“I feel I am his rib”/ 2005-2007

Your adversary the devil walks around as a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. (1 Peter 5:8)

The devil is lurking around every corner seeking to devour whoever is without vigilance. I didn’t pray about my third therapist. I had moved and needed a different therapist, one that was closer to where I lived. I should have prayed, and asked the Holy Spirit to guide me in choosing a new therapist, as one divulges a lot of personal information in a therapeutic relationship. I should have sought God instead I went into it based on convenience, convenience of location, as I didn’t have a car at that time. It was within walking distance.

When I met Scott, I was a 40 year old mother of a 12 year old daughter who suffered from bipolar disorder. I came out of a war with this child. For the past several years she had been scratching my face and hitting me nearly every day. We were in the time before the next battle, and I was exhausted.

Scott Underwood was tall, “6”, when he first greeted me, he towered over me, as I was only “5,2” He was attractive in a non obvious way the color of his eyes were pale green. His brown hair parted on the right side. His smile was a mischievous smirk. I learned in that first session that he was divorced.

Satan had preyed on my desperate desires to get married. It was the lust of the eyes, Scott wasn’t great looking, but I had a hook stuck into my flesh for nearly two years. Not trusting in God to meet my needs was a dangerous place to be in my case it was also emotionally dangerous, as I was a cutter.

Almost from the beginning, Scott started doing and saying things I knew were inappropriate. He began to say strange things to me. Once he told me, “I want to have sex with my pretty female patients.” He made me feel extremely uncomfortable by saying things like that. He intimated to me that he had been watching pornography on television the night before then detailed the plot for me.

Almost immediately he wanted to see me twice a week. I had never seen a therapist more than once a week, but he was insistent, that I see him more than once a week. Since my diagnosis was borderline personality disorder, he told me he needed to see me more than once a week. This was a godsend to me, I was extremely lonely.

Scott started to call me Matilda, instead of Matty. It made me feel set apart that he called me something no one else called me.

In one of our sessions he asked me what kind of sex I liked to have. Taken aback by this vulgar question, I answered the best way I could.

“You know the regular kind.” I said. Scott prodded further, how did I like to have it?

I wanted to tell him what did it matter? But he was insistent on knowing. When he saw I was extremely uncomfortable, he told me this was important information in my therapy. I should have left, when Scott started talking this way. But then he would say something funny, he had a rich sense of humor that was so familiar, like my daddy’s. He would say such odd things, yet wildly funny. Scott’s personality was familiar to my soul.

He was open with me, telling me about his own life so that only fueled my old maid prayers. My little sister Mia who was 20 was already engaged. This contributed to the wild fantasy I had of wanting to be with Scott. God can do anything I told myself.

In the next few months, there were sessions he would cuss at me, for no reason, and without provocation. I began to recognize his hatred towards women. Yet his cruelty did not deter me, whenever I would tell him that I had just cut myself the night before he would mock me, and tell me to “take a scalpel cut deeper, next time.” “I could get you one from a doctor friend of mine.” This crushed my spirit. Weren’t we just talking the night before for an hour?

When I told him about my past relationships he told me that it was my fault that my professors had slept with me, that I wanted them. He intimated to me that I must have dressed in a seductive way to have gotten their attention. The more I tried to defend myself, and explain that I was in a vulnerable state, the more insistent he was in telling me it was my doing. "You wanted them to “(expletive)” you."

There were sessions, between Scott and I where we clicked, the conversation was like talking to an old friend. He would arm wrestle with me. We would watch you tube videos. He would lie down on his own couch, while I sat on his chair. We would laugh and talk about old movies and old songs. I was delusional, in my mind our time almost felt like dating.

One day while I was smoking a cigarette outside his office, he came out to me with my over-sized bag slung over his shoulder. Scott smiled playfully and told me to follow him inside. He swung his hips to and fro and imitated me. That image was impressed in my heart a long time. Scott was quirky and different, and it weakened my stamina, whenever I decided to leave. The long phone calls would tug on my heart, and Satan told me to be patient.

It wasn’t all bad, Scott held my hand over the phone he talked me out of cutting myself, which was ironic. When I was in his office he told me just the opposite. He was a sort of Dr. Jeckyll and Mr. Hyde. His concern for me on the telephone felt genuine. I felt he cared about me, despite what people around me told me. Many times he talked me out of my own despair.

“Scott, I can’t take it” I would call banging my wrist on the frame of my futon. “Shit, I can’t take it.”

"You’ll be alright, you’re strong.” he said in an encouraging tone.

“Do you care about me, just a little?”

“I wouldn’t be talking to you if I didn’t, Matilda, silly girl.”

There were times when I was on the phone, Scott offered to see me. “Tell me if you feel suicidal, and I will cancel my next appointment and you can come in.”

“No, I can make it until tomorrow.”

“Lord, you can’t tell me he doesn’t care about me, he does. You don’t know how he makes me feel.” It wasn’t a romance, but we had an affinity, we got each other, our sense of humor was similar. He would say such ridiculous things. When Scott would talk about Michelle, another therapist in the same office building, he referred to her as the wicked witch of the west, and then sang the witch music when Margaret Hamilton was on the bike. Then we’d both laugh. Whatever difficulties we were having I could get through, I had to.

Still, the therapy didn’t stop my cutting, it only became worse. I was oppressed in therapy. I could feel the heavy chains of obsession wrap around my mind, body and soul. Eventually I cut my feet so viciously, I could barely walk. The rips across the flesh of my feet, were satanic attacks. It was hell washing the cuts the water was like acid to the fresh wounds. I put socks on so Emma wouldn’t see. But the white sweat socks got pasted to the cuts and bled through. I had to remove the socks, and peeled the bloody flesh along with it. Walking on the damaged flesh was always hard the cuts stabbing at me to stop walking. Later the wounds would ooze pus, and began to smell. There was always the chance for infection. This was the life of a cutter. Instead of cure me Scott seemed to take pleasure in my suffering.

Satan was using this therapist, to undermine my faith, by captivating me with that piece of rotten fruit on the tree. It was the promise of marriage, something I so desperately wanted my whole life, to be loved by a husband. It was the family I was trying to fix all of these years, my momma and daddy’s marriage, that created a pit inside of me, that for years I used to cling to men who were in power positions. It was not a relationship in the truest sense it was a relationship that was unbalanced. Scott was my therapist, I confided to him the deepest torments inside of me he could always use this to his advantage, and keep me in therapy. Scott played with my illness like a puppet master. The hooks he put into my back, I danced for him, whenever he would pull them. The frequent phone calls were like glue. He told me to call him whenever I was sad. So, I called him between sessions quite a bit, at night, during the day, it didn’t matter he would even take my phone calls when he was in session with other patients. The devil filled my heart with lies, he cares about you or he wouldn’t let you call so often.

But when I saw him, the sessions weren’t always good. One session he asked me what I wore to Church. I told him my dress was too short, and I spent the whole time pulling it down. Then he told me I was a slut, and wanted men to look at me.

“No, I just made a bad choice for a dress.”

“You wanted to be (expletive).”

The way he said things cut my soul, instead of making me feel better he would make me feel worthless and cheap. Scott’s response was so vile. I slunk to the corner of his office like a slug. I felt urinated on. I sat in the corner scrunched down to avoid his vicious assaults on my woman hood. He sat smugly, secretly happy with himself, that he had reduced me to a sobbing child. My petite body pressed deeply into the corner of his office wall. Instead of encourage me, he became more vicious, and would tell me this was for my own good.

In the months ahead, I continued to lie to myself. The tension between us was a deep knife wound we quarreled like we were in an intimate relationship. Satan fueled the fire with his nasty lies, “He really cares about you, look how much you’re hurting.” I convinced myself I just needed to pray harder.

Every night I prayed, almost like a witch, focusing on this thing I needed, rather than on Jesus. I was in open rebellion with my prayers. I kept declaring “I am his rib.” How did I even know that I was his rib? Scott appealed to the damaged part of my soul. The devil reveled that Scott hurt me, whispering to me to keep going to therapy. I was already so hurt from therapy. He would crush me, with insults. But the devil was insistent that God would answer my prayers.

The sessions were a roller coaster, emotionally high seeing him, emotionally draining, tearing at the tender places of my soul. He seemed to be mean just to deliberately hurt me. Once I borrowed his phone to call my momma, and I accidently scrolled his contact list. He violently grabbed the cell out of my hand.

“Are you (expletive) stupid?”

“I’m sorry.”

Once I was standing outside with another patient, who was a man I was talking to. Scott flew by and I said, “Hello.” He only responded by saying, “Get your ass in my office.” I smiled embarrassed. I knew it was going to be one of those sessions where Scott ranted and raved. When I went inside I sat down in the lobby. He came out of his office, looked right passed me, and went back inside his office. Finally, after 20 minutes, he stormed outside and ordered me to get the (expletive) inside his office.

When I walked into his office and sat down in the chair directly in front of him, he looked at me angrily.

“Where the (expletive) were you?”

But you saw me sitting out there.”

“No, I didn’t.”

For the next hour Scott rained curses at me, assaulting me with screams. I spent the rest of the hour trying to calm him down. But, he enjoyed humiliating me. Yet, I took it believing God would change his heart.

I went deeper into the rabbit hole. He said I had “cognitive dissonance,” claiming I heard things wrong. In a telephone conversation, he told me he would go with me to meet my Pastor. The next day he told me, why would I say that? I’m not going to go with you to meet your minister. I felt like I was going crazy. He would distort my words, and make me feel as though I was hearing the conversation wrong. He would say I only chose the parts of the conversation that I wanted to hear, and dropped the rest of it. There wasn’t a drop of sanity in my therapy. I put up with sessions like that because he let me call him every day. This was a life line to me. He would take my calls, regardless if he were in session with other patients. Sometimes, he would let me talk to his patients. He would even tell me about other patients he was seeing. I felt it was unethical, but it made me feel important that he was sharing his work with me.

Once he asked me to cut him with a razor blade, and gave me the razor blade. I was mortified, and declined. Scott made strange requests of me. Another time he wanted me to strangle him. I didn’t want to, but he was insistent. I said, “I don’t want to hurt you.” He smiled that impish smile, and assured me I couldn’t hurt him. So I put my hands around his neck, and squeezed slightly. He wanted me to squeeze his throat tighter. I tried, but I didn’t want to hurt Scott.

He only laughed, saying, "You can’t hurt me, I’m “6,” I could knock you out."

It wasn’t all horrible, he was so funny, and when he wasn’t angry with me, he made me laugh. I needed to laugh when there seemed to be no sign of Emma getting better. Whenever he talked to me on the phone he was a different person, he made me feel better, and would stay on the phone until I felt better. Scott even encouraged me to go back to college. “You’re so bright you need to go back to school.” We made a contract I would study to be a substitute teacher, and would take the test. So, I bought the book at Fresno State, I showed it to him the next day.

In other sessions, he encouraged me to write again. I used to read him some of the things I had written, reading my stories to him made me feel the connection between us grow deeper.

We had agreed I would go back to City College and study to become a Drug and Alcohol Counselor. Scott wasn’t completely destructive with my self-worth. He didn’t always tear me like a piece of paper. There were times he looked at me as if I were beautiful and told me he could see Paul Crouch Jr. of TBN falling for me. (I didn’t know Paul Crouch Jr. was already married.)

“Really?” I’d ask him so thrilled that he thought Paul Crouch Jr. would want me. When it was really him I wanted.

“You look good, of course he would.” He’d answer without sounding disingenuous. He said things like that that made me feel like I was worth something.

At night, I prayed fervently to The Lord with tears to stay with Scott. Even though I knew that therapists could not have personal relationships with their patients. In wanting my own will, I was certain God would work this out for good. After all, I was already 40 I had waited such a long time.

“I know I am his rib Lord, I feel that I am his rib.” “I really love this man Lord.” “It’s different this time Lord.” “Why would he open his shirt, so I could touch his pacemaker?”

I told Scott about my heart condition, and he told me he had a similar condition then he unbuttoned a few buttons on his shirt, and asked me to touch his pacemaker. I wanted to, but was shy about touching his chest. I gingerly fingered the pacemaker that bulged through his flesh. Our faces were close enough to kiss, our whatever kind of relationship grew more intense for me.

When he wasn’t in his office, I would call him when he was on trips to Los Angeles. He never told me not to call.

“Where are you, Scott?” I asked.

“I’m on the freeway in Los Angeles.” He answered.

“Then I guess you can’t talk.” I would say my voice riddled with sadness.

“No, I can talk.” “I’m visiting my mom.” He answered not bothered by my intrusive phone call.

In one of our therapy sessions, he showed me a bottle of liquor he had behind a picture. Immediately I told him, you shouldn’t have that.

“I don’t drink it.” He said.

“Then why do you have it?” I asked.

“In case someone ever wanted to drink with me.” Then Scott smirked. His answer puzzled me. But, I was glad that he had trusted me.

I discussed Emma with him quite a bit. He told me I needed to take the television out of my house, and bring it to his office. So, he drove me to my apartment to take the television out of the apartment in an attempt to discipline my daughter Emma.

The ride home in Scott’s car seemed so natural. I was euphoric, seated next to him in the passenger’s seat, as if we were driving home together. In those few minutes, every cell inside me burst. I wanted to lean into the man I had convinced myself I was in love with, but didn’t allow myself to. After he put the television in his office, he drove me back to my apartment. He parked in my parking spot for a little while and just sat with me. It gave me the old feeling of sitting in the car after a date, not wanting to leave. As I looked over to him, I hadn’t realized how handsome he had become in the last few months. There were times Scott was thoughtful. He lingered with me, as if he wanted to say something to me or just lean over and kiss me. He didn’t, and I didn’t really expect him to.

Other people I talked to about my therapy said it was unethical, that he came to my apartment. But I didn’t listen, I was certain he was the one. I became aware that I wasn’t listening to The Holy Spirit, especially when my cutting became more frequent and intense. Scott told me I should cut different parts of my body when I told him I had cut myself. “Why don’t you cut your butt?” He told me. I didn’t know if he was joking.

A lot of the time, I came out of therapy feeling worse than when I went in. Everyone from momma, to friends, to my sisters, to Emma wanted me to quit therapy. But it was so hard to quit. I couldn’t leave him. Scott had a strange hold over me. It was the abuse I thought he cared because of the verbal and emotional abuse. I was so desperate to have him love me.

When he would go away to the Philippine Islands, I missed him intensely. Except for his vacations he was always there for me. I began to need him more and more. Whenever Scott would leave town I tried to get away, frantically as if I was a hostage trying to escape. In his absence, I would call other therapists in town, make appointments, and see them only once. Whenever he returned from his trip, I would fly back to him as if the situation were going to change. I didn’t recognize it then, or maybe I did, that the enemy was using Scott to hurt me, and to pull me away from Jesus.

I had been going to a Lutheran church near my apartment. He came to support me in my trying to study and become a member. I was both elated, and nervous that Scott was going to meet the Pastor. He met Pastor Young, and shook his hand. We both sat in front of the minister, like an engaged couple receiving counseling for marriage. I was sure this was a sign. I remember watching a lady on TBN (Trinity Broadcasting Network) say, “The Lord will bring the man to your house.” He came to my house, and now we were both sitting in front of the minister, as if we were receiving counseling to get married. This was more than a coincidence he was going to be my husband.

The way Satan worked was devious, I was ensnared, and the trap snapped shut with me inside of it. I was excited about the upcoming session, we had. I had missed him the week he was gone. I still recalled the hug he gave me before he left. I had laid my head close to his chest.

When Scott returned from one of his many trips to the Philippines Islands, I was struck hard across the face, with the gold wedding band he was wearing on his left hand. Scott had gotten married he belonged to someone else now. I can’t explain, or maybe I can try to write, my heart disintegrated into ashes. My heart was crushed the way I had callously murdered insects that were in my house. I struggled for Scott not to see the damage. But I was determined not to let him have my tears too. I slipped my hand into my purse, and quietly, yet methodically slid a cigarette between my lips, which he demanded I take out of my mouth almost immediately. But I wasn’t going to let Scott bully me anymore. I refused to sit there the whole hour knowing he was married to another woman. Scott married another woman, while he treated me cruelly. When I took out the match to light it, he warned, if I lit it, he would kick me out of therapy. Which wouldn’t have been the first time he kicked me out of therapy before, actually it would have been the third time. I lit the match in defiance to end two years of torturous therapy. Scott immediately stormed out of his office, and said, “I’m done.” I sat there and finished my cigarette. I didn’t realize it was the Lord who freed me.

Jesus came to set us free. Whom the Son sets free is free indeed.