Fear

Passages

Every passage tagged with this emotion in the Vela corpus. Search the body text, narrow by source or register, click through to a book’s profile to see how the passage sits with the rest of the work.

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• From Wild (2012)

  “What the hell are you doing?” a man’s voice called, and a moment later the red-haired man appeared. “I had to hike all the way back up here to find you. I thought you got lost.” He looked at me accusingly, as if I were to blame, as if I’d conspired with the sandy-haired man to get him to stay. “We got to go now if we’re going to make it back to the truck before dark.” “You be careful out here,” the sandy-haired man said to me, pulling on his pack. “Bye,” I said very quietly, wanting neither to answer him nor to rile him by not answering. “Hey. It’s seven ten,” he said. “It’s safe to drink the water now.” He lifted his Pepsi can in my direction and made a toast. “Here’s to a young girl all alone in the woods,” he said, and took a sip and then turned to follow his friend down the trail. I stood for a while the way I had the first time they left, letting all the knots of fear unclench. Nothing had happened, I told myself. I am perfectly okay. He was just a creepy, horny, not-nice man, and now he’s gone. But then I shoved my tent back into my pack, turned off my stove, dumped the almost-boiling water out into the grass, and swished the pot in the pond so it cooled. I took a swig of my iodine water and crammed my water bottle and my damp T-shirt, bra, and shorts back into my pack. I lifted Monster, buckled it on, stepped onto the trail, and started walking northward in the fading light. I walked and I walked, my mind shifting into a primal gear that was void of anything but forward motion, and I walked until walking became unbearable, until I believed I couldn’t walk even one more step. And then I ran. 18 QUEEN OF THE PCTIt was raining when I woke as the light seeped into the sky the next morning. I was lying in my tent in the shallow trough of the trail, its two-foot width the only flat spot I could find in the dark the night before. It had begun to rain at midnight, it had rained all night long, and as I walked through the morning, the rain came and went. I thought about what had happened with the men, or almost happened or was never really going to happen, playing it over in my mind, feeling sick and shaky, but by noon it was behind me and I was back on the PCT—the detour I’d inadvertently taken having wended its way up to the trail.

• From Sex with Kings: 500 Years of Adultery, Power, Rivalry, and Revenge (2004)

  Worried that Lola’s foolhardiness would indeed get her killed, her coachman and a lieutenant harnessed her horses to a carriage and threw her inside. The coachman sprang on top and whipped the horses through the jeering crowd. Against her will, Lola left Munich. Within a few days, Lola, dressed as a man and wearing a false beard, sneaked into Munich and managed to visit Ludwig briefly to secure her financial future. She and Ludwig arranged to meet in Switzerland a few weeks later when things calmed down. But word flew through the city that Lola had visited, and angry crowds, hearing that she was hiding in this building or that, would surround them and threaten to tear them apart. In the midst of the uproar, Ludwig abdicated the throne, hoping to leave Bavaria and go to his Lola. But Bavarian citizens, furious that he would escape with state funds and crown jewels for his whore, grew riotous when word spread of his intended trip. His son, the new king, begged Ludwig to stay in Bavaria or else he, too, might lose the throne. Despite several efforts over the next two years to meet, the pair were always thwarted. And slowly, as reports filtered in about Lola’s lifestyle, Ludwig’s heart hardened against her. And he looked back wistfully on his blinding, foolish dream of love. But the revolutions of 1848 were the last convulsions of the French Revolution. By the late nineteenth century, Western Europe had settled into a more polite form of civilization where society could not be roiled by anything as boring as a king’s mistress. When Edward VII became king of Great Britain in 1901, he was labeled “King Edward the Caresser,” a pun on his saintly ancestor King Edward the Confessor. Englishmen roared with laughter when they heard a story first reported by a naval officer on the royal yacht who, walking by the porthole of Edward’s cabin, heard him cry, “Stop calling me Sir and put another cushion under your back.”22 NineThe Fruits of Sin— Royal BastardsThis making of bastards great And duchessing every whore The Surplus and Treasury cheat Hath made me damnably poor. —1680S POEM ABOUT CHARLES II MORE VALUABLE THAN A TIARA OF DIAMONDS, A LARGE BELLY was the greatest proof of the king’s affections. A child bound the king to his mistress long after her disgrace or retirement and usually ensured her a lifetime of generous pensions. It is no wonder that most European courts were littered with royal bastards.

• From Less (2017)

  The dinner party is on the rue du Bac, in former maids’ chambers whose low ceilings and darting hallways seem made more for a murder mystery than a banquet, and so, as he is introduced to one smiling aristocratic face after another, Less finds himself thinking of them in terms of pulp fiction: “Ah, the bohemian artist daughter,” he whispers to himself as a sloppy young blonde in a green jumpsuit and cocaine-brightened eyes takes his hand, or, as an elderly woman in a silk tunic nods his way, “Here is the mother who lost all her jewels at the casino.” The ne’er-do-well cousin from Amsterdam in a pinstriped cotton suit. The gay son dressed, à l’Américain, in a navy blazer and khakis, still reeling from the weekend’s Ecstasy binge. The dull ancient Italian man in a raspberry jacket, holding a whiskey: secret former collaborateur. The handsome Spaniard in the corner in a crisp white shirt: blackmailing them all. The hostess with her rococo hairdo and cubist chin: spent her last penny on the mousse. And who will be murdered? Why, he will be murdered! Arthur Less, a last-minute invitee, a nobody, and the perfect target! Less peers into his poisoned champagne (his second glass, at least) and smiles. He looks around, again, for Alexander Leighton, but he is either hidden somewhere or late. Then Less notices, by the bookcase, a slim short man in tinted glasses. An eel of panic wriggles through him as he searches the room for exits, but life has no exits. So he takes another sip and approaches, saying his name. “Arthur,” Finley Dwyer says with a smile. “Paris again!” Why is old acquaintance ne’er forgot? Arthur Less and Finley Dwyer have, in fact, met since the Wilde and Stein Literary Laurels. This was in France before Freddy joined him, when Less was on a junket arranged by the French government. The idea was for American authors to visit small-town libraries for a month and spread culture throughout the country; the invitation came from the Ministry of Culture. To the invited Americans, however, it seemed impossible that a country would import foreign authors; even more impossible was the idea of a Ministry of Culture. When Less arrived in Paris, thoroughly jet lagged (he had not yet been introduced to Freddy’s sleeping-pill trick), he took one woozy look at the list of fellow ambassadors and sighed. There on the list, a familiar name.

• From Emotional Inheritance (2022)

  I’m sure my grandparents didn’t want to be reminded of that, but as the next generation, I want not only to face the past but also to cherish it.” Her face lightens as she looks at Ruth, who is sound asleep. At this point Rachel and Marc begin exploring the possibility of moving with Ruth to Israel. “I’m going to fulfill my childhood dream,” Rachel tells me with a smile. “I feel so lucky that Marc can get a job there. Did I tell you that he has family there? I grew up with very few relatives around. My grandmother was an only child; she had an aunt who she was not in touch with. And there was no one on my father’s side. But in Jerusalem we had one family friend, a man who had survived the Holocaust with my grandfather and who was like a brother to him. After the war my grandfather immigrated to America, and his friend went to Israel. We used to visit him during the summers, and I remember his daughter and his granddaughter, who was more or less my age. I’m sure he has died by now, but I wonder if his family is still in Jerusalem.” Rachel opens her phone and swipes through her pictures. She finds one from her childhood album and hands me the phone. It is a photograph of Rachel at the age of eight with another girl; they are holding hands and smiling for the camera. “This is in the old city market of Jerusalem,” she explains. “I don’t even remember the girl’s name. We are planning to visit this spring, to work out the details of moving there. Maybe I should look for this family. It would be really special if I could find the granddaughter, don’t you think?” A FEW MONTHS before their planned visit, Rachel wakes up covered with sweat. From that night forward, she starts having sleep terrors. Right after she falls asleep, she suddenly jumps out of bed, screaming in fear. She is confused, worried about what is happening to her. Sleep terrors are caused by the overarousal of the central nervous system, and research shows that the majority of people with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) suffer from those terrors. Unlike nightmares, which are bad dreams with story lines, sleep terrors usually involve a strong feeling of fright without a clear narrative or story attached to that feeling. The person wakes up screaming and doesn’t have a dream to report. Because people don’t usually remember these events in the morning, it is not surprising that historically, sleep terrors have been attributed to demon possession or other ghostly activities. Rachel is upset. As in her childhood, at night she feels that she is in danger, that she is about to die. Something frightening is happening that she can’t explain.

• From Take Back Your Life: Recovering from Cults and Abusive Relationships (2000)

  Embedded and rote, this type of thinking may persist for some time after a person leaves a cult. If you continue to see things in the cult's black-and-white terms, you are still under the influence of the cult's indoctrination. This us-versus-them mentality will hinder your recovery and tend to keep you isolated. If you can review your precult beliefs and values, as well as those instilled by the cult, you can decide how you want to reshape them and work toward who you want to be now. Naturally people born or raised in a cult will not have had precult life experiences, so they must decide what beliefs and values are important to them now that they are free of the cult's influence and control. Be careful about making hasty judgments or reactions about ideas, people, or activities. Remember that it is perfectly fine now for you to disagree with or be different from others-just as it is fine for others to differ from or disagree with you. Most importantly, remember that just because someone thinks, dresses, behaves, or believes differently from what you were taught, it does not mean that the person is bad or should be shunned. The world is full of all kinds of people, philosophies, religions, and ideas-that's what makes it so interesting. Don't fear or reject the vastness of it; just learn to embrace it one step at a time. Most of all, have patience with yourself and others. Learn to tolerate differences of opinion and belief. Gradually you will develop the ability to see others' viewpoints without feeling threatened or needing to change your own. Isolation and the blind assuredness of being uniquely right are traits that hold cults together. Undoing those false bonds is part of what recovery is all about. FloatingA sense of disconnection, a lack of concentration, and feelings of dissociation or separateness from others and your immediate environment are all symptoms of floating, a common postcult difficulty discussed in the previous chapter. According to Singer, "When they leave the cult, many find that a variety of conditions-stress and conflict, a depressive low, certain significant words or ideas-can trigger a return to the trancelike state they knew in cult days. They report that they fall into the familiar, unshakable lethargy, and seem to hear bits of exhortations from cult speakers."4 If you are having such experiences, it may be helpful to remind yourself regularly that floating (or dissociation) is a natural by-product of having lived in a confined, controlled milieu, especially if intensive mind-altering practices were part of your experience. Induced dissociation is inherent in many cultic situations and can linger after you leave the cult. This sense of floating should decrease over time. Two techniques are helpful in controlling floating episodes. This first technique is quite simple: • Wear a rubber band around your wrist. • As soon as you notice difficulty concentrating, snap the rubber band, but not too hard.

• From Take Back Your Life: Recovering from Cults and Abusive Relationships (2000)

  This is the key to understanding the distinctive challenge of preventing child abuse in totalist groups."" Siskind herself grew up in the Sullivanians, which Janet Joyce wrote about in Chapter 2. Siskind concurs with us and many other professionals who assert that children raised in such groups may be at risk for specific types of psychological problems and tend to face difficult problems of adjustment if they later leave the group. Calling for more research and more in-depth examination of child-rearing practices in these closed groups, Siskind writes, "Not only would further research be useful for academic reasons, but it might also prove valuable to those who are charged with helping children who live in totalist groups."19 It is unrealistic to expect that all the effects of cultic emotional, physical, and sexual abuse can be easily undone. Nevertheless, it is encouraging to note that many children can and do recover. Singer interviewed many abused former cult members who grew up to be well-adjusted, fully functioning adults.20 However, more research is needed to assess the postcult recovery needs of second- and third-generation cult members.21 Psychological EffectsMental health professionals note patterns of aftereffects in children who have endured abusive, violent, or extremely frightening experiences. Unfortunately children experience these aftereffects with an intensity unmoderated by growth and maturity. "Repeated trauma in adult life erodes the structure of the personality already formed, but repeated trauma in childhood forms and deforms the personality," writes Judith Herman. "The child trapped in an abusive environment is faced with formidable tasks of adaptation. She must find a way to preserve a sense of trust in people who are untrustworthy, safety in a situation that is unsafe, control in a situation that is terrifyingly unpredictable, power in a situation of helplessness. Unable to care for or protect herself, she must compensate for the failures of adult care and protection with the only means at her disposal, an immature system of psychological defenses."22 Professor of psychiatry Lenore Terr studied twenty-five children who were kidnapped aboard their school bus in Chowchilla, California, in 1976. They were held in an underground vault for sixteen hours until they escaped by digging themselves out. Their post-traumatic symptoms were intense, despite the relative brevity of captivity and lack of physical or sexual abuse. Terr identified symptoms that parallel the emotional trauma suffered by children in cultic situations:23 Terror. This may include the fear of helplessness; fear of another, more fearful event (fear of fear); fear of separation from loved ones; or fear of death. Often such ordinary childhood fears as fear of the dark, of strangers, and of being alone are magnified and retained throughout childhood; sometimes they are never outgrown. Children in cults may fear the devil, outsiders, their parents, other adult members, leaving the group, or displeasing the leader. Rage. Children who are abused or terrorized may have difficulty controlling their anger, which may be expressed as rage when they are frustrated, bored, or annoyed.

• From Take Back Your Life: Recovering from Cults and Abusive Relationships (2000)

  Some battered women speak of entering a kind of exclusive, almost delusional world, embracing the grandiose belief system of their mates and voluntarily suppressing their own doubts as a proof of loyalty and submission.' An abused partner must generally submit to the following abuses and/or behaviors: • Early verbal, physical, and/or [sexual] dominance • Fear arousal and maintenance • Guilt induction • Contingent expressions of "love" • Enforced loyalty to the aggressor and self-denunciation • Promotion of powerlessness and helplessness • Pathological expressions of jealousy • Hope-instilling behaviors • Isolation/imprisonment • Required secrecy' Several additional behaviors are seen in cultic abusive relationships: • Coerced adulation of the abuser, who self-proclaims godlike qualities • Excessive use of manipulative methods of persuasion and control • Enforced adherence to a doctrine or belief system that justifies the abusive behaviors • Severe loss of self, and merging of identities, with the subordinate one merging into the superior one • Insistence on carrying out the "plan" of the master The story of Hedda Nussbaum and Joel Steinberg illustrates how these behaviors take shape in one-on-one cults. Hedda Nussbaum: "He Was the Center of My Universe"In late 1987, America was shocked by the news of the horrific death of a sixyear-old child who was beaten unconscious in New York City by her father. Police were alerted after the girl's mother called 911, concerned about her nonresponsive child. From news reports and later trial testimony, we learned of the nightmarish existence of Hedda Nussbaum, a shy children's book editor, and her two illegally adopted children, all of whom were living in fear and druginduced squalor. This twisted, perverse world was the creation of Nussbaum's abusive common-law husband, wealthy attorney Joel Steinberg. He had killed the young child earlier that night before Hedda called for help, and about a year later he was convicted of second-degree murder and first-degree manslaughter. He was given a maximum twenty-five-year sentence; he served about twothirds of it and was released in 2004 (news reports indicate that he continues to deny responsibility for the child's death'). Hedda had met Joel thirteen years earlier, in 1975, and they began living together shortly afterward. They never married because Joel said that a so-called piece of paper wasn't necessary if two people were truly committed to each other. The emotional abuse and control began almost immediately. During an interview on Larry King Live in June 2003, Hedda explained that Steinberg was not overtly abusive at first, but focused on molding her personality. She was shy and compliant, believing the changes he urged were for her own good. "Almost every night he would work with me like a therapist," she said. After social outings, he would critique Hedda in detail: "You should have done this, you should have said that," he'd say.' Three years into the relationship, the physical abuse started. At first, the beatings were occasional, but they soon became more frequent and intense. Like many other victims of abusive relationships, Hedda was hospitalized numerous times.

• From Take Back Your Life: Recovering from Cults and Abusive Relationships (2000)

  While the therapist needs to respect the client's wish to stop therapy, it may also be a propitious opportunity to examine related issues, such as conflicts that are interfering with functioning, difficulties in expressing disappointment or anger at the therapist, unresolved financial issues, and so on. While exploring possible problems, the therapist can raise the possibility of "shelving the issues for now" and stopping therapy. If the therapist does not respond to the client's termination request, the client may equate the therapist with the cult leader. Cult leaders often point to members' unresolved conflicts as proof that they should stay in the cult. The cult holds out the promise of perfection if members stay in the group. It's important to help the client understand that nobody is ever cured in a cult, by psychotherapy, or in life. We are all more or less adjusted to our circumstances. We are all more or less satisfied with ourselves. When I work with someone who has reached her goals, I ask if she has thought about ending therapy. This is useful with all clients who may feel fearful about raising the idea of stopping therapy. Psychotherapy clients often feel relational guilt or fear about leaving someone who has been parental. Broaching the subject is particularly important in relation to former cult members, who may feel they will be punished for thoughts of leaving. It is useful to point out that they are not leaving, per se, but rather they are stopping the regular sessions. I point out that I am always here if they would like to call and let me know how they are doing. Also I tell them they are welcome to consult with me in the future if they have something they want to work on. I let them know that even if they don't call me to tell me about themselves or call for appointments, I am still here. They can return for any amount of time at any time. They can be out of touch for years, or forever, and I will still be available. Their comings and goings can be no different than their hiring a handyperson they trust. One may want to call or send a holiday card (or not) to a trusted handyperson. And one would certainly call such a person if some-, thing needed attention, whether it was two weeks or five years from the last visit. When the therapist and client achieve a solid demystification of the relationship, talking about stopping sessions can be one of the most fruitful periods in the therapeutic relationship. This is particularly true for former cult members. These clients can observe the myriad feelings they have toward the therapist, and the fears they have about being on their own. Some of the so-called transference distortions that can arise during this period can help the client work through old parental issues and powerful conflicts about the cult.

• From Take Back Your Life: Recovering from Cults and Abusive Relationships (2000)

  Therapist Shelly Rosen points out that, contrary to uninformed opinion, these women are not frail and weak-minded, but "strong, ambitious, and intelligent."" In abusive relationships, manipulative and controlling persuasion techniques begin to replace wholesome two-way communication between equals. Sometimes the abuser, or leader, intentionally seeks out a partner or follower whom he believes he can shape into submissiveness. In those cases, the courtship phase is a type of recruitment: prospective lovers are carefully screened and chosen. Once the leader makes a selection, usually based on knowledge of the individual's needs and vulnerabilities, courtship begins. Although the public tends to think, wrongly, that only those who are stupid, weird, crazy, and aimless get involved in cults, this is simply untrue. Based on studies and the professional experience of those working in this field, we know that many cult members went to the best schools in the country, have advanced academic or professional degrees, and had successful careers and lives prior to their involvement in a cult or cultic abusive relationship. But at a vulnerable moment, and we all have plenty of those in our lives (a lost love, a lost job, a rejection, a death in the family, and so on), a person can fall under the influence of someone who appears to offer answers or a sense of direction. The case of Lee Boyd Malvo illustrates the kind of violence that a person trapped in a cultic relationship can be influenced to commit. Deviant behavior can easily flourish in these closed, controlling relationships that are outside the norms of society and tend to remain hidden from view until too late. Lee Boyd Malvo. "Like a Puppet"All one-on-one cults do not necessarily involve sex or sexual intimacy. Some are controlling in other ways, such as when a subordinate person is dominated by a powerful older figure. One example is the relationship between Lee Boyd Malvo and John Allen Muhammad, the two responsible for ten sniper slayings in the area around the nation's capital in October 2002.12 Sadly, Malvo was enlisted in the psychopathic Muhammad's plot to terrorize and kill innocent citizens across the country. The overbearing Muhammad coercively influenced young Malvo to the point where the boy could not tell right from wrong. Malvo, a teenager more or less abandoned by his mother, was completely under the spell of forty-two-year-old Muhammad. Muhammad had been in a brief relationship with Malvo's mother, and when that relationship ended, Muhammad invited Lee to live with him and trained him to be his "shadow." A former army soldier, trained in weaponry, Muhammad forced the slight-built and shy teen to live under various strict regimes in a perverse version of military boot camp. As many other cult followers do in relation to their leader, Malvo referred to Muhammad as his father, and was dependent on him for everything. Muhammad's constant surveillance kept the malleable teenager in check.

• From Less (2017)

  Here it comes, the trip he dreads: the one when he turns fifty. All the other trips of his life seem to have led, in a blind man’s march, toward this one. The hotel in Italy with Robert. The jaunt through France with Freddy. The wild-hare cross-country journey after college to San Francisco, to stay with someone named Lewis. And his childhood trips—the camping trips his father took him on many times, mostly to Civil War battlefields. How clearly Less remembers searching their campsite for bullets and finding—wonder of wonders!—an arrowhead (time revealed the possibility his father had salted the area). The games of mumblety-peg in which clumsy young Less was entrusted with a switchblade knife, which he fearfully tossed as if it were a poisonous snake and with which he once managed to impale an actual snake (garter, predeceased). A foil-wrapped potato left to cook in the fire. A ghost story with a golden arm. His father’s delight flickering in the firelight. How Less cherished those memories. (He was later to discover a book in his father’s library entitled Growing Up Straight, which counseled paternal bonding for sissy sons and whose advised activities—battlefields, mumblety-peg, campfires, ghost stories—had all been underlined with a blue Bic pen, but somehow this later discovery could not pierce the sealed happiness of his childhood.) Back then, these journeys all seemed as random as the stars in the sky; only now can he see the zodiac turning above his life. Here, rising, comes the Scorpion. Less believes he will head now from Berlin to Morocco, with a quick layover in Paris. He has no regrets. He has left nothing behind. The last sands through his hourglass will be Saharan. But he does not head now to Morocco.

• From Sex with Kings: 500 Years of Adultery, Power, Rivalry, and Revenge (2004)

  When he found her, she was ready for him. No more fear. On her deathbed, according to the duc de Saint-Simon, “she summoned her entire domestic staff, down to the humblest, and made public confession of her publicly sinned sins, asked pardon for the long and open scandal of her life. The terror of death which had so long obsessed her was suddenly dissipated…. She gave thanks to God that He had permitted her to die far removed from her children, the fruits of her adultery.”39 Madame de Montespan’s body—the one which had delighted a king, propelled her to riches and power, and been daily massaged with oils—now received ghoulish insults. An apprentice surgeon botched the autopsy. Only the lowliest servants said prayers over the corpse, the rest having disappeared. Her body was dumped outside her door while various priests argued about possession of it. The parish church won the argument; the coffin was placed there and seemingly forgotten for some two months. Finally, a funeral procession “remarkable for its shameful parsimony” set out for Poitiers, where her remains were placed in her family crypt, under a black marble stone.40 Meanwhile, according to custom, her entrails were placed in an urn to be buried separately. A porter was hired to take the urn to a convent, but, smelling something rotten, he peered inside the poorly sealed vessel. The man was so revolted by what he saw that he threw the contents into the gutter, where a herd of pigs stumbling by promptly ate them. When this story was told at Versailles to great guffaws of laughter, one noblewoman remarked, “Her entrails? Really? Did she ever have any?”41 Madame de Montespan’s bastard son the duc du Maine “could not conceal his joy” at his mother’s death. Her only legitimate child, the duc d’Antin, rejoiced, “Here I am at last—thawed out!”—perhaps alluding to basking in the Sun King’s rays without his mother’s shadow blocking them.42 Surprisingly, Madame de Maintenon, who had been quite cold to Madame de Montespan in her final years, was so upset to learn of her death that she locked herself in her toilet. Nor was anyone less astonished at the king’s utter indifference to the death of his longtime lover who had borne him seven children. When the king’s beloved granddaughter-in-law found the nerve to ask him why he did not grieve, he replied coldly “that when he parted from Madame de Montespan he never expected to see her again and so far as he was concerned she had been dead from that day.”43 The most surprising penitent of all was the impetuous Lola Montez—whorish, selfish, deceitful Lola who had broken old King Ludwig’s heart and lost him his kingdom. After her 1848 banishment from Bavaria and his abdication, Ludwig prayed that she would one day realize the error of her ways and sincerely repent.

• From Sex with Kings: 500 Years of Adultery, Power, Rivalry, and Revenge (2004)

  Two of the women produced girls, much to Bianca’s dismay, and were paid off. The third woman, Lucia, chosen for her health and beauty, gave birth to a boy. Immediately upon hearing this, Bianca pretended to go into labor, rending the air with cries of pretended pain. Francesco, hearing the news, raced to comfort her and brought with him his court physician. The baby, who had been unceremoniously nabbed from his mother and brought to Bianca’s house in a basket of goods, remained hidden until he could be smuggled into the safety of her four-poster bed with curtains drawn. The labor lasted many hours until Francesco gave up and returned to the palace. His doctor, however, remained to assist with the birth. When the doctor, who had not been permitted to touch or examine Bianca during her gut-wrenching performance, saw her old serving woman Santi bring in the basket through the garden, he understood what was happening. He tactfully obliged when Bianca instructed him to bring her wine. Upon returning, he was presented with Bianca’s newborn child. And the real mother? Lucia, deprived of her child and still bleeding, was forced to go on horseback on a long journey to Bologna with Gazzi, Bianca’s humpbacked doctor, who had cared for her during her pregnancy. Gazzi obtained a position for her as wet nurse to a wealthy family under an assumed name and told her the whole story. Her son, whom Bianca and Francesco named Antonio, would have a brilliant life. But Lucia feared the Medicis would not hesitate to silence her to protect the secret of Antonio’s birth. For twelve years she wandered around Italy using false names, always looking over her shoulder for a Medici dagger. Soon after Antonio’s birth, Archduchess Johanna finally gave her husband a son and heir, and temporarily at least, Antonio’s importance shrank. Meanwhile Santi, Bianca’s accomplice in the phony birth, began to blackmail Bianca. While on a journey with other servants, Santi was attacked and knifed by mysterious bandits who ignored the others in her party. Santi died—we must conclude she was murdered at Bianca’s instigation—but not before confessing the whole story to a priest. Archduchess Johanna died in 1578, and as she lay cooling in the grave, Francesco married Bianca. Rumors about Antonio’s strange birth flew on swift wings, even as Europe reeled from the news that the archduke had married his mistress and crowned her. Francesco, Bianca, and Antonio became the butt of sneering jokes across Europe.

• From Emotional Inheritance (2022)

  I was a nineteen-year-old soldier when the Gulf War started . We were on the road and the rock-and-roll music we played was loud, so loud that we had to make sure we didn’t miss the sound of the sirens and could run to the shelters to put on our gas masks in time. At some point, we decided to give up on the masks and the shelters and instead ran to the roofs every time there was a siren so we could watch the missiles from Iraq and try to guess where they would fall. After each thunderous explosion, we would go back to our music and play it even louder. We sang for the soldiers, who were also our childhood friends, neighbors, and siblings. And when they teared up, as they often did, I felt the power of touching another heart with my own, voicing the unspeakable. Our music expressed so much of what no one could say out loud: that we were scared but were not allowed to admit it even to ourselves, that we were still too young and wanted to go home, fall in love, travel far away. That we wanted normal lives but we were not sure what “normal” meant. Making music and singing out loud were meaningful and liberating. It was the beginning of my journey of a search for truths, the unveiling of the emotional inheritance within me. Eventually, some years later, I left my homeland, moved to New York City, and began studying the unspeakable—all those silent memories, feelings, and desires that are outside awareness. I became a psychoanalyst, exploring the unconscious . The analysis of the mind, like a mystery story, is an investigation. We know that Sigmund Freud, the great sleuth of the unconscious mind, was a big fan of Sherlock Holmes and maintained a large library of detective fiction. In some ways, Freud borrowed Holmes’s method: gathering evidence, searching for a truth beneath the surface truth, seeking out hidden realities. Like detectives, my patients and I try to follow the signs and listen not only to what they say but also to their pauses, to the music of that which is unknown to both of us. It is delicate work, collecting reminiscences of childhood, of what was said or done, listening to the omissions, to stories untold. Looking for clues, piecing these together into a picture, we ask, What really happened and to whom? The secrets of the mind include not only our own life experiences but also those that we unknowingly carry with us: the memories, feelings, and traumas that we inherit from previous generations. It was after World War II when psychoanalysts first began examining the impact of trauma on the next generation.

• From Sex with Kings: 500 Years of Adultery, Power, Rivalry, and Revenge (2004)

  The following century was only slightly more civilized. After the death of Edward IV of England in 1483, court and public opinion were so violently hostile to his final mistress, Jane Shore, that she was forced to march through London wearing the white shroud and dunce cap of a penitent, holding a candle. Though there is evidence that she survived another forty years, a legend sprung up that she died on a dunghill, pelted by stones, and many subsequent royal mistresses were heartily wished the death of Jane Shore. The new king, usually the son of the former monarch, often ached to punish the woman who had hurt his mother the queen. Charles VII’s son and heir Louis often bristled at the insults offered his long-suffering mother by his father’s mistress Agnes Sorel. One day in 1444, Louis, running into Agnes, cried, “By our Lord’s passion, this woman is the cause of all our misfortunes,” and punched her in the face.2 Perhaps it was lucky for Agnes that she predeceased her royal lover; one cannot imagine a peaceful existence for her under Louis XI. In 1760, as King George II of England lay dying, his beloved mistress was nowhere near his deathbed. Lady Yarmouth, who knew the future George III was no admirer of hers, was quietly stuffing ten thousand pounds into a strongbox to take back to her native land of Hanover, where young George couldn’t get her. Upon hearing of a monarch’s serious illness, friends deserted his mistress in waves in an effort to ingratiate themselves with the future king. Madame de Pompadour experienced this in 1757, when a madman stabbed Louis XV as he entered his carriage at Versailles. Though superficial, the wound in his side was bloody, and Louis thought death was imminent. Madame de Pompadour, whose rooms were always filled with simpering courtiers, suddenly found fewer visitors, and those with gloating faces. “They came to see how she took it,” wrote her lady’s maid.3 Her enemy the marquis d’Argenson could not conceal his glee when he reported, “She pretends not to feel her disgrace, but little by little people are forsaking her.”4 Crying, deserted, the royal mistress packed her bags and prepared to flee to her safe haven in Paris in the event of the king’s death. But after several days Louis, rallying, grabbed a cane, called “Don’t you come” to his son, and hobbled down the private staircase to her rooms.5 Madame de Pompadour’s position was once more secure, and the obsequious courtiers once again waited in her antechamber for an audience.

• From Take Back Your Life: Recovering from Cults and Abusive Relationships (2000)

  He tells the harrowing story of the years he spent in what he calls a "wilderness sex cult" led by an unethical psychotherapist who called his ranch his "human relations laboratory." Steve was nineteen when he met the man he describes as a "charismatic charlatan" who "highjacked [sic] my youth in exchange for saving my life."4 Though the following accounts focus mostly on female victims, we are by no means slighting male victims of sexual abuse. Seduction, rape, drug abuse, induced altered states, fear, manipulation of emotions, and misuse of power all surround the sexual abuse perpetrated in cults and cultic relationships. We explain here some of the main categories of sexual exploitation and abuse. Reproductive, Marital, and Sexual ControlIn a broad sense, reproductive, marital, and sexual control through enforced celibacy or mandated relationships are forms of sexual abuse. In many groups, husbands are given absolute control over their wives (and usually also their children), including a license for sexual conduct without consent. In these situations, marital rape becomes an accepted standard. Sometimes the leader will dictate exactly when and how sexual activity between married couples is supposed to occur. Some groups demand sexual abstinence or celibacy, or enforce certain sexual prohibitions, for example, against homosexual relations or unsanctioned relationships. Cults may also control reproduction and childrearing. At first glance, such rules may provide some relief from the confusion of trying to master the intricacies of sexuality and intimate relationships. In reality, however, they are clearly manipulations. By controlling sex, marriage, and procreation, the cult is better able to influence and manage its members. In some cults, women are discouraged from bearing children, with sterilization and abortion used as means of birth control. In others, childbearing is expected and sometimes ordered by the leadership. For example, Alexandra Stein describes both an arranged marriage and being instructed by the leader to adopt children in her book, Inside Out. A Memoir of Entering and Breaking Out of a Minneapolis Political Cult (North Star Press of St. Cloud). Sex as an "Honor"In many cults, members are led to believe that a sexual encounter with the leader is an honor, a special gift, or a way of achieving further growth. A devotee may be asked, for example, to help the leader relax or feel better. In cults where the leader is regarded as God, sex with him may be interpreted and rationalized as being spiritually beneficial to the devotee. Often members submit to a leader's advances out of pure fear. Given the imbalance of power, it is difficult to say no. The mask of honor is merely a cover for the blatant abuse taking place. Sex as a TestSome abusive leaders test members' commitment and loyalty, often to achieve their own sexual satisfaction. The more a leader demands, the more power he gets, until he intrudes in and controls every aspect of life. The justification is that nothing is too sacred to withhold from the leader.

• From How to Be Yourself: Quiet Your Inner Critic and Rise Above Social Anxiety (2018)

  Ellis was an extremely shy child. Despite the prominence and unguarded eccentricities of his adulthood, as a kid he refused to take part in classroom plays and “sweated and sizzled with anxiety” whenever he had to recite a poem or accept an award. So at nineteen, Ellis assigned himself a project—some structure. He decided to talk to as many women as possible. Every day, he took himself to what is now called the New York Botanical Garden. In a 2004 interview with National Public Radio, at the age of ninety, he recalled his project as if it were yesterday: “Whenever I saw a woman sitting on a park bench alone, I’d sit on the same bench and give myself one minute to talk to her. If I die, I die. Fuck it.”1 Over the course of a month, Ellis talked to over 130 women. He was brave for the short time it took to approach, sit down, and say hello. And what happened? Ellis said, “I saw philosophically, cognitively, that nothing happened. Nobody cut my balls off. I had a hundred pleasant conversations.” Nothing happened. This is the ideal outcome: nothing. Nothing our imaginations can conjure. Nothing our Inner Critic can predict. Even rejection, once experienced, is seldom as bad as we imagine. Another thing Ellis discovered is that repetition is key. Like Brandon Stanton’s experience, the first approaches were the hardest. But every time Ellis approached another woman, it got a little easier. With every approach, he was a little less anxious. What’s more, he recovered more quickly—the sweating and sizzling didn’t last as long. Indeed, as your confidence catches up, as you choose your structure and play your roles, here’s what you’ve been waiting for: your anxiety will also ebb away. But don’t take it from me. Take it from none other than Albert Ellis. THE ONLY THREE GRAPHS IN THIS BOOK Since a picture is worth a thousand words, let’s bring in some visuals to see what was happening to the young Albert Ellis. Take a look at the first graph. The x-axis is time ticking along. The y-axis is anxiety, anchored by the official scientific terms of “chillin’” at the bottom and “freaking out” at the top.

• From Tipping the Velvet (1998)

  They can fuck upon the streets, like dogs.’ Another lady, very drunk, said that, in that case, at least they should have the thrill of watching us, from a window. But I looked only at Diana; and, for the first time in all that terrible evening, I began to feel afraid. Now Maria returned with Mrs Hooper. Mrs Hooper’s eyes were bright. She held my old sailor’s bag, that I had brought from Mrs Milne’s and cast into the furthest corner of my closet, and a rusty black dress, and a pair of thick-soled boots. While the ladies all looked on, Diana threw the dress and boots at Zena; then she dipped her hand fastidiously into the sailor’s bag, and pulled out a crumpled frock, and some shoes, which she cast at me. The frock was one I had used to wear in my old life, and thought fine enough. Now it was cold and slightly clammy to the touch, and its seams were rimmed with moth-dust. Zena began at once to pull on the dreary black dress, and the boots. I, however, kept my own frock in my hands, and gazed at Diana, and swallowed. ‘I’m not wearing this,’ I said. ‘You shall wear it,’ she answered shortly, ‘or be thrust naked into Felicity Place.’ ‘Oh, thrust her naked, Diana!’ said a woman at her back. It was a Lady from Llangollen, minus her topper. ‘I’m not putting it on,’ I said again. Diana nodded. ‘Very well,’ she said, ‘then I shall make you.’ And while I was still too amazed to raise a hand in my defence, she had crossed the room, torn the robe from my fingers, and lowered the hem of its skirts over my head. I writhed, then, and began to kick; she pushed me to the bed, held me fast upon it with one hand and, with the other, continued to tug the folds of cloth about me. I struggled more fiercely; soon there came the rip of a broken hem. Hearing it, Diana gave a shout: ‘Help me with her, can’t you? Maria! Mrs Hooper! You girl — ’ she meant Zena. ‘Do you want to go back to that damn reformatory?’ Instantly, there came upon me what felt like fifty hands, all pulling at the dress, all pinching me, all grasping at my kicking legs. For an age, they seemed to be upon me. I grew hot and faint beneath the layers of wool. My swollen head was knocked, and began to pulse and ache. Someone placed her thumb — I remember this very clearly — at the top of my thigh, in the slippery hollow of my groin. It might have been Maria. It might have been Mrs Hooper, the housekeeper. At last I lay panting upon the bed, the dress about me.

• From A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians (1921)

  Tivecbe ws eyo, bTt Kayo ws tpeis, adEAPoL, Séowar vue@v. ‘Become as I am (or have become), because I am as ye are, I beseech you, brethren.” With this sentence the apostle, under the influence, probably, of the fear expressed in v.1, turns from argument to entreaty and appeals to the feel- ings of the Galatians. Cf. the similar manner of approach in 3'-3, and notice here the affectionate adeAdor (cf. on 1") and the use of déouar, “I entreat.”? The entreaty itself is enigmati- cal and paradoxical. Yet its meaning can scarcely be doubtful. The apostle desires the Galatians to emancipate themselves from bondage to law, as he had done, and appeals to them to do this on the ground that he, who possessed the advantages of the law, had foregone them and put himself on the same level, in relation to law, with them. Thus while yivecOe as éyo@ addresses them as subject to law, or on the point of becoming so, ws tues looks at them as Gentiles without the advantages of law. A similar thought is expressed less enigmatically in 2%, 16 (cf. v.°) and in Phil. 34%, esp. v.8. Cf. also 1 Cor. 9”. It affects the sense but little whether with xdy& we supply eiut or yéyova (or éyevéuny); yéyove corresponds best with ytvece and the actual facts, since the apostle’s freedom from law was the result of a becoming, a change of relations.

• From How to Be Yourself: Quiet Your Inner Critic and Rise Above Social Anxiety (2018)

  In addition to genetics, the seeds of social anxiety are also sown through learning. At some point, like Jim, we learned to fear the judgment of others, learned to conceal what was potentially humiliating. This lesson might have been seared into us through a discrete experience, like throwing up in front of the whole school during an assembly or having a panic attack in a crowded restaurant that resulted in a well-meaning waitress summoning the entire fire department. It might have been a horrified witnessing, like seeing a friend destroyed by bullies or a classmate demeaned, day after day, by a bad apple of a teacher. It might have come from growing up in an insular family that didn’t see the point of socializing. However the lessons of social anxiety were learned, they created a fear of being caught doing something stupid or inappropriate—of being revealed. The lessons are often subtle and impossible to pinpoint; for me, like many others, there was no real beginning—it just always was. With Jim, Maeve’s lessons that he was being watched and judged everywhere he went, combined with confirmation from the Mrs. O’Neills of the world, shaped him over the years like a stream wearing a groove in the bedrock. Fifty years later, he says, “I always had the sense that people were watching. That they’d see something wrong. She drilled it into my brother and me.” Like sponges, we absorb our families’ lessons, without quite realizing that a core belief is crystalizing inside us. In other households, very different lessons may be modeled; for example, that chatting on the stoop with neighbors is the ideal way to spend a weekend afternoon or that showing off your moves at the center of a dance circle is exhilarating rather than a crisis. My husband grew up thinking it was mandatory to invite the roofers or the plumber to stay for dinner. But if we grow up in a house like Jim’s, or even a subtler version thereof, we learn to expect that people will not only judge us, but judge us harshly. And this fear feels like a fact. We think it’s just how the world is. And that world makes us feel surrounded by judgment, yet alone in our fear. This fear costs us: it makes it hard to meet people, get close to them, and have a good time. It makes it hard to ask for what we need. It can make others think we’re snobby, unfriendly, or cold, when really we’re just nervous. At its worst, it can leave us depressed and isolated. And of course, the fear gets in the way of being ourselves. * * *

• From The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian (2007)

  I was a human punching bag. I lost fights to boys, girls, and kids half my age. One bully, Micah, made me beat up myself. Yes, he made me punch myself in the face three times. I am the only Indian in the history of the world who ever lost a fight with himself . Okay, so now that you know about the rules, then I can tell you that I went from being a small target in Wellpinit to being a larger target in Reardan. Well, let’s get something straight. All of those pretty, pretty, pretty, pretty white girls ignored me. But that was okay. Indian girls ignored me, too, so I was used to it. And let’s face it, most of the white boys ignored me, too. But there were a few of those Reardan boys, the big jocks, who paid special attention to me. None of those guys punched me or got violent. After all, I was a reservation Indian, and no matter how geeky and weak I appeared to be, I was still a potential killer. So mostly they called me names. Lots of names. And yeah, those were bad enough names. But I could handle them, especially when some huge monster boy was insulting me. But I knew I’d have to put a stop to it eventually or I’d always be known as “Chief” or “Tonto” or “Squaw Boy.” But I was scared. I wasn’t scared of fistfighting with those boys. I’d been in plenty of fights. And I wasn’t scared of losing fights with them, either. I’d lost most every fight I’d been in. I was afraid those monsters were going to kill me. And I don’t mean “kill” as in “metaphor.” I mean “kill” as in “beat me to death.” So, weak and poor and scared, I let them call me names while I tried to figure out what to do. And it might have continued that way if Roger the Giant hadn’t taken it too far. It was lunchtime and I was standing outside by the weird sculpture that was supposed to be an Indian. I was studying the sky like I was an astronomer, except it was daytime and I didn’t have a telescope, so I was just an idiot. Roger the Giant and his gang of giants strutted over to me. “Hey, Chief,” Roger said. It seemed like he was seven feet tall and three hundred pounds. He was a farm boy who carried squealing pigs around like they were already thin slices of bacon. I stared at Roger and tried to look tough. I read once that you can scare away a charging bear if you wave your arms and look big.