Almost three years ago, Lovefraud published the story of a man from the UK whom I called Tom. Tom’s wife left him for another man, took their children, had him arrested on false charges nine times and wiped him out financially. Here is the original story:
UK man says sociopath stole his life
Now, three years later, Tom still hasn’t seen his children. His ex-wife and her new husband, who also sounds like a sociopath, have removed the children from the UK. They live in France, at a small town near the Swiss border. “My heart bleeds every minute for the loss,” he writes. “It is a living bereavement and a nightmare from which I may never awake.”
I asked Tom if he was taking care of himself. Here’s his reply:
I have taken care of myself and for the most part I am okay. Some days are worse than others. I do have my very depressed and painful days ”¦ but I close my eyes, dream of days and memories of long ago, sleep and they pass.
I have to deal with my health and look after my parents. My mother phones me and cries about her grandson all the time. She has post-traumatic difficulties and says she cannot connect with her other grandchildren because of what she feels for my son. She feels a deep loss and is constantly worried about the kids. Every open discussion starts with them [opening the scar] and ends with them.
I am holding my own and my health has deteriorated but I am stable. I hold my family in the balance on many fronts. I am keeping it together but the pain is immense at times.
I am working and seem to have bounced back somewhat to where I used to be”¦ the years have been tearful, painful and costly. I don’t think that I will every really recover.
Releasing the pain
How do you cope when there is no resolution in sight?
I asked Tom about how he is taking care of himself because that may be, for the time being, all he can do. Emotional pain weakens us and makes it difficult to continue the battle. So somehow, Tom needs to alleviate the pain, even though his circumstances have not changed.
This seems counterintuitive—how can he feel better when his children are still kept away from him? The solution is to deal with the pain directly. Pain can be processed and released, even when the source of the pain has not changed.
Pain comes from wanting things to be different. The solution is to accept what is, for the time being, reality. This does not mean giving up hope. It does not mean quitting the legal battle. But it does mean letting go of the internal upset that keeps us trapped, and makes us ill.
How do we do that? We allow ourselves to feel the pain and grief at our loss. This is best done privately, or perhaps with a skilled counselor. We allow ourselves to cry, moan with the anguish, perhaps pound pillows in our anger. We continue until we feel a release, and then we stop.
Tom will probably have to do this many times—the well of his pain and grief is deep. But each time grief is released, it makes room for healing. And from a place of healing, it is possible to find the internal resources to continue the battle.
PS-after saying I was the crazy one that needed to be on meds [of which I have NEVER taken anything] both my X and my daughter which were both on meds…..have declared themselves cured of their problems/depression and so have stopped their meds. If anything: I do believe they act more irrationally than before. This worries me greatly for my little granddaughter because my daughter drinks and runs around with other men while my son in law is out to sea.
i found an interesting site thru Candy. The site refers to Don Juan. I think you will find it interesting. here’s the link: http://www.gordonbanks.com/gordon/pubs/donjuan.html
(the story is entitled Don Juan as Psychopath, c 1989 by Gordon Banks)
something that resonates for me, as my X-Psychpath likes to bed other men’s women (please be assured that any woman are fair game, too):
psychoanalyst Ethel Spector Person writes: “The psychopath’s insight is always directed toward his internal needs. These needs are not what they appear to be. He is not predominantly hedonistic, although some of his behavior, particularly sexual, might lead one to think so. Instead, he is motivated primarily by the need to dominate and humiliate either the person he is ‘taking’ or, very often, someone connected to a person with whom he is involved. He may, for instance, seduce a friend’s girlfriend.”
Also, an excerpt…”lying is a defense mechanism of the weak.”
blessings to all…god knows the more i learn the more i cringe.
these Psychopaths/Sociopaths know no boundaries!
PIGS
Bumper sticker spotted recently: Real Men Don’t Hit Women
Oh, good post candyharlau! Good read. I know….these people make us shudder. It’s almost as if they are not really human……
Sabrina,
This response to you is very late but hopefully you will see it as I just read your post and wanted to share with you and the others.
Most of you who have read my comments are aware that I’m a fairly logical, rational, sensible woman. My innate nature is quite level headed, rooted in reality.
In other words, I am unfamiliar with flights of fancy (unless I’m reading my beloved sci-fi/fantasy adventure books. Then, I’m all about celebrating vivid imaginations)
Yes, I have been seduced, betrayed by PDIs but that naive gal no longer exists. I am oodles smarter, more informed, confident, liberated from past baggage. Life is good! Wonderful! Amazing!
Anyway, when I was in my late 20s I was being stalked by a real piece of vile work aka psychopath. The dude would not desist in daily harassing. I tried diplomacy-fail. I tried righteous fury-worked…briefly then the idiot was back, pounding on my door, window, yelling my name outside.
Total nuisance. Drove me bonkers and I was also struggling with depression and anxiety which both had been with me since I was a teen.
One night I lay in my bed, sobbing and begging God to just take me as I was just so tired of my own emotional/psychological pain and the cumbersome crap from others. I was done with my so-called “life”. I eventually fell asleep.
I had a blessed visitation. I still vividly recall it even to this day, many years later. I also appreciate my visitation now a 1000 times more than I did then.
I remember a bright, shining light that didn’t hurt my eyes a bit but evoked feellings of peace and love. A tall, rangy man with a cowboy hat and the most serene, loving, radiant blue eyes sat down on the edge of the bed, took my hand and said, ” It is not your time”
I can’t remember if he said anything else and it doesn’t matter as I was in awe of his presence.
The next morning I immediately called my Mom and told her about my visitation in an effort to prove to myself that I’m not stir crazy, having hallucinations, seeking validation, assurance from a trusted, rational person.
She gave me that added validation, totally believed me and then I also believed. She was moved and supportive.
Today, I am healed and happy. And I will never forget my blessed visitation as long as I live.
Peace, Joy and Love for all…
🙂
Jane, as you may have seen from MY posts, I am NOT particularly level headed and quite prone to flights of fancy lol!I am also not religious. I read your post and feel like telling you that something similar happened to me. It was the day my father died, I had given birth to my son a few months earlier and despite my father being no kind of a good man at all, I was experiencing extreme pain and grief, the likes of which I had never known. I will never forget the experience but have told very few people because I dont know where to ‘put’ it and it makes me sound bonkers, but I was sitting on my bed, having just fed my baby and the pain was almost unbearable, and then the atmosphere in the room changed completely, the room filled with the brightest blue white light that didnt hurt my eyes though it seemed it ought to, every fibre of my being was utterly and completely filled and enveloped with a sense of calm and well being, I did not hear a ‘voice’ in the normal sense but there was something there/in the atmosphere or light or in me ‘telling me’ “it’s all right, everything is going to be alright”. I have no idea what it was, I was not asleep, on drugs or drunk. Maybe something happens from outside or chemically within, when a person is in extreme emotional pain like that, I have no idea, but it ‘left’ and there I was. It was the most blissful and comforting experience of my life. Just felt compelled to share:)
…slightly embarrassed now, but will post it anyway:)
Thanks to all who responded. Your support means so much and it seems the general consensus is to avoid anywhere that he is, so as much as I hate to adjust my routine because part of me thinks “that’s giving him what he wants – he wins,” maybe what he really wants is to see me there, knowing the effect he has upon me, because I did reveal to him that I wanted to get to a place where we would both be peaceful in each other’s presence. However, even now, in the post-breakup phase, I still walk on eggshells and give him waaaaay more than he deserves in terms of consideration and courtesy.
According to him, it is he who needs time to heal, but you all know the whole projection/transference tendency of these creatures. They really are like aliens aren’t they, just cloning themselves based on things they take in from others. I don’t think he’s ever had an original thought in his head. Even his responses to me were almost “cut and pastes” of my emails to him….emotional plagarism, yet another new concept/term that I think fits. Now, I am feeling more empowered and less at his mercy…I think I’m feeling some very appropriate anger and no longer romanticizing or missing the good times we once shared. I did my best to try to make peace with him solely because I want to be able to go to my church and not feel such anxiety and animosity. I was going to such great lengths to get him to soften his angry attitude towards me but basically I was doing major ass-kissing, then he threw a wrench into the whole thing and manufactured a crisis which caused him to pull back his trust, for fear of being hurt again by me. That’s when I lost it and told him about all the things i knew about him that violated my trust and of course he responded back all sorts of justifications. That was on SAT and I have not replied, nor do I have any intention of replying.
So now, I do feel that what I will do is either go to a different service for a while, maybe a different congregation, or maybe even not go at all if I so desire. I’m feeling a little betrayal from my priest to be honest. I reached out to him in a very sincere way and asked him to help me save my spiritual life and I think the response I received was very cold and indifferent. So maybe he doesn’t care, maybe he doesn’t want any trouble, and maybe he doesn’t want the $1200/year that I give in the collection basket. It might be good to take a break. There are a number of people that I look forward to seeing at that service, but I know some of them well enough that I can see them outside of church if I wanted to. And when they ask me why I haven’t been coming, perhaps I will tell them what the S has done. Almost everyone I have told about this, thinks what he’s doing at my church is a HUGE boundary violation and inappropriate as it gets, so normal people do “get it” about this particular part of the problem.
My S even said in one of these emails that he hopes i’m not engaging in seeking alliances and slandering, exactly the things he’s been doing according to a mutual friend of ours who knows his games very well and who told me because he knew how much I was hurting and he didn’t think that this guy was worth me crying over because he certainly wasn’t feeling anything similar about me.
I have to admit that now it feels GOOD TO BE ANGRY and no longer sad, i feel much more empowered. It’s almost like I’ve broken up with him all over again, and this time, letting him have the last word, MINE ARE TOO GOOD TO WASTE ON HIM.
I also bought some S books yesterday, including “The Sociopath Next Door,” “Without Conscience” & “The Narcissism Epidemic.” Also bought “The Four Agreements”
Thanks again everyone, I love what you had to say and I will keep my healing going by continuing to read these books and share on this site, and read all of your inspiring stories.
James
Blueskies,
Lovely experience you shared. And don’t be embarrassed. There are so many mysteries in the Universe that our little human brains are quite unable to ever completely understand such amazing occurences. Science can’t explain everything, no matter how hard folks try.
I no longer analyze my blessed visitation. I accept it, appreciate and realize that I AM worthy and deserving of being the recepient of something so wonderful, so powerful, so life and spiritually affirming.
It is what it is and I dig/dug it!!…
8)
xxooxxoo!!1!!!1
BlueSkies, I just am taking a break from packing and read of your holy experience.
I don’t have time to tell you of my similar experiences but I just want you to know I think your experience was real (even heavenly) and I thank you for sharing it.
I got “shivers” (I call them gospel bumps) reading. “…the room filled with the brightest blue white light that didnt hurt my eyes though it seemed it ought to.”
The closest I have come to try to describe that light (to a few trusted friends) is the “halo” of light around oncoming headlights on a dark night. But it was a 1,000 times brighter than that — and didn’t hurt my eyes, either.
You say you aren’t religious, but I’m sure you remember from somewhere that Jesus said, “I am the Light of the world.”
Bless you for sharing this!
ANL:
And my boomerang!