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Printed from https://www.writing.com/main/view_item/item_id/2183044-The-Stalkers-Notebook
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Rated: E · Other · Psychology · #2183044
Summary / Synopsis
LAURA NICKELBAUM is arrested and accused of the misdemeanor stalking of her former therapists, Gertrude Bender & Emily Altheim.

Laura must come to terms with her feelings of inadequacy, her past and battle mental illness as she navigates the New York legal system.
Megan Reilly, the prosecutor, claims Laura will never get better and she wants to be there when 'Laura fails and contacts the doctors again' so she can charge Laura with a felony and send her to prison for a long time.

Laura suffers from "a high functioning form" of Borderline Personality disorder and OCD.

Laura meets therapist, Olivia Dunn, who had first seems like a ray of sunshine but under the extreme pressures of being prosecuted and thrown into a therapy program that isn't working old patterns emerge. Laura is once more rejected as her inability to stay within the bounds of therapy spoils that connection.

With the fallout from the prosecution and having been given the highly stigmatized label of "stalker" Laura loses her job, sells her million dollar midtown studio and moves to the 'Jersey hood' to rebuild her life.

Laura runs an Airbnb. Through the new relationships, she makes including Virginia Washington, a guest and "international woman of intrigue"; Harrison, her Leo Dicaprio look-a-like neighbor, and Sophia her "virtual therapist" that she purely sees on a therapy app on her iPhone Laura learns to opens her heart and love again.

Laura takes notes in the form of a notebook. From the notebook she writes a novel telling the story of how her therapists betrayed her and how the criminal justice system discriminates against people who suffer from mental illness. Her book is wildly successful. From the ashes of her despair, Laura is able to "build a life worth living."

It is a story of “stalking” told from the “stalker’s” perspective. It is a look inside the room behind the closed doors of psychotherapy. It is an indictment of the US mental health system and broken justice system for its failure to treat the vulnerable which too often leads to criminal prosecution.
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Printed from https://www.writing.com/main/view_item/item_id/2183044-The-Stalkers-Notebook