How to recognize and recover from everyday sociopaths - narcissists

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    • March 3, 2021 at 10:09 pm #65419
      sept4
      Participant

      My ex used to absolutely spoil me with gifts and flowers and chocolates and luxury items. I always thought it was because he loved me so much. I felt very loved and pampered and spoiled.

      He started this in the early love bombing phase but actually continued all throughout the marriage and even during the breakup. During the breakup this confused me so much because how could he want to both leave me and give me gifts? Did he love me or not? If he did not love me then why did he buy me gifts? If he did love me then why did he leave me? I did not understand his motives at the time.

      Only later did I realize the gifts were not tokens of love. They were manipulation tools to control me. To bribe me into thinking he loved me. To control and coerce and brainwash me. To weaken me emotionally and to bond me emotionally so I could not stand up to him. To pacify me into feeling content and loved instead of looking into what he was really doing. To distract me from any clues about what he was really doing. And during the breakup to emotionally weaken me and trick me into thinking he still loved me so that I would not fight him in a divorce.

      • This topic was modified 3 years, 10 months ago by sept4.
    • March 5, 2021 at 6:49 am #65424
      Donna Andersen
      Keymaster

      sept4 – that’s such a good observation. My sociopathic ex-husband also gave me gifts, flowers, etc, especially in the beginning. He made a big show out of it. There was also jewelry – although I later learned he was stealing the jewelry from other women. He also went through my jewelry to give to other women.

    • March 6, 2021 at 10:35 am #65427
      Jan7
      Participant

      Sept4, yes! the lovebombing gifts giving during my attempted break ups escapes was the worst with the level of confusion. I wanted so desparately to escape but, he was so masterful with his pity me manipuation, gift giving etc tactics…I’m not a person that needs gifts to feel love, so it always was a RED flag when he bought gifts & tons of flowers. It acutally made me uncomfortable and wondered why he was doing this action.

      Donna, I beleive my ex was doing same with stealing my expensive jewelry I had before we met, as it would go missing for some time then “returned” or go missing indefinitely and he would “buy me” gold/jewels jewelry that looked out of style (possibly a inherited old jewerly). It was all very odd.

      Also, if I left earring on the bathroom counter in a dish, one of the earring would go missing indefinitely. I thought the first time this happened that he put the one earring down the drain. My gut did not trust him. I was always took good care for my jewelry, especially how I stored them. So for this to happen it was crushing. but, I never said a word to him about my gut instincts, maybe out of fear.

      Thanks you for posting your post it just solidifies that my gut was correct with regards to him stealing my jewelry & giving it to others then returning it at a later date and same with the other women he was messing around with jewelry.

      He is a sick minded man.

    • March 6, 2021 at 6:27 pm #65428
      sept4
      Participant

      Jan7 that is so terrible about the jewelry. 🙁

      Mine bought me overly expensive jewelry as well but I was with him at the store to buy it.

      During the breakup he even took me to the Chanel store and bought me a super expensive handbag. Yet he made no attempt to get back together or to have any sort of genuine conversation about what was going on.

      I was soooooo confused that he spent thousands of dollars buying gifts but didn’t seem open to any sort of genuine communication about the marriage falling apart and next steps to take.

      I experienced extreme cognitive dissonance and confusion about what was going on and whether he loved me or not and whether he wanted to get back together or not. I could not understand it at all.

      Thankfully I found out pretty quickly about personality disorders online and then everything started making sense.

      Although my first research online was about early onset Alzheimer’s disease. Because he was acting so strange and so erratic and contradicting himself so much that I thought he had some horrible brain disease. Because I just could not imagine that his behavior was intentional. 🙁

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