When we realize that we’ve been involved with a sociopath, and that person has callously betrayed us, we inevitably ask, “Why? Why did this happen to me?”
To help find the answer, one of the books that Lovefraud recommends is The Betrayal Bond—Breaking Free of Exploitive Relationships, by Patrick J. Carnes, Ph.D. The book explains the deep psychological wounds caused by trauma, and offers a way for us to identify and overcome abusive relationships that we may have experienced.
When I read the book, I was struck by what Carnes wrote on page 68:
My experience with survivors of trauma is that every journey of recovery depends on the survivor coming to a point where all that person has gone through means something.
I believe there is meaning in what we have experienced at the hands of sociopaths. Here it is: The object of the exercise is to force us to jettison mistaken beliefs about ourselves.
Promising to fill the void
When sociopaths come into our lives, they snag us by promising to fill some void. For most of us on Lovefraud, the void is our missing soul mate, but sociopaths can also promise career success, monetary rewards, spiritual enlightenment—any number of things. (Please note: This dynamic doesn’t quite apply when sociopaths are family members.)
Sociopaths are experts at identifying our vulnerabilities and exploiting them. So the question becomes, why do we have the vulnerabilities in the first place? Here’s where the mistaken beliefs come in.
We believe we cannot attract a fulfilling romance.
We believe people only want us when we do something for them.
We believe we cannot succeed through our own efforts.
We believe we aren’t good enough.
We believe we are unlovable.
We believe there’s something wrong with us.
We believe we cannot cope with life by ourselves.
We believe other people come before ourselves.
We believe someone will come and make all our troubles disappear.
These just a few of the erroneous beliefs that create voids within us. Where do they come from? Perhaps from abuse in our past, as outlined in The Betrayal Bond.Perhaps they come from simple misperceptions. In any event, the sociopath steps right in to fill them.
Feel free to add your own mistaken beliefs to the list.
Critical juncture
So the sociopaths make promises—and break every one of them. At some point we wake up, come out of the fog, and realize that our lives have crumbled into piles of debris. That’s when we ask why? Why did this happen to me?
This is a critical juncture. We can certainly blame the sociopath—they are evil, and they deserve to be blamed. We can say it was fate, or luck, which is sometimes true—there are sociopaths who randomly assault or kill people. But in most of our cases, we believed the sociopath, went along with the charade, for a period of time. Why did we do this?
If we can find the answer to this question, we can discover the meaning in the betrayal by the sociopath.
As much as I hate to admit it, I did benefit from the destruction wrought by the sociopath I married. I am not the same person that I was before him—I am wiser, healthier and happier.
Why? Because I found and released all those mistaken beliefs.
Yes, it was painful. Yes, it was traumatic. But by looking for the meaning and undertaking the healing journey, my life is now much richer than it ever was.
Thanks for all the insightful posts. I am happy to announce that I started a set of 10 free sessions with a new counselor through a church on the other side of town. Not only did I really like her, but I even felt the spiritual approach to be just what I need. I cannot afford her normal rates, but I’m hoping she can work something out with me. If not, back to the drawing board.
Way to go Stargazer!!!
Good for you, Star. I think all the approaches pretty much come down to the same thing, learning to love and take care of yourself.
Sky, I had to sleep on whether you can call me mom. I don’t know why. For some reason, I get that question from a lot of people. I don’t feel like mom. I feel like Sister Mary Catherine, the tough old fourth grade teacher at St. Francis of Assisi Elementary, who we all feared and loved. It’s a post-menopausal thing. I used to feel like Barbie. This is much better.
But you know, I write for people who can hear me. People who are where I am, or who can imagine being where I am. People whose brains are organized at least a little like mine.
And I mention this, because one of the reasons it took me so long to get up the nerve to write as I am was because I used to think I had to write pretty much the way I had to live. Do in the way that everyone would like me. Now I know better. If I’m me, I’ll attract the people who want to know someone like me, or read the ideas of someone like me. Which is much, much better than having to pretend I’m someone I’m not.
Which is pretty much what Oxy just wrote in a wonderful post on the thread under her latest article. This is me. If I look like mom to you, or like the guru on the road with the two-by-four whacking you and telling you to wake up, or the over-ambitious philosopher who sometimes writes herself out on a very long and skinny limb, it actually says more about you than me. Your dreams. Your needs.
We are all each other’s mirrors. If there is something you particularly love in me, it is something you love in yourself, whether on not you recognize it yet. And likewise, if there is something you fear. And likewise if there is something you need desperately. All of this is about you.
Not that I don’t enjoy it. I love being the mirror for other people’s dreams, and saying things that help them articulate them. But there is something even better than that. Something so memorable and rare that the times I’ve experienced it stand out like neon in my history.
It is the times when I’ve encountered someone in way that has absolutely nothing to do with me. When I’ve simply observed them as a separate being who is delightfully different, and has nothing I particularly want or fear, but is just so real that my sense of the world changes in their presence. Because I realize that there at least two of us. Two real souls traveling the world, with all the intelligence and life of the soul and survival instinct and memories of a lifetime to share with no reason except the pleasure of each other’s company.
It’s such a hair-raising experience that I’ve never been able to handle much more than one other person like that in the room, unless I count certain dinner parties or moments in a booth at a bar with a bunch of friends who are all on their second drink, or a few long-ago psychedelic experiences with near-strangers who joined me in shedding our egos.
It’s the best reason in the world to get well, to get over our histories, and develop new awareness of what’s going on around us, untainted by bitterness or anxiety. Just being human is pretty challenging, and I don’t think any of us, even the Dalai Lama ban in this clear-eyed state all the time. So neutral and awed and open to life.
But it’s so worth it to work on it. And in the meantime, to develop a sense of humor about our own projections. Not everyone is going to get the joke, when we smile when we admit we are in love with them or need them or are scared of them. Particularly not people who are intimidated by other people’s self possession. And when we meet people who do get it, we may not particularly enjoy the mirror reflection of our own irony.
But it’s another stage on the path. Ultimately even self possession falls before something else. Call it humility or gratitude or awe or something like that. Some comfortable awareness of how small we are in the larger scheme of things, how normal and predictable our dramas are, how predestined it was and how illusory our sense of who we are, and how little we can actually affect this great machine of life. And in that shrinking away of our uniqueness and importance, we surprisingly gain a perfect freedom to do and be anything. It doesn’t matter, except as it matters to us. And we are free to follow anything that intrigues us or concerns us or makes us happy.
That perfect freedom to be ourselves exists in all of us now. The fun of this work — and it will look like fun in retrospect — is clearing the path to knowing ourselves that way.
So Skylar, you can call me mom. And just playing along, if you were my daughter, I’d tell you everyday that I love the way you think. I love the way you’re going up. And I’m so proud of you.
Namaste, sweetie. To everyone that hears me.
Kathy
Kathleen:
Did you happen to see my ‘BOOK’ I responded to your question of me with…..
Fear or Healthy respect….
I have no idea where I posted it, and I just saw your post last night…..but I hope you come across it at some point.
I have thought about your question all day.
Thanks for the spark!
Keep well…..
EB
Erin,
I may have missed it. Was it yesterday? I can go looking for it. I’m in and out so infrequently now that I’m missing a lot.
Kathy
It was last night….I’m sorry I cant remember the thread it was posted on….but it was very looooong……
I’ll go looking too…..
Erin,
I just searched this thread and read more of your story than I knew. You just break my heart with good feelings for you and the wonderful kids you’ve brought up.
I really hope you write this whole story someday.
Kathy
Kathleen….I had it still on my desktop on word, so it wouldnt’t disappear into cypber holes……here it is….
I appologize to everyone who read this before……
Kathleen….
I’m sorry….I didn’t see your ’gogetemgirl’ to me up above about 18 inches…..
THANKS FOR WRITING THAT, and I am glad I inspired these thoughts in you…..
Now to address your well written questions of me…..I hope I can respond with justice”.
I have always attributed, as I told you before, my willingness to fight due to the fact that I was so downtrodden and after my cancer and et al….I got to the point when I gave up the fear.
As a youngster, into my mid 20’s I worried about EVERYTHING……back then….I came to the conclusion I was tired of worrying…..and realized that 99.9% of what we worry about never comes to fruition…..so each time I found myself in a state of worry….which was daily….does she like me, did I say something wrong, do something wrong, do a good job, make a good enough meal, park the car right, wear the right outfit, hurt someone’s feelings, blah, blah…..I started asking myself…….AM I, OR IS ANYONE I LOVE GOING TO DIE OVER THIS…..like DIE….as in death…the end….The answer was ALWAYS NO……so I trained myself to give up the worry and eventually I didn’t worry about everything…..It takes work and reminding myself to stand back and evaluate….
So….fast forward when I faced death…..ALONE…….I spent all these years fruitlessly worrying about others, and when I needed some worry at home plate, I was abandoned! Not only abandoned, but tortured….kids kidnapped, family alienated me and husband filed for divorce during treatments as a sabotage tactic.
I didn’t have much to live for, and I knew it would all be uphill…….but I wasn’t ready to die…..
So…….I gathered up my ‘fuck you’ attitude and decided to fight…..If I had of died…..I didn’t want the world talking about me as they had perceived (through his stories and lies) me……for eternity and brainwashing the kids with this as their memory of a mother who had always fought for them……
So this is where my ‘fuck you’ you are not going to kill me because…..I”M NOT AFRAID TO DIE attitude hit me….
I removed the fear of dying….my perception of the last, end, and greatest fear….
Whether it was the S or the Dissected Carotid artery or cancer killing me…..take me if it’s MY time…..BUT I AIN”T GONNA GO WILLINGLY.
So……the world changed for me……at that moment in time.
It kicked me in gear and I went high speed into healing, walking again, getting out there and doing what I needed to do….
Fear is very powerful, it can be paralyzing. I couldn’t be paralyzed……I wanted my kids safe and at home….so I had to give up fear.
YES”..I believe there IS a difference in being afraid VS having a healthy respect for the damage they are capable of.
One is fear and one is awareness.
I believe we should always be aware of everything around us—but NOT fear it!
I removed the being afraid equation and I decided I could do more damage to them, so they should be the one respecting ME with HEALTHY respect.
Since sociopaths see everything as win/lose”..I was going to do anything I could to expose and learn what it was I had to do”..tactic wise to repel BOTH of the sociopaths in my world”..the ex and the new business idiot. Legally! Show them legally, I was bigger, badder and not a force to be reckoned with. Like a tsunami”..we all think we can swim through one, until you have the wave hit!
I have taken precautions”.alarm systems in my homes, security cameras, alerting the neighbors, having the police do house checks on both properties”.
I won’t lie, cheat or steal”..and I have what we call dignity”..but I grew balls bigger than theirs and decided I was going to humble them in court”..and follow up hard in court, through the system to let them know”..I’ve got more smarts than you and I’ll use em! It’s empowering, and it enables me to teach my kids to stand up for what is right.
Since they are not capable of notching up their game, stop the lies and manipulations—I have a leg up there”..My story is always the same, because I have nothing to keep track of”..they do”.but, they can’t!
I go in over prepared with the documentation”.organized and presentable for the judge”..but I also go in organized and prepared with my body language for the S’s”..and this is a great tool”..invaluable.
Now”.thus far, (and I hope it’s no more)”.but whatever”bring it on”..I have only had 2 Sociopaths that I have gone into the courts with—but I have seen over 9 judges and 15 court appearances—and in the end is when I fine tuned the tactics directed AT the S’s. I paid attention to how everyone around responded to them, their behaviors and I learned how to approach the situation. I has worked for me.
Know the game!!!! Them, you and your judge.
Being concerned about the potential damage”..well”.my safety”of course”..but I’m not going to run because of the fear, the threat. It goes back to I’m not afraid of dying concept.
Your question about the damage”.as in things”..I separated myself out from my ’things’ when I faced death”ya know”.ya can’t take it with you”..BUT—it sure would be nice to live with them while I’m around”..so I am ambiguous about the items”.I’ll fight for them, if they are bundled in the point and repelling the S’s”..yes”.why not. It’s the cherry on the soda.
I think my main point in fighting is 2 fold”..exposure and repelling.
With the above, it adds to our element of safety, letting them know”.sorry”I got your gig and I ain’t keeping my mouth shut about it and the law/courts/neighbors/ friends/family knows who you are! YOU CAN”T CONTROL ME, So stop trying, cuz your damn near jail with all your hiding!!!!
And if anything happens to me—.you’ll be the first person they look for!
If we look at how many of our sociopaths killed”.(and I in no way mean any disrespect for those that have lived life threatening or lost their lives in situations of violence) it’s pretty low. Yes, Most Cluster B’s are talk, empty talk”.destructive, but not gun toting, knife wielding kill you dudes. They are all capable of killing, but I am too”.if we look at it that way.
So I place myself, in dealing with them”.above them”.I become smarter, savvier, more aware and more able to present a case that shows the truth”.after that”it’s up to the judge”. I know my enemy and I don’t go in blind.
I do think, it’s KEY to be overly prepared, under emotional, emotional in the right presentations and hit all angles possible.
I didn’t know the inside out of the S #2”..the ex I knew inside and out, and can still predict his moves. Not the business S. I know him from what I reconned of him”.and it was substantial recon”.I have access to all his personal files”..he left them in the property and I evicted and took possession of everything. So I studied it all, every scrap. And made notes”.Things that didn’t make any sense, made sense when I opened up another file folder”.I put the puzzle of S #2 together. I contacted people undercover”..and I gathered other victims input on him”.. I didn’t need much of it to present to the judge, because he had the burden to prove HIS case”..NOT ME.
So I didn’t reveal much”..just enough to let him know—I KNOW WHO YOU ARE! And I ain’t gonna keep my mouth shut and I could really cause you some damage with what I have!!!!
Another angle I took which also helped”..was going to community forums and asking this judge about how he deals with Cluster B’s from the bench”..He didn’t know about ’cluster b’s’—Not surprisingly”.so I went on my diatribe at the forum and they all were educated”.surprising what a perceived ’mentally ill’ person looks like when she’s educating the community—and rationally and answering questions and sparking interest”..(attacked two issues”..there). Hmmmmm not so psycho am I—Yes, I REALLY DID HAVE CANCER—thanks for the support!!!
I NOW use the description cluster B, when speaking with ’outsiders’—because, if you ask someone if they know what a S is”..they all say yes,(and most have the perception of a killer, not their pastor, neighbor etc”.) because we’ve all heard the word, but no one has the balls to say”.NO, YA KNOW, I DON”T REALLY KNOW WHAT A SOCIOPATH IS—we’ve all been there”.
But THEY ARE ALL stumped with CLUSTER B”..and ask WHAT a Cluster B personality disorder?”..and it’s my lead in”..I don’t have to force it on anyone—they ask”.they are interested. Cluster B personality disorder—what’s that”.
So”.by going to this forum, and I only went because I knew we would meet this judge one day (the ex)and I had a personal agenda to network on MY level..”..it helped me personally and I’m sure it helped others—
Is that manipulation or networking? Hmmmm?
I think where they have a ’leg up’ is in the lead up to court, the years or months it takes to get there”.this is where we can’t take anything personal”..whatever they shoot, we need to listen and decode with the sociopaths dictionary”. NEVER TAKE IT PERSONAL”..They beat us up so badly leading up, that we end up saying enough, give it all to them. They financially destroy us, mentally, physically”..and this is where we break. This is where they win. But they don’t ever go away, they are NEVER HAPPY!
Again, in my case”.it was the cancer/strokes/dissected carotid/alienation from my support etc”.If THAT ALL DIDN”T BREAK ME—I was in for the long haul for sure.
It wasn’t easy”..there were a lot of times I doubted the process, I would back away for a few days”.but I was always lead back. I knew I couldn’t walk away.
I changed attorneys—I couldn’t afford to”That was a vital move, I would not have done near as well—I would have been destroyed. My former attorney didn’t get it.
He told me straight up”..you can only choose one property”.I said, no way”.I have full title on my invest. Property”.it’s always been mine”I’m not going to choose”..tell me the legal basis of your statement”.he couldn’t provide a legal basis except my state was community property”It didn’t make sense! It was my legal property, I funded it, I managed it, and all rental checks came in MY name and I had ALL documentation”..WHY”he couldn’t give me an answer. I QUESTIONED AUTHORITY”..I’m good at that.
He eventually yelled at me”..at that point we no longer had a good working relationship and I felt like I was back with the S”.kind of like”.just shut up and do what I say”..I began to focus on finding the right attorney for my case”..this was a whole other bag of worms”..and costly”.and very time consuming”.I interviewed many”.it was election time”.I interviewed judges—I read books again”..and made the THANK GOD”.right decision!
I paid attention to others advice that have been there”.and weeded it out”..to fit my needs.
I read e-books about what others experience was like in court with a Narcissist. Essentially they are the same”..in court at least”..all a pain in the ass, all lying, all projecting and muddying the waters. I NEVER got involved with the muddying without documentation—.
Muddying works on the streets—because people love juice”and they squeeze it”.but in a courtroom—mud is not productive to the S”..and Certainly NOT if it’s not provable.
Courts are based on facts! It’s a business transaction”.cut and dry. S’s are emotional”.this is why we can’t be! We need to be the CEO of our court dealings.
You wouldn’t go into a business meeting with shareholders in tears”..so control them in here! Period! AGAIN IT”S NOT PERSONAL, it’s all business!
S’s try and place us on the defensive—the whole time leading up to the hearings”and again in court”..There is NO LAW that we must respond to anything—we produce documents that are requested, but we don’t have to go on a letter writing campaign defending ourselves—NEVER! Stick with the facts. Bank statements, contracts, Deeds, former orders—and whatever you have documented Police reports, school reports, social workers reports, therapists reports, photos, videos, phone records etc”.
Whatever it is you’re trying to show.
I knew what I was up against and dedicated myself to MY cause!
I think, in the end”.yes”.they are more threatening and we are certainly threatened from the intimate relationship we have had”..and this tends create more fear in us.
This is why our neighbors don’t believe us and are not scared of them, our family, our mutual friends”etc”.if he was so scary, then why did you stay with them so long. They have a certain control over us that fears us out of fighting them in the legal arena.
In reality—I say fuckem”..let them know WHO you have become ”..and if you find it a requirement—HAVE NO FEAR”.THE EX OF A SOCIOPATH IS NOW HERE!!!!
After all that”.I think I answered your question”..and yes, to sum it up”.I agree with you Kathleen!!!
XXOO
EB
Erin, great stuff. So many nuggets of wisdom and good advice that It’s worth reading over and over.
Right this minute, the takeaway for me is how you’ve become your own person. So full of dignity, so able to be objective and clear, even in the midst of the craziness they create, so … this thing I call self-referenced. But it’s a pretty abstract way of saying what you describe as a fuck-you attitude. You see through your own eyes and trust your own vision.
What you said about facing death and how that affected you also really resonated with me. I almost died of a fever when I was in my 20s, and also was caught in an undertow in the Pacific a few years earlier and nearly drowned. But nothing really gave me that near-death sorting out of what was important and what wasn’t until the aftermath of the experience with the sociopath. I was so sick and so close to suicide that it really forced me to reorder some of my thinking. I realized I wasn’t afraid of dying, but if I was going to live, I wanted to figure out what was worth caring about and what wasn’t. And then I started the long work of stripping off the silliness and the baggage.
But I didn’t have the battles to face that you did. Once I kicked him out of my life, he was gone. I lost what I lost, and everything that remained was mine. I didn’t have kids with him. Didn’t have business entanglements.
This battle gave you an opportunity to discover what you’re capable of in a way that just awes me. The way you use facts. The way you network and work the system you have to depend on. (You can dump the word “manipulate” from your vocabulary; it just means to shape or influence and it’s a good thing.) The way you realize that how you communicate is just as important as what you communicate. The way you dumped the unhelpful lawyer and invested what you really couldn’t afford to find the right one. The way you made a decision to win and make things as right as possible.
You say they can be threatening. They can, because people don’t see through them. But I totally agree about them not being able to step up, if we improve our game. They live off other people’s gullibility. You don’t find them hanging around with smart, strong people. And when pitted against one, if they can’t find a weakness to exploit or a way to discombobulate us, they are just screwed.
I didn’t have to do all the physical security things you’ve had to do, but I have mentally explored and rehearsed every scenario I could think of with my ex and with other people I see as potential threats, however minor, to my financial or emotional wellbeing. And it’s really paid off. I find myself saying things to people I never would have said before. Feeling entirely comfortable with challenging things they say or standing up for my own interests, and I don’t even have to be confrontational or competitive about it. I can smile when I say, “You’re not serious, are you?” or “That just doesn’t work for me.” As far as I’m concerned, this is friendly conversation. If they can’t deal with my self-interest, they need to find someone else who cares less about herself.
But my favorite thing, I think, in all of this was a line about letting them know who you’ve become. I know a lot of people go through a mourning phase wishing they were still the same trusting, loving, innocent person they used to be before they met the sociopath. And I know that a number of us suggest that they are subscribing to a fairytale that glorifies dependency and lack of responsibility. But what you’re saying here and what you’re doing makes the point so much better.
Empowerment isn’t just some cold concept. It’s the ability to use more and more of who you are. To do it with dignity. To be able to choose what you want and have enough faith in yourself to work for it to come out that way. To share emotional and ethical strength with our children, family and friends. And to attract affection and affirmation for the right reasons, because we are worth it, not because we’re buying with acquiescence and giving up who we really are.
Thank you for posting all this. It is invaluable stuff. The more you share, the more we get from you. Please keep it coming.
Kathy
It’s probably getting too cold now, but in the spring, I think we should all visit to have a campout with shovels and metal detectors in your backyard. I could bring my dog, Jesse, who has a healthy respect for bears and would bark up a storm if one showed up. And Gracie who really likes to dig. And a couple of bottles of brandy, because I don’t like tequila. We could just get the whole place tilled for next year’s garden.