Editor’s note: Lovefraud received the following story from a reader who we’ll call “Jenna.” At the end, she posts a document written by her sociopathic ex about the price of his soul, which provides a unnerving glimpse into how he truly thinks. Names have been changed.
I have spent the last 18 years dealing with a classic sociopath, a man who lies beyond my wildest imagination. I have come to believe that he isn’t just evil that is too easy an explanation. Evil people can’t help themselves; they can be “born bad.” No, this man chooses to be sadistic and mentally cruel. He can be “nice” when he wants to. He has a now four-year-old granddaughter who adores him and thinks her “Papa” hung the moon. If she ever sees on her own what he is, he will be her first broken heart.
He calculates his moves and sets up his victims over a long period of time — feeding off one woman after another, using the exact same pattern, until they no longer are sating his appetite for whatever it is he hungers for money, respect, ego gratification. I have never met anyone like this before. He enjoys what seems to have been his life’s work. He often said he “didn’t like women or children.” I should have listened.
I met him through work in April 1992. I was 44 years old, attractive and I thought relatively intelligent. My boss knew him from a previous job, considered him an associate, and brought him in to do some computer consulting. Looking back, my first impression was that he was focusing on me, trying to impress me. I should have heeded my bells and listened to my first impressions. He was knowledgeable about everything, charming, and I realize now he talked only about himself, his business plans, his big ideas. Going for lunches developed into a relationship. He was never pushy or all over me just the opposite.
Moves in
He moved in with me on January 2, 1993 after I had broken off with him because I thought he was playing me. I went away that Christmas alone, and when I came home, he was ensconced in my home, with the fireplace burning, two dozen long-stemmed red roses, a bottle of wine and a six-page handwritten letter about what a fool he had been and how much he “loved” me. The fool was me; I let him stay.
I had been on my own for a long time so I tried to establish some beginning boundaries. The first year we were together, he had to pay half the rent and half the living expenses, but slowly that morphed into us having joint accounts, and making decisions as a couple.
Within two months, he would fall asleep on the couch watching TV. I worked, he didn’t. He was trying to build a consulting business, but I think he did nothing most days. I’d come home and he’d be busy doing dishes that he had obviously just started, so it would look like he was busy.
No sex
Within six months, he withdrew sex. “I don’t know why” was his stock answer to every attempt to work through this. I thought maybe he had problems so I backed off and learned to live without a normal and healthy love life. It was step one in completely undermining my own self confidence, self image and willingness to walk away. I was mature, had not been committed enough to really work at previous relationships, so my mindset was, “I love this man and I am going to work at this.”
In 1994 he got a job that lasted four months. He talked me into starting my own business and I did freelance accounting. When he was fired from his job I was never able to find out why, but they let him go on a Tuesday and paid him only to the end of that day, which had to mean just cause. Knowing what I know now, no doubt he was inappropriate with female staff or maybe even male staff, because now I wonder about everything. Nothing was as it seemed.
August 1996 and he has just started his second job lasted six months, during which, I find out, he has been having an affair with the receptionist. He moved out March 1997 and came back begging me to give him another chance in May, saying he was nothing without me; he might as well go live on “skid row” because he would never be able to get off the couch again if I wouldn’t take him back. We had a business to consider he reminded me. He made love to me four times during the “take me back” stage. Soon as he was safely back, sex stopped, but he did come to bed at night. In later years, he would sleep in the living room, on the couch every night, in his clothes and only came downstairs to get a change of underwear, knowing that hurt me and was the exact opposite of what I wanted.
In business together
Over the years this scenario was repeated. In 17 years he held down four jobs, all of which lasted max six months. He talked me into going into business with him and we are 50% shareholders in a small home-based business that supported us from 1999 onward. I am seriously living to regret this, as I divorce and try to extricate myself from him. He talked on the phone a lot, and I did all the heavy lifting.
I had my life savings, which wasn’t much, but it bought us the home I live in now. We moved here in 1999. Yet another “job” he had, this time contracted through our company. He lasted five months in what was supposed to be a five-year contract.
I have to say that the privacy act and employer’s unwillingness to share information is a tremendous handicap to women in my position. Even as 50% owner of the company, no one is willing to tell the truth. If any one of the people who saw through him, anywhere along the line, had had the courage to tell me what my husband was up to, it would have opened my eyes. I was getting his side of the story only, and his best skill is, he is a honed and practiced liar. No matter how suspicious or concerned or questioning I might be, he could talk himself out of it, so I’d wind up giving him the “benefit of the doubt.”
Job in Florida
On April 21, 2009 my husband (he wanted to get married in 2003) left “on business” to take a consulting job in Florida. When he left, I prayed that this would be make it or break it. My health and spirit were so broken that his decision to take this job was almost a relief.
A month after he was gone I began to feel better physically, but such was my commitment to my marriage that I actually said out loud, what worried me was he would want to come back, and I wouldn’t want him to. I would feel obligated to take him back, even though I knew I was living in a toxic relationship. A counselor said to me afterwards that if you have a kind heart, cut people some slack and believe in God, and in doing unto others, you are custom made for this type of predator. They count on it! Your decency and your ability to love and forgive are the very tools they use against you.
First month, he web-cammed daily while I helped him get set up, furnish his apartment and paid his bills. He phoned me 10 times a day on his way down to Florida, saying how much he missed me already.
Cheating
The lies kept up until June 27, 2009 when he avoided an opportunity to web-cam home to see our 3-year old Granddaughter who was visiting. Everything began to add up. I spent all day July 1, 2009 trying to figure out how to hire a private detective in Florida. Turns out he had put himself on a dating site within three weeks of arriving there, and he had “grown an inch” from the time he left here. By August he was on Craig’s list as well and had grown yet another inch!
I had to take control of our business servers and over the course of the next few months I received emails from two women, who came after the one the private investigator filmed him with. His story to them he had been a widower for 40 years, had raised his two girls alone, his wife had been tragically killed in a car accident, t-boned when his youngest was just 2 months old. He had sacrificed himself to raise his daughters. Turned out I wasn’t the dead wife he was speaking of he was actually referring to his first wife, who is alive and well and who is still married to the man who really helped her raise the children.
Second woman who contacted me, did so because she had been told I was his “cousin” and I “worked for him” and she wanted to know if I was going to be helping her learn how to work for him. Both the women who contacted me were kind enough to send me the “ads” they answered, and photos of themselves and one even send me photos of them together, which I could have lived without.
My honesty saved the two women who connected with me, but every woman who crosses his path is at risk. I have come to see that he is like a reverse serial rapist. It is all about power and control, and once he assesses what you want and need most from him, in my case, warmth, love and affection, he withholds that from you. He apparently was quite lustful with the women he met on line and I wonder now, who was he cheating on me with during the 10 years we’ve been in this town? A man doesn’t go from being celibate for 17 years to suddenly being active. I now consider it a gift that he didn’t touch me at least I know my health isn’t at risk.
The document
Interestingly enough, in the “document” you read below, the woman referred to as “Marsha” is in fact his first wife (you know, the one who wasn’t killed in a car accident). The second woman he mentions, is the woman he cheated on “Marsha” with and left Marsha for. It would seem that none of us who came after mattered at all.
I found this document while searching his computer using the word “university” because he claimed to have a Bachelor of Commerce degree and I wanted to share that with my lawyer. This document, written by him on Oct. 1, 2005 at 7:30 pm, popped up. His oldest daughter’s birthday. The night after my 58th birthday. Two years and one month to the day after our marriage, and two months before he would “set me up” by putting me as sole director of our company, which as it turns out, has backfired on him, but it was part of a long-term plan he had and was slowly working on, a trap that would be used when he was ready to spring it.
I can tell you that when I opened this document, it embarrassed me to read it. I never knew this man at all. I have no doubt that I was in my office working, or making dinner, or cleaning up after dinner, while he sat in his office writing this. I can tell you that knowing what I know now, he doesn’t have “a soul to sell.”
I’m weeks away from my divorce being final. He has fought me every step of the way, threatening me, filing lawsuits against the company, using the business and my fear of losing my home and what little security I have left. He has harassed both me and my lawyers, gone out of his way to increase my legal fees, hoping to break me. He represents himself, and at every turn is foxier and more cunning than one could ever believe. Normal does not apply. I wonder what the women before me went through and know in my heart, they went through exactly what I am going through. I can’t wait to get rid of his last name legally.
He threw away his life and I need to be punished for that. I wasn’t supposed to find out. I was supposed to continue in the role I had played, the easily conned wife who kept knocking herself out trying to make her marriage work, while he kept his options open and explored for greener fields.
PS: Job in Florida lasted four months, then they let him go. I have no doubt he is trolling for his next food source as I write.
The Price of My Soul
- To return to Easter, 1956 when my parents moved.
- To have all of the knowledge that I have now and have had in the past.
- To be popular with both boys and girls. At school, in clubs and all other parts of my life.
- To excel in sports without injury, particular in hockey, track, football and baseball. To be good enough in football, baseball and track to attract quality athletic scholarships.
- To excel in school without undue effort. To receive the highest marks in every subject, to effortlessly complete all homework and assignments. To receive the highest possible marks on all tests and examinations. To be the valedictorian in both High School, University. To be first in my class in Graduate School.
- To have the inherent ability to make the right and correct choices regarding education, finance, investments and career.
- To be attractive, fit and athletic for my entire life. To live well in to my 90s and to be happy, contented and satisfied with my life. To die with no regrets.
- To never smoke or partake of non-prescription drugs. To always drink alcohol responsibly and never get drunk or impaired.
- To never have an illness and to be immune from all disease.
- To be hardworking, focused and disciplined. To be courteous to everyone. To be calm, soft-spoken and fair. To have, and experience, no prejudice.
- To be unusually attractive to all women, of legal age, regardless of age, race, color, marital status or religious beliefs. To have the inherent ability to communicate my interest to a particular woman and to have her feel a tingle in her loins and know that, by overtly contacting me, she will experience the most satisfying sexual encounter that is it possible to have.
- To have the inherent ability to bring women to the deepest orgasm possible at my whim and thought. To do so, if I wish, just by touch, by stroking, or by any other means that I wish. To have women become addicted to sexual relations with me. To be completely uninhibited in sex and to have each of my partners wish to be willing to try anything. To be able to bring my partners to orgasm orally, anally, vaginally and any other way I choose. To have them long for each way. To be able to bring women to multiple orgasms, including ejaculation, and to be able to experience multiple ejaculations, myself, within minutes of each other. To never lose this ability until my death.
- To never, either myself or a chosen sexual partner, experience a jealous husband, fiancé, lover or friend. To never end a sexual relationship in any way other than as enduring friends.
- To have women become so addicted to my sexual prowess and their satisfaction that they will do anything that I wish to continue the relationship. To have them recommend me to their women friends and to have those friends join us in the relationship.
- To have this attraction begin from the moment of puberty and, until I am of legal age, to have these relationships with women older than myself.
- To have these women pay me for my company until I have graduated from school and have become a wealthy person. It would be my expectation that, beginning at 13 years of age, I would earn $100 per week from each of my lovers and that I would have five lovers. I would expect my income to increase with each year until legal age.
- To have the inherent ability to save my money and to invest in the most profitable manner. To always know the correct time to buy stocks, bonds or other investments and to always know when to sell at the maximum profit. To never make a losing investment.
- To always know the correct time to create a new company or service and to always know the correct time to sell the investment. To never lose money in this manner. To always have prior knowledge of startup companies and to know which ones will succeed and which ones will fail. To always know the optimum time to cash in the investment.
- To be financially well of by the age of 18. To be a millionaire by the age of 20. To be a multi-millionaire by the age of 25. To be a billionaire by the age of 30 and to be the richest man in the world by the age of 40. To remain so until my death.
- To be asked to mingle in the highest levels of society all over the world. To be politically astute and to have political influence worldwide.
- To never marry and to never have children. To die, peacefully and happy, having left a legacy of both deeds and money that will be invested for good. To have planned those investments so that they will never stop working for good.
- To have several loving relationships during my lifetime. To love deeply and be loved deeply. One of those relationships is to be with Marsha Jackson and the other with Susan Morris. Both are to be deeply satisfying for everyone involved but are not to be monogamous on my part. As in other relationships, they will be so satisfied that they will want to share me with their female family members and friends.
- To be an outstandingly accomplished dancer. To be able to bring a women to climax just by whispering in her ear while dancing. To be able to engage in a conversation, with a woman, about absolutely anything. To have her feel no offense at the most intimate of conversations and comments. To be able to bring her to climax during those conversations.
- To be appreciative and knowledgeable of the arts. To be an engaging and interesting speaker. To have an inherent ability to lead people in the direction I choose for them to go. To always do so for good, never evil.
- To be truly satisfied and happy in everything that I do. Especially in each and every sexual relationship that I have. To be able to give the deepest possible pleasure to my partner and, in turn, to receive the same.
DW,
I don’t know your guy or how he thinks, but what you describe is more like my parents. They still want me to be dependant on them.
My exP also behaved the way you describe, being the strong dependable man that took care of me. Especially car related repairs. What I didn’t understand is that he was sabotaging the car in the first place to KEEP me dependant. He was also sabotaging my life, poisoning me so that I couldn’t work for over 20 years and KEPT me dependant. He sabotaged my friendships to keep me dependant. He tried to sabotage my confidence but I’m WAY too narcissistic for that- it didn’t work.
All the sabotage was done behind my back – I was completely unaware until the last few months.
I also stayed with him because he used various other angles, like my pity for him, financial stress to undermine my ability to move, and bringing home so many cats that there was no way (he thought) I could find a home for them. He knew I’d never leave my cats or my house. Boy was he surprised when I split with all my computers and 5 cats in the middle of the night.
Dear Sky,
QUOTE: “all my computers and 5 cats in the middle of the night!” LOL ROTFLMAO choke, snort snarf!
That’s a good one sky!
Yes, they do sabotage our lives to the best of their ability. It was only after the Trojan Horse Psychopath and the P-DIL were arrested that I got a chance to read the letter my P son wrote to the TH-P outlining the various things to do to keep me off kilter…taking over my cell phone account and messing with that, from deleting my phone numbers to turning the phone account off and on and adding services and lines.
Never dawned on them though that I would SNEAK AWAY in the MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT either! I was gone before they knew it and they knew not WHERE! At least that was a good move as they couldn’t hurt me if they didn’t know where I was.
I’m glad you had the courage to pack up and leave with your computers and your 5 cats in tow! It is only when we summon up that courage that we can escape! TOWANDA for you!
sky – there is a korean noodle that is just yams – not sure of the carb count on it, but i love them. they are glassy like an asian rice noodle, but have more texture and substance.
skylar,
You are priceless, being an interesting person. I read about your experiences, being amazed by them, especially the insights that you gleened from P-encounters, having really put much thought into how they operate in society. What you share is often helpful because you’ve seen the behaviors and done the research, so you know what motivates the spaths. Interesting.
Oxy, if I recall you went camping with several pets as well? LOL.
Here’s the best part: The P’s do what they do partly out of malice but also partly out of the love of manipulating. That is how they exercise their power and they love to push and pull to see how you react. That’s WHY grey rock is so effective. And that’s also why they have a TERRIBLE fear of abandonment. So when you and I left and they discovered it, I know that they felt “abandoned”. Having no one left to manipulate is SOOOOOO PAINFUL FOR THEM. It’s exactly like when you abandon a baby, they want you back so badly.
My neighbor was in on the ploy and she reported me in as a missing person twice in one day. The cops were friends of the xP so they knew it was a game and played along trying to get me to respond, but I wouldn’t answer the phone. He sent cops to my mom’s house over and over. They try to get the AUTHORITIES, to do their work for them – just like they did when they were infants.
Onestep,
that’s the noodle: shirataki. They are made either as tofu or yam or sometimes both I think. They all taste great and are prepared in 5 minutes in the microwave, then add pasta sauce or whatever. They are found in the refrigerated section and are cheap too.
i have only had the 100% yam – i buy them dried in the Asian stores . quite awesome. don’t really ‘work’ with Italian sauces (former cook here), but i find them inspiring to cook with – they like sesame and sesame likes them.
bluejay, thank you, you are priceless too. your words also reveal how much thought and comprehension you have on this subject.
For me there is no more important subject in the world, simply because it addresses the root of so many of the hurdles that humanity faces and always has faced.
I don’t imagine that we will eradicate evil in my lifetime, but I’d like to make a serious dent in it. So I look to understand it to the best of my little ability and to spread that understanding. Perhaps, because of all the details that we report here on LF, someone with clarity will be able to put it together and really come up with a concept and a solution. (I mean a solution other than Kim’s idea: sentence them to wearing deer costumes and living in the woods)
The internet is a powerful tool and already there is PLENTY of discussion on this subject which used to be unheard of. When Scott Peck’s book was written in 1984: “People of the Lie, the hope for healing human evil”, I don’t think anyone had ever written anything like it before and it didn’t sell as well as his previous book, “The road less travelled”. Now it has become one of the handbooks for understanding sociopathy as it pervades throughout humanity.
I read it then but it made no sense to me because no one else was talking about it and therefore I had no context, plus I was 17 and already knew it all – right?
Dear Sky,
Well, FUNNY thing about me “escaping”—the TH-P came over to the house to vandalize it (I am guessing in the middle of the night) and he never “found me home” BUT at first the dogs were still here (in their kennels) so he knew I wasn’t “gone” for good, just he could not catch me at home.
The LAST TRIP I took the dogs so when he came over here and the dogs were gone, HE KNEW I WAS GONE and not just “not home at the moment.” BUT he couldn’t let anyone else know I was gone, because to admit he knew would be to admit he had been over here at my house doing the vandalizm. I think the only ones he told were my P-son and the P-DIL, so they changed their plans (he and the P-DIL at least) as that must have been when they decided to steal the money from the Egg donor and skip out and leave P-son and C in the lurch as well as egg donor…but then the DIL had to not just leave but to Kill son C before she did and try to make it look like “self defense” when he discovered their affair. Funny thing about that is that if she hadn’t had to Kill son C and had just been content with stealing the money and leaving they could have gotten away with it and no one could have done a darned thing. Egg donor had put the money in an account that she could LEGALLY SIGN ON and take the money…even though it wasn’t “hers” morally, legally she could have taken it. But NOOOOOOOO, she had to kill C so it ended up she got nothing and went to jail, they both did. Now SHE has a FELONY record and 5 years of probation. LOL So she SHOT HERSELF IN THE FOOT.
I would come back over here a couple of times a week before the arrest always armed, always with someone with me, and at odd times of the day/night to check on the place and check on the livestock. Those couple of days before I took the dogs with me were anxiety ridden, but I knew if I took the dogs he would KNOW I WAS GONE and I didn’t want anyone to know til I was GONE. I would even come to the local general store where everyone would make an appearance, and chat with the other customers and the owner at least once a week, so even the neighbors wouldn’t know I was “gone” or “not around.”
HIDE IN PLAIN SIGHT! LOL
That is funny about them reporting you missing and sending the cops to your mother’s house. LOL Yep, cagey! If they had done that to me the jig would have been up, but either they didn’t think about it or the TH-P was afraid of getting nailed for the vandalism. I had been actually afraid they would burn my house with me in it, but then I realized that they didn’t want to destroy the house (they wanted it after I was dead) and secondly, if they had burned it and I WASN’T dead, I would have gotten the insurance money….after the TH-P and DIL’s arrest I found a letter from P-son to TH-P telling him plans to bankrupt me and keep me from having any money—HE THOUGHT! He knew DIDDLY about my financial state but he THOUGHT he knew everything, when he knew nothing. I had played “poverty” with him for years when he would beg for money. I sent him some commissary money for years but never much, not as much as he wanted and when he wanted more I always plead poverty, “Just don’t have it”—see, I could lie too! LOL I think he thought that if they could bankrupt me it would make me easier prey. What he didn’t realize though is that even if I had had to LIVE IN A TENT AND EAT OUT OF A DUMPSTER I would still not have knuckled under to their control or my egg donor’s control any more.
I am a STUBBORN OLD BAT if you push me! They led me by the nose for a long time, but I’m like an ass, if you push me I will BALK!
Skylar,
In your post to Dancing Warrior you wrote about the narc/spath wanting us dependent. You feel cared for and taken care of until you realize you have lost your voice, and they are happy about it. Getting my voice back is the hardest damn thing I have ever done.
The key to finding yourself is by communicating what you need assertively. It may fall on deaf ears, but it’s the first step in finding your inner strength. I realized that my being passive aggressive and crying so much played right into his hands. He could tell his friends and family how nuts I was and it got him sympathy and he could behave badly without people questioning him. “Oh poor, poor Spathy, he has such a sick wife, no wonder he is a womanizer. His wife is really depressed, must have mental illness.”
My attemping suicide (or just trying to get attention, for him to ‘see’ me), stooopid thing to do, but he was ready to send me to the institution the next day. I begged him not to do it. Looking back, I know that someone who honestly cared about my welfare would have behaved differently. If he did talk about suicide I would help find a counselor and get therapy for him, not the extreme of institutionalized help.
The other day the traffice was really bad and spath had taken off on his motorcycle. I hoped he had died in an accident and that’s why traffic was backed up. I hate that I wish for something so horrible because that makes me no better than him.
So life goes on and sometimes we just survive.