Accusations Against Me (Part 5)

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Danu Morrigan/Tracy Culleton, operator of the website Daughters of Narcissistic Mothers, after banning dozens—if not hundreds—of vulnerable women from her site’s forum without explanation, got wind of the fact that not all of these callously rejected women crawled off into dark little holes to lick their wounds. some of them decided to fight back by publishing their experiences with her on the web, a fact that apparently sent her scrambling to do damage control. Ultimately, she published a rebuttal to the accusations she found on the web, a rebuttal that was laced with subtle and not-so-subtle untruths, and which left no space for disagreement, correction, or comment.

Herewith, the truth about Tracy’s rebuttal to the truths published on the web about her:

(My remarks are in violet, Tracy's quotes from SoaringDove’s blog are in blue)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The last time I checked, Danu Morrigan, (wasn't that a red flag that she wouldn't even disclose her real name?) has at least 13 websites, all coming from a different angle, but with the same motivation. Making money. On her business marketing site she refers to potential customers as *food*, to be trapped, hunted, or farmed

I do have a number of websites, yes, although I'm not sure it's as many as 13. It could be I guess. And yes, all the others are business websites with the aim of making money. It's called capitalism.

What nobody says here is that Danu and Morrigan are both goddesses, Danu being the Celtic mother-goddess. Grandiose, anyone? And, interestingly, Tracy doesn’t address the issue of her failure to use her own name. She does address the insignificant issue of how many websites she has (I could only find ten, but it doesn’t mean there aren’t more out there), but sidesteps the very salient issue of her hiding her real name. She claims on the site that it is to keep her family ignorant of her site and activities (plausible to DoNMs because we don’t want our narcissistic mothers to know what we are doing lest they find a way to spoil it for us) but it was relatively easy to find out and now, at this point in time, it is dead simple: a quick Google search will turn it up. Considering what the name means and considering that since her real name has been public knowledge for at least two years now, one must wonder why she continues to cling to the pseudonym, even to the point of publishing a book using it. Can she, after all the disclosure to date, still privately think of herself as a Celtic mother goddess?

To be honest, I wouldn’t be surprised. My research has turned up evidence that she is a self-proclaimed expert on vegetarianism, breast feeding, home schooling, and eco-building, among other things. Very Mother Earthy stuff. As I said earlier…grandiose, anyone?

As for the metaphor of customers as food to be trapped, hunted or farmed - this is a metaphor originating with marketing expert Dan Kennedy, and shows the difference between a sustained ‘farming’ model of agriculture where you keep in touch with existing customers and look after them on the one hand, and a ‘hunting’ model of marketing where you are desperately looking for new customers all the time.


It was a metaphor. I’d never have used it if I’d known it was going to be twisted like this. And I can only say that I do not view the members of my DONM forum as food or prey or anything like that.

Of course it is a metaphor, you silly twit! Do you think we are so stupid as to think you actually farm and hunt customers? It has not been twisted at all. The fact of the matter is that this choice of metaphor is demeaning, degrading and dehumanizing and you don’t seem to even see that!

Interesting that Tracy doesn’t offer the link so you can see for yourself, isn’t it? Well, here it is: http://www.massive-action-marketing.com/Relationship-Marketing-Newsletter-Marketing.html. Some excerpts: “... ‘farming marketing’, better known as Relationship Marketing…With this type of marketing you plant your seeds, tend your crop by weeding, watering and fertilising, and produce a predictable and consistent harvest.

Relationship marketing, at its simplest, works by:

- Taking names, addresses and e-mail addresses of customers

- Keeping in touch with them - e.g. newsletters (and lots of other ideas too)

- Offering them special offers and discounts

I can help you organise and arrange this relationship marketing. It would be like hiring your own personal farmer to do all the sowing seeds etc - you just enjoy the harvest.”

Think about this for a minute—isn’t this strategy just exactly what she applied to the DoNM website forum? “Planting the seeds” of EFT as a cure-all, “weeding” by eliminating people who she does not think are susceptible to her blandishments, “watering and fertilising” by dropping in once day and selecting a few posts to give personal attention to… She not only farmed us using this technique, she milked our histories and our experiences and our pain for gain, not just on the website, but in her upcoming book as well.

And what difference does it make if she didn’t invent the concept? She used it, never expecting that anyone at the DoNM website would ever find out, ever catch on. She used a different name on the DoNM site and if people Googled her, they would never connect her with her real name, her other activities, or this. In fact, I doubt it ever occurred to her that people might be offended to be referred to as food to be farmed…I doubt she has the empathy.

Again, you'll make up your own minds about that, as you should.


As for not using my real name, I explain on my website about that - I would prefer that my family not find out about this. I wasn't keeping my identity that much of a secret or Kate and others wouldn't know it.

Oh, that’s just hogwash. Two years ago I had to track it down using multiple websites and deductive reasoning, starting with Whois. Today her real name is easy to find because she’s been outed by people like me, but two years or further back, it took a bit of digging. I suspect her reason for not using her real name was to keep the women joining the DoNM site from finding out who she really was so they would not be able to connect her to her other lucrative sites and scams. She had to create a sympathetic persona, someone they could relate to, someone soft and non-threatening they could rely on. And isn’t this exactly how a narcissist operates? Which brings us to Kate’s next point…

I am not a mental health expert, but I would peg Danu and Light as textbook Ns

You'll need to make up your own minds about this too.

Danu's EFT credentials aren't that great either. The last I checked she had the equivalent of several weekend seminars of instruction.

I have done a lot more than that; I have been undergoing continuous training and learning for the past seven years. But it’s true that I did not attend a year-long or two-year long course. Those things don't exist. Just as the first people in any evolving model aren't officially trained or certified by some central body, neither are EFT people.

Again: there is nothing available on the web, even from websites that publish articles that have appeared in peer-reviewed journals, that indicate any independent studies have been done on EFT and confirmed its efficacy. Additionally, at around the time Tracy wrote this apologia, I had done some research on her and among the things I investigated were her educational credentials: she was only a Level II “practitioner,” (basically still a beginner) even though to read her self-promotion you would think she was a master.

I thought about posting this anonymously, but I can't make that work, so let the chips fall where they may. I would be glad to talk with you via email. Let me know if that is something you would be interested in. There is a growing community of women who have all had similar experiences and I'm sure they would be more than welcoming to you if you'd like to process this [the shock of being unexpectedly banned –V] with others who have been there.

It’s true that I have made a lot of enemies doing this. Whether that’s because I’m N and have hurt a lot of innocent people as Kate and Soaring Dove claim, or whether it’s because I’m an ordinary DONM who has banned a lot of trouble-makers, trolls, and Ns in my turn, I leave it to you to decide.

Please notice that it is Tracy who creates the negative paradigm by referring to the women she banned as “enemies” while Kate talks about welcoming women and processing the experience of being banned with sympathetic fellow-sufferers. Tracy creates herself the poor misunderstood, misperceived victim who was just doing things to help…and those of us whom she banned without warning or explanation are “enemies.” Neat little piece of twisting history and reality into a reasonably subtle gaslighting episode, eh?

And now we find even more reasons she finds acceptable for banning people: “troublemakers, trolls and Ns”… This from a woman who claims no education or training in psychology and who is not an expert on narcissism—suddenly she is competent to judge whether someone she has never met is a narcissist or not. And, given her proclivity for redefining words to fit her needs, what she calls a “troublemaker” or a “troll” may, in truth, simply be someone who is persistent in wanting some information she doesn’t want to give out, someone who is trained and is trying to correct some incorrect bit of data published on the site, or even someone who has grown weary of walking on eggshells and speaks her truth, damning the consequences. Remember, earlier Tracy claimed that only by contravening her Terms of Use could you get banned…here the truth finally comes out: all she has to do is label you a troll, troublemaker or narcissist and you are out. You get no appeal, no explanations are allowed, and no warnings or explanations are given. Pretty cruel and one-sided, if you ask me, an archetypal exhibition of all the empathy and compassion you would expect of an N.

Did you notice that Tracy did not even acknowledge Kate’s mention of a “growing community of women” who have experienced the same? Tracy is aware of the group for which I serve as an administrator and rather than acknowledge and bring attention to the fact that there is such a group, she just ignores it. How do I know that she knows? Because, according to private sources (anything you can read on the internet she can read as well and this is one area where I must protect my sources), she now discourages women on the site from using social media or joining outside groups. Do you know that this isolation technique is a red flag for abusive behaviour? An absolutely fundamental tactic of the abuser is to isolate the victim(s) to eliminate outside support and make the victim(s) emotionally dependent on the abuser. This way the abuser becomes essential to the victim’s emotional life and later, when the real abuse starts, the victim has no place to go. Tracy, combines the “farming” techniques noted earlier with classic abuser tactics—isolation, tightly proscribed behavioural ground rules, gaslighting, threats of (and actual) banishment all to control the members of her forum.

I do not wish to escalate this or get involved in the drama or such. I am just answering the accusations. I do not expect anybody to comment in my favour on Soaring Dove's blog - that would just escalate the whole thing.

Mercy me, heaven forbid people go to SoaringDove’s blog and, with their hits, boost its rating on Google. And let’s not even consider the possibility of the comments on that blog post, comments that support it and reveal even more victims. Nope, can’t have that…don’t go, don’t write, just let it die right there so she can get back to the business of binding you to her so she can pick your pockets and feed just a little bit more…

I have spoken my truth now and people can make up their own minds. I have no attachment to what they decide.

And if you believe that, I have some nice real estate on the moon for you, with a terrific view of the Big Blue Marble… Of course she has an attachment. If she didn’t, why bother to write this long paean to herself and her purity of intent and action? Throw a monkey wrench into her forum and lure the members away, like she did to Dr. McBride, and see how much attachment she has to their decisions. But, I didn’t expect much truth from her in the first place. Did you?

Next: Characteristics of Narcissistic Mothers

Accusations Against Me (Part 4)

Part 1 

Part 2

Part 3

Danu Morrigan/Tracy Culleton, operator of the website Daughters of Narcissistic Mothers, after banning dozens—if not hundreds—of vulnerable women from her site’s forum without explanation, got wind of the fact that not all of these callously rejected women crawled off into dark little holes to lick their wounds. some of them decided to fight back by publishing their experiences with her on the web, a fact that apparently sent her scrambling to do damage control. Ultimately, she published a rebuttal http://www.daughtersofnarcissisticmothers.com/accusations-against-me.html to the accusations she found on the web, a rebuttal that was laced with subtle and not-so-subtle untruths, and which left no space for disagreement, correction, or comment.

Herewith, the truth about Tracy’s rebuttal to the truths published on the web about her:

(My remarks are in violet, Tracy's quotes from SoaringDove’s blog are in blue)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

There are so many other women who have walked in your shoes. Women who are angry and wish they could expose this fraud for who she is.

It's true that there are many women who have been banned from the forum and are angry about it.

That’s it? No, “I’m sorry if being banned hurt or upset them,” no comment at all? Is this dismissive or what? Dozens—perhaps hundreds—of women are angry and upset and think Tracy is a fraud…including at least one person who worked inside the organization…and she thinks she can sweep it under the rug with a curt, one-sentence dismissal? These women were hurt by her actions, some of them deeply. One person comments about her reaction to being banned: “…It was the proverbial last straw, during a hell of a time of intense, horrible recent loss and abuse. I became suicidal. My husband took me to the hospital emergency room. I was put on an antidepressant. The day I went to the hospital was June 26, almost 4 months ago, and I am just now beginning to be able to live again…” (Comment by outofthecrazycloset http://dealingwithtoxicpeople.blogspot.com/2010/05/buyer-beware-unsafe-forum.html)

A lot of bad things happened on Danu's watch. A forum member committed suicide. It was hushed up, because Danu/Light didn't want the members to get upset. This woman was someone that Danu had "befriended" on Dr. McBride's site. This woman had had a horrendous childhood and had already been hospitalized for a previous suicide attempt. Danu believed that she could cure her with EFT.

This is such a misrepresentation of the truth that I gasp to read it.


It is true that a forum member committed suicide, that I met her on Dr. McBride's site originally (and she had come to the new forum) and that she had had a horrendous childhood and had been hospitalised.


It is not true that I “befriended” her in quotes. I did befriend her and I venture to suggest that I was a good friend to her. I did offer to do some EFT with her (EFT is excellent at helping with trauma) but she didn't want to and that was fine.

Some friend… “Oh, I’m sorry your life has been such a wreck and you are in so much pain…open your wallet and I’ll perform some useless mumbo jumbo over the phone and save you from having to actually get up, get out, and do something proven to help depression, like a doctor, some therapy with a licensed and trained practitioner and some antidepressant meds to keep you going until you feel stronger…that’s it, open wider…wider…wider now, I still can’t get my hand to the bottom of your purse…” Remember, no bona fide independent study supporting the efficacy of EFT for any condition exists. None. Nix. Nada.

Her suicide had nothing to do with her membership of the forum, and the insinuation that it was is totally erroneous. She had not even been on the forum much (or at all, as far as I know) in the last few months of her life.

Ever known a narcissist to take responsibility for anything? Tracy cannot know if the woman’s membership in the forum had anything to do with her death or not, but she is sure pretty quick to disavow any connection, isn’t she? What, did this woman send her a note saying “I’m going to kill myself now, but this has nothing to do with you.”? There are sins of omission just as there are sins of commission, and by failing to refer this fragile woman to competent, qualified help may well have had some bearing on her choice to end her life. We don’t know—and neither does Tracy. For all we know, Tracy callously banned her without explanation like she has done to so many others and this poor lady wasn’t taken to the emergency room in time.

And it is true that we didn't allow her death to be announced publically on the forum. This is for two reasons. The first - and biggest reason - is that, since she hadn't been on the forum much at that time, most of the current members didn't know her and so it felt sensationalist and drama-seeking to speak of her death in this way. Those of us who knew her spoke of her and mourned her behind the scenes.

Oh, puhleeeze! Tracy was doing damage control, nothing more. If word got out that one of the members of her site committed suicide, it could do untold damage to the membership, not only in terms of women abandoning the forum and taking their precious dollars with them, but new women being wary of joining. But it didn’t stay a secret, it just became one more thing nobody was allowed to talk about. It happened before I joined the forum and it was one of the first bits of gossip I picked up and people were still whispering about it when I was banned months later. The secrecy and the fact that it was verboten to speak about it surely gave it a longer life than it would have had if Tracy and Light had not tried to hide it from everybody.

The second reason is that we didn't want to upset the members - it's a fact that speaking of suicide can contribute to it.

And that gives Tracy the right to censor adult women from the truth? Isn’t that a little high-handed and smotherish? For heaven’s sake, suicides happen all the time, they are on the news, they are spoken of in hushed terms in offices and on public transport, they are published in newspapers and magazines…what kind of forum infantilizes its members by keeping a truth from them under the guise of protecting them from it? Not one run by a person who views the members as adult human beings, that’s for sure.

The term 'hush-up' is another loaded term, insinuating that we had something to hide about it. This was not so.

If you had nothing to hide, then why not be honest and treat your members like the adult women they are?

Another friend of mine was bullied into doing EFT with Danu, the subject being the woman's molestatation [sic] by her father. It is stated on professional EFT sites that it is best to leave the deeply traumatized to the care of a therapist, and to use great caution in opening up really deep wounds. Danu strong armed my friend into agreeing to the EFT and then proceeded to stomp on her soul with hobnail boots. The friend ended up in severe emotional distress and told Danu that she did not want to continue. She was strong-armed into another session, and then hounded to write up "testimonials" for the DONM forum website and for Danu's EFT website. Despite the women's expressed worry about her abusive family finding it on the internet, Danu posted the "testimonial" with the woman's full name and location.

This is another misrepresentation.

No, it is not. I have first-hand knowledge of this because Tracy posted the testimonial on not one, but two of her websites (she has at least ten of them), one was simply signed with the woman’s initials, the other gave her full name…and I was able to find the woman and make contact with her when we were setting up our FaceBook group, to invite her to join us. We had several chats over email and in the group and, straight from the horse’s mouth, what Kate says above is absolutely true.

This woman was already in severe emotional distress due to huge abuse. I encouraged her to go for therapy or to a local EFT practitioner, but she had no money to do either of these things. I therefore offered to do EFT over the phone with her, for free, on my own expense of international phone calls, and she agreed. I did say to her that this was far from ideal - as I said, the ideal would have been one-to-one personal therapy with a local EFT practitioner, and she told me she understood that. I did ask her that if she got good results I would appreciate a testimonial from her, and she agreed to this. I dispute entirely that I ‘hounded’ her at all.


She did get good results on the two or three sessions we had, as best as I could judge. By which I mean that she came to the call with a particular memory which was really upsetting her, and by the end of the session that particular memory no longer bothered her at all. And she wrote me testimonials to indicate this. She put her real, full, name and general location on them, and I double-checked if she was happy with that (most people just use their initials). She said she was, and on that basis I put them up.


She never expressed any worry about her family finding it - not to me anyway. And when she wrote asking me to take down the testimonials I didn't do that as they were honestly and freely sent at the time (I have done so since), but I took her identifying details away immediately upon receiving that.

OK, can we say “invalidating”? If Tracy goes on the web using a fake name ostensibly to prevent her family from knowing what she is doing, how can she not have empathy for someone who asks that her name not be used? So what if it was “freely sent” at the time? Even if they were, circumstances may have changed and she needed her anonymity back. But, truth be told, the woman told me that Tracy badgered her into writing the testimonial even after she told her...repeatedly...she was not inclined to.

I dispute entirely that I strong-armed her into anything, and when she said she didn't want to continue I accepted that immediately.

Not according to the woman’s comments to me—and obviously she told Kate the same thing long before I even knew about the situation. How’s Tracy’s credibility holding up now?

Next: Part 5

Accusations Against Me (Part 3)

(Find Part 1 here.)
(Find Part 2 here.)

Danu Morrigan/Tracy Culleton, operator of the website Daughters of Narcissistic Mothers, after banning dozens—if not hundreds—of vulnerable women from her site’s forum without explanation, got wind of the fact that not all of these callously rejected women crawled off into dark little holes to lick their wounds. some of them decided to fight back by publishing their experiences with her on the web, a fact that apparently sent her scrambling to do damage control. Ultimately, she published a rebuttal to the accusations she found on the web, a rebuttal that was laced with subtle and not-so-subtle untruths, and which left no space for disagreement, correction, or comment.

Herewith, the truth about Tracy’s rebuttal to the truths published on the web about her:

(My remarks are in violet, Tracy's quotes from SoaringDove’s blog are in blue)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Danu was love-bombing the members that she felt would be helpful to her business aspirations, starting and maintaining off site friendships with these women, many of whom thought they were her new Best Friend, not realizing the others were receiving the same treatment. I was one of the major voices on that site, and was sought after by Danu as well. We emailed back and forth daily for almost a year. I am sorry to say that I ignored the red flags; I was just beginning the difficult healing process of separating from my family of origin and Danu stepped into the gap in my life left by those losses. [This is part of a long comment on SoaringDove's blog by Kate, a former admin at Tracy's DoNM website. -V]

All I can say to this is that I had no game-plan, and was not 'love-bombing' people. Yes, I was making friends - people do. But I was not grooming people or similar. I had no nefarious agenda.

Well, the evidence points in quite a different direction, Tracy. Kate struck me as a person of very high integrity when I knew her. I cannot imagine her claiming that Tracy was grooming multiple people as her “best friend,” none of them aware of the others, unless it was true. This is a “she said—she said” situation and I’m siding with Kate for a couple of reasons: 1) I’ve spoken with Kate numerous times after she left Tracy’s forum and she felt trustworthy to me; 2) Kate’s information backs up what I heard from numerous other sources over a period of months; 3) Kate was actually inside the organization and privy to information the rest of us could not know but could guess at. Kate 1 Tracy 0.

Again, you'll have to make up your own minds about this.

The result of the other member confronting Danu on her issues is that it effectively split the group. Danu started her own site/forum and a handful of us went with her. There were four original moderators, including Danu.

This is true, as far as it goes, except that there were five original moderators, not four. I set up the new forum as the old one was unsafe and unmoderated and I wanted to create a safe place.

Now isn’t that interesting: nit-picking about how many moderators but completely glossing over how Tracy and her issues divided and ultimately destroyed a forum that served the needs of numerous women dealing with narcissistic mother issues, a forum run by a trained and licensed therapist. In true N fashion, she sussed out the forum’s weakness (it was unmoderated) and not only used that to destroy the forum, but side-stepped taking blame by saying it was “unsafe and unmoderated,” completely ignoring the glaring fact that it was perfectly safe in its unmoderated state until she came along. All of the other ladies played nice without a moderator until Tracy came along and made it unsafe.

I won't go into my story of how I became aware that I was participating in a giant scam, what ended up happening is that I decided to quit, but Tracy needed the last word and so I was fired and banned from the forum.

What actually happened is that Kate took exception to something a member had said, and wrote a PM to, as she thought, the other moderators complaining about this. This wasn't a Code of Conduct issue, but rather Kate's upset that the member was handling her (i.e. the member's) situation in a way which Kate didn't agree with.


This was bad enough, as it's not the moderator's place to have any opinion on the members' actions once they don't contravene the Code of Conduct. But worse, she somehow sent it to every single member of the forum. I have no doubt that this was a mistake, as Kate said it was.


But still, the repercussions would have been enormous. How could any member have felt safe if she thought she was being commented on behind her back like that? And Kate didn't try to contact us to cancel the PM. It remained to Light to stay up till 3.00 a.m. her time, until she could contact me and get the PM deleted.

In her conversations with me, Kate acknowledged her accidental revelation and her remorse for it. But what Tracy fails to address here is that it was not a single post by Kate but a conversation between Kate and other mods. “How could any member have felt safe if she thought she was being commented on behind her back like that?” Indeed, Tracy—but the issue for you was secrecy, wasn’t it? Not preventing or eliminating such behind-the-back convos between the mods and the management team, but keeping those conversations—which undoubtedly continue to this day—secret from the membership.

You would think this kind of thing would no longer be happening, this inappropriate discussion of members by staff, right? That once Kate was kicked to the curb, it would happen no more. Think again: Sugar, from Words From the Daughter of a Narcissist blog reports this posting on 29 August, 2010—more than six months after I was banned (and Kate was banned before I even joined the forum!): “This post clearly belonged in a private staff forum, but somehow ended up in the public general discussion. I find it quite odd though, that THREE staff members participated in the topic and not one seemed to notice that it was in the wrong forum so that their gossiping was viewable to all. Take a look at what Light says about this member:

“Light: member's name is [name redacted]

This post scared the crap out of me. Would you guys have a look? I put it in the Q for a bit. I don't know what to think. All I know is, to be honest, I don't want her here after reading that. Maybe that's not really fair, but maybe it's something I should listen to carefully. Like I said, I'm not too sure just yet. I think I need time to think about it. Let's chat about this?

It would have been one thing if she'd said she got into trouble as a kid or something, but this felt like a lot more than that, and I'm feeling pretty uncomfortable with her...

I don't know about [name redacted]. There's something that isn't sitting right with me about that post. I just get an intuitive fearful feeling.

“Wow. Just..wow. I remember reading [name redacted]’s posts and nothing gave me an ‘intuitive fearful feeling’. She just wrote about her experiences with having a NM in the ‘My Story’ section of the forum, which is meant just for that - SHARING YOUR STORY.”

So Kate gets banned but when Michelle does the exact same thing, from “having an opinion on the member” (which Tracy has just said, above, is not permitted) to making that opinion and the discussion of it public, the forum member gets banned! And all without a violation of the ToU in sight!

Even then we did not turn on Kate. Turn on Kate?? What are you, a pack of wild dogs?? We were asking her what happened, alright, but it was in, ‘Gosh we've got to sort this out’ way - to make sure it never happened again.


But Kate got very defensive and felt that since she had apologised that should be an end to it, and that we were shaming her to continue going on about it. She and I e-mailed briefly about it, and as far as I was concerned I was still trying to sort it out, but Kate quickly asked me not to contact her again, and to delete her account. So I did not contact her again and we closed her account at that point.

Well, I’m gonna have to side with Kate on this. Going on and on about something that is over, has been acknowledged and apologized for is shaming! And it is one of the ways that our narcissistic mothers got N-feed and controlled us, too, so naturally Kate would be sensitive to it. Why, if she was also a DoNM rather than an N herself, would Tracy continue harping on something that Kate had acknowledged and apologized for and could not change? I don’t buy the “we needed to know X in order to prevent it from happening again”…why? “I pushed the wrong button” isn’t enough?” How many ways, how many times, can a person say that?

I suppose any of us would get defensive if we felt we were being shamed and we felt we had made adequate amends. Kate acknowledges that she asked Tracy to close her account but when she checked later to see if it had been done she found that, instead of simply closing the account, she had been permanently banned. Sounds like a spiteful retaliation, the kind of thing an NM would do to a daughter who walked away from the bullshit and refused to play the game any more.

There are many articles in the self help part of the forum that I either wrote, or copy/pasted from other sites. Within a week after I left, my name disappeared from those articles and they were attributed to others.

I genuinely don't recall doing this, but I cannot swear we didn't with regard to the copied articles. I do not think we attributed her writings to others. If we did, we should not have done so and I would still correct that once I knew which ones she's referring to.

Tracy, Tracy, Tracy…after banning her from the site so she can’t tell you which ones she wrote and you gave attribution to someone else, she’s supposed to call you and beg you to pretty please, acknowledge her? Besides, even if she could and did contact you today, it doesn’t alter the fact that you did change the attribution of those articles…more spiteful retaliation on your part like banning her instead of just closing her account?

There is currently a group of women on FB who have an under the radar type of group...all of them victimized in one way or another by Danu. Your story is a familiar one. I believe there is a revolving door or women being banned from that forum for bogus and/or arbitrary reasons.

I am one of those women. We have no moderation and we all get along. People leave as they move along on their healing journey and feel they no longer need the support. Kate, in fact, joined us early on and eventually left for exactly that reason. Only once has our lack of moderation been a problem and that was when a member hijacked the group, naming herself group administrator and then kicking people out who wouldn’t lick her boots. One of the other women started a new group, we all migrated to the new group where we now have three administrators (I am one of them), none of whom do anything except hold the position so that nobody can come along and hijack us again. Almost every woman in the group spent time in Tracy’s group, some of them were banned, others just walked away in disgust. And we are only the tip of the iceberg.

We run a tight ship on the forum, and we do ban people who are contravening the Code of Conduct (Terms of Use as it now is called), and also people who give off big N-flags. This is done to protect the existing members.

Big N-flags? This from a person who states unequivocally, above, that she has no training as a psychologist nor is she an expert on narcissism. Notice, too, the change from her earlier claim that you are only banned if you contravene the ToU—now she has given herself permission to call you an N for any reason she deems fit (since she is no expert and has no training, what does she have other than her own definitions of “N-flags” to determine who is personality disordered and who is not?). And remember, in the narcissist’s world, everything exists to serve the narcissist and her goals. Tracy doesn’t consider banning vulnerable, hurting women from their support forum with no warning and no explanation to be abusive—even though it sure felt abusive to those of us who were banned in such a way. How do you trust that her definition of an “N-flag” is any more objective or less self-serving than her definition of “abusive”?

It is very interesting to me that Danu's hatred of Christians has become so pronounced. Since she's from Ireland, her only experience with organized religion is with the Roman Catholic church, but she uses a very broad brush to color all people of faith.

In my very first phone conversation with her she jumped all over my beliefs. I had identified myself on the blog as a Christian, not in an obnoxious or pushy way, it just came up in my posts when I shared. Danu attempted to tear into my beliefs on the phone, which I politely sidestepped. That conversation was full of red flags, looking at it in hindsight.

I have no hatred of Christians. I certainly did not intend to tear into Kate's beliefs, but it is very possible that I was clumsy and it felt like that to her and I apologise unreservedly for that.

You know, this sounds good, but the facts simply do not bear it out. Tracy’s own words come back to haunt her: “I run a website and forum for daughters of narcissistic mothers, and have long believed that the Christian Churches fall into the category of narcissism…” You can read the rest of her very unflattering commentary about Christianity and Christians here. The original citation is here.

Next: Part 4

Accusations Against Me (Part 2)

(Find Part 1 here.)

Danu Morrigan/Tracy Culleton, operator of the website Daughters of Narcissistic Mothers, after banning dozens—if not hundreds—of vulnerable women from her site’s forum without explanation, got wind of the fact that not all of these callously rejected women crawled off into dark little holes to lick their wounds. some of them decided to fight back by publishing their experiences with her on the web, a fact that apparently sent her scrambling to do damage control. Ultimately, she published a rebuttal to the accusations she found on the web, a rebuttal that was laced with subtle and not-so-subtle untruths, and which left no space for disagreement, correction, or comment.

Herewith, the truth about Tracy’s rebuttal to the truths published on the web about her:

(My remarks are in violet, Tracy's quotes from SoaringDove’s blog are in blue)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

How much weight you put on my assurances is, of course, up to you.

Danu, like all Cult Leaders is very charismatic and has the gift to tell you just what you need to hear, so that she appears to be an educated, insightful, understanding & trustworthy person. She told me it was both her professional & personal opinion that I am a talented & gifted writer, and that she was surprised I never thought of writing and thought that I was not very good at it. She had the ability to tap into a passion I never knew I had and only recently realized by communicating w/other DONM members, starting my own Blog and joining A Safe, Healthy, Encouraging, Very Enjoyable & Inspirational On-line Support Group, WebofNarcissism.com.

It is true that I encouraged Soaring Dove to write as I found her writing to be good, and to set up a blog. I find it hugely ironic that she now uses this blog to defame me and also that she has, somehow, twisted this encouragement to meaning that I am trying to be a cult leader and have some nefarious purpose for encouraging her.

It is only defamation if it is untrue and while I see the irony, Tracy has no one to blame but herself. She should never have encouraged a person whom she could not control to write outside the forum…and maybe that speaks more to the crux of SoaringDove’s expulsion from the forum more than anything else: Tracy could not control her.

You see, if you read her Terms of Use, take on board all these women who Tracy has jettisoned without remorse like so much trash and then put your thinking cap on, you eventually come to a single, simple conclusion: Tracy runs that site solely to fill her pockets and certain people get in her way—and those people have to go. People who have outside support sources like faith (people who believe their faith will support them and make them OK in the long run), knowledge (like mental health professionals such as my friend the psychologist), people who are far along in their healing (like me—NM dead for 12 years, veteran of 5 years of intensive, supportive therapy), people of high intelligence who can work out for themselves what she is up to, people who are charismatic or persuasive in their own right—these people all get between Tracy and the money. She needs her members to be needy, vulnerable, dependent, willing to try anything to feel better…she does not need people who are not susceptible to her sales pitch, people who can see through her and maybe even tell others what they see.

Now, stop a minute and think. Who else do you know like that? Who else do you know lives a life strictly self-oriented and has no use for people who can see them as they really are, who can see through the mask to the real grubby, greedy, grasping creature behind it, and associates almost exclusively with people from whom they can get something? Uh huh—your NM…and mine… Isn’t the resemblance remarkable?

At the DONM forum, I enjoyed my interactions w/many great women and that is why I continued to stay even though it became very clear that Danu had placed a neon target on my back and it was only a matter of time before I was Unjustly Banned.

Soaring Dove kept breaking the Code of Conduct by proseltyising [sic] and preaching her religion and we gave her a number of warnings asking to to stop doing this. This is now interpreted as being a Neon Target.


In the end we did ban her for consistently breaking the Code of Conduct.

Unfortunately, we have only Tracy’s unsupported word for this and at this juncture, that’s not good enough. SoaringDove is very religious and for those people who are, it is an integrated part of their lives. I have several family members and friends who are and while none of them are so presumptuous and rude and to try to proselytize and convert me (I have come to own my position as the Black Sheep of the family), phrases like “God is good,” and “it is a blessing,” and other religiously-tinged things pop up in their writing all of the time. SoaringDove did put up a post about Tracy’s accusation that she was proselytizing here and if we can trust what she says, Tracy made a mountain out of a mole hill…which would make me, an avowed atheist, wonder why…

I suppose if I was querulous or looking to pick a fight, I could cite my religious family and friends being so wrapped up in religion that they can’t speak without referencing it as a reason to cut them out of my life. In other words, I could take any religious-sounding phrase and use it as an excuse to blame them for me doing what I want to do in the first place. I suspect either SoaringDove’s faith irritated Tracy or she feared it would drag in a bunch more overt Christians who believed their god would give them strength, or maybe she was afraid SoaringDove’s faith would be contagious to other members and they wouldn’t be susceptible to her blandishments to be saved via her very costly, wallet-filling EFT. And she did what any self-respecting narcissist would do when someone gets between her and her goal: she got rid of her quickly, quietly and efficiently and in such a way that none of her intended victims ever got a hint of what was happening. You have to admit, Tracy, if you’re not a narcissist, you do an amazingly good imitation of one!

********

Next Soaring Dove shares a message she got from Kate, a former member and moderator.

Message from Kate:

I found your blog today purely by accident, but I'm so glad that I did.

I was one of the original moderators on Danu's DONM forum, and have my own story to tell, as do many other women who have been hurt by this wolf in sheep's clothing.

The site is basically run by Danu and Light who are both severely disturbed women. Danu has no training in psychology, is not an expert on narcissism, and created the site as a money making venture pushing her EFT.

Whether Light and I are severely disturbed you will have to decide for yourselves. I don't think so, but then I would say that of course.


It is true that I have no training in psychology, but then I never pretended to.


As for not being an expert in narcissism - again, I do not pretend to any more expertise than that of a DONM who has researched it.

And yet, without claiming to having any training in psychology, without claiming to be an expert in narcissism, she “diagnosed” me and the banned psychologist as narcissists and sent the membership into a tizzy when she announced we had been outed and removed. How does that work? She also claimed, even when I was a member, to have ferreted out and banned narcissists from the forum. With no psychological training and not being an expert on narcissism, how did she do that?

I did not create the site as a money-making venture pushing EFT.

Well, Tracy, you coulda fooled me! PayPal donation button, an Amazon link begging members of the site to buy books through the link so the site gets money, constant harping on EFT as a cure all for everything from PTSD to fear of clowns to writer’s block to narcissistic abuse, all for a fee—NOT a money-making venture? You are only kidding yourself. How many of your members know that your third novel was based on a narcissistic relationship, the inspiration for and information source were vulnerable DoNMs…oh, not from this site, but from the McBride forum you destroyed? (more on that later) And now you have written a book that, unless it contains NO anecdotal illustrations, will line your pockets further with the pain and suffering of the women who trusted you not to disclose their private agonies to the rest of the world.

I created it as a resource for fellow-DONMs. I put months of my own time into creating the website and its information which is available free for anybody. And hours of time has gone, and continues to go, into running the forum, all for free. There is the possibility to donate if people want, but this is not required and, frankly, most people do not donate and the income from that is minimal - and that is fine.


As for the EFT - I am creating resources using EFT for people to purchase, and I make no apology for this. EFT is a wonderful tool for recovery and healing and I am delighted to be able to share it. I give the EFT instructions for free and it is only if people want the more specific resources that there is a cost. There is also a full money-back guarantee, so there is nothing underhand about this.

First of all, there are no bona fide independent studies that confirm EFT has any beneficial effect. The one study cited by Tracy on her site was not done at an “arm’s length,” meaning the people who would benefit from the study were involved in the study. I used to work in the biotech industry and was involved in the preparation of documents for submission to the FDA for approval of our products—I know first hand how bona fide studies are conducted, and this one was not done that way. I have searched the web, including websites that carry articles from professional journals (where such a bona fide study would be published) and nothing shows up. A huge red flag should be the testimonials…if this EFT thing really did work, there would be no need for them, there would be two or more research studies done and published in professional journals, and Tracy would be citing them as proof. Testimonials are what is known as “anecdotal evidence” and has zero credibility with the scientific community. It might get them interested enough to do an independent study or two, but the testimonials—and their writers—would never be considered as part of the study or its conclusions. Real studies are done to find out the truth—the study that Tracy cites on her website was done to make the process look like it works.

A word about the writers of testimonial writers: they are not liars. They felt better when it was done. Does that mean it was effective? No. It means they experienced the “placebo effect,” a well-known phenomenon in medical research. It comes from you and your belief that it will work. So, I could send you a brass disk wrapped in string and tell you to balance this on your head every day for ten minutes and it will make arthritis pain and stiffness disappear and, if you really believe me, it will work!! EFT works much the same way: it is simply your brain believing it will work and providing the relief. But placebos don’t work for everybody, as you will later see.

As far as her claim that she put the site together as a “resource,” that’s pretty cheeky, considering she got the whole idea from a forum for DoNMs run by an honest-to-god therapist who actually knew what she was talking about, which Tracy ultimately destroyed in order to get the participants to join the site she built to make money from…

I first met her on Karyl McBride's forum for DONMs, which Danu was using as feeding grounds for new EFT customers. There were many red flags about Danu from the very beginning, and she was actually publically accused by another member of being a narcissist. The group there did not have a moderator so it was a bit like the Wild West, enter at your own risk.

It is true that this is where Kate and I first met. I was not using it as a feeding ground for EFT customers, although I was keen to tell people about it, and looking back, I can see I was too keen. But I was so excited to be able to share this amazing resource to try to help DONMs (again, you could learn it for free online).

Sometimes we don’t see ourselves as others see us—and sometimes others see right through us. Having had numerous conversations with this same Kate myself, I’m going to have to go with Kate’s version of events, especially since I have also had conversations with a few others who were on the site when Tracy, under the name of Dana, brought the whole thing crashing down and Dr. McBride closed the forum. Which, unfortunately, played right into Tracy’s hands because the participants were shut out of their forum and had only one place they knew of to go—to Tracy’s new site.

Oh, and notice Tracy tells us we can learn about EFT for free on line—did you know this rebuttal page is not accessible from inside her site, so unless a member finds it on Google, they will never know that those overseas phone calls and Visa charges were totally unnecessary. Tracy, you see, does not disclose the free availability of EFT on the DoNM site.

I cannot comment as to the red flags - certainly Kate, who for a while was a friend of mine and was, as she shares below, a founder member of my forum, didn't see them at the time.


It is true that I was accused by another member of being N. Many members at the time did not agree with her, although several, including Kate, came to think so in time.

Next: Part 3

Accusations Against Me (Part 1)

Danu Morrigan/Tracy Culleton, operator of the website Daughters of Narcissistic Mothers, after banning dozens—if not hundreds—of vulnerable women from her site’s forum without explanation, got wind of the fact that not all of these callously rejected women crawled off into dark little holes to lick their wounds. Some of them decided to fight back by publishing their experiences with her on the web, a fact that apparently sent her scrambling to do damage control. Ultimately, she published a rebuttal to the accusations she found on the web, a rebuttal that was laced with subtle and not-so-subtle untruths, and which left no space for disagreement, correction, or comment.

Herewith, the truth about Tracy’s rebuttal to the truths published on the web about her:

(My remarks are in violet, Tracy's quotes from another website are in blue)


It has come to my attention that various accusations are being made against me. My first reaction was to ignore them, but on reflection I am going to answer them here, and you can make up your own mind as to the truth of it all. I have no attachment to your end decision – I am not trying to persuade you in any way. I will just answer the accusations.


These accusations are being made at the following blog: http://dealingwithtoxicpeople.blogspot.com/2010/11/clear-present-danger-to-others.html. I’m not making it a clickable link as I don’t want to help it rank in the search engines, but by all means copy and paste the link to go and see for yourself. [This link no longer functions. SoaringDove however, writes about this rebuttal here  –V]

The blog is written by a woman calling herself Soaring Dove. She was a member of my forum and was banned for persistent breaking of the Terms of Use with regard to posting religious content. She feels that this was very unfair and indeed had written a previous blog post about this. I do not have the link for that to hand but it’s no doubt still on her blog and she could point you towards it.

SoaringDove’s perception is that she was banned for being a believer, not for posting religious content, and that she and others have been banned for breaking a rule that did not, at least at the time they were members, even exist. “Danu still refuses to update her Code of Conduct to reflect how she truly feels about God and instead chooses to Gaslight members by saying that they broke a rule that doesn't even exist! Danu allows members to use God's name and the name of His Son Jesus in vain, which is attacking someone else's beliefs AND against Danu's own Code of Conduct, yet those posts are not edited -- why not? It is okay to put God & his people down on the DONM forum, but to praise God & his people for the help & blessings in one's life (especially in regards to dealing w/a Narcissistic Mother) in their own post, that will get you banned from Danu's DONM forum.” See the whole post here. -V

They have exposed my real name on this blog post, but I have changed it back to my screen-name. Also the person 'Light' that is referred to is one of the other founder-members of the forum and a moderator.


I will quote her blog post and answer the comments:

DONM members you are in danger. Danu is not who she appears to be. The following information comes from one of the original DONM (Daughters of Narcissistic Mothers) moderators who knows firsthand how evil Danu is to fellow DONM members. I can confirm that Danu's real name is [my real name] I pray more and more former DONM's members will come forward to share what they know.

Obviously this is Soaring Dove's opening position, and she goes on to make her case, so I'll answer the points as she makes them.

Let me add one more very Dangerous Person to this list. She was/is a moderator of Danu's KoN [Kingdom of Narcissism-V] and she admitted to me that she knows that Danu & Light target certain individuals and their Code of Conduct is very deceiving in that people should not be attacked for what they believe.

Soaring Dove is referring to username 'Grace'. I doubt very much that she ever said that I and Light 'target individuals' or that our Code of Conduct (now known as the Terms of Use) is 'deceiving'. Even if she did say this, how could it be 'deceiving' when it was made very clear?

This is disingenuous at best. Obviously, if someone misinterprets something in it, then it is not “very clear.” SoaringDove saw nothing in the Code of Conduct that would prohibit her or others from mentioning God in context with their stories or comments. This is not the same as proselytizing and, even though I am an atheist, I do not object to other people practicing, even talking about, their faith as long as they keep it in context with their stories or, out of context, among themselves. If Tracy is an atheist and objects to any mention of God or other things religious, in order for her CoC or ToU to be “very clear,” she needs to spell this out in very specific language. I do not know the date SoaringDove was banned, but the ToU were most recently updated in March of 2010 and does allow limited religious content. However—I was banned in February of 2010 for things that were not in the CoC and so was someone else I know, so SoaringDove’s claim is entirely plausible.

Notice that Tracy does not even address the changes in the Coc, only refers to its changed name which implies that nothing else was changed. In fact, there were significant changes made, not the least of which was the prohibition of mental health professionals offering their insights—something I find especially peculiar on a site in which such input, especially free of charge, should be embraced! Anyway, you can find the current ToU (which were revised less than a month after I and a highly credentialed psychologist were banned for “offenses” not on the CoC) here. -V

I also note the loaded word 'admitted' - Grace may well have held an opinion, but that is not 'admitting' anything in the sense of admitting something shameful or hidden - it is making a statement. It is true that Grace did not agree with my policy on religion on the forum, but that was fine - we (as far as I know) agreed to differ.

Tracy’s response is entirely out of context. SoaringDove wrote: “…and she admitted to me that she knows that Danu & Light target certain individuals…” I would have to say that ‘admitted’ was the proper word this event because targeting certain individuals, singling out specific members for unkind treatment is “shameful” and quite obviously Tracy and Michelle (Light) kept it hidden from all but the admins. If you were the scapegoat child in your NM’s lair, this must have you squirming in your chair—seeing these women, who were looked up to and trusted by the membership, single out specific members for scapegoating.-V

I also need to say that nobody is attacked for what they believe. They are just asked not to share it. This applies to all faiths, not just Christianity.

As recently as 23 April of this year, the following appeared on the web via Twitter: “Beware of Danu Morrigan (Psuedo name) ‪#crooks‬ ‪#creeps‬ ‪#scamalert‬ - She hosts websites for abused people... and is persecuting Christians.” Obviously the perception persists to this day.-V

She told me she knows Danu has attacked other DONM members before I became a member and she resigned her position as Moderator (I now question whether or not that was the truth).

Again I doubt very much that Grace said I had attacked other DONM members, but even if she did, it is not true. Grace did resign as moderator, in fully amicable conditions, and…

Unfortunately, we have only Tracy’s word for Grace leaving the site amicably…and I note that she has no compunctions against calling Grace a liar: “…even if she did [say Tracy attacked members], it is not true…”. Since Tracy has blatantly lied to the membership about why I and the psychologist left the forum, since SoaringDove’s perception of her banning does not match Tracy’s, at this point I am not prepared to accept Tracy’s unsupported word…and neither should you. I know at least one moderator who asked to leave due to becoming aware of the site being a scam (more on that later) who, instead of being simply removed from her post, was also banned. And it was a great shock to her. -V

Soaring Dove has absolutely no reason to doubt this, so I don't know why she says it.
She then goes on to accuse Grace of stuff which a) is not true and b) I won't share here because it's not my place.

Whoa there! SoaringDove thinks she has good reason to doubt this—doesn’t this seem a little high handed here, substituting her perceptions for and discounting someone else’s? I smell gas here…as in gaslighting. She says it because she believes it and because she likely has heard of other people who got railroaded out of the forum under false pretenses. -V

Along with Light this person [Grace] promotes Danu as a "Healer" when they both know she is an abuser of her own members.

Neither Light nor Grace promote me as a 'Healer' or ever have. Even *I* don't promote me as a healer, with or without a capital 'H' or quotes. I am an EFT practitioner and do promote myself as such - again, more below of this.

Scroll to the bottom of this page to find the Organized Wisdom Health Site Award that Tracy, who emphatically claims not to be a healer, displays on this page. Interestingly, you won’t find it on any other pages—can you guess why? Because a bunch of people wrote to the Organized Wisdom site  with their stories of abuse at Tracy’s hands—now she not only no longer displays the award on her site (but somehow it got left behind on this page), she is no longer listed on the Organized Wisdom site as a recipient.-V

And certainly Light knows that I do not abuse my members, and I do not think that Grace holds this opinion.

I would agree that Light “knows” this because, like the Ns I have had to deal with in my own life, their definition of “abuse” and mine are light-years apart…I was one of those abused by them, so I can state that as an unequivocal fact. But isn’t that a typically N tactic, though, to change the definition of something to fit what they are doing? My NM used to “spank” me daily—in retrospect, what she called a “spanking” was, in fact, a brutal beating with a thin leather strap that left whip-like marks on my skin. She—and a few like-minded friends—would never have called it a beating, but I certainly would. So, by changing the meaning of spanking to include beating me with what was essentially was a whip she could “honestly” say she did not beat me—and if Light and Tracy are on the same page regarding the definition of abuse—that it does not include suddenly and without warning or explanation, expelling people from the forum—then they can agree that nobody is being abused, at least by their definition.-V

Grace tried to help Soaring Dove at the time she was banned from the forum, and knowing Grace (we have met in real life; I have even stayed in her house) I can assure you that this was done with integrity, compassion and a genuine desire to help. But Soaring Dove has twisted this around into a rant on her blog about Grace and Grace's so-called agenda. I won't share that here as it does not pertain directly to myself, but I can assure you all that Soaring Dove's interpretation is not true.

Oh, nasty nasty!! Casting aspersions on SoaringDove with loaded words like “twisted” and “rant” and “so-called” and then refusing to provide a link so you can’t see for yourself if is was a twisted rant, using the excuse “it doesn’t pertain directly to myself.” Gee, it was germane enough to bring up to assassinate SoaringDove’s character and make her out to be a demented whiner, eh?-V

Next up--Part 2