Not long ago, Lovefraud received the following note from a reader:
Your articles have given me a lot of peace and the ability to see good in life again, though I’ll never go back into the mainstream of society because of the abuse and betrayal I’ve experienced. It’s sad that the vision and understanding one achieves after being victimized by a sociopath prevents you from ever being able to get close to anyone again. I’m working through that though, so I just take it one step at a time. Maybe you could write some more about that?
Yes, dear readers, we do need to take recovery one step at a time. But know that we can go back to the mainstream of society. We can recover to the point of allowing ourselves to open to love again.
For each of us, the experience of the sociopath was probably the most traumatic of our lives. The betrayal shakes us to our souls. But sometimes what gets shaken loose is the negative beliefs that enabled us to fall for the sociopath in the first place. Beliefs like “I’m not good enough.” “Nobody loves me.” “There’s something wrong with me.”
Those were my beliefs. They were buried deep in my psyche, hidden by my brains, writing talent and management ability. But my ex-husband, James Montgomery, plowed through my life, crushing the structures I’d built to present myself to the world—like my career, bank account and credit rating. With the structures gone, I came face to face with the beliefs.
The beliefs were wrong. It was the sociopathic upheaval that enabled me to realize that and let them go.
How did I do it? Quite honestly, it was painful. I cried. I raged. I released layers and layers of negative emotion. And finally, on April 19, 2001, I gave up the battle to make my ex pay me back.
Nine days later I met Terry Kelly. We dated. We fell in love. We married.
Friday was our fifth wedding anniversary. We still love each other as we did when our romance was new and fresh. Today, we exchanged mushy Valentines.
These have been the happiest years of my life. We enjoy each other’s company. We comfort each other in times of stress. We support each other in everything—in fact, without Terry, there would be no Lovefraud.
So yes, there can be life and love after the sociopath.
Please do not give up on life because of the terrible experience. If you do, then the predator will truly have won.
Instead, give yourself time and permission to heal. Find the blind spot within you that made it difficult for you to see the sociopath’s agenda. Recognize that you are now educated about this personality disorder, and you won’t be fooled again. Trust your intuition.
When we’re in the midst of the pain and trauma, it is difficult to believe that life can turn around. But we really do need to believe it, and allow ourselves to move, day by day, toward our own healing. Because healing can bring us love.
Yea with all the weather we’ve had it’s been really nasty out, today was rain and cold, and still ice on the ground. Going to be below freezing tonight so the outside dogs get to come in before bedtime, my son D’s “Black mouthed Curr” dog smells like a HOUND DOG, boy does she ever. Washing doesn’t help either it is just that “hound dog smell” so she gets to go in a crate, and my Border Collie doesn’t smell much better so he gets to go in the bathroom so he doesn’t pollute the carpet in the rest of the house with his nasty smell! He did have 6 new “grandpuppies” born a couple of days ago though, that makes nearly a hundred “grandpuppies” that I know about! The inside cat who thinks she rules the world and the little inside dog feel invaded and jealous…yea, it’s a ZOO around here sometimes but they keep us belly laughing with their antics! Watching the little dog and the cat wrestling on the floor, each sooo careful not to hurt the other one, but appearing to really “fight” is a hoot! I think if I couldn’t have any other animals I’d have to have a gold fish at least! Or one of Star’s snakes, only a tiny one in a big glass cage, not to handle! Just something breathing to watch if nothing else.
I love my skillets, too, they are great to cook in and great weapons too! Great non-stick surfaces if you take care of them and some of mine are at least 100 years old, going through to the 5th generation of cooks when I am gone. Even as many folks here on LF as I have “boinked” they are still in one piece! LOL
Now I am imagining lightening bolts coming off your skillets as you wave them… what with all the bad weather… ya know.
thanks, donna, for all your hard work in keeping this site going and growing. it most likely saved my life.
Dear Donna,
So many times I have come to LF to learn, seek solace and share. I’ve read so much on here and had so much help from you and others on here. I know this site was started because of YOUR pain and you took that pain and did something magnificent with it. You started LF. Thank God you did! Your story, which I’ve read in depth, your journey and where you are today gives me much hope for the future. I know there is a light at the end of the tunnel and I can even see it on some days! 🙂
My Valentine’s Day gift yesterday was to myself. I spent yesterday recounting all of the GOOD things in my life, the very special people who have loved/ and still love me and thankfulness those people are or have been in my life.
I had a very profound moment in which the world stopped, or so it seemed, and I could see through the confusion and chaos, the messes I’m still cleaning up and slogging through… and I saw ME, a wonderful human being, a perfectly imperfect person made in the eyes of a loving God. I am here for a reason, a good one. God doesn’t make mistakes with any of us. We survivors are a special lot. I don’t think anyone comes to value the true meaning of self-love and the REAL love of others such as we do. I’ll never be perfect (perfect is boring!), but I’ll keep striving to be the best ME I can be. If you ask God for validation that things will get better, He gives it to you. It was a wonderful moment, suspended in time, that showed me what was to come and that I can get through anything.
I agree with lostingrief, this site has pretty much saved my life as well. I’ve been able to write my way through so many rough times and there’s always someone here who “gets it”. Wherever I am at any given point in time, someone on LF has been there before me and understands. That’s such a gift!
Thank you again, Donna!
Cat
Wow…. I haven’t been on here in quite a while and haven’t posted anything on here in just as long…..
Like my friend Aloha, finding love again hasn’t happened yet for me either..but…when that gift does come my way.. I will be ready. I saw it written above and I have said it many times myself… Good does come from bad… that is if you let it. My s-path adventure beagn nearly 5 years ago now and ended a year later… what a difference a year makes…. my story is like all the others, so I won’t re-hash it … and like everybody else, I was left beat-up and kicked to the curb…It was nine months (and a nervous breakdown later) after she slithered out of my life that I found lovefraud and it simply blew me away when I read all of those traits, read the stories, then read the blogs…..I simply could not get enough information about adult personality disorders and with everything I read… over and over it all fit together… I had been dupped, conned, abused, devalued then thrown away….Like many here, I went through many stages in my healing..anger, denial at times, self-pity, disbelief, PTSS…and for the most part… a hopelessness… the pain just would not go away…my self esteem and my pride were severely damaged and even though I intellectually knew that it wasn’t about me, I felt worthlessness about myself….This was not me… I had never felt this way about myself before…the trauma of it all had affected me deep within my psyche.
For the next few years, I worked very hard on me..trying to figure out the how’s and why’s about me and why this event in my life seemed to stop me in my tracks. Slowly, in time I began to heal… I began to recapture the essence of myself and I did fall in love again…with myself…with the beauty of my own heart.
It’s been four years now since I was involved with a sociopath, and the journey has been a long hard road to say the least…. but I can look back and see a lot of good that came from my journey and during that time, I grew spiritually and emotionally… and I became a stronger person because of it all….but I think the most important thing… the most beautiful thing that came from this whole ride was… my capacity for love grew and my wisdom and knowledge of just what real love is went to a new, higher level….
Today, I am thankful… I love myself and I love my life…. God used the sociopath (she was the perfect instrument) to bring me closer to Him and closer to being the man He always intended for me to be….and that makes me very, very happy.
“I am strong because I am weak
I am beautiful because I know my flaws
I am a lover because I’m a fighter
I am fearless because I have been afraid
I am wise because I have been foolish
And I can laugh because I’ve known sadness.”
Love to all..
Southernman
http://www.myspace.com/southernman429
southerman – Dr. Leedom has posted that they need more responses from those of us who were involved with femail spaths for the lovefraud survey.
there is a link on the ‘How does ODD relate to sociopathy?’ thread.
Send a southernman a note on his blog.
hi aloha – i am not on myspace, so i will hope he comes back here.
Dear Donna and all Members of LF, just so grateful for this site and realize it is a process , all of life . I spent 1 valentines in rehab 6 years ago, best decision of my life then quite a few waiting for the s to appreciate me , then recently took a detour with another guy and lost a little more trust but im learning and yes im still hurt over many men and decisions i’ve made but i know now that im worth so much more so if im meant to be alone anothe r 8 years than so be it. Im finally starting to get where the self love comes in first and it’s nice just to do what i want when i want to . There are so many things i’d like (Job, nice man) but i have what i need and i know nothing or nobody can truly make me happy it has to come within so im letting God take care of this part, handing it over to him when i can. There is a song called “Little Wonders” and i picked it as mine in the Trauma program by Rob Thomas as it’s really the little things in life that really matter and ther is a line that says “it’s the heart that really matters in the end” and that is what we’ve all learned the hard way, if someone doesn’t have a heart , we can’t give them ours. Anyway that song just makes me grateful and i wish everyone a great Valentine s Day. love kindheart
One-step,
I will send Southernman a note on Myspace.
thanks.