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Infamous: Chad Johnson Part 1 · The Ben and Ashley I Almost Famous Podcast

0:00
Speaker 1: Ben Higgins and Ashley I bring you Infamous. Sometimes roses
0:05
Speaker 1: are red flags.
0:07
Speaker 2: Welcome to Infamous, because sometimes roses are red flags. This
0:11
Speaker 2: is Bob Guiney and I am taken over for Ben
0:13
Speaker 2: and Ashley today as our story continues with Chad Johnson.
0:16
Speaker 2: Now you know him from JoJo's season and Chad, I'm excited.
0:20
Speaker 1: This off to you. Man, Welcome to the podcast. Thanks
0:21
Speaker 1: for joining us.
0:22
Speaker 3: Yeah, thanks for having me. Bob.
0:24
Speaker 1: Of course, where are you at right now? Where you live?
0:26
Speaker 4: So I'm actually in Oklahoma at the moment, kind of
0:29
Speaker 4: in a middle ground. I just moved out of Huntington Beach.
0:32
Speaker 4: I've been there a couple of years, and then I'm
0:34
Speaker 4: moving to Florida. But once I got here over Christmas break,
0:38
Speaker 4: I saw a family and I was like, all right,
0:40
Speaker 4: I'll stay for a little bit.
0:41
Speaker 1: So yeah, yeah, I get it, man, I get it.
0:43
Speaker 2: You're home and hard to leave once you start seeing
0:46
Speaker 2: everybody that you know and love, you know.
0:48
Speaker 3: Yeah, I know. So kind of in that middle grad.
0:51
Speaker 1: Yeah, no, I got you.
0:52
Speaker 2: So, hey, tell me about your So how did you
0:54
Speaker 2: end up on the show in the first place, because
0:56
Speaker 2: you were obviously from JoJo's season and was it one
0:59
Speaker 2: of those things where like you knew she was going
1:01
Speaker 2: to be on the show, and you're like, I got
1:03
Speaker 2: a meet her, or and if you've talked about this
1:04
Speaker 2: in the past, I apologize, but I just want to
1:06
Speaker 2: give context.
1:08
Speaker 3: Honestly.
1:09
Speaker 4: You know, I had done some acting and modeling and
1:11
Speaker 4: stuff in the past years before, and so people knew
1:15
Speaker 4: that friends around me, and I had a friend just
1:18
Speaker 4: send me a link to it on Facebook. Yeah, and
1:21
Speaker 4: they were like, you know, you should go try this,
1:23
Speaker 4: And I didn't even consider it. I had no idea
1:26
Speaker 4: what I was doing in life. You know, I wasn't
1:28
Speaker 4: really looking to get married or anything. I never even
1:31
Speaker 4: I had no idea who Jojo or any of these
1:33
Speaker 4: people were, right. So I just signed up or I
1:37
Speaker 4: didn't sign up. I actually just drove out to an audition.
1:40
Speaker 4: There was a couple hours from me, and turns out
1:44
Speaker 4: I actually went to the one that was the girls casting.
1:46
Speaker 3: I didn't even know, and so you.
1:49
Speaker 4: Know, they went ahead and did my interview and we're like,
1:51
Speaker 4: you know, we'll call you in six months, and I
1:53
Speaker 4: was like, yeah, right, you know, so yeah, six months
1:56
Speaker 4: rolled around though, and they actually called me, and you know,
1:59
Speaker 4: then I had to figure out, Wait, what the hell
2:00
Speaker 4: am I doing?
2:01
Speaker 1: Yeah, no, I hear well.
2:03
Speaker 2: I mean I remember I remember you from that season,
2:05
Speaker 2: like episode one, because you you were jacked.
2:07
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm sure you're still in great shakes. I
2:09
Speaker 1: know fitness has always.
2:10
Speaker 2: Been a big part of your life, but I remember
2:12
Speaker 2: you coming on that show and it was just like,
2:13
Speaker 2: you know, you were like the bizarro world me like
2:17
Speaker 2: what I thought I looked like in the mirror.
2:18
Speaker 4: You know, it was actually one hundred pounds and six
2:21
Speaker 4: foot two. People don't realize it's a camera trick. Like
2:24
Speaker 4: I literally did research before coming on the show. Should
2:27
Speaker 4: I come, Like is it better to be thinner on
2:29
Speaker 4: camera or bigger?
2:30
Speaker 3: Yeah?
2:31
Speaker 4: So I shed like thirty pounds and just half the
2:34
Speaker 4: size of the other guys. But it was an optical
2:36
Speaker 4: illusion just by being so ripped, and it made me
2:38
Speaker 4: look like look like, yeah.
2:40
Speaker 1: No, you were definitely jack.
2:42
Speaker 2: Part of me sometimes wonders too, you know, I mean
2:44
Speaker 2: you come onto the show and I mean, obviously in
2:47
Speaker 2: hot with hindsight being what it is, right, you have
2:49
Speaker 2: a chance to look back and see how you were
2:51
Speaker 2: portrayed on the show. But you know, it was almost
2:53
Speaker 2: like from the very beginning that you were kind of
2:55
Speaker 2: came in and you were like the villain or the
2:58
Speaker 2: antagonist of the season.
3:00
Speaker 1: And I mean, did you think that that was.
3:01
Speaker 2: Something that you know that the producers created or is
3:05
Speaker 2: that something that like, did you really feel like you
3:07
Speaker 2: just didn't wait vibe with these guys at all?
3:09
Speaker 4: Honestly that I tried to be myself at first, but like,
3:14
Speaker 4: so here's the thing, I'm very hard on myself. Like
3:17
Speaker 4: anything that any of the bad jokes you've heard me
3:19
Speaker 4: tell on TV, I say on a daily basis a
3:22
Speaker 4: thousand times worse to myself. Right, I came in trying
3:26
Speaker 4: to be actually myself, and I made like one of
3:29
Speaker 4: these bad jokes, and then it turned into where now
3:33
Speaker 4: I'm being attacked.
3:34
Speaker 3: And so what I.
3:35
Speaker 4: Did was I had throughout the years of my life
3:37
Speaker 4: I'm kind of I'm not like super confident when I
3:40
Speaker 4: got on and talked to people, I'm kind of shy.
3:43
Speaker 4: So I created this alternate persona of this like asshole, cocky.
3:47
Speaker 3: Kind of guy. Yeah, And when.
3:50
Speaker 4: I started getting attacked, I just pulled out my safety mechanism,
3:54
Speaker 4: which was that cocky, confident, like asshole, joking guy. And
3:59
Speaker 4: that's where and you know, everybody just kept playing into
4:02
Speaker 4: it and I didn't. It was at a certain point
4:04
Speaker 4: where I was playing the character so much that I
4:05
Speaker 4: was like, I didn't know when to stop it, right, yeah.
4:08
Speaker 2: Yeah.
4:09
Speaker 4: And once you're locked into that, you know, the producers
4:11
Speaker 4: wanted more of that, and they you know, they thought
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Speaker 4: that's who I was, and I'm like, no, I kind
4:16
Speaker 4: of want I want to go.
4:16
Speaker 3: Back to like the real me.
4:18
Speaker 4: Yeah yeah, but now all these situations are happening because
4:21
Speaker 4: I used my like safety mechanism character that I built
4:24
Speaker 4: and so hard to explain, like you know, you would
4:28
Speaker 4: probably like a ten minute explanation on camera for me
4:30
Speaker 4: to be like, hold on, everyone, sit down.
4:32
Speaker 3: I got to explain it. Well.
4:35
Speaker 2: Plus I'm sure too, you know, you get to a
4:37
Speaker 2: point too in those moments, not to justify anything, but
4:40
Speaker 2: I do understand that because I mean, I have a
4:42
Speaker 2: buddy of mine who was actually on my season with Trista,
4:46
Speaker 2: who you know, he suffered from anxiety so bad that
4:48
Speaker 2: he kind of put up a lot of walls too
4:50
Speaker 2: to protect himself, and you know, he went to a
4:53
Speaker 2: little more of a like a more of a quieter
4:55
Speaker 2: place when he's actually more out there and and the
4:57
Speaker 2: reaction can be whatever it is, but it's like, you know,
4:59
Speaker 2: in that moment, but now you're kind of bought into it,
5:01
Speaker 2: and like you said, the producers are like, no, no,
5:03
Speaker 2: you're doing great, keep it up.
5:04
Speaker 1: You know.
5:04
Speaker 2: So were they encouraging you to kind of be confrontational
5:07
Speaker 2: with people?
5:08
Speaker 4: Oh yeah, well, I mean they would set the things
5:10
Speaker 4: up where it was like, you know, hey, this guy's
5:13
Speaker 4: saying something and I'm like, I know, but I'm really
5:15
Speaker 4: here to just like I want to go back to
5:17
Speaker 4: be me. Can I just like talk to me? And
5:20
Speaker 4: they were like you need to confront him, and I'm like, man,
5:23
Speaker 4: and then I'm you know, I'm because I'm super shy.
5:25
Speaker 4: So I'd be back there like sweating, like I don't
5:27
Speaker 4: want to do this. I don't want to do this,
5:29
Speaker 4: like all right, and I'd be like okay, and I
5:31
Speaker 4: turn it on and be like all right, let's go
5:33
Speaker 4: and then just go play that character again. And honestly,
5:37
Speaker 4: it screwed me up for a lot of years because
5:40
Speaker 4: once I started playing it, that was my weekend fun
5:42
Speaker 4: character for going out with my friends occasionally and make
5:46
Speaker 4: a joke so or like you know, again protecting myself
5:49
Speaker 4: and sure by playing it on the show and that happening,
5:52
Speaker 4: I got stuck in that loop for like nearly a decade.
5:55
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, you know it's funny.
5:57
Speaker 2: I mean, you kind of came on the show that
6:00
Speaker 2: was really when social media really started to blow up, right,
6:02
Speaker 2: So it was kind of like and I can see that,
6:05
Speaker 2: you know, I could see that being something that you know,
6:07
Speaker 2: you're you're kind of protecting yourself to a certain degree.
6:09
Speaker 2: I'm sure a couple of the guys jumped on the
6:11
Speaker 2: bandwagon pretty quickly, which fires you up even more because
6:14
Speaker 2: now you're.
6:14
Speaker 1: Like, Okay, well, if we're doing this, I guess we're
6:16
Speaker 1: doing this right.
6:16
Speaker 2: Because I've I'm sure I've been in those in those
6:18
Speaker 2: moods of those moments myself, you know.
6:21
Speaker 1: And then you got to start wandering back.
6:22
Speaker 2: Like when you look back, I bet you were probably
6:24
Speaker 2: feeling kind of a little bit manipulated by the producers
6:26
Speaker 2: because they were they were pushing your buttons to get
6:28
Speaker 2: you ramped up to that point and all you're doing
6:31
Speaker 2: is just delivering, right, and you you don't even know, Hey,
6:33
Speaker 2: maybe this is gonna be good TV. Maybe I'm gonna
6:35
Speaker 2: be you know, they're gonna think it's funny, you know,
6:36
Speaker 2: I'm sure to a certain degree, especially in the beginning.
6:39
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean, you know, once once you start playing
6:42
Speaker 4: the character and kind of given what they want and
6:44
Speaker 4: they're pushing for more of it, you just kind of
6:46
Speaker 4: keep giving it to them, and it gets to a
6:48
Speaker 4: certain point.
6:49
Speaker 3: Where you really don't know, you know.
6:51
Speaker 4: I mean for me, I almost thought of it as
6:53
Speaker 4: I was like method acting, you know, and I got
6:55
Speaker 4: caught into it for years because yeah, they you know,
7:00
Speaker 4: they wanted it, that's what was working, that's what people
7:03
Speaker 4: seem to like. And so especially with social media and
7:06
Speaker 4: all that stuff. Now I'm playing the character offscreen. Now
7:09
Speaker 4: I'm being my own friends and family, and you it
7:13
Speaker 4: really I'll be honest, like it kind of screwed me
7:15
Speaker 4: up for a while.
7:16
Speaker 2: Now, That's how I was going to say, you know,
7:17
Speaker 2: I mean, social media really kind of creates that thing
7:20
Speaker 2: that's bigger than life, right, and it keeps going.
7:22
Speaker 1: So I could see I'm sure, you know, I could see.
7:24
Speaker 2: You coming off of that show, especially if what you
7:27
Speaker 2: were doing was more, you know, a defense mechanism, and
7:30
Speaker 2: you come off that show and you're probably having a
7:32
Speaker 2: rough time figuring out where your head's at and then
7:34
Speaker 2: all of a sudden, everyone starts piling on and here again,
7:37
Speaker 2: you got you got a choice, right, either you you
7:40
Speaker 2: curl up or.
7:42
Speaker 4: You know, I was even mean to Ben, And I
7:43
Speaker 4: don't think I really was Ashley, but you know, I
7:45
Speaker 4: had talked to him on tweets and stuff, but it
7:48
Speaker 4: was a certain point, Like so I went on the
7:50
Speaker 4: show originally, like, you know, the reason I went and
7:52
Speaker 4: did the audition and stuff was because my mom had
7:55
Speaker 4: just passed and I'd always told my mom was going
7:57
Speaker 4: to be successful. So it was real a way for
8:00
Speaker 4: me to just to make something of myself to show
8:03
Speaker 4: my mom. So in a way, when when they're attacking me,
8:06
Speaker 4: they're attacking my character, but they're also attacking my goal
8:10
Speaker 4: to show my mom. So it's like you're you're stopping
8:12
Speaker 4: me from doing something that I'm here to do.
8:14
Speaker 3: For my mom.
8:15
Speaker 1: Yeah.
8:16
Speaker 4: Yeah, just I guess after everything, you know, it just
8:22
Speaker 4: it just seemed like.
8:24
Speaker 3: I don't know, I kind of lost that thing of
8:26
Speaker 3: the mom things for a second.
8:27
Speaker 2: Nah.
8:27
Speaker 1: No, I get you, dude, I might believe me. I
8:29
Speaker 1: lost my dad a few years ago, and I understand it.
8:31
Speaker 4: But but I guess my point was social media you know,
8:34
Speaker 4: I was trying to do that goal for my mom,
8:36
Speaker 4: and when it came to social media after the show,
8:39
Speaker 4: I continue to play the character because what it's what
8:41
Speaker 4: I knew was seemingly going to get me to the
8:44
Speaker 4: point because I'm now I'm locked into that character and
8:47
Speaker 4: the only thing that's going to get me to the
8:48
Speaker 4: goal of success. But it seems like whether that shows
8:51
Speaker 4: or anything, you know, just buying able to buy a
8:55
Speaker 4: house for myself for my dog was going to be
8:57
Speaker 4: to continue playing that character, and so I had to
8:59
Speaker 4: keep doing it because it's the only thing that I
9:01
Speaker 4: knew that was benefiting my life. And anytime I started
9:05
Speaker 4: being good and being quiet and being regular talking about
9:08
Speaker 4: normal things or God or being good or doing nice things,
9:11
Speaker 4: no one cared at all. I'd get like three likes
9:13
Speaker 4: on Twitter. So I was like, okay, so being me
9:16
Speaker 4: isn't what is going to get me to my goal. Ultimately,
9:19
Speaker 4: this is an end to mean to an ends.
9:22
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9:32
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9:34
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9:38
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9:43
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9:47
Speaker 6: buttery soft, super flattering and very comfortable, but they're also
9:52
Speaker 6: very supportive in the right places. So I started wearing
9:56
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9:58
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10:02
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10:06
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10:10
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10:38
Speaker 2: You know what, I'm sure when you say stuff like that,
10:40
Speaker 2: you probably got people going, hey, man, that's a cop out,
10:42
Speaker 2: you know you, that's not what you were really going
10:44
Speaker 2: through because they think they know you for how you
10:46
Speaker 2: were portrayed on television, you know, when in fact, you're
10:50
Speaker 2: trying to be real with somebody and say this is
10:51
Speaker 2: how I was really feeling at that time. Now I
10:54
Speaker 2: know too, Like a lot of the situations on the
10:55
Speaker 2: show too. You know, it is a television show, it
10:59
Speaker 2: is produced. We all know that, right. So one of
11:01
Speaker 2: the scenes I remember on the show that set out
11:03
Speaker 2: was they brought security in.
11:04
Speaker 1: Right because they were saying they were really worried, worried
11:06
Speaker 1: about everyone's well being. Did you think that was warranted?
11:10
Speaker 2: Was it something that was set up ahead of time
11:12
Speaker 2: or was it one of those things where you know.
11:14
Speaker 4: That that to me, I mean they came in and
11:16
Speaker 4: told me, you know, they're like, hey, we're going to
11:18
Speaker 4: give you the security guard, like you know, and and
11:20
Speaker 4: and the thing is, every time there was almost a
11:23
Speaker 4: like they thought there was going to be a confrontation.
11:25
Speaker 4: They'd be like, hey, you're not going to actually hit anyone, right,
11:27
Speaker 4: And I'm like, no, you think I want to hit
11:29
Speaker 4: any one? I literally would happen like I'd literally be like,
11:31
Speaker 4: I'll give you, and then I'd walk into the like
11:33
Speaker 4: closed door behind the talk with him and I'm like,
11:37
Speaker 4: oh my god, dude, like you know, and they're like like,
11:40
Speaker 4: you're you're gonna hit him. I'm like no, no, God,
11:42
Speaker 4: Like I don't want to. I don't even want to
11:43
Speaker 4: be involved in that, I'm like I can yeah. Stop,
11:46
Speaker 4: I'm like, but now I'm in it. And if I
11:48
Speaker 4: walk out the door and I'm like, hey sorry, man,
11:51
Speaker 4: it's going to be very confusing for everyone. So yeah,
11:56
Speaker 4: so I think you know, they they in a way
11:58
Speaker 4: like they were like, are you going to hit him?
11:59
Speaker 4: But I told him a million times I was like, no,
12:01
Speaker 4: you know, I'm not going to hit anybody, Like, yeah,
12:03
Speaker 4: hit somebody, I'm going to go home from the show,
12:05
Speaker 4: and that would run like everything. So you know, if
12:08
Speaker 4: they hit me, fantastic, then they go home. That eliminates one.
12:11
Speaker 4: And I'm closer to.
12:11
Speaker 2: The end right right, So you were thinking about the
12:15
Speaker 2: games and the ship was still at play.
12:17
Speaker 3: I get it.
12:17
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean that was my ultimate go I would
12:19
Speaker 4: have don anything. I would have let ten guys start
12:20
Speaker 4: punching me in the face if that's what I meant
12:22
Speaker 4: in order to get to where I needed to be
12:23
Speaker 4: in order to achieve my goal.
12:25
Speaker 2: Well, and I mean you kept getting a rose right
12:26
Speaker 2: for a few weeks there, you got roses and you
12:28
Speaker 2: stuck around, and so you know the behavior, I guess
12:31
Speaker 2: to a certain degree probably with the headspace you were
12:34
Speaker 2: in in that moment was was being rewarded, right, So
12:37
Speaker 2: you're thinking, Okay.
12:37
Speaker 4: What I did do was when any time I was
12:39
Speaker 4: with her, I completely shut that all off and went
12:41
Speaker 4: back to being myself. Yeah, that's why there were interviews
12:45
Speaker 4: of her where she was like, I'm super confused because like, right,
12:49
Speaker 4: he's like this, but he's seeming like he's like this.
12:51
Speaker 4: It's because when I talk to her, I just one
12:53
Speaker 4: percent cut out the character of the bull crap and
12:56
Speaker 4: tried to talk to her. But you know, unfortunately they
12:58
Speaker 4: didn't even really the character took over and they didn't
13:02
Speaker 4: even give me any time to really talk to her.
13:04
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, because I mean, yeah, there was talks about,
13:07
Speaker 2: you know, you being aggressive with the other guys. I
13:10
Speaker 2: think Evan shirt got ripped, you know, stuff like that,
13:14
Speaker 2: I mean, punching the door.
13:16
Speaker 1: You know, it's like that.
13:18
Speaker 2: I'm sure that a lot of those emotions probably are
13:21
Speaker 2: you know, maybe were how you were feeling in the moment.
13:24
Speaker 2: But you know, if you weren't kind of all jacked
13:26
Speaker 2: up to be this agro character on TV, you probably
13:28
Speaker 2: wouldn't have reacted in the same way.
13:30
Speaker 3: Right.
13:31
Speaker 4: No, not in real life, man. You know, people try
13:33
Speaker 4: to start stuff. I could care less like, yeah, but
13:38
Speaker 4: once once you realize that, you know, the cameras are
13:41
Speaker 4: now portraying you as this, it wouldn't like correlate.
13:45
Speaker 3: You know what I mean?
13:47
Speaker 4: Like you know, like if you if you see someone
13:49
Speaker 4: I don't know, if you see some guy driving a
13:54
Speaker 4: rolls Royce, but then he gets out he's wearing like
13:56
Speaker 4: clothes with clothes with like holes in him, Like.
13:59
Speaker 3: It doesn't make sense, you know what I mean?
14:01
Speaker 1: So yeah, it makes.
14:02
Speaker 4: Sense is the tough guy to then let these other
14:04
Speaker 4: people push him around. And so then I'm all twisted
14:08
Speaker 4: in the head because I'm half in character on half me,
14:11
Speaker 4: and I'm like, I don't know if one time they
14:13
Speaker 4: could come up to me and they're like, are you
14:15
Speaker 4: are you okay? Are you mad at this? Like you know,
14:17
Speaker 4: and I was like, I don't know if I'm mad
14:19
Speaker 4: or if I'm supposed to be mad, but I think
14:21
Speaker 4: the best move is to just be mad, like I'm
14:23
Speaker 4: gonna do angry things right now.
14:27
Speaker 3: Yeah.
14:28
Speaker 2: I mean, I could get it too it because it
14:29
Speaker 2: was a you know, you were still it was still
14:32
Speaker 2: earlier on in the reality TV.
14:34
Speaker 1: I mean, how many years ago was that for you?
14:36
Speaker 3: Oh man? Nine years?
14:38
Speaker 2: So almost Yeah, so so nine years ago, so it
14:40
Speaker 2: was still kind of early enough on the reality TV zeitgeist.
14:44
Speaker 2: I guess that, you know, you you could be kind
14:47
Speaker 2: of part of you at that time, I'm sure was
14:49
Speaker 2: playing into the the villain part of it too, right,
14:52
Speaker 2: Like you're you know, you're leaning into that because you're like, okay, well, hey,
14:55
Speaker 2: at least I'm at least I've got my own identity
14:57
Speaker 2: on this show. I'm this guy, right, And so you know,
15:00
Speaker 2: at that point in time, you don't know, you know,
15:02
Speaker 2: you don't know what's going to get you to your
15:04
Speaker 2: end game if you're you know, like if you weren't
15:06
Speaker 2: going on there specifically to find love, you were just
15:08
Speaker 2: going on there to you know, have some fun and
15:11
Speaker 2: show you show your mom that hey I can I
15:13
Speaker 2: can do this, you know, and doing it for her posterously.
15:15
Speaker 4: I could see I had the goal, but then I
15:17
Speaker 4: was over, like, you know, dating the girl and finding love.
15:20
Speaker 3: So I tried to open.
15:21
Speaker 4: On one side, but I also didn't want to let that.
15:23
Speaker 4: I didn't want to let one stop, you know, me
15:25
Speaker 4: from the other.
15:26
Speaker 2: That makes right and which goal was more important? You
15:29
Speaker 2: probably didn't know the answer to that either, right.
15:31
Speaker 4: Right, honestly, Yeah, that's why I was, like I was trying,
15:33
Speaker 4: like hoping, like give me time with her, like let
15:35
Speaker 4: me drop this goal for that goal, you know.
15:37
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I mean when you look back on it now,
15:40
Speaker 2: I mean obviously almost ten years ago now, when you
15:42
Speaker 2: look back on it, are there just you know a
15:45
Speaker 2: million things you wish you'd done differently, or do you
15:47
Speaker 2: kind of own it? And you know, I mean, I
15:50
Speaker 2: like with what you're saying right now, with it being
15:52
Speaker 2: a character and with your feeling like you were sort
15:54
Speaker 2: of just sort of playing into it. You know, if
15:56
Speaker 2: you ever had a chance to go back and see
15:58
Speaker 2: any of those guys and be like, hey man, I'm sorry,
16:01
Speaker 2: or talk to Jojo or anybody from that season producers
16:04
Speaker 2: or anything like that, where you've had a chance to
16:06
Speaker 2: actually say what you're saying now, I.
16:08
Speaker 3: Mean, I did the whole thing wrong, you know.
16:10
Speaker 4: I mean, yeah, sure, the camera's looked at me, But
16:12
Speaker 4: to be honest, it's it's super hard for me to
16:14
Speaker 4: look back because I'm not even that person at all anymore.
16:18
Speaker 4: I mean, you know, ten years ago, I can't even
16:21
Speaker 4: relate to that guy. So it's kind of almost even
16:23
Speaker 4: hard to like explain for him like the stuff that
16:27
Speaker 4: I did. But but but I do know that I
16:30
Speaker 4: would one hundred percent do it completely different. And you know,
16:33
Speaker 4: I hold no grudges towards anybody or any producers or anything,
16:36
Speaker 4: because everybody was just doing, you know, what they thought
16:39
Speaker 4: was right, you know at the time, Like I said,
16:43
Speaker 4: like myself, you know, I thought what I was doing.
16:45
Speaker 4: Everyone's just making what the decisions that they think are
16:48
Speaker 4: the best for them at that point in time.
16:50
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, have you ever but have you ever
16:52
Speaker 2: had a chance to talk to any of those guys
16:53
Speaker 2: or now, have you ever had.
16:54
Speaker 4: A chance to Yeah, quite a few of them, quite
16:57
Speaker 4: a few of the guys, you know, and they're always
16:59
Speaker 4: super cool now, you know.
17:00
Speaker 3: Yeah, even like right after the show.
17:02
Speaker 4: Aired, everybody was super cool to me, which was really
17:05
Speaker 4: weird because I'm like, why were you fighting? Like why
17:07
Speaker 4: were you starting stuff with me on camera?
17:10
Speaker 2: Yeah?
17:10
Speaker 3: You could have done this on.
17:12
Speaker 4: Like you joined in everyone else, man, Like why didn't
17:14
Speaker 4: you just talk like this? So it was really kind
17:17
Speaker 4: of because then I'm like, wait, was I acting or
17:19
Speaker 4: were you acting?
17:20
Speaker 3: You know what I mean?
17:22
Speaker 1: How about Jojo? Did you ever have a chance to
17:24
Speaker 1: talk to her at all? After the show.
17:26
Speaker 4: No, never, after the show, she kind of got sucked in.
17:30
Speaker 4: And I think, you know, I only got to have
17:32
Speaker 4: like one or two real conversations with her before she
17:35
Speaker 4: came across really scripted. Yeah, just like I I just
17:39
Speaker 4: having a regular conversation. I was like this, this is
17:43
Speaker 4: just a scene now, like we're just shooting a scene.
17:45
Speaker 4: So yeah, we kind of you know, and after the show,
17:48
Speaker 4: I was, you know, I didn't know what else to do.
17:51
Speaker 4: So obviously I was mean to them and attacking everybody
17:53
Speaker 4: and stuff, and I had no idea what I was doing.
17:55
Speaker 3: You know.
17:55
Speaker 2: It's interesting, I feel like, so, I mean, you know,
17:58
Speaker 2: I think we kind of had opposite experiences on the show.
18:01
Speaker 1: I was like the I was lucky to get a
18:04
Speaker 1: real good at it, I.
18:05
Speaker 2: Guess in that regard, and you know, and I and
18:08
Speaker 2: there was a different, obviously experience for you. And it's
18:10
Speaker 2: it's I wonder like a few years later, like when
18:12
Speaker 2: did it When did it hit you? When was it
18:14
Speaker 2: the moment where you were kind of like you woke
18:16
Speaker 2: up one day and you're just like, as I got
18:18
Speaker 2: to stop this thing, you know, or when did you
18:20
Speaker 2: see that you had.
18:21
Speaker 1: A way out?
18:22
Speaker 4: Honestly, like it was probably within the last year say
18:26
Speaker 4: I'd say, you know, I've you know, one of the
18:28
Speaker 4: things that you know, having been on the show and
18:30
Speaker 4: all has afforded me is the ability of time, so
18:33
Speaker 4: you know, not having to like go to work and stuff.
18:35
Speaker 4: So I've spent a lot of time soul searching, searching
18:38
Speaker 4: for God, going to church, doing all types of different things, meditation,
18:42
Speaker 4: and just literally changing who I am as a person.
18:46
Speaker 4: And you know, looking back on everything that I'd done
18:49
Speaker 4: and having to forgive myself for all the crazy, crazy
18:52
Speaker 4: different you know, not even just the things that I
18:54
Speaker 4: had done for my own you know, like reputation and
18:57
Speaker 4: things like that, but like the different ways I hurt
19:01
Speaker 4: people for no reason, just like through Twitter, and I
19:03
Speaker 4: used to just trash people for like to hope that
19:07
Speaker 4: maybe someone would write in an article about it, just
19:09
Speaker 4: because hopefully that would lead to something else, because I
19:11
Speaker 4: guess I was desperate at the time.
19:13
Speaker 3: Yeah, so I look back.
19:15
Speaker 4: Now and I'm just like, man, that was sad. Like
19:16
Speaker 4: you know, everyone else thinks it's like, oh, he's being
19:19
Speaker 4: a dick. Really it was just this like kind of
19:21
Speaker 4: like cry for help, looking for meaning in life. I
19:23
Speaker 4: had no meaning in life and I had no god,
19:26
Speaker 4: I had no nothing, and you know, eventually just kind
19:31
Speaker 4: of had to grow out of it and you know,
19:33
Speaker 4: find my own God. And it's not getting the press
19:36
Speaker 4: article or finding in this.
19:37
Speaker 2: Now, you know, there is a little vacuum that comes
19:40
Speaker 2: from that experience, you know, from being well to be,
19:43
Speaker 2: from being infamous in that moment, right, Like you know,
19:45
Speaker 2: for a period of time there you were this guy
19:47
Speaker 2: that was you know, he didn't care what anybody thought
19:50
Speaker 2: about him, right, and he's that guy.
19:51
Speaker 1: But you know, my mom has always had this thing
19:54
Speaker 1: that she said to me.
19:54
Speaker 2: For years, you know, and it was always like, you know,
19:56
Speaker 2: the guys who are making the most noise and pound
19:59
Speaker 2: of their chest most those are the ones that you
20:00
Speaker 2: gotta wonder. You know, that dude needs a hug, you know,
20:03
Speaker 2: And it's one of those moments. It's like, you know,
20:07
Speaker 2: I think of that situation a lot, like you know,
20:09
Speaker 2: when I think about the stuff you were probably going through,
20:11
Speaker 2: because I could see that, I could see the.
20:12
Speaker 1: Chicken or the egg happening like what happened first.
20:15
Speaker 2: And now you're almost like trying to keep up with
20:17
Speaker 2: what expectations are because the fame is better than the anonymity,
20:24
Speaker 2: I guess, then.
20:25
Speaker 4: Sitting in a quiet room in Oklahoma with no money
20:27
Speaker 4: and doing nothing with my life like I was doing
20:29
Speaker 4: you know years, right, you know, And yeah, that's a
20:32
Speaker 4: lot of the things too, not just getting just a
20:34
Speaker 4: bachelor of a bachelor in Paradise and all that stuff.
20:37
Speaker 3: You know.
20:37
Speaker 4: I I caused a lot of my problems with alcohol,
20:40
Speaker 4: like you know I was, and it wasn't an alcoholic
20:43
Speaker 4: I guess. There's different ways to explain it. But I
20:45
Speaker 4: would go on these vendors for ten years.
20:48
Speaker 3: You know what I mean.
20:49
Speaker 4: And I just recently got out of that and fully
20:52
Speaker 4: quit drinking.
20:53
Speaker 1: But yeah, well good for you. That's not an easy
20:56
Speaker 1: thing to do.
20:56
Speaker 3: I know that. Yeah it was.
20:57
Speaker 4: It's been very difficult off and on. And you think
21:00
Speaker 4: you're having fun and you think you're you know, when
21:02
Speaker 4: you're on TV you're making good TV or whatever, or
21:06
Speaker 4: you know, I'm on Twitter making some stupid Instagram story.
21:09
Speaker 4: It's just like you're just making an idiot of yourself.
21:11
Speaker 4: And yeah, you having fun at the time, you just
21:14
Speaker 4: have these three day long panic attacks afterwards, and then
21:16
Speaker 4: the minute you get better, you do it all over again.
21:19
Speaker 3: And I went in that cycle for now.
21:22
Speaker 4: I mean I was probably going through that, you know,
21:23
Speaker 4: for another ten years before the show, so it's really
21:25
Speaker 4: been about twenty yearsuntil I finally got out of it.
21:28
Speaker 1: Wow, that's that's a tough pattern to break.
21:31
Speaker 3: Man, it's a bad cycle.
21:32
Speaker 4: And while in the middle of yah, I'll tell you that,
21:34
Speaker 4: you know.
21:35
Speaker 2: Yeah, all right, Chad, I'm gonna stop you right there.
21:38
Speaker 1: We're gonna take a break.
21:40
Speaker 2: This has been part one of Infamous Sometimes Roses are
21:44
Speaker 2: Red Flags with Chad Johnson, and we will come back
21:48
Speaker 2: and get a little bit more into detail with part
21:50
Speaker 2: two in just a few days. Follow the Ben and
21:54
Speaker 2: Ashley I Almost Famous podcast on iHeartRadio or subscribe wherever
21:58
Speaker 2: you listen to podcasts.