The Tsunami of Journalism

This week, I was invited to participate in a CBS special tribute to Rob Reiner. I was honored to be involved, and canceled my schedule to be available in Los Angeles. Then I was canceled last minute—twice—on, then off, on, then off … all the while spinning with grief like the rest of the world as the details of Rob and Michele’s deaths were being reported.

After that, I was passed over to CBS Mornings, where I took time to complete an interview and provided the B-roll photos and footage they requested at 10:30pm (five hours before airtime), only to be canceled yet again—this time just two hours before the segment was scheduled to air.

I was told that my interview was being repurposed for social media, but that never happened either.

I have my own beliefs about why this happened, and I do think it may relate to my copyright infringement lawsuit against Lauren Sanchez since I already have proof of a smear campaign against me from Lauren’s PR team to editors and press. But what struck me most was the irony: the person—or people—behind this flip-flopping were behaving in a way that is the exact opposite of who Rob Reiner was, the man they are honoring. He would never placate to narcissistic billionaires, misrepresent the truth, or misuse his personal favors to silence someone looking for justice.

Rob never treated me as “just a yoga instructor,” because he didn’t treat anyone as lesser than anyone else. He answered my emails. He genuinely wanted my perspective—whether that was my opinions about 9/11 or how stress affects our bodies. And he consistently showed appreciation for the work I did with his family. Whoever decided to axe me could learn a thing or two about Rob Reiner and why he was so respected.

Life moves in cycles and waves, in general—but this is one tsunami I’ve experienced enough times to recognize clearly: being pulled into national, even global, news stories at mock speed. So I’m using this moment to shed light on the high-profile situations I’ve repeatedly found myself caught up in, and how being misrepresented to the public affects our lives.

The fact that I keep ending up on the periphery of high-profile incidents isn’t meaningless—it means something. And no, I’m not seeking it out. What I have sought is to clarify the truth after it’s been distorted—whether through sloppy reporting, sensational framing, or what I believe have been smear campaigns by people I dared to expose.

I believe in synchronicity and the Law of Attraction—and I believe there’s something far more powerful at work in being involved—far more than snickering commentaries or jealous wannabes can recognize.

This is the strange position I’ve occupied as a private yoga instructor to celebrities: close enough to witness the human reality behind public narratives, yet outside the protected inner circle that tries to control the story. To be frank, a private yoga teacher often shares more intimate moments with celebrities than their co-stars or glitzy friends ever do. That proximity doesn’t make me “famous,” and it doesn’t make me opportunistic—it makes me someone with real relationships, real history, and real consequences when headlines hit.

I wasn’t anyone’s therapist, but I became a trusted friend who would listen and offer advice, always there to help make their lives a little better. That is, until I realized I was just a pawn in the game of Hollywood narcissism, a truth I explore in my book Knock It Off!: Imitation Isn’t Flattering. That’s when I decided to walk away from 80% of my clientele. Since then, I’ve been processing and healing from those experiences. Ironically, and many years later, several of those stories have made headline news.

Trust me—if I wanted attention, I could have chased it in far grander ways, and I would have easily achieved that. The irony is that, as a yogi, I’ve intentionally made choices in my life that steer away from that kind of spotlight, and I only started posting on my personal social media pages yesterday (a meager ten years late).

Let me be clear: this is not what I wanted for my life—being attached to scandals or tragedies—and it’s not how I ever wanted my reputation to be perceived. But when you’ve spent years working privately with some of the most well-known figures in the world, you don’t have “casual” connections—you have intimate, human relationships. Like any relationships, they can get deep and/or messy. You see people behind the brand, behind the PR, behind the polished persona.

So when Keyboard Critics sneer that I’m “inserting myself” into the news, they’re missing the key point: I wasn’t rubbernecking from the sidelines, and I wasn’t trying to promote myself—I was there, and I was asked to be there. My voice is as relevant as everyone else’s, especially because my experience is real. And yes, it can be convenient for celebrities—and for celebrity-worshipping media—to discredit someone like me precisely because I’m not one of them. My involvement risks devaluing their prized, over-hyped, and desired by way of elusively lives. But that doesn’t erase my proximity, my truth, or my right to be heard.

How the Tsunami Rolls

There’s a moment after a tragedy or scandal—before facts settle, before loved ones can even breathe—when the media machine flips on.

Ping. Ping. Ping.

Grief becomes “coverage.” Loss becomes “content.” Gossip is paramount. And anyone even remotely connected to the story—witnesses, friends, former colleagues, trauma-adjacent people—gets treated less like a human being with overwhelming feelings, and more like a clickable resource and competition to other media channels.

They all want the first hit, the exclusive, the juicy, scandalous details!

“Cold-Turkey” Reporting

A reporter texts you out of nowhere with an intense, manufactured urgency—often sliding into a faux-friendly tone, like they’re your friend.

“Can you comment?”

“Call me ASAP.”

“Any details?”

“Why did Nick kill his parents?”

“Were they fighting?”

”What were their relationships like?”

“Do you have photos?”

This is cold-turkey journalism: ambushing people closest to tragedy—often while they’re in shock—because speed and clicks matter more than humanity.

And of course, you want to share your story if it helps readers understand the reality of the situation, so it’s a double edged sword. However your version is rarely going to be the media’s version. Or they’ll slip a single salacious word into the headline—one that skews the meaning and warps the truth of the entire article.

And once you respond to one outlet, the rest of the hive swarms in.

The First Lesson: The Adam Levine Whirlwind

Years ago, after working for Adam Levine for many years, we had a very unpleasant fallout that is fairly public (and I have written about) so there’s no need for back story or details here. Later, when a public scandal exploded about Adam texting several women while his wife was pregnant, and I saw other women speaking up about his character, I shared my own experience online, using the hashtag associated with the story. When you’ve seen someone’s true nature up close—while they maintain a polished (and very different) public persona—it can feel like a burst of sunlight when the truth finally starts to break through. So, after my post, I put my phone on silent and went to teach a yoga class.

However, when I walked out of that yoga class, merely an hour later, I was shockingly front page news on the Daily Mail.

Front page. “The Third Woman!” The headlines blasted. OMG…

My words were twisted. My phone blew up. Reporters chased an “exclusive,” not clarity. Inside Edition pushed for an interview, and I said yes—thinking I could control my narrative.

I have regretted that decision for years.

Instead of honoring my story, they arranged to have paparazzi waiting outside, and positioned the idea of “taking a walk outside for B roll footage,” which was merely pimping me out to nasty paparazzi photos while I was in my most uncomfortable state.

Once the media decides you’re useful, your nuance and feelings become inconvenient. Your boundaries can be moved if needed. And your story becomes raw material. And when they’re done, they’re on to the next. Wham Bam!

The Second Lesson: My Lawsuit with Lauren Sanchez

My copyright infringement lawsuit against Lauren became my next lesson.

I am currently in a legitimate, meritorious legal dispute involving Lauren Sanchez, and part of what I’ve alleged—based on my documented experience aside from the copyright infringement of my children’s book—is that there have been behind the scenes efforts to smear my name to the press and media.

When Lauren’s children’s book was published and I read it for the first time, I was incensed. It clearly tracked what I recognized as essentially my exact story, with a few changes. I didn’t have time to shop for legal representation. I started preparing a legal complaint myself because I felt I had to stand up to her immediately. She was trying to get away with stealing my thunder and tossing me to the curb.

I had told only three people that I was filing this lawsuit.

Unfortunately, one of them leaked it to TMZ. I wasn’t ready for the press at all, I wasn’t prepared yet. I hadn’t even served her yet! And because of that, I lost my position to tell the facts of the story. Her PR team swooped in to discredit me and influence the press against me.

To this day, I can’t say with certainty how the leak happened—but it felt like betrayal, because my circle was so small. And once the lawsuit filed, paparazzi were outside my house within hours and I was once again front page news. Reporters were hyenas feeding on a carcuss.

Each time this tsunami of media frenzy comes pummeling in, I’ve learned—and always the hard way—how to brace for it, and hopefully I am learning how to surf the waves instead of getting swallowed by them.

This experience was clarifying in the worst way: even your attempt to seek legal remedy can be turned into a spectacle. Even before you’ve been heard in a courtroom, the media can shape who you are to the public—by implication, by framing, by headline. And people with wealth and power will often do everything possible to keep their dirty secrets from seeing the light.

So worse yet, now imagine that the person you’re suing is a billionaire who can pay to have you silenced. Who can hire a PR team to smear your name to press and editors so that they don’t listen to you, all the while watching them continue to misappropriate your work.

And now, recently, came my more recent experience with CBS, which only amplified this sense of being silenced.

So could it be coincidence that this person’s close friend was the CBS interviewer or host? Sure. But, could it be suspicious? Absolutely. Is this energy anything that Rob Reiner would be involved in? No fucking way.

When you’ve already lived through your words being twisted, your character being framed, paparazzi invading your sense of privacy, and powerful people pissing on your pure-hearted reputation—and when you’re already dealing with a situation where you believe public narratives are being manipulated—patterns don’t feel like “nothing.”

They feel like warning bells.

And then you find the proof. The editors and producers bold enough to speak the truth and sign sworn declarations for you, proving that your name was intentionally slandered as a means to silence your voice. These people are gold in human form.

The Third and (Hopefully) Final Lesson: When Tragedy Turned Into a Feeding Frenzy

More recently, after I saw that there were “bodies found at Rob Reiner’s home,” and before knowing more details, I shared something personal on my social media accounts and, in my view, it was completely valid: my first children’s book was inspired by Nicky Reiner, the son of Rob and Michele Reiner, who I taught yoga to over twenty years ago.

I shared my post and backstory with one reporter who I trust and admire for his ethics to uncover the facts: Josh Boswell at the Daily Mail. He responded immediately that he was interested in an exclusive and we spoke that night.

After that piece was published, however, my phone didn’t stop pinging for three days from reporters from every major news outlet looking for a story.

I wrote the following on Facebook, and it captures exactly what this felt like:

“The majority of media is ruthless and a bit unethical, and I hope I learned for good this time. I posted a valid story on social media about my first children’s book that was inspired by Nicky Reiner, which is current news as he is publicly accused in the atrocious deaths of his parents. Anyone else in my shoes would post the same.

I was very clear that I would only discuss my book, working with Nicky and how extraordinary Rob and Michele were. Period. Yet, they find a way to twist everything to make it salacious or scandalous (except for the Daily Mail, FOX, and People).

I am in no way promoting / selling a children’s book that was my first and not my greatest! I was sharing my history around writing it. It may even have a typo in it because I wrote it 22 years ago 😵‍💫 so any snide comments from the Keyboard Critics that I am just looking for attention to promote a book is grossly false.

What happened to journalism?!”

That wasn’t PR or self-promotion. That was sharing my personal story.

It’s easy to understand why public figures have agents and managers to control the narratives and organize the perceptions of these situations while carefully calculating the most beneficial public responses.

And not because every reporter is cruel or looking to exploit, there are many impeccable reporters! … however because the system rewards fast news at all costs, this kind of ferocious tsunami is often a by-product of the frenzied race for a story.

Now, after a week of overwhelming grief, dealing with invasive reporters, seeing my story misrepresented in the media, feeling incredibly sensitive about Romy and Jake (Rob and Michele’s other children), I also feel deep regret for not being part of the CBS Tribute, especially after being initially asked to participate. On top of that, I’ve been struck by both awe and anxiety that my children’s book turned out to be somewhat prophetic, and naturally, I’ve wanted to share that with my social circles. All of this, combined with the whirlwind of my schedule being completely upended, has left me feeling completely and utterly drained.

I used to think Hollywood and the music industries were the most exploitative, but tabloid journalism may be even worse in how quickly it uses people and then discards them.

Then the thought that anyone might care only pulls me back into this tragedy, deepening the sadness. No one cared about the world as much as Rob Reiner did, leaving us all to be more vulnerable.

Maybe Nick felt the brunt of this, too, peripherally, and combined with his addictive personality, early childhood experiences, big shoes to follow, as well as the other obvious factors that led to his destructive and tormented character.

The Alpha is Gone

I also shared in one of my posts that, as someone who has lived through plenty of injustice—and who’s watched how easily the world can be manipulated while so many people look away—the loss of Rob Reiner feels enormous. He was a rare kind of Alpha Protector: unafraid to stand up for the underdogs, unafraid to challenge power, and willing to initiate real change. And in his absence, I honestly feel more vulnerable.

Rob could see the Titanic heading straight for the iceberg while so many other people in positions of power continued dancing in the ballroom. He was one of the rare people with real influence who genuinely cared about others—not just himself—and he didn’t “support causes” to look philanthropic or likable. He took action because it was the right thing to do, often quietly and anonymously, precisely because it was never about praise or image.

And he had the greatest manager of all: his thoughtful wife, Michele.

So it’s on us to stand up for truth and stand up for humanity—not only because that’s what Rob Reiner did, but because that’s what being human is supposed to mean.