Sexist Conservatorships & the Reward for a Lifetime of Loyalty

 

Love her or hate her, Wendy Williams' life story is a heartbreaking and enraging reminder of what women going through a hard time in America can face at the hands of those who supposedly love them.  After her husband and long-time business partner Kevin Hunter cheated very publicly with a younger woman, Wendy went down a serious spiral into alcoholism.  She'd previously overcome a crack addiction and went on to become a major force in daytime TV after alleging that Diddy had her fired from her radio show in 1998 for joking about his homosexuality.  She always spoke highly of her husband Kevin and their son Kevin, Jr. on her talk show.  They were the loves of her life, her pride & joy.  Even amidst the cheating rumors and tabloid photos of him with another woman, Wendy came to his defense on national TV.    

They were also her downfall.  While already dealing with the loss of her mother, her talk show and marriage, Kevin Jr. apparently told her he wanted to rent "a boat" for his graduation.  She gave him her credit card.  He rented a yacht.  This triggered her bank, Wells Fargo, to file for a conservatorship under the belief that she was being taken advantage of financially.  Which, to be fair, she was.  By this point, Wendy was in bad shape cognitively:  it was clear her speech was affected like someone who'd maybe had a stroke or something.  She put out a video claiming repeatedly that it "wasn't fair" and "wasn't right" that Wells Fargo had frozen her account.  But the worst was yet to come.

Showing signs of Thyroid Eye Disease and dementia in 2024

Eventually Wendy was placed in an old folks' home for people with dementia after being diagnosed with frontotemporal dementia (FTD)--the same disease Bruce Willis was diagnosed with in 2022.  FTD is a 100% progressive and fatal brain disease that tends to strike younger than Alzheimer's but follows a similar path of memory loss, personality change & eventual loss of all bodily functions.  A 2024 documentary Where Is Wendy Williams? showed what looked to be a person in the middle stages of this disease, with Wendy even exhibiting sundowning typical of many dementia diseases.  She briefly met with her son at the end for a moment (he showed up late and seemed annoyed with her the whole time, claiming she'd been diagnosed with alcohol-induced dementia, something I noted as contradictory and odd at the time). 

Overall, most fans found the whole thing exploitative and heartbreaking, assuming it was the last "production" we'd ever see Wendy appear in.  Her eyes were huge, she made no sense when she talked, lashed out randomly at people and had horrific lymphadema among other issues.  And she drank throughout the movie.  A LOT.  

But then she turned up on The Breakfast Club morning radio show sounding damn near like her old self.  And she kept making appearances and sounding like she'd improved, so much so that she was tested AGAIN for dementia and determined NOT to have FTD!  Indeed, while dementia patients may have moments of clarity amidst the fog, they don't go backwards and regain previously lost function.  Once those brain cells are dead, they don't regenerate.  So why tf is she still in a memory care home with 80 and 90 year olds and a frozen bank account?  Even if she's doing better because she's not drinking, isn't it her choice to destroy herself if she so chooses?  



Alcohol-Induced Dementia: A Under-Recognized Affliction

Alcohol + the brain = a deadly combo

Unlike FTD or other dementias, alcohol-induced dementia is not inherently progressive and fatal if the person stops drinking and gets nutritional support.  It may not be 100% reversible depending on several factors (duration of drinking, severity of neuron damage, age, etc) but it won't progress to death on its own without continued alcohol consumption. 

Alcohol impairs every function of the brain from reasoning and judgment to memory, language, personality & spatial understanding, making symptoms of this dementia hard to distinguish from other other types, especially in older people with multiple chronic illnesses like Wendy has.  But a history of alcohol abuse should serve as a major clue.  Thiamine (Vitamin B1) deficiency plays a large role in this condition; some professionals have even suggested adding the vitamin to beer and other alcoholic beverages as an easy solution to prevent the condition.  Because women metabolize alcohol less efficiently than men, we're more prone to developing this and other harmful outcomes of drinking than men consuming the same amount of alcohol. 

Apparently we're also more prone to being institutionalized for having public mental health/cognitive crises, as evidenced by the conservatorships of Britney Spears and Wendy Williams while maniacs like Shia Lebouf, Kanye West, Andy Dick, Ezra Miller, the Tate brothers, Charlie Sheen & Chris Brown repeatedly act unhinged, violent & mentally ill on the public stage & maintain control of their bank accounts/freedom.  The amount of drugs, sexual assault and arrests between these men dwarfs that of any list of female celebs you can throw together, yet her they are, selling out shows and living it up while we tear down Chili of TLC for her voting habits & Chappell Roan for maybe putting up a privacy boundary with a fan.

Wendy's mast err, guardian: Sabrina Morrissey

If prison is for poor people, conservatorships are for rich women surrounded by greedy opportunists who bleed them dry and then refuse to get off the gravy train when it goes off the tracks, as trains tend to do after decades of chugging along without rest  Apparently Lindsay Lohan came THISCLOSE to being put under one in her party days too, and it was the same lady that initiated Britney's who came up with the idea.  Like Wendy & Britney, Lindsay's family consists of unrepentant stage parents and greedy types whose main concern is getting at her money.

A Lesson for All Women

Domestic servitude in the 1950s.

The lesson here is one I've witnessed in my own life many times: you can devote your whole life to being loyal to a man and giving your kids everything only to be tossed aside like yesterday's leftovers when they get bored or you hit a rough patch & need support.  It's often the most loyal women who get trampled on the hardest--the ones who were actually codependent and put up with too much, enabling bad behavior under the guise of love, putting the "sanctity" of marriage or shame of divorce above their own dignity and happiness.  I have no idea where that misplaced loyalty/martyrdom complex comes from but it definitely missed me. 

It never ends well for these women for one reason: we teach people how to treat us, and once you've set the bar low it's almost impossible to raise it with those people in that situation, be it the home or work or wherever.  Low key users will subject you to household labor inequality or small things like "forgetting" anniversaries; the pros will cheat, lie, steal and abuse overtly as long as you stay.  These types will calculate how much mileage they can get out of someone before discarding them, which usually happens when the effort becomes greater than the reward, such as during menopause or a mental health crisis.  The antidote is for women to stop fearing loneliness and start embracing solitude.  Only then are you able to walk into relationships from a place of calm dignified openness rather than neediness.  "I want this, I don't need it energy."   

As for alcoholism, it does make people impossible to be around.  Constant mood swings and lashing out, erratic and embarrassing public behavior, loud sloppy puking-redfaced-yelling-crying-sweating-trembling-stumbling-passed out-forgetful-aggressive outbursts.  It frankly makes a person more insufferable than heroin or even meth in some cases.  There's nothing more wicked than an angry drunk's tongue; something I know because I am one.  Which is why I don't drink.  At all, ever.  I'm not drug-free but I know better than to fuck with substances that make me feel and behave WORSE because this is where it gets you: locked up, either in prison, a psych ward or a dementia home for the elderly.  It may take a while but eventually that's where it leads, either that or the morgue.  And you'll wreck a lot of good relationships and opportunities in the meantime.  

...so yeah, keep living those Tradlives that slowly steal your spirit, staying drunk to get through the day.  Spin it as social drinking, call yourself a "Wine Mom," joke about how your family "drives you to drinking".  But make no mistake:  you're incurring brain, liver and other organ damage with every glass.  The legal status of booze has no bearing on its risk to your health.  If you doubt this, just watch Where Is Wendy Williams? or look at her current reality.  (Can you even imagine if cannabis or any other drug had put her in this situation?  There is no other drug that causes literal dementia--only alcohol). 

Or perhaps you'll end up like Diane Schuler, villain of "There's Something Wrong With Aunt Diane" who killed herself, her daughter & 3 nieces as well as another innocent family while driving drunk one morning going the wrong way on the Taconic State Parkway.  (Diane was a hardworking overachiever with a bum husband who likely got mad at him on the camping trip that weekend and did what she did for revenge FWIW). Instead of just splitting up and getting the mental help she could easily afford, she took 8 lives to "teach him a lesson".  Or because she couldn't wait to get home and drink to the point of blackout.  Or whatever.  

The bottom line is, there's nothing heroic or admirable about putting yourself last and tolerating repeated blatant disrespect.  It's not a sign of strength or character but an unhealthy coping mechanism that will lead to others, like drinking to excess.   And yes, people can tell even if you're "functional" and working a full-time job.  It's obvious in the little slips of memory, the repetitive questions and slurred speech.  The sudden mood swings and bursts of anger that seem to come from nowhere.  The red eyes, the disheveled look by the end of the day, the way you have to hold onto others to steady yourself in photos.  That's not judgment, it's just real.  And shame on you if you drive in that condition.  That IS judgment because you have no right.

Just remember Wendy Williams' plight when you stay in that bad marriage or pour your next drink.  Your outcome could be even worse.

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2009 Taconic State Pkwy crash that killed 8