I’m a Catfish Victim – But It’s Not What You Think

Normally writing a blog post is an easy and natural process because an idea just pops into my head, I jot it down, and away we go.  Today’s is different.  Today’s blog post is a topic I have been conserved writing about for a while but I have been cautious because it is a personal topic but also the dark side of putting your life out on the Internet.    Bottom line;  people on the internet are pretending to be me to get money.    When I say people, I meant that in the plural as this is not the first time this has happened.   Let me explain:

The first time started off with some emails to my blog email:

I knew exactly which photo he was talking about.  I posted it a year and a half ago after my friend’s Charleston wedding on Instagram and then later here on the blog  from the porch of the Magnolia planation – this one:

I was shocked and dug in to find out more.  It turns out this girl was using my photos pretending to be someone named Dierdre but told men like Eddie that she was 48. Rude.  And it was not actually the photo of me in Charleston that got her caught in the lie,  “The long green dress was the one I found to be a standout. I noticed, I guess, because I do some photo shoots, modeling, commercials, etc. That photo to me was rather exquisite. I continued to comment on it, all of the time I’m thinking (upon her insistence that she is 48). I made many comments on that photo. Once I had it analyzed and I found you and the blog, I asked I got the first lie.”   The long green dress?  That’s this one.  And after being confronted by Eddie, the girl said she was actually me but got a couple of key – and easily verifiable facts wrong – she said she was living in South Africa, not London, and was from Albany originally.  

It all became much clearer though when Eddie reached out to ask me if I had an accident.  She used pictures from 2012 and 2014 knee surgeries (here) to try and extort money from him saying she needed to pay for surgery and things.  I contacted E-Harmony with all of the details Eddie had given me to get the profile taken down but it was already removed by the time I heard back from them. 

And that was the end of that.  Until it wasn’t.

If we have chatted in real life I have likely shown you some of the sketchy messages I have received on Instagram – they are very varied from people wanting signed photographs (laughs) to wanting to be a sugar Daddy.  But the reason I still check them is sometimes brands want to collaborate or friends from growing up want to connected nearly 20 years later.  Well in February I got this message:

My first thought was ugh, no, not again.  And it baffled me that my reaction was not rage or shock but annoyance.  Is that what 2019 really is?  Acceptance with this kind of thing happening – it shouldn’t be and one of the reasons I am writing this today.

Again, I reached back out to this gentleman to find out more.  He had already requested that CMB (Coffee Meets Bagel) take down the profile and shared that “Guys in my age group get hit on by scammers almost weekly. They are usually easy to spot at first greeting but this one was a bit craftier.”  And he also commented on other photos of mine to let me know exactly which ones she was stealing.   Fast forward and that profile is taken down now too but to be honest, it makes me question sharing things about myself on the Internet. 

And then it happened for a third time two weeks ago with the following message, “Hey hun, im concerned because my father in law is chatting to a woman online and I believe she is fake and she is using your photos and saying her name is Kelly. We are in New Zealand and she is saying she lives here. He’s a lovely man just looking for love so I’d really appreciate it if you could confirm for me that it’s definitely not you talking to him so he can move on.”  I screenshoted the message and posted it to my Instastories, with all relevant details erased, and 96% of you requested a blog post explaining – well here it is. 

I have uploaded more then 10,000 photos in my six and a half years of blogging (granted I am not in all of them) and I also have a public Instagram –  is there any way to stop this from happening besides stop sharing things about me?   And if there are two people who have pretended to be me that I know about, what is the real number?