UPDATED FOR 2023: Lovefraud received this note from a reader; we’ll call her Allison. She offers excellent advice for recovering from your entanglement with a sociopath: Don’t take it personally.
I want to thank everyone involved with the Lovefraud website. It is truly a gift. To the brave survivors, I wish you peace. I am a survivor myself. In fact, I’m divorcing mine as we speak. I will write my story another time because this time I only want to give a piece of advice that has helped me the most. When I was able to do this, the rest was easier to get through. I stopped taking it personally. It was not an easy task. I read everything I could get my hands on and while I learned his actions were mostly textbook, it was easier for me to let go. Once I convinced myself that I was not the first nor will I be the last, I shut my heart off and stopped taking it personally. This was my key to survival. I offered a silent apology to the women of the world for throwing this one back into the dating pool and went on with my life. I stopped taking it personally and I slept better, dreamed better, laughed more and found that I’ll be just fine. If this helps even one person, it will have made it worth it. Take care.
Simple, effective advice
Allison’s advice is very simple, but it goes directly to the core of the sociopath’s manipulation, betrayal and abuse. The sociopath never cared about us one way or the other. We were convenient targets. We had something the sociopath wanted. Or we presented an opportunity for the sociopath’s amusement.
Sociopaths do what they do, because that’s what they do. We just happened to be there.
Of course, that’s not what the sociopath told us. First, he or she proclaimed love and devotion, or a sterling opportunity to succeed together — whatever the promise was. Then, when the promise started falling apart, the sociopath told us it was all our fault.
We, as normal human beings, believed the original promise — how could anyone say those words and not mean them? So, when the blame started flying from the person who made the promise, we believed that as well.
As we say here on Lovefraud, the sociopath is the lie. And the sociopath lied because that’s what they do. They are missing the parts — emotional connections to other people and conscience — that make us human.
Opportunity for healing
Still, there is a reason that we went along with the sociopath’s program, and that is something we do need to take personally, for our own recovery and growth.
Read more: Seduced by a sociopath — It’s not love, it’s love fraud
This does not at all excuse the sociopath’s heartless behavior, nor is it meant to blame the victim. But most of us engaged because we wanted to believe the original promise.
We have to ask ourselves, what was missing within us that allowed us to believe? Did we have experiences in our pasts that made us susceptible to the manipulation? If so, it’s time to look at these issues and heal ourselves.
So as we extricate ourselves from the sociopath, understand that this is how they are, their behavior is not our fault, and don’t take it personally.
But we should take very personally the opportunity to excavate the old, erroneous tapes in our heads, and create wonderful new lives for ourselves.
Learn more: Comprehensive 7-part recovery series presented by Mandy Friedman, LPCC-S
Lovefraud originally posted this article on April 6, 2009.
LETTERS TO LOVEFRAUD: Hyper vigilance and PTSD
OxDrover
The older Ps that I have known, or known of their antics, did “slow down” some if they lived long enough that they got feeble physically, but if their minds were clear, I didn’t ever notice any emotional “improvement.” I know I should not “glory” in the downfall of any person, but I know of a couple of them that after a lifetime of conning others and abusing others “got theirs” the last few months of their lives with their health and no one to be “there” for them, as they essentially suffered and died alone. Plus I did witness her behavior get worst not better on the years.
Thanks. Having been with my ex s/p for 17 years I saw her “behavior” get worst over time. Therapy didn’t help and even losing two other children through a previous divorce didn’t teach her anything. I guess this is what really drove me “crazy”. Non of her actions i.e. decisions made any sense to me. Which is way I started to research and found out about personality disorders. God! How I wished I knew about this before hand because in my heart of hearts I believe I would have done things a lot differently. Which is why I still here and at other sites. “if i only knew”…
Anyway, HAPPY EASTER TO ALL!
Dear James,
Yep, in retrospect, I think we all would have done things a lot different than we did. LOL “Hindsight is 20/20,” but as my late husband used to say, “Life is tough, she gives the test first, and THEN the lesson.” So we can’t go back and get a “do-over” on all this mess.
Personally, I think that I still have a lot of things to work on in MYSELF, and now that I have given up on trying to fix the unfixable, I am becoming more enabled to work on me, and see more of what I need to work on. THAT is why I am “still here” on LF, as well.
As I get stronger and build emotional reserve strengths that I can “draw on” like a positive balance in a bank account, the smaller things in “life” (the “chit happens” stuff) don’t knock me to my knees any more. I am feeling more confident in setting boundaries and in moving those people who do not respect my boundaries or me to the curb and not looking back and questioning myself about doing this. While I did care about these people, and in some cases, felt VERY close to them, I realized that the relationship(s) was pretty or very ONE SIDED and I don’t need ANY one sided relationships any more. They just aren’t worth the EXPENDITURE of emotional energy that they “cost.”
Some of these relationships I have actually grieved over, and others I have had an “oh, well…” reaction to their loss, but in the end, I am grieving less over these losses than I previously would have before I “got smart” (or smart-ER, at least! LOL)
I do know I have reached a point in my healing that I am starting to put myself first, to be really and truly GOOD to myself and not feeling guilty or shameful for doing so. Plus, reaching this point, gives me so much more time and energy to focus on the GOOD in my life, the good people in my life, and the JOY of the here and now in the simple things in life.
My P-sperm donor used to talk about the “Old Chines Curse” of “May you live in INTERESTING TIMES”—and when you think about it, when nothing bad is happening all the time life may be kind of “boring” but when you are involved in chaos and drama it sure is “INTERESTING’—well, I am so tired of living an “interesting” life with drama and chaos that I am savoring every moment of peace available to me. Every moment of NOT having chaos, every moment of calm and serenity! It’s amazing to me now just how wonderful calm and peace and serenity is, and how much satisfaction I get out of life now without the other.
I have been involved with this site for just a short time but it has been so helpful already. People who have never been on the receiving end of an “S” just don’t understand how different these perps are from your every day jerks. It is so refreshing to hear what all of you have shared.
Does anyone know if there are any “sociopath survivor” support groups around the county? What a wonderful thought!
Justabouthealed,
You mention about looking inside of ourselves and asking what made us vulnerable to the sociopaths.
In the last few days, while I’ve been going through a lot of anger over a so-called friend I loaned money to, I have also had the urge to write down my life story. It’s been going through my head a lot. I always starts with: “I grew up being abused, neglected, and humiliated regularly till I moved out at 16” But in the last recital of the story to myself, I remembered another piece. I also was forced to work to pay my room and board from the time I was 7. The very day after my mother married my stepfather, he required us to work like slaves whenever we weren’t at school. This went on for years. Later, when I got old enough to get a real job and make my own money, I started saving. My stepfather managed to manipulate me into taking money out of my savings and giving it to him.
The issue with my friend not repaying the loan brought up all of these memories of being exploited for money from a young age. The question screaming through my mind is “WHO’S GONNA TAKE CARE OF ME???”
This is what made me vulnerable to the sociopath. Unconsciously, I have been waiting and waiting and waiting for someone to take care of me. I feel entitled to it and that I deserve it. Painfully, I have learned that depending on someone else to give me what was never given in childhood can backfire. The only person who can be the parent I never had is me.
Stargargazer:
Your post to “justabouthealed” was such an eye opener for me! I am at the point in my situation where I am starting to think in terms of moving on. Visualizing what my future might look like. Yes I would like a mate again but it scares the hell out of me to think that I will get sucked in again…. Your post has really got me thinking about my life story and it is so parallel to yours. I have asked myself over and over, what it is that has set me up to be ripe for the pickin’ for all the S’s out there. These next few days I am going to re-play my life from childhood forward with the hope that the journey will help me see the patterns, the abuse. All the revelations you have had so that I might for once find a sane, kind, genuine person to share the rest of my life with.
After dad left home (I was 9) I became Mom’s slave girl. My two older brothers and new baby sister were the fair haired children. All of the housework and cooking became my responsibility. Siblings got store bought school clothes, I got someone elses hand-me-downs. I could never join after school activities because I had to be home to start dinner and clean. My siblings were encouraged to participate in sports, scouts etc.
And for me, mom had “the look.” She had the ability to look at me in a way, that said volumes. It said I was dirty, un-loved, ugly and a thorn in her side. And she never had to utter a word! Aent out of her way to make me feel ugly, dress ugly…… Not having a dad at home along with this crap of hers of course, set me up as a target for hungry users who saw how vulnerable I was.
Anyway, thanks for getting me thinking on this. This is great.
Spanky
I’m having a hard time today. All the memories have come flooding back. It helps to read your posts everybody. Thanks.
Knowing how vulnerable I was makes me feel weak. I’m still vulnerable bc nobody cared. I never had my mother’s love and my father was an abusive SOB. After the S got thru with me there was nothing left. My soul is gone. I keep telling myself to take it one more day. Just one more day until its over. I have to let natural death take me bc of a promise that I made to my kids. Sometimes its so hard.
I can’t post anymore today bc I’ve got to go home and take care of my family. I feel like my whole life is about taking care of other people and never about me. I told my husband once about what the S did to me and his response was….to change the subject.
Sorry people. I’m having a pity party today….
Dear Gogettergirl,
I hear your pain, and I think I can relate to that as well. Taking care of everyone else and never myself, it is hard to stop that CYCLE, but I am doing it one day at a time. I also hear your desire for this pain to stop STOP, and I am glad that you will not end your life prematurely. Many suvivors have wanted to end their lives and later changed their minds….no one who ever ended it was ever able to change their mind at that point, so I am GLAD you won’t hurt yourself.
The thing now is to get you to start taking care of YOU.
I’m not sure who your family is made up of, but unless they are tiny infants, then I think you can stop doing “everything” for them and SOME THINGS FOR YOURSELF. If you have been doing all the “taking care of” for them they may object to this, but YOU HAVE A RIGHT, A DUTY AND AN OBLIGATION TO TAKE CARE OF YOURSELF, if you don’t take care of yourself, how can you take care of someone else. NEGLECTING OURSELVES TO CARE FOR SOMEONE ELSE IS ****NOT OK**** unless that person is a critically ill infant! Even then, we have to take breaks from caregiving it cannot go on 24/7 for very long. EVERY CAREGIVER who is obligated to care for others is also OBLIGATED TO CARE FOR THEMSELVES.
I never knew that for a long time, now I relaize I hvae neglected myself for most of my life, but I am NOT going to do this any more. It doesn’t mean I don’t take care of things that have to be taken care of, becuse I do but I put myself first before I take care of others. My kids are grown, and though they live with me, I don’t “care for them” like children, we SHARE responsibilities for household duties and I have raised them that I am NOT their maid. Since each of us has our own talents and strengths, we do sort of have things divided up in to different duties, but any of us can about do most of the things around here (we live on a farm) so while most of the time we do the things we like the most (or dislike the least) the household duties are a SHARED RESPONSIBILITY for everyone. You might tell your family that you are tired and that you think things should be more cooperative about taking care of things.
Even if your children are small, they can pick up their toys, put their clothing in the dirty clothes hamper and start to learn to dust, put groceries away, run a vacuum cleaner, mow grass, set the table, etc. As they reach 10-12 years old there isn’t much about cleaning a house that they shouldn’t be able to accoplish with a little guideance and oversight.
IF you have not had them doing these things earlier, they may object, but be firm and set some boundaries. STICK TO THEM. If your kids are old enough to do their own laundry, insist that they do it. Tell them in advance, then say “If you don’t wash your own clothing it will not get washed.” Then DO NOT wash it. When they get down to dirty clothes they will usually start to do it.
IF they are old enough to help with cooking and dish washing, if they don’t help, let the dishes pile up— you can eat a P-B and J sandwich and let them fix their own if they won’t help with the cooking. Let them wash dishes or eat out of dirty plates. YOU ARE NOT POWERLESS. You just have to exercise that POWER. Sometimes it is more h assle to exercise the power than it is to do it, at least it seems that way, but stick to taking care of YOU and it WILL GET EASIER! You are not responsible for making everyone in the world happy, fat and lazy—YOU DESERVE CARE TOO! So start taking care of yourself!!! ((((hugs))))) and my p rayers for youl.
Thanks Oxdrover. Yesterday was a bad day. A friend of mine got word that they were being laid off and it triggered a bad reaction for me and I spiraled out of control.
You’re right about needing to take care of myself more. My kids are actually pretty good about helping out; the problem is that I pamper them bc I was never pampered myself and don’t want them to feel as unloved as I did. I need to work on on pampering myself more, I just don’t know how. I’ll work on that.
You’ve been very supportive to all of us here and I thank you. You are indeed an angel. Thanks again. ((((hugs back!!)))))
gogettergirl….kids. I have good ones. And I’ve “spoiled” my 13 -year old daughter. Now I’m “unspoiling” her. She’s beginning to learn about my new boundaries, what NO means, and what respect for others means.
Yesterday, we talked after school. Her best friend has “control” issues. My daughter is discovering what happens when you stand up to a bully…what it costs and what you gain. I think she’ll figure it out….she’s getting there.
Take care of yourself. Your kids will see it and learn something….and probably gain more respect and appreciation for you, and themselves.
I re-found a quote I saw a few months ago yesterday…reminded me of my parents…best anyone could have:
It was in Gavin de Becker’s The Gift of Fear, under the Chapter heading, #12-Fear of Children, pg 254…..
“My father did not tell me how to live. He lived, and let me watch him do it.”….Clarence Budinton Kelland
gogettergirl….live, live well…let ’em watch. They’ll probably help.
Best wishes for you and them,
Jim