The two most recent Letters to Lovefraud both had the same theme: Sociopathic men who relentlessly pursued women, proclaiming their love, making glowing promises of a committed relationship. The men pushed for sex, and although the women resisted, eventually, believing they were involved in real romances, the women succumbed to the men’s physical desires. With that, both women were dumped.
Read the letters here:
I met him on Facebook, was used for sex and dumped the next day
I felt bonded, even though this made me nauseated
Both women were astounded at how they were unceremoniously booted. They had a hard time coming to grips with the idea that they’d been used and abused. How could a man say all those wonderful things and not mean them? How could a man who talked so eloquently about love be lying? How could a man paint such a beautiful picture of the future and then discard me? Was there something wrong with me? Wasn’t I sexy enough? Smart enough? Pretty enough?
Both women tried to get answers from the men. The men, however, never admitted the true reason that they did what they did:
They wanted to.
Core of a sociopath
Sometimes it’s hard for us to get our minds around how truly different sociopathic individuals are from the rest of us. This is understandable. After all, 96% to 99% of people are like us—capable of love and consideration.
But that 1% to 4% who are sociopaths—well, they might as well be aliens. These people:
- Feel no empathy at all towards other human beings
- Have no conscience
- Are interested only power, control and sex
This is the core of a sociopath—no empathy, no conscience and desiring only power, control and sex.
Implications
So what does this mean? It means sociopaths feel entitled to take what they want, regardless of how their actions may damage others. It means they get no satisfaction from connectedness with others, they only get satisfaction from winning. It means sociopaths view the world as predators and prey—they are the predators and everyone else is prey.
This is shocking. Mind-blowing. Impossible to understand.
So we cannot try to understand. We can only accept. This is how they are.
They do not want us as lovers, partners, friends or family members. They want power, control and sex.
Narcissism is easier for me to spot than sociopathy. However, while its easy to spot and avoid narcissists, avoiding sociopaths requires setting boundaries and noting red flags as the appear.
Buttons,
Good to see you here.
Yes.
Wish I was above the place where I feel like I am meat for every predator to consume. The Hole in the sands of survival keep collapsing. It will get better, but today is bad.
The GD power company stole from me, I went to the State Energy Commission and they validated that I was correct and now I am waiting for a Company to give me back by grocery money while they, a leisure decide when and by what process they will return what they stole without apology or interest.
When the System wouldn’t move forward on the legal for the issue with the marriage I went to my Congressman for help. He never called me back.
The tenant in my home 1600 miles away has decided to take me for a free ride and I can’t do anything about it or the repairs that I need for the property.
There is no end to the bullies and the people who are paid to help if they do any thing more than listen and hang up, I haven’t seen it yet. Don’t get me started on Social Services. I wish I did believe that the standards for illegals in this country were the same as what was demanded from me – which is essentially that there is no help.
My family reccomends that I accept that nobody in this place thinks that for what ever the reason my situation is worthy of the attention of providing the assistance that fall under agreements like job descriptions.
And I come to find that legally no DA can refuse a felony case and that the attny telling me that there is a choice not to is not the right answer.
I’m paying this *.* ?? While the power company has my grocery money and won’t give it back even thought the state told them to? And the DA’s home well lit and well laid?
The community says fight on and we talk about doing wildly imaginative stuff but that is as fantastic as a relationship with a SPATH. Wildly creative takes tons of time and time needs to be spent on survival People who have to live in the dark eating beans don’t have the ability to chase OPRAH because she isn’t listening, doesn’t care and has another agenda. I don’t have the ability to fight the DA because the battle to fill my belly looms.
There are no ANGELS. I don’t say these things to rant and rave so much as to say we need to find a real way to get real people real help because after a SPATH episode, over and over again there is a month or two when its desperately needed. And all the stuff that is supposed to be there? It isn’t. And all the creative solutions do is take time away from survival- its not that they can’t work, but it is that the don’t work in time.
When a fish is out of water, time is the critical factor. That is true here. Especially for those who have not yet had the luxury of a couple of years out and away from the raw experiences of shock and grief.
How do you get back the trust in the world being a good place? I don’t think that being positive without being grounded in real gets the job done. That to me, is a straw house which will fall when the wolf blows.
Where is the house of bricks? Where is the real world? It isn’t where it is supposed to be because real things aren’t working real well. So what is the address we’re headed for?
Boundaries. Bully Defense. How to keep the lights on a day longer, how to go through a sociopaths world when the good guys will leave you standing on the side of the road and the kindness appears to come from the most damaged – not the most respected members of it.
This day is an on going cluster that has nothing to do with the SPATH except that the “good guys” make him look better for the kind words he spoke and the gentle touch he made even if he was lying his ass off- these others make him look like a real hero because at least he was saying what I wanted to hear- not just reciting his personal calendar or more important than you you are agenda.
It confuses me that the world to bound out and the one that we so champion being part of is such a world of vapid unperforming people who don’t care as long as their bellies are full and their homes are lit at night and who seem to believe that if they can prove that they are more important that you they have a right to take what is not theirs and ignore whatever they feel like.
And the last time the world saw that sentiment truly rise was when a woman in Paris laughed charmingly and tossed her powdered hair saying”Let them eat Cake”……
How many heads need to sit on display on pikes before the incentive to perform becomes real?
I have a very tight boundary today. “Vive La Revolution”
Tennis anyone?
Silvermoon,
I no longer believe the world is inherently a good or safe place. And based on my experience I have come to know “reality” operates on 2 factors: who you know, and how well do you know them?
You’re describing low-level functionaries who usually do not care, and who are afraid that they could be us one day; the disenfranchised, the defenseless, the *victims*. Many are one state or local budget decision away from losing their “power” and that is sobering and frightening.
Keep the lights on. Play the fiddle. Nothing is as it should be. Agencies dissapoint. “Lack of planning on your part does not constitute an emergency on our part” is a slogan I’ve seen posted in many a government office. We didn’t plan. We didn’t follow the “rules of good conduct.” We didn’t “know better.”
So we aren’t their problem. The social contract is broken.
I’ve lived in the world of Halliburton heirs. Still do to some extent. Their reality is not that of the average citizen, and with one phone call your deaf DA would work overtime lining everything up…your utility refund would be hand delivered. It’s who you know, and how well do you know them.
And has always been so.
I’ve also lived in the world of undocumented workers and still have one foot planted in that world. They are scapegoated for political reasons, scapegoated by the very companies who need them and abuse them, scapegoated over and over with little or no legal recourse. While working to provide us with services we don’t want to pay a living wage for.
They get no special treatment. Or at least no *positive* special treatment. Been in the trenches on that one.
My dad was a high-level cop. I never got a ticket. Got special treatment instead. “Well, hi there! I just saw your old man this morning! OK, have a good day!” and no explanation of why I was stopped. I drove with impunity. Ace up my sleeve.
Asked my dad why, and he said, “It’s bad form to give a cop’s wife or kids a ticket.” Or the DA or a rich businessman, or a doctor, or anyone who could lobby for and/or approve their next raise.
Got a ticket a couple of years ago. No longer have my dad’s surname. Told my dad. “Did you tell them who you were?” “No, dad, I didn’t. Let’s pretend the system is fair, shall we? I had it coming.” He laughed. Stupid me.
Sorry you are having a hard time, Silver. I’ve lived the can of beans scenario. Have lived the one month wait for a bank to refund a few hundred dollars they mistakenly credited to someone else’s account. And tried to get the bank to explain that to my landlord. Not their problem. Wait.
Joni Mitchell: “I’ve looked at life from both sides now…”
The Halliburton side is far easier. Even the cop’s daughter side is far easier. Complained to a rabbi once–he laughed too, “who said life is fair?” Well, no one. We were raised to expect it would be, fed that lie of egalitie, fraternitie, liberte.
La Revolucion is us.
silvermoon,
No one can say it like you do…
I am there with you holding your hand. Not that this is much comfort….
I have been exactly where you are in the “combat zone” of trying to find resources that exist, (they have a physical address and telephone number) but might as well NOT exist, when you are trying to enlist their helping hand.
Its like a big vicious circle. I remember having to go out and spend thirty dollars at a time to get minutes on a pay as you go cell phone in order to be able to call the toll numbers, as I can’t make toll calls on my land line. That thirty dollars would have been better spent on food or my electric bill. However I needed the phone to call the resources that were going to “help” my son…..
Generally speaking it was like a big joke, and the joke was on me. There really WAS NO help out there. I spent hours, days, and weeks, mostly making calls, leaving voice mails, and waiting for call backs. While waiting for call backs, I researched online for more places to call for help.
If I had a job outside of the home I would have been fired. Instead I work from my home and during these weeks, my work suffered and I needed to work, to make the money to buy more phone minutes and keep my internet service conected to continue trying to find the RIGHT resource.
In the end there was no help. I call it the valley of the closed doors. Because that is exactly what it was.
I hate to say it…..But I will probably never vote in an election again. There is no one that I trust enough to vote for. I am angry at the system.
If my kid had cancer there would have been places that would have treated him. REGARDLESS if I had insurance or not. Once he was Dx with cancer, doors would have opened.
My son was actually Dx with a treatable disorder. Bi Polar, and mood disorder, & major depressive disorder recurrent. Regardless of the fact that I fear that he might also have a budding personality disorder lurking within this layered diagnosis, the professionals are the ones who gave him this DX he HAS, so why couldn’t they treat THAT when he was 15 1/2 – 16 years old?
So WHAT if he was resistant to treatment? Would it have made a difference if he was resistant to cancer treatment? I don’t think it would have. With parental permission he would have been treated for cancer at that age.
In-Patient residential treatment for a mental illness. Thats what I was looking for. I might as well have been asking for him to be sent to the moon. There was plenty of “evidence” that his illness was impairing him in his daily life. But criteria for medicaid to pay for in patient evidentaly needs a suicide attempt.
I think its a crock. Thats what I think.
Now he is 17, even more resistant, and pretty much if there WAS a WINDOW of opportunity to treat him, to see what proper medications could do for him at a younger age, stabilize at least the Bi Polar, and see what’s left once that was stabilized…..I WILL never know, will I?
And although you are navigating through a bit of a different system than I did, when the door closes, it feels the same. I feel your pain.
It feels like no one cares. I continued my quest until I ran out of places to call. And my google searches ran dry.
One resource that couldn’t really help me, but I found was pretty “user” friendly was Legal Aid. Did you call them….I would imagine that you have. But because you need more of a legal avenue, in your case….Why can’t they help you?
My Spath does not want sex. He wants the pleasure of the orgasm. He can pleasure himself. He won’t turn down sex, but it is one of his tools to dominate, something he has that others want. If he favors a woman, you will get some (Not satisfying/no orgasm) When out of favor, he will come on to her, get her all hot and bothered, and walk away laughing at her for being weak and wanting him. It’s a gotcha moment!
Sp’s trap people in various ways…being in the presenece of an SP can be toxic depending on the situation…it’s hard dealing with sp’s, narcissists…in any way shape or form…in some cases though it’s crazier ie in the case of the sp im dealing with which involves, black magic or the dark arts…people dont believe in it, not suer why…being trapped metaphysically is a different ordeal…. i’ve had it happen twice, and it’s a nightmare on another level… there is the mental psychological emotional and energetic… the SP i deal with does some heavy negative energy stuff to me….and in the past two months so badly that it felt he was trying to kill me…..not sure what his reasons were except to possibly make me drive to his place in anguish…or to drive me crazy….so im dealign with things I have no control over… until the sp ‘chooses’ to stop putting me in anguish or pain….it is difficult…until he finally gave me some relief… but tht may not last…its a trap i can’t get out of….though i try fight and resist.. my desire or addiction for the sp rests solely on whether the sp wants me to feel that way or not, and its just his method of having control over me or his victim…and no matter what it’s all about the powertrip or control.. so in every element he feels he controls every aspect of my emotions, which is sort of true in a sense.. there is still the desire/addiction but worse the whole metaphysical aspect of it too so it’s much worse than normal…and what iv’e had to go through is excruciating horror in my opinion….and still going through it but with less suffering than before…. it’s scary to know there are people that get off on having ‘puppets’ as they say on the side ‘wanting them’ so tehy can keep getting the attention and supply….while rejecting them non-stop and refusing to see or be with them….and for the most part…people they have made want to see them so they can keep doing this to them…. its worse to be one of thos e people and face the reality of the horror….as in the past the sp would give some relief in the midst of the suffering…not let it get to a point where the victim is beyond tortured….and its endless suffering with no relief….so two sp’s ive known have been literaly energy vampires or witches… and who delve in dark arts, and negative energies…to conquer destroy control their victims to an extreme… even put them in excruciating pain…and suffering…ie as this sp had said he owned me, controlled me, owned my soul…etc…this sp never wanted sex togetherness….his only goal was to control/torture hsi victim…not much else….he had a way of doing it long distance so he didnt even have to be in the victim’s presence….and just use her in any way possible, mentally terrorize her etc….also deprive the person of anythign or little things so they are cosntantly asking/begging for normal things that the sp won’t give them…so he had them under his thumb…constantly rejecting, giving nothing.. no relationship no together…not even his presence all while he was mind screwing the person…and in order to get those things, the person had to go through severe psych torture…for long periods of time to get little elements of anything normal… having no contact if there is peace and cutting ties completely is one of the only real ways out…. and there are other methods, but when you have someone so obsessed and ingrained with conquering or destroying you it’s scary.. or controlling you in any way possible…worse having all sorts of odd crazy plans such as wanting to get restraining orders, trying to have u put in jail, claiming you made them lose their job…creating devious scenarios to make yuo look crazy…so they can try to have u put in jail…and not even being in your presence..worse calling and harassing your paernts at work…wanting to try to get money from your parents….just scary n sick…worse the last time i talked to the sp….after weeks of extreme torture his response was I need 500??? u cost me 250.00…i’ll see you for three hours if you pay me 500.00… and i gave my gun to someone to hold so that i wont drive to your place and put a bullet in your head…so scary sick…it all is- the only way that sp would threaten to drive to see me…is to do something nasty to me…or abuse threaten to shoot me etc….or claim he’s coming over to harass my mother….but never to visit me…anything negative or horrific….his only goal was to have me begging or asking to see him so he could keep rejecting me and feel powerful about doing that….that he can reject a girl who wants to see him …24/7.. the only way he would be in my presence…is if he tortured me mentally to horrendous extremes….psych tortured me for weeks/days..made me do things buy things, beg, plead, degrade myself..suffer….just so he ‘allowed’ me to be in his presence for a few hours, which i had to dress up wear heels…be on time…then get kicked out…ie suck a person dry, torture them, take everything from them…and give them nothing in return then turn around and claim that you sucked people dry and ‘take from people’….and projected whatever he was doing to you onto you….after he treated the victim lower than anything you can imagine…..especially dealing with a monster who is that sick or cruel…it is a shocking revelation…..same person would pay prostitutes to take trips with them in the past, buy lingerie for other women….hang out with others while he had mentally terrorizde his victim…and wouldnt be around her but was hanging out with others…and never had sex with the victim but rejected her sexually….the victim– never went anywhere with her.. never took a trip with her…never went to a beach with her….nowhere in three years…and he charged her money to walk down an empty street during bike week for five minutes, when she wanted to just walk around and hang out…he in essence paid others to hang out with them…but made the victim pay him…..gave his friends thousands of dollars, bought expensive dresses for other girls who he was like a sugar daddy to…owns 100’s of pairs of high heels, dresses, yet made the victim buy ‘heels’ to wear to his place…..let prostitutes in his bed and rummage through his wallet — in the morning as he said….his victim…wasnt even allowed to sleep in bed with him….or to stay the night…he charged her money to see him…never gave her anything….if he let her sleep in bed she had to wear high heels…he kicked her out in the morning…refused sex with her….so twisted backwards and sick it is beyond shocking….to me its extremely sick sadistic and so twisted to comprehend…and there are even more elements involved…and i pesronally havent heard of a sadist like that before…and scary to even know people out there like that exist… and revenge….or anger….is good for any victim…. it’s good to release in safe ways if needed so u dont harbor the anger….and it doesnt destroy you….hating evil is a good concept… there is just so much evil out there that ie becomes more hating those that commit evils or that aer in your life who might be out to harm you….
katydid… the sp im dealing with did the same thing….when i first met him….all he did was lead me on sexually….for one sexual act…get me hot bothered then run off and laugh… he never did that sexual act…until about 7 months later….then it was the only sexual thing he ever did to me and nothing else….he still lead me on and rejected me for minor things and laughed about it….and still leads me on for major things….such as seeing him or just anything….and doesn’t care and laughs about it or calls me names… seems to be an SP thing….yeah narcissists like to frustrate humiliate women…make them want them….reject them sexually..they get off on the power….but some moreso than others….and those types do use sex to dominate/control others….sp also refused to have sex with me ever…and got off on being able to reject dominate control have me wanting to have sex with him, while he constantly insulted me and said i wasn’t good enough to have sex with and it would be ‘one more thing he had to do to me’ so he declined…meanwhile he’s offering to have sex with any creature that exists and trying to…and says “most guys just try to get it anywhere they can”…ie talking about himself…but you had a pretty girl who u rejected….makes no sense…. just scary how they function and why….
also agree that while dealing with spaths and narcissists…scary how people tend to lean towards the sp’s…ignore the brutality they do to others….and even take their side….try to see the ‘good’ in the sp…..have witnessed that countless times….even if they have detroyed your life in many ways….or even committed crimes against you …there is always that ‘oh they just want what’s best for you’ or who knows what…people will find reasons to support the SP….and reasons to tell the victim how nothing can be done legally…but if you bring legal legit things up they just say “well its your choice if you want to file charges”… that’s it…nothing else really….theyre trying to find ways to et the sp get away with their crimes….and sometimes even insult or harass the victim….the world is a cold and ignorant place….
It is satisfying to note that for all the nonsense these men go through to be lousy partners that eventually they will be automatically and involuntarily retired from having sex at all.
The world takes the position that you should have known better or done different – e caveat Emptor- you got yourself in, now get yourself out.
So here is where the attitude shift changes: You go for it. You MAKE things happen and you say no and make it stick.
Its amazing how little in life you need anyone elses’ approval onr concensus for. Especially concerning putting these people who do so much damage behind bars or at least in the corner.
Do what it takes to drive them off and run them down. Love yourself piece by piece and enjoy the epiphany that you CAN have a nice day anytime YOU want to.
Sure, there are and always will be problems. So what. Eventually you find a solution or they work themselves out –
but from experience I tell you that the days you expect or look for help before you make YOUR decisions are the longest and that hiring someone to work for you is not the same as asking for and receiving help.
Remember the old addage “I’m rubber and you’re glue”? Well, when you feel insulted, let it bounce off because you have been insulted by a spath and you figured that one out, didn’t you?
What could possibly be more? What insult can get through the thick skin you grow to heal over this wound? Well, it had better be a deep one perfectly delivered because after this- there isn’t much to waste time on.
And time, your life, is precious. Don’t waste it on pathetic partners or mediocre injury.
“There are worse things that could have happened to me than just a scar on my thigh. While tanning is pretty, I’m not going to die for it.”
Molly Brown quote
Ox,
There’s no question that bitterness is ‘bad’, and that righteous anger is good, once you get to higher ground. But I have to say, it is a mistake to get between a victim and whatever anger they feel, however they feel it, when they are first starting to get away from the abuse, or first starting to feel the anger that they have been suppressing for what may have been decades.
The thing is, repressed anger, unacknowledged, unprocessed is often going to be bitter and nasty when a victim first gets in touch with it. It may have been festering and rotting while they’ve been neglecting it, not even noticing that it was draining them of all their life-force/energy/vitality. You had the right to pass through your bitterness phase just the way that you needed to, in order to reach the next stage, — and so does everyone else, without being made to feel guilty about it, or that somehow, it ‘should not be’ exactly what it is – bitterness.
When a person gets in touch with the bitterness, if they really want to heal, they won’t stay in it any longer than they have to. Some will hopefully move on to righteous anger, and once they get in touch with that, they may just realize that behind or underneath all that anger is just a bunch of really hurt feelings, emotional traumas. Then they can work on the feelings that were hurt, and hopefully, they’re releasing all that they need to in this process, with bitterness and righteous anger showing up again and again, being processed again and again.
But to suggest to a victim, who may just be getting to the place where they’re ready to deal with the anger, that the bitterness they feel is not somehow justifiable or natural or ‘good’ adds to the feelings of guilt and shame that have kept them buried in abuse and suffering for so long. Telling them ‘you shouldn’t feel X’ or ‘don’t be so sensitive’ or ‘it is wrong to feel X’ is just what the abusers have told them all along, to keep them feeling like were wrong to care about the impact that the abuser was having on them. The twisted idea that we are somehow guilty, wrong and shameful to feel what we feel when we’re abused is a message deeply embedded in the psyches many victims. It is precisely those feelings of misplaced guilt and shame and self-doubt in the hearts of victims that abusers use to ‘lock’ a good person inside an abusive situation. The guilt and shame belong to the abusers, let them carry that weight.
On the other hand, suggesting that bitterness is often a natural part of the process, a natural result of being abused, and one a victim wants to pass through as soon as they can, gives hope that something better is waiting on the other side of the bitterness.
I think the point you and I do agree on is that moving through bitterness is a really important thing to do.
I would just add, let them do it as soon as they can do it, and don’t make them feel ‘bad’ about not being able to do it immediately.
And yes, Luke Skywalker defeats Darth Vader only because he’s willing to give up bitterness, aggression, fear, and even justifiable anger. But that’s when he’s a hero, a full jedi knight. He had to pass through a lot of emotions to get to that place, some of them not too pretty 🙂
Psyche
Silvermoon,
I love your attitude, it’s one I feel on my better, stronger days.
The world does take the attitude of ‘you should have known better’, and in my opinion, the world can sometimes really suck. it’s a kind of apathy in the face of evil, to say that if someone experiences it, well, ‘too bad because they should have known better.’ Plato once said something like: the price that men pay for disinterest in the common good is to be ruled by evil men. I see a lot of Spaths in positions of power, some of them got where they are because people turned a blind eye to the patently bad behavior of the Spath.
On the other hand, another approximate quote that I remember is that loving yourself has a way of putting everything into place. I think there’s a lot of truth in that one. Taking care of the business that really belongs to us (our own). I think that once we have ourselves in good order, we can do a lot for the common good just by being who we’ve become. (I say ‘we’, even thought I don’t feel that I’m there yet, but whatever).
I love the reminder not to waste emotional energy on mediocre injuries, that’s the truth. I do waste time on them with work colleagues, because I still have to work to convince myself that I’m not always the ‘bad’ person in every situation (a role I’ve been conditioned to play since earliest childhood).
Thanks,
Psyche