Can a totally sick environment create mental illness?

The harassment at work had decreased, but there were still incidences of manipulation and the annoying, harrassing phone calls still continued. I could judge the level of harassment just by the number of annoying phone calls I would get per day. I was actually being conditioned to anticipate increased levels of harassment by the frequency of annoying phone calls. Whenever I started getting an increase in the annoying call at home, I knew I was in for increased harassment at work.

The harassment was being increased in regular cycles and once I became aware of this, I marked items down on a calendar and found that the harassment reached a maximum about every six weeks and then it would decrease. This apparently was to give me the "highs" and "lows" that are so common in manic depression or bipolar mental illness. Once I was aware of this pattern, attempts to cause me "highs" by manipulating my environment only caused me to become more depressed. One of the common techniques used to give me hope and a "high" was to tell me, usually by suggestion, that I was being considered for a management position. Remember, I originally took the job at Gamma Supplies because it was suppose to be a management position. By the spring of 1979, no suggestion about a management position, no matter how direct would not get me up for a period of time. It finally reached the point that the only thing that would give me "high" was the hope that the harassment would stop. Given the fact that at this point in time I had been receiving four or more harassing phone calls every day for over two years, I couldn't see an end to the terrorism.

In April 1979, during an approaching "high" period, my captors made a major mistake. I had calculated on my calendar that I was due for a "high" period, and I was wondering what "they" would do to pick up my spirits. As usual, the level of harassment decreased, and the people I worked with commenced talking with me. That seems like a minor thing, but when your environment is totally controlled to manipulate ones feelings, a person becomes very aware if people communicate with him. But lessening the level of harassment alone was not enough to give me a "high", and my tormentors were obviously aware of this. I was alone working in the laboratory one day when Dick Sawyer came in and we exchanged greetings. Then Dick blurted out, "What's wrong, Russ? You look down. Don't worry; you can forget all that Gamma Supplies stuff now. It's all over."

I was too depressed to react to what he had said, and I just said "Yeah" and went on with my work. I took his comment as an attempt to lift me up. Later, the significance of what he had said finally hit me. I had never told anyone at RAM about the Gamma Supplies stuff, and what what was suppose to be "over" now? The SUGGESTION was that the harassment was over. But Dick's comment was a major mistake. One of the constant arguments that had been used against me to prove I was mentally ill was that there could not possibly be any connection between RAM and Gamma Supplies. Bill was now admitting that he was aware of my Gamma Supplies problems. I had never discussed my Gamma Supplies problems with anyone at RAM and, in fact, I had not even told most of my coworkers where I had worked prior to coming to RAM. If anyone had asked, I would answer that I had worked for a small company in Chicago. I actually felt sorry that Dick had made such a statement because I knew the plan was, and always would be, that I was mentally ill. No other explanation was acceptable.

I will demonstrate in a later BLOG how manipulation of my environment and behavioral conditioning was used to control my reaction to medication. Really! That is, control of my environment could effect my emotional state as if I were reacting to medication I was suppose to be taking. Again, the total control of my environment was used to make me appear to be mentally ill. Unfortunately, my sick, deranged captors actually believed they could convince me that I was mentally ill by controlling my environment and mentally torturing me.