By Joyce Alexander, RNP (retired)
One of the things I have heard from victims of psychopaths here at Lovefraud, seemingly over and over, is that people compare their losses to my losses and Donna’s losses and Dr. Liane Leedom’s losses, etc. and think that their losses don’t “count” because they haven’t lost X, Y, or Z and we did. They seem to think that because I lost a child, or Liane lost her medical practice, or Donna lost a quarter of a million dollars, that they are not entitled to feel as injured as we were/are.
The people expressing this somehow seem to have “survivor’s guilt” about feeling so devastated when their losses were somehow “less.” Or they feel that we are somehow “super heroes” because we survived “big losses.”
I felt that way too when I was reading Dr. Viktor Frankl’s book, Man’s Search for Meaning. Dr. Frankl wrote the book after his years in a German Nazi concentration camp, in which he lost everything except his life, and barely retained that.
Pain is like gas
I felt that my own losses didn’t compare to Dr. Frankl’s losses, and that somehow I should feel guilty for feeling such great pain and desperation. Then I read Dr. Frankl’s explanation of how pain operates like a gas.
In science, we learn that a gas, because it has atoms that are far apart, will expand until it completely fills an empty container. It will also compress easily so that a larger amount of the gas can be put into a small container. In any case, the container is full. It is totally filled.
I realized upon reading this that my pain was just as “total” as Dr. Frankl’s, and that my losses were just as “big” (or “small”) as his were. All pain and all loss is total. If something is important to us, we value it and when we lose it, we grieve for that loss. We feel pain, which is what grief is.
Grief process
The “grief process,” as Dr. Elizabeth Kubler-Ross explains it, is an emotional process where we come to grips with loss, and eventually come to acceptance of that loss.
Dr. Kubler-Ross’s grief process consists of denial, bargaining, sadness, anger and acceptance. These five stages of grief are not processed in a linear 1-2-3-4-5 formula, but in alternating steps, more like 1-3-4-2-3-4-1-2-4-5. Eventually we come to and stay in the last stage, which is acceptance of the loss.
A baby who drops his pacifier is totally in misery and pain. He cries from the depth of his soul’s loss that his grief is total, his pain is total and his life is ”˜ruined,’ because he doesn’t have his pacifier. Of course we know that his life is not ruined, he will recover, but he doesn’t know this at that time because he doesn’t have the knowledge and experience to know he will come to acceptance of his loss and recover.
Pain is proportional
When we lose something that we care about, our pain is in proportion to how much something means to us. If we drop a penny, usually we will not be devastated. We know that we will still be able to buy lunch, pay the mortgage and go on with life. But if we drop the bank deposit for our business and lose it, it is another matter entirely. Now we may not be able to make payroll and things will get very bad, so our loss is bigger and we grieve over the problems this will cause, the bigger loss.
When we are devastated by the loss of a “great love,” or by the betrayal of someone we trusted, depended on and cared for, we have suffered a great and grievous loss that rocks our world. It isn’t anything we can put a dollar value on; it is an emotional attachment that has no price. How do you quantify “love?”
When we have lost something that is of utter value to us, whether it is something that we can quantify, or whether it has no monetary value, only value of the heart, the soul, then we must realize that our grief is total. We must not compare our losses to what someone else has lost and feel that their loss is “greater,” because it isn’t greater. The pain isn’t greater. It is all TOTAL LOSS. The pain is total.
So if you start to feel that your loss is nothing compared to someone else’s loss, Stop! Realize that your loss, your pain, is your loss and pain. No one else’s is more or less.
kim frederick
I found this article interesting, especially because I have been coming to terms with x hub’s sex addiction and narcissism. It explains the shame vs. guilt dyad.http://www.wellsphere.com/brain-health-article/the-neuropsychology-of-shame-vs-guilt-narcissism-vs-psychopathy-the-sex-addicted-difference/1078642
skylar
Gosh Oxy,
I’ve already explained that they DONT FEEL SHAME AT ALL. They HAVE it, but don’t feel it. Instead they FEEL 180 DEGREES THE OPPOSITE: Narcissism.
Narcissism is a defense against shame.
And further as Kim pointed out, it is an “or” so there are many reasons why a person would have shame. Guilt might be one. Abuse might be another. The only NECESSARY condition is that you compare yourself against another and find yourself less than in the comparison.
kim frederick
Which brings us back to projection and the feeling of being slimed. If you FEEL that queesy, slimey sensation when you are around a certain person, it is likely that you are a threat to their perception of themselves as superior to you. They will then project onto you, their feelings of inferiority in an effort to preserve their god-like status. If they succeed, you feel shame.
This is why one of the core issues of trauma bonded individuals is shame. It is also one of the things that keeps you in the system.
skylar
wow! kim, great article link.
One of the very best I’ve seen on shame since it ties in the specific brain area. I’ll have to read more from that person.
I had never seen it explained in quite that way before.
It’s interesting though, that the author said that she wasn’t very familiar with shame personally, having experienced guilt more often. That’s what I used to think. Then I realized what slime was.
This is really interesting from the perspective of Girardian theory because it pertains to the scapegoat, who is accused and expelled. But the scapegoated person is not just accused, but also slandered and abused before being expelled.
Ox Drover
Quotes below from the article Kim Linked to:
SHAME and GUILT are NOT interchangeable. In fact, they could not be more different psychologically, neurologically, or biochemically. And therein lies the proverbial rub. Period.
Whereas shame is about the quality of our person or self, guilt is the painful emotion triggered when we become aware that we have acted in a way to bring harm to another person or to violate some important code. Guilt is about action and laws”
In the most recognized and first work to distinguish between the two emotions, Lewis in 1971 described “shame” as an “acutely painful emotion accompanied by a sense of shrinking or of “being small” and by a sense of worthlessness and powerlessness. Shamed people also feel exposed” (Tangney & Dearing, p. 19, 2002). While guilt-prone persons may also experience a fear of exposure, it is in a decidedly different context. Shame-based persons are afraid of SELF exposure, whereas guilt-based persons are afraid of OTHER exposure. Shame-based persons feel horrible about themselves. Guilt-based persons feel horrible about what they did to harm another and what the discovery of that action or actions will do to harm still others in a dominoes-knock-the-one-down-and-you-knock-them-all-down kind of effect.
The above are quotes from that article Kim linked to,
and quite a good article it is too, but I think they are using the terms “shame” and “guilt” in different ways than the DICTIONARY does….and there’s the rub. Medical personnel and especially psychology use terms a bit different than the rest of society does so it make it heard for people to “get it” when they are using the term one way and we are using it another.
So, yes, according to THEIR definition of “shame” and “guilt” it is probably correct, but according to mine and the dictionary’s it’s not. So we have been talking about the same thing using the same words,. but with different definitions.
skylar
This quote from the article Kim linked to, is extremely TELLING:
I added the bold type on “moving on”. This is what narcissists tell us to do after we’ve been traumatized by spaths. “forget about it and move on.” “Don’t let it define you, it’s in the past, let it stay there.”
When you hear those words, yeah, move on away from those people because they are deniers. It is denial that allows evil to exist. The denial of shame is why we have scapegoats.
Libragirl72
Almost 60 days of NC down the drain in a matter of 3 days! No more! I will block his number now. I see him as the manipulative very callous ‘thing’ he truly is.
Remember, after nearly 2 months his first text to me was showing me he had no empathy for my feelings at all and took pleasure in my pain.
“You cried to my mom??” LMFAO…
Well, yes that did spark a response. I’m analyzing myself and why I felt the need to respond. It’s just always how he played the game. Nasty comments. Then just try to touch him or talk about them like adults. Same treatment I got from him when he was my boyfriend.
So, today is the Spaths bday. And, I still had tax papers and school books in my trunk. I figured, why not. I’m feeling strong enough to simply say “Happy Birthday, I left your things on the porch”. Um…no. I got set up ..again. I should have seen it coming. He said he had a g/f but I didn’t really believe him. I thought it was just another lie like everything else. Well, he had her answer the phone. She was a little rude, but when I said I was just calling to wish him happy birthday (she wouldn’t let me speak to him, I could hear him in the back ground HANg up! Libragirl is a bitch. So, I said Spath stop being verbally abusive. ) She hung up. But, my stupidity got hold of me and I called back. “Like I was saying, Just tell Spath his stuff is on his moms porch”.. Then.. she actually said “I have a question for you?” Yes, I said? If you two have been sooooo broken up for such a long time..why (Then he interrupted and said hang up) I said, because it hasn’t been that long at all. Almost 2 months. And, I said the only reason I have Spaths number at all is because he textd me first the other night. She actually said “Well, if I send you my phone number will you forward me the messages?”. wow… I said, sure but who are you? And, then she hung up… Well, I know NC NC NC!!! But, amazingly I feel better. It’s like closure I guess. I could have told her sooo many negative things about him, but I told her “you’ll have to find out for yourself, you wouldn’t believe me if I told you”.
But, I finally see the manipulation and game playing. She has no clue. It was a game for both of our benefit. He had her answer to ‘surprise me’ and ‘hurt’ me. And, she got her first taste of doing what he wanted. I mean really, my call could have gone to voicemail. He wanted her to answer. What a douche!
darwinsmom
But he wanted her to hang up before she learned how short it has been since you’ve separated. From the little convo it seems she thought you had been separated longer… it’s probably the first time she realizes he had two relationships at the same time.
Libragirl, I hope you realize now that you’ll never get a responsible, adult response from him… NEVER. Please go NC again (with his mom, his gf, himself). Your system still needs to heal from the past stress and traumas. Any contact will only create more wounds, while the rest of hte past still needs to heal.
I wish you strength to choose for peace for yourself 🙂
Libragirl72
Thank you darwinsmom, and you are correct! I am back on track to NC. For some reason it’s a whole lot easier when I know he isn’t home. Meaning, when he’s offshore 2 weeks out of the month..I have a sense of peace.
Yes, he wanted her to answer to ‘shock’ me..and ‘hurt’ me. And, he wanted her to hang up before she obtained any info. Boy, I could’ve told her some stuff. (Like he lied to me for a year that his own father is dead (not), all the money he owes me and my family, he’s never been in combat or had an injury due to an IED explosion, and so much more.) I’m still thinking about her asking to send me her number to view the texts to prove he text’d me first..afterall, she answered HIS phone..she should have seen my number come up and text me her number from her own phone? Oh, well I’m sure he recovered quickly by saing “she’s crazy, don’t tell her who you are..blah blah blah”..
I don’t wish her harm. But, at the same time I hope he causes her the same pain and misery he has caused me.
darwinsmom
You don’t need to hope he’ll cause her the same mysery and pain. You can be sure of it that he does and will. The fact that she mentioned this plan about sending her number to read his texts indicates she’s already trying to get info other than from him. She’d only do that if she doesn’t have a hunch already that he’s been lying to her about lots of stuff. But she’s also still in a phase where she’s very likely to confront him with the data that doesn’t fit with his claims. And as long as she confronts him, she’ll be duped into it again and again… just as you were for a while, and we all were… hoping that confrontation would turn them magically into honest and genuine people again.
Libragirl, it’s tempting to volunteer lots of info to her. But in all likelihood he isn’t using the exact same lies to her, but different ones, and an overload of date may frighten her off to reject the info as not credible. She’ll come to you for info when the time is ripe for her to do so.