how i was spiritually raped and left for dead (part 3)

part 1 is here

part 2 is here

prior to my move to arizona, i had hired george to serve as program director for the atlanta program. i had also arranged for bob to begin doing seminars for kids and parents.

bob had approached me, saying that his car was about to be repossessed and he was on the verge of losing his house. the houston hospital deals had fallen apart and his california residential was all but dead. the state of california had forbidden him from any involvement in drug and alcohol treatment and he had “sold” the center to former employees. he was trying to get them to make payments to him, but they weren't able to get any paying clients. he had turned the center into a “retreat” and was trying to run it, secretly meeting with the staff behind the state's back. to make matters worse, he was apparently caught by some staff members naked and in bed with a client. it was reported that he had threatened to use his influence to see to it that the client would lose her child if she didn't keep her mouth shut. additionally, some insiders claimed that his wife suspected he was sleeping with the client and that, in an attempt to catch him, she had secretly followed him to palm springs where he was supposed to be speaking at an na conference. “if i could just do seminars for the kids and parents [in all the cities where bob's organization had programs], i could make enough to get by.”

he claimed he needed $10,000 per month to “make [his] nut.” it was 1992.

bob was not well-liked in houston, so i arranged for his first seminar to take place in atlanta. i contacted george, gave him specific instructions, and although i was about to lose my own home to foreclosure (remember, i had taken on the hospital staff, and lost my best employee and older group to the guy who lived in the rock-star's house.), i paid his expenses to fly to atlanta and give seminars to the kids and parents.

what i didn’t realize at the time was that bob’s plea for help, was actually a con. he had started the process of creating a new hospital contract in arizona—a deal which would exclude his partners . he needed to take full control of at least some of the existing programs, wrestling that control from them and jim. the seminars were his vehicle.

he began in atlanta. when he got there, unbeknownst to me, he met with the staff and told them that i was “fvcked up.” he convinced them that george, my employee, should take over the program. he told them that he would arrange to get the parent group to finance the take over. he instructed them that, if i refused to allow george to take the program, they would all resign immediately, reopen under a new name, and take all of the clients with them.

next bob held his seminar with the kids and parents. the primary topic was seekingintongues is “fvcked-up.” he slandered me. “the program is going to fall apart,” he claimed. “the kids will be left with nothing. they will return to drugs and die.” then he convinced the parents to donate money so george and the staff could take control of the program. he threw his partners and long-term friends under the bus as well.

this was the start of meehan’s conscious and systematic split/hosile take-over of this national organization, controlled by bob and his two partners.

he went to st. louis, dallas, austin, and threw his partners and me under the bus in those cities as well. he convinced the the city directors to side with him. he had already managed to take over phoenix and put his own person in the directorship position there. he now had every city, except houston, to use as a referral base for his hospital contract. he realized that he could not take houston because, even though i was the “owner” on paper, the program was really controlled by one of his partners who lived there. i was the owner only in the sense that i had the legal and financial responsibility.

bob returned to houston, on my dime, and layed out the con. “atlanta is just a thorn in your side,” he said. “george is a mess. he’s not invested. if you want to survive, you need to sell atlanta to george. maybe if he owns it, he’ll pull it together and make the program work. right now, things are worse than you realize.”

of course, he neglected to tell me that george had already incorporated and taken over the program, that they had become bob’s staff, that they would simply walk away from the building we had leased and reopen in a new suite under george’s new corporation, and that i had already been “fired.”

i asked bob all the right questions, including, “are you going to split with jim and al?” he lied.

i agreed to sell atlanta to george on a payment plan which would allow him to make payments based on the amount of revenue generated. this would allow him to pay less if money was tight, more when things were good.

george never paid a dime. never.

when i was recruited to go to phoenix, shortly after i arrived, i was beaten into the ground by meehan and the other directors i was told that i didn’t deserve anything from george. i was not to be paid. i had lost my home, which had been paid for with inherited money, left houston and turned over the program to jim, was living with the current arizona director's house (i had no money), and was thrown under the bus by jim, who told everyone that everything that had gone wrong in houston was my fault.

jim painted himself as the hero who was going to fix houston (in the long-run, his entire staff ended up quitting and he was later investigated for medicaid fraud). bob painted himself as the hero who was going to fix everything else. i was held up as the source of all the problems.

the ironic part, regardless of what anyone has said, is that my programs brought more money into the organization than all the others combined. i kept the referral records for all the programs. no one, besides jim, al, and bob ever saw any of that money though. they didn’t pay me, which meant that i had great difficulty paying my staff (including those i had inherited from the hospital). i could not pay my bills. i lost my house and all the equity i had in it.

it was the culmination of all these events that allowed bob, under the preplanned, orchestrated attack delivered by all the directors, to tear up the sale contract and allow george to take the atlanta operation for free.

a side note: george has since “sold” the atlanta program and then, together with bob, beaten down the individuals he had sold it to and taken back ownership at least 2 times. in each of these “sales” the “marks” have made payments to george and received nothing back after they were ousted. their equity was simply taken away.

now i'm in arizona, having lost everything.

the arizona program was limping. the director was someone for whom i had tremendous respect.

very little money was coming in, many of the staffers were on the hospital’s payroll, allowing them to do work in the outpatient/support group program for free. in addition to my other responsibilities, i was also running older group meetings. the arizona program had several free, 12-step support groups for young people and parents that served as feeders for the inpatient, residential and intensive outpatient programs. young people and parents would come to the free support groups for help and ultimately would be shuffled into the expensive fee-based treatment programs.

the tempe support group was fledgling. the tempe parent group was dead. so i began doing parent education groups as well.

one other “slight” problem…the program was not licensed. it was/is illegal to run an unlicensed treatment program in arizona.

one day we were told that the state would be coming in to do a licensing inspection…tomorrow. i knew that the state would either grant us a license or shut the program down. it generally takes months to prepare a treatment program to be licensed. we had about 18 hours.

there was no policy & procedure manual (the first thing the state inspectors look at). there was no acceptable system for keeping client records. there was no acceptable employee file system. if i remember correctly, there was not a single person in the city who had ever written a p&p or licensed a program. except me. remember, i was the broke d!ck guy who was worried about all the “white folk crap.”

i quickly put together a team of people and, with the state regulations in hand, began writing a policy and procedure manual that was in line with state regulations. sometime after midnight, i sent the director home. he would have to be fresh at 8 am when the state came in. i created employee files and a client file system. we worked throughout the night to bring the facility up to code.

i left the following morning, finishing the job an hour before the state arrived. i went home, took a shower, and went to work at the hospital. for this effort, i was paid exactly $0.00.

that day the arizona program received its license. the state was so impressed with the policy and procedure manual and client files that they asked for copies to use for training purposes.

to this day, i have never received even a thank-you from bob or anyone else. more likely, bob ridiculed me for being “damaged” enough to be able to pull it off.

back to the story.

did my coworkers and subordinates confront me the way george explains it in his book?

it was fall of 1995, november if i remember correctly.

bob's inpatient center, which i was running, was going strong. i had built relationships with many of the insurance companies and succeeded at increasing the average length of stay for hospital patients from 5 days to 16.5 days, which was unheard of for adolescent inpatient treatment. we were receiving referrals from a variety of sources. even the other hospitals were referring patients to bob's center rather than treating them in their own facilities

i had managed to get the center moved to its own hospital wing. we painted the wing so that it did not look like a drab hospital unit. we were able to mount stereo speakers in the hallway so the kids could wake up to music. i had battled with a member of the hospital’s administration to prevent him from setting up his office on our unit, allowing us to have an office and hang-out for all of our staff. i had also arranged for breakfast to be served outside on the lawn.

each morning the kids woke up to great music. they went outside to a table with clean linens and various pastries, juices and coffee, for breakfast and a morning meditation meeting.

this was my idea of how a young person should be treated while having to live away from home and while participating in rehab. i felt that this set-up would help them maintain dignity and self-respect and serve as constant reminder to everyone who was responsible for their treatment that they were human beings rather than “dope-fiends.”

i had also begun hosting huge christmas fund-raising dances. we raised thousands of dollars each christmas to buy toys for the children living in residential treatment at the hospital. this was important to me because these kids, some as young as 4 years old, could not spend christmas with their families. many of their parents were in prison. they did not get presents, except for socks, toothbrushes, and other essentials provided by the hospital.

i was well-liked and respected by the hospital administration and the 'non-bob' hospital employees. they consulted with me on other cases, made it a point to introduce me to corporate executives, and even talked to me about concerns related to their own children.

bob never got a phone call. no complaints. more telling, no one called him to consult on other cases, meet with corporate execs, or on concerns related to their children. he was seen by the administration and the corporate execs, as a necessary pain. at that point, i could have walked away with the center, though it never would have crossed my mind to betray bob and my friends in this way.

this concerned bob's wife. she felt that i had too much power, though i had no authority over anyone.

joy also voiced concerns about my involvement with the parent support-group. i had been doing parent ed for quite some time. parent-ed sessions were standing room only. she clearly stated, to me and others, that she thought that i would use my influence with the parents to take control of the entire program.

she was paranoid. these thoughts never would have occurred to me. moreover, she was wrong. the arizona program had an exceptional parent coordinator. if anyone could have taken control, it would have been her. she also would never have betrayed anyone in such a way.

george presents it as though some of my subordinates and coworkers got together and decided they needed to confront me. that is a lie!

here’s what really happened.

george was about to marry bob's daughter. we'll call her muffy. george was living in atlanta, running the atlanta program that he'd taken from me. bob's wife was determined to see to it that muffy did not move away from her to be with george. she had to bring george to phoenix.

she created an insidious plan. she would ultimately set it up to steal the the arizona program from the current director and give it to her soon to be son-in-law. she would also set it up to send away the director and his family and move george and muffy into his house, which was in the same neighborhood where joy and bob lived.

bob initially arranged for george to be the program director, working under the current arizona director, who would be the executive director. the problem that i saw in all of this was that there was no way bob's wife was going to allow her son-in-law to be second man on the totem pole.

one option would be to get rid of me, move the current arizona director to the hospital, and move george to the position of ultimate authority in arizona. bob's wife had already begun campaigning against the current director behind his back.

bob's wife, with bob’s help, hatched a 2 part plan to drive me into the ground, probably hoping i would either leave or commit suicide.

part one: she arranged for my wife to be ostracized from the group and then harshly confronted. for months no one would talk to my wife. she had been told, without my knowledge, that i was unhappy with her, that she was flawed and on the verge of losing her family and all of her friends. after a long period of anguish and loneliness, bob's wife took her back. she befriended her, “rehabilitated” her, and took her under her wing.

part two: she set up staff to confront me. everyone involved with the phoenix program was told that i needed to be harshly confronted. it was explained to them what was wrong with me. many reported to me later that they had said that they had no complaints. they were told to come up with some. they were told to go all the way back into my past and come up with whatever they could. i needed to hear everything i’d ever done wrong, they were told. they were told that it had to be harsh. i had to be destroyed and, if i survived, rebuilt.

bringing my wife into her fold, bob's wife, who was now directing her every move, convinced her that the “defects” for which she had been previously ostracized were the result of being married to me. i was the source of all of her problems. i had held her back all these years and would continue to, not only hold her back, but destroy our daughter as well, unless i changed everything or unless my wife left me.

i should also point out that george was conveniently out of town when the confrontation took place. later, both he and bob's wife blamed the whole thing on the the arizona director, the guy who was doing what he was told to do by bob and his wife. it was part of what was used to discredit him and to take the arizona program and give it to george.

the confrontation

it was a fall evening in arizona. my wife, my daughter and i had moved into a modest 3 bedroom house in scottsdale. i was standing in the backyard, just outside the sliding glass door which opened into the family room. to my left was my daughter's swing-set. the sky was strange. unnatural streaks of pink and burnt orange stretched out from the western horizon as though the colors were struggling to escape the darkness which was drowning the sun in the desert dust.

the wind was gusting, blowing the empty swings, twisting them slightly, as though an invisible hand was holding them out in front of their natural lie. toxic oleanders formed a lovely and inviting hedge, enclosing the yard and hiding the 6-foot tall cinder block fence. something didn't feel right.

it was “purpose” night. every other friday night, at 7 pm, every staff member in every city, along with their spouses would gather for pseudo-therapy groups facilitated by the city directors. we called these meetings “purpose meetings.” the idea was that we would gather to expose and resolve any personal shortcomings which interfered with the program's “primary purpose.” what was our primary purpose? “...to carry our love and understanding to others and practice the principles of love and honesty in our daily lives with the help of god as we understand him.”

there was always some degree of anxiety associated with purpose meetings. one never knew when the the attention would be focused on him or her. anyone could be charged with spiritual corruption at any time. often, the consequences were severe.

through the glass door, i could see my blond-haired, blue-eyed daughter playing play-doh on the floor. my wife was greeting the baby-sitter who had just arrived. the baby-sitter had been chosen for us by linda, bob's “spiritual daughter” and the most trusted member of his inner-circle. linda's husband arrived a little later. he was also part of bob's innermost circle and was bob's best friend.

i later learned that his job was to take my daughter and hide her if i tried to leave during purpose. they had arranged a scenario where, either i would endure an orchestrated attack and demonstrate that i “got it,” or i would be put out on the streets without my family. if i tried to go home without their blessing, linda's husband would take my daughter. “bob's girls” would take my wife.

i knew something was up, but i didn't realize the extent to which they had gone to set me up.

my wife and i backed out of the carport and drove silently south, out of our neighborhood and then west, toward the struggling sunset on our way to our purpose meeting. we were both anxious. we knew something wasn't right, but neither of us knew what was about to happen.

we parked in the side lot and entered the building through the steel door which separated the meeting room from the back alley. the floor was covered with bluish industrial carpet. the walls were textured and painted off-white. about 30 folding chairs lined the walls, making a sloppy oval. there were a number of other staffers milling about. they had been prepped for the meeting.

the air was filled with trepidation. in a forced gesture of betrayal, several staffers hugged me and smiled at me, though none would look me in the eye.

a couple of “bob's girls,” members of his inner circle, immediately guided my wife to one of the offices and closed the door. the director led me to his office. he closed the door. we sat down.

he said to me, “dude, this purpose is going to be about you.” he attempted to hold a compassionate facial expression. he continued, “some people have some things they want to say to you. it's going to be tough.” he explained that they were doing this because they loved me and that it was going to help me. after a speech that sounded as much like a justification as it did an explanation, he said, “you don't have to go through this if you don't want to.”

at that point, i got it. what choice did i have? if i didn't go through with it i'd be put on the streets. bob's wife, who was pulling the strings over the telephone would convince my wife that i had gone crazy. they would whisk her away and take my daughter as well. besides, if they said i was this screwed-up, i'd better pay attention. this group was my lifeline, my family. they knew me better that i knew myself. they loved me unconditionally. that was what i'd been taught.

then the director said, why don't you stay here and pray. i'll come get you when we're ready.

so, i prayed.

a short time later, the director returned. he escorted me to the meeting room and motioned for me to sit in the only available folding chair. the other chairs were filled with about 30 of my friends--thirty staffers who had called themselves family, people who had professed their love for me.

my wife was positioned across from me. to her sides were “bob's girls.” she was obviously terrified. they comforted her. they had convinced her that she had to be tough on me—that my life was on the line. that i was spiritually bankrupt and that my condition threatened the well-being of both her and our daughter. they were doing this to save them and, if possible, save me. if she showed any compassion, she would sabotage the entire process.

for the next 7 hours each person in the room, including my wife, took turns verbally assaulting me. they confronted me with every unkind word or action, real or imagined, that i had spoken or taken over the last 10 years. they assigned nefarious motives everything i had done, good or bad. they told me how the evil deep within me had caused me to harm everyone and threatened the very existence of the program, even though i was unaware of any desire to cause harm.

they provided long and painful explanations of how i was harming my wife and daughter, holding them back from spiritual and financial freedom. they said i was unconsciously trying to “keep them down,” so they wouldn't leave me.

the director's wife, whom i had considered to be one of my most trusted friends, said to me, “i know i'm supposed to love you unconditionally, but i can't find a single redeeming quality in you. i look at you and all i see is pure evil.”

at some point, my wife left the room with linda. they went into an office and got on the phone with bob's wife. she returned a few minutes (or a few hours) later.

after she returned, flanked by “bob's girls,” she made it clear that if i didn't “get it” and have an immediate change, i wasn't coming home. a stream of bob's wife's ideas came out of her mouth. she said she'd worked hard to get where she was (spiritually). she said that she had worked hard to develop the close friendships she currently enjoyed. (these were the friends who had ostracized her just a few months earlier, refusing to even answer a phone call, no matter how much she was hurting.) she told me she would no longer allow me to hold her or our daughter back.

there was blood in the water. at some point, the confrontation went beyond anything that was supposed to be helpful to me or anyone else. instead, every fear, every bit of anger, all the desperation, dread, hurt and betrayal perpetrated upon these people by bob's dysfunctional totalitarian regime was directed at me. these people had devoted their lives to bob's program. in return, they had been made to work endlessly for little or no pay. they had been forced to move from city to city to do “god's work.” they lived in poverty. they were constantly afraid.

but no one dared to admit their fear, dread, hurt and anger, not even to themselves. on this night it would be vomited on me.

also at some point, i realized that i was floating above my body. it was strange, but i was actually able to look down on myself. people in the room were getting increasingly angry at my lack of an emotional response. but i was powerless to respond. i wasn't there.

sometime around 2 a.m., linda decided that i “got it.” she told my wife that it was okay for me to go home. she said that i hadn't responded because i was “in shock,” which was true. also true was the fact that enough of my real shortcomings were mixed in with everything that was said about me that i believed that everything they said was true. since i was pure evil on the inside, i had little hope that i could change.

later i was told that some of the them had expected me to commit suicide that night. they were happy that i had "chosen life."

for the next year, i suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder. i wouldn't say that i changed so much as that the experience changed me. gone was my creativity, passion, sense of humor, desire to help others. i didn't watch tv, read a book (other than program literature) or see a movie. i didn't feel i was worthy to even have a desire to do anything enjoyable.

i didn't dare laugh or smile. i didn't allow myself even a single pleasurable thought. for a year, i was a zombie. i had spells of uncontrollable sobbing. whenever, my daughter acted out, i had to leave, because i couldn't stop crying. i had destroyed this beautiful child that i loved more than anything in the world. i had brought evil upon everyone with whom i had come in contact, even when i thought i was trying to help them. as one staffer put it to me, i was “toxic.”

i was broken.

one night, a few months after that purpose meeting, i was with a couple of other staffers when they decided to stop for ice cream. as they ordered their ice cream, i became afraid. i wasn't sure what to do. was i supposed to have ice cream? was i allowed to? i finally worked up the courage to ask them, “am i allowed to eat ice cream?”

i was 33.

part 4 coming soon—(just when you thought it couldn't get any worse)