In my post last week, I referred to an article on Salon.com called, Facebook status: In a scam relationship. The article starts with an anecdote about a guy who met a woman on Myspace. She supposedly lived in Ghana and proclaimed her love, then told him a hard luck story. He sent her a total of $14,000, even though they never met. The person did not exist. The guy was scammed.
After relating the anecdote, the article stated, “He’s a victim of what’s called ”˜love fraud.’”
I had two reactions to that sentence. The first was, “Wow—”˜love fraud’ has entered the lexicon.” The second was, “This writer doesn’t get it—love fraud is not limited to cyber scams.”
Then, a few days ago, I received an inquiry from a television talk show producer who is considering doing an episode about “love fraud.” He Googled, “love fraud,” and of course, immediately landed on this website and blog. He too, however, seemed to think that love fraud was limited to fake romances conducted over the Internet, which turn out to be money scams.
It’s time to set the record straight.
When I learned that my ex-husband, James Montgomery, was a sociopath, and that millions of sociopaths were out in the world putting peoples’ lives through a meat grinder, as had happened to me, I realized that the public needed to be educated. Although I was in the midst of my divorce and couldn’t immediately embark on an education program, I decided that I would eventually build a website.
So 12 years ago, on August 7, 1999, I reserved the domain name, “Lovefraud.com.” If you want proof, check the Who Is information.
Lovefraud.com launched on July 20, 2005. Our logo is trademarked. “Love fraud” is my term. Therefore, I will define it:
Love fraud is the intentional exploitation of an individual through manipulating emotions and trust in a personal relationship. The exploitative relationship is frequently romantic, but can also be between family members, friends and associates. The relationship can take place in real life, or exist only through communications media. The people who engage in love fraud are sociopaths.
For years, I’ve heard from people who want to tell me about their “love frauds.” In fact, I have collected more than 2,500 cases of people who tangled with sociopaths. Yes, I’ve heard about online scams. But I’ve also heard about betrayal by high school sweethearts, long-term spouses, family members, first dates, co-workers and business partners. This type of exploitation is widespread. In fact, it is epidemic.
So to all you bloggers and journalists who are suddenly interested in love fraud—this is not just an online money scam. Love fraud occurs any time a disordered individual uses a personal relationship of trust for the sole purpose of exploitation. Unfortunately, it happens much more frequently than most of us realize.
Duped;
Well, the good thing I did was let go of all but two stocks. Yes, at a big loss but the reality we are in deep economic problem and even with meaningful debt reduction, that will only give a small bounce. Plus, right now, the market is penalizing even minor misses far more severely than it is rewarding good news. Case in point, one stock I am holding lost 5% because a competitor, while having a great last quarter, is concerned about the remainder of the year and next.
When a market goes bad, it is sometimes hard for investors to “let go.” Interestingly, I only lost money when I did not let go. Once I decided to hold bad stocks for more than a day, I got burned. In addition, I placed too much faith in our politicians to compromise and that compounded things.
Funny, now that I am back to my basic business model: make smart non-contrarian picks, cut losses and run and don’t hold overnight, I made some money.
Tonight I am meeting some friends. I was so rapped up in things, I did virtually no socializing in the entire month of July.
Tomorrow is a new day and I am so relieved. If I had done this last week, I would have saved 1/2 my losses.
I have so much anger with my spath. He’s applying for jobs – I would love to find a way to throw him UNDER THE BUS and make sure he never, ever gets hired again.
I’m angry with myself, too, that I sometimes seem to get hung up thinking about him. Why the fuck is it so hard to move on?
OK, it wasn’t my fault
OK, it was all about him
OK, I loved him, and he didn’t love me
OK, he pretended to love me, and doesn’t love anybody
OK, this week I broke No Contact and he lied again
He’s such a f’ing piece of shit and I still want revenge.
!@.......)@.......!)#(!@.......)#!
Superkid
(P.S. I’m not like this! I’m not a “revenge” type person!).
Louise;
Mine is a total poof. Of course pale. He could not fight his way out of a paper bag. While lean, with very little musculature, he has a bit of a pot belly. When I first saw him with his shirt off, I was very concerned, as the first thought in my mind was that he does not take care of himself and the only other people I knew with bodies like his were alcoholics and I was well concerned about his drinking.
But that physique is also a symptom of early lipodystrophy…
BBE:
That belly is a sign of an alcoholic. Yeah, a lot of men have bellies, but if they drink as much as he does, that’s an alcoholic tummy. Mine was getting a tummy also the last time I saw him. Drinks a lot or maybe not a lot, but at least a beer or two every day, but sometimes much more. And he is getting older now so I worry about him even though I KNOW I shouldn’t.
SK:
I feel the same way! Get it out on this blog, girl!!!
I have a lot of anger…a lot and still want revenge and I am also not that type, but boy, did he ever bring it out in me!!
So you talked to him this week and he lied again?? They never change.
Louise;
When I first saw him with his shirt off, I knew there was something different about him, but he was only 35 then and to already have an alcoholic body, but that is what I thought then.
But his body is a strong clue that he is HIV+ and once the light bulb went off seeing his online profile and porn sites under the same name, I immediately thought to that moment as it is forever etched in my mind, since he took his shirt off slowly, an indication he was embarrassed about his body.
And we should not care but we still do…
BBE:
That’s sad. I just wonder what he is doing now. He probably is HIV+ and that’s why he didn’t want to get close to you. Sigh. We can’t save them all…
Superkid,
As long as you break NC you will remain in the SPIN CYCLE and in pain.
NO CONTACT IS THE ONLY WAY. ***ONLY**** no other!
Louise;
Again, I am only 99.999% sure about the HIV. I could be wrong but just like his sociopathy, there is nothing I know that excludes him from being a sociopath. With the HIV, there are clues in his online profiles, not only the way he did not want to get close to me but his bizarre reactions when I tried to, even his employer as before Obama, HIV+ persons could be legally barred entry into the USA and virtually every foreign airlines required an HIV test for employment with one of the few excepts the one he worked for.
In fact, before I learned abut sociopathy, I used the fact they he could lose his job as the reason why he did not trust me and was a factor in my leaving the USA as it made me hate America.
You know BBE,
It really doesn’t matter if he is HIV+ or not to YOU since you did not have sex with him, but you know there are those out there (they just sent another one to prison) who will knowingly have unprotected sex with people who do not know they are positive and they don’t tell…because they don’t care.
But as long as people have sex with others that they hardly know, and are willing to have sex with people whose HIV status is UNKNOWN, there are going to be those who KNOW they are positive and still do it. Not everyone who has sex with a person who is HIV+ will get HIV infected or get AIDS, but some will. Which I think makes it important for those of us who choose to have sex TAKE SOME RESPONSIBILITY AS WELL. One of the groups with the fastest rising HIV+ rates is heterosexuals over 50, because too many times they don’t even try to practice safe-r sex. (Notice I said SAFER, not “Safe,” as there is no way to be 100% safe if you are going to have sex with another human.)
Psychopaths though, because almost none of them faithful partners, increase the risk for their FAITHFUL partners by hiding their affairs and by having sex with multiple partners, and partners who are “sex workers” as well other “high risk” groups. So it behooves those of us who don’t want to become HIV+ to watch who we are intimate with pretty closely.