Chapter 25
Martina is starting us off with a lecture on attraction, today. She has drawn a diagram on the whiteboard, and she is gesturing with the pen as she talks.
“… we are told that attraction is something innate, and primal.” She stabs the air with her pen.
“But when we view attraction as something outside of our control, it leads us to making bad decisions. When we let attraction reside in the subconscious, it gives us an excuse to let ourselves be run by our impulses, as opposed to taking control of the process.”
I notice, offhandedly, that she has buttoned her shirt wrong. One side of her collar is higher than the other. And her hair isn’t its usual smooth, shiny self; the braid looks hastily pulled together. A little tuft of hair is sticking out the middle of it.
Martina stops and lowers the pen for a second.
“This is important, ladies,” she snaps. “So please pay attention.”
I see Clara jumping at the harshness of her tone; Leyla seems to sink deeper into her chair in a mild show of teenage-style defiance.
“The world tells us that we have no power.” A little bit of spittle has gathered at the corner of her mouth.
“It tells us that we are supposed to wait to be chosen. That to be chosen is an honor, and we should be grateful for any attention, sexual or romantic, that we get. But we have to reframe ourselves as the ones who do the choosing. When we’re not thoughtful and proactive in how we go about engaging with potential partners, we fall back on stereotypes.
We end up picking who we think we should be with, rather than those we might actually be able to build a happy life with. ”
She looks around the room, fixating on each of us for a few seconds, letting the intensity of her stare do the work.
She’s agitated, I realize, my pulse quickening ever so slightly.
Something has happened. Something has changed.
But what?
When Martina lands on me, she smiles. It is not a kind smile.
“Let’s take you, Isobel.” She taps the pen against the palm of her hand. It’s a harsh, meaty sound.
“What about me?” I ask her, my voice climbing half an octave in surprise.
“We established yesterday that you pick sexual partners because you like the attention, correct? And not because of an innate sense of animal attraction.”
“I don’t—” I start to say, but she raises her voice and begins to talk over me.
“Being chosen made you feel powerful.” It’s not a question. “Engaging with partners who were attracted to you made you feel like you were the one in a position of strength. But you never actually made use of that strength, did you?”
“What do—what do you mean?” I stammer.
Martina stops tapping her palm.
“Let’s open this up to the group.” Martina smiles. “How do you think Isobel used her power?”
She looks around the room.
The silence that follows is a terrible, oppressive thing. The pressure to say something, anything, is overwhelming; I feel as though my ears are about to pop.
“You’re not helping Isobel by staying quiet, you know.” The disappointment in her voice is scalding. “You are supposed to be her companions through this process. You are supposed to help nurture her, just as she is supposed to help nurture you.”
She throws me another glance, cruel and quick.
“And challenging the harmful ideas she is carrying around is part of that process.”
“She didn’t use that power,” Clara pipes up. “Because it wasn’t real.”
She leans forward in her chair, eyes locked on me.
“The sense of power was fake,” she says.
“It was just a comforting story you told yourself so that you wouldn’t have to do the work of choosing yourself.
As long as you could keep telling yourself you were in charge, you could blind yourself to the fact that you kept giving up your true power to mediocre men who meant nothing to you. ”
She smiles at me. I don’t know if I imagine the slight challenge in her eyes. As though daring me to speak up, defend myself.
Martina nods to her, and says, with a cool, clear voice:
“Very good, Clara.”
Then her head snaps around, and she’s looking at me again.
“Do you recognize that, Isobel? Does that sound familiar?”
I want to protest, want to give in to the boiling anger that tastes like bitter coal on my tongue, but I swallow it down.
I refuse to end up today like I did yesterday. Yesterday, I wasn’t prepared for the intensity of all of this, how quickly it would get under my skin.
But now, the stakes have become clearer than ever. I have Sandra here with me again, and we’re about to get things moving. If everything goes as it should, we’ll have actual proof by tonight.
All I have to do until then is be Isobel Anderssen.
I let my head hang down, and I draw a deep, theatrical breath.
“Yes.” If I give in to it, they might move on.
“So tell us,” Martina says.
When I look up, I see that she has walked into the circle, that she has crouched down on the floor in front of me.
“Tell you what?”
“Tell us that you allowed yourself to be taken advantage of,” Martina purrs. “Tell us that you let yourself play into a false narrative in order to not have to make yourself vulnerable.”
Martina has lowered her voice until it’s almost a whisper, like a twisted form of intimacy.
“Don’t tell me because you think it’s what I want to hear,” she says. “I need to see that you understand that it’s true. I need to see that you believe it. That is the only way you can change.”
“This is a bit much.” Leyla has sat up in her chair.
Martina rises to her feet with admirable quickness and dexterity; she’s got at least ten years on me, but my knees would have sounded like Pop Rocks if I’d tried the same move.
“What do you mean, Leyla?”
She doesn’t sound angry. She sounds curious.
But I can feel the sudden charge in the room all the same; I think we all can.
“You’re putting words in her mouth,” Leyla shoots back. “That’s not how therapy is supposed to work.”
She looks over at Clara.
“I know we’re supposed to help each other progress, or whatever, but right now it just feels like you’re getting us to gang up on Isobel,” she continues, now aimed at Clara. “That didn’t feel like support. It just felt like bullying.”
“That’s ridiculous.” Clara’s voice becomes a squeak. “I wasn’t—I wouldn’t—”
She turns to Martina.
“She’s disrupting the process!” Clara exclaims, pointing at Leyla.
“Now, wait.” Martina puts her hand on Clara’s shoulder to soothe her, like a mother shushing her child.
“I want to hear what Leyla has to say.”
She smiles at Leyla.
“Go on,” she says. “This is a safe space.”
“It doesn’t feel like a safe space. It feels more like you’re encouraging us to gang up on each other.
This doesn’t feel like therapy, it feels like you’re trying to get us to break down and cry so that we will feel like we’ve had some major breakthrough.
It’s manipulative.” Leyla crosses her arms across her chest and looks steadily at Martina.
“Okay.” Martina says, removing her hand from Clara’s shoulder and nodding slowly. “So what does therapy feel like, then?”
“I mean, in my experience, therapy usually means recounting your experiences and then having the therapist help you untangle them.” Leyla raises her eyebrows.
“Give some perspective. But you’re just telling us what to say and then expecting us to agree with you. That’s not therapy, that’s a … sermon.”
Martina stops in front of Leyla and clasps her hands in front of her.
“You’ve done therapy before, I take it.” Martina smiles at Leyla.
Looking from one to the other, I’m struck by an urge to warn Leyla.
Stop. It’s a trap.
“Yes,” Leyla responds. “Of course I have. That’s basically a requirement to be a functional adult.”
“And how has that worked out for you?” Martina immediately asks, quick as a flash. Like a snake, striking faster than the eye can see.
Leyla wavers.
“Well,” she begins slowly. “It let me work through some stuff. Made me healthy and functional and able to deal with life.”
“And yet, you’re here,” Martina says.
“Because my mom wanted me to,” Leyla shoots back, pouncing on the opportunity.
“And why did your mom want you to come here?” Martina’s voice is soft and slippery as silk.
“She’s worries about me.” Leyla looks away.
“Because it didn’t work, did it?” Martina continues. “I’m sorry. You’re right. I shouldn’t be, as you said, putting words in your mouth. How have your relationships gone, Leyla?”
Leyla shakes her head, muttering something to herself.
“What was that?” Martina raises her eyebrows.
“I don’t have to take this from you.” Leyla stands up from her chair.
She turns to the door, and Martina raises her voice, just a little bit.
“If you leave now, you can leave Himlafall,” she says. There’s no edge to her words, no open anger; there doesn’t need to be.
“You can stay here, and participate, or you can go. It’s up to you.”
Leyla is standing very still, her back turned to us.
There is a part of me that wants to stand up with her, take her arm. And just go. Leave and not look back.
Go, a voice inside me whispers, urging her on. Go on, leave. Get out of here.
“I won’t force you to do anything.” Martina is sweeter now. Concerned.
It’s masterful, really.
“But I want you to ask yourself if you’re just repeating the same pattern again.”
Leyla isn’t moving.
The sinking feeling in my belly gets deeper and darker.
“This is exactly like what happened with Alexia, isn’t it?” Martina delivers the name like a gift, and I see Leyla flinching, see her every breath growing shorter.
“She asked you to open up, and you wouldn’t. So you walked away. Like you always do. And now you’re trying to walk away again.”
Leyla turns around slowly. Her lips are gray; her eyes suspiciously shiny.
“I told you that in confidence,” she says.
“Because you trusted me,” Martina responds. “And I’m asking you to trust me again.”
She walks up to Leyla and takes her hands, ever so gently, between her own.
“Do you really want to end up like your mother, Leyla?” she asks, barely more than a breath, yet every syllable rings out in the room.
Leyla draws a quick, sharp inhale.
I see the moment she gives herself over.
“No,” she says.
Martina embraces her.
“I know,” Martina murmurs, rubbing her back in soft circles, as Leyla begins to cry. “I know.”
Clara is covering her mouth with her hand, her eyes wide and shining with admiration. Pernilla is gritting her teeth, a vein jumping in her temple.
When I look at Martina, I see, for but a second, a triumphant gleam in her eyes.
And she’s looking directly at me.
fr: anoncomplaint123456@
05:11 09/27/2023
Subject: Filing a complaint against Dr. Martina Hastings
Hello,
I am writing to you with the intention of filing a complaint against Dr. Martina Hastings, as well as the treatment center she founded and now runs, the Himlafall Clinic.
I believe she is a danger to her patients, that her license needs to be taken away, and the clinic in question needs to be shut down.
I was a patient at the Himlafall Clinic. My experiences there were very traumatic, and I wish to remain anonymous, so I will not reveal my name or the dates of my stay there, but I urge you to take this complaint seriously and launch an investigation.
The Himlafall Clinic was described to me as a place where patients could go to receive help with their romantic lives. The fee for a stay is very steep, and I paid all my savings in order to secure a spot there. But once there, I found myself in an incredibly toxic environment.
Rather than support and uplift her clients, Dr. Martina Hastings and her colleagues engaged in a targeted brainwashing campaign against me.
They attempted to convince me I was a horrible person, and tried to gaslight me into thinking I was irreversibly broken.
They refused to listen to what I said, instead pushing their own narrative.
I got the impression that the psychologist who treated me, Dr. Nina, had taken a negative view of me immediately, and was trying to break me down on purpose. I was in an incredibly vulnerable position, and if I had had a weaker sense of self, I am sure I would have given in to their narrative.
The Himlafall Clinic is dangerous. Dr. Martina Hastings preys on the weak, and causes horrible, lasting damage.
She is completely unfit to be a psychologist. I suspect she might herself be an undiagnosed narcissist, and that she was drawn to the profession because she was lured by the prospect of being in power over those weaker than herself.
Dr. Martina Hastings should have her license taken away. She should, quite honestly, be in prison for the harm she has caused.
If you have any care or concern for those in her care, please do something about it.
Best regards,
xxx