Dear Forum Members,
Ellie died August 26th, 2001, of pancreatic cancer. I last talked to her on the phone on that very day, only a few hours before she died.
She left very few family members and almost no friends. She kept being unfairly attacked because of her beliefs up to her very last days – and even post portem.
Yet she meant no harm.
Her current Web site and discussion forum will be kept as an archive and I will only answer questions privately. The reason is I am no scientist myself and cannot take Ellie’s place in elaborating her theory further. The second discussion forum, named depression-conquered, was meant only for post-flood people (I would recommend at least one year delay after post-flood is reached, to enable people to have more perspective). Time has brought some evidence that post-flood people do not feel at ease to talk at length with other people they don’t know, and with whom they only share the experience of having used RST.
A few weeks before her death, Ellie told me she was considering closing the forum down because, having answered all types of questions a number of time, she thought she was wasting her energy in an unproductive media. People who were going to use her theory simply did it after reading her article, very often without even trying to get in contact with her, and the ones who were asking questions and discussing her theory endlessly thereby avoided finishing up their recovery process.
If anyone of you feels interested to open and maintain an interactive forum either for people starting with RST or for people who have been post-flood for some time, please feel free to do so. But be prepared to dedicate a lot of your time to it, because the task is both demanding and time-consuming.
As a matter of fact, information will be maintained available but contact with the author is for ever interrupted. No one can pretend he or she would answer questions as pertinently as she did.
This is why I feel it is important to state the following :
- all information you need to succeed in your recovery is in the pamphlet and in the archives of this forum.
- for related literature reference, please read Alice Miller, Arthur Janov, Jean Jenson, Melody Beattie, Aletha Solter, etc…
- for medical or psychological advice, please refer in person to a certified therapist or doctor.
- for group support, please look around for AA or ACA-type of support group.
If after thorough reading, you feel that Ellie’s theory contradicts what you already know about your own health, please discard it without regret.
Please remember that you cannot rescue anyone but yourself, but recovering your own emotional balance is the biggest step you can make to save the world. However, although your current sufferings will be relieved to an extraordinary extent, emotional recovery is still a painful experience, and life afterwards remains painful, even if it is in a very different way.
On August 26th, 2001, at 2am, she told me "Farewell"
With deepest regards to all,
Thérèse, Ellie’s adopted little sister.
P.S. Since Ellie died, I have already spent close to 800 hours working my way through the Web, overcoming IT obstacles and recovering from PC breakdowns related to her Web site and forum.