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
quack – meow – yee haw – bark – sounds like a zoo too me
Dear Oxy ~ Glad to hear you got yourself a good deal on the water heater. I’m with you on not having the water too hot. I like to hand was a lot of the dishes too.
Interesting names for the kitties lol.
Dear Hens ~ all Oxy needs now is the cluck cluck from her ducky daddy LOL
Yea, when I was a kid my granny boiled the men’s work clothes out in the back yard in a big kettle…she had a wringer washer from the time I was a baby but she used the kettle to boil the work clothes clean….I still hang clothes out in the summer time on the line…except for good clothes (go-to-town clothes I dry in the dryer) cause I like the way they smell when they’ve been on the line.
When we were in the bush I washed clothes by stomping on them in a big tub of water and soap…I can “make do” if I have to….but do like my comforts when I can have them.
It is like a zoo….and I’m the monkey!
Just got done watching “Cadillac Records” about Muddy Waters and Little Walter and Howling Wolf, and Etta James and all the great musicians of the 1950s….loved the music!
Usta have a cat named “Chairman Meow”—sucker kept crapping behind the piano, NEVER IN THE BOX, so I threw him outside to live and he would wait til the kids opened the door and scoot in under their legs and yep, carp behind the piano…when they let him in I made them clean it up….I got to abusing that cat—could hit the garage wall when I flung him out the back door! Finally decided, “enough is enough, he dies when I get home from work today”—even the kids were OK with that. Well, he knew I was gonna kill him I think, and he knew I would have ENJOYED DOING IT, so he flung himself in front of a car that day while I was gone to work, and kilt himself. Deprived me of the joy of doing it, the sorry sucker! Never had another cat that refused to use a litter box….son D’s cat will carp in his bed if he is gone from home for days at a time if she can get into his room, but that’s just showing her displeasure in him leaving her, Chairman NEVER used the cat box….refused to. Only pet animal I ever grew to HATE! D’s cat tolerates me only when he is gone….and he’s such a fool over her it is disgusting! And he’s not even a “cat person” just this one cat…
I think chairman meow was a psychopathic cat, or a demon or something….but he was so beautiful, but EVIL! Yep, that’s it, he was a P….
Oxy,
I’d love your farm esp. the gurly kittens! LOL the cat kilt himself…lololol.
Yea, Ana, sometimes it is the FUNNY FARM and sometimes the crazy farm! But the animals are therapy sometimes and I like watching them and interacting with them. Dog and Mouse are so cute, haven’t had any kittens for about 3 years now and am enjoying them.
OX You mean ole biddy, hurtin that poor little putty cat. I am not a cat person at all..but when spathboy moved in with me he had abandoned his cat’s, so his X called me and told me to tell him to get his f–in cats…so we go and get five f—in cats, put em out in the barn for a few days so they wouldnt run away, soon the whole place was infested with fleas including the wieners and my self, well I spent a fortune and weeks gettin rid of flea infestation..then those cats turned into 15 cats..so I found new homes for all but one and when he left me he left the cat..and the cat screamed and hissed at me everytime I looked at it, so I gave it away…fast forward two years the X shows up in a shiny new truck askin for his cat – well i say it aint here and slam the door on him…nah i dont need a cat…there are a few strays that keep the mice population down..no offense to cat people, kittys are cute.. he didnt want his f–in cat, he just wanted to show off his truck .
Hens,
How repulsive! Just to show off a new truck…ewww. I could nevah abandon a cat.
Oxy,
Do you have any nanny goats? I also meant to ask you what is oat groates? I’ve never heard that before. Glad the animals are therapuetic for you, very niiiice.
Ana, nah, no goats now, too much trouble to keep and I don’t need that much milk any more….oat groats are the oat kernel of grain with the HUSK off but it is like a little oval shaped nut-like kernel. Rolled oats are the flattened ones like you get for regular Quaker oatmeal…the groats have a nutty texture but take longer to cook.
I like goats though, but just can’t have everything in the world, takes too much time effort and money to keep everyone healthy and happy. I used to milk goats and kept females and only got a male part of the year, I do most of my own vetting, shots and such, worming etc. but animals are NOT cheap to keep. Fortunately I can buy the shots for my critters, dogs and cats and do it myself and a few things I have to purchase at the vet’s but keeps the cost lower than if I took them to the vets for everything. I do my best to keep them healthy and keep the fleas and ticks off them….cause if they get on the critters they get on me when I handle the critters.