This is the eighth article in this series about the recovery path, and it is about the second half of the path. This is after we have fully accessed our anger, and begun to grieve our losses and let go. This article may not necessarily be helpful to someone who is still reeling from betrayal and loss, or even someone who is still exploring righteous anger. However, it is part of this series because a growing number of people on LoveFraud are considering the influence of their histories on their relationships, as part of healing themselves and their lives. Please, take what is valuable to you, but if this one doesn’t make sense or, God forbid, makes you feel like you’re being blamed, it just means that you’re at another healing stage. Which is good. Every stage is necessary and good. Be where you are, love yourself and heal. That’s all that matters. — Kathy
In recovering from a trauma or extended trauma like a sociopathic relationship, we often discover that what we lost isn’t what we first thought it was. In fact, our very resistance to letting go — the thing that often keeps us stuck in anger or even bargaining or denial — isn’t exactly what we thought it was.
The traumatic recovery process, if we have the courage to see it through, turns out to be very different from the “he done me wrong” drama it first appeared to be. It’s not about unrequited love. It’s not about us not being good enough or smart enough. It’s really not about anything that is between us and our sociopathic opposite number.
It is really about us waking from a dream.
What is real?
An old friend talked to me recently about feeling so disoriented that she had difficulty finding her way out of her hometown airport. She was returning from her third trip to visit a man in another city. Based on phone conversations with him, she had become convinced that he loved her, wanted a future with her, and accepted her as she was. When she arrived, she discovered that what he wanted was “friends with benefits.” And by the way, would she please invest in his condo because he was having trouble making the payments?
As on the previous trips, he was cold, critical and exploitive, expecting her to pay for staying with him and pay for everything they did together. Knowing that he had less money than her, she did that willingly. She would have given the five-figure investment in the condo, except that her money was tied up in a trust. The one thing she could not do was casual sex, and she could not understand how or why he did not remember that this was a baseline truth with her. If she was in a sexual relationship, it had to be serious and committed. Of course, they had sex before his idea about “friends with benefits” became clear, leaving her feeling used and ashamed.
After the other trips, she had felt wounded and depressed. Half angry at him, half wondering what she had done wrong. This time was different. She finally understood that she had been deluded, and it didn’t matter if he had misled her or she had misled herself. She contacted me to ask me what to do about the feeling of disorientation. She didn’t know how she could have been so mistaken, and she didn’t know what was real anymore.
“I want my old self back,” she said. Then she thought a moment, and said. “No, I don’t. Not if it’s the old self that keeps doing this over and over.”
The broken part
My friend is not stupid, though she has a history of relationships with exploitive people. Listening to her talk about how ashamed she felt about the love letters she had written and her feeling that she was too stupid to live, I could almost see the broken cog in the machinery of her psyche.
With her, as with many of us, this broken part is not really about the exploitive people who take advantage of it. We feel like these relationships are “happening to” us. But what really happened is that a certain set of circumstances triggers something in us that I call a “state.” (Some psychologists call it a ”˜trance,” because it is a form of self-hypnosis. It may also be called a “fugue state,” after a type of music where a single melody line is repeated in many variations.)
A state is a reactive response with certain characteristics. One is a narrowing of focus. Everything else fades to lesser importance. Other, possibly unrelated experiences are interpreted through our intense involvement with this state and its triggers. The anger we have discussed in previous articles is a state. The disorientation of my friend and the distressed confusion of early-stage recovery are also states. Other characteristics of states may be reversion to childlike emotional behaviors — tantrums, outsized hunger for validation or security, confusing the feeling of relief with love.
Another characteristic of these states is often disassociation, or distancing ourselves from objective reality. “Inside” the state, we identify with it. It feels “right,” often passionately right, the truth about ourselves. A feedback loop can evolve. The state becomes magnified by our attention; so we pay more attention to it. If the state is painful, we may start looking for self-medication through alcohol, drugs, video games, shopping, work, etc. If the state provides pleasure, we may do more and more of what we think is creating the pleasure. As we pursue or avoid feelings, learning skills or living with the effects of our actions, the state’s structure evolves into more complexity.
So where do these states come from? Especially the painful ones. Anyone who has been reading this series of articles knows already. They are residue of unprocessed trauma. One of the simplest ways to grasp this is to ask, “When was the first time I ever felt this way?” We may not immediately remember the first time, but most of us can track the state backwards through events in our history.
My relationship with a sociopath was not the first time I’d felt completely subsumed by a romantic attachment. (It was just, unfortunately, the first time I’d done it with someone who felt no ethical responsibility toward me.) I realized, fairly early, that what was happening with him wasn’t “different,” but only a worst-case scenario of something I’d been doing my entire life.
Leaving Las Vegas
Few of us on LoveFraud would consider ourselves gambling addicts. But if we think about what gambling addicts really want, we might see a bit of ourselves in it. When a gambler is winning, the emotional payoff isn’t the money. It is the sense of basking in a kind of sunshine of divine acceptance, where s/he is magically doing everything right and being loved for it. The love may be expressed in financial winnings, but the thrill is that big, loving, supportive “yes” from the cosmos.
From the book “Leaving the Enchanted Forest: The Path from Relationship Addiction to Intimacy” by Stephanie Covington and Liana Beckett, here is a brief description of the progression of an addictive relationship:
1. Experiencing the euphoric high of a new relationship, which enables us to focus on another person, rather than dealing with our true emotional state
2. Seeking the positive mood swing, looking forward to it, being willing to make sacrifices to get it, suffering occasional feelings of dejection or jealousy or panic, but the pain is still manageable
3. Dependence, where focus on the lover crosses the line from choice to need, and life becomes narrow, unbalanced, unhealthy with obsessive thoughts and compulsive behaviors
4. Maintaining contact just to avoid being in a state of chronic depression and emotional pain, because there is no more euphoria and the inner balance is in shambles
Is this a state? It actually sounds like a series of states with a common thread. If we return to the gambler, we can see a similar fundamental story. A pursuit of magical redemption in which we get the prize if Lady Luck smiles on us, or fall back into a kind of emotional hell if she doesn’t.
But is that a fair analogy? Games of luck depend on the random distribution of a shuffled card deck, the end of a wheel’s momentum, the way dice fall. The gambler is essentially passive, beyond risking the stakes. In our relationships, we do so much more, don’t we? We don’t just show up and hope. We go out of our way to be charming, agreeable, enthusiastic, compliant, understanding, tolerant and supportive, while we kiss, cook, make love, arrange our schedules, dress to please, help out with their finances, children, careers, leave behind huge chunks of our lives as they were before. We’re actively building, investing, sacrificing, trying.
Still, the gambling analogy holds, because of one thing. The success of it all is out of our control. All we can do is our best, and hope that we earn a happy ending. In sociopathic relationships, we learn several very tough lessons. But primary among them is this: if our happiness depends on something outside of ourselves, we are living a gambler’s life.
The crumbling foundation
A recent show on HDTV was about the crumbling foundation under a house. Contractors mortared cinderblock up against the old walls and dug trenches around the outside of the foundation to divert the water that had weakened the concrete. In all, they managed to preserve the rooms of the house above by shoring up the old foundation.
What we face in getting over a sociopathic relationship something like the same problem, although our solution may be quite different. Our “states” are like rooms built on the foundation of old coping responses we adopted when we faced an overwhelming event when we were younger. When I was very small, I learned that no one would protect me from my father’s unreasonable verbal and physical abuse, and in fact, I was responsible for keeping him happy. At three years old or so, I developed an immediate coping response that involved alterations in patterns of feeling, thought and behavior, designed to manipulate circumstances and myself in order to survive. All of it was founded on an awareness of impending danger. But it also included a memory of the time before the danger, a dream of a better time, when I was loved, safe and could thrive as who I was.
That is a quick illustration of the foundation under a “room” in my psyche. I developed through my childhood and adult life with that “state” ready to be triggered by any circumstances that seemed to “fit.” Through the years, I furnished this room with more experiences that supported its reality, learned more survival skills for a world of impending danger, and once or twice, learned that I could relax and be myself in certain circumstances, thinking I was making big progress in my life.
But the twilight-zone reality of this room, which began with the original decision about how to handle an overwhelming childhood event, is what allowed the sociopath to take residence in my life. A coping strategy that was designed to help me survive danger as a child turned into a vulnerability to tremendous danger as an adult.
My friend who kept going back to a man who is incapable of loving her and uses her for money isn’t trying to hurt herself. In fact, she is trying to help herself out of other circumstances in her life. Because of her family background, she has a life strategy of being very, very good and helpful, because love must be earned and the alternative is punishment. Her dream is that, if she earns love, she will be able to recover the lost state of being accepted for herself and the right to her own identity. In this “state,” she is vulnerable to interpreting small kindnesses or seductive behaviors as “love” and acceptance. Especially if the other person meets certain other criteria, like bearing psychological resemblance to her pathologically selfish father.
All of us have gone through these perfect-storm situations when the right stimuli and our old coping strategies come together to throw us into a “state” that seems exciting and redemptive. But for my friend, on her final encounter with this man, something new emerged from this relationship — a realization that she was deluded. She was understandably disoriented because this realization potentially affected not just this relationship, but the structure of her entire life. When she said “I don’t know what to believe anymore” or “maybe I’m just too stupid to live,” she is talking about cracks in the foundation. Not just in the way she understood the world, but even in her ideas about her own identity.
How much can we lose?
In dealing with the residue of a sociopathic relationship, we feel separated from parts of our identity. We talk about not being able to trust again or love again. We talk about the loss of ourselves as lovable or attractive people, as trustworthy to ourselves or others, as believers in the goodness of the world or in a benevolent deity. We have feelings — like bitterness, anger, vengefulness — that we fear or dislike in ourselves. It seems like our rules of social engagement, romance or personality integrity have become broken or unreal.
It is no wonder that many of us need time before we jump back into the world again. With so many basic realities up in the air, a larger question emerges. If the world is so different, if we are so different that what we imagined, then what is real? Or more importantly, is real about us?
As profoundly disorienting as this may be, it is also part of the grieving and letting go stage of trauma processing. Because as we start to allow ourselves to face irretrievable losses — like the loss of the person we loved and the loss of the dream that person represented — we often discover that those losses are just the superficial veneer over deeper losses we have not yet grieved and let go.
In my case, grieving the loss of this man also brought me to the realization that he, and all the other lovers of my life, were band-aids I used cover a very old wound. That was the too-early loss of supportive protection when I was a child. I saw how much of my life was constructed around my coping with impending danger, and especially in my search for safety and restoration of a sense that I belonged and was welcome in the world.
In healing, I had to revisit that child who still existed in me, who was still holding up the foundation of that now-dysfunctional room that welcomed my sociopathic lover as a savior. I had to grieve with her about the childhood she lost while I reassured her that I was taking care of her now. That she could drop that weight finally, stop holding together all those coping strategies like a little Atlas with the world on her shoulders.
If you had asked me five years ago who I am, I would have given you a list of all the characteristics I developed in that room. Hardworking, responsible, trustworthy, generous, tolerant, kind, polite, presentable — all “virtues” that were really highly developed skills to earn the acceptance and approval I needed to feel safe. If you had thought to ask me who I was underneath all of that, and I was feeling particularly honest, I would have told you I was scared and tired and alone. Chronically and unfixably, except for the temporary respites I got from diving into another relationship, winning some praise for my work, or buying or eating something that made me feel better.
Today, if you asked me the same question, I would just smile. The question doesn’t compute. I am my “states,” and yes, they still exist. I still have knee-jerk responses to the stimuli that remind me of my old “world of impending danger.” But increasingly, I recognize them as responses to trauma. I observe myself slipping in and out of these states, being tempted to behaviors that are band-aids for pain.
In getting outside these states, I stopped limiting my identity to characteristics based on arranging my life around impending danger. I freed myself to grow into a larger identity. It includes characteristics — like selfishness, undependability and anger — that were forbidden before. I am more fluid and accepting of myself and other people. But most important, I find that my center has shifted. It’s hard to describe who I am now, but it includes this “observer,” as well as more awareness of the world around me, and more openness to feelings of joy, awe, gratitude and compassion.
I let go of a lot of things. It wasn’t always easy. There was backlash from well-intentioned “rules” and critical voices designed to keep me safe in a world of impending danger. I had to feel my way along to discover what rules were reasonable and which were obsolete artifacts of coping with a scary daddy.
This process of letting go of parts of myself will, I believe, never end. But, to my surprise, it becomes increasingly enjoyable. I once grieved over the discovery that I was not always trustworthy and that, despite all the effort I put into it, I could not make everyone like me. Now, when some inner voice tells me “I have to” do something, my inner observer frequently pops up and decides whether that “state” is useful or whether we have better options. More and more, everything about me is optional, because every moment is new with new challenges and new opportunities that have nothing to do with my history or with some frightened little identity that is really just baggage from that history.
As far as impending danger goes, that’s another issue that we’ll discuss in a future article. Fear, the natural fear of the dangers of a random universe, is something we still have not addressed in this journey of recovery. Grieving and letting go paves the way for that next stage.
Namaste. The joyous awakening spirit in me salutes the joyous awakening spirit in you.
Kathy
P.S. I owe a debt of gratitude to the writing of Stephen Wolinsky, Ph.D., for many of the ideas in this article. You can find his books on Amazon.
Oxy, Your previous post should be archived. If I had a wish list for LF (if even I should ask for more) it would be that we could “save to favorites” or even plug in different bloggers names to pull out their stories -would be easy to keep everyones stories straight!
Your post helps me to remember to “be kind’ to those who mean well, and also to shut my big mouth when others may be sick of chatter or take our well meaning comments wrongly when they are grieving. Oxy, well said.
Hi All. This is my first post. For weeks I’ve been very encouraged by reading posts from such wise and understanding people!
I could do with advice, and it’s a bit off-topic, but here goes…
From what I’ve read here and an other sites, I can’t tell if my ex is a N or a P. My ex didn’t/ hasn’t threatened physical violence. The chilling stories I’ve read here about what so many of you have had to go through give me hope but they also make me wonder why I feel so, so AFRAID of my ex. I don’t think he would physically hurt me but I do know he would like to annihilate me psychologically, emotionally, socially.
My ex N/P is a specialist doctor. In his profession he gets to play god – saving people’s lives, and he seems to think he is perfectly entitled to act like God. I found out later that he can be a nightmare to work with – he gives the nurses hell.. I met him when he started attending my church. We had this understanding when the relationship started that if we split up, he would attend church elsewhere. One of the first things he said to me when we did split up was ‘that he’d changed his mind, he liked my church and he was planning to stay’. And that’s what he has done. (That’s also when it became clear that everything else about him and our relationship was also a lie.. )
He has charmed all my ‘friends’. He alternates between flaunting his success and wealth, name-dropping and generally bragging, to acting humble and polite and friendly – whatever works to have these people accept him as a nice guy. He also turns them all slowly against each other – I’ve never seen someone so cunning and conniving in backstabbing members of the group, even his so-called closest friend. He is clever at acting like he feels pity for someone when he gossips about them and manages to spread the most hurtful things about them. He is a genius at reading people and finding their weaknesses /archiles heel..
My life has ground to a standstill because unfortunately, this church was the nucleus for my social life too. Now that I’ve seen my ex n/P’s rage and utter contempt, and have heard what he really thinks of me once I said it was over – it was really psychologically harmful for me, going to church every weekend.
I split with the ex over a year ago. I tried going to church for months and months, trying to pretend I was ok. Initially I did try to explain to friends how awful it had been with him, but at that stage I was soo confused about why I felt so betrayed and angry and so scared, that I probably made little sense and put it this way – they don’t get it. Looking back, I now see that I am very, very lucky that I didn’t try very hard to expose him. I know he would have made me pay dearly, somehow.
Now I’ve given up. Haven’t gone to church for 6 months, and have cut contact with most friends. The final straw was seeing that my girlfriends have become friendly with my ex N/P’s new GF. One of them even repeated to me what the new GF was saying about why my ex N/P’s previous relationships (many) had all failed – and it was a lie.. But a lie that I had believed once, too. Point is, my ‘friend’ knew it wasn’t accurate but didn’t bother informing the N/P’s new GF of this..
So, now I feel betrayed by my friends too and utterly alone. Until recently I couldn’t understand why his current behaviour hurts so much – especially when compared to all your stories of physical violence… Now I realise why: it’s because this network of people at my church were like my family. I am a single girl, my real family live interstate and are busy with their own lives – and this network of people are all I’ve got. He is targetting my only support group. and he is winning.
I think the best description I have found to match him would be a malignant narcissist. He craves power. He really really gets off on messing with people’s lives; loves the drama of turning people against each other; loves being able to influence people’s lives however he sees fit. I am thinking this whenever I see him, and it messes with my head.
So, Oxdrover’s description earlier about a ‘sick dog hiding under the porch’ – or something to that affect, is me. I have finally started to try N/C – and I feel great not seeing the ex N/P, however this N/C is coming at a great cost. Last night I didn’t attend a friends’ engagement party because ex N/P would be there. I know I’m not popular with friends for missing it – and its not the only social event I’ve withdrawn from in recent weeks. and of course, no longer attending church with them or being involved..
So, I don’t think I can stay here under this porch forever. Its no life. I clearly need to do something but I dont know what. I feel utterly without hope.
-I’ve considered moving away but haven’t a clue how, or where;
-or I’d just love to request some more support from friends and acquaintances but don’t know how and I am way too timid to give them an ultimatum such as “It’s him or me!!”
-or I’d love to scare him away from my church and my friends but that’s probably wishful thinking
-or I need to completely change my state of mind to have no fear whenever I go to places / church where he is..
So, your advice and support would be very much appreciated.
Dear Sugarandspice,
Welcome to LF, I am so sorry that you “qualify” for member ship in our “club” but if you have to qualify, this is a good place to be.
First off, it doesn’t matter if the “label” is narcissistic or psychopathic, they are BOTH TOXIC…and sometimes emotional “violence” is worse than a beating!
The damage you are feeling I think is that he took over your “space” and your social and spiritual sanctuary and made it his. People generally don’t get it about these people and people in churches SURE don’t get it…they want to believe that “people are basically good”—CRAP! That is not always true. Not ALL people are “good”–some are EVIL.
Since you are a Christian, I suggest you go back adn read in teh Gospels about how the Pharisees treated Jesus. These were the “churches” and spiritual leaders of their day and they were EVIL psychopathic people who acted like your X and were pompous and when Jesus started speaking the truth to them, they decided to kill Him. Welcome to the world of psychopaths. they smear if they can, and if that doesn’t work they destroy!
I am sorry that your “friends” didn’t speak up, but they have NO clue, so try not to hate them for not being supportive.
My suggestion to you is to find another church to attend and different friends. Your X is going to tell his new GF that you are a crazy and hateful witch and that any of the truth you tell is a lie, and he will vouch for it. This is called the “smear campaign” and is very typical. Unfortunately, there isn’t really any way to fight it except NC.
No contact, and that also means NC with others who want to talk about him, to carry tales, etc. If someone comes to you with information about him and his new GF or wants to tell you something, my suggestion is to say, “Mary, I really don’t want to talk about Stan and his new GF.” (that is setting a boundary and stick to it) If Mary insists on talking about “Stan” then say it again, “Mary, I MEAN IT, I do not want to discuss Stan or anything about him.” If that doesn’t work, then turn and walk away from “Mary.”
In general I think people who carry tales like this are just trying to stir up drama. DRAMA should have no place in our lives.
I am so glad that you came here. I suggest that you read as many of the older archived articles as you can. That knowledge will show you that you are not alone, they are all so much alike, and that we can heal and come out stronger on the other side of this trauma. “Laying up under the porch” for a while is not a bad thing, it gives you some time to rest and start to recoup. Now you are posting here and learning more, so you are in a new phase trying to figure out all this mess. You are coming along! hang in there it does get better and easier! (((hugs))) and my prayers for you!
Thank you Sabrina, I do know the “grief process” which is the first healing we have from any accute trauma or loss (no matter what the loss is, by death, or whatever) is always a painful an dfairly predictable succession of emotions, the problem is that it doesn’t flow in an “orderly” fashion, but jumps back and forth from one emotion to the next and back again, over and over, until finally, if all goes well, we may reach acceptance of the loss and peace with it.
When a persion is grieving over SEVERAL losses at once, it intensifies and gets “insane” in intensity. The Ps, I think, in some ways KEEP US off balance by a series of losses one after the other, a series of hurts that by the time we almost get over one, they slam us with another one, and so on.
In my case, I was already under stress from my P-son’s incarceration, then my stepfatehr’s cancer diagnosis, my egg donor’s illness, then bingo, my husband’s death, my inability to work, my son being burned in the same wreck that killed my husband, then my step father’s death, then the P-x-BF that targeted me, and on and on and on! To NOT be freaking crazy after all these losses one after another would have been INSANE. Of course that was teh time my P son targeted me with the Trojan Horse psychopath he sent into our family, who showed up like a SAVIOR to “help” me….ahhhh, how they manipulate and twist things and keep us off balance.
The thing is that EVERYONE here has had a SERIES of griefs, a series of attacks, even if it was only one pyshcopath….because it is a continual build up and let down, build up and let down, build up and let down. Injury after injury and false hope after false hope. That is why it is so devestating. Coping with grief and all the emotions of sadness, anger, bargaining, denial etc. when you are constantly being built up and then let down and re-injured is a daunting task. It is the “crazymaking” that goes on, and I can tell you right now, I WAS DEFINITELY AS CRAZY as an outhouse rat!
Sugarandspice:
Oxy is right….it doesn’t matter….you feel bad, you have been abused and your seeking a way out.
You will continue to find that people just do not “get it’. Most people need to become a victim to ‘get it’. I did have a few, that saw his behaviors first hand…..only 2 friends though….I ditto Oxy’s advice….start seeking out other friends and support and set your boundries.
NC is perfect…essential to healing…or you stay right in the mix.
READ
Sugarandspice-We feel your pain. I “totally” relate to what you are saying about the church as I went thru very similar situation. My x N/P (very narsissistic, but he was soo focused on himself, I didnt see tremendous drama with others, of course it was there, but he devoted such enormous time on talking about himself-how strong,he is, how this,how that ..
UGH)
THe N/p, being satans right hand man, at first managed to cause me to have a feeling of devalue & discard by my church as well as by him.The N/P had the home field advantage, as I never went back to the church in fear of him showing up, so with all the congregation, he put on the best act eva! I had to really work on not allowing satan to get a foothold in my “emotions” that might lead me to blame the people at the church,and be bitter toward the lifestyle in general (and toward God)
Afterall, I reasoned- the church is GODs house, the congregation HOWEVER are only human, trying to do the best we can,in all of our frailties- Humans WILL fail you.-GOD says, He never will leave OR forsake you and I try to focus on that.
Sugar-I will say this, If you have those in your life that are not supporting you- the “friends” that hang out with the new GF and ignore your pain. I would sever those ties ASAP- I think most of us would probally agree- If they arent helping you in this situation- they are hurting you. I had to do the same with what I thought was fence strattlers- I found myself exhaustingly trying to “prove” my damage from my X, validate my feelings, that never seem to be realized- I later saw, they were working for the S to continue damaging me. (he is the ultimate puppet master) YOur better off without those back stabbers. Even if you can excuse their behavior, for being scammed by your X- You DONT have to communicate with them. You are out of the crazy making- they still dont and may never get it!
WHY do they get to continue the pain of the S- he has gone, but the trauma remains fresh with each “devalueing” others are doing with your precious and fragile feelings and heart.
THe S had your heart-this is the time to get dead honest with yourself on HOW much damage they are doing to you by this blatant disregard. In leaving a S- unlike other broken relationships- there are NO grey areas- its black n white, life and death for your spirit. N/C is serious stuff. ANY connection is heartache for you.
Im not saying to hate these people- but be “fiercely protective” of yourself & love yourself enuf to remove them from your life OR be strong enough to say” I cannot deal with this, Your behavior is unacceptable and damaging to me.”
You can do it. You have the choice. Please take care of yourself, and post often and READ tons! You will find the answers here- YOU are not alone.
xoxo
Spice – I think he goes to that church to intimadate you. It get’s him off to see you uncomfortable. And your so called friends are shallow and under his godlike spell. No Contact your self from him and his foolish follower’s. Church’s are full of hypocrites – God is right there with you under the porch..welcome
Help. I think i was involved with a sociopath. I had a guy that i dated briefly, he was french, decided to move here to where i live after two years. I paid for his ticket out here and his hotel bill and he said he would pay me back in full. I moved into an apartment with him. Stupid choice for me. He became sullen looking for work, he has a phd but cannot find work. He slept erratic, threw tantrums in my apartment thowing wine at my walls and glasses. He almost got me kicked out. He was not affectionate, told me he loved me and begged me to stick it out with him. I am out lots of money now, he has not paid me back, i kicked his ass out last week, took him to a hotel where he proceeded to get drunk and smash the lamp in the wall. He tried to turn everything on me saying he was under pressure and i badgered him. He was a pig, spitting lugies, throwing cigarettes out, drank every morning he said to calm his nerves. Would be fine for a couple days then fly into a rage over trivial things. i think he must have been bi-polar. I now know that he was using me. I found him a new roomate, poor woman and now he is using her. I have gotten so confused and depressed, i thank god he is gone. But wonder how i could have been so stupid in the first place. I thank god have peace of mind now. The man would throw up when his nerves got bad, and i of course was the one rubbing his back etc. I never understood what i did to deserve those rages. My self esteem is in the garbage, my depression is a ten. Can this other woman not see this? i tried to warn her. He uses his accent and is so charming to others. but this man is moody, sullen, then can turn and be charming and sweet. But he would scream at the top of his lungs at me for dumb things. I wanted him out so bad. Now i am left in debt for all the things i did for him. He even stole from me my meds and lied about it also took some personal things. Was very sneaky and hidden. Went through my stuff and took stuff and put in his closet telling me that i lost it myself when i would find things. He had me thinking that i was crazy. This man would take 7 sleeping pills at night and still not sleep, would be writing his new resume for days and then sometimes would be very silent to me and cold. I am so confused and so lost now. i thank god he is gone and was with him only two months before i threw his ass to the curb. but i have to pay back the hotel for the damage. The damage he did to me was awful. Is it normal to feel so sad and sick inside. Why would someone be mean to my dog. I have a 16 year old sweet little dog, he would pull his ears, and say see he likes it, and i saw him grabbing my dog and my dog yelped. I lost it then and told him to get out. But my family said he was mean to my dog and i think this man was sick in the head. Help, how do i get myself back. Is this man a sociopath. I know he lied, about trivial things even. Wanted me to go to england with him for a job, i did not go thank god. He has a brilliant mind, but has a dark side to him. he was never physical with me but the verbal abuse was awful. where do i go from here, why did i even take that abuse. I have lost myself. Any advise would be so welcomed. I feel drained of life itself.
I feel also like im losing my mind, afraid of life, cannot trust even myself or decisions. I wander around alot trying to figure out who and what this man was, and how i got duped. hope that someone can read and tell me as im so confused and i feel so stupid and alone right now.
Kittycat3660
From what you wrote I would say you are in the right place. Please read as much as you can and plus there are links for other sites. Welcome and yes I for one for said you came to the right site. Welcome again! There are many “seasoned” members here that can and will help you.