Not long ago, I heard from a woman whom we’ll call “Rochelle.” When Rochelle was in her 50s, through a high school reunion, she reconnected with the first boy she ever loved. Rochelle had a crush on him when she was 14. They dated for almost five years, although he always seemed to have an eye out for other girls. When they broke up, Rochelle was heartbroken, but she moved on, married, divorced, and life was reasonably good—until that first love came back into her life.
He poured on the charm, and Rochelle felt like finally, after more than 30 years, she had her chance to be with the guy she always wanted. Rochelle left everything to move out of state with him. They eventually married.
Well, he lied, fabricated, manipulated, accused, took her money, ruined her credit, filed for divorce behind her back, and left her with nothing. It was the type of behavior we all know so well—sociopathic behavior.
Rochelle realizes that the guy is disordered; she was exploited; he never loved her. Still, she wants him. Yet she also realizes that she’s in love with a person who does not exist.
She asks, “When does it get to the point where he stops taking up space in my brain?”
Scope of the question
The first thing to understand is the scope of this question. “Getting the sociopath out of my head” is the ultimate goal of everyone who has been betrayed by one of these predators. Once you’ve achieved it, you’ve achieved full recovery.
So cut yourself some slack. This individual probably crashed through your life like a battering ram. Your emotions, finances, home, health and/or psyche may all be in splinters. This is going to take time to repair. If anyone says to you, “Just get over it,” this person has no idea what you’re experiencing.
Understand what happened
You were probably blindsided by this experience, so in order to move forward, you need to understand what happened. We have lots of material here on Lovefraud to help you. Many people have told me that my two books, Love Fraud and Red Flags of Love Fraud, were especially helpful.
Here are some key concepts:
- Sociopaths exist. They are social predators and they live their lives by exploiting people. They do not feel remorse for their actions, and they will never change.
- The sociopath never loved you. You were targeted because you had something he or she wanted. It could have been money, sex, a place to live, business connections or cover for his or her secret life. Or, the sociopath messed with you simply for the fun of it.
- There is nothing you could have done to make the sociopath treat you any better. The involvement was always about exploitation. You were probably targeted because you were good, caring, giving, responsible, and in some way, vulnerable.
- The blame for what happened rests squarely with the sociopath. This person lied to you, manipulated you and betrayed you. You were guilty only of being human.
Acceptance
Recovering from sociopaths is a process. The key to the process is accepting what happened. This does not mean that you excuse what happened, or that you try to forgive and forget. But you must believe that yes, he or she did it, and yes, the sociopath knew what he or she was doing.
You can’t make time go backwards. You can’t take back the things you said or did that enabled the sociopath to become part of your life.
Once you come to terms with the fact that yes, it did happen, you begin the healing process.
Addictive relationship
In the case I described at the beginning of the article, Rochelle said that she still wanted the sociopath. This is not quite accurate. The truth is that she was addicted to him.
Relationships with sociopaths are highly addictive. They actually cause chemical and structural changes in the brain, similar to what substance addictions do. Therefore, you need to treat leaving the sociopath like kicking an addiction.
The way to do this is to have no further contact with this individual—no phone calls, no email, no text messages. Certainly do not meet the person. Don’t even go to the individual’s Facebook page.
If you must have contact with the individual for some reason—like you have a child together—do your best to implement Emotional No Contact. That means you remain absolutely neutral in any interaction. Sociopath love to get emotional reactions from their targets, and will do whatever they can to engage you. Do not take the bait.
Staying away from the sociopath can be really difficult. But the longer you stay away, the stronger you’ll become. If you give in and have contact, you’ll have to start all over again..
Processing the pain
This was not a normal relationship, and it’s not a normal break-up. Even if you weren’t physically or sexually assaulted, you suffered massive emotional and psychic injuries. You have losses that need to be grieved, including your loss of trust.
I believe that you must allow yourself to feel the pain of the experience, although you may not be able to do this right away. In the beginning you may just be numb. This a protective measure taken by your psyche, because the injury is just so massive.
Eventually, you need to let yourself feel it. You cannot bottle the pain up within you. It will either poison your life, or it will make you ill. You must get the pain out of your system.
Cry your eyes out. Stomp you feet in anger. Take up boxing and hit a punching bag. It’s scary at first to face your own anger, embarrassment, rage, humiliation—whatever the sociopath caused. But allow yourself to feel the emotions, honor them, and then let them go.
Let joy into your life
Draining the negative emotions will leave an energetic void within you. How do you fill the empty space? You allow joy into your life.
Any kind of joy will do: Enjoying a sunny day, letting your pets comfort you, having coffee with a friend, letting a waitress be nice to you. Soak up any joy and pleasantness that you encounter.
As you drain the negative emotions, and replace them with instances of joy, you’ll slowly change your perspective. Gradually, you’ll find that the sociopath is no longer renting space in your head. And that’s what you want to achieve.
Oh, but I forgot to add that in real life, Dudley-Do-right…..or, guy with the bow-tie, also becomes the other guys in the drama…..before too long he turns into Snidely Whiplash….or the guy with the ominious moustache.
And I’m sure a case could be made that poor little Nell is a gold-digger female spath who is using the pity ploy to ensnare poor innoscent Dudley-Do-right who only want to help her and do the right thing……..
I love that I was a Lit major.
I am really looking forward to some feed-back on these thoughts. I hope this doesn’t get covered over, because I ‘m posting in the wee hours……mostly my only time to brainstorm……
Moon, I always wanted a man like “Grizzly Adams.” LMAO!!!!!!!!!!! And, lookit what I actually picked! ROTFLMAO!!!!!!!!!
kim frederick wrote:
“And I’m sure a case could be made that poor little Nell is a gold-digger female spath who is using the pity ploy to ensnare poor innoscent Dudley-Do-right who only want to help her and do the right thing—.. ”
You mean it all comes down to cash and control?
Was Nell a ‘ditz’ to swoon for the guy in the bowtie? Did she lose herself?
Was the villain in the moustache somehow alluring because of his power and money?
I am past 50 now and have rarely met and yet to attract and know (date) a woman that makes Love and Faith her core priorities.
It’s as if – maybe – when one goes about their business and presents themeselves as a ‘nice’ guy all that you attract are people that want or think that they can get something off of you – or sociopaths/con-artists that see an easy ‘mark.’
When living ‘on the edge’ or in a high visibility position/situation – the opportunities to date and meet women expands exponentially.
Maybe most women don’t want or, aren’t wired for a ‘boring’ life/guy – period.
Kim, the person who commits the crime or sin is “to blame” for their own choices and decisions. The psychological entrapment that people experience with predatory human beings is NOT something that ordinary human beings are equipped to recognize and defend against, especially with people like me who have such a strong shame-core and damaged “inner child.”
If I’m to take any “blame” for what was done to me, it will only be for the fact that I trusted the exspath. I trusted that his word was his bond and that when he asserted that he loved me, he meant it. I trusted that when the exspath said (and, I quote), “I will NEVER abuse you like HE did,” he meant it. I trusted that the words that he spoke were genuine. For that, I am to blame.
But, having typed that, just because I trusted the wrong person with the flawed beliefs that I had does not mean that I somehow “deserved” the sins and crimes that the exspath committed against me.
For me, the cog/diss is deeply rooted in a lifelong system of flawed beliefs. And, at this late date in my life, I’m finally beginning to “get it” that there are very bad people out there who have NOT been charged with a crime or incarcerated. There are people out there with very, very cruel and selfish intentions that exploit vulnerabilities.
So, the “Victim Blame Game” is always in full swing with many players whenever someone is deliberately harmed by another human being. “If you hadn’t been wearing that short skirt and sheer blouse, you wouldn’t have been raped,” or, “If you hadn’t left your car unlocked, your vehicle wouldn’t have been stolen.” Think about it. If a person leaves their purse or wallet on the seat of an unlocked vehicle, does that excuse a thief from opening that car door and taking the purse or wallet, and contents? OF COURSE NOT.
So, the person to “blame” is the perpetrator. The victim may have not been vigilant enough, or too trusting for the wrong reasons, but those vulnerabilities did not give the perpetrator the RIGHT or EXCUSE to exploit them.
Brightest blessings
Ox;
It is possible he lied on some of the questions but given that there were so many he would have to be a consistent liar. In addition, since his complete “dating profile” is not a very attractive one, I would certainly think that if he was lying, wouldn’t he lie to make his dating profile look better?
Also, whatever algorithms are used, they are somewhat complex. In one test, the x-spath rated “Manchild” which is the the worst possible dating “persona”:
“Okay, Manchildren have some good qualities. They can be unpredictable, brash, magnetic—and therefore highly charismatic. Particularly, you’re passionate and are often a hell of a lot of fun.
But we’d like you to consider not using our site. You can be unthinking and hurtful, and we think you LIKE seeing bad things happen. You’ve had a moderate number of relationships, but broken a disproportionate number of hearts. In total, you mean well, but don’t really have it together.”
Almost reads like a definition of a sociopath. When I took that test, I was the “Loverboy.” I tried several times to answer it such that I would score Manchild, but was never successful…
Plus, there were many bizarre questions in which he appeared to answer in what I would call an abnormal way. For example, in order to “match” better with him, you would have to be willing to date somebody with a sexually transmitted disease…
Fixerupper, I think that being a “nice guy” or “nice gal” precludes that “nice” people accept and tolerate bad behaviors.
For instance, if I’m a “nice” gal, I’ll ostensibly accept and tolerate quirks and eccentricities that, upon further examination, aren’t “quirks,” at all, but clear and defined “Red Flags” of behavior.
I am not attracted to “bad boys,” although I’ve dated a few. The only thing to be said about these types is that they tend to be spontaneous, etc., but they are NOT keepers. It’s like BBE noted in the personality tests that name someone as a Manchild. They may be fun and exciting, but they are not candidates for healthy, committed relationships.
Perhaps, Fixerupper, the focus might be better served on abandoning “your interpretation” of what a “nice guy” is, and redefining that into being a “truthful guy.” By “truthful,” I mean that approaching life and living by acknowledging and validating emotions, but reconciling those emotions with fact. And, with facts come very strong foundations for boundaries.
“Nice guys” are men who, in my experiences, allowed others (men, women, AND children) to run roughshod over them. If a “nice guy” made a date with someone, and the someone canceled at the last minute, or didn’t even show up to meet them, they “excused” their date’s actions and simply Put Up With It – cognitive dissoance man-style.
I think I can be a “good” person with constructing boundaries that are solid for everyone, equally. I also believe that I can be a “nice” person when the situation warrants it – a give/take of emotional connection, let’s say. I would rather be a “good” person than a “nice” person, today, because being “nice” to people only feeds and nurtures my damaged “inner child.” I can’t (and, WON’T) be all things to all people, and I’m not going to give in to that need to tolerate bad behaviors because my damaged “inner child” is afraid of abandonment or invalidation.
I don’t know if that helps you, at all. It’s only one female’s perspective, and others may have more enlightening observations. What I have typed applies to me, alone.
Brightest blessings
Kim, I’ve really been pondering your questions about whom is to blame, and I firmly believe that those of us who have a damaged “inner child,” and have been introduced to that part of themselves can probably help answer that question.
As the now-famous saying goes, “Mistakes were made.” By me, the mistakes were choosing an abusive spouse and failing to get some solid healing under my belt before I jumped into another relationshit with someone who, in retrospect, waved a variety of “Red Flags.”
Yepper, mistakes were made, and I really hope to learn from them so that I don’t make the same ones, again.
Brightest blessings