The Beginning
Shrink Heaven
from 
JoeUser Forums
JoeUser Forums
It started quite a while back, these odd feelings about that place near Los Osos. In 1984, while pregnant with my younger son, my husband, five year-old son and I were drining on Los Osos Road heading towards the Sand Pit. There is a point in the road where the trees join from either side of the road to form a natural tunnel.
As we were driving along, I became terrified. It was blinding, taking my breath away and leaving me numb and speechless - all at the same time. I had no idea why I was frightened. I only knew that I was relieved as we passed from underneath the foilage of the path. I chalked up the experience to pregnancy paranoia since it didn't happen again for a very long time.
Fast forward to 1998. I met my boyfriend, Stephen online at Yahoo. He answered my post and we knew from our first conversation that we were a pair. About a year after we had been seeing each other, he wanted to go to the beach and talked about his favorite swimming hole, The Sand Pit. Since I was unfamiliar with the area, I readily agreed, since I love being with him.
As we were driving, I realized that this was the place that I had the previous bad feelings, but pushed aside my reservations and said nothing, thinking that 1984 was a fluke. Since I hate going in the ocean, I held onto Steve's watch, keys, pants and towel while he splashed around. As I was watching and enjoying the cool breezes (this was in November), I felt a thought come to me - "This would be a great place to hide bodies."
Now, since I am not a violent person and neither is Steve, I was shaken by the thought. I shook off the thought and we had a pleasant enough weekend. When I went home is when it all started: the nightmares and the intrusive thoughts. The first nightmare was vague. A man was in a bar in Atascadero hitting on women. There was country music in the background and I could barely see him. He was slightly balding and on the heavy-set side, with brown hair and blue eyes wearing black geek glasses and cowboy boots. Then I remember him assaulting the woman. A single mom, new to town, who just was there to unwind before going back to her version of reality - except he made sure that she didn't make it home. They went outside to "talk" and he forced her into the trunk of his car. He drove out on the freeway and took her to the Sand Pit. He made her go out onto the plateau overlooking Morro Bay and slit her throat, then he raped her as she was dying - trying have his orgasm at the exect moment that she died. Then he mutilated her nose and eyes. I could still "hear" her last gasps and gurgles before she died.
Over the next several years, the nightmares repeated themselves, only with different women. I tried to explain them away, believing that something was wrong with me - that the nightmares were caused by a variety of factors in my life, depending on what was happening at the time. But, even though the events and feelings and relationships in my life changed, the nightmares, instead of going away, became more vivid, I remembered more details and felt more "real."
It seemd that the man was preying on single women, each year seeking out women who were one year older. His criteria for picking the women was simple. He told the women that he was a plastic surgern and asked them: "If you could change any part of your physical appearance, what would it be?" If they said that they were happy as they were, he found a way to move on and the woman was safe from him. If not, later in the conversation he would say, "I'll bet that you're a screamer." If the woman protested in any way that she was not, indeed, a "screamer", he would again move on. Heaven help the woman who answered as he desired.
He would find a way to get the woman to an isolated place: either the bluff (or below it), the wooded area where was first terrified or at a ranch near Atascadero. The ranch was owned by an elderly man who was slightly senile and deaf. THe murderer would help run the farm and the elderly man allowed him free run of his ranch.
When the man was alone with his intended, he would first tell her that he was so attracted to her that he wanted to help her fix the parts of her with which she was unhappy and he would take a Poleroid picture of her. Then he would move in and assault her as I described before, except that, instead of the nose and eyes, he would mutilate her part with which she had described as imperfect.
As we were driving along, I became terrified. It was blinding, taking my breath away and leaving me numb and speechless - all at the same time. I had no idea why I was frightened. I only knew that I was relieved as we passed from underneath the foilage of the path. I chalked up the experience to pregnancy paranoia since it didn't happen again for a very long time.
Fast forward to 1998. I met my boyfriend, Stephen online at Yahoo. He answered my post and we knew from our first conversation that we were a pair. About a year after we had been seeing each other, he wanted to go to the beach and talked about his favorite swimming hole, The Sand Pit. Since I was unfamiliar with the area, I readily agreed, since I love being with him.
As we were driving, I realized that this was the place that I had the previous bad feelings, but pushed aside my reservations and said nothing, thinking that 1984 was a fluke. Since I hate going in the ocean, I held onto Steve's watch, keys, pants and towel while he splashed around. As I was watching and enjoying the cool breezes (this was in November), I felt a thought come to me - "This would be a great place to hide bodies."
Now, since I am not a violent person and neither is Steve, I was shaken by the thought. I shook off the thought and we had a pleasant enough weekend. When I went home is when it all started: the nightmares and the intrusive thoughts. The first nightmare was vague. A man was in a bar in Atascadero hitting on women. There was country music in the background and I could barely see him. He was slightly balding and on the heavy-set side, with brown hair and blue eyes wearing black geek glasses and cowboy boots. Then I remember him assaulting the woman. A single mom, new to town, who just was there to unwind before going back to her version of reality - except he made sure that she didn't make it home. They went outside to "talk" and he forced her into the trunk of his car. He drove out on the freeway and took her to the Sand Pit. He made her go out onto the plateau overlooking Morro Bay and slit her throat, then he raped her as she was dying - trying have his orgasm at the exect moment that she died. Then he mutilated her nose and eyes. I could still "hear" her last gasps and gurgles before she died.
Over the next several years, the nightmares repeated themselves, only with different women. I tried to explain them away, believing that something was wrong with me - that the nightmares were caused by a variety of factors in my life, depending on what was happening at the time. But, even though the events and feelings and relationships in my life changed, the nightmares, instead of going away, became more vivid, I remembered more details and felt more "real."
It seemd that the man was preying on single women, each year seeking out women who were one year older. His criteria for picking the women was simple. He told the women that he was a plastic surgern and asked them: "If you could change any part of your physical appearance, what would it be?" If they said that they were happy as they were, he found a way to move on and the woman was safe from him. If not, later in the conversation he would say, "I'll bet that you're a screamer." If the woman protested in any way that she was not, indeed, a "screamer", he would again move on. Heaven help the woman who answered as he desired.
He would find a way to get the woman to an isolated place: either the bluff (or below it), the wooded area where was first terrified or at a ranch near Atascadero. The ranch was owned by an elderly man who was slightly senile and deaf. THe murderer would help run the farm and the elderly man allowed him free run of his ranch.
When the man was alone with his intended, he would first tell her that he was so attracted to her that he wanted to help her fix the parts of her with which she was unhappy and he would take a Poleroid picture of her. Then he would move in and assault her as I described before, except that, instead of the nose and eyes, he would mutilate her part with which she had described as imperfect.