Happy Independence Day weekend. It is a lucky coincidence that this is our topic, because emotional freedom is truly about personal revolution. It is an end to collaboration with and submission to abuse. It is an end to the emotional slavery of feeling responsible for other people’s feelings and other things that are beyond our control.
Emotional freedom is something that might be difficult to imagine when we are in the first stages of healing — especially if it’s the first time we’ve ever processed an abuse-related trauma all the way through to the end. At least once, we need to go through all the stages to take a good look at patterns of denial or bargaining that made us vulnerable to abusers or tolerant of their behavior. We need to develop internal strengths — like easy access to anger and confidence in our rights to defend ourselves — that might have been suppressed before. We need to learn for ourselves that we can live through loss and letting go, and actually learn something from it.
But if we get to this point — thinking about the idea of emotional freedom and working on developing it in ourselves — we are close to the end of fully integrating this experience. Turning it into a gift rather than a disaster, and coming out of this long tunnel with our new selves in a new world.
What does respect have to do with it?
In the last article on self-love, the concept of respect was introduced. It is connected to self-love, because as we come to love, trust and believe we are entitled to care for ourselves, we develop a sense of separateness. Of boundaries. We come to realize that we have private interests, concerns and needs. They belong to us. They are our responsibility. They are also the sources of good in our lives. And we are entitled to explore them, define them for ourselves, pursue them, and plan our lives around them.
If anyone reading this finds the last paragraph triggering an emotional reaction, a feeling like you really need to get away from this article, go find something else to read here on LoveFraud, you have clear evidence of something important in yourself. Because that paragraph contradicts all the emotional training of abusive, enmeshed, victim-rescuer environments that demand loyalty, silence and compromises of identity and self-respect in order to be loved or simply survive.
The first time I ever encountered information like that, I read it over and over. The words made sense. But they didn’t compute. I had phrases popping up in my head like “easy for you to say” and “you don’t live with the demands and pressures that I do” and “I would be rejected by everyone I need to support me, if I thought like that.”
If you are having a reaction like that, I understand and respect the reality behind it. This push-back is coming from a normal strategy for survival that works. If we are willing to give up pieces of ourselves — our independence, our individuality, our ethics, our expressiveness — we can get paid for it. One of the real challenges that every person faces in life is to walk a fine line of balancing what we can do, need to do and are willing to do to fulfill our survival needs and our discretionary (but important) wants.
Where this becomes dysfunctional and self-destructive is when our sense of what we can give away — and still survive as whole people — is broken. When we have been “trained” in some excruciating and threatening situation to deny important aspects of our identity or fundamental human needs in order to get through it. When that situation is finally over, we are often left with warped ideas of relationships. But more important, our relationships with ourselves are damaged . Because it felt like a choice, even we perceived it as life or death. Some part of us holds us responsible and simply does not trust us anymore. We may live around it. We may develop all kind of strengths to compensate. But it feels as though some wires have been pulled inside of us. As though the lights have gone out in certain rooms of our mind.
This is why, for so many people, it is necessary to find a good therapist, experienced in trauma or childhood abuse, to help us untangle these situations. The “cure” is to go back and reject the deal we made. Not reject ourselves, but to reject the unfairness and inhumanity of the circumstances that forced us to do this damage to ourselves. Do it in memory, but also in our emotional systems. To identify the causes as abusive and wrong and not respectful of our normal human needs to maintain our own integrity. And to say to ourselves, and possibly the people involved, I no longer agree to this deal. I am taking myself back.
Integrity, like respect, is one of those words that many of us barely understand. We talk about integrity in terms of ethical issues, and that’s part of it. But integrity is much more than that. The world means wholeness, like “integer” means a whole number, rather than a fraction of a number. For our purposes here, we can imagine it as having all the internal “electrical” parts that we are supposed to have — all the natural emotions, open connections among the various parts of our brain, a balanced and high-functioning nervous system, vivid sensory awareness — adding up to keen animal survival instincts and the full range of sentient consciousness we have as human beings.
If something disrupts or corrupts our integrity in any way, we feel it deeply. We live with the pain of knowing something inside of us is not right. For many of us, that pain is the way we know ourselves best. But as we start to resolve these issues, to go back and reject those deals and repair ourselves, we become more conscious of something we have mutely longed for — the simple but powerful feeling of wholeness. Our integrity.
Even if we get there by incremental resolutions of the sources of pain — which is how most of us do get there — every step forward delivers a breathtaking new awareness of who we really are. It’s not that we are special exactly, although we are. Or good, although we are. But that we are. The word “I” becomes different. It’s no longer associated with any sort of battle for recognition or acceptance or love. It is awareness of some central identity that is the backbone or hub or inner seed of everything about us.
And when we grasp this, this permanent center in us, it is easier to understand the concept of respect. Because as we look around us, we realize that every living thing is also organized around something like this. We could talk about this from all sorts of angles — genes, souls, whatever — but when we find it in ourselves, we recognize it in other lives. In this we are alike, but also separate. We can relate, and we also may find that we have a great deal in common. But our identity, our integrity is our own. As theirs are theirs. Knowing this is the cornerstone of respect. The knowledge that we have boundaries, that something inside of us belongs to only us.
Having grown-up relationships with ourselves
It’s logical that we can’t have adult relationships with anyone else, if we don’t have adult relationships with ourselves. That doesn’t mean that we lose touch with our inner child. Or that we don’t experience the less “practical” states of emotion or awareness that enrich our lives.
What it does mean that is that we take our own needs seriously. That we recognize our needs as needs. Necessary. Not optional.
A whole, healthy human identity has different layers of needs. Some relate to physical survival. Others are about emotional health, intellectual development, social connection, and more. The study of human needs has interested many brilliant people. But for me, the most helpful of them has been Marshall Rosenberg, creator of non-violent communication (NVC) and the man who introduced me to the concept of emotional freedom.
NVC is based on the premise that all people have needs, and ultimately the most effective type of communication is about sharing information about our needs. Rather than going more deeply into that concept, I recommend two brief videos on You Tube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-dpk5Z7GIFs and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XbgxFgAN7_w&NR=1. If you find this article challenging, I guarantee these videos will help you make more sense of it.
Rosenberg points out that a lot of our language is basically about power and control. That is, keeping power and control in the hands of people who have it already. There is a lot of judgment in our language, ways to make people — including ourselves — wrong. And this language serves to separate us from our needs, or minimize the idea that everyone has normal human needs. As a result, compassion becomes subjugated to “rules.” Even though we are aware of our own suffering or the difficulties faced by other people, our responses are not compassionate or questioning of their (or our) circumstances. Instead, we are trained to assume there is something wrong with them, they are bad in some way, or they have some contagious problem we should avoid.
A few examples of this are racism, elitism and ageism — ways that we “name” other people that makes it easy to blames them or judge them, without having to consider their realities and how lack of resources may be contributing to their “lower than” status or behavior. Another example of this is the Magna Carta, the foundation of English law (and U.S law by extension), which is not about human rights at all, but only a concession by the Norman king of England to honor the property rights of Norman nobles who had come from France to claim and rule English land and the “serfs” attached to it. One of the difficulties we face as victims of sociopaths is that common law incorporates very little recognition of human needs, beyond our property rights to our own bodies, and even that is limited in many ways. The rights of “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” mentioned in the Declaration of Independence and free speech and religious choice in the U.S. Constitution were huge advances that shook the world of absolute monarchies.
To get back to needs, here is a partial list of needs from NVC website (www.cnvc.org), which has been developed over the years by people working with this type of communication:
Connection — acceptance, affection, appreciation, consideration, mutuality, support, to understand and be understood, trust
Physical well-being — air, food, movement/exercise, rest/sleep, sexual expression, safety, shelter
Honesty — authenticity, integrity
Play — joy, humor
Peace — harmony, order
Meaning — clarity, competence, contribution, effectiveness, growth, hope, mourning, purpose, self-expression, to matter
Autonomy — choice, independence
The first time I saw this list, I was mind-blown. It never occurred to me that I was entitled to even want most of these things. At the time, I was still struggling with whether I was allowed to feel angry, because the sociopath made me feel bad. The idea that I could unapologetically pursue any of these things in my life was staggering. All of a sudden all those internalized voices with comments like “You’re getting too big for your britches” and “No one likes a crybaby” and “You have to suffer to go to heaven” and (the monster of them all) “You owe us” became more clearly what they were. Coercive “rules” to convince me to forget about my needs.
But the needs didn’t go away, because I agreed to give them up in order to stay in that family. Unmet needs continue to generate demands and feelings. All of us are familiar with the how it feels to be treated with disrespect. You can find another list of it feels when our need are met or unmet here at the NVC website. If you want good reason to start thinking about getting your needs met, you’ll find it here. In a nutshell, would you rather feel happy, confident and fulfilled, or angry, helpless and despairing? Not a hard choice.
Empathy and self-interest
Structuring our lives to meet our own needs means several things. First it makes us responsible for our own feelings, because we realize that they are generated by our needs. If our needs are not being met, it is our responsibility to take care of ourselves. This is part of survival and also integrity. It is the essence of compassion for ourselves. Thinking about our needs also helps us interpret our experiences in ways that don’t make us wrong, but simply people who trying to get their needs met, often in situations that are not particularly supportive and that force us to look elsewhere in creative ways to keep ourselves healthy and whole.
It also makes us less inclined to take responsibility for other people’s feelings. We may empathize with them. We may see that our mothers are dissatisfied with how their lives turned out or our fathers are suffering because they feel like failures. We can see they are expressing negative emotions at us, because they have unmet needs. Or trying to manipulate us, because they are trying to get their needs met. But we also see that this is their stuff. The language they use of disappointment, anger, regrets and demands is about them — their inner landscape, how they view themselves and the world — and not about us. Even when they are trying to recruit us to their reality by making it about us.
One of the ways we can define sociopathic interactions or N/S/P relationships is that someone wants us to take responsibility for fulfilling his or her needs, in ways that cause us to abandon our needs. All the love-bombing, gaslighting, guilt-tripping and various types of abuse are just strategies to obtain this result.
A reasonable question would be: if we become emotionally independent, does that mean we become just like sociopaths? If we don’t feel responsible for other people’s feelings, does that make us unfeeling monsters?
I think you already know the answer to that. Not feeling responsible is not the same as not caring. (Just as caring doesn’t mean that we are responsible.) If we choose, we can offer support in ways that don’t compromise our integrity or well-being. We may feel sorry for our sociopath’s hard luck story and sympathize, but not agree to help him murder his ex-wife. In less extreme situations, we may give our friend or family member the gift of sympathetic attention. The key is to decide what we can afford to do without compromising our primary responsibility to take care of ourselves.
For practice in emotional independence, here are possible responses to use with people who are pressuring us, complaining about our behavior, judging or naming us (“you’re always so selfish”) or using any confusing or indirect means to get their needs met through us.
“I empathize with you, but I’m not certain what you’re telling me you want from me”
“What do you need to make you feel better?”
“Is there something you want from this relationship that you’re not getting?”
You are looking for more concrete requests, so you can decide whether you can meet their needs without damage to yourself. Often, with non-sociopathic people, these discussions are very fruitful. Both sides come to understand each other better, and often find simple things they can do for each other that un-trigger the feelings of unmet needs. (“I don’t feel like you really respect me” often turns out to be nothing more serious than a request to share the dog-walking responsibilities.)
However when we’re talking to people who are cannot be honest about their feelings, needs or wants, or actually have a control-related reason for hiding these things from us, our questions may be treated like an invasion of privacy or cause an attack of criticism, more emotional acting out, or obvious dissembling.
If we choose, we can do some empathetic probing (“I hear that you’re angry, but I’m not sure what you’re asking for.”) or suggestions about what’s going on with them (“Is this about you feeling lonely?”). But if they still refuse to say anything that sounds like they are talking about their own needs (rather than talking about us) or making specific requests, so that we can make choices about what we want to do for them, we also have the choice to stop participating in their game.
We can choose that because we meeting our own need to participate in things that are meaningful, respectful and effective. (Or whatever needs are “alive” in us at that moment.)
This is just a brief introduction to emotional independence. It’s not all about self-defense. A lot of it is about being honest with ourselves about our needs, and specific with other people about what we are requesting from them. They are free to turn us down, just as we are free to do the same. But clarity is a wonderful thing.
Imagine how much different our lives would be today if we had said to our ex-S, “You’re a charming person, and I’ve enjoyed our time together. But before we go further, you should know a few things about me. I need fidelity in my sexual relationships, respect for my decisions about myself, appreciation for what I do for you and reciprocity in all financial arrangements. And I need to be able to trust you to be honest. Anything less does not meet my needs.”
Can you imagine saying this? If so, hooray for you. If not, practice in the mirror, with a warm smile on your face as you assume the other person will say, “Wow, excellent list. I’m very comfortable with all of that, and feel the same way myself. Except that I also need fun in my life. Are you down with that?” When you can do this without worrying about what other people think of you or how this makes them feel, you’ll be a lot closer to being able to manage healthy friendships and intimate relationships. The next article is will be about love.
Namaste. The happy independent spirit in me salutes the happy independent spirit in you.
Kathy
henry: your above post at 12:04am made me cry (a good cry, not a bad one!) it’s so sweet, and so much of it I can completely relate to… just can’t put it into words as well as you do. Thank you. You are a wonderful person.
FRANCIS:
You are in such a place of recovery and healing. You are safe here. I have found that when I need to, I can write to my heart’s content. As I journal, I process, and it is never too much at once. My psyche knows how much is enough. You will have a new normal in time. NO CONTACT is the best advice I can give you, and I do believe tht is the first bit of advice I’ve given anyone on here. Usually I try to share my experience, strength and hope.
God bless you as you continue the journey out of the land of evil and pain and into a place of light and joy!!!
Shabby – ahh shucks – didnt mean to make you cry, but if it was a good cry then thats alright. Shabby I have somewhat kept up with your post. You can relate to the way I feel. I look back on my life and realize I was not so dysfunctional, just in a very dysfunctional family. I thot maybe I deserverd all that happened cause I was a homo and such a disapointment to God and everyone else. Have gone through life kinda hangin my head down. Always wondering if I would ever feel good about myself. Well guess what. I do I do I do~! I can be the best me ever and that is all that is required. Do no harm. Respect myself and othersand avoidthe monsters. And really this past year has been the tuffest of all. Because I was reaching out for help, desperatly, I was really a mess, I thot i was so bad a person inside, but I am not bad. I finally held my head up and looked the monster’s in the eye and boy did they scatter…self respect and knowing the truth and gettin pissed off about it changed my life—yes my heart got broke by my X sociopath BF – but I can look at the man in the mirror now – he’s an ok dude…..thanks shabby
Yes, Henry, ” but I can look at the man in the mirror now – he’s an ok dude.” Hang onto that thought. God does love you, just as you are. I believe that with my whole heart.
I’ve read so much in the past few days, I can only rejoice that this site exists and helps so many hurting people.
What I wanted to share with the group is a concept I just learned a few days ago from a different source (Suan Brown?)
She wrote that the longing to break the no contact is based on the longing for what never existed — but we thought it did because our feelings were real.
She compared this longing to the phenomenon of the “missing limb,” i.e., when a limb is severed from one’s body there is often a sensation that the limb is still there. The false sensation is real — but does go away after a time when reality and acceptance sets in.
I hope I summarized the thoughts well. It made a lot of sense to me.
However, I have to admit that I have never had the urge to make contact with a “man” who tried to kill me so I can’t truly identify with some of you. As far as my memories, though, I do experience the “missing limb” illusion at times still.
One small example: I haven’t worn my wedding ring that I wore for nearly 50 years for over 7 years now. Every day, I have the sensation that it is still there on that fourth finger. Wierd!!
Anewlily – Thank you and thank you for sharing that missing limb concept. And missing what was never there. I was so baffled by this feeling. Would wonder why I missed such a pain in the butt. I just kept telling myself I am confused and sanity will return some day. I think I am getting there. Lily 50 years of wearing that ring was real too you. Maybe you could trade it in on a newlily ring?
Great article Kathy, and great thread everyone!
I could do with some advice on what I’m currently trying to do to gain emotional freedom.
My relationship with a N/P ended almost 2 yrs ago. I had no idea about P’s back then and I did it all wrong and wasn’t aware or prepared for the smear campaign, complex finances or the dischard or his will to win at absolutely any cost. But finally the direct communication ended.. however since then I’d been torturing myself by attending my church every week, where he had now made himself very comfortable amongst my group of friends. So I was still seeing him weekly, and had to fake being polite and calm, in order to see my friends and attend my church.
Thanks to LF, I’ve realised who he is, and why I felt so fearful and anxious around him and why NC is needed, so for months I haven’t attended that church, and have also gone NC on half of the group of friends too, because they’re way too cozy with him. And life is getting better.
But 3 disturbing things have happened:
-the N/P got engaged to his new gf, the first girl he’s dated after me;
-the N/P actually rang me and left a message announcing his engagement saying ‘maybe its best I heard it from him’. (WTF?) he hasn’t phoned in almost 2 years. (he prefers smear campaigns and manipulating my/our friends…)
-when I sent a panicky text message to my closest remaining church friend about it, she replied saying it was thoughtful of him to do it!! (and I replied ‘Are you serious???!!)
-when this same friend went to church last weekend, the N/P was there, they talked, and he asked her directly if I’d received his phone message about his engagement. AND SHE CONFIRMED IT WITH HIM THAT YES, SHE KNEW I HAD RECEIVED HIS MESSAGE
Last night i finally had the courage to explain the obvious to this friend that I want no contact with my ex, and that I also expect my friends to not give up any info on me to him either (via a text message because I’m a coward!). Her reply was
‘I am quite sad to find that you have such little faith in me, after all this time. and while I’m willing to be suitably vague if your name should ever come up, (which it rarely does) I’m not so willing to lie if asked a direct yes/no question – as I was. It was not a usual occasion and would’ve thought I was trusted in judging situations accordingly, with your best interests at heart.’
So, I’m depressed. I don’t know how to respond to this friend who thinks she knows better than me, it seems. Am I missing something? She’s the last of my church friends I’ve kept close to. she was always my confidante, even though she can’t actually ‘get it’ about this guy being a N/P.
Do I need to give her up too because she’s dangerous? or am I being hypervigilant about information about me going to the ex, and making a mountain out of a molehill? This expressing my own needs thing is tough!
Kathy, Oxy, we certainly need more practical articles on this… 🙂
Hi Sugar:)x This sounds tough and I am sorry it has left you feeling so low:(
If I was in the same situation with a friend of mine, who KNEW what happend, I think I would find it very difficult to continue the friendship… but things are never black or white I guess.
Trust your gut. Trust the way you feel, if you feel let down or not supported by this person then it is probably a good thing to distance yourself from her… for good, or until she ‘gets it’.
I cant see why, knowing how you feel, she would have any reason to engage in a conversation about you with him. Its not about YOU having little faith in her ( that is an attempt at laying some b/s on you) it is about her not respecting your wishes, or your friendship. A simple ” I am sorry I dont want to talk about (sugarand spice) with you”, would have done fine. Its certainly how I would play it in the same circumstances and how I would expect a true friend to play it… I guess to be fair to her, these creeps can be very good at sliming people into talking and giving up information they want…
I have only one friend who is still in touch with the creep,(our other mutual friends have ditched him, not because of me, but because they too have be ‘stung’ or have seen the mask slip) but he is not close, he doesnt know about what happened and I believe he sees the creep as exactly that anyway… keeps him pretty much arms length, has nothing to tell and no reason to talk about me or the other way round, so its not a problem.
I have to say her reply would have been a total wind up to me. Before all this happend, If I got a reply like that I would most likely have found MYSELF apologising for being so silly, then gone off feeling bad about myself… these days a response like that would mean a regretful end to
communications, and definitly confidences, with someone who I once trusted… is it hyper vigilance? I dont think so, I think with me anyway, its about taking this time to re-evaluate my boundaries , my friendships and carving out the life I want to live.
I hope you find a way through this that is the BEST for YOU:)xxx
Sugar
I think that you have to do whatever you feel is right to protect yourself from this creep. As we know, they are masters at appearing very charming and benign, while all the time enjoying the control and pain they can cause us.
You have lost so much of your life to this half-human. I am so sorry for the anguish that the remaining bits are being ‘chipped away’ – personally, I couldn’t bare to be in your situation and have no contact with the S, no knowledge of what he’s doing. I have two remaining ‘vague’ links to him and both these friends are aware of the pain I have suffered as a result of my 4 year involvement with IT. They fully understand that I don’t want to know/don’t need to know about him – on the rare occasion any reference has come up, I have said “not interested, let him whirl” – they get what I mean – say no more.
All love to you and keep posting here for strength and true understanding from those who have been through the nightmare – this lovely club of people who would really have preferred not to have been so damaged they had to join. Hey, but it’s saved my sanity.
sugarandspice,
Here’s what I think. Let me start with your friend, because that situation is difficult. The text you got back from her was the response of someone who feels like you are trying to edit her behavior. Whatever she did, she did it from her own best judgment. And she is telling you that she wants her judgment respected.
Even when someone is a very close friend, we cannot always control them. You can tell her explicitly — and if you haven’t already, you probably should now — that you would prefer that she not discuss you with your ex. And explain to her that you don’t want him to have any information about you at all. Your NC process requires you to drop an iron curtain between your lives. You don’t want to know about him. And you don’t want him to know about you.
That said, you have to leave it to her how she handles your request. Sometimes we request things from friends that they can’t or won’t deliver for reasons of their own. In this case, we have to accept that we can’t get this from them, and make adjustments — whether that means it’s important enough to give up the relationship entirely or that we have to continue the relationship in a more limited fashion.
The truth of the situation with her may have been that she was just blindsided by a direct question from him, and he asked her because he knew that she was the only person who could answer the question. Most people, myself included, would find that situation difficult if they aren’t already prepared to evade or lie. So this is one more reason to clarify with your friend that anything discussion you have about him is confidential between the two of you, and if she doesn’t feel like she can do that, then you have to take responsibility for not talking to her about him.
On your side, I understand how you feel. I would have felt the same way myself. Though after I thought about it, I think I would have been less upset with her than with him. He started this by contacting you. He was the one who asked her for information. He is the one who is inserting himself into your life again. And as always with him, these interactions cost you something. In this case, peace of mind, but that is real and worth noting.
It’s clear that he’s cost you a great deal, and you’re still dealing with those losses. I don’t see in your letter that you’ve replaced your church. Or that you’ve replaced the friends who are part of the losses. You’re still in processing the pain. And because of this, every additional loss just adds to the load.
If I could give you any single piece of advice, it would be to start making more efforts to find new sources of good for yourself. Write off the losses that you can’t recover. I know that’s easy to say and hard to do. But at some point you will do this, because you want to be happy again. And because you realize that now is now, and all this grief is for something that’s long gone.
I’m not suggesting that you rush your own grief process. But I am suggesting that you start thinking about a life on the other side of it. And that might help you put your friend’s slip in perspective. Or not. It might truly be the betrayal of an uncaring person. But I suspect not, if she has been a companion to you through this difficult journey. It takes a lot to deal with someone who is in pain, and I know from my own healing period, that the few people who stuck with me were generous and kind in ways that seem almost unbelievable to me now.
I hope this helps. My heart is with you.
Kathy
Kathleen
Wise words as always – to Sugar.
I agree about cutting your losses and finding new sources of joy. I think it’s when the outrage and anger are still prevelant that this is so very difficult. I tend to move forward a little bit and then revert back to feeling angry when faced with the far reaching consequences of this past nightmare relationship (in my case, mostly financial and health). It really is a case of keeping going isn’t it? I now feel I am through the grieving process in terms of ‘missing’ any part of the relationship – afterall, it was with a ‘ghost’, an ‘illusion’ not a really fully rounded person.
I also identify with what you said about the companiship and support of friends who have helped you through the horrors of it all – no one is indefatiguable and that’s why this site has been so helpful to me – because I haven’t been boring the pants of my closest friends on a daily basis about it all. I realise how you can start to sound ‘stark raving bonkers’ at times! (I know I was obsessed about phone bills in the early stages – that’s how I finally nailed the git) – I look back and see myself poring endlessly over phone number after phone number of numerous women – trying to piece together how the times and dates of the calls fitted with things he’d said, arguments he’d started and the mysterious sudden ‘fishing’ trips – I think I became obsessed and was probably crazier than him at one point. What a waste of my life!
I only share these memories because I would lay money on it that other people have been on this site and are feeling the ‘shame and embarrassment’ that I felt about my own mad behaviour. I didn’t NEED confirmation of this really (I persuaded myself at the time I did) – I already knew – that’s why I went searching. In my broken and debilitated state, I was seeking to ‘prove’ what a lying, cheating B***** he was – it seemed important at the time to that all my ‘ravings’ in my head were validated by hard ‘proof’.
I wish I’d just trusted in the proof of my own intuition, not sought explanations and thought “I’m out of this sick situation – goodbye”. Well, I didn’t and that is just another thing I’ve had to work hard at coming to terms with. All I’d say to anyone going through this is this:
“You weren’t like this before – it was a reaction to being in a dysfunctional relationship with a lunatic”.
As far as I know, the S is continuing on his merry-go-round of destructive behaviour with numerous women – he has the ‘stable’ regular relationship in place and is doing the same to this lady – has the ‘back burner’ women lined up for when he’s bored, not getting his needs met (as he perceives – god how that changes from moment to moment) and, no doubt, creating the same mayhem and leaving a trail of disaster and illness in his wake.
I, on the other hand, am working on making myself right and not using or abusing anyone else in the process of this or any other part of my life.
To live well – the best revenge. I pray everyday (to a god I don’t believe in!) to grant me serenity and INDIFFERENCE. Once I feel indifference, I now I’ll be there.
Sugar – what he does with his stupid life is irrelevant and, as for your friend, perhaps be kind in thought and say to yourself “thank god, she doesn’t know what she dealing with” in response to her comment about “it was thoughtful of him” – I’m sure she didn’t say it to hurt your feelings. Afterall, who would wish this knowledge on a friend – it would mean she would have had to have come through the same hell you’ve been in.