Chelsea Handler | He Said He Was Coming Back

The Person Who Believed In Me with David Begnaud

Chelsea Handler shares her deeply personal story of loss, resilience, and healing on 'The Person Who Believed in Me,' recounting how her third-grade teacher, Carol Schectman,

Key takeaways

• A single caring adult can profoundly impact a child's life during times of trauma and neglect.
• The lie Chelsea told to avoid pity ultimately revealed her need for connection and validation.

Main topics

• Childhood trauma and sibling loss
• The impact of supportive educators

Notable quotes

"You're so special." – Ms. Schectman's repeated affirmation that became a lifeline for Chelsea.

Conclusion

Chelsea Handler reflects on how one teacher's belief in her helped sha

Transcript preview

Speaker 1 (0:00) Sometimes it just takes one person to make a profound change. She Speaker 2 (0:03) was the best teacher I've ever had. Nobody was really checking on me. She would always take me aside and be like, Speaker 1 (0:09) you're so special. Speaker 2 (0:10) And as a nine-year-old kid who's being neglected in a family, you need that if you're going to become something. You need somebody to tell you they believe in you and that you have something that no one else has. Speaker 1 (0:21) Does the grief still travel today at 51? Speaker 2 (0:24) I don't feel grief. I just hated seeing my mom like that. Speaker 1 (0:43) I'm just grateful you're here. Thank Speaker 2 (0:44) you. So here we go. Speaker 1 (0:45) We ready? All right. On three, two, and one. Welcome to The Person Who Believed in Me. I'm David Begnaud. Chelsea Handler, the sharp-tongued comedian, host, and seven-time best-selling author, built an empire on saying things nobody else would say. But before any of that, she was a nine-year-old girl in Livingston, New Jersey, being barked at in the hallways of her elementary school. A kid who told her whole town she had been cast in a movie with Goldie Hawn because a made-up family felt somewhat safer than her real one. One adult was standing close enough to see what that lie was really about. It was her third grade teacher, Ms. Sheckman. Chelsea spent 30 years assuming Ms. Sheckman and her might never see each other again and she might never have the chance to say thank you. But then a passing comment on Chelsea's Netflix show led them to reconnect again, this time as adults, restarting a friendship that would last another eight years. Please welcome to the show, Chelsea Handler. Speaker 2 (1:41) Oh, that was so sweet. Cute. Speaker 1 (1:47) Why am I laughing? Are you being genuine there? I am. Yes. Yes. All right. Speaker 1 (1:53) Do you have a hard, is it hard? Is it hard proving to people that when you are being genuine, that it is genuine? It's not just funny. Speaker 2 (2:02) It's come up before, but it doesn't seem to be the main, the main issue. It doesn't seem to be a primary problem. It just wants every once in a while, people don't know, you know, are you being, but no, I'm being sincere. Speaker 1 (2:19) Here we go. Speaker 2 (2:21) Oh, look how young she was. Miss Speaker 1 (2:24) Carol Shechtman, born in Brooklyn, went to NYU and taught you in the third grade. Speaker 2 (2:30) Yes. Speaker 1 (2:32) First memories of her. And first of all, why you chose her as the person who believed in you. Speaker 2 (2:35) She was the best teacher I've ever had. And it made me believe and understand how impactful it is as a kid to have one person in that, like how much impact a teacher can have on a kid. Because I was the youngest of six children in my family. My brother died when I was nine years old. Speaker 1 (2:55) Chet. I Speaker 2 (2:56) was in third grade. Yep, Chet. I was in third grade and she was my teacher. Speaker 2 (3:02) She not only was my teacher in the third grade, we kept our friendship going fourth grade, fifth grade, sixth grade. She kept an eye on me throughout that because she saw what happened to my family when my brother died. And she saw what happened to my relationship with my father. And she saw me start distracting myself from any of the attention that was. getting that was garnered from my brother dying, which was very uncomfortable to me as a nine-year-old. I didn't want pity. I didn't want anyone to feel bad for me. I didn't have the tools to, you know, deal with that. My parents weren't sending us to therapists. They weren't seeing a therapist. That just wasn't happening. So, you know, when a family loses one of their children, he was my oldest brother, my parents' firstborn child, we all kind of retreated to our own sections of grief. And nobody was really checking on me. And I had lost my brother, who was like my North Star. He was my biggest brother, and he took care of me. And as a result of my brother dying, my father was apoplectic. He had to blame someone. and pursued legal action against the people my brother was hiking with, who was his best friend from high school. He sued them. It just, he became, he, he got so embroiled in all of these lawsuits and was so angry at losing his child, which obviously, you know, that happens. Uh, but it was like, not only my brother died, it was like my father went away too. Like I had lost the two guys in my life that were the most important figures in my life as men as a nine-year-old girl. And I only know all of this because I've been to therapy and I've figured it all out. Obviously at the time, I didn't know which way was up, but I remember coming home from the summer. My brother died on July 10th and I came back to school and all the families and all the kids were like, you know, is she okay? Are you okay? And I didn't like that attention. And so. You know, you mentioned the private Benjamin story. I was like, let me flip this around. I'm going to do a little whoopsie doodle on this. So I had another story for them to focus on that was positive and bright and happy. You know, like it was my job at that point in my life to make everybody happy again. I wanted happiness in my family because it was such a dark time. And Mrs. Sheckman, who was my teacher that year. So she saw me go through this and was able to pick up because of her experience with children and teaching that I was being neglected, you know, and that nobody was checking in to see if I was okay. I was only nine. Like, you know, it's my other, imagine my five other siblings that had to deal with the loss as well. Well, my four other siblings and my parents. So she just took me under her wing. Speaker 2 (5:58) She had me come to her, which, you know, you don't do today, but she would have me come to her beach house. She had a house down the shore with her husband. And on the weekends, she would say, could Chelsea come with us to our beach house? And my parents were like, you know, they were out to lunch before my brother died in terms of micromanaging. Whatever the opposite of a helicopter parent is, is what my parents were. So she took me down the shore and I would spend a lot of weekends with her. Not every weekend, but a lot. And she... made time for me all the time. And if I was having a bad day at school or if I was, you know, she tried to engage about my brother dying so she could get me to talk, I was shut down. I was like, it's fine. It's fine. He's dead. It's okay. We're just moving on. You know, like I didn't have the vulnerability. I wasn't in touch with myself. I was just a kid. And she just was a constant presence in my life. Not only that year, the year after. I remember her once walking into my parents' house and it was like a Tuesday night. And I was lying on the couch. I was lying on my mom's head. And my mom was checking my hair for lice or something. There was like a lice outbreak at school or something. And my mom was checking my head. And Mrs. Shackman just came over. And at that time, you know, I didn't think anything of it. But in retrospect, and many years ago, I also realized this when she and I reconnected was, she was coming over to just like take the temperature of the household to see what was going on in my house. And she would always tell me. Like she always, and she may have done this with all of her students. You know what I mean? That's how incredible of a teacher she is and probably did do that with other students. I just didn't know about it. But she would always take me aside and be like. just tell me you're so special. You're so special. She didn't even say like about what she's like, you have a gift. Like, and, and, and as a nine-year-old kid who's being neglected in a family like that, and, and there's so much grief for someone to tell you you're special, you really need that. You need that if you're going to become something. You need somebody to tell you they believe in you and that you have something that no one else has. And she did that in the most beautiful way. And like, she was a seminal figure in my childhood. My whole family knows Mrs. Shuckman. And then I ended up hearing from her later in life, like as you recalled earlier, and she came on my Netflix show. I was like, Mrs. Shuckman is still alive and she lives in Florida. Speaker 2 (8:39) And she came on my Netflix show and I was able to see her. And then we kept in touch. And she was just wonderful. And she was just like, you know, she really was that person that made sure I didn't go down the wrong road. Speaker 1 (8:55) If I would have met the nine-year-old you, what would I have seen, that third grader? Speaker 2 (9:01) Just, I had such a strong personality from the minute I was born. There's no way to, my parents were just like, what is this? And I was like, get out of my way. Everyone get out of my way. Like I have ideas. I'd like to see some financial statements. This doesn't seem like a stable environment. You guys have six kids. And my father was a used car dealer. My mom kind of worked. If my dad was low on cash, my mom would work. But my, so our phone would get shut off every once in a while. I'm like, you guys. have a lot of children and I want to know what the game plan is here. Like I remember being like eight or nine and asking them to see a financial statement. And I was like, do we have savings accounts? Do you have money in the stock market? What, what's happening? And my father would just be like, who is this? Speaker 1 (9:50) And Speaker 2 (9:50) my mom would be like, they would look at each other and she'd be like, I don't know. I don't know. So it was all fun and great. until my brother died. And then it was anger. Like you're angry at the loss. And I was angry at him because he lied to me. He said he was coming right back and he never came back. And I was like, he's a liar. Like as a nine-year-old brain, as I learned when I went to therapy as a 40-year-old woman, in your nine-year-old brain, that is a betrayal. That is a lie. You abandoned me. You didn't die. You let yourself die. When you told me you were coming back for me. And my brother and I had a really special bond, as did all my siblings with my brother. He would take me, like, we had this, we would drive to Martha's Vineyard every summer, right? And he would take, I would always drive with my brother because I love cold air. I love air conditioning. I love the air conditioning here. I love to be cold. Not everybody feels this way. And he would drive me up. It would be five hours to the Woods Hole from New Jersey. We would drive up to the ferry and he would keep the windows down and he would bundle me up in all these blankets. And then he would sit there while he was driving and be like, it's so cold. It's so cold. You know, like. fucking with me, you know, to be like, this is what I do for you. But that is what he did for me. And then when we would get home, if we came back at the end of the summer from Martha's Vineyard, we'd get home. And I understand Martha's Vineyard sounds like we were wealthy. My dad got that house for $25,000 the year I was born. He bought... 10 acres on Martha's Vineyard for $35,000. It was the best thing he ever did because our best memories are from that time. And we would drive back and it would be five hours and we'd get home, you know, late at night. And I always pretend to be asleep. I would always pretend to be asleep because then my brother would carry me up and put me in bed and carry me up the driveway. And my brother would always pick me up and be like, I Speaker 1 (11:45) know you're not sleeping. I know you're not sleeping. Speaker 2 (11:47) you know, and then dropped me off in bed. And then he'd put me in my room and he'd open the window, even in the middle of winter, because he's like, she likes it cold. And he was just like, you know, that was my guy. That was my like crush almost, my first love. And being the oldest of the family, he was in charge of our family. And like, he was the person you went to before you go to my parents or to go to our parents. And so Mrs. Sheckman, Like, she knew him also, which was a huge benefit. I think she had been maybe his teacher, too. She definitely taught my other brothers and sisters. Maybe not Ms. Shetman. Maybe she didn't teach Chet, because he was quite a few years older than me. But she knew about our family, because she and I bonded just from, like, skip. As soon as I started third grade, I was like, oh, I like this teacher a lot, because she saw me in a way that I hadn't seen myself. Speaker 1 (12:44) The family photo. So here they are. You were the youngest of six. Dad, Melvin. Mom, Rita. Your mom was a Mormon who converted to Judaism. Speaker 2 (12:56) She never converted to Judaism. Oh, she didn't? She just cosplayed Judaism. Speaker 1 (13:01) Got it. Yes. And you can Speaker 2 (13:02) see the look on my face there. That was pretty much my... That expression on my face sums up what I thought about my parents parenting. So Speaker 1 (13:11) I felt the same way when I saw that photo. I was like, this is so Chelsea. Speaker 2 (13:15) It's so like, ugh. Speaker 1 (13:18) But when you look at that little girl, what memory comes back? Speaker 2 (13:21) I was pissed. I remember specifically that day I was pissed. Because that would have been Shoshana's bat mitzvah. The girl, my sister, standing to my right. That would have been Shana's bat mitzvah. And I remember that outfit. And I was pissed about that outfit that they made me wear. I was pissed about my hair. And I just had this scowl. And that was before my brother died. So I already just looked like the family accountant or something. Speaker 1 (13:51) It's such a good photo with this long running hair in a church looking dress. Speaker 2 (13:58) I know. I know. I just, I always thought my parents had no business being parents. You know what I mean? I was, I was always just like very suspicious of them. I was like, that's not how you do things. That's not how you, I'm like, mom, you have to pick me up from school when I'm done. You can't just let me walk home in a snowstorm. And she's like, it's only a down the street. It's a 15 minute walk. I'm like, no, no. Other mothers are picking their kids up in snowstorms. You need to come. And when you come to get me from school to sign me out for lunch, or if we're going on a special, once it was my birthday, I was like eight or nine years old. And my mom's like, I'm going to take you out to lunch. I'll pick you up from school and we'll go to a fun lunch at like, you know, Chuck E. Cheese or whatever. And then I sat in the principal's office like this, so excited on my birthday, waiting, waiting, waiting, waiting. My mom never, no one showed up. I had to go back. No lunch. I went back at the end of the period. And at the end of the school day, I charged home and I was like, what the fuck was that? Today was my eighth birthday. Where were you? And my mom's like, I was there. I had my car. I was outside. There was these chains, you know, that so people couldn't drive through the school during the day. So there was like two entries to the school, but they were changed. She goes, I was outside of the chain waiting. I'm like, mom, I'm eight. You have to come in and sign me out. I can't just leave. I'm a child. And she's like, I didn't know that. I'm like, this is your sixth child. You didn't know you had to sign me out of school? Like, that's how my parents operated? Speaker 1 (15:28) That was my thing. They had five kids to get it right with. How were you the one who was giving them this reckoning? Speaker 2 (15:34) I think my mom from the get-go was, she was European and she was just, la, la, la, la, la, la, la. That's her attitude about everything. I'm going to take a nap. and I'm going to have a liverwurst sandwich and bring it up to my room, and I'm going to eat it in bed, and then I'll probably take a nap, and then maybe later. It was always like, la, la, la, la, la. Like, there was no... And so my sister has a story because they're like, it wasn't just you, Chelsea. My sister has a story. My mom had three boys and then she had three girls. And then so she had the three boys and the first girl in four years. She was 21 years old when she had her first kid. So by the time she was 26, she had four kids, okay? And so my sister, the boys were all going to elementary school, Riker Hill Elementary, down the street from our house. Not a long walk, but, you know. And she... She, my sister, oldest sister, had been going to school with the boys once they started going to school for like four days before they called my mom. And they're like, hi, Simone is coming to school every day. She's three. Like, she's not ready to be in school. We really can't have her here, but she's coming with her brothers to school every day. And my mom's like, what? Speaker 2 (16:53) My mom's like, she's coming to school? Like, where did my mom think my sister was? And it was the 70s with them. So I don't know. But it just was always, they were not all hands on deck. My dad was much more involved in like the school stuff, showing up at softball games, showing up at teacher meetings. My mother was not interested in that. aspect of things. Speaker 1 (17:17) So dad ran the used car lot, right? Yes, which was our Speaker 2 (17:20) driveway. Right. Speaker 1 (17:22) So, which by the way, I'm told also doubled as the family fleet, right? Which was full of flat tires and missing wipers and permanently lit check engine lights and- Speaker 2 (17:30) Batteries, car batteries strewn across the driveway. Picture Sanford and Son Speaker 1 (17:34) in Speaker 2 (17:35) a Jewish Italian neighborhood. Speaker 1 (17:38) In a wealthy school district. Speaker 2 (17:40) Middle class. Speaker 1 (17:41) Okay. But Speaker 2 (17:42) yeah, middle class. Speaker 1 (17:43) When you went to school- Did you feel like you were the poor kid on campus? Speaker 2 (17:48) Yes. I did feel that way. I wasn't poor, but yes. I wouldn't say we were, we were never hungry. Do you know what I mean? There was never food insecurity. So I don't want to say I was poor, but we weren't wealthy. We didn't have money. You know, we didn't have, everyone in that neighborhood had a nice car and they had two cars, not seven. Everyone had, you know, like their. lawn looked nice. Ours was not nice. Ours are, we had like brick steps and half of the bricks were on the steps and half of the bricks were off the steps. It was like unkempt. Do Speaker 1 (18:21) you remember having a thought as a child where you said, I want a life more put together and better than this? Yeah. Like Speaker 2 (18:26) when I was two, I was like, when am I going to be able to get my own place? I knew that I, I believed that I. would be better suited to manage our family than my both of my parents. I believe that at a very young age. And I let them know. And I told my brothers and sisters, I go, guys, I can get us out of this. Just follow my lead. And they were like, you're four and five years old. Like, what are you talking about? But I was serious. I knew that my future was not going to be like that because it was an example of exactly what I did not want, which was just chaos. Speaker 1 (19:03) Where did that confidence come from? I don't know. Speaker 2 (19:06) I really don't know. I think you're just born with it. Speaker 1 (19:09) I would agree. You're now the baby. You've had so much success and you have a lot of money. Do you feel like you're the leader of the family in that way, in a way that you wanted to be? Speaker 2 (19:18) Yeah. Speaker 1 (19:19) You do. Speaker 2 (19:19) You Speaker 1 (19:20) do. And are your siblings okay with that or are they challenged by it? Speaker 2 (19:25) I'm sure there's some challenges or they are challenged. buy it or have been maybe, but it hasn't come up as a big issue. I, yeah, I liked, I wanted that responsibility and now I've got it. Speaker 1 (19:46) How does it feel to have that and to be able to do that for them? Awesome. Speaker 2 (19:50) I've sent every single niece and nephew to college. I've sent 20 kids I've never met to college. I've been able to do so many great things that I wanted to do when I was a kid. I was like, when I grew up, I'm going to be, I'm going to have my shit together so much that I'm going to be able to help people that I don't even know. And I want to be the patriarch of this family. That's what I wanted to be, like the patriarch, not the matriarch, the patriarch. Like that's what I had in my head. I'm going to take care of everybody. I just didn't want any of my brothers and sisters' kids to feel anything that we felt when growing up. And it wasn't. so dark. Even in our darkest hours, our family was very joyful. There was so much laughter. And we just had so many, there were like, there were so many glistening and glimmering memories. Mrs. Sheckman being one of them, like, she was just like, you know, whenever I think of her. I wonder how many other people she had that impact on that she did on me. I wonder how many other Chelsea's there were that she changed them or just loved them that little extra. You know, teachers can't do that now, take you home for the weekend to their house. That's like,