Dancing with Demons

by Tim Watson-Munro

  By December 1998, however, my depression was through the floor and the intensity of my despair had become too much for Carla to handle. Despite my bad experience with my first psychiatrist, which set back my recovery by years, I made an appointment with Professor Isaac Schweitzer. Carla had told me that he was considered a leader in his field and a highly regarded expert in the area of mood disorders.

  At our first meeting I warmed to him and respected his professionalism. Eventually I came to trust him. He changed my medication and a number of the disabling side effects from the earlier anti-depressants disappeared. Despite these improvements, I was unable to confide in him about my cocaine use. This was a function of my profound sense of shame and embarrassment, coupled to unresolved fears of rejection and abandonment as a consequence of the ‘Tyrol’ experience. I had, in fact, told my first psychiatrist about my drug use in our first meeting and I’d been surprised when he didn’t pick up on the issue in later meetings. He was probably using himself. Clearly this avoidance was manifestly stupid, but not uncommon in people who suffer from addiction disorders. Had I the balls to put it all on the table at the time of my initial diagnostic interview with Professor Schweitzer, it is probable that my heavy use of cocaine would not have escalated to that of a majestic addiction several months later.

  By June 1999, I was severely affected. I was regularly snorting a gram of the best each day, typically after the close of business when my levels of physical and mental exhaustion had all but consumed my flailing spirit. I feared the imminent death of Susan, and I would escape from my nightmare by retreating each night into a state of drug-induced oblivion. I was not only psychologically moribund but also gravely ill. My weight had fallen by some twelve kilos and I was experiencing regular episodes of severe chest pain and tachycardia. On some nights I would sit in my chair at home for hours, terrified that if I moved my heart would explode into a thousand bits. I was also becoming increasingly paranoid. Sometimes I was so overwhelmed by my anxiety that my complexion became more grey than a Mersey sunrise and I found it impossible to venture from the house to the front gate to collect the mail. I lost touch with reality.

  Susan died in the early hours of Sunday 22 August 1999. Three weeks later Andrew Fraser was raided and arrested. Another three weeks later, my dear friend and business partner Dr David Sime unexpectedly passed away. Clearly my life would never be the same.

  SURRENDER

  The news of Andrew Fraser’s arrest was brutal. After my initial discussions with Philip Dunn, Con Heliotis QC arrived at the party. He had evidently spent time with Andrew at the police headquarters and his news was grim. He advised that I was now collateral damage to the primary investigation into Andrew and that there was considerable evidence of my drug use arising from police intercepts.

  It may seem surprising, but making the decision to change my life was easy: I decided to surrender myself to the police and tell the truth about the humiliating disgrace my existence had become. I had no hesitation taking a course of action that forced me to address my recovery. Andrew’s arrest was the catalyst for me to totally accept the depth of my illness and to embark upon my path to recovery.

  The hard part was telling Carla that I had been lying to her about the extent of my drug use. During the course of the afternoon at Philip’s party, I confessed the extent of my problem to her. The thin veneer of my consistent, and at times desperate, denial of my problem had now been irrevocably shattered. She was furious but, true to form, nonetheless supportive. We left the gathering shortly afterwards.

  ‘What do you plan to do?’ Carla asked, her obvious anxiety adding to my discomfort.

  ‘Have a line?’ I nervously joked.

  But this was not a time to ease tension through levity.

  ‘Are you carrying any of that fucking shit?’ she snarled.

  ‘No, it ran out last night,’ I responded, noting the new aggression in her voice. The halcyon days of my wife countenancing my bullshit were gone forever.

  ‘Philip thinks I should sign on for a six-week residential rehab program – there’s one tailored for bourgeoisie cokeheads at Warburton. The boys reckon I should sit tight and not burn my powder.’

  ‘We don’t have the money to fund any more of your frolics, Tim. And let’s get one thing straight – any fucking powder discovered on your person by me in the future will be sprinkled over your coffin to be cremated with you at your funeral. Got it?’

  It was apparent that in her tense and suspicious state, Carla had misconstrued my reference to powder. I had rarely seen her quite so angry.

  ‘Relax, will you? I don’t want to steer that course. I’ve already told them that I need to make a clean fist of it all. Avoidance of the past will not help my recovery.’ My anxiety was transforming into impatience. ‘And besides the money issue, I can’t disappear for all that time, not now, not with the children the way they are.’

  I was already rehearsing what I would say to the children once news of my plight hit the public airwaves. I knew that I had to be around to support them, especially Jessica and Tom, in the wake of their grief at Sue’s death.

  ‘I have to organise an urgent appointment with Schweitzer. He has to know the full extent of this. I feel so torn for not having levelled with him. I just felt too humiliated.’

  ‘He’ll understand. You’re not the first coke user in the world to have denied the existence of an addiction, let alone its depth,’ Carla said. I sensed her pity for me, which had temporarily ameliorated her rage.

  My first appointment the following day was an appearance before a County Court judge in relation to a long-term client. By this stage, word of my drug use was rapidly spreading through the legal precinct. The court appearance involved a straightforward plea, which mercifully did not relate to drug offences. I was nonetheless twitchy. I arrived early in order to avoid the press who were gathering like jackals on various street corners hoping to obtain some footage of me. The sagging grey bags adorning my eyes spoke of the sleepless night I had just endured.

  My evidence was run of the mill, with none of the potentially devastating cross-examination relating to my cocaine use which I had feared during the course of my sleep-deprived angst the night before. My false sense of relief was quickly shattered as I left the courthouse to be confronted with a barrage of television cameras. While this type of media attention had become bread and butter to me over the years, I knew that their interest in me that day was more sinister in its motivation. The grapevine between some elements within the Victorian Police and the media has always been a hot one. The way that I was followed down the street by a flotilla of cameras alerted me to the reality that the cat was already out of the bag.

  Upon returning to my St Kilda Road office, I was greatly heartened by the numerous messages impaled upon the spike on my desk. Numerous lawyers had rung to offer support and their professional services. Brian Rolfe, however, was a trusted mate and a highly respected practitioner who I instinctively knew was the right man for the job. I scheduled an urgent conference with him for that afternoon.

  At the time, Brian Rolfe, or ‘Rolfey’ to his inner circle, was considered to be one of Melbourne’s top criminal attorneys. He was, for a time, in partnership with Andrew Fraser and Bob Galbally. They sacked Andrew – an on the spot, no nonsense ‘pack your bags fuck off’ – when the extent of his coke addiction became clear. From that point onwards and for years to come, Brian and those in the firm simply referred to Andrew as ‘Cunt’. I knew Brian from the endless, crazy grind of the Grollo trial, during which we had developed a close friendship. I loved his wit and his seamless capacity to cut through the bullshit. Brian’s integrity was beyond reproach. Importantly for me, the police also respected him. I knew he could negotiate my position with them better than most. He was clearly the man for the job when it came to my newly uncovered, precarious circumstances.

  After a brief conference, Brian phoned Detective Wayne Strawhorn at the offices of the drug squad, and an appointmen
t was made for me to surrender myself to him two days later.

  Brian accompanied me to the appointment. When we drove past the front door of the police complex, we saw a gaggle of journalists and cameras eagerly waiting to document my arrival in time for the 5 p.m. news, so we entered via the rear garage, then took the lift up to the drug squad offices on the sixth floor.

  The ‘Blue Team’ treated me well. It seemed that they were aware of the extent of my depressive illness, offering at one stage to adjourn the meeting until later in the week if it became too much to bear. They were also aware of Carla’s miscarriage in 1997 and the fact that she was now thirty-seven weeks pregnant! Apparently a number of prominent Melburnians alive to the gossip surrounding my plight had contacted the police to speak on my behalf and to advise them of the living hell I had endured during the preceding months. I was amazed.

  As it eventuated, the police questioning lasted for less than an hour. They revealed that ‘Snowy’ had been in their custody and closely questioned for nearly twelve hours, prior to being granted bail at the Melbourne Magistrates’ Court. They also intimated he had sung like a canary.

  His very public ‘pinging’ represented the culmination of an intense police operation codenamed ‘Operation Regent’. The surveillance had been running for five weeks.

  Many months later, I was able to listen to the police intercept tapes of conversations between Andrew and me. We were clearly flying several propellers short of a plane. At the end, we were contacting one another several times a day simply to talk shit and compete with each other to see who could articulate the most nonsensical drivel.

  ‘Yeah, they must have been jumping off balconies before they took that crap to market.’ (A disparaging reference to the diluted nature of our recent coke acquisition.)

  ‘You playing footy later today?’ (Shall we meet after work and use cocaine?)

  I have since heard that the police fell apart with laughter listening to hours of this relentless drivel as they manned their telephone intercept posts.

  On the whole, the drug squad crew were sympathetic. Perhaps it was because they, too, were dancing with their demons. Several months after I was charged, three of them were arrested in a drug trafficking sting. No doubt jealous of the huge profits attached to the underworld drug industry, they decided to join the club. Strawhorn, Malcolm Rosenes and another were eventually sent to jail, while another lost his job.

  Everyone associated with my case that day expressed a strong desire that I dry out and commence rehabilitation to address my addiction.

  ‘You were not the focus of this enquiry,’ they said, signalling that I was a casualty of the real target of the operation, Andrew Fraser.

  The singular and collective loathing of Andrew among the Victorian Police Force had been ongoing since the murder of two innocent police constables in an ambush in Walsh Street, South Yarra, on 12 October 1988. Andrew had been caught on tape advising one of the key suspects following his arrest and placement on remand at the old Custody Centre in the Russell Street Police Cells in Melbourne. The tape, full of profanity and bother-boy rhetoric, was put to air on the Hinch program. Many have argued that it was Andrew’s involvement in this case that ultimately was his undoing as it was felt that he was responsible for the alleged offenders being acquitted.

  I managed to avoid the media when I left – they had all shifted to the rear garage door so I simply walked out the front – and I headed to Professor Schweitzer’s rooms. Along the way, I rehearsed the best way to broach the prickly issue of my little problem with cocaine. My anxiety concerning this peccadillo was somewhat alleviated by the fact that I had not been charged by the police and that they had told me that when this did inevitably occur, I would be summonsed to court rather than arrested.

  Despite my fears, Professor Schweitzer took the news well.

  ‘Well, I had no idea, you certainly hid it well,’ he said.

  ‘I present well,’ I joked. ‘Look, Isaac, I’m really sorry for not having told you earlier, I just felt too ashamed and humiliated to level with you. I wish that I had, maybe then I wouldn’t be in all this legal shit, not to mention having a powerful addiction to beat.’

  ‘It could be worse. Cocaine is easier to kick than heroin. Have they charged you yet?’ Schweitzer asked.

  ‘No, but inevitably they will. I’ve made full admissions as to my use. They want me to get some help.’

  ‘Well, I think we’re all agreed on that point, Tim. Now tell me a bit more about how and when it started.’

  I gave the professor a detailed history of my cocaine use and its escalation over the preceding six months.

  ‘Do you feel I need treatment as an inpatient?’ I nervously enquired. The thought of being out of circulation for a time was impossible to contemplate. I needed desperately to be with my family. Besides, Jessica and Tom would never cope with the sight of me trussed up in a hospital ward, so soon after their mother’s illness and death.

  ‘No, but I believe that perhaps more intense psychotherapy may be of use.’

  ‘What, analysis?’ I said.

  ‘Perhaps, yes. I can recommend a very well-regarded analyst who lives out your way. Why don’t you attend for an assessment appointment and see how you relate to him? If you proceed further, it would probably involve seeing him more than once a week.’

  I had been seeing the professor once every two to three weeks, essentially to monitor my progress and to vary the dosage of my medication, if necessary. What he was proposing was that, in addition to this process, I should embark upon an intensive journey of self-discovery involving twice-weekly psychoanalysis.

  I had spent most of my professional life as a sceptic when it came to the Freudian model of the mind and its treatment mode, psychoanalysis. My training at the University of Sydney had occurred during the 1970s. Cognitive behaviourism was in vogue and if you wanted to do well with your marks you toed the party line. Cognitive behaviourism claimed that it was sufficient to treat the symptoms of distress and not bother about its cause. For example, when treating me a behaviourist would focus on the times, places, people and rewards that ingesting cocaine provided. Analysis, in contrast, would explore relevant issues in my development that may have led to my addiction. As some of these may have been too traumatic at the time, they may have been dispatched to the unconscious mind. Psychoanalysis would eventually allow their conscious expression and, once exposed, the need to self-medicate with cocaine would cease.

  By then I had abandoned the arrogance of my youth about Freud’s methods. After seeing more than 20,000 clients, I realised that much of our behaviour reflects the power and expression of the unconscious mind, to which we are all held captive. And besides, as my predicament clearly reflected, I was in no position to argue with the professor.

  ‘I’ll give it a go – what’s the bloke’s name?’ I asked.

  Two days later I found myself at the doorstep of a modest Victorian house in the Melbourne suburb of Hawthorn. The door opened and I was greeted in a formal, somewhat distant manner by my soon-to-be sage.

  ‘Dr Peter Smith,’ he announced with an outstretched hand. ‘Please come in.’

  ‘Tim Watson-Munro,’ I nervously replied. I was already feeling uncomfortable. After twenty-one years of being the one in control, I felt awkward; the notion of surrendering my life story to a stranger did not sit well with me. My training had equipped me with the knowledge that people who enter into the psychoanalytic contract frequently experience a profound change in their personality structure.

  Often there are casualties along the way as old fears, well-established defences and dependencies are relinquished. In essence, I felt as though I was about to surrender my psyche to the good doctor, who through some arcane process of alchemy would then re-engineer my soul. Spooky stuff.

  Dr Smith’s room was at once calming yet mystifying. Paisley wallpaper, a lamp, two chairs and, neatly positioned by the curtained window, a couch. I felt intimidated. As there appeared to
be a choice between the couch and the chair, I opted for the latter. Lying down with my eyes closed was just too confronting.

  Dr Smith explained to me that he had already been supplied with a letter of referral from Professor Schweitzer, and that the purpose of the meeting as he understood it was for us to explore the possibility of psychoanalysis as a treatment choice. I relaxed somewhat – it was clear that there would not be too much heaviness on this first occasion. Nonetheless I felt that it was important for me to narrate my sorry saga as best I could during the clinical hour. Mercifully, Dr Smith was well-prepped.

  ‘Well, you’ve certainly been through the mill,’ he calmly exclaimed at the end of the session. ‘It would also seem that you are now at a time in your life where analysis may help you.’

  My spirits momentarily lifted. Could it be that the emotional pain that had plagued me for so many years may finally dissipate?

  ‘It will, of course, require fairly intensive work. What are your thoughts on how many sessions per week we should have?’ he asked.

  ‘That’s really up to you,’ I replied. ‘I’ll do whatever it takes. I simply cannot live with this pain anymore.’ I was starting to open up, and hoped that the session would soon draw to a close. I was frightened that the raw nerve, which his apparent concern for me had touched, would lead to an embarrassing flood of tears. I was not about to relinquish control of my emotions on this occasion, despite my intuitive belief that Dr Smith was a man whom I could trust.

  ‘Well, let’s start with seeing each other once a week. I only have one space available until towards the end of the year. Dependent on how we’re travelling, we may increase our contact to twice a week.’