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.
toknowimok – welcome to Lovefraud, although I’m sorry for the experience that led you here. You’ll find that everyone here knows exactly what you are talking about. You’ll also find support and encouragement. You can recover!
Thank you Tea Light, fight and Donna for your feedback. I know I glossed over many details, but just wanted you to get the gist of it. Tea light, yes you are correct, that is what happened. And I had never considered sociopathy to ever really affect my life. I knew, peripherally, what it was. But I never gave it much thought. Now that I had this experience, it’s ALL I think about. Isn’t life hard enough ? Now knowing how vulnerable I really am (or at least how vulnerable I was 7 months ago) it just makes me wonder that if this is the personality type that I attract, I probably shouldn’t be so openhearted . Well at least not so quickly. I’m approaching middle age, and don’t want to be alone, I would like to settle down. I’m going through that subject in therapy. The thought that I keep having is I may just end up alone because of my trust and abandonment issues. I may just have to accept that as I am getting older. I will definitely be posting and reading on this site often. I appreciate all of the support already, thank you!
toknow: I hope you will continue to read and see that you are not alone and it is THEM, not you. We CAN learn to see the red flags as Donna discusses, for future reference. But, often, we can be quite hurt when we are allowed by the spath to see those red flags. They can cover them up for a few months and then we are in their web and pulled in by the love we thought it was. There is a great Archives of articles here, and a lot of support
Thank you flight! Yes I’m definitely reading it all. What I’ve found so far is how lucky I am that I didn’t meet the guy face to face. I imagine how much worse it could have been. At the same time, I’m grieving the death of an illusion. I was duped. Not only for the nearly 2 months of seemingly romantic phone chatter, but 5 years of what I thought was a friendship. I think that’s what hurts the most. It was all a lie and I believed it.
You’re welcome, toknoimok. Thank you, also. We allhelp each other here.
You are not alone in feeling the way you do. Many people give decades of their lives before understanding what they are dealing with. The thing about full human beings is that we tend to think that others are like us. If we are kind, compassionate, don’t lie, want to love and please others, we think everyone is that way. What we find with Sociopaths and other personality disordered people in that category, is that they absolutely do not think or feel like we do. The things that make them feel good are “reading” us (in person, by phone, online, etc.) by what we reveal to them in trust as a fellow human being, figuring out how to get any multitude of things out of us, their “accomplishment” a getting us to trust them when they know they are not to be trusted, etc. It is the same as any confidence man. Their only goal is to gain our confidence, get what they can, and get out. A man/woman like that online could have hundreds of people feeding his ego and he is hurting any of them who don’t think and feel like him/her. We get a rush out of feelings of love and care and fulfillment from a job well done, helping others, etc. They get a rush from lying, cheating, tricking, etc. They will do anything to have a bevy of people they are tricking.
Donna posted a great article here a few days ago. I will see if I can bring it back up at the left with a comment. It was FROM a Sociopath. Donna must be a strong person because I’m sure she gets these people trying to con and play games with her all of the time. In that article, she shared with the rest of us how they think…what really makes them tic. Stuff we need to know to protect ourselves.
It is definitely one of those growth processes we don’t ask for! Take care.
Toknowimok, 5 years…that’s a long time to be investing emotionally, becoming attached to and presumably opening up to this person. The depression is of course, as you know, grief at the loss of the illusion of trust and care this man appeared to offer. It’s such cruel behaviour. What helped me, as I did not want to lose faith in others, was to keep reminding myself most people are well meaning and many are kind and very caring by nature. Don’t allow this pitiful gameplayer to isolate you from others. Be careful, know your red flags, have your boundaries, but lettre yourself continue to love. It will be returned. Stay safe!
Well said, Tea Light! Very compassionate as I always see here from you. I am grateful to see you here.
Once again, thank you Tea Light and flight, for your words of support. They mean more than you know. I’m definitely taking this time to heal. I’ve come a long way, but still have a long way to go. Definitely need to go easier on myself. I miss the person I was a year ago
If you go up to the top red bar here and go to the “About” link, you can click on “Archives” and search and find articles that fit what you are going through right now. I have found that extremely helpful to read a lot of the articles to keep my head in the best place. If I fill my head with the good things, it is difficult for the spath to take up much room. Also, as I spend time here reading and writing, I am too busy to spend much time with him/doing much for him. I am taking care of me here and being who I am and finding other people that are recovering themselves from out of the dark hole of living with, or having been maltreated by, a sociopath.
Thank you for this article.I so need understanding and support like this right now. Thank you very much!
Hi,
I’m struggling getting and keeping him out of head. I find myself searching social media just to learn wht he is presently up too. I understand everything I’m reading but still it’s not helping me. This is hindering all aspects of my life nd I have no one tht I can essily just share it all with tht would even understanding…please any help or advice I would appreciate! Thk you!!
2Trusting, you will find most of the comments in this article was for my benefit a few years ago. It takes time. block him on social media. No exception. In time it will be easier to not think of him. I hardly do anymore, and I’m doing great! Thanks to the support and suggestions from everyone here, it really helped! My only suggestion is block him block him block him, then start living your life, and as time goes on, you will see that it’s better without him, I wouldn’t have thought so myself almost 4 years ago, but here I am!
toknowimok,
Thank you for your advice, I’ve blocked him. My first post which explains the jest of waht I went through with me I posted in the response section of Spiritual sociopaths by mistake last night. I was in tears tpying. I just have a need to fill in the gaps of the many times we could have been together but bc of the calling him out it all fell through. Today I dug further through facebook and found more lies. I can’t believe how the damn trusting and how I left him just use and fool me as he did, just blows my mind. We got back from a weeeks trip to SD on aug 3 last time i saw him actually, tested here and there but he always had an excuse for not being able to get together. Well I found out today that on the Aug 6th he took another gal to his grandson’s birthday party it’s all on video on facebook but no9t under his fb but the aunts, I like holy shit nd she is very comfortable with his family so she’s been around I never knew, I just found out about the other gal about 2 weeks ago bc she posted things on her timeline about all these trips. How could I have been so snowed, all the things he told me and the passion and plans, I’m left her not even trusting myself to brush my own teeth….do these other women I exist or they both exist…. I so want to beat his chest and scream at him and tell what a monster he truly is I want everyone to know…is that wrong, he is living his life and having all this fun and I’m devastated..wht the hell….how does someone do this to another person….??? I’m sorry I’m exhausted and stressed nd literally am mentally spendt…thks for letting me vent, I’ve been reading all day and tonight and I get what I’m reading but then I remember how and what he said to me and how he deeply loved me and didn’t ever want to hurt me, he wanted an exclusive relationship nad then it switched all up and he had to have had it planned bc these two women just didn’t fall into his lap…. and you know what I bet they are just entangled nd haven’t even got a clue ,,, what do I do with all the pictures and texts? I hate going through and seeing them but I don’t want to discard them bc it would be one hell of a F book….I need to stop and get sleep or at least try.
What I have been told to do is focus on myself. That has been helpful to me.
A great article.
Time and rebuilding a new life by the beach have helped get the ex-sociopath out of my head- at least consciously. Subconscious thoughts are another story. The monster still shows up in my dreams. And every time I see a middle aged couple walking hand in hand……I still want to cry for the life that was stolen from me. The sociopath simply clicked his heels and moved on to another woman. Apart from animals, I don’t feel like I will ever be able to trust or love again. I feel damaged to my core.
I spent more than half of my life with a liar, cheater, deceiver- logic tells me it’s going to take time. It’s been about a year now since I fled from the sociopath. Lately, I have been having more good days than bad days. That’s a definite step forward.
kathleenkelly you might look at the post= joyce brown- men are not the cake, they are the icing on the cake.
A great article. i’ve been listening to some coast to coast AM radio. there was a healer named sherry anshara on. she is in scottsdale, very positive.