Self-Therapy

Out of all the places I rented in Moscow, Russia, one in particular stands out. To begin with, I moved in there under stressful circumstances and moved out under even more shocking ones. Also, it was a tiny room, where my landlady placed her old refrigerator that wasn’t working. When asked why, her reasoning was beautiful. “When the existing one breaks down, I try and get the old one repaired.” I should have known from the start, but the rent was beyond low and I had to move urgently, so...

At the time I was in between my bachelors and masters programs, so I had to move out of the dormitory for the summer. At the time I was teaching English to a young man who had just got divorced, so I wasn’t particularly surprised when in lieu of payment he offered a spare room for the summer.

This arrangement worked wonderfully for about two weeks and then he started hinting at his newly gained fluency in English and no further need in lessons. Instead he suggested we start being intimate. He even suggested we date for real, and then the payment is not an issue...

Freaked out, I started browsing newspaper rental ads. He noticed and backed off. One day I came home and saw an almost empty bottle of vodka in the kitchen with three shot glasses nearby. I felt relieved, hoping a good threesome would hold him back. However, just a couple days later he offered the companionship again, and when I refused, he handcuffed me to his bedroom door. I threatened to break a window, so he let me go, but I literally called the first number in the paper for a cheap room and moved the next day.

My new landlady handed me a key and headed to her room. Neither her nor her teenage son ever said hi. Only the grandma who stopped by once a week to check on them brought some clarity. She explained they were both heavily depressed and I better stay out of their way.

That didn’t encourage me much, so I was basically coming back only to sleep for about two years. My time was shared between work, studies, and fun. It all ended abruptly though on the day I wrote the last chapter of my thesis. I stayed at work late, but walked to the apartment from the subway quite fearlessly. After all, it was a seemingly safe neighborhood.

It was around 1 am, and right next to my gate a man asked me what time it was. Before I had time to respond, he punched me in the solar plexus and kicked me in the shin, grabbed my bag with all my belongings, including the floppy disk with my thesis, punched me some more and escaped.

I luckily kept my cell phone, but my chest and legs were covered in black bruises. I couldn’t stand close to people for a while and had to limp to college for my exams. I also moved out almost immediately.

Some years after I moved to the US, I started seeing this one recurring dream about once a month. It was always quite creepy and I’d wake up in cold sweat. In the dream, every time I would remember that I still owe rent for one month, so every single time I walked into that apartment and found it empty. Also every time it was a late night, so I had to stay over in my room. I also tried to open the living room door to hand the money to the lady, but then I’d realize her and her son died or were killed.

After several years of that recurrence, I realized that maybe my moving in and out experiences with that place were a bit more traumatic than I believed. I thought of seeing a therapist, but then I really wasn’t sure what else I would tell them besides the obvious story.

So about seven years ago I decided to take the matters in my own hands. While visiting Moscow in winter, I asked a friend to drive me to that apartment. I walked around the building, gave my friend the full breakdown of my “being robbed” story, and then, quite symbolically, I left some coins by the gate, as if paying all remaining debts to that place.

These scary dreams stopped right after. Maybe it was the visit to the place, maybe talking things over with a friend, or maybe I just finally let go of the painful memories...