Final Analysis - Catherine Crier [99]
Nevertheless, this intimate look at his fragile emotional state was a key revelation, one that, if true, had dramatic implications—as a judge and a jury would eventually be examining his psychological state as well as Susan’s. For years, Felix had openly questioned his wife’s mental status, while shying away from his own problems. This report was yet another example of the psychological double standard that he employed. To Felix, his own mental issues were never significant enough to interfere with his ability to parent his sons; only Susan’s problems were severe enough for that. In truth his psychological conflicts ran as deep as hers, and yet he refused to take the steps necessary to heal his wounds.
During another interview with Susan, she described for me the sexual abuse she allegedly suffered as Felix’s teenage patient. “What I remember is that he became extremely interested in me.”
Susan claimed that Felix made it clear right from the start that he was “violating some sort of protocol” by seeing her as a patient. “I think he was referring to a sexual interest in me and I think I was just blocking out as much of that as I could.
“What happened was he started giving me a cup of tea when I came in. I’m sure there was a drug in it because what I recall next is counting backward and then no memory of what took place, but just looking at the clock, and the times, and saying ‘What happened? What did we talk about?’
“And this feeling, this sense of loss. This gap. It was a very, very disturbing experience, to not be able to recall what had happened.”
I asked Susan if she’d ever raised the issue with Felix.
“I brought it up, and he looked nervous,” she said.
Susan’s recollections of her early sessions with Dr. Polk seemed fuzzy at best; her words often became twisted when I asked her to clarify the abuse she allegedly suffered as a patient, and she failed to answer my question as to whether there was physical evidence to confirm her fears. After all, if she were a virgin when she first went to see Felix, then she would have most likely noticed some blood in her undergarments that first time.
“I recall the content of some of those hypnotic sessions, bits and pieces,” Susan answered in a soft voice. “And I recall being told not to look.
“I guess at that time I didn’t really think it was great that he basically had sex with me. And put me down…it just made me, you know, I was doing what I was told, but he was so overwhelming. So just, physical. It was just awful. And I really didn’t remember that for years.”
Susan claimed that she completely blocked out the sessions in which she was “raped” by Felix until she was in her forties. She described their sexual relationship as husband and wife as “unpleasant” and alluded to years of “rough” sex during their marriage. She said Felix enjoyed physically restraining her during intercourse, even as she lay crying.
“So what happened?” I asked.
“He essentially, what he told me was that if I ever left him he would kill himself, or he would kill me.”
“So even when you were seventeen he was telling you this?”
Susan could not really answer my question. In many ways, her responses were childlike, and she appeared at times to be no more than a teenage girl trapped in a woman’s body.
“Felix wanted someone to dominate,” Susan maintained. “He wanted a doll. There was no individuality left, there was none of me.”
From all the evidence that I had seen and what she told me in this conversation, I had little doubt that Susan was abused during the marriage, at least emotionally. Felix had misused his power and position as a therapist to wield control over his vulnerable patient. His selfish decision to begin a relationship with the teen had probably prevented Susan from getting the help she so desperately needed.
“My husband was a professional,” Susan explained.