I have wrestled with this question for a long time. While with him, I sometimes wondered, ”˜what on earth am I doing here’? Since gaining my freedom, I have looked back on those 4 years 9 months and wondered, ”˜what on earth was wrong with me that I stayed so long’?
I know there are the physiological/psychological factors that compounded my convoluted thinking causing me to believe that I was incapable of leaving him. I know these factors attributed to my inertia and the resultant trauma bonding that held me pinioned in his unholy embrace. But none of these factors explain why an intelligent, well-educated, articulate woman did what I did — before the trauma bonding, the Stockholm Syndrome, the depression, the pain.
Why did I stay?
I stayed because in the process of burying my truth beneath his lies, I turned off my inner voice of reason. I quit listening to myself telling me I had to leave, I had to get away. I gave into despair, helplessness and confusion and gave up on me. I wanted the rosy sunrise of his promises, the gilded cage of his castle in the air, the perfection of his promises of happily ever after.
I stayed because I didn’t want to take responsibility for what was happening in my life, my daughters’ lives and to me.
I stayed because it was easier to stay than to leave. It was easier to take the coward’s way out by staying locked into his machinations than to take the leap into the unknown by leaving him and his lies behind.
I stayed even though I knew he was lying. I knew he was deceiving me. I knew he was manipulating me. I knew all of this but I refused to look at the truth because to look at the truth meant having to look at me — and I was too frightened to do that.
I stayed because I was a victim and I didn’t want to admit it.
As I write this I think about those who will say — but you can’t blame yourself. You didn’t know who he was when you first met him. You went into that relationship with your arms wide open in love and expected to have your love reciprocated in equal measure.
And all of that is true.
None of it matters though when I look at the reasons for why I stayed.
I could walk into a hundred relationships with my arms wide open and still find them empty — because my arms wide-open were filled with my own empty promises that I would treat myself with love and respect, truth and honesty. My lack of clarity in my beliefs, my values, my principles trapped me in his lies because I didn’t know what I stood for.
I stayed, not because of him, but because of me. My weaknesses brought me to my knees. My weaknesses kept me locked inside the web he wove around me.
On the other side of the relationship, revelling in my freedom today, I am willing and able to stand in the naked light and love myself as I state, unequivocally, I stayed because of me.
He abused me. He lied. He deceived. He used terrifying stories to hold me silent. He manipulated my mind and smothered me with his untruths.
But I am the one who chose to believe him. To let go of reason and accept his unreasonable words and actions. Accept his unacceptable behaviour and compromise on myself — not because of who he was, but because of who I was and who I refused to be — independent, strong, uncompromising in my belief in me and what I deserved from love and life.
In my world, post sociopath, I am 100% accountable for me. Post sociopath I cannot hold him accountable for what happens to me today —Just as he is accountable for what he did, I am accountable for what I did, and what I do today.
I stayed because I did not have the courage and strength of character to stand up for me without fear.
I stayed because I believed he could make up for the past. He could make my life all better.
Today, I let him go in peace. Holding onto resentment, bitterness, anger keeps me from living the beautiful life I deserve. Today, I stay away from holding him accountable for what happened to me because I have the courage to take charge of my life today, to be 100% accountable for me today and to make choices that love and support me today.
In stepping fearlessly into my life today, I leave him behind because I know that the past is gone, today is alive and tomorrow is just a dream away. A dream that will come true as long as I walk my path with dignity, grace and ease, 100% accountable for me.
LIG
I feel the same way, exactly. Even though we always had good sex, after a while I became cautious and a bit resentful that he could jump up out of bed and act like life was all roses between us. It made me sad to be with him and feel somewhat detached from it.
I spent Christmas day alone, and I liked it.
I talked to the first sister two days prior, and even though she suggested we not tell him we’d spoken, she just had to call him on Christmas eve.
He was furious at me…that two of his “victims” had actually gotten together and we ruined his Christmas eve.
He resorted to childish remarks, “You’re life is really gonna suck”, “You must like being alone”, and “You’ll never know what reality is…”. It was quite laughable. He had a glow on and was talking in circles in an attempt to confuse me, but he only ended up sounding really childish.
In the end, he resorted to saying, twice, “I was going to pick you up tomorrow and bring you down here for Christmas day and dinner, but after tonight…”
As if I don’t know that all 4-6 of his other women have children and families to be with…the poor boy didn’t have anyone else to play with and I was supposed to be thankful for the opportunity to be second fiddle to all of them.
He’s the one who has to get drunk to hang around with himself – now that’s a life that sucks! He’s the one who can’t stand to be alone with himself. He has no concept of reality…
I had to laugh, and sent him a scorching email. I don’t think I’ll be hearing from him. He doesn’t want me anywhere near his world now. I’m a threat to his charade.
LIG, I spent 15 months stuck in what seems to be where you’re at. The only thing that saved me was finding this board. Hang in there. The spinning world does slow down.
pb: i’m doing pretty well. 20 years of loving him and 4 months NC. i don’t cry too often now. i just get really lonely for the shiny disco ball that he was. i’m a very intimate and sensual person, and i now have no outlet for that very important side of me.
i guess i’m still climbing out of the hole he left me in. it bothers me to know he moved on so easily. that maybe he’s treating his new pregnant gf better than he ever treated me. but that doesn’t matter. none of it does.
what’s done is done, and i just have to get to the other side of this loneliness. he brought excitement to my world (good or bad, it was excitement nonetheless), and the void is still gaping.
i will never speak to him again because i know that if i ever do, it will all be the same … lies and manipulation. i don’t think he was ever capable of speaking truth. the level of deception is still mind-blowing. i not only had to give him up, but his family, his son, and our mutual friends as well. i left everything behind in order to have NC.
as i move into this new year, i pray that i can slough off what remains of him in my heart. i don’t want to hate him, but i do. how can one possibly go from being someone’s world, to being their refuse in a matter of months. it hurts.
but i am healing. i am stronger. i am happier.
… and so it goes.
while we’re on the subject, any one have an answer for this one:
why is it that he ALWAYS used a condom with me, but got another female pregnant in a matter of months?
was he trying to protect me? did he WANT to get her pregnant? he knew i was completely loyal to him and that his new gf had a boyfriend! what’s up with this???
HH’
“I bet he had sex with every woman the same way.”
When my S did his cute little thing of batting his eyes at me a few weeks ago, I looked at him and said, “You do that to all of us, don’t you?”
“Oh yeah, you bet!” was his response.
When I left my rings next to his bed the last time we spent the night together, I showed up unannounced after work the next day to pick them up. I figured, rightly, it was too early for anyone else to be there.
He had the pillowcases from “my” side of the bed in the dryer, and had the blankets pulled back, removing my hair from the bed.
“Destroying the evidence?” I laughed.
He mumbled something about perfume.
I laughed to myself because I noticed he forgot to throw “my” robe in too (I suppose I should say, “our”, seeing as there were a few of us using the thing).
I’m probably the only person on the planet who knows what he is, and he seems to be able to let his guard down with me to some degree now (or, at least until I pissed him off on Christmas eve – LOL).
If asked outright about specifics, he denies or lies, but he has called himself a “Monster”, and an “Abusive piece of s**t”. He’s said “Even though it’s not who I am, it’s inside me, so it is who I am, and I know I can never live with a woman again.” “I don’t know why you’re upset. It was a year ago”, and “Someone poked the bear and you just happened to come along at the wrong time”
Most of that was said during a conversation on Dec 15th. I shook for an hour afterward and we even talked about in it a call later. When asked if he aspired to anything different, he replied coldly, “No. It’s what I am and I don’t want to be anything I’m not, and that’s that.” It completely blew my mind. He didn’t understand my shock, “I know what I am. I’ve dealt with it. You need to deal with it”
Part of me thinks he was just paying lip service, but when I asked him if he was being sarcastic, he said, “No, I’m being truthful.”
He didn’t hit his ex-wife, but he gradually became a horrible drunk. I think she perhaps had a level of control in the relationship that no one will ever have again. He claims to have spent tens of thousands on jewelery for her, a hundred thousand on unsuccessful in-vitro, she’s a “psychobitch” who used him…he did “everything” for her. She had 3-6 boyfriends (depending on whether he’d had 3-6 beers)…blah, blah, blah.
“She stuck the knife in and twisted it and you just happened to come along at the wrong time”
And, she did have a, one, boyfriend. She stuck around long enough to get her company off the ground and left with half of the house after 22 years. Sadly, she now won’t deal with their daughters issues because it will mean going up against him – she wants nothing to do with the man…and the daughter is on her own. Mom doesn’t ask.
But, I digress.
pb: my ex used to tell me that his evil side was ”right around the corner.” it was a joke between us, in that he could turn from a loving person to ‘the beast’ in less than a second if he didn’t get his way.
Mine refused to use a condom. That’s pretty much how this all started for me – the light at the end of the tunnel.
He said he was seeing other women, but denied he was having sex with them and consequently didn’t feel we needed to use protection.
There were clearly at least four of us and I wasn’t buying it. I counted his Cialis weekly for six weeks and when I told him, he was shocked, but he fessed up to the second sister and whipped out a couple of condoms for when he was with her.
Problem with that was that the same two condoms were still there weeks later and I knew she had been there.
He was angry with me for looking at his pecker pills, and I told him that if he had “put a lid on it” in the first place, none of this would be my business…I honestly wouldn’t have looked.
“I never know what you’re gonna do” he said with mistrust and some dismay.
“Yup You’re right. That’s why you shouldn’t lie to me”
The man had used 24 doses of the stuff in a six week period!
Oh, even though I’d already told him I’d counted his pills, I didn’t clear his scanner after I scanned his prescription in Oct. (I kept a running tab on the scanned page). He called me and wanted to know why there was an image of his scrip in the scanner when he went to use it…Oops!
Well yesterday I wrote about my husband coming over and playing with our child and his stepdaughter. He asked when he left if he could get our baby today at about 4:00 because he has family coming. I said yes but all night and today I was thinking about if I would really let her go because he never comes and gets her on a weekend.
Well, it is 5:30 and I have not heard from him. Why am I surprised? It is like he has no feelings for our daughter. He has no problem spending money on people. Our last Christmas together he bought me $1,000 earrings and a coach purse even though he had a pregnant mistress at the time. She got a new coach purse.
So my husband bought our daughter a $250.00 barbie jeep, elmo live, a digital camera and some other very nice things. I don’t know what that is about. He pays me over $1700.00/mo. in child support.
So did he forget about our daughter? I don’t understand it all but I guess it is hard to understand a sociopath. Here I was stressing about if I would let her go and he doesn’t even call. He has been off days here and there for the holidays and have not once come to get her early. He usually picks her up after work and spends about 2 1/2 hours a week with her.
I wish I could go NC altogether but it just isn’t possible with a child.
Nic,
Mine spends incredible amounts of money on his daughter, primarily to impress and confuse her – not that he would admit to either. He “loves” her…That also happens to be why he yells at her for hours or days on end.
She’s only 10 now, but spoke up to him last May, and he was furious. I can only imagine what it’s going to be like when she finds her voice, gets her own life, or starts dating. It scares me.
He called her down to witness the assault, and stopped fighting long enough to make me look like the aggressor.
How sick is that? To call your 9 year old to witness a scene.
We’re all merely possessions to them – remember that.
“~The Wolves Within~
An old Grandfather said to his grandson, who came to him with anger at a schoolmate who had done him an injustice, “Let me tell you a story. I too, at times, have felt a great hate for those that have taken so much, with no sorrow for what they do. But hate wears you down, and does not hurt your enemy. It is like taking poison and wishing your enemy would die. I have struggled with these feelings many times.”
He continued, “It is as if there are two wolves inside me; one is good and does no harm. He lives in harmony with all around him and does not take offense when no offense was intended. He will only fight when it is right to do so, and in the right way.
“But the other wolf, ah! He is full of anger. The littlest thing will set him into a fit of temper. He fights everyone, all the time, for no reason. He cannot think because his anger and hate are so great. It is helpless anger, for his anger will change nothing.
“Sometimes it is hard to live with these two wolves inside me, for both of them try to dominate my spirit.”
The boy looked intently into his Grandfather’s eyes and asked, “Which one wins, Grandfather?”
The Grandfather smiled and said, “The one I feed, son, the one I feed.”
~ Author Unknown ~ (has been attributed to Shaw though)”
Thanks BloggerT7165!
This is so cool and true to life! How I can relate and how much I try hard to feed only the good wolf in me but also know of my “bad hungry wolf”… 🙁