By Joyce Alexander, RNP (retired)
Someone posted one of those “signs” on my Facebook page today that everyone forwards and shares, which I call “one-sentence wisdom or humor” but this one struck me as suburb wisdom.
The past is where you learned the lesson.
The future is where you apply it.
Don’t quit in the middle.
We have all had the misfortune to learn our lessons the “hard way” in associating with a psychopath (or two), but actually I think “misfortune” may be the wrong word, because learning things “the hard way” means that we will not forget those lessons. “The burned hand never forgets the fire” is another way to say it. Maybe we have actually been fortunate to escape from the psychopath when we are still able to escape, and when our “burns” were not fatal. We read in the newspapers, on the Internet, and see on television the faces of women (and men) who did not escape with their lives from associating with a psychopath.
Now that we have escaped, I think we need to apply those lessons learned in the past, to the future. We can’t quit in the middle.
Treating the wounds
While I realize that many here on Lovefraud still have open wounds, sores that are still bleeding or weeping, that are still painful to touch. The pain caused by those wounds, by the physical, financial, and emotional wounds can be horrific. Worse, still, can be the pain of treating those wounds.
I recall my son D’s burns after the plane crash. They weren’t quite severe enough for him to be hospitalized since he had a trained medical person at home, so they sent him home with me with a car load of creams and potions with minute instructions on how to cleanse and re-bandage his burns daily.
Each day I would pre-treat him with a dose of morphine to numb the pain somewhat, though he said it didn’t actually numb the pain, just made him where he didn’t care. Then I would start the process of taking off the old dressings, exposing his wounds to the open air, then wash the burns, removing the old, dead skin, then put on the creams tenderly and carefully, and then replace the bandages which went from the tip of his fingers to his shoulders and back.
I can’t even imagine just how he must have hurt, but my own empathy for him as I treated his wounds was extremely painful to me as well. I know there were many times he wanted to just “give up” and many times I wanted to as well. Just quit! It was too painful to go on treating the wounds! (Just an aside: my son’s wounds healed successfully and unless you know where to look with a magnifying lens, there are no scars visible.)
Emotional wounds
There were times I felt the same way with my emotional wounds in life. It was just too painful, I just wanted to QUIT! Anything to stop tearing the bandages off and treating the wounds again. It was too painful.
After my husband died, I was in such emotional pain that I didn’t want to do the grieving. I didn’t want to tear those bandages off and treat those wounds of my loss. It was just too painful. So I became vulnerable to the psychopaths in my life. The new boyfriend looking for a new “respectable” wife to cheat on was not a successful way to end my pain and grief. I had quit in the middle and didn’t apply lessons I had learned in the past to the future.
Associating with psychopaths leaves us with wounds of all descriptions and levels of damage. Those wounds are difficult and painful to heal, but we must not quit in the middle. Therapy is painful. We have to tear off the scabs that keep us from being able to heal and allow new growth. Whether the therapy is from a professional or is self administered, it is painful to expose our raw inner selves to the open air of examination.
Applying what we learned
When those wounds are healed, however, we must apply those lessons learned to the future of our lives. We must watch for the RED FLAGS of disordered people in the future associations of our lives, and when we see a RED FLAG, we must HONOR that red flag by running as fast as we can away from the person(s) waving it. If not, we will be burned again ”¦ and again ”¦ and again.
Our healing processes start out in learning about the psychopaths, but they end up being about learning about ourselves as well. Learning why we were vulnerable to the psychopaths in the first place. Fixing those vulnerabilities and using the knowledge we learned from our past, to make our futures better.
Don’t quit in the middle.
Darwinsmom,
good for you seeing through the manipulation. It sounds like a family of enablers, aka narcissists.
Excusing his evil behavior is the same as condoning it. Enabling it is the same as being an accomplice.
I guarantee that he is behind the emails from her. No other explanation makes sense. The whole thing just doesn’t “smell” right. Somehow, this post on the dating site has cramped his style, as it should, and he is trying to continue manipulating you through his sister, just to show that he can.
GO NC.
Darwinsmom, I agree with sky, he is getting her to do this. Next they will offer to pay the fee….hee hee. Block her e mail so when she sends the offer ot pay the fee, her e mail bounces. LOL
😆
I’ve had the feeling too, actually from the moment she mentioned the profile, that he’s behind it. The way she inquired with me about it was manipulative to begin with. I don’t think his mother would ever request such a thing. She might be shocked, but see it as part of what he sows. His sister-cousin wants to protect him though and does enable him … when his dad and mom stopped enabling him, she took over.
I don’t think he or she will wire me money over it. If they do offer it, I’ll say it doesn’t feel right to remove it (covering up), and that asking me to remove it “out of friendship” just feels wrong, and that if she feels she cannot be “friends” with me because of my refusal, I wouldn’t hold it against her 😉
She’ll most probably be a source of info for him about my life anyway: whether I go to Nicaragua or not, where I might be living. At the moment though I’m curious how far she’s willing to cover and manipulate for him… This new twist in the exchange (and we haven’t had much of any exchange at all since last summer) perked my interest in what it says about her morals, so I’m safe high and dry in a tree like a cat watching the going-ons.
Also told my mom about this: she felt like myself and you… that he’s most likely behind this; she found it rather funny, and asked me not to delete it before she could google it (LOL), if I decided to delete it (I won’t though).
Darwinsmom~
I agree with Sky and Oxy. The ex spath I endured came from a large family of enablers who all supported and excused the spath’s behavior, ESPECIALLY his creepy sister. They’re all tricksters.
His half brother would tell me constantly, “he’s a liar”. His belated father would either say, “I’m not interested in the stories he tells, I don’t wanna know,” and if I happened to say a claim the ex-spath had made about himself and his past to his dad, his father would nod his head and then tell me the truth (It’s how I started to find out about several lies). And it was his father who made him tell me about his son, and he would have forced him into rehab. While after his death my ex inherited a sum of money, it was done in such a way that his mother could guard it (and use it for the grandson), and she lived at the other side of the country. She came down for the money and left again. The three children of his half-brother don’t want anything to do with him either. They’d either ignore him or do no more than engage in short, functional replies. The first summer with him, their father and grandfather were not at the house, and going to school and making food themselves. My ex had a separate house part to sleep, and they only shared the kitchen, which they would lock up at night. He came home one time with lots of drama, claiming he was threatened by the guys he got into jail for the assault-robbery on me (and those guys hadn’t done it), and shouted through the kitchen door to be let in so he could call. They didn’t allow him in, and instead called his dad in fright to warn him that he was going nuts. He busted down the door and broke the phone. They all knew to “grey-rock” him. At the time I went along with his pov, though I tried to explain to him that his cousins were young and acting in a way to keep themselves safe. Now of course, I see that it was typical drama-rama created for his need of attention, as ambient violence for me to witness and get accustomed too, etc… And I fully think those kids behaved in the best anti-spath way they could; so did his brother and father and mother.
But his sister-cousin would constantly worry over him, if I wasn’t around, mail me to try and help him get out of the town, because he might be using drugs or party. She’s the one who wants to “save” him and put responsibility on other people to make that happen. The last half year, I once told her that he was a grown man and not a child, and that I was at the other side of the world, and there was little I could or should do at all. (I barely got him on the phone or on the internet more than once a week anyhow, because he wasn’t there) She’s definitely the enabler, and imo she’s trauma bonded to him, and she has continued to regard him a her “baby brother”, the mask he’s very good at playing. She blames the vices and temptations of the town, but never recognizes how much of it is him seeking it himself wherever he is. Even in Belgium he’d rapidly find the most shadiest people. She still treats him as a believable source of information, if something bad of him gets known (like when he ditched me for the new victim). She’s not narcistic imo though… she’s just a victim of his with a saviour complex.
The whole thing of last week though made me think over how he managed to come off as sweet… He does it both to his sister and lovers… He goes in some type of peaceful baby mode: putting his head in your lap, making you caress him, asking you to get rid of his zits. Even then, he’s narcistic, and using mothering instincts in women to create some sensation of sweetness and peace. Of all the sweet moments I remember, not even 10% were in being sweet to me or others, the other 90% were making others be sweet to him.
I have confirmation me thinks that this whole contact was coming from him and his latest victim… Someone anonymous left a comment at his profile that “he’s a sweetheart”. LOL. Sure, he’s a sweetheart, when he’s not stealing, conning, lying, keeping you awake, ignoring you, being drunk, hitting people in the face with a belt, etc… But if it makes people feel they’ve hit the jackpot of sweetness, then I’ll let them live in their bubble. A cat for a pet is a less destructive choice imo, cheaper too.
Darwinsmom, exactly. I blocked all of the spaths accounts from my own and I don’t even want to know what he’s claiming. The exspath isn’t sweet, kind, giving, loving, truthful, honest, or caring. He puts those masks on when it suits his needs. And, warning his next victim? It won’t happen – they will have to learn that awful truth on their own, as well. Who would believe it, anyway? The exspath is a Good ‘Ole Charlie Type – unassuming, quiet-mannered, and oh-so-subtle.
A cat is definitely cheaper and it also is incapable of conning us! LOL!!!
I think I have the answer why it’s so important for them to get rid of the profile NOW…
I’m sure they’ve known about this profile for a long time now. At the very least he was aware of it, Ever since I put it up last year, he never put up a fb pic anymore of himself in close up, only pics of himself in full body and small head (he used to have close ups all the time). It took a while, but late fall he put up a pic of himself with her, and not until 1 or 2 months ago did she put up a fb profile pic of herself with him in front of Buckingham Palace.
And now, almost a year later, suddenly his sister has to beg me to delete the playerblock profile? Sure, I’m cramping his style… but what style?
I think he’s applying for permanent residence in the UK, possibly he’s been married and has to prove it’s not a sham. If UK authorities investigate their relationship, and him on the internet, up pops his profile with me claiming he’s using women to go to countries and that he’s a petty criminal. And I’m starting to think that’s the real issue… they fear or he’s not getting the OK to be a permanent resident in the UK.
If that’s the case, I have a very vested interest in him not getting permanent residency. If he gets permanent residence in the UK, he’ll become a EU citizen and can apply to “work” and “live” wherever in Europe afterwards, including Belgium. Guess where I do not want him to have a chance of living?
I think I should prepary myself for some more action being taken in order to get me to delete the profile: manipulative, violent, a ring at my door, mails and messages, smear campaigning, and if that doesn’t work smooching me up again.