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Prior to being attacked by Ana, a number of things happened that seemed impossible. I had built a successful career as a Licensed Clinical Social Worker - a Therapist - in Wilmington, NC.
This was a journey that began in 1984 which will unfold throughout this book. In 1984, I graduated from Southington High School, in Southington, CT. I had been accepted to various colleges/universities and they were all far away. Southington was a rural town in Connecticut with roughly 30,000 residents spreadout over a wide area with apple orchards and trails through the woods and across Ragged Mountain.
I went to the Georgia Institute of Technology (Georgia Tech) and through the help of psychology and a psychologist, I had overcome social anxiety, shyness, social phobia, and what might be diagnosed as selective mutism - from Junior High, through High School and into Undergraduate School at Georgia Tech, I almost never spoke at all in a classroom where I might be the center of attention.
I didn't want to bring attention to me. I definitely NEVER wanted to bring negative attention to me. Clearly, the events that were alleged to have occured on October 1, 2004, would have brought negative attention to me which would follow me for the rest of my life. No matter how far I had come in overcoming the shyness and social anxiety, I certainly didn't want to give people a reason to point a finger at me, to dislike me, to reject me!
I had spent about 16 years building a life that was defined by success. During the late 80s, I worked on my social anxiety. I learned social skills. I realized that engineering was not a good match for me.
In 1992, I moved to Wilmington, North Carolina. Eventually, I would fall in love with Lynn Denise Krupey. Two years later, we were living as husband and wife.
As late as early July of 2000, I was on top of the world. I had a family - Lynn and I. I had a home. I had built a successful private practice as a therapist. What more could I possibly want?
Lynn and I were madly in love. I thought that I would be with her for the rest of our lives. I thought we would have a home just like I knew when I was growing up. It would be two stories... with a big yard. I would have a six figure salary.
This part of the story is more complicated and I will get to it later.
Lynn started to get very sick in late July of 2000. I thought she would die. This was overwhelming and too much for me.
A meteor had come crashing into the life I had known and destroyed everything that year.
This is the best way to describe something that you don't see coming.
There was a character named John Freifeld that I mentioned earlier. He was providing therapy to some of my clients and they were getting worse. I spoke to him in 1998 and met him in 1999. He made a referral to me in 1998 for someone he thought had Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID). He was running an online support group based on the 12-steps for alcohol and drug dependence.
Details about this will be provided later. In July of 2000, as Lynn was getting sick and I thought she might die, I learned that John Freifeld (John) had convinced 5 of my clients to sign a single grievance letter statement to my licensure board and to file a malpractice civil suit against me. As a clinical social worker/therapist, I had worked in settings that do not cater to the most vulnerable in society so every working environment was not the best match for me. However, I NEVER had issues with clients having problems with me and how I performed.
I never imagined that I would have to defend myself against allegations by clients. This individual, John, was very persuasive. He had the characteristics of a cult leader - a malignant narcissist. He could make people believe he was acting in their best interests even when he was making them worse because he was not trained to work in this field.
I would end up moving from the home that I had known for years with Lynn in Wilmington to living in an entirely different city in North Carolina by the end of 2000.
Again, I was on top of the world in early July of 2000. In love. Successful. I had a home and a sense of family with Lynn. Everything was perfect. This was 16 years in the making - 16 years of work to build this life that was everything I could have imagined.
By the end of 2000, I had moved to Durham, NC to live with other victims of John.
I had already known injustice. I had been taken to court as a result of a false claim by John Freifeld. I thought nothing would come of the matter.
Several months earlier, I had ended all contact with John when I learned about who he really was... when I saw his true colors. I had called on behalf of a client named Tracy. I am just using a first name for confidentiality. Tracy had rejected John's sexual advances and ended up having to escape by train or bus back to New Jersey and move into a domestic violence shelter. That was the last conversation I had with John.
So, in late 2000, after closing down my private practice, losing my home, losing Lynn, the love of my life, I was falsely accused of something called cyberstalking and harrassing phone calls. I didn't understand the cyberstalking. When I read the law it seemed like others would be more guilty of posting negative information about John and so I couldn't understand why he was targetting me.
The harrassing phone calls never happened. I assumed that for this to go anywhere, for me to worry, there would have to be evidence which would not exist because it didn't happen. There were no voicemail recordings, no call records. Nothing. It didn't happen.
After I had lost everything, I had to rely on a public defender for this matter. He was ready to go to trial right away without getting the phone records.
Who was I to argue? Since it didn't happen there couldn't be any evidence and so nothing could go wrong. As it turned out, the judge believed John, who represented himself in court. He had no evidence because there was none to have.
After I was found guilty of the harrassing phone charge, though it was a misdemeanor and carried no jail time, I demanded my lawyer appeal the decision. My lawyer, a public defender, approached me in the hallway outside court and asked if I wanted him to appeal and get the phone records!
I was livid. I said, "Yes, it did not happen, get the phone records."
Shortly after that I would lose my job in Wilmington where I was working again as a paraprofessional. I was providing direct services to individuals with various disabilities at various ages. John had called the agency and told about the issues relating to my licensure... and they had to dismiss me from the job.
The job did not require clinical licensure but that didn't matter.
I had been speaking to a couple in Durham, NC, who suggested that getting away from everything with John obsessed with destroying my life was the best thing to do. I was very resistent to this plan.
My perfect life had been in Wilmington. I wanted that all back. Naturally, I wanted that all back. I didn't want to just give up everything I had known.
When Lynn had gotten sick back in late July, my so-called family - my mother Kathleen Whealton, father Bruce Whealton Sr. and my sister Carrie Whealton - showed no compassion or concern for anything I was experiencing. They didn't seem to care at all that the love of my life, Lynn, might die. No cards. They never said "is there anything I can do?" Nothing!
Instead of putting things in context and remembering that my so-called family was narcissistic and lacked a capacity for compassion and any form of empathy, I thought I didn't deserve anything.
Earlier Lynn had said that she wished I had kept in touch with our mutual friends. This was when she was getting sick in July or August of that year of 2000. She had not suggested I reach out to my parents or my sister. She had met them when we visited them and they visited us. There was an ongoing relationship with my parents and my sister. Yet Lynn had not suggested that I reach out to my family.
She wished I had kept in touch with our mutual friends. That would have included our long-time friend Thomas Childs. Lynn was fighting for her life and she couldn't support me with what I was facing. She couldn't comfort me when the greatest terror was losing her.
She knew the day would come when our "normal" life together would change. I was in denial of that day. All I could do is cry bitterly, weeping, on the phone when I called her... after she moved in with her mother in Wilmington... more on this later in the book.
For some reason, I reached out to my parents and my sister. I found no support - emotional or otherwise. I then lost a job in Wilmington that didn't require a degree or my clinical licensure.
So, I packed up what little I had... it could fit in the trunk, front and backseat of a car and after calling my new friends in Durham, I said that I was on my way up there.
Their names were Quillpen and David Zabriski.