Editor’s note: This article about the importance of boundaries and belief in herself was submitted by a Lovefraud reader.
It has been about a year since my story was posted on Lovefraud, Not one thing about him was real. It has been two years since I broke off the short relationship with this disordered man. It is a year and a half since he stalked me. I hope to share at least some practical points that have helped me in the healing process. It does get better. And it is a process.
I wish I could say that others may be helped PRIOR to involvement with a sociopath, but as we all know, sometimes the inevitable entanglement occurs before we even realize we have been manipulated. This entanglement would have ended much earlier if I had had clear boundaries, zero tolerance for lies and bad behavior, and the will to walk away alone and create my own closure.
There are many events and bizarre experiences with him, his family, his indiscretions, the pathological lies. I now realize that the ONLY purpose to ANYTHING he did was to make himself look good, please himself, hide the truth, devalue others for his own perceived greatness, impress people and get off on his lies and deceptions. He loves that he manipulates people to admire him as the hero, and to come to his defense as the broken victim that he plays so well. He doesn’t want you to realize he IS the stereotypical villain. He was just good at imitating the qualities that are truly admirable like modesty, bravery and dependability. Telling people he was a Navy SEAL hero, working for the NSA, CIA, using aliases, killing terrorists, giving away fake medals, telling stories of being tortured. It’s always about him. And what he calls LOVE is more like an OBSESSION.
He surrounds himself with people who are weak, easily manipulated and vulnerable. They WILL turn their heads to the truth. He wants them to need him. It’s tantamount for HIS very survival. Smart people will question him. Weak people will live the lie, sometimes because they need something from him and sometimes because they are just too weak to admit they have been conned. It’s tantamount for THEIR survival. I know because I was there for a short time. It’s a vicious circle and a world of denial that feeds his sociopathic hunger. In reality, he needs his victims more. He is only as good as the reflection he sees in the eyes of the victim. When I questioned his veracity, I was disloyal. But I was right. I asked good questions (eventually) and he could not keep up the rotting facade of his fabricated life.
Back to basics
I had to get back to basics in order to trust others, myself, my instincts, my intuition, my belief system, religion and all the rules I used to live by. I had to respect myself, gain back my self-esteem and learn to be tolerant but ONLY of those who do not violate my beliefs and boundaries. I also had to learn to stop accepting bad behavior much earlier and stop the self defeating behavior I recognized in myself.
I made lists of those “boundaries” and used them along with real life examples of behaviors that were no longer tolerable. The will to keep those boundaries safe came from the anger I felt after revisiting conversations and events and learning all of the lies. It was painful. I needed to forgive myself, not him, and I decided I would never allow that behavior again EVER.
Read more — Quiz: Are you a target?
I was mind raped. No doubt. I lost an innocence, not unlike being a rape victim. The abuse and exploitation is so ambient at times that you don’t even realize what has happened. It is ridden with intermittent generosity and professions of love while your thoughts, actions and behaviors are so closely controlled through undermining manipulation, guilt and shame. You are in a whirlpool of words and actions that are so inconsistent. And manipulation that has you believing you are wrong, and that everything you learned to date is wrong and that what you are witnessing must be real, while all you know to be right and good has defied you. My intelligence and good rationale failed me. Still I wanted to believe and have hope and faith.
I made lists
It was therapeutic for me to make lists:
- Things he took from me.
- Things I gave up to him.
- Lies he told.
- Red flags I ignored.
- Names he called me.
- Things he did and said to violate me and my children and friends and all the things he did (behaviors) which were inconsistent with the things he said.
I was too manipulated for far too long. NO MORE. Finally I understood that there was nothing of substance there in him to begin with. I thought he had more to offer me than I had to offer myself. But it was I who had what he wants and needs desperately. Perhaps he saw an innocence, a vulnerability, a naiveté about me and he knew I could be conned.
As much as I read and studied narcissism, sociopathy, and any number of disorders, I still could not comprehend why he lied and cheated as he did and why I allowed him to keep coming back for more. Someone told me that normal, healthy people cannot make sense of irrational, impulsive and sometimes delusional behavior because we simply rationalize. People who are disordered and impulsive just do what they do because they can and it benefits themselves in some way. It truly is that simple.
Creating boundaries
There are things I have learned to practice that have allowed me to find closure, take my power back, regain my confidence, which hopefully will keep me from EVER making this mistake again. I don’t need someone else to provide closure to a bad relationship or situation I never did. It was in me all along.
Creating Boundaries: These are mine:
- HONESTY — I ignored my instincts and the facts even when I caught him in lies.
- INTEGRITY — He was not and never will be a man of his word.
- FIDELITY/LOYALTY — The best indicator of future behavior is past behavior. (He cheated constantly on his previous wife, on me and on his current wife. I have been told she is wearing the same engagement ring I wore.)
- RESPECT — (The verbal abuse, the cheating, the lying, the inability to do as he says are ALL encompassing of issues of respect). The bad behavior, spitefulness, drug abuse and allowing all of the above with his adult daughters.
I learned all over again to verbalize my rule of zero tolerance. I didn’t always speak up in the presence of the sociopath because he HAD to be in control and raged or had a tantrum for days.
The closure I seek these days, which I learned as a practice from my therapist, is that when someone is disrespectful, lies or doesn’t treat me well, that I need to close it off with direct communication about what I think and feel and to NOT let them back in again. When I do, I feel like I am in control of my life, my beliefs, and displaying respect for myself (and in an appropriate way). I have truly taken my power back. It is important for me to say, “Don’t contact me again. You are behaving inappropriately. I am not interested in you any longer. I don’t like what you just said to me.” IT IS ok to protect yourself first. I explain this at the risk of sounding juvenile or patronizing but I truly had to relearn these practices, which came so naturally to me previous to the sociopath.
Recognizing my value
All of our lives are eventually a result of the decisions we make. This is particularly true of the sociopath. In fact, I prefer to believe that his life is like a constant panic of desperation to gain what others have, what he needs to see in our reflection to fill the emptiness of his disturbed soul. He can’t fulfill his own fantasies fast enough and so he scrambles daily to find victims to manipulate in order to feel superior.
Listen now — Don Shipley: Exposing phony Navy SEALs
Recently, this man’s family and new friends found the truth about him on an internet site where he has been exposed as a military impostor and con man. He has known of the exposure for two years after an investigation. He chose not to respond then. He has dishonored those who served and gave of their lives. Other women/people have now come forward and also identified him and his stories. Justice comes in strange ways sometimes. He counted on all of his victims to cower to his intimidations but HE is the coward. Those who continue to live the lie are the cowards. Yet he still has potential to be prosecuted for his crimes. HE IS EXPOSED. I prefer to be on this end simply observing the drama that he is creating with his new followers and family, with no involvement.
At some point I saw more value in what the sociopath had to offer me than in what I had in myself. And I was willing to give myself up to be what he wanted, demanded, expected. The abuse I suffered as a target of a sociopath has taken a toll. To recover, I first had to clear the fog, find myself, and understand my value and importance.
There is a kind of confidence that is exuded when we know who we are and what we want and don’t deviate too much from that. People see it in us and respect it as well. The road is long and this experience with this dysfunctional man will stay with me for a long time. I found myself through recognizing my value and making sure it is respected and appreciated, if not by someone else, by ME. After all, I am the one who has to face me every day.
Learn more — Survivor’s guide to healthy people and healthy relationships
Lovefraud originally posted this story on Dec. 9, 2009.
Advice for dealing with sociopaths: Don’t take it personally
Dear Donna,
This article SPEAKS TO YOUR POWER—and the POWER WE ALL HAVE, IF WE WILL JUST GRASP AND USE IT!
!!!!! –0 !!!!! PLATINUM SKILLET AWARD FOR THIS ONE!
(To the audience) APPLAUSE APPLAUSE!!!!!!!!!! WOW! A Standing ovation, Take a bow Donna, you deserve it!!!!!!
And, thank you donna, for showing us all that we also have this power, this power to SEE THE TRUTH, SET BOUNDARIES, TO ENFORCE THEM, AND TO VALIDATE OURSELVES AND TO HAVE A LIFE, A REAL LIFE, FREE OF THE LIES AND MANIPULATION OF OTHER PEOPLE!
:
I began posting shortly after your original article. Our journeys have run parallel in so many respects. You became such an important part of my healing process. Of course, I guess that’s why we became such good friends in real life.
“At some point I saw more value in what the sociopath had to offer me than in what I had in myself. And I was willing to give myself up to be what he wanted, demanded, expected. The abuse I suffered as a target of a sociopath has taken a toll. To recover, I first had to clear the fog, find myself, and understand my value and importance.”
It was this abnegation of self that was one of the worst things for me to grapple with in the aftermath. I now understand, courtesy of books like “The Betrayal Bond” and “If You Had Controlling Parents” how my sense of self was always pretty shakey and my boundaries were very weak, two factors which played beautifully into S’s colonization of my mind. But, it was the fact that I allowed myself to become obliterated that was so difficult for me to grasp.
I now see that in a wierd way thats awful as it was, I almost needed to “learn the lesson of S.” After S I finally learned how to draw some hard and non-negotiable boundaries. After S, I learned to say no and not honor my word, if to do so would be detrimental to me. After S, I re-evaluated the people in my life and, if they were found lacking, I got rid of them. After S, I established new criteria for the people I chose to let into my life. While I realize I suffered substantial losses while I was involved with S, I have also made tremendous gains in gaining the tools for how to live the kind of life I alwas wanted.
“As much as I read and studied narcissism, sociopathy, and any number of disorders, I still could not comprehend why he lied and cheated as he did and why I allowed him to keep coming back for more.” So, true. Like you, I studied sociopathy/narcissism, etc. I had “Without Conscience” and “The Sociopath Next Door” memorized. But, I still couldn’t grasp why he acted this way. And that’s when I realized I was asking the wrong question. The question wasn’t why he acted this way, the question was why I allowed him to act this way toward me. Once I framed the question that way, I began to heal, because I put the focus back where it belonged — on me.
So many people on this website twist themselves into pretzels trying to figure out “why he/she acts this way”, “surely there must be more I can do to win back that wonderful person I fell in love with” etc, etc. But, as you so eloquently put it, that isn’t the issue. They are damaged beyond repair. And if we, the victims, don’t put the focus on us in order to heal, we will be damaged beyond repair.
Wonderful article and thanks again, for sharing.
MY PARDON— my admiration for this powerful article still stands, and also my admiration for Donna for LF and all the time and effort she puts into it.
Thanks, Matt, your comment is also a very powerful piece of writing, outlining that control must be taken by ourselves.
Thin that Rolodex, Bro!!!! Weeding our gardens of life!
OxDrover:
How you doin’ (to quote Wendy Williams, love that show)?
Went on a job interview yesterday. While I”m still crushed over the screw-over my ex-boss did on my getting my dream job, I’ve decided I’ll take what I can in the interim, view it as a “bridge job” until I can get what I want.
Am enjoying the holiday season. Put up a 9 foot tree this weekend with the BF and then went out to do an early XMAS dinner since he’s leaving the country for 3 weeks to go back to see his mother abroad.
I just realized that my first article was posted on Love Fraud a year ago, on 11 December 2008. As hard as this year has been between driving off S-ex,losing my job and health problems, I finally feel my life is on the right track on the personal front. Now I need to get things nailed down on the professional front.
Someone recently sent this reminder to me about “letting go” — a message by Rev. T.D. Jakes. Even if one is inclined to identify as more “spiritual” as I do, rather than religious per se, there is relevance here in our journey of struggling to understand the encounters with N/S disordered persons and various other life challenges, and being able to move forward and grow toward “knowing with humility” (a favorite term of mine from the late M. Scott Peck, M.D.) — in stages of acceptance…
There are people who can walk away from you. And hear me when I tell you this — when people can walk away from
you: let them walk.
I don’t want you to try to talk another person into staying with
you, loving you, calling you, caring about you, coming to see you, staying attached to you. I mean hang up the phone.
When people can walk away from you, let them walk. Your destiny is never tied to anybody that left. The bible said that, they came out from us that it might be made manifest that they were not for us. For had they been of us, no doubt they would have continued with us. [1 John 2:19]. People leave you because they are not joined to you. And if they are not joined to you, you can’t make them stay. Let them go.
And it doesn’t mean that they are a bad person — it just means that their part in the story is over. And you’ve got to know when people’s part in your story is over so that you don’t keep trying to raise the dead.. You’ve got
to know when it’s dead.
You’ve got to know when it’s over. Let me tell you something.. I’ve got the gift of good-bye. It’s the tenth spiritual gift, I believe in good-bye. It’s not that I’m hateful, it’s that I’m faithful, and I know whatever God means for me to have He’ll give it to me. And if it takes too much sweat, I don’t need it. Stop begging people to stay…Let them go!
If you are holding on to something that doesn’t belong to you and was never intended for your life, then you need to…LET IT GO!
If you are holding on to past hurts and pains …LET IT GO!
If someone can’t treat you right, love you back, and see your worth…LET IT GO!
If someone has angered you…LET IT GO!
If you are holding on to some thoughts of evil and revenge…
LET IT GO!
If you are involved in a wrong relationship or addiction…
LET IT GO!
If you are holding on to a job that no longer meets your needs or talents…LET IT GO!
If you have a bad attitude…LET IT GO!
If you keep judging others to make yourself feel better..LET IT GO!
If you’re stuck in the past and God is trying to take you to a new level in Him…LET IT GO!
If you are struggling with the healing of a broken relationship…LET IT GO!
If you keep trying to help someone who won’t even try to help themselves…LET IT GO!
If you’re feeling depressed and stressed…LET IT GO!
If there is a particular situation that you are so used to handling yourself and God is saying ‘take your hands off of it,’ then you need to…LET IT GO!
Dear Matt,
I’m actually doing pretty well, and so are my sons!
Finally heard from the X-friends with a pity letter (e mail) said hadn’t been able to contact me sooner because had lost my phone number (but obviously had NOT lost my e mail) and also complained that son D “wouldn’t answer his pone” since Jan 15, I asked D about that and he said, Nope, that was the last time they had called him, wanting money and he had said NO.
I didn’t answer the first e mail of them wanting to get together with US to make arrangements to get the stuff out of storage (there is nothing left there but rained on trash and boxes of rained on books now) So then I get this second e mail asking if the first e mail got through and hinting that they are COMING out here.
They have had a KEY to the storage building from the get go and have come and gone from there at will without coming up here or notifying us they are going to the storage. For years they are under constraint to NOT come to the farm proper unless they call FIRST before coming. (which they highly resent that boundary and I have caught the wife crossing it when she thought I was gone and I wasn’t)
So I had intended not to reply to their e mails, but as son D pointed out the whole thing about the stuff in storage and the e mail to “get together” wasn’t about the stuff in storage, but about US and seeing US—DUH! Of course it was!
So I wrote an e mail back to them telling them that they had a Key to the storage and if they had lost it they had my permission to kick open the door which is easily done in any case, to get their stuff. I also said that I saw no need in them “getting together with us” and if they decided to pay my son D back the money they owed him, they could mail him a check. (they didn’t think I knew about that one)
So I get back a poor pity part e mail of “well I guess I shouldn’t bother you with my problems, I’m in a wheel chair all the time now and ya da ya da.
Well, having worked with spinal cord injured patients in rehabilitation, I am not used to being thrown into a pity by someone being in a WC as it is quite possible to have a good life even in a wheel chair and I know lots of people who have had great lives while confined to a WC, but because our X-friend chooses to sit in a WC (which he has been in 90% of the time for the last 30 years,) and feel that the world owes him a living, and everyone else has to do his bidding and wait on him hand and foot while he sits in a marijuana and Rx Pill stupor feeling sorry for himself doesn’t fly with me. Which I told him in the return e mail. Which I open copied to mutual friends and acquaintances that he has been loudly complaining to recently about how we have “Abandoned” him in his hour of greatest (pitiful) need. (Smear campaign recruiting these people to try to put pressure on us to take care of him).
Unfortunately, his “smear and pressure campaign” sort of back fired on him as the people involved saw through it as well as we have. His and his wife’s problems now is that they have “used up” all their friends and we were the last hope they had to get someone to “do for” them.
These people aren’t classifiable psychopaths, but they are highly dependent people who want others to take care of their needs. I call it MOOCHES. They make poor spending choices, then borrow money that they can’t pay back. No matter what you do for them or give them, it NEVER HELPS THEM because they are not willing to see WHY they are in the financial hole they are in, that it is the result of THEIR POOR CHOICES.
They envy anyone who has more, and don’t get the idea that the reason the other person has more is because that other person made BETTER choices, like not spending money on non-essentials when money was tight. Like saving money for a “rainy day” when money was in better supply.
In any case, in spite of promises to pay my son the money borrowed, I doubt we will ever hear from them again. My son D has finally “seen the light” where these people are concerned, and that is a good thing. It was a pretty big grief for him but he is about through the process. In fact, I am getting pretty impressed by how much my sons are both learning about people who would take advantage of you in any way. About those that you can “help” and those that all you would be doing to try to “help” them would be to enable them to continue in their dysfunctional behavior patterns.
My sons are becoming amazingly wise men at a much earlier age than I garnered the wisdom needed about people.
Our little “garden of friends” is no longer choked with WEEDS that suck the sustenance out of the soil of our souls.
Dear Recovering, You and I were posting over each other, but your post is awesome. I’ve seen it before but it is one of those things that we must MUST KEEP IN OUR HEARTS AND MINDS.
Thanks for posting this!
Hey OxDrover — I feel so blessed to be among this healing group of people at Lovefraud, and I want to give encouragement whenever I can since I receive so much support directly and indirectly from others who are willing to share their experiences and wisdom.
And I notice that you in particular do such a great job in welcoming new people. I thank you for that, since all of us have different gifts that can benefit this healing group as a whole.
Matt said, “She walked away from the person who was causing her pain and created her own closure. I had to do the same thing.”
Me too. That’s how I had to do it.
Disordered individuals are not really interested in sitting down and having a “heart-to-heart”.
I think a large part of life is really about looking within yourself and knowing exactly who YOU are as a person.
It’s like the Whitney Houston song, “Greatest Love of All”, when she sings, “learning to love yourself is the greatest love of all. And if by chance that special place, that you’ve been dreaming of, leads you to a lonely place, find your strength in love.”
Depending on a sociopath or any disordered individual for closure in a relationship is just not healthy, as far as I am concerned.
Hell, a sociopath will convince you that the only way you can get closure is to kill yourself.
That’s how sick they are.
QUOTE ROSA: “Hell, a sociopath will convince you that the only way you can get closure is to kill yourself.”
TRUER WORDS WERE NEVER SPOKEN, ROSA!!! You put it in such a nice concise sentence!
Matt, I love hearing your strength and your determination and how far you have come since you logged on here. Your advice is so good and so right on!
While we (suvivors) DO have empathy and compassion for those who are still grieving and wounded, at the same time, we must speak the TRUTH of HEALING. The “medicine” of healing may be truth that doesn’t “taste” good, or that the healing doesn’t want to take, but never0the-less we must speak the truth.
I got to thinking about working with diabetic patients, and the ONLY way for a diabetic to manage their disease is to TAKE CONTROL of their life and make GOOD CHOICES. All the medicine in the world won’t do a bit of good if they dont’ make those changes.
I even had one patient who was DETERMINED not to make any changes, totally UNWILLING TO, scream at me “Don’t give me those diets, just give me more insulin!”
I didn’t motivate every diabetic patient I had to make those GOOD CHOICES any mroe than we here at LF will be able to motivate every victim here to take charge of his/her life and make GOOD CHOICES in the future–but just as managing diabetes is NOT dependent upon the medical professional, it is dependent on the PATIENT, so is our healing.
I used to tell my patients that it was a “do it yourself disease” and that I was like a coach, I couldn’t get out on the field and play the game, but on the other hand, if they didn’t know the RULES of the game, they couldn’t play a good game either.
As survivors in various stages of healing I see us as coaches for the new members of the healing team. I see our roles to SPEAK THE TRUTH, and to support others by our compassion and empathy with the hard times they are having, but speaking the TRUTH above all is I think the most important part of our mutual support.
I also notice that some fairly new members who have come here in great pain, QUICKLY start to reach their hands out to other members who have fallen down. I think this helping others while we ourselves are still learning the “game” is also a big issue in helping us to heal ourselves. Extending a compassionate hand to others helps to give us strength in our own healing journey. That’s why I am still here at LF after nearly 2 years (I can’t even remember exactly when I joined) I know it was well over a year ago, because Matt and Henry have been here a year, and I was here way before that.
I am reinforcing MY own RESOLVE to LIVE THE TRUTH, to see the truth, to think the truth, to reconginze the truth, and to share that truth with others, and that truth is that we must each of us find our own truth, our own faith in ourselves, and to use that faith to heal ourselves. God bless each of us on our journeys! (((hugs))))