Ethics Complaint Update: Anastasia Was Not O.K.! And, Then She Was Awesome!

Liberation, transformation – from the Dark to the Light!

Look for more back story links to be added.

Thursday, October 18, 2016

An old and dear friend called this morning, asking, “Anastasia are you ok?”

I was sleeping when he called. So I got the message on voice mail when I awoke. Had I picked up the phone when he called, the answer would have been an easy ....

NO!!!! I AM NOT!! ABSOLUTELY NOT!!!

In that moment before I turned on my phone for the day, I had been in morning contemplation, reflecting on how damaged I've been by events of the past ten months, based on my  “almost” every interaction with the Ethics Committee (EC) of the International Transactional Analysis Association (ITAA).

OMG! Chaos!! A living nightmare!  Corruption!

The story begins like this –

Back in December, I had “accidentally” discovered a drawer full of documents of clinical training and supervision notes, letters and other memorabilia, collected from my term with a Transactional Analysis (TA) mentor. 

Upon my finding of these, especially in this time, just after the Harvey Weinstein/Hollywood scandals and beyond, and the momentum of the #MeToo movement, I knew exactly the implications of what I had in hand and what I needed to do!

The documents told of a harrowing ordeal of sexual harassment of me by one of my clinical trainers and how he had retaliated against me for my rebuffs of him, bringing me much career and financial loss.

Although I left the TA training and credentialing association, the ITAA, as a result of this episode, my heart never had. Accordingly, I had, not infrequently kept abreast of the organization, its principles as they evolved and the members of the TA community that had been so beloved to me.

Thus upon finding these documents, it was within easy reach for me to call up the ITAA Ethical and Professional Practices pages on the ITAA web site, in search of guidance, as to what one, such as myself, would do in an instance like this, where ethical standards and professional practices had been violated.

Finding appropriate procedures for making a formal ethics complaint, I immediately set out to follow them.

What a tortuous, traumatizing experience began for me, that day! 

With my Ethics Complaint effort now set in motion, I had unknowingly, quite innocently, set myself on a frightening course that was to dramatically alter my life!

Seeking only justice in the form of healing and reconciliation through an organization whose principles, as I understood them, I had built the past forty-five years of my life upon, I was now on a Stalinesque-feeling path!  

Of course, the TA community is notorious for pathology-blaming. So this seemingly outlandish claim on my part would immediately be written off as Anastasia's personal pathology, now on display for the world to view!

Oh well!

OMG!! Do I regret it? Absolutely not! 

Have I wished for and sought out a different ending to the chapter now completing?

Most certainly! Yet the rewards, though difficult to assess today, have been priceless, to date and are already increasing as I write this.

As the I Ching, one of my most trusted sources for daily guidance states in one of its readings –

“You may  always trace back to the beginning and there will never be an end to what you are about to set in motion."

And, so it has turned out --  my formal Ethics Complaint, filed with the ITAA EC, became the hugest chaos I have ever consciously chosen!  OMG!!!

Yet, in chaos there is order which I am already finding, even in the last twenty-four hours.

All options are not open to every person. And, the ones that become our own, are perhaps what is in our best interest though not yet readily comprehended.

Friday, October 19, 2018

In the past twenty-four hours the drama that has turned my life upside down for close to ten months culminated!

Simultaneously I quit and the ITAA fired me!

Among my closing comments, as the drama was reaching its crowning peak, were the following, written to an ITAA past president I had known well, back in my training and supervision days. 

I had been communicating to her, where I stood, based on the ordeal I had been experiencing.

Dear Linsey (name changed for privacy)

I reached out in good faith, almost ten months ago, to the only TA representative I could locate, J C. The only time in my more than forty-five year association with Transactional Analysis that I have ever done such a thing.

My need, at the time, was great!

I had just discovered a long-forgotten drawer full of TA training and supervision notes, letters and various other pieces of memorabilia that told of a harrowing ordeal of sexual harassment of me by my training and supervision sponsor of the time. 

(Perpetrators name to be publicly revealed on December 22, the one year anniversary of my finding the lost documents.).

These documents also showed me, beyond question, that in my rebuffing of ,,,'w intrusions, he retaliated against me by throwing my training contract into limbo and defaulting on his collaborating with me on a book contract I had just signed with the Random House Publishing Company.

This contract signing included an advance of close to $100,000 in today's currency for my work in progress, Surviving Addictions: Transforming The Rebellious/Survivor Inner Child, a book based, entirely on ...'s advancements of certain theories of Eric Berne and my research and advancement of these works which .. was working with me to develop.

At the time of my initial contact with TA affiliate, J C, I was in great emotional pain over this discovery. 

In reaching out, as I did, I asked only that I be able to tell a TA person or so what had happened to me. And for that person or persons to hear my story and guide and support me in finding remedy for the damages I had suffered. A very simple need to fulfill, one would think! 

It is now going on ten months since my original reaching out. And to date, other than, briefly, being able to announce my plight, I have yet to have had even one single, conversation, accommodating my great need, expressed repeatedly, as having a corresponding great anguish.  Yet I have been promised for this to be provided and more.

I reached out in a time of need to representatives of a credentialing organization and affiliated community that I trusted to care for me. And, that would additionally, care and be concerned that the beautiful legacy that ... left behind of his life's work, combined with my own, would be honored and preserved in spite of the stain he had imposed on it

Please be assured that I have no desire or intent to take legal action as recourse for the harm I have endured, attempting to get that which should have been easily provided: an opportunity to tell my story to a compassionate listener and be received with kindness, respect and support.

I will, however, continue to reserve my right to tell my story wherever and however I deem it to be appropriate and to take legal action, unless and until my very simple needs are accommodated.

As I stated above, simultaneously I quit and the ITAA fired me!

Now, I am totally and completely free to share the details of the ordeal I’ve been through, trying to deal with violations of me through sexual harassment by a trusted mentor and retaliation against me through his sabotages of my career and thus my finances.

Yesterday was the culmination of nearly ten months of a nightmare saga for me!

Now my story can be told., without my holding back, protecting the ITAA and covering my ass so as not to attract their wrath, which I did, in the end, anyway.

Look for more to come as I, now, move full force into being the guide I generally am known to be, putting not only my rich professional background to use, on behalf of others, but now with the addition of the personal #MeToo ordeal I am just coming through.

From here forth count on me to help you, whoever, you are, through the machinations and chaos of the #MeToo era!

My background and expertise are especially, but not exclusively for women, who are managing their way through gender tyranny.

I am free! And so can you be too!

Check out what I have to offer, as a private coach and consultant and in my partnership with the New Horizons Small “Zones of Peace” Project through its latest initiative, Beyond Gender Tyranny.

I am an equal opportunity consultant. Here for the men as well as the women.

Just ask Steve, my radio show co-host. Also, read about Steve and I as #MeToo Poster People at New Horizons.

Liberation, transformation!

in a manner I would wish for every woman, man and child who has ever been sexually harassed/abused by someone in a power-over position in your life.

Awesome!

For your guidance and support needs, personally, in relationships, businesses or organizations, I can be reached at mountainwomanrj@aol.com