By O.N. Ward
Every week, a chapter of my book, “Husband, Liar, Sociopath: How He Lied, Why I Fell For It & The Painful Lessons Learned” (available via Amazon.com, just click on the title or book cover) will be published here on Lovefraud. To read prior chapters, please see the links at the bottom of the post.
Chapter 8: I Will Follow Him
Deeply in love, or so I thought, Paul and I agreed to coordinate our job search so we could stay together after business school. In early January, Paul received his first job offer—to work for a niche consulting firm in Minneapolis. I wanted to stay on the East coast, closer to family in Vermont. I hoped to work in public relations after getting my MBA, but almost no public relations companies interviewed at Yale during my graduating year, and I needed to generate my own leads. I did, and I got four offers in my desired field, all in Massachusetts and Connecticut. However, Paul wanted to stop his job search, accept his first offer, and cancel his many upcoming interviews with firms in Connecticut and Massachusetts.
I was confused. Hadn’t we developed a joint job-search strategy to generate job offers in a few agreed-upon cities, including Minneapolis, and then make a “what’s best for us” decision once all relevant offers had been extended? As a sociopath, Paul needed to appear as if he wanted to cooperate with me, all the while doing only what was best for him. If he had made it clear early in the job-search process, which started at the beginning of our second year in business school, that staying with me was not his priority, it is likely I would have ended our relationship. He would have lost access to all the advantages I provided as his girlfriend—an apartment, access to a car, a study-mate who would help him get good grades with less effort, better food than the cafeteria, and physical intimacy. Why blow that?
“It’s a perfect match,” Paul explained. “No matter how much I interview, I’ll never find any firm or job I like better. I won’t make much money, but money doesn’t matter. I know I’m going to love it there.”
Once Paul played the “it’s the perfect job for me” card, I did not want to stand in the way of the man I loved and his ideal first position out of business school with a boutique consulting company. Wanting to be a loving, supportive, understanding girlfriend, I played right into his hand and encouraged Paul to take the job. I would keep looking. I broadened my search to any type of job that I could do well, not just the type of job I really wanted. After a few months, I received a lucrative offer from an investment management company in Minneapolis. Shame on me, but I took the job so that Paul and I could stay together, not because it was a position or long-term career I really wanted. I left those dreams behind back East.
Clearly, I am not the first woman to trade off career in favor of a relationship. Maybe I would not have done it if I were younger with decades of time ahead of me to find Mr. Right and start a family, but I was thirty-six years old when I finished business school. I wanted children, and my biological clock was ticking—loudly. Besides, I was in love with Paul, and I thought he was in love with me. Once in Minneapolis, I hoped I would be able to craft the public relations career I wanted.
In truth, Paul probably didn’t care if I got a job in Minneapolis or not. If I, like Jenny, was naïve enough to sacrifice my ambitions to tag along where he was going anyway, that was fine with him. After all, in Minneapolis, we were able to get a bigger and nicer apartment than either of us could have afforded on our own. This was especially true for Paul, because he had a bigger tuition debt and a smaller salary than me. My relocation package was more generous than Paul’s, too, and my company was happy to give Paul’s belongings a free ride to our new apartment in Minneapolis. The lack of balance in our job search process did not set off alarm bells for me. After all, long-term relationships are full of give and take, tradeoffs, and compromise. I assured myself that the scales would balance over the long term.
What a sociopath says he will do for the benefit of someone else and what he actually does can diverge wildly, especially over time. You can explain away any single incident, but beware of a disturbing long-running pattern. Each decision I made, each trade-off I offered, made sense to me at the time and was couched in logic and long-term purpose. Yet, years later as our marriage dissolved, I asked Paul what meaningful tradeoff in our almost twenty-year relationship he had ever made for me. He could not recall even one.
Neither could I.
Start from the beginning:
Go to previous chapter:
Go to next chapter:
Notes
Identifying names, places, events, characteristics, etc. that I discuss here and in my book have been altered to protect the identity of everyone involved.
Excellent.
Once again, you have put into words, the patterns of the SP.
Perfectly.
The thing is we sacrifice so much for them that walking away means we sacrificed all for nothing and they know that. They know that we sacrificed everything that made us who we were as individuals.
My marriage counselor who recognized the inbalance of power and abuse that was occurring counseled me on my own in the end. He asked me what I did for myself. I answered and his reply was no you do that for so and so not you. I answered again with another reply and he said no that’s for so and so. This went on as I tried to think about what I did for myself and his continued reply was no that’s for so and so… . My counselor then told me that I didn’t exist. I broke down in tears because I realized that my entire life with my husband, at that time, was geared towards trying to please him and in return trying to avoid the abuse to me and my children by doing so.
So at this point and while I was still married to him I didn’t exist. I phoned 911 with the last assault. This meant divorce and the threats of him taking my children away from me and ruining me actually occurred because I didn’t have the social status nor strength physically and financially to fight him for divorce and custody.
I had my reality taken away when the marriage ended and all of his lies that were crafted by him during the marriage come out front and center to me.
I have had my children taken away by him. He won 100% custody. I rarely see them and they treat me horribly and accuse me that I abandoned them when I do see them. They don’t remember the abuse they endured from him or done to me. They remember nothing about me in their life when I raised them alone 24/7. He was out with other women.
I have had my health taken away. He would throw me into walls and doorframes in rage. I am an incomplete quadriplegic. My quadriplegic condition which he has caused is deteriorating and I have been in ICU 4 times in the last 1 1/2 years. The last two times I didn’t think I was going to get out alive.
I have had my career taken away. I had 10 years post secondary education and a lucrative career that was unfolding before me when he was making just above min wage with his. I was told that I had to give up my career if I wanted to have children and raise them. Daycare was not allowed.
I have had my public status taken away. He put forth that I was mentally ill and antisocial. His diagnosis is taken over that of professionals who state the opposite by the public.
I have had my financial security taken away. I have fought for 8 years to see my children and the alimony I receive is pittance. I have had my future taken away because of him. My children are into fun, fun, fun and don’t find it necessary to see me because I am not fun and cannot fund them. They like his money.
He systematically destroyed all of these things about me, that made me who I was as a person, bit by bit and I don’t exist anymore. I am too busy just trying to survive now.
Things didn’t get better upon leaving the psychopath but got worse. I don’t wish this on anyone and hope that these people can be realized one day in the courts.
Dear Kendall68, I’m so sorry for all the grief you’ve had.
I too feel I’ve lost my life and family to Spaths. My ex-husband of 34 years immediately replaced me with someone who looks remarkable like me after I filed for divorce. But she has more “charm”, social status and assets. There’s no telling what my ex spath told others about me and why I divorced him but I’m sure it wasn’t the truth.
I got taken advantage of in court not once but 3 times. I lost huge amounts of money fighting my ex after our divorce, when I found out he had hid a asset of $74,000 from me and the court during our divorce. He eventually got away with it because my attorney filed the wrong kind of motion. I now owe him his attorney’s fees. The family courts favor Spath behavior. There’s no winning in court with a Spath.
I have two adult sons. I only have contact with one. The other married a female Spath who set out to destroy my relationship with my son and grandkids. She was successful. I haven’t seen or heard from him or his children for almost 6 years.
After several years of disliking me, my other son has come around to where he’s finally seeing what a useless human my ex is. Mainly that happened because he needed financial help and my ex (who is well off) refused to help him while I sacrificed and did everything I could to help him even though I’m poor. That son in my life now but not fully aware of what his dad is. But he’s learning. Recently he told me that on Mother’s Day my ex texted him a nasty comment, complaining because my son didn’t send my ex’s new wife a Mother’s Day card. My son said he was so shocked he couldn’t even reply. I hope he’ll continue to learn the truth about my ex.
The only slight sense of justice I’ve felt is when I discovered that the woman my ex married may be a Spath. My ex told my son early on that she’s a retired school teacher. She is but the truth is she was asked to leave and offered retirement because she was in her 60’s and near retirement. She was offered that after she was caught stealing from the school district. She agreed to pay back what she stole in exchange for retiring and not losing her pension. But she didn’t pay it back and was taken to small claims court and got a judgement against her.
Also before she moved my ex into her home and he was helping her out financially because she couldn’t pay the real estate taxes. When they met she had her house for sale on a short sale (less than she owed). My ex helped her keep her house. They then got married. They’ve been married for over 4 years now and online records show she has yet to put my ex on her house deed. The house is in her name only. I smile when I think of how that must aggravate him! And a few years ago I got charged for their prescriptions by mistake. When I saw the prescriptions she was taking I knew he was in for a wild ride. She’s a real pill popper!
Just knowing those facts makes me feel better about the injustice I’ve been through. Like you, my life, in many ways, did not get better after leaving my Spath. But I at least feel I can be myself. I could never be myself with my Spath. I also know I’m free to do anything I want to do and I’m safe. His abuse left me very timid when it comes to meeting others and doing things with others. I have only one friend but that’s enough for me. And I actually have some days of complete joy knowing that my Spath is out of my life. Those days happen more and more often now.
Hang in there because there’s hope your children will see the truth and that your spath will pay for his behavior one way or another.
Dustey
So very sorry Kendall!
The number of lives ruined by these monsters is staggering.
You should have let him go to MN w/o you. The things we do for love!
Kendall and Dustey – I am so sorry for all both of you have endured. I hope you can find peace.