By AlohaTraveler
“Why?”
Why is a hard question to deal with when recovering from a sociopath or pathological partner, and yet, when we distill our questions down to their purest form, “why” is all we want to know.
Why did he ____________________ ?
Why couldn’t he _________________?
Why does he think _______________?
Why can’t he stop _______________?
Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why?
There is no answer that will satisfy you because you are looking for a reason in the wrong place. Chances are, you are looking for a link between you and what you did and him and what he did. There’s nothing.
Let us pause for a moment and repeat that to ourselves…
There’s nothing.
Wow. Think about that. There is nothing you did to deserve what he did. There is nothing you did to make him into a liar, a deceiver, an abuser and a manipulator. Of course, he was hell bent on you believing that all of his actions were due to some character defect in you. Or that he did all he did because he “had to” because you “made him.” Or maybe he didn’t say any of that stuff… he just did all his evil deeds in secret until you found out and then he left quicker than you can say “pop goes the weasel.”
Yes, I did choose “weasel” on purpose!
The answers are complex and yet, they are quite simple. M.L. Gallagher spelled it out so simply in her post: He’s gone. Looking at the Sociopath Through Open Eyes. Another name for her essay could be: Cliff notes on “Why?”
The result of this simple truth, at least for me, is FREEDOM. I even love saying it.
They do what they do because that is what they do!
Now I have total freedom from spending one more sleepless night asking “why?” I honestly think I have been sleeping better ever since I read and fully understood this concept. And since then, I have noticed a shift in me. I feel happier. I feel lighter. I haven’t had an anxiety attack lately. I used to have an anxiety attack every time I read something on LoveFraud that rang my bell and sunk in a little deeper for me that I was played and abused by a pathologically abusive partner… maybe even a sociopath. The grip of this painful time in my life has loosened and I am starting to laugh more, live more, do more, be more, eat less. :o)
I might have been eating a little too much to deal with the stress. Look for less of me in the near future!!!
Also, I have found a way to give meaning to my personal train wreck. By the way, finding meaning for our suffering is a normal step in the process of healing. This is another gem I have picked up on my way to recovery land. I intend to put my encounter with a sociopath to good use in my future. The worst thing to have ever happened to me has given me a drive, focus and purpose I have been looking for but couldn’t seem to find. And it has given me an appropriate avenue for my inborn compassion and my desire to help people.
It is a future goal of mine to work with victims of abusive relationships and when they ask “Why?” I will have an answer for them, but I know that it may take awhile for them to accept it.
Blindsided – you are as welcome here as anyone – how many of us here can say we didnt screw up—this is all about healing. One year ago I was the only gay man blogging and did not always feel welcome – you are hurting and this is a place to heal – dont go away….
I don’t ask myself “why” anymore. I’m so much better lately. I don’t know that I won’t have a relapse, but my time of crying on my bathroom floor seems over. I came in here to check on all of you. I know I still have to see him one last time, but I really don’t even care about that anymore. It’s more of a nuisance than a test of my strength. It doesn’t even hurt my feelings anymore. I feel nothing about it one way or another.It’s so good to not care anymore. I mean really not care to the point that I barely think of it. I laugh again, flirt, work out and feel lovely again. I think the worst is over.
I hope all of you can feel this way someday. It’s a true freedom that can’t be taken away.
Another rough hurdle today, my daughter goes back to college after spring break. For the past week, while she was home, it was much easier to focus, like blueskies says, on things I used to enjoy. I too, for nearly two years, focused almost exclusively on R.
Today, a few times, that awful feeling went through by body and I re-lived some of the callous, hurtful things he said to me when the mask came off. The term”heartache” must have been coined with this type a situation in mind- because, at times, my heart literally aches. I think about the trip we took last June to a car show in Ohio. I thought the trip would become an annual event- he seemed so happy( what a great actor he was). Now , I guess his new “love “will go on the trip this year. And I will try to remember to do the things I used to enjoy doing in hopes I will eventually enjoy them again.
Thanks Henry and everyone who has written to support me.
Blindsided – you will enjoy them again. Im glad your visit with your daughter was a positive one. Try with all your might to continue one of the things you enjoyed doing with her. And if you need to reach out to a gf to join you to help you shift your focus, try that too.
Re-living the moments and the awful feeling they bring with them -is something that decreases but it does take time and effort to challenge our mind to go to more positive thoughts to literally reprogram our mind redflag the thoughts. It is work for sure.
And remember not only “what a great actor he was”,.. but what a great actor he always will be – no matter who he is “pretending to love” or take places. You dont deserve a fake cruel callous partner.
Blindsided, I felt like you did last summer when suddenly my relationship with the man I thought was the love of my life fell apart overnight. It all came crashing down on me when I found out what he was. I was suicidal for a month. I tried to distract myself, but nothing worked. I couldn’t even read a book. I finally just surrendered. I felt like I wanted to die, so I just accepted that. I cried a lot of tears over the next few months. Slowly it got better. It will get better for you too. There is life after a sociopath.
Sabinne, I’m happy for you and a little jealous. I want to be where you are on your journey. There is still a lot of work to be done on me to make the Sp a necessary bad for my ultimate good. I have faith that one day in due time I will get to the point of feeling nothing about him one way or the other. Please continue to share your progress from time to time. It gives us newbies hope to see veterans survive and thrive after their lovefraud wars.
Blindsided, Glad you are still with us. Few of us are spotless without some blame in what happened to us. It doesn’t hurt any less and it may just hurt more when recognize our own role in the bad situation. This is the place to heal.
Joy,
You’ll get here. It was a long process actually. If I think about it, it took years to get to this place. It wasn’t until this last time when I found all of you and realized what he really is that I could let go. When I thought his actions were monstrous, but that he wasn’t a monster, I kept clinging to him. Realizing that he IS A MONSTER is what helped me let him go. Giving myself permission to cry and realizing that my tears were washing me clean was the most powerful experience I had. I think that day was my turning point. Everyday since has been better and better for me.
I really surprised myself last night when I was listening to a song and suddenly started crying for the man I believed was the love of my life last year (the sociopath). I know intellectually what he is and would NEVER seek out contact with him again, nor would I ever even take his calls again. I guess the heart has its own process, too.
It doesn’t surprise me in the least that so many people have trouble letting go of S’s. They sold us our fantasies. No one in their right mind, or even in their wrong mind, would accept the terrible things they do for a second if they weren’t delivered wrapped up in not just any fantasy, but your own personal fantasy. I think the reason why I had no feelings of love left by the time I left the S was because my fantasy was already dead by that point, what was once a dream had become a nightmare. A lot of the posters here were either left by their S’s, or left the S’s themselves, before they reached that point and still see glimmers of that fantasy from time to time. One of the things I learned from my involvement with the S was that the fantasies I thought I wanted weren’t even what I really wanted or needed. I mourned for what could have been while I was still with him, but I knew there was better for me out there, I was just afraid I’d never find it. I could have married him and settled for the misery I knew, and that’s a truly frightening thought. If I had I wouldn’t be married to my husband, who is a thoughtful, genuinely honorable man.
Great post! Haven’t been able to blog for a long time. I’ve had a Facebook post by his new ‘lady’ saying how great her dream is, and telling me all the wonderful things they are doing and how great he is…blah, blah, blah. Delete and trash. Like I believe it! I’ve had two phone calls from him telling ME to leave HIM alone and that he knows I’ve hired a P.I. to investigate him. NOT! Oh brother. I haven’t had contact since the middle of Feb to let him know about his daughter (not mine) being put in jail and it was a quick call. And NO P.I., not sure what that’s about except his paranoia. It’s been a weird few weeks. I have NOT responded to the email or his phone calls. Yahoo! Another step for me in the right direction. Wish I could blog more.