and basically dodge the accountability of being involved as a producer, as the executive producer a little bit fishy there. And then also on the flip side, anyone who's on social media, you know, TikTok, Instagram, reels, Facebook, the POV videos of Tyra. Was one comic that made a video about, oh my mama used to beat me with pots and pans, and then I told Tira that and then she made me do a shoot. With pots and pants. So it's sort of, you know, utilizing trauma of these girls that came on the show with these you know, various SOB stories and exploiting those for ratings. That was obviously something that definitely did take place. I have my own experience with all of that, but I also can't help but be a bit frustrated by the fact that Tyra Banks it's becoming somewhat of a trend to drag Tira, to roast Tyra Queen, Tyra Banks, Tyra Banks, the great and powerful Tira that you know. Years ago, when there was a resurgence of popularity with America's Next Top Model in twenty twenty, I believe it was or around this time, Netflix bought out the rights to show America's Next Top Model, and there was just a meteoric surge, at least what I saw online of and from my perspective, it was a lot of us getting attacked as the girls. You know, maybe we were edited a certain way, maybe it wasn't palatable to the viewers, and oh, let's attack these girls. They're not human, right, They're this two dimensional Carrey. They went on a reality show. They were asking for it, right, Like, by being on a reality show, you're asking to be treated as less than human. Believe me, I get it. But now the lynch mob, it's Tyra's turn. It's Tyra's turn. Tyra is the witch in question of the witch hunt, and I just see everybody turning on her and very little of the hate being directed to any of the other producers. There were some judges that weren't exactly innocent, you know, I know, they went through their own things, and I didn't get the pleasure of working with some of those og judges like Nigel Barker, you know, Miss Jay, mister j and hey, they seem great. I've met Miss Jay, and I'm sorry for what they went through. But there were some things. I mean, it's they knew what was going on as well, and you know, there was a level of complicity with everyone in that saw some truly deeply, darkly disturbing things going on, and you know, to be a part of the winning team, you just sometimes you turn a blind eye and you overlook some of these things. So I don't think it's fair that Tyra is getting one hundred percent the brunt of the hate, because again, it was it was a. Hive mind, you know. It was. It was an entire team of producers and directors and things like that kind of working together. There were some very positive things too, you know, and there were some very negative things. So the purpose of this podcast that I'm doing, I'm interviewing myself. I'm gonna ramble a little bit. So bear with me, you know, ride, ride in your car, put on a bubble bath, do do your thing, do whatever, and and buckle up because we're going to dive in from one contestant's perspective of what America's Next. Top Model was really like. So I'm calling this back to reality because sometimes I like to sort of give the representation of America's Next Top Model as a fever blister, cold sore. It just keeps popping back up. No, no, no matter I've had, Believe me, I've had my moments that I'm like, could somebody please just burn this footage? You know, I want to use the name the A and TM stamp as like, I'm going to use that until the day I die as a branding thing. But sometimes it's like, gosh, you know, the resurgence of this just coming back over and over. It can feel like a lot, and it can be trauma, you know, it is. It's a reliving of trauma. Seeing people tag me in videos of me being all upset, and the bullying in the house, and it's a lot. You know, It's things you try to bury and it just keeps getting dredged up. But I'm glad, I really am glad that the documentary happened. I'm glad that we're having these discussions to kind of look at society, to look at shows like this and to see why was there an appetite for the torment of these young girls, the exploitation, and the assumption of that as entertainment. Because obviously there was a reason that the producers felt like it couldn't just be a modeling show, you know, it couldn't just be challenges and runway and the development of someone as a model and focus on more positive aspects, because there's something psychologically in people that negative news gets more ratings. You know, everybody cranes their neck to look at a train wreck, but if there's a beautiful garden of flowers that you're driving by, you know, you're not gonna have a ten car pile up because people are bottlenecking to look at it. Everybody wants to see the train wreck, everybody. So why, you know, That's That's kind of what I want to ask from all of this. Why is there and why certainly was there such an appetite for this more dark, disturbing, exploitive content. Why did those elements of this show have to be put in in order for it to be the top reality show, you know, the top modeling show. Why couldn't it have been more positive? So gonna do is I'm just gonna talk about my experience and sort of interview myself if you will, as all of this happened, taking it back to the very beginning, I'm from a very small town, one traffic light. It's a it's a really agrarian community. It's a lot of farmland. It's you know, if you want to work in the agriculture industry, it's the place to be. But if you're interested in the arts and modeling, which I always was, there's not a lot of opportunity there for that. So there was you know, it's that classic story of girl trying to you know, get out of the town that she was born into and and go and explore and see the world and you know, kind of build a platform and and pursue the career of my dreams. So from the time I was really little, I was you know, making creating fashion shows with my Barbie dolls and putting on Sirius XM in the other room, and you know, my cat walking by and like dodging that and just you know, there's always the stressed outctor Barbie that was coordinating everything. So from from. A very early age, you know, the modeling stuff that was that was a dream, and also working in the business aspect, more in the business aspect of it. So as a baby, I was scouted to do some modeling for Gap and Baby Walmart. Nobody wants a Wednesday Adams frowning baby. So you know, fast. Forward to when I refused to play my little part and do my smiling, giggling thing. My baby modeling. Career took a hiatus, and then when I was about eight or nine, I discovered that my cousin was a Ford model and which was one of the still a top agency, one of the top agencies at the time, and I said, you know how I want to do that. I want to you know, I want to work in this industry. And I, you know, was old enough eight or nine to have a little bit of sentience and and kind of my own grasp but what I wanted to do. So my amazing mom would drive me about two hours each way to Mike Mom classes, and I learned about the runway, about the posing, about facial expressions, and my cousin would sit me down and play episodes of America's Next Top Model, and I just remember thinking I would feel so bad almost after watching the episodes, and even you know that young. I was like, this is just this is depressing. You know, these girls are so upset. You know, they're they're starving, they're uh, you know, they're they feel they're belittling one another, and and it's just it felt so negative as opposed to being inspirational. I felt inspired by my lessons. But I just remember watching the show and thinking I would rather do anything than be on that show. I remember distinctly saying when my cousin said, one day, you know you're gonna be on that show. People are going to gather around their television watching you. And I'm like, Lindsay that was my cousin's name, that that show's for crazy girls. You know it's for crazy girls, which looking back, that's that's a very unfair statement. I do think there are a lot of crazy girls on the sho show as being one of said crazy girls, but I think they're driven to that point. Usually there's it's a little bit of reactive abuse going on when you just finally snap. But you know, I just I even remember then kind of recognizing and realizing the more negative elements of the show. So fast forward, you know, I said, when I was a teenager, I hit a time about seventeen, which was a year before I was the legal age to be able to go and be on America's Next Top Model. I said, if I'm not where I want to be in my career, because you know, when you're when you're a teen in those formative years, that's the time to really be building. If you want to work in fashion and in modeling, it's a time to really be building your portfolio, to be building your base, to be thinking about where you want to go in the industry. So I said, you know, if. I'm not at the point that I want to be at, I am going to audition for this show. Because at the time, you know, I was doing dual enrollment for college. But I wanted I wanted to monetize this. I wanted to make this my career. I wanted to work in the business aspects of it. And I knew with as competitive as everything is, and you know, pretty or whatever you want to call it, girls being kind of a dime a dozen, I needed something. I needed something else. I needed that kind of stamp of approval by somebody that did have some serious clout, like Tyra Banks. So I turned eighteen. I was just barely eighteen, just barely old enough, and I saw an advertisement on television. It was this very cheap, poorly done advertisement that was basically a video of a business card. It was just like somebody whipped out there. It honestly looked like it was made. Do we remember the Blackberries, You know that was all the cool people had the blackberries, but they were the very like kind of primitive versions of the phones. That we all enjoy now. But it looked like somebody took their BlackBerry and just took a video of a business card and they're like, do you want to be on America's Next Top Model with so show up at this apartment complex. At whatever time, I was in Tallahassee, Florida, so uh we you know, my mom drove me there, and a friend of ours had put this like weird Count Dracula voice on our Garmin GPS because at that time, you know, nobody had the we didn't have all the fancy, new fangled technology on the phone, so we were all using the garment like truck or GPS. Is and it was this weird, like. Dracular voice like make a turn here, and it was I should have known that that was probably an omen for just how horrifying the experience was that was was going to come. But anyway, so, so Count Dracula got us to this, uh, to this audition this apartment complex where a sea of girls, I mean just a absolute sea of girls were they're auditioning, and a lot of them were you know, dressed very provocatively in the like booty shorts and the crop tops and the things like that and and spray tnds, and they had all the you know, there were a lot of girls with lip injections and things, and and there I came, you know, I mean, I would say I have a pretty traditional model build with my olive oil looking self, you know, gangly, and I somehow I just kind of assumed it didn't bother me. But I assumed I am not the type of girl that they're going to be picking for this show. You know, They're they're going to go for one of these other types, these girls that kind of look like they spend their weekends at the club. And here I am coming in. I just sort of I wouldn't. Say I counted myself out, but there were so many people. There are just hundreds upon hundreds of people. And anyway, so I waited. I waited in line dutifully, you know, for it was gosh, just hours that we were standing in line waiting for everything. And a producer came out and was talking to some of the girls that were in line, and this I'll never forget what they said that they said, this is not a modeling competition show. This is a personality show. So if you don't have personality, if you are not going to talk, if you think that your looks are enough just to get you through this turn around, pack up and leave. But if you can show us something, if you can show us some personality, that's really what's going to be the make or break thing. Yes, you know, looks are a. Certain It is a modeling show, but it basically is, you know, ninety percent how much you can bring it to the camera of you personally, and then the other ten percent, you know, just bring your modeling a game or you know, if you don't know how, we'll teach you. So I sort of, you know, something kind of clicked when he said that, and I'm like, you know, I can talk. I am very you know, talking is sort of my I've always felt like I've had a bit of a gift for articulating myself. And I have personality, you know it, love it or love it or hate it, take it or leave it. I do have some personality I'm working with here. So I went in the audition room and I talked and I talked and I talked, and you know, once that process was over. I did the runway walk. You know that the talking was the first part of it that it was like, okay, this is really this is important. And the interview process it was very intensive. There were a lot of questions being asked. It was just generally a lot and then the runway walk and the posing and all of that. And by the time I left, you know, I had been there for hours. Hundreds of girls were in line. A guy walked up to me and he said, be sure to think whoever brought you here, like he said from the producers, thank you so much. And so I went out aside. They sent me out a side door. They said they didn't want me walking past all the other people, but they were very very adamant about making sure they had my contact information and that they could, you know, get back in touch with me. And I looked back and there were like maybe ten or fifteen producers just with their noses pressed up against the glass watching me walk off. And my mom was with me. She was like, what is that all about? And I'm like, I don't know's I'm hungry, my stomach scrowling, let's go eat, you know, I I and then I didn't think about it. I did not think about it again after that. I didn't give it much thought until a couple of It was about a month, maybe a month and a half later, I got a call from a three to one zero number, which is Los Angeles, and it was from the CW network, which was the host network at the time for America's Next Top Model, and it was a producer calling and they were interested. They said that, you know, Tyra Banks herself watched my tape was very interested in advancing me to the next round of auditions, and the next round of auditions would be in Houston, Texas, and that was sort of going to be a fateful next round of you know who kind of who gets picked ultimately to go to the house in Beverly Hills and duke it out in that final round before getting selected to move into the house to be on the actual show. So I get very competitive. You know. There were hundreds, hundreds upon hundreds of girls that showed up I think about one hundred and fifty thousand people in total that audition for America's Next Top Model the season that I was on the show, So it was very competitive. You know, your chances measuring up you know, statistically, like you're one and one hundred and fifty thousand, it's not a great chance. You know, you kind of feel like your chance of getting struck by lightning might be a little bit more. But I went, and again I must have said or done something that resonated with the producers because they started called Michelle Mock, who's a really big casting director, was actually there in person. I was shocked to see her in the flesh because she's cast for some really big projects and I did recognize her, so, you know, I didn't allow myself to get intimidated. I just went. I did what I needed to do, and they gave us numbers. So felt a little bit like Stranger Things, you know, one eleven. But we didn't have names, we had numbers. So I remember distinctly I was number forty seven, So they called out my number forty seven, maybe two other numbers, and there were just hundreds of people there, and there were a lot of really upset girls. I mean, this is you know, this is a a big dream for so people were dying to be on this show. I mean literal people were just crazed about this show. So it was it was really competitive it was very dramatic, you know, to kind of be in that atmosphere. But my name got called, or my number number forty seven rather, and I was presented a contract. That contract was probably the longest contract I've ever seen in my life, probably the most disturbing thing I've ever read in my life, and I have read The Handmaid's Tale, so if that doesn't tell you something. But I took the contract back and we had a long ride, you know, from Texas back to wherever we were going, and I just remember kind of pouring through the contract. It still wasn't guaranteed at this point that I would be in the house. Of course, certainly not guaranteed that I would be on the show. There's no real guarantees when you're when you're working in something like this. So if you you know, if you let it be consume all of your thoughts, or if you let it kind of be your be all end all, you're going to be set up for disappointment. So basically, with you know, I was just kind of taking it for what it was, trying to not let it be an all consuming thing. But looking through the contracts, I mean. There were there was quite a bit of disturbing stuff in there, that possible death. Psychological torture, I believe was an actual term used in the contract, psychological manipulation. There was a lot of just psychological stuff. Basically, what you were doing was you were signing your life away, you were signing your rights away. You know, to uh to to talk about the experience, which a lot of girls are doing now. And I've always been trepidacious to talk about the experience because I didn't want to get sued by really powerful people. I also felt like, you know, this was a show that so many people were dying to be a part of. So who wants to hear me wine and belly ache? Right, Oh h my lobster is too buttery, my blankets are too soft, you know, boo hoo. Right. But anyway, so, but back at this point, reading this contract, being this like small town kid where you know everybody, he knows everybody. It's kind of Mayberry Andy Griffith environment. And then you're seeing all of this really disturbing stuff. It's it's a lot to take in and it felt really surreal at this point, I've top models still seems so far away for me. But I thought, well, if I don't sign the contract, I'm. Never going to know. I'm never going to get the opportunity. I you know, I don't want to spend the rest of my life asking what if. So there's all this stuff in there, you know, possible starvation. Basically, whatever they needed to do to manufacture a dramatic show, they were going to do it, even if it meant pushing you to the absolute brink of death. You know, my mom saw the contract and it was it was so long, and it was so complicated, basically completely protecting production and offering no protections whatsoever for contestants. What as a lot of contracts are. They're they're pretty much for the sake of protecting whoever it is that created the contract, and not so wich the person signing it. And you know, if I didn't sign it, tough. Look, there's hundreds of thousands of other girls who would sign a contract like that, probably without even reading it. But my mom said, I'm afraid if you go through with this, I'm afraid if you sign this and it works out, that they are going to send you back to me in a body bag. And I I just remember her distinctly saying that, and I looked at her and I said, that's just a risk that I'm willing to take. You know, I want this to be my career. I have an idea of what I want my future to look like, and I feel like this could be my path. So I signed it. Sent the contract off, got the call eventually that I had been selected to make it to the final round. So this was about thirty something young women that were selected to you know, advance to go to Beverly Hills. They flew you out there. They you know, put you up. In a hotel room and basically you did interviews and you you met with some very important people, rubbed elbow, shook hands, you know, met Tyra Banks Smith, the judges. So I was whisked off there. We stayed in the Beverly Hilton, and I remember already getting to that point. I was completely exhausted. There was a woman named Danielle had She kind of taught like that she was really nasal. And Danielle, if she didn't call me ten times a day, she called me hundred times a day. She called me constantly, question just wearing me down. Really, I was so worn out by the time I got there. They had me send like a hundred videos in you know there. I remember there was one video that I was cheering because it was college edition. I am not a cheerleader, you all. I am my gangly, disjointed, uncoordinated self. I'm not a cheerleader whatsoever. But anyway, they had me doing this cheer. I guess to laugh about it or make me look stupid, and so I did a cheer in this video and send it off, you know, getting to that point of this semi final round, and then they apparently that wasn't good enough. Then I had to redo the cheer with pom poms. It was just always a hoop to jump through, always something, And I remember by the time I got there, I had probably sent one hundred videos in which back at that time it was impossible to digitally send things like you did now. So I would like record them on these little discs. And there was this guy and like Doth in Alabama that I would pay to do it every single time. And I remember finally just telling them I don't want to do this. I'm irritated. I'm gonna we're gonna go. Broke, sending all these hundreds of videos that you guys are requiring. So I already had just kind of I'd had enough, But I was there. I wouldn't say I was desperate at that point to get picked. I know a lot of girls were, but I was feeling really uneasy about everything. You know that Danielle was like my handler. I didn't exactly feel comfortable with anyone. And it got to Beverly Hills Hilton. We each had our own private rooms, and our rooms were guarded. We had actually armed guards to make sure that we didn't leave our rooms that we didn't you know, we had no They confiscated our cell phones. We had to turn those in when we checked in. If we were selected, we went straight into filming and we were told you'd had very little contact with the outside world, you know, no phone, no Internet, no talking to family members unless it was recorded by production and heavily supervised. So I was already, you know, I was missing my mom, I was I was feeling uneasy. They were all these strangers. I was in Los Angeles, I you know, didn't know that. You know what, if I did get picked, would this be a regret? Would this change me forever? You know what, what's gonna happen? But I had an armed guard outside my room, and I would get called to various you know, outings and just different things, and so they I remember one time, at like eleven at night, they called me to meet with the head. It was like the head of CU network. I don't know why the meeting was so late, but I noticed there was a theme of getting whisked off very very late to meet with certain people and to talk with people, and then being awakened at you know, six in the morning to eat mandatory oatmeal. And I'm like, you know, why, okay. Why am why am I just getting a couple hours of sleep? Like what's good? This does not feel normal. But again, these girls were desperate for this opportunity, myself included. I mean, I knew that I was going to go through with this, so things were a little bit weird. I remember distinctly that, you know, we they took us in for a psychological evaluation and we had to take an IQ test. So I do not know why we were taking an IQ test. I don't if your IQ had to be I'm not trying to throw shade, but there were a few people in there. I'm like, now, how did they make it through? If IQ was a prerequisite for this. But anyway, we all took our IQ test and then we were presented the results of our IQ tests and not these personality like Nagram or aptitude tests. And I remember meeting with a psychiatrist and she she told me, you know, she gave me the results of my IQ test, and you know, they were good. She she told me I was smart. Yay, I'm so glad, apparently not smart enough to pack my bags and leave when I when I had the chance. But and I remember her telling me she thought that I was like really paranoid that I was. You know, she was kind of breaking down what my personality type was and telling me, you know, uh, this is the type that that we want you to portray on the show. You know, we basically we were told by psychiatrists and by producers. They all kind of worked together and told us what our personality type was going to be. And at the very beginning, I was actually an empowered woman, right. I was a feminist. I was. That was my personality type. It was all about feminism. I was a she woman, not really a she woman hater. That's probably what they were gonna make me be. But you know, I talked a little bit about women's and girls' rights and things that I'm really passionate about, and they were gonna make that my whole personality. I did have a moment that. A producer, I don't know why she said this, but she said something that made me really emotional about missing my mom. And I missed my mom at home. I was tired, I was hungry. You know, the food would come, but it wouldn't really be like enough food, and I was I was already on edge, I was already sleepy, I was I was worried, I was anxious. I was thousands, you know, so far from home. And the producer said something to me that kind of triggered my missing of my mom, and I just started crying, and she was like something clicked in her and I just sort of broke down. And then she started pushing on that a little more, like, well, if you're you know, what about one day when your mom is dead and you have no one? And I started crying more and she just started she just sort of zoned in. It was it was the mom thing, and it was all about my mom dying or my mom getting sick, or what if my mom is sick right now, and I don't know, and I can't know because I can't call her. And it was just, you know, and I was very very young, and I was very naive and I lacked experience, but she was just saying things to consciously upset me and recording me as I got upset, and I at that point, I think they thought, all right, this girl, you know, she's different. She can talk, you know, she's she's got the model thing going on that we want as well, but she's not a feminist. She's a mama's girl. And she's a mama's girl that misses her mom and cries about her mom. And that's going to be the angle that we take for her this season. And so I think in that moment, I switched my character that I was assigned. You know, you always have the crazy girl, the bully, the party girl, the you know, the slut. I mean, right, we all know the Shondi story that you know, a girl was essentially aped on air. They plied her with alcohol, they starved her, they brought me all models in, and then they created this whole storyline that she was this cheating girl, she was slut chained, very unfairly, and she's forced to relive this over and over. And now in these more progressive times that we're in, you know, people watch the playback and are like. Wait a minute, this isn't fair. But everybody wants you know, it seems like consumers want a one dimensional character, not even two dimensional. And I think producers saw that and they thought, you know, these girls were gonna take them. We're gonna reduce them to this character that we want them to be. They are not allowed to deviate from this character or they will be kicked out. So that's essentially what I was told. This is your character. You will not deviate from this character. You will act as crazy as we tell you to act, you will be as emotional as we can possibly make you be. And if you don't comply, well there's the door, you know, and you can go back to your that's always their thing, right, you can go back to nothing. It's either this show or nothing, And that's the way it's gonna be. So, you know, And and when you're when you're young and and a bit more naive, you're you're gonna believe certain things. And so I truly was convinced if I didn't go through with this, you know, see it to the bitter end. Well, that's just you. Know, I'm not gonna have any modeling opportunities whatsoever. My life will be an abyss of mediocrity and nothingness. So I went through, you know with that, and I kind of dutifully was was playing my role and uh talking about the things that they allowed me to talk about in my interviews and things of that nature. And I remember we were getting close to that point. They made us pack our bags in case, you know, we were sent home. Now keep in mind that some of the girls that were eliminated, they kept in holding areas throughout the entire experience. So we were told. That, you know, we we would be kept in a holding area the entire three months or however long it took, even if we were eliminated. So I remember that was a source of real anxiety for me, you know, being cooped up in a room with an armed guard outside. What if I was eliminated first off, And that's all I could think about about, was what if I, you know, got picked, I got eliminated. I was the very first girl to go home, didn't get to compete and had to just waste my time in a hotel room. That was that to me was like the that was worse than being fed to a grizzly bear. It's all I could obsess about was, Oh my gosh, I'm gonna get eliminated. For I was not cocky, you guys at all. I did not think I was gonna make it past the first couple rounds. You know, I was. I was scared. I was anxious. I remember. One of the moments that really it all became real for me is that my handler, Danielle and a couple of the producers said that they were taking me to go get like just some standard health test done, you know, before the show. And it was just all a very standard thing. Keep in mind, I had already gotten like ten vaccinations, I mean tetanus. I had gotten all the vaccinations that they made us get. I probably made us get a rabies vaccination. It was crazy, the stuff that we had to get. But anyway, I had all I was. I was all vaxed up, you know. So I was taken into this room and it was actually it was not a medical clinic. It was just a random room at the Beverly Hilton. I believe it was is where we were doing all of our pre like psych tests and things of that nature. So I was taken into the room and there was a guy in a lab coat and a few a few producers and this guy he was very ominous looking. He spoke really softly. He kind of looked like that caricature like comic book villain. He had really thick hair, kind of grayish, you know, salt and pepper. And he's standing there and I see like syringes, I see like several needles, and I'm standing there in this room with this man and needles and producers, and I was really scared and I said. No, what is this? And I went, you know what's going on? And they wouldn't tell me. They wouldn't tell me what was going on. I could tell he was prepping, you know, he was putting gloves on, and I was being like basic pushed over to him, and he started to roll up my sleeve and was not telling me what was going on. And I'm like, are you about to inject me with painful? Like what is happening here? And I'm demanding to know what's going on. I'm being sort of man handled and like held in place, and I was told that they needed to draw blood because they needed to run some tests to make sure I was healthy enough to do the show. I knew this was not okay. I knew that this was not something that was expected for them to do because I had already gotten my blood tests, I had already gotten my vaccinations. But they fed me all these lines of you know, we need to check, we need to we need to do. Some blood work. So there I was in the middle of. A hotel, you know, anxious, scared, surrounded by strangers, and they jammed the needle into my arm and drew blood, and they drew another vile of blood and I was already dropping weight at this point. I was I was anxious, I was eating properly, I wasn't sleeping properly. And he drew blood and there was. Another syringe and that was also put into me, and I was injected with something. I don't know what it is to this day. I just remember feeling totally mortified and violated and not being explained what was going on, and I was being told this was all just standard stuff. But also we signed very very meticulous, detailed paperwork that specified we were not to talk about our experience with any of the other girls. They would do something. They called it putting us on ice. This was before all the you know, this is not not the ice, but this is ice. Ice has always apparently had some sort of connotation. But they called it putting us on ice, meaning that we could not talk to one another unless the cameras were out. And again those conversations were very, very manipulated and overseen. So i walk out of this room and and you know, I've had two vials of blood drawn, I've been injected with god knows what. Still to this day, I have no clue. I've never I'll never see those producers again. They're all doing something different, probably trying to bury the guilt if they even have guilt of what. They did do us. But I remember after that feeling different and sort of gaslighting myself into thinking, well, this is normal. You know, I signed up to be here. This is apparently what they do to everyone. But I felt weird, My heart rate felt high, I felt extra paranoid, extra anxious. By the time I got selected, you know, Tyra Banks and the judges, we had this pool party. It was Nicholas Cage's old mansion. This very like haunted looking. It was probably haunted with that. If walls could talk, there's no telling what that house has seen. It saw enough during cycle nineteen of America's Next Top Model, but they called us into the house. It was later edited to look like I was the last one called out and the camera kept panning to me like crying. I was crying. As a matter of fact, I was crying. I was crying because I was scared and I wanted to leave. I did not want to do the show. At that point. I was like, I've seen enough. This is It's already been so bad leading to this point, it's gonna be even worse. But I was standing there and I, you know, I was crying, and Tyra Banks, actually I was one of the first ones that was called out to be in the house, you know, so I had already done my panel process. I already done my thing in front of the judges. But they edited it to make it look like I was the last one called out and that I was crying because I was so desperate to get picked. But that's not how it happened. Of course, we all know reality reality shows are are definitely augmented. It's definitely a sort of sort of a over edited version of reality that they want to present to us. So I got in the house and I remember the casting director was there, and I pulled her aside and I said, I don't want to do this. I don't want to do this. Is it too late to go home? And she's, you know, she said. You can go home. You can go home at any point, but just stick this out. We really want you on the show. Tyra personally has vouched for you being here. You've been through all this, just stick it out a little bit longer. And you know me, I'm quite the opportunist, so I'm I was like, oh, I guess you know. I can't lose sight of the opportunity. But I kept obsessing about getting eliminated. I didn't want to go to a room. I didn't want to sit there with an armed guard, you know, guarding my room. And I was really anxious about this. And she said, we'll work out something with you too, and we'll make it where you don't have to do that. If you do get eliminated, you can go home. And I was wanting to get that in writing. I wanted to get a contract. I kept pestering anyone who would listen about that. But Michelle sort of disappeared, and there we were in the house. We were ready to begin our America's Next Top Model experience. Now stay tuned because a lot of you have asked me eliminations, you know, how how was that? How? Let me let me just say there was a lot of backroom stuff, a lot of producers that manipulated things. Tyra, we did see some of Tyra. For me and my experience, Tyra was a figurehead. The producers were the masterminds. And that was my personal experience with America's Next Top Model. Back Room injections, rigged eliminations, uh, systematic starvation of contestants, at least this contestant. So much went on behind America's Next Top Model that you didn't see on television. We're going to dive further into this on the next episode episode of Back to Reality. Thank you all so much for listening in. Thank you for your continued interest in America's Next Top Model. Because again, good or bad, hate it or love it, it was a defining show of an era, and uh it is. It's it's iconic with all of its flaws and all of its darknesses and uh, and we're finally getting to the point that we're actually talking about, Hey. Was that normal? Was that really normal? What they did to these girls, what they televised for everyone's entertainment. It was not normal. And we're gonna dive a little bit more, at least into my perspective from the show. Thank you all so much again for listening, and we will catch you next time on Back to Reality, our limited series for Backstage Pass. See you then,
