 De Blanc, who traveled frequently, ended the engagement soon afterward.In 1965 and 1966, Joplin commuted from her family's Port Arthur home to Beaumont, Texas, where she had regular sessions with a psychiatric social worker named Bernard Giarritano at a counseling agency that was funded by the United Fund, which after her death changed its name to the United Way.Interviewed by biographer Myra Friedman after his client's death, Giarritano said Joplin had been baffled by how she could pursue a professional career as a singer without relapsing into drugs, and her drug-related memories from immediately prior to returning to Port Arthur continued to frighten her.