When people realize that that they are involved with a sociopath, the standard advice from Lovefraud is that they should, as quickly as possible, cut the predator out of their lives. That means no phone calls, no e-mails, no texts, and certainly no in-person meetings. It means No Contact.
Of course, there are times when this is difficult, as when our reader works with the sociopath, or they have children together. In these cases, they need to implement No Contact as best they can. But let’s now talk about situations where it is possible to get rid of the person, such as in a dating relationship.
What is the best way to establish No Contact? Clearly, firmly and permanently.
The rules of No Contact
The book called The Gift of Fear, by Gavin de Becker, devotes several pages to the topic of rejecting an unwanted suitor, and these pages are among the most helpful of the entire book.
De Becker writes in the context of a woman who decides she doesn’t want to be involved with a man. Do not, the author says, try to “let him down easy.” Here’s what he writes:
One rule applies to all types of unwanted pursuit: Do not negotiate. Once a woman has made the decision that she doesn’t want a relationship with a particular man, it needs to be said one time, explicitly. Almost any contact after that rejection will be seen as negotiation ”¦ If you tell someone ten times that you don’t want to talk to him, you are talking to him—nine times more than you wanted to.
Here are more points that de Becker makes in the book:
- If you get 30 messages from a pursuer, and finally call him back to say, “stop calling,” he learns that after 30 attempts, he will get a response.
- If you make an excuse like, “I don’t want to be in a relationship right now,” the stalker assumes you will want to be in a relationship later, and keeps calling.
- If you say, “You’re a great guy, but I’m not the one for you,” the stalker thinks you’re just confused, and will come around in time.
- Never explain why you don’t want a relationship. If you give a reason, it gives him something to challenge.
- A nice or delicate rejection is often taken as affection.
“The way to stop contact is to stop contact,” de Becker says. “I suggest one explicit rejection and after that absolutely no contact. If you call the pursuer back, or agree to meet, or send him a note, or have somebody warn him off, you buy another six weeks of his unwanted pursuit.”
Giving in
What happens if you’re wishy-washy about No Contact? Not long ago, Lovefraud received the following letter from a reader who we’ll call “Lenore.”
I literally had to count the days that went by as I refused contact with him, and on day 120, I celebrated because I felt healed. Well, on day 121, he emailed me, and against my better judgment, I emailed him back. He told me he had been in therapy, he realized what he had done wrong, he was on medication.
I was cautious and wary, and decided, amidst warnings of concern from my friends and family, to perhaps work on a friendship again. We worked on being friends for a few weeks, and everything was great and fine. I felt in control of the situation.
Then his old behaviors started creeping in. He installed a GPS app on my phone so he could track my whereabouts. He began calling and texting incessantly, and flipping out if I didn’t answer right away. The verbal and psychological abuse had begun again. Fortunately, this time it did not escalate to physical abuse. He began lying again, gaslighting and acting erratically, and began seeing other women on the side. Last night, it once again became too much and I told him not to contact me again because my heart and my spirit couldn’t take any more pain, and his inconsistency is so bad for my son.
So today begins Day One again without him. I am writing you today to tell you that your no contact advice was the best advice I didn’t take. For 120 days I went without him. It took a while, but by day 90 I was happy and free and at peace. Now I am back to square one.
No Contact is the path to healing from an entanglement with a sociopath. The stronger you can be about No Contact, the faster you will recover.
Dear Findingmyself,
For a while I had dreams about my egg donor, and other parts of it all, I think somehow our subconsciious sorts through these things while we sleep. Some I remembered, and some had a “Theme” which was usually me taking care of something or someone that was HELPLESS while my own life fell apart—can we say ENABLING here? LOL
Once I “got the message” then the “theme” dreams stopped. Other times I would be thinking about a way to handle a situation and my wonderful step father would come into a dream and tell me what he would have done with the same situation, and his advice was always good.
Now I seldom have dreams I remember or “theme” dreams and I think really it is because the MAJORITY of those problems have been worked out and thought over, but last night I dreamed about the beloved dog I lost this summer, and in the dream I got a puppy that was his son. That decision to get a new pup or not was something that I had not made a decision yes or no about, so I think it was my subconscious trying to make that decision.
On your dream I think such an OBVIOUS symbolic dream was your way of working out emotionally and subconsciously what your intellectual mind knows. It is pretty clear that he was wearing a mask, and that he was trying to get you to “go with it”–and WOW!
It sort of gives you almost a closure doesn’t it?
I sure felt that way about the symbolic “theme” dreams and the ones in which my step father came to give me advice. (He passed away 6 years ago in January, 6 months after my husband)
I don’t think there is anything supernatural about our dreams, but I do think sometimes we use them to work out our emotions and questions. ON a dream like the one you had, I think they can give us CLOSURE on some things that there is no other way to get.
I seem to dream ALOT about my X..never anything good but the dreams are intense and stressful..I have this fear about running in to him somewhere. Fear that he is gonna be hangin on to some guy and flaunting his happiness and reveling in my alone-ness if that make’s sense. The few times I have gone out to the places he may be he never was. Maybe I need to confront this fear and meet somebody new in the process. I think that is what will help us more than anything is someone new. I feel more confident than I ever have before but his memory is still the boogerman..maybe I love him maybe I fear him.maybe he has moved to kalamizoo or maybe he is dead…maybe maybe maybe…..
Dear Henry,
I don’t think “meeting someone new” is going to be the answer, though Ii think many of “us” (former victims) think it will be….I think we have to get them out of our souls BEFORE we meet anyone new, so that the new relationship is a good, healthy one, not just something to DISTRACT us from the old one.
Just my opinion, darling, but I think you are DEPRESSED and I think you need to see about some treatment for that. From your posts here that show obvious DESPAIR and HOPELESSNESS and being down on yourself, I don’t have to be a genius to “diagnose” that you are depressed. Now tell me I am WRONG?
When we are depressed (that is “we, humans”) we have low self esteem….and I think you have also demonstrated that…and for proof I will quote the post you did about if you are not “kissing someones ass or f-ing it you are worthless.”
I think your dreaming about him, is because you still have not resolved the fact that HE IS A PIECE OF SLIME and that you did NOT DESERVE to be treated that way, and some how some where you think HE IS GOING TO BE HAPPY with someone else.
THAT IS NOT TRUE….but it is a FEELING you have, and feelings are not right or wrong, but we must DEAL WITH THEM, and I think you being depressed is not ALLOWING YOU TO DEAL with those feelings.
Now, darling that is just my arm chair diagnosis and my fee is 5 cents, just like Lucy’s psychiatric care, 5 Cents. LOL So put your nickle in the mail to me today! Oops, the PO doesn’t run on Sunday, so I guess this is a freebie!@....... LOL Love, Your twisted sister ((((hugs))))
Oxy, I agree that it is our sub-conscience working things out. And yes, it is a form of closure and the fact that my heart has finally caught up to my head the dream just confirmed that. I had that fight for so long, my heart vs my intellectual head. I KNEW he was toxic, I knew he was unable to reciprocate in a healthy way, yet over and over my giving, forgiving, nurturing/caretaker wanted to hold to “the good in him”-the false self. Those little crumbs he would throw out of “normalcy” to keep me hooked in. To be able to finally be unhooked from the insanity of it all feels so good. There will always be a part of my heart that wants the best for him-whatever that entails I have no idea.
But I now know the truth, I except it and I am able to shut that door for good. I know that being here at LF and finding a community of people that understand the insanity, knows the emotions, the ups/downs of it all has helped me tremendously–and I thank you ALL from the bottom of my heart. I wished I had found you all a couple years ago when the insanity started. For whatever reason, in my thinking, I wasn’t meant to yet. Everything happens for a reason and every thing in due season. Hugs to every one!!
Hens – do confront the fear. go out. i think it’s only by challenging our fears that we can move on.
i know what you mean about meeting someone – i have to say that the only thing that got me over the n-ex, was the spath…but that was because she could actually speak a bit of truth while in the midst of manipulating me. but what does meeting someone do? it raises our hormone/chemical levels; provides a good mirror of our desireability; brings new energy and interest into our lives…we actually can do all of that for ourselves. thing is, we have to WANT TO – TO CARE ENOUGH ABOUT OURSELVES TO DO SO. So, if we work on our esteem…
and we have to learn how to do that.
just some thoughts. i have one hell of a way to go myself.
It has been 2 years and 14 days of no contact on MY part. It was/is not easy but I have stuck to no contact as if my very life depended on it and I am proud of myself for sticking to NC. I will NEVER give him another chance to hurt me, use me, lie to me, manipulate me and reject me. Sayonara you lying cheating heartless coward. THIS ship has sailed.
Hens,
Bless your heart. I Do SO know how you feel. What a battle it is: thinking, “I wish he could see me now (feeling confident, or being skinny again, as I am now)”, but then realizing, “OMG but what if he was with someone else & they both looked lovely & happy & in love!!” It would be SO brutal.
Ever since J walked out, I’ve had multiple daily fantasies of going to where they’re living now [the place I turned him onto, took him to, planned to live with him for the rest of my life, & that he let me believe we’d do up to the day he walked out, leaving me with my house packed up to go & all my winter clothes given away or packed away]……& then I realize OFM!! I’d DIE if I saw them together. And yet some part of me almost longs for that…..for that—maybe like the Ultimate Pain, the Fatal Wound—the one that will kill the love/longing forever.
Maybe like what seeing someone in their casket is sposed to do….make you realize it’s/they’re DEAD.
[Something I’ve never done & will never do….my mother was Furious with me for refusing to look at my 32yo son so I could remember him “that way”—my 11yo granddaughter said, “dead??” But I digress…..]
On a MUCH lighter note, I was watching “It’s Complicated” last nite—you know, with Merryl Streep & Alec Baldwin as the 15 yr married/10 yr divorced couple. *That scene* was replayed again & again in several different combinations thru-out the movie: seeing him with her, seeing him without her, seeing her with him, etc. It is Comedy, but it was so accurate in portraying the emotional whacks of encountering the ex again, & the Complications that breaking NC can incur…..whether SPs or good ol “normal” people….not to say that the people in the movie were “normal”, since they were all incredibly accomplished, wealthy, & successful w/ accomplished children & fulfilling lives! I can’t imagine Merryl or Alec going thru the depression & disintegration of self-ness that we experience as a result of a SP’s slamming/sliming us & our lives……but the movie is a light-hearted look at what “divorce” does to people.
Kinda fun. 🙂
Dear Whyme,
You sound like you are having a better day today!!! Good for you! I’m having a lazy one….so far any way but have to get outside and do some walking, even though it is chilly today. I think Indian summer is over. LOL
Had a difficult time with my life style change motivation the last couple of days, did okay yesterday but sure had to FORCE myself to stay within the confines of the caloric limits and the sodium limits. Today I am not wanting to exercise, but know I need to so will FORCE myself to do what I know I NEED TO DO.
I tell you I have CHANGED so many things about myself that the NEW AND IMPROVED VERSION OF OXY IS just going to be AWESOME!!! No more smoking! Yea for me! No more high sodium diet (no more TASTE! ha ha) No more sedentary days (got to get out and get moving!) and be so slim I can’t stand myself–about 18 pounds down now! Setting those boundaries for those in my life and BOUNDARIES for myself, I won’t allow me to treat me less than I deserve. That last one is the hardest of all to enforce! (((hugs))))
Oxy,
I haven’t even told you yet how very f’n Proud I am of you for your determination & perseverance in your NewLife & NewYou & loss of 18#!! I’d never had a “weight problem” til after he got “home” from prison & we got sedentary (at our computers all day), & he made dinner every nite—always very light & healthy (salads or soups), but I’d eat it all. I packed on 10# from depression while he was in prison, but that wasn’t SO bad, til I packed on another 10 in the next 3 yrs…..& even after I started I started working out 4-6x a wk over a yr ago, I couldn’t lose but a few pounds! It was maddening!
*Low sodium: I know I asked you this before, but have you tried sea salt? Specifically Himalayan Sea Salt. It’s So low in sodium, & So high in all sorts of nutrients, & just the tiniest sprinkle of it is (as my chef gson says) “a flavor enhancer”. No brine taste, no brine effects. I used to retain fluid from the slightest bit of salt, but Himalayan Salt doesn’t do that. You can order it online. I think it’s like $19 for 2 pounds.
That’s the ONE THING I can thank him for:his leaving me made me lose the 20 pounds I’d gained from the last 6 of the 8 yrs of being with him!!
You know, when I think back, I SHOULD’VE noticed—the top-of-the-list signs that your partner is cheating on you:
#1 he’s not interested in sex (with you) anymore.
& #2 he’d gained a lot of weight after he got out of prison…eating a lot of peanut butter…he was a very well-built man, with broad shoulders & nice butt & beautiful legs, but I teased him that I could barely get my arms around him anymore~~~~suddenly one day he stopped eating peanut butter & suddenly his jeans were too big, his belly was almost gone, & he bought New black drawers & t-shirts!! I thot, “how cool!! look how good he looks & i’m so glad he’s not hanging around in his baggy, saggy ol house pants anymore!”
OH GEE, WOMAN!!
No wonder he said, “if you’d been more aware, you’d’ve noticed what was going on since i got out of prison!” DAM!
I thot he was doing that FOR ME!! How Stoooopid can ya get!
But I digress—-what I started out to say was that those Boundaries are the big thing. For me it’s a GOAL I make myself meet: I MUST go to the gym at LEAST 2x a wk, preferably 3, & I MUST set the cross-trainer for 30 minutes, & stay on it til it says, “workout finished.” I always want to cheat, “hell, I can stop at 24 min/27 min….what’s the diff?” Or “oh look at the time….I can’t get to the gym now.” Or—my latest excuse—(since the childhood bf N I finally ditched stole my keys out of my car while I was at my therapist’s after I told him I wouldn’t accept his nasty *credit card* he’d gotten for me!)—my gym key was on there & I have to pay $10 for a new one, so I can’t go after-hours or on wk-ends. Now that one’s really lame!!
But as long as I have that GOAL in mind, I hafta stick to it as best as I can force myself to do!
I’m NOT really better today, darlin…..in fact I’ve had a wicked couple of days…..all of a sudden arguing with my son (actually him arguing with me!)…..my printer ran out of ink right when I needed to print out notes for a chart reading….my HideousBrother is still refusing to send me my measly monthly stipdend….he’s still not trying to sell the ranch so I can get my inheritance…..& we haven’t heard from our atty in 3 wks….I can’t get or don’t want a fricking JOB selling underpants at Marshalls or especially running a cash register at a hamburger stand or being a school custodian…the weather is crap cloudy & cold…& my darling son hasn’t paid me “rent” for the 5 mos he’s been here & certainly isn’t helping now that he’s saving HIS $ to get his OWN Place…& I don’t have enuf to cover my bills for the month—& still be able to afford the $150 a month I’m spending on cigarettes, which is the ONE thing I CanNOT give up right now!! And besides that, I still wake up every morning thinking, “I was sposed to be living in paradise with my whole life ahead of me today & now I don’t even see a life ahead of me atall.”
I know. A crap attitude. Where’ll I ever get with that mindset. I’m MORE than aware of positivity & faith & hope & “thots are things” & “we attract what we think & say” & every bit of that——-but I think that applies to *emotionally healthy people*—not to people in the depths of depression they can’t climb out of long enuf to see the sun & the beauty of the day & the promise of life. All of those ways of thinking & talking & acting were easy & natural for me *BEFORE*. I think, “I thot positively, prayed daily, believed with all my heart in his success & our reaching our dream of living in paradise together…..I thot that for 4,6, even 8 yrs…..& what happened? I prayed him into reaching the dream with her. WTF?”
Whyme – interesting that you mention that movie; Alec Baldwin’s character creeped me right out….thought he was sociopathic.