Why should the spath have no consequences?

[barnesss]

I had a 4 year long distance relationship with a man I met through a mutual friend. I went to visit him several times, he came to visit me as well. He definitely love-bombed me and he knew my history of having come out of an emotional and verbally abusive relationship a couple of years earlier. He seemed like the perfect partner for me. He sent gifts, talked constantly about our future together, we skyped almost every day, he got me to trust and open my heart to him, he convinced me to move to California to be with him, along with my daughter who he referred to as his future step-daughter. He told me he was a very private person so he didn’t want our relationship splashed all over social media, and he didn’t want his family thinking I had broken up his marriage. Completely by accident, 2 months before we were supposed to move out there, I caught him in his lies. For the past year he had been seeing another woman who lived in Ireland, she had been to visit him 4 times and had met all his friends, and for the last 4 months of our relationship he was actually engaged to her! He told her he had also been seeing 3 other woman before he met her while he was dating me and making all those promises to me. When I confronted him he concocted an elaborate story that was all lies and when it didn’t add up, I contacted his fiancee’. He had hacked my computer without my knowing and when he saw that I texted her he immediately became a raging, angry maniac who said insanely hurtful things to me. She and I talked for about 2 months and I showed her all the proof I had of our relationship, but in the end she decided to give him a “second chance”, likely because of all the lies he told her. Now she will have everything that I was supposed to have, and he has no consequences at all. His family still believes he is a wonderful person, as do most of his friends and he has told them really derogatory lies about me and used his spying software to block me from talking to any of them. I know what he is and have no desire to go back to him, but it makes me incredibly angry to think that he will just get away with this behavior again and that the people around him don’t know what he really is. By staying silent, are we allowing this kind of behavior? Are we enabling these kind of people to just get away with what they do? Every day my overwhelming instinct is to publicly call him out, to expose him for what he is to his family and friends. I can’t stand the injustice that I and my daughter have to suffer and he gets to enjoy life and be happy. It is NOT RIGHT!!

[zoe7]

“Now she will have everything that I was supposed to have.” No, now she will have a beautiful illusion that is punctuated by moments of wtf, and how could you do this to me, followed by more bloviated lies. You did what you could by warning her. Consider yourself lucky that you got away, and try to resist the urge to get revenge. Sooner or later other people will see him for who he truly is, and rethink everything that he said about you. Go forward and live the best life that you can with your daughter. You are both safe, thank God, and now have a chance to have a wonderful, substantive life.

[Donna Andersen]

Barnesss – count your lucky stars that you have escaped. As far telling other people — this has been the topic of much debate here on Lovefraud. Type the search term “warn the next victim” into the Google search bar at the top of this column to see the discussion.

Yes, silence allows them to get away with their bad behavior. But yes, exposing them can be like poking the snake, and they may retaliate against you. Also, the people you tell may not believe you, because he has already painted you as crazy and vindictive.

My advice is that you do what is best for you. If speaking up will help your recovery, and you can do it safely, you may want to do it. But if you anticipate retaliation that will hurt you or your reputation, perhaps it’s best to move on. Of course, you can always change your mind later. Or, if another victim seeks you out, you can tell the truth.

[traumatized41]

I think silence in the immediate aftermath kind of provides the survivor with some protection. At least I should say that we need to be cautious and tactful how we expose
them. Keep in mind that he may try to use how you warn others against you in a smear campaign. I have been relatively fortunate so far with others reactions to my warnings. But, I know that the responses may not have been so favorable and could have caused me more harm than good. And, he has tried to use these things as intimidation how only he can in texts and voicemails which has caused me to regress a little. I think I am done warning others for now. I don
t feel envious of them at all. I feel sorry for them because they are going to experience the same inevitable harm. The book psychopath free talks a bit about this. I do plan on volunteering for some sort of advocacy group or providing public education somehow about psychopathy in the future once the dust settles. I am angry too. It is just such an awful and confusing mind blowing experience. Read sandra browns little red riding hood revisited. I think im going to put it in a frame next to my bed. And remember that we are so much stronger and morally better in a million ways than a psychopath. We are resilient. The psychopath will forever continue their same shell of a life.

[slimone]

barness,

I also experienced quite a bit of bitterness that he would walk away, a free bird, to exploit as his heart desired. After several years that morphed quite a bit, and now I couldn’t care less. Not that I don’t care about the other people that he will use and abuse. I do feel sorry that he can continue to hurt people. But, I don’t care about him, what he is doing, and with whom. When I was feeling angry, sad, bitter, and depressed, I could not imagine getting to the point that I would feel nothing about him.

I did post (anonymously) on a couple of dont-date-him kind of websites. Nothing much came of those but it did feel like I purged a bit of that bitterness from my heart. A couple of women found the sites and posted that they had been harmed by him too.

Then I had the chance to get involved with several other women who were wronged by him, and make public what we experienced. In the end I decided against this and turned my focus back onto my own healing, and making my life better. I later learned they got him fired from a job- which made me smile.

He is now still going full swing, with a whole new angle to his twisted behavior. And his online presence paints a picture of him as a self-actualized, happy, free, loving man. Many of these types are REALLY good at projecting their false image into the world, with great flair, confidence, and ‘joy’. Doesn’t mean it’s real.

Just like your guy having this other woman. It’s not real. It’s just as false as what you experienced with him.

In hindsight I am still glad I did not choose to take up arms. What he does is horrible, painful, degrading, and completely unacceptable. But none of it is illegal or irreparable. He is just a good looking, charismatic, fun loving, ego maniacal and abusive manipulator.

[traumatized41]

Slimone, i look forward to the day i no longer think of him. Im happy for you. I have looked for websites that post names of dont date him names, but could not find them. Do you know the websires by chance?

[Stargazer]

There are two parts to a sociopath having consequences. The first part is that if you follow their lives over a period of years, you will see that they usually DO have consequences eventually. It may take time, but a person so soulless cannot have a truly fulfilling life. The second side is that once you have disconnected your energy from them, you won’t care one way or the other what they are doing. Truth.

[ridgid]

I too am dealing with this sort of frustration. Mine has lead so many men into thinking they had met the perfect match. She makes certain they are totally in love with her, soon as she knows this it’s over and always in a very brutal way. She has no problems breaking it off with one man in the afternoon and going to bed with the new one same night and making sure they know that she did through face book.

I wanted revenge, truth is there isn’t any. If you go telling people not to date her they won’t listen, hell I knew what she was capable of and I dove right back in. Even if you did stop one person from getting involved, it wouldn’t matter to her because she has 2 or 300 more guys waiting in line.

I don’t wish harm on her, but sooner or later she is going to play this game on the wrong guy and get her self hurt or killed. I think if people like this want to waste their life on lies and games the best thing is to let them and keep them out of our life.

[zoe7]

I am sorry for your pain, rigid, but revenge is the wrong reason to do anything to the sociopath, in my opinion. The man who victimized me’s wife kept contacting me and pumping me for info, and I wanted to help her understand who he was, but not when I was still a little jealous that he went back to her, or because I was a “woman scorned.” Finally, I did respond to his wife, but only because I was concerned about her and her kids, who were still teenagers. Still, she blamed me, the messenger, and discounted what she begged me to tell her over and over again. No good deed goes unpunished, as they say.

[ridgid]

Sorry for your encounter as well Zoe7. The woman I was involved with was married for a time. Her spouse and I also had words, I felt horrible for what he went through. I was honest with him about everything that had happend, even handed him proof of what she did in e-mails she had sent from her work. He still took her back and tried to work things out. With in a month she was at my house telling me she was leaving him again. Same as yourself he ultimately blammed me for what she had done.

[traumatized41]

Does anyone know the ‘dont date him’ websites? I am thinking i can probably connect with fellow survivors from the same spath…?

[slimone]

Look at don’t date him girl. It was up and running many years ago, and may still be

[Sunnygal]

there is karma.

[marinapearl]

I can totally empathize. With my ex-fiancé, I wished so badly that I could tell others the truth about him. His family and friends think he’s the greatest, most selfless guy on the planet, and it’s all an act to get attention. But what would it accomplish if I tried to tell them the truth? He’s already been telling them how heartless I am, how I got cold feet, and conveniently leaving out the part where he drove me away with his insanity. Who would they believe, the woman who they’ve only known a short time, or this guy who has them all convinced he’s a saint?

Yes, I do wish these people could be held accountable, that they could feel the repercussions of their actions. It seems unfair that they should be able to live among us, to take advantage of us, and seemingly get away with it. But in a way, I do think they get what they deserve, at least on some level. For one thing, you said this guy gets to “enjoy life and be happy.” I don’t believe sociopaths and narcissists can EVER be truly happy. Nor can they ever feel real love. Any “good” feeling they experience will only be shallow and fleeting, because the fact is they can’t maintain their relationships with their victims forever. They can never hide behind their masks indefinitely; sooner or later their real selves are exposed, and they have to move on.

They will never know peace. You can. I’d say that’s at least a form of justice.

[Author]

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