The Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast Episode #270 - Alana Stott

TRANSCRIPT

(Note: This is generated by AI with 98% accuracy. However, any errors may cause unintended changes in meaning.)

Melanie Avalon:
Friends, welcome back to the show. I am so incredibly excited and honored about the conversation I'm about to have. It is with a repeat guest who I specifically sought out for this episode for a few reasons, which you're about to hear. So I recently had, actually, yeah, it was pretty recent, at least in the trajectory of the show. Alana Stott on the show a few months ago for her memoir, She Who Dares, which was absolutely incredible and fascinating. And honestly, Alana is just one of the most inspiring women that I've met, and so it's such an honor to know her. So listeners, definitely check out that first episode. Trying to figure out how to go about this introduction. So basically, Alana does so many incredible things in life. She's raised millions of dollars for causes for mental health, for veterans, and especially for the fight against human trafficking. Okay, she was put on the King's Honors List 2023 for her work supporting vulnerable women and mental health awareness, which is so cool. She was also awarded the title of Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire, which just sounds so fancy. She's basically just done so much in this world for so many incredible causes. And like I said, we had her on for her memoir where we heard all about her story and everything that she's doing. But the reason I wanted to have her back today was for two reasons. One, at the time that I interviewed her last, I had not read her prior book, which is called How to Ask for Money. I love just how in your face and blunt the title is. I really selfishly wanted to read that because I'm constantly working on different projects. And one of the projects I'm working on right now is probably gonna require a lot of fundraising. And I just don't have those skills. Like it's just so foreign to me. And so the concept of this book was great. I was like, I have to have her back on for that. And then second reason, a lot of you probably know because I've been running in the past ads on this show for it. I actually in 2020, I don't even know now, 2021 or 2022, probably 2022, I had an instance of sexual battery slash assault from a massage therapist. And that was the whole really revealing and interesting experience for me to go through. And I learned so much from it. And talking about it openly, because when I've been talking about it on the show, I hadn't told about how it ended because it's been drawn out for so long. But just talking about that experience, I've been receiving so much feedback from listeners and in particular from women who said they had gone through similar things. And a lot of them were saying that they were too scared to actually ever tell anybody about it. And I was really inspired learning about the stats about it and spreading more awareness. And that case finally came to a close, yes, it would have been 2022 originally, finally came to a close a few months ago. And I was really feeling led and inspired to share my story about that, but I didn't really know what format to do that in. And so then I was like, oh my goodness, I have to invite Alana on because for a few reasons and her memoir, she actually talks about her own experience that she had when she was younger and her experience with the courts and what she learned from that. And like I said, she's doing so much today spreading awareness for women. So I thought this would be the perfect vehicle of a conversation to talk a little bit about that as well. So that was a really lengthy introduction, but Alana, I'm so grateful for everything that you're doing and thank you so much for coming back on the show.

Alana Stott:
Oh, thank you for having me back. I'm really excited about this.

Melanie Avalon:
Trying to decide where to start with this conversation, maybe we can start with the heavy stuff. Could you, because I mentioned it briefly in your memoir, could you talk a little bit about the experience that you had in the past with the, well, I'll let you tell the story, but involving the sexual assault. And I'm also curious, was that a direct relation to the work that you do today with human trafficking or was that inspired by other events and things in your life as well?

Alana Stott:
Yeah, I guess it came from a mixture of it. So when I guess it's establishing when you become vulnerable. And it's a conversation I have a lot about, you know, the legal side of trafficking, I call it, which is the grooming side, it's the stage where the traffickers build trust and get you into their fold and do all the kind of love bomb inside of it. And that's, I guess where it started from me, I was 14 and my mum was really heavily in her illness and she died when I turned 15. But of that year, I guess the 14 year old year, I was in an incredibly vulnerable position because I was young and I didn't have something that I could turn to mum was really ill. I suppose that's really where it began for me where, you know, people started to look at me in a way that they could see as that innocence that they could take advantage of. So by the time I, my mum had passed away when I was 15. And then my little brother's dad got custody of him. And I moved down to where he lived, which was in England, I lived in Scotland and moved down to England. And I was really, I was 16 at that point. So again, I was pretty much on my own, didn't really know anybody and live in that kind of adult environment as a kid really. And I met a guy and he was 10 years older than me and started off nice, then became not so nice. We dated for a while and then we broke up and then this one party, this one night, him and his friend, I still don't really know to this day what happened. All I know is I had two drinks and then passed out and then woke up at various stages throughout the night. Again, I really didn't know what had happened until I start, I knew, I woke up and knew something had happened to me just physically, I could feel it, but I didn't know who I didn't know, what stages I didn't know anything. And then it really came from a friend of mine had come round. She saw I was in a bit of a distress and she took me to the police station. And then all the people that were at the party were interviewed and these two guys immediately said that they said they had intercourse with me. And their explanation was that it was okay. They did actually say that I was passed out at the time. And they said that it was okay because I was one's girlfriend and the other guy said it was okay because my so-called boyfriend had told him it was okay. So that was their explanations for what they'd done. That was on the evening of the assault. The following day, they both recounted their statements. Obviously, when they gave their statements, they didn't realize they were massively incriminating themselves. So they both recounted it straight away. And then that really did mean that the police obviously knew what happened. They'd heard the original statement. So they knew the story. And then throughout the time, other girls came forward and said that similar to happen to them. And through the whole thing, I was always saying, I don't know what happened because I was unconscious really. But it went all the way to the court case. And I believe the court case came and then the first guy pleaded guilty. And then the other guy went and proceeded through the court case. And I think for me, it was seeing the other girls that it happened to and hearing their stories. And some of them were a lot more traumatic than mine. And then I remember being in the victim services waiting room and just finding how little support there was. And I was only 17. And I think I turned 18 by the time I'd gone to court. But still, you just felt completely unsupported. And then when you're in court, you're obviously, you're under attack from all the questions and everything that's said about you, what you're wearing, what you were acting like, how much you had to drink, other comments you've maybe made in the past, all these kinds of things are brought in about you, not about the defendants. And it really did get me into the track of how the judicial system works, how women are treated, how I guess at the time, I kept calling myself a woman, but I was a child. So how children and women are treated. And then it led me into the process of the previous kind of grooming stages, and then learning more and more about human trafficking. I guess it started off in the sexual abuse side of it. And then I learned about trafficking. And it just became a passion of mine. And so I guess from that point onwards, it's been a huge part of my life.

Melanie Avalon:
Did you and do you still have any emotional residual trauma surrounding it? Is it hard to talk about at all?

Alana Stott:
So for me, no, I think that I've worked out a lot, and I think I worked out through helping other people. That was definitely one of the methods that I chose. As a younger girl, I worked out in really bad ways. I would maybe drink too much, or I would pretend everything was okay and go out and party like everybody else, and I would do things that I wouldn't be necessarily proud of, but it was just all part of the healing. I think what I learned was that everybody deals with it in a different way. Some people go completely reclusive, some are 100% promiscuous, some people change attraction to another sex. There's so many different ways that women deal with assault, and no one way is the quote unquote right way. But it took me, I guess, I was very... I would go out and I would do, but I wouldn't date as in a long-term date. I wouldn't be romantically involved with the people. I love you all, that kind of thing. I was kind of cold in that way. In the same time, I had that little girl longing for love inside of me. I think when I met my husband, he was the first person who really actually didn't back down to that. He was like, okay, no, I think she's worth fighting for. I think from that, and really actually, since we met, since we last spoke, I ended up going on a bit of a plant medicine journey, and that was probably the most beneficial of everything that I've done. That really, even though I felt like I was healed at the point I went on it, when I went on it, I absolutely realized I wasn't, and it really gave me a huge different perspective and helped me a lot. So again, there's a million different ways to be treated and to heal, but that to me was the best thing I've ever done.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh, I love, I love hearing that. And I hear that from so many people, especially because I've had a lot of guests on this show with, you know, specific things that will be addressing when it comes to health issues or trauma or whatever it may be. And that is such a common story where people, I'll meet them, you know, earlier on, and then I'll re meet them, or you know, the relationship continues, and then they will have had some experience with some sort of plant medicine and had really beneficial effects. So yeah, maybe we can circle back to that, because I'm really, really interested in that. Was it micro dosing, macro dose or macro dosing?

Alana Stott:
Well so at the time I was working, so obviously to the book How to Ask for Money, one of the roles I have is non-profit consultancy. So I was working for a non-profit that done plant medicine for veterans and I'd been employed by them and we were discussing all the things that they do and all the amazing results that they were getting from veterans with PTSD and suicidal thoughts and I was hearing about guys literally going in with a suicide note and then coming out three days later and never thinking about suicide ever again and I was thinking this has to be something that there would benefit sexual trauma survivors as well. So I went on a retreat through them because I qualified being a military spouse as well so they let me go on one of their retreats and it was a psilocybin, definitely not microdose. It was a four-day retreat and you do go pretty deep and I think if people say to me what was a psilocybin like it was very much like not pleasant at all because I did go very deep into who I was but when the kind of release happened and almost like there was a point where everything, everyone bad that had harmed me kind of left my body and it was just the most amazing feeling ever. It's kind of brought me on the journey of learning more about it and actually I'll go into it a bit later but it's taken me to the point of setting up my own foundation for trafficking because I was finding there were so many organizations that worked with with veterans in particular for healing and for getting them through but I couldn't find anything that actually focused on that and I was finding that when I was working with the veterans and working with sexual trauma survivors they had the same kind of symptoms and actually the same pathway you know like most veterans have childhood traumas that they were dealing with and then they go into this career because a lot of them found that that was their only path or it was like that or jail or they didn't know what to do with their life. They're taken into something that they're not 100% sure about and they're made to do things that they don't necessarily want to do that causes them a lot of trauma and then when they leave they're kind of on their own and not sure how to live life anymore so there was very similar things between trafficking victims and veterans leaving with PTSD and so I started looking at both both fields and realized that actually the same sort of trauma needs to be released from both so I thought well I need I need a foundation that I can do human trafficking education and prevention I need something I can do rescue I need to work with a disaster release stuff that we do but then I need something with healing as well so I thought this would be a great add-on to what we're doing.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh my goodness. I am so excited to hear that. That is amazing. I know I was actually interviewing, I think last week, Dr. Sarah Gottfried, I don't know if you know her, she talks a lot about plant medicine and her new book. And we were talking about the latest developments because I think, didn't they just sort of recently not approve MDMA? Yes.

Alana Stott:
Yeah, the FDA rejected it, unfortunately, but I can kind of see why they have. There's a lot of issues with big pharma and everything else, but I can kind of see that there was things that came to it. But for me, it's kind of mind-blowing, especially in America, how much drugs there are in the market. Yeah, it's something that is actually very, very beneficial and proven to be then. And it's one of those, do you want things on the mass market that anybody can abuse? But I guess there is already that. Most drugs can be abused in some way, but I can just outweigh the benefits of the people that it would heal. It's a very difficult one. And I know some people who have got very, very, very strong views on both sides. But from what I've seen with the actual treatment with MDMA, it's amazing.

Melanie Avalon:
I'm really excited for the future because I do feel like it's moving forward with everything. It's just a journey to get there and I feel like we're going to hopefully someday get to a place where it is approved and it can be used more freely in the appropriate situations and not be abused and we'll be looking back on the dark ages of the fight for it.

Alana Stott:
Well I mean it did, it used to be here you know that was what we had in the past and then it got banned and then I guess a lot of people made a lot of money from it not being available but people get sicker and then all I can ever speak about is from what I've seen and the differences it's made to people and how much better their life is when they're taken through you know real a real plant medicine ceremony as well you know not just playing about with it actually doing the integration and the preparation work and everything that comes with it and really making those adjustments into your life.

Melanie Avalon:
Yeah, I think like you're saying that like the set and setting is so important as well, because we know that basically, I don't know all of the mechanisms and the specifics, but I know one of the mechanisms is they basically create a state of, you know, really intense neuroplasticity in the brain where you can actually make changes. So that's why it can also be a really vulnerable situation if somebody's not in the right environment when they're doing it and mindset.

Alana Stott:
Yeah and 100% we obviously we've still got our security company and we actually got called upon Christmas time around Christmas time where one one of our client's sons had a bit of an addiction and he'd gone on a Ibogaine retreat but straight from the Ibogaine retreat his his kind of peers or his friends or whatever to come straight out to party like literally from the Ibogaine retreat and as you say like the neuroplasticity then is like literally form and you know and it's funny because I was saying to my husband who doesn't he barely drinks like he'll maybe have he'll have a glass of wine with me and you'll you'll share some champagne or whatever but his last medicine retreat we came out and we were actually going on a dinner date and I was like should we maybe be giving you wine right now because maybe we might form some sort of addiction for you it was quite funny I was like I would actually quite like you to drink more wine with me so maybe we could do this like

Melanie Avalon:
Let's sneak this in a little bit. I mean, it's funny. Yeah. Well, that's that's really exciting So right now you're working on forming that foundation. Yeah

Alana Stott:
I've registered it, we're just in the middle of our 501c3 status, websites forming, we've started to apply for funding, really started to get done. It's really going to be, we're going to focus on the educational side of it, so I have like a teaching tool that we can use for teaching kids to avoid grooming and online exploitation, so that's the first part of it that we're going to be doing along with other just prevention and educational tools. And then we'll have, it's going to have a disaster and evacuation relief because we've still got that as part of our work as well. And really that mixes with human trafficking in a way because it usually whenever there's a disaster, the traffickers move in. And then the rescue side of it, actually for victims, we've been looking at the, even just with the US, we're looking at kind of 650 kids have been brought across the border in the last 10 years, there's 450,000 in the last four years. And on the sponsorship program, a lot of them are unaccounted for. I think we're looking at over 300,000 kids are unaccounted for in the US and a lot of them have been put into trafficking. So we're looking at the rescue element there and just forming task forces with governments and law enforcement agents. I think it's really important that we work with the right people and not just, you know, do anything by ourselves. And then just forming partnerships. It really came from somebody asking me, it was a donor who was looking to put funding to the right place. And he said to me, he's like, Alana, why don't you have your own foundation? And I'd always said that I won't do it because there were so many other nonprofits out there that need help. But after him kind of having a lot of discussions with me, it just really made a lot of sense. I have all the connections, I have all the partnerships, I know the good people and the bad people in the space. So that's where it came from. And then we said, we'll form it into the sections that I know need the attention. And then I said, well, I do the restoration side of it, the safe houses. And again, I said, I can form partnerships with people that will do that as well. And then the other part, I said, well, we definitely need to add the healing element into it because that's very, very important. So I said, well, that'll be it then. We'll do the education, we'll do the disaster response, the rescue and the healing.

Melanie Avalon:
wow that's amazing wait so this is actually cuz i was gonna say how many foundations do you have because you seem like such a foundation person this is your actual first personal.

Alana Stott:
This is my first year. Yeah, so I've only ever wanted to just help other people build theirs because I've just seen how many there. I'm like, there's weight. I was almost like I'm never going to build my own because there's so many out there that need help. But I think just he really, he really convinced me this guy and he was like, no, he says you've got the right tools and you could pull it all together. And I think, you know, 25 years of really being in this space, I was like, actually, this maybe is the right time. And something just almost gave me like a call and it was the right time to do it. And it just felt felt so right. And Dean agreed. Dean was like, yeah, it's kind of helping other people isn't really getting us to the goal. And it's kind of dancing around a bit. So let's actually do our own and put all our efforts into it. So that was only last month we decided on that. So it's been a pretty busy month already.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh, I bet. I'm so excited for you. Do you have a name for it? Yeah.

Alana Stott:
It's the Blue Rose Foundation.

Melanie Avalon:
Where does that come from?

Alana Stott:
Actually it came from we were in a healing retreat and we were discussing it and we had a lot of messages came through almost from Mary Magdalene and there was a few other things kept popping up the Knights Templar and then Dean and the guys were getting meshes about Knights Templar and about saving the children and all these kind of things and then I kind of meditated and said like give me a name give me a name and the blue blue rose just kind of popped up in my head and then when I googled it I found out that there was like an order of Mary Magdalene that was about rescuing children so it kind of blew my mind and I was like okay that's definitely the name for it.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh, I love that. This is so I'm so I'm so excited and happy for you and grateful. Yeah, definitely keep me updated. I love to, you know, share about this anytime that I can. Wow. Okay. So going back to that original experience you had with your boyfriend at the time, because like I said earlier, when I had my experience, which was not nearly as bad as what you went through, but for me, it was I was having a massage and he was just started touching me and appropriately, but really slowly was building up to it. So I wasn't quite sure what was happening. It wasn't like he just, you know, came on to me really obviously it was a slow buildup and and I was mostly just really like frozen and scared and didn't know what to do and didn't know if it I was like imagining things. But I just remember I, I drew lines in my head on my body. And I was like, if he crosses the lines, then something is definitely happening right now. And I did ask him to stop. And he did. And I stayed still because I was just so I just want to get out of there. And I didn't want to create a scene. And I didn't know what's happening. And I was scared. And then so when it was finally over, I just left, I wasn't going to tell why didn't know I was kind of in shock. And so I went home, I didn't really know what to do. Then I called a friend. And I just started balling. And she's the one who told me to go to the police. And I was still really nervous about going to the police. But then I actually thought and it's kind of what you were saying earlier about seeing other people like when you're in the victim's unit and seeing other people going through similar things. And so I just thought, well, this guy has probably done this before. And, you know, I just need to go speak up because to try to stop him from doing it again. And that was kind of what motivated me to actually go to the police because I was scared about the whole situation. And so I will just say briefly, so I was really grateful that the police officer that I went to was very kind and definitely believed everything that I said. And then what's actually really interesting was, I went home. And then he actually went and tried to arrest the guy. And he said that he asked the guy what had happened. And the guy wouldn't he wouldn't say anything. He just said that he wanted a lawyer. And the detective said, and I thought this was so telling, he said, if he had said anything, like literally anything, like if he had said, I didn't do it, or it was a misunderstanding, or I don't know what you're talking about. He said he wouldn't have been able to arrest him. But because he didn't say anything, he could only go off of what I had said. And he believed me. So he was actually able to arrest him that night, which is really interesting to the it just goes to speak to, I think, a large share concept of problems with the system in general and not blame on one side or the other. But just there's always the he said she said thing. Okay, so questions that come out of this for me, for you. When you when everything first happened, because you did go to the police, do you remember? Were you? Like, were you nervous to tell somebody or what were the events at that time? That's right. That's right. That's right. That's right. That's right. That's right. That's right. That's right. That's right. That's right. That's right.

Alana Stott:
Yeah, I mean, I remember not knowing what to say because I didn't have anything to say. And I remember because when I come down from the bedroom, there was like five or six guys in the room and I asked them all I was like, was anybody in the room was there and they all denied it completely. But I knew something had happened. I knew there was something. So when I was talking to the police, I couldn't really give any he was, you know, they asked all these questions and I was like, I don't know, I don't know. And then so there was really nothing that I was saying that was like giving the police anything. It wasn't until they came in and they said it, you know, they they gave them what they needed. So the one thing I still remember this was, yeah, you know, 26 years ago, and I still remember the policeman's name. He was like, we have to get these and remember, I remember specifically, he kept calling one of them by his last name, but almost like sounding angry when he would say it was like he knew something that I didn't know. And I think that was when he started to get he may have even had other people before I don't know, but he was he had almost like a need to to to go for this this guy. And I think it was a lot of what they'd actually said themselves. But he was a big I mean, when this was a small town I lived in. So I was nobody in the town, believe me, not anybody. I was literally barred from every shop. I was like disliked by everybody. Like I was horrible. Just living there. Stayed like look back now. And I think you should have just left. And but you know, that that girl was pretty strong. She was like, I'm staying here and I'm going. And I just had to keep like, dealing with that every single day. Somebody would say something to me on the street or somebody would like refuse to serve me in a shop or like, I just couldn't do anything. But he was the one who almost kept me going, who was like, no, this is like, you have to do this. And especially as everybody. So yeah, I would say that that long for and there's an interesting thing that I dealt with in Orange County here, one of the ladies that works for the Global Center for Women and Justice. And she had a case where this young girl had been trafficked, she was 14 years old, she'd been taken, she'd been a police officer, recognized the signs, managed to pick her up, got her into a safe house, she was taken in as a child traffic victim, taken into a safe house, and then the trafficker managed to convince her to to get out, she ended up coming out of the safe house, and then he caught her and then he ended up stabbing her like a hell of a lot of time, like 17 times or something. And then when another cop then found her, she was dead. And this cop registered her as a prostitute. And so her death was registered as a camera was that it's like in the process of crime. So she was in the process of crime when she was murdered. So it wasn't treated the same way as any other victim would be treated. And her death was registered with this this way to her parents, there was all sorts of things like you don't get your help with your funeral, like there's all these things. My friend, Sandy Morgan, the Global Center for Women and Justice, she fought to get this this changed because it was only a matter of one police officer recognized it was trafficking. Another police officer didn't recognize trafficking. So that was the difference between how this girl was treated in life and death, basically. So it's so important that the law enforcement side of it, I mean, I hear about it so often that just women aren't believing. No, no, no, no, I know women lie. I know that there is this awful part of the world as well that, you know, women get revenge and do all these things and they'd be they accuse men of things. And I think it's awful. I think there's nothing like that's up there with what the guys are doing themselves like we like it should never happen. But there is ways to tell the woman's telling the truth or not. And I think from you know, what you're saying is your gut was telling you immediately that this was wrong. And I think what a predator relies on is that fear and that doubt and that shame, you know, a lot of people are like rape and sexual assault and everything is sexual. And of course, it is sexual, but it's not. It's about the power and that control and like him knowing that you were probably in that state of fear and confusion and everything else is probably enough to get him off in a way, you know.

Melanie Avalon:
I guess it's nice to hear that you had that detective that definitely believed the situation and wanted to see justice. That was one of my reflections was I was thinking about how much of it probably comes down to who, assuming you are telling the truth about everything and you're coming from a place of truth, a lot of it comes down to just the forces, the power people that you're dealing with. It seems like random chance in a way. I was really grateful that the detective I spoke to originally really did believe me and did what he did, and then when I got into the actual court system, it was good and bad and there were curveballs for sure, but maybe I'll just tell that part right now. Basically what happened was it got really, really drawn out, especially because of COVID, the cases were really backed up in the courts. Like I said, this was a few years ago that it actually happened, and so I wasn't getting updates for months and months. What finally ended up happening was I was placed in the Special Victims Unit with an victim advocate, and they were all very kind and supportive, so that was nice, but what ended up happening was they said that his lawyer had worked out a plea deal and he was going to plea, it's called NOLO here in Georgia, Atlanta, and it actually means, it's basically like no contest, but basically you're not saying you're guilty, but you're accepting the punishment. I think he originally had three cases of sexual battery against him and then one of disorderly conduct, and so they agreed to let him plea NOLO to only disorderly conduct, and draw up the sexual battery charges. The reasoning that the Special Victims Unit told me that it's really, really hard to get a guilty charge on a sexual battery, it's really hard to get a guilty verdict on a sexual battery charge, and she said it was better to just get some sort of acceptance of something on his record, and then that would just be the way to go. What was interesting about my experience for that moment was I wasn't sure, because my goal in all of this was to go through with everything, I was down to go in and share what had happened and fight for justice, and I wasn't sure how much agency I had in any of that process. They kind of just told me what was happening. Nobody ever asked me what I wanted to do, and I wasn't sure, I wasn't sure if I could have had more agency, if I had spoken up more, but basically I just was like, okay, you know, I accepted for that path to be the path we were going to go on, but I still don't even know if I could have gone any other way.

Alana Stott:
I know that, I mean, I got the first person pleaded guilty, I believe. I believe they both pleaded guilty, but one wanted the lesser charge. I think it was indecent assault versus the rape. There was one, one had said one, and one, I think they both originally pleaded guilty to indecent assault, and then one said that he would plead guilty to the rape for a lesser charge. And I can't remember exactly, but I do remember that I was consulted. So I remember that it was up to me whether it accepted the plea, but I mean, it's a long time ago. And this was in Scotland, right? And that was in Scotland, yeah. I mean, I don't know what the law is here. So I don't know if you do get a say in it or if the prosecutor is the one who makes the final decision. But yeah, I only heard about that, that, you know, contest rule recently, actually, I think it was listening to the Hunter Biden trial I was hearing that there's a way that you can basically accept without actually accepting the guilt, which is, I don't know, it's a little bit of a, I feel like there's a couple of ways you can go, like if they admit to what they've done and the whole point is that they're sorry, and they'll never do it again. I feel like the no contest doesn't actually give them that wrongfulness. But I think that sometimes for victims, the court case is really important to them to have their voice heard.

Melanie Avalon:
Yeah. And actually, and now I'm realizing that I told it out of order. Everything's running together in my head because the original, he agreed to plea guilty to disorderly conduct. That was it. Guilty to the lesser charge, drop the sexual battery charges, and that's what we were going to accept. Then when we went in, this is what happened. Then when we went in for the actual case, he went up there, the judge read everything. He was like, how do you plea? That's when he said no low. So basically, they curveballed us. They told us he was going to plea guilty. And then he pulled the no low card. And that was a really upsetting moment because I was sitting there. I heard him plea that. And then I heard the defendant, they were saying why he was pleading that. And they were saying, he said, well, because there's probably a misunderstanding or she's making it up. And then he said, the reason she's making it up is because she didn't say anything and she stayed the whole time and then she paid and she tipped. And so hearing all of that was really hard because it was interesting. What was interesting about it was it reminds me of your story where you're saying that they had said one thing the night before and then changed their story. And so you knew that the police knew. It's like when I was in that courtroom, everybody in the room, I'm pretty sure knew that he wasn't telling the truth. It was so evident to me. And then I went up there and I had prepared a victim impact statement that I was going to just read after the supposedly guilty admission that he was supposed to do. And then when he said that, I read it, then I went off script and I addressed what they had said. And I explained why I didn't leave. I explained about the tipping that I'm just like a tipping. I was just in my normal mode of like, get in there and get out. And I actually, I know it sounds crazy, but I would actually feel guilty not tipping. It's like if I go and I said this to them, I was like, even if I get really bad service at a restaurant, I will still tip like 30 or 40%. It's just like who I am.

Alana Stott:
think this is something that is really difficult to understand and I think it's like me saying, you know, trying to explain a plant medicine journey to somebody who's never been on it. It would be like I'm talking to like telling somebody that's never been through that, you can't really understand until you've been in that mindset yourself. I mean, I went dancing after mine. I went into a nightclub and I was on a dance floor. There's no explanation as to why you behave in the way that you do afterwards, whether you're thinking about it. I think the problem is Hollywood has a very clear idea of what a rape scene looks like and what the aftermath of a rape scene looks like and they do this, but that's not that's not I don't think I've ever come across anybody that's behaved in the way that Hollywood portrays it. Even with and I've dealt with people who have been in full almost died kind of assault battery rape situations and they'll go to the grocery store straight away or they'll like, you know, there's no normal way to act afterwards and really like however you would normally act. So if you would normally tip, then that's probably what you would do just to make because you're almost still in that defense mode. Like how do I get out of here the safest best way? Well, I don't want to attract any attention. I want to pay. I want to all those things would be so any any person who would know these things would be able to explain that to the judge if they didn't understand it very, very easily. I think psychologically wise.

Melanie Avalon:
That's so good to hear. And I think probably so helpful for people to hear for any situation that they may go through and be in that trauma state after. Yeah, no, I love hearing that. And what was really validating was, so I shared my whole, my statement, and then I addressed those things. And then the judge said that he would not accept no lo. He would not accept the no contest from the guy. He said he had to either plead guilty or he had to go further to trial, which felt, it really felt validating. I felt really seen. I felt really believed, especially by the judge. So I was really, really grateful. The only second next curve ball though was, and I don't want to make this a super political statement either way, but basically his original sentence was supposed to be X amount of jail time, which he had already served. And a certain amount of community hours and then 12 months of probation. And they asked if the probation could be reduced to like 11 months and 20 something days. I don't know, not exactly 12 months, because they said he was an illegal citizen and he could not get citizenship if he had 12 months of probation on his record. They accepted that. So that was upsetting.

Alana Stott:
It's really interesting how they do that. I remember the time that I got hit when I was a bank manager and this guy punched me in the face and split my lip open. I was closing his account and he was angry and he took his credit card and rammed it into my face. My lip burst open and then the police came. The whole time I remember he was from Pakistan and the whole time he kept saying he was within his rights. He was within his rights. Then the police came out and they said to me, if you press charges, he's going to lose his... He had a visa to be there for two years. He worked in oil and gas. It was almost like the police were making out like I was the bad one. If you do this, then this poor guy is going to lose. I remember at the time when the bank had this policy that there was all these issues and I just didn't want to actually go through anything else like that. I was like, okay, but it really made me go, wow, poor him. We don't want him to lose his status or we don't want him to lose this. My point was, well, if he'd done this to me in the bank full of people, what does he do to other women? The police made it clear to me that they really weren't interested in doing the paperwork, I guess, that was involved and what would happen to this guy and how it might affect things. It almost becomes that question of what is more important, his legal status here. I'm here on a visa and I know that I have to abide by every rule. If I do anything wrong, I face... I don't know. I feel like from everything that you're saying, he knew what he was doing was wrong when he was doing it. And that has to be a consequence.

Melanie Avalon:
I agree as well and so that was a really shocking moment for me. All of it aside, it was really nice to have it behind me and I do feel like I did everything I could do at the time that everything was happening. So I feel good about it and something interesting I've heard about and read about trauma and especially I'm actually one of the other books I'm prepping right now is all about childhood trauma. I've heard that a huge predictor in whether or not people get PTSD or lingering traumatic effects from a traumatic experience has to do with how much support they feel they have like right after the incident and so I'm so grateful that throughout the whole process I felt very supported especially when I started talking about it on the show and just hundreds like hundreds of people were reaching out to me. Listeners like I said with similar stories and support and so I was just so grateful for that and that really also made me realize the importance of support and did you have support at the time?

Alana Stott:
No, it would probably be that I went to court on my own. I didn't have a lot of friends. I moved down to that place because it was new. And then I had people that I knew, but as soon as that happened, they all turned on me. I had my dad in my life, but my dad obviously wanted me to move back to Scotland to get away from it all. And I didn't want to do that. So I would say I was pretty much on my own throughout most of the process. I didn't really have a friends group. I didn't have anything like that. And I think that did kind of... You're right. The support you get from people will be a huge... And I think feeling believed and feeling that you're not a bad person and that it wasn't your fault and all these kinds of things come into it. And I was speaking to a girl the other day. She was in the military and she'd been abused in the military. And she was immediately they turned on her because obviously the military don't want shame on them. And it's kind of... She's now still 10 years later stuck in that trauma of people not believing her, of being blamed for what had happened. And I remember when I was talking to her about it, she kept saying similar to what you said just earlier on there. She said that, you know, but yours was worse than mine. And then I was talking to a lady that had actually been violently raped in her younger years. And she was asking me about mine and she was saying, oh yeah, but yours is worse than mine because you don't remember. And I was like, isn't that crazy that we all actually think that because I would think that being on a military base, being sexually assaulted would be horrendous. And this girl's saying yours was worse. I think what's happened to you being in such a vulnerable position in a massage table would be like such a traumatic thing to go through. But I also think that being dragged into a bush and beaten up and raped that way. But we all think that the other person had it worse. And then the visual, like the world, I guess the male world almost say like when they think of rape, they think about that violent assault. So there's this perception, but the whole point is like you were violated and you were in a position that you weren't in control and you were frightened and you didn't know all these thoughts are the same for each one, regardless if you were beaten or if you were just touched or if you were videoed or whatever it might have been, your body was violated in a way that kind of sticks with you.

Melanie Avalon:
I'm so glad you drew attention to that because actually when I said that phrase, I meant to address saying that phrase because I do think this actually is an issue and that people, exactly what you said, we compare to other people and we assume it's worse for other people and which it may or may not be objectively. But the point is people go through all these different experiences and I don't want people to think, oh, well, it's not as bad as XYZ and so that means it's okay or that means I can just forget about it. I think the comparison game doesn't help anybody. And so like you said, I'm really glad that you said that because I actually meant to talk about this. So that was perfect for bringing that up. Thank you. So was there anything else from that experience that you would just tell people today and particularly women? What is your main piece of advice for women who experience anything on this spectrum?

Alana Stott:
I think for me, as you say, the support that you've got is so important and if you've got support then that's great but I think if you don't then you almost have to find it. You have to find it through trauma counsellors or through alternative therapies or anything like that because really what we've been left with is just shame. Immediately it's that because most of these crimes are he said, she said. They're pretty much heavily weighed on the he said, she said side and you can almost start to doubt yourself. You can almost be like, how did that go? Really, did I do something wrong if I said something? I think that goes for domestic abuse, it goes for sexual trauma, it goes for all these things but that shame can sit with you forever and that's the thing that needs to be addressed straight away because it's important to know that you've got nothing to be ashamed of and that you did nothing wrong. Even if you can name some things that you feel like you should have done differently, like should you have wore a different outfit? Should you not have been walking through that park in the middle of the night? You can name things that maybe you could do differently. That's what we do with personal awareness and security training and that doesn't take away from the fact that that person shouldn't have done that to you, that you have nothing to be ashamed of for the situation. You can learn from it and you can grow from it but the shame needs to go.

Melanie Avalon:
I love drawing attention to that. I was actually thinking about that recently. I know there's a lot of trauma surrounding this movie, but the movie This Is Us came out, wait, no, sorry, It Ends With Us came out, which focuses on domestic violence as the theme. And I remember I was reading some of the reviews of it, and they were talking about how they thought that it didn't show enough of domestic violence, like that it was basically too watered down and didn't show the horrors of it. And I thought that was an interesting commentary because to me, my takeaway was by not showing as much, it spoke to this theme that we're speaking about right now, which is, you know, these things can happen and they don't necessarily have to be this stereotype that you might have in your head of X, Y, Z, or basically just really want there to be more awareness around these different things that happen and empower people to speak up. And like you said, I think shame is such a boundary to that or such a barrier.

Alana Stott:
Yeah. And I think the one thing I love about that is that they made him very likable and they made him a person who was like, oh, but wait a second, would he do that? And I think that is one of the worst things about the Hollywood. And you're like, if you think about enough Jennifer Lopez, like the guy was a monster and you could tell he was a monster. And like, that's not how it is. Most of these guys are, and how often I've heard, oh yeah, but he was a nice guy. He wouldn't do that. Like, he was like, so he done all this charity stuff, or he done this amazing things, or he done these things. Like, it makes no difference. Like, when it's a sexual predator, sometimes they're very, very, very good at all that manipulation side of it. And, you know, most of the kind of coercive control and all this stuff comes from being very good at being a master manipulator. And if we look at people like, you know, look, we've got people like the Andrew Tate's of the world who openly tell us he's an asshole, like, and we've just got to listen. But like, most, most bad, bad guys come across as very good, nice, friendly guys. And it comes to that situation where, you know, if you look at the kind of student world or, and then, oh, but you know, he's brilliant at football, or he's a really nice guy. None of that matters. It doesn't matter. And that's actually normally who they are. But once again, the movies kind of teach us to see one of these guys is the you can tell that he's a bad guy.

Melanie Avalon:
Yeah, exactly. Okay, it's good to hear that you had that thought as well. So parallel things in your life as well, that this concept of your book, how to ask for money, like I said, this is not my skill set, not my forte. Have you always had a knack for this or were they skills that you had to acquire?

Alana Stott:
I always enjoyed fundraising, especially if it was for a cause. So from eight years old, I remember doing fundraising. And then when I started working at 11, but it was 13 when I went into sales. So I was doing telemarketing, and then I would do commission-only jobs so I could make as much money as I wanted, depending on how much I would sell over the phone, or eventually I'd run door-to-door sales. And then I got into debt collecting. So I'd always had worked around being able to ask for money in some kind of way. And I never realized it was a skill until I got into the debt collecting. And the guy who asked me to do the debt collecting job said that it was a job that most people didn't want to do. But because I'd seen what my mum had gone through when she would have debt collectors knocking on her door, I didn't want to scare people like that. So I would instead try and fix their problems and see I would just approach debt collecting in a completely different way. And we would work out where they are, where they need to be, and how we're going to get there. And so I took those kind of formulas of working and then became a bank manager and then was in the nonprofit world for most of that time following. And then I remember speaking to a guy a few years back, and he was a prominent businessman, but he was absolutely terrified to send invoices and ask for payment. And he told me, he said, it's like up there with people's biggest fear. They don't like asking for money. And I kind of went, well, I think it's just an unknown. Fear is just an unknown. And you don't know whether they're going to be offended. You don't know if they're going to be able to pay you. I think there's a million different reasons why people are scared to ask for money. So I really try and break that down and make sure that you've got all those answers before you even go in. So the book is really, I wrote it with a nonprofit mindset, but as I was writing it, I started to kind of combine and realize that it worked for business and nonprofit because if we're looking for investment, if you're looking for a pay rise, if you're looking to quote a certain amount of money for what you do, there's a lot of mindset and everything that needs to go into it before you do that. And so much people know exactly what they should be getting, but they don't like to ask for it. And they can get very nervous about the state and their worth. And the book hopefully helps people through that.

Melanie Avalon:
I found it so helpful and this is how much this is not my skill because you're saying how you didn't realize that this was a talent. I'm having flashbacks. So in I think my first encounter with like where he was supposed to ask somebody for money essentially was high school I think and I was in the on the newspaper team and we had to secure like to be on the newspaper we had to get ads for it like three ads from like local businesses. I cannot express to you the amount of anxiety that gave me like we had to do it over the summer before the semester or sorry the what do they call it they call it semesters in high school I don't remember before the school year started and like literally feeling the anxiety in my body I it was horrible I think I actually like enlisted like a sibling to help me do it it was that bad. Is there a difference between because I don't think I would be as scared even now as scared to ask for like debt collection or something where it's already owed to me that so that's like one path in my head I see about asking for money where it's something that is already owed the path of asking for money where nothing is owed so like like I said needing a sponsor or something is I just yeah it scares me. So is there a difference there with those two?

Alana Stott:
I mean, as a teenager, you're going through those years where rejection is the worst thing in the world anyway. So that's obviously going to add into that. But I think even if you were to say that it's not owed to you, if you were to take into like, do you, you're an actress, right? If you go into an audition, does it scare you that they might say no? No. But it's not owed to you that that role, but you're going in there knowing that, yeah, I can do this. Like I'm a great actress. I've rehearsed it, I've read the script over and over, like I know what I'm doing, I would be very good at this, they'd be very lucky to have me, I'm going to go in there with that mindset. It's the same thing, that role isn't owed to you, but if you got it, you would be very good at it. So it's that same sort of mindset, okay, you don't have to give me the sponsorship, but if you do, I can do, you know, whatever it might be, I'm curing childhood cancer or saving trafficking victims, whatever your cause is, or, you know, I'm going to do cycle across America, whatever your ask is for it, if you really truly believe in what it is you're doing, and then you're able to also give them, so when you're doing an audition, you're showing them exactly what they're going to get, like, you're doing the same thing when you're asking for money, you're saying, okay, this is what you're going to get, this is how it's going to benefit you, this is going to how it's going to benefit us, the world, everything else, you're showing them all those things. I put all that into what I'm doing, I want to make sure that when I go in there and ask them for it, that they're literally seeing the full benefits of everything. And it's the same if I send a bill for my services and any of my work, like my fee might be slightly higher than most people, but I know that it's worth it, I'll be able to show them evidence, it's worth it, other things that I've done before. And I feel pretty confident before I go in there. And if they say no, then that's okay to me, it's just, well, they can't afford me, that's okay, they maybe need to go and find a way to make more money or however it might be, but I'd never take it personally as long as I've done the full work.

Melanie Avalon:
I think I know still the key difference hang up for me, but before that, I will just say one of the big takeaways I took from your book was just that importance of knowing inside and out, you know, what you're asking for, what you're selling, and listeners and friends. If this situation is any situation you anticipate being in, definitely get this book because Alana goes through exactly what you need to know all the answers to, and it's a lot of things. Um, before you, you know, do any of these meetings up front. So it's so helpful. I, I'm, we're going to go through, make sure that we have the answers to all these questions that we need to know the answers to. But so I think the key difference for me with the, the audition situation is at least with that, I'm presumably invited to the situation. So like they already want to see me compared to somebody who might not have asked for me to solicit them.

Alana Stott:
Yeah, call soliciting can be quite different and I think that the one mistake that I see a lot of people make is just doing like the bulk, like send it to a thousand people and hope one person says yes. My job, my kind of paid job is an investigator problem solver. I do intelligence gathering for my Siri company and I do the same thing when I approach a donor. So I don't just ask my kids like what is their day to day look like? What are they interested in? Like most stuff is available online. So I would rather send to 10 people that I fully investigated and got down to the net. How can what I'm asking them for like play into their brain? Like what is going to click in their brain when I ask them for something and it might be to do with their kids. It might be I really try and find out something that's really going to click with them and then I'll contact them and just get that and rather than I try and keep it really really on point to that. So it's not like a big long plea email because most of them just get deleted. Like you're you are lucky, you know you do get the odd person that will read it and will respond but they are just the cold kind of mass mail shot email. I don't find that approach works so well as to really go in personal with them and if you can't do it, if there's somebody else in your team that is good at researching them just finding out basic day of people and it's you know 2024 there's not much you can't find on the internet now.

Melanie Avalon:
Yeah, I think the reframe of knowing whatever you're selling or asking money for to this entity or person or whoever it may be. For me, I think what would be really important, like you were talking about the confidence and everything. Like for me, it's like me knowing that what I am asking them for is something that I truly believe in and that will benefit everybody. Like I would never, I think that's my, it's like the why game where you keep asking why like to get to the root cause of something. I don't, I think I guess I don't ever want to take something from somebody.

Alana Stott:
Yeah, I think, I think Dean, my husband's got that same thing, like he likes the giveback, he wants to make sure and I see this a lot with people in like film and television as well that are influencers or anything like that when they get sponsoring Kind, you know, they get, they get to have like garages full of stuff, just like free stuff all the time. And free stuff is great, we all love that. But who is the free stuff actually benefiting if you're wearing it and showing it around because it's nice to have it, but like to put money in your bank, that's not going to work. But if you if they're willing to provide you with free stuff, then they would probably open a discussion about some cash for that because there's a reason they're interested in giving you this stuff. So I speak to a lot of people who are in like maybe reality TV or in him along that lines. And I say like you need to you need to be this is your this is a career you've chosen. You need to be branding yourself so that you can go and ask. And I've done it for Dean since he started and he hates that part part of it. He'll he'll get them to love him and then I'll do the the money side of it. But I don't let him do just in kind relationships.

Melanie Avalon:
That's so interesting. Yeah, I'm actually actually I had an email the other day or a potential relationship about a filming thing in this sphere. And then they asked me just what my rate was. And I just felt really uncomfortable with that question, even though literally that kind of undoes what I said earlier, because they're asking me, you know, to give them a rate. And I was like, I still felt like I was somehow like taking from them. So yeah, it's so interesting. And I loved in the book, you talked about, you said one of the first one of the biggest or first mistakes you had about the idea of of this whole work was assuming that everybody had the same motivation behind what they're doing. Like, basically, there are eight main motivators. And you wrote them out as power, self growth, recognition and approval, winning, helping other people, money, passion, and time with loved ones. And doing the exercise because you recommend in the book that people go through and rank them for yourselves is act is really revealing, like, and hard. It was hard for me. to actually put them in order.

Alana Stott:
What was your motivator?

Melanie Avalon:
So I wrote down my list in the order and it also made me feel like a selfish person writing them out in this order. So well, my main one was really easy. The first two are really easy for me, which was recognition and approval was number one for sure. And then number two was passion. And then three was self growth. Four was power. Although I think I had to think about the definition of power and like, what does that mean? And I don't think I mean that in the stereotypical sense of it, but the broader idea of power. And then five, helping other people, six, time with loved ones, seven, money, eight, winning. Although even looking at it now, I've reordered it a few times.

Alana Stott:
I mean, there's a couple of things. I work with a guy, it's called Culture Index, and he can kind of give you your personality type as well. And, but with what you've just read out to me, it would almost tell me that you shouldn't be the person negotiating your fees. I would almost say because you're interested in, that's where Dean kind of ranks as well. Like he, his recognition is kind of high too. And that's somebody who is almost becomes like a people pleaser to an extent. Like they want to like, I don't want to take money from you because it doesn't feel right. I don't feel like I've actually worked for that. Like it becomes like they find that difficult to give their own value in themselves. So they often need somebody else who's going to be like, I know how important Melanie is to your brand. I know how special she is. I know what she can do. And they're almost like your little cheerleader going, no, this is how much she's worth. So when I do Dean's negotiating, I know who Dean is. I know how much he's worth. I know how valuable he is to the brand. So I'll go in with a much tougher stance saying, this is how much it'll cost. And then sometimes, sometimes if it's someday that I'm not quite sure of what fits with them, I'll just ask their budget, you know, I'll just say, look, you're wanting to book Dean for like a speaking gig, let's say. And I have no idea what they're thinking of in terms of amount. So I'll just get their budget. And then normally they go way too low on their budget. So you just push that a little bit higher and they'll agree to it. So, but it sounds like, I don't know if you've got an assistant or anybody who kind of is your little cheerleader in life, they might be the person who should be driving your brand.

Melanie Avalon:
This is actually one of the main reasons I like having a publicist because I don't... This whole idea of like pitching myself or any of these questions are not what I want to be doing. So, shout out to Kyle. I can let him handle it. But it was even like coming up with the rate in my head was difficult. I actually haven't answered it. So, now I like that. I'm going to do that what you said about asking what their... whatever you just called it. Their budget. Budget.

Alana Stott:
It's just something along that lines of that, you know, you, your rates can vary depending on the reason, the cause, you know, whatever it might be, and then kind of give the description and just say it would be really helpful if you could tell me what your budget is for this project and then I can work out if we can work together, something along that lines.

Melanie Avalon:
And for you for ranking them, what were your top ones? Were they helping other people?

Alana Stott:
Yeah, I think helping other people and money has been kind of up there on the tune. Power was kind of always very low for me. Passion rated pretty high, winning was kind of always in the middle. But I mean, now that I've got a family, I would say when I was younger, the money, and they're helping people money, and then, I don't know, recognition and approval wasn't very high for me either. But now time of loved ones is very, very high up there. I'd say that time of loved ones is probably trumping money now. So that's what happens when you have kids.

Melanie Avalon:
No, my slight, well, I actually had time with loved ones as the last one, which was interesting to see ranked out. I moved, I bumped it up because I realized that included my favorite thing pretty much every week is, you know, going out with loved ones. Then I realized, well, that's more, I don't know if that's more about just my experience. Yeah, it was shifting around for, I think power. I think I'm equating that to having influence.

Alana Stott:
Yeah, I think I think it can be seen in different ways having the having the power to a lot of people is just about rising through the ranks and being in charge and I see it a lot in the in the kind of non-profit world where people are want to be like the boss or but they don't actually want to make the change or do the things it's more like I want that as my over the overwhelming thing is to be the boss whether it be like the President of the United States or whether it be like run the company like the power thing is very huge but again it can be seen I guess as being within your own power and your own strength so I guess is how you interpret

Melanie Avalon:
So another big takeaway I took from your book was the importance of planning. And I think we talked about this last time, a little bit planning. I have a question for you. I hope I didn't ask you this last time. Do you think some people, okay. Cause I am just such a planner. Like I am such a planner. I live by plans. I would not be able to do anything I'm doing if I didn't plan everything down to the, the new, like the nuance detail. There are people who just seemingly, seemingly cannot plan. And it, it blows my mind. Honestly, I just don't understand. Like I don't understand how you don't, how you can't plan. And some people hate planning. So do you think that's like a inherent trait, whether or not you're a planner or not?

Alana Stott:
So I think after I'll need to send you my friend's business, this culture index thing, because I was blown away when I'd done it, and my results came back, and Dean's results came back, and I was thinking about my old executive assistant, and I was going to bring her back on because she left me a while ago, and she wanted to come back, and he'd done her results, and the guy was like, you absolutely can't work with her, and he kind of gave me all the reasons why, and that was the reasons from previous, and I was like, oh yeah, that doesn't work, and I said, so who can be my assistant then, because I really do need somebody, there's a lot of work here, and he goes, Dean's profile fits perfectly for your assistant. I was like, okay, I'll take Dean on as my assistant, that's cool. Once you see the results of it, and then you can almost, because he's like, a lot of people try and make people fit into something, and make people become a, like, I'm just like you, I've got my to-do list notebook that I have to write into, and I have to tick it off, and I have to do that, but some people hate that, some people just like to be told what to do, and then they'll do that, and then wait for the next instruction, but that's just who they are, but there's a role for them somewhere, so it's a really, I'll have to send you, I'll connect you to Michael actually, because it's really interesting.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh no, that would be great. Did you actually hire Dean as your assistant?

Alana Stott:
He is actually, he calls it my warrior though, so he doesn't want to be called the assistant.

Melanie Avalon:
So, it's just funny, I actually hired my sister as my assistant, like, actually. And it's been the most amazing thing, like, it has been so great.

Alana Stott:
The great thing is I know him and I basically give him a warrior list that's what he gets every day and he you know this is like a tier one special forces operator like he goes and achieves that list every day like without fail and it could be like anything from like picking the kids up to to like you know forming a task force to go rescue people from Haiti like it doesn't matter what it is he's he's going to achieve that list.

Melanie Avalon:
I love it. I love it. I'm also thinking about how I have this one friend and we want to hang out. We really want to hang out. I don't know if we never hang out and it's because I have to plan. She cannot plan. She refuses to plan, so we're never going to hang out because her approach is just spontaneously invite me. I'm like, you don't understand. I don't spontaneously invite. It's not going to happen, but she can't do a plan, so I can't plan anything for her. So we just don't, we just perpetually like don't hang out. It's so interesting though that some people just don't see the world that way, which I understand they don't see the world that way.

Alana Stott:
Yeah, everyone's different. And I'm the same with my friends. And we, like, we, I just took top of the couple of friends last weekend, and it was our first time in a year. And we're like, that's just who we are. And then we had to eventually, like, the day is there. We're doing it then, that's it. But and then I had a friend on Saturday who messaged me in the middle of the day and was like, Do you want to get cocktails? And I'm like, No, it's Saturday. This isn't being in a diary. Like, we can't do that.

Melanie Avalon:
the exact same. And something I need to work on, it's almost like when people ask me that, I momentarily feel a little bit offended, which is something about my ego. But I'm like, literally, that's my first response. Like, do they really think that I can just do that?

Alana Stott:
right now. We must have. I'd love to see what your personality type is then, that'd be interesting.

Melanie Avalon:
Yeah. For the one that you're talking about. Yeah. No, I'm definitely, I'm excited. I want to do it. I would love to, to connect with him.

Alana Stott:
I was looking at your bio before we were chatting today, because I obviously spoke before, but I've never looked. We have, well, first of all, I'm also a member of MENSA. I have my WISIT, my Wine and Spirit Education Trust, at level two. I didn't get level three yet. Me too. How are you? And what else was it? And I'm a nutritionist, so we're taking some boxes.

Melanie Avalon:
I wish we lived in the same city. We could get drinks.

Alana Stott:
Thanks all the time. Well, I have something new coming at the end of the year, which you might enjoy. I'm coming out with my own champagne, so that's exciting.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh, that's so excite. Oh, and that's all my goal. Not not champagne, but I have a goal to have a wine. Wow, really? What inspired that? Oh, I'm so excited. What inspired that?

Alana Stott:
Somebody approached me and said, you should have your own wine. One of my good friends is a guy called Joe Fattarini and he used to do a show called The Wine Show where they travel around him in Dominant West and Matthew Rhys would drink wine around the world. His nickname is Obie Wine Kenobi because his wine knowledge is out of this world. We've been chatting about it. I've been helping him with a few business things and this other guy said, look, for a percentage, I'll help you build the brand and I said, okay, this is something interesting. But what's funny is when Dean used to go on Special Forces missions, he always used to send me a bottle of champagne and some flowers and then we would drink the champagne when he got back from the mission. It was just our thing. So we said, okay, let's do a champagne brand. And the reason I kind of went champagne was because I stopped drinking red wine almost two years ago, but I haven't stopped permanently. I just wanted to see because I loved red wine so much I went, I'm going to have a break from you. So I still love it, but I needed just a little break. And I've enjoyed that break, but I do miss it. But we went with champagne in the end because it kind of told a story about Dean and I. And then a percentage of it is going to go to the foundation as well. So we're about to start the taste inside of it and we've just taken on a consultancy company. So we're hoping by the end of the year, it'll be done.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh my goodness. Okay. Can I ask a few more questions about it? I love this topic. This is so exciting. Do you know where it'll be from? Like, is it a you at Cali, for you?

Alana Stott:
We're going to do Champagne Method but in probably, I think she said there's a Nappa brand she was thinking of so I think it's definitely, I had the idea do we do do we go to France and just get it but actually it's just so much more simple to do it here.

Melanie Avalon:
Are you going to look at the raising practices at all like sustainability or organic or anything like that?

Alana Stott:
Yeah, she's going to say, so I've taken on this company who does all that for us. I've told her the list of the things that I would like to happen. And then Joe's going to do like the consultancy stuff for us to make sure that everything is done the way that we want it to be done. And then they're going to say she said she had for everything that I gave her, which was all that as well, she had two brands in mind. And then I mean, Dean's kind of not really involved. He's just waiting for the drink inside of it, for the taste inside of it. But yeah, there's a few of that.

Melanie Avalon:
I actually as well, I took a year off and I didn't drink any wine. I just wanted to see, like I was just curious if I would feel any different. I didn't really. And then I decided I was like, I'm just keeping line in.

Alana Stott:
I did look I did like I lost about 30 pounds but at the same time I just had the baby as well so that might have been the same thing but what I did find was I changed my eating habits because my eating habits kind of like where do you want to go it would depend on what wine I wanted to drink that night so if I wanted to drink red wine I would go for a nice steak dinner or something like that so when I stopped drinking red wine I wasn't doing the same eating that I was doing before so I think that's part of it so I'm going to go to the two-year mark I've said to Dina go to the two-year mark and then I think I've got a book that I'm writing in a minute and I've said when I finished that book that's when I'll have a glass of red wine.

Melanie Avalon:
Do you have a teaser about the topic of the book or is it a secret?

Alana Stott:
It is going to be my first fiction one, but based on real life events and it's about white slavery. So it's a new take on slavery really.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh, wow. Okay, that's exciting. Yeah, I actually I had an article published, I think like two weeks ago in Fox, and I was talking about the benefits of red wine for health. And it's always actually really interesting when I do that, because I get a lot of I get a lot of like excitement, but I also get a lot of upset people commenting about how and actually makes me I actually was having a moment yesterday where I was like, am I doing bad by talking about this? Because some of the comments would be like, I can't believe you're doing this alcohol is a poison. Like how can you say this?

Alana Stott:
everybody has, you know, there was a time in life where fat was really bad, there was a time in life where a very nice glass of red wine could be more, I mean my iron dropped, my irons dropped since, and I just had to get some iron infusions, and I didn't have that when I drank red wine, and now it's there. It might be because I ate more red meat at that time, who knows, but there's always going to be kickback, I think, no matter what. I think some of the heavy fitness influencers have some questionable nutrition choices on what it is they eat and how much they eat, and maybe one day they might be like, you know, protein's really bad for you. We don't know what might change over the years, but I don't think red wine does any harm to anyone.

Melanie Avalon:
In two days, I'm interviewing the researchers who were partly involved with coming up with the MIND diet, which is sort of like the official diet for Alzheimer's prevention and cognitive decline. And I know they literally include red wine in their diet. So that's nice to see. Oh my... Okay, I'm so excited about your... You'll have to keep me updated about the champagne. That's so exciting and inspiring because like I said, it's been a goal of mine.

Alana Stott:
Yeah and I'll introduce you to Joe as well because the one great thing about Joe is like he's a speaker he does a lot of wine talks and he does but he can he knows so much he's like a walking encyclopedia when it comes to wine so he could maybe give you some really fascinating facts as well about the history of health and wine and things that he would definitely be a good person for you to speak to in general.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh, yeah, no, that would be amazing. Wait, so he is he the one who does the they were saying earlier?

Alana Stott:
He's Obi-Wan Kenobi, that one, yeah. I'll send you his speaker profile, but he's incredible. I could listen to him for hours. The way he talks about wine is just so beautiful, and he just retains information. He doesn't just know about the wine. He knows where it came from. He knows the family. He knows how they work. It's so amazing how he just takes that knowledge in and keeps it. But yeah, I just booked him for a speaking gig for one of my non-profit events, and he's going to do so amazing.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh my goodness, I would love to talk to him. Yeah, if he's interested in coming on the show as well, I mean, that would be amazing.

Alana Stott:
Yeah, I'll hook you guys up.

Melanie Avalon:
Awesome. Wow. Thank you. Okay. Well, I think now listeners can understand if they didn't first time around with you. Definitely now, just how inspiring and incredible you are. It's so amazing. You probably get asked this a lot, but how do you do all of it? And you have kids. We talked about this last time having kids and working. How do you do all of it?

Alana Stott:
I don't know is the answer and you know what I just find the balance every day we just we just go really hard all day and then we have our kid time and then we make sure we you know there's certain times a year that we don't work like Christmas and we've got a really I've got a really awesome family who are I mean you at the start of this this call you know Harley was crying and she wanted mom and it's really you just got to make it all work and we just just do it just seems to work.

Melanie Avalon:
I think a big part of it, at least for me, because I get asked that question as well, comes down to do you have purpose and passion, you know, behind what you're doing? Because when you're, when you feel, I can't explain it. It's kind of like you were talking about earlier with you can't really explain plant medicine. It's hard to explain having purpose, but I, but I feel like so many people say they don't, you know, it's hard for them to find their purpose or their passion.

Alana Stott:
And that really does like, I was actually saying that to Dean the other day, I said, I, I wake up every day and I like jump out of bed, like I'm ready to take on the day and I'm excited about all the things we're going to do. And then like, I'm working and every single thing I do when it comes to my work is something I enjoy doing. And if it isn't, I just don't do it. Like I turn down work all the time because I'm like, that's not for me. It's not something that I would be passionate about. It's not something I want to do. And then I've got this really great support. Like, as I said, Dean is now pretty much supported me on on what I do pretty much daily. That's his kind of job now is just is is doing that with me and then having the kids and raising them and knowing that I'm doing it for all those like having a purpose every single day is is so amazing. And the days that I struggle is probably the weekend if we've we've not got anything to say, let's take a lazy day. Like, I just sit there like, oh, I don't like this.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh, man, we're so similar. It's crazy. I really can't thank you enough. This conversation was one of my favorite conversations that I've had in life. It was really amazing. Was there anything else you wanted to share with listeners? How can people follow your work?

Alana Stott:
I think I've shared it all as I said before it was just alanastott.com and then all my socials are @alanastott and then yeah I'll share the foundation once the website's ready and and that will all be on there too.

Melanie Avalon:
Awesome, well, thank you so much. The last question I ask every single guest on this show, you might remember it from last time, but it's just because I'm so passionate about mindset and gratitude. So what is something that you're grateful for?

Alana Stott:
I am grateful right now, I would say, for my health. It's one thing that I think I've been really, really blessed with, is that I am able to get up every day and do everything that I've got to do and be with my family and work and everything else, because I think my health is really good. And I don't know if God's just watching out for me, because I don't know if I particularly look after myself as well as maybe Dean does or something, but I do feel full of energy and I'm coming up to 42 now, and I've never felt better. I don't think I've ever looked better, which is something that I would never have been able to say before. I was never very proud of my own self, so I'm very happy to be who I am now.

Melanie Avalon:
I love that so much. Fun fact for listeners, you are Mrs. Scotland, which they might not anticipate after hearing about your insecurities surrounding that. But I think that also just speaks to it's like that we were talking about earlier with a comparison game and you know, the inner monologues in our heads. So thank you for doing what you're doing for listeners and the show notes will put links to everything that we talked about so many things. And I'm so excited to see the launch of your foundation and the champagne and just the next book and thank you so much and I can't wait to talk to you again.

Alana Stott:
Thank you. Good speaking to you and you take care. And I'm here anytime you need anything. Never hesitate.

Melanie Avalon:
likewise. Thanks, Alana. Bye.