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.
LilOrphan,
It doesn’t sound like you are losing your marbles. It sounds like you are in pain, and grieving the loss of a relationship. With an S relationship, I think there’s an additional level of grief – not only did your relationship end, but you discover that the person you thought you loved didn’t really exist. It is a horrible feeling. Add to that feelings of betrayal, having been lied to, manipulated, possibly abused or ripped off financially – there is a lot to deal with when getting over a relationship with an S, that’s for sure.
I know at times it may feel like you are going crazy, but it sounds like it is in reaction to the craziness of having been with an S. Something else I heard from my counsellor that was helpful (not to sound like a broken record), was information about the “stages of grief,” because part of what we are doing when these toxic relationships end is grieving. I think there were 5 stages – denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and finally acceptance (or moving on or healing or whatever you want to call it).
These stages are not linear – you can be in more than one at a time, you can go through each stage a few times before you finally get to acceptance. This helped me to know that the reactions I was having were normal reactions to a very abnormal situation. There’s a really good blog I read that has a lot of information about getting out of bad relationships, healing, and grieving when relationships end. It’s at gettingpastyourpast.wordpress.com
Good for you in remaining committed to NC. It really will help. It’s not easy to admit that we are vulnerable to someone who has hurt us before, it actually takes a lot of strength to admit that to yourself.
Alohatraveler,
My ex had a similiar kind of effect on me – intoxicating. We had a very, very intense physical and sexual bond. I’ve never had chemistry like that with anyone before. I hope, really hope, that someday I will find someone else that I can have that kind of connection to, who is healthy and treats me well. I miss it, even though I don’t miss him per se, or the other crap that came with the relationship.
lso, I think our perceptions of someone’s beauty can change based on our emotions about the person. I know for myself, when I first met my ex, I was very attracted to him, even though I didn’t think he was that good-looking. As he got me emotionally hooked though, and as the hormone and endorphin rush got going, that changed. After a few weeks I thought he was absolutely gorgeous. Maybe once you and your current partner (or a future partner) establish more a connection, the passion will be there?
GreenGirl and everyone else who feels this way:
That is one thing I can’t get past myself. The sexual bonding. And he knows it is there, because back when I was stupidly honest, I admitted it to him. So that is where he goes to abuse me.
I have the same hope, that someday, I will get that same connection from a mentally sound, healthy man. It makes me feel good to read an entry like that. It helps to validate those last feelings I have that I have not been able to evacuate from my memory. They are the best memories. It was where we worked everything else out. Bonding sexual experience, followed, sometimes, by talking for hours, eating, laughing and caring for each other. I accept now it was all a lie, but it is the one and only thing I miss. I don’t admit it to anyone, cause I feel weak for even thinking it.
Greengirl,
The sexual bonding and the “perception” of “looks” is something I have noticed too.
My late husband was anything but “good looking” by anyone’s standards, even as a young man. He had a huge nose that got larger as he aged, and as he aged he gained weight (he had been a very fit athlete when he was younger) but not only me, but almost every woman from 6 to 96 was attracted to him sexually. There was something about him that was so seductive, made you feel so special that you just “loved him” from the get go.
I never was sure about what it was, but he could look at me and I would melt on the spot. He wasn’t inappropriate in any way with other women, it was just that he was one of these people that women were obviously attracted to, felt comfortable with.
My son D used to laugh at the “old folks holding hands” because as we sat and read, or watched TV or whatever we were doing, we were touching. He never stopped looking at me with the look of adoration, nor me him. That was very special, and that “look of adoration” was what I saw on the face of my P-x BF AT FIRST, but it didn’t last like REAL love does. It is only the bait in the BAIT AND SWITCH game that they play.
The wonderful “hormonal rush” that you get with “new love” lasted a long time with my husband and me, but even after it was gone, there was a level of contentment that transcended what words can describe…it was just a special caring, a trusting and a knowing that the other person put you FIRST, always put you FIRST….above all others….
I wanted that again, so badly, that I fell for the FAKE “adoration” offered by the P–that wonderful smile that comes when they see your face after an absence, of a day or an hour–just glad to see you. To be with you. I missed that so much.
Reading this all and want to absorb it and respond to some key points you all mentioned. You guys have such great ways of looking at things, having been through all of this, too, and have gone through various stages.
Greengirl, I think said they have a magnetic pull, not from acting inappropriately. He definitely had that, but you know, it was pretty indescriminate. Almost male-whorish. It wasn’t deep, or profound, or based on his having any kind of personality to back it up. Just Alpha-Male dominance – he was clearly the guy who Didn’t. Give. A. Shit. about anyone else but himself. And for some reason, I think a lot of women find that quality perversely attractive.
Except one of my best friends. She told me she’d kill me if I brought him to another of her events because “arrogance comes out of his pores.” Hahaa. She saw right through.
But once they score that initial attraction, they can’t do anything much with it, really. It requires tools they don’t have to create a real connection. And we feel that lack. We don’t know what the cause is, but you can feel that sheer superficiality of it all.
Righteous Woman your paragraph really described how things used to be between me and The Wolf, years ago:
“They are the best memories. It was where we worked everything else out. Bonding sexual experience, followed, sometimes, by talking for hours, eating, laughing and caring for each other. I accept now it was all a lie, but it is the one and only thing I miss. ”
We had this fantasy relationship, back then, sporadic, completely without rules, both of us pretty newly divorced people. I thought that was what was keeping him from becoming real with me…his own divorce and both our fears of getting involved too much too soon. So we never got too deep. I was wrong as to why, though.
Then this time, we were more like a regular relationship, he was trying most of the time to do what a regular guy would do in a relationship when not being abusive, gaslighting, withholding, etc. (that sounds hilarious as I type it…) but no love was coming from him. No sense of him ever putting me first, EVER. I wanted even again to feel the love he emanated during the first years we were seeing each other. That was actually much more real and you could feel it. But this person…was a shell of that person. Figured maybe those feelings were placed with someone else and I had some kind of “purpose” to him, but he no longer had feelings for me.
It honestly felt like he was going through the motions, most of the time, like you describe, Ox-D the fake adoration. One of the rare times I saw that total adoration on his face it was directed towards one of his “best friends” wives. Which creeped me out.
Guess I’ll never know what was up with all that and whether or not his “love” was going elsewhere. Thing is, anyone who can love someone else and spend most of his time with another woman he doesn’t love but he says he does…well, there you go — disordered. Doesn’t much matter what his exact situation was, the fact that he dragged me into it, inserted himself into my life again under false pretenses…well, all of it was unethical and a lie. And that’s not love…love is not superficial beautiful packaging. Think that’s where WE all actually started to sense the disconnect. Where things didn’t add up. We had the packaging, but not the depth of what came with it — because they were not capable of it.
I may be an “old foggie” but that is one reason am so not for “casual” sex…not just for “moral” reasons or “STDs” but I think that having sexual relations before you get to know someone well–VERY well—leads more to the “bonding hormones” and especially for a woman than even for a good man.
That hormonal surge that sex releases tends to focus the relationship on that and bond us (women) to them before we even really get a chance to know them.
I’m certainly no prude, and I really think sex is wonderful, if, and I say, IF, it is between two COMMITTED adults–but having sex BEFORE commitment seems to bode bad in my estimation for the relationship. Leaves us (women especially) more vulnerable to becoming “blind” to other things.
I think it was Benjamin Franklin who said “things are sinful because they are bad for you, not (labeled) bad because they are sinful.”
To me this deal of “friends with benefits” thing wouldn’t work simply because if I were sexually intimate with someone who was a “friend” I would feel more drawn to them than just “friendship” so would be setting myself up to be hurt. I know some people who can pull that relationship off, but I am not one who could.
To say nothing of the fact that there are some KILLER STDS out there today and I’m not interested in that for sure.
In a relationship with a P who is having indiscriminate sex with gosh knows who–they are risking your life every time you go to bed with them. To me that is like using a gun on me, even if it isn’t loaded and you point it at me, the one I point back WILL be loaded.
Ariadne,
I have told this new man clearly that I DO NOT want to be swept off my feet.
I am unsure of what LOVE is supposed to be like now and for a long time, I was sad that I knew it wouldn’t even be like the euphoric days with BM. Even though early on there were signs, those days were still the happiest in my life. How sad.
And yes, it is our culture that says it’s supposed to be chocolate and roses and raomance and being swept off your feet. When my younger sister became engaged and seemed so happy, I asked her first, “Is he too good to be true?”
I joke around a lot here and make fun of what happened but the truth is, I am deeply sad and disappointed in a lot of things about life. Mainly that my sister is beating me to the alter. HA! That stinks… She just turned 30 and I am turning 39 in a few weeks. At this point, if I ever get married… I don’t even want a big romantic thing. I don’t know if I would feel safe with that. I don’t believe in all that stuff anymore. My sister is doing her big thing… blah blah… but I have already fallen on my face after what seemed like the happiest time of my life. So, I don’t even want to climb up that high again. It’s a long, long way down.
It is kind of sad that the euphoric period isn’t there like it is with a S or N, but I guess that nice guys don’t need that to “hook” a woman. Since S/N’s know that they are going to put their partner through hell later on, they need to start the relationship with a bang to get them addicted.
I can totally relate to the sex thing too, as embarassing as it is. It was really good at the time. But after I got married to the nice guy, I realized that even though it wasn’t as explosive or frenzied as with the N, it was better because he actually cares about me! He puts me first and that is sexier.
When I was with the N, sex was a way of getting some intimacy in the relationship because otherwise I didn’t feel connected to him at all. So even if he didn’t feel bonded to me afterwards, it was a hormonal shot in the arm for me every time. I felt like if it is this good, then we must have something together, right? But it was all in my head.
It’s really sad because we feel like we are giving ourselves in this vulnerable way to someone else and it doesn’t mean anything to them. When I think back, I realize that some things that we did were only for him to exert control over me in bed. Now to think of them makes me want to puke. My husband would NEVER do anything like that to me because he actually respects me. I even found out that the ex talked about me and our sex life to his skeevy friends after the breakup. THAT really hurt.
But you know, I think that giving up a little bit of euphoria in the beginning is a small price to pay for being able to find someone that will cherish you and love you unconditionally even after the new relationship feeling is over.
“but I have already fallen on my face after what seemed like the happiest time of my life. So, I don’t even want to climb up that high again. It’s a long, long way down.”
Funny, was reading posts going backwards from bottom to top…and didn’t realize you wrote this, but that was an “aha” when seeing your name. You put it perfectly.
My daughter got engaged a few days before Christmas. They live together, are constantly together, and while I’m happy for her, I don’t trust it. Also felt just awful when they got engaged…you know, happy for her but just a whole lot of other emotions.
One of my closest friends is getting married in a few weeks. Again, happy for her…she’s loved this guy forever. They were far from ideal for a long time. She loved him but it didn’t seem returned aside from friendship. Again, am happy for her but it raises all those other feelings….like “Am I the only person who loved someone and was totally duped? What am I doing wrong?? Why didn’t I get who I really loved and wanted and why wasn’t he really there – are these guys really there?”
Helluva drop, isn’t it?
Sometimes it just seems safer here on terra firma. Maybe no real highs, like we felt with our Bad Men, but no devastating falls, either.
Aradne and Aloha,
I can relate to both of you and what you say–not wanting the big wedding etc, Aloha. I don’t think that is just because you have had the P experience, but just because you know that an expensive and flashy wedding doesn’t make a RELATIONSHIP. You are more mature. Less dazzled by “splash”—besides, your sister has a 50% chance of divorce, keep that in mind. Big wedding or not.
I had the big wedding the first time through because I just thought that was “what people did”—
Ariadne, I don’t agree that you have to give up the euphoria at the beginning, maybe before you get to know the guy, like no “INSTANT” EUPHORIA, but as you get to really know him, and to fall in love with him, the euphoria does come–it’s the hormonal surge. I’m not sure that we can NOT have it since it is chemically produced by the body.
Sex to the P is a SOLITARY pursuit–they just use us like blow up dolls and carve notches on the bedposts for the “best blow up doll–mine is better than yours (to their friends)” Like little boys talking about who has the “fastest bicycle or biggest skate board.”
Love with a good person I think can be as exciteing and as stimulating as with the P if we look at it correctly. My late husband was a terrible “gift giver”—I dont’ think he ever gave me a gift that was really what I wanted, he forgot birthdays, and the last year before he died our anniversary, but he was a bit of an “absent-minded professor” but the GIFTs that he gave me of his time, his effort and his love to DO things for me that I cared about and he didn’t–those were wonderful “gifts” even if he did get me a new toaster for Christmas or a car once that HE loved and I HATED…and a horse that nearly killed me. I can laugh at those things looking back, and even then could laugh at them, because they were just PART OF WHO HE WAS…I appreciated the THOUGHT that went with the “gift”–and the best gifts that he gave me were the day to day things that he did FOR me because he knew they were what I wanted or needed.
He encouraged me, told me how smart I was and how proud of my accomplishments he was–what kind of price can you put on such a “gift” as that–and yet it didn’t cost a dime? Those are the GIFTS that I remeber and cherish. I have about 30 letters that he wrote to me when we were separated by distance, short notes mostly or inside cards, but I keep them in a folder/notebook and when I feel really worthless I can reread them and know that’s not so.
The P held out to me a “fake version” of that REAL love, and because I was vulnerable, I grabbed for it–the brass PLATED RING that appeared to be golden. Araiden, I am glad that you have found a wonderful man and Aloha, I pray that you find your REAL prince. But I hope both of you will come to realize and appreciate that the REAL thing can be just as exciting and a lot more satisfying than the FAKE.
The “roses and romance” fantasy is just that and doesn’t last, but a man who is there through thick and thin is pretty wonderful too.
“The “roses and romance” fantasy is just that and doesn’t last, but a man who is there through thick and thin is pretty wonderful too.”
I’ve never had that, peggy. My ex was not proud of my accomplishments. His friends were. They read all the college newspapers when I was editor and writer. He dismissed them. He dismissed me, entirely. I married my family of origin: the dismissive mother, the father who was the life of the party and great to everyone but his family and the violent, abusive brother all rolled-into one person! Stellar. And he’s a totally lousy father to his kids. Now that they’re older, they talk about it openly…and I feel so bad for them. They call him “Father Christmas” because that’s the only time he bothers to call or see them since 2004. I was interchangeable to him, a warm body to cook, clean and sleep with him. His current wife seems happy with that. But then again, according to our girls, she’s pretty devoid, also, emotionally.
Really know I want someone like you describe, someone who truly loves you and puts your relationship first. Someone who shows you they love you, if they cannot tell you.
There has to be something in me that keeps me from getting this.
Last night my youngest went to work with me and we were talking. It dawned on me that she is the only person in this world whose heart and soul I truly understand and maybe the only person who has ever shown what unbreakable, unconditional love really is. I know that even if she says or does things that hurt from time to time they are NEVER done maliciously, but from love.
Guess maybe that’s more than some people have ever experienced, and maybe what I’m really wanting will never come my way. But if there’s something in me keeping me from meeting someone capable of it, I have to fix that thing.