Donna Anderson’s important latest post reminds me that one topic which will never be worn out is that of the psychopath’s lies and their impact on others.
This week I want to very briefly introduce yet another take on this inexhaustible topic. Everyone lies, but there’s something else at stake in the case of the psychopath’s lies.
To illustrate: you might say about any regular (non-psychopathic) person, “Things would be better if s/he was to lie less often. Her/his soul or psyche would be healthier as would her relationships.” That’s true. Now try this on for size and notice how wrong it seems: “Things would be better if the psychopath was to lie less often. His soul or psyche would be healthier as would his relationships.”
Weirdly, this is patently not the case. The psychopath will be just as sick/evil no matter how many or how few lies he tells. It’s not a quantitative but a qualitative matter.
It is commonly said that a defining characteristic of psychopaths is that they are pathological liars. This is right if you mean that they are profoundly dishonest and not to be trusted. It does not mean, though, that psychopaths lie a lot. They do lie a lot and those lies cause havoc. But as I hope my illustration above shows, lying less will not make them better people.
So, how does this work? The thing about psychopaths is that even their truths are lies! Or rather, whether or not they happen to be telling the truth or a lie at any particular moment is not what makes them psychopathic. What makes them psychopathic is that they use and destroy people; truth or lies are for them just so many weapons for pursuing their prey.
M.L. Gallagher said a lot when she wrote this:
He is the lie….
From hello to good-bye. I love you to I hate you. You’re beautiful to you’re ugly.
It was all a lie….When friends or my family ask, but what about this, or what about that, I tell them. It was all a lie. There was no truth in him.
If I spend my time trying to figure out fact from fiction, all I am doing is trying to prove I wasn’t so stupid. See, this was true. That’s why I fell in love with him.
Truth is. I fell in love with him because I believed his lie.
When I discovered the truth, I was so enmeshed in his lie, I couldn’t find the truth in me. And so I sank.
superkid: don’t you dare watch from afar…
it ain’t worth it. be the beautiful YOU that I just know you are and do your hair, make up and go out to dinner or to the bar…get out, be around people; IGNORE the LOSER.
You will be just fine. Remember you are not alone in this.
I completely understand you and where you are coming from.
I was trapped for almost five years in this. If I told you all some of the horrible truths of our relationship, you would be in awe. I just can’t right now. It is unlike anything anyone would believe. Sometimes I don’t believe it myself. Actually.
I am alright. I think I need a nap. Maybe some carbs…
hang in there superkid…do something else to keep your mind off it. The more you try to do, the easier it gets. xxoo
DUPED
DUPED:
THANK YOU! Yes, I see the mind control. But I guess I have to ask…he doesn’t KNOW that I cannot get him out of my head. I haven’t even talked to him at all for almost three months and even then it was all texting. I haven’t actually spoken to him since August; that’s 10 months now. So yes, I understand the mind control, but he doesn’t know it is happening…does that still constitute mind control? Sorry if this is confusing.
YES: that still constitutes control. LOOK AT IT LOUISE. Don’t you think for one minute that he doesn’t know you are hurting over this. That was his intent to begin with. He knew when he started he was hurting you; right? And, he knew when it ended; right? Don’t you have that unexplainable ‘bond’ with your spath still? You do; don’t you? THAT is the control. Rebuke it. Get it away from you. It’s there when you start pining and missing and thinking that just maybe one more time to see them, a miracle will happen. But that miracle never comes.
They know it’s happening because they know what control they had over you. Whether this is intentional on their behalf or not, it’s the way it turns out to be. And then they will either go away and/or stay and taunt you some more. MINE always tries to contact me just to INFLICT that thought of him into my world.
He enjoys upsetting my world and does it on purpose. He finds it amusing. Well, I wonder who is laughing NOW. Apparently NOT him, sending me threatening emails. Not too happy, I would suspect.
Yes, Louise, I believe they KNOW the control they had over you and try to use that bond once they have split to keep themselves in your mind so that they have another chance to come back in and wear you down and maybe the next time COMPLETELY devour you. No; I am just closing the door to all this madness and getting it out of my life. If he does not honor the NC then I will be doing other things. He already has a history of violence. I am not starry eyed and haven’t been for a long time. I have been trying to UNVICTIMIZE myself because THEY SURE WONT HELP YOU FIND A RESOLUTION – you have to build one for yourself.
That takes a whole lot of STRONG but once you realize you almost got sucked down that hole of madness and chaos and drama, once you realize that it is always a downhill spiral, with them, never upwards. Once they start beating, they will continue to beat. So forth and so on. They use your weakest spot against you: your heart and your conscious to get their way and have their way with you and the whole while you are loving it. Mine once told me: “As long as I am good in bed, I can have anything I want from a woman…I know that the only thing women want is sex.”
I told him to ‘get over himself’. He hates me because I am so outspoken and direct and not afraid to stand up to him. But, at the same time, he is obsessed with me and they hate losing.
They can’t find direction and/or purpose in their lives because they don’t have the same things in their heads as we do.
It’s sad; yes. This has been my best friend for a long long time. I believed him. I trusted him. He broke that trust when he tried to kill me a year ago. When I found all the lies and deceptions. All of the blatant disrespect and twisted logic.
If you find yourself in this situation (mine was truly a nightmare of horrors) each situation is different, I would assume; if you find yourself in an abusive situation, WITH ANYONE, don’t overlook it otherwise that is being construe as acceptance of bad behavior and it will continue on and on and on and only digress negatively, not progress positively, inside their view of you. They see us as weak. They take kindness as a form of weakness because they are not kind. They are not weak.
They have morals only in so much as they may need to in order to get themselves out of a bucket of hot water. Or to tantalize and entice until they have you caught then they slowly start to devour you from the inside out. Or, from the outside in.
I wish I could contact every single ‘older’ woman on the planet who frequents the internet dating sites. It is where he and I met and where he and all his women have met. I tried to keep a tally and track of this so I know it’s true. Whenever one of the sheep leaves the flock, he starts fishing for a new one to take that one’s place. It’s always THEIR fault when the end comes. I know because I have heard it all about others just like I know THEY have heard all about me.
Now, we can give in under the pressure of this emotional stress OR we can constructively DO things to make all these horrible symptoms go away from us. I am not sure if we are ever going to be ‘right’ again after our experiences, but one thing is for sure: we cannot move forward in this position; right?
We need to purge ourselves and then ground ourselves and begin making active progress in delete;delete; delete…
everything from our NOW that was in the PAST. And let it stay there: in the past. For your own sake and welfare.
Don’t you dare open that door again! Remember how difficult it was getting THIS FAR…how horrid it has been readjusting to life without the spath. Every time your conscious tells you that maybe you are making a mistake and should give the benefit of the doubt one more time; oh…it would make you just the happiest….IT ISNT GOING TO HAPPEN….remember the pain that brought you to this NOW; this very point in time. And you slam that door or else you are going to have to start all over again….It’s the truth; I know. I have done it too many times.
I am stupid; a laughing stock; someone to be talked about and ridiculed by spaths everywhere. 🙂 yay! haahahaha
Take care Louise and everyone else…
This is a very difficult journey we are on but at least we have one another to lean on. Not even my counselors can understand me as well as the understanding I have found here. It’s difficult to ignore experience. It’s just so amazing to me that all of our respective spaths are so similar. Where is this personality type coming from? Amazing. Just amazing to me.
*HUGS* all around…
DUPED
DUPED:
I get that part about wanting a miracle to happen. I already went through that thinking every time we had contact that maybe THIS time I would do something amazing or say the magical words he’s been waiting to hear and I then I would be the ONE for him…HA…what a fantasy.
I will not and cannot open that door again because I know I will be back at square one and I cannot endure that pain again. I have come this far; I can’t start over. I think it would surely destroy me emotionally this time.
Again, thank you.
DUPED:
Wow, your X spath truly thinks he is God’s gift to women, huh? The comment about as long as he is good in bed and that’s all women want is sex! I think all men want is sex!! Women like it, too, but geez…
Actually, I am just finding out how much women like it. I hate to say this, but it seems like we have all made it awfully easy for these men to lie and cheat and do whatever. I hate that I was contributing to that. Makes me never want to go there again.
My x sp thinks he is God and I truly believe that. He has told me so many times. He thinks women should be controlled like animals and only used for intents and purposes and should have no say in any matters of the world nor life. That all women should shut up and obey. Obey. That is a big word for my x sp. Unfortunately, for him, ‘this chick’ was just a little stronger than him.
They hate that truly when the woman doesn’t obey, you know.
Oh yes, Louise: if you open that door, it will be like inviting the devil himself into your life again. I am not far off from being truthful, there, you know. “Miracles” happen to people who seek them. SPATHS don’t believe in Miracles. They believe THEY ARE the miracle. Truly.
Oh sure, you don’t see that at first; so charming; so proper…
then the monster begins to come out. I know what evil looks like and I know how it feels to live around it.
Right: back at square one. This has been way to difficult up until now to turn back now. Love from afar. Inside your mind but don’t let it destroy you. Once they get inside your mind, it is difficult to get them out. Avoidance behaviors are great because your body actually NEEDS that shut down time. If you only do one thing for yourself, every day, DO IT. Something to take your mind off the situation.
I meditate a lot and burn candles and pray. I have been told several times that he would hurt me if I didn’t have people so close to me. I have heard NUMEROUS descriptions of how I would die. That’s right. Unfortunately for him, I have proof and he knows I do. The best thing he can do for himself is to get away from me and stay away – far, far, far, away or I will put him in jail where he belongs. Period.
I will make sure he never does this to anyone else ever again.
This is CRIMINAL and how do I let it rest and forget? Hmmm?
Do I really make my life NOTHING and turn my head the other way and adhere to his threats? Must I be subjected to all of this just because I truly cared for someone and was unconditional in my love and support? No. The answer is no.
When I survived that heart attack, it was like GOD himself was speaking to me, telling me that I had one more chance to get this all right. One more shot at it. I am not going to tarnish this chance at life I have left, no matter how short it might be.
HE is not going to destroy what I have left.
I refuse to let him have it.
NC everyone………..remember that! Don’t give in.
You will be sorry later on if you do because it’s not going to be any different, no matter what they tell you. They are a complete lie and farce from get go and unfortunately, it’s us, the nice people who pay for the devil’s play. Ouch. But: THEY are the losers because they just don’t ‘get it’. They will spend their whole life that way, while “US”, in the meantime, are healing and moving forward, WITHOUT THEM and THEIR TORTURE AND TYRANNY. The way life was intended to be lived.
Stay strong everyone.
We are in this together.
DUPED
That’s right Louise..Ya cant go back or you will die, if I took my X back my son’s would take turns ringing my neck…Yes I still even now have itty bitty moments of _ well maybe a miracle will happen _ but NO miracle can erase the screwing around behind my back, using my computer and my bed to do it in…dont think mother teresa could ever undo that. So I realize when I have those ‘ miracle moments’ it’s me wanting what he mimmicked that I want, a partner, somebody to share my life with, yada yada…..I could never go back or take him back, it just is impossible, if I respect myself..so I only have one way to go and that is forward…He has his life to live, and I am so glad I dont know a fricken thing he is up to, dead or alive, happy or sad….that is what ‘absolute no contact ‘ did for me….it was my only weapon – nothing got his attention more than a slamed door in his face and a recording that says – I am sorry but that number has been changed to unlisted so please fuck off….your not welcome here anymore.
OMG, two references to Mother Theresa within half an hour!
…and one joy gives a little clap for an outgoing phone message with a punch! (one joy likes her some profanity)
One/joy – that was my censored version..