Written from the streets of Limerick. Michael seemed slow on the uptake, he thought he was abandoning me back to the streets of Dublin, seeming to forget that I had moved my life to Limerick and had updated him regularly on the transition from Dublin to Limerick after he made empty promises about helping and supporting me. This letter was sent to Michael on October 22nd, 2024.
Boundaries. Unfortunately I cannot see Michael concentrating long enough to either read or understand these. Someone should read them to him and talk to him about responsibility. Money doesn't absolve authority, nor does power, indeed it enhances responsibility.
Michael.
●
All the people you draw in to mentor are
vulnerable in some way. Your disinterest in my feelings, boundaries and
distress make it hard to fathom why you get involved with vulnerable people,
but one thing you really should do is Listen. Listen to your client's concerns
and adjust accordingly. In my case, where I poured out my concerns to you and
said I didn't understand why you didn't listen, you responded with an email
about how you'd tired yourself out working in the garden. Do you think that's a
better response than listening? Did it solve anything? Most of the people who
you mentor are voiceless, cannot write as I do, are you hurting them? I'm
concerned for that young lad at 89 ********, which has a terrace that is easy
to jump off, if you play with his life as you played with mine.
●
Most vulnerable people,
especially in Ireland, have been abused or exploited in some way. If you take
over their lives, they need to know that you are 'safe'. If you treat concerns
raised with you with contempt or ignore concerning situations - by being avoidant
in your case, and for example the antisocial behaviour on the terrace at ********
- you will not be 'safe' to the vulnerable person who you have taken over and
the reaction you may get is anger - if you put a vulnerable person in a
situation, you are responsible, and the antisocial behaviour on the terrace at ********
was a new and terrifying situation which I shared with you as you were in
control. The situation became that you weren't 'safe' to me because you ignored
my concerns, but I did form attachment to you and you were offering me housing
even after you stopped pretending to be offering a future and 'developing my
talent', and it was very very hard to live like that. Listen to concerns and
resolve them, they do not go away if you don't, all that happens is that cracks
form in the relationship and most vulnerable people would continue to depend on
you and suffer as a result. Not many would speak up as I do, they'd just
suffer.
●
In a mentoring relationship as
in any other relationship, you should not see yourself as superior, and every
goal and aim and action, should be discussed on equal terms, you do not go
behind your client's back, you discuss things honestly, if you don't, something
is wrong and the relationship needs to be rethought or ended. You can cause
limitless harm by thinking that you can make decisions without the client's
knowledge or consent, and I remain profoundly shocked by your withdrawal of the
tenancy we'd arranged HAP for, and your crazy conversation with me afterwards
which explained nothing and left me on the streets. You can't make a person's
life into a game and end it to suit you.
●
Dishonesty in a mentoring
relationship, or encouraging the person in the weaker position to be dishonest
is a no. Trying to get me to lie to the authorities about the place at ********
Apartments was a huge abuse of position and trust and could have had serious
consequences for me.
●
Don't make false promises or
offers you cannot fulfil. You somehow thought that filthy ******** Apartments
place was suitable and that I would lie in order to get it, don't put your
clients at risk either, but after that, there was the apartment with the stairs
where you played that rather dodgy game of getting me to climb the outside
stairs while you watched - not the first man to do that, Michael! Then you
swapped between 34 and 12 ******** a number of times and changed the terms,
rent and conditions, and there was that ultimatum after you'd offered me the
place with the stairs, it's not okay to do this to someone. In the end you
settled with 34 and I acted in good faith with the HAP application and you then
at the last minute tried to change to 12 and say you were handing me over to an
unknown person or persons, no proper explanation and some weird texts, and the
end result was I was left homeless and very damaged. I won't put myself at risk
and you'd already proved untrustworthy. I hope your actions have never driven a
client to death but do not do this to anyone, it was deeply unfair and I don't
understand what you thought you were doing.
●
Be very careful not to try to
change who someone is, in order to meet your own needs. You tried to tell me
autism is just a label, sounds like you swallowed a cliche there, it is not, do
not undermine identity, and likewise, do not try to label someone as nuts after
distressing them, that is archaic and a classic abuser's trick - think
Magdalene Laundries. I am sure you didn't like me calling you an alcoholic,
does that clarify? Unfortunately when I said you appear to have a neurological
condition, I do think so, and possibly your appearance of being drunk at ***
was to do with that, although you did continue to drink with the meal. Every
time I was with you, you would blip out as if having an absence seizure and be
completely unaware of me, and you would persistently forget anything that was
said and any arrangement. Your sudden unexplained withdrawal of the tenancy and
weird texts too, and your bizarre recent email after your appalling response to
leaving me back on the streets were not normal. I would suggest you get checked
out, get an MRI, and never try to diagnose anyone else, you are not a medical
professional and making me out to be nuts and in need of a specialist service
for nutters, was not okay, don't do it to anyone, it has no place in a
mentoring relationship especially not one failed by your inappropriate
behaviour. Since you withdrew accommodation, it's not up to you, my local
authority are the only ones who can decide on that HAIL service for me, and
obviously it has never been an option as far as either side are concerned. That
service is waiting list and priority for people being treated for mental
illness who need supervision. And I will echo what I said to you in return for
you slurring me that way. I do not need supervision and am not being treated or
medicated for mental illness. I am seriously psychologically injured, which is
not the same thing.
●
If you realise you don't have
time for a client or don't feel able to face what the relationship brings up,
you are responsible for being honest and ending things - not by suddenly
withdrawing a tenancy and leaving someone street homeless and in shock, that is
sheer lunacy and dangerously irresponsible. That was not how to end a mentoring
relationship and because you have refused to explain, I am having trouble
healing from it. Your failure to engage at all, just simply leaving me like
that, it's not at all okay. I worry very much about that 19 year old who lost
his parents who you claim to be mentoring, I am afraid of what you might do to
him, and if you were to harm him, drive him to jumping off that terrace, you
wouldn't take any responsibility. In my case, I avoided the terrace at *** when
you caused the worst of the damage, not hard to do with those people shouting
and smoking dope on the communal terrace next door, it was like a Tallaght
housing estate out there and I felt vulnerable even going in or out of ***. I
am worried you will cause a death, I am still affected by your behaviour now, I
wouldn't be writing this if I was okay. I'm coping with life as well as a
homeless person offered accommodation and a future only to be thrown away, can
cope with life. At first I nearly didn't make it because of the shock, but I
have adjusted and am being supported, Limerick is good for support where Dublin
is not.
●
Money isn't part of a mentoring
relationship, and unfortunately what you gave me, about 200 over the time you
knew me, only covered the messing about with the storage unit and moving my
things as you let me down. A mentor is someone who coaches someone to gain
desirable qualities, money isn't part of the equation and shouldn't be used to
keep the person being mentored hanging on when the mentor's behaviour is
unreliable. Those of us you draw in are needy, and you like giving out the
money and feeling good, but it's not quite right, and in my case, it didn't
benefit me as I was messed around so much. If you didn't have accommodation
suitable, you shouldn't have offered it. That place at ******** Apartments was
not suitable and I'm still shocked you'd put me at risk and make me act
dishonestly, no mentor should do that to a vulnerable client. As for the rest
of the messing about, unless your Daily bell really has taken your conscience
completely, how could you do that and leave someone suffering? The fact that
the support network I had were bewildered by what was going on and that
affected my support, while you didn't care, speaks volumes. What were you
doing?
●
Data and privacy. You shouldn't
have taken, or have, any personal data of mine, neither the notes where you put
me in a situation where you made me talk about myself and took notes - don't do
that, you are not a professional, nor the doctor's form and letter which you
intercepted and used to jerk me around, you have no right to such personal
material nor to use it to harm me. Destroy it. My personal life is none of your
business and you have no right to abuse your position to breach data or be
involved in misinformation about me. I feel violated and disgusted. If someone
did the same to you, you would be shouting about your rights. You are not
allowed to take data, use it to access a person's life and be part of
misinformation about that person which harms them, this is why there are laws.
Anyone who has allowed you to access data or misinformation is also breaking
the law, for example the local council. Your boast about knowing people in high
places does not exempt you, even Simon Harris isn't exempt from the law, and if
he was to abuse his position to override the law, that would be seen as
corruption. I remain concerned that you will feel you have the right to
continue to interfere in my life, especially after your crazy email of October
10th, 3 weeks after I asked you to formally conclude our relationship, which is
what all your mentees would do if they could articulate and were not dependent
on you.
●
A mentor does not hand clients
over to others routinely. You kept on trying to hand me to strangers without my
consent and having made arrangements behind my back, when my agreement was with
you, not them. I trusted you, and you tried to give me to that dirty man at ********
Apartments, and onwards tried to hand me over to strangers - remember going
behind my back to arrange 7 people in Limerick including that unsuitable young
lad, because you didn't have time for me? Your efforts to hand vulnerable
people over to all and sundry smacks of human traffiking, and I noted that you
actually looked straight at me and snapped out of your daze when I told you
about how I volunteered for a charity raising awareness of human traffiking.
What the hell, Michael? If you and I had agreed a tenancy and done the HAP
forms, why did you withdraw the tenancy, try to hand me over to strangers and
not explain? What did you expect me to do? As a vulnerable person did you still
expect me to go along with it without question?! You knew from the ********
Apartments debacle that I wouldn't. It was dodgy as hell. I may be in a
terrible state from what you did, but I trusted my instincts and kept myself
safe. Anyway Michael, if you are traffiking, an ugly woman isn't worth much, it
may be hard to find pretty women on the streets, but no one wants an ugly one,
unless they are desperate like the dirty man at ******** Apartments, or does it
not matter as long as they have a vagina?
●
Supervision and accountability.
If you are serious about mentoring, make sure someone starts overseeing what
you are doing. No one actually knows how many people you are involved with or
what you are doing with them, the notes or emails you copy to your wife aren't
enough, your wife doesn't fully know what's going on, obviously, even if it's
her money. Your actions have had such an impact on me that I am afraid you will
hurt someone else or cause a death, you may already have done so. Is there
something else, more structured and regulated, that you can do, instead of
mentoring, that can fulfil your curiosity and satisfy your needs without
causing harm?
Please don't take on any more people, you
'don't have time' for them as you 'didn't have time for me', and people are not
toys, if you make a commitment to someone, you are an adult, you take the whole
person and scenario and not just the bits you like. Your actions have undone
any good that you are praising yourself for, for example in your email of
October 10th where you praise yourself for having me to stay at ***. I am on
the streets and destitute and with the life I'd started to build in Limerick
before the move left chaotic and part functioning at present. I am glad I came
to Limerick but it is very hard to live like this and live with the after
effects of what you did and your terrible response to what you did. You don't
need to have an interest in vulnerable people, you have everything a person
could want except happiness, and that doesn't come from the Daily Bell or
messing with lives, it comes from integrity for a start. The empty hole in your
life is a sheepdog not a crocodile, but you don't need to fill it with
controlling other people's lives.
Goodbye Michael.
Anna
Comments
Post a Comment