In the world of healing from an encounter of the P(sychopath) kind, it is easy to forget that there is a world without fear, without lies, without terror, without uncertainty, out there, just around the corner from the insanity of his abuse. It’s easy to forget that people don’t always manipulate, deceive, devalue and destroy you. And, it’s easy to forget — you never deserved their lies and manipulation in the first place.
It’s one of the things that makes healing from these encounters so difficult. We forget who we are as we fall into believing we are who they say… Whatever it is they tell us we are — from beautiful to ugly, impossible to live without, impossible to live with. The most incredibly intelligent woman they’ve ever met to the stupidest woman who ever walked the planet.
In their eyes we become less than we ever imagined possible because, in their eyes we do not exist. At least, not the ”˜we’ we’ve known ourselves to be. Because their eyes can’t see ”˜us’. All they can see is the ”˜target’ of who they needed us to be while they stalked and plotted their way into our lives.
When I was first released from that relationship, I couldn’t believe what had happened to me. And then I had to remind myself — believe it. It happened. “But how could he have done it?” my mind raced. “He said he loved me. Would never hurt me.”
Hah! Face it. He lied.
Facing reality of his lies is imperative to healing from these cretins evil passages through our lives. Believing they did what they did, said what they said, lied and deceived and cheated and coerced us into giving up on ourselves, is vital to our recovery.
And facing the truth about the sickness of their love, and our sickness while believing we were in love with them is critical to soothing our aching hearts and sorrow filled psyches.
So many times someone will say after they’ve told me all the things he’s done to abuse them, “But I still love him.”
And I always ask, “What’s in it for you to keep believing you love someone who treated you like that? Who betrayed you? Cheated on you? Lied to you with every breath? What’s in it for you to keep believing he is worthy of your love?”
Because after they’ve gone and devalued and discarded us one more time, we are the one’s who keep ourselves attached to their machinations with our picking at the scabs of the wounds they’ve inflicted at us, worrying the sore of their abuse with our repetition of their words running through our minds. We are the one’s who keep thinking about them, worrying about what they’re doing or saying after they’ve walked out the door one last time leaving us standing with the pieces of our hearts falling through our fingers into the puddle of our tears pooling on the floor.
It is not easy healing from a relationship with a sociopath. But, it’s a heck of a lot better than being in relationship with one.
When I was with the sociopath, I did not know up from down, left from right, in from out. Every day was fraught with some new terror, some weird and wacky story about why he couldn’t turn up, didn’t have the money to pay, didn’t have the guts to call, or simply didn’t do what he’d say he’d do in the first place. Every day was a roller coaster ride through his crazy-making words and antics, with me constantly searching for truth and order, fairness and kindness amidst the insanity that was his ”˜love forevermore’. In staying with him, I became more and more sick. More and more incapable of seeing that it wasn’t that I ”˜couldn’t leave’, it was that I kept telling myself, “I couldn’t leave.” because…. he loved me. Needed me. Wanted me. I loved him. Needed him. Wanted him. I kept telling myself I couldn’t walk away and trapped myself into believing I couldn’t because I loved him and he loved me.
He never knew what it meant to love. He never had it in him to love me. And, while I walked into that relationship with my arms and heart wide open to love, I stayed because my mind closed down and my heart broke up into a thousand tiny pieces with every moment I remained within his unholy arms.
When I was first released I wanted to believe he loved me, at least at some point in that tortorous ride — it couldn’t all be for nothing, could it? I wanted to believe it wasn’t all a lie or some sick game played out on the battlefield that became my life. In healing, I accept, He never loved me. He never could. It was always a sick game and I was the pawn who could never gain entry into his castle — because his castle never existed. And he was never the prince of my imaginings.
Poison doesn’t kill you because it loves you. Poison kills you because it’s toxic.
And he was toxic to my life. A poison I consumed with every breath I took whether I was in proximity to him or his voice was simply coming down the umbilical cord of the telephone through which he fed me my daily dose of lies.
In those first minutes and hours and days away from him, within the protective veil of No Contact, I came face to face with reality and accepted my truth. I never loved him. I wanted to think I did. I truly wanted to believe I did. But, in reality, I loved a mirage. A shimmering creation of his duplicituous creation. He was the chimera. Facilely capable of shifting shape to suit the weather, the time zone, the geographic formations around him.
I never loved him. I loved the thought of him. The idea. The dream.
In accepting the reality of my love of the idea of him versus the truth of who he was, I freed myself to awaken from the nightmare of his embrace. In my awakening, I opened myself up to all that is possible when I let go of living on cloud nine, squeezing my feet into too small high heeled shoes that inevitably trip me up. Feet firmly planted on the ground in my size nine hiking boots, and armed with my shield of No Contact, I strode fearlessly away from my need to hear his voice, to know what he was doing and saying and thinking. To make sense of his nonsense. To understand his machinations.
He did what he did because he could. It’s what he does. It’s who he is.
There’s no rhyme nor reason that can ever justify what he did to me or continues to do to others. Away from him, there’s no sense in spending my precious breath trying to make sense of his nonsense or trying to figure out if there is some way I can make him hear me, see me, look at me. There’s no closure worth being in contact with him. No point in having the last word. There’s never a last word with a sociopath. They’ll always think that one word is the opening to more.
He is the lie and I am free.
He will always be the lie and I will always be free — as long as I stay true to who I am, my values, beliefs, principles and ideals. As long as I stand up for what is right and loving in my life and turn up for me in all my beauty, warts and all and love myself for all I’m worth.
Today, these boots are made for walking. Away from abuse. Away from deceit. Away from anything or anyone who believes they have the right to tell me who I am, what I can do and where I can go.
In walking away from the belief that I loved him, I walk into the truth that I deserve love and joy and all that is good in this world. In walking away from him I leap fearlessly into creating my best life yet, of living this moment without fear that I will fall into the arms of someone who believes they have the right to take my life and make it theirs.
Nobody has that right. And I’m not giving up my right to live my life in joy and love and wonder, creating my best life yet for all I’m worth.
And I’m worth a lot.
So are you.
I survived an encounter of the sociopathic kind. I am no longer a victim of his abuse. I am a victor on the path of success, creating beauty and love in my life today because, I deserve it!
So do you!
ErinBrockovich, My heart goes out to you, Karma do exist what goes around comes around. He will get whats coming to him. Going through all that alone is the bravest!
justabouthealed, I understand everything your saying about loving yourself and I do love myself completely it just that Im missing the companion the one who suppose to enhance what you already got in place not take the love away and use it in a negative manner against you the way who love him the most. I just got involved with a SP who has no idea that the way love goes. I honestly know I got played but I gotta keep hope alive.
JAH – You crack me up – being alone does not exist for me anymore – I have me and i keep my self intertained out here in the sticks, cutting firewood in my pajamas or my boxers, sometime not shaving for days. I talk to my dog’s and they talk back..solitude – nothin better…
justabouthealed, I understand everything your saying about loving yourself and I do love myself completely it just that Im missing the companion the one who suppose to enhance what you already got in place not take the love away and use it in a negative manner against you the one who love him the most. I just got involved with a SP who has no idea that the way love goes. I honestly know I got played but I gotta keep hope alive.
(Report abusive comment)
Witsend:
No. Unfortunately, she probably does not get it.
If she DOES get it, she is not willing to “go there”.
After all, she probably wants to interview Bobby Brown (and other “troubled” stars) in the future, as well.
It’s sad, because she has got the platform to blow this subject wide open, and disspell a lot of the misconceptions about personality disorders.
But, there are still other ways to skin this cat.
And this cat definitely needs to be skinned, if you know what I mean.
Rosa, I know exactly what you mean.
This cat would’ve been skinned a long time ago if people knew that it comes in so many forms.
We have abusive parents and abusive children. But everyone just turns a blind eye because those thing happen to other people. Doesn’t CPS handle that? that’s why we pay taxes.
We have spouse abusers, but there are women’s shelters for that right?
We have corporate criminals and serial killers, but they seem so few and far between.
We have slavery and kidnapping, but aren’t those just things that happened a century ago and rarely happen now?
We have the racism and misogyny but let someone else protest it, perhaps some caring politician can pick up the cause.
We have con men and control freak lovers but it couldn’t happen to someone as smart as me… right?
It’s all the same cat: MALIGNANT NARCISSISM. If Oprah and Obama knew that slavery, under the guise of so many faces was still alive and well, maybe they would take up the rallying cry. Because slavery is still considered horrific. And yes, what happened to us was slavery, just because our chains were emotions and lies doesn’t make it any less so. Our wills were taken from us when we were lied to.
But they aren’t done yet. Corporate narcissism and political narcissism are still out there. There are books on this subject that explain how what has happened to us from our P’s is being duplicated on a grand scale everyday by our culture.
The art of manipulation is studied and taught as a way to be successful -in the corporate world, in politics, in relationships, in business. It’s all about presentation. forget about what’s underneath. It’s disgusting.
It goes on and on. No one wants to talk about it because if they face it they would have an upheaval of our entire belief system in the western world.
Imagine the day your ran for your life from your P, only on a gigantic scale as the entire nation panics and runs from everything they thought was real but now knows it isn’t. Does this remind you of last years economic collapse?
We are due for the fall out.
The field of clinical therapy is going to make a lot of money in the years to come.
*steps off soap box*
To Luv716 — I understand your need to make contact. Those who advise you not to contact him from here on — so soon after your shock and slowly-evolving realizations — all did exactly what you want to do, and had to learn from the experience. Sometimes that is what it takes to fully grasp the reality of the situation. So if you do decide to get in touch with him to say what’s on your mind, just keep your goal clear — it’s not to try to change him, but to get whatever clarity you need for yourself.
Well-meaning people who say just to stop all contact before you are fully ready have in fact learned from their own mistakes after going back-and-forth. You are human too, so don’t beat yourself up. Just try to prevent further victimization and put limits in place. As you know, words alone can no longer be good enough — you can train yourself over time to not be swayed by “I love you” — as you continue to acknowledge the contradictions of his actions.
Shabbychic, I came home and looked to see if you had posted. 🙂
I cannot remember which book I read it in. It may have been the Martha Stewart book (The Sociopath Next Door). She says one of the key identifiers of a sociopath is that they ALL use the sympathy card. Once you start feeling sorry for them, you’re hooked, and it’s dangerous. We have all been raised in a culture that teaches us it’s good to help people and you should never say no to someone in need. This is not a healthy way of being, IMO. There are many many needy people who would love to drain your energy, suck the life out of you, and take your blood if they could. There is no shame in saying NO. This is not to say that you can’t ever help someone if you feel moved to do so. But I feel it is unhealthy to do it at your own expense.
One of my massage clients could not stand up to her family. Her mother has Alzheimers and needs round-the-clock care. The siblings all had reasons why they could not do it, and asked my client to do it. My client had just lost her husband in a car accident and got hurt herself in a car accident. She lost her job due to her grief. Since she happened to be unemployed and without children, her family manipulated her into being her mother’s full-time caretaker because, after all, SOMEONE had to do it, right? It wasn’t long before the stress caused her retina to detach, and now she needs 3 surgeries and cannot take care of her mother. Interestingly, the other family members have stepped up to to the plate.
The only person you HAVE to take care of is yourself, and your kids, if you have them. Other than that, it is not your obligation to take care of others, give them money, give them your liver, etc. And you can choose to say no to preserve your own sanity. Some people will think you are selfish. So what? All the people who would tell me I’m selfish are not people whose lives I wish to emulate!
But the other point I wanted to emphasize is that while we can get our energy drained by giving too much to needy people, it is downright DANGEROUS to give your energy to a sociopath. You may as well just flush yourself down the toilet if you let him back into your life.
Oh yeah, y’all were also discussing older women/younger men on this thread too. Yippee! I love that discussion. My S was 10 years younger than me. He was 38 and a perfect age for me. I don’t physically set out looking for younger guys. I just happen to find that I have gotten attracted to several in the last 8 years since I had a serious relationship of 3 years end. Prior to that I mostly dated older guys. Some of the younger ones (if the age difference was only 5-10 years) were promising relationships. But if the age difference is 20 years, it just cannot have a happy ending for me. I always get my heart broken. I cannot do casual sex. For me, it’s never casual. And yet I still have no regrets. I’d rather open myself up and get hurt than never open up at all. This is a much different place than where I was at 6 months ago.
henry,
OMG!!!!!! He did it 🙂
America picked the chicken farmer….I love it.
My only regret was Granny didn’t make the top 5.