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
Sorry, It’s none of my damn business!
Kim-I have felt like she was a lot like me from the beginning, and I think that’s why I was happy to move in next to her-initially. She also seemed happy for me to be there. Once I lost my job, and everything went down hill, her behavior changed. She has thrown up a brick wall since the day after I gave her the ammo. I know I scared her. When I went to her 2 weeks later to get it back, she looked like she was about to cry when I asked for it. I had to reassure her that everything was alright. Several times I had to look at her and say DK, it’s alright, it’s OK. Finally she gave in and gave it back. I apologized for giving it to her to begin with, and she said “it’s ok, I would rather have you here-so don’t worry about scaring me.” After that it seems that a brick wall was up, because the next time I saw her she was different and has been ever since. On the night I have it to her she told me” ya know even before you lost your job, I could tell that you weren’t happy-even when you first moved in here, I didn’t think you were happy”.
I still think that we are a lot a like and I wonder if she has something painful that she has been burying down there deep like I have been. She doesn’t let herself feel-I didn’t let myself feel for 18 years until this finally boiled up on Sunday morning. I feel so confused. Part of me feels what Sky is talking about but part of me doesn’t. It’s really hell being a compassionate and empathetic person. I feel too much.
Kim,
at first I thought as you did. I thought the problem was in 2bcop being tooooo dramatic. and yes, she is. But that isn’t the problem here. It’s part of the problem because she ran into a spath. And that spath saw her as EXCELLENT drama supply and she is trying to feed on her. She has been very manipulitive. A normal person would simply AVOID 2bcop because of all the drama. She would scare off a normal person, but this isn’t a normal person. She is doing the whipsaw, blowing hot and cold to get MORE emotion out of 2bcop. Furthermore, she is the one who started talking about suicide, just because 2bcop has a gun. She talks about death and dying. She is not normal, Kim.
2bcop has lots of issues and she is trying to deal with them. Unfortunately the NL is trying to feed off those issues. Drama queens attract spaths, you and I know that. Once you’ve been spath supply, you attract more of them.
When you stand back and look at the whole picture, it appears very different than when you just focus on one of the players.
Sky-thanks so much for making me feel so much better (sarcasm)
(((2bcop)))
I hope I didn’t offend you. You are not very different from most of us here, having been raised with drama and N’s. I can relate, completely.
I’m only now learning to “put my hands up and step away from the drama” (said using a police officer’s voice)
I still attract spaths! But I no longer feed them. They leave looking very confused!
Sky-I’m not offended. I am kinda sarcastic in nature and sarcasm doesn’t come off well in written language cuz you’re minus facial expressions or tone of voice.
The truth is I AM A DRAMA QUEEN and I don’t know if that came from my past but I wish it could stop. I really think that I alienate people by being this way and I am alienateing DK next door because of it. She totally avoids me now and I am avoiding her but it doesn’t feel right. I wish things were like they were before I lost my job-we were friendly with each other and she smiled at me. I don’t think that she is the first person I’ve alienated at all. I hope I can address this too when I am in counseling-maybe the rape and me depressing it has something to do with it. I just don’t want to be like this anymore.
She’s spath as far as I’m concerned, so alienate her away!
🙂
Try to envision your alter ego, dressed as a cop, telling you to “step away from the drama”. It’s kind of what I do. I hear an authoritive voice saying that.
But it’s hard when there is a spath around, they are soooo disgusting.
Sky-it’s hard to understand because she didn’t come off like that in the beginning-when things were good.
I’m going to try to do what you said. I can hear my friend HK’s voice saying that to me. She is the district commander where I live who is wanting me back in the police with her. I can totally hear her saying that to me.
Yesterday I said happy Police Week to this really cute female sargeant that was by my house working. They were filming a movie in the neighborhood and she was doing traffic. She was really glad that I said that to her. She was so cute!
My spath reached out to me – sent an email – he’s back with his ex wife- they’re “reconnecting and rebuilding” – he says he doesn’t ever want to forget me.
It’s been about 5 weeks NO CONTACT.
There are moments that I feel so glad he’s gone, and then there are moments when I just feel so sick to my stomach. I’m not sure if it’s
a) I miss him
b) I’m just so pissed at myself for allowing the abuse
c) I feel so alone
Maybe a combination of all three? I don’t know what PSTD is, but I’m still shaking from all of this.
Will it ever be over? Will I ever have a normal day?
I noticed I do feel better if I don’t watch from behind the curtain.
Superkid10
superkid10
my advice would be to not read ANY of his correspondences to you, whether they be email, text, voicemail ( well this one is a bit more tricky but the instant you know it’s the P I would say STOP listening to it and delete it right there )
In my opinion it is a very IMPORTANT part of the healing process to minimize any contact whatsoever. You are still trying to make sense of what happened, you don’t need the triggers, you don’t need the word-salad that the P will spew in order to encourage “What if?” type thinking ( that’s how they hook you, see? )
It WILL get better. Let me repeat : It WILL get better! Do not read any of his messages, do not allow an iota of a word or letter coming out of his mouth to be acknowledged. It’s just going to be the same thing. Take back control and that is maintaining NO CONTACT.. reading his emails is not part of NO CONTACT. You already know his M.O.
You’re still in the early stages of putting things back together so no doubt it’s painful. You’ve just endured hell on earth. But you’re away from the P now, you have the opportunity to flourish and surround yourself with good people, good energy, good vibes, you have the opportunity to put your energy ( that was wasted on the P ) into yourself. So I will say, no matter how tough the road in healing may be, remember in the back of your mind, you’re already on your way, you’ve already championed your soul from the depths of hell ( time with the P ) and it may not feel good now, but you have to trudge through the mud to get to the other side.
It’s frightening sometimes, it’s overwhelming. I’d say if you can take a few hours out of each day to do something for yourself, something you enjoy, to do so. Healing is an arduous process, and is not to be tucked under the rug or ignored but being good to yourself is important too.
((((((big hugs))))))
It’s going to be okay ! Trust me. <3
You’re already on your way.