Editor’s note: The following story was written by a Lovefraud reader whom we’ll call “Alyce.”
When is it possible to forgive myself?
I met a very charismatic man who was lecturing at a local dog boarding kennel. Over the course of a year I attended training, and I watched him help many people. He quoted science books and talked about papers he had written at university. We became friends, me asking for advice and he was always obliging beyond anyone else I met. I was quite attracted to him, but happy to keep that attraction to myself.
Then he declared one day he was attracted to me. I suppose I was flattered. A romance began and we moved far too quickly. Before I knew it we were living together. I brought with me to the relationship my three pet dogs and quite a bit of money. He owned very little an old car and a breeding program of shepherd dogs for detection dog contracts I was told. He appeared kind to all the dog owners at training. Very sexually forward with me, a bit different to anyone I had ever knew. But he spoke to me in a way that was palatable to me. He promised fidelity and honesty. The love of animals, like me. Playful. I thought everything was good.
Deals with myself
Then I started making deals with myself. Discounting his behaviour drinking binges to ‘cope with his commitment to dogs,’ his mood swings. Cruelty to dogs. Slowly I started loosing friends. They slipped away and I didn’t even notice it. He dominated my life in every aspect. Every person that was lost was more space for him. I kept hearing little ‘bends on the truth.’ They were repeated so much it was like a chant I began to believe.
I had previously been in the jewelry industry. He told me he had trained as a jeweler, so I funded a jeweler business we could both work out. We moved to a new country town as he had made so many enemies where we lived. Everyone else’s fault of course. I accepted very explanation.
Beating animals
Dogs would go missing. Heart attacks. Snake bites. He beat chickens and turkeys to death for ‘misbehaving’. He would choke a dog for misbehaving. He said to me to ‘mind my own fucking business’ if I ever challenged his ways. His temper got worse over the course of our relationship. He would be nice one minute, turn around and be pure evil the next. Staring straight at me, egging me on to challenge him. He would ‘set me up.’ Make me say something insignificant, or do something totally innocent, then days later play it against me. Hours of lecturing me until I was exhausted. This was my life. Trying to not make him angry. Trying not to get ‘set up’ and suffer the consequences. He killed many family pets too many to recall.
I turned a blind eye
I took no phone calls myself. He monitored every call that came into the house. Work became my sanctuary to some degree as I actually had contact with customers he couldn’t interfere with.
We were slowly going broke keeping him in all his business ideas. Leap frogging from one brainstorm to another. Instead of just working hard at the shop, he was always chasing something bigger. He spent so much time on the Internet, we lost customers due to his arrogance. We were slowly sinking and he was oblivious too busy flirting with women in the dog world, but I turned a blind eye to it all.
I always knew deep down inside he was seducing women. But I lived in denial. One day one a mutual friend started to pursue him. I discovered correspondence between them of a sexual nature. That proof left me stunned. I was at the point where I was exhausted by him and our relationship. I confronted him. He went wild. My life went into slow motion and I froze. I ask myself a million times, why didn’t I run? Call police?
But I took everything he did to me. I have been raped and so emotionally tortured. He threatened to kill me if I told anyone. He smirked and stared the whole time. Through every torment, as right throughout our relationship, his eyes would twinkle with delight when I showed any emotional pain.
He left me
He eventually left me for that mutual friend. I uncovered emails that unfortunately showed me that he, along with this female friend, had been plotting for him to leave me, and how much money and property he would get.
The day he left was the day I was freed. I had lived a life so controlled in every way. I was distraught. I knew I was free, but I didn’t know what to do with that freedom. After he left he bombarded me with text messages asking me to write down how I felt. I was so distraught about being left to run a home (lived on a property with over 500 birds that needed feeding every day, and 11 dogs) and a business, I didn’t have the time to write my feelings to anyone. So made up my mind never to communicate with him again. He went wild. Bombarding my email and phone with filthy hateful messages. I changed phone numbers, changed email addresses, and blocked him everywhere.
I spent the first 14 months post relationship under the weight of all his lies, and I didn’t know why. I still don’t know why. I was diagnosed with post traumatic stress. I lost a huge amount of weight, I couldn’t eat, the nightmares where shocking.
Discovering the truth
I discovered this man I was once in a relationship with had been to jail on at least one occasion, and had been in mental insitiutes at least twice. Only education he ever had was up to high school. All lies ”¦
Today he owns more dogs than ever. He has access to guns. He is still contacting himself with the academic world. He apparently has a website with all his ‘credentials’ I have never looked at any of it.
I am two and a half years away from that relationship. I have been through court proceedings as he made claim against the business and me financially. I am free of him now. I have attended loads of counseling. I never wanted the past to own my future. I have worked hard at freeing myself from the past. I struggle with the guilt and shame of losing most of my assets to this con man. I am riddled with guilt why I never stood up to him in regards to what he did to pets.
I am now rebuilding my life bit by bit. I am not close to anyone, but I still have my pet dogs and they have shown loyalty and trust which has been a comfort. I have a new career in a great work place. Many friends have come back into my life post relationship. I can’t say I am back in one piece emotionally, but every day, bit by bit, I am putting my life back together.
I’ve hit the books, but for me, the best defense is just to keep asking questions of someone. Sometimes they’ve rehearsed this act through the next few answers, but you’ll reach the end of that yarn at some point. It’s best to keep a straight face, just deadpan, unemotional, through the questioning. If you’re on the phone, take notes. I’ve never had a single one call me out on it, as if my questions are inappropriate. They’re conditioned to look for sparks, fire, arousal, emotional upheaval, and when you sit there all deadpan like that, they don’t notice they’re being taken down.
Keep going and keep asking: “And who is this person you know at the Washington Post? And how do you know him? Oh, he wrote a book, that’s interesting, what’s the title? . . . ” Be like that guy on “Dragnet”: “Just the facts, ma’am.” You can verify instantly on the Internet.
Before I read one more book, I’m just going to resolve to ask, ask, ask. Everything.
Just the facts, Sir. That’s my new motto. Thanks sister!
Thanks for your support! Getting myself a nice lunch today.
Enjoy that lunch sister. And stay away from the dubious man.
fight,
I like your approach;to look at a prospective partner as if you’re ” shopping” for a friend!If the person wouldn’t ‘do’ for a friend,then you should respect yourself enough not to lower yourself to that level of person!
sister,
GOOD that you ask all those questions in such a ‘deadpan’ way! Another term for showing no emotion is “greyrocking”.
Tell me more about “greyrocking”!
By the way, my perspective on looking for a “partner” is that they should be a partner in more ways than just emotional. They should want to be a supportive team member with me in my life. Sadly, a lot of spaths are good at holding out that carrot, but if you really probe it, you’ll find it’s all fluff, promises, and no delivery. Wait for them to show you “where’s the beef.” Look for actions, not just the expression of desire.
I have a lot to be embarrassed about in not checking it all out before I lept into relating to this guy, but one thing I’m pretty proud of is my hard-nosed holdout for a real “plan,” as in, “I await your plan, Dr. X.” As in: You want to start a relationship with me, “continue indefinitely,” but what’s your plan for visiting me, sending me a plane ticket to visit you, and so on? Practical matters. If you ask for that and get vague answers, or some vague plan to fly out to Vegas or Australia (Australia!), or a suggestion that you make the plan or pay for the ticket, buyer beware. These people live on a cloud of fantasy and deferred promises. Their feet never touch the ground. I suggest the flying-you-out plan rather than the I’ll-come-to-you; that way you can figure out if he’s actually married or living with someone else in that faraway place.
There’s a hint of that with this guy, not a clean break with the ex, and I’m suspecting there’s more to that:
What think y’all about phone calls where the line picks up but you get ambient noise, people talking in the background, and nobody saying hello? And then dialing the same number later, not a wrong number, programmed into your phone as before, and getting his voicemail? And then he calls you back from precisely that number and says you must have dialed wrong the first few times? I’m thinking, there’s still a family going on, and he silences the phone by picking it up.
A woman should let the man lead the dance. Noticing the places he takes you in that, builds trust in a good man and yields valuable food-for-thought about a bad one.
Hi Blossom: Thank you for the encouragement and support. He comes back from the VA hospital today. I hope I can deal with him better this time. I have reading about this type of person and how to handle him in a more protective way. I am scared, but a girl’s gotta do what a girl’s gotta do.
Sister: I truly appreciated what you said about questioning them. There is a quote I remember. I think it is Socrates, and also wondering if it was Einstein for some reason: Never Stop Questioning. They HATE questions. I questioned and questioned recently and finally got information. I made it clear that if I keep having to exhaust myself asking questions, he will be enjoying a view from beneath the local bridge in a cardboard box. It’s like just telling the truth when they know the truth HURTS their sick brain somehow.
I just made some notes on what to cover in my upcoming discussion with Dr. X when he calls again. He has already left a message on my phone this morning, and I voicemailed him back. I know, I know, I know, NO CONTACT. But I’m going to list for him HONESTLY and devastatingly what I consider to be his lies, and just as dispassionately as I questioned him. Closure. And we’re done. There will be no reopening that conversation.
I work indirectly with him on some projects, but I suspect the other members of the group are taking him off those. They will in any case do that when I get to them about his behavior. So I’m doing it all methodically and honestly. So far, one of these gentlemen has been very understanding.
For some reason, I find it necessary to just be honest. No excuses, no “I’m getting back together with my ex-boyfriend” and such. I just tell them honestly what I believe happened, what was a lie, and what I intend to do about that: No contact. Usually, they go away. (However, the last time, the guy hung up the phone and then called back 10 minutes later with, “What happened to the phone?” I said, just as honestly, that he hung up on me and that I didn’t want him to call me back.)
Honesty is disarming. They try to go into stuff like, “Oh, it sounds like you’re very upset!” but to no avail. I simply restate the facts.
Being honest leaves no loopholes to be opened later.
Oh God, now this is hard.
Is it real, or is it gaslighting?
It turns out the book title he cited was wrong, and he gave me a similar title, and the name of the guy in the New York media, and it turns out it all checks out, the background of the author, the title, what it’s about.
Because I’m still concerned about this guy. We had the discussion about whether it was a good idea to try to approach the media here (and make a fool of himself and expose the other members of the team), and I’m not getting all the details about the issues he’s having with the rest of the group he’s working with, but it seems they want to follow some sort of plan before they start publicizing things.
So he’s being the non-team player here, and arrogant as hell about it.
I have loyalty to the other members, and I think they act less rashly than he does. In fact, I told him to calm down and try to understand the strategy.
And don’t come to New York. Which now feels awful because it’s a kind of personal rejection of someone I’m not sure is a spath. But yes, an alcoholic. That’s bad enough.
I’m going to continue to tell it like it is. Spath or not, honesty is the best policy. My integrity is not on the table here, not up for grabs.
If so, then I have to be honest with myself: The drama continues around this person, just swirls like a tornado, ripping up everything around it. How much do I want to be a part of that? I’m telling him I don’t want it.
Does anyone still know the answer about answering a telephone like that? He claimed he was at a birthday party last night, and that must have been what I heard. But is there a history of spaths answering the phone and yet not answering it?
What is it about some people that the drama just never stops?
sister,
LISTEN TO YOUR GUT FEELING!I believe you are correct when you describe the phone calling.
http://www.baggagereclaim.co.uk/have-the-willingness-to-listen-to-your-gut/#more-10473
sister,
I forgot to address your question about grey rocking.It’s simply a method of talking to a sociopath without feeding them the emotions they’re looking for;THE DRAMA!No Contact is always best,but if that’s not possible,grey rock is the next best thing.
Sounds like a good way to deal with a drama-mongering alcoholic, too. Now it turns out I’m the only person who can talk this nut job out of doing something stupid! I’m SO over him, and laughing. I told one friend I’m going to reclaim my virginity after all this is over.
I misbehaved, got stupid, fell for it, but it put me in the right place at the right time to head off disaster. Too much to explain, but it’s pretty hilarious.
No diabolical spath-like plans on his part, just complete, alcohol-induced idiocy. In a really smart person!
sister,
I had to laugh at your statement:”I’m going to reclaim my virginity after all this is over.”! 🙂 There are certainly worse things! I guess though,that would describe how I feel except that I’m happy I have 3 daughters.There was never much beyond that anyway.So I learned a loooooong time ago that I didn’t need a man!