Editor’s note: Lovefraud received this letter from a reader who we’ll call “Abigail.” She relates how she felt bonded to a man, even after he brutally assaulted her.
I grew up very sheltered in an ultra-religious family; I had no knowledge whatsoever about deceitful liars. I should have because my also very innocent and trusting mother was misled by one man like that, who deceived her, promising her marriage, just to end up getting her pregnant (with me) and then leave her and us for good. My family, however, preferred to deal with this issue by keeping it as much secret as possible, so unfortunately I couldn’t learn from my mother’s mistakes.
I have been sheltered in a “glass box” all my life; my family tried to keep me away from inappropriate relationships and people. In the meantime, however, my family was also very unhealthy, being very respectable on the surface with many nasty buried skeletons beneath. I have been lonely, suffering from the emotionally abusive and hypocritical atmosphere at home, and the lack of father figure. My family was even jealous of my female friends.
I never had interest in boys my age. Somehow, I was always looking for a man I could look up on, almost like looking up at a father. Truthfully, grown men used to notice me, too, by the time I was 12-13 because of being naturally curvy on certain areas. I totally innocently flirted with them, looking for no sexual relationship but approval, acceptance and love above all.
My best friend’s uncle
I remember when I was 13, my best friend’s old uncle started to inappropriately touch me, trying to seduce me into sexual relationship privately at his own home, but being so naive and innocent about all sexual matters, I had no idea what was going on. All I knew was that I was enjoying the situation and felt thrilled about it some unknown pride crept into my life, where I felt I finally had the ability to gain affection from people.
Thankfully my family discovered it before it was too late and that put and end to it, including my friendship with my best friend. I don’t even know how I managed to avoid exploiting sexual relationships through my high school years, but actually loving to study and excel at school might have had something to do with it.
Sorry for the long intro I wanted to explain what background I am coming from.
Mr. Charmer
I was still a “kid” at heart at age 20, longing for a “Dad” to look up to, when I met Mr. Charmer, completely coincidentally. The attraction was mutual and immediately overpowering. He was all I have ever fantasised about: tall, dark, handsome, masculine, enchanting with the eyes and voice of a snake charmer mesmerizing from head to toe. I was hooked. He was very affectionate, extremely romantic and caring and I was in heaven.
Read more: Sociopathic seduction — as long as it takes
He didn’t live very close to me, so in between being able to meet, we kept in touch online/over the phone. It felt like we hit it off right away and he seemed like everything I’d ever hoped for. I told him very early on that I was a virgin and I wanted to stay that way until I met that special someone who will be my husband. I thought I must have sounded like a weirdo for him, but much to my surprise, he was extremely relieved about it, and voiced admiration about my strong morals in this crazy world.
I knew he had many girlfriends before (with his Greek god-like looks, I wasn’t surprised at all, plus I always found experienced men “thrilling,” so I didn’t care) but he made it very clear that he was tired of girls that play with his emotions and he’d been disappointed a lot. All he wanted was a serious relationship with me, who was a very good and faithful person with a touch of wildness in my heart. He admired my looks, too, and seemingly everything about me. He was a great listener and a great support when I felt I needed his sympathy and “protection” when things went bad at home or I felt insecure. All said and done, I adored him. I idolized him. He seemed to really enjoy it which I noticed, but gave him excuses for being a little vain who wouldn’t be with his inner and outer qualities, after all?
Mask starts to slip
Months after meeting, and after lots of romantic talks and intense romantic involvement, we started to talk about marriage. It was like a dream come true. I was walking on clouds and so was he, seemingly. Unfortunately, at this point I started to have some serious doubts and nagging questions about him. I don’t know when the “mask” started to crack, perhaps when I first started to discover (and experience) his extreme mood swings. Then he started to be less affectionate and more demeaning. He even started to lie and when he was called out on that, somehow it turned out to be my fault.
He claimed how much stress I caused to him, and how hurt he was that I didn’t trust him while he was so loved by everyone else; I didn’t even deserve him. He started to criticize me and “naturally” I never questioned the validity of his words. He was experienced, I clearly wasn’t I believed he knew much better, he must have been right, after all, I was so young compared to him (he was 10 years older).
Begging myself to leave
Nevertheless, my bad gut feeling started to grow by the day. I often felt so hurt, so heartbroken and lonely. I remember writing in my journal about him practically begging myself to wake up from this dream that was about to turn into a nightmare.” Yet every single time when I started to feel strongly about running from him, he charmed himself back to my heart. I often chose to close my eyes and turn the other way, since I was really afraid to lose him and the emotional investment, engagement and so forth.
I also learnt to be afraid of him by then, not that he ever hurt me physically, but his anger outbursts and our arguments were extremely exhausting and I wanted to avoid them at all costs. I knew I wasn’t perfect (he let me know over and over in case I’d forgotten) and I thought to myself: “Well, he’s not perfect either, after all, but just as much as he sticks with me even though I am imperfect, so will I.” I am a very faithful person and I always took pride in that.
Now he wants sex
In the meantime, somehow, he lost his appreciation for my virginity. He now became demeaning about it, and he heavily worked on me to give in to have sex before we got married. He achieved it by a lot of erotic talk and I have to admit I was really not immune to this at all. I was bouncing over the walls from the (sexual) frustration by then, and the pressure and fear of letting him down and making him angry with me. I needed to prove to him that I was able to keep him and satisfy his needs, because I am “good enough of a woman” for him. So I gave in.
On that special day I found him to be a little too ADHD and hyper, but I thought it was just excitement on his end. He seemed to “burst at seams” with an almost unnatural excitement, he was grabbing me, suddenly pushing me up against his car in public, circling around me like a lion that’s about to eat its prey, staring at me with predatory eyes, licking his lips — it was unnatural. It was a turn-on too, of course, to experience such a wild and demanding and overpowering and sizzling masculinity, all directed at me. But it still made me feel very uncomfortable. I even started to wonder if this was such a good idea, and I contemplated telling him, somehow, to wait, but I couldn’t work up the courage for that.
No affection or love
Once in his room, Mr. Charmer was gone. I didn’t notice it right away it was a very exciting and “sacred” moment for me, and I didn’t think of anything bad right away when he started to “make me” please him in all kinds of ways. It felt degrading and without love, so I got a little confused and eventually, scared he had no affection, love or gentleness for me at all.
After me pleasing him for a while, he immediately wanted to have sex, which I tried to stop, realizing that this is just too much for me, being extremely confused and hurt because I felt all of a sudden as if he didn’t care for me romantically at all. I stopped him and he withdrew, became extremely cold, emotionless, and his anger started to build up. I was scared. I tried to calm him with hugs and kisses, tried to explain that this is not what we talked about, but he told me to make up my mind to decide what I want, if I want him at all or not. I tried to explain that I did want him, but this was not how it was planned, so much without love and gentleness.
Brutal and animalistic
Well, he made up his mind that we would have sex anyway. I will spare you from the details of this torturous, horrible experience. Multiple times I asked him to stop; he didn’t care, he did it anyway. It was as brutal and animalistic and unbearably painful as anyone can imagine. He would also make me do things to him for his pleasure, and he didn’t take “no” for an answer. He didn’t look at me or touch me, he was lost in his own world where he dominated and he was the best lover, probably, because after he was done he asked me if it was indeed great and what I liked best.
I wanted to vomit. I was frozen, emotionless, torn apart physically and emotionally, in an extreme amount of pain with severe bleeding. I felt like a slave with “her master.” Reality became surreal and I flat out didn’t even know who I was anymore. This torture went on for the whole weekend. I had the “physical” ability to leave him, since he never locked/bonded me, but I did not have the emotional/spiritual ability to leave, if that makes sense at all.
I still “loved” him, I was extremely hurt and scared, I had nowhere to go really (not physically but emotionally — he was my everything and now that this idol was torn, I really felt like there was nowhere else in the world where I could go anyway.) I immediately felt extremely bonded to him physically, even though this made me nauseated. (I knew nothing of betrayal/traumatic bonding back then.) I realized by then that this is all that he wanted from me, and all his love was fake. He even told me that he’d teach me how to please a man, because I was young and I needed to have fun and skills. Yet I still believed somewhere inside that if I was willing and obedient, then somehow I could regain his love for me.
Dumped and isolated
All said and done, after these tragic days/nights, it didn’t take long for him to dump me. Better to say, he really didn’t dump me, he just stopped talking to me. I had to provoke it and kept calling him, etc. to try to make sense of all that has happened, to try to come to terms. I couldn’t let him go. I didn’t want to. In a sick way, I couldn’t imagine that I could ever live without him. My religious beliefs also made me feel very guilty; I felt dirty, shameless and like a “slut.” Some of my also religious friends (once they figured out that I had sex with him) also treated me that way, so I became completely isolated. This isolation made me feel bonded with him even more, because of what we’d shared in the past, and because of the physical connection that was a very strong bonding power for me, despite of the torturous and brutal nature of it.
After a month or so of such a weird “relationship,” he decided to not to pick up the phone anymore, nor answer back, throwing me into a hysterical crying fit for days. I begged him to return, even though deep inside, I wanted him to be gone as if he never existed. But I couldn’t live without him and the “security” that he represented to me.
Lonely burden
I don’t remember those weeks afterwards; it was all a blur. I have no idea how I survived, especially that I haven’t told anybody about this at all. I was so lonely, so extremely lonely with this burden to bear alone, while having to try to pretend that all is well in my world. We had one final talk about a month later, where I tried to be civil (so did he) but it turned into a nasty argument immediately when I tried to call him out on all that happened. He claimed nothing happened and he did nothing to me that I didn’t want, and if I ever tried to find him or talk about it, he’d kill me. He also called me dirty wh*re and it was like a final punch on my heart. I was now “dead.”
How many months passed when I tried to repress, forget, pretend that I was okay, hide the real reason why we broke up, and so forth — I don’t know. The human mind is awesome. Half a year later, I really believed that I was all better, despite the nightmares about being chased and raped, panic attacks and so forth.
Thought I recovered
Years passed, I finally never even thought of him and I thought I recovered fully. I got married (to my “real” prince who is an amazing, wonderful, supportive man), had a family, lived happily. Of course I’ve always experienced problems (nightmares, panic attacks, snapping at people, all kinds of aches and pains, unexplained fears, depression, lack of true enjoyment of sex) but despite of all of that I was still very happy because I was very much loved and safe and appreciated.
A major traumatic event the past few months, however, triggered a complete outbreak of reliving my memories for first time in my life. My husband — who only knew a little bit about all that happened — finally heard what truly happened and I am working on opening up more and more. Details flood my mind, and some days it feels like I am going crazy.
The most twisted and sickening detail — my unnatural, nauseating “bonding” to this man finally came up, and I was able to admit that this trauma didn’t go away at all just because I hid it. I was scared of it, feeling extremely dirty — until finally I got my hands on some reading material (Women Who Love Psychopaths, etc.) and it dawned on me finally what was going on.
Psychopath narcissist
He was the perfect example of a psychopath narcissist, such a frighteningly perfect example. As much as it was a relief to finally understand that what happened wasn’t my fault and failure as a woman, it became unbearable for another reason. For so many years I believed that I must have meant something to him, even if he was a jerk, he still must have loved me at some point. The realization that I was nothing but narcissistic supply, an object to use and throw away that is ripped another hole in my chest.
My feelings were so true to him, and that was the only thing that made me feel better for years. I was not a slut; I loved him! But how could I love him if I didn’t even know who he was? I will never have an explanation, an apology, or any type of closure! He betrayed me on such a level, not only physically but more so emotionally and spiritually, given that he was my everything and I trusted him with my very life as if he was my father and he used me and threw me away, walked away without a second thought, just like my father left me.
A new chapter
I have major trust issues. My husband does not deserve for me not to trust him and rely on him because he is awesome, and now he suffers too. My relationship with God suffered a lot because I even lost my trust in Him to some extent. I don’t have a lot of friends and I can count on one hand how many people I trust. Yet I have a hard time trying to not to be naive and not proving my “worth” to everyone. I get depressed and hurt when people don’t see me for who I really am, even if I don’t let them close so they can get to know me at all.
It’s a new chapter of my life now. After 10 years I am finally starting to deal with the aftermath. It’s going to be hard and I realize it won’t go from one day to another. I now have hope that it will get better, because I am now not afraid to take a good look at what happened and admit that I was a victim of emotional and physical rape and violence. To experience it from somebody whom I trusted and loved so much is devastating. To realize that I am not alone, that there are many of us suffering from the aftermath of psychopaths, is very redeeming, however tragic it is. Next step will be counseling. Being able to open up and talk to strangers is a good first step to practice so I don’t chicken out talking to somebody in person!!
Learn more: Free! The Basics — Love fraud and how to avoid it
Lovefraud originally posted this story on May 6, 2010.
Hamas terrorists: Psychopaths or brainwashed
I howled over the trash in the car! I had to drive my big diesel truck the other day, hadn’t driven it in a while, and either D or Ihad left 3 loaves of bread in there–which was NOW MOLDY LIQUID inside the sacks and STUNK to high heaven in the closed up and hot truck!!! YUK! So yea, I love Jr’s “breathe NOW” line!!!! I couldn’t breathe in the truck either! LOL HOlding your breath all the way to town gets tiresome!
Well, I hope you can get the foreclosure thing settled, I’m not sure there but here if your house sells for less than you owe on it, then they will go after any other asset you have (like your rental house) to get their “loss” back. BUT also here at least, you could move into your rental house and make it your primary residence and they can’t get it. In the past some folks would put all their assets iinto their house and then declare bankruptcy and have a 10 million place free and clear. Crooked, but legal. Not sure if that is legal now with the new bankruptcy laws though. Some states even back then limited the amount of equity you could have in your home. Here it was 40 acres and a house, could be a shack or a mansion and could be 40 acres of down town Little Rock!
Yea, the laugh is all we have sometimes, but sometimes that is ALL WE NEED!~ Have a good day shoppiing for a matching outfit.
LUV, the best thing that you did was to NOT sleep with him. He would’ve been the same as he is now had you.. oh, he might’ve tried to have sex again.. but that is all.
A man that cares for you doesn’t leave because you aren’t ready for sex. And sex on a first date is plain STUPID. You don’t know him after 20 years have passed.
come check out http://www.womenexplode.com
there are more insights and community to explore.
Here’s an exert of Mel Gibsons rant…..yeah….I bet most of us too have lived with these degrading situations.
Certainly not the MG he portrays in public!
http://www.radaronline.com/exclusives/2010/07/world-exclusive-audio-mel-gibsons-explosive-racist-rant-listen-it-here
EB, yea, I saw that link earlier today when I was kind of surfing the news…what is interesting was when he did the Passion movie he was talking about how “Spiritual” he was, yea, RIIIIIIGHT!!!!
Those digi recorders, not big at all and with great directional mics are WONDERFUL, and with video recorders so small and all, people are getting CAUGHT with their MASKS DOWN. I think Mel would have been better off with his PANTS DOWN than his MASK DOWN! LOL
And you know you just about can’t go anywhere without security cameras on you now, from a wal mart parking lot to anywhere else, and that little girl 4 that was grabbed by the pervert but gotten back alive was because of a wal mart security camera…and the two guys (right wing nut job and his 16 yr/o son) that killed some cops here off of I-40 in Ark were caught on wal mart security cameras an hour later when a wild life officer rammed their car with his and kept them from killing more officers.
That anthony witch that killed her baby was caught on security cams shopping while the baby was “at the sitters” and so on. Plus the phone pix and vids that citizens catch of various things. Don’t leave home without your camera and/or phone and/or recorder! Might mean your best witness some time!
I never know where to post things. I wonder if anyone else here is treating themselves like a rape victim would? The psychiatrist has ‘diagnosed’ (he mentioned these words to me but I don’t know what he wrote down and was crying too much to take much in) dysthymia (constant long term depression) caused by childhood trauma, dependency disorders (same cause) and ‘re-traumatisation’. I was taking care of myself by looking at everything I could about complex ptsd, because that’s the symptoms I have, but I am now looking at rape trauma syndrome. It feels right to me. The therapist says the spath has just reminded my brain of the initial abuse (forgotten until his abuse brought it back) and now I am suffering from, and processing slowly, the original trauma AND this latest one both at once. That makes sense.
I’m healing on every level I can, as much as I can. Anything that feels right, that feels like ‘me’, I do it. Slowly I’m coming back into the world. The dissociation was constant, but now it comes and goes.
Anyhow, I was wondering if anyone else is doing the same thing and healing themselves from rape? I hope it doesn’t sound stupid. I was emotionally raped and when I told my story to the rape forum I joined they did confirm that my experience was a rape experience as the spath could see how sick I was becoming and how much trauma was occurring but he was only exploiting that situation. It was making him feel powerful and he got what he could out of my pain. Edit: The trauma did start during sex, for reasons I won’t go into but I think are all part of the joys of being with a sex addict. It was obvious that I was dissociating but he had no empathy and so it continued.
verity – of course, it makes sense. of course. of course.
it’s like that link you posted about physical and sexaul abusers – there are many ways to contextualize our experiences.
i use terms like conned and dupe. i don’t feel that using the word ‘victim’ is helpful to me, but i always use the words spath or ppath, and am also very clear that SHE USED ME, on purpose, with malice and forethought. she took things from me for her own gratification, and because it was all a lie, that makes it a rape.
there is more info and more developed paths for healing from rape, physical abuse, incest, etc. than there is for spathy. Is there ANYTHING for healing from spathy???? or is it just us, here? it makes good sense to use what is available.
given the nature of my con, i never had ‘physical’ sex with the ppath. i don’t know how i would have survived that. probably like all us survive any of this crap – we do because we have to, we do because we want to. i know it would be much harder for me. and i would be much more prone to driving on over and beating the crap out of her. god, i don’t even want to think about it.
i am a tiny bit leery of the psychiatrist’s diagnosis of ‘re-traumatization’. does that mean he recognizes it as a trauma on its own or only seen as a trigger?
i relate what you said about dissociation. i experience this too. i just haven’t been using that word. i go for awhile getting more grounded and being able to pay attention. then i wander off. the wanderings off have a lot to do with physical pain and environmental toxin triggers; with being around emotional incongruent people or people who are hiding things; and with dissonant or conflict situations. i wander off for days or weeks sometimes. i started to wander off yesterday. still pretty gone today. its hard and it scares me that i just get lost. but i am starting to notice it more (and not just experiencing it as a time of darkness and unqualified emotional pain), and to define what the triggers are. this is progress.
best wishes to you. you have a plateful, but you also have a spirit that wants to be free.
I heal a little bit more every time somebody says what you have said to me one_step. Thank you. Validation. What was missing when I was small and what I must find from MY OWN SELF eventually. I still need it from others, for a bit.
There’s bloody nothing we can use specifically designed to heal from spaths apart from coming here is there? I use Kathleen’s posts mostly as her experience is really so similar to mine (especially the old lady/handsome young man thing, hehe)
Oh, one_step the physical sex with the spath is a killer. I nearly killed myself rather than know what he had stolen from me and what he had TURNED ME INTO! ‘Scuse the caps lock but this is heavy stuff for me. He turned me into a sick, begging, grubby girl who would have been happy to have been beaten into a pulp because the abuse ‘channel’ was reactivated in the brain. Well, my father turned me into that girl, but I had buried her until then. The spath has enabled me to dig her up and heal her — great news — but until that healing is done I would like to cut his dick off. Apologies. You understand. I was entertainment. I know we all were and maybe my childhood experience has just made the sex such a big deal. I was not in my mind or body with him. I was a child.
The psychiatrist did not want to know one thing about spath boy. Just told me not to contact him any more. As you would expect. Nobody wants to know about the spaths. Nobody is trained in such things. I was too weeping and wailing to push it. Even the therapist tries to steer me to talk of my dad because ‘it’s about him really’. Fair enough, but thank goodness there is this place to get it out and to read others’ so similar experiences. People must have gone entirely insane before the ‘net. I honestly don’t know if he sees him as trigger or separate entirely huge event on its own. He has left me for three months to see how I cope, now I am no longer at my worst. I am so much better, as are you I know. We can all see it in each others’ postings.
Yes, I know you have the environmental triggers, which I don’t. I am more prone to the dissonance, having experienced so much of that. If anyone messes with me or tells me my truth is shite I am prone to overreaction. I can only be with entirely safe people. Well done on working, I can’t yet. Yes, if we can at least see the dissociation while we’re in it (sounds impossible but I think I ca. Maybe I’m just recognising it immediately afterwards) it’s a bit easier. What doesn’t trigger these days? I’ve lost so much, but hopefully it will be reclaimed. I love the moments that I can find pleasure in something. They are few. We are progressing. Everyone here is, thank goodness.
Thank you for giving me the opportunity to get this off my chest. My very best wishes to you too.
Dear Verity,
Yes, the “layers” are like an onion and we have to peel them back one at a time, and unfortunately for some of us, there seems to be one “problem” healed and then another one seems to pop up. One after another after another after another. It never seems to stop and we get so TIRED.
Yes, and the ones we turn to for comfort devalue or trivialize our pain, and it is “rape” whether it is physical/emotional/spiritual/financial or all of the above.
When we have a trauma that is not healed (just swept under the rug like cat crap, but it still stinks) and we have another trauma, it is like a person who is sick with a broken rib, and then gets pneumonia and the next trauma is a broken leg, and so on, the person becomes sicker and sicker, but it is a geometric rise in problems not just an additive one. One can fight a broken rib okay, though it is painful, but when you add in the pneumonia and the coughing causes agony, both the broken rib and the pneumonia are 100 times worse for having both. Add in a broken leg so the person can’t stand upright and it gets even worse.
The traumas that we had as children (or previous to the psychopath) like the broken rib might be bearable but when we are re-traumatized with the pneumonia of the psychopath, the coughing starts the broken rib to be a horrible pain, so in order to heal the pneumonia we must also splint our side with the broken rib so we can go on and heal the pneumonia by hacking the crap out of our lungs—as well as take medication for it.
Verity, you are fighting for your survival, so give yourself a break….take care of YOU. Work on the problems until you become tired and then REST—the peeling isn’t going to be done in a day…or a week….but it will eventually be accomplished. ((((Hugs)))) and my prayers.
Oh yes, Oxy. What’s the word? Exponential! The pain grows exponentially. I think that’s the one. 🙂 Great analogy! It is tiring, although I’m nowhere near as tired as I was. I do work on the problems too much, because I find I still can’t find much of an interest in anything else. Going out seems to be the best thing. If I’m home and not cleaning or eating, I’m actively healing. Boring!!!! It’s compulsive and in a horrible way I think like Hens said about coming here, it’s actually a way of keeping him alive in my head. Got to watch for that. Thank you dear Oxy, as ever.
Dear Verity, EXPONENTIAL yes, I was having CRS and “word finding difficulty”–Gosh that is so FRUSTRATING to me to search for a word, and not find it….just part of the PTSD, and is BETTER than it was 6 years ago, but still not where I want it to be.
Doesn’t matter if it is a big word or a small one, I got stuck once trying to think of the word TREE….I could see a “photo” of it on the back of my eye lids, but not find the WORD! DUH!
I actually do better typing than I do verbally, but still frustrating. Even with the typing though I will type HERE when I mean HEAR or two when I mean to or too. Or forget how to spell a word, and can’t even get close enough so spell check will correct it. LOL
All those “little things” like that that frustrate the carp out of me and make me want to scream. I’ve always depended on my smarts and my brain and now it seems like even it has LET ME DOWN. I don’t want to be “retarded” or “senile” or even SOUND senile. LOL But I know it isn’t just my age (63) because my adopted son D is 32 and has the same problems with memory that I do almost exactly and we are both about as “bad” as the other. We tease each other about it, but it actually used to be a problem because I would KNOW FOR SURE I told him something and he would KNOW FOR SURE I did NOT tell him. Who was right? Who was wrong? Hell, neither of us knew, but at least we both finally came to the realization that we DIDN’T know for sure, and we didn’t BLAME each other for not remembering.
I realized I even had some small episodes of “amnesia-like” episodes where some UNUSUAL event that I normally would have remembered happening and I had NO memory of it at all.
Talk about blowing your self confidence in reality away!!! Boy, it did that for me. Totally blew away my confidence to determine what was real and what wasn’t. I could also watch a movie at one point and then watch it again the NEXT DAY and NOT remember it at all until maybe 3/4 of the way through, and then still not remember the ending. PTSD can mess up your memory in lots of ways.
My memory HAS gotten better, and I hope will continue to, but I’m also reconciled to the fact it probably will not ever be “the same” as it was before the aircraft crash put the full-blown PTSD into action, and the psychopathic chaos made it worse and worse and worse. After 3 years of insanity, when I finally DID get started on healing though, which is about 3 years ago now, I’ve made remarkable progress toward recovering my sanity and my wit, and improved in many ways. I am not “there” yet, and I will never quit trying to continue to grow, but I’m at a spot now where I am COMFORTABLE most of the time. I get setbacks from time to time and am not as resilient now as I was before, but even that’s growing.
Don’t give up on yourself, and by the same token, don’t get cocky and think “Oh, I’m all healed now” because either of those things will cause you grief! Believe me, been in both places. LOL