So, what happens when you suddenly discover that the person who has been sharing your life is actually a stranger? Worse than that, they turn out to be a person who has deliberately deceived and manipulated you with surgeon-like precision. Wrapping you in a web of deceit — delivered so skillfully and carefully that you’ve welcomed the silken threads as they tighten around you. Freely allowing yourself to be wrapped in the cocoon being made by your soul mate. It’s only once you have morphed in to an emotional mush of confusion and fear that you realize you are trapped. And by then, of course, it’s too late — and your mate is off to the next willing victim.
I know, of course, that so many of you will identify with this experience. After only one week as part of the Lovefraud team, I have been amazed by the responses I have been receiving. I can feel the support that resonates among the community here, and I am delighted to be a part of it. I am not happy, of course, that so many of us are joined together here because we have suffered at the hands of another — but I know that together we can heal… no, I know that we are healing. After all, we’re here aren’t we?
If you’re anything like me, you won’t have come in to contact with the terminology ”˜sociopath’ until it happened to you. For my part, I had never even heard the word. It created an earth-shattering jolt in my consciousness when a dear friend of mine shared her opinion that the man I had called my soul mate was in fact a sociopath.
So for my second post I thought I’d share what happened to me when the truth suddenly dawned on me, because that moment marked the beginning of my healing.
It was nearing midnight on Thursday 9th July 2009. It was a typically warm summer’s night that found me in my bed at home in France, distractedly checking through my emails on the iPhone for the umpteenth time. Anything to try and quieten my mind and bring me back to normality. I was mentally and physically exhausted but my tortured mind and aching soul refused to let me sleep. No matter how much I tried to rationalize the past ten weeks, or how much I attempted to make sense of the situation, I simply couldn’t find any answers. Peace seemed a very distant memory as I continued to search for clues. What had happened? Where had I gone so wrong? What had prompted my beloved husband of 10 years to lie to me for so long? Why did he need to create so many other lives? What had I done to make him stop loving me? How had I missed the signs? What could I have done differently? The questions circled, round and round my head like the mythological embittered Harpies — snatching at my rising fears, cackling at my confusion, their cruel wings fanning the flames of despair that threatened to engulf my soul.
I am a motivational coach and leadership trainer, known for my ability to quickly get to the heart of the issue. I am employed for my skills in reading and understanding people, so how had I been so blind to my husband? We were a team, we worked together, lived together, loved together and had spent nearly every day and night in each other’s company since the day we met — and I loved him totally; heart, body and soul. Only the year before we had celebrated our ten-year anniversary together, and just a few weeks before Christmas we’d spent his 40th birthday together on the beaches of a beautiful Caribbean health spa. Our life together, as I thought, was perfect!
And yet now, here I was, alone with my son in the beautiful French farmhouse we had lovingly restored over the past 6 years, betrayed and deserted by the person I truly believed was my soul mate, left alone to deal with the enormity of the emotional and financial wreckage caused by my husband’s double life. It had all happened so suddenly — the chance email just three months earlier that led me on a trail of discovery to uncover the horrifying truth that I was married to a stranger. Cold, hard, black and white proof that my idyllic life was in fact a total sham — and the equally cold hard fact that my husband had simply vanished out of our lives the second he knew he’d been rumbled, leaving my son and I to deal with the fall-out. Disappeared without a trace just as quickly as he’d arrived in our lives more than ten years earlier.
Around and around the questions turned in my head. The Harpies I had named “Who” “What” “Where” “When” and “How” mocking my stupidity, berating my gullibility, and piercing ever more deeply in to my already broken heart.
And then I saw it. It was an email out of the blue from an old friend Mandy, which naturally pricked my interest. It was a kind and thoughtful message of support, the contents of which seemed harmless — the very same email that had me shaking to the core just a short while later as I explored the following words:
“”¦Interestingly, you may or may not know that I am doing my masters degree in forensic psychology at the moment, and recently have done loads of work on sociopaths. Lets put it this way – he shows all the signs – in retrospect of course! So in fairness, he was highly skilled at fooling everyone. In fact, not just skilled – it was natural to him. Therefore, who would have known? He has no conscience. And before long, he will find another place for himself, and will never feel any remorse, because he doesn’t know how to”¦”
Sociopath was a term I had not come across before and so, after a quick scan for more information on the internet, I discovered that a sociopath is also known as a psychopath. My brows furrowed as disbelief and comprehension entered my head at the same time. So I asked the question out loud to see if it made a difference: “You mean to tell me that my husband is actually a PSYCHOPATH?” Chills ran through my body, my mouth went dry, and the Harpies were suddenly very still and very quiet.
Random images of famous psychopaths came flooding in to my head — Norman Bates from Psycho, Peter Sutcliffe the Yorkshire Ripper, America’s Ted Bundy and Heath Ledger as The Joker — the absurdity of the idea prompting nervous laughter to erupt from deep within me. And then silence again as I truly began to consider the enormity of this new information. The room was still. My mind was quiet. My heart started thumping loudly in my chest. Holding the iPhone in my left hand, and hugging myself with my right arm, I read yet another ”˜checklist’ for sociopathy and realized with absolute clarity that my ex’s behaviours actually ticked each and every one of the boxes — to a tee. I shuddered, forcing myself to breathe, and blinking wildly, hoping that I had somehow misinterpreted the information.
And that was the precise moment when the archetypal psychopath, Dr Hannibal Lecter made his sudden and unwelcome appearance in my mind — crystal clear and standing just a few feet away from me in the corner of my bedroom. Sucking air through his teeth and smacking his lips, he held me hypnotized with his ice-cold beguiling stare, clearly enjoying my confusion as I quietly considered the overwhelming evidence that my estranged husband, the man I had loved with all my heart and soul, was in fact a text-book psychopath.
“But surely I’d know if I was in the company of someone like that?” I reasoned to myself, the dank smell of Hannibal’s cell now beginning to permeate my senses, his chains rattling my imagination. “I’m an executive business coach! I’ve been working in the field of personal development for over 13 years! I’m wise to the ways of different personalities and what makes people tick!” I tried to rationalise, becoming more aware that my bewilderment was arousing the curiosity of my uninvited guest.
I was hooked. And as I read further, uncovering facts, examples of typical traits, and stories from other victims of a sociopathic relationship, I was gradually coming to the horrifying comprehension that my friend’s prognosis was correct. In equal measures of horror and relief, I also began to understand that I was not alone. That there were literally thousands of women with stories just like mine — many of which I found on this very site. Intelligent, professional, and successful women who had willingly succumbed, fallen in love, followed their dreams and been thwarted by the malevolent charms of the skilled and charismatic sociopath.
As we all now know, these people are predominantly men. Charming, witty and attentive — the life and soul of the party. Men who can sweep you off your feet, make you believe that you are the most precious person in the world. Men who let you dare to dream that all your dreams have come true and convince you that you’ve found your true soul mate. Men who make you feel that anything is possible, and encourage you to live life to the full. Men who slowly and deliberately bleed you dry, suck out your soul and leave you for dead, without even a backwards glance — but by the time you realize this, of course, it’s too late. Much too late.
Suddenly I began to see things from a different angle. Suddenly things started to make sense. Dr Lecter faded safely back in to the darkness of my imagination, as I began to replace his image with strangely comforting feelings of relief. Because it was finally dawning on me that the experience I was living, my own personal living nightmare, was not something I could have foretold. So I was not to blame for what had happened — there was nothing more I could have done. In fact, I’d had a lucky escape.
This marked the beginning of my journey towards understanding what had happened to me. How I’d found myself in such a horrific and unimaginable mess. After three long months, April’s hurricane of discovery that had all but broken me in its relentless force to destroy all that I had believed in, gradually started to loosen its grip in light of this new information.
At the same time I also realized, with frightening clarity, that in order to truly comprehend what had happened, to come to terms with how I had come to find myself in such a horrendous situation, I was going to have to embark on a journey of self-discovery. I would need to find out more about what had happened to other people. Understand the true meaning behind the word sociopath, or psychopath. Recognise the traits within myself that allowed me to be the perfect target — dig deeply in to my own psyche and explore my own choices in life. Examine how I’d got here, what I’d believed about myself and others and my own deeply held personal values. And, most importantly, to find my strength and finally to heal.
My years of experience in personal development told me it was not going to be an easy journey. Some of the deeply buried feelings and experiences of my past would need to be re-examined. I would need to dredge through parts of my life I thought I’d already dealt with. Old scars I thought I’d healed would need to be re-opened and treated anew. It would be painful. It would mean re-visiting old chapters of my life. Re-living the hurts of the past in order to truly understand what was going on.
And I would also need to venture in to the depths of this murky world that I was just beginning to discover. I would likely need to stand in the shoes of these soulless people I now knew existed for real, and who live and work among us. Because unless I could comprehend the workings of a sociopath, I would neither be able to heal nor protect myself in the future.
I was alerted to the sounds of Dr Lecter once again shuffling around in the back of my mind, his interest clearly intensified by my growing fear at what lay ahead. And I heard a barely perceptible laugh — or was it a cackle — coming from the darkest corners of my imagination. The unpalatable solution hit me like a steam train, and I understood at that moment that he would need to become an ally in my journey; for who better than the archetypal sociopath, Dr Hannibal Lecter himself to help me understand the twisted workings in the mind of a psychopath?
“If I help you, Melanie, it will be “turns” with us too. Quid pro quo. I tell you things, you tell me things. About yourself. Quid pro quo. Yes or no?”
His perfect and calculated logic slithered towards me, the words and the consequences of what I was about to do sending shivers through my body. I would need to let Hannibal Lecter inside my head if ever I was going to become free. It was the only way to regain my sanity and claim my life back. And, surely, this couldn’t be any worse than the real life experiences I had already survived?
So I nodded my silent agreement and the deal was done. I would allow the specter of Hannibal to steer me as I unravel the past and make sense of my pain. A smug sneer crept across Dr Lecter’s face, as he pulled himself upright and acknowledged my consent “Brave Melanie. You will tell me when those lambs stop screaming, won’t you?”
So this was the beginning of my recovery. I started preparing for my own personal voyage of soul-searching, education, self-questioning and personal discoveries right through to the eventual victory I knew was waiting for me. I’d have to return to the innocence I once knew, and in returning there I knew I’d have to face some ugly and painful memories. I’d have to rearrange them to make sense of what had happened, and to ensure that I would never again be taken in by anyone whose sole intention was to hurt me.
Hannibal fixed me with his steely stare, the rest of his face shrouded in shadows as he slowly wound his fingers around the bars in his cell.
“Clearly this new assignment is not your choice” he hissed “rather I suppose it is a part of the bargain but you accepted it Melanie. Your job is ultimately to craft my doom. So I am not sure how well I should wish you but I’m sure we’ll have a lot of fun. So let’s start at the beginning — tell me everything you know”
With that his image once again faded away, and I felt that I had just made a deal with the devil. But at the same time, I knew that my journey to freedom had begun.
They are not predominantly men; I think it’s a safe bet to say it’s about a 50/50 deal more or less. There are a lot of reasons as to why one would get the impression that they are composed, predominantly of men… but I assure you, that is not the case at all. ( As someone who has seen both sides of the “coin” so to speak )
Anyway, a lot of great comments here.
Duped- I agree, they are like creatures… from hell.
Sisterhood- I feel for you when you doubt yourself. If it’s your first encounter with a psycho- it’s HARD to wrap around your head that someone could be EVIL TO THE BONE. You want to believe otherwise, I know, because it completely throws your previous worldview up on its head. Evil, not bad, but evil, as in deliberately and maliciously calculating to hurt someone all under the masquerade of “kindness” and pumped up false as hell “generosity” ( blech… i think i need a trash can… ) it’s all smoke and mirrors. ( Just in case that wasn’t clear : they are grubby and greedy as fiends, they just need to “appear” that way to others ) Anyway.. doubts will surface, but you know, deep inside that what you encountered was unequivocably NOT HUMAN.
Speaking of which, I was thinking about this today. Looking at pictures of certain psychopaths ( Madoff, among others.. celebrities I won’t name at the moment ) is bizarre. They certainly look human, don’t they? But there’s this coldness.. there’s an emptiness, no matter how colorfully they may try to word things.. an underlying hollowness. And that hollowness is kind of a cold steadied steel harness of pure and unequivocable evil.
And i want to say sisterhood, even if you may sometimes be plagued with these feelings of self-doubt ( you’re human ).. stick with it. Keep reminding yourself. It has to be consolidated in our worldview- if it isn’t already. The notion that there are EVIL creatures out there ( again, not human ) masquerading as human beings, all with the sole intent of destroying whatever lies in their path as they spin onward on a self-obsessed spiral of fuckery and hollow experiences.
Like i said, you’re not used to the idea that psychopaths are very real ( 4% of the pop according to Martha Stout… that’s 1 in every 25 people. And that’s just an approximation. I wouldn’t be surprised if there were more. But as it stands, 4% of the population is still a helluva LOT of psychopaths, I’ll tell ya. ) You just have to carry on and remind yourself, keep at it. (((hugs)))
And since we’re on the topic I thought I would post Kathy Krajco’s wonderfully succinct blog post/article entitled, ” NPD? A Male Disease? An Adult Disease? ” here for you all to read.
NPD? A Male Disease? An Adult Disease?
Here’s an excerpt :
That’s just an excerpt, I recommend reading the whole article in full.
Also, you can replace NPD/Narcissist with Psychopathy/Sociopathy… she’s referring to the same thing.
Thanks for your comments – I had no intention to be disrespectful by stating that this applies ‘mostly to men’ and I am very sorry if my words have offended. My information has been based on the numerous books and sites I have read since my own discovery, where I read repeated figures that say 75% are male.
I completely buy-in to the argument that women can be just as destructive (I’ve had the experience) and I also recognise that it can be harder in society for men to share their experiences. This would surely affect the surety of ‘figures’ that are written about… Plus, sociopathy as a subject is relatively young in the public arena, so the ‘experts’ are learning all the time.
I am neither a doctor nor a scientist, and any knowledge in these subjects is rooted in personal experiences. From my point of view, abuse of any sort is not gender based. Nor is it age, race, creed or colour based. The fact is it is happening – and my intention is to help bring it out in to the open, joining the growing band of people who want to make a difference. I’m not going to ‘get it right’ all of the time – I know that, who is? But if in my own way I can help speed up the healing process for just one more person, well, then it’s all been worthwhile. Mel xxx
skylar says:
“In fact, the worst combination is spath plus intelligence. That is really scary. really really scary.”
Tell me about it! High functioning, extremely intelligent and almost more intelligent than most; like that quiet little rat that sneaks out of the alleyway at night, in through a crack or a window, searching for it’s next snack or meal. You know how mice do that: somehow they can always find the smallest little crack to get into to make it to where they want to get. And they do it for what they want. Yah, just like that. Smart like that. Smart like red ants, making their trails to and from a water supply. Like that too.
Thanks Mel for YOUR post. I appreciate your being here and happen to appreciate your gift so much! 🙂 Thank you for coming here and for sharing. It adds unto the journey, Dear. 😉
You are right: this isn’t about gender, race, class, age, sexual preferences, creeds, etc….it’s about acceptability and non acceptability and where WE fit into all of this. No stone should be left unturned because what we know and what we have experienced is going to pave the way for a different understanding of this problem in our world and society. The ‘human soul hunter’, we shall call them, trying to keep disdain away from our conversation. 🙂
I have seen just as many women socipaths as I have men, since I noticed and from looking back over my life. And although I am a woman, I am saying: I think the women were actually somewhat worse then the men I saw because of their PMS, etc. 🙂 Yah…think about that! yikes! ahahahaha I am sure we have all been THERE! 🙂 Well, maybe not all of us…. 😉
We are all here to help one another and I, for one, am here to say that Love Fraud has been like 1/3 of my therapy. Just being able to come here and have a place to share with ‘like minds’. This journey has been amazing and ‘magical’ almost since I have been here and you all have added something to this experience in a very positive way. Just by being here and being YOURSELVES. 🙂
Hurry up with the next article, would ya, Mel…
I just can’t wait! xxoo
Dupedster
takingitslow ”“ welcome to LF
There are many people on here parenting with a spath who will be able to guide you. 14 months is GOOD. Well done.
It’s tough when the courts don’t get it. Soldier on.
Make this about YOU and your daughter. Don’t give him head room.
If you try to figure him out you will be wasting your time and energy. There is NOTHING to figure ”“ none of it makes sense.
He’s not sick, he’s a spath. He cannot be made well.
Others here will suggest methods of managing the visitations.
Stay and learn.
In 3 days it is going to be 3 months since I have spoken a single word to it or allowed it to contact me in anyway whatsoever. I am getting nervous because Monday is fast approaching. It never makes it past the 3 month stage so this will be a HUGE moment.
I just never know what will be next. But I do know ONE THING: I am not tolerating anymore of this around me. Period.
It has been quiet so far and I am hoping it stays that way. There is NO WAY I would EVER agree to meet with it any more. Not ever. There is no excuse nor reason for it to bother trying to contact me any further.
Still, though, that burning thought hangs there in the back of my mind, trying to sear a hole straight to the core of my being and it isn’t going to continue! — “WHAT IF?” 🙂 Ruminations: be gone! Thought patterns: change! Inner strength and peace: here I come! 🙂
It’s a long and daunting journey but it is one we have no choice but to take. I think we are going to find ourselves on the other end. xxoo
Duped, Congratulations on the 3 months of NC—that said, QUIT WORRYING ABOUT “what if?” and “Will he?” When you find yourself doing that worrying about tomorrow’s problems….STOP yourself right there.
I am working on the same thing….trying to live in the here and now, the TODAY rather than the “what if”s of tomorrow. Making decisions today based on “what ifs” are difficult.
Again, congratulations on 3 months total NC! TOWANDA!!!!
Duped – the only thing you have to fear is fear itself. Someone famous once said that so I can’t take the credit!
I think they last 3-6 months with their ‘new’ love before the mask starts to slip. THAT’S when they start hovering around for past loves. That’s when triangulation comes back into play.
Others may think differently (it’s just my experience)
Are there any statistics? I don’t know. They can only keep up the ‘front’ for a short time. How we deal with it, and how long we put up with it, varies.
If/when he contacts you, do you have a plan Duped?
Thanks, (((Ox)))….
I know you are right about stop worrying what ‘if’ but I mean, we are talking about someone that truly is unstable and off the hook and I can’t help but be concerned for my safety at this point. I would be so foolish and blind to ignore it now.
You are right and I completely understand you and I try to do that: not worry about tomorrow’s problems. Right: making decisions based on ‘what if’s’ is very difficult.
I want it to just go away now and not upset my life anymore.
It has done enough. I will never forgive it. How can I?
TOWANDA OX!!!!!
mwah! xxoo
duh-Dupedster
((candy)) Good day to you! 😉
Yah, I have a plan: “Move away from the door and leave the premises the cops are on their way. Unless of course, you would like to stick around a while…” THAT is my plan.
We don’t live in the same cities so that has made it a little easier. And we have never formally ‘lived together’ because I wouldn’t allow it. Way too off the hook for me! BUT: it knows where I am. And, although that does not ‘scare’ me, it gives me ‘chills’ to think about it now that I have learned of the murder attempt.
If I am out and about in public and it approaches me, I will simply not look at it, put my head down and walk in an opposite direction. I will NEVER say another word to it; not ever again as long as I live. It needs to just go away. If it continues to follow me and/or harass me, I shall phone the police on my cell! 🙂 Which I am never hardly farther than around my neighborhood, anyways, and they all know about all this…not to worry. It’s just that he is so very unpredictable. About the time I think I know it, it bolts in another direction so I don’t trust it at all.
I think there are enough people now, in the world, who know about it and are aware of it and all of the threats, not just to me, but to others as well. It will have to lay pretty low to avoid the storms. IT is fortunate that the people who it has harmed along the way aren’t pre-disposed to murdering like IT has been.
*Blessings you guys*