Memoirs of A Healer/Clinical Social Worker: Autobiography of Bruce Whealton

Chapter 59: No Stable Home - Defending My Professional Performance

Hopefully, you are wondering, dear reader, what exactly was happening to my career. I left out some details with the focus on Lynn's health. I said that individuals who were also getting treated by John Freifeld were suing me and they had filed grievances with the North Carolina Social Work Certification and Licensure Board (NCSWCLB).

The NCSWCLB would have the final say as to whether I could continue to work in my field. So, this was not just about my private practice. This was not like losing a job. This was career-changing, or it could end my career. I was a mess at this point and I needed time off to heal but I had my entire future on the line.

The role that John Freifeld played in this situation is important. Some of what I was being accused of doing either I had heard that he was in fact doing those things or I could see how if there was someone to blame for the deterioration of the mental health of my clients, the fault should go more toward the individual who did not have any training or expertise. I am NOT saying that this means I didn't care about my clients.

As you will recall, John Freifeld had admitted that he was not a trained psychotherapist and he had no degree, had no specialized training, and no credentials. He had admitted to my client Jessica that he had misrepresented himself previously as a therapist.

If asked, he would say that he is "just a support person." My colleagues had readily recognized the problems that I was describing and had advised me to tell my clients that I cannot be their therapist if they are receiving services from John.

However, I have sought to explain how and why his actions were not helping others and were in fact making people worse. I would later in 2020 begin to talk to his sister Ruth.

She said recently when I asked if John would have stopped hurting me if he knew it was hurting another innocent person (a fact I will get to later) and she said "John had no sympathy, compassion, or empathy for other people... if he sought out to hurt someone and he found out indirectly he was hurting someone else they love that was more power to him he lacked empathy."

As a psychotherapist who wanted to work in private practice, I had to obtain malpractice insurance or liability insurance. It is standard practice for this to cover up to $1 Million per claim and $3 Million total. I'm not sure where I heard this, but I heard that Freifeld knew about this insurance coverage and that he expected to benefit in some way from this. It is hard to imagine that a specific detail like that would just happen to be made up by someone.

One could imagine the proceeds of a civil suit being used to set up a treatment center in Wilmington, and Freifeld would imagine a role for himself in that treatment center. I have no proof of this. I can point out that when my client went over to where John was staying, she said, "the place is like a damn treatment center."

I felt like I was on the run during this time.

I regret that I had to end things with my clients so abruptly, but my life was falling apart so fast. I didn't feel competent for the first time in my career. At least temporarily, I was not well.

I closed the office and turned in my key. Some of the office furniture was thrown away or left for someone to pick up. The owners of the building had a say in how that was handled.

As I took one last look at the office I thought, "It was amazing how Lynn had made the office look so nice and comfortable/inviting. I felt so good about how I had fixed up the office without spending too much money. I had gone from renting an office that was used by Chris Hauge, DSW, LCSW to getting my own office fast, within a couple of months. That was an amazing accomplishment and not something my colleagues had expected.

It's hard to believe that that was just a couple of years ago. It seemed like another lifetime.

I tried to store the client files somewhere stable but nothing about my life was stable at this point. My entire life had collapsed in just under two months! So, other than furniture, I packed everything into a car and tried to figure out where I was going to store everything. I brought some of it to our house, but then all of that was being packed up in that first week of September. Plus, the last thing I wanted to do was to overwhelm Lynn with the details of what I was confronting at this time.