Editor’s Note: Lovefraud received the following story from a woman whom we’ll call “Abigail.” She relates how she fell for her so-called boyfriend’s lies, over and over.
I met my now ex-boyfriend June 2004. I had been divorced for 4 years; my kids were 7 and 10. He is a police officer. The night I met he seemed depressed, I asked him, “Why are you so sad?” He replied, “I got divorced this week.” By the end of the night I was really excited; I really liked him!
I had been alone for four years. We started dating. Since I thought he was recently divorced, I didn’t question him when he didn’t call and sometimes, although I would speak to him, I wouldn’t see him on the weekends. That only lasted for a couple of months. Then we were seeing each other all the time, going out every weekend. We would go everywhere, alone, with friends.
That Christmas he gave me a beautiful diamond heart. I didn’t spend the holidays with him as I had not met his family, again thinking that due to his recent divorce, it was okay. April of 05 he decided to go to Vegas with his mom, didn’t ask me to go. While he was gone, I decided to take my diamond heart to get cleaned. That’s when my life turned around. I searched for the diamond certificate. When I found it; it was carefully cut out—amount, address, phone number. I thought my children had done that. I called my friend and she immediately said something is very wrong! I called my sister and asked her to check the clerk’s records for divorce files — yep, no divorce! He had been lying to me for almost a year!!!!!!! By then I was totally, stupidly in love with him!
After that I confronted him. He cried; he got a nosebleed. Please forgive him! “If I told you, by the time I knew I was in love with you, I was afraid you would leave me. We live in the same house but we are not together.” We were separated two weeks and then he said he just couldn’t live without me. “I will get a divorce, I promise.” I fell for it a million times.
Timeline
November of 05 — his wife got pregnant, in vitro fertilization, I thought I was going to die when I found out. I forgave him.
December 05 — wife loses pregnancy. He told me nothing would make him happier than becoming a father.
January 06 — we plan a pregnancy, without him giving me any reassurances. I took the chance because I loved him and wanted to see him happy.
February 06 — I get pregnant, one week later he walks in, tells me he can’t do it! One week after that, I abort the pregnancy that was created with such love! (By me.) I went alone, of course. Night of the abortion, he calls begging for forgiveness, he didn’t realize what he was doing, please do not abort when he knew I had already done it.
Read more — Sociopathic seduction: As long as it takes
March 06 — I forgive.
April 06 — He moves out of the marital home and in with his mother.
November 06 — He tells me his father is sick and needs to travel. I get suspicious, check AA airlines — he left to go to Washington with his wife. Wrote me a letter, which his mom handed to me. “Please forgive me for this trip, I need to end my previous life so that I can start new with you.” A few weeks later, I forgive.
February 07 — Picks fight with me — I get suspicious — pretend I know that he is going away — find out he is leaving on a trip to Puerto Rico with the wife, although they no longer live together. He texted me 10 days in a row from his trip — it’s a business trip, please forgive him. When he gets back I get an email from his wife, seemed like, excuse my husband for taking a trip — the email stated that it was a business trip and that she knows he was texting me and that they grew apart. One day later — I forgive him.
In 2007 we went back and forth a million times. In December of 07, again he went away to Jacksonville. The next couple of years were the same—promises, promises, he went to see an attorney several times, but never went through the divorce.
February of 09 — We broke up.
July of 09 — He begged me back. Bought rings for both of us, wanted to bring the family together to give me the ring in front of them. I refused after I found out that he went back home, took her to New York, then came back and decided that it was never going to work with her.
Finally together
I refused him until September 09. We got back together; it was good for the first time in a long time. He moved in this past December. Still no divorce. We brought our families together; I thought this was it! This past Saturday, he was in the shower, his phone was buzzing, I checked his messages for the first time, it was her! Asking him where was his happiness, why was he doing this, she wanted an answer.
I confronted him—why he was communicating with her? He denied everything. I told him to please just tell me the truth; he was being so good that I knew that maybe it’s just her. He denied. I asked him about the divorce, he said it would get done. When? His reply — when it does. Finally I said I was going to email her to get answers.
That’s when he lost it! He asked if I wanted bloodshed. He took me to the bedroom got his gun, loaded it and placed it on his head. I told him all he was doing was diverting from the truth, all this drama in order for him not to tell me the truth. He said he was going to do this outside. My 13 year old was in the other room. We walked over to the back door, at which time he started kicking it because the key wasn’t in the lock. When I didn’t get the key, he shot the door. HE SHOT THE DOOR!!
He has never displayed this aggression before. Also, in the almost two months we were living together, he never discussed what bills we were going to pay. He bought the food and that’s it, knowing that I’m drowning and behind on the mortgage. But he was still paying half the mortgage of the marital home.
I still can’t believe how calm I was; I guess maybe shock??? I picked up the shell of the bullet, looked at him and said, “You know this is it, and all because you wouldn’t tell me the truth.” He packed up everything and left.
Don’t feel sad
Last summer I did see a therapist and he did tell me that he is a sociopath and I still went back to him. l’m relieved; for the first time I don’t even feel sad. I can’t believe it took this for me to realize that I would have been at this for years to come.
So sorry, I know this was long, but it makes me feel better. I have even lost friendships because of him. My best friend just got so tired of seeing me like this that she literally broke up with me, saying it was just too painful to watch.
I wish I could write a book or talk to people about how important it is not to get robbed of your own emotions. It happened to me in the worst way and took six years away from me. I’m petrified to start over. I don’t know if I can!!!
Thank you for taking the time to read about my difficulties. I even have a feeling of embarrassment. I am smart, good mom, have survived on my own, held the same job for 17 years. I thought I knew better than this!
Learn more — Why it’s so hard to get over loving a sociopath and how you can recover
Lovefraud originally posted this story on Feb. 25, 2010.
If a sociopath cries at movies, does it mean he has feelings?
Ox,
I cannot tell you how happy I am that I am here too. I remember the first time I went in search of the definition of a sociopath and realized that this man might be one. I talked about it but didn’t want to believe it. It was so hard to admit that it could be true. How could this person who I loved so much be a person who really doesn’t have feelings? He cried, he seemed to care so much, he told me how much he loved me, he made me part of his children’s lives, he lived with me, he said he cared about my children, he married me. How could this be.
Then there were the behaviors that appeared–the anger at me for asking questions, the failure to look for work, the leaving to “go look for work” in another state, then coming back “home”. Then i could deny it no longer when he would disappear for days and wouldn’t want to say what he had been doing. All the signs that he was with another woman. The fact that he gave me an STD. Was this not enough for me to learn? When I started getting honest with myself, I realized that he was never really there for me financially or emotionally. He lied and continues to lie. He will not admit to this day that there is another woman even though he just showed up with her at his mother’s house last weekend. I realized that I had to get real. I cannot ever allow him back in my life. His own children have asked me not to take him back!!! He always told me that I was a strong person and he is right. He is about to find out how strong. Because I read all the articles on here and there he is in every one. He is a sociopath and there is no denying it anymore. And I can’t deny that I have become damaged by him. More so than I realized and that is extremely frightening to me. Every time I read something on here, it feels like I am taking a step on the path towards the light of day!! Thanks for all the support all of you give, you propel me towards the light.
OX, they do suffer. They just don’t show it. There is AlWAYS drama in thier lives. My x monster, had SOmany problems while on the police force; His first wife and one child caused alot of drama for him…getting him for child support, which killed him to pay!….and slandering his name..etc.
Then, his second wife ended up throwing him out on his a$$ in the end and he cracked up and lost his home…then a woman he was dating, took everything he owned, EVEYTHING she could carry, clothes, pictures, computer..and BURNED it in a truck . It was worth it for her to get arrested..( I wonder what he did to her?) He has a gleam in his eye when asked.
Then, he almost got fired from the job we worked at together and is ALWAYS get turned in by someone there…THEN, he finds someone, finally, who gives him her all..(me) and I kicked him to the curb!! And, HE ended up in a psych ward on meds once!
So, his KARMA is plain old bad. He has bad luck in everything he does! He is always broke, losing things, making bad decisions, ending up homeless.
So, don’t think that they don’t get what they deserve in life. It always comes back.
Now, my Xhusb monster, has lost everything…home, business, my children don’t want anything to do with him..(they saw for themselves) and now he might be going to Brazil with his new wife…(who he already called the police on and had HER put in a psych ward…great marriage)…and that poor country might get hit with an earthquake because Satan is visiting….I hope not for all of those innocent people.
But, my point is that they are NOT happy and they are living a life that I surely wouldn’t want.
Case closed. lol
Oh..I was reading some articles on here…i think its the one about how S’s think..
They started talking about the Cat and Mouse Game…
Do you believe, when I was chatting with him on some dating site..and he didn’t know it was me…he told this woman(me), that he is enjoying the cat and mouse game!!!!!!!!!!!!
Thats when I deleted the profile and never chatted again. I was only trying to see how he handles things online with the poor victims!
And, he called her honey, and babe from the start. RED FLAG…seducing her already! lol
OMG..I am staying FAR away from internet dating. I know there’s some normal people on there…but NO THANKS for me…the odds are that there are more people on there are S’s.
They hide behind the computer…and texts…and even phones.
90% of my relationship was texts and phone conversations.
So, what am I missing? NOTHING
In fact, its nice not to have the distraction and be able to shower, read, and eat without the S stalker contacting me all day long!!
PEACE at last!!!
Listening to Paula Abdul’s COLD HEARTED SNAKE on utube…
ENERGIZING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Hi Hens and LTL and All,
I couldn’t help but jump in, though I didn’t read all the subsequent posts regarding ‘what kind of person would make the p happy?’. It appears MANY of us became exactly what they needed us to be (to stay with us for any length of time).
We adapted to their conditioning. We contorted ourselves until we were not recognizable. And we were still not what they wanted. We were still found wanting and less than. And in the end we were discarded.
Even the most perfect enabler is ultimately considered stupid and undeserving. They reject their own creation.
But I don’t think the reverse is true either. There is no strong person who will know how to handle them, and avoid the devaluing and discard. Who will lead them beyond their impulsive and unyeilding patterns of self distruction to a place of growth and awareness.
On the surface it seems to go like this: I am wanting such and thus. And such and thus is generally morally repugnant and hurtful to others’. So, in order to get what I want I have to condition (or trigger) other people, through various manipulations, lies, and abuses to allow me to meet my unacceptable needs.
The only thing I can think of that creates that kind of hatefulness, when in fact someone is trying to give them everything they want, is that what they are compulsively striving for is not what they REALLY, deeply, psychologically, and spiritually need. That their deeper, healthy egos are fiercly and bitterly frustrated and angry, but so buried by their defense mechanisms, that they cannot affect the meatstick they inhabit. So their shitty wiring, karma, upbringing completely blinds them to their real human needs, blocks them from having itimate knowledge of themselves, and they end up with the crappy/false/tacky substitute that they create. And this is a cycle that repeats itself ad nauseum resulting in mounting vicious rage, that then must be again ‘discharged’ into the environment.
As someone who has self-sabotaged many times I know it is really painful and frustrating. And even though they do not seem to be able to develop a level of self-awareness that allows them access to these frustrations, shame, anger, and disappointment, they look to me like they are constantly expressing them through their hateful rejection of anyone who gets close to them.
They seem to be in a terminally black mood, unable to find any way out of it, instead only able to project it outward. Despite what they promote themselves to be, and even what many people at superficial glance register about them, they live from absolute self hate, self denial, total self negation.
They seem like exaggerated versions of the idea of self-fulfilling prophecy. Only they don’t know they are prophesizing their own doom. They think they are only doing this to others’. And fail to see, because they cannot emotionally connect to it, that they do what they do to themselves. They reap what they sow. And they are always disappointed with what they reap, but never choose to sow new seeds. Instead sowing the same fruitless crop over and over and over. Not that it is fruitless in the sense that they don’t ‘get stuff’. But genuinely fruitless in it’s ability to produce them with a sense of identity and beingness. It does not address their infantile rage.
This is what we get when we break old patterns, try new things, commit to new ways of being in the world, and learn from our experiences. As Oxy pointed out in her last article. When we break out we get a stronger and clearer vision of our own identity, and our sense of beingness, or connectedness to everything, is bit by bit enhanced. I guess in Maslow’s model it is the path to self-actualization.
They do not appear to be on the path to self-actualization. They are stuck down in the low part of the pyramid, in the food/shelter area. Stuck in the first chakra of archane tribal dispute, sex for domination, and warfare.
I think there is no one for them. Not even them is for them. Not really.
slimone…..Great post!! You said it all….
My X monster was always Poker faced and angry…never seemed happy. NEVER.
Rarely smiled…always uptight.
Whenever we were together…he was always talking so negative…never positive and happy.
I told my g/f that I really can’t stand being with him. He was bringing me down.
He acted “paranoid” all of the time. I thought it was because he was a cop. He had that MEAN look all of the time…
When we went away for a a few days, prior to me breaking it off with him…I realized that he was no FUN.
I was wishing I was home with my kids!!!
When I went to the ladies room in the airport, I had so much fun talking to a woman on line..we laughed and laughed.
I didn’t want to go back and sit next to the ugly faced monster. lol
Dear Ox D,
And that is exactly why it is part of the greatest story ever told. I think that is why it all becomes so true for me now.
We are why that story is part of the larger one- to specifically include those betrayed by those they love and to incorporate the deepest level of suffering in the redemption story.
We have been redeemed, we are already forgiven and our pain is taken if we allow it to be so.
At least that is my take.
And the hard part of it is, that coming from where so many of us have, its difficult to give up being a victim because it has been a place of safety and of confort by familiarity for a long time.
If that is where I was when he hit me, then it was something that fed me. Obviously at the time, I thought the way I was was working for me and I’d have said I believed I’d done the work to get to a good place in life.
So, there is a lesson and beyond the lesson, growth. Something to look forward to and prize because if any of us were still stuck in that relationship we would forfiet the opportunity to grow out of it and into happy, healthy ones wouldn’t we?
Yes, this part is pretty awful. And it isn’t going to last forever unless I nuture it and the pain of having been betrayed.
It hurts. It is hell. And it is a poignant moment in which to remember the promises of the greatest story ever told- Love is the greatest power of all (I specifically do not inlcude the SPATH and his lies there) and we have been included in that story by the very example you bring up.
We have great fortune to have found each other who can remind us that we can forgive ourselves as we are forgiven and we can let go of the pain as it was taken to the cross by Christ.
Our burden has been borne in that story.
I think it means that God knew these guys were out there and what they’d do and that the story tells us that he did and he will claim us, not them in the process of recovery because we can.
I also believe that any of them who ask will be forgiven in the end because that is a promise that is bigger than what happens on this earth.
But this is getting pretty deep huh?
I guess I just have to say that I recognize what has happened to me and to other people here and I feel it to the marrow. What hurts me is magnified in the stories I read.
And in that compassion, is the root of healing. In the power of knowledge and understanding what happened is the begining of a new life without that pain. And, its starts with NC – No kidding!
You told me that in the begining and it has made all the world of difference- Applause, applause and thanks. I wouldn’t have guessed all this stuff!
I have a very strong belief that family (the healthy ones), friends (the good ones) and the community here give and accept the kind of love that is more powerful than what any one man who lies all the time can calculate. And that, in the end, it will over come.
Bravo Silvermoon–well said. Good night all!
TBH,
Interestingly the last p I knew was Mr. Happy Spiritual Guy. And superficially people thought he was so ‘up’ that he must have secret knowledge and a personal connection to The Divine. But that was just the outside act. Some people saw through the act, and could feel the willfullness and rage. But very superficially he was upbeat and always expressing things in this overly perky, Mr. Manifesting All Goodness and Light kinda way.
Privately though he would try and control others’ to be just like him. You couldn’t say you were ‘fine’, when he asked. You had to say you were ‘fabulous’ or that the meal was ‘yummy and perfect’. When you spoke around him you had to express yourself in expletives, so he would have his false self mirrored back to him. Very narcissistic. When he led (ha ha ha) workshops they were basically him getting everyone in the room to do exactly what he wanted, mirroring himself back to him. Or he had them do things that were distressing and humiliating, leaving them with the impression that he could do these things without embarrassment (which he could cause they were just made up ridiculous things that had no real meaning for him, but that he peddled as ‘spiritual’ practices), and that they must be somehow flawed for feeling stupid.
And the hair trigger temper was there, the revenge for perceived slights, the devaluing through small comment or overt disloyalty.
But I have known the type you were with. The overtly angry, tough guy. The guy who can barely hold it in. Who gets kicked out of the burrito hut because he cannot order without getting offended by some question the counter girl asks him.
Oh, they are a motley crew.
Hmm, got this today from a friend….hope you all laugh as hard as I did! It seemed relevant….
MORAL FOR TODAY
One day a farmer’s donkey fell down into a well.
The animal cried for hours as the farmer tried to figure out what to do.
Finally, he decided the animal was old, and the well needed to be covered up anyway; it just wasn’t worth it to retrieve the donkey.
He invited all his neighbors to come over and help him.
They all grabbed a shovel and began to shovel dirt into the well.
At first, the donkey realized what was happening and cried horribly.
Then, to everyone’s amazement, he quieted down.
A few shovel loads later, the farmer finally looked down the well.
He was astonished at what he saw.
With each shovel of dirt that hit his back, the donkey was doing something amazing.
He would shake it off and take a step up.
As the farmer’s neighbors continued to shovel dirt on top of the animal, he would shake it off and take a step up.
Pretty soon, everyone was amazed as the donkey stepped up over the edge of the well and happily trotted off!
Life is going to shovel dirt on you, all kinds of dirt.
The trick to getting out of the well is to shake it off and take a step up.
Each of our troubles is a stepping stone.
We can get out of the deepest wells just by not stopping, never giving up!
Shake it off and take a step up.
Remember the five simple rules to be happy:
Free your heart from hatred – Forgive.
Free your mind from worries – Most never happen.
Live simply and appreciate what you have.
Give more.
Expect less.
NOW …Enough of that.
The donkey later came back, and bit the farmer who had tried to bury him.
The gash from the bite got infected and the farmer eventually died in agony from septic shock.
MORAL FROM TODAY’S LESSON:
When you do something wrong, and try to cover your ass, it always comes back to bite you.