By Ox Drover
One of the themes that seems to run throughout the stories of many of, if not most of, the people who have had experiences with psychopaths is that we have either had repeated episodes of being abused by the same psychopath, even after we saw their dishonesty, or had episodes of being sucked into the webs of multiple psychopaths. Or, we have both of these—multiple episodes with multiple psychopaths.
Most of the people I have known who were formerly victims of psychopaths are not stupid. In fact, some of the smartest, most accomplished people I know are former victims, and have been repeatedly victimized by one psychopath after finding out that this person was dishonest and abusive. Somehow, they kept on going back to the relationship, even after multiple attempts to disengage from the abuser. Why? Why does a person who is smart, accomplished, and otherwise successful in life and business keep repeating the same behavior that allows them to be hurt?
There is an often-used quote, “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.” It seems by this definition that the victims of psychopaths are “insane,” because we keep on trying to have a relationship with someone who is repeatedly abusive. There must be some reason that otherwise smart and successful people keep repeating the behavior that is unsuccessful in its outcome. There must be some common thread among victims and former victims that makes us susceptible to frequently returning to an unsuccessful and painful relationship.
Here’s a little story that may contain what may be a grain of truth that might point us toward the answer to the question of. “Why?”
The Chief and the Snake
Once upon a time there was a very wise and kind Indian chief. One day as the chief was walking through the forest, he came upon a rattlesnake in the path. He stopped and started to go around the snake, not wanting to hurt it, but not wanting to be bitten either.
As the chief started to pass around the snake, the snake spoke to him (not an unusual thing in those days) and said, “Chief, please have mercy on me, my wife and family are on the other side of yonder river, and I can’t swim, and I can’t get to them. Won’t you please pick me up and carry me across the river?”
The chief looked at the snake and laughed a bit and said, “Why, if I tried to pick you up you would bite me and I would die. I am sad that you have a problem but I must not be bitten, or I would die and my own children would starve because there would be no strong man with a bow to hunt brother deer to provide meat to my little ones. Though my heart feels sad for you, no, I must refuse to pick you up.”
The snake then spoke to the chief saying, “But such a brave man as you should not be afraid of such a small snake as I, and I promise from the bottom of my heart that I would never harm you if you were to help me across yon river. I am so afraid that if I am not able to get across, my wife and children will perish. Please help me in my hour of need.”
The chief looked at the snake and his heart was sad because he knew what it was like to have one’s children without food. His heart took pity on the snake, and he agreed to take the snake across the river, if the snake would agree not to bite him.
The chief reached out to pick up the snake and held him high over his head as he waded the swift and cold waters of the river. About half way across the river when the chief was doing his best to protect the snake from the cold waters, the snake reached down and bit him on the neck, sinking his poison fangs deep into the chief’s blood stream.
The chief was surprised and said to the snake, “Brother Snake, why did you bite me, now I will die and you will drown as well. You promised on your honor not to bite me if I would have mercy on you and help you, now we shall both die and our children starve. You promised me.”
The snake replied, “Ah yes, I promised, but you knew what I was when you picked me up,” as they both sank under the swirling cold water of the river.
What we have in common with the chief
What caused the chief to reach out and pick up a snake that he knew was poisonous, that he knew had the power to harm him, and that if he was wrong in making this decision to pick up the snake, and the snake did bite him, that his own children would suffer because of his decision?
Empathy is what the chief had, empathy for the children of the snake. Because the chief loved his own children, he assumed that the snake must also love its children. Just as the chief would do what was best for his children, he empathized that the snake would also do what was best. Since the chief knew that he would never do anything deliberately to cause consequences for his children, he did not see that the snake would deliberately do something that would cause problems for his own offspring.
Thinking that others have the same motivations that we have can get us into the same problems that the chief got into. The chief wanted to help the snake. He felt pity for the snake. He knew that he would not want someone to refuse to help him if it meant that he would die and his children would go hungry, so it never dawned on him that the snake would be willing to make a decision to do a deed that would insure that the snake-children would go hungry.
The chief’s empathy and his thinking that others had the same empathy, the same motivation for their behavior, and no reason to hurt another, even at the cost of hurting themselves or their near and dear, caused him to want to believe the snake’s promise not to bite.
The snake, however, was right. The chief knew what he was when he picked him up. When we allow ourselves to believe the promises of people who have proven that they are dishonest, we open ourselves to be repeatedly injured or even killed. When someone shows you what they are, believe your eyes. Believe what you see, not what you hear.
No Contact
“No contact” is the commonly accepted “treatment” for any abusive relationship. This means that only contact that is required by law (such as meeting that person in a courtroom due to a law uit) or the minimum amount of contact required by law to co-parent with such a person, is the only interaction between you and your former abuser. No contact allows the injuries to cease, and keeps you safe from new and repeated injuries from the abuser.
“No contact” also includes not stalking the person’s Facebook page or other social media. It means blocking or deleting any text messages, phone calls, e-mails or any other form of communication, including having others tell you what the former abuser is “up to.” Refusing to engage in tale carrying, gossip, or drama involved with the former abuser is also essential. If you must speak about the relationship, do it ONLY with a trusted friend or family member who sees that the relationship was/is abusive, and with assurances that the person will keep your information in absolute confidence. This process can be likened to “not renting them space in your head,” which includes wondering if they have a new relationship, and if they are making this new person happy o,r if they will change for this new person, or wondering if you were wrong about what they are.
You know what they are now, so don’t pick them up. NO CONTACT WORKS.
Dear Petite,
I know your do “not want to be ugly”—but the thing is that being “polite” and “civil” to a psychopath is a LOST CAUSE…..just giving them the potted plant or gray rock treatment (either pretending you don’t even notice them or just booooooore them.) is the only way we can handle it. We do not have to be “warm and nice” to them.
Remember how you used to worry about K? Well….if you saw him now at a meeting you would just keep on walking and if you HAD TO you might nod in his direction but you would NOT STOP AND CHAT LIKE NOTHING WAS WRONG…..the same thing with B….you must just essentially pretend he does not exist or is not important to you….just another part of the decoration of the hotel lobby where you run into him….Or if he speaks to you in front of others, just say, “Oh, excuse me, I forgot my _____ and I must return to my room” Or some other such excuse and then leave and collect yourself before you go back where you might run into him. If he catches you alone, you simply say,, “B. I do not care to speak to you, please leave me alone.” then turn and walk away. You do not have to keep up a PRETENSE THAT NOTHING HAPPENED IN THE PAST….
I am the QUEEN of “let’s pretend none of this happened” (whatever happened!) and acting like someone who had grossly abused or used me had never done it and would never do it again. FOLKS, THAT IS INSANITY TO PRETEND THAT!!!!!
It is like Let’s say for example, that I got mad at you and burned your house down. Poured gasoline on it and torched it because I was mad at you.
Then later, I said to you “Well, I’m sorry I burned down your house, but YOU MADE ME MAD. But now I said ‘I’m sorry’, so let’s not ever mention it again.”
Would that be an appropriate way to handle it? OF COURSE NOT. Yet the psychopaths in our lives expect us to do just that PRETEND THAT NONE OF THIS HAPPENED….pretend that they are honorable and good people when we KNOW THEY ARE NOT.
Well, folks, I am NO LONGER WILLING TO PLAY PRETEND. When I was five years old it was fun to dress up in my egg donor’s cast off high heel shoes and play “pretend.” But I am a big girl now and I am no longer willing to play “pretend the bad guy has a good heart and good motives and never did anything horrible.”
I’m going to “play REALITY” and just keep on walking by them to show them (for what that’s worth) that even though I am thrown by circumstance into the same geographical spot on the earth that they are, and I can’t, for whatever reason, avoid it, I am NOT going to pretend they are my friend. I won’t make a scene if I can avoid it, but I will walk away.
I have the RIGHT NOT TO INTERACT WITH PEOPLE I DON’T CARE TO INTERACT WITH….even if others don’t understand that, it is MY RIGHT AND I WILL ENFORCE IT.
Petite, I know that “being polite” is part and parcel of your culture and your customs as well as your individual self, but there comes a time, my dear dear friend, when “polite at all costs” is abuse of SELF. I spent a great portion of my life trying to “keep the peace” and “be polite” and “not make a scene” like if I did one of those things and offended a psychopath, the PROBLEM WAS ME, NOT THEM….and I realize now, that is NOT TRUE. I think you also need to realize the same thing. If you “snub” a psychopath and they get offended, YOU have not caused the problem…THEY HAVE caused it by being what they are. (((hugs)))
Dear agreenbean –
While I agree with the idea of publicly exposing the N/P/S. I find it a very entertaining thought, in fact.
Unfortunately, I’m afraid that it would backfire. I’ve been reading that many of these folks are quite adept at “playing the system”. I can hear the outcries of the unfairness of it all, and how they were so badly misrepresented. etc etc. Then, of course all about how THEY are the victims… omg the possibilities are endless.
oh its intriguing indeed but yes it would likely not end well at all, i’d not want it done to me, so….
Hope and Bean,
There WAS a website, something called something like “girlfrienddon’tdatehim”. I did some sort of google search and found a reference to the web site but it looks like it’s long gone.
So my guess somebody did try it at some point.
Donna is pretty clear at identifying HER sociopath (Montgomery) yet the rest of us protect ours. Why?
I’m not necessarily advocating a point of view, I’m just thinking out loud.
Superkid.
Hope2heal,
Naming names here on LF IS DONE if the person has either been convicted or arrested or charged, etc. or is “public property”, but Donna does not allow people to come here and say “John Smith is a psychopath! I hate him” unless there is PROOF that John Smith is in deed a psychopath or criminal! So it is a self protective mechanism for Donna and LF—that is why there are so many “true love fraud stories” here (look under the category)
I NO LONGER PROTECT MY P SON or shield his name, but have chosen here on LF to post under “Ox Drover” rather than my own name for several reasons, but it is NOT to protect my P son.
I kept my son’s being in prison and his crimes “secret” from my friends and the community and my extended family because that was how I was raised to behave….keep the family dirt SECRET. It was a “shame” directed at myself if that kind of information got outside of the immediate household. I no longer operate under that kind of thinking.
As far as “outing” them….I tried to out my egg donor and that did backfire on me, she is GOOD at her “masked” self in the community and protecting herself from being recognized as the liar that she really is, the manipulator and the enabler that she is. She plays the Pity Ploy well.
I no longer care though….and realize that it really doesn’t matter what others think as Long as I am comfortable with myself…let others think she is wonderful (shoulders shrugging here) what skin is it off my nose…they are the ones that are deceived not me. My truth is my truth, and I am the only one who determines that, not them. I determine my truth and I validate my truth.
When Columbus was the only one in the world who thought the world was round, it did not change the shape of the world. Democracy may rule, but voting on something doesn’t change the truth of it, only the popularity of an idea.
yup, it was called “don’t date him girl”!
there was a slander lawsuit or something of the like over it, perhaps it no longer exists?
i have no desire to publicly out my spath, humiliate him or do anything malicious. the people around me know, and it turns out they all had suspicions anyway. i don’t want to open myself up for any more attacks from him, since all the previous were unprovoked, i can only imagine what he’d do if he felt i slighted him intentionally!
nope, just not worth it. that being said, i AM fascinated by the idea of how similiarly some spaths may look/represent themselves, thats why i think it would be really intesteresting to see other poster’s. but thats my own curious point of view i’m sure not all share.
So, regarding no contact…..I have been very strong to not contact my ex spath. But he continues to try and call and sends many text messages. Finally on Saturday, I emailed him a very straightforward note saying not to contact me any more in any way, shape or form. I said that I was not trying to be mean spirited, but for my own mental health, I needed NO COMMUNICATION. I thought it worked. Until today. The text messages started again. Him saying that we will never lose communication and to tell my boyfriend that!! By the way, I don’t have a boyfriend….this is something he has fabricated in his own head, that I must have broken up with him to be with someone else, like I am not independent enough to be alone. He also said I should never threaten him again. I absolutely never threatened him. I think he must have been just trying to get me fired up so that I would reply. I will not reply. EVER. I will, however, keep track of all of his messages and calls, and file harassment charges if he continues. I’m sorry if this is boring to you, it’s just the only web site that I have found that there are actually people who understand what I am going through. I just want it to be overwith so that I can move forward, and get that boyfriend that truly does love me, with no strings attached!!! It’s been almost a month since I broke it off with him, and we were only together 6 months!! I just hope the anger doesn’t set in. I don’t want him showing up at my doorstep!
toogood,
he will show up. they always do.
just be ready with a surveilance camera so you can record the drama. It will be priceless.
Don’t engage him, just let him do all the acting. That’s all it is – acting.
Oh!! I didn’t think about that! I don’t have a surveilance camera. Would it be too obvious if I just took my camera out and openly video taped him?? Yes, I know it is all acting. Would be quite entertaining. I won’t let him into my apartment. I could just stand on my balcony and video tape him begging to come in…
Hey Ox Drover-
My BM found out I’m pregnant and is flaring up at the moment. My psychologist wants me to call the cops and start getting something put into play so she knows her limits. ..but I’m afraid it’s just going to get her onto my trail even more. . . .any advice or good books you recommend? I want to put all of this behind me swiftly, but need some direction. We have hired a lawyer to help us with some stuff. . . .will be seeing him in a few days and want to know good questions to ask etc. . . Thank you!!!