Editor’s note: Lovefraud received the following letter from a 24-year-old woman, a graduate student.
He told me he was all I needed; he told me that he was the only person who cared. He told me my friends hated me because they were so mad at me because I got sick. He told me they were just all bitches like all of the other girls in the world. Like his ex-girlfriends, like his mother, like (me).
I had no idea that sociopaths existed. I thought that “sociopath” was only a word thrown about on TV, late night news, America’s Most Wanted.
My therapist told me that my ex-boyfriend is one of the worst sociopaths that she has heard about in her 12 years of practice.
Abuse starts slow
The abuse started out subtle; the control started out slow. He told me that I’d look cute if I just started dressing a little more suggestively. He told me that a slight heel (high heels) would do wonders for any girl’s appearance. “Didn’t I want to be the girl all of the other girls were jealous of?” He would tell me how to dress in order to make guys stare.
He would walk me down the street, hand around my neck, but whispering, “Babe, you look great. God, baby you’re my good thing; look at all of them watching; they think you’re so HOT.”
I now think they were wondering what was up because I was dressed like a whore and my ex boyfriend would ask random guys if they would pay me to provide sexual favors for them.
Controlled everything
I dated this man for two and a half years. He would control what I did, what I wore, what I ate, when I slept, how I slept, what I was required to wear to bed, what I could do in bed, IF I could move in bed ”¦ He wouldn’t let me move; he would get angry if I woke him up. He needed his sleep so he could “go out and make money the next day. You know you’re just a needy woman. You need me, the big strong man…”
And he’d laugh at me. He would ridicule me. He would make fun of me. He would laugh if I thought I was smart. He would laugh if I thought I could do something. He would introduce me to people as “the retard.” He would tell me not to talk—why would I bother? It wasn’t like I knew what I was saying anyway.
He would tie me up tell me it was sexy and that everyone else was doing it. He would punch me in the stomach, but he would tell me that he was seeing how tight my abs were. He would show me horrible, horrible movies about what women do when they’re hurt.
He showed me the movie Secretary, where the woman gets sad and then cuts herself, gets found out by her boss and her boss says something like no, don’t do that. And they proceed to have sex while her boss beats her butt with a wooden paddle. My ex would force me to have sex while slapping my butt and digging his hands into me, saying it was love.
Getting out
The list of scary things goes on longer than I want to remember right now. It got to the point that my parents were afraid. My ex-boyfriend was losing control, and I was stuck in the middle.
I would do anything for him, but then I did the one thing he forbade me to do. I got out. I realized that my parents didn’t hate me. I realized that my friends didn’t hate me, and I realized that I am stronger than he is and that I didn’t have to be his “good thing” anymore.
Then he told me that he made a huge mistake. He told me that he was “so sorry,” that it was normal to fly into insane rages when one loses something that he loved. He tried to get me back. I broke up with him. He stayed around for a few months trying all of this.
He convinced me that we could still be together if we were just “F” buddies, because I was the best girl for sex or at sex that he’d ever had. I know that is complete b.s. now, but at the time, when he told me I was the “only one” and “oh so special,” it worked to keep me around.
But, yeah, I mean there’s no doubt in my mind that if I had stayed with him, he would have convinced me to kill myself, or killed me himself. He would tell me to take pills. He said it was a way for me to show the world how “hurt” I was (all said in a condescending and convincing tone).
Anyways, there’s more, but yeah he tried to get me back. He tried telling me how heartbroken and lonely he was without me, which didn’t make sense to me, because when he and I were dating he told me he didn’t get lonely, he just didn’t “feel” it. It’s weird because when I was with him and he was being manipulative and abusive, he almost always told me what he was doing, but he always said, “But baby, it’s okay because we’re different. No one else is like us; we’re better than everyone; just trust me.”
Apart for six months
I can say simply that when I was with him he was emotionally abusive, physically abusive, sexually abusive. He would always say, “You can’t rape the willing, and you know you’re always willing, don’t bother saying no, because I know that no means yes.” Mind games and everything. He would get me so confused and afraid that if I said no, he’d be angry, and if he was angry he would hit me. Or at least I was terrified that is what would happen, because he would always tell me that he was bigger and stronger…
I have a restraining order against him now. I am in therapy now. We have been apart for six months, but I am still so shocked from it all. It still hurts really bad. I was with a man who told me he loved me, but that was just so that I would keep playing his bitch, keep being his doll and keep being his slave.
Thank you so much for your unquestioning support and faith in an equally invisible half way around the world person:)
It HAS been very hard and I feel as many people would in my position and that is what happened then to me and my children is now, THANK GOD, past. This doesn’t mean I have stopped being rather obsessed with still finding the answers, I am still learning, but now I feel that the answers I am looking for is how best to move on from here, how to protect myself and others. How to deal with the inevitable crossing of paths I will have with my P due to the equally inevitable life events of the future etc etc
We are all individuals but I have learnt by reading that we, the victims, also all seem to share certain psychological responses to trauma and when I was in the middle of my nightmare I had no way of being able to see the ‘bigger picture’. I was in continual crisis for a long time and my self worth diminished to virtually nothing.
One of the worst ‘realities’ I have had to face is that I meant absolutely nothing to my P apart from the abstracted ‘narcissistic supply’ to him that I was. That is a very hard thing to come to terms with.
When I read now about what responses victims have to their experience I seem to be rather a text book example and although this is comforting in one way it also makes me quite ‘usual’ and rather predictable.
Prevention is better than cure and I have done everything in my power to educate my children in the rights and wrongs of relationships even though the chances of them having the same experience is so small.
If I am writing here on ‘Love Fraud’ for any reason it is not to shock anyone with my stories or to be self righteous about how I overcame the ‘evil’ in my life, as I am still very much still learning, but it is to help give insight in the light of my own experience which may or may not help which is why I now ask you this question.
What would be the cruellest twist of fate to befall any woman or man who had had a relationship with a P?
I think it would be to have another one.
What kind of person does a P identify and pray upon?
The vulnerable.
After a relationship with a P that is exactly what I was, vulnerable, weakened,confused and lonely.
For myself I was also a ‘prostitute’ my body meant absolutely nothing to me and this has led me into all kinds of very unsuitable relationships and situations.
I hasten to add that none of my ‘encounters’ and relationships have ever affected my children. I was at least conscious enough to take the decision that I would never live with another man and not involve them until they were ‘safe’. They had been through enough.
So two pieces advice to anyone out there who may be entering into the phase of being available again to form another relationship are these:-
!. Give yourself time. This web-site advises ‘at least a year’ before looking for any relationship and I feel this is very good advice. Think of it like an ’emotional break’ I actually use this phrase now to explain to anyone why I am not in a committed relationship.
2. Beware of the internet and dating sites- they are the playground of P’s, married men and other very strange people.
Because my network of friends had completely broken down due to my wanting to protect them from my P this left me again very open to further abuse.
I know how much one wants someone to now love and protect them but find this in your own time knowing this time what it is you want and what you will and will not tolerate.
Thank you again for your kind support and understanding of my own experience.
Hi,
I am the author of this post “He wanted me to keep playing his bitch” I wanted to say thank you to everyone who has responded, your support means a lot to me.
As I have thought about this all more [my relationship with my ex] I have come to understand that he had me so brainwashed and completely alienated from myself.
He took the fact that I had been sick as a teenager and always threw it in my face, saying “Remember when you were 16, remember you’re brain damaged, remember how sick you are, were, are, Remember how much you need me..”
It was sick.
I just wrote another part of this all I am just still trying to come to terms with it..I mean, I know that it happened, but it hurts like hell…
here’s this [what I just wrote]
He said, “I love ya, baby”
As he punched me in the face.
He pulled me to the ground and said
“You know you can’t rape the willing….. honey (as an afterthought)
“You know that this is right.”
I’d start to cry he’d turn away, never seemed to notice
WIth an impatient wave of his hand
He’d gesture down
And say, “Get to it”.
As he quickly unzipped
his pants
his pants.
I wish it was always that blatant. If it was that obvious and clear I would have gotten out sooner. He’d treat me like shit but then whisper sweet nothings and say that he meant them that I had to believe him because I couldn’t trust myself, didn’t I remember I had brain damage? Didn’t I remember that I needed him, for this, for that, for everything?
Obviously I couldn’t leave him if i was always gonna need him
So he’d punch me in the face again then laugh and say
Come on.
Truth mixed with mystery, lies confusion pain he was the reason, he was the savior, he fucked with my head made it one and the same…
I learned to dress to please him
I learned the things to say
I learned to move to please him
in every fucking way.
I said the things I walked the walk I slowly, quickly lost
me
I wasn’t to eat
I was to work out
And take the pills
Always
the pills
to stay so pretty to stay so thin
so thin
Stay thin
So thin
stay thin
thin
thin
thin
–
[dead]
He just got in my head f’ed with my emotions so much, told me how i felt, what was right to feel how i could feel when i could feel what i could feel, and then would tell me that I was wrong. god this is just hard to get over..
to Still Standing,
Inside of you is a bright spirit waiting to reemerge. I am going to quote Khatalyst because it was so powerful what she said quite a while back… she talks about this beautifully to another reader:
“all I can tell you is that there is a center in you that is not harmed, can’t be harmed. Your blown-open heart is making a lot of noise right now, but it’s just talking to you about how mean he was and how it hurt. Deeper inside you is a powerful and visionary woman who is learning and judging and thinking about what is the next best thing for you. Trust in your own healing. Be kind to yourself. Take your time. You are ten times the human being he was, and what you have to do now is just figure out how to experience your life that way.”
You sound very damaged but as you say, you are Still Standing. There are others that don’t make it out of these kinds of situations. That thing that holds you up is the thing that Khatalyst is talking about… that center of you.
Stick with us here at LoveFraud. Know that you can come through to the other side. It seems like you fully understand how he did what he did. Perhaps you will have a growing up moment like I did. I let the Bad Man tell me who I was. I let him tell me who I wasn’t. I was unsure of myself. I was open to hear anything. I am not this person anymore.
There were things I was unsure of about myself and then again, there were some things he said that I knew just weren’t true. Find one thing he said that you know wasn’t true. Write down the truth and use this as a brick to stand on and rebuild the foundation of you. If you have to, build a real pile of bricks and write on them what is good and true about you.
Begin rebuilding you a little everyday, by finding something about yourself that you know is true. Create a trail and follow it back to yourself. If too many bad things are coming into your mind, write them down and then burn them up in your fireplace.
Find yourself, dear soul. Our lessons were painful. I have been a slow learner when it comes to loving myself. Now I am catching up. You will too. Don’t waste another minute on your Bad Man. He is doing his Sociopath thing and it really has nothing to do with who you really are.
Someone explained it to me like this…. if you go to the theatre to see a movie, does the screen have anything to do with the movie playing on it? No. It’s just a big blank white sheet. Wipe the screen back to blank and write on it who you are and don’t let anything your Bad Man said to sneak on there. There really is nothing of value they can tell us about ourselves. Nothing.
I will be thinking of you out here in Internet land.
thank you, your response means a lot.
i know in my heart that I’m stronger than him, i knew that when I was with him, too. It was strange because I always kinda knew in the back of my mind but he was there in the front tellin’ me what I was…anyway,
I will try your advice, I need to put this behind me and just chalk it up to ‘bad’ cause it’s not doing me any good.
I have a quesion for you, anybody really, though.
Has anyone who was involved with a ‘bad’ man [or woman] felt compassionae and wanted to find the good in them because you think there has to be good and I know there isn’t good, it’s not there…
but sometimes i still waiver and want to think of him as good cause that was the act…
ay, but anyway, thank you for being here,
take care
I think many of us have been drawn into taking care of and feeling compassion for someone who really doesnt want to be fixed, but plays on it when it suits them. My ex did not play on his turbulent childhood and background and infact would not discuss it at all and often told me not to caretake him. If he mentioned he liked mushrooms, I bought mushrooms – I did way too much for him, above and beyond the miniscule return I got from him, he denied me any emotional input and cleverly pretended that he was in a relationship with me, when his behaviour clearly showed that he was out of the relationship. One thing I learnt above anything else and I have had plenty of dysfunctional relationships – is that if they dont consistently back up what they say (more or less) then their words mean absolutely nothing.
One of the mental and emotional dilemmas of being involved with someone with PDs, is that it is very difficult to get a true understanding of what is real and genuine and what is fake about them and their behaviour.
We have to do our own inner work, why shouldnt they? They truly do not deserve all the attention and benefits they (take) get, whilst some of us who have worked a whole lifetime on ourselves are left high and dry – yes I am angry about that.
Good Morning alll….just finished reading the last couple of entries…and, I had to respond…
Stillstanding you said:
“Has anyone who was involved with a ’bad’ man [or woman] felt compassionae and wanted to find the good in them because you think there has to be good and I know there isn’t good, it’s not there”c
but sometimes i still waiver and want to think of him as good cause that was the act”
ay, but anyway, thank you for being here,
take care
AND YES YES YES, I have been there! I sometimes get very confused by some of the times when he seemed very sweet and helpful, etc. But, I measure the few times against the vastness of the conning, cruelties, devasation that he caused in my life/our lives (I have a 14 year old daughte)…and realize that my perceptions then (AND SOMETIMES NOW) are not necessarily reality.
You see, I was raised in a very unpredictable house my survival depended on me denying the truth, finding the good in the father in my house…finding the good in him was a fantasic tool, defensive device, and I have always tried to “find the good” in people. Everyone has some good sure, but, some are downright evil…and, are more evil than good.
Wanting to see good is not a bad thing, being confused is not a bad thing…grieving is not a bad thing…one thing I found in the beginning of my recovery…it was very helpful to remove the JUDGEMENT in my words toward myself…grieving, recoverying is very very painful…and, acceptance that it will be this way, even confusing, and maddening at times….this has been helpful…it will pass…with dedication, hardwork, and knowledge that others have walked this road…has given me HOPE.
Good morning Aloha…I liked your wiping the screen clean analogy…STILL STANDING, this is the exciting part, has been for me…I GET TO START OVER…and, create the me I WANT to be…ONCE I realized my badman was PROJECTING his own stuff onto me (he would say I was dishonest, cheating on him, a psycho, etc etc) I knew I had to DISOWN THOSE WORDS…this was HIM!!! Not me. I learned that I had to create more positive views of myself…and, I did this with self-chants, writing affirmations on the wall, speaking with people that I trusted and loved me who could mirror my goodness back to me….I wrote….and wrote and wrote…
Stillstanding, do NOT judge yourself for thinking he is still good sometimes…just make sure you you HONOR yourself…
and continue no contact. All of us have some good…in us…but, not all of us are MOSTLY EVIL. I laugh sometimes because I have struggled with wanting to think my ex has some good…and I told my friend…yes, he has some good in him…he’s breathing…and, that’s about it….
I have had trouble with my longstanding philisophical beliefs, beliefs I have had since surving my childhood about PEOPLE…
and, it can be downight confusing…but, for me the bottom line is…he was sick AND EVIL, IS sick and evil; and today, I chose to no longer engage with people who do not bring virtue into my life (unless I have to,like at work). BECAUSE I AM WORTHY of so much more….
I am a wonderful person, just touching the surface of my magnificence…and, my light was just a flicker a year ago…and, NOW…it is beginning to find its fullness…and, day by day, its getting even brighter and brighter. As will yours!
And, many people can say the same thing here…it takes time….for me, I have been DETERMINED to heal, be kind to myself, and to trash all the trashtalk he sent my way!!
IT’S ALL OVER…the war is over…now it is time to take an inventory of my assetts, to live well, take care of myself, love myself…and, surround myself with people that love me. Sometimes when I start thinking of him…I immediately switch over to an image of a rose, a beautiful rose….or the word LOVE…and focus on these images…and, say NO THANKS, I don’t want you in my life anymore!
They do not deserve any more of our time, attention, or precious LIFE ENERGY…it is through crises and struggles that we have the opportunity to EMERGE…YOU are never alone…none of us are…I am so grateful to have this site!!!
Have a great day you all…my daughter and I have to travel to DC to the Holocaust museum for a school assignment today…a year ago, I would not have been able to be emotionally present for my daughter…TODAY I am able to be…this is due to the hardwork, healing, support and friendships I have with so many wonderful people…
Thank you all for being here…and, helping me to maintain my commitment to LIVING A GREAT LIFE! I NEED this site…and, am so grateful for it…
Peace, love…and hugs (if you would like them!)
Peace
Grace63
Thank you. I found myself smiling through your response. See, that’s the thing, I’m not broken, I’m not messed up, I just have this huge b ad thing that happened to me. I, like you, want to see the good in everybody. When I was with the bad man I tried my damn hardest to find the good in him make what he did “good”. I lost myself in that process, I was so busy trying to make him good I forgot to care about myself. And wow I just said that for the first time.
Maybe that is part of what I should be learning from this…
Thank you all again for your support.
Still Standing,
YES! I believed the Bad Man had good in him. We all believed this and that is why they chose us. My Bad Man was a former Minister. Imagine?! I had a very hard time balancing in my mind what was happening to me with the idea of “ordained Minister.” A few times in public, people approached us with bigs smiles, “Pastor J! How nice to see you! Are you still doing Humanitarian aid in Tonga?” This was a complete and total Mind F–k for me. (please excuse the expression but there really is nothing better for it.)
I am sure your BadMan attempted to put the idea in your head that he was good and you were not. If you take away ALL of his words.. take away EVERY SINGLE THING he told you about himself and who he thinks he is, and look ONLY at how he acted, you will see the real person. Let’s go back to my movie screen analogy. Watch in your mind a silent movie of your Bad Man. Who is he now?
Their words are used to convince us that what our senses tell us is not true. They are brainwashers. There is something very un-human about our experiences with Sociopaths. I believe this is why it is so hard to grasp. It’s like looking at a newspaper in Korean. I don’t get it at all. Reading Korean is completely out of my scope of life experience.
I can honestly say that I did not begin to heal one bit until I found LoveFraud. I was pretty much out of contact with him but my fantasy of him and who he told me he was was still there in my mind. It was a powerful fantasy. I was still wondering if somehow it was me that made things not work. He wanted me to think this of course. He wanted me to think that I was the most dispicable character that ever walked the earth… how ironic.
If you stay here with us at LoveFraud, you will start to get that everything your Bad Man did falls under sociopathic tactics. Eventually, your Bad Man, will disappear… POOF! and the real man will emerge. You know who the real man is, you just have to accept it. Once you accept it, you can begin to shed the lies he told you about yourself.
Back to compassion… Compassion is beautiful. Have compassion for you. Have compassion for me. Have compassion for a small child who dropped their ice cream cone. Have compassion for a stray dog dragging his tail low to the ground. I am going to quote myself now about Compassion. This is from my essay here at LF:
“It’s noble to throw yourself in front of a bus to save the one you love, but not if they are the one driving the bus!” (Do I have to put quotes when I quote myself? English majors? Anyone? HAHA!)
Anyway, the point I was trying to make is that I was trying to help someone that I thought was in a lot of pain but ignoring his actions toward me which were completely unacceptable. Then one day, I had this vision of trying to save him from being hit by a bus… and then I saw in my mind that the Bus driver was the Bad Man…. frothing at the mouth, driving full speed ahead at ME!? I got it! Why am I trying to help him? He is trying to destroy me and he is doing a very good job of it!
After my Sociopathic encounter, I am emerging a much stronger woman. I needed to wake up. My eyes and ears have changed. Now I know the language of disordered people and I can separate what is me and what is them. If I am honest with myself, I never was able to make this separation in my life until now.
If you believe that there is some inner core of goodness in your Bad Man, we are here to tell you that there isn’t. Whether he was some kind of genetic mistake or product of a tragic life, it doesn’t matter. Believing in your Bad Man’s invisible goodness is unproductive for you. Remember the bus driver with the frothing mouth, the fearsome eyes…
If you have a picture of your Bad Man, add a few details… perhaps some fangs, horns, nostrils flaring… this will remind you that you weren’t seeing him how he was.
With warmest Aloha…….. E.R.
It is very difficult to separate the real from the illusion, the illusion – the mirror they set up to pretend that they were us, that they fitted in with the values we hold high. My ex N, feigned personal integrity, fidelity and nobleness as the high qualities he had, but he knew that these were the qualities I want in a man.
That is why I took on a man with nothing, as I thought that personal qualities are in higher regard. But I ignored the stuff that was staring me in the face – his poor living conditions, his 85 pages of jobs, lived all over the place. Made allowances for him over and over – based on the illusion. We have to keep remembering the real side and not the illusion. They were just mirroring us. Just read in an article, that in a sense we were responding to ourselves reflected back to us – and if we fell in that deep – we must be truly wonderful.
Really liked this, Beverly, because I’m angry about it, too – “They truly do not deserve all the attention and benefits they (take) get, whilst some of us who have worked a whole lifetime on ourselves are left high and dry – yes I am angry about that.”
Without going into a whole life’s story, I will say that while thinking about counseling, I get angry over the things that have happened since childhood that necessitated counseling. I didn’t do these things, first of all. They were done to me. Second, I am not the person in denial or, in the case of the P ex, skipping merrily along to the next victim! Was talking with a friend on the issue of counseling and I said, “it really pisses me off that they did this stuff and I have to find more time, be more accommodating, just to work through it.
But, as she said, we’re the ones who want to work through it. We have a lot to gain from working through it. We can heal. We can become whole and put our abuse and the perpetrators in their rightful place in the context of our lives.
It stings, though. Dredging-up all this crap from the past (and some from the present) is a tough journey; we do our inner work because we have an inner being begging us to fix ourselves and an outer Universe that keeps reminding us it’s necessary…sometimes by placing P’s in our paths.