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.
Someone on this or another thread mentioned Dr. Estes’ “Women Who Run with the Wolves” and the story of “Bluebeard.” After having the book for a number of years, I just read it last week and was in tears.
Then, just a few days ago I picked up a book of poetry by Sylvia Plath. She writes:
“I am sending back the key
that let me into bluebeard’s study;
because he would make love to me
I am sending back the key;
in his eye’s darkroom I can see
my X-rayed heart, dissected body;
I am sending back the key
that let me in to bluebeard’s study.”
Warrior,
I have seen a few stories here and in another forum where women had an affair with a Sociopath. That does make it difficult sometimes to find sympathy or empathy but I imagine this is the right place for you… because I CAN imagine a Sociopath preying upon an unhappily married woman and/or a happily married women who is hitting a rough patch or whatever. Sociopath’s can be so exciting at first so even if everything was okay in your marriage, and then you crossed paths with a Sociopath, they can creat such an over the top feeling in their victims that you could start to feel like maybe there is something MORE than what you have/had.
If we are married, I don’t think we can innocently claim to be a victim 100% but I do get how any vulnerability could be just the right crack in the door for a Sociopath to slip right through.
I hope that makes sense. BTW, the other forum I saw stories like yours was Don’tdatehimgirl.com but the bloggers were totally bashing women that had affairs with abusive men so don’t bother with that blog. They seemed unimformed as to what ppl were really dealing with.
Well, I am delirious so I hope what I wrote makes sense. what I was trying to say is WELCOME. I hope you find healing here as so many of us have.
:o)
Okay, I have a few more to add for you OxD:
DRY IDEA Treatment — Opposite reaction than what they’re expecting. If they’re mean, laugh. If they make a joke, give them a dour look. Named after the “Never let ’em see ya sweat” product.
CRAZY LIKE A FOX reaction — When they say something nutty or bizarre, TOP IT. Say something about the end of the world being nigh and how you’re looking for a job walking around with a sandwich board that proclaims this fact. Turn away from the P and begin a conversation to empty air with your dead relative — ANY dead relative.
KLEENEX EXPRESS response: No matter what they say, good or bad, start weeping. Gnash teeth. Throw arms in air. Remember, a good little P hates emotion of any kind — so get going, there Julia Roberts, and strut your dramatic stuff!
Hee. This is kind of fun. Can we come up with more?
diamond girl; thanks for for saying that my sharing helps you. i know mine is out there doing the same thing right now to some one else and getting all that he wants. maybe things trigger me too. i have some real bad days sometimes, and i think how much i loved him and htought he did too. he has basically left me for dead i think he never makes contact now at the moment he has a new victim. i am glad he doesnt contact me, but it does make me sad he just acts like i do not exist. what trigers your emotions when you have a bad day if i can ask you it may help me. thanks ………
Orphan, Yea, I lilke the “talking to your dead relatives” bit! LOL
Warrior, yes, welcome. I think we ALL to one degree or another fell to the “snake-oil salesmen” ploy—they held out a picture of a dream that we all had, and though it was fake, we still wanted that picture that we thought was real. Whatever it was that we already had, a marriage, a life, friends, family, we became so engrossed in the dream, the picture, the hologram, that we neglected what we did have to focus on the fake.
I think very few of us victiims are 100% free of collusion with our victimizers. Most of us saw the “red flags” long before we either broke free or were dumped, and ignored them.
We’ve all had a “hard lesson” in the University of Hard KNocks, but it is one from which we CAN HEAL AND GROW as people. ((((BIG Hugs))))))
Thanks for the warm welcome. The feeling that keeps cropping up with me is that I still love this man for whom I THOUGHT he was; those feelings are very real and continue to this day. I can’t say what I would like to do to whom he really is . . . .
I was warned by so many people; it was a superb case of denial on my part . . . and I believed his excuses/reasons for people not liking him.
Even though I’ve been reading a lot and learning a lot about socios it is still hard to believe there are “humans” who do these kinds of things to other people just because.
Another twist in my story is that my daughter and his son started dating a little over a year into our own relationship. When I said that we needed to discuss what we were going to do, he said, “Don’t worry, everything will be all right.” He said that a lot.
My daughter and his son were married last fall, a few months after finding out about the affair and the father running away to another country. The father even threatened to bring the new woman to the ceremony; he was trying to get a rise out of someone (me). That didn’t happen, and I did my best not to look at him. He was so cowardly that he didn’t even stay for the reception. He looked terrible and much older.
Since that time, I have found out so much more about him from a lot of people in town (those who had figured him out before). I’m surprised he wasn’t run out of the area before. Sheer luck for him.
He slinks back into town occasionally to see his family and probably hooks up with one of the other women he was sleeping with during our time together or goes to bars and picks up young women (he’s very slimy). Those stories are interesting, too.
He has denied the relationship he has in the other country several times with people here; says he doesn’t know her that well and that she is engaged to someone else. This was after he declared his “love” for her on a website for his genre of music. And, of course, she’s head over heels. She’ll find out when it’s her time.
I’m working very hard to figure out what was awry inside of me to allow the abuse for so long, to allow the not seeing of what was right in front of me. That’s why I have to be away from the “family” unit and figure out what I want in my life and whether I can get it as part of a relationship unit or by myself. It’s been an uphill battle, but one I needed to fight. I’ve finally been awakened from the deep slumber of a long terrible night.
Free,
I see so many women (and men) go from one BAD RELATIONSHIP directly into the next one without taking ANY time to see what made the relationship “bad” in the first place. It also seems that #2 guy/gal is a carbon copy of #1, and #3, #4, etc follow in the same thing. Just “one”person, but different faces.
To me, having an “emotional autopsy” with a failed relationship, of any kind, afterwards, and taking the time to see what part YOU played in the failure is the only way we can learn from our mistakes.
Even if we are victimized, and maybe especially if we are victimized, we need to see why we let it happen. If we played a big part in our own victimization, we may need to make some drastic changes in how we go about our lives.
I realize full-well that though I certainly didn’t deserve to be treated like I was by my Ps, I sure ALLOWED IT TO HAPPEN by not setting appropriate boundaries and defending them. I got sucked into the “dreams” and “fantasy” and didn’t want to let go of it.
I don’t think I am any less culpable than the woman who went with a man she knew was married, or a married woman who took a lover. I AM RESPONSIBLE for letting the bad relationships and the victimization continue.
The old saying “Crap on me ONCE, shame on YOU, Crap on me TWICE, shame on ME”! is certainly applicable here in discussing the Ps.
We let them GET AWAY WITH IT, at least for a time. We knew what they were doing was wrong, how they were treating us was wrong, and in my case I can say that I KNEW THE WHOLE SITUATION(S) WERE WRONG, but I didn’t ACT to stop it until wayyyyy down the road.
I’m not “blaming the victim” here, even myself as “victim,” but I think I must face the fact that I didn’t behave 100% appropriately either in allowing it to continue. I can’t change THEM, but I can alter my own behavior in the future.
Not understanding exactly why they behave like they do, is more understandable to me than not knowing why I DID WHAT I DID is. I can’t control, or even predict everything that they will do, and I sure can’t understand what it is like to operate without a conscience—because I’ve never been with out one. I have violated my own conscience from time to time, but it isn’t the same as NOT HAVING ONE.
To me, understanding what motivated ME to continue in dysfunctional, painful behavior, is the KEY to it all. I had to be “getting something” out of the relationship or I wouldn’t have continued in it, even if it was “negative attention”–whatever it was, it met some UNMET need in me…for something. What? How can I meet that need for myself, rather than depending on someone else to furnish this thing (whatever it is).
Life is uncertain at best, and anything that we have can suddenly disappear–be it someone we love, a dream, our financial fortunes, our health, ANYTHING we “have” can vanish over night without warning—somehow we must prepare ourselves to depend on OURSELVES, our internal selves to weather these storms and still be “complete” humans.
My reading of Dr. Viktor Frankl’s “Man’s Search for Meaning” and to compare what I “lost” to what HE LOST—everything except pain and his life—and yet, he STILL Found meaning even in his suffering. (Shake head here) Now THAT is someone who is strong, who turned “lemons into lemonade” for sure.
I strive to emulate his attitude—and some days I do, other days I fall far short of it–but it gives me a goal to strive for. To find something noble in myself, some reason for all this pain and chaos, and the only think I can see is that it is to have ME become a better person, one who can still trust, but not indiscriminately, and one who can still love and care, but not allow myself to be victimized by the “evil ones.” To know my own worth, appreciate my own worth, and not look to outside sources for appreciating that worth, but to within myself.
I guess it is sort of “remedial philosophy 101.”
Did/does anyone else out there have those screwball moments when, even after and still suffering the terrible heartache…you find yourself saying to others.Please dont think too badly of him ..Hey? WHY not!! And yet, I do..maybe cos I still cant believe he did all those terrible things to me….
and I will get my money back from him, and he really DID love me…..??? Oh god.. Im not there yet..as you can see… and what a terrible waste of life it is to have to consciously think of all the BAD things he did, to help you get through the day.
Phew…. I look forward to the time when he is not the first thing on my mind as I wake and the last as I try to sleep. And the one that created a woman I hardly recognized. So ANGRY and so broken….
Thanks for being here Lovefraud
OxD:
You sound a lot like a Transcendentalist – which is probably what I consider closest to my natural state. Some of us in this world are charged with the duty of finding what is spiritual in this world and of sharing that with others. That reminds me of you. Also reminds me of me.
I have some crazy ideas on what to do with all this love I have and the lack of place to put it, and how to “help” others without getting too emotionally entangled in their situations, a way to deplete my overwhelming need to “fix” and “help” that will hopefully keep me off the P radar.
I’m going to, behind the scenes, do for others what I did for him, minus the physical relationship, of course (unless that becomes a real natural outgrowth of my association with these people). When I discover someone hurting, in need of a friend, be it online or in the real world, I am going to reach out to that person. I am going to encourage them, help them bear their burdens, listen to them and share in their troubles, offering advice if asked.
Sort of like we do on here, but for people who haven’t necessarily had interactions with P’s, but still are good people with problems and maybe nobody else to listen.
I started this today with a stranger. Actually, started it a few weeks ago with a different person, and find it very gratifying. Also find that it’s taking away my desire to reach out to the P in any way, shape or form, and it is rewarding because I am pouring kindness and goodness onto others with NO AGENDA of my own.
It’s helping me heal, like this board is helping me heal. And eventually, with enough good karma and loving kindness put out into the world, I will find someone who will shower me with the same, hopefully.
No victimization involved, either. No crossing lines. It’s a good way to work on my boundaries, as well.