Who Am I Now? — Identity, Healing, and What Monique Tepe Built After McKee
True Crime Today | Daily True Crime News & Interviews
Tony Brueski
4.2 • 612 Ratings
🗓️ 28 February 2026
⏱️ 22 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
You get out. The divorce is final. You're physically safe. And then one morning you're standing in your kitchen and a thought hits you that you weren't expecting: Who am I?
Not "what do I do now." This is deeper. What do I actually like? What do I actually think? What do I actually want — not what keeps the peace, not what avoids punishment — what do I want? For someone coming out of coercive control, those questions can feel impossible. Because the person who entered that relationship has been systematically disassembled.
True crime coverage talks about the abuse. The escape. The arrest. It almost never talks about what comes after — the healing, the identity work, the daily act of becoming yourself again after someone spent years trying to erase you.
This episode honors what Monique Tepe built after her marriage to Michael McKee. She chose Spencer. She chose parenthood. She chose joy while carrying fear. And she did it knowing — according to family — that the threat had never fully gone away.
We cover what recovery actually looks like: the identity excavation, the role of therapy and its accessibility barriers, the shame that doesn't belong to survivors, and the community of people carrying the same silence. This episode speaks directly to anyone still rebuilding after what happened to them.
You are not what happened to you. You are what you build after.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hiring isn't just about finding someone willing to take the job. |
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| 0:27.6 | this podcast. Indeed.com slash broadcast. Terms and conditions apply. Hiring, do it the right way |
| 0:34.4 | with Indeed. If you're into true crime, not just the headlines, but the human stories behind them. |
| 0:40.6 | Join us at Crimecom Birmingham, an intimate one-day event on April 25th, |
| 0:45.1 | featuring in-depth sessions with investigators, creators, and the families impacted by crime. |
| 0:50.2 | With just 200 attendees, you'll also share breakfast and lunch with the speakers, |
| 0:57.9 | giving you the chance to spend time with the people shaping the world of true crime. |
| 1:05.3 | Crimecom Birmingham is partnered by the True Crime Channel. For 10% off, go to crimecon.com.com.com.com and use the code Birmingham at checkout. |
| 1:11.3 | Hiring isn't just about finding someone willing to take the job. You need the right person with a right background who can move your business forward. If you want candidates who match what you're looking |
| 1:15.6 | for, trust Indeed sponsored jobs. And listeners of the show will get a 100 pound sponsored job |
| 1:22.1 | credit to help get your job the premium status it deserves at Indeed.com slash broadcast. |
| 1:34.7 | Just go to Indeed.com slash broadcast right now and support this show by saying you heard about Indeed on this podcast. |
| 1:41.6 | Indeed.com slash broadcast. Terms and conditions apply. Hiring, do it the right way with Indeed. |
| 1:46.5 | If you're into true crime, not just the headlines, but the human stories behind them. |
| 1:52.1 | Join us at CrimeCom Birmingham, an intimate one-day event on April 25th, featuring in-depth sessions with investigators, creators, and the families impacted by crime. With just 200 attendees, |
| 1:58.1 | you'll also share breakfast and lunch with the speakers, giving you the chance to spend time with the people shaping the world of true crime. |
| 2:04.6 | Crimecom Birmingham is partnered by the True Crime Channel. |
| 2:07.3 | For 10% off, go to crimecon.com.com.com and use the code Birmingham at checkout. |
... |
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