A popular food influencer with over two million TikTok followers has claimed that she was drugged and then kidnapped at a Hollywood premiere party four years ago.
Meredith Hayden, the social media chef behind Wishbone Kitchen, addressed her mental health in a video response to a now-deleted TikTok criticizing her for speaking openly about travel anxiety ahead of a birthday trip to Japan.
“The reason why I was crying and anxious about flying across the globe is because four years ago, I was roofied at a Hollywood premiere party in a very luxurious setting where I thought I was safe and I thought I could trust the people around me,” Hayden, 30, said in the video posted Tuesday.
Being “roofied” refers to being drugged unknowingly with a date-rape drug like Rohypnol, which typically causes symptoms like drowsiness and memory gaps.
Hayden said that at the party, she tried to go home because she “started to feel weird,” but then someone “pushed me into their car and kidnapped me for, like, a few hours.”
She added, “And I’m laughing because humor is the way I cope.”
The chef went on to say that she never spoke about the incident online because it happened as she was gaining a following on TikTok, and she did not want to be known as the “roofie kidnap girl.”
She also said she did not report it to the police because she did not know anyone at the party and knew that there was no security camera footage at the event. “This is something I know because the invite to the party said, ‘Don’t worry, the cameras will be off, so we can all really let loose,’” she said.
“I put my big girl pants on, and I shoved the feelings down for as long as I could. So, yeah, I still get anxious leaving my house. And I probably will forever,” she said.
Hayden did not immediately return The Independent’s request for further comment.
The popular food influencer rose to viral fame in early 2022 with her “Day in the Life” TikTok vlogs documenting her work as a private chef for a fashion designer in the Hamptons. She quickly built a loyal following by sharing daily content and recipes, and now counts nearly four million followers across Instagram and TikTok. Last year, she released The Wishbone Kitchen Cookbook, which spent 12 weeks on The New York Times bestseller list.
Recently, Hayden has kept her followers up to date with her 30th birthday trip to Tokyo. She said in her new video that although she was excited for the vacation, she still felt anxious about visiting the crowded city because after her alleged experience at the party, she was diagnosed with “PTSD, anxiety, depression, and a pinch of agoraphobia, where I’m afraid to go into crowded spaces,” she said.
“So, yes, I was staying in very nice hotels. It was my 30th birthday, and that was my present to myself,” she said. “But that doesn’t mean you can’t have anxiety about your situation, about being in a foreign country where you don’t speak the language and you know nobody except for the person you’re traveling with.”
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