Here is an e-mail exchange that recently took place between me and a Lovefraud reader:
Arlene: I was married to a man for 23 years. I found out so much in the last few years. He murdered my soul, my spirit, and financially devastated me. He moved another woman … brainwashed my children. My 18 yr old now is on cocaine…she was a nice girl…he has trashed her also and she is not living with me. The children now that were close to me are not empathetic and cold.
He grew in power and is an intellectual. He spread vicious rumors about me to cover his tracks. I am just to move on. Even though I was such a devoted mother and this family was my life. I have tried everything to recover and I am alone. You see I have no extended family. Some friends but they have their own lives.
For me I cannot forget my children… I am human…I have such pain daily. I feel nonexistent in my life. I cannot recover from the loss of my family and to see them turn out cold and unloving is too much than I can bear. I pray everyday for God just to take me home. Because living life without love is no life at all.
I was more into the connection of my family’s life and he made sure I was disconnected, so well planned. I repeat many of the scenarios I read on your love fraud…so I know I am not alone. Like one day … I was thrown out of my life planned…I was used all those years … and treated like trash and devalued. The loss of my soul…the loss of my smile”¦my hopes…my dreams. I just want to die.
Donna: Please do not act on your statements. I truly understand the pain Ӭand devastation that you are feeling, but you must not give in to it. ӬSociopaths are evil. They are professional manipulators. Whatever Ӭhappened is not your fault. You did not deserve it. The best thing Ӭyou can do is to recover.
Please seek professional help. Make sure whatever counselor you see Ӭunderstands sociopaths, because not all of them do.
Arlene: Yes they are evil. But you see I have been to counseling …and it does not make it any easier. Because normal people have human connections and emotions and they have none. I cannot forget the memories of my children…my children have turned out as manipulators themselves and with no empathy. I never thought it would be possible. But he not only damaged me…he damaged them permanently.
THANK YOU FOR CALLING it EVIL because no one understands but us…it is entirely different than a normal divorce or split up. When you come in contact with evil it seems to change you for the rest of whatever life you have. If you are young…there is a better chance of recovery because you can start maybe with a new family. I am turning 50 years and I was looking forward to the connections with my children for the future and the grandchildren and that is all gone now. It seems that I wasted all those years and all the work I did was for nothing. But thank you for your comments they mean so much as I know that you really understand where I am coming from.
Understanding
I wish there was a formula, a prescription, a therapy, for making the pain inflicted by sociopaths—such as Arlene is experiencing—go away. I don’t know of any.
All Lovefraud can offer is understanding.
First of all, Lovefraud helps people understand what they are dealing with. Sociopaths have no heart, no conscience and no remorse. They feel no emotional connections to other people. They have no family and friends, only prey and pawns. People who have tangled with a sociopath are not stupid, they were targeted.
Secondly, Lovefraud is becoming a community of people who understand and can empathize with the experiences of those who have been targeted. We know what it’s like to be deceived, bankrupted, assaulted and then ignored by people in authority while the sociopaths go on their merry ways.
I can only hope that these two types of understanding can serve as a foothold, a starting point, a ray of hope, so that the victims like Arlene can begin recovery.
but sky n is a PD, and what i describe as injured esteem and codpedency is something that can be changed. this is one reason i cannot bring them together,
Oh, I see.
I was under the impression that PD’s could be changed. Except for the spath PD.
I have been reading that borderline PD, which has always been considered very resistant to treatment, is now much more successfully treated with DBT. (Dialectical Behavioral Therapy)
http://www.dbtselfhelp.com/html/what_is_dbt_.html
((One Joy)): “No truth and no real safety” was my reality built on a foundation of quicksand. Shalom
sky: you said:’ incorporating methodologies from various practices including Eastern mindfulness techniques.’
hahaha- okay, excuse my humour, but the n ex was fake all over that. i’ll take a look at the link.
n ex was a big magical thinker -and youthful. unfortunately i confused immaturity with youthfulness and curiosity. same with spath.
skylar
I just went and read posts on Sociopath World. Eye opening. One young lady sounds just like me – or rather, that her experience was just like mine.
I am agreeing with elements of what you said about N’s. I don’t know my own boundaries. I thought I could fix my spath. My boundaries are goofed up.
I can’t even get my hands around other PDs. There are times I want to try, I’ve put forth soooo much effort into it. But mostly I just want to get my happy life back.
Superkid
shalom – the lack of truthfulness, honesty and transparency; and integrity with the reality of our lives was a huge gaslight for me in my childhood…and this continues for me. my buddhist lama said: ‘yo have to tell people the truth about yourself or they can never be safe.’ he rarely said things like this, taught i a very different way, but this one phrase meant a lot to me.
Superkid,
first time on spathworld? It’s interesting huh?
I didn’t even KNOW what boundaries were until Kathleen Hawk explained them to me. I didn’t have any. I think it shows. Trying to learn though.
All these PD’s sort of merge into each other since they all have narcissism at their root, IMO. Then you add temperment and circumstance and you end up with different flavors of the same problem: being stuck coping with inadequate tools.
It really, really helps to be able to see your parents clearly. It’s like being a forensic investigator, putting together clues at the scene of a car wreck. I’m finally seeing what happened and how I ended up in such a mess.
Skylar
Seems to me like you had 20 years of stress and confusion and abuse in your childhood and another 20 on top of that with your spath. Your body chemistry has to be permanently altered, like mine. I can’t imagine working through that on your own.
I was in my therapists office last week, again, like nearly every week the last 2-3 years, crying my eyeballs out.
I was mad at myself for letting myself get spathed.
Mad at myself because I grieve my N mother who no longer speaks to me.
My family is so flipping disfunctional.
It’s burned into my personality and I can’t undo it.
I guess I was so NEEDY, I let my spath abuse me.
I was so accustomed to being ABUSED, the fact that he was abusing me didn’t make me flinch.
I just kept going back for more.
I wanted to make him love me.
The joke was on me.
Spath men marry their mothers.
Louise
Any translation or interpretation you can provide on that?