Saturday night, the Lovefraud reader “rriinnaa” posted the following under Heeding the Exploiter’s Earliest Warning:
I cant stop crying .. and I dont know what Im crying over ! Im crying over the happy-go-lucky joyful loving warm Rina.. the woman I once was .. THAT I POSSIBLY won’t be again ”¦. i want to be held and rocked until this pain goes away, but i have to work, i have to pay bills,i have to bring up my children ”¦ all the PROMISES HE MADE TO ME, “when you cry Rina, I will cry with you” ”¦.. “I would die for you Rina—¦. “such simple things make you happy Rina”.. “Rina, you are the light in my life—¦ “Rina, you are strong and I believe in you” .. AND AND AND AND AND AND AND .. oh my god AND I BELIEVED EVERYTHING HE EVER SAID TO ME”¦ I believed him .. he hated me because I was strong and he did everything in his power to crush that.. he didnt have that sense of fun, that wacky sense of humour, that friendliness that everyone fell in love with THAT WAS ME, THAT WAS THE GIRL HE MET”¦. and I have lost that girl i once was.. i want it back, i want to live and laugh and be happy .. he has turned me into his apprentice monster ”¦ oh my god !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
TELL ME THERE IS KARMA.. TELL ME HE WILL HURT ONE DAY PLEASE TELL ME THAT HE FEELS .. yeah right ”¦”¦”¦I still can’t get it in my head THAT HE IS A SICK SOCIOPATH.. I STILL CANT BELIEVE I FELL IN LOVE WITH THAT THING ! IM GOING CRAZY .. i cant get my head around it .. i saw a psychologist.. it was the worst thing i could have done last week ..IS THERE A GROUP MEETING WHERE I CAN TALK TO REAL PEOPLE IN MELBOURNE ABOUT THIS MONSTER ????? can someone guide me to somewhere, someone that understands what I am going through ????????????????????
i am sorry”¦ i am ranting”¦. maybe i have finally gone over the edge ? nooooooo NO NO .. i never will. I will find the strength.. .again .. im up and down and my kids are suffering.. as much as I try to hide it ”¦”¦. they feel it, they see it and I HATE HIM FOR DOING THIS TO ME I HATE HIM ..
I remember feeling like this. In fact, when I read Rina’s message, I got that old tightening in my chest, that inability to breathe, that constantly-on-the-verge-of-tears feeling again.
I remember the rage, the hatred, the utter despair.
They’re normal reactions to the betrayal of a sociopath.
Why it’s so bad
We’ve all had romantic relationships end before. Why the end of a relationship with a sociopath so much worse?
First of all, the scale of the deception is beyond what most of us have ever experienced. These people don’t just lie about where they were last night. Their entire lives are lies—everything they ever did, every human relationship they ever had. In my case, as I started to unravel what was really going on, each day brought another fabrication, another betrayal. Recently, nine years after I left my sociopathic ex-husband, I discovered yet another lie. It never ends.
Then, the degree to which we were used is unbelievable. My ex-husband wanted a place to live, reliable sex and someone to finance his dreams of grandeur. All his love notes, his little gifts, and his forever promises, were designed to make me provide those things. It worked. Then, two and a half years later when I was used up, he moved on.
But perhaps the biggest reason why it’s so bad is because sociopaths steal our dreams and use them against us. In those heady early days of the relationship, as the sociopaths listen intently, we’re spilling our guts, telling them what we really want, what is really important to us, what we want out of life. We think they’re listening because they truly want everything that we want. In reality, they’re listening to discover the deepest places within us where they can set their hooks.
Sooner or later, it all collapses.
At that point, we lose our trust—trust in other people, trust in ourselves, trust if life itself. And as Karin Huffer writes in the Legal Abuse Syndrome, “the most profound loss is loss of trust.”
Dealing with the pain
We’re left with the emotional wreckage—along with very real problems like physical illness and injury, financial devastation, caring for children and legal issues. And all of it was caused by someone who supposedly loved us. What do we do?
The only way out of the pain is through it.
People often call and ask me how to cope. I suggest that you hold yourself together while dealing with the practical, financial and legal issues. Somehow, you have to keep your emotions in check so you can think and make decisions.
But after those concerns are handled, and you are alone, let it rip. Allow yourself to cry, yell and curse. Get physical—stomp your feet or twist towels. My personal favorite was envisioning my ex-husband’s face on a pillow, and punching the crap out of it. (For more information, read Releasing the pain inflicted by a sociopath.)
Why do we need to do this? Because emotions are physical. They are not intellectual concepts that will dissipate upon discussion. They are physical sensations, and must be dealt with physically. The tears, yelling and punching are the means by which the emotional pain is drained from the body.
What you’ll find is that there are layers and layers of pain—you’ll release some, and more will rise to the surface. So you do the exercise again. And again. And again.
Older, deeper pains
Then what you’ll find is that older pains—injuries not inflicted by the sociopath—will also rise to the surface. Perhaps they were injuries from your family of origin, or other relationships, or profound disappointments in your life.
When you find these pains, you have struck gold. These are the pains that made you vulnerable to the sociopath in the first place. They too, must be released. When they are no longer buried within you, you will be able to move into a new life of peace, contentment and happiness.
It’s hard to believe this when you are in the midst of the trauma. But it is true—you can pass through the pain and come out the other side. The process is not pretty. A therapist, if you can find one who gets it, may be able to guide you, but you alone must do the work. And it will take time.
Many of us on Lovefraud have talked about how we’ve become stronger, wiser individuals after our run-ins with the sociopaths. This is how it happens. We persevere through the pain, and then we are set free.
icansee and polly: shrimp shells for revenge moves like EB and Henry – using shrimp shells to invade home and car of spaths.
and icansee – i’ll send you the spath’s mailing address for the shrimp shells.
EB – all the fish are in a come here – and no respectable shrimp would be caught this far north even in the middle of summer.
think the safe little get backs are funny as hell. – i don’t have a problem with it.
to me it isn’t about the spath, it would be about ME. and i don’t think it would turn me into someone attached to revenge. actually – i think it uses less energy to do something safe then to spend all my time talking myself out of it…. every fricken day. just my opinion.
but, safety first. THAT is one conversation i have been having with myslef and i DO see a change in my understanding of protecting myself and putting my safety and stability first, before my need to do things due to anxiety, and before my desrie to protect others who will be equally duped when they find out who she really is.
EB – that should have been ‘all the fish are in a coma’
wanttomoveon, you wrote,
“Concept of forgiving is so bizzare and foreign to me as I have no clue how you do that when spath is impacting your life everyday. I do want to do that as I know anger and rage are killing me and making me miserable while he is living the life and even to the kids you look like a mean angry person.”
Honey, forgiving is not what you should be worried about right now. You don’t need to be making yourself even more stressed by giving yourself a hard time about not being zen about this jerk.
Your anger is righteous and reasonable. So, the question is, how can you channel it into productive output? Right now, he’s making you feel beleaguered. If you think about it, that’s really what’s making you crazy. feeling like a victim. I know you could give me 45 reasons right now, all true, why you are a victim. But the reality is also that you’ve got jerk on your hands, and this is your live. The more important question is what are you going to do about it?
So what are you going to do about it? Not about him. About your life.
I’m not trying to give you a hard time, or give you something else to worry about. I’m trying to shift your mind to a different position. And in doing so, shift your brain chemistry.
You’re in the process of getting this character out of your life. I’m not sure how clear that is to you right now. Because he’s taking up so much real estate in your head. It almost sounds like you’re trying to talk yourself into something. Or waiting for someone else to say something so clear and incisive that it will just snap all those jumping-bean thoughts into a perfect order that will show you something like truth. Or give you some clarity about the way to proceed.
I suspect that the clarity is already there. But you’re not quite certain about buying it, about this being your story. So maybe it would help if someone else feeds it back to you. And you see what you think. Here goes.
This man is no one’s friend but his own. You cannot depend on him for what he promises, nor for any common thoughtfulness about what you might need. The only way you’r ever going to get anything out of him is by exertion of some kind of force. probably legal. (Don’t worry about whether he’s got it to give. This is not about him. This is about your life and what you’ve got to work with.)
So, is all this relatively accurate in broad strokes? So just to play around with the story line, let’s just kill him off or have him disappear in a puff of smoke. What would that mean? How would your life be better and how would it be worse?
AS I write that, I can almost feel the “ouch” on your end. Am I imagining it or is this story hitting some big point of resistance. And no, this is not about your kids or any other hook he’s got in your life. This is whether you can take him off all the lists where he still exists in your life — as a person you care about, as a resource, as someone you can depend on for any kind of support or understanding, as someone you trust, as someone you even like. The only list he’s still on is the one for sneaky, conniving snakes that you have to outwit to get what he owes you. And that list comes with a built-in calculator to advise you when what you get out of him ceases to cancel out the annoyance tax of dealing with him.
If you’re going, no, no, no, you don’t understand. I have to depend on him; I can’t even think right now of what it would mean if he disappeared in a puff of smoke, well, at least you have a handle on what bit of reality you’re resisting.
But you’re working on it. You’re laying out the evidence for what an irresponsible and undependendable jerk he is. How your efforts to get him to man up have been like talking to a four-year-old who’s skipping around with his hands over his ears, singing “Lalala, I can’t hear you.” And how you not only have to be responsible for everything, but you have to clean up after him too, and on top of everything you have the added burden of dealing with feeling emotionally whacked everytime he disappoints you.
So here’s some good new for you. The first thing that’s going to go is the last item on that list. You’re going to get a solid and permanent grip on what a loser he is, and you’re not going to be arguing with him, yourself or God. That knowledge is going to stand alone, like a neon cactus in the desert, without any other thoughts about what it might mean to other issues in your life. It’s just fact with it’s own weight that, in its fact-ness, has nothing to do with you.
And when you’ve had a chance to let this sink in, you’re goint look in the mirror one days and say to yourself, “This is my life. My life. And of course, I love the kids and I’m going to do my best to take care of them. But first I have to take care of me, or I’m not going to have anything to give.” And then you’re going to start planning, researching, talking to people who can help, and taking your life back.
The peole who depend on you may have to adjust their expectations to conform with the new reality. Your daughter may have to drop out for a semester and get a job to earn her own tuition. You younger kids may have to be convinced that you’re living in a kind of live Monopoly game now, and sometimes there’s money and sometimes there’s not, and sometimes there’s funny money like foodstamps. But this is all about building a better life, based on reality, for you and them.
And he doesn’t even come into it, except for your private battles with him to get whatever the courts says he owes you. This is not about him. You can get better advice on how to refer to him with the kids from someone else. But I do know that kids, even when they’re older, need for their own emotional security to feel like their parent isn’t falling apart, so you might want to find some private time to kick things around and play darts with a phtograph of him and try to put on a calmer front for them.
I don’t know what your status is with him now. If you are looking at any kind of legal issues, we have two wonderful resources here. Matt, our super-smart and generous attorney-survivor of a relationship with a sociopath. And ErinBrock, our house warrior-goddess of the courtroom, who has repeatedly disproven the idea that you can’t win in court against a sociopath and is glad to tell you what she’s learned, so you can do it too.
I don’t know what you think of all this. I hope more than anything that I’m helping to move you mind a little to a more focussed kind of anger. You’re ramping up the fight and I’m really not trying to rush you out of that beleaguered feeling. But I know how it feels. And I know how much better you’re going to feel, when you get clear about him and start taking care of yourself. But maybe not. Maybe you recognizing the load you’ve been carrying and what a strong and tough woman you are.
What I’m trying to say, is you’re doing great, as hard as it seems right now. It’s going to get easier. And you have a much better life ahead of you. Time and the healing porcoess are on your side.
Kathy
wanttomoveon:
If he is still getting credit and has no discernible means of income, I would be concerned that he is using somebody elses identity to get credit — ie you. If he has had access to your bank accounts, social security number or other information this is a big concern. If you haven’t done so, pull your credit reports from all 3 creditreporting agencies immediataely. Then I would put a security lockdown on all 3 reporting agencies so they cannot give out your information without you providing written notice and your password. Note this is not the same thing as a credit warning or fraud alert. The agencies can still give out the information with those. More to the point, it has been conclusively proven that the fraud alerts do not work. So, put everything on a lockdown. If you find that he has gotten you entangled on this lease or anything else you didn’t authorize, go and report him to the police immediately for identity theft.
With respect to him getting sent to prison for credit card nonpayment, that doesn’t happen unless the issuers prosecute him for fraud. Most times they sue in civil court for nonpayment.
Matt, I was thinking the same thing: stolen identity. If his credit were good, and he was running up the credit cards, he would probably be getting ready to file bankruptcy.
Thanks Matt and Stargazer. I just did a refi and had no issues so I think I am clear but will do lockdown. I have a fraud alert but as he gets desparate not sure what he will do. Unfortunately I can’t find out any info on the car due to laws where I live so no clue to how he has managed that. He truly is a mystry and able to con many people over the years and get away. I go crazy trying to figure things out but find very difficult even to prove things to the court. I have a court date soon and I am hoping to put and end to this mess but knowing this spath he may just find one more excuse and waste my time and money and delay things. Everyone makes money on your misery and you continue to suffer from the mess created by the spaths while they go on living as their “normal” lives.
Dear wantomoveon:
When I was no contact with the sociopath, I got over being angry at him. But the one thing that could bring it back was seeing or hearing how he was conning someone else. That’s why no-contact is so powerful. Out of sight, out of mind. You may as well assume he’s conning someone when he’s done conning you. He will just move on to the next one because that’s what they do. Just like a scorpion stings and a snake bites. (And I happen to love snakes. LOL) When you are farther along in your healing, it won’t matter so much to hear what he’s doing. But until then, you will keep getting triggered every time his name gets mentioned.
In an effort to go no-contact with mine, I actually left my favorite website for a long time (with intent never to return) because he was still posting there. And I broke off contact with every person who was in friendly communication with him. It worked. Those of us who were conned by sociopaths need to learn how to set boundaries. Consider this your first lesson in boundary-setting. 🙂
Kathleen
I am so glad I am on this site having such wonderful support from so many caring people trying to help each other. I go back and forth about wanting him back and very happy about him out of my house. He has poked so much at my soul that I know I was the support for this family and he was the loser at times I question being able to do things myself. I have been really good at being strong but lately soon losing the job, court battles, having to pay him alimony while he screws around brings out so much rage. I want to shake him up or as you wish he was gone in a poof as if he wasn’t around things will be so much easeir. He is extremely vendictive and gets his kicks from being vendictive so as long as he is alive he continues to stir up some mess. I hate him for wiping out so much money and creating debt and never even think of the kids. I come from a culture where you support your kids education and pay for their weddings and I worked to make it a reality and this low life took it all away. I know the court battles have taken it’s toll and having to waste more and more money to end this battle makes things harder. Eventhough it’s not a reality, I dream of him gone and feel the peace inside.
I appreciate your advise and I will read it few more times to get it through my head. I like your point about adding additional stress of forgiving as I do force myself to feel that but may be i need to just deal with the step I am at. I am going to start reading the Gift of Betrayal and hoping that also helps me.
I knew he was a sociopath but until coming to this site I didn’t quiet know what that meant so I think some of the anger and pain is coming up as I am able to connect the dots of all he has done over the years and I am able to understand things that were such mystry to me about him.
Thanks again for taking so much time to give me help.
Polly:
” he has no house, no car of his own and no assetts at all. ”
I woke up this morning laughing to myself, I read this again last night…..the one sneaky thing he did…..and I had asked my first attorney about it……was steal all the art from my rental unit.
I asked the attorney if I should take it all out and store it…..he said NO! So I cooperated. (fired him later)
But….against court order, S removed all the art…..honestly, the majority was his prior to marriage, so not such a biggie….
BUT….this morning I thought …..how ironic was this…..
HE HAS NO HOME TO HANG it in!!!! He’s homeless and wandering from state to state, island to island…..
BUT HE HAS ALL THE ART!!!!!
(I got both homes)…..
This is where it was confirmed to me…..POSESSION IS 9/10th of the law!
🙂
Erin – that’s the tragic reality of it all isn’t it? The lack of logic – bet he was determined about it “I’ll be damned if she’s having the art” so he went after something petty and didn’t think about the consequences – nowhere to hang it. My ex had the audacity to demand that my lawyer list in the separation agreement that he had all rights over all scripts written during the together period.
My lawyer was like WTF? He said “Do you have contracts with producers for these projects or are any of them in film festival circuits?”
I said “No – most are shorts and nothing has been done with any of them. A few shorts were made but weren’t submitted to any festivals”
He raised his eyebrows and said “You know on these agreements items are generally only named if they are worth something financially.”
I said “I know but just put it there”
The irony of it was they were MINE. My thinking, my characters and scenarios and my work. It’s just so stupid though = here was me concerned about the concrete joint financial obligations and arrangements for the pets and here he is bargaining over bits of paper. He had his choice to take whatever he wanted and made out he was taking the high moral road (ha!) by leaving me with everything. More like he doesn’t want responsibility for anything. I can see him at age 50 with nothing at all to his name but debt.
Unless you’ve lived through it you would think we were making it up!