By Ox Drover
Donna’s great article about Victory, of a sort, over a sociopath the other day got me to thinking.
Just what is “victory?”
My wonderful stepfather was a young basketball coach when he got his first real job coaching for a very small rural school which had not had a winning game in over a decade. The team was dispirited and had no real expectation of ever winning a game.
One of the local coaches bragged that he would beat them “by a hundred points!” at the next game. The team thought there was a good possibility that that coach’s team could do just that. However, it is “good sportsmanship” for a coach playing a much weaker team to let their second, third, and fourth strings get a chance to play, and to win over the weaker team, but not “tromp” them.
Daddy thought this other coach’s brag to stomp and tromp his team was poor sportsmanship so he made a plan. When the fourth quarter started and Daddy’s team had the ball, they “froze” it (which was legal in the game then) and wouldn’t either shoot the ball or take a chance on losing it, so passed the ball from one of Daddy’s team members to another the entire quarter. They didn’t make any points, but they kept the other team from even getting their hands on the ball the entire quarter, and thus making points against them. Daddy’s team didn’t win, but the other coach didn’t win by his “hundred points” either. That little team went on the next year to win their division championship because of the confidence that Daddy inspired in them.
Sometimes “winning” or “victory” can be interpreted in different ways. I’m also reminded of the old Country and Western song, the “Winner” where an older man and a younger man are in a bar talking. The younger man wants to be a “winner” in bar fight brawls, and the older man is educating him on what is “winning” and what isn’t.
Sure, you can get into a fight and you may inflict more damage on your opponent than he inflicts on you in the fight, but like the old man said, “He gouged out my eye, but I won.” Sometimes it is better to walk away from a fight and not lose more than you have already lost, or allow your opponent to take another “pound of flesh” in your attempts to “get justice.”
It isn’t always about getting what you deserve, or victory over them, or even seeing that they get “what they so richly deserve,” sometimes, I think, “winning” simply means keeping them from taking more out of you and, like Daddy’s team, “freezing the ball.” Sometimes, it is like the would-be barroom brawler, walking away (intact) with the other guy yelling curses in your direction.
It is emotionally tough to watch a cheater “get away with it” when they have ripped us off, and go “waltzing away” unscathed and apparently the victor. It eats at our sense of fairness to let them “succeed” and not pay a price for their bad behavior.
Yet, sometimes, “discretion is the better part of valor” to use an old phrase, or to “be a live dog, rather than a dead lion,” and “retreat and live to fight another day.”
Those victims who are not able to fight for a “victory” of any sort, I don’t think need to feel that they have “failed” because they chose not to fight the sociopath.
Too many times fighting the psychopaths are like “fighting a circular saw,” as my grandmother would have said. It “just isn’t worth it,” because the damage to yourself will be worse than you can possibly inflict on the psychopath. They stack the odds so in their own favor, that even if you “win,” you end up like the old brawler sitting in the barroom, broken and so gravely injured yourself in your effort to gain a “victory, of sorts” that in retrospect the price was too high.
Sometimes, it is better to walk away a “loser” but still intact, and with your head held high, using the energy and resources you have left to focus on healing yourself, on recovering what you have lost in terms of finances and strength, and take care of yourself. To me that is also a “viable victory.”
Everyone: re Kim fredericks comments to me:
” A lot of people here have taken a good deal of time to explain to you what the article is trying to say. If you’ve done thaqt much work on yourself you should get it. Getting defensive and then spewing vile sarcasm and insults at people is one way of proving the very point of the article.”
I am still reeling from this whole conversation between Jill smith and kim frederick about me.
Hey Tilly, nice to hear from you.xxx DONT REEL anymore. STICK a pin in it! Draw a line under it! Get back to healing!
You are truly supported and loved here.xx
I think it’s all good and proper for us all to express our opinions on here but we do have to be mindful that things can be read wrong or mis-construed.
I also think its fine (i am talking about me) if I come on here and act up (for any number of valid reasonsxx) that another might come in and say WOAH there lady, you have that all wrong!x
I dont know if you remember, but some time ago now, I was in a really hurt and angry place and I for some reason got it into my head that I was being ‘ignored’ on here…and flounced off…. now that whole behaviour was down to how I was feeling, totally understandable…BUT WRONG! (it was also a little selfabsoprbed methinks) I was comforted by a number of members that I WAS NOT BEING IGNORED, and I had to take that on board and adjust my way of thinking…because it was just plain NOT the case. xx
I dont wish for ANYONE to encourage my misconceptions and bad behaviour when it crops up and I thank my lucky stars that there are people out there who will say…STOP, youre looking at this all wrong.x when this happens it is a godsend, another oppourtunity to learn and grow and be a better me!
I think this started form your expression that an article may have been blaming the victims of S/P’s and i feel that you felt personally affronted by that and expressed it.(which IS finexxxx) After others came back and comforted you, you still felt hurt by it (this is my own conjecture boink me if I am wrong) and then maybe it looked like you werent ‘listening’ to some people and of course when we feel not listened to it pisses us off! Crazyness ensues!!x
SO GLAD YOU”VE COME BACK TILLY!xxxxxxxxxxxxx
I hope everyone here can chalk this up to experience and learn whatever they need to learn from it, ‘kiss and make up’ and get on with the talking healing!xxx
with MUCH love
Bluexxxx
Oxy you rock!xxx Thankyou so much for sharing all of your experiences and wisdom with us. xx Your crappy experience with the Misinster and how you processed it is SUCH a great ‘story’ for us all to hear. It helps us all to see that even after years of work we can still get sucked into the malstrom (because we cannot control external factors), BUT we can also get ourselves right back out again with a little self reflection, re-grouping and calmness… these are the tools we all need. You rock missus.xxx
To Tilly and all, I apologize for being B—-y. I guess we all behave badly, sometimes. I don’t want to alienate anybody, and I hate feeling alienated myself. Tilly, I hope you’re feeling better, now. Yes blueskies, lets all get back to the matter of healing.
Kimfrederick and jillsmith:
RE: your posts on : “After the sociopath is gone: Our thoughts become our reality”.
Please do not post TO ME or ABOUT me ever again.
I was just mulling all this over, and I wanted to say, sometimes when things blow up, it is AN EXCELLENT oppourtunity to really look at why it happend and WHY we felt so hurt and really confront it and deal with it.
It’s a bit like my trusty ‘broken car analogy’ (the one where I describe myself as put-putting along for years held together with sticky tape and chewing gum) you can go for years with…lets say a leaky valve…and never know until it blows and the red light comes on. (this seems like a calamity because now the car wont work, but it is actually a great opportunity to look at it and fix it properly.(am I gettin’ random enough for you guys at this point)xxx So Tilly, IMHO, this is not the time to cut yourself off (especially from anyone one here, personally I need all the support I can get so I ‘aint narrowing it down!), the interactions that were strained on here were maybe the ‘red light flashing’, the best way to get a positive out of this is to look at the root cause of the upset for YOU and deal with it.xxxx
Everyone, and this includes Tilly,
Sometimes, in our pain we “act out”—STRIKE OUT. I have done it, so I am not “throwing rocks” at someone for doing something I have DONE.
This blog is only good if it is supportive, but in being supportive, we must ALSO TELL THE TRUTH. Sometimes the truth is that we don’t always WANT TO SEE THE TRUTH.
Tilly, I told you (along with the others) at the time you were throwing your “tantrum” because you were (a) stressed out at the time and (b) “STRIKING out” and (c) you were reading something into the blog article THAT WAS NOT THERE.
Now before you get angry at me too and quit reading, I’m going to tell you a story.
I was in therapy years ago after my divorce, and the therapist gave me a bookk to take home and read between sessions. I did. I had been trying to “prove a point” (in other words I was trying to say she was wrong and I was right) so I took the book home and read it, and BINGO, i found the place that said EXACTLY WHAT I HAD BEEN TRYING TO TELL HER.
I was SOOOO halppy and I went back to therapy next week walking proud as a peacock because I WAS RIGHT AND SHE WAS WRONG. I told her that, and then she very calmly asked me to READ it ALOUD.
I very confidently did—-and guess what! I HAD HALUCINATED WORDS ON A PAGE because I wanted it to say what I thought. The book actually said the OPPOSITE of what I had wanted it to say. I WAS WRONG. But I wanted so toBELIEVE it said what I wanted it to say, I twisted it in my mind.
TILLY, there is NO ONE here who wishes you ill, or who I think has mistreated you in any way. You were angry at the time, and they didn’t tell you anything I didn’t tell you. NONE of those articles BLAMED the VICTIM, but you were FEELING blamed, I think, and so you READ IT THAT WAY—
“FRIENDS don’t let friends drive drunk” is a saying over here, because you don’t want your friends doing something that hurts themselves. And in my opinion, LF FRIENDS don’t let LF FRIENDS go off on a “Drive” down the WRONG ROAD EITHER.
You were angry at the time and STRIKING OUT, in a post to me after I had posted to you, (I think it was) you went off on how you had a “right” to blow off because you were stressed and mad.
Tilly if there is anyplace in the world lwhere people care about you, I think jyou would know by NOW it is HERE, and this is a good place to VENT, throw a FIT or “point the gun” but like I told you before, PLEASE DON’T POINT IT AT US.
You refusing to “talk” to certain people here indicates that you “don’t like” them or think they treated you badly, but they said the same things to you that I did, that you were NOT getting what the articles were saying. I still believe you weren’t because you I think were doing the same thing I was when I read that book. I was angry, I was “righteous” and I was PROJECTING. I think you are too.
Tilly, every one gets stressed and angry at times, and maybe says something that isn’t true (not lies, just mistaken) but that’s what LF is about is FRIENDS, people who care, being good enough to point those things out.
Tilly, lplease think about all this and get over your anger at anyone here. You are not the ONLY person here who NEEDS TO HEAL, and we ALL need to treat each other with respect and with LOVE—and that “love” is in the sense of respect, caring, and good intentions. The rare psychopath that comes here soon showes themselves up and goes away. So please think about your anger, Tilly. This is a good opportunity for growth and we don’t grow much while we are pithed off. ((((Hugs))))) and my prayers, Love oxy
Hi everyone,
I already posted this somewhere, but let me try again in another way. I have done lots of writing, but it is not one of my strengths. For published writing, I’ve needed lots of copy editing. I have learned that even if ONE person misinterprets my writing and speaks out about it, there are probably at least another 100 who thought the same thing but didn’t speak out.
the truth is that part of the pain of being with a P is that we DO get into self blame. We DO have that chip on our shoulder. Many of us. Understandably so! So do many women who are physically raped.
The book “Emotional Rape” states “emotional rape victims have a two-fold responsibility to themselves: to resist the NATURAL tendency toward self-blame, and to not unquestioningly accept the critical judgments of others.”
He goes on to say “Certainly there is a time and place for a victim to ponder on how what happened could possibly have been prevented, but there is also an important difference between health self-examination and unhealthy, counterproductive self-blame”.
He also states “When someone commits an evil act against you, you are the victim, not the assailant nor co-assailant. Don’t take seriously anyone who suggests otherwise. What they are saying will endanger rather than aid your eventual recovery.”
So if you were walking down a dark alley in the worst part of town in a string bikini at 3 AM and got physically raped, YOU ARE A VICTIM. A crime was committed. If there had not been a bad man, you could have done what you did and NOT GOT HURT.
What some do, is focus on what the woman was wearing, where she was walking, and what time of night and say she attracted that into her life.
I think the healthier thing to do is to first focus on the fact that she got raped, and give aid and comfort and try to do something to bring the criminal to justice, if possible.
Then, we may want to have a talk about it is too bad the world is so evil that it is not really safe for a woman to go walking there at night….and to realize also that the string bikini has NOTHING to do with it. It looks like it does from a NORMAL mind, but since rapists are all about power, not sex, the only thing the bikini has to do with it, was it made it clear she was unarmed.
So it wise to remember that our choice of words in dealing with this whole topic is very tricky in the printed format.
Do we speak of “healing”, of “recovery” of “learning additional tools to try to protect ourselves from evil”, etc. All the words can mean different things to different people.
I think it is wise to be alert to the fact that emotional rape victims, p victims, parental victims…ARE VICTIMS. Dr. Phil likes to call some “a victim, but a victim who volunteered” But that is pretty harsh. WHY did they volunteer? Did they REALLY sign up for what they got? Isn’t that again putting the focus on the victim, not on the BAD GUY???!!!!
Can we benefit from learning about trauma bond? About trauma repetition? Yes, but in a very loving environment that says this has to do with how the brain is wired, etc… AND REMEMBER, if there were no bad guys in the world NONE OF THIS WOULD BE A PROBLEM. My husband has known from almost day one that he could bring me to a fetal position with a few well chose words….but he has never done so…no matter how much I invited trauma repetition….BECAUSE HE IS NOT A BAD GUY.
I have felt there is too much blame the victim. I do think authors have to be SUPER careful how they word things, knowing the sensitivities of emotional rape victims and their tendency to blame themselves.
So it is hard to say …..here is what you can do NOW to protect yourself, without implying “so it is your fault that this happened the first time”. IT IS NOT. NO BAD GUY=NO PROBLEM. We MUST always remember that.
I have taken self-defense courses….not because it is my fault that a stranger entered a home and raped me when I was 12. But because I now realize it CAN happen, there ARE bad guys, and I need to learn to protect myself, despite my “weaknesses” like weaker upper arm strength compared to a man, my tendency to black out if someone chokes me for 10 seconds…..
Not all our “weaknesses” are really weaknesses. We can only work out so much,learn so many moves, get our brains ready to be willing to HURT someone. But we still might get raped again.
Because there are bad guys out there. Not because we are weak.
J AH, your point is well taken. I tried to make myself clear, but maybe missed the mark. My point is simply this: If you continue to believe and act on the belief that you can walk down that dark ally at 3 AM in that string bikini, and emerge unscathed, if you stubbornly believe that because you were the victim in that isolated incident, you can continue doing, being, acting in exactly the same way you did before, you might find yourself victimized again. I understand that we are not to blame…WE WEREN’T THE BAD GUY.
One definition for insanity is: doing the same thing over and over again expecting different results. I, for one, have had at least three of these relationshits in my life, and I’ve wasted, oh let’s see, about 35 of my 50 years on them, complete with the turmoil, the pain, the anger, the frustration, the confusion, the hopeless, helplessness of it, and I can tell you, I never thought I had anything to do with it. Now I know my low self-esteem, my need for excitement, my obsessive personality, my desire to be right, my stubborn insistance of having it my way has definatly contributed to my condition. I want to address these issues in myself so I never repeat the
pattern.
That is just where I’m at. I’m not trying to assign blame to anyone else. It takes what it takes, and maybe self evaluation isn’t necisary for everyone. But I think it is for me Peace, everybody.
Beautiful powerful posts JAH and Kim:)x Thanks for sharing your thoughts.x