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.
Thank you all for your kind thoughts and it does help to feel validated.
Kattt
OxDrover…
just wanted to drop you a line. I went into my marriage to a P/S as a Christian, but I ignored the red flags. I am learning how to forgive myself for not hearing that voice.
I am lucky that I don’t believe my P/S gets joy out of what he does, but everything he does is for him, he is a shell, I watch how he changed the day he left me and now fits OW’s taste…he was the same with me, went to church and seemed to enjoy it, talked about God, even roped in christians at work. now he’s totally different.
yes it is comforting to know he doesn’t love this new girl either and he’ll do the same to her.
But now my worry is my son. P/S will fight tooth and nail as long as I want our son. I know you can bargain with a P/S, but I haven’t got him totally figured out yet. I didn’t even know he was a P/S until late May 09.
But I have figured out his bark is much worse than his bite..he has always barked and it has worked, but he’s never had to bite.
Yesterday I told him “no” for the first time and nothing happened.
But I so fear S/P will turn my year old son against me.
All I ask right now is for you faithful ones her on LF is prayer for the Lord to watch over court on thursday.
And that I grow in faith and let the Lord banish my fears.
Banana
Dear Banana,
“The prayer of the righteous availeth much” and I know that prayer helped me to accept what IS for today—and to gain in patience and to accept the promise in the Bible that “all tings work together for good to those that love the Lord.” We don’t always see how this is so, but keep your faith, and pray and take care of yourself and your son. Hopefully, your X will get bored with your child before the boy gets big enough to remember him.
Liane Leedom M. D. has a blog and site for “co parenting” with the toxic ones, you might join her there and get information that will help and comfort you.
Play your cards close to your chest and don’t ‘react” to whatever your X pulls. Don’t antagonize him, but at the same time, don’t give in either is my advice. At some point if he doesn’t pay child support it might be possible to get him to sign over your child in exchange for you not pressing for child support.
Toxic ones (ps or not) can pretend to be religious and holy and good, but they are wearing masks—from the letter yours wrote, he sounds like that type of person. Always trying to find someone else to blame for his own failures and bad behavior.
Keep your faith and be glad that you are away from him, it can only be BETTER away from a man like him. (((hugs))) and God bless.
Hi Kattt, well, I guess life isn’t over til it’s over, and you’re still here and you’ve got your boys! I am so glad you wrote that you refuse to let him win, so don’t let him win what’s inside of YOU!!!! I don’t know too much of your personal story but it sounds like you have already been through a lot and you are still standing. I’m glad you are hanging in there with the rest of us. I hope you keep writing. I will be thinking of you.
In Melbourne in Victoria, they have a judge whose nickname is “santa clause.” He is a psychopath who can be bought with money or “favours” to give you whatever sentence you want. I can’t be specific here and tell you what some of them were, or it will identify me. Such is the nature of staying safe.
Some days I wonder if it will EVER go away.
I still live with the financial consequences as a reminder. I have been so weakened by the whole sorry saga I have little enthusiam for anything. I try to engage in activities – social etc. but some days, it just doesn’t happen. I never had health problems before the S and they started about a year down the line with him.
I didn’t know it was possible to HATE a person this much.
Dear Morgan,
You must be so very proud of yourself! Way to go for not calling him back and being committed to NO CONTACT. In fact, if you see him at the gym you do have the option of totally ignoring him or just brushing him off not even mentioning the call.. “oh, hey, gotta run… etc..
I cant imagine what you endured physically. You are one strong woman ! Take care of yourself and your health. The less stress the better!!! You DO NOT NEED HIM causing continued chaos and pain in your life… you are perfectly fine without him and can handle anything that comes your way!
Towanda!!! STAY STRONG! YOU DID IT!!!!
Dear Escapee,
You are right, I did not believe it was possible to HATE SOMEONE so much, and when I realized that I hated my egg donor with a white-hot rage it hit me in the face like a bucket of coals—I am past that now, and I finally realized that hating them takes ENERGY as well, and I don’t want to give them that much of my energy and thinking. THEY DON’T EVEN DESERVE MY HATE! I am, as one poster here recently said, entering the NIRVANA OF INDIFFERENCE. (CRS can’t remember who said it) I think that 3-word phrase is the way to go, it takes time and it takes work, but it is sure worth it. When we can actually be indifferent to the point we wouldn’t cross the street to pith on them if they were on fire. That we just don’t CARE.
We accept them for the EVIL BEING that they are, acknowledge what they did to us IN THE PAST, and don’t let that PAST BE OUR PRESENT. We can’t change the past, our decisions or their actions in the past, but we can sure take CONTROL OF TODAY and our decisions and our lives TODAY.
Just liike if I had been bitten by a cobra in the past, and maybe even lost a foot because of that toxic bite, I still have a missing foot, but I don’t have to spend every minute of every day HATING COBRAS, or thinking about them when I pick up my crutches or put on my special appliance so I can walk.
I had plenty of REASON to hate my egg donor, and I really DID HATE HER, she even looked at me and said “You really hate me don’tyou?” I realized at that moment, yes, I hated her enough to kill her without any regret at that moment. But—I am not a psychopath, and I will not let her “provoke” me inito doing something I will regret later, no matter how “justified” I feel I would be by doing it. And, hey, I still feel there are some folks so “evil” that they “juist deserve to be put out of the human race”—but that is for God to handle not me. My Bible tells me that “Vengence is mine, sayeth the Lord” and I figure I would rather have them face the personality that can meet them out what they TRULY deserve.
I will leave that vengence to God, and get the hate out of my heart, not for their benefit, but for MY BENEFIT.
Just stay on the road t6o healing, Escapee, it will get smoother and will have less pot holes and rocks the further along you go!!! (((HUGS)))) and my prayers for your healing and strength! Oxy
Wow~ I feel for each and everyone of u. I have my daughter who is a successful, contributing member of society that lives only 20 minutes away! We have a healthy relationship. She is a nurse. She has however, endured sadness seeing how I have allowed people to treat me. I cannot imagine (truly) the pain you all must feel for the losses of your children.
To Kate09, What is a home if you are not happy in it? I have done that, only to move on to another S. So, you are evolving in that you are in a happy home.
My father is a drug addict P. Went to a state hosp. when I was 10. Turned some of my sibs against my mother. (Victim). I never turned cuz he scared the hell out of me with a gun once. They divorced and remarried. My sister is a P. She is a big bully. Way bigger than I am. She beat me from head to toe on Apr. 18. this year after her ex-husbands funeral, where they read 2 poems I wrote. I do not ever want to see her again, unfortunately my parents are flying here tonight to stay at her house. I am uncertain what to do. I know I don’t want to see her ever again. My Aunt just died and memorial is Friday. I feel like I need to be there to support my mother. She is truly a victim of a P all her life. I feel like I need to have a “guard”, with me but I am alone. I believe she would have beat me to death if my P partner would have not been there. In this instance he saved me from her. He was actually traumatized by what happened and he is from South Boston and has seen much ugliness. She gave no warning, we were not arguing, she just came over to where I was sitting and yanked my hair out, was just an animal. Slammed my legs in the door when I tried to leave. Huge bruises, all down to my feet. Couldn’t walk for weeks. Bumps on my head, etc. Punched her best friend in the face. Next day, I talked to her friend. She asked me “what the hell set her off?” There were only the 4 of us there and noone knows what did it. Coulda been that she was going to appear in court the following Thurs. for domestic violence charges against her boyfriend. She is nuts. I am 51 years old. I do not engage in physical violence. She never even called to apologize. I seriously feel as though I need to get “bear spray” or something in case she tries to do it again. ??????? She is dead to me in my heart but I feel like I still have to see her. How can she be dead if she is in front of me?
I have read for days on these blogs, what I have learned that has helped me is: Quiet the redundant bad thoughts and step into the pain. FEEL the pain. It helps to feel.
Last night I read on another blog and actually laughed!! The frying pan stuff. It felt soooo good to laugh. I so need that in my life again.
You people are so helpful. I feel as though I can see. Truthfully. I can see through the confusion. My head is not so clouded. Being calm, walking THROUGH the pain. It is a release. I pray to God that we ALL find open doors that lead us to evolution within ourselves and freedom. Peace be with all.
2much2take.(big hug) That sounds horrific. My mother and sister are both violent bullies, but the physical attacks on me stopped when I left home at 16… they just continued knocking the crap out of each other for a bit.(of course not of that really happend if you asked them!)
When you say ‘she just came over to where I was sitting and yanked my hair out, was just an animal.’ it sends shivers down my spine, both m+S display kind of rabid beast behaviour when they come up against anything. Even when we’ve been ‘getting on’ it has always been like walking on egg shells, you can FEEL the aggression/jealousy/anger prickling below the surface.
Then my sister left the country and things settled down ( well no stir ups and cresendos, just low-fi manipulation and daily crushing and undermining from my mother) when my sister snorted her business up her nose and returned it was right back to 24/ 7 hysterics, threats of suicide bitching triangles…drama, drama, drama. I have decided, on the back of what happend to me with the P/S, and the strength(Ha! I feel as weak as a kitten today) I have subsequently gained here to step out of it again, and for good.
I can also relate to your saying you can know see through all the confusion, I feel I can see clearer now. But it is hard, I feel like I have been dismantled and am in the process of rebuilding myself from scratch. I think someone made a butterfly transforming analogy and i keep that in mind.
In my very heart and soul I KNOW that this is one of the most important processes in my life i will go through and its long over due.
But phew, today I am exhausted.
I come here every day and I find the discussions, information and thank heavens sometimes, giggles, soul food:)xxx
I like your idea about bear spray! Hopefully I wont need it!x