By Patricia Jackson
When you live with a sociopath or psychopath (the difference will be the subject of a future article) you find yourself analyzing everything he (or she if you were unfortunate enough to be targeted by the fifteen per cent that are estimated to be female) says can be a source of endless analysis.
The questions go something like this:
1) Why did he suddenly change? (Meaning why did he just go from being pleasant/kind/good/nice/reasonable to mean?)
2) What happened in his past that makes him act like this?
3) What did I say, do, fail to say, fail to do, that provoked him?
4) What if I do X. Y. Z? Or for that matter A. B. C. D. E. F. G. through W? (Maybe that will reach him.)
Sound familiar? How many hours have you spent trying to figure him out? Thousands? Hundreds of thousands? How long have you felt like a small animal trapped in a hamster wheel? These questions do not lead to the doorway out. Do everything you can to stop. Stop driving yourself crazy. (He’s already done enough of that.)
The more time you can spend not thinking about him (not easy) the better. Inside, in the midst of the madness, a small, still voice tells you that life should not have to hurt this much, that you did nothing to deserve this level of suffering and that there is a way out. That small and courageous voice is right.
About a year before I filed for divorce, a wise counselor told me I would have to travel all the major roads in life but that I could profit if I just believed that staying rooted in a horrible abusive marriage was NOT stability. Rather, it might have been some false sense of being a martyr, of feeling strong for having endured a hell of some sorts. She said she admired fidelity in people, but not at the cost of mental health. I pursued my divorce and 3 more years until it became final and have had no regrets.
I believe it takes leaving until we realize just how awful things had been and how abnormally we did live. Keep hope and trust in yourselves. Follow your gut.
Thank you for your help….Many hours have been spent trying to figure out the madness…Some parts seem so good…so normal …and then it becomes a twisty, miry,mess!!!I am trying to stay away and end the crazy….I see better now and that I must….I have struggled with the Faith factor of my life….not wanting to give up…not wanting to be unfaithful to God….I can forgive but I am not willing to stay in something that I will lose my mind…family and friends….thank you for this site….I want to be able to help others…when I recover….
Grace, I have been in your shoes. It gets better. I stayed far too long, and let my kids believe their father was a far better person that he is. It’s been hard, but I know that had I stayed, I would either be dead (perhaps of my own hand, though sometimes I wonder if he was capable) or incapacitated by mental illness. It wasn’t until I left that I started realizing the only time I felt crazy and doubted myself was with HIM! My other relationships all worked quite well. You will recover, your life will be good again and you will help others. Have faith.
I used to spent hours trying to figure him out. I am a bit on the analytical side so I packed a double whammy of intense “reasoning” him out….Going along with the why and what, I also kept hanging on to what I saw then as “good” or something “kind” he did or “nice” or “caring”….and it was hard to let him go as I hung on to these feelings…although all the bad and nasty and uncaring acts sure outweighed these few and far between “good” acts…
In his book, The Betrayal Bond-Breaking Free of Exploitative Relationships, By Patrick J. Carnes, Ph.D. (sold here on Lovefraud) Carnes writes how trauma/betrayal bonds keep us holding on to the “good” as “there is always something kind, noble or redeeming about someone who has betrayed you.” He compares this entrapment to how monkeys are captured in Africa.
He writes: “Tribal people put out slotted crates filled with fresh fruit. The cages are anchored securely to the ground. Monkeys discover the cages, reach in and grab the fruit. Of course, they cannot retrieve the fruit because as long as the hand holds the fruit, it will not fit through the bars of the cage. The monkey is then trapped. They could always let go of the fruit and escape, but they refuse to let go. Even as their human captors pick them up, they hold on.” He goes on to state: “Victims of betrayal will hold to those good things even while the world crashes in around them. BY HOLDING ON THEY STAY STUCK, JUST LIKE THE MONKEYS”
After I read that I realized I needed to let go of the why, what, and those so called “kind” things he had appeared to do…If I kept holding on, I was like those poor trapped dumb monkeys…I just needed to let go…or stay trapped in my own prison….
I recommend this book as I helped me tremendously. Carnes helps to clear your mind and see the light….and why we have a betrayal bond….
I also read the Betrayal Bond. This should be LF required reading!
Aloha
This is an excellent article and so very pertinent to having lived with a sp. When my daughter left for college, she returned home once to tell me that new friends she had met at college told her that she analyzes and hyper-analyzes everything. Then she said, “I got that from you.”
In fact, she probably did get it from me. After having spent 21 years married to her father I became this way. I wondered, I pondered, I questioned (few answers), I observed, I asked why, how come, I thought he always had a mysterious quality about him,what was his childhood like, and on and on and on. His mother once told me that I thought he was raised wrong. Thank you ex-mother-in -law for letting me know how I think. I was often baffled, in awe, in surprise, is it something I said, do I owe an apology, again on and on and on. What if I changed me, what if I don’t react? I said to him, “Life just doesn’t have to be this hard.” Yes it is, he would reply.
The only way out is divorce and no contact. It’s totally true. Cut them out like a malignant tumor and you will experience remission and energy again.
I have been reading here on this site and trying to understand “why” did this man do this to me? Why make all the promises and continually profess his love for me”all the while cheating, lying, and deceiving me for years. I have cut and pasted some of your thoughts to help me get through this horrible time and move forward from this betrayal of trust. If this helps just one person move forward and break free then this will have been worth it.
You didn’t create the monster raging in front of your eyes. And you are powerless to stop him being who he is. Your power lives in stopping his abuse in your life by stepping away from the source of your pain. His abuse isn’t going to change. He doesn’t have to. And all the wishful thinking in the world will not make it happen someday.
To end abuse, you must wake-up to its reality
1. Go NO CONTACT with him. Believe it or not, he enjoys you telling him off because you are at least noticing him, giving him attention, and that is what he wants more than anything is to BE NOTICED, to realize he has “zinged” you good. Every time you talk to them, they get “supply” and you get “another wound.” he would gloat, knowing I was so upset
2. You have not done anything wrong, you have been used, abused, manipulated, lied to and mistreated beyond belief. The reason he tells you that you are “worthless” is because HE IS WORTHLESS and he is “projecting” his own self on to you.
3. They are INCAPABLE of bonding to other humans, it is a “short circuit” in their brains, this is not just the way they act, and they are HARD WIRED TO BE THIS WAY. They are not capable of caring for others. It is all about them.
4. It is almost like you could “write a book” predicting the “stages” that they go through in the way they romance us, hook us, then cheat and lie, and use and abuse. There are some plot variations but not a great deal of them, as far as the patterns of abuse go
5. If you had been Miss Universe, you would not have been “good enough” or “pretty enough” to make him faithful or make him love you. Darling, HE IS NOT ABLE TO LOVE, he can only FAKE IT.
6. Do Not Engage: A sociopath cannot survive without drama. They will accuse, blame, slander, rant, cry, yell, threaten, lie and intimidate in order to get their opponent to engage in the verbal boxing match. The truth is there is no ’winning’ an argument with a sociopath, just as there is no winning an argument with a two year old. The only way to really win is to ignore everything they say and do and focus on your own healthy path.
7. Keep Records: They hate to put anything in writing. It is an automatic deterrent of their verbal abuse and lies. He knows I will keep a record of everything, and if he puts it in writing, he cannot pretend he didn’t say it.
8. Believe in Yourself and Trust Your Instincts: Don’t let a sociopathic partner or ex make you question yourself when you know in your heart what you are doing is the right thing. Remember that these ’people’ have no regard for other people, including children, and are only concerned with their own childish needs.
9. Don’t Give Up: It may seem that sociopaths come out strong right at the start, but they do not think things through all the way. If you are consistent and persistent, eventually, their lies will start to reveal themselves.
10. Don’t Respond To Anything Right Away: it is much easier to not engage when you give yourself time to let emotions settle, sort through the provoking verses necessary information, and decide if it’s even worth responding to.
11. When they deceive you about their character in order to cause you to feel a love bond with them. Denial keeps us paralyzed unable to act to protect ourselves. When the denial can’t continue because they hurt us so badly we can’t pretend it’s not abuse any longer. Painful to make the adjustment from denial to the harsh reality that “this is abuse, he knows he is harming me and deceiving me and this is not going to stop because he is a sociopath and he will never ever change”just look for another victim when he is done with me
12. He tries his hardest to knock me down, if I am doing too well and if I am too happy. I’ve learned that when another really loves us, they embrace our happiness, not try to destroy it.
13. This is what you get—..
Chaos, cruelty, tantrums, manipulation, grief, lies, hurt, hate, disrespect, anger,
confusion, stress, unhappiness, loss. He got off on hurting me, betraying me, deceiving me, and confusing me. Duping, pity ploy, devalues & discard” reptilian stare. . ”..Emotionally isolated”.. Repeatedly pressured to accept what we don’t want to accept.
14. Diminished”. Confused”. Self-doubting. Raped of my self-confidence and self-esteem— Self-centered, lack of emotions, lack of personal responsibility, false and frightening smiles, extremely controller personality.
15. No honesty, no integrity, no conscience or empathy. Just exploitation, entitlement and blame-shifting
16. The lies and manipulation are the same, the devaluing, the abuse, the soul rape, the gas lighting, the devaluation and the pain. The mean, vengeful shell of a person is the only thing that he ever really was.
17. When you get to that place of realizing that if you have to FIGHT for him to be considerate of you, then you’ve already lost the war, and then you too will know your only option is to LIVE a REAL LIFE FREE from his oppression and the ONLY way for that to happen is to live FREE from him in your life.
18. Your weaknesses and your strengths. He targets both. You are being subjected to psychological warfare NO DIFFERENT from what a prisoner of war is subjected to. NO DIFFERENT. He “can be wonderful” because it keeps you hooked
19. Any time ANYONE shows you what they are, BELIEVE THEM the VERY FIRST TIME and never look back.
20. If someone is not HONEST and KIND”.you do not need them in your life, no matter who they are. So use RULE NUMBER 1 in all that you do with everyone. If you see a sign that someone is dishonest or unkind—ANY SIGN OF THAT—run from them, get away from them and STAY away from them. If they steal or do drugs, lie or cheat, you do not need them
21. They are victims of their own success as children. They were so good at emotional manipulation that they never bothered to learn a better way and they stayed emotionally retarded unable to stop manipulating, unable to feel for others, lacking empathy and therefore evil.
22. He always had another woman on the side. They operate this way. They always have a backup individual because they know something or someone is going to give, so to be on the safe side, they have someone on the back burner. Someone they don’t have to give much attention to, someone who has low self-esteem and won’t require much from them. That is who they keep on the back burner. When one woman becomes too much, they let her go and take the back burner girl until the next “challenge” comes around and so on and so forth
23. When we treat others well, we expect that others will reciprocate that treatment, but when it doesn’t happen, then we think, “well, there must be something I can do to show X that I love them, I will treat them BETTER and then they will treat me better” It will all be in VAIN it is like a never ending rollercoaster.
24. They have rage and passive/aggressive tendencies, view themselves as “special” They are insecure and needy and having affairs validates their masculinity
25. Tired of the repetitive lies. There is always a lie waiting to be confirmed from details given a few days prior on any given issue. Always have to be on alert for the next lie.
26. It got to the point it was healthier to miss him than live with him—sure I still think of him but our relationship was toxic, unhealthy and there was so much pain/bad history he had caused that there just was not a place to start over and make all that craziness go away, I will never miss the way I felt when we were together
27. They’re not about to walk into therapy for help, because it’s never them, and what can be done anyway? It doesn’t seem that any of them change that much over time. Possibly because it works and that’s all that matters to them. They all need to win, and to get one over on people. If nothing else, the shame of admitting what they’ve done to others seems to keep them immune to the truth.
28. There are so many things we experience with individuals like this. It doesn’t seem real. Never real. How could someone so loving, turn so quickly. The feelings were never real to begin with. That is the scariest part of all. Someone who could FAKE AN ENTIRE RELATIONSHIP.
29. They seem to have an innate ability to find the weakness in people, and are ready to use these weaknesses to their own ends through deceit, manipulation, or intimidation, and gain pleasure from doing so. The lack of a conscience, the manipulation of others, dishonesty and the inability to love and/or have lasting and profound personal relations and cruelty are key signs of a sociopath.
30. Facing the truth of what I had done and what I had become hurt. But, to be free of the past I had to face myself and love myself for the wounded, abused woman that I was and acknowledge that I did not have to stay there. I had to accept that only I could create the change in my life that I desired, that it was up to me. If I wanted to move beyond his abuse, move away from that painful place I found myself in, I would need to find my courage and turn up for myself so that I could step into forgiving myself.
Dear Sick
Great refresher list. Very consolidated. Ouch did that hurt. Very good reminder though. Thank you. I’m going to save it and put it on my fridge.
Kathy
Thank you so much for creating this excellent fact list. Very interesting your comment “I have to accept the fact that only I could create the change in my life.” I think this is one of the most difficult decisions to make. I always knew I needed to get out but I never had the courage to do so. I thank God every day that he made that decision for me by leaving his family one night and discarding us. After 20 years of lying, betrayals and cheating he left for the mistress. I don’t miss him anymore and I filed for divorce. The no contact is so important. You are so right about him not getting any reaction out of me anymore. Why answer and suit myself to more abuse, more insults and more pain. For what? So he can have his pleasure out of it ? No thanks, he can now do this to my replacement. He had her all along on the back burner and when I did not “meet his standards” anymore she came into place. And yes even I was “miss universe” I would never be good enough. It took me awhile to accept all this but now I know none of this nightmare was my fault. He can justify and demonize me as much as he wants to my don and I know it was him and only him. Good luck to everyone. I encourage everyone who is in a situation like that “don’t wait 20 years like I did” they will never change. No matter what you do.
Hi Kaya48, see my post reply below in the comments. You have so much courage girl! I really admire that after 20 years you found yourself and have been staying so strong. Blessings to you and your son.
I liked Sick@heart’s comment about the back burner girlfriend. Mine had a pretty big stove as he had several back burners. Glad I am no longer one of them…remember when I told him I wouldn’t remain friends to be put on his ex list? I told him to call one of them….
His biggest slap in the face was the NO Contact…ha, he never thought it…..
Dear Sick@heart:
You sure summed it up! Every word of it”As I read through your points, I couldn’t help but say Amen”.So glad you are healing”I sure felt your pain and your sp was just the spitting image of mine”fake smile and all”
Once we are out of denial that the man we thought was such a “good guy” was a big lie, that the love he claimed was all a big lie, we start to see the truth and accept it..
If we teeter between denial and acceptance, between what we perceived as “his goodness” (“some of the nice things he did” )we can go nuts with going back and forth from the reality of who he really is (evil) and what we thought he was”
Our illusion of him will !poof! disappear in time when we have NO CONTACT”.and we have spent time learning who he really is/was and gaining knowledge of sp’s and ourselves, absorbing this reality of him as you described so accurately above and finally our emotional state will heal”.
All of us here at Lovefraud, woman or man, recovering from an sp’s abuse, should give ourselves a standing ovation every once in a while. Here it is: APPLAUSE!!!!!!WE ARE WONDERFUL!WE ARE ALIVE AND WILL SURVIVE!! WE ARE LOVEABLE AND WE ARE COURAGE, HONOR, HOPE AND LOVE!!! WE WILL ALWAYS STAND UP FOR OURSELVES AND ALWAYS STAY STRONG!!
Dear vision
Thanks for your comment. Somehow, after I enforced the no contact about 6 months ago, I feel empowered, I feel strong and I feel like I in control. And does he “hate” the no contact. Since I have changed my phone no and email he sends messages to my son occasionally. Of course he blames me in the messages and demonizes me. My son deleted those messages and never responds. My son is 19, there is no custody issue. We both are so happy now. We started putting happy stickers on a calendar starting the first day of no contact . We just noticed that we passed 6 “happy months”. I know there will many obstacles, issues in this “nasty” divorce. I know for a fact that he is livid that I filed first. It really does not make a difference legally but how dare did I take this control away from him. I figured he wanted to “surprise” me with divorce papers. He was not aware that I have been talking to many attorney starting the day he discarded us. Just had to find the one I felt “most comfortable” with. Someone who is not afraid of this “dirty” police officer. I am so ready now. The if’s, why’s, what’s are all gone. My new life started the day he left for the coworker. I am confident as a fellow police officer she can “handle” him. 🙂
Dear Kaya48,
I loved the idea of the happy stickers!! Wish I had done that!….your ex was angry you took the control away. They burn at that for sure!…and as far as the coworker girlfriend, she is his next victim and if she is just like him, she will be devalued and discarded next….
Mine sent pictures of an internet photo of a woman in lingerie…told me it was his new honey etc. He said he didn’t want to be in a relationship. I said ok and good bye. He wanted to be friends and I said no. and then no contact. But he was angry to have no control….so he sent a pic I described of a woman to get me back.
Good to be rid of the drama kings…