Lovefraud received the following e-mail from a woman whose daughter is caught in the web of a sociopath. The woman and her husband are not enabling the relationship—the sociopath, of course, wants money. They are hoping and praying that their daughter will escape.
Here is her question to other Lovefaud readers:
What was the “turning point,” “awakening moment,” “realization point,” that woke them up OUT of the fog, the gaslighting, etc., and what made them realize they needed to RUN, to get away from their sociopaths? Â What finally “did it,” what finally “broke the camel’s back?” Â Where they realized what was happening to them, had been done to them, when they finally realized things were NEVER going to “get better?”
There must be a “trigger” here somewhere. I’m just trying to grasp what it’s going to take. Â What is going to have to happen to jar her awake from this brainwashing/fog?
My experience
I remember the moment for me.
I knew my husband, James Montgomery, was lying to me, although I didn’t realize the extreme extent of the lies. I knew all my money was gone; my husband had spent about $227,000, much of it carelessly. I suspected he was cheating on me, and when I discovered proof, I left him.
Still, even after I left him, I thought my husband was just one of those guys who can’t stay faithful. I did not realize that my entire marriage was a scam right from the beginning.
The real moment of truth came when I called one of the women my husband appeared to be involved with. According to bank records I’d found, she had given him $6,000. The conversation went like this:
“I’m Donna Andersen. I’m James Montgomery’s wife, and I’d like to suggest that you don’t give him any more money.”
“It’s too late. I already gave him $92,000.”
I almost dropped the phone. And with that conversation, I realized that my husband had married me for the specific purpose of taking my money. That was all.
Your moment of truth
This reader has asked a really important question, one that may glean some possible approaches from helping people escape the sociopathic trap. So please post your experience.
What did it for you? When did you finally realize that you had to get out?
Ox, you are so sweet. Thanks for the hugs, and HUGS for you too. I just don’t understand people sometimes. Being a mother makes me so much more aware of how crappy my parents were. BUT they taught me everything not to do with my babes. I will never be like them, and even being a single mom I have wonderful kids because of it.
I also wanted to post on one of your topics (I think it was yours, but I wanted to reply to you). My internet has sucked where I live, and I erad a lot on my phone. It is just awful with the on screen keyboard to reply though. IF you ever need any advise on how to run, should the time come, let me know. I packed up a baby, my 9 yo son, my mom, and our house in a matter of a couple of days and had us living in another state. It was fast, hard, and scary, but it was so much better than death. I had been being stalked for 3 years and things got to the going to kill us part. I am still afraid to talk about it in anything public, but if you ever need help with running and hiding, I can help you.
Dear Jen,
Thank you so much, and I am glad that you are safe and had the gumption to RUN!!!! I also ran QUICKLY when the time came…my biggest problem was making myself DO IT, to not want to stand and fight and defend my SPACE! LOL Finally coming to the realization that STUFF wasn’t worth dying over and that I could run and could be safe…and that I SHOULD RUN and should be safe.
I don’t have that problem now, I am WILLING to run and run hard and fast…Dr. Sherry L. Meinberg’s book “Toxic Attention, Keeping safe from Stalkers, Abusers and Intruders” as well as several other good books I have found on how to “disappear in plain sight” (after all we are NOT hiding from the FBI but simply from the paper trail that will lead some private investigator to us.) Dr. Meinberg was stalked by her mean and crazy X husband for over 40 years! Yet she managed to raise her kids, go to college and to keep safe in spite of the fact that in those days law enforcement would do NADA for her even when she wass lying bleeding in the street literally.
Thank you so much for your offer of help and comfort! You have NO idea how much that means to me. I understand how it feels to be in fear of your life, and I can’t even imagine how it must have felt as a child. I just finished reading a book written by a child who was abused by his step mother that was absolutely unbelievable, and the man finally was able to confront his father who had not defended him from the EVIL step mother who had done such horrible things to him until he was nearly 60 years old. He managed to come to closure and to accept his father for the flawed person he was–I actually cried reading the book.
I’m glad that you survived Jen, and not only survived but have THRIVED. Thank you for extending your caring hand to me and to others here on LF ((((hugs))) and God bless you and your children!
Jen I understand what living in fear is, but nothing as compared to what you describe..your a fighter and I admire your tenacity.
As for Oxy needing a hiding place, I have already told her I will put a bed out in the chicken house for her if she ever needs a place to run, she will be right at home with the hens..
Dear Hens,
You don’t have any hens, you told me you got rid of the chickens, I ain’t sleepin’ with no CHICKENS no-how! The chickens just go poop everywhere and at least the donkeys and the piggies do it in ONE SPOT…LOL When I get up at night to go pee I don’t want to have to dodge chicken poop! I thought about going to Erin’s but out there is BEAR POOP and I don’t think I want that either…and she has all that white fluffy cold stuff on the ground arse deep to a tall Indian all winter…of course it might be okay in the summer cause it’s cool…I may be considering moving to ALASKA come summer time here! LOL
Thank you guys! I love you all just in case you don’t know! (((hugs))))
Jen,
Your upbringing really struck a chord with me. My mother is also a narcissist who married a sick abusive man when I was 7 and my sister was 5. He never abused her, but he beat us and terrorized us – for me it was 9 years – till I left home at 16. My sister was so young when the abuse started that she never developed the ability to bond with others. So I have never been able to have any kind of relationship with her. I tried for many years, then I finally accepted the reality of it. My stepfather also separated us (emotionally and geographically) from everyone else in my extended family on both sides. We actually moved across the country. My psychologically weak and beaten down bio father made a feeble attempt to stay in touch with us but eventually faded, never to be heard from again. I begged my mother to leave the monster. I offered to get 2 jobs at 14 to help support us. But it wasn’t about the money. She was an educated person with a decently paying nursing job. She just was all about herself. She stayed with my stepfather until the day he died, many years after I left home. Then she married an alcoholic child molestor who died in jail because they didn’t give him his heart meds (oh what a great loss to society that was!) I remember visiting them when I was 30, and him trying to hit on me. My mother sued the jail and ended up with $50,000 after lawyers’ fees. In her huge act of contrition, she sent me $1000 of it to “make amends”. Never mind that at the time I was working as a stripper making $500 a night so I could get away from a violent child molesting boyfriend myself!
After my stepfather died, my mother decided she wanted to have a relationship with her kids. She made a feeble attempt to apologize and said she wanted to “make amends”. But her amends were for herself and not for us. It didn’t take long before the “Get Over It”‘s started. Neither of us has contact with her anymore. I still send her mother’s day cards. It’s more just a tribute to the fact that she gave birth to me. And probably some fanciful thinking that for one day out of the year, I can pretend I have a mother. This usually evokes a flood of emails, cards, and calls from her, trying to be my friend. I’m sure it hurts her terribly not to have her kids in her life. Too bad so sad, eh? I did try over 2 decades to build a relationship with her. My sister never even bothered. But she was just so narcissistic, I got wounded every time. I finally learned my lesson. When she contacts me, I turn into a big gray rock. I don’t say much. I don’t get angry. I don’t try to reason with her. After all, I never felt like much more than a gray rock growing up. No one ever paid any attention to me unless it was to use me for something or take out their anger on me. The last time she wrote me, she wanted to pay my way to come visit her and her bf. I wrote back, “Thanks for your offer but I won’t be in a position to travel for a long time.” That is about as generic as it gets. And then I turned around and planned my next trip to Costa Rica.
The sad thing is that I will most likely never get an inheritance (of the $50,000) because I am not in touch with her. If anyone ever deserved to have some help…. But I’m okay with it. If she and I were a real mother and daughter, I would tell her to spend it on herself anyway, and die broke and happy. I don’t really believe in inheritances, and I think energetically they create bad karma, because you are looking to profit off of someone’s death.
I often wonder how my life would have turned out if it weren’t interrupted by a sociopath at age 7. I absorbed all of his fear and anger and carried it around in the form of depression for 43 years. I am just now learning to let go of it. But my life has been very limited at best, and I have always been in survival mode. I am a very creative person wtih an IQ of 160. I wrote a novel at age 10. I used to draw and paint and dance. I was reading 6th grade level books when I was 7. I could have become a writer, a doctor, or whatever I chose to be. Instead, I was unable to work for nearly a decade due to depression, then took jobs as a stripper and a secretary to make ends meet. I had no self esteem for many years.
Fortunately, my massage career has given me some self esteem, and I hope to still make something of my life, especially if I can ever move to Costa Rica. A sociopath’s presence in my life really changed the course of my life. But I am trying to take responsibility for that, too. My energy worker/therapist friend believes we all choose our life lessons before we come into the world. It’s really hard for me to swallow that anyone could “choose” being raised by a sociopath in order to learn something. But perhaps when I have learned the lesson, I will report back.
Hugs,
Star
After reading all the posts about our various turning points, we should all pat ourselves on the back for having finally rid ourselves from our spaths…. Kudos everyone.
My story is no different, he was a constant liar, deceiver, cheater, basically a no good human being, but I let it go on for years. I actually figured out his cell phone voice mail passcode and got to listen to his calls – most were from friends, nothing from any other women (I found out he had a toss away cell phone) but many from his ex wife. He had this crazy relationship with her (they still jointly own the marital home – should be up for sale this year) and she always seemed to stick her nose into our business – she would call him about a movie to watch, book to read, etc., I told him that this bothered me and only to speak with her on things about the house – he promised to. Yeah, well I would get into the voice mail – find out she left a message, delete it and a couple days later ask him in a round about way something about the message – always lies. So, that pretty much did it for me. Once a liar, always a liar.
Also, I was watching “Stepford Wifes” yesterday on tv and thought, isn’t that what all the spaths want from us? To be obedient, don’t ask questions, don’t talk back? I may have unlocked the secret…. LOL
Dear Star,
I’m sure by now your mom has already spent the $50K on herself, probably just pithed it away here and there….so even if you were tight with her I sincerely doubt that you would have gotten a centavo!
I laughed out loud reading that she offered you $1,000 as “blood money” out of her win fall from suing the prison for the LOSS (LAUGH) of her husband. Choke snort snarf! LOL
I really think that the lessons we learn ARE up to us but sometimes we have to “repeat the class” a few times before we GET the lesson learned. I’ve taken “psychopath 101” several times and “setting boundaries 101” a BUNCH of times but Ii think God has been patient and there’s no limit on how many times we can retake the class until we GET THE LESSON LEARNED.
It isn’t fair for any child to be abused, it isn’t right for any child to be abused or for any parent to NOT PROTECT their child even if they are NOT the ones doing the abusing. But that is what happens when abusive people and people who are NOT nurturing are allowed to raise children.
Star, I am glad that you are starting to heal and to “graduate” from your classes in “psychopath 101” and “life lessons 101” and to move on to “peace 401” and graduate level “contentment 501” It gets easier as we learn the very basics! (((hugs))))
I relate so completely to all the posts–the turning point came ONLY AFTER months and years of lies, humiliation, squandering money, stealing money, the crazy making stories that changed readily, etc. However, the final point came rather calmly on a Thursday afternoon after I had refused to cosign a note for something he wanted. (I had already learned my lesson by then). After many promises of “ready to be a real husband if you will only take me back this time”, and of course, I did. That day, he very casually told me that he had changed checking accounts and had his paycheck direct deposited into HIS new account. Nevermind that I had already paid bills out of the our account, the one he wanted so he could be a “real husband” and “contribute like I need to”. Once again, it was because he didn’t want me to see what he squandered money on. AND for the first time, it didn’t hurt when he told me his new secret. I didn’t want to cry anymore because he had betrayed my trust once again. Actually I think he was more shocked at my behavior than I was. No more begging him to treat me better, not to lie to me, not to gamble so much, etc. I think I had done the grieving over those past years, and had finally got the grieving over with. Then is when I realized that, after lying to myself for over five years, the truth was that it was I who had the biggest problem–I chose to believe him in face of insurmountable evidence to the contrary that he loved me! I chose to believe the lies, stories, etc., — deep down I knew the truth but I wouldn’t allow myself to see it…..it would hurt too bad. I too had my own vision of what I wanted this relationship/marriage to be and by darn, no one was going to change my mind that it was not! Then that Thursday, I realized the truth, and suddenly looked very squarely at myself and said to myself, “it’s you or him, you will never have both. You will end up crazy or dead if you continue this, but you have chosen it so far and it is your choice now to continue. He will NEVER change”. The realization that I had chosen it myself gave me tremendous power, because I had not seen myself as the one that had a hand it continuing this charade. I didn’t cry that night; I knew I would again, but I also knew that I could continue to hurt living in this madness, or hurt one last time and get it over with. And that is what I did. And Oh it did hurt, more than anything I had ever been through before. I thought the hurt would never end, but I vowed not to take him back again, and I didn’t. I maintained NC as much as possible, saw a lawyer, refused to allow him to pull me back into talking, emailing, etc. And now free for over three years, I look back at that crazy thinking during those years with him and do not recognize me….I became someone other than who I am just trying to live my vision! Oh what effort I expended, I was exhausted all the time trying to do enough, be good enough, love enough, etc., etc. Now I am happy again, rested, energetic. I still ask myself what happened to me, and although I know the answer, it is hard to believe that that was really me. There is freedom and peace after a spath, and there is life again. Thank God I finally found it. I do credit reading posts here through those years-actually trying to find evidence that HE WAS NOT A SPATH (LOL)-in helping me finally see what was. Thank you all. The strength I gained from this site was far more than I knew at the time.
Dear Lagayle,
Thank you for that uplifting post to shine a light on healing and that it is not only a dream but POSSIBLE! Glad you are here, thanks for your post! God bless.
Thank you… I sincerely appreciate the words of encouragement. You all are such a blessing!
I do have to share how I came to find this blog… My dear R and I were watching an episode of “House”. The patient was a female sociopath. It was our aha moment! The woman reminded us so much of his exS, it gave us both chills!
So I did what I do when I don’t know much about something. I googled it! and voila, I found you all!! (((hugs)))