Last week, I posted Letters to Lovefraud: Who we used to be, written by the reader who posts as “Panther.” She called herself a “new survivor,” having just left the sociopath and gone “No Contact” less than a month ago. She wrote:
Through reading various Lovefraud articles, I’ve realized that the veterans have so much invaluable advice to offer. However, at times I wonder how the voice of a survivor sounded right after the break. The reason this matters to me is because the veterans seem so much stronger than I feel right now. I cannot help but wonder, as I read through their wise words, if they have something I don’t have, which enabled them to get over this.
To Panther and other Lovefraud newbies: The only difference between you and the veterans is time. We’ve been on the healing journey longer than you have.
I left my sociopathic ex-husband in February of 1999. That was more than 12 years ago! I’ll tell you what I was like when the wounds were raw. Here’s what I wrote on page 287 of my book, Love Fraud How marriage to a sociopath fulfilled my spiritual plan. In this part, I’m describing my state of mind, and state of being, when I discovered the treachery of my ex-husband:
James Montgomery proclaimed his love to me—just as he had proclaimed his love to 20 or 30 other women who had discretionary income and access to credit. I was just another pawn in a long line of women who heard the words “I love you” and believed them.
Why had this happened to me? All I ever wanted was what everyone wants—companionship, happiness, love. I was a good, considerate person. I worked hard. I treated people fairly. I did not deserve to be so exploited.
I paced up and down the hallway, my thoughts tumbling over each other, building into a mountain of pain and confusion. I leaned my back against the wall and slid to the floor, talking to myself. I felt like I should cry, but I could not. My dog, Beau, worriedly licked my face.
I was angry. I was outraged. Yet all I felt was numbness. I decided to call my therapist, Elaine Anderson. Luckily, she was available to do a session with me right then, over the phone.
I lay on the bed in my spare room, the meditation room, and told Elaine what I had found in James’ papers: Correspondence to his business associates that was full of lies. Letters from women asking for their money back. Stock certificates made out to many of these women. Proof that the corporation issuing the stock certificates was defunct.
The dam within me began to crack, and then it burst. I cried. I groaned. I choked. Emotional pain rose from deep within me to the surface of my awareness, like pus rising from a deep infection. Painful energy traveled to various parts of my body—my hands, my eyes, my heart. My hands clenched. I struggled to breathe.
I don’t know how long it went on. But slowly, the pain dissipated.
That was the beginning of my journey to recovery. I spent many, many hours curled up on the floor, crying. I also spent many hours envisioning my ex-husband’s face on a pillow and pounding it with my fists, pounding until I collapsed. I spent many hours with my therapist, coaxing the anger and bitterness out of my emotions and out of my soul.
The betrayal of the sociopath creates deep, deep pools of pain and disappointment within us. To recover and regain ourselves, we have to drain those pools. It takes time.
And then, as we drain them, we find more pain and disappointment in the pools, left over from injuries that we experienced before the sociopath. In fact, it was those injuries that made us vulnerable to the sociopath in the first place. Those emotions must also be drained.
Healing doesn’t just happen—we have to make a conscious decision to face all of the negativity head on. If we don’t make the decision to heal, if we just try to put the experience of the sociopath behind us without dealing with the pain—well, then it was all a waste, we didn’t learn anything, and we’re likely to repeat it by finding another sociopath.
Recovery is possible, but it takes time and commitment. Here the words I said to myself time and time again: “Just keep going.”
So to all of you who are just starting out, just keep going. I promise you, you can overcome, you can recover, and you can find peace.
GREAT QUOTE DONNA:
“Healing doesn’t just happen—we have to make a conscious decision to face all of the negativity head on. If we don’t make the decision to heal, if we just try to put the experience of the sociopath behind us without dealing with the pain—well, then it was all a waste, we didn’t learn anything, and we’re likely to repeat it by finding another sociopath.”
AMEN! AMEN! AMEN!!!!!
That conscious decision and the work to go with it is I think like quitting smoking or any other major change or addiction, it is a continually necessary to be strong, and if we fall off the wagon, we must get up and GET BACK ON! As long as it takes! Great article!
Donna,
Oh gosh, me too. Hours and hours of crying and processing and obsessing, and just crippling emotional pain.
The realization I had spaths in my family, and that I’d been in relationships with multiples of them….it wasn’t until I dug into that emotional graveyard and faced the truth of them, and of me, that I started to really feel like my life was going in an entirely new direction.
The journey continues, and educating people about personality disorders, and danger signs is still a part of my journey. But the pain isn’t ‘really’ there anymore. The memory and a sense of outrage is still there. I will never forget.
But I no longer have that feeling that I am an unnecessary. I no longer feel disposable. I feel connected again and can feel an exchange of love with others’.
For those of you who are holding on by your teeth. Keep holding on and really LOOK at what they are, and apply yourself to your own self-exploration and ‘house keeping’.
There is a real possibility I would not be where I am today, had it not been for LoveFraud. This site opened my eyes. And gave me strength.
xo to all of you..Slim
Donna,
Thank you so much for writing this. I find so much of what you say to be true. I also agree that this experience has made me realize that I cannot just “stuff it down” anymore, because all those old hurts ended up leading me to the straw that broke my back, which was the most recent sociopath (although he was no straw…more like a falling pine tree)
In fact, I didn’t even remember what my father had put me though until this most recent experience. I hadn’t ever faced how much he damaged me when I was very young. It wasn’t until I had no choice but to deal with the pain that I finally made up my mind to do it. It’s like that Anaïs Nin quote:
“And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.”
Your words there about how you felt right after the break….ring so true. I have come here to LF and from the first moment, I have decided to trust people here. When they said, “Don’t answer that email,” I didn’t answer. When they said, “Delete those mails,” I deleted them. When Ox said, “Label the file ‘toilet’ if you must keep some as evidence,” I labelled the file “toilet” (seriously). So far, following the advice of people on here has been the best placement of my trust in so long I cannot remember….and the reason I knew I should do this is because in here, on LF, I read story after story after story that I myself could have written. I KNOW these people get it and are possibly the only people who do (within my contact range at the moment).
So, if you all tell me: time. I will trust in this and do what is prescribed. Face the pain? Okay….one chip at a time, I will. The only thing I can imagine being worse than facing the pain of my past….is knowing that if I DON’T do that, I could end up with another sociopath…and the next one might kill me. Heck, the last one almost did. I cannot afford to “oops, he’s CRAAAZYYY” anymore.
Just keep going….so simple….but so daunting. Some days, I might have to modify this phrase to: Just keep breathing.
Thank you again for this post. I really would like to read your book one day. This won’t come as a shock to people in here, but I have actually been rendered so broke (I gave that guy, some freaking how, more of my salary than I kept for myself) that I can barely afford food right now, let alone a book. In about 1-2 months, this should improve. Now that there isn’t a sociopath to screw up every single plan I put in place, I can start cleaning up this huge mess!!!
Thanks Donna!!!!!!!
To Ox and Slimone:
Amen to your both.
Slimone: hanging on by your teeth…yup, but at least I’m still hanging on….grrrr….with a Pit Bull lock jaw!!!! Rawr!
Donna
Thank you for this. You’ve changed my life.
It’s not enough to read some books. It’another thing all together to tell my story, to have it validated, to get help from others who have been there. This is a unique experience of grief and recovery.
I just want to get my life back. I’ve said that over and over again. I want to be my normal, happy self.
Thanks to you, and One/Joy and Oxy and Skylar and Hens and Louise and Panther and everybody else I’ve interacted with or have read from in the past, I’m getting there.
I’m grateful. And I’m going to just keep going till I get there.
Superkid
You are all so very welcome. I am glad that Lovefraud is helping you.
Donna
Hi Panther, have any of his other victims come looking for you yet? I know or know of more than 12 and they are all lovely women. You were selected based on your good qualities and exploited with lies, just like these women who I know were victimised.
Donna thinks that we need to work on ourselves spiritually to avoid another psycho. I think there need not have been anything wrong with someone spiritually for them to be exploited by a predator, sometimes an ordinary person is just in the wrong place at the wrong time Animals in the wild are not always weak sometimes they are just in the wrong place at the wrong time and get taken by predators. I do think such an experience makes you weak and isolated. If a lion tries to grab a victim and wounds it then the victim gets weaker and is more likely to be taken by another lion. There is nobody who would say there is some original spiritual deficiency with that gnu zebra or whatever. I don’t like it when people claim there is some original victim mentality which people who attract psychopaths have, I resist tha thought like I resist the concept of original sin. It might be true for some people but that does not mean it is true for all.
What you need is a safe place to heal, sometimes your friends and family are not that safe place you need, sometimes they are just like the primitive herd who smell the weakness and reject your needs in a very primitive way, and this is because like animals they sense that WEAKNESS ATTRACTS PREDATORS and they instinctively act to protect themselves first. Find safe places where you can heal and believe me you are not to blame for the weakness you now have because of the injury this predator caused you. Congratulations on your escape and keep running like the perfect zebra that you are!
Thanks Donna..
I have been apart from my ex-husband sociopath now for 3 years. Divorced for one of those.
I so relate to the letters, lies, women and more lies and infidelity. My x-path has seen around 450 women during his life. I was as far as I know the only one he married..I too sometimes wonder why me? I had two children with the x-path and have tried to have very minimal contact with him and between him and the children but courts here in Australia are very pro both parents needing to be in the children’s lives. Even though I have had counsellors/psychiatrists tell me that the children are better off without him in their lives.
And I really notice the difference in them from when they have no contact for 6 months and then are in contact only via telephone. They turn into feral animals almost..lol
I asked my daughter why after she speaks with her daddy is she really naughty for me etc and her answer actually surprised me- although I know it shouldn’t. She said “Daddy is mean to you so I will be mean to you”. Out of the mouth of a 4 year old that just breaks my heart.
Some days I struggle to stay on top of my emotions but I find if I listen to music especially this song
http://youtu.be/eVLJ4HOzi1c
Set fire to the rain by Adele
It carries me forward. I think she may be singing about a sociopath….lol
Hope you all enjoy the song as much as I do.
In response to the comment above, I’d like to clarify my views about sociopaths and spirituality.
From a spiritual perspective, I don’t think there is anything “wrong” with any of us who have been targeted by sociopaths. I believe that our most important job in life is to learn and grow, and sometimes we select big, profound lessons to learn. Sometimes sociopaths come into our lives for our own spiritual growth.
This seems counter-intuitive – why would we want something as horrific as being betrayed by a sociopath as a “lesson”? But when we keep going – keep plowing through the experience, keep facing the pain and purging it from our systems – when we get to the other side we find that we have, in fact, grown. And, we’ve found and healed the pain that left us vulnerable to the sociopaths to begin with.
Before I met the sociopath, despite my seeming “success,” I was numb, walled off, clueless and questioning my own value. Now I love, am loved, and feel like I have something to share with the world.
I’ve seen many people on Lovefraud make similar comments – after the sociopath, they’ve grown, they have more wisdom, they are free of the obligations they felt before.
There is light at the end of the tunnel, and it is, in fact, a bright shining star!
On my way to recovery I have suppressed all of what happened too long and now it’s biting me. So I start with a right counselor and I will recover thanks for your article Donna.