[Disclaimer: I have used aliases to protect the confidentiality and identity of clients or patients. No other names have been changed.]

I found out from Jessica that John Freifeld was moving to Wilmington. She said that he was going to move in with her and her family. She had a husband named Mike, that I met a few times, and a son.

I asked Jessica, "why is he moving in with you and your family?"

She said, "he told me he will help me deal with the flashbacks I am having... when I remember the bad things that happened. It's happening all the time. I have panic attacks and John helps me online. He will be able to help more if he is here with me.

"He is not a therapist, though?" I asked, seeking to confirm that she understood this.

"I know but he can help me get grounded or centered," she said.

Those were words we had not used in therapy; I didn't think. So, I asked, "Is that what he said he could do?"

"Yes," she answered.

This story was troubling me. A concern that I had may not be easy to understand for a layperson. Some professionals had stated in the literature that sometimes dissociative symptoms including those found in Dissociative Identity Disorder, can be iatrogenic, which means caused by the interventions of a therapist. I thought that it wasn't possible for someone to create such a complex disorder or condition just because they didn't do things correctly.

I would begin to get a sense of just how possible this was when I describe the sessions I had with Tracy.

Years later, I would speak to John's sister who shared my extreme concern about what John was doing. Yet, someone else might think that all he is doing is offering advice. It's hard for me to reconstruct memories of every single little thing that troubled me as I write this years later.

It seems like a little more information is needed before every reader feels the same hair on fire call for help reaction that I was feeling.

John indeed did move in with Jessica, her husband Mike, and their son.

In essence, John had diagnosed Jessica with her condition. He had said to me that he just suspected that she might have DID but she later told me that he told her that's what her diagnosis was.

Just as I cannot diagnose medical conditions nor can I advise people about their psychiatric conditions, a layperson shouldn't diagnose a person as having a psychiatric disorder, especially one as complex and confusing as DID.

While it is true that Sadie and Patricia already knew or believed they had different personalities – they believed they had DID – what worried me about Jessica is that she had discovered this only recently in her work with John.

Jessica said he was going to bring two other women to live with them so he could help them.

I should clarify something. Jessica had never spoken of John as one of her friends that she knew, and he was helping her specifically. He was someone who had been helping people online.

I knew from my own experience that a person should only have one therapist. That's why, for example, when I was working with people with schizophrenia during this time period as described above, I made sure they didn't already have a therapist. I told her and later others that they shouldn't have more than one therapist.

They would answer that he is "just a support person."

I tried to explain that even if one is just doing active listening or demonstrating empathy, it's best for only one person to be doing this because of the nature of their condition and how confusing it is to them. They all stated directly or indirectly that they were confused and looking for answers... What had caused their problems? Why did they have these problems now?

In my conversations with John, he never struck me as curious about how other people are coping or what would make them happy. He talked about himself. I wish I could remember exactly what made me think he was narcissistic, lacking in empathy and compassion but it's been so long and sometimes things like this are subtle. I'm not diagnosing him just describing his impact on others.

When he came with Jessica, he took charge even if her husband Mike was there. He was directing her to tell me certain things. I wanted to hear from her when she was ready and to learn about how she felt or experienced events, her flashbacks, or her panic attacks.

Sometimes we get certain feelings that are the type of feelings that lead people to believe in psychic phenomena. Let me give an example.

I had been offering a support/therapy group for people with dissociative disorders and I had some attendees who were seeing other therapists in the community. I had been networking through my various roles and affiliations.

In one session, we talked about inviting a significant other to join them for the group.

In one session, John showed up as Jessica's support person. Others brought someone to the group who was more of a significant other - a wife, girlfriend, or husband.

Amy was one attendee who was seeing another therapist. I had heard that she believed she was psychic and could sense things about a person like they gave off an aura, I guess.

I could tell that Amy was not comfortable with John being there. I couldn't quite put my finger on what it was that stood out for her that John did. He was talking like he knew a great deal more than he did and in general trying to "teach" people what he knew. He spoke like this was about him as he shared a story. Eventually, the story got around to making a point of advice or guidance.

While I had said this was a support group and I was not going to be a leader as I would in a "therapy" group, it was clear to me that Sadie was a bit troubled by how John was directing things or instructing them. This was before she had completed her therapy with me.

Anyway, Sadie turned to me and said, "what do you think about that, Bruce?"

I had said that some of these things should be discussed in individual therapy sessions and that we should do some creative activities like scrapbooking.

After the session ended, Amy approached me after John and some others walked down the hall and said, "He's evil! I'm not coming again if he is."

I just wanted to assure her to come back so I said I would tell Jessica that the group should be for family or significant others.

I would later read about studies involving psychopaths that might explain what Amy sensed. Psychologists have noticed that people can describe certain sensations when they are observing a psychopath doing something rather neutral, like just walking by.

For more information, please start with a book like "The Wisdom of Psychopaths: What Saints, Spies, and Serial Killers Can Teach Us About Success" by Kevin Dutton. In his book, he also presents research demonstrating how psychopaths can spot good victims better than the average person. They pick up on vulnerabilities. I suppose.

I had not been in the same room with John more than about three times. So, I cannot tell you more about what I was sensing other than that I had sensed that John lacked empathy and compassion. It was a realization that grew over time, so I cannot tell you one jaw-dropping example of this other than what I am about to describe.

At some gut level, I had a feeling that made me uncomfortable when I was in the same room with him. It wasn't anything so clear as what some people have described in the research to which I am referring. I just had a feeling or impression.

When John moved down from Virginia, he came down with two women who had come to believe they had DID. One of them had just picked up and moved for reasons I never understood, her name was Alice. The other was Tracy. I mentioned them above.

Alice hardly ever came for therapy and so I never got to know her very well at all. She wasn't forthcoming.

Tracy had moved because she was leaving a domestic violence relationship. Both Tracy and Alice had moved in, along with John with the family of Jessica and Mike.

Tracy and I talked, and she seemed very confused about her diagnosis that she had gotten from John. She didn't state that he diagnosed her but that was the gist of what she was describing.

Tracy seemed embarrassed that she might have been pretending to have different personalities. She said, defensively, "John was demanding to talk to one of my child personalities and I felt like I had to do what he was directing."

She added, "I wasn't sure that I was faking the other personality, it just happened."

We went through the different dissociative experiences from the Dissociative Experiences Scale and where Sadie or Jessica was indicating that most of the experiences happen 60% of the time or higher, Tracy had indicated 20% to 40% on most questions.

When I asked her an open-ended question like "what is that like?" she just said, "I don't know." So, I suggested we could talk more next time.

On our next and last session, she said that she was not feeling safe in the house where she was. She had turned John down when he asked her out for a romantic outing or date. She didn't want to go out with him. She was afraid now.

Indeed, I could tell that she had reasons to be afraid. Her hands were shaking as she spoke. She was shaking like a leaf. Her voice sounded scared to me. I was used to hearing people scared so there are little things that you notice.

"John must have done something because Jessica thinks I am flirting with Mike and she is mad," she said. She continued, "She has a temper and I'm afraid she is going to hit me, throw something at me, or something else. I left this kind of situation with my husband to find safety."

I helped her relax with some guided imagery and deep breathing. We talked about her leaving and whether she could afford an apartment.

This session lasted more than the normal hour. It was over an hour and a half. After helping her to relax, we were planning her escape. That's what would go through my mind later.

I thought that there might be some misunderstanding and I asked if I could talk to John and someone at the house on her behalf. She agreed.

Maybe there was something I had sensed myself about John that seriously concerned me at this point, and which told me things would not work out well for Tracy, but I had to try. She was going back there for now.

As I was driving home from the office, I grabbed a payphone before going too far. Something told me that I should try to resolve things before she gets back. She felt scared and she had enough issues to deal with without this additional stress or this fear.

I was also frustrated that her mind was so jumbled and confused. I couldn't figure out what her diagnosis really was. She had started out as someone who believed she had DID and different personalities but now neither of us knew what to think about that.

At the same time, it never seemed to me that she was being deceptive with me. She seemed genuinely confused and a bit disoriented. I would have needed more time to better describe that feeling that she was "disoriented."

We had uncovered some more dissociative symptoms but there was so much confusion that she had about what was meant by a particular question about an experience and/or how often it happens.

I got John on the phone when I dialed the number and he picked up. He talked about how difficult things were because she wouldn't do what was expected of her. I asked, "well, what about her problems, she is scared and confused?"

I added, "this is why I called, I wanted to help because of how scared she was. She said she is scared more than she was in her home up in New Jersey and she said that every day she feels more and more uncomfortable. I saw myself how scared she was today."

"I was just hoping that we could help her feel comfortable now when she comes to her new home," I added.

Then I heard him say, "well, she disrespected me!"

I squeezed the phone with my right hand, taking a deep breath to keep from saying anything rash. My face felt flush. I felt my jaw muscles were clenched. My left hand had formed a solid fist. My whole body went stiff, each muscle ready for fight or flight.

I was livid! This was the fight or flight response in me.

I can safely say that in over five decades of my life no other person or incident has caused such a reaction in me.

What more can I add to put this into perspective. It had been a year and a half since I first spoke to John. I can assure you, dear reader, that I do not jump to conclusions about people.

I have honestly portrayed myself as feminine and a pacifist who deplores violence. Yet, at that moment, I felt a different set of feelings that were utterly foreign to me.

In retrospect, looking back at the over five decades of my life, this and the unthinkable idea of someone hurting Lynn or Celta would be possible to transform me from a butterfly into something different. And if truth be known, hurting or threatening Lynn or Celta would be more likely to cause me to act differently. Even if I was attacked, I would be less likely to respond with aggression.

What I am saying is that I would try to protect someone I loved in my personal life. I was concerned for Tracy and angry at that moment that he was hurting her and/or making her life hell. However, I wasn't as emotionally invested in the lives of my clients as I was with people I loved. I was angry, though.

Previously, I had stumbled upon some things that were said about him online when I first heard those things from Jessica, about him misrepresenting himself as a therapist. I had read something about some people who claimed to have traveled to his "treatment facility" in Virginia and how they alleged to being drugged and sexually assaulted and when they wanted to leave after one day, they were not given their return plane tickets.

While I didn't have proof that what I read was true, he had written a response online that showed him attacking these individuals and their character. I had not believed those things because it seemed that no one could or would be able to get away with everything that was alleged if it was true. I mean you can't just invite people to your home telling them it is a treatment facility. Right?

There was something about the callousness of his reactions and responses to my concerns that made me believe he was capable of anything and indeed, he did not care about anyone. I suppose it is my job to make those assessments.

The problem was that most of what I was learning was from clients and was therefore confidential. I couldn't reveal anything that was said during a session even if I knew who might want to look into these matters.

Later, I would learn that some people had gone to the police and that the Virginia Bureau of Investigation had opened up an investigation into his activities.

I later found out from Tracy that she had caught a train back to where she had been living and she moved into a shelter for women who are victims of domestic violence.

That was the last time I had direct contact with John.