A Lovefraud reader asked me what I thought of advice offered on a website called “Womensdivorce.com.” In a post about relationships after divorce, the website says women should start dating as soon as possible. It also seems to advocate that women engage in brief sexual affairs, and find a transitional partner who can help a woman heal, but whom she shouldn’t marry.
Read Your first relationship after divorce, on Womensdivorce.com.
My reaction is that this advice may be okay for someone involved in one of those amicable divorces, where the partners simply grew apart, are still on speaking terms or even friends, and want what is best for their children. The advice is terrible for someone who has been heavily damaged by marriage to a sociopath.
People who have endured marriage to a sociopath need time—perhaps a lot of time—to rebuild themselves. Healing may have two distinct dimensions.
Recovering from the sociopathic relationship
First, you need to recover from the sociopathic relationship. The difficulty of the recovery depends on the psychological damage done.
I now know that I was relatively lucky in the type of predator that found me, although it sure didn’t seem that way at the time. My ex-husband, James Montgomery, only wanted my money. He lied to me, he used me, he betrayed me—but he didn’t try to destroy me. When my money was gone, he just abandoned me.
Many Lovefraud readers had experiences that were far worse than mine. Some of you endured physical and sexual violence, gaslighting, threats and brainwashing. Some of you continue to suffer because you have children with the sociopath, and your ex purposely tries to use the children to hurt you.
If you are raw from one of these extremely damaging relationships, the last thing you should do is try to find a new partner. Instead, you need to focus on personal healing.
The first step is to take care of yourself physically—eat well, find time for exercise, avoid drugs and alcohol, get enough sleep. You also need to rebuild emotionally. There are two different paths of emotional recovery. One is allowing yourself to grieve, and feel the anger and pain. The other is finding ways to bring joy into your life, however small. Nourishing encounters with friends and family whom you can trust will help.
You’ll find many articles to assist you in this section of the Lovefraud Blog: Healing from a sociopath.
People often ask, how long should it take to recover? There is no standard answer to this question. Recovery takes as long as it takes. But until you are feeling stronger and healthier, it is best not to get involved in another romance.
Here’s an important reason why: Sociopaths target vulnerable people. If you are not yet healed, you are vulnerable, and a prime target for another sociopath.
Recovering from deeper injury
Many Lovefraud readers, as you make your way through recovery, have realized that the marriage to a sociopath was not the first damaging relationship in your life. There was an older, deeper injury that made you susceptible to the sociopath in the first place.
Some of you recognize that a previous romantic relationship was exploitative. Some of you realize that one or both of your parents were disordered. For you, the games sociopaths play may have seemed normal, because that’s what you grew up with.
The pain caused by the most recent partner may cause you to realize that you have a long history of mistreatment. In fact, sometimes recognizing trauma in your past helps clear up one of the big mysteries of involvement with a sociopath. It answers the question, “Why did I allow this predator into my life?”
There may even be spiritual reasons for the dangerous encounter, which I talk about in my book, Love Fraud—How marriage to a sociopath fulfilled my spiritual plan. So before looking for love again, you need to recover from the sociopath, and you need to recover from any deeper traumas as well. Thankfully, you can do both at once. The process is the same as described above—slow physical and emotional healing.
So as you walk the road to recovery, be careful about listening to advice from others. As we well know, most people have no clue about what it’s like to be involved with a sociopath. They have not walked in your shoes, so however well meant, their suggestions may not be helpful or healthy for you.
skylar:
Thanks! I always knew I was different and this really helps me to know that there is actually a name for what I feel. I am extremely perceptive and intuitive…really almost like a sixth sense like this says. One of my friends told me years ago that she actually thought I was psychic and wondered if I should try to develop that ability, but I didn’t want to go there. Ten things can be going on in a room and I can be aware of everything. I guess that is why I have been so extremely upset over being taken by the X spath and the narcissistic liar in my office. It just goes to show how cunning they are because a whole lot normally does not get past me. UGGHHH. But at least I learned a lesson and won’t let it happen again.
Alina:
Wow, he thought he was God!
During our relationship he was the diva, he was the demanding one, he wanted me to buy him a digital camera ($1000) worth, he asked for a laptop, a dinning set, a recliner… always asking for crap, never buying anything, not even a valentine’s card for me…
By the way, i didnt buy him any of the things he asked for.
Alina,
Parasite is the best way to describe them, poisonous parasites. They refuse to take responsibility for anything. They don’t want to work and they want you to take the blame for everything. The word RESPONSIBILITY is anathema to them. Really, just try saying the word responsibility around one of them and you’ll see, they squirm and freak out.
Louise, I’m the same way. I would always see birds sitting perfectly still and camoflauged in the bushes, when not even my cats could see them. Spath noticed this. My eyes aren’t that good anymore, they are covered with floaters, but the amygdala picks up on things anyway. I somehow see things in my peripheral vision that others wouldn’t notice. The only time these abilities went away was when my doc put me on thyroid medication. It was frightening to be so unaware, I thought I would have a car accident, so I stopped taking them.
Alina:
What a bum a** jerk!!!! Count your blessings to be away from him!
skylar:
Responsibility. Yeah, it scares them. They don’t want it. My X spath told me he was unreliable. He knew. He didn’t want to have to take care of his kids…that’s why he has the wife around. I don’t think he would have any idea what to do with them. They are a little older (one is a tween and one is now a teenager) so they don’t need as much care now. And at work, even though he is an executive, it is obvious he tries to get by with as little effort as possible. Just enough effort so that he will still look good. He’s very smart so he knows how to do this.
I know it’s a good thing, but to me, I almost feel like it’s a curse to have these abilities. I also have a photographic memory and I do see that as a blessing and a curse.
Louise,
I’ve always felt it was a curse to be so sensitive too, but I’m reading up on it and you can turn it into a good thing. The key is to be really brave.
skylar:
Let’s be BRAVE and use this to our advantage! Yay!
Wow reading all these stories from everyone has really helped me. I didn’t even know what a sociopath was until a couple of months ago.
This is why my story is a lot different to the others I have read. Unlike other people, I never married (or was in a proper relationship) with my sociopath, and luckily did not have any kids with him.
I first met my sociopath in my teens. When I met him, to me it was lust at first sight. We kissed and he was completly charming and amazing. He was everything I wanted in a guy. It was like my perfect wish list in a partner had come along. He looked/acted and sounded all the right parts.
Pretty quickly things got sexual between us. I was mad about him so much, completly infatuated that I put up with the lies and the crap. He kept telling me he wasn’t ready for a relationship because he always “screws” them up, that he has an unhappy home life. Told me his mum is a psycho and he is always getting thrown out of home etc.. Of course I felt sorry for him and believed him so did not put any pressure on him to be with me fully.
I remember after this bumping into him in a bar and him all over this other girl, but of course I felt hurt, but I could not complain because we weren’t “together” it wasn’t my place. When I told him I was hurt, he told me I had no right to complain because we’re not even together.
A few weeks later he comes back begging over to me wanting to see me again. Of course he will meet up with me, get as much as he can sexually or emotionally out of me, then not call me for weeks. If I complain I haven’t heard from him, I am told I am too needy and whiny and I have to be more independent (I think I deserve a freaking phone call after a month!).
Anyway, he ended up getting a girlfriend (some commitment phobic hey?), and I was so devastated I couldn’t eat or sleep, I even failed a lot of my college exams because without him I felt like I was nothing. My friends got angry at me saying I had to move on and of course, I tried to meet different guys, but I just did not have that intense connection like I had with the sociopath. It was like I can’t do better when I have had the best.
The sociopath told lots of lies about me. I was gutted over what happened, so he told his girlfriend I was a stalker, that I was “obsessed” with him, that we only kissed once and ever since I have been hooked, that I won’t leave him alone. He told mutual friends this as well, and of course they believed him and it made me look bad.
Stupidly I got back with him after he finished with this girl. I waited months before sleeping with him because I was so nervous about getting hurt but he wanted a clean slate and promised to be good etc… It turned out the WHOLE time he had a pregnant girl living at his house with HIS kid. I only found out after the baby was born and I confronted him and he said it was the result of a one night stand.
He is the only guy I have ever slept with, and it turned out he has tried it on with a lot of my friends, he has slept with one of my friends (which he denied even though I had flat out evidence from reading emails)… he even gave me an STD, and when I told him the first thing he said was “have you told anyone?” Again I was so stupid I still stuck by him,
We had a row in the street and he violently shoved me into a wall. He smashed up my phone and my belongings. Then cried and told me he cared so much about me and that he would never leave me. I bought all of it and I feel so stupid now.
It turns out he has cheated on everyone. He dated another girl who it turned out he cheated on and used to bring girls back to HER apartment when she was out. She found out and kicked him out… now 5 minutes later he is with a new girl. And of course the new girl believes his lies, about how he is a victim of everyone and everything. (funny how nothing is ever his fault). A week after dating he is already saying he loves her.. even though 2 weeks before that he was crying about losing the “love of his life”
It has been 2 years since I have done anything with the sociopath. But it still hurts. I can hardly even look at a guy, and I have had to go on anti-depressants and have therapy. I feel suicidal most days. The messed up part is I feel like I still love him, even though I know what he is like.
I never got any closure and I never will. Even though the guy is a jerk and I can do better, he still would not commit to me, and to this day I feel like I have failed as a woman.
All I had to offer was sex and emotions. These other girls have money/social status/their own house etc… and that is why he is with them (I know that now). But I still feel repulsive and as if I am to be ashamed of.
Sorry for the long rant just thought I’d add my 2 cents.
crazy – that wasnt’ a long rant; you should see some of us when we get going! i don’t know if you have posted before, but welcome.
we talk about how hard it is to get closure with these buffoons. but i thinik it is possible. it’s called moving on, an dit takes understanding what the nature of their disorder is; the emoional, chemical reactions and processes involved in their hooking us; and regaining our self esteem. when our lives start to function better and we are not obsessing 24/7 about what they did to us we are healing and starting to move on.
it is not that easy to integrate the experience evil touching our lives. it takes time and knowledge to deal with this piece also.
you see his manipulation and lies – so you have a good start. you understand your relative ‘place’ amongst the woman he has conned. you are right – if you had had more of what he could abuse, he would have. but, it’s good news that he didn’t stay around longer. he was a jerk and didn’t commit to you and this is where you have to train yourself to believe that this is a blessing.
it’s an interesting paradox: everything he did was about him, and now everything you do needs to be about you. you can work on healing. work on understanding how you got duped. you were young, and most of us know what our younger relationships were like. you described the infatuation that a young person would have with anyone – disordered or not. unfortunately for you, he was disordered.
one of the things they do really well (as well as lie) is project things their deeds onto others. his mom was a physco? kicked him out? hmm, maybe he was the physcho and he ran away a lot, or maybe she HAD to kick him out because he was a spath.
he used and manipulated you. it’s so clear. this is painful, but you have to get that it wasn’t personal. it’s just what they do. there is a very good book, The Betrayal Bond, that would help you work through what happened and why you were targeted as supply. It is available through this website, through Amazon, and other bookstores.
give Kathleen Hawks series of articles a read – they can be found through the authors list (int he ‘Categories’ section on the left side of the blog. keep posting. you’ll start to understand and unravel the residual hurt and shame and loss of identity.
all the best to you.