Everything about this event was made to hit one person square in the heart and that would be Sean Astin. Between the indirect reference to his daughter, his character but also children's charities, these are all things he is very passionate about. So Victoria took her shot. In person. On September 11 2002. At a 9/11 memorial service. And Sean Astin agreed to help

The group had decided that the library they wanted to build this garden at would be in Oregon, where Abbey lived with her husband. Victoria lived in Virginia and the two had travelled back and forth to see each other and Victoria had decided she wanted to live in Oregon so she moved in with Abbey and her husband as their roommate in October 2002

This doesn't last long though as Abbey would find out that the house was being foreclosed on because her husband had decided to just not pay the bills. Her husband moves out and three other members of the Bit of Earth forums move in, they would begin to refer to the house as Bag-end and themselves as the Bag-Enders

The actual event for Project Elanor would be happening in Apr 2003 so they had 6 months to prepare. They had picked out a library in Portland called Rockwood where they would be building the garden and planning had kicked off with many forum members volunteering their time and effort.

But tragedy struck in Nov 3 2002, Victoria would announce that she's withdrawing from all fandom for good, leaving Bit of Earth in Abbey's care. No one could reach Victoria, but Abbey insisted the show must go on and plans for the garden continued in earnest. Around this time a new member named Jordan had joined the group and quickly stepped up to fill in the gap left in Victoria's absence.

Jordan Enters the Chat

On November 30th Jordan would put out his first post as Bit Of Earth's Public Relations Director. Jordan announced Bit of Earth's first event which would be line party at Regal Cinema in Portland in celebration of the release of the Two Towers. Line parties often occur when people know that they are going to be stuck in lines for a long time to keep things interesting and these things were definitely more common in the early 2000s when if you wanted to get in to see a big movie on opening night you couldn't reserve tickets online, you had to go stand outside the theater to get in.

I grew up in a tiny ass town and even we had a line to get in to go see Star Wars Episode II it was only for an hour but still. In bigger cities like Portland you could be stuck in lines for days to buy tickets.

By all accounts the line party was a success "There are games with prizes, a costume contest, a raffle with proceeds going to Reading Is Fundamental (RIF), karaoke, a viewing of the animated The Hobbit and LotR movies, and more"

Leaving everyone all the more amped up for the upcoming Project Elanor. By February 15 2003 Sean Astin would officially be confirmed as attending Project Elanor. There would even be screening the night before the event of the Two Towers which Astin would be hosting

Outwardly things seem to be going smoothly but suddenly on Mar 12th, two weeks before the event is supposed to happen, Abbey announces that the garden won't be happening at Rockwood Library but instead at the Riggs Institute Learning and Literacy Center in Beaverton, OR.

Internally things were a mess. Suddenly all their plans had to be adapted for an entirely different location, and even before that the team was hitting various road bumps. Around this time a woman named Jeanine would get involved

At the 11th hour Jordan called Jeanine and told her that the woman that had been in charge of acquiring the lumber had just quit. Jordan said that the woman had been negotiating with a lumbermill to get the wood, but then just stopped taking their calls and they got pretty mad and now want nothing to do with them and Jordan begged for her help

Jeanine had experience working as a volunteer in the past and had dealt with flakey volunteers so none of this particularly sounded suspicious to her so she agreed to do it. She had to find lumber for a 30x30 deck, how hard could that be? Jeanine began to ask around to find out that what she was looking for was around $3000 worth of wood for immediate delivery. She spent 3 days calling every person she could think of to see if someone could donate the wood and finally found a company, who while they couldn't just donate the wood outright, sold it at cost of $1800 and agreed to accept payment in 3 weeks after the project's donations were tallied

Jordan was thrilled with Jeanine's miraculous success and lavished her with praise, making her feel very valued and like an important part of the team

They were ready as they were going to get for a bunch of kids who had never ran something like this. The night before, the screening of the two towers went without a hitch, Astin giving a speech and answering questions from an audience of 600 people. Abbey also gave a speech and said that they had raised $3000 and that all proceeds would go to the organization "Reading is Fundamental"

Project Elanor

The next day volunteers and Sean Astin went to work landscaping the chosen site

The crew worked their butts off but they still had to return the next day to finish it, unfortunately Jordan had injured his finger and was unable to participate in work the next day. But they did it, and the garden ended up looking quite nice!

That summer the bagenders were faced with the reality of living in a house going into foreclosure as they now had until the end of July to GTFO, so they reached out the Bit of Earth community for help.

Musicfest and Filmfest

Jeanine felt sorry for them, she had had friends that got screwed over by vengeful exes in the past so she began to ask around with friends but none of them wanted to take on 4 smokers rent free for 2 months. The bag-enders would end up finding a small, cheap unit in a rough neighbourhood and Jeanine put down the deposit and paid the first two months rent for them as well as some utility hook-ups totaling $1635

Jeanine began to get closer to the group and in particular, Jordan, she also began to grow a little suspicious of him. He told her that Elijah Wood was his cousin and that he had descended from an IRA crime family that were looking for him because he chose not to get involved in the family business, but knew too much. Jeanine asked the obvious question of "well if Elijah is your cousin wouldn't they be hunting him too?". It was well known that Elijah Wood didn't have a good relationship with his dad and Jordan said that this is why

Bit of Earth would go on to attempt to put on a handful of other events none to the same level of success. The next event had been planned to be music festival was called the Hall of Fire and was set to take place from Jul 25-26th. One of bag-enders (re: roommates) had connections in the music industry and was able to arrange for some bands to come and perform and even was able to borrow some sound equipment for the event. Jordan was dreaming much bigger for this event and had announced intentions to get Elijah Wood, the actor for the main character of the Lord of the Rings to MC the event, though this didn't pan out

The first day of the festival as they were setting up a park ranger would arrive saying that there was no permit for a festival in the park that day. Jordan was baffled as he had given the task of getting a permit to someone that went by Miss-Tree and he was furious that she had failed them.

The ranger said the event could still happen the next day if they managed to secure a permit in time, which by some miracle they did. Unfortunately because of the chaos of the first day, many of the bands that were supposed to play chose not to show up. While Jordan couldn't get Elijah, he had managed to convince Sean Astin to call in and answer some questions for folks. Abbey took that call on stage prepared to do the interview when Astin said 

"I am actually calling today for someone else. Someone there loves you very much. He's a little shy so he wanted me to ask you this question, you don't have to say yes if you don't want to, but Jordan wants to know if you will marry him"

Abbey said yes. It seemed for some time that Jordan and Abbey had been dating, and while the festival didn't really go well, they had that to celebrate. Though a few days later Abbey would come to the Bit of Earth message board saying that they owed around $2500 for costs associated with the event and the permits they acquired and that the bag-enders simply didn't have the money to afford it. They managed to raise the money through old school word of mouth crowdfunding, friends and family, and promised that they would be more financially responsible in the future

The next event would be the Lost Palantir Filmfest on September 20th. Jordan had spread rumors that Billy Boyd, the actor for Pippin would be attending, but had to drop out, at which point Sean Astin, Dominic Monagan and Viggo Mortinensen would be attending instead as they were filming a documentary about celebrities and charities, but with the release of Return of the King suddenly they no longer had room in their schedules, so like Elijah and the music festival, none of the stars made it to the event. But Astin was kind enough to send a heartfelt video to kick things off

By this point the rent that Jeanine had paid for the bagenders was running out so the group decided to instead move to LA. The bagenders spent their last night in Oregon sleeping on Jeanine's floor and the next day she watched them leave, somewhat melancholic thinking of how she would miss those kids

Jordan's Real Identity/LA

Not long after, some time in mid October that year Jeanine would be contacted by a Detective Myers who was looking for information on a missing person by the name of Victoria Bitter, the original founder of the Bit of Earth site. Apparently Victoria's parents had received a really strange suicide note and desperately were trying to find out what happened to their child. The detective had reason to believe that Victoria Bitter was now living as Jordan Wood.

Jeanine was shocked by this, but after the detective left, she called Jordan to get his side of the story. Jordan explained that he had a vindictive ex girlfriend that had been spreading this rumour that he was the same person as Victoria Bitter. He swore Victoria had just been a former girlfriend of Abbey's that she kind of looked like him. Jordan tells Jeanine that this ex was so vengeful that she had once hacked Bit Of Earth's site to redirect it to a journal entry she made where she had all these photoshopped images of Jordan's head on the body of a girl to prove that he was secretly Victoria

Jeanine hadn't been around when Victoria Bitter was running things, she only ever knew Jordan and Jordan and was adamant that he was male, but Jeanine couldn't shake the fact that Jordan and Victoria looked awfully fucking similar.

Jeanine was perplexed, Jordan was her friend, he had many friends and did all these events and charity and openly gave out his address and all that so certainly didn't seem like someone in hiding

The story that Jeanine knew about Jordan, was that Victoria had been with Abbey first and when Jordan showed up Victoria became jealous of him as he seemed to get everything she ever wanted. Victoria's jealously only deepened to the point that she began to take on his identity and dress like a man but she made a mess of everything so she receded into the shadows letting people believe that she was dead

Jeanine decided that the easiest way to for Jordan to prove he was not Victoria, was to obviously, take off his pants. Which unsurprisingly, Jordan refused and reminded Jeanine that under no circumstances could he be taken into police custody, or else the IRA would find out and come for him

According to Jordan if the officials ever got their hands on him that would be it. But Jordan also owed her $1400 so to Jeanine that choice was either Jordan's death, or the loss of her money. With no clear course of action Jeanine sat on it, uncertain what to do and what to believe

Jordan determined that the simplest way clear up this whole mess was to email Victoria's parents and explain the situation, so he had Abbey, under the name of Bit of Earth, write the letter

This letter told Victoria's parents that the a now ex staff member, their head of security, Bob had been attempting to blackmail Bit of Earth, among this staff member's many threats was to reach out the Victoria's parents and tell them that their missing daughter, was actually their director of Celebrity Relations, Jordan Wood. The letter would say that this was untrue and would put Jordan in danger as he was escaping an extremely dangerous and abusive home situation and having him be exposed to the police early (as he's preparing a testimony against his family) would put him at great risk.

Jeanine didn't like that she had been marked down as a character reference without her approval, but what's done is done. This letter of course didn't give Victoria's parents any peace of mind and soon Sean Astin would be make a public statement about his involvement with Bit of Earth

"I was approached on Sept 11 2002 to ask me if I wanted to be a part of this thing. I was a little nervous about the level of intensity in their fandom, but I recognized in them a kind of leadership capacity. I wanted to support and nurture in a small limited way because there was a lot of emotional dysfunction in their group I didn't want to deny the energy that was being directed toward me. I wanted to help shape their imaginations for a moment and hopefully inspire them to use that passion in service " - Strange Aeons

By the end of October, Jordan would confess to Detective Myers, that yes, he really was Victoria Bitter

Jeanine was pissed after all the guilt and stress that Jordan had put on her for not believing him and all the things he'd asked of her in the name of protecting his very real identity he just came out and admitted her was lying? She was even more pissed when the detective told her that there would be no legal action against Jordan for what he'd done.

It turned out that Jordan had tried to change his name, by going into a social security office in Portland claiming that he had been born on a pagan commune that didn't believe in registering with the government so he had no official documentation, but he did have these handy hand written notes to prove who he said he was. They rejected him, but did allow him to add "Jordan Wood" to his legal name as middle names

So, Yes he had attempted to change his identity in a dubious manner, but the DA wasn't going to waste the time extraditing him from California, he had no criminal record and was involved in charity work, he just wasn't worth pursuing

Jeanine urged Jordan to make a public statement about this as she and others felt that the people deserved to know. Jordan sure wrote a statement. Jordan double downed, saying that he had confessed to Myers rather than get involved with the legal system and get tracked down by the IRA

Tentmoot

This was all happening as Bit of Earth was ramping up for their biggest event ever "Tentmoot" named after the meeting of the ents in LOTR "entmoot". It was a convention projected to have an attendance of 4000-10000 people at the Portland Convention Center for five days in December making it the largest Tolkien con to date.

But you don't plan a multi-thousand person con for free even if you're doing it for charity, booking convention centers is not free. Neither was flying out guests from New Zealand, but Jeanine didn't want to be involved so she let the bit of earthers figure it out until one day, two weeks before the event Jordan comes crying to her

He explains that they had made arrangements with Air New Zealand months ago, the airline having this program where every month they give away 20 tickets to charity, they first give them to people who need to fly for organ transplants and if there any left over they pass those out first come first serve. They had 14 left for December so they had given them to Bit of Earth, but after Return of the King premiered interest in travelling to New Zealand skyrocketed, so someone high up had decided they weren't going to give out free tickets anymore

Jordan says he had called them to make the final arrangements and suddenly these tickets they were promised were being taken away.

Jeanine overwhelmed with a sense of outrage that the airline would do such a thing took the task on. She needed to get 5 tickets, Jordan had only been able to wrangle in some lesser known stunt doubles and extras into coming to the convention, only the most hardcore of LotR film fans would have any idea who they were. But the airline had promised, according to Jordan

Jeanine called a friend who was a travel agent who said they could get the tickets for $18,000. The agent agreed to accept payment across multiple credit cards which meant the other bit of earther's could pool their resources, but there was still $15,000 outstanding

The travel agent told Jeanine they needed to make that decisions now or the tickets wouldn't be available for much longer, as by this time it was already dec 10 in New Zealand so the actors would need to get on the plane that day. Jeanine bit the bullet, then sent an email out to the staff informing them the international flights had been taken care of but here was still the matter of getting the actors from LA to Portland

Jeanine made sure that Jordan knew that she was not happy about the situation, but she was in fixer mode. She demanded the rest of the credit cards/billing addresses etc ASAP so she could book the domestic travel.

Somehow they wrangled enough cards for everything to be booked. Jeanine had done her part.

By this point another member of the team was getting quite suspicious of all the con's last minute crisises so she called air new zealand to check out Jordan's story. She would call Jeanine not long after to tell her that Air New Zealand hadn't heard of the con or the charity or anything (they even had someone specifically on their team to handle all LOTR related flights and they hadn't heard of it either). They also confirmed that they had no such program to give away tickets to charity and never had

That was it. Jeanine was livid, but willing to give Jordan one last chance to explain himself she called him and demanded he tell the truth and if he was going stick to his story he needed to produce receipts and she was giving him 30 minutes after which she expected him to call her back.

He didn't call back, so Jeanine did at which point one of the roommates known as Little Sam answered and told Jeanine that Jordan was locked in the bathroom throwing up

There were 2 hours before the actors would get on their flights, so Jeanine called the travel agent, telling them to cancel the tickets and that she had been conned. But she had no way of reaching the actors as Jordan had always kept that information to himself

Not long after though Jeanine received a call from Abbey telling her that Jordan had attempted to take his life and was now under 48 hour watch at the hospital. That was it, Tentmoot as canceled, the bag-enders began calling all the volunteers and bands to tell them that event was cancelled

Unfortunately four of the actors went to the airport, and air new Zealand somehow let 3/4 fly despite their reservations being canceled, and were now on their way to LA having no clue the event had been canceled. This was apparently due to the type of tickets that Jeanine had purchased, where they were like vouchers, which also meant that Jeanine did get charged for them

When Abbey got word the actors were at LAX she did the only thing she could think of, pick them up and take them out for dinner and offered them her floor to crash on until their flights next day as they couldn't afford to put them up in a hotel. Jeanine had begged them not to use the voucher tickets in her name, but they needed to get home and it wasn't their fault that the organization for everything had been such a mess, so they did

The bag-end household would fall apart quickly thereafter and soon Abbey and Jordan were the only ones left, desperately trying to make ends meet by being character actors on Hollywood boulevard, not even able to afford internet at home so they spent a lot of time at internet cafes.

Much of that time was spent reading, with horror, Jeanine's blog.

Jeanine had gone feral. She had never felt so used and she became determined to tear everything down to the studs to find every lie, every skeleton, every time they had made a turn without signaling. She was determined to burn everything Jordan had ever done to the ground

Sometime in 2004 Jeanine hunted down Abbey and Jordan while they were working on Hollywood Blvd to screaming at them while she waved a book in their faces. A book she had written. About them

While Jeanine's story does shine light on a bunch of the things that happened, often supported by quotes or actual documentation. There was also a lot of unnecessary things, inaccurate things based off rumors and salacious things. She also threw people under the bus, and was unnecessarily vicious and cruel.

The realty is, is that Jordan, who now goes by Andy, is a trans man. But to Jeanine him changing his gender identity was all a part of his elaborate grift, and for a long time she used his dead name and she/her pronouns to describe him in all her retellings, before eventually switching to gender neutral terms and writing his name with quotes.

Note that I used the name Victoria Bitter when talking about Andy pre-transition, Victoria Bitter was a handle that Andy had used at that time and not his real name. Andy is a douche bag but that doesn't mean he doesn't deserve to have his identity respected

Even if we give Jeanine's book a pass because it is warning about someone who is dangerous, the way she covered the story didn't just harm Andy. It harmed his victims, most particularly Abbey

In 2014 someone asked Abbey what she thought of Jeanine's book

Jeanine and I made peace, and I do forgive her for her actions. That doesn't mean I condone them.

She spread a lot of vicious lies. She created Andy's "transwank" defense, which is used to this day to derail. She put out false, exaggerated and melodramatic versions of real events, which muddied the waters.

And beyond that, she did it with both Andy's and my real names. I accepted long ago that my name would forever be tied to all of this - it is the reason that I started blogging. [Jeanine's] actions were only a threat to me leading a reasonably normal life if they were accepted as fact and hidden or ignored. It's only a dark secret when it's a secret. Furthermore, as I still plan on becoming a published author, I wanted the chance to tell my side of the story and, I hoped, clear my name.

This is also why I resolutely defend Andy's former victims' right to stay as anonymous as possible. I did not have a choice in having my name and the chronicle of my past out in the open. They do.

Furthermore, it is why I keep writing now - because Andy continues to rewrite his history - a history I am unfortunately and publicly a substantial part of. - Abbey

When speaking about how the book impacted her, she said

"between that and the online stalking, I've been terribly intimidated. I think I would have gotten out of that fucked up situation a lot sooner if she hadn't been so vengeful. At first, I stood by [Andy] we were both falsely accused. I later realized both that he had been lying when he said he was innocent, and that I was lying to myself about how much I was guilty of. Later, it didn't seem like I ever could leave, and even if I did the persecution would never stop" - Abbey

Abusers like Andy use an "us vs them" narrative to isolate their targets and make them feel like the world is a place that doesn't want them and that only they truly love and know them. When this narrative is reinforced by outsiders, like Jeanine in this case, it makes it all the harder for victims to imagine an alternative

By now I am sure that you have gathered that the version of events that I have presented here isn't the whole story. This is just what the story appeared to be from the outside. And I am sure you're wondering what was even true and what wasn't. Seven years after Jeanine published her book, Abbey would come forward and begin to tell her side of the tale and what had really happened from the inside

Note I will be referring to Victoria/Jordan as Andy going forward as that is current legal name and public identity

Abbey's Story

In 2001 Abbey was in a loveless marriage completely stuck in a rut and suffering from undiagnosed depression

Deep down, I knew before the wedding that it wasn't going to last, but I also decided, at twenty-two, that this was the best I could do. Once we lost the distraction of college classes it evolved into just playing house. But that playacting in place of a real relationship let my depression flourish. The only times I felt much of anything was when I'd go to the movies with my girlfriends - Abbey

When she went and saw the first Lord of the Rings something in her jumped to life and she became obsessed with following the high that world brought her. She needed more, she devoured the books then turned to the internet to find others who loved the story just as much as she did and that's how she would meet Andy on fanfiction.net. She had been a fan of his writing, so when he said he was going to make a forum just for Sam Gamgee fans she was all aboard, being a huge Sam fan herself.

Andy had this magnetism around him that drew people in and his writing had a way of reaching people, so by the time that Abbey was getting to know him he already had a tight circle around him but it wasn't long before she too was in that circle.

Those he was closest with, he would tell them that he could speak to the dead. This wasn't the craziest thing in the world, many people having made a living with just that claim, but Jordan's charm and ability to wax poetic made the claim all the more enthralling and Abbey so desperately wanted to believe there was something more

It was towards the end of M's and my marriage when [Andy] flew out for a week-long visit. In that week, I was exposed to the full force of his charm and charisma. He knew me so well so fast (or so it seemed). I felt comfortable. Excited. Important. Loved. And oh, so special. Most important, I was feeling things, which in the fog of depression was a light in the darkness. During that week, he also stepped up the magic from communicating with the dead to actually channeling them - Abbey

So it wasn't a far leap when he began to say he could channel the fictional characters of Lord of The Rings. Andy would claim to have a master that was training him on channeling and posed to Abbey "what if Tolkien thought he was writing a fantasy book but instead was tuning into the frequency of real historical events?"

Andy "My Master says that some of the creatures of Middle Earth – Elves, Dragons, Dwarves – existed much as described, as beings Other Than Man – long ago, because there are artifacts found beyond the capability of the cultures they are found in, and there are just TOO DAMN MANY myths from tribes that never knew each other, countries that never collided that are all the same."[My Master] says that the surge of interest in Tolkien's Middle Earth has created a huge explosion of creational energy…not only through the fans, but through the thousands of deeply devoted people in the production itself. …the real star-spirits and tree-spirits are reacting to it, reaching out in return. … In our case, they reach to us through the most closely identified aspects…hobbits." - Tea Blogger

It actually seemed more plausible to me that there was a prehistory with few surviving artifacts, particularly when the "real" story [Andy] was "revealing" could match up fictional locations (like Rivendell) with real places (like Stonehenge) - Abbey

Andy was an excellent snake oil salesman and Abbey needed magic, needed to feel something.

Saying "I talk to ghosts" only brings in a few people. Explaining that what most people call "the afterlife" is actually an alternate dimension by using String Theory and quoting Michio Kaku isn't the same thing, by a long shot. I felt smug and educated, because it felt like I really knew how the world worked. I was privy to the great secrets of the universe! - Abbey

And this was all held together, out of the eye of public scrutiny by Andy's insistence on keeping this all secret, for his and everyone's safety, besides regular people couldn't handle it. And to top it all off, Andy liked to call this ability, the mindhole

Abbey would find herself getting laid off with most of her coworkers during this period which left her drifting, rudderless, the only light in the darkness being Andy's elaborate fairytales so she was only further drawn in and began to spend more and more time talking with him

When Abbey and her husband first got their house he pretty much had moved into the garage where he would spend most the week with his buddies playing dungeons and dragons or hosting LAN parties, so the distance between the two had already grown quite significantly and once Andy was added to the mix, even more so as Abbey spent more time online. But it wasn't just her husband she would also withdraw from her real life friend group, getting completely wrapped up in everything Andy, which only further increased when Andy would end up moving in with Abbey and her husband

It finally ended when we lost our house. I had been just handing my unemployment checks to [my husband]; I couldn't bear even thinking about the finances, and [my husband] said he was paying the bills. I don't know what happened to the money; I think he may just not have bothered to do anything with it. I do know that I told him the marriage was over the day I found out he hadn't paid the mortgage or any bills, and I only saw him twice after that; once when he moved out, and once when we signed the papers. I don't blame him for cutting ties, but we were equally (ir)responsible. Either way, with a house that was going into foreclosure and no job, I invited a handful of friends to move in. By then, I was in Andy's thrall twenty-four hours a day - Abbey

It was at this time the roommates known as the bag-enders moved in. A little more detail about who those were:

• Diamond: a sheltered young woman who was just leaving her strict christian upbringing
• Shopping cart bob: a vulnerable and tender tough guy that wanted to be loved
• Little Sam: a 14 year old girl who was staying with them with her mother's permission

A side note about Little Sam, because "omfg there's a minor??"

In 2011 Little Sam would comment on the experience ensuring people that yes her mother knew where she was and had an idea of the life they were living which is why she would send Sam grocery money every week. Sam recognizes that a lot of people take issue with her mom letting her do this, but she says that people don't realize how messed up she was and that she was a "rotten little brat" (her words) who threatened her own life or to cut her mom out entirely multiple times if her mom did not let her go

I think that moving in other friends was a tremendous step forward for Andy. He didn't have time to be the storyteller online once he was living with me, but now he could gather people in a concrete location, which he (through manipulation) completely controlled.

[…]

[Andy] was very skillful at letting other people draw conclusions that he controlled. With time and perspective, it was a clear and obvious pattern. He'd spend as much time as possible isolating his next target, taking extended walks and talking for hours and hours. Eventually, he'd start weaving in all the supernatural stuff and then suddenly someone else "had figured it out." Which, of course, was more proof; they hadn't been told, they had put it together independently. And once we believed, we believed. Even when it started to be waaaaaaay beyond normal - Abbey

This probably won't be a surprise, but the names Diamond, Little Sam and Shopping Cart Bob were not the real names of the roommates. Everyone that moved in or would get tightly involved with Jordan would be given a nickname at some point or another and it was a big part of the indoctrination. For Abbey, Andy would call her by her middle name Louise.

Bob, Sam and Diamond all considered legally changing their names, and almost certainly would have if the cult hadn't fallen apart. Bob was lucky; he wised up and got out before he could be fully indoctrinated, though [Andy] had started saying that he "thought Bob suspected what's going on." There were several other failed converts later, after most of the originals had gone. And, of course, [Andy] changed default names every time there was a "core" change - Abbey

It was around this time that Andy had began channeling living people, particularly the Hobbit Actors and this would be how Victoria Bitter would become Jordan Wood

if I hadn't taken the step-by-step route, I wouldn't have believed any of the crap I ended up believing. And that's the thing; I really did believe it. I'd say that I believed 95% plus of what [Andy] created. There was always a little tiny part of me saying wait, what? what the fuck? but I was very good at ignoring that. It's the same part of your brain that, when you're drunk, knows that you're making an ass of yourself.

[…]

I don't want to admit I believed all these things. On the other hand, I really hope that maybe I can raise awareness of this kind of cult/abuse so other people can get help. Not just other people he's controlled (or is currently controlling) this way, but maybe bring to light other abusers. I've met at least three other people who were in cult/relationships like this one, just as lavish in their mythology and just as personally devastating to the believers - Abbey

Andy would tell the Bagenders that each of them had like a guardian elf/guiding parental figure that was watching over them, and those figures would speak through Andy. There was also a "doctor elf who dispensed medical advice, mostly natural medicine that was scientifically unfounded"

He would switch between characters by closing his eyes and jerking, just like every medium in every television show ever. The characters Andy would take on would be referred to as "the others"

The way Andy described the channeling was it was like his entire body and mind would be taken over by whoever he was channeling, so much so that when he broke out of the channeling, he claimed to have no memory and would ask the witnesses to tell him what had happened

For the most part all the housemates participated in this except Bob. He was aware of what was happening, he just didn't buy into it or really care? He would later say that he had previous similar cult experiences like this, so he was numb to Andy's overtures.

You see, before I even met [Andy], I'd lived with this sort of crazy, had participated in this sort of crazy since I was 15. The lies, the need to be followed, almost worshiped… It all was very familiar - Bob

He said he would try to drop hints to Diamond and Sam, to make them think critically about what Andy was claiming in hopes that they would recognize the ruse, but he felt like it never got through. Because of his past experiences he knew you couldn't force someone to leave a cult, that combined with his big brother type personality, made him want to stay to protect the two young women. At the time he believed that Abbey was in too deep and was a lost cause, so he didn't make similar attempts with her

"The Others" were always around, day and night, but particularly liked to show up just when it was the most convenient for Andy. There was always some drama or problem they needed help with and at least one of the housemates would have to be involved in solving these issues. These often occurred right when someone was about to go to sleep, keeping them up to deal with whatever scenario it was. Abbey would say that Andy was only ever Andy maybe 2-3 hours a day sometimes.

Abbey said the best way to explain it was like living in a video game, you could go on missions, unlock characters, get rewards, but it was a 24 hour game you could never escape, which would wake you whenever you tried to sleep. And we all know sleep deprivation is fantastic for the human brain and our ability to reason

Doubts were used to reinforce our commitment. Questioning was encouraged, because as many Others as necessary would explain away any doubt you had. Sometimes Andy himself would bring up doubts, so you'd have to hear the entire argument why all this was real and then recount the entire thing to [Andy] when he "came back." Asking for any kind of "proof" was met with the same sort of thing. Sometimes you ended up feeling that your faith wasn't strong enough, or that your doubts were insulting. Sometimes, he would deliberately create doubt in your mind, usually as punishment. - Abbey

And of course the cult classic: isolation

[Andy] worked long and hard (heh) to separate people from friends and family. He would carefully sow seeds of doubt, while the elf guide would give you "therapy" for your fucked up family life. Therapy was a huge part of the entire thing; there was always something terribly wrong with you that needed to be fixed. And the only fix? More hours of walking and listening. He was amazingly skillful at creating false memories, which is scarily easy and incredibly convincing. Once you "remembered" your friends or family doing terrible things to you, it was far easier to get you away from them - Abbey

I remember all the "therapy" he gave me. He made me feel like it was safe to open up to him. In fact, he was remarkably perceptive. He pushed me to face every personal shortcoming; I felt like I was growing into a better version of myself. I thought of him as my hero, my savior. He made me stronger. Braver. Better, because I was dealing with all the abuse I'd suffered. My "neglectful, cruel mother" (who was really just a working Mom; she wasn't neglectful). My insensitive, uncaring friends (who didn't support me as I got more and more into his world). He helped me remember horrible, horrible things and deal with them. Some of them were real things that happened to me, like my abusive high school boyfriend. Some of them were fanciful exaggerations – such as some of the extreme abuse. He'd keep telling me, in the form of my father figure/guide, that there was more to remember. It was like a game; unraveling these riddles that had (apparently) always been inside me, ruining me. - Abbey

But it wasn't just the bag-enders that had secret tragic backstories. Andy used to allege that his father had forced him to have sex with other people in an attempt to "cure Andy" this allegation went so far as to lead to an official investigation by the police (which cleared his dad of all charges). Andy has since also claimed that Abbey groomed and assaulted him as a minor. They met online when he was 18 and she was 23, they did not meet in person until he was 19 and they did not have an explicit relationship before that. Andy in recent years likes to claim that he had been 15/16 when their sexual relationship had started, which the math doesn't math being he was born in 1983

Birth of Project Elanor and Elijah Wood

By this point Andy had met Sean Astin and had begun planning Project Elanor, having that connection to Astin seriously legitimized Andy's whole thing, though how much they interacted outside of the events he planned is really hard to decipher as he seemed to have no issue name dropping him at every turn and I extremely doubt they were besties talking every day

Meeting Astin also made way for a fantastic opportunity in Andy's mind. You see, Andy was concerned about Elijah Wood as he seemed to be looking thinner and unwell in recent press photos. He brought it up to Astin who said that he too was concerned and that his friend had become quite depressed and that he could really use someone like Abbey to talk to and asked if Andy could ask her if she'd be willing to do that

Of course she would and they begin to allege that she and Wood had become good friends, that he had flown her up to Washington and they had dinner where he confessed to his deep love of Dominic Monagan (all the hobbit actors were secretly gay with each other). Abbey said that he needed to find an outlet and suggested he create a livejournal which he did

The idea was that Wood should not reveal his real identity on the journal but kept "accidentally" dropping hints like making references to his known favorite bands etc. The journal would run for a couple months and during this time its activity aligned with Wood's press schedule, activity waning when he was at events and bolstering when he wasn't

While Abbey's discussion about this friendship only existed on her private posts word got out and as expected. No one bought it and it left a sour taste in the fandom's mouth many pulling away from the bit of earth group and their connections with Andy and Abbey

Eventually Abbey admitted to her friends that it had been a farce and that she hadn't been talking to the REAL Wood but was instead talking to Andy who was channeling Wood. Same same. Unsurprisingly that explanation didn't go over much better

The Birth of Jordan

On Nov 3 2002 Andy would make his final posts as Victoria on the yahoo group and his personal LJ, saying he was leaving fandom forever

"it has been unofficial for several months now, but I regret that I must now officially withdraw from online fandom… not just LotR but all of it, I cannot go into the various reasons, but I will always miss and treasure the kind and talented friends I've made here"

He would give Bit of Earth to Abbey and then disappeared. Soon word got out that Victoria Bitter had died.

At some point, the original (female) inhabitant of his body just refused to return, which was in essence the non-corporeal version of committing suicide. The body, needing a "core" program, "duplicated" the last person who he had channeled. Thus, he became Jordan, which was short for Elijah Jordan Wood. This "core" switch happened a total of three times while I was there, and in retrospect served to start a major storyline change. The cores were always male after the original "died."
[…]
Over time, there were more and more people who "came through." Initially it was a limited number of Lord of the Rings characters. Later were vampires (which were really a subgroup of elves), time travelers, movie stars, soldiers, and a good-sized handful of X-men rip-offs, all of whom had powers that could almost be reasonably explained by science - Abbey

This is why Abbey supported Andy's versions of events when he would say that Victoria had died and was gone forever, because by the logic he had outlined, Victoria was dead

The Hacking of the Prancing Pony

Remember how Andy had told Jeanine that he had a vengeful ex who was spreading rumors that he and Victoria were the same and that she had also hacked bit of earth? There was some truth to that

In response to the news of Victoria's departure the Bit of Earth forum was hacked the website then redirected to a journal entry by one of Andy's exes where she showed pictures of Victoria and Andy assuring everyone they were indeed the same person. But she claims to not have been responsible for the hacking and did not condone that behaviour. Despite the pictures clearly depicting the same person, between Andy's insistence and the back up support by his inner circle, this didn't seem to make nearly as big of an impact as you would imagine

Line Party

Remember the "Two Towers" line party I mentioned earlier?

That event was a success – inasmuch as it wasn't a big enough event to fuck up. We still managed to fuck up parts – the tent almost blew away, the radio promos never happened (because Andy creeped out the DJ's), the trivia questions got lost…okay, in retrospect, it was kind of a failure. But nothing bad happened, and people had a blast. And we made a bunch of friends - Abbey

Project Elanor

From the outside, Project Elanor, their little garden project seemed to go relatively smoothly outside of a few hiccups and was a big success. On the inside? Not so much

Remember how originally the garden was going to be done at the Rockwood Library in Portland, and then two weeks out it was changed to Riggs Institute in Beaverton Oregon?

The reason for this was, while their expert gardener (re: Andy channeling Sam Gamgee) was designing this garden, no one had actually talked to the library about this. When they got word that they were going to be surprise gifted a garden they reached out to Bit of Earth and were like "thanks and everything guys, but we don't have the budget to maintain a garden"

Andy tried to protest this by standing outside of the library asking for people to sign a petition for the library to get a garden… yeah clearly that didn't work out.

Then there was wood thing. Andy had told Jeanine that there had been someone responsible for the wood and had worked something out but then burned bridges with that lumbermill, ghosting them. From as far as we can tell, there never was any deal with a lumber mill, Andy had just expected that someone would just give them the wood and sent Jeanine to figure that out last minute

[…] There's something about ten years passing. On the day of the event I was still completely involved in the exhilarating upswing. BitofEarth was becoming extremely popular. I was newly divorced, had filled my (already in foreclosure) house with friends and was seeing the fruition of a project I had put my whole heart into. I was elated, joyous, proud, and truly believed I had stepped out of the dull, gray, boring life I'd fallen into since college. This was the new, improved me, better and happier than ever. That was from the inside.

From the outside…I was an immature, irresponsible, vain, selfish child, obsessed with popularity and with my "secret life" with Andy – although he was still Jordan Wood then. Also, I whined a lot. Although I can see the good qualities in what I was doing, mostly I am ashamed and hideously embarrassed at my behavior, and the overtly stupid decisions we were making. I definitely knew we were in over our heads, but I think I was having too much fun to care.

[…]

We had the screening of The Two Towers the night before, where I stood in front of the whole theater and said that we'd raised $3000, and that all the proceeds would go to Reading is Fundamental. I know I said proceeds, because even before the screening I knew we were in the red for the garden. […] We spent ourselves empty to cover the last of it. The money wasn't where the lies were – it was the people. […] We were the lie, not the project.

[..]
My memories of that day are patchy. I was in a blind panic once we were actually trying to pull things together – the whole day was like a controlled fall. I wish the memories of the day itself were better, because things were already crumbling. Andy's behavior was distracting and bizarre, and mine was just embarrassing, to the point that both of us got a "talking to." It is a horrifying experience to have a personal hero and legitimate celebrity pull you in private and chastise you.

[…]
Sean Astin came to the project in good faith. He was an incredibly hard worker, kind, generous, gregarious, inspiring… Honestly, he was everything we all thought he would be and then some. And I wish I still had his respect. But I lost it – and not just because of Andy's lies and manipulations. When Sean pulled me aside and talked to me, it cut right to my heart. He called me out on the more outrageous parts of my attention-seeking, [..] He also said good things and inspiring things, but those aren't what stuck with me. Just the intensity of his eyes and the blunt honesty of his words.
[…]
Still. I loved that garden and the project from the moment Andy suggested it. I poured my whole heart into it. Elanor was, for me, the best part of all of BitofEarth – it was the one good, real thing we did. And I'm glad that people loved it and cared for it, and that it made people happy. I don't take credit for that by any means, but at least some good came of it. For a time I'd planned on going back to see it, but I don't think it would bring anything but pain to anyone. - Abbey

As I mentioned before, they didn't finish the work in the first day and had to come back for the second, but Andy came back saying he had injured a finger, and thus was wearing a full arm cast that enclosed his pinkie finger. This of course was bullshit.

The "broken finger" was diagnosed and set by Imrodyr, the elf doctor. The cast was made from plaster from Michael's craft store. It came off two weeks later, because "the mindhole" heals *ever* so much more quickly than a "normal" body.

Draw your own conclusions. - Abbey

Music Festival and Film Festival

Abbey hasn't spoken much about the two other events Bit of Earth hosted as she has said that she wasn't really involved with their planning. What we do know is that in both cases, Andy would claim that he had tasked someone with something vital, thus making it their fault that nothing went as planned. And in both cases if those people came to try and defend themselves on the forum, their posts would immediately get deleted

For the filmfest, remember how originally, Sean Astin, Viggo Mortinsen and Dominic Monagan were supposed to come to the festival but had to bail when Return of the King press tour filled their timeslots? Astin would end up sending a video instead and but there were supposed to be videos from the other two as well.

They sent a staff member named Sue out to LA to acquire these videos. Getting Astin's was easy, Sue just dropped by his agent's office, easy done! She had been told that Viggo Mortensen was recording VO that day so she was told they'd meet that evening, but he never showed and later Sue was told that he was too tired from working that day and would meet her the next day. The next day he never showed either.

Andy would give Sue an address for Dominic Monagan's house so she could go pick up the video but due to the traffic, she never made it, having to make the choice to take the cab to the airport instead to catch her flight home.

Jeanine would later be able to confirm that there had never been any meetings scheduled with Mortinsen or Monagan. Which leaves the mystery of where the hell was Andy trying to send Sue when he gave her Dominic's "address"

For the film festival itself, it had been set up to be a contest with prizes for the winners, but it would be later revealed that nearly all entries had been made by the bag-enders and one was even stolen from someone's private blog and is thought to have been added to the roster to make it less obvious that the group had made all the content.

LA and Detective Myers

By early October 2003 the bag-enders were crashing on Jeanine's floor and would set off for LA. It would be not long after they left that Jeanine would be contacted by Detective Myers about the missing person's report on Victoria Bitter

It later would be revealed that Andy had in fact sent his parent's a suicide note, it's alleged it was all part of this effort to kill who he was before, to have her legally classified as dead and legitimize his new identity

Tentmoot

The bag-enders had landed in LA in early October with the plans of running a 4000-10,000 person convention in December

Once we'd relocated to LA, things were really hopping in planning Tentmoot. We each had our own "jobs" to do, but mine were surprisingly low-level. Andy made a big deal of keeping me out of a lot of it. At least, a big deal to me. I was the mouthpiece on a regular basis; giving speeches he had prepared for me. I prepared and gave presentations about things. But my job? Was taking care of Andy (and all of the Others).
[…]

Initially, it was just supposed to be a massive line party, but at some point it became a CONVENTION. I honestly can't remember how, even reading through old documents. It's kind of a blur. I do remember a "meeting" that happened on our porch in San Dimas – Bob, Sam, Diamond, Andy, Me and Sue. We discussed if we thought we could really pull things off – tickets weren't selling yet and numerous problems were starting to pop up. Andy was relentlessly determined to make it work. I remember I wasn't sure but I went along with him (which is the short form for about 80% of my life with him). I don't remember what everyone else thought, but I do know we all agreed to push ahead. - Abbey

Like I mentioned earlier, the only people they eventually got to confirm were folks that really only the most hardcore of LotR film fans would know, we're talking background extras here

One such person was a guy by the name Bret Mckenzie and they got him to agree to come, he even was in a band called the Black Seeds and they offered to play the event, it would've been their first show in the US so a good opportunity for them. What it would mean for bit of earth was flying 9 people and all their equipment from New Zealand. Shopping Cart Bob argued against this instead suggesting if they really wanted Bret Mckenzie to perform they should get this nobody band that Mckenzie was also in, it was a comedy band so it would provide music and laughs! And even better there was only one other bandmate, it was this nobody band no one has ever heard of ever called the Flight of the Conchords, which at the time really was a nobody band in North America as it had yet to break the scene there.

But Andy declined saying that Flight of the Conchords weren't performing anymore anyways which Bob of course would later find out was a lie. Not like it mattered though as Mckenzie and Black Seeds would end up backing out due to the terrible communication from the group lack of commitment and overall chaos.

The Plane Tickets

Let's talk about the plane tickets

All along, "Airfare for Kiwis" had been Andy's job.

[..]
Then one day early in December, Andy came to me and said the Airfare donation had "fallen through." I was panicked, but he told me that he and Jeanine were working on an alternate plan, and that Jeanine was talking to a travel agent friend of hers. I was still worried, but he was adamant that things would be fine and I was not to fret. There was so much going on as things got close that I didn't really see any alternatives.

The explanation Andy gave me for why the donation had fallen through was the same one he gave Jeanine; there was a donation from Air New Zealand, but they reneged due to increasing tourism to NZ because of Lord of the Rings. I was staying calm, and then Andy hit me with another shock: in order to "verify" the tickets, we had to come up with a credit card (with a limit greater than or equal to) the amount we needed. It was all frantic at that point. He swore that it wasn't to charge the cards; it was just to secure the tickets, and then the actual money would come out of ticket sales.

Our only choice was to call around for volunteers to finance it. I fought against it, hard. I hate using the phone and the idea of calling everyone I knew to beg for their credit card numbers was humiliating and hideous. I don't remember all the people I called. I know he made me call my mother and my father, despite my (correct) protestations that they would never, ever, ever help us in this. He made me call any friends I could think of, plus I had a list of people who had worked with Bit of Earth previously to pester. I was horrified, but I obeyed. That afternoon is a literal blur of panic and shame. Between calls, Andy was alternately reassuring and threatening me that everything hung on my shoulders at that moment. - Abbey

Andy's Suicide Attempt

It would be around this time that Jeanine would confront Andy leading to his suicide attempt

It wasn't the first time I was awakened by trauma. Eventually I developed a phobia of napping, because when I'd let my guard down, bad shit would happen. I don't remember who shook me awake, but Diamond and Little Sam were frantic. Andy had locked himself in the bathroom. They'd pried the door open with a screwdriver. That was when I got there. And there on the floor was Andy, apparently unconscious next to a pool of vomit that was mostly made up of pills. There was a note; it said that Jeanine had canceled the airline tickets, Tentmoot had fallen apart, and he was sorry. Someone had already called 911. I was beyond destroyed. I was in total shock, at a level that I wouldn't experience again until we were stranded on the Canadian border.

We went to the hospital after the ambulance took Andy away (as he fought and begged the EMT's not to take him). I remember seeing him in that hospital bed, pitiful and sad-eyed, with charcoal residue around his mouth. They'd pumped his stomach, in case he had taken more pills than he had admitted to. He said they were going to put him in a facility for a mandatory 48-hour lockup.

[..]
In retrospect, it was a completely transparent move on Andy's part. He was undoubtedly feigning unconsciousness. There weren't any medications that were likely to be fatal in our medicine cabinet – he had mostly taken NyQuil Liquicaps, Advil and multivitamins. Further, the pills were all intact

[..]

He most likely took several handfuls of the (effectively nonlethal) pills and immediately made himself vomit – Andy regularly made himself vomit, usually for dramatic effect. Then it was just a matter of lying still on the floor while we screamed and begged him to wake up, until the EMT's "revived" him. And [voila], he didn't have to deal with the immediate, terrible fallout.

[…]

When we visited him in the hospital, he said he'd "panicked and snapped" because he was so hurt and devastated. He maintained that he had gotten a donation that really did fall through, all the way up until after the next core switch. At that point, it became my fault, because I had "pushed Jordan so far" and he had been so terribly desperate to please me. Ultimately it was chalked up as one of the many failings of a previous core – Andy always, always badmouthed whoever he had "been" before. But again I digress. He was completely happy and at ease when we saw him, full of promises that everything would be just fine.

[...]

Of course, with Andy in the hospital for 48 hours, it was entirely on Diamond's and my shoulders to deal with the fallout. I remember many, many phone calls and emails. To everyone. All of whom were furious. Resignations from nearly every single person who had worked with Bit of Earth filled my inbox. Bob was enraged. Jeanine was interrogating us and sending us documentation proving that there had never been a donation. Seeing proof that Andy had lied was the worst of all; it shook all three of us to the core. None of us could figure out what to believe. We were completely lost without Andy's leadership, and were unable to comprehend (or cope with) his lies - Abbey

Andy had told the other staff members that they had 800 advanced ticket sales, but Bob on the other hand knew that Andy had only sold 28.

"I knew for a fact that Tentmoot had not fallen apart, as it was never together. This was an event that was NEVER going to happen, there was NO way that it could have. At best it would have lasted an hour before we got booted from the convention center. " - Bob

While the group had arranged a few events with the actors almost no content had been prepared for the convention, no panels, no vendors, nothing. And there had been almost no marketing at all, accounting for the complete lack of interest. Bob and Sue had known about the ticket sales and had been begging Andy to cancel the con for weeks

Bob had flown out to Portland to prepare for the con and decided that enough was enough and left the bag-end house for good.

"after I left our place in San Dimas I was filled with rage, regret, sadness, almost every emotion I'd felt up to that point. I never really made a big deal out of it, but all of the going down of the shit that I was privy to happened in the six months after my dad's death.[…] In the end I was willing, still to forgive ALL of that for my friends until that stupid, staged suicide attempt. THAT was the thing that pushed me well over the edge." - Bob

"I told BoE that I resigned at that moment, that I never wanted to hear about this again, and that they made me sick. To the people that had been my best and nearly only friends for a year. " - Bob

He talks about talking to the housemates before getting on the flight to Portland with everything being good and then landing on the other side to find out everything had fallen apart. But it was Andy's actions that broke the camel's back and that's because Bob's dad had taken his own life

Maybe Diamond, Little Sam and I would have realized how much he was lying to us if it things hadn't taken another crazy turn. Maybe we would have had a chance to process, and maybe, without distraction, he wouldn't have convinced us that he was still telling the truth. But that was about when we found out that three actors from Lord of the Rings were currently stranded at LAX with no tickets either to go to Portland or back to New Zealand. - Abbey

The Actors Land in LAX

Brian had family he could stay with, but the other two would stay with Abbey

At the house, everyone was introduced around. It was fairly late in the day, so we weren't up that long. We showed the actors their rooms and then we sat around the living room and talked for a while. I wish I could remember that conversation too. Jed told many stories, while Paul was very quiet. I know that Paul kept giving Andy strange looks – Andy later swore it was because Paul "somehow knew" that Andy was secretly Elijah Wood. At some point Paul did comment that we smoked the same brand of cigarettes that Elijah did – which was waved in front of us as "proof" after the fact. I'd wager that Paul was really just staring at the truly bizarre, creepy person doing crosswords and pretending to know way more than he actually did about the movie industry.The actors eventually went to bed. We had three bedrooms, but one was unusable. Andy told us that it was because Bob had trashed the place as revenge when he moved out, but subsequent discussion has proved that not to be the case; when he left, Bob still thought he was coming back. Which means that Andy had gone so far as to trash the room and piss on the mattress to vilify Bob. So Little Sam, Diamond, Andy and I all slept in a heap on the floor of the otherwise empty dining room. Andy called it a puppy pile, but what it really was was sad and messed up
[..]
It was just Diamond and I that ended up taking the Kiwis sightseeing around town before they left; [..] At some point, we stopped at a store so they could get snacks for the flight. Before they left, we promised to pay them back every cent they'd spent (something we had all been saying since the moment we found out they were in L.A.).One thing I can say is that I kept that promise.
[..]
Little Sam would be taken back by her parents very soon. It was the beginning of a long, dark winter. - Abbey

Diamond

With Shopping Cart Bob leaving during the aftermath of Tentmoot and Little Sam leaving not long after, this left Andy, Diamond and Abbey living together. They struggled to make ends meet, sometimes they were homeless or living out of sketchy motels, all the while both women were subject to Andy's constant need for attention and validation, leaving them with little emotional bandwidth or energy to think of much else

Andy would begin to pit the women against each other and make them compete for his love and affection

I am actually ashamed to admit this, but I will, because other people he has hurt (or is hurting) might recognize it, but he very deliberately seduced each of us [Abbey and Diamond] – with different Others.

The bottom line is that, since the Others were not the same person as Andy, they could have relationships with other people. So, it wasn't any of my business what he and Diamond were doing; it wasn't my boyfriend who was seducing another woman. This took a really drastic turn when "Jordan" died and "Andy" became the core, because at that time "Andy" was not in a romantic relationship with me. Ultimately, I think the jealousy was the death knell – although there was plenty of other stuff.

We were also getting "therapy" (or "help" as I suppose he'd call it now) for our various "issues," including things like self-harming. We both had some issues with that; I had a cutting phase at the end of my first marriage, and Diamond had some issues with biting herself. We both had body-image issues, though Di had an actual eating disorder. And, as I'd mentioned before, he convinced me that I had multiple personalities. He exploited these actual issues (and made-up ones as well) and blew them up until they were the focus of our lives for a while. And we all went along with it, because we honestly thought that he was the only one who could help us. And we were indeed hurting, vulnerable women, or we never would have fallen for him to begin with.
[…]
And talking [With Diamond] about just how much damage there was, how many lies he told together, in person, really revealed how very far he went in the name of manipulating us. And all the while, he was endlessly claiming he was "helping" us. And now he's reached the point of implying that he saved us because we are alive to get therapy and recover from how badly he hurt us. - Abbey

Eventually Andy would kick Diamond out, leaving Abbey and Andy alone

Hollywood Boulevard

When Andy and Abbey had arrived in Hollywood they were jobless, but they managed to find jobs they didn't hate in the most unexpected place

Imposters, by James Knoblauch and Shawna Kenney, a book about the character ambassadors on Hollywood Boulevard.- Tea Blogger

Andy and Abbey struggled to get by as character actors only able to access the internet for short bursts at internet cafes, Abbey would spend that time reading what new horrific take that Jeanine had on their lives, whatever skeletons she could dig up. It was exhausting it was horrible but she couldn't stop herself.

[..] I also know that he read Jeanine's blog ravenously. We didn't have a computer, but we haunted internet cafes, carefully downloading copies of everything she wrote onto discs.
[..]
The big reveal, not long after Tentmoot, was that I had multiple personality disorder. I hadn't "completely split," so I was still sometimes aware of what my "alternate" personalities were doing, and sometimes he would claim that my "alters" had done things I was unaware of. He labeled my temper, my sexuality, my fear, my childlike [nature], and my memories of abuse as different personalities, and one by one we had to deal with each of them. There were benefits to this – because of this "therapy," I finally gained control over my wild temper, a control that I've only gotten better at over the years. I got past the sexual violence I'd gone through, so I no longer had panic attacks. […]

Later, there were interventions. I was a "control addict" and needed to recover from that, because I was ruining lives (his and Diamond's specifically, at that point). I was utterly devastated, and did everything I possibly could to own my "addiction" and "make reparations." Sometime after that, he got me to believe that my regular panic attacks were because I was possessed by a "secular demon" (because "demons" are real, but they don't always conform to religion because religion is flawed and Andy, or rather, the elves, knew the truth.) I went through several weeks of careful preparation and finally went through an exorcism ritual.What I'm saying is, I believed not only his stories, but that I owed him my life. I thought he had saved me from my misery, brought me to a better place, made me feel, made me face my fears, made me whole. More than once, I swore to him that "even if I didn't believe you, I would stay, because this life is better than 'normal' life." Beyond that, I also believed I had an important, special future because of him. That I had a duty to stay with him, that the world itself might be at stake.
[..]

Later, "Jordan" "committed suicide" (the same way [Victoria] had previously) specifically to punish Diamond. And Andy came – that is, now he was the duplicate soul of Orlando Bloom, who also had a history full of abuse and unprocessed pain [NOTE: This also has nothing to do with the real Orlando Bloom.] We had to "help" him too. After Diamond left (or rather, was forced to leave, by Andy), there were many, many more quests. I became involved in war among the gods, because I might be a Maiar (like Gandalf) trapped in a human body. Later, it turned out that Gandalf was really Satan, the actual devil himself, and that most of the things I'd been involved with weren't real after all.

[…]

All along, way deep inside, there was doubt. Tiny, niggling seeds of doubt that I pushed aside when I heard them, or chose to ignore. When I looked deep inside myself, I believed more than anything that this life was better than the one I'd left behind. I could not bear the thought of going back to my boring, bland life in front of a computer with nothing to feel, nothing to do. I sneered at "normal" people, who watched TV and went to work and never did anything that changed the foundation of the world. I couldn't imagine living like that.

Jeanine

Abbey says Jeanine's rampant attacks played a large part in keeping Abbey by Andy's side

Jeanine/Turimel's persecution did make us circle the wagons – and that's an excellent description of it. Those of us who still believed him redoubled our commitment. It was much easier to turn a blind eye to things she said that were true (or to let Jordan/Andy explain them away) because there were things that we also knew to be provably false. And it was far, far too scary to stop believing him at that time. Particularly with a tide of rage against all of us. - Abbey

We have seen this time and again, you can't shame someone into leaving an abusive situation

Beginning of the End

After several months of building up to it, [Andy] announced that we needed to flee the country and move to Toronto. I don't really know what his real motivation was. He painted this picture of Canada as free, safe place where the mean ol' Bush administration wouldn't harm us, where there was socialized medicine and open minds and not so many damn mean people. He had a character who was a Mountie who explained how very, very easy it was to seek political asylum in Canada. [Andy] backed this up with a handful of documents he pulled up on different immigration sites. I was wary, but eventually just let myself be convinced. I knew I couldn't tolerate life as it was much longer. Maybe that was his reason; change the scenery enough that I would stay

At any rate. He concocted an elaborate story about opening a cafe with some people we met, who were going to let us move into their apartment. We told everyone we knew we were moving to New York, but really, that's just where we were landing. We were going to just walk to the border from Buffalo (so that no one knew we were leaving the country.) The funny thing is, there was nothing stopping us from getting passports and visas. There was no reason we couldn't leave the country. I even had a valid passport, and Andy had a perfectly legal ID. But no, that's not possible; THE MAN might find out and then it was off to the Shop for us. Everything was super secret. We reduced everything we owned into three giant suitcases, the cheap wheeled style that is favored by the homeless.
[…]
So there we were, two crazy people, […]three giant duffle bags and a pack of lies, heading from Los Angeles to Buffalo. In February, 2007.

I want to interject here to say that this was occurring during the February 2007 "North American Blizzard" a weather event so impactful it has its own wikipedia page

After several months of building up to it, [Andy] announced that we needed to flee the country and move to Toronto. I don't really know what his real motivation was. He painted this picture of Canada as free, safe place where the mean ol' Bush administration wouldn't harm us, where there was socialized medicine and open minds and not so many damn mean people. He had a character who was a Mountie who explained how very, very easy it was to seek political asylum in Canada. [Andy] backed this up with a handful of documents he pulled up on different immigration sites. I was wary, but eventually just let myself be convinced. I knew I couldn't tolerate life as it was much longer. Maybe that was his reason; change the scenery enough that I would stay

At any rate. He concocted an elaborate story about opening a cafe with some people we met, who were going to let us move into their apartment. We told everyone we knew we were moving to New York, but really, that's just where we were landing. We were going to just walk to the border from Buffalo (so that no one knew we were leaving the country.) The funny thing is, there was nothing stopping us from getting passports and visas. There was no reason we couldn't leave the country. I even had a valid passport, and Andy had a perfectly legal ID. But no, that's not possible; THE MAN might find out and then it was off to the Shop for us. Everything was super secret. We reduced everything we owned into three giant suitcases, the cheap wheeled style that is favored by the homeless.
[…]
So there we were, two crazy people, […]three giant duffle bags and a pack of lies, heading from Los Angeles to Buffalo. In February, 2007.

I want to interject here to say that this was occurring during the February 2007 "North American Blizzard" a weather event so impactful it has its own wikipedia page

After several months of building up to it, [Andy] announced that we needed to flee the country and move to Toronto. I don't really know what his real motivation was. He painted this picture of Canada as free, safe place where the mean ol' Bush administration wouldn't harm us, where there was socialized medicine and open minds and not so many damn mean people. He had a character who was a Mountie who explained how very, very easy it was to seek political asylum in Canada. [Andy] backed this up with a handful of documents he pulled up on different immigration sites. I was wary, but eventually just let myself be convinced. I knew I couldn't tolerate life as it was much longer. Maybe that was his reason; change the scenery enough that I would stay

At any rate. He concocted an elaborate story about opening a cafe with some people we met, who were going to let us move into their apartment. We told everyone we knew we were moving to New York, but really, that's just where we were landing. We were going to just walk to the border from Buffalo (so that no one knew we were leaving the country.) The funny thing is, there was nothing stopping us from getting passports and visas. There was no reason we couldn't leave the country. I even had a valid passport, and Andy had a perfectly legal ID. But no, that's not possible; THE MAN might find out and then it was off to the Shop for us. Everything was super secret. We reduced everything we owned into three giant suitcases, the cheap wheeled style that is favored by the homeless.
[…]
So there we were, two crazy people, […]three giant duffle bags and a pack of lies, heading from Los Angeles to Buffalo. In February, 2007.

I want to interject here to say that this was occurring during the February 2007 "North American Blizzard" a weather event so impactful it has its own wikipedia page

After several months of building up to it, [Andy] announced that we needed to flee the country and move to Toronto. I don't really know what his real motivation was. He painted this picture of Canada as free, safe place where the mean ol' Bush administration wouldn't harm us, where there was socialized medicine and open minds and not so many damn mean people. He had a character who was a Mountie who explained how very, very easy it was to seek political asylum in Canada. [Andy] backed this up with a handful of documents he pulled up on different immigration sites. I was wary, but eventually just let myself be convinced. I knew I couldn't tolerate life as it was much longer. Maybe that was his reason; change the scenery enough that I would stay

At any rate. He concocted an elaborate story about opening a cafe with some people we met, who were going to let us move into their apartment. We told everyone we knew we were moving to New York, but really, that's just where we were landing. We were going to just walk to the border from Buffalo (so that no one knew we were leaving the country.) The funny thing is, there was nothing stopping us from getting passports and visas. There was no reason we couldn't leave the country. I even had a valid passport, and Andy had a perfectly legal ID. But no, that's not possible; THE MAN might find out and then it was off to the Shop for us. Everything was super secret. We reduced everything we owned into three giant suitcases, the cheap wheeled style that is favored by the homeless.
[…]
So there we were, two crazy people, […]three giant duffle bags and a pack of lies, heading from Los Angeles to Buffalo. In February, 2007.

I want to interject here to say that this was occurring during the February 2007 "North American Blizzard" a weather event so impactful it has its own wikipedia page

After several months of building up to it, [Andy] announced that we needed to flee the country and move to Toronto. I don't really know what his real motivation was. He painted this picture of Canada as free, safe place where the mean ol' Bush administration wouldn't harm us, where there was socialized medicine and open minds and not so many damn mean people. He had a character who was a Mountie who explained how very, very easy it was to seek political asylum in Canada. [Andy] backed this up with a handful of documents he pulled up on different immigration sites. I was wary, but eventually just let myself be convinced. I knew I couldn't tolerate life as it was much longer. Maybe that was his reason; change the scenery enough that I would stay

At any rate. He concocted an elaborate story about opening a cafe with some people we met, who were going to let us move into their apartment. We told everyone we knew we were moving to New York, but really, that's just where we were landing. We were going to just walk to the border from Buffalo (so that no one knew we were leaving the country.) The funny thing is, there was nothing stopping us from getting passports and visas. There was no reason we couldn't leave the country. I even had a valid passport, and Andy had a perfectly legal ID. But no, that's not possible; THE MAN might find out and then it was off to the Shop for us. Everything was super secret. We reduced everything we owned into three giant suitcases, the cheap wheeled style that is favored by the homeless.
[…]
So there we were, two crazy people, […]three giant duffle bags and a pack of lies, heading from Los Angeles to Buffalo. In February, 2007.

I want to interject here to say that this was occurring during the February 2007 "North American Blizzard" a weather event so impactful it has its own wikipedia page

After several months of building up to it, [Andy] announced that we needed to flee the country and move to Toronto. I don't really know what his real motivation was. He painted this picture of Canada as free, safe place where the mean ol' Bush administration wouldn't harm us, where there was socialized medicine and open minds and not so many damn mean people. He had a character who was a Mountie who explained how very, very easy it was to seek political asylum in Canada. [Andy] backed this up with a handful of documents he pulled up on different immigration sites. I was wary, but eventually just let myself be convinced. I knew I couldn't tolerate life as it was much longer. Maybe that was his reason; change the scenery enough that I would stay

At any rate. He concocted an elaborate story about opening a cafe with some people we met, who were going to let us move into their apartment. We told everyone we knew we were moving to New York, but really, that's just where we were landing. We were going to just walk to the border from Buffalo (so that no one knew we were leaving the country.) The funny thing is, there was nothing stopping us from getting passports and visas. There was no reason we couldn't leave the country. I even had a valid passport, and Andy had a perfectly legal ID. But no, that's not possible; THE MAN might find out and then it was off to the Shop for us. Everything was super secret. We reduced everything we owned into three giant suitcases, the cheap wheeled style that is favored by the homeless.
[…]
So there we were, two crazy people, […]three giant duffle bags and a pack of lies, heading from Los Angeles to Buffalo. In February, 2007.

They had no home to return to, they had given up or sold everything they owned, all they had were the clothes on their back and Andy had run out of plans. The immigration agents let them crash on the floor that night. The next morning they tried to formulate a plan, Andy was even considering calling his parents despite all the terror he had put them through in the preceding years, but Abbey was just so exhausted and just wanted to talk to her mom

Abbey hadn't had contact with her family for years, Andy had led her to believe that her mom had been abusive, fabricated memories and all ultimately culminating with Abbey giving her mom a book Andy had written full of accusations of abuse that Abbey's mom was allegedly responsible for. Shame had kept her from reconnecting for a long time but at this point she had nothing to lose and they had no other options

So she called her mom. She listened and told Abbey to call back in an hour. During which time Andy thought of all these schemes and big new plans, but Abbey was out of gas and just nodded and waited.

What I didn't know is that my mother had been doing a lot of research over those years. She made more than one trip down to Hollywood, just to see for herself that I was alive and reasonably safe. She had been saving money in a dedicated account, waiting for the day I might call. She had kept tabs on all the internet gossip about [Andy] and I. She had read up on (and worked with a therapist extensively) on folie a deux and the proper treatment of it (which is generally separate the usually sane person from the crazy person). She was ready for the day I called - Abbey

So when Abbey called her mom back she had already booked a flight and hotels to meet them in Buffalo and said they would discuss the steps going forward from there.

Abbey's mom would fly the group to Virginia where they would meet up with Andy's parents who as you can imagine had a lot of questions about things. Abbey's mom would make her an offer

she would help me get set up in an apartment in Virginia with [Andy], if I would come home with her for one month and go to a therapist with her. This seemed entirely reasonable to me, although [Andy] sulked terribly. He would be staying with his parents for the month, and he wasn't grateful at all. But it wasn't any choice; I had no desire to be homeless and destitute in a completely unfamiliar town. - Abbey

During this month Abbey would go to therapy 2-3 times a week, her mom took some time off but when her mom wasn't around Abbey didn't know what to do with herself. She had spent the last 5+ years constantly running from one crisis to the next, she didn't know what down time was anymore

Abbey was only allowed to talk to Andy once a night and only for an hour and she began to realize five weeks in that the only time she felt anxiety was when the phone rang or the mail came in as it was usually Andy

After five weeks their agreed time apart ended and Abbey's mom offered to go with her to Virginia for a week to settle in with Andy and she was thankful to not be going alone. But when she met up with Andy, things weren't the same

I honestly winced when he came toward me. He hugged me and was talking to me, and all I could think was get your hands off of me. I felt physically ill in his presence. He noticed, too, and I spent a lot of that evening having to deal with how badly my reaction had "hurt him." I was welcomed back, punished, lectured, and all in all, didn't feel happier to be with him again
[…]
I didn't want to spend half the night talking to Others. I didn't want to frantically patch things up, or go for long walks, or get nagged to find a job. I was so tired of it all, and I hated the way [Andy] treated my mother, who had been nothing but patient and kind with him.
[..]
For the first time, I had been willing to see [Andy] as he was, and having the blinders off I couldn't pretend he wasn't outright, baldface lying to people
[…]
We met him at his parents' house; my mother had called them so they would be prepared for what was coming. Part of the conversation was in private, where there was a brief, brutal onslaught of Others, pleading, condemning, cursing, crying. I couldn't be alone with him any longer; I came out to where our parents were. I told him I just…couldn't. He kept asking me, "You can't what?" over and over, trying every possible way to give him a reason he could deconstruct, or a person to blame. I couldn't. He became more and more heated. I remember all our parents moving as one, his to stand on either side of him as my mother gently took my arm. I needed her to help me walk away; I could not turn from his pleading eyes. She guided me to the car as [Andy] began to scream; that same hideous, chilling, keening wail that he terrorized all of us with in the cult. Now no longer the howl of some supernatural anguish, but that of a thwarted, monstrous child. I got into the car and Mom drove us the hell away from there.
[..]

Our flight wasn't until the next day, and it wasn't even noon yet. We decided to walk around Colonial Williamsburg for a few hours. It was incredible; I felt dizzy with my freedom. We walked around, sometimes laughing, sometimes crying. Mostly I felt like a tremendous weight had been lifted from my shoulders. I couldn't believe that I could just let go. I wasn't responsible for the fate of worlds anymore. -Abbey

During the six weeks I was at home (circa the Fauxpology), he had a job that he described as a "sous chef" for "a friend of the family who owns a restaurant." If I remember correctly, he'd been doing some artwork for a restaurant owner. I do know he got fired right before I came home.

According to my mother, his parents said after the screaming fit when I left, Andy stood up completely calmly, went to the phone, and got a job - don't know if it was his job back, or if it was something else - Abbey

Andy did not take the break up well. For years he would send Abbey letters and packages, alternating between howling in rage, blaming her for everything and swearing up and down he had changed and begging for her to return. These were very hard days for Abbey as she worked to deconstruct all the conditioning and beliefs Andy had instilled in her.

She made a private livejournal where she posted about some of this, which has since been left public

It isn't like I just have to deal with the lies he told me (and is still telling me at times, although it's now been almost a month since I heard from him--that was when I requested my things back). I have to deal with crowds of people--including people I respect, including professionals--lumping me in with the lies he told. It hurts, because there isn't a defense for it. I knew he was lying about some things and I stood by him.

Yes, I stood by him when I knew he was lying because I thought he had to, or at least I thought he thought he had to, if you can dig that. I knew that the suicide wasn't real, obviously, but he swore it was the only way he could ever live freely to be himself, free of a terrible abusive family. I knew the stories he was telling about said family were lies--but I thought that they were "just modifications" of the truth so that he could escape. The fact is, he was lying about all of it, and I should have known. So all this BoE bullshit is still my own fault. - Abbey

Andy too would return to the internet and would begin to weave his own narrative on what happened, he would write lengthy public apologies seemingly taking accountability for many things, promising to make amends with anyone he'd harmed if they just reached out to him. Everyone that did reach out to him says they never heard back

But he would also begin to spin Abbey as this horrible person

Andy has tried to frame me as an abusive ex, accused me of statutory rape and has literally reframed his own actions as things I did (e.g. saying I'm the one who sent him packages and presents after we broke up). - Abbey

She tried not to react or get involved, until he began claiming that she had taken his son Connor from him and refuses to let him see him

Abbey Speaks

In 2011, seven years after Jeanine had published her book, and four years after Abbey had left Andy, she began to talk about what happened on her blog

Because secrecy is what he hurt us with – Diamond, Little Sam, the ones who have come forward from DAYD – all of us. The secret was the entire point. We had to keep Andy's abilities secret, and therefore, we could not tell anyone else the truth about anything. Everything had to be screened for outsiders. Can't tell a story about all the friends you hang out with if, technically, they're all one fucking person. Always, always pleading that we just not tell, no matter what.

I am not beholden to promises I made to an abuser while still in his power. Because emotional and psychological abuse is every bit as legitimate and damaging as physical abuse. Because families and friends that don't even use computers have been hurt by Andy's manipulations, to say the very least. - Abbey

Abbey would go on to share stories and memories of everything that happened. She said that keeping quiet was just letting other people tell her story for her. In Apr 2013 , Abbey and Jeanine make peace, finally putting an end to hostility and Jeanine agreed to use more neutral pronouns when describing Andy in the future

Abbey in no way shies away from the harm she participated in, acknowledging that while Andy was at the heart of many of her most hurtful actions, she was the one that still did them.

We did bad things, he and I. We lied to many, many people. We fucked up big time. It doesn't matter in the slightest who was the leader and who the follower for this, because we both lied. In text, over the phone, and in person, to people who loved us and trusted us completely. We lied on the internet. We lied on message boards. We betrayed people's trust in so many ways. - Abbey

She hopes in being open and honest it could help others. She talks about how learning about the FF7 house helped her

And already her story has helped others. In her posts I saw a commenter I recognized, who was thanking her for sharing her story as they had just gone through something very similar. I know this person to be a survivor of a Matrix cult that I had intended to cover with this before I realized there's no way I could fit 3 fandom cult stories into one session.

Abbey would also reconnect with Diamond, Little Sam and Shopping Cart Bob. For a long time she was scared they would resent her and want nothing to do with her after what happened, and reconnecting wasn't a smooth nor easy process, but with time they rekindled their friendships. Abbey considers Diamond in particular one of her closest friends

I am very grateful to reconnect with Di, and with Sam and Bob. We're all talking very regularly, and are even hoping to have a little get-together after the holiday season. It is incredible to be able to talk freely about the things we saw, heard and believed. And all of us are hopeful that, by sharing our experiences openly and without shame, we actually can help some people - Abbey

Abbey has spent a long time recovering, today she lives with her husband and child and has found her happiness

It turns out that the life I have after being with Andy is nothing like the gray, bland life I'd left behind. Yes, I watch TV and relax. No, I'm no longer on world-changing missions. Because once I let go of the fantasy, once I said no more, I realized I hadn't been changing the world. I was playing pretend with someone who was using me to perpetuate his own imaginary world. All the tears I wept. All the sleep I lost. All the anguish. All the fear. The triumphs. The failings. None of it mattered after all. It was the greatest, most agonizing loss I'd faced in my life, and I had no one left in my life to turn to. Andy was my father, brother, child, lover and friend, and leaving him took me to the lowest I'd ever imagined.

But then. Then I learned that the stakes are not what he claimed. I am not single-handedly responsible for the fate of worlds. Multiple worlds – the undying land, the ghost cities, the alternate timeline in 1944, the children I adopted…None of it. It was the greatest burden I'd ever bourne. Having it lifted from my shoulders is indescribably freeing. I am able to enjoy the dailiness of my life so much more, because if I make a mistake? It's ok. I won't be punished for it.

Abbey can be found mostly on tumblr these days where she takes questions about what happened. She talks about how every once in a while she is triggered and it can be hard to talk about sometimes, but knowing that her words could reach someone who was in a similar position makes it worth it.

She also serves to help identify Andy and keeps up to date on his movements.

Where's Andy Now

DAYDians and Brittany

In December 2009, over two years since she left Andy, Abbey got word that for he last two years Andy had been in the Harry Potter fandom, building up a whole new group of followers around him. His popularity kicked off when he began regularly writing his fanfic "Dumbledore's Army: And Years of Darkness", often shortened to DAYD and its followers DAYDians. This fanfic would end up at 256,000 words and would become quite notorious. Most people had no idea that the person writing this and running this little fandom, was Andy, but Abbey could tell and was horrified to see him moving in many of the same patterns as he once had.

Abbey was furious, but thus far had kept a low profile online, scared to draw his attention or for others to find her and come for her for her "past crimes". She was still healing and was in no position to take Andy on, so she did the only thing she could think of and made a fake LJ account to anonymously post on Jeanine's blog

Jeanine, ever the dog with the bone, latched on fiercely and began to flip tables and root out Andy and his victims, spreading the word far and wide that Andy was indeed Jordan Wood who was indeed Victoria Bitter, connecting it all together and catching the attention of "wankers" (people who love online drama).

Andy pleads with Jeanine to stop and paypals her $100, promising to paying her $50/month until he has paid her $1000 to compensate her for the funds she lost in the Bit of Earth days. Andy never sends another dime, and Jeanine had no interest in stopping

Jeanine didn't stop Andy's antics, they just drove them further underground and out of public light, also perfectly painted him as a martyr to his followers. Information about his activities become spotty and are mostly seen when someone new he has abused escapes his grasp and reports back on what they have gone through the preceding years

We see time and time again Andy making the same moves, convincing his closest followers that everyone in their lives are abusive, isolating them. Making conventions, relying on the funds and generosity of others

In late 2010 he even moves in with another woman who was living with her husband (her ex husband for all intents and purposes but still). But unlike Abbey and her husband, things didn't end amicably. The woman's name was Brittany Quinn and on May 7 2011, Brittany's former husband would come home and decide to kill Brittany and a roommate of theirs. Andy somehow only was shot in the ankle before the husband would take his own life.

This sounds exactly like the kind of tragic backstory Andy would make, how he was the lucky survivor. If it weren't for the very real news reports it would be very easy to believe that to be the case. But this was a real tragedy. One that Andy would turn around and use to his own advantage. Nine days after this event Andy would post in the facebook fan club, a eulogy for Brittany. Ending with:

Brittany had her heart set on the New Zealand trek. … She used to say without really joking at all that she'd do it over her own dead body if need be. And so I will. - Andy (Via the Tea Blogger)

Andy would spin a narrative of Brittany's husband being abusive and that her death had been the culmination of a domestic violence situation. He would use this as a rallying cry, claiming to want to help those trying to escape from domestic violence, making a charity called "It's About Power'. We don't know if Brittany's husband had actually been abusive or not but Andy wears this new identity as an advocate with pride

Over the years he's had many pit stops in other fandoms including: Glee, the MCU, Supernatural and Critical Roll. Last news we have is that he has moved back to LA and is trying to get into film as a costume designer. And people still seem to be regularly coming out of the woodwork to share their experiences with him

The last big one I saw was when he befriended some people in LA who knew some of the CR cast, convinced them to let him stay with them for a week as he was moving from Virginia and needed time to find a job and a place. They agreed, only for a friend to connect the dots and recognize who he really was (as he had not told them about his past) and for them to realize that he did all this in an effort to get close to the CR cast

My fiance also reminded me today about how he was constantly bragging about being a gourmet chef but didn't know how to boil eggs, and he also put together a menu for a Critical Role themed dinner he wanted to host at my house (so I could invite the CR cast, naturally) that involved menu items like guinea pigs and peacocks. My dear friend [redacted] who is actually a fucking incredible high end chef laughed out loud when he saw the menu, thinking it was a joke, and he and Andy had a heated conversation about it where Andy genuinely suggested we go hunt peacocks in Beverly Hills and buy guinea pigs from pet stores to make into meat. IT WAS SO FUCKING WEIRD. He had seen some of [the chef's] previous rather exotic menus and needed to one up the other men, as usual. - Member of the "Critical Roll" Household

Patterns

There have been numerous times over the years where Andy has come out saying that he has changed, that he is getting help and decrying his previous behaviour. He's a good writer and makes it seem like he really is taking accountability for his actions, but in every case so far, it would turn out that nothing had changed at all

In an AMA Abbey did in 2014 she answered a lot of questions about the very nature of Andy and if she thought he would ever stop

Does he believe his own lies? Has he always been like this?

I do not think he has ever believed his stories/lies.

I feel fairly certain he's a compulsive liar. I don't know if it's something inborn, or just being so steeped in deception that he has no control. A less hilarious Cartman-with-self-induced-Tourette's, so to speak. I do know that he's done it since childhood, though. - Abbey

From his parents. And he lied like compulsive liars do - about everything, for no logical reason. One example I remember was that he would lie about what he had for a meal, even though his parents knew full well what he had eaten. But on a major scale. - Abbey

All the reports I've heard from people who knew him growing up (parents, friends of the family, former classmates) say he was "off" even then. He lied constantly, created drama and was sneaky and manipulative. As far back as anyone has ever talked about him. - Abbey

Would he ever be content with a normal life?

No way he wants a "normal" life with a job and bills to pay and people he has to answer to. He's happiest either supported by people so he's comfortable and extravagant, or when he's dirt poor and scrounging - Abbey

Who he targets

Certain factors are pretty consistent with his victims, and immaturity is across the board. You have to be immature enough to accept his reinterpretation of reality. The world simply does not work the way he claims it does - no matter how convincing he is. And he excels at whipping up that youthful crusader "I know better" passion. He's also good at playing people who lack emotional maturity - people prone to being "oversensitive" or "overdramatic." A lot of us have ADHD too, which makes it that much easier to overwhelm you and keep you too busy to keep *his* story straight. - Abbey

Does the negative attention bother him at all? Does he pay attention to it?

Depends. When it was everywhere and unavoidable he read every scrap of it and then used it on Diamond and I. Pointed out anything that was wrong or a lie and used it as "proof" that he was telling the truth (even when he wasn't - ESPECIALLY when he wasn't). He'd sometimes use it as a threat - look what's out there waiting like wolves in the woods for you - or as woobie fuel (oh poor me, so persecuted...). But I've never seen him actually bothered by it - not sincerely. Just using it as he uses damn near everything. It's pretty chilling to witness when you're not drunk on Kool-Aid. - Abbey

And while Andy's antics have been extensively reported on, there's still a lot that hasn't. Survivors tend to reach out to Abbey and only a small percentage choose to tell their story publicly or with all the details

There's a lot of really, really dark stuff that isn't public. The sexual stuff - some abusive, some just really twisted. The worst of the abuse is hidden away because it's all too personal for anyone to talk about. I barely have, and I'm public as hell. Tell the worst, most intimate abuse and *Andy will recognize who you are* which is something a lot of people are not okay with. Think about that for a minute - he abuses so consistently that people can tell a LOT about how what they went through with him - and be anonymous enough that even ANDY isn't sure of which of his victims is speaking up?? - Abbey

How to Spot Andy

So how do you spot Andy?

Andy appears to be continuing his long cycle of latching onto a character/person and diving deep into that obsession.

The whole reason that Andy got into LoTR is because he was obsessed with a show called Sharpe that only ran one season, which starred Sean Bean. It was because of Sean Bean that he watched the first LoTR movie at which point his fixation would shift to Elijah Wood.

When Andy fixates on a person he begins to emulate their appearance, how they speak, acting like how he believes that person acts and even donning accents (he had a "English" accent through much of LoTR era, which seemed to be because Frodo had a vaguely English accent). He will references events that have happened to the person as if they happened to him and he will latch on to anything that the person says they like or dislike

Here is Andy through the years

Harry Potter

During his Harry Potter era Andy would claim to have a lightning scar on his forehead and would claim to look just like Harry

Critical Role - Taliesan Jaffe/Mollymauk

And these posts are always like "lol look I accidentally dressed like my favorite thing, how silly of me!"

I want to be clear that none of this by itself is a problem. It's natural to gravitate towards things we like that bring us joy.

What is an issue is how historically, Andy's first steps into a fandom are typically to begin taking on the traits of whoever he's latched onto. He then uses this to bolster his claims of knowing these characters better then anyone, slowly leaning in to how much he's just like those characters, to claiming to be those people and using that to take advantage, of often much younger fans

We don't know what Andy is doing right now, if he is worming his way into another fandom or if he's still deep in Critical Roll. His twitter has been made private so the news creek has shrunk to the occasional drop of water. One of the last things he publicly shared was from Nov 20 2024

He shared a playbook on how to convert MAGAs to more progressive ways of thought.

Conclusion

There are dozens of blogs keeping tabs on Andy and his movements and recently one of my favorite Youtubers, Strange Aeons has done two episodes talking about Andy, the first one covers the Lord of the Rings era so much of what we talked about today, but in much greater detail. The second one talks about his time in the Harry Potter fandom, the tragic death of Brittany Quinn and much much more, I highly recommend it if you want to know more about this situation

One of the best resources I found was the Tea Blogger, a tumblr blog that has been reporting on Andy's movements for years at this point, they keep extensive records and citations on everything they post and approach everything with an even temperament and objectivity

in 2017 they also took a trip to the site of Project Elanor

There's something strangely poetic about the garden still existing, but nearly all LoTR related trappings have been removed. The Riggs Institute even rebranded it from "Elanor's Garden" and now is referred to as "Mary's Garden"

In a way it's like all that was Andy has been removed, leaving behind a garden growing wild and strong and finding a life of its own beyond his reach, like many of his survivors

Full Source List

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• https://kumquatwriter.tumblr.com/post/92268521113/what-do-you-think-of-jeanine-rennes-book 

• https://kumquatwriter.wordpress.com/2011/08/18/book-of-days/ 

• https://kumquatwriter.tumblr.com/post/92550156558/one-thing-i-see-mentioned-a-lot-in-blogs-by-andy 

• https://kumquatwriter.wordpress.com/2011/09/14/why-i-dont-believe-in-god-part-4/ 
• https://theteablogger.tumblr.com/post/111965921252/andy-blake-a-timeline-part-ii 
• https://kumquatwriter.wordpress.com/2011/10/12/why-i-dont-believe-in-god-part-5/ 
• https://kumquatwriter.wordpress.com/2011/11/28/a-moot-point-part-1/ 
• https://kqcrazytrain.wordpress.com/2011/11/26/a-letter-to-the-daydians-my-life-with-andrew-blake-laid-bare/ 
• https://kumquatwriter.tumblr.com/post/92508804348/ciyarra-the-child-prostitute/ 
• https://kqcrazytrain.wordpress.com/2013/04/07/ten-years-later-2/ 
• https://kumquatwriter.tumblr.com/post/91159028958/theres-a-picture-of-you-as-jordan-from-the/ 
• https://kumquatwriter.wordpress.com/2013/06/25/all-the-rage/
• https://kqcrazytrain.wordpress.com/2011/12/04/a-moot-point-part-2/
• https://kumquatwriter.wordpress.com/2011/11/01/its-actually-quite-easy-being-green/
• https://theteablogger.tumblr.com/post/119234546457/impostor

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/February_2007_North_American_blizzard

• https://kumquatwriter.wordpress.com/2011/11/08/operation-catch-and-release-part-2/
• https://web.archive.org/web/20141015100356/http:/kumquatwriter.livejournal.com/45780.html
• https://kumquatwriter.livejournal.com/12073.html 
• https://kqcrazytrain.wordpress.com/2014/07/04/the-cult-test-questions-1-10/
• https://kqcrazytrain.wordpress.com/2013/03/06/paper-cages/
• https://kqcrazytrain.wordpress.com/2011/08/31/a-little-birdy-told-me/
• https://kqcrazytrain.wordpress.com/2011/11/06/questions-from-a-daydian/
• https://kumquatwriter.wordpress.com/2013/04/09/sme-things-need-to-be-shared/
• https://theteablogger.tumblr.com/post/114962566362/andy-blake-a-timeline-part-iii
• https://kumquatwriter.tumblr.com/post/82102497384/looking-at-the-timeline-of-things-you-guys-moved
• https://theteablogger.tumblr.com/important
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-jXeAYq_pj4