Martha Stewart Will Never Escape These Salacious Rumors

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Business mogul and self-professed OG tradwife Martha Stewart is no stranger to bad press. Over the years, she's been the subject of many less-than-stellar headlines. "I don't understand it. I write books. I've [got] beautiful magazines. I've done television shows that are devoted to ... good living. I don't know," she lamented about the incessant rumors and gossip that plagued her during a 2013 appearance on "Today." 

Fortunately for Martha, she's a tough nut to crack. "I'm a tough person from [the] start. I've always been a tough person. Tough, meaning I can survive," she told "Today" host Matt Lauer. "I'm a survivor." And that she is. From the insider trading scandal, to all of the gossip about her purported plastic surgery, to accusations of workplace bullying, and everything in between — nearly every aspect of Martha's life has been dissected, embellished upon, and at times, downright fabricated. Unfortunately, there are some salacious rumors that the domestic diva just can't escape. Let's get into it, shall we?

First things first: No, Martha Stewart was not found guilty of insider trading. Unfortunately, prior to Netflix's documentary "Martha," many people, including some of her most devoted fans, believed that she had been convicted of insider trading and that was why she did time in federal prison. (Welcome to the untold truth of Martha Stewart.)

Stewart was a billionaire riding high when everything — including the behemoth empire she had created from the ground up — suddenly came crashing down. "It came as a surprise when I got a call from my law firm that I was being requested by the U.S. attorney for an appearance to question my sale of ImClone," Stewart recalled in the Netflix documentary "Martha." According to Stewart, her decision to offload the stock was simply business as usual. "I called Peter Bacanovic, who was my broker. It was a very short conversation saying, 'The stock's going down. I think we should sell.' And I said, 'Good. Sell,'" Stewart revealed in the doc. In the end, prosecutors were never able to convict her of insider trading, but she was convicted of conspiracy, obstruction, and two counts of lying to federal prosecutors. 

It should be noted, however, that Stewart still maintains to this day that she never lied to authorities. Stewart claimed in the doc that she had been advised by her attorneys to simply say she didn't remember or couldn't recall if something was unclear to her. "I wasn't scared because I hadn't done anything wrong that I knew about. My lawyers didn't think I had done anything wrong. I did exactly what my lawyers had told me. Answer everything as truthfully and as honestly as I could possibly. And when I didn't remember, I said I didn't remember," she explained. 

Did she or didn't she?! It's long been rumored that Martha Stewart gets by with a little (read: a lot) of help from her plastic surgeons. Never forget Stewart's history-making Sports Illustrated Swimsuit cover that launched a thousand cosmetic procedure rumors. 

As it turns out, however, Stewart's stance on plastic surgery is clear as day. "I've had absolutely no plastic surgery whatsoever," she told Variety, swiftly batting down all of the speculation about her appearance. "Every now and then there are certain fillers that I can do for a little line here or there, but I hate Botox. It's a weird thing for me." She added, "I really and truly don't do a lot."

Things got so bad that Stewart's own dermatologist, Dr. Dan Belkin, came to her defense during an appearance on her podcast. "When I see your Instagram, one of the trolls that you get is, 'Tell us who your plastic surgeon is,'" Dr. Belkin said on the episode. "And I end up telling a lot of people, there wasn't a plastic surgeon. It's just minimally invasive things for a long time in a really thoughtful, excellent way," he said (via the New York Post).

In March 2005, Martha Stewart returned to work after spending five months as an inmate at the Federal Prison Camp in Alderson, West Virginia. First order of business: fawn over all her employees who kept the ship afloat while she was away. "All of you are my heroes," she told the Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia Inc. staff, according to the Herald-Tribune. "It's really wonderful to be back. I've missed you, as you can imagine. I've thought about you every single day."

Unfortunately, however, it's widely rumored that in real life, Stewart is nowhere near as complimentary or appreciative of her team. "At a board meeting, Martha walked in with a pot, slammed it on the table, and goes, 'This is crap. I don't want my name on it," a source told New York Magazine in 2011. Meanwhile, another source told the magazine that the ladies' restroom was always full of "women in there crying literally all day long." Enter the ugly side of Stewart.

Interestingly enough, however, Martha has never really tried to dispel the rumors that she is tough on her employees. "I dislike waste. I dislike inefficiency, avoidance, impatience. I dislike people who think they can do more than they can do. I dislike not paying attention to details," she rattled off at the beginning of the Netflix documentary, "Martha". At one point, while cameras were rolling in the doc, Stewart didn't think twice about admonishing one of her employees for using the wrong knife to cut an orange. "Isn't that a stupid knife?" she scolded the staff member. "I don't think I've been the mean and nasty and horrible person portrayed in certain publications," Martha later said about the rumors during a confessional. "I'm strict and I'm demanding and I'm all those good things that make a successful person." 

Perhaps, however, the most hurtful rumors that plague Martha Stewart are the ones surrounding her former marriage — namely, what kind of wife she was to her ex-husband, Andrew Stewart. Long after the ink dried on Stewart's divorce papers, people were still recounting old stories that painted Andrew's time as Mr. Martha Stewart as anything but pleasant. 

In the confines of the 1997 unauthorized biography, "Martha Stewart: Just Desserts," author Jerry Oppenheimer reported that Martha commemorated one Mother's Day by throwing a breakfast tray at her then-husband. According to Oppenheimer's account, Andrew told a friend that he ultimately decided to leave Martha "because she became gradually an awful person." He added, "She was selfish beyond any imagination. She was untruthful, unpleasant, rude, and angry all the time," Oppenheimer penned about the moment the curtain finally closed on the marriage.

But as the old saying goes, there are always two sides to every story. To hear Martha tell it, Andrew wasn't the best spouse either, engaging in several extramarital affairs, including one with an employee of hers. "If you're married and you think you're happily married and your husband starts to cheat on you, he's a piece of s***. And look at him. It's a piece of s***, and get out of it. Get out of that marriage," she said in her Netflix documentary, "Martha."