The Break-Up Retreat(3)
“Last chance to turn back,” Armin says, and I know he’s only halfway joking. If that.
“Seriously, it’s going to be fine,” I laugh, my voice pitched high, my heart thrumming in my chest.
I’m anxious, sure. But I’m also excited.
After so many long hours, alone in my room, trying to get people to come forward, setting up my trail of breadcrumbs, taking out a loan I might not be able to pay back . . . I’m finally here.
It’s been six months and four days since I stumbled upon the forum post that set me on this path.
If all goes right, I’ll be able to take the Himlafall Clinic, and Doctor Martina Hastings, down.
Kick-start the career that has, so far, utterly failed to materialize.
And maybe, just maybe, once and for all, prove to both myself and the world that I am nothing like the man who raised me.
If I pull this off, the sign will have been right. My new life will, indeed, have started today.
r/SelfImprovement
i think my sister is in a cult and i don’t know what to do
posted by: u/maxwallin(user deleted)
02:13 12/07/2023
susie, i know you go on this page a lot. if you see this, please just let me know you are okay.
does anyone have any experience with cult deprogramming?
background: my sister has always been v. susceptible to outside influences. shes passionate but not much of a critical thinker. she got really churchy in our teenage years, then after high school she abandoned her softball scholarship to start selling cheap makeup for one of those multilevel marketing things. every time she falls in love its “the one.” you probably know the type.
ive never worried too much before bcs i thought she would grow out of it. she met someone a few months ago and they got engaged. i thought maybe she was finally growing up. stupid, maybe, but i had my own life and problems. not making excuses, just saying how it felt.
but then the relationship fell apart. im not sure what happened, but next thing we know she has taken all her savings and all the money she has put aside for the wedding to go to some kind of “break-up rehab”? i thought it seemed insane but our mom thought it might be good for her. i looked it up and it sounded legit.
but then she just cut all of us off. at first she wouldnt take any of our calls, and then it just said that her phone number had been disconnected. i tried going to her apartment but she wouldnt answer the door. or she wasnt there. i texted and called all of her friends, and they said they hadnt heard from her. i got in touch with her gym and the club where she plays tennis and they said she hasnt been around in months. i even tried to get in touch with her ex and just got a short text msg saying “havent seen her, dont contact me again.”
im so worried. she went away in september. no one in my family has heard from her in months. i called the so-called treatment facility and they said that she had already left. they wouldnt tell me if anything had happened. i made a report to the police but and they said they would look into it but i dont think they even took me seriously. i dont know if they even made a report.
the place is called himlafall clinic. its really fancy. if you look it up online you see all these people talking about what a great experience they had and how it changed their lives. i feel like im going crazy. my mom thinks my sister is just going through something but this isnt like her. it seems like this place is some kind of cult and im worried they brainwashed her or did something to her.
does anyone know if there is something i could say to the police to get them to take me seriously? i dont have a lot of money but if there is someone you can hire to help then i can give them what i have.
im just so scared and worried for her. shes my baby sister. i just want to make sure she is okay.
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Chapter 2
The first thing I found when I started looking up the Himlafall Clinic, six months ago, was that there were no pictures of the premises anywhere on the internet.
There were plenty of interviews with the founder, Martina Hastings—the so-called revolutionary new actor whose romance-centric vision of psychological treatment is changing the world—but they were all performed in the safety of hotel restaurants; cozy little coffee shops; or, on one occasion, which resulted in a clearly very starstruck reporter, an exclusive private club.
The topic of the lack of images came up in a couple of the interviews I found, and Martina always gave a variation on the same answer.
“I want our clients to come to us without any preconceptions, with a completely clean slate. It’s important for the success of our treatment model. We also put a high value on our clients’ privacy. Even a faraway picture might give away a client’s identity, from a reflection or a silhouette, and the very possibility of that goes against our basic philosophy. All our employees sign NDAs when they start working with us, and our guests do, as well.”
The reporter had tried to ask a couple of inferred questions about some of the rumored celebrity clients—a famous musician, a well-known Danish director—but Martina had deflected, with a laughter the reporter had described as “strangely seductive,” while also getting in a quick description of her impressively toned shoulders.