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.
Rochelle, every spath that I have encountered does, indeed, have criminal tendencies. Whether they act upon those urges or not depends upon a great number of variables.
First, they bend and warp general ethics and morals to meet their wants. Then, if “bending” or warping those ethics and morals aren’t sufficient, they will resort to criminal acts. Whether or not they’re ever caught and charged is a whole ‘nother matter. I will bet that digging deep into the spath’s choices and actions would expose any number of petty crimes.
In my situation, the exspath managed to forge my signature on my private, individual drafts and relieve me of over 75K in cash and personal payments that benefitted him and this did not include the other 230K that he removed using ATM’s and coercion. If the exspath were charged with his forgeries, it would be a Federal Offense, and where he is employed would be a huge factor in whether or not to pursue prosecution, although I could think of no better consequence than for him to be incarcerated.
Other spaths that I have encountered clearly stepped beyond the boundaries of ethics and morals. Sure, it’s not illegal to be an a&&hole, but insurance fraud, taking out individual loans with no intention to repay them, and lying on job applications are all “criminal” intent to me.
Brightest blessings
Eva:
I agree and thank you for that. I saw that in mine…that empty vacuum that he was always trying to fill. Pitiful.
Eva, the rush of adrenaline is probably more satisfying than any sexual experience for spaths.
They carry secrets, and secrets require a great deal of energy, attention, and focus to maintain. Maintaining the secrets becomes all-consuming.
Imagine this: anticipation of a superbly crafted cheesecake after a perfectly prepared prime rib dinner and hearty wine. Absolute satisfaction and one that cannot be repeated the same, exact way. Variables might cause the cheesecake to be underbaked, or the prime rib might be over-salted or grilled too long. The scalloped potatoes might be a bit runny, the next time. So, it is that one consumable meal at that precise time that makes it so memorable.
Now, imagine the spath anticipating the outcome of a short fling or long-con. Whatever the end result is, they want more and they want “better.” Because victims (like prime rib) are metaphorically “consumed,” they move on to the next target with gleeful anticipation. Whether it’s sex, money, or power, their adrenaline pumps in OVERdrive and presents an even greater force than any foreplay imaginable.
For a sociopath, maintaining the secrets (sexual, financial, career-oriented) provides the ANTICIPATION of gratification. My belief is that this keeping of secrets and the adrenaline rush is the only time when a spath truly feels “alive.” Even the conquest is anti-climactic because the conquest ENDS to pursuit, no matter what the conquest is about.
Brightest blessings
denbroncos007:
Thank you. You bet he cares about no one but himself. What you described is A LOT like the one I know. Exactly…mine has been married for at least 20 years now and same thing…the image with two beautiful children, huge house, big job, etc. And yes, same thing…a wife who has only put up with his crap…without a doubt. I am sure it is because she loves him and because of the children and probably in part also because she doesn’t want to give up her lifestyle. He has been able to maintain this image while sleeping around off and on their entire marriage. He actually told me, “I’m not the marrying kind.” Hahaha! Really? But in reality, he is telling the truth…he’s not the marrying kind…not cut out for it, but he likes it because it’s a cover for him and all his shenanigans.
I see why these men stay…just like you said about yours, why wouldn’t he?? He was getting everything he wanted from you and from wherever else.
Here is another theory. I do agree with you and others that this woman mine has now is probably just stupid and giving him what he wants, but I wonder. From what I can perceive, she is really independent, smart, pretty, etc. I think it’s because he hasn’t broken her yet! I think he sees her as an extreme challenge and he’s going to keep her around until he destroys her; takes her from a beautiful, smart, independent woman to a groveling mess…just like us! That’s kind of what I think. Just like what he has done to his wife, the OW in my office and me!
Well, when I look back on it…mine is a drug addict. So of course, using illegal drugs is against the law. He has not used in about 15 years or so. But then again, the company he works for does very thorough background checks. He could have wormed his way out. He told me he spent time in rehab and signed himself out against medical advise. Bottom line is, these people are great at what they do. He did lie on his job application for the job he has now that I am thinking of it. They contacted his reference before they hired him and what they don’t know is that it was his mother. So when she would come into town to visit, we could not use her real name. Geez…the more I remember, the more sure I am that he is a sociopath. The NC thing has been working for me…now I have to banish him from my brain. I am finding myself anxiety ridden. I am on medication, but it doesn’t seem to be doing too much. I find myself tensing up, clenching my jaws and sometimes I shake. I get a strange feeling in the pit of my stomach. No matter what I do, I can’t seem to calm myself down. I am seeing my therapist today, and I have not seen her in quite a long time. I am also thinking of making an appointment with a psychiatrist so I can make sure I am on the right medication for my symptoms. Yes, I believe recovery from a sociopath affects us physically. Thoughts?
I hate this. In the past few days I have thought that me not getting closure from the spath is all my fault. He tried to talk to me when he saw me out almost a year and a half ago and I ignored him (my fault). And then he was somewhat communicating with me about getting closure and then I said something that made him mad and he shut me off (again, I feel like it’s my fault). I think I have come to the conclusion that this is my closure…I have to accept that he got tired of my behavior. I have no idea why I acted like I did both times. But now I am feeling like the one who was wrong. When I look at it, I really think I was. I wonder why I am feeling this way?
Louise,
He wouldn’t have given you any closure, except dangle it in front of your nose, and would always have used some action by you as an excuse not to give it to you.
Any person who actually has loved another person, would never refuse to give someone else closure. Irregardless of the relationship being over, they’d wish to set the other free to move on. My first ex did whatever he could to give me closure. The second ex may have had his issues the past decade, and very self protective originally when ending things… but months afterwards he sought to give me closure and did it in a way he made sure I would have the needed words for closure withing my reach whenever I was ready.
People who really care for you, will feel guilty over breaking your heart, even if they don’t regret their decision, and will give you the keys to find closure and acceptance of the inevitable.
Louise, Who cares if it’s your fault (it isn’t…) even if you’d reacted in exactly the way he wanted you to, there would not have been closure. Furthermore, this man is a lying ass cheat who collects women and pits them against each-other….that’s all the closure you need. Acceptance is the key.
I know it’s easier to blame ourselves then to accept that the one we loved never really loved us in return, bot there it is.
I also agree with the others who say that the new woman/old flame is nothing more than a supplier, and as such, she is being used and objectified. She is being duped, and this duping is what feeds the jerk.
Rochelle,
As a retired mental health professional who prescribed psychotropic medications and did therapy with other people, I knew I had to get THE RIGHT HELP FOR MYSELF….and I saw a psychiatrist to Rx my medications (and we changed them several times til we got it right) and I saw a couple of different therapists. I finally saw an EMDR (rapid eye movement) therapist for my PTSD and got GREAT results from that.
I am now, finally after 8 years off medications for depression and PTSD and am doing okay, but previous trials of getting off medication resulted in MELT DOWNS in only a few days.
I AM DIFFERENT than I was pre PTSD, my short term memory is not as good, my focus is not as good, I have to use lists of things to remind myself but over all my judgment is adequate and I am FUNCTIONAL. I sleep well, I don’t have bad dreams on a regular basis, had one lately but it was related to my anxiety over a particular thing, so I processed it in a dream, and now I no longer worry about that thing.
I am no longer HYPER and I don’t jump and startle at the least noise and though someone driving up in the yard makes me reach my hand for my pistol until I see who it is, my heart no longer races, and I don’t shake until I see who it is.
I go to sleep soundly at night with my guard dog lying by my bed, secure in the knowledge that is someone strange comes through my bedroom door they will immediately have a mouth full of teeth sunk into their neck or shoulder, buying me the time to wake up and reach for my gun.
I live cautiously because I know the danger is STILL REAL that Patrick will send another of his ex convict buddies to “off” me if he can arrange it. But I do NOT live in TERROR any more.
The difference between CAUTION and TERROR is simply emotional I guess you could say, because I am as prepared as I can be, and I ACCEPT that there is some danger, REAL danger, not imagined, and Being PREPARED for it, expecting it, allows me to live my life and not be AFRAID and TERRIFIED. I imagine I am like a soldier living in a combat zone, where there could be an attack at any time, but I focus on living and being as prepared as I can be, not quivering in fear.
What is that old saying “a coward dies a thousand deaths, but a brave man dies just once.” I am done with the dying a 1000 deaths.
Louise,
I think it is all your fault that you are no longer in the clutches of a personality disordered individual and that you are instead on the road to healing.
You just don’t have it in you to be a door mat. Sorry to be so blunt but you’ll never amount to anything in the world of door mats. What kind of proper door mat gets up and leaves her post?
LOL! Seriously, Louise, I think you have some very good defensive strategies that you aren’t even aware of. That’s why you kept quiet, didn’t respond much, didn’t give him drama. Your gut warned you. And yes, it did piss him off and made him slither away. Lucky you.