Editor’s note: Lovefraud received the following email from a reader who posts as Whirlwind71.
I have just finished reading Love Fraud just mere moments ago, and up until now, I really hadn’t been interested in books at all. Previous to this, I read Mary Jo Buttafuoco, Getting It Through My Thick Skull as well as Snakes in Suits and Pathology of a Psychopath (a hard read) ”¦ all in an attempt to understand what the heck happened to me and my family when a guy (whom I described as the most amazing man I have ever met) came into my life ”¦ I now realize that the word “amazing” has many different levels!
Once married to my kids’ father, I was now a divorced ”¦ or shall I say a HAPPILY divorced, self-made career woman. I hold one insurance brokers designation and am halfway to another. These are university course levels, so for someone who only had a high school diploma and being a single mom raising two little kids, studying, was ”¦ well ”¦ a feat in itself.
Somehow with the strength of my family and more so God, I plugged away. I actually liked being on my own, but really craved having someone to share special moments with, and when my kids were with their father, have a male companion ”¦ not necessarily for marriage but for companionship. Strong willed and financially capable, I grew my little kingdom to building a new house, having a rental home, van, truck, camper all paid off except for the two houses. But the mortgage payments were decent. I am smart with my money and let it work for me.
Amazing man
Then one day I met this “amazing man.” He was strong willed, energetic, wonderful with my kids, attentive and provided us with this fast paced, fly off the seat of our pants life. A wonderful musician all self-taught, he could learn to play anything within a short period of time. He lived “outside the bubble,” something I (as a strict planner) looked up to. I wished I could just throw caution to the wind and be more like him. He liked the things I liked camping, spending time at home, hiking and socializing with friends. We spent the first few months doing crazy things; spur of the moment camping in the middle of nowhere on some mountainside away from everyone.
He called himself the skunk catcher, as no one in our town would do it (not even by law, so he advertised his services and people would pay him to catch these things). After caught, he would play with them, show them around the neighborhood and even drive him around to show others. At first it was neat to see, but when he actually put a caught skunk in the back of my jeep, that’s when I was no longer impressed. He seemed to think that there was no smell, but it was rank. I spent hours cleaning and fumigating it and even burnt candles in it overnight to help…he said that his mom would come and clean it for $75. I told him I WOULD clean it and he could pay me ”¦ I never got a dime.
He pulled away
Then there was a period of time in the very beginning of our relationship that he pulled away from me and I actively pursued him, as I really did like him. Looking back, I think that he was pulling away as perhaps he was causing some sort of grief for his last ex ”¦ The one he called nasty names to anyone who asked about her.
Soon, he became mine and I could not have been more thrilled. He is in my opinion, VERY good looking with his blue collar/hard-working look (which I like). By far, one of the best looking guys I have ever been with. Sex was passionate and exciting. When my kids went to their father’s house, we had so much fun. Soon, we were inseparable, but that’s when things started to go wrong.
Temper like blasting oil
Granted, there were Red Flags prior, as I knew he had a temper like dynamite ”¦ no no like blasting oil. I remember one day he screamed at me in his back yard because I didn’t come fast enough to help him fix a wind-blown gazebo that was laying in a pile for nearly four months ”¦ apparently because I didn’t come when he wanted me to, it was all my fault that it was completely wrecked and he was out $200. He told me to get the (eff) off his property and never come back. Within an hour he called and apologized profusely that he had a horrible day because his co-worker is a dink. At first I resisted his apology however he got mad at me for not forgiving him so I just gave in and forgave him.
Another day he was SO angry because I wasn’t answering his phone calls, as every time I answered he would scream in my ear about how horrible his day at work was. I was tired of listening to the screaming so I ignored my phone, but after at least 13 back-to-back calls, I finally answered. He told me to get my (effn) travel trailer off his property and get the (eff) out of his life. I simply said, “Okay, I’ll be there in 15 minutes with my truck.” Within five minutes he called back and apologized. ”¦ the same song and dance when I refused to accept, he yelled at me and told me that it was my entire fault that he got so mad and if I would just not provoke him, he wouldn’t yell and scream. I ended up dropping the whole thing but my heart was hurt.
I watched when he would fight with his roommate and throw HUGE temper tantrums when the roommate would ask him to tidy up his mess. I have never seen anything like this before. He might as well laid on the floor and kicked and screamed like a 2-year-old ”¦ to this day that old roommate won’t have anything to do with him and he cannot figure out why. And that’s not all he did to him.
Evicting them
He advertised his services on the Internet, so that if you had an abusive boyfriend or husband that you wanted out of the house but wouldn’t leave, he would go and evict them. I heard stories of how he would bust into the door, push and shove some drunk or stoned or deadbeat guy around and throw them out. When I questioned him about how dangerous this was ”¦ I mean what if this guy had a gun or worse ”¦ he simply said, no one can hurt me first, they would never even get their hand on the gun let alone the trigger. So then I asked him, this is illegal, you can’t do this, your going to get thrown in jail ”¦ he said, “I’m above the law.” He would recite some chapter of the legal system because he has read the entire Canadian criminal code, how it was his right as a civilian to arrest someone. He thought that he was the be-all mister knowledge about the law, and would spout of some code at random. I never double-checked his words.
Fun or ruckus
But it wasn’t bad every day, we did a lot of fun things, but it was always one degree away from causing some sort of damage or ruckus or borderline illegal. He likes air soft guns (shoots little plastic beebees) and my son LOVED that his passion was guns and war things. They would run around the neighborhood shooting each other, however, he would get carried away and usually ended up with someone getting hurt at his hands. Parents of my son’s friends were skeptical about letting them come play.
For every good memory I have 13 bad memories, camping trips ruined, extreme road rage explosions, near disaster trips, screaming at the kids and calling names, turn on the dime mood swings, bone chilling stares ”¦ when he is a really bad mood, his eyebrows go really pointy and his eyes have an icy blue stare. He yells like a drill sergeant and doesn’t care what language he uses ”¦ I have been called names I have never heard before and then 10 minutes later he wants to go have sex because he is done with his tantrum. Sex was HUGE with him, and he couldn’t understand why on the weekend, when the kids were gone, that I didn’t want to have sex 14 times or at least every hour and a half, as this gave him enough time to re-supply his energy for another “round.”
He abused all of my vehicles and I am convinced that this is the reason that I had to put TWO transmissions in my truck. He slammed the house doors so hard even the second floor windows shook. He kicked my solid mahogany seven-drawer dresser so that it lifted off the ground, kicked the railings of my deck, puked over the railings after a night out of drinking and anytime I condemned him for any of these things, I got yelled and screamed at. I wasn’t silent, I always was on him but that’s why we fought ALL THE TIME! He would tell me that if I would just shut up and be good, everything would be fine.
Moved in
Somehow he sunk into our life. I never asked him to move in, he just invited himself and I just let him. That’s when the ugly came out (the things you have just read). For the first seven months after he moved in he was unemployed as we suffered a recession and the oilfield halted. He sat on my couch everyday and did NOTHING ”¦ he smoked, ate and pooped and that’s all he ever did. Slept in until I would call him at 1 p.m. and then he was up all night.
He was on this laptop the entire day. One day, I wanted to see what he was looking at on the Internet that could keep him so occupied, so when he was sleeping I tried to get into his computer, but he had a password on it. He found out that I tried to get in because the next time he logged in it said “one log in attempt failed.” He was angry and screamed at me. He had NO problem going through my computer and even my cell phone, which I caught him doing several times, but if I yelled at him, he yelled at me louder.
We made plans to move from the city and build a house closer in the mountains. This would help us, he said. He wanted to open a welding shop, a wood working shop, and some other kinds of shops, I was going to open an insurance brokerage, but it would be my money being set down, as he had no credit. He hasn’t filed income tax for at least five years, he owes for a student loan over 10 years ago, and who knows what else.
No rent
He officially moved in, in July and it wasn’t until December when he started paying me rent. When he did pay rent, he would throw it at me, or tell me “here’s your rent, now shut the (eff) up,”or make me scavenger hunt for it. He was always late and had to be reminded ”¦ even though what I asked was SO little. He drove my jeep under my insurance (as he held an out of province driver license), yet never wanted to buy the jeep off of me when I asked him to. I was going through a rough financial period and said that I had to sell the jeep and he lost his marbles, so I said, well then you buy it, you’re the only one who drives it. He said, “If we would just get married, then it would be mine anyways so why should I pay for something that would end up being mine?”
Also, he also had no provincial health care which when I found out, I could not understand WHY wouldn’t he fill out the paperwork. In our province, we don’t pay for the health care”¦ I mean what would happen if he was in a car accident? Who’s going to pay? His deadbeat family who has NOTHING to their name? NO”¦I would be stuck with it, as we would be considered common law.
From the moment he moved his boxes in I could no longer get even a bicycle in my garage, my basement was so cluttered with all his things that you could barely walk in there. When I asked him to clean up and box some things to organize it he would go into a complete FIT! Soon, I didn’t even bother.
Wrong ring
Prior to him moving in he proposed to me. He put the ring under the hood of the jeep and said to me to come out and look at the jeep because the engine was making a weird noise. When I lifted the hood, there was a ring, however, it was the wrong ring. He gave me the wedding ring, not the engagement ring. He thought that I got the smaller ring first and if I actually show up for the wedding, I get the bigger one. I wore the ring for a few months but I ended up giving it back to him as I told him that this isn’t working out and I won’t wear something that I don’t believe in. He told me, and I QUOTE, “If you would shut the fuck up, wear the fucking ring and be GOOD, then everything would be fine.” I never did wear it again.
I had tried for at least nine months to convince him that this is no longer working and that he needs to move out. The very first time I told him to move out, he told me “no. ”I just looked at him in astonishment and said, “Can you say that?” I tried to reason, yell, beg, plead, threaten but nothing worked.
He began to steal from stores, nothing big, little things like spices, hair products, makeup, batteries, groceries, dollar store things but soon my basement was filled with thousands of dollars of stolen items. He said to me that if I left him that I would lose everything, as all this stuff was in MY house and I would lose my house, my job, and my kids and have nothing. Even though I DIDN’T steal this, I had it in my possession ”¦ so for many months, I felt like I couldn’t do a thing. One day, I broke down and told a friend and she said to me that I had NO choice but to move him out and that I wouldn’t be held responsible.
Moved him out
On VERY cold February day when he was out of town I packed up all his belongings and moved them into a storage unit. I put all his instruments in the basement of our church as they are temperature sensitive. I didn’t do this to be mean; I just couldn’t do this anymore. I turned into someone I no longer recognized. I was angry all the time, would snap at small things, I gained SO much weight, every day was tense and my world was crumbling right before my eyes and there was nothing I could do. It was like trying to catch the rain”¦ My kids and I could no longer take it.
My daughter had moved with her father as she couldn’t take the pressure of living in such a tense house, and I could feel that my son was going to leave me too. If I lost my kids, I would curl up and die ”¦ I chose THEM, so I moved him out. But it didn’t end there, when he got back into town stuff really hit the fan. He scheduled a meeting with our pastor at the church and basically said that if I didn’t allow him to come home that he would kill himself something he threatened quite often in the last few months. Being that I didn’t want him to self-destruct, I allowed him to come back BUT on the promise that in his five days off, he/we would look for a place for him to move to. He PROMISED me, in front of our Pastor, so I let him come back to my house.
The next day I had to work, I called home to talk to him and asked him what he was planning to do today (thinking he would say, checking out the rentals) but instead he told me that he was going to call his buddies to come and finish the garage interior and I was supposed to order all the wood to frame the basement. When I said WHAT? He said, well, call your lawyer and get them to draw up a prenup agreement, we will get married and I promise everything will be good.
Went to the police
I panicked. On my lunch break I went to the police station to see if I could get some help to get him out of the house. The officer asked a millions questions and finally got out of me (not the reason I went there), but I ended up confessing that our relationship had been physical. He has thrown me around, pulled me across the floor by my hair, flipped me over his leg, held his fist over me, football tackled me and said he was going to (effn) kill me.
In a whirlwind, the police came to my house, but he had a suspicion that something was going on, because I didn’t come home for lunch and he couldn’t get a hold of me all afternoon (and I’m not like that) ”¦ he had left the house. The next day he called me at work and I told him that the police were looking for him; he couldn’t believe what I had done. He did turn himself in.
He broke the no contact order we had when he contacted my daughter (who was back half time with me) and said it was a matter of life and death. I talked to him (because of course I was worried) and somehow he convinced me that he had changed and that we can work on things. He also convinced me to write a letter to the crown prosecutor explaining that I didn’t mean for all this to happen—which was the truth—I was only wanting some help to get him out of my house, but then the truth came out. But, it didn’t convince anyone and he ended up pleading guilty.
Dating again
After the court date, we still were somewhat together. He promised me that things would be better and he was getting help and that he needed me by his side to do all this as if I wasn’t then he had nothing to work towards”¦so I did. We dated, went out for nice suppers, went on small weekend trips and things were nice. This is what it was supposed to be like all this time, but I never did get. I liked the space from him, however, over the next month he started to become anxious again. At one point he said that if he wasn’t moved back in by April that it was over. I said, well then it’s over cause you’re not moving back in.
From that point on, it was a quick down slide ”¦ I wasn’t wanting to be around him anymore but didn’t know how to get rid of him. If I didn’t answer his millions of texts, then he would call, if I ignored his calls, he would show up”¦at my work, my house ”¦ wherever ”¦ and he would make a scene.
Easter was coming up and he asked what I was cooking, and I said it was just me and the kids, so just a chicken. He said he would buy a turkey. I asked why? He said, because I want a turkey and I said, please, just let me and the kids have a quiet holiday. Then he said, “I’m going to buy a fucking turkey, you’re going to cook the fucking turkey, we are going to sit and have a family fucking meal!” I ended up cooking the turkey and we sat together.
Shot a horse
After supper we went out to shoot this new paintball gun that he and my son bought. (This is where I did something wrong.) We were driving and I saw this horse up on a hill — quite far off the road. I took the paintball gun and out of curiosity wondering if it could reach it, I shot the horse in the BUM. The horse barely moved but I got it on the hindquarter. I know it was a stupid move, but I knew where I was aiming and I didn’t hurt it, it just sat there looking at me ”¦ well little did I know, he actually was videotaping me.
A couple weekends later after constant bickering back and forth, he used the video against me. He came to my work and stood on this hill by the parking lot and held the phone up and yelled, “You should see this video of this mom shooting this horse; maybe someone should show social services.” He ended up calling the police on me, however, once I spoke to the officer, he just gave me a warning and let it go!
That was the very officer that called him a “sociopath,” a word I never heard before, but that night I sat at my computer and Googled it. Dr. Hare’s list came up, and it was BANG ON!
Called my bosses
Earlier to this, he called all of my bosses and left messages with them, one ended up calling him back and he ranted and raved about things that my boss said wasn’t valid except one thing. He said that I broke client/broker confidentiality; however, when I explained to my boss what I said, he dismissed it. But then I found out from another boss that he told that other boss that we had sex in the office. The entire day he drove around my office to see if my van was gone, as he thought I would be fired (his whole plan).
Even after that, he weaseled his way back to me. I asked him how he could say that he loves me so much yet try to get me fired. What would you have done if right now, I am standing in front of you and I DID get fired”¦what would you do then? You know what he said? “I would take care of you.” I was mortified.
This isn’t all of it either”¦there’s SO much more”¦
He’s engaged
To date, we go to trial soon on yet another three charges recently laid on him. He plead not guilty to this one though. I found out just the other day that he is ENGAGED”¦ after telling me over and over that I was his last relationship and if I ended it, then I have ended him, but apparently he has found love again and in just a short few months (no more than four). I wonder if she got my old engagement ring the ring from the girl prior to me. LOL
Healing is taking a long, long, long time. He never stole the kind of money from me that yours did to you; I simply didn’t have it. But he lived off of me for free, drove and abused my vehicles, treated my kids good one day horrible the next, while I paid for camping trips, holidays, food, bills, entertainment, etc., and that’s devastating enough.
He grabbed nearly all the gifts he ever gave to me, every birthday, Christmas gift or whatever gifts, and even a potato bin that he made me. I voluntarily gave back a wooden garbage bin and computer desk he made for me, in an attempt to avoid him showing up again and screaming for the things he calls HIS. He said they were only mine if he was around. I never received nor asked for one thing back that I had given to him. A while back, when he was winterizing my trailer, I asked if he would do this for me come spring, and he said, “If I’m not fucking you, I do nothing for free.”
Some of his favorite sayings were: “God always gives me what I want.” At prayer time at supper, he would end his prayer with, “Thank you for not giving us what we deserve,” and my favorite, “If you would just shut up and be good, every thing would be fine.” Ironic that he prays at supper every night yet, steals from others that day.
Sociopath
I have gone through the Dr. Hare’s list for sociopath and I could give you many, many examples of each and every “sign” he lists. There is NO DOUBT in my mind that my ex is a sociopath, just as that officer said.
I am trying to educate myself to understand what happened”¦how to avoid another relationship like this one, and how to make sure that IF he ever reappears, that I have the strength to walk away. This is a deep-seated fear. He has taken my self-confidence, and for the first time in my life, I suffer from panic attacks and anxiety. I have calmed down A LOT, but I still feel it inside, and it’s going to take a while before I move on.
Weirdly enough, I grieved this relationship ending more than I did when my marriage ended. That I don’t quite understand. I believe, though, it is because this was an emotional abuse relationship, whereas my marriage simply ended. The worst part of all of this is, it really has grown my children and I apart.
My ex-husband uses the tension and horrid memories against me in an attempt to have both kids go and live with him (at least a week and a week), as he is not too proud to take child support from me. He is manipulative and at the drop of a dime would take everything away from me, too. He is just jealous of how successful I became without him, and would love to see me fail.
So I have been trying to rebuild this crumbled relationship with my kids. My daughter and I are good, she missed a lot of the tension at home when she moved out, but is back with me a week on and a week off, but she is 17 now and won’t be home for much longer. My son (age 12) is another story; it’s a bridge I have to cross soon.
Thank you for your book
Thank you for your book; it was one of many steps I have to take on my road to recovery. Only those who have personally been preyed upon can understand the depths of our words. To others, it is just a story ”¦ a devastating one, but still a story. To us, every word cuts like a knife, every story reeks of familiarity.
At times, while reading your story I thought to myself”¦HOW can our stories be SO alike ”¦ did she look into my windows? How can sociopaths read from the very same book and act exactly alike BANG ON!!! It was creepy to read and one day I’m going to reopen your book and highlight everything that was MY life that you lived.
I have often thought of writing my own book. Perhaps one day and maybe as a healing method. Thank you for taking your time to read this, I know it is long winded but to be honest, this is still only a glimpse of all that happened. Looking back, I wonder how I walk upright. Perhaps it will help someone else as your book helped me.
Guys there are lots of kids who have been bounced from pillar to post and back again, that do not become ODD or wild and dangerous….I think it is back to the genetics + environment= outcome.
There used to be a theory that abused kids become abusers and that unless a kid was abused he wouldn’t BE an abuser….and that theory has been shot out of the water many times.
Remember that nurse in Tennessee that got the kid out of Russia and he was RAD and she ended up putting him back on a plane to Russia? What this woman did I do not approve of in any way, but I think those of us who have parented “extremely difficult” kids can empathize with this woman’s frustration and being at the END OF HER ROPE.
When you do not dare go to sleep at night for fear that your 10 or 12 year old kid will KILL YOU OR BURN DOWN THE HOUSE on your head, it works on YOUR coping and ability to live.
Remember when that state passed the law that you could drop off your kid at a hospital and not be charged with abandonment, and parents from all over the country drove there to “drop off” their uncontrollable teenagers?
There are programs all over the country (as well as hospitals etc) that attempt to deal with these children and adolescents. Unfortunately too many of them depend on the parents having insurance and even then insurance doesn’t pay much of it. The state takes some of the kids when they have committed crimes and are arrested, but so many parents struggle with these kids. I know I did when mine started the law breaking and didn’t get much help.
Remember Witsend, the blogger here whose son was so scary that she was afraid of him and she came here desperately seeking a cure for him, and in the end she had to let him go when he finally turned 18….she was at her WITS END….
There are some kids that at age 2-3-10 or 12 who are essentially out of reach of even the best therapy, and for sure out of the reach of a regular parent’s ability to live, make a living and care for that child and keep them safe and be safe from them.
Our prisons and streets are full of these kids—run aways and throw aways, criminals and drug addicts. It is a “crying shame” for sure, but there have always been these kids as far back as history records (go back and read some of the British history from the 1700s and 1800s. Bunches of these kids were deported to Australia as criminals because the British didn’t know what the heck to do with these kids and their petty crime.
This is nothing new, I can look around my neighborhood and see these kids and almost “predict” which ones will end up in and out of prison. Some of them come from “good” hard working honest families that raised other kids that became good hard working adults. It still boils down to CHOICES. What causes some of these kids to decide at early ages that they enjoy hurting others I’m not sure, but it is nothing new. It has been known though for a long time that the “adopted kid syndrome” is that there is a high percentage of them turn out to be “trouble”—but if you look at the kids that ARE AVAILABLE FOR ADOPTION most of them are “available” because they have parents who are high in anti-social traits (criminals or drug addicts or other problems) so they start out with a high genetic tendency in the first place.
What do you do with these kids? Can’t put them all in institutions, but the people who DO take them in need support and education and I don’t think they get it most of the time.
My cousin who is a registered nurse practitioner as well as affluent and a stay at home mom after she adopted one she knew was “off” (fetal alcohol syndrome) and she devoted her life to helping this kid and he turned out fairly well considering what she started with. He has several other problems as well as MR, but with the educational and financial resources she had she was able to “pull it off”—I admire her for what she did. I know others who are raising their grandkids and even great grand kids with various levels of success in overcoming the genetic and early environment. It is a big job and one that many people are not educationally or financially or emotionally able to cope with.
So, I am not going to criticize these people or label then narcissistic for trying with this kid. I know that their shoes are full of BIG ROCKS not just pebbles. I’ve walked in those shoes and they are not comfortable. There have been plenty of people who have said that the reason my son is a psychopath is because his mama didn’t raise him right. I don’t buy that line.
One Joy,
Well, it looks like my post to you has been permanently lost in cyberspace. But no harm done – it was a good lesson in equanimity! (Speaking of which, I made reference to your Buddhist practices in my earlier post, so maybe my mention of “The First Noble Truth” was what caught the censor’s attention!)
Anyhow, I was saying how sad it is that you went from the N to the S in so short of a time period. That must have been a very dark time for you. But in regards to the N, it does sound like she’s more of that – perhaps with some “spathy traits” as you say – than an outright sociopath. Obviously, it’s impossible for me to say from this distance. However, as a general “vibe,” that’s what I’m sensing…..
But isn’t it funny about the “Indigo Child” thing?! It’s amazing how you can make inferences about character from just a few telling facts. Yet as I said before, I know the type, and have experienced it first hand. Unfortunately.
The other point I was making, is that you might consider looking for the qualities which appeal to you (“curiosity,” “adventure” “love of language”) in a number of different people, rather than hoping to find them all in a single “love relationship.” In other words, since it’s almost impossible to find any one person who combines even a fraction of our varied tastes and eccentricities, the next best thing perhaps, is to split the difference among several different people. So, for example, maybe your next lover won’t end up being a mountain-climbing Buddhist with a glib tongue; but maybe the pal you meet at work – or down the road – will be at least one or two of these things.
Anyhow, that’s always how it’s worked for me. I’ve never had a girlfriend who likes the books that I do (and I probably wouldn’t trust her if she did!), but I must admit that the best relationships I’ve had, were always the ones where someone whom I never would have picked “in the abstract,” ended up being the perfect match for me.
Just some stuff to think about. But you’re pretty wise and intuitive, so I’m guessing you don’t need anyone to tell you what you’ve probably already figured out for yourself!
Nevertheless, I think you’ve definitely paid your dues by getting “narced” and then “spathed” in such quick succession! So hopefully this means that you’re officially done with the “Life is Suffering Tutorial” – and are now on to the good part!
One Joy,
I’m not sure, but it just erased another post of mine to you! I guess we’re running into bad luck today! That being so, I’ll talk to you in a few days when I know my words aren’t going to get deleted.
Is this happening to anyone else here? Maybe something needs fixed on the site?
Hi Constantine,
Actually, I am pretty sure now the whole thing was BS. There was a leak in his story. I contacted his best friend (like a brother to him) who is coincidentally another possible spath, and I told his best buddy what was going on immediately. His best friend had no idea and contacted the family immediately. I was trying to bring more people into the situation than he would have planned for if it was a fake, basically to see if he’d fumble with all the new variables coming in. In other words, I was sorta letting his best friend “check the story” and then let him relay back to me what he had learned. Sure enough, his best friend made such a simple comment that blew the whole thing out of the water. I am not sure if his friend even knows that he blew his buddy’s cover, because he may not even know himself that the whole thing was BS. His best buddy claimed that yet another friend had just received a phone call from my ex-spath who was just waking up. Right as I was reading this email, I got a text from his uncle stating that he hadn’t woken up yet and everyone was still waiting. Bam. Caught. I don’t care which story is true. All I know is that when stories have leaks and they come from his direction, it’s because they are total BS or are at least surrounded by his BS.
Him? Seeing a therapist? Oh, I fell for that one before. He seems to forget that he already played that card and lost it. His “therapist” contacted me awhile back via email. Then his “therapist” had a reverse IP address that went to my ex. Now he expects me to believe he is seeing a therapist again?
I am guessing I might be contacted in a few months by someone with a British accent asking me why I was so mean to this innocent puppy dog in his/her office.
Even IF the suicide attempt was “real” it was done precisely so that he wouldn’t die but be just hurt enough to make his family do whatever the hell he wants. It was supposed to “work” on me too, but he didn’t know yet that he’d already lost his leash on me. He lost his “supply” in me and his parents just sold their house. He probably realized that he needs to find a new supply with cash pretty soon, and bingo there they are. Don’t they even wonder why they haven’t heard from their son for the past 5 years they have had not a dime to spare and suddenly he is running to their arms?
Melly, that spath ex of yours sounds ridiculous. What a nightmare. I am appalled that he did this in front of his own child, but not surprised. I am SO LUCKY I didn’t get pregnant from my ex. I was starting to realize that I’d be in a situation very much like the one you’ve had to deal with. If our kids had managed to avoid his most dangerous genes, they would probably have out-matured him within 10 years of birth. Either that, or I would have just been replicating more of the same problem that was driving me crazy to begin with.
Good job throwing him the rope. MAN I know that feeling! So many times I was at that place too with him! I just wanted to say GO ON AND DIE THEN because he drove me freaking NUTS. It felt so cruel to have such emotions towards him, but he drove me to my very very last nerve on a regular basis. I would rather live with a chimpanzee or a lion.
I read that whole blog, and I just do not know what to make of it all. I think the adoption was a bad idea all the way around. I do not think these people were any benefit to this child from the get go.
I have some huge concerns over their ideas and parenting of a child in general, much less an abused one. They didn’t want to deal with all the work and time involved with a baby? Kids are work and time, esp ones with emotional problems, at all ages. I do not get how they would adopt a child with problems (bonding problems no less), and expect him to be fine while they both worked all day. He needed one of them to be a stay at home parent and be there. This child needed more than they seemed willing to give.
I also think their punishments were sick and wrong. ‘We just wanted a reaction, so we basically tortured the kid trying to get one.’ I did feel that was way wrong, and maybe working on more positive things might have been better than standing him in the corner for 4 hours as a young child. That timeline thing, made me sick and it freaked me out. My son will commit his first rape at this time. Huh?
I think these parents needed therapy as well. Yes, this kid does seem really scary, and I think he was made worse by his adoptive parents. I also think this boy was sexually abused and it seemed rather obvious. He needed counseling to deal with what he had been through, but from what I took out of everything is that he was in therapy for his behavior issues.
This kid does sound like he has a lot of other things going on, not just being a spath. I think they were just labeling him that to get themselves off the hook. I do not doubt that he will be one with a little more time, and probably a serious danger to society. It is very scary to think of. I read that blog before I went to bed last night, and then ended up with nightmares. Go figure.
QUOTE FROM THE BLOG COMMENTS: “Raising a Psychopath”
Anonymous said…
The main thing reading this blog and the comments has shown me is that most people are completely ignorant of the reality of psychopathy or mental illness that exhibit similar behavior. Anyone who is blasting Harry for his frank discussion of the issue is simply living in a fantasy world where everyone is born a whole person and can develop into a beautiful flower if only they are loved.
This is not true.
Psychopathy is real. It is serious. It is untreatable. It is very destructive on the lives of those who get involved. Some psychopaths can have successful lives exploiting others because so many people refuse to understand that such things exist.
Yes, it is sad, but being sad about it doesn’t accomplish anything. It’s not clear what does, but I applaud Harry for writing about it, at least, so we can start to pull the veil off this awful issue, which may effect some 1 in 200 people.
July 3, 2011 11:56 PM
Reading through the father’s comments and the comments of the various people who had read it is in many ways very understandable on both the part of the father and of the various critics of his attitude as a parent.
Looking at the attitudes of the father, and I realize he is no “model adoptive parent,” and also looking at the situation he was going through with a child who was not bonded….and the comments made by the parents of other children (biological and adopted) who were not bonded…the whole situation is SAD beyond words. Sad, sad SAD.
Hi Oxy. I agree with both views on this one.
Though a psychopathic child is something that very few people can truly relate to dealing with, I do think these parents have done some things that are completely unacceptable. For one thing, the very blog itself struck me as cold–I mean its very existence. I wonder how that child might feel if he saw this on the internet. I am sure he probably has. I also immediately guessed that whatever happened in his life before he came to these people, it has not been addressed, and sexual abuse was the first thing I sensed might be in his history. Then the biggest thing I didn’t like about this whole blog/parent/situation is that this father is publicizing when his 13 year old son masturbates!
Okay, I know he is at wits end and in over his head. I know that most of us would have a hard as heck time with this kid as well and probably lose our marbles just as much. BUT he’s turned this into some sort of experiment, and I think that telling the entire world when your 13 year old son masturbates is crossing the line. I also find the 4 hour punishment cruel.
True, a sociopath/psychopath child is going to be a tough case, but no two cases are identical, and I really think that these particular parents aggravated the problem. I do not think they intended to, but I can see areas here, lots of them, that would drive me to rebellion if my parents did it, and I am not even an spath. I cannot imagine how an spath would take some of this. I would feel utterly betrayed by the people “loving” me if I knew about this blog. I would assume they were pretending to love me, labeling me, and using me to get internet fame. I’d feel devalued, unimportant, and tricked into thinking I was about to have a family. Then I would probably seek passive aggressive revenge, internalize a lot of their beliefs about me and think that maybe I was evil, give up on trying to be good and just embrace what I’ve been labeled, figuring no one can see me anyways, which would spiral the problem.
Okay what I am saying is that they could screw up a normal kid with a lot of the things they are doing.
I know that some kids, no matter what a parent tries, are impossible to help. In this case, we’ll never know, because we cannot go back now with this particular kid and try to do things a bit better the second time around. What’s done is done.
The blog itself is indeed fascinating and had me thinking about a lot of things. I learned a thing or two from reading it. I still don’t think it’s in the best interest of the child, though, and the child’s best interest should come first.
Yea, it is a sad SAD SADDDDD situation.
Did you read the comments from the other parents of children with attachment disorder?
Actually, it seems the kids that I have worked with in in-patient settings seem to “do okay” if they are observed continually, but you can’t take your eyes off them. It is only when they realize that there is available force to restrain them that they seem willing to go along with “the program.” But if for one minute, one second, they sense that no one is watching or willing or able to restrain them, it is like they are a log truck rolling down hill without any brakes.
Panther–you were talking about how the cultural climate in Turkey was so male oriented, and male dominated–what was it about this man and that culture that drew you into a relationship like that? From what you’ve posted, you don’t seem to me to be the kind of woman who would prefer a STRICTLY male dominated culture or relationship.
I hated the culture with a passion, every moment of it. The patriarchy drove me nuts on a daily basis and I was constantly getting into arguments and sometimes almost physical altercations with men on the streets who would harass me. The reason I didn’t leave within the first year is because the ex spath drained all of my money into the negatives and I couldn’t even afford the plane ticket out of the country.
Ironically, as you might even guess, this guy initially presented himself as a feminist who hated all the men in his country and was looking for a way out of it all. He claimed to be world traveled. I don’t know how I completely missed the obvious improbability of his story: that he had lived in 32 countries. He was only 25 when I met him. I just bought this. Didn’t even do the math. Duh.
Turkey itself was somewhere I ended up for a few reasons, some of them logical-ish…some of them stupid. For one thing, I had studied Conflict Resolution and Negotiations in the Middle East at university. I was very curious to check out that region of the world after reading about it in text books for so long and hearing about it in the news. Turkey was a sort of middle ground with a little bit of Europe but also some Middle East.
But…there is another thing which I haven’t mentioned here. I recently told One/Joy in a private email, but I have felt really awkward confessing this all in LF. I had an internet “relationship” with a guy in Turkey for 4 years before I moved to Turkey. It wasn’t really a relationship, but he had me convinced that he loved me and that one day we would be together. When we finally met, after 4 years, there was chemistry…..so I thought. We spent a little time together and ended up straight in bed. Then he tossed me straight to the curb….literally. In came his best friend, whom I had never met before and didn’t know anything about. This was my ex spath. I am now sure that they both were orchestrating the whole thing since day one, because their personalities as “presented” to me have some overlaps. There were times when information I was being fed from the first guy is something that I recognize as having come from the other one. When the buddy came along, he told me that his a**hole friend didn’t know what he had lost, that he could see I was really made of gold, bla bla bla. They were both spaths, without question, and they doubled up on me and literally passed me from one to the other.
I am just barely starting to grasp what really happened.
Ox, I really didn’t know what had hit me.
When I was a child, someone once told me that if you looked up gullible in the dictionary, it wasn’t there. In fact, when I first heard this, I at first thought it was true.
The weird thing is that I was academically at the top of every subject in every class, but socially I was a lost cause. (I really suspect I might have some sort of Asperger’s, but I am not sure)
I am honest to a fault, literally to the point that dishonesty didn’t even register on my radar until this experience.