“Would somebody please tell me why he did this?” is one of the most common questions victims of sociopaths have. Three weeks ago I introduced the idea that the Inner Triangle can help each of us understand the individual sociopath that infected our lives. The Inner Triangle is formed by three qualities that develop in concert during childhood. These three qualities are Ability to Love, Impulse Control and Moral Reasoning. Last week I discussed the concept of Ability to Love. Lack of Ability to Love defines those with sociopathy. No less important however, is the lack of Impulse Control, also universally found in people with this disorder.
What is Impulse Control?
I’m sure many of you noticed that sociopaths have a lot of energy. Their minds come up with many plans and ideas. This energy would be a good thing if the sociopath could direct it toward positive goals. Sadly, however, the abundant energy sociopaths have leads them to pursue goals that damage others. The reason is poor impulse control. Sociopaths are unable to control the many impulses that come from their basic drives and emotions.
This poor impulse control causes sociopaths to be vulnerable to addictions of all kinds. Once these addictions are established, they are particularly resistant to treatment. Many have noted that the impulses sociopaths have are especially destructive. For example, sociopaths are often sexually driven. They may also be greedily driven to obtain possessions. However, the impulse to have power over others is the central defining impulse of sociopathy. Sociopaths expend most of their energy trying to gratify impulses related to having power and influence over others.
The desire for power
The desire for power has been very difficult for researchers to study. The reason is that unlike our other desires, there is no feeling associated with it. Think about it—when you want food, you are hungry. When you want affection, you are lonely. When you want entertainment, you are bored. When you want sex you’re”¦. The point is, how do you know when you want power? Researchers have established that this motive is completely beyond our conscious awareness!
Victims high in empathy do not recognize sociopaths
One of the main reasons why victims high in empathy do not recognize sociopaths is that the desire for power is non-conscious. People high in empathy make use of their knowledge of their own emotions to interpret the emotions of others. Can you see then why people who rely on empathy in interactions with others completely miss sociopaths? An empathetic person correctly observes that sociopaths enjoy the company of others. He/she then self-references his/her own feelings of affection with regard to enjoying other people. The victim is fooled into interpreting power motivations as affection-related motivations.
Power motivated people are high in testosterone
The power motive is directly related to testosterone levels in both men and women. This is likely also responsible for the hypersexual behavior seen in sociopaths. The relationship between testosterone and the desire for power is so strong that testosterone predicts dominance behavior better than psychological tests.
Many studies have shown that sociopaths do have higher testosterone levels both during adolescence and adulthood. This higher testosterone of male sociopaths may also make them more attractive to women. Women unconsciously sense male characteristics that indicate high testosterone and are attracted to these qualities.
Medications that “help” sociopaths
Medications that reduce overall energy and block driven behavior reduce problematic behavior in sociopaths. The medications that do this are called antipsychotic medications. They are also used to treat schizophrenia. The most commonly used anti-psychotic for adolescent and adult sociopaths is Risperdal. In the past, we used Thorazine for this purpose.
You may also wonder if castration works. Eliminating testosterone through either surgical or chemical castration does help some. However, removing testosterone does not restore Ability to Love and so does not really treat the underlying disorder.
Why me?
It is my hope that providing you with knowledge about this disorder will help you answer for yourself the “Why me?” question and will help you stop the self blame. We all can benefit from considering our own Ability to Love, Impulse Control and Moral Reasoning. The best thing for victims is to come out of this experience wiser and better.
thanx Gem and no that is not my actual address just my sic humor again..i will ask Donna to give u my email
hens, your sense of humor is a scream. I’m glad little Crickit is home, your are Nurse Hens now! Poor little thing, it is so sweet how she made it home to you to get fixed up and be safe, my cat made it home to me a few weeks ago after a dog attacked him, he’s an inside cat now. These animals know how much we love them and they trust and love us so much.
shabby chick They say comedians are very insecure people. Anywho glad your cat is doing well after his dog attack..there are some kittens at the local country store coming out to eat hand outs, there is a solid black kitten I am tempted to bring home but with three dogs, food and vet bills i am just not sure I want to take on another responsibility…
Hens, if comedians are insecure… I should be headlining in Vegas!!!!
I know what you mean about the vet bills. I should have been an insecure vet, lol. I would LOVE to have another cat, but I worry about the cost also. I had to put the vet bills on my credit card… not good!!!
hens you are BADD!! I got a doggy card today for Criket, and nearly sent it to that address! Well, I didnt know! just goes to show how gullible I still am!.
Ill wait to hear from Donna, and you can give me your email first if thats OK. BOINKKK!!
Love,and a Hug for you and Criket,
Mama gemXX
delete
I found this site a week ago and have been in absolute shock and denial since. Reading everyone’s stories I feel like someone has been in my mind writing my innermost feelings and questions. So I decided to share my story…I don’t know if I want to be convinced that he is a monster or that he isn’t….they both cut to my soul.
I was 35 when I met D. We hit it off from the first day. Talked or IM’d almost every night that we didn’t see each other face to face. He made me laugh, he out a twinkle in my eye and a little crooked smile on my face. He asked if I would be his GF on the third date…said he new he just felt something different with me. I was hesitant but I thought why worry about the label…enjoy your time with him. Soon after I decided that I should share some of my background with him. I’m all about being open and honest in relationships so I felt like he needed to know some of my morals/values early if he really wanted to go into this as a “relationship.” You see I was 35, very well educated and successful professionally, but I’d never been in love, I’d never had a long term relationship, and I had never been intimate with anyone. I’d believed that intimacy was shared between two people who were committed to each other…it wasn’t just a part of every dating relationship. Now let me be clear…I’m a pretty girl….cute v beautiful….girl next door v siren. I had been heavy through college and grad school which limited my dating but had lost a significant amount of weight and had started my “dating life” a little later. My lack of relationships and intimacy were not because I’d never had opportunity…I wasn’t desperate for a relationship when we met. I wanted love…I wanted marriage…I feel like I was made with those desires and gifts to be successful in that kind of relationship. Bit I wasn’t desperately seeking that…i always thought better to be single than be with the wrong person. I was actually probably the strongest and happiest I’d ever been.
D was full on winning me over. He used to joke that he was always 5 steps ahead of me but that was ok because I would catch up. He told me he loved me in the first month. It scared me but he seemed to truly loved me so I stayed in…I didn’t feel pressured…I just felt adored. In the beginning of the relationship D told me he had just been laid off…he was living with his mom because she had a major surgery and he was helping her in the recovery. He didn’t have a car but explained that he had been living in downtown Houston and had been able to take mass transit without problems. I actually felt it was neat that he was being financially responsible and not getting a car or keeping an apartment when he didn’t have a pay check. D said he had an MBA from Berkeley…he had been let go in cutbacks at his job just a few weeks prior but was interviewing for new positions.
D had moved back home a couple years before. He’s been in a successful, well paying job in LA but felt he wanted to move back closer to his family to reconnect with them. He wanted to start a new life with new values…or so he said. In that he said he felt blessed to have found me…I was different than anyone he had ever dated…he felt like God had given him a special gift in me. I felt understood and loved the fact that he not only accepted my values but seemed to really appreciate them.
Over the next few weeks I met his sister and by accident we learned that I had worked with his aunt. He got a reference on me…I passed with flying colors!!! I met his “favorite” aunt and uncle the next month. We were together ALL THE TIME now. When I did question things that would have been flags with someone else he got a pass because of the relationship I had with his aunt…she made him credible to me. We were attached at the hip and I was falling in love quickly! We were so easy together…i’d never felt so natural and meant to be with anyone. He was the most loving, understanding, caring, affectionate person I had ever met…I really thought that we “got” each other in a way most people didn’t. It felt meant to be. 4 months into our relationship D got in a fight with his sister who he was living with then and she kicked him out. Because I felt like I was part of the reason they had gotten in the fight I told him he could stay with me for a couple of weeks until he found a place. HE was going to move in with his best friend…then he got a job in another state so D was going to take over his apartment…then the office found out and wanted him to sign a new lease…so…..he ended up staying with me two weeks turned into 8 months.
After being attached at the hip for 3 months I was beginning to notice small things that bothered me. D seemed to always have a great plan but never be able to follow through, he never made anything really happen the way he built it up. I always wanted to be appreciative of the effort. I never wanted him to think I didnt recognize him or appreciate him. You see D told me VERY early on in the relationship that he had NEVER felt unconditional love from anyone…his family very much based their love on his success…when he did good things he was loved…when he messed up he wasn’t. That broke my heart….when I knew I loved him I decided that He would never fear me taking my love back…he would know unconditional love
D continued to be unemployed. I was concerned, but he was so intelligent, so good with people I knew something would come through. It was early 2009 and so many people were out of work…I thought he needed time. I was patient…he was looking for a position with a real estate investment group or as a hedge fund manager. He lived to “make deals” and loved getting people to invest with him. He got one job but was “let go in budget cuts” within two months. The job hunt continued for months…on more than one occasion he was offered a job but something happened that made him leave the job within the first few days…if he started the job at all.
By this time I was covering everything. I was paying for food, drinks, clothes, even helped with his phone bill a few times. I thought he would do it for me if the shoes were on the other foot. He seemed genuinely appreciative and embarrassed to have to ask for help in the beginning. I never wanted to make him feel bad….I even got angry with his family of a few occasions wondering why would they not help him. e seemed so loving and giving..how could they not support him during such a hard time?
On mothers day I caught him in the first big lie. His mother had not had the surgery he said she did. We took her to church that day and while I was talking to her she said something about her leg pain….being a therapist I asked about the surgery…she said she didn’t have it. He knew I was furious. I didn’t care that he was living with her…I cared that he lied to me about why. At lunch he brought up the situation and told his mom that he told me she had the surgery. HE apologized to both of us and then introduced me to her as her future daughter in law.
Over the next few months I would catch him in “smaller” lies. Not always lying to me…just always not telling the entire story, exaggerating, or leaving part of the story out. He would tell his friends stories that didn’t seem to ring true to me…or they were seriously exaggerated to make him sound like he was doing better than he was….but never really full on total lies. We had multiple conversations about how important honesty was to me and he told me he struggled with it because his childhood had been very hard. He said he started lying in Jr high because he didn’t want people to know how bad his home life was. He said it was a struggle but he was working on it and recognized how important it was.
During this time our relationship became intimate. He didn’t pressure me in an obvious way but I knew that that was important even though he said he would “wait” as long as I wanted to. He always said there were other things we could do to be intimate with each other.. He was seemed very nurturing and caring during intimacy…he seemed very interested in my experience…he always said he wanted to make me feel good…that it wasn’t just about him…but I struggled with guilt which made it difficult at times. I needed the affection and caring after and that wasn’t always there. Don’t get me wrong….sometimes he would hold me for hours…but sometimes I felt like I had to beg him to just come back and snuggle me. I also struggled with not feeling as aroused as I should…so many times I just felt a distance that made me sad. Whenever I tried to talk about it he said it was normal….it would take me some time to get used to the physical part of it and I shouldn’t worry about not being aroused the same way he was. He said I would get there. There were times that he seemed to want me all the time and then there were times that he seemed to pull back…I never could figure it out.
Months 4-12 of our relationship was more of the same…no job, no money, but very loving. I remember when he first moved in. I came home one day and he had cleaned my house top to bottom. I’d made a comment about how I’d love to come home to a clean house one day (it was a MESS) and he said he wanted to make me smile so he cleaned it. Another time I called him on my commute home…I’d had a terrible day…when I got home he made me a bubble bath, told me to relax, and he cooked dinner while I was in the bath. He was so loving and attentive. He told me that he had always put himself and his wants first but I made him want to put me first…he cared more about my happiness than his. He loved me more than anything….even Cal football…and let me tell you….the boy loves some Cal football. I thought I had met my prince. He was perfect…now all I needed was for him to get a JOB and a drivers license.
I’d discovered during this time that he not only didn’t have a car but he also didn’t have a DL. He’d gotten a DUI a couple of years before and never finished paying all the fines to have it reinstated. He promised me over and over that he had worked out a payment plan and it was fine. In the meantime I was his taxi cab. I drove him everywhere…I didn’t mind at first but it did get old. I just wanted to feel provided for at times…and the simplest thing…like him driving would help that.
He continued to work on “deals” which always fell through…he was always working on a next commission…but it never came. From months 6-12 I started to notice his drinking seemed to increase. From having a few once or twice a week to a couple of glasses of wine a night and a couple of mixed drinks…or a bottle of wine every night. He once told me he needed a drink at night to wind down..he also said he would drink because he was bored. When we went out with his frineds he out drank all of them. He was always the one saying one more round…and it was always on MY tab. I remember the night that I first saw a different side to him. I’d taken him to a concert for his Bday. It was a small venue and he had several beers the first show. He was a little tipsy and decided we needed to stay for the second show. He had a bottle of wine during the second shoe and was mean drunk by the end. I’d never seen him like that. I was a very upset that he would behave the way he was. I started crying when we got into the car. He started fussing at me…”REALLY…REALLY…your gonna cry now” He told me he was in the relationship because he wanted to be…I was in the relationship because I had to be. When we got home he was saying how much I he loved me and it sucked that I wouldn’t tell him how much I loved him too. I’m kinda stubborn ans was not going to say I love you to a drunk who had been mean to me…and that seemed to really make him mad. I had to put him into bed. Now I wish I’d left him on the side of the road that night! We had out first trip together planned the next day…I almost canceled it but didn’t want to over react. He said he didn’t remember behaving that way and swore that he had never done anything like that before. He said he had been sick all day and had never been physically ill after drinking before. He said it had to have been the energy pills he took for working out mixed with the alcohol that mad him react that way. He even had hives on him so I believed him that it was a physical reaction.
He was his normal self after that…we had a few more “moments” in the next few months but we never really fought. I never saw the I love you I hate you switch turn off and on until we were living in different towns. We had disagreements about the drinking…we had little arguments about other things but he never really attacked me personally.
A year into our relationship D took a job in another state and our relationship became long distance. I was working on getting my license to practice and we planned for me to move with him asap. When he moved he said that we would talk every day…we had plans to be together every couple of weeks at a minimum. I was fine with the distance. I loved him with all of my heart and I felt we were fortunate to have jobs that would allow us to be able to spend that amount of time together until I could move.
Some of the biggest red flags appeared at the time of the move. He took a job that required him to move in two weeks. He didn’t have any money and the move was going to be on my tab. He was going to pay me back but I had to loan him the money to get started. I found out that he didn’t have a bank account and when we went to set one up he couldn’t open a checking account because of an outstanding loan/account he had defaulted on. I didn’t feel comfortable with him walking around with that cash so we went to a Cash Express store and got a pre paid credit card. I was very frustrated but I felt that these we mistakes from his past and to be angry over something that happened two years ago was unfair. When he got to California he called me with another emergency…his ride from SF to OC hadn’t shown up and his “credit card” wasn’t working. The next three months was more of the same. He constantly needed more money…he always had a great reason….and he usually needed it today. He told me he took a new/better job about a month after moving..and he needed a car for the commute. I wired money to the seller and sent him a check for the repairs. The check wouldn’t clear in time so I had to wire him money as well. I would be there in a few days and he would pay me back. He didn’t.
Over the next couple of months his behavior became more erratic. He wouldn’t return calls, he was distant when we were together. I excused it to stress and illness…he had been sick. After becoming extremely concerned that he had become very ill on a business trip I checked his email to see if he was at work…and I found something that shattered my world. Let me say…he had given me his password earlier in or relationship..he said he had nothing to hide and I could check his email anytime I wanted. I’d never felt the need for checking his email…I trusted him with my life. When I checked it he had been working..and playing! I found solicitations for sexual encounters on Craigslist from the night before he left for his business trip…he was at a hotel in LA. I also found a match .com account he had set up two weeks before….three days after my last visit. I decided to address it face to face when he would be home the next day.
Before I confronted him I had him sign a promissory not for the money he had agreed to repay. Then I told him what I found. He initially laughed…a nervous laugh with a quick apology. He said he felt like I wasn’t coming to LA and that is why he had set up the dating account…he hadn’t “really”used it. He said the Craigslist was just to get people to send him nude pics…he never met anyone in person. Again i wasn’t around and he had to satisfy himself. When we got in the car he seemed to breakdown and apologize….he said going to California without me was the biggest mistake he’d ever made..he was so sorry. On the way home I told him that my best friend was following us…she didn’t know how our conversation was going to go and she was concerned about my well being so she followed me. Thats the first time I think I saw the switch…a change in body language…a change in him. I took him to his sisters house and we agreed to talk the next day.
When I got home I decided that he was remorseful and decided to work though this if he was willing to go to counseling with me. I went to talk to him the next morning and I think thats when he really decided I was weak. He commented during our conversation that “you’d be devastated if I broke up with you” I thought…if you break up with me…what is he thinking…he’s the one that did this…If anyone is breaking up with anyone it should be ME breaking up with HIM. He said he needed to think about things…he needed to get some input from his sister…and he would call me later. When he called later he said he wanted to work on us…that we could be stronger after working thorough this.
He was scheduled to go back to CA a couple of days later but stayed to “work on us” He seemed very sorry for what he had done…I was still struggling with it all and crying a lot. He would hold me and promise he was going to protect me…he was sooooooo sorry for hurting me. He promised that we would talk more/skype/and see each other again in two weeks when he left. Thats when I started seeing the biggest changes. When he went back to CA I didn’t hear from him for a couple of days….he decided that he couldn’t talk of tues because he had a trivia game at one of the bars he wanted to go to….wed was taco night with his friends. He just became more distant and seemed to think that I was too demanding. He became more hostile to me when I would point out his behavior. I got drunken texts at 3-4 int he morning multiple times a week. I found that he had tried to purchase Viagra on CL within a few days of going back to CA.
When i saw him a few weeks later I confronted him on the Viagra and the drinking. HE was angry that I saw his email on the Viagra (he had changed his password so that I couldn’t check it anymore but had left himself signed on at my house) He agreed to make an appointment with our pastor to talk about the issues we had been having. During this time he was still loving (at times) but he never did things for me anymore…he seemed distant and would get frustrated and angry with me when I would cry or be emotional about us. He didn’t understand why I was so reactionary..my emotions were too much sometimes…he said relationships change and I had to accept that he loved me…he didn’t feel like he needed to say it all the time. I should know by now how much he loved me. We both went back to CA for a couple of weeks and that is where things began to fall apart.
He took me out for a late Valentines day celebration…he was happy because I was having drinks with him…he said he was having a great night all his favorite things..me…good food…drinks!! But on the way home he became distant…and when we got home he wouldn’t even sit next to me…I couldn’t figure it out. I was attending a professional conference and was making lots of connections for jobs in the area…all good things to get me to CA soon. He was hot and luke warm about it all. He was never really cold to me…just not excited like i thought he would be. Later I would find out that this is when he had contacted “her.”
When I left CA he said he felt like we needed to be together…he was going to move back to Texas until I could get my license and then we would move back to California together. Two weeks later I found out that he had been having very intimate conversations with her. He had told her that he never loved me the way he had loved her…and what he would give up for the chance at those feelings again. Obviously I was shattered and furious both when I found out about their communications. She had pursued him from the initial communication…she poured her heart out to him…told him all the “with you” things she wanted to do with him…how amazing he was and how wonderful it was to have him back in her life. She told him about the terrible time she’d been through with her health and the recent betrayal of her husband and ending of her marriage.
When I told him I knew about her he told me I was crazy…it was my fault for reading the emails…those were private conversations that I had no business reading. I didn’t understand that they were expressing old feelings. I was too insecure and jealous. He started hanging up on me everytime we talked if I became emotional. I wrote him and read him an email pouring out my heart..how I felt such grief and loss because of his actions…how I couldn’t keep fighting for something he had walked away from…it was my way of saying goodbye. He hung up on me and texted saying he needed to process it. HE asked to talk again…he was cold at first…saying he’d never been so hurt by me…he was cold because I’d hurt him. He asked me to not give up on us yet…he thought we could work through it…if he felt like I had really forgiven him…if he felt like I really loved him…faults and all…he would give me his everything. We continued to talk long distance for a couple of weeks. Hot and cold….some days he loved me and he couldn’t imagine life without me…he was so blessed to have such a loving woman in his life. Other times I was ridiculous to expect him to pay me back money he owed me before he went to Vegas…i had the worst timing when I asked about his feelings…I was too insecure…the only reason I told him I loved him was so that he would say it too. It got to the point I felt like I had to ask him if I could call him…there were times he wouldn’t answer but he would play a weird sound bite then hang up…he just seemed like a different person but I thought if we were in the same place again he would be ok.
Three weeks after I discovered the conversations with her he said he wanted to come home…to see me face to face. He spent two weeks with me…he said he wanted to recommit to us…he said that she was his past..that I had misunderstood everything…that I was his future. But when I asked about her…when I saw texts from her that were inappropriate and called him on it he would get angry. Then he would apologize and say he would tell her to back off…that I was right. We discussed going to a professional counselor and we planned for him to move back at the end of the month. He went back to CA to pay rent and get his things in order to move…I dropped him at the airport…he gave me a peck…and I never saw him again.
He didn’t just disappear…he continued to tell me that he loved me…asked me to help him with his phone bill…actually acted somewhat normal for the next two weeks….until he game me his phone records (to pay his bill) and I saw the amount of time he was spending talking/texting her…and ultimately until I found out he was in Vegas with her!!! He;d told me he was going with his best friend…I found out from the best friend that wasn’t true and knew who he was with.
After spending the weekend with her in Vegas he texted me that I was crazy…I killed us….I had lost it and caused all of it….if I hadn’t ———- then this wouldn’t have happened. A few days later he emailed his family to take care of me because he knew that I was hurting. When they told him that he had not acted honorably that he had lied and cheated he replied with a hateful personalized reply that was a scene from the movie Good Will Hunting that he had changed to include his family. He basically said that he loved this girl so much for so long that no one could understand what she was to him…
In the weeks to follow he asked for us to talk…to keep a converstation going….to try and save our friendship….he said he was sorry for hurting me…he said he thought something was wrong with him not me…he was understanding until I would put blame on him…until I told him he was wrong for what he did…until I called him on his actions…then he would become angry and hurtful. Always blaming me…always telling me that he was sorry for things he did wrong in the end…until I found out how much had been lies
Because his family and I had become so close in 15 months we were together we remained in close contact. Through conversations with them I had discovered that he had lied to me about soooooo many things. I discovered that he lied about his education…his family says they don’t think he has a degree at all much less a MBA….they told me about his history of “needing money now” for rent or other things…they told me he had lost his job long before dec when we met because he wasn’t able to pass a licensing exam not because of cutbacks. And they told me that he had ruined family members credit years before in a publishing scam and ran to mexico years ago when the business started going south. I’m not sure why but I wanted to find out if other things he told me were true so I investigated myself a little bit….I found he has a warrant in MN for credit card fraud, he didn’t have a job when he moved to CA, I found MORE things on craigslist soliciting sexual encounters (even some suggesting bisexual curiosities) he has student loans in default from 1993…even when he was making 6 figures he didn’t pay on them. Thinking back he always used cash…no bank account until he moved to CA and I insisted so I could more easily get him money (not have to wire it). I found pictures of himself he had downloaded on my computer (sexually explicit) and photos of him with the name ‘josh” saved. Other things started popping up in my head…a email with another name that was open on his/my computer when i visited once…I only saw it for a couple minutes but it was all sexually oriented…when I asked him about it he took the computer, said he had no idea it must have been a roommates friend and close it down…said I shouldn’t look at someones email. I even talked to his ex before me..she said he told her he’d graduated from Princeton, he’d never held a job while they were together, and she couldn’t begin to start with the lies….he also owed her a significant amount of money.
He lost his job the monday after Vegas and headed to Atlanta (where she lives) by the end of the week. (that is actually true!!!) He has family in the area so that was his “reason” for going. I even had a converstation with ‘her” and she has supported him since he moved there. She said he told her that we were never together after they reconnected and exchanged the inital emails. In fact she says he said he knew months before he left for CA that our relationship wasn’t going to be long term and he thought leaving without me would tell me that….not at all the message he was giving me. She said he had told her so many jaw dropping things that if he was all in then she had to be too. She said he told her on his way to Vegas “so the way I see it the music plays, we run into each others arms and live happily ever after” (he called me on his way to Vegas and asked me to pay his phone bill and buy him a ticket home on Sunday so we could talk through our issues) If he was willing to move to ATL from CA for her then she had to put all of her in. She had supported him for the 4 months he had been in ATL because he was struggling professionally. She had spent 15000 in that time paying for weekend hotels and drinking, dinners, and trips to CA. She had even given him a business deal and taught him what she had done for years. She said he should made 30-40K in the next few months so he could pay me back. The best part…she says that her brother doesn’t like him…he thinks he is a con man because of things he did when they were friends 10 years ago.
While in Atlanta he would send me a mean email telling me he had to do the sexual stuff because I didn’t satisfy him, until the end, and he struggled with our intimacy issues. He said that I was mean to him in the beginning…I was emotionally immature and he endured it because he loved me. Then a few days later I’d get an email saying that he doesn’t cry but he remembers———- and he understands my pain. When I told him that he had given me an STD his first response was that he’d just had tests a couple days before and was clear. Then weeks later a heartfelt apology that he was so sorry…”sick to the point of nausea” that I was having to deal with it. Basically whenever I confronted him with anything I had discovered he would lash out….then apologize.
I guess I don’t know what it is that he wanted in the end….he obviously wanted to be with her so why keep me invested for so long…why keep wanting a “friendship”…why be so mean and hateful and then turn around. I called him a monster once….he said he hated that I felt that way about him and wanted to know what he could do to change that. If he had no feeling why would he care????
So I guess I just see how he fits into so much of what yall describe….i can go down the check lists and say yep, yep, yep!!! But he was never that Jekyll and Hyde when we were together…only after I confronted him and he was away. I know he doesn’t deserve me in his life…but can’t figure out how he could be such a different person in the end than when I fell in love with him. Why such hot and cold in the end. I don’t understand any of it…but I have such a hard time believing he is without true emotion. He seems to love his friends and family….but he also hurts them. (Makes me think now about the way he described his best friend to me….the guy always had his back…no matter what he did good or bad his friend would support him and have is back…I guess he loved that there was no accountability) And I see it now has been a pattern.
So I know this is REALLY long. But I didn’t want to just point out his bad parts….I wanted to share the love he showed and offered. If yall met him today you would probably think he was the best guy ever…he fits in with everyone…everyone loves him. I wanted yall to see the relationship not just the monster…I don’t know how to process it…I don’t know what to believe…is he really that dangerous…is he really a spath on some level…or is he just a cheater and liar. I will never understand how he could do what he did. I just hope that talking with others who seem to have experienced some of the same betrayal might help. What am I getting and what am I missing. Is all of this really there or I “blowing things out of proportion” like he says I do??
I’m open to anything here…if you can help me get this please do!!!
stolen_innocence, hello, welcome to LF, it’s a great website, has really helped me a lot. When I was reading your story it made me think of Donna Andersen who owns this website, she married a man who turned out to be a total spath, always needed money for “business deals” that never happened, etc. etc.
Whatever he is, you sound hurt and confused, which is exactly what led me here. I hope you will continue posting and reading the articles and comments here, I learned that people are not always what they seem, some of them are evil, I just didn’t “get it” until I realized that I had been a target for years because of my desire to help people. I “loaned” out money myself, never paid back, I won’t be doing that ever again!
I’m not suprised everyone loves him, some of them can put on a great act!!!!!!! Whatever he is, spath, cheater, liar, whatever!… he sounds bad for you (or for anyone else for that matter) please keep reading and learn to have no contact with him at all, he might come back if the lady paying for everything stops paying, you need to be strong and knowledge will be your power. You sound like a very intelligent person, I’m sorry you had to go through all of this.
As far as you being the one “blowing things out of proportion”, ugh, they always try to make everything that goes wrong sound like it’s your fault, sounds to me like you were seeing red flags and questioning them…of course he wouldn’t like that. Talking with others will help, it has help me so much.
Hi StolenInnocence,
Welcome to LF. I have found a lot of information, insight and validation here. I can relate to your story. It is uncanny some of the details we have in common (Craigslist, my footing the bill, him misusing thousands of his own on I don’t know what porn or gambling, he was my first and I thought my only true love, then the Jekyl and Hyde Act). I know his game and his patterns now. I have moments of weakness (I won’t let him know that) but I know there are better days to come. The more distance I put between us the stronger my resolve and the better I feel.
I think the fact that they can present as the love of your life, your perfect mate and turn around and treat us so inhumanely that MAKES them monsters. Someone who truly loves me will not make me feel so bad. He would have me crying in hysterics because he would twist my words or criticize simple choices like which bill I paid first and just when I can’t take any more he lays off and tells me how much he love me. That emotional turmoil is crazy. I had to get mad, understand the pattern and say: “ENOUGH!!!” He is out of my house, but not out of my life. We have a beautiful child.
I feel for you, I know it is hard to wrap your mind around this emotional mind game. It’s been 7 months since I discovered the ads online and the emails and the reconnection with the x-girlfriend. Yesterday, I was able to laugh about it. I hope you get away from the cycle and find a day when you can laugh about it soon.
Dear stolen innocence,
Welcome to LoveFraud, I’m glad you are here, but sorry that you have a reason to bE here.
Your X—is definitely a con man, a parasite mooching off of others instead of providing for himself. That is the typical psychopath, just like a vampire bat, sucking the life blood out of others, but the difference between him and the bat is the bat doesn’t pretend to love you while he sucks the lifes blood out of you!
Knowledge of these creatures is our power. To be able to recognize them by their behavior. They look like human beings but we need to be able to distinguish “them” from “people.”
One of the main things I suggest is that you go back through the archives and read—read about them, read about healing yourself and educate yourself until you see a red flag waving and known the meaning. RUN!!!!! RUN!!!! and don’t look back!
I have set the “red flag warning” at ONE FLAG AND I RUN.
ONE lie about anything and I no longer TRUST that person. I don’t care if the “reason they lie” is that their mother didn’t breast feed them enough, or that their father was a drunk. A lie is a LIE is a LIE and I do not want liars in my intimate circle of people I love.
NOT ASSUMING RESPONSIBILITY FOR THEIR ADULT SELVES—that means WORK. If for some reason they are “out of a job” in these tough economic times and living with me, and I’m working—then they clean the house, wax the car, fix the meals to CONTRIBUTE to the household’s upkeep with their WORK. As Captain John Smith said at Jamestown colony, “Those that do not work do not eat.” So if you live at my house, you contribute or you get out. Or the other option is to stay and starve. LOL
You fell for his lying pity stories because you thought he loved you and you had grown to love you. In fact, he was UNABLE TO LOVE ANYONE. He had just learned that he could SAY “love” and PRETEND “love” and for a while he could MOOCH OFF OF women.
What a piece of trash he is. Shame on his family for not telling you the WHOLE truth earlier—but—would you have believed it back then? Probably not. I have been warned about psychopaths, and I didn’t believe it either.
The main thing now, is you are no longer Innocent where psychopaths are concerned. And being WISER NOW, you will learn more and more. One of the things that is great about now, is that you know you are NOT alone, you have people who DO understand what these monsters are and are here to support you while you heal! “What doesn’t kill us makes us stronger” and you are going to end up much stronger and much wiser than before. God bless your journey toward healing!