He was arrested at 9:14 am on May 21, 2003. It was a sunny, blue sky morning. The birds were fluttering and twittering in the trees. The river flowed lazily by, meandering through the forest, dappled with sunlight, sparkling, clear.
We were in hiding. Had been since February 26 when we’d fled the city we lived in 1,000 miles away, heading west, heading to the US, he’d said. “I’ve got money there,” he insisted. “I’ll just leave this mess to my lawyers to fix. No sense hanging around waiting for them to get it cleared up. I’ll let you go once I’m out of the country,” he promised.
Like all his promises, like everything he’d ever said and done, it was all a lie.
On that morning in May, the lies fell apart and he was exposed. Two police officers walked in and took him away. “Are you on drugs?” one of them asked me as I sat, rocking back and forth, back and forth in a chair watching the scene unfold, a quiet, low keen seeping from my mouth. I was catatonic. I was not on drugs.
They took him away and I sat surveying the mess around me, trying to make sense of the mess of my life.
I hadn’t heard of No Contact with the abuser, but I knew after months of no contact with family and friends, I had to make contact with someone beyond the narrow confines of my world with him. He was gone. I had to reach out for help.
I called my sister who lived an hour away from where we had been in hiding. She didn’t ask questions. She didn’t yell or scream at me. She came and got me.
No Contact was the only possibility. He didn’t have my sister’s number and it was unlisted. He did keep calling the couple who owned the cabin where we’d been staying. They called my sister, she advised them not to give him my number. He called my mother. She hung up on him, even though she felt it was rude. “He’s the man who almost killed your daughter,” I told her. “It is not rude to hang up on him. It’s vital to my well-being.”
I didn’t want to think about him but at times, my mind betrayed me. I’d be walking down a street and hear a cell phone ringing and it would be his ring. My mind would leap to thoughts of him. What was he doing? What was he saying? What was he telling people about me?
I posted No Trespassing signs in my mind. When thoughts of him intruded, I’d mentally hold up a sign and send the thoughts back to where they’d come from, my fear, my shame, my guilt.
I knew that one day I’d have to go through the thoughts of him and examine them, but for now, I had to give myself time to grow stronger. For now, it didn’t matter that I had to rid myself of his presence in my mind. That would come later. At first, what mattered most was that I build emotional strength so that I could eventually deal with thinking about him without making myself sick.
In those first minutes and hours and days weeks and months away from him I focused my thinking on me. On what had happened inside of me. On what I had to do to become healthy again.
The police asked me for a statement about anything I knew about his illegal activities. I had to do the right thing to show myself, remind myself; I was capable of doing ”˜the right thing’.
I wrote it down. It hurt. I was scared. What would he do when he found out I had ”˜told’ on him?
I couldn’t let my mind go there. The monster of him in my head was bigger than the reality of him, out there. Out there he was in jail. I had to escape the prison of my mind trapped in thinking of him. I held up my No Trespassing sign.
Focus on doing the right thing, I told myself.
I kept writing.
To remind myself that I was so much more than that five year relationship, that my life was made up of so many other important things than just ”˜him’, I made a list of things I’d done in my life that I was proud of. Being a mother topped my list. “What kind of mother are you really”, the voice of self-denigration whispered. “You deserted your children.”
I posted STOP signs in my head. Whenever self-doubt, negative self-talk invaded, I held up my STOP sign and consciously reframed the negative into more loving words. “I am a courageous woman. Yes, I did something I never imagined I would ever do as a mother. I was very, very sick. And now, the poison is gone and I am healing. I can make amends. I am reclaiming my life. I am courageous and growing stronger every day.”
I kept adding to my list of things I’d done that I was proud of. In Grade five I raised $122.00 for a charity by walking 21 miles. I was an honor student. Got a scholarship. I ran the marathon. Wrote a play with a group of street teens and produced it.
My list reminded me that I was capable of living in the world beyond the narrow corridor of his abuse. It reminded me that I was a competent, caring human being.
At first, I wanted to cry and cry and cry. At first, I did. And then I knew I had to build emotional muscle, to build my willpower. I gave myself a time limit for crying. It began with ten minutes on the hour, every hour. That was when I let myself cry. The other fifty minutes I had to do at least one constructive thing (Work on my resume. Phone about a job interview. Take a walk.) to take me one step further on my healing path. The ten minutes every hour became eight and then five and then only every two, then three, then four hours. Eventually, as I kept doing more and more things to take me on the healing path, I forgot to cry.
At first, I wanted to tell everyone my story. Talk about what he had done. How hurt I’d been. How confused and scared and lonely. At first, I thought everyone knew what I’d been through just by looking at me. Couldn’t they see the scars? Couldn’t they see my pain? I couldn’t understand how the world could be so normal. I needed to embrace its normalcy. I enforced No Contact in my speech. I could not talk of him. I could not tell the story again and again. The only time I had permission to talk about him and what had happened was when I went to an Alanon or Co-Dependents Anonymous meeting. There, with the safety of the 12-steps empowering me, I could speak up and give voice to my pain, my fear and my hope.
The greatest danger wasn’t contacting him. He was in jail. My greatest danger lay in thinking about him. In remembering those gentle moments where I had felt his ”˜love’ embrace me.
“It was never love,” I reminded myself. “Love doesn’t almost kill you.”
I kept working at No Contact in my mind. Good times or bad, thinking of him wasn’t healthy for me. I kept my No Trespassing signs posted. My STOP sign handy. Over time, it became easier. A cell phone ring wouldn’t startle me. My body wouldn’t jerk suddenly at the sound of a car backfiring, or a door slamming. I wouldn’t cry at every turn. Sit in silence immersed in sadness. Thoughts of suicide were arrested before they even saw the STOP sign in my mind. I was building my will to survive. My will to rejoice in living life fully every day.
In time, it became easier to live without the fear I would always be the abused woman I had become. In time, it became easier to live with the possibility of life beyond his abuse, beyond the lies he’d told me about who I was, what I could do, where I could go and who I could never be. It became easier to believe in me. It became easier to talk, about him, about what had happened, about what I’d done to betray myself and those I loved without falling into despair. It became easier to love myself, not as an abused woman, but as a woman who had the courage to face her fears, to turn up for herself and love herself, exactly the way she was. A woman capable and confident enough to let go of abuse and claim her right to live freely in her own skin.
I was an abused woman. Today, I continue to grow and heal, to love myself for all I’m worth and to give myself the space and time to let feelings flow through me without having to stop them.
Today, I give myself the grace of loving myself enough to know, I am okay. The things I did that hurt those I love, and me, are nothing compared to the things I do today to create a beautiful life all around me. I am not measured against what happened back then, my value is in what I do today to make a difference, in my life and the world around me.
Today, he was just a moment in time, a small segment of my life. He has no value in my life today. My value is in how I live, what I do, say, how I think and look at the world through eyes of love. Today, my value is in me.
Tomorrow I’ll be back at work, but for today, I’m checking in to get my ‘medicine’ as it were…But really, isn’t a common thread for all of us that we’ve chosen to entertain a day-to-day relationship with these people who turn out to be emotional vampires? Are our lives not interesting enough? Are we out for some kind of punishment? Do we think that somehow God is giving us points for our continued pain? Do we get some kind of interior payback from seeing how f**ked up they (and then WE) can be?
Most of my friends are overall happy people, good to their spouses, don’t cheat, good to their children, eat healthy, play sports, volunteer their time to worthy causes. Why do I continue to have this kind of ‘secret side’ to me? A side that says I can’t sustain a normal, happy relationship or at least screen out someone right away who is destructive to my well-being? It seems like most of us here (maybe different from our friends, maybe not) have had some kind of prior abuse, either as kids with our own families (whom we don’t ‘choose’ unless you do believe we come into this life ‘choosing’ to have certain life lessons with the people,including family in our lives). So I’m thinking of feelings I’ve had before similar to those posted by recovering – I know because of a past marriage that terrorized me and now this current crazy relationship, that I should not deny being leery of anyone, boyfriend or otherwise – who makes me uneasy or pushes old buttons – for good reason. I’m all for working past irrational fears to be a stronger person, but why should we have to have an excuse (even if you owe someone money like recovering, you can make it a strictly on-paper, I’ll meet my obligation kind of thing) to feel comfortable, COMFORTABLE and SAFE with those we let into our everyday lives right NOW. I think recovering has a right to, without having to explain it to us or this person, to have a clean slate, not have to worry about being a Nice Person (sounds like you already are…) and just go on like Erin B. says, just putting one foot in front of the other and trusting instincts when someone makes, or has made you feel UNCOMFORTABLE.
I know I have to remember to just appreciate what trials God’s given me. I know I can change or in a way, RECLAIM myself – I remember my daughter (who was about 11 at the time) seeing me reading “Courage to Change” stretched out on my bed. I was crazy to see what I could do to live with a man who was an alcoholic-it lasted a year…She said, Mom, you don’t need to change, you’re FINE just the way you are!’ And though that probably wasn’t quite true and I still need work, sometimes we get so caught up in other people’s problems and personas that we start to lose our own true character, everything that was fine and noble. So now I know in my own gut what I’ve gone through, all of us has our own internal journal that is unique – and I think we can all give ourselves points that we’re willing to be selfish in good ways now, in a way that we can just say ‘all things must pass’ if we make healthy choices now. Life is challenging enough with what comes our way unexpectedly without inviting trouble or someone else’s extra baggage. I’m praying that I can follow through with these thoughts myself.
persphone,
it is ineresting that you chose the words “‘secret side’ to me”. Because that seems to be a recurring thread with sociopaths AND their supply.
Example: my exP was living 2 lives, the veneer he polished of an eccentric inventor/pilot with a wife and God only knows what kind of drug dealing pervert etc…
One of the ways that predators isolate their victims is by telling them a “secret”. Or getting them to engage in illegal or clandestine activity. Forcing the victim to live a dual life too. This is very common.
But, I remember that as a kid, I also liked living a dual life – except I did it out in the open. I went to private schools. But when I left school all dressed in my preppy clothes, I would hitchhike all over the city and the suburbs. I knew that this looked very strange, to see a girl dressed as I was – in smart, preppy clothing, walking down the street hitchhiking every day like a street punk. That was my dual life. I met lots of strange/interesting people this way. It entertained me to create this juxtaposition of images in the light of day. Everyone saw me do this every day for 2 years. That’s why when the green river killer picked me up and propositioned me, I bitched him out. How dare he NOT see what I WANTED him to see? How dare he percieve me as a prostitute? LOL.
I’m seeing that the dual/secret life aspect keeps popping up in the lives of narcissism. I wonder why?
Persephone, I’ve also found myself looking at other people – my whole life – and noticing how “normal” they are and never feeling that way about myself. I remember thinking that they must be bored to death being so normal. I noticed Witsend mentioned her son had said this, too. Now I long for boring and normal, but when I met the P I was 17 and I liked the excitement he brought to everything. But I never imagined what he really was – an evil predator whose sole pleasure in life is murder by suicide.
persephone7: you make many good points — the issue of nice-ness. I definitely was trained for co-dependency due to some abuse and being an “invisible” child who had to take on adult responsibilities in an “alcoholic” family-of-origin. I have been working on Co-D recovery for years. I am making progress because as I find myself increasingly uninterested in tolerating someone’s company when they’re spewing non-sense.
Thank you all for great insights in the posts here. I feel more positive reinforcement in ways to continue NC on my terms, and I am seeing more clearly that I can continue emotional withdrawal/ practicing detachment despite still owing money to my ex-N.
Interestingly, I
The rest of what I was going to write: Interestingly, I have begun to feel more peaceful and firm in saying no consistently when he out of the blue asks for physical contact — so that’s one thing I do not feel obligated to do just because I owe him money. Mainly, I’ve felt obligated not to always be “cold” by at least talking on the phone sometimes when he calls — and sometimes I just don’t answer the phone. Occasionally when I’ve called him, I keep realizing that I really don’t have much I want to say to him anymore, so the calls have gotten shorter and more infrequent from my end.
recovering: you sound like you’re living up to your name here…actually, it’s great you have your own business! And you sound like your own feelings are getting more ironed out to where you can just focus on what you feel like doing at the moment, putting your own needs first. Whenever I choose to just get busy with my own art and business (I do have my own self-employed status other than my other job) I feel more confident and focused and happy – doing what I love! And that seems to be the best medicine of all when you can just think about the task at hand and not OBSESS. And when you’re not obsessing, there’s room for that peaceful feeling, which is healing in itself.
hey guys, haven’t been posting in months and am starting the N o contact phase again and i literally feel like im detoxing, just like when i quit drinking. I just hope this passes and it feels like physical withdrawal like im drawn to make contact and i can’t see him for the bad guy. i was diagnosed with the Stockholm syndrome in a Trauma program which explains not being able to see him for what he really is and denial and questioning myself but it’s so dam frustrating to say the least. The self doubt gets stronger i’ve found the longer i’ve continued to be in denial. love kindheart im praying to God to remove the obsession but it’s minute by minute right now.
Hi kindheart! So very good to hear from you! How is your father? Sorry if you already wrote about that and I missed it. I think you can see the P/S for exactly what he is, you wrote about every crappy thing he has done, don’t let this diagnosis put you in denial, get out of the fog and face the truth, of course it hurts… but at least there is a light at the end of the tunnel, if you stay… there is always hurt — it never stops. Why don’t you try journaling (like Edna did in the latest article) put down what’s happening in black and white so you don’t forget, write your conversations down and write your feelings about it. Don’t give up, you can do it, the “detox’ phase will pass!!! I’ve done exactly the same thing you are describing, start feeling good about yourself again, don’t let the self doubt take over, you know him for what he is, you don’t have to be with someone who doesn’t respect you, or take care of you, or love you — as you have written in the past, he only loves himself.
kim frederick:
Good point, Kim, and I think you are correct. Yeah, what you said about your mom is so true of this friend. But, you know what, I always tell this friend he is just like being around my mom! Now I understand why. Just exactly what you said about always being there to lift you up….but they don’t want you to really soar. I understand…but, it’s like I told him-in your own way you are keeping me in a box too. Hmmm, passive manipulation. I get it. Thanks, Kim!
ugh, I’m on the phone with the P right now.
I wish I could let you all hear.
He wants me to sign papers he wants money. I had imagined that I could at least feel sorry for him. But he is such a slimey disgusting creep, it’s hard to even care for him at all.
Kindheart, I am fairly new here. Couple of months. But, not new to what you are going thru. The NC is vital to breaking the obsessive pull. Create a life quote and stick with it. Mine was/is: “He does not love me; love does not abuse, lie, cheat and abandon.” Keep this quote in your memory and when the thoughts occur repeat it over and over until it becomes your rebuttal. This reminder and NC will overpower the obsessive thoughts, the oppression/obsession will gradually subside and you will grow free. It’s also important to replace HIS wharped value system with one of YOUR own and nuture it. As YOUR values and personality began to grow, along with NC [very important!] you will slowly break the toxic bond. Best wishes and understanding hugs to you!!!