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.
“first, our pleasures die, and then our hopes, and then our fears, and when these are done, the debt is due, dust claims dust, and we die too.”
that’s beautiful oxy. thank you.
she is going – and now i am just going to celebrate her and grieve her – not try to control the death of her body in any way. she’s so special.
Dear One/Joy,
At 95 and with her body failing her, having outlived most of her friends, there probably aren’t many pleasures left for her in this earthly plane, but losing her fear allows her to move on to the next plane.
Most of us still have some pleasures left and some hopes, and we still have fears and aren’t ready to move on to that next plane yet. Your gram is past the point of this earthly plane having much meaning to her, so she CAN freely and without fear pass on. I think that is a wonderful gift and you can grieve her, yet not with so much sadness or pain. Just be grateful for having known her, and for her example. That will allow you to remember the times with her, to remember her example, and not feel huge pain in your grief. (((hugs))))
she’s the only good one in the bunch oxy….it’s hard to lose her.
Dear One/Joy, I am sure it is difficult for YOU to let her go, but in this instance it will be (and I am sure ALREADY IS) best for HER to let go of PRESENT REALITY and of this mortal plane in which her body still lives and breathes. That’s the thing that is so hard, is WE don’t want to let them go for our own selfish desire to keep them WITH us.
But, like with my step father’s illness and death, when the time came for him to actually depart this mortal plane, he was ready to go and we were ready to let him go. We had done our grieving BEFORE he died physically. So that most of the “work” and “pain” of the grief process was over by the time he actually quit breathing. I grieved his dying together with him which made it easier for me to go through.
I know you’ve had one painful “event” right after another, and sometimes we think “Man, I’ve paid my dues with pain, I deserve to not have any more events for a while” but that isn’t the way life works, I’m sad to say. Events will pile up one on top of the other until we think we will be crushed by the weight of their pain. You’ve had more than your share of them lately, but at the same time, I have seen so much recovery and so much growth in you, One. “What doesn’t kill us makes us stronger” so keep that in mind as you bear the burdens of more grief.
Stop, take a breather, and turn around and LOOK at what is already behind you in the last couple of years, don’t just look ahead at the mountains you still have to climb, but look back and see JUST HOW FAR YOU HAVE ALREADY COME! ((hugs)))
oxy, life ceratinainly doesn’t work that way – or i woul dnot have had the tradgedy in mine that I have had. those piles, well i think we could call them ‘cluster fucks.’ i don’t really expect that to stop. ‘there is suffering’…there are a couple of ways i know to live: to enjoy the tiny things, and to meditate enough that there is space around the agony of life.
i have not had a great deal of happiness in my life. I do not know how that came to be, but it is true. i do not know how to change the next part of my life – i don’t know HOW to make it different.
BUT, each day there is something that makes me smile. and that might be all i have for a long while, or ever. it’s not really ‘enough’, but it is still worth it.
oh my, losing gram is making me quite verklempt.
i think the hardest thing about cluster fucks is that they take away meaning. they depress me. they always have.
no good perspective tonight, just feel overwhelmed with pain.
fucking anniversaries.
Dear One/Joy,
Find pleasure in the small things of life. I think that is what makes up “happiness”– those tiny things that make us smile, that give us joy and peace. When we get the angst and rage, thirst for revenge and wrath out of our hearts and mind, there is ROOM for PEACE.
Even “Sadness,” like for the upcoming loss of your gram, need not ruin your peace or joy.
onesteprs – is verklempt a new word?
one – your not alone in feeling not happy – like something we didnt get from the get go…
I gave up on happy and replaced it with peace of mind…
Maybe in our next life?
sweet dreams and sleep well – and take life one step at a time and find joy in your neighbor dog and anything that makes you feel peaceful.
Hens, I had to look it up too but it means “choked with emotion” and depending on which definition you accept is either Yiddish and/or German origin. See, I told you I learn something NEW every day on LoveFraud.
oh come on, you guys!!!
you don’t remember, “coffee talk with linda richmond”?
Mike Myers was Linda Richmond on Saturday Night Live.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QqPiJ0L7YmY
He made the word “verklempt” part of the cultural vernacular.
You gotta see this, it’s just to die for.
Could it be that the behavior we are here discussing is true of 98% of men and there is in fact only a few decent men? I ask cos men in general are not very emphatic and its more often than not men who break up families either cos of violence or affairs?