Nancy Benoit's Sister On How Chris Benoit's Personality Changed, What Caused Benoit To Snap
As noted, Nancy Benoit's sister, Sandra Toffoloni, appeared on Chris Jericho's podcast this past Friday. We will have a detailed report of the podcast soon, below are a couple of highlights (h/t to The Inquisitr for the transcription).
How Benoit's personality changed over the years:
"What really became noticeable was a little bit more of ? like a sense of ? un-safeness and paranoia for the family. He'd just would like, be constantly checking the alarm at night, constantly be checking things, and for himself. Like when we would go to the gym and do things like that, he would take different ways every time, different routes, The way we would go in the morning is not the way we would go after dinner, and never ever before had that been. He used to be fairly laid back about stuff like that, there was never any issue like that, so when it did start happening I noticed immediately.
"It was a huge personality change, not crazy-huge where everyone else would notice, but people that was around him a lot would notice. I didn't really understand what was happening and to be frank, I still kind of look back on it?was it a precursor to everything that happened ? I don't know."
What drove Benoit to murder:
"I think that it [drug abuse] was a huge contributing factor to what happened. The autopsy said so, I had seen it prior to that ? the alcohol and medication, not just the steroids but everything else that had been going on ? it was a huge factor. I know that everyone talks about the concussion issue with Christopher, maybe that played a role as well, the autopsy never said he had Alzheimer's, that he couldn't find his way, the things they are saying related to concussions wasn't Chris and wasn't anything I observed ever. That guy could get in and out of an airport in eight minutes flat, and I mean any airport. It wasn't that, it was a combination of a lot of things. A huge boulder of weight from loss and grief, I think it was a ton of medication altering his body chemistry, his brain chemistry, alcohol, everything that was going on at that time.
"I know there were issues in the house that he was having, again, with himself. Struggling inside with things that are privy to he and I, and my family and my sister, that I wouldn't put on blast for anyone to know. But that coupled with the facts of what I know from being there immediately after that weekend, and seeing everything, it wasn't the act of someone with brain damage. It wasn't, it's impossible for that to have been the case. I understand the necessity to want to put it on something and say, 'this is why he did it, this is the reason right here.' Because the daily pain of not knowing why and not really knowing what happened, is crippling.
"I can't put it on any one thing; it was a combination of many things, outside factors, and an inner struggle that he had been going through for quite some time after Eddie and everyone else?he almost had this look in his eye ? it wasn't more of who's next, it was more of, am I next ? in his eyes."