If you’re like most Lovefraud readers, you’re here because you were romantically involved with a sociopath. This person probably declared love for you repeatedly, exuberantly and convincingly. Then the individual lied to you, betrayed you, cheated on you, abused you and perhaps even threatened you.
You were left stunned, distraught and devastated. How could someone who loved you treat you so badly?
A letter Lovefraud received recently might help you understand why that person’s love was so shallow:
I have read several articles on your site out of curiosity and boredom over the past few weeks, and I agree with almost all of their content. If I weren’t a sociopath I would probably find some of those articles useful. In my opinion, however, you seem to have missed one important point about us. I’m not blaming or criticizing you for this, because it isn’t your fault. This point is that we can love in some way.
It isn’t some intense feeling. You aren’t “attached” to the other person. It is more like a different way of seeing a person. They stop being just another background character in your life, who does things for you and who you occasionally have conflicts with. Instead, you enjoy their company, feel protective and possessive of them, and become very disappointed if they die or otherwise fall out of your life. Another sociopath, a friend of mine, once told me that he felt a similar way for his girlfriend, and he was surprised that I could relate to this.
What I think is strange about this version of love is that, for me at least, is that I had the same feeling for a close friend who has since died, my pet guinea pig, and a boyfriend who I became bored with and broke up with. In the latter case, I felt disappointed when I realized we had nothing new to talk about, and we had fallen in to a rut. The disappointment was over by the time I formally broke up a few days later.
This particular sociopath equates “love” with “enjoyment.” From her point of view, if the enjoyment is no longer in the relationship, neither is love.
Other sociopaths equate love and sex. When they say, “I love you,” what they are really saying is, “I want to have sex with you.”
So sociopaths may not always be lying when they say, “I love you.” Sociopaths may think they do love you. They simply don’t know what the word means.
Three parts to love
What exactly is love? Poets, playwrights and songwriters over the ages have struggled to describe the sensation of falling in love, and the pain of losing love. No matter how beautiful the language, words are often inadequate. We just know love when we feel it.
Scientists have also tried to explain love. Philip R. Shaver and Mario Mikulincer wrote a paper called A Behavioral Systems Approach to Romantic Love Relationships: Attachment, Caregiving, and Sex. Their explanation of love is useful for us because it illustrates why sociopaths can appear to be in love, when they really aren’t.
Shaver and Mikulincer say there are three distinct components to romantic love:
- Attachment you want to be around and spend time with the person you love.
- Sex you want to have physical relations with the person you love.
- Caregiving you want to take care of the person you love. You are concerned about his or her health, wellbeing and growth.
Real love has all three of these components. Sociopath, however, only experience two of them.
Sociopaths fail at caregiving
Sociopaths experience attachment they definitely want to be with you, especially in the beginning. And they certainly want sex.
But sociopaths are not capable of true caregiving. They really are not concerned about you, your future or your fulfillment. Sometimes they seem to be taking care of you, but it’s not because they actually want what is best for you. Sociopathic caregiving is all about manipulation and control.
This is why love with a sociopath is so confusing. They do actually want to be with you. The sex is often extraordinary. They sometimes pretend to take care of you. And sociopaths can keep the act going for a long time—until you are no longer useful to them, or they lose interest.
Another email
I never replied to author of the above email there is no point in engaging a sociopath. So about a week later, she wrote again.
At this point, I’m sure that if you were going to reply to my letter, you would have by now. Why haven’t you written back? I considered writing it from the perspective of a normal person, but I figured that you would see through it if I began with “My friend has this disorder and SHE said…” Do you think that just because I’m different from you that I deserve to be ignored? It isn’t my fault that I was born a certain way. You could have just as easily been born a psycho. Would you ignore normal people because you think you’re better than them? I don’t. I know that both types of people—and we are both people, I hope you aren’t so deep in your own world as to think we aren’t—have their merits, strengths, weaknesses, and perspectives that are worth considering. Don’t you agree?
Actually I don’t agree. Yes, it’s sad that sociopaths are born with the genetics for the disorder, and often grow up in difficult, even abusive, environments. But when someone says she’s a sociopath, and sounds like a sociopath, I have a choice on how to respond. I’ll play it safe and stay away.
“You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”
The process of understanding and healing is a gradual process.
I thank you EVERY day for your work on this website, Donna.
You’re saving lives right now, and that will multiply in the years to come!
Thank you Corinne. But everyone here is saving lives by the support you are all offering. Thank you to all.
I still love my ex, because he is the father of our three kids and even when I left him I hoped he would get counseling and we could get back together. I meant it when I took my vows of till death do us part and I tried valiantly to live them out. It is the stuff that my ex has done since I left and the discovery that he had been cheating on me that make it so I would never go back to him.
And maybe it is an illusion I still love, but we have a lot of memories together and while I was hurt too much to ever even think of going back I am trying to keep my everyday focus on the good memories we made (as much as anything for the sake of our kids). But early in our marriage the good memories far out number the bad ones. I do not know how to shut off the feelings that made me love him and stay married to him for so long. And I do not want to loose that part of me. As a minister my greatest gift is my compassion and empathy towards others. But to quote a Scripture out of context, my goal is to be “as wise as a serpent and as innocent as a dove.”
I believe I am called to love ever body no matter how wicked they are. But I will not allow myself to be hurt by him again and I am doing everything the courts will allow me to do to protect our kids. A passage that has seen me through a lot of days throughout this process is this one from Romans 12. I read especially the last part in a tongue in cheek manner that makes me laugh to myself:
“Bless those who persecute you. Don’t curse them; pray that God will bless them. Be happy with those who are happy, and weep with those who weep. Live in harmony with each other. Don’t be too proud to enjoy the company of ordinary people. And don’t think you know it all!
Never pay back evil with more evil. Do things in such a way that everyone can see you are honorable. Do all that you can to live in peace with everyone.
Dear friends, never take revenge. Leave that to the righteous anger of God. For the Scriptures say,“I will take revenge;I will pay them back,”says the LORD.
Instead, “If your enemies are hungry, feed them. If they are thirsty, give them something to drink. In doing this, you will heap
burning coals of shame on their heads.”
Don’t let evil conquer you, but conquer evil by doing good.”
Trust my I am well aware that all of my acts of kindness probably do not even reach my ex’s radar screen and I don’t think he knows how to feel shame, but it makes me feel good when I can in a small way seek retribution by being naturally kind toward him. I hope that my kids will eventually see that i am not the one being vengeful and full of spite.
I also do not want to end my life a bitter, and lonely old woman. So I guess you could say, that I continue to love him for my own sake as much as anything else. I am beginning to see inklings of my ministry being transformed to one that seeks to minister to women in a similar plight to where I was. God only knows at this point if that will materialize.
All this love does not mean I still do not hurt and I am still working on forgiving my ex, myself, the legal system, the middle judicatory of our denomination, and God.
I have many layers of healing to do.
revjanice-
I understand the feeling of not wanting to lose so much of yourself by disregarding all the positive memories, and you don’t have to lose who you were just because you lost the person who you thought your ex was. If that makes sense.
I take great pride in the fact that I loved unconditionally, and I know love is a strength, he is the one holding on to the hate and the anger, that is his weakness. I still get angry and embarrassed and sad when I think of all he did and the manipulation, etc, but it does not run my life, they are normal emotions that I acknowledge and then move past.
I have always tried to live as you do, give to those who need it, love above all else,don’t try to hurt others especially in revenge, but what I have learned is to protect myself from the hurtful behaviors of others and not accept responsibility for others’ actions. In other words, I live as an example to my children and teach them that love conquers all, but loving someone should not mean you give up your sense of right and wrong, compromise yourself, accept any type of abuse, etc
I’m just afraid that by continuing to love someone who is incapable of loving you back, you are putting yourself in harm’s way: YOU ARE NOT LOVING YOURSELF
Your kindness toward your ex will most likely be his key to hurting you and your children. You don’t have to be mean, you just have to be firm, set boundaries, don’t think of this person as someone who can change. I tried to be kind and compassionate after my divorce, my ex became more and more invasive and intrusive over time. It would have been easier if I just set boundaries and remained neutral from the start. My children would have benefitted more from the safety and security of the boundaries and the attitude I have now.
They thought they had to be compassionate to him and they followed my lead only to get hurt emotionally and manipulated by their father. I do not ‘bad mouth’ their dad, but I educate my children, and they are stronger for it.
Please remember that you are not alone in all the healing and that means hurting, too. Don’t feel guilty for having normal emotions of anger and hurt, it’s part of the process.
Quinn
About 3 months ago, when my ex moved in with another woman, he announced that he was no longer going to communicate with me directly. That all correspondence to him had to go through his lawyer. While it has been a pain in the butt to me, it has been very freeing. I am no longer getting nasty communications from him, Praise God for that!. But it also means that when things like my daughter being injured by a fall from a horse had to go via email through his lawyer! (If she had been severely injured I think I would have defied him and texted him though). And intimate details about the kids lives are having to be shared through a third party. He is the one paying for it, because I no longer have a lawyer! I have to admit there have been occasions that i have purposefully sent two emails when I could have sent one, just to make him pay a little more.
I have felt myself healing as the weeks have gone by without the nasty contact. (Ex: He accused me of kidnapping the kids when they were on a two hour delay from school due to snow. He threatened me with court action and child services report because the kitchen sink was stopped up for a couple of days. That I was selfish and self centered for completing some training I had started before I left him, because it took time away from the kids)
The less contact you and your children have with him the better off you will all be. Ge grateful and do not worry about him not finding out soon enough in emergencies or any other matter. He did it, let him live with it. It is nno longer your responsiblity. Enjoy it.
Quinn, Very well put! I was finally able to leave the psychopath when I read in one of Eric Butterworth’s books that forgiving does not mean condoning or continuing to be a victim. Allowing a psychopath access to your emotions and the emotions of your children is not forgiveness, it is stupidity and child neglect or abuse. I learned too slowly and my children are seriously damaged and suseptible to his evil because I unwittingly condoned some of it in the guise of what I thought was best for my children. All my good intentions only led to being him being able to revictimize me through my children.
revjanice,
I’ve always lived in harmony with the Bible,so I understand exactly what you’re saying about taking your marriage vows seriously;remembering the good things about your marriage and not wanting to be a bitter and lonely person.
Last night I was watching a TV show that I’ve “gotten into”,it’s called “Criminal Minds”.This team of FBI agents
are behavior scientists(meaning they study psycopaths,etc).
Anyway,they visited this couple in prison who were about to be executed.The husband was the guilty one.He was termed a “sex psychopath”.But he had accused his wife of joining in murdering;and because she wouldn’t do anything to prove her innocence,nothing could be done to save her.She kept saying her son was in a “better place”.Again her husband accused her of murder.Finally it was figured out that she had put him up for adoption.Before she was executed,she said to one of the agents,”my life ended the day I met my husband”.She simply had given up;did not want to live any longer.She had protected her son and knew he was happy.I cried and cried as I thought of her last words.
I struggled with the idea of divorce.But that is the only way I can get the protection I need.I grieve the fact that my marriage was a sham.
My need to forgive God stems from my wrestling with the desire of having a God who answers prayers to stop evil and abuse. When you are hurting you want an all powerful God that can fix anything and control everything. But instead we as human beings have to come to grips withe pain that is caused by God granting us free will and the ability to mess up and hurt other people royally.
I believe in a God who is loving enough to allow us to be angry and to shout and rant even as we still believe. That is how I am still ministering even in the midst of all of this. And my parishioners are getting a lot of sermons that deal with my working my way through the answers. But I think that varying levels we all struggle with these “big questions” of the faith:
“If God is all loving, why are some of us hurt more than others?”
“If God is all powerful, why do bad things have to happen?”
“If God is all knowing, why isn’t evil stopped before it starts?”
“If God is all present, why do we feel so lonely when we are at rock bottom?”
I do not claim to have all the answers. But I do believe God is there and loves us beyond words and that free will is both a blessing and a curse. And I wrestle on.
well, I think you are very strong for sharing your healing with your church and others. I don’t think you need to answer any of the questions, I think whomever we believe to be in charge would want us to take responsibility and ownership for our own lives in a way that keeps us healthy and healing. Maybe God is there as your guide and support, and he gives you the strength to keep figuring it all out along the way.
Stay strong-
Quinn
revjanice.
You wrote: (my comments in perenthisis)
“I believe in a God who is loving enough to allow us to be angry and to shout and rant even as we still believe. (Amen to that) That is how I am still ministering even in the midst of all of this. And my parishioners are getting a lot of sermons that deal with my working my way through the answers. (Your parishiners are very fortunate) But I think that varying levels we all struggle with these “big questions” of the faith:
“If God is all loving, why are some of us hurt more than others?” (It is a learning experience, Pain has only one purpose and that is to facilitate learning. IMHO)
“If God is all powerful, why do bad things have to happen?” (Because heaven and hell are right here on Earth and we get to choose. If we continue to learn and grow from bad and evil experience we are able to grow Spiritually.)
“If God is all knowing, why isn’t evil stopped before it starts?” (I can only hope that is because it must be overcome before it can be stopped.)
“If God is all present, why do we feel so lonely when we are at rock bottom?” (Because we are missing the connection with God because of our own state of mind.)
I do not claim to have all the answers. But I do believe God is there and loves us beyond words and that free will is both a blessing and a curse. And I wrestle on.” (I agree and I wrestle on too and I am also an Ordained Minister)
Dear RevJanice,
I really do not know what to say. I guess if your love does not overrule your mind, there is nothing wrong in loving him. My problem is with the emotion that over rules the mind and not only cause the suffering to continue and exacerbate but also to help it spread like the cancer through out the fabric of the whole family. This is where the emotion (love, forgiveness, tolerance, etc…) is a very dangerous factor in the psychopathic world. These are the emotional tools that the psychopath uses to wreak havoc in the live of everyone around him.
The other thing I can say is that abusers, cheaters, and bad people come in different shapes and forms so not all bad people are created equal. But for someone to earn the psychopathic title, he should be of a totally different magnitude in badness and to continue allowing such a monster to function because of our emotional attachment is not right. It is like feeding the beast so one day the beast can eat you.
I wish you all the best in your life. There are many things about our lives and feelings that we do not really understand.
Regards,
I love my ex, but I absolutely want no actual contact with him. I know he is a wicked and evil person. I view it kind of like someone who is diabetic. They know they can’t eat sweets anymore, but they have fond memories of how wonderful they tasted and all the events like weddings and birthdays where you had them.
Even after I left my ex lived out his prior threats in his attempts to ruin me financially and professionally and to never let me have the kids if i left him. He also threatened me physically once and threatened to kill me another time after I left. I got that threat on a voice recording and played it to the police, but was told it was a “figure of speech.” While in the scope of things the physical abuse he meted out to me was not horrific, I often feared for my life. The look in his eyes was frightening, something the courts do not take into consideration. But the psychological and spiritual abuse I endured was over the top while I lived with him.
My final freedom from my ex started in May when he demanded that we could only communicate via his lawyer which has been very freeing. No more nasty emails from him. Yeah! I can say I have gradually felt my shoulders unwind, etc. now that i do not have to dread opening my email everyday.
Last July, after more than a year of requesting, a court motion stated that all of our communication had to be via email. So I have not communicated directly with my ex for well over a year. He is simply too mean spirited. I made the decision to request this, because when we communicated by phone the kids would often over hear the dialogue and certainly saw the effects on me afterwards. And I knew emails would be better on us all, because I could measure my responses back to him much better and do them at a time the kids would not be around. It still took me awhile to learn not to get baited even with the emails.
I would say that is part of the reason he doesn’t want to even communicate by email anymore. I wasn’t any fun after I quit getting hooked into responding in a hurt way to what he was writing. I would rant to my friends, and ignore his emails or simply respond back with 1-3 sentence responses restating a fact.
His callous disregard for the the children’s physical,educational, social and spiritual well being was present throughout these emails. And it was obvious to me he was simply trying to get to me through the kids and it didn’t matter to him that he was hurting them in the process. All three of my kids have been in tears at some point, due to their pain of being literally in the middle of all of this. I have made it clear to them that I do not want to fight with their dad any more. But I will stand up for their rights and they will have to let me know if certain issues are important enough for me to stand up to him about. Currently we are dealing with the fact that my oldest is in marching band and will be missing scheduled weekends with her dad due to activities related to this.
My ex prevented the oldest from going on a week long travel seminar that she had a full scholarship for, when the divorce was still not final and she needed his permission too in order to leave the state. He tried to prevent the kids from going to a family member’s funeral, and my son from receiving medical treatment. He is still refusing to let my two younger children participate in religious rituals that are part and parcel of our faith. I am going to have to get of my qualms about having them do without his permission and I think my son will likely refuse to participate, because he knows his dad is not behind it. Etc. Etc. Etc.
Having minor children in middle of a divorce with a sociopath is very difficult even when you have sole custody.
I feel for his new girlfriend and her two kids who are living with him full time. But I know I do not dare try and speak to her. He has made it clear that he would file defimation of character charges against me if I try to talk to anyone about him. I lost the protective order against him, so I truly believe he would file charges against me if I did. And I am sure she has been told I am a crazy as they come, so she wouldn’t believe me anyway. So she is on her own to figure him out.
GettingOn-
Romantic love IS a form of addiction! You nailed it on the head!
Alcoholics crave the chemicals that make that make them feel a certain way. Not having those chemicals in their system will create a craving for more. The same is true of drug addicts and people who are in love.
The animal phylum denotes the order of sophistication of the animal kingdom. Homo Sapiens, us, are on the top. Most of us are born with, or develop brain chemicals call nuerotransmitters that enable us to be social beings. We are designed to have intricate relations with one another that are based on trust. The “trust” and “love” glue that binds us with others is called oxytocin, which is a neurotransmitter that is emitted during “trust” producing acts such as sexual intimacy. This neurotransmitter is at the heart of affective empathy, the person’s ability to care about what another person feels. It also makes us feel “loved” and we will attempt to retrieve it if it is taken away.
To digress for a moment, affective empathy is automatic in some people. They’ll feel an immediate “ouch” when another person falls off a chair. People without affective empathy might laugh, because the only affect the accident produces for them is humor toward the action or expression by the injured party. While they might ultimately extend a helping hand, it’s because they know it’s expected of them, not because they care.
Here’s another example: I was in the emergency room for a sprained ankle. I called my son to pick me up with the car. We were leaving the emergency room in the elevator when a gurney approached with a very sick woman who was moaning with pain. The orderly was hurrying her to another floor, probably to surgery. As they approached, the door began to close and I instantly put my hand out to hit the “door open” button. My son made a face and pulled my hand away.
The trust and chemical reaction to the person you “love” is supported by your production of brain chemistry. Without this brain chemistry, we are more consistent with other animals. Mother lions will nurture their cubs because they are wired to do so, but they will also eat their cubs, given certain circumstances. They don’t feel “love.” And human beings who lack oxytocin don’t feel love either.
Getting back to the point: when we are betrayed by a morally disordered person (who lacks oxytocin and therefore, affective empathy,) our brains go into a similar craving mode as if we were an alcoholic craving a high. This longing sensation can take significant time to dissipate but it will if we work at it. Understanding the underpinnings is an important place to start.
Once you can understand that you are fighting a form of addiction, you can grasp why it’s important not to have contact with the person. With time, the chemical longing that is attached to the separation will ease. You can speed this along by doing other endorphin pumping things that make you feel good about yourself, and spending time with others who you feel “loved” by.
Wishing you and all of our LoveFraud family a speedy recovery from the morally disordered beings in our lives! Although they think they are superior, they are truly lesser beings by what they lack, they just don’t know it.
JmS
Excellent physiological conclusions. I only question three of your premises and then only to promote potential dialog on an interesting topic. (1) “Homo Sapiens, us, are on the top”. Clearly unproven and solopsistic JMHO. (2) “People without affective empathy might laugh, because the only affect the accident produces for them is humor toward the action or expression by the injured party.” People will often block or coveup empathy because it makes them uncomfortable, unfortunately, this has been promoted in our society since the begining of slapstick comedy, if not before. This is still very different from the true psychopath who has no empathy at all and would actually take pleasue and feel superior to the suffering person’s plight. (3) “Without this brain chemistry, we are more consistent with other animals. Mother lions will nurture their cubs because they are wired to do so, but they will also eat their cubs, given certain circumstances. They don’t feel ‘love.'” Mother lions and mother humans nurture thier children for the same probably chemical reasons. Cubs and children will each be and are eaten or sacrificed by their mothers, fathers or communities in certain circumstances, sometimes for good reasons like survival of the spieces or tribe or bad reasons like genetic dominance. Only humans sacrifice their children for no good reason. And animals do feel love just as much as humans albiet probably for the same chimical reasons.
Interesting topic, I hope to hear more on your comments about all of this as well as my three poins. Thank you for sharing such a thought provoking comment.
To me, love is quite simple . . . It is “caring about someone else’s well being”. Since sociopaths are incapable of caring for anyone/anything except themselves (or when there is a direct benefit to themselves i.e., exploitation). They can’t love! To me, it’s that simple. “Sex and attachment” are not love. They are “sex and attachment”. That’s just me.
Sarah, I agree wholeheartedly. I would only add that, for me, to love is “caring about someone else’s well-being as much as, or more than one’s own”. Love is what propels a parent to sacrifice his/her own life to save that of their off-spring.
Sarah999,
I totally agree with you. A sociopath is not capable of any love, empathy or compassion. You stated it so correctly. They are obsessed with sex because it gives them instant gratification and at the sand time a victim they can manipulate and control. I wish I would have seen the truth in my husband much earlier but I didn’t. I will never feel any love for this man. I am a believer but I will never forget the pain and hurt he put me through. Therefore I will not hold on to good memories even if I think of him as the father of my child. In my mind he never existed, he was an illusion. By cutting off all contact including emails and only corresponding through attorneys I am able to move on with my life. Otherwise he would still have that control over me. I think the no contact is the only way you can start to recover. At first it was difficult not to text or call of email . I am in my 3rd month of no contact and it feels great :).
Sarah, So very happy for you that you apparently recognised what sort of personality you were married to before decades or offspring ensued. I had the ignorant misfortune of having been faced with a double whammy: first, the devastating reality of my ex’s psychosis and then 30 years later with the realisation that, despite all my loving efforts, my 5 adult children’s character’s also erupted with the identical traits. Due to my ignorance and love for my children, I’ve had to go through the emotional death of 6 members of my immediate family and now, the traits of three grown grandchildren are questionable.
Hurrah to you and I pray you stay the course…it is the only solution; difficult road but well worth it in the end.
Tawanda, Sarah999!
In 1999 I rented a chair in a salon from a woman who was seemingly nice. She was attractive, personable, charming and seemed caring. At the time, I was in a woman’s group for childhood trauma victims. She would call me the nest day pumping me for information about my life and confirmed how “understanding she is.” In time, I discovered she was selling drugs, while sleeping with married police officers that tip her off when the heat is on. I wanted to leave but the pile of clients I was supposed to be getting from another stylist that had left the industry seemed to only make their way to her appointment book column. I basically was paying her to answer her phone, in hopes that she would decide to hand someone over as she was now booked months in advance. One day my husband told me, “Hey! Your boss is a weirdo. She is calling me while you are in route to work and asking if I am sexually satisfied with you.” Then flowers came one day from a boyfriend of mine from the past who really broke my heart. Then the phone calls started coming in from my highschool boyfriend David who was one of the biggest sociopaths of my life. She had gotten names and did her research and gone and met them. I was always getting sick every time I brought lunch to work. Then I found a thing of arsenic under the sink. I asked, “When did we get rats in here? I have never seen droppings.” She had a cold blank stare and did not respond. Then one day someone* put acid in my facial toner which made a small zit, swell to the size of a ping pong ball, open up and bleed. I went to Kaiser and the doctor said, “Get out of there. No witnesses no crime…the police will do nothing to her. You are working with an insane and dangerous person.” After being poisoned, robbed of $200 scissors, what little money I did make right out my purse when I used the bathroom, color, perms, etc…I gave her my one month notice in 2000 which she said “was highly unprofessional.” After I left, she drove into my driveway with the sociopath 1st boyfriend, by my work and on my birthday, had me served with a summons to appear in court that I was stalking and threatening to kill her and her then teenage son who was living in another county with his father who had full time custody since he was a baby. For a good reason…he caught her in bed with her very own brother and she refused to give up her drugs and alcohol and get real help. Years went by, she or the ex boyfriends tired of her and she fizzled out from driving by my house/work. Only to this day, she tells people she fired me, and that I am a dangerous person. Not that I gave her a 30 day notice. Technically she was my landlord, not my boss! People with anti social personality disorder…sociopaths, have no relational boundaries. They see sex as a competitive sport. They steal. They slander and they have absolutely not remorse for what they do. They think nothing of suing a doctor for something stupid they did to their own body, and ruining their career. Only we “normal” people have to give them the final word so they can feel like they won so they do not go into one of their many psychotic tantrums. Presently when women tell me they have incestuous relationships, take drugs and have not relational boundaries with the husbands and boyfriends of the women in their association, I drop tail and leave as I see them as potentially psychologically unfit. Someone who will harm me without a conscience.
hi, i am new to this site. After a 12 year relationship , I ended all of it six months ago. He now is living with the woman he cheated on me with for several years. All of it makes me sick. I tried to warn her, she has extensive knowledge of this illness and even went as far as writing a book on the subject but yet she fell for it again. Twenty years prior she had lived with him- had to call the police. I heard that she is spending large sums of money on him and his
son now- i guess she is trying to keep him. But i know the truth- he is using her now and their relationship is not real,
just like mine was. I saw him recently and he saw me but i did
not say a thing and keep walking. All of it is hard to comprehend and very painful.
BSCharming – welcome to Lovefraud. Wow – some people just don’t want to get it.
Based upon my research and my years of interaction with my present (psychotic) grown children, I believe those experts who say they believe the psychotic’s inability to love is not based on incapacity, but rather a willful choice the psychotic makes in order to mold themselves into becoming “superior” human beings. This allows them the ruthlessness/power needed to fire, humiliate, debase or destroy another human being at will.
For years I watched my oldest son’s library in his living room expand with books on the “Mensa” organization; he clearly aligned himself as being Mensa material. All the while, he had no qualms about having several office “affairs” which ultimately caused his divorce and his firing from several prominent firms.
Later it was drummed into me by my 4 other children that I persistently “lived in the past”, “exaggerated”, “was overly emotional”. They couldn’t stand to be confronted with what they knew was the truth, the facts. This self-conditioning to unemotionalism gives them the “superiority” to discard their associates, their children, their spouses and their disabled mother at will…and feel no remorse whatsoever. They feel they are superior to the rest of humanity because they are somehow “above” the emotional attachments the rest of us feel. Yet it is this very same quality which they inexplicably find so lacking in their own lives and which propels them to pursue a lifetime of incessant affairs,risky behavior, the acquisition of material “objects” etc. to fill this void.Is this the emergeance of a new race of super-human robots or a mental illness? One cannot help but wonder as one sees psychotic traits proliferate across the globe.
Wow flicka, Thank you for sharing this intensive thought provoking material. I can relate to what you are seeing and saying. It seems to me that psychopths are coming out of the woodwork like droves of roaches. They are often very successful in our dog eat dog crumbling greedy business and political complexes and rampant on the streets and in our prisons.
Where did they all come from all of a sudden? Perhaps we have developed the perfect enviornment to bring out the traits that were once considered to be totally unacceptable. The unacceptable is becoming acceptable in our society and those with the gene or propensity are grabbing the oportunity to become self-created psychopaths. We who are aware are floundering in disbelief and the rest of society is in total denial.
I see it in all of my children of the psychopath sperm donor. My situation seems much like yours. I am the designated “crazy one” while the rest of my family are slowly developing more and more psychopathic traits and seeing the psychopath as the “reasonable one”.
Which brings me to something I wanted to ask everyone here. I often see comments on total no contact with the psychopath with which I totally agree. It is a dead end and continued contact is futile. But I am concerned that I also often hear comments that indicate that anyone who is upset by being ignored is a psychopath. I totally disagree with this line of thought and actually believe that no contact and shunning are ploys of the deranged psychopath to torture his tarets or victims for not co-operating.
I have been shunned by my famiy because of the reactions to the psychopath re-entering my life and targeting my adult children. My reactions to the revictimization were not good but do not warrant being cut off by my children and losing my grandchildren. So I am devistated to have lost my entire family to the psychopath. I am not handling being shunned well at all but that does not mean I am the psychopath and he is not.
The psychopath may stalk and act like he is hurt by loss of a loved one but it is all a ploy to use and get pity. All I want is my family to come to thier senses and include me in their life again. But the logic is 180 degrees off. Anyone understand what I am tryig to say? Thanks in advance for any enlightenment, wisdom or understanding.
I’m not sure I understand exactly what you are saying. I totally agree with your first two paragraphs; it certainly seems that psychotics are proliferating in our current selfish, greedy, mercinary,and growing morally corrupt society.
However, I believe that we both know the self-inflicted damage done by the re-introductiom of the psychotic into your life. One of the benefits of going NC is that it allows the time and distance for the victim to restore the former “self” and free him/herself from the distorted thinking process of the psychopath.I really don’t think the psychopath gives a hoot about being “shunned”; he freely just moves on to the next victim. Why your family is currently shunning you, I have no idea. Perhaps they feel disappointed that after having once supported you emotionally, you renegged on their care by reactivating your relationship with the psychopath?.
This is a difficult situation to be in and I can relate to it although mine was a different type of encounter. The psychopath is good in getting what he wants because of the weakness of others. Most people think it is okay to overlook certain acts of badness in order to obtain some benefits. Well there is no benefit in condoning bad behavior but the one who tries to be good ends up isolated because the psychopath is good at manipulating others. My advice to you is to find one sympathetic member in your family or to seek the help of someone outside the family who knows you well to establish contact. I know this is not going to be easy as the psychopath is very good at enforcing his controlling boundaries in his sphere of influence but this is the only way to rebuild your contact with some of your family members. I know how it feels to be shunned but you should not allow this to break you down as this is the real purpose of everything the psychopath does: break you down.
dear bscharming, So very sorry to know the pain you are suffering but hang in there; it is a painful, long journey to recovery but regaining one’s self-esteem makes it all worthwhile. What helped me immensely during the healing process was the poem “The Man In the Glass”. If I could look myself in the mirror and feel good about what I saw, I knew all would be well. The pain may never go away completely but it dwindles to a long-forgotten, horrible memory.
bscharming,
Welcome. Sounds like he was a good one to get rid of. Be grateful you got rid of him and let her have him…yet again. Sounds like she is a glutton for punishment.
BScharming…
Welcome to the LoveFraud site. You are not alone in your feelings. I was in a 4-year relationship with a spath. I moved out of the home we lived in together about three days after I found out he was interested in someone else. What he failed to announce was that he had been in a relationship with this person for months while we were still living together. Our relationship ended just over 1 1/2 years ago.
However, about six months ago on a fluke I found out who he had been seeing. I, too, tried to warn her of him. She even called me as he had lied to her a couple of times and she was devastated. Even after all I shared, she still stayed with him.
It’s no longer my problem. I did what I could…but she chose to look the other way. He’s very, very manipulative and she obviously bought it all.
carolann
Crazy is not it? but what you wrote regarding how the psychopath thinks and behaves is the a text-book example of their operation manual. If you have never been manipulated by a psychopath, you would never believe such stories. I only wonder how they have the time and the ability to do these type of things while having everyone believe whatever they want them to believe. God helps you as the cancerous woman is not going to give up on her badness unless she gets in real trouble.
This was a great post. When EX-husbnad (sociopath w/ extreme NPD)left he informed me that he did not want to be responsible for anyone except himself. *lack of caregiving
What he didn’t realize is that if you’re not responsible for anyone, no one will be responsible for you. He now complains that he has no one but himself on a regular basis. You are living the exact life that you said you wanted to live. What’s your complaint?
I was devistated when he left. I felt like I would die if I couldn’t be with this man. I had no clue how freaking miserable I was. I was so busy trying to keep him happy and please him that I didn’t even know that I was unhappy.
He used me to get into the country and left me as soon as I helped him to obtain a good job, citizenship, a car, a new house and money. He took everything that he could from me, EVERYTHING, including my closet space which was the only thing that I told him that I was not willing to share. He had to have that too. Once I had nothing more to offer him, he was out the door and on to the next victim. He has had a string of them since me. The last straw was when he pretended (in court) to want to take my daughter from me as well. He accused me of being unfit along with all of my family. The problem was he couldn’t prove it nor could he find another person on the planet who would agree with him. He lost that battle and the war. It was long and hard and costly but I fought for my baby and I won. He’s still a little bitter, needless to say.
I feel sorry for my daughter because I know that they will never have a “normal” relationship. I explain to her what behaviors are not ok and not accptable on a regular basis. I’m so proud of her because she is quick to tell him what she will and will not accept and she is only 6yrs old. “Daddy, you lied to me, my mom never lies to me. When you lie to people or tell stories , they don’t trust you anymore. Do you want me to trust you??” It’s like watching an old wise woman. I’m soooooo proud of her.
She is the ONLY good thing that came out of that fraudulent marriage.
FreedomAtLast – Your daughter is brilliant. It’s heartwarming to hear how strong she is.
What a wonderful child. Beware the silver tongues viper though. My daughter was wooed away by her psychopath father as an adult even though he did not want her as a child. There is a strong desire for the parent who was not there and the undying attachemt to the “long lost Daddy” who can play her sympathy.
Hello my friends,
I have been on this site for almost 5 years, and it has helped me understand what a sociopath is. I was married for almost 20 years, and because I loved him with all my heart, I think I actually lost myself in him. My two beautiful kids live with me and have not seen their father in almost 5 years, that is how long I have remained no contact. My kids, a girl who is 21 and in University and has ambitions to become a doctor is the most compassionate, kind, and giving person you would want to meet. However, no mention must be made of her father in front of her, she has changed her last name, and has erased him from her future. She had seen his violence firsthand towards me and her brother, and understands that her father is not able to be cured. This of course comes from knowledge from her textbooks and research. She is angry at her father because he purposely hurts people and no good can come from her association with him. My son who was totally hated by his father, has no fond memories of him and hates him for what he did to me and his sister. The hardest part at the beginning of my separation was accepting that my marriage was an illusion, that I was married to a ghost and he did not actually exist, I actually had loved an non-existant person. Hard thing for my heart to understand, but somehow, the love that I had for him, manifested itself in my kids, they are the total opposite of him. God somehow gave me all that love back in my kids. It was all worth it. My children turned out to be kind only because whatever gene was within was probably suppressed by a loving environment. My days are getting better, sometimes I fall into that past pit of evil and my mind asks questions and I get sucked back in, and it takes all my energy to come out of the pit and to be grateful that I came out of it in one piece and I am able to take care of my kids. I am still battling the courts, but when he sees me, I see the anger because I have never looked better, he on the other hand looks like hell, and that is where he belongs. I actually think he will live a long life, cause the devil does not want him, too much competition.
So do sociopaths love ? Yes they do, in their own way, which is not the normal kind of love,its more of a temporary addiction, and when you tire them, for whatever reason, they find the addiction elsewhere. I was idolized, swooned, made to feel like a princess, and then thrown away in a blink of an eye, I did not know what happened. If it was not for family therapy, the police department and this site along with an overload of information, I am not sure what would have happened. But I did want to say to you all that there is hope, and if we look around we can see good things coming our way.
Thank you everyone for your input, please keep them coming.
Take care and God bless.
So very glad you have the love and care of your two grown children; hang on to that whenever you feel weak! And please don’t ever feel quilty as it van happen to the most intelligent, kind and talented person. You may have been seeking love but aren’t we all? And you are the victor with two wonderful children! Bravo girl!
Wow this testimony assured me once again that I should not feel “guilt” that my 18 year old son has cut off all contact to his father also. My soon to be ex husband does not realize what scars he left behind and should feel ashamed for what he has put his wife and don through. He was trying so hard to put all blame on me in telling my son I was mentally ill,mentally unstable and going as far as saying I am not taking my prescriptions accordingly. I never had. A mental illness in my life or took any prescription medication other than for hypertension. Strangely my hypertensive vanished a month after my husband discarded me. The past 20 years have been a total lie and the lies that I still find out are unbelievable. I still remember the silent treatments we received as a form of punishment. The outbursts when he yelled and steamed at us in a drill seargent voice that made me shake and cry. My son also attends a university here in hopes to become a successful computer engeneer. He always saw the truth on his father. I wish he did not see me cry in a closet on a daily base. But things are getting better. I will get through this divorce and plan on keeping the no contact at all. I want him to just vanish to smother state or far away. My son and I feel so much at peace and in a way we are so thankful for his young deputy co worker to take him away from us. If it wasn’t for her we would still suffer. So Miss deputy thank you from the bottom of my heart to initiate an affair with my husband. At first I hated you but today I want to thank you and I hope you have more strength than me to deal with a narcissistic sociopath. You know when you become boring or unattractive to him he will discard you the same way. Until then enjoy his anise and you know his good looks are just a mask he will eventually take off.
thanks for all the support , i really need it. i have been lucky to have good family and friends and
doctors who really care about me. also my cats too . It is hard to accept all that has happened to
me and all the lying as well. When he saw me he had a shame reaction- he put his hand to his head
and looked down . he has what to be ashamed about. I told his family that they have a responsbility
to protect innocent people and not look the other way. The family has been in contact with me alot.
His mother calls me but i will never forget her words…..he has done this before and never trust him.
His own 85 year old mother said that to me. This woman who is with him now is being manipulated
and used- she wrote a book all about her relationship with him and even wrote on this site – that is
how i found Donna, which has helped me because i did not understand what the word narcissism meant. His brother many years ago before we got married tried to warn me, he said he is a narcissist. The red flag did not go off then for many reasons back then. So today i understand.
I do not want to end up like her. I want to get better and find a partner who will really love and care
about me .