The reason I went running to Lemmy* was to put a dividing wall between myself and the Doctor. The last time I saw him, he had arrived at McDonald's with his friend. It was one of the few times he left behind his ex-girlfriend, Yvonne. I was still in a daze over the effects of being raped and choked. This would be the day I began to snap out of it.

I can't remember exactly what he said. He criticized my dress and looks. I recall that he claimed I was too serious and political in a conversation. I remained silent and looked at him. There was a look in his eyes. It was the same look he had before he assaulted me at the movie theatre, as The Unforgiven was playing. It was just before the scene where the hooker has her breasts cut off.

It was a very alienating, animalistic look. His light blue pupils turned black and spots ran across his iris. I saw a dark cloud form. It was at that moment that I realized he was going to do something to me. My gut reaction was to leave. I made up some excuse, took the bus home, and wrote down my shifts. Then, I called up my ex-boyfriend Mike, who had introduced us.

"I want you to break up with him for me. You owe me a favour," I told Mike.

"All right. You say he humiliates you and has a bad temper. Well, I introduced you to him. I will call him on the phone and end things between the two of you," Mike said.

"Thank you. I am afraid he will lash out at me," I responded.

Mike called him later that day. I never heard from the Doctor again. For someone who claimed he was devastated and suspected I dropped him after using him for sex, he neatly forgot that he was a rapist and we had dated post-traumatically for two months. This was a situation of abuse and post-traumatic reaction, not a real relationship. People who suffer from PTSD and Stockholm Syndrome tend to identify with their abusers, rapists, and captors. It is well-documented and has been recognized since the 1970s.

The Doctor did not seem to miss me much. I did not receive the barrage of phone calls, letters, and visits that usually occurred after I ended a relationship. I consider such behavior to be stalking. Mike certainly refused to leave me alone. It was in his character. The first time he dated me, he had relentlessly called me thirty times in forty-eight hours.

The Doctor and his friends began a campaign of defamation against me. He claimed that I had used him for sex when he was incapable of having sex due to his rare condition of sexual priapism.

I met Lemmy three weeks before I broke up with the Doctor. He showed up in early April of 1993. A friend of mine arrived with him and introduced me to him. He was driving the car.

"Come on, get in on the side. This is Lemmy. He is a friend of mine," my friend said.

She sat in the front passenger seat. Cigarette dangling from her hand out the window, I smelled the Du Maurier wafts through the car. I was allergic to cigarettes, so I asked them to turn on the fan.

"Why do you want the fan? It costs money to run the fan," Lemmy said.

"Oh, I see," I said. "Well, turn it on, anyway."

"It will drain the gas tank," Lemmy insisted.

"It doesn't affect the gas tank. It gets over thirty degrees here in the valley," I told him.

The Firsts

The first boyfriend I had was named Mack. He attended Rutland Senior High after he had transferred from Kelowna Senior Secondary in Grade 11. A year older than I was, his teachers had held him back for a year over his poor mathematical skills. What he lacked in math, he made up for in creativity.

Mack was constantly writing. He kept journals and books of poetry. Our weekly meetings involved trips to the North End park by the Mill, off Coronation Street and Knox Mountain Drive. There used to be a secluded bushy inlet near the north side, later cut down by the district. We used to go hide in there.

I brought along 'shit mix', a mixture of various hard spirits and liquors including dark rum, gin, amaretto, Strega, vodka, cheap Bourbon, and brandy. We sipped the toxic mixture from a thermos, occasionally supplementing with tea and lemon on the side. Mack showed me all of his journals and poems. He could easily have been a writer.

At the same time, he was up on all the latest bands: The Pixies, Jesus and Mary Chain, The Psychos, 10,000 Maniacs, R.E.M., Mudhoney, Mother Love Bones, Screaming Trees, and others, to name a few. He brought mixed tapes with notes for me to look over. I learned a great deal about the music scene from him.

Mack looked like a cross between a young Hell's Angel recruit and James Dean. I never cared for his interest in motorbikes. Bikers scared me; I avoided them due to their connections to domestic abuse, racism, human trafficking, and hard drugs. This was before I was raped at the age of seventeen, in the spring of 1993 by my second boyfriend, a man I shall refer to as 'The Doctor'.

Mack and I never had sex; he was not uninterested in me sexually. It was obvious that he preferred blondes and considered me a naive 'goodie-two-shoes'. Drinking and occasional pot-smoking were my only indulgences. I was a pescatarian who walked everywhere and spoke of world peace. My only expensive habit was fashion. In the end, Mack and I had little in common outside of an appreciation for poetry and alt-rock music. His sexual rejection, increasing level of moodiness, lack of commonality, and involvement with a questionable group of people from his high school forced my hand. I ended our relationship after one year.

We remained friends and he introduced me to 'The Doctor', a young man with medical aspirations, good looks, and a sadistic, sociopathic attitude towards women and life. At this point, I would have to state that I experienced the worst type of sexual violence and choking before I ever experienced sex. I left Mack with my virginity firmly intact. It was not the way I wanted things at the time, but I respected Mack's decision. My feelings, however, were seared by his rejection. In the end, he settled for a young, blonde hairdresser who shared his love of ATVing and motorbikes. They are still married today. She forced his hand when she got pregnant.

When I heared the news at the age of nineteen, that he was getting married, I was rather neutral. As his first girlfriend, he expected a reaction from me. My friends told me about it through the grapevine. By this time, he had finally stopped calling me. For two years after our break-up, he called me between 4:30 PM and 6:00 PM five days a week, Monday to Friday. My family did not approve of him; he had figured out when to call and not to call in order to avoid them. He was considered a 'corrupt greaser' in the style of Montgomery Clift by my parents. Mostly, they just couldn't handle the idea that I even dated and had boyfriends.

Their reaction to men I dated was the same as their reaction to red hair and red lipstick. I felt sorry for them, fantasized of flying back east permanently, and avoided them like the Plague. I had no reaction to Mack's decision to marry after he got his girlfriend pregnant. Why would I? He had not wanted me and over two years had passed. I was mildly happy for him and basically disinterested.

The calls stopped, to my relief, due to the interference of his new wife, Angel, and rightly so. I could understand why his fiancee no longer wanted him to be in contact with me. He hadn't wanted me in the first place; I never understood why he kept calling. The conversations had descended into sad tales about his cow-tipping, unemployment, personal issues with depression, and fondness for a cartoon called Ren & Stimpy.

By this time, I had graduated from high school and accepted a Social Work scholarship. I worked at a newspaper and was dating a libertarian activist of Native Cree and Scottish background by the name of Abraham, a highly intellectual and alcoholic man. My world revolved around discussions of Homer, Sophocles, Nietzche, and other philosophers, not around Harley-Davidson and cartoons. I had grown up and out of that period.

I happily moved on and eventually married Abraham. Unfortunately, I was unaware of the extend of his alcoholism, which would later derail our marriage. I have always protected his privacy, particularly since his death. Four years after we separated, he died in an alcohol-related boating accident in Eastern Manitoba. I learned of his fate while working at a ski resort in Kananaskis, back in 2003. It had been my intention to divorce from him or annul the marriage; his reserve-based Native family fought over money and refused to push him to sign the papers. They kept his location and identification from my lawyers in Vancouver and Banff. I had offered to settle fro $60,000; by this time, he refused all contact and would not look at any papers, let alone attend a hearing. I was forced to shelve my plans. His death released me from that marriage. I was disappointed but not shocked. It was obvious when I left Abraham that rehab and sobriety were not options for him. He had been offered an intervention, help from Alcoholics Anonymous, the chance to sober up at his mother's house, counselling, and rehab by his friends and family. He refused them all. In 1998, his drinking had accelerated from three to five binges a night. He kept a refrigerator full of whiskey, Southern Comfort, and amaretto. Weekends were dedicated to binging on beer. Two flats and a pile of hard liquor bottles decorated our front door each Monday morning at our Juniper Road residence. He had a service come pick them up for recycling at 9:00 AM each week. The house smelled of alcohol; a former freezer used for saving meat from hunting and fishing was now stocked with frozen liquor mix and hard liquor bottles of Strega and rum. Abraham did not even like rum.

As his drinking spiralled out of control, the headaches, depression, and anger increased. He complained of migraine headaches brought on by his five-night-a-week drinking binges of twenty or more drinks. He started fights and confrontations at bars. At the time, I was only working twenty hours a week, so I spent more time at home. Previously, my schedule for the first three years of our marriage consisted of secretarial and English Literature classes. I had abandoned my Social Work program for what I really wanted to do: literature and business. Though I was a certified teacher of braille and ASL, I disliked the work for a number of reasons. I also worked four nights a week plus all of Saturday as a newspaper employee. Most of the time, I was not around for his drinking binges.

Abraham had agreed to manage a music group by the name of Who's on Bass, a house band at Angie's club, from 1996 to 1999. We attended over 100 concerts at that time. One day, at work, it was announced that staff members would work Saturday nights instead of daytimes; this change released me from attending yet another concert. After Who's on Bass? received a record deal with the help of Abraham along with video promotion and grants, they no longer had a use for him. He no longer soothed their egos diplomatically, helped them with lyrics, and persuaded them to put aside their differences and get on stage; without his assistance, they unraveled quickly in less than two years. Leguilloux was a talented blues guitarist; he went on to form his own band in rhythm & blues. I am not certain what happened to the Jim Morrison clone in a tacky tourist shirt of a lead singer. Perhaps fancying himself as a replacement for Roger Waters of Pink Floyd, he set up that cover band he had always envisioned as an alternative to his band.

I had tired of band fights, politics, and equipment loss years before. There was only one song by them that I could tolerate. Apparently, they went on to collaberate with the Planetsmashers and Revenge of the Egg People. Only the Planetsmashers were worth noting; they were an excellent live act and I went to see them three times when I lived in Banff. Surfing in Tofino is one of their better-known songs and a live act staple. There were few bands who could get ska-punk right; the Deftones were not one of them.

Band management had given Abraham purpose after he abandoned his education as a paramedic and dream of becoming an ambulance driver. He had lost his trucking status due to his drinking and failure to renew his Class 1 license, so he took up the study of Wilderness and Industrial First Aid, reaching three levels in each. His friend recruited him to paint and design doors for a local company. His job kept his busy from 9:00 AM to 6:00 PM five days a week. I had to leave earlier, owing to cab and bus times, as well as my class schedule. Mostly, my marriage was relegated to weekends.

During those years, my drinking had become minimal. I felt uncomfortable drinking around an alcoholic. Typically, we would order two rounds of drinks at Angie's. I then took over orders and got them to put a little alcohol as possible in his drinks while offering me a simple diet Coke or Sprite. It was a trick I used with Joe as well; neither of them knew better. They probably thought I could keep up with them and was a real trouper. The truth is, I rarely had more than two drinks around them. If I had more, it was a special occasion over dinner at him. Unfortunately, someone had to be somewhat aware in the late night bar surroundings and it certainly wasn't going to be either of those lushes. Joe was simply an escapist binge drinker during his time off from trucking and audio engineering; Abraham was the true pathological alcoholic.

Abraham's favourite drink was an Alabama Slammer. I hate that drink to this day. He enjoyed doubles in five or ten rounds with Estelle. She often took acid beforehand. Acid was a drug I avoided, much like this favoured cocktail. I tried it once, gagged, and never drank it again. My drinking with Estelle consisted of weekend gab sessions over one or two double Margaritas on the Kelly O'Bryan's patio. Unlike other people, she was a VIP regular who did not require reservations or waiting in line. Hanging out with Estelle was easy; we got into everything including bars, restaurants, night clubs, and fashion shows from the age of seventeen onward by just showing up and offering her name.

Estelle was like a VIP model-socialite back in the 90s in this town; she persuaded all the owners of restaurants like Johnathan Segal's and Joey's Only Seafood to give her free food, drinks, and immediate entry without reservations. We always had a nice table, dining with Estelle. It is too bad she failed to enjoy food.

After two years of modeling and anorexia, she turned to film extra work. Fortunately, she regained thirty pounds on her 5"8 frame of eighty-five pounds. Pot helped her eat, though her diet was limited to Clamato juice, Chinese food, brownie mix, French chocolate cake icing, hot dogs, ramen noodles, Kraft macaroni and cheese, McDonald's hamburger happy meals, and her famous potato and onion casserole. I don't think she had ever heard of unprocessed food; her annual garden famously rotted.

This did not stop her from ordering me plates upon plates of food. Apparently, I was 'heavy' at 140 pounds and 5"9. I was the eater of the group; this did not mean I enjoyed five plates of food at a time. At Kelly O'Bryan's she ordered me five of the following dishes each time: Patchos with Emerald Island Dressing and all the toppings, Twice-Baked Potatoes, Broccoli Bacon Soup, Chicken Lips, Caesar Salad, McCracken Rolls, Yorkshire Pudding, and Margarita Flatbread. The only thing I wanted to eat was the Margarita Flatbread, which replaced my usual order of Bruschetta. I usually skipped lunch or dinner on the days we went out. Prime Rib Yorkies were sirloin steak medallions placed on bread and baked with gravy. Chicken lips were breaded strips of chicken breast. The Emerald Isle dressing was honey mustard mayonnaise with a hint of lemon. McCracken Rolls were crab and shrimp stuffed wontons filled with cream cheese and deep-fried with lemon. Pachos were lattice-shaped fries served with green onions, melted cheddar cheese, and Emerald Isle sauce.

The food was usually doggy-bagged and taken home to Abraham. He enjoyed the meat and potatoes. Most of the spicier food and vegetables were tossed. To this day, I never understood their hatred of vegetables, which I loved. Then again, Abraham's two most famous recipes were his barbecued bran muffins and his much-hated Golden Paradise Potatoes. The recipe was the following:

1 large jar of Cheez Whiz

1 cup of ketchup

2 packages of French Onion Soup Mix

1 can of French-Fried onions

1 package of cooked cabbage

5 hot dogs (optional)

2 bottles of Golden Italian seasoning

6 sliced green onions

1/2 cup canola oil

3 pounds of Yukon Gold potatoes

1 sliced yellow onion

French seasoning salt and black pepper to taste.

The dish was heinous and a waste of Yukon Gold potatoes. The potatoes were never cooked through and the messy sea of sauce worked as a sea for the potatoes to swim in. The recipe was supposed to be golden and tender. It was sloshy, undercooked, and the color of cheddar string cheese.

I tolerated the mixture, which he claimed I loved along with Who's on Bass? for three years until I had to be honest. He was devastated. Abraham was never a good cook. Estelle's cooking was even worse.

(All names have been changed in this story).

I entered Grade eight at Kelowna Senior Secondary, a school I deny I ever went to. My high school graduation entry on Classmates.com reads, 'died tragically in Scuba diving accident in Mexico, circa 2019'. I didn't write it, but I left it. All of the toxic people had registered on the website, so I decided it was better if they thought I was dead. I went to school with 330 people. I knew about sixty of them.

There were over 2,000 people at a school built for 800. The premises had failed the fire code since 1979. I had entered the school in 1998. The place was covered in trash and graffiiti. The headbangers threw razors, bottles, and tampons at the walls behind the the smoking area and bathrooms near the far gym, usually used for basketball and high school events. And yes, some of the tampons were used. I nearly regurgitated by bologna sandwich. Even the smell of cigarette smoke turned me off.

Gone were my glory days as an upcoming athlete in the world of track & field, as well as my status as second lead in the school choir. I ended up dumping my creative energies into misplaced bright red and copper glazed vases in weird angular fashion in ceramics classes, as well as scribbling down poetry in journals. I got a handle on the poetry. I never got a handle on the ceramic spinner. Mostly, I just pulled up, baked, and painted red. The rest of my artistic projects consisted of cut-up photo collages of models and celebrities. No, I was not on my way to becoming a serial killer; nobody ever got a note made out of headlines and cut-up newspaper letters from me.

One of the students was the emotive Cluster B personality, Corey Ivanitz. He liked to have dramatic confrontations and meltdowns in elementary school. Sadly, I had to endure him from Grade 5 to 7. He was inherently intelligent and artistic. His abusive father caused his mother to divorce him. After that, there was no court-appointed visitation, for obvious reasons.

The courts worked better back then; there were no honey badgers, M.R.A.s, and M.G.T.O.W.S. trying to force visitation out of bitterness or people accusing rape and domestic violence victims of lying or engaging in mutual abuse. It has always been well-known in Social Work circles that men are generally the instigators of rape, domestic violence, stalking, and abuse. Cases of mutual abuse and female instigators are in the minority.

Ivanitz was obviously suffering from the effects of abuse and the absence of his father. His meltdowns involved turning read, screaming, making threats, scratching on chalkboards with his nails, throwing himself at rows of desks, howling, crying, holding his breath, choking himself, and rolling around in the dirt on the classroom floor. He tried this in art class once; the institution came to take him away. We never saw him again. What was tolerated and managed by his teachers in elementary school was considered unacceptable by our cop-turned-principal Don Ennis. Too bad he couldn't clean up the mess behind the school. I loved punk rock; I sometimes hated the culture around it.

I was becoming a teenager. Slowly, I came to understand the meaning of teenage angst, best expressed by songs written and performed by members of the Northern Pikes or Corey Hart. INXS was all about sex with groupies and a lost girlfriend. It was not particularly substantial past the age of twelve. This was in the late eighties, before grunge and alt-rock became huge. Sometimes, the Pixies, Siouxsie & the Banshees, Sonic Youth, the Psychos, Metallica, and Mudhoney made their way into my music collection. I recall being fascinated by the Jesus & Mary Chain, 10,000 Maniacs, The Sugarcubes, Bjork, and Cowboy Junkies.

All of this music would lead me straight to the dual histories of Led Zeppelin and Velvet Underground at the age of seventeen. I quickly became a connoisseur of alt-rock, but by no means an expert. (I have been put in my place by a few 'musical experts', though I suspect they disliked women who knew something about music and accused them and myself of competing egos. These 'musical experts' struck me as oversensitive and egocentric).

The punk purists disliked any kind of punk music besides the Sex Pistols and the Dead Kennedys. I enjoyed Killing Joke, Lou Reed, David Bowie, Madonna, Corey Hart, U2, Van Morrison, Kate Bush, Voivod, and many mainstream heavy metal groups. I never had that issue with pop music or heavy metal.

A substantial part of my collection were bands like Aerosmith, Bon Jovi, Cinderella, Helix, AC/DC, Black Sabbath, Def Leppard, and other pop-metal or whatever groups. I disliked Debbie Gibson, though she was a good songwriter. Whitney Houston and Sade were favorite singers of mine. I appreciated the vocals of Mariah Carey. When hip-hop began gaining ground amongst us middle-class and suburban white youths, my sister latched onto the likes of Public Enemy and others. I appreciated their music, too. Puritanical tendencies had no place in rock music. These people sounded like early David Bowie fans who couldn't handle change.

Many people reminisce over old friends regardless of their differences once they pass away or become ill; this reaction has never occurred with me. I remember my more casual and upbeat friends with a certain fondness. Sometimes, I struggle to remember Jody's epileptic episodes. Other times, I remember them clearly. We played basketball, wrestled, wrote together, looked through sex manuals, discussed boys, and made commentary on her large collection of Fleetwood Mac records. At the time, we seemed to have a lot in common. Eventually, she moved away in Grade 9 and went to Spring Valley Secondary, near Ziprick Road.

In Social Work and the social sciences, the concept of the cycle of abuse was introduced to explain incidences such Stockholm Syndrome, Lima Syndrome, co-dependency, childhood abuse, addiction, and Battered Women's Syndrome. It

explains how these forms of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder work. Of course, I am not a certified psychologist or therapist. As a former Social Service Worker, I am well-trained and well-educated in these matters. I also have the personal life experience to defend what I am talking about.

If you are one of the idiotic, inexperienced, and naive Polyannas on the hard Left who occupies a position as a student of Social Work or today's Social Sciences, the next few pages are not for you. I am never going to agree with you. As far as I am concerned, you are a destructive social force at work. You do not care about victim's rights and do not speak for me. I am not interested in a debate about this matter. Save your opinions for people who will listen.

These are the same people who call race a social construction and pretend it does not exist. They might as well pretend that racism does not exist. They claim there are no visible differences between people on the basis of race. To suggest otherwise is to be called a racist. By no means am I justifying my father's scientific racism and support for apartheid here. I am just pointing out that such views are not the views of minorities or people of color. It is not right to speak for them. I am certain about this point. To pretend that race does not exist makes it incredibly hard to make a case against racism or white colonialism.

Then again, liberalism has been stolen by people who glorify ISIS and radical Islam, who do not care about gay or transgender people, who do not speak for African Americans or Black South Africans, who have alienated the working class, and who do not comprehend feminism. These people do not speak to me. I have always been the moderate progressive/classical liberal. I have a little respect for the Hard Right as I do for these people. Again, save your letters and arguments for someone else.

To discuss matters with these people is to face censorship, arguments, denial, and going in circles. They have no concept of or respect for the simple notion of free speech. For me, free speech means free speech. That means no censorship of any kind.

There is no point in having an artistic or activist bent if you are going to limit the rights of others. Eventually, you will limit your own rights. Not my bag. This includes the use of nudity in advertising, questionable films, burning the flag, stepping in protest of the national anthem, political protest, or any other expression of free speech. I am more concerned about pollution, razors on the beach, and garbage than I am about the practice of free speech. If you don't like it, don't listen to it or read it. And it is up to parents to regulate what their kids have access to. It is not a court matter. Case closed.

The First Amendment provides that Congress make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting its free exercise. It protects freedom of speech, the press, assembly, and the right to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Leftwingers are like that boyfriend or girlfriend you just couldn't get rid of. The one who wants the truth and then gets mad if it is not what they want to hear. The one who complains his or her feelings were not taken into account when you stated the truth. The one who takes everything personally. The one who wants the truth on his or her terms, with or without reality.

The one who wants to shape things his or her way. The one who hates reality. The one who confuses reality with fantasy. The one who thinks he or she can control things. The one who thinks nothing bad happens to anyone until it happens to him or her.

The one who is offended by normal conversation. The one who confuses directness with deliberate hurt, abuse, or bad manners. The one who expects to be catered to. The one who wants everything his or her way. The one who always needs an audience. The one with cognitive dissonance combined with suppression and arrogance, but can't or won't acknowledge it. The one who only wants to see what he or she wants to see.

The one who will be different than the others. The one who lives in Polyanna world. The one who thinks it is wrong to express natural, realistic, or negative thoughts. The one who engages in toxic positivity. The one who thinks he or she is special. The one who thinks he or she is entitled. The one who thinks he or she is a savior. The one who attacks others who disagree.

The one who punishes people who do not agree. The one who expects to get whatever he or she wants. The one who thinks he or she can shape the world and relationships to his or her own agenda. The one who lies himself or herself to get what is wanted. The one who forces things to be his or her way. The one who keeps secrets.

The one who uses the past against others. The one who accepts something, then plans to make things his or her way. The one who won't take no for an answer. The one who punishes honest people. The one who spreads lies. The one who is passive-aggressive. The one who expects others to read his or her mind. The one who changes minds all the time. The one lies and lies, but denies it. The one who finds reality an inconvenience. The one who hurts, leaves, punishes, lies, defames, and then comes back for round two.

They have a lot in common with Cluster B personality. I don't expect people to automatically get this, but it has been brewing in my head slowly like tea in a samovar for thirty years. Thirty years of observation from college to rape to travel to relationships to a bunch of other 365 degree stuff, that is.

Does the cycle of abuse cause Cluster B personality? I am not an expert on Cluster B personality but I doubt abuse causes people to develop Cluster B traits. I believe most Cluster B personalities are abusive on some level. That does not mean they are all a bunch of rapists, sadists, domestic abusers, and predators. It means there is a spectrum of abusive behavior. Evidence shows that people who grow up in abusive families repeat patterns. That is what the cycle of abuse is getting at. It was never meant to justify abusive behavior on the part of abusers or to suggest that abuse victims automatically become abusers.

I believe most serious abusers were born with narcissistic, socopathic, sadistic, borderline, and psychopathological traits. They may or may not be abused. Early childhood trauma, substance abuse, and head injuries may correlate with the development of abusive tendencies. However, there is has always been a nature versus nurture debate that is ongoing. As one psychiatric student told me, "Correlation does not mean causation."

I am not convinced that the statistical claim is true, "One-third of abuse victims become abusers". First of all, no definiation of abuse is given here on either side. Abuse runs the spectrum of neglect, control, and verbal abuse down to murder, rape, choking, and domestic violence. I have been on the violent edge of that spectrum as I am a rape and choking victim. For many years, the other stuff looked mellow to me. I suspect Stockholm Syndome combined with being a survivor of violence has made me feel lucky to be alive and far too tolerate of verbal abuse in my own life. I am not a verbally or physically abusive person.

I take offense at someone claiming one-third of abuse victims become abusers. Most of the abusers I have met have never made any claim of victimhood. Many of them, however, have admitted to a great love of hardcore pornography, violent family traits, and dysfunctional childhoods.

It makes sense to claim, however, that one-third of abuse victims end up in abusive relationships. People tend to trace back their steps and repeat themselves in life. It is as if a script is being played out and relived in their lives and heads.

Cluster B personalities are charming and erratic by nature. They do not seem abusive at first. They are masters of manipulation, passive-aggression, gas-lighting, bait-and-switch, acting, pathological lying, guilt-tripping, and veiled hostility. Personality disorders are hard to treat. The most responsive is borderline. Fifteen to thirty-five percent of borderline personalities respond to therapy.

There is some evidence that D.B.T., or Dialectical Behavioral Therapy, is most effective with personality disorders. Leading experts suggest that one to three percent of severely narcissistic, psychopathic, and sociopathic personalities respond positively to treatment. There is always the risk of acting and disguising. These personality-disordered people are known to respond to attention, positive or negative.

The desire for attention is at the core of a dysfunctional Cluster B personality. These days, the I.C.M. may describe them differently. My rapist, the Doctor, was certainly like this. For various reasons including privacy, he will be called Greg*.

When I left him after two months, there was a certain look in his eyes. It was as if the Jeckyll was coming out from behind the Hyde. I thought he was a split personality. His eyes were a mixture of cobalt and light sky-blue. He had the most beautiful and deceptive eyes. They contrasted with his curly head of black hair. He always moussed his hair in a disgusting way. He also put oil in it. I never touched his hair, which he viewed as his crowning glory.

In the morning and before we went out, he spent several minutes fawning over his image, especially his hair. His back was a mess of popped pimples. I never touched them either. The idea that I ever touched or had sex with this man after what he did is probably astonishing to others. It feels normal, if disgusting, to me. It is what I know.

I never really understood Estelle's* problem. She took to drugs like a duck to water. Her first choice was opiate prescription medication. Her acts as a street addict were basically a rich girl's attempts to cozy up to a dealer with access to morphine and crack cocaine. Apparently, there were monthly morphine injection parties at one guy's house up at Mount Royal. Mount Royal is the area on upper Knox Mountain west of Magic Estates. It over looks Poplar Point and is accessible via Mountain Road off Glenmore. Estelle never lived up there; she was an Upper East Mission brat who hailed from Regina, Saskatchewan.

Stories circulated that C.D.* the one who planned these parties. As he was the dealer du jour in the early to mid-nineties in this lakeside town, that would not surprise me. I banned C.D. from coming near me after he produced acid on sheets of stamps and envelopes in Johnathan Segal's restaurant one Sunday morning in April of 1993, when we had gone for drinks.

He kept offering two tabs for $35. I had no interest. He then tried yelling to get patron's attention. That failed to work, so I told him to sit down and shut up. That also did not work, so I threatened to report him to the R.C.M.P.

*Name has been changed.

Rochelle Rochelle

How many pennies in the wishing well

Will your dealer pay a dime

Well, time will tell

You get your way

That we know well, Rochelle Rochelle

All the other good junkies died

You know the ones with talent

And the ones who committed suicide

But you just keep coming back

You do more and more

You suck to steal s'more

They say it's ten to one for you

Bags of what you score

But you refuse to die

When you're high

You just keep coming back

Don't you like it out there

No, you like people out there

For you, addiction is not detention

It's fuel for the fire

The neverending flame from hell

That burns through you

Taking others down

But never you

You just keep coming around

You fly up there

While others die

Then land back here

With your feet on the ground

You keep coming around

I just want the northern star

Aurora in the sky from afar

I just want the northern star

The feel of cold, no signs of war

The snow under my field

As lightning is to thunder

No crackle in the sky when it falls

Each snowflake unique

Crushing under my feet

Winter wonderland, let's go

Winter wonderland, let's go

Under the northern star

We can go as far as we want

Three seas east, west, and north

We can go as far as we want

Northern star, let's go

Northern star, let's go

Come on come come on let's go

All about how you're hot,

Delicious and slanderous

Wildly adventurous

You leave me numb

After you got what you sought

I was under your thumb

But baby no more no score

We are we are we are done

I am who I am

I don't care what doors you slam

In protest of the loss

I don't give a toss.

Don't you know in love

We are we are we are done

All that talk, fast game

But you lost the race

And you're the one to blame

Love is not a competition

I've got a new love now

So let's go

So let's go

We want to go around the world

So you need to go

So let's go let's go let's go

You leave me numb

You leave me numb

You leave me ice cold

From fingers to my toes

Don't you really want to love someone

To end up in the arms of a love

Who will do no harm

Isn't it time to disarm

No, I don't want to die young

I only want kind words

On the tip of my tongue

We don't need the mess

That has been shot and flung

I only want kind words

On the tip of my tongue

Tonight is the night

The song should be sung

Don't really want to hear a heartbeat

Don't you want to come undone

Don't you want to really love someone

It's a disappointment

To not know love's contentment

I don't want to die young

Don't you want to hear my heartbeat

Don't you want to come undone

Don't you want my love

On the tip of your tongue

Don't you know it's somewhere

Between the wind and the rain

Don't you know that in life

Each day is a sin

And the night is in vain?

Oh, anything

Oh, anything

Oh, anything at all

Like jumping six floors up

And onto a wall, so never

To run and hide

To live the lie

But search for the truth denied

It takes a little Esther and Ruth

Somewhere between modesty and pride

To know that you have always lied

These days are not matters of pride

These days are not matters of pride

Don't you know you ran from me

And you lied, you lied, you lied

Liar liar liar liar

What is your heart's desire

Oh, you burn in the fire

Liar liar liar liar

Assholes

If you're an asshole like me

It can turn ugly

He proposed to me suddenly

At the age of seventeen

Ruined my graduation

Not up for anticipation

He used to just stare at me

In the cafeteria

I felt like running away

I just stepped over him

In my high heels

And said nothing

If you're an asshole like me

You do what you want

It doesn't matter what they say

Or how much they taunt

The idea of taking you back

Makes me choke on a bone

Stop calling me on the phone

I just want to be alone

It's okay

It's not Hiroshima, you know

(I hear the bombs going now)

If you're an asshole like me

You want to keep on working

And for your boyfriend to

Stop jerking around or being a jerk

Now I got my feet on the ground

And it's the turnaround

He better listen to me this time

It's such a love crime

At least when you're down

There is only one way

To go and that's up

There is nothing left to lose

So you can only win

Turn the sands of time

Around again

Better than acting like you're dead

Melodrama of sixty or seventeen

It's a number, it's nothing

Selling your soul

Well, I thought about it

I would never sell mine

But yours, well, I thought

How much would I get for it

For the Devil it's a bargain

Bargain basement dirt cheap prices

That was all I could get for it

I decided to leave it

At least I don't take the

Stairs up from hell

To go to work

I suppose it's hot down there

It's kind of cold up here

Oh, I get the Faustian temptation

The winter of my lust and lost

Is not something for veneration

You get instant satisfaction

During my Joblick anticipation

At least I kept my soul, though

That's a dirty deal done cheap

With a real high price, dude

You bought her over the Internet

For $20,000

She likes to brag she

Sold herself for $40,000

Shows up in a hooker outfit

Of PVC in purple-red

With platform white heels, it's sad

How you regret

Bills and two kids and no fun

And expensive fashion habits

She took the money and ran

She went back to Japan

Well, it's not my problem

Anata wa abunai desu

Oh, the truth you deny

Shinjerarenai

I can't believe it

I don't believe you

You lie again and again

I would rather be alone

Got a guy on the phone

For a little dirty talk

And if he doesn't do it for me

Well, he can walk, so

How are the kids then?

Really not interested.

You want to be with me, honey

Well, I was never in it for the money

Why don't you try being funny

But the way you act today.

It's going to cost you some money

If I got to put with that

Let the bills start talking.

Don't be so blue

I'm not the one who did it to you

Don't be so blue

I don't want to be suffer for you

Why do you expect me to?

You want to be with me honey

Or you just want to be.