UPDATED FOR 2024. Editor’s note: Lovefraud received the following e-mail from a woman who we’ll call, “Cybil.” She was married to a sociopath, and is now raising two toddlers, paying 75% or more of their support, and being run into the courts, stalked, threatened and harassed.
Today I was thinking about this comment I get a lot from the supposed “resources” I have. What I have found is that there really is not much in the way for resources out there for abused women. Even my family, who have been helpful and are starting to “get it” little by little, can be a little backhanded in their support.
The comment goes like this: “Well, you chose this guy. You chose to have kids with this guy.” It is always said after they are frustrated at your upset or stress, or after they have gotten stressed, or when they realize they really can’t help you. I guess it’s a kind of guilt deflector. A way of saying, ultimately it’s your own damn fault so take the drama somewhere else. Even if the drama is externally created and you’re trying your best to have the boring, drama-free life that is SO attractive now. I would love boring.
I did not choose this guy
The thing is, I didn’t “choose” this guy. He chose me. I chose a different guy, the one he was pretending to be. Yes, maybe I got involved too quickly. They are good at moving things along. So yes, I made a bad decision. It’s true. I would undo it if I could. Some people make hasty relationship decisions and have it all work out fine, like my parents did.
But is that one bad decision I made as bad as all the things he has done: the emotional and physical abuse, the con, the isolation, the crazymaking, the fact that I had to give up a great career, my life savings, my car, the fact that I am being run into court on an almost monthly basis, the fact that my good reputation is now sullied with the lies he tells.
No, I didn’t choose this. I was smart, successful, maybe a little vulnerable, but not stupid. And I was nice. That’s why he chose me. That’s what people don’t get. I am not this psycho-bitch he keeps telling people I am. If I was, he would have moved on to an easier mark. The reality is that I was a semi-Pollyanna, who believed in helping people, giving the benefit of the doubt, being NICE.
Only a little bit my fault
So, no this is not my fault. This incredible nightmare that has become my life since I met this man, is not entirely my fault. It is a little bit my fault. I am more cautious now. But his behavior is not my responsibility, as awful as it is. And nothing I did was so bad that I deserve what has happened and is happening.
No, I didn’t choose this. Even though my mother said it today. Even though the cop that was supposedly on my side (after I received a death threat) said this after they brought him in for questioning, and then reduced the whole thing to a “domestic matter.”
I didn’t choose this guy and this nightmare. It chose me. I was just a little too naive to tell. I am not anymore.
Learn more: Sociopathic seduction—how you got hooked and why you stayed
Lovefraud originally posted this story on Nov. 16, 2010.
Dancing as treatment for depression
LOL. Its true what you said before about Clinton but no one would ever believe it because he is. So nice. Just like my xP.
Until I learned to see the red flags, he was my favorite pres.
Actually he still is because all the others have been psychopaths too, just not as good at “feeling your pain”
That’s what is so amazing about the true successful psychopath, even knowing how evil they are, its hard not to like them. How do they do it?
I only met clinton a time or two when he was gov, enough to shake hands etc. but you know, he was slimy then and still is as far as I am concerned. I heard him contradict himself once at a meeting I was at and I whispered something sort of pointing it out to him, and you should have seen the look he gave me.
I agree that most people in high public office have had to sell their souls to Satan to get there–but I truly believe that Clinton is EVIL. SLICK? Yes, a liar, even when he is caught red handed? Yep! The “I did NOT have sex with THAT WOMAN, that Ms. Lewenski” (however you spell it) is a PERFECT EXAMPLE of a psychopath lying in the face of evidence to the contrary.
If I wasn’t convinced he was one before that, that video clip was enough to convince me.
I have seen my P son and the Trojan Horse Psychopath lie to me like that….knowing I had evidence to the contrary in front of me. The thing is too, that my egg donor would LIE TO ME, and in the same breath CALL ME A LIAR with a lie still in her mouth she hadn’t had time to even swallow. It was traumatic for me to learn at age 60 that my mother was a LIAR, that she was even capable of lying, much less that she would deliberately plot against me to throw me out of my home….she doesn’t meet the “criteria” of a psychopath though, her score wouldn’t be all that high on the PCL-R (which was BTW developed to score CRIMINAL psychopaths) she lead a “AVERAGE MIDDLE CLASS PROFESSIONAL LIFE STYLE” and supported herself, only married twice, and the last time for 50+ years, no crimes, no addictions except cigarettes, professional job, steady, with one job for over 30 years…yet, we know from “SNAKES IN SUITS, When Psychopaths go to Work” (Dr. Bob Hare) that NOT ALL psychopaths are criminals, and many of them have “stable” relationships and careers at least on the surface of them. I have had trouble for years trying to decide if my egg donor truly is a psychopath or not, and I know according to the PCL-R she is NOT considered a psychopath, some people would say she is an “enabler” and she is, but she is also a CONTROL freak, and we know that psychopaths are big about CONTROL don’t we?
She also has some just plain ordinary “psychological issues” and she has some “abandonment” issues sort of like a Borderline Personality Disorder–so I can’t come up with a “this is what she is” definition…nothing cut and dried. But, I do know that she had me fooled for a long time.
When we train a pair of calves to be oxen (the term is a job description, not just a breed of cattle, any kind of bovine (cows) can become an ox) we train them from babies to respect us because we are “bigger” than they are. Literally we can shove them around because they weight 50-75 pounds at birth and we feed them on a bottle so they become bonded and attached to us humans, who are “bigger” than they are, then we cut off their testicles so they have no hormones to tell them to move up into the rank…and they never know that they are eventually 10 x or more larger and more powerful than we are, so they obey us without question.
An ox that is properly trained and made submissive from birth will never ever challenge the teamster/drover no matter how badly he is mistreated. That’s why I could get 4,000 pounds of big steers to come and go and stop with just a word and holding a switch that wouldn’t scare a fly much less hurt them, but I was BOSS because they BELIEVED I was boss.
My egg donor was my boss, she made the rules for me because I never really challenged her or thought I could successfully do so. She had her “angry god” on her side which she waved around like a club to validate her will and her commands. I was so scared of her “angry god” from when I was little that I was like those big old steers of mine, they thought Ii could beat them to death with a pencil so they never challenged what I asked them to do, and I thought she could beat me to death and throw me into hell using her “angry god” if I revolted.
The researchers may not realize what a SNAKE in a suit looks like, but I do—and they may not even score heavy on the PCL-R, and they will never have a criminal record, but I think the people who DO have criminal records don’t hurt their victims many times as badly as those who wear the MASK OF NORMAL.
I think it is the SNAKES who do 100 times more damage to unsuspecting children, who raise them up to be fearful of other’s opinions, who raise them up afraid to displease someone, who set that child up for a life time of unhappy people pleasing. The mothers and fathers here on this site, who are liberated from that cycle, who have broken free from the never ending desire to please others at any cost—they can bring up their children free of that curse! The curse STOPS here! Thank you God.
Amen.
OMGosh so many of us had experienced this……I thought i would die….It is so true…I divorced him after many years of being trapped and had no idea there would be more to come….the smear campaign…..destroyed relationships with the children and my own family? OMG people ….they believed all his lies….yes in my family it was my mother who was abusive and training me to be a good girl listen and do what you are told..be a pleaser…you made your bed now lay in it….It had been many years and much heartache and sorrow and climbing out of the pit to finally understand all the dysfunctional dynamics…only now have people begun to see him for what he was all those years…stay strong and please do not give up…surround yourself with only positive loving genuine people and somehow someway you will overcome the evil…it is by the grace of god we are freed in body then in mind and finally in spirit…take care of yourself and keep strong….
We are all here because we believed his/her lie. We all fell in love with the man/woman he/she pretended to be. We were seduced by their lies. Bitter pill to swallow. If we knew then what we know now, we would all be running for the opposite direction and not be here on lovefraud. Bottom line WE WERE CONNED.
I wish there was an easier and kinder way to learn life’s lessons such as…there are many people out there “who appear” to be perfectly functioning decent people but it is all an act to reel us in. WE ARE the bait but we don’t realize it until it’s too late.
I had a therapist tell me once that I was one of those people who walked around with a giant “V” on my forehead (“V” standing for victim), and I had another therapist tell me that I needed to take responsiblity for what happened to me.
OMG, people are amazing. I think that unless someone has witnessed a sociopath’s capabilities with their very own eyes, they can’t possibly understand what we’re talking about. I spent years thinking there was something wrong with me but now understand that those of us who have experienced an S belong to a special club and I thank goodness for you guys every day…
jordeez great quote!
”it is by the grace of god we are freed in body then in mind and finally in spirit!
AMEN!
Thanks for the encouragement this morning!
soimnotthecrazee1!!
Deceived:
Very well put!
Gogettergirl:
Isn’t truly amazing how ignorant those that haven’t had the plesure(choke) of being a victim of an spath can be?
God’s speed!
soimnotthecrazee1!!
Agree with notcrazee about the great encouragement this morning! Lots of doubts and paranoria this morning passing through my mind like…wondering if the spath hole had anything to do directly with the absence of 2 friends the past week?
ARRGH! You know what…I don’t care anymore. I have listened and embraced the sound advice I was given here on Lovefraud. Just last night, after ruminating over the friends and ex spath hole…I realized…”I don’t give a flying fuck! I really don’t give a darn about these people any more.” I’m telling you…this is the FIRST time in over 2 years! I’m hoping and praying that I have just turned a corner!
Yes- I can totally relate to this post.
It’s akin to being intimately involved with an unexpected natural disaster, I would liken it to running into a volcanic ash cloud, earthquake, tsunami, 9/11 or all of the above…you didn’t couldn’t see it coming and NO ONE, not one person can see them coming, we scurry around trying to pretend we are in control
just imagine saying to someone in the twin towers on that day “well you did choose to be in the building at that time….”
And still you say at the end
” I was just a little too naive to tell. I am not anymore.”
so you are admitting you were somehow defective in falling for him !! lol
The only way forward is to forgive yourself for allowing yourself believe it was somehow your fault…and then forgive yourself again.
It’s like saying…well the way you know a tsunami is coming is the water rises and then rises more and then more..so you better run…if you are standing in front of a man who is a psychopath…the only thing to do is run for your life…and we all know by that stage it’s too late, because if you are running you have been hurt and your world will never be the same again..