Editor’s note: The following story was submitted by a Lovefraud reader whom we’ll call “Marsha” about the coldest man she’s ever known.
I just wanted to write and share my story. I did some research on all the characteristics of what makes someone a sociopath. My father is a psychologist and knew my situation. He had mentioned the concept that my ex-fiance was a sociopath after everything that happened to me and I didn’t think to ask him more about what that meant. After exploring this site with the symptoms, I realized that my dad was 100 percent right. Here’s my story:
When I met my ex-fiance, it was through a mutual friend. He was charming, funny and seemed to be very witty and smart. He displayed himself as a go-getter, very ambitious, etc. We were friends for several months when our relationship seemed to get more serious. It was around that same time that I was living in an apartment that I loved within five minutes of my workplace. He lived in a fairly expensive high-rise condo on the beach, a condo that he owned, whereas I was renting.
He was a mortgage broker at the time and the housing market was steadily headed into the downfall. As we continued to date, his job stability as a broker seemed to be in question. Sure enough, about six to eight months into our relationship, he lost his job working for one of the major banks as they had some layoffs. He faced the challenge of paying his bills and mortgage in his condo as he waited for the opportunity of new employment.
Moving in with him
He created this idea that our relationship was headed in the right direction and that he “loved me.” He advised that really the only thing to do at this point would be to move in together. He urged me to quickly move into his condo so that we could play house in a sense and combine our incomes. Looking back I realize just how much I was duped.
I decided to give up my wonderful, beautiful, convenient apartment to move 30-45 minutes across the town to his location. I began paying him rent, month after month and not really seeing where the money was going. It turns out he was saving the money with plans to not pay the mortgage and lead his own self into foreclosure. He then anticipated that since we were not married he could just short sale the property in my name.
Now during all of this time, I let a lot of these financial plans slide through the cracks. I trusted him and figured that he had a plan. I didn’t know that this was a true con artist act in disguise.
During the span of time that I lived with him, he had kept in contact with an ex-girlfriend and stated that they had to keep in touch because he had known her for so long and that she was a friend. Again, I let this slide, even though I didn’t like the thought of it. Mainly because the communication was often and not of real purpose. Flirtatious, in many ways.
The marriage proposal
After one year of dating and living together I truly felt that I was in love with him. He proposed to me but even the proposal was cold and emotionless. We were arguing one afternoon and he laid the ring on the table showing that he had gotten the ring and that this should get me to stay.
This was never what I would have thought my proposal from the love of my life would have been like but again, love is blind and the sociopath can find a way to have you hanging onto a relationship that you know deep down doesn’t make sense.
He wanted silence
Needless to say, after several additional months his personality began to change and change and change. I never knew what personality I would get on any given day. He was oftentimes very irritable and mean. He was cold. I would come home from work and he would state that he couldn’t talk to me, he wanted silence. He would spend nights upon nights sleeping on the couch (by choice). What young engaged man chooses to sleep on the couch and not in the bed with his woman by choice?
Read more: Seduced by a sociopath — it’s not love, it’s love fraud
It was as though all he cared about was the money that I was paying and the plans for the short sale.
He would talk sometimes about how people always betrayed him growing up and that he blames his father for being abusive. But, he rarely ever showed affection — kisses, hugs, terms of endearment.
I made excuses
I always would make excuses for him and say to myself — He’s just going through a lot right now —or he really cares, he just doesn’t know how to show it. Yet, over time it just seemed to be that he was purposefully being emotionally abusive and standoffish. He told me that I was too close to my family and should cut the close ties. It was almost as if he was jealous of my close relationship with my family and didn’t want that closeness to continue on.
Looking back, I realize that he didn’t want anyone else to figure him out. He didn’t want anyone else to realize that he was a fake, a fraud and that his love wasn’t real. His love didn’t mean anything.
He would always find a way to charm me, or reel me back in like a fish out of water, when I started to question his intentions or when I would take a stand. Then, there were other days where he just really didn’t give a crap.
I can’t say enough how this was the coldest man I’ve ever known.
Charmed again
After additional communication between he and his ex surfaced, along with his decision to allow a buddy of his (male) to come stay in our house for well beyond a few weeks, without asking me of course. I decided it was time for some separation. Although separation was there I still missed him. After a few days, he charmed me again and offered the possibility of my coming back home and things changing.
I came back, of course, and things didn’t change and he was as aloof as he had always been. The problem was that I still loved him and wanted to marry him, wanted to change him. Within a few additional days something very devastating took place — He cut the ties of the relationship with as much care or emotion as a gravedigger. Again, it was cold and at this point he devastated my life — he told me that he just couldn’t deal with this anymore and couldn’t be in a relationship.
After all I had sacrificed emotionally and financially, he was just easily done with everything. I took steps to move out. After that point, he didn’t call; he didn’t attempt to communicate at all.
I would have never been happy
At first, I went through hell. Replaying the events and wondering what I could’ve done differently. But looking back, he just wanted to live by his own rules — he clearly was a sociopath.
What is he doing now? I hear he is still living in the same place, filed bankruptcy and works out all the time to make himself look more muscular. He dabbles into drugs and is even further down the wrong path.
I’m just happy that I got out because I would’ve never been happy. He had no care or concern for anyone but his own self. I tried not to blame myself or get depressed. I try to realize that people like this, I call them users, don’t have a heart. They don’t care! They are truly sociopaths and will do whatever they can to win and to live by their own set of rules.
Please learn from my lesson.
Learn more: Sociopathic seduction — How you got hooked and why you stayed
Lovefraud originally posted this story on April 30, 2009.
To escape a sociopath, trust your perceptions
LTL…
If that is true then that is a difficult thing for a curious fellow like myself. On the other hand, this site has given me all the closure and the answers I need but still, ya know…with what you all are saying about NC, then I truly and for a long time will regret the second letter I sent to her. I’m not sure if you read the letters tht I sent to her that I posted earlier, but I know that the first one telling her I’m done was the way I should have gone out, and the 2nd stupid one I sent will probably lead her to believe that I am waiting by the phone or checking me email and that burns me big time. That is why I even considered writing her back and saying things like I mentioned before about realizing it was all and act and telling her I’m too strong to be broken down and that I have already found my smile (not entirely true but moreso recently thanks to you all) and telling her that I dont miss her but I miss the girl I thoght I knew but I know that she isnt real and I know who the real person is etc.
Hearing what you are saying now makes me regret sending her that 2nd one big time but I didnt know then anything about this stuff
and this line too…
If this is like a report card for you on how to fuck with someone in a life-altering way and you think that you got all A’s then your wrong. I am much stronger than that and instead of thinking you won, frankly you lost, something real special
Oh my goodness Good grief,
please dont ever regret anything you do… do you know how many texts I sent prior to my final NO CONTACT? And yes I regretted things to. The point isnt what you write or who thinks what or who has the last word (although I was all about that when I too was where you are)….the point is whenever you finally GET IT, GET WHAT THEY ARE ABOUT, is when you go silent and make no contact and have shown them you are no longer weak. Like you are doing now.
Honestly what you wrote in your first second or third letter..doesnt even sink in to them…they just see that you are still making contact so they kick back, chill and wait for more to follow…but now that 3rd one isnt coming! You are doing it! I will go back and read your second letter, but I really was just responding to you saying how do I get the point across to her to forget about me, and that Im done with her, and not to bother with me….My suggestion is that you are already doing that, the day you stop making any contact. But you have to believe in that, and do it because you realize what she is all about do it for yourself — not to get the last word – or to feel you one upped her — you have to do it because you know she is toxic for you and your life and doesnt treat you well.
Stay strong. You are on the right track when you start to see that No Contact is what will get the message to her loud and clear – the message thats says Im stronger and wiser now!!
“verbally abusing me in a way that was worse than the last 30+ years of it, attacked me physically, then brought a no contact order against me by lying and charging me with domestic abuse (which he later dropped).”
“I’d say that you’ve gone the distance? 30 years, wasn’t it?”
Sorry missed that part, doing some “speed reading” so sorry nomore_discombobulat and yes, you have put in your time so to speak. But still if you are just now learning about these disorders, research is necessary to understand what you are dealing with.
Good Grief,
I just re-read your last note to her. It was beautiful. It was heartfelt and its what you needed to do for you. It was to the point. It offered her the opportunity to explain (she didnt take you up on that – because they dont do the things like that – that we do unless its guaranteed to get her something she wants)…and it offered her the opportunity to apologize to you (they dont do that either – cuz they never believe they are wrong – well, they do “fake apologies” if it gets them what they want)
You did nothing wrong or nothing to make you appear needy or weak. It was a great Goodbye. And you are really showing her how strong you are and wise youve become by making no further contact.
When you are ready to focus on yourself and your business and others who WANT to treat you with common courtesy and respect, you will welcome that into your life again. For now, you can try to focus on all of the things that were really awful and hurtful and awkward. And any question you would want to ask her.. Ask yourself first and answer it honestly… not well maybe it was this or it could have been that.. trust yourself with what the answers are.. nine times out of ten we already know the real answers!
thanks so much LTL! for you to put that much effort into me and my situation along with everyone else has really helped me start to get back my smile 🙂
thanks
Good Grief,
I will never forget the destruction, the pain, the confusion the loss of my way in life..when I was left with almost nothing in my savings account and next to nothing in my soul. I went through all of the emotions most likely every one of us has. I did things I wish I hadnt and I did things I absolutely needed to do for myself despite the best advice I could receive.
Its a process. Its deprograming the dream…the fantasy…and reprogramming reality back into our lives. Its accepting them for who they are and who they will never be – NO MATTER WHAT WE DO — its learning how to protect ourselves and see the relationship for what it was. We can tend to forget the worst of it when we are all alone and lonely and sad — but we must really remember the reality of it was the worst of it!
Relationships are filled with ups and downs — BUT NOT SHUT UPS AND PUT DOWNS AND LIES AND CHEATING AND STEALING. These are things that are huge red flags – our instincts are our best tool – but only when we act on them. We only hurt ourselves when we let others treat us badly continually.
Hang in there!! Writing to you helps me to remember to revisit and refresh myself on all the things I need to do to protect myself, respect myself, love myself and trust myself going forward. And to never let anyone allow me secondguess myself again in terms of how I deserve to be treated. Id rather be alone than with an emotionally abusive and disconnected partner!
learnthelesson:
“Id rather be alone than with an emotionally abusive and disconnected partner!”
At the end of that so-called relationship with S I remember thinking that I was in a relationship, but had never felt more alone. So, if I’ve got to be by myself, at least I don’t have to put up with the abuse.
Works for me.
Thanks James, Matt and Learnthelesson!
That’s great Learnthelesson –he almost got to you! You sure got me laughing. You have no idea of his powers in that department — he gets to everyone. (unless they know me well)
You are all quite right and really reitterating for me what I already know (but too easily let go of). Problem is he wears me down after so many instances of contact. I was quite discouraged when I first wrote tonight, and just the act of getting on here and writing a few words, and having you all respond, has really helped.
Matt, you said, “Remind yourself daily of every horrible thing he ever did to you.” Yes, yes, yes. This surely is the antidote.
Thanks so much James for writing. I think I read the book you spoke of last summer, but don’t remember much. I’ve gone through the gamit of various disorders trying to figure him out, starting years ago with the books “Malignant Self Love” and “Why Is It Always About You” (still two of my favorites that fit him). I was just about ready to check into multiple personality disorder when the last major incident happenned. I have a couple stacks of books on that subject sitting on the dining room table, but lost heart as to reading them and I don’t think they apply anyway. I’m sure he fits somewhere into the cluster b you and Matt speak of. I’d never thought of them as a related category. As you say it takes amazing commitment (go the distance) to work with this, and if he’s not willing I’ve already lost, and in truth he’s not willing.
You guys haved helped to lift my spirits. Thank-you!
Learnthelesson you said, “decades of this type of personality and treatment probably equates to set in his ways unless he made the effort to want to change on his own.” Another yes, yes, yes to this! Need to keep this thought at the forefront of my mind along with the list of horrible things h ever did.