‘The Monster is So Much Bigger’: Brianna LaPaglia Appears to Shed New Light on Her Split with Zach Bryan

During a new episode of the Him & Her Podcast, Brianna LaPaglia appears to open up about her romance with Zach Bryan, while delving into how to leave a toxic relationship.

Back in November 2024, shortly after their split, LaPaglia accused the ‘Something in the Orange’ hitmaker of emotional abuse, and of trying to get her to sign a $12 million NDA. The furore around the break-up led to a lengthy war of words involving LaPaglia's two BFFs co-hosts at Barstool Sports, Dave Portnoy and Josh Richards.

Now, LaPaglia has stopped by the Him & Her Podcast to seemingly shed new light on a previous tumultuous romance, with the objective of offering others that might currently find themselves in a toxic relationship advice and guidance on how to get out of it. It's worth stressing that LaPaglia never mentions Bryan by name on the podcast, but fans widely believe that she is indeed discussing the highly publicised and contentious relationship based on timing, context and past comments.

LaPaglia alleges that, near the conclusion of the relationship she is discussing, she learned that her ex had been paying “hush money” to girls he was seeing as a way of keeping them quiet, “Towards the end, I started finding out that he had done this before. And there was, like, a lot of hush money before with not even girlfriends, just, like, side girls that he would pay off so that his current girlfriends didn't find out he was cheating, and stuff like that. So I started to piece everything together”.

She goes on to use this as an example of how, when people are in positions of status and are bringing in their teams huge sums of money, they often turn a blind eye to their actions, “But with powerful people like that - and not just him, just in general - they have these crazy teams around them that make so much money off of them. They will do anything and everything to cover up anything negative that these people do...It's not just him, the monster. The monster is so much bigger”.

LaPaglia candidly expands, “It's the whole entire system, and it's the people that allow these things to go on. It's the people that support these things, that turn a blind eye...and they, like, get away with it as well”, adding, “There's not just blood on his hands...It's his whole entire f***ing team that knew what he was doing”.

Elsewhere during the conversation, LaPaglia offers some counsel, “If you're afraid to speak up in the sense of, saying it out loud to yourself, you need to ask yourself, ‘What position am I going to be in in 10 years from now?’ That's what I kept asking myself. I'm like, this hasn't gotten better, it's only been getting worse...I am miserable, I don't recognize myself. Look in the mirror and ask yourself, ‘Will I be happy in 10 years? Do I have the potential to be happy without this person?’”

LaPaglia emphasises, “I think a lot of people get stuck and scared because they think without them, they'll be nothing and they can't find happiness again. You have to remember you are a person, a whole entire human being with a life and love before you even knew this partner existed. You can always return back to who you were because you were that person first...If you stay with this person, you're never gonna get her back...I think with toxicity and, like, trauma bonding in relationships, you feel like you become one and you can't live without that person”.

As for her personal story, LaPaglia recalls becoming distant from her loved ones, “I think that my family and my friends didn't recognize me anymore. It's heartbreaking to, like, walk into a room with your family and friends and they're on edge or they don't know how to talk to you anymore. They don't know, like, what's going on...I would walk into a room, and be, not the loudest, but I'm just outgoing. I want to talk to everyone. I'm happy. I'm asking questions. I'm very inquisitive. And throughout that relationship, I was kind of put in a corner, told not to speak. I was told when I was allowed to talk and things I was allowed to do and who I was supposed to be. Because if I upset this person, I knew what was going to happen”.

She recalls, “So that translated into my friendships where with my family, I would go sit down and have conversations...I was just shell of a human. They were like, ‘Where's Brianna?’ I don't understand where this happy go lucky girl is. You're saying that this relationship is perfect, but you can't even look me in my eyes... I wouldn't make jokes anymore...I would just sit there and speak when spoken to”.

As for whether she has communicated with her ex recently, LaPaglia muses, “I don't even remember the last time we talked. I think I just like kind of stopped answering him because he was crazy. But it kind of turned into his team, like a team war”.

She outlines how defensive her ex's followers continue to be across social media, “His fans are crazy. They still are. Like, I get death threats and hate comments every single day from them. And then you go, like...I'll get a bad comment. You click their page. They're like at his concert. I'm like, oh my gosh...I didn't do anything to you or to him. I was the one that got something done to me”.

The purpose of the podcast episode is to help those who are in toxic and abusive relationships, with LaPaglia delivering words of hope to anyone feeling trapped in this situation.

Wherever you stand on the specific split between LaPaglia and Bryan, and regardless of whether you are a LaPaglia fan or a Bryan fan, this message is undoubtedly a worthy one.

Watch the full conversation below:

For more on Zach Bryan, see below: