By Ox Drover
Sometimes former victims of psychopaths have voiced to me that they just want others to know that the psychopath was not the victim, but the abuser. Former victims are frustrated that others don’t recognize someone is an abuser. Many times the actual victim has instead been painted by the real abuser as the “bad guy.”
I remember reading a letter from my psychopathic son from his prison cell who told me in the letter he knew that I had to be the one who was “wrong” because he got along with everyone in the family circle and I got along with no one, so therefore I had to be the one “in the wrong.”
Well, democratically voting on something does not make something “right,” it only means that something is “popular—”but not necessarily right. Back in the days when everyone thought the world was flat, and Columbus was about the only one that thought it was “round,” popular opinion did not change the shape of the earth! While in this country we are proud of our democratic system of government, voting on something is not always the most “fair” way to pick a choice. Sometimes “democracy” is like two wolves and a sheep voting on what to have for dinner tonight! The bad guys gang up on the weaker ones and take advantage, but that doesn’t make it “fair” or right.
One of the most frequent ploys of the psychopathic abuser is to initiate what is frequently referred to as “the smear campaign.” This may actually start behind the victim’s back while there is active victimization going on between the abuser and the victim, or it may start after the victim has either escaped or been discarded by the psychopath. The psychopath starts to talk badly about the victim to others in their circle, to destroy the credibility of the victim so that if and when the victim starts to talk about him/her to others, they are viewed as the scorned lover or business partner spreading hateful rumors, when in fact, just the opposite is true.
Unfortunately, many times by the time the actual victim realizes that the lies have been spread about them, the damage is done and there is no effective way to counter the damage done by the abuser and their duped accomplices. Many times these accomplices of the abuser are actually unaware that they are accomplices, and are acting in good faith to “protect” what they perceive as a “victim” from the person they now consider an abuser.
The abuser/psychopath recruits as many of these unsuspecting accomplices as possible so that the “consensus” of opinion is that “all these people can’t be wrong.” The sheer numbers of supporters that a psychopath can sometimes recruit is unbelievable. The “gang mentality” takes over sometimes, and the poor legitimate victim is victimized again by having their reputation besmirched. Sometimes they lose their livelihoods, as well as their self-esteem and self-confidence.
Our reputation is important to most of us, and our self-confidence is also important to us, and the strength of an attack from not only the psychopathic adversary, but their dupes and accomplices as well, can destroy that reputation and self-confidence. Sometimes it destroys lives.
In order to survive this attack, we must first understand that “might (and numbers) does not make right.” We must also understand that we can validate the truth, and that our own validation of that truth may be the only validation that we can obtain. We may not be able to convince “others” that we were not the abuser; we may not be able to publicly verify that we were the one who suffered unjustly. We may not be able to prove in a court of law that we were the victims of a psychopath. We may have to raise our heads and to walk away from the situation, emotionally wounded and bleeding, while we see our abuser “skip off merrily into the sunset,” apparently none the worse for wear.
Life isn’t always “fair” and many times those who most deserve justice seem to get the least of it, but we can achieve closure within ourselves. We can find validation of our own personal truths, and no matter what the “vote” is, it doesn’t change that truth. It can be enough to sustain us.
Thanks again for a great message. It is easy when we are not with the sociopath to tell everyone he is the crazy one, but we all know we look like the crazy one to everyone else. After all it was us that stayed with them as long as we did. So I get my validation here on this web site that I do not stand alone. Thanks for reminding us that what is important is the truth within us, and not the truth people think they see in the sociopaths face. I look in my ex’s face and I see nothing, a deep blankness. All of his pictures have the same blank face as well.
ps
Why did we need Columbus to tell us the earth was flat?
Almost 3500 years ago Job stated in chapter 26 verse 7 that the earth hangs upon nothing.
and – The prophet Isaiah wrote in chapter 40 verse 22 about the “circle of the earth”. duh!
Dear SueK,
The powers that were at that time talked about the Bible talking about the “four corners of the earth” as proving the earth was flat. –DUH? LOL
No, sue you are NOT alone. And that validation is good, but the internal validation is I think the most important. Learning to VALIDATE OURSELVES. It was/is difficult for me and I do appreciate the external validation, but that INTERNAL is what I am working on.
Glad you are here! (((hugs)))
(((hugs))) back
4 corners= N.S.E.W. maybe and who actually knows??? Not me.
But thanks for all you do
I’ve been a victim of this kind of thing a lot of times. The worst part for a mature, empathetic human being is, you start to believe there’s something wrong with you, yourself. It goes to the heart of what a psychologically healthy, growing person does: They take criticism, adjust, improve. In that context, this can be the worst kind of gaslighting.
I remember this happening to me in my church, where somebody spread the rumor that I was “harsh.” I had confronted a few people, yes. I was defending an unpopular point of view, that’s true. But “harsh”? I never quite traced it, but I have reason to believe it came from one woman who once even called me up on the telephone to tell me that everyone at a certain church meeting had just called her for help — that I had been “disruptive” at that meeting! And by the way, she read a letter I wrote and said I was a poor writer.
This went on and on, until she told me I had to apologize to a very young woman, still in college, whose self-esteem had really suffered from a remark I had just made. I actually apologized publicly, in a circle of people, immediately. The girl looked confused. She hadn’t been insulted at all; in fact, she hadn’t heard my joke. I told her what I had said, and she said it didn’t bother her. My tormenter looked like she was about to die — good! I walked away, followed by the pastor’s wife, who gave me a hug, telling me that was awfully big of me. I was speechless.
I guess I scored. But it’s weird. Over the years I kept hearing that I had some kind of problem with this very popular girl, the college student, when I remember no tension between us at all. Up on the bulletin board there was tacked a photo of our first meeting, where we are sitting at a table, she is playing the guitar, and I look like I’m glowering at her. Actually, I’m just looking down, at the guitar. It’s like some kind of engineered impression.
Somebody with mainstream psychological therapy training might say I’m in denial. I just don’t see how I come off to other people. Because obviously, so many people see this problem, but I don’t.
I left the church long ago, but I have good relations with most of my old friends there — except when I say something about what a strange vibe there was, ostracizing, toxic. They don’t want to admit how they participated in that.
My experience has been that most do not believe that the sociopath is really a sociopath – something I cannot entirely fault them for, because I have been there too with him…loving, forgiving, enabling, and just BELIEVING. Or, they know “something is wrong”, and even verbalize it on ocasion, but never actually do anything about it out of love, fear, shame, or because the sociopath is just that darned good at pulling people back into his web. And sometimes it is just for the sake of a quiet life. It irks me though that for the sake of this quiet life, family and friends are willing not only to IGNORE what he does when it hurts the children, but also continue to OUTWARDLY support his choices in the community, for the sake of appearances, while decrying his actions in private, again, even when those actions hurt the children. Easter Sunday is a huge deal in my ex sociopath’s family, and not one of them sent a card, emailed, or phoned to wish the kids a Happy Easter. By contrast, we sent out a video early this morning, along with pics of the Easter Egg hunt, and well wishes to all. In previous years, the children would have received eggs, gifts, clothes, and it would not have been unusual for the dollar amount spent to exceed $100 per child. I always thought this was grossly excessive, but how do you reconcile this decision to exclude them now? Suppose it is because I “took them away” – although I did so with his family’s support, despite their sadness…because they knew it was necessary, for me and for the children, because they do KNOW what he is…just do not understand at all. Sometimes think they are all sociopaths together.
and it does hurt – like being victimized over and over and over again. Really want to cut ties with them, but trying so hard to “understand”, and “see the good”, and “do right by the children”, and “recognize that they are in a terrible position” – it’s starting to feel like my marriage is just continuing…except with them. And how on earth do they come to terms with the negative fallout he has caused in term of their own relationships with his children? And continue to support him? And you know, intellectually, it is easy to understand that just because they all act this way doesn’t mean it is right, but for those of us who still harbour those doubts about it all – doubts about the sociopath, doubts about ourselves, doubts cultivated over a long-term relationshit, and designed to keep us perpetually off-balance, it sometimes still feels like “crazy-making”. I know we have to accept “what is”, and do our best to walk away, and it is better now, but EVERY TIME there is a day like today, it is RIGHT back to square one – at least for a few hours until I can shake it off. And what are you supposed to say to the children? Nothing? Ended up light-heartedly asking if they wanted to make nay Easter calls, and hated myself for doing it because it feels like it’s teaching them to put up with this, and to excuse it. But they didn’t – though you know, part of them did. So tired.
Going,
I hear you. How can we continue to have normal relationshits with people who, though not spaths, are toxic? Will we get slimed? Will children learn to enable?
That’s the most important question, I think, what does it teach our kids? How do we model the best behavior, for them and for ourselves?
Thanks Skylar, I just don’t know. Sometimes it feels like I have to quash my own instincts so as to not pass on my “pleaser” behaviour. But that just feels rude. Unnecessairly. Though I DO follow the rule with my ex – who I believe, in my less uncertain moments, to be a bonafide sp, as opposed to “just” toxic, and work hard to extinguish that knee-jerk politeness, because it invites conversation and makes him think that “all is just fine” with his behaviour, which in turn makes him think “he can push open the door a little bit more, to take further advantage”. But yeah, just simply don’t know with the rest of them. Hopefully we get it right, more often than we get it wrong. Fingers crossed.
Dear Going through the motions,
It is very unfortunate but too many times the “family relationshits” are just more SUPERFICIAL than we would like to think they are…and I have come to realize that and I know you must want for your children to have “good relationships” with family members, aunts, uncles and cousins, but it must be two-sided so the thing can be a “teaching” point for your kids that just because they want a relationship with someone that it isn’t necessarily mutual but it does not mean that it is anything “wrong” with your kids.
Even as old as I am I wanted relationships with relatives (I don’t have any full sibs and don’t have relationships with the half sibs I have) but do have some cousins I had relationships with and wanted to keep them going as adults…but other than just very superficial relationships I finally got the idea that my cousins don’t care about a relationship with me….and I have NC’d my youngest and oldest BIO sons, one a P, the other just a jerk, NC’d my egg donor, my step father is dead, my husband is dead, and so my “family” consists of my adopted son and my friends and some distant cousins of my P sperm donor that do love me.
You know you just have to accept that not everyone who is blood related to your kids are going to care diddly about your children….and it is disappointing for the kids as well, but I think you handled it very well asking your kids if THEY wanted to make any calls, and if they didn’t, then I wouldn’t push them to do so. You sound like a very wise parent! Good for you!
Ox Drover,
I keep wondering if my should encourage my children to have a relationship with my narc mother, who last year said she never wanted to hear from me ever again.
In a quandry.
🙁
SK – i know you addressed your post to oxy, so i hope you don’t mind if i chime in with an unqualified: NO!