Editor’s note: Lovefraud received the following essay from a reader whom we’ll call “SnowWhite.”
He is clever and cunning. He has many talents. He sees you before you see him. It may be something you are wearing that attracts him. Maybe it’s your laugh or your spirit. You are vulnerable. He knows it. You are trustworthy and caring. He knows it. You have only been with two men your whole life. He knows it. You are lonely. He knows it. You have been married for 25 years. He doesn’t care.
He is a carpenter. He builds your trust and friendship. You see him weekly in your workout class. One day he smiles at you. The next day he says hello. Months go by. Each day he shares his story and hardships with you. You are compassionate and feel his pain. He knows it. He becomes your friend. You start to text each other. He becomes your confidant. Before you realize what is happening, he is becoming your best friend, one by one replacing all others. The bond with your husband begins to loosen. He has been saying good night to you for weeks in his texts. You are addicted.
One fateful evening he tells you that there is something special between you. It is more than friendship. You agree that there is an attraction but cannot act on it. You are married. He persists. You are confident that the friendship is more important. You are strong. You can handle it. He is stronger, more powerful. You don’t want to lose the friendship.
He is a gardener. He plants the seeds of doubt telling you your husband and marriage is broken. He cultivates them until they grow, taking root in your mind. You start to believe.
He is a poet. He tells you it’s love. His words are sweet. You start to fall.
He is an architect. He builds and lays out what your life would be like with him. He will give you everything you need as a couple. You will be happy.
He is a painter. He paints a beautiful picture of what could be, a picture of you his “future wife”.
He is relentless. For months you resist but are afraid of losing the friendship and connection. He knows it. He wants more. He threatens to end the friendship if you cannot be with him. You seek therapy. It doesn’t help. He is powerful. You feel helpless in controlling your own emotions. You agree to stop talking”¦..one too many times. You agree to end it and meet one last time. Then it happens. You have no control. The connection is too powerful. He now controls your mind and body.
The weight of him telling you he is waiting and alone bears down on you. He tells you that you must leave your husband. The pressure builds. You feel his pain and want to heal him. You are confused. Your life starts to unravel. You start to lose your soul. You are confused.
He is NOT a cardiologist”¦ he cannot fix your heart. For the heart will always find its way to love that is true, real, honest and everlasting. The heart knows. It is resilient. My heart will recover.
zootowngirl,
how are you doing? Are you hanging in there?
It sounds from what I read (unless I missed something very important) that yours is not a physically violent relationship, but a hostile, crazymaking, lonely one. Is that right?
If so… it is very, very hard to leave. I can tell that you want to. I can also tell that you will, but it is tougher than you thought it would be.
If you can, try to compartmentalize your time remaining, while you are still packing. If you can, try to pack alone (if he will let you). If you can, contact the DV people and see if there is an advocate who is willing to come hang out with you while you pack (this is sometimes but not always possible). If you are not safe, you can also enlist the police to come.
I don’t know how much packing remains to be done.
I also don’t know how well he “obeys” you if you tell him to his face to please leave so you can pack.
Zootowngirl, LEAVING is one of the hardest things about this. It is like you are pulling yourself away from a very strong magnet pulling you back. Those of us who have left, KNOW this. But we are no different from you. You can do it, too.
Be prepared for the numb feeling of shock you will feel immediately after you break the magnetic bond holding you there. It is an empty-void feeling. It will pass. It is also a vulnerable time because you might be tempted to fill the void (with him?). So don’t. Think ahead with something positive you can fill it with, and keep No Contact.
If you are returning to a place with old friends or family who can help you, that might help. It is hard to say without knowing your situation.
This is a time when you have to be strong, when you will feel weak, but you can also push yourself through it — it is an act of love for yourself. Do it.
Truthspeak, I want to thank you for that link also…I bookmarked it and also emailed it to my therapist…it was a great article.
Zootowngirl, I think this link would be good for you to read…
knowledge is power and I always found comfort while i was reading..(i didnt know about this site or any other until year and half after i was discarded, painfully to almost death but grateful for my prayers came true) …try to replace all the thoughts … (it doesnt make sense but it works).think of something happy (not with him) or immediately tell yourself (100 times over..days if necessary for 24 hrs in the day) affirmations such as..I love you, “Zootowngirl”, you are doing a great job and I am proud of you!! over and over and over… You will make it…there is a light at the end of the tunnel, i promise…there is peace…there is growth …
Poppy, you can use “borrowed hope”…i too, saw death as the only option to end the pain…instead,after reaching out, i took the steps (with void) that were suggested for me to do..just like baking cakes..i hadnt done that in 12 years…each cake baked, gave me a day of life..so silly it sounds…but trying to find purpose just to “be” …i cant tell you how many cakes and cookies i baked..i didnt want to do it, i just did it because i couldnt find a way out of the dark and just did what a trusted person told me to do.i did the action but was still in zombie form until little things started to happen, like i’d taste the batter, then throw in some extra extract!! that for me was the beginning of functioning as a live being again…..what is something that you like to do? diverting your thoughts even if it is just for small amounts of time, will help you not feel so overwhelmed and defeated…stuff is not important…most people like to downsize as they get in their late 50’s and early 60’s so you can view your position from a different perspective..there have been some great suggestions posted…poppy, there are loving people that will help you..go to a womens shelter, call your local mental health hotline…you will rebuild and overcome..please keep writing
Poppy,
Please don’t kill yourself. Please. I understand the desire to die…not because we want to be dead but because we want something to change so badly. But no one is worth that and I know that there is a part of you that knows this, even if the voice that tells you so is really really small…or overwhelmed with what happened to your life. Plus, if you will accept a morbid joke from someone who once felt the same way…tried it…succeeded and died but was brought back to life in the ER…they’ll just send you the bill.
I will be 50 next year. I have lost everything I ever worked for too. I’m actually in the process of selling everything I have left so that I can live in a van. I used to teach at the college level. I was a successful, positive person. Life was never a rose garden but I used to feel that no obstacle in life could side line me. I used to think that life was beautiful, no matter the challenge or the hurt that came my way. I thought I could handle it, move through it, and move on.
I want to believe that I still can, but most days I think I’m just a piece of sh*t. Most days, I think I’m not worth the effort it would take to scrape me off your shoes. I think that because it’s what he taught me. I don’t know why the lesson stuck…but it has and it will be a while before I think differently. I will survive, but I will be a different person. I can only hope that, one day, my story will help others the way the stories I read here are helping me. Inch by excruciating inch, I am dragging myself into believing that all of these brilliant survivors are right…and that I can save myself.
Today he reaffirmed his opinions of me. For almost 7 hours he harangued and berated me with his sarcasm and hostility. The highlight came with “You never loved me. You’re pure evil. I should have never trusted you. You’ve betrayed me and destroyed my life. My life is a joke because of you. I’ve lost everything because you’re breaking up with me, you stupid f*cking c*nt.”
An hour later he was crying and apologizing and begging me to forgive him.
And the roller coaster goes on.
I finished packing today. I have 10 small boxes that I will store somewhere. I have my clothes and a few small mementos. I haven’t told my friends exactly how bad things are, but they are beginning to suspect. I want to be able to prove…to myself…that I can do this. So I want to do it alone. I’ll need help with everything else: where to store my things, how to declare bankruptcy, where I’ll go from here. But I want to leave him on my own 2 feet.
20years is right, there is no physical violence in our relationship. There is intimidation and there have been some physical moments, including one instance of forced sex. Fortunately we have roommates and he’s extremely paranoid, so he won’t do anything in front of witnesses. (He’s so paranoid that he makes me whisper when they’re home so that they can’t hear us, despite the fact that they are 3 rooms away and there’s a television in the background for noise. I also have to whisper in the yard, so the neighbors won’t hear.) I often find myself wishing he would beat the crap out of me. Not because I want to negate the horrible suffering of people who are physically abused…but because I would be able to walk away from that with NO PROBLEM. For some reason, the emotional and verbal abuse doesn’t give me that…freedom. For some reason, I think that I can work harder, have more faith, be stronger…or maybe I just didn’t know, all that time, that what he was doing was wrong. Until now.
Skylar is right…they make a new reality whenever they want to. Yesterday was all about him rewriting history…telling me that all my feelings and decisions were based on the fact that I misunderstood him….or on miscommunication. According to him, nothing I felt or thought or understood is real because he says it’s not. When it came right down to it….I either had to accept his reality and lose my mind…or find a way to let go. After 7 hours of constant verbal vomiting today….I think I reached my line in the sand.
Now I’m trying to pull away from that magnet that 20years mentioned. I get dragged back in when he mutters under his breath, laughs harshly and makes a sarcastic comment, curses the day he met me, begs God to save him, calls me the worst thing to ever happen to him, etc. A friend of mine says he’s putting on a show and I can’t disagree. If he’s a show…then I want the remote…because I want to turn him off.
Snow white called it a spell. Blue jay said they suck the life out of us. I feel both of these things 100%. He does these nice things and I find myself saying “Am I wrong? THIS is the man I fell in love with…this NICE person.” But the minute I fall for it, he hits me with something that’s not nice at all. I have nothing left but a disability check…and he still clings to me as though I’m the only way he has to survive. Today he said his life was overwhelming…all because he doesn’t want to turn to his (wealthy) family and ask for money to help him move back home. He doesn’t want to sell anything. He doesn’t want to pack anything. He doesn’t want to move anything. And he doesn’t want his family to know that we broke up. I broke up with him nearly 2 weeks ago and his family has no idea that they’re going to have to take him in…again. It made me wonder…were they under his spell too? He hasn’t worked since 2006. His family supported him until he moved in with me. Did they drink his Kool-aid too? If so, they must have been relieved when he switched his attention to me.
I know my story is meaningless while you’re in the middle of your own hell Poppy. I don’t mean to ramble on as if it doesn’t matter. But if I can drag myself forward, so can you. I have faith in you. I believe in you. I don’t know what the answers are. Half the time I don’t even know whether the reality I’m invested in is real or something he concocted. But I know this…the closer I get to leaving, no matter how much I’ve lost, the better my life gets.
Your life isn’t over. Your life is going to begin again. I’m sorry about your home. I’m so damn sorry. But you are amazing for making it this far and you can make it farther. Your life might be much smaller and humbler. It might be vastly different. But YOU will still be here to inspire other people, like me, to never give up. Please don’t give in to the pain he left inside of you. Please. It’s selfish and it sounds stupid…but I need you. I swear it. I NEED YOU. Please don’t leave the world to figure things out without you.
Zootown,
Your instincts are screaming for you to go and run. It is best NOT TO LISTEN OR TALK to him.
Your values and morals compell you to be honest to him and tell him that you’ll leave him. This way you give him a chance to use his hypnotic abilities on you.
Spaths have this total weird natural ability to put you under their control as if you are in a hypnotic state. I confronted him with the craziest shit I heard or had seen, and I truly believed it to be wrong, and I was packed and ready to leave… and he only had to touch my arm and use his voice in an ultra innocent calm way… saying, “Everything will be all right. Nothing happened. All’s good.” And I would feel as if everything was alright again (even if my brain knew the opposite). But hiw I felt (calmed down) had more power over me than what I knew. He literally could lull me back into submissive state.
By interacting with him, by telling him, showing him, and by letting him open his mouth, he makes YOUR BODY feel as if there is nothing wrong, and what you know and see and belief cognitively cannot fight those feelings.
Please, if you had the power to post this cry for help, then use every bit of your energy to grab the minimum you need and get away, NOW!
zootown,
darwinsmom is right. The way to leave a spath is to abandon him when he’s not looking. IT’S THE ONLY WAY.
Some spaths will actually kill you rather than let you escape. They have a terrible fear of abandonment.
Somehow, I knew. Each time I left my spath, I did it when he wasn’t there. My spath never hit me. But I knew.
Unfortunately, I also didn’t go NC until the last time, because intellectually, I knew nothing, and I kept talking to him. He would reel me back in. This last time, he didn’t even want me, but he still tried. Just for the power of it.
What is important is known in your gut. You know it deep inside, that he will trick you again and again. You have to escape when he’s not looking.
Zootowngirl, give some thought to Darwinsmom & Skyar – they’re on the “outside” of this nasty situation and can clearly see what’s going on inside that bubble. Perhaps, an advocate of your own woud be appropriate. Keep two things in mind, right now: the “forced sex” was an act of RAPE, by legal definition; emotional battery is FAR more insidious than physical abuse because there are NO indications that it’s happening (no bruises, broken bones, etc.). FORCED SEX (rape) is a very, very powerful tool that an abuser finds useful – how does one “prove” that they’ve been raped by their spouse or partner? Who would believe the victim, anyway? Isn’t that what we’ve been taught to believe?
Poppyfields, at this point I would make a gentle suggestion that you post back for the sakes of the caring and concerned people who have supported and encouraged you. Although suicide may FEEL like the only option, you know in your heart and soul this simple equation: victim suicide = spath WIN. So, post back – imagining the worst-case-scenario to an online plea for hellp without any response could cause 2 possible reactions: a> triggered anxiety, or b> irritation that heartfelt encouragement was seemingly discarded. Many of us have been terrorized during former spath entanglements with threats of suicide – please, try to understand that this can be a serious trigger, so post back.
Brightest blessings
Poppyfields, you are in a very rough spot. I am not sure that I have any advice to give, but I want to lend my voice to the chorus here to say that suicide is so tempting at times, but it is not the answer to your problem. I hear your pain that you are unanchored with no home. I think some good advice was offered here, to find (for now) another situation like the one you have, but maybe more stable (not a man who wants to date, so you are in the way). Could be there is a divorced mother with young children who needs help with that? Or an elderly person or couple?
I hear you that you are living a hidden life, not using your name. Is declaring bankruptcy not an option for you? It is no fun, but if you are able to do that with the help of a pro bono lawyer, would that not enable you to at least come out of hiding? Then perhaps you could register with an agency which could help you find suitable employment.
I hear your despair at the great losses you have suffered (independence, home, a successful business) — how terrible. It is, indeed, devastating. I’m so sorry that all of this happened. I’m glad you have reached out here, and I hope very much that you are able to find something to anchor to, and do not take your still very precious life.
Dear Poppy,
I am sitting here with tears streaming down my face because your thoughts of suicide and the method and the feelign of hopelessness you are having is exactly the point at which I was at when my husband (of just 2 years) left me to go to another woman, after stealing everything I had worked for over 25 years. Penniless, as he emptied my bank account containing the proceeds of my house which he had persuaded me to sell (to buy another one btwn us), with over 25 thousands pounds of debt racked up in my previous name over those 2 years with him, isolated in an area with no friends, and family refusing to talk to me due to me persuading my elderly mother (at certain points when he wanted cash for this that and the other) to hand over £40k over the 2 years from my late fathers estate.
I know exactly how you are feeling and I feel for you but there is one thing you need to keep in mind …… if you go ahead and finish your life he has won. Like you say possessions are not everything, happiness and trust and knowing that you have a good heart are what is important. Why should an evil cold hearted beast succeed in destroying someone who is beautiful within and has such a lot to give in this world to people who actually need help. Keep going … 59 is not old nowadays and you can build your life up again. 2 years later the trauma will still be with you but in a year you may feel a lot better and your life could be so much better too. Even if this job ends, then the next job could be what makes the difference. I have bankrupted myself now and I must admit I feel a sense of relief from at least not having to look over my shoulders. With this and counselling and reading this site you will get through.
Zootowngirl,
I’ve lived in the back of my pick up truck with only a “shell” over it for 3 months with 2 kids and a cat (1980) after my divorce from hell….I bought an RV a bit upscale from the pick up truck this last time (2007) and fled my home in order to stay alive and escape my stalker….it isn’t easy but you can do it.
I found out that “stuff” doesn’t matter like I thought it did. I had hung on to every picture my kids had painted in first grade,, and every mother’s day card they had make through grade school…. and every other reminder of happier times. I’m a sentimental fool. NO MORE! Stuff doesn’t matter what matters is being safe and being away from those that would hurt us.
I kept trying to talk myself into not running away…”be brave” and all those things I told myself. But in the end, the dog who runs from the fight with the lion is the one who lives to fight another day…staying around to defend the dry bones of “stuff” is not wise in any way.
While I was living in the RV I read Dr. Viktor Frankl’s book “Man’s search for meaning” which he wrote after being in a Nazi prison camp for 3-4 years during which time he lost every relative and everything he owned and his wife. Yet he found meaning in his suffering, and he saw others who found meaning in their lives as well…he also saw people who gave up, and turned their faces to the wall and just died. He also saw people whose suffering made them angry and filled with rage and the desire for revenge. I realized then that no matter how bad our suffering is, or how “little” compared to his, that we CAN find meaning in our lives, in the things that happen to us.
God bless! You can do it. BTW what you wrote to Poppy fields was wonderful.
Dear everyone. I just wrote a long post and its all gone – I think I lost a connection for a second or so.