I know this may not be a popular discussion thread but I feel a need to express the disconnect I felt with the p even during the most intimate moments....

P used to close his eyes when he was making love to me which basically made me feel like a "thing" and not even there. There was no tender look, tender caresses or soul connection. There was a deafening quiet and absence of intimate pillow talk that connects souls as well as bodies. No compliments, no discussion, no playful interaction, just the act itself. In some ways I thought it was a comfortable silence of two people sharing deeply but that was just my projection. He felt nothing emotional while I was deeply in love with him and our expression through lovemaking. To him, it was a skin thing, further evidenced by his penchant for wanting to do it with the lights out. No need for eye contact or connection. Can only say this in retrospect. At the time I was pleased as can be that he was interested in pleasuring me but that became less important to him as the months rolled on. And then after I had the baby and weeks had passed he was disinterested. I know now because he was getting it somewhere else.....

survivor

OK, here goes: mine was an actor. The sex was phenomenal, for me at least. And I believed that he was "making love" to me, and me to him. That was probably the only marker of quality in the relationship. A few times I caught a hint of something that seemed off, just not right. When we did it at his place, I sometimes had intrusive thoughts, images of him doing it with someone else there. In the same chair or other spot. Although his actions were almost entirely loving with me, I had the sense that his pleasure was all in his head, that he was fantasizing about someone else as we did it, and that was what got him off. I thought he could have just lay there alone and gotten off just through fantasy. Once he told me that he actually could. I don't remember him always having his eyes either closed or open. One time he spoke to me in a language that I don't know. He said something about, "beautiful". Yes, that was a big, bright, red flag for me. When I asked him about it he denied saying it, and caught himself quickly. Yet when he said it, I had the sense of him being in another place, not really present with me. As I write, I am still tempted to think that maybe it was just my "own low self esteem" or mental weakness, or distrustful nature (that is what he would have written it off as). But then I remember that I was NEVER like this (suspicious) with any other partner. And I realize that the suspicion was caused not by some inherent flaw in me, but by his overall P dishonesty, and by the first time he betrayed me. After that, it was very hard to ever believe him again. Because he never really came clean about any of it,not the first one, and not any later ones. And I don't know the extent of his disloyalty the first time, but I do know now that he had intent to carry it out as far as he could, even to marrying her.

What made it so hard is that I bought into the lie so completely. I belived that since overall it was SO good, there had to be some love, some loyalty, something of value in our relationship. It couldn't possible be all bad, right??? Wrong. He was incapable of loyalty. That simple fact turned all the rest (anything that appeared to be good or true), into "mud".

He could get out of bed, walk three steps and and betray me without a second thought, and then lie about it.
And he did.

-"Leti"

I remember the first passionate kiss so many years ago, just like it was yesterday. Halfway through, he took a deep breath almost like a big sigh. I will never forget it and I asked him about it because my gut was telling me that he was bored or something. He said that he just needed some more air. Red flag. I ignored it.Then during our intimate times, he seemed to know so much about a woman's anatomy and told me all about it. Slowly over time, I was not allowed to face him anymore, had to be face down. If on the rare times I did get to face him, he always stared straight ahead at the wall or covered my face with a piece of clothing. The kissing, hugging and foreplay no longer exist either.

Hi Blondie and all

I am relating my experience and opinion below:
For the p, sex is a stimulating obsession with him. Women in his life are just for his amusement and pleasure. The sex, at first, is all consuming and very passionate. Later on, he seemed to have gotten bored, like the thrill is in the getting and it is on to the next victim or else he cannot contain the beast in him or most likely at little of both.

If you look closely enough, you will notice the p has an obsession with a certain part of the female anatomy, not really the person after the initial thrill as worn off for the p. Then, the physical part gets more and more bizarre.
He related his fantasy is about women covering their faces and being tied up. So, the mask slipped in his quest for a bizzare fantasy.

In the beginning though, while he is wooing you and the sex is great, he is still out there looking for his next victim---in the bars and on adult personal sites or in chatrooms, creating a persona of Prince Charming.

At first I thought I wasn't pretty or perfect enough for him, but then with the help of this forum, I now believe it isn't about me. It is about him. His wife can't satisfy him nor I couldn't satisfy him nor can any single women can---a bottomless pit of a sexual pervert always on the prowl for the next one. So, the more women know that he's out there, they can save themselves the emotional toll it as taken on his previous victims. Beenthere

kris
(member)
08/13/02 08:50 AM

p.s. I wanted to add to the above story that the topic of sex had not been part of the earlier discussion which had set off p's rage. That discussion had only been about our financial situation.

This is illustrative of some things: EVERYTHING was about sex to my p. Any issue over which I struggled for some control was about sex to him. He told me, in later years, that he really viewed me as always attempting to control HIM. In his twisted view, if I sqirmed for any control over my own life, I was controlling him. I understand, now, that the p believes he has the right to control everyone, and when his victim attempts to gain any control over her own life, she is wresting that control away from him. She has no rights. She does not actually exist, in his view. She is an extension of him. I believe that, for psychopaths, sex and control are all bound up together.

P used sex, from our beginning, to take away my autonomy. He violated me sexually by having sex with all my friends, neighbors, associates, so that I could not turn anywhere without being confronted by the sickening awareness of p's sexaul betrayals. He had sex with other women in my bed. He humiliated me, in all social settings by having sexually charged conversations with other women, in my presence, often stranding me somewhere with our babies, while he disappeared for hours, with one of these women.

I did not have a jealous or suspicious bone in my body when I met the p. But, OF COURSE, I developed those traits. It actually took a long time, and tremendous effort on p's part. I did not understand that behavior. Because it ran contrary to the wisdom of my heart, I remained innocent for a ridiculously long time. While p was setting me up to become his invention, he constantly planted the concept, in my mind and the minds of all observers, that our problems were the result of my irrational jealousy and suspicion. This worked perfectly, in later years, when he had perfected his act so that he did not behave, in obvious ways, in front of others, but seduced women by pretending to be suffering from my irrational jealousy and control of him.

P turned every issue, in later years, into one about sex (and MY mental sickness about it). It did not matter if we argued over who was to get the water softener salt, p turned the argument into one about my torture of him over sexual issues. This thing he had done to me became HIS absolute out.

When we went through a horrible time, while he was working for a mental health agency (a problem-ridden time which had NOTHING to do with sex), he was befriended by 2 female therapists on the staff. I asked him how he characterized our problems to them. He said, "I told them I made a few mistakes years ago, and that you have never been able to let it go."

P was the sole creator of this fiction. No matter how hard I tried to stay away from the subject, HE invariably brought it up within seconds of any conflict, "Now you're going to start telling me how I slept with all your firends. I can't take it anymore. I'm going to kill myself."

This speaks of 2 things to me, now. One is that p contructed a reality in which he tortured me, sexually, while creating an illusion of the opposite, that I tortured HIM sexually. The other is that sex was his ultimate soul-destroying weapon. I have read that sexual abuse is absolutely the most damaging, that it destroys the souls of children (and I think it has the potential of doing that to adults, too). This makes sense because, when you think of sex, as an expression of love, in order for it to work, the person who loves has to surrender her being, her separateness, for a moment, and allow herself to fall backward, over something that feels like a waterfall. She has to relinquish control, abandon her boundaries. This can be a spiritual experience, and in its truest, purest expression, it IS a spiritual experience. Thus, sex can be a vehicle of ultimate healing power, or a vehicle of ultimate destructive power. It is a question of WHO and WHAT is in control in the moment that the woman (in this case) relinquishes control. I have no doubt that the psychopath recognizes (perhaps not consciously) the exploitative potential of sex as a weapon to destroy at the deepest level. Mine used it to breathtaking perfection.


kris
08/13/02 09:48 AM

p.s.s. Now, I want to expand on the effects of p's sexual torture. Because of his many affairs, and the way they were stuffed in my face, and his incessant fantasizing in my ear about sex with other women during sex with me, I became unable to have sexual feelings as myself. As myself, I was so bloody wounded by p's betrayals that I could not experience erotic feeling without hellish pain so overwhelming it shut me down.

I was so, so, so determined to overcome "my problem" and continue to satisfy p's "needs" that I never once allowed "my problem" to get in his way. Instead, I dissociated and became whatever woman p was fantasizing about. In other words, I became the woman p was cheating on me with, in my inner identity, my sexual identity. Inevitably, as I approached and crossed the threshold, that place where you let go of all control, and fall backwards (body falling, spirit rising), I ascended, not into paradise, but I descended into hell. That moment was rich with all of kris's agony, the recognition that I had just participated in another annihilation of my self, another soul murder, another debasement to the bottom of the world.

Sometimes, when we were not being sexual, I talked to p about "my problem", very gently, hoping "we" could work on solving it together. P's most usual reaction was extreme self-pity. "Wow, that really hurts me to know that something that is so special to me actually hurts you. I don't know if I can get past that." (Poor thing to be so burdened by my problems.)

So, in sexual situations, I was careful to keep "my problem" to myself. P never noticed that I suffered a descension into hell at the big moment. And he might stop the fantasizing for a week, after a discussion, but he never stopped it for long. So I guess he was able to transcend my thoughtless burdening of him with my problems.

This speaks to what I was describing, in my previous post, that the p is able to cause almost limitless destruction to his victim, to her soul, to actually take her soul to hell, repeatedly, through the weapon of sexual torture. And all the while he is doing it, he paints her as HIS abuser. She is always hurting HIM, not the other way around. The psychopath has all the exits covered.

Kris,

So much of what you share in this post speaks to what happened with my p too. I never viewed the open flirtations with other women in my presence as humiliating. I was hurt by it, but stuffed the pain/anger and just felt miserable about it. Now I realize that the hurt I felt was the pain of humiliation.

The next sentence stopped me cold: "As myself, I was so bloody wounded by p's betrayals that I could not experience erotic feeling without hellish pain so overwhelming it shut me down"... Kris, I have gone and am still going through something like this too. I was aware of it, but am still not able to put it into words yet. I think when I realized this part was happening, I was amazed that I could be so F-d up emotionally, actually F-d OVER BY THE P, that even this aspect of my life would malfunction. Thank you for expressing it so clearly. I was with P for only 5 years total.

I am in awe of your strength to have survived after so much longer.

God bless you,

-Leti

Beenthere,

You wrote: "In the beginning though, while he is wooing you and the sex is great, he is still out there looking for his next victim."

This was the most difficult of his betrayals for me. It was when the relationship, if what he said was true, was totally perfect in every way. It was when I should have walked, and didn't. I guess the writing was on the all back then, and I chose to ignore it, and to believe his words instead.

One of my friends tried to tell me, and I was so twisted by then that I thought she wanted him for herself. (Duh!!! maybe she did, but it still would have been her loss and my gain to get rid of him.)

Anyway, I had never felt such pain as with that first betrayal, and some others that happened in the first 18 months. And I spent so much time trying to change myself so that he would become faithful. What a sick situation. Looking back, everything after the first 18 months was like rolling downhill. And I was in such a confused, hurting state all the time that I was almost numb to what happened later on.

-Leti

Leti, I absolutely see this sexual abuse as the most vile, pernicious abuse in the psychopath's repertoire. I suffered every kind of abuse, emotional, physical, psychological, but the sexual abuse was, without question, the most agonizing and deeply, deeply damaging. Sexual abuse is abuse to every level of a person's being. It reaches into one's core humanity and poisons and destroys.

Sex, "intercourse", is a physical metaphor for spiritual intercourse. It is one of 2 acts in physical human life in which the boundaries of human separateness are penetrated, and it mirrors the spiritual concept of love. The other act is violence and murder, and this mirrors the spiritual concept of hate.

The psychopath is a vessel of hate masquerading as a vessel of love. Sex, to him, is a weapon of destruction, a hateful act, a means of penetrating to the victim's innermost being, and doing violence to her soul.

The victim cannot protect herself because the very nature of sex is surrender, opening the self, and surrendering it to the other.

The open flirtations with other women hurt because they humiliated you, and put your head down lower. You were being devalued. A man honors a woman with his sexual interest, if it well-intentioned and respectful of her as a person. When a man turns this interest on other women in the presence of his wife, he is saying he does not honor his wife with his interest...he honors another. The wife feels stripped of her value and ashamed to be who she is. Whether or not your husband is sexually happy and bonded with you goes to the core of your feeling about yourself, and your comfort within your own skin. I can remember feeling like I was covered in wads of loose squishy flesh from the feeling of the shame on my skin (and I wasn't, lol).

"The next sentence stopped me cold: "As myself, I was so bloody wounded by p's betrayals that I could not experience erotic feeling without hellish pain so overwhelming it shut me down"... Kris, I have gone and am still going through something like this too."

When your shame in your sexual identity becomes intolerable, you cease to occupy yourself there. You say you have this problem, and you were only with the psychopath five years. Leti, by the time I was with my psychopath five years, I was already waging war with this demon. I do think you have a shot at healing in this area. I do not believe I do because I stayed 25 more years. What has a possibility of working for me may be different for you. But I know I will never attempt sex unless I love a man with all my heart, and I am certain that he loves me the same. It's similar to mind over matter. Love over body may have a chance of prevailing. I am 50. I have not made love as myself since I was perhaps 23.

I didn't survive, Leti. I just kept going.

May God bless us both,
kris

.

Please excuse me for signing in here, and up till now I didn't feel it entirely right to do so.

When my ex wife was a young wife, a new young wife, she used to smell like hell often. It was horrible. One afternoon we were to go up to her parents place. She turned up at the appartment, and she really looked her worst- lank greasy hair, oily skin, and of course smelling awful. I said, why don't you have a bath? She said- oh I'll leave it till we get there. And she did, so I got two hours driving with this hellish aroma in the car.

Shortly after we got there, her Dad made a comment about her appearance. I didn't hear what she said, but he turned to me with a funny look and said,"Yeh, you've got your man now". But then he repeated it with as hateful a look directly at me as I have ever seen. I swear it damned near knocked me down.

Long after that, when we were getting divorced, she told me about how she had had to go to school in extremely poor hygienic conditions. It occurred to me that her Dad had apparently liked her like that. And in going up in such a disgraceful state - married now - she was giving him the finger as if to say, here you are, now you can't have me.

To understand this appalling image you have to see a beautiful young woman, and a well off middle class home.

But she always liked him as far as I knew and saw. He was regularly in our home, in this country and that, always treating the undersigned with a just restrained enough contempt for me not to eject him.

The most odd circumstance of which I have ever heard happened to me. Just amazing. What a fool I was.

Laura, I know that if my husband had been like yours, he'd have had a true believer in me. That kind of focused sexual attention makes a woman feel so claimed, so wanted, needed, bonded. I had almost forgotten because of what life with my husband was like, but he was like that, in our beginning. Before we lived together, we spent entire weekends in bed. I remember him taking me back to his cabin for a weekend, driving over a bridge at 100 mph, then once in his house, turning me upside down and shaking me out of my hip hugger jeans because he couldn't get the zipper down fast enough. Having sex for literally hours at a time, rest briefly, start over. I had never had a relationship like that. I felt like he was starving and I was the only food on the planet.

His sexual humiliation of me began before we married. But the moment we were married, something else changed, too. His hunger for me. Suddenly, it was as if he'd always just finished a big meal, and I was cold spinach left on the plate.

I know what you mean about feeling raped after your husband expressed such need for you, and then abandoned you just 24 hours later. I felt some version of that, after being the tantalizing steak in a hungry man's eyes, and then reverting to cold porridge overnight. I well remember the feelings of confusion and rejection. What happened to you, in an instant, happened to me over 30 years. I gradually realized that the focused sexual attention had not been passion born of love. You realized it the moment you realized he had left just after expressing such need and passion. And it does feel alot like rape.

(((laura)))

kris

BonnyR, Though it's small evidence, it sounds like something may have been not quite right between your ex-wife and her father.

Kris,

Unfortunately there was a whole heap more evidence, and my fear is that some of it is walking around, and its been giving me the willies for about six years since the extraordinary supposition came into my head. It fits the facts and not just selected facts. And it fits the circumstantial aspects - all of them.

Regards

BonnyR, There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that child sexual abuse plays a role in the formation of some psychopaths. I stress "plays a role". I just finished a long post in "good vs. evil" in which I discuss the various factors which I see as playing a role. (Oh, you know that. You responded.)

As has been discussed, on this thread, sex is a portal into the depths of a human being, into the soul. It is not random coincidence that sex is the ultimate expression of love, although we may tend to forget that, in these times when we can turn on the tube and hear whole families bantering back and forth about the purely physical mechanics of sex, according it the same weight and sacredness as a soccer match. But no matter how desensitized we become to the sacred in life, the laws which govern the sacred remain the same. Sex is a sacred act, capable of opening a portal between the physical realm and the spiritual realm, through which a soul can pass from one realm to the other. This is what happens when a child is conceived, and this is what happenes when "two souls are joined as one" or two people experience the sacred while joined as one.

Doubters might say, "Oh, please, animals have sex and conceive. They are hardly expressing the sacred in themselves when they do." But human beings are not animals. We share in the nature of animals, and we also share in the nature of God. We occupy a realm, spiritually, above the animals. Not that animls have no spiritual nature, but theirs is different. Animals actually are amoral. Governed by instinct, they have not been gifted with free will. Humans have the choice to honr the sacred in their sexual selves, or to serve the animal in their sexual selves.

A person who is disconnected from the sacred in themselves and others, disconnected from their soul, from God, behaves sexually, according to their instinctive animal nature. The sexual self is not mediated by higher impulses. Wherever such people see sex, they take. I believe that it is common for psychopathic (or otherwise personality-disordered) parents to "take" from their own children. And that this is one of the links between psychopathic parents and psychopathic offspring (only one, and not a factor in every case).

What happens to the sexually abused child? How does this stunt the child's capacity to love? A child experiences love through how the parent "loves" him/her. The child's soul is somewhat more naked and accessible than an adult's soul. Part of the work of becoming an adult is the development of boundaries, which comprise the self, and protect the naked soul. The very young child is enmeshed with the mother, and real mother love aims to guide the child in development of his separate self. Real mother love is love of the child, "the other". False mother (or father) love is really love of the self, and perhaps unconsciously, but out of the drives of its true nature, seeks to claim the soul of "the other" (child) for its OWN self-gratification. The child's value to such a parent is its potential for gratifying the selfish drives of the parent.

When a parent touches a child sexually, the child experiences a cataclysmic horror, like being eaten by the parent. The loving guardian transforms into a devouring monster. Whatever fragile boundaries of self have begun to develop are shattered for there is simply no deeper intrusion into the sacred realms of a human being than the sexual path which leads right into the soul. This is death to a small child. Soul death. He has no means of protecting his soul.

Often, I believe, such children will remain the infantile primordial soup that they were born. They will never develop a self. And a self is necessary for directing the work of making choices and becoming a full-fledged human being. They will view the world as a pool of sharks out to devour them, shark eat shark, have to eat the other sharks first.

However, I don't believe that this result is written in stone, either. I know that my husband's mother molested him. She used to carry on to me about how she always thought she would die of jealousy if her son ever got married, that she used to gaze at his little manhood and think it would kill her if he...you know. She was such a fool she had no idea how sick and wrong her attitude was. And I so bought the "wonderful mother crap" that it took me years to figure it out. But I also know my husband molested my two daughters (I did not know it until a few years ago). And, while both of them are deeply scarred, and misguided about some things, both have hearts, and the ability to make moral choices. They have selves, boundaries. They are walking the path of full-fledged human beings.

So while early childhood sexual abuse is, without a doubt, in my view, a contributing factor in the formation of some psychopaths, it does not necessarily equal a psychopath, either.

Kris, its easy to see how upbringing can damage a person, in fact its obvious. But I am convinced that remorselesness is pure genetic. I mean, if a guy is going to mess around with his kid, there's something seriously wrong, and his kid will have it. Anyway, I don't give a stuff about her- she fluttering around the old Bast--d when he was sixty five. And her cronish mother - that was a good expression you used- "a ridiculous woman". She was a Doctor alright- she probably worked a combined total from beginning to end of seven years, and considered herself as a dear and glorious physician. I wouldn't have trusted her to get nits out of her own hair. She was another one who was "dying" about twenty years before she actually made good and keeled over good and well. I was in Karachi when I heard the news. I ordered a Gin and Tonic from room service instantly. (Not entirely straightforward in Karachi, so to lessen the pain of the evening's administration with filling in the forms, I actually ordered four. I got them too). Three days later her younger sister keeled over. All that lot were oohing and ahhing that dear Mother in Law had "come for her". My remark at the time to my dear ex wife was that if I had any idea of the principle, that kind of thing didn't happen from heaven. Anyway, younger sister had been the favourite aunt of ex wife and dear brother in law. They didn't bother to stay for the funeral a couple of days later. Cool eh? Regards

Well, none of us really knows for sure what makes a psychopath. But we do see certain factors over and again. And other psychopaths in the family is certainly one of those things.

One thing most of us agree on is that the families of the psychopaths...at least the ones we married...were not our favorite people. (Nor were we theirs!)

Happily, most of us unloaded a whole train carload of unpleasant characters when we dumped the psychopath. I spent last weekend with my daughter. She was exclaiming over her great joy and relief in being rid of all her nauseating relatives, and she's only 26, got a baby, and you might think she would feel some sadness at having no big extended family to share it all with, but nothing of the sort. She does have that on her partner's side, and she has me, and her sister's family, and she's pleased as punch to be rid of the rest.

There are actually a few of them I can bear, but not one that I miss.

As my daughter puts it, "I never felt that any of those people loved me." And that is true even of the best of them. None of them loved us because we weren't part of the sticky incestuous communal glob that is "them".

Kris,
I am having difficulty thinking about the psychopath and sex topic and have not posted for a while. There is something you wrote about surviving vs "I just kept going". I don't want to be argumentative, but would like respond to it.
I don't know the exact definition of a survivor, but to me it is a person who keeps going. A victim stops. Those who keep going, will eventually find their way through and out of the situation, or the situation around them will change. It also seems to me that to be a survivor does not mean to be free of scars or pain after getting out. It simply means to keep going.

There is a book about a small child who survived a horrendous battle here. It is a true story, and the child wrote it after becoming an adult. Although it is told as an autobiography, and is slso about the facts of the battle as seen through a child's eyes. The book is about war as experienced by a non-combatant, and it is about survival. This child was about 5 or six when the battle began. She lost EVERYone and every thing. She had no idea where she was located, nor where she was headed. She just kept walking. She ate the supplies of dead soldier from both armies. She ate anything she could dig out of the ravaged earth. She had no awareness of what was going on other than the fact that her current surroundings were horrible, and she was hungry, she was dirty, and she was living through a nightmare. She walked alone, in the wrong direction, through the worst part of the battle, without knowing where she was going. She later learned that she had walked in a circle, and even ended up near where she had started. She slept in craters created by shelling. She is a survivor, she didn't even have an awareness of anything beyond the few yards of terrain that was her immediate physical surroundings... She is a survivor, she just kept going. Eventually she was in a safe place, mostly because the battle had ended. She survived not because of her knowledge, skill, or a plan to get out. She survived simply because she "kept going".

-Leti

Hi Leti,

I totally agree with you about being the most difficult of betrayals. Finding out that he was out there still looking just floored me. Even when I confronted him about this, he would deny and then said he forgot about it. For a long time, I blamed myself. I should have walked right then, but I didn't. I thought may be he won't find someone else or tried not to think it. I was in denial. What we need to realize, Leti, that we could look absolutely perfect and he would still be out there because that is the way he is---getting his thrills from chasing. I think that emotional intimacy is not in their vocabulary and for most of us, that is a very difficult for us to understand. Beenthere

Leti, Thank you for the beautiful story. You have lifted my self esteem up several notches. You are so right. Survival isn't about being unscathed, unscarred, in perfect health, strong as an ox. It's so easy to forget that in this culture in which we are all supposed to be flashing smiles full of blinding white perfect teeth as we flex our strong tanned bodies while jogging through surf. Had I been untouched by my life with the psychopath, while it's true I would not be chronically ill, broke and sexually dysfunctional, I would also not be clear about who I am, I would not know God, I would not be 50 years old, I would have remained 20, clueless and vulnerable to psychopaths.

You lose some things. You gain others.

Thank you.

kris

AND a wonderful sense of humor you have, kris! I'm lol'ing from your descriptions of our culture's expectations.

Cherie

Why Cherie, What sense of humor? I was merely describing myself. (My nose just grew a foot!)

hahahhah...breathe...heeeheeehahaha!!!!

((((kris)))

Cherie

hee hee ((cherie))

Kris,

When I read this post I could see you with a tan running down the beach with your hairing flying in all directions. I've just recently found this site as I've posted a few times before. Since then I've read almost all of your posts. What you do here is amazing. You are rich in wisdom and compassion. You are beautiful in being open and sharing the tragedy of your experience. We are all vulnerable at any age. We need to help keep each other well and from harm's way. Would you have touched and supported so many so deeply had you not been through all of this?

50 is a cool age, in any condition. To truly know God is cool too. I didn't know him before my p in the way I know him now.

If one thing could change in your life right now that would make the biggest difference to you, what would it be?

C.

Been there,

How very true, the more and the more taboo the better to a p.

I recall after I'd been with my p a few months and we were on vacation he looked down at me when I was laying on the bed and he said "You really ARE beautiful." It bothered me for years until a few months before I finally left him. Last summer he said to me one day, "You really ARE beautiful." I said nothing to him either time.

But now I can see all the other times he had said it to me or to any one else on the hook at the time, it was a line. He didn't mean it, only those two times. For some reason those were about the only two times I ever believed him. He hated me really. He loved the illusion and the trap he made for me, not me. He was seeing a former girlfriend who was a lawyer throughout our relationship. She wasn't beautiful in the physical sense. But I wonder about the lies he told her about me. She was never my adversary except when I dreamed he was with her when he passed me over. He used to tell me I was jealous, which I wasn't. I just finally got so hung up on wanting to know the truth and was so unprepared for what was really happening. He's out there still preying on teengagers and nieces, maybe daughters of his divorced girlfriends. He hated it when his friends liked me. I stil can hardly comprehend this type of evil exists and goes unrecognized and unpunished.

What is it that gets us through?

Cooper, Thank you so much. Your words have touched me in the place where I live. No, I wouldn't have been able to touch others suffering as I have had I not suffered it myself. This has become the major gift I see as my life having given me. Almost everything else was taken away. But this is what I have to show for my life. I understand good and evil. And I may be able to help others understand it. That is true of all of us. We help each other understand.

If one thing in my life could change right now that would make the biggest difference to me it would be publication of my book. I have been working to achieve this every day for six months. I feel a burning, driving commitment to seeing this book make its way into the world. If that happened, I could die a happy woman (I'm not dying, just a an image of the importance of this to me.)

Hi Cooper,

I'd like to welcome you to the forum, belated as it may be.
I just read back through your posts and can see that you identify with a lot of what the posters have written on the threads.

What traits did you personally observe and experience that lead you to believe you were involved with a psychopath?

Sincerely,
Cherie

Cherie,

It was quite a long time before I finally figured it out. I didn't realize the kind of evil he is actually existed.

He is a pathological liar, he used me and others malicously, he lives in a bubble by no one else's rules, he likes the dark, he lives a parasitic lifestyle, he thinks he deserves things from others, he's been an alcoholic for almost 40 years and a sex addict for almost the same. Once he's done with you he discards you, but you give him still a glimmer or interest and he knows that there is adoration and interest. He wants, he gets. I have horror stories of almost everyday of my life with him. They match others that are on this site.

Nothing in my life with him made sense. My frame of reference disintegrated. He lied to everyone behind my back and he is so charming everyone believed him before I even knew what was going on. He cares about nothing except pleasing himself in the current moment. I've read everything I can get my hands on by Dr. Hare and all the checklists descriptions fit my p to a tee.

Initially I could have left the relationship and thought it would have ended because of his drinking, the other women, the psychological abuse, etc. but I've somehow had the opportunity to see the true BIG picture. I learn more all the time. I'm starting over and each day I am more firmly committed to figure out what this experience was supposed to be in my life. Like Kris, I have also been writing a book. It has broadened my perspective and my appreciation for things like mercy and compassion, and resiliency and character. Regaining your integrity is the best thing you can do. It doesn't come back in an instant, but it keeps you centred once it starts coming back.

My journey has just started.

Hope this helps.

Hi Cooper,

Thank you for responding and being willing to share some of what you've experienced. Although I can hear from what you've written that you've been through such pain and degradation, I also hear your hope and committment to healing coming through.

You wrote:

"Regaining your integrity is the best thing you can do. It doesn't come back in an instant, but it keeps you centred once it starts coming back."

Thanks for the uplifting words.
Cherie

Hi Cooper,

I only got the "beautiful" line in the beginning twice and I believe that was to get his emotional hooks in.
Yes, I agree with the more taboo, the better.

To go on more about what you wrote, I don't think physcial beauty means much to the p. For a long time, I believed I was not good looking enough for him and now I think one could be as beautiful as a Miss America contestant and the p would still be out trying to get his next victim. For the p, it all has to do with the chase and getting and everything seems to be so wonderful. In reality, the p is using all his charm in the getting, then being bored (why, I don't know) and then off to the next victim.

I, too, do not understand this evil and as I posted before, I am bitter that he continues to do what he is doing and is not held accountable. However, he is not breaking the law---he is breaking hearts and souls and there are no laws against that. What gets us though? I hope that he is breaking God's law and in some way, he will have to answer to what he is doing.

Kris. . .thank you for the hug. . .this week has been the week from hell. . i have gone the gamaut of hating myself for being SO stupid. . .it seems like a story out of a really bad novel. I am so grateful God led me to this forum. In reading through the posts, I believe I have found an answer.

The Bible speaks of people like this, I just wasn't aware i knew any of them. well, that's not entirely true, there were times I thought of it but thought it unChristian to entertain thoughts like that. iIwas SO idealistic, although my instincts warned me, my heart wanted to believe the lie.

I had a horrible experience this week. That is what led me here. I'll try to describe what happeded as soft as I can. I really am looking for answers.

The p i WAS involved with was very careful never to lead me on. Just said enough to let me fill in the blanks. I had thought periodically over the years my husband might be a p. A counseler had suggested it to me once but he had problems with alchol so we labeled it that. After reading through the forum. . .he's a p. I have been connected to him for over 30 years. In and out of marriages with him. You gotta know, he was a master at the good p to suck me in. The last time we got married, he worked on it five years. Five minutes after the cermony. . .out comes the bad p never to go back to the good p. What a surprise. I'm really over this p.

So, on the cusp of all this. . .enter p #2. Very good looking, smart, educated, successful, nice, kind, encoouraging, validating, attentive, sensitive. Very low key, no pressure, no overt passes. Just offering friendship. I had the sense that he was interested but i was married and really was not looking to have an affair. I was however, starved, literally starved for love and attention. So. . . anytime he called, I welcomed it. Wanted to do lunch. . . I was there. Coffee. . . just tell me where and what time! And calls, morning, noon and night, on weekends too! I was beginning to sense he was becoming a BIG part of my life. All of this is on a friendship (LOL ) level. I was getting concerned about it, but it felt so good to have someone checking on my saftey, my whereabouts, concern for me as a person, I didn't want to give it up. He never said the words, but, who needed them the actions were speaking for themselves. After 150 years with p #1. (they are like dog years right) it was like pouring water on a parched, starved desert. I opened up like a rose. Truly, it was the first time i really ever fell in love. This went on for almost three years as a friendship and in a very vulnerable moment I caved. After I caved. . .so did he. I was traumatized.

This may sound weird but I had to stay connected until I could figure it all out. It has taken six years. He is a p. God help me. I do not want to be a p magnet.

i met P#1 while seperated from my first husband. i would say I was in love as much as i knew about it at the time. As the years and the abuse went by, I knew enough to know this was not love. I listened to other people tell me about my obligation and responsibily to my marriage vows. He (p#1) was a profile p. I see that now. Charm, personality, good looks, nice car, money (temporarily) liar, sneak, thief. gambler, pervert. If he was a woman chaser, he was really discreet but I "had the feeling" ALOT ( one time he got crabs and iIknow he didn't get it from me). He helped me believe he picked them up from a toliet seat. yeahh, right. .

so. . .p #2 is actually the p who pushed me over the edge. i fell in love with this p. . .oh wait. . fell in love with the illusion.
Fast forward. . .six years trying to figure this out. Truly, I was traumitized. I kept thinking about "how is was" and "when is it going back" "I thought you cared" "what did i do" I never said those words to him but I said them to myself. All the time. And because this was a SECRET, I had no one to talk to. . .it sounds so sinister now.
I has been one stab in the back after another. And me, still trying to figure it out. You know as I'm writing this, it is hard to believe this is ME I'm writing about. Is this part of the "spell". ok. . .here's the part i gotta get out. i'll trust you can read between the lines. a few nights ago he wanted to "be with me" i drove a LONG way to get there and it was fairly late when i arrived. i had a glass of wine, we talked briefly and then . . .
i'm going to flash back here, when i read some of the other posts about closed eyes, stone silence. . .it was like reading about who i was with! scary. . .
well, this was really weird, but i overlooked it (red flag) he went around and gathered all my stuff and put it in one pile. i still wonder about that. . .i mean he commented on it, made a point of it.

then, it's true what you say in the love and surrender portion of your post, cause that is me for sure.
then. . . .he didn't ask. . .but wanted me to do something i was not comfortable with and didn't. then. . .oh God, this is awful. . .he took care of himself. . .violently. . . even screamed. Thank God for the wine or i would have probably freaked out. but you know what i thought. . . wow. . .he really must trust me to do something like that in front of me. this guy has a very COOL persona. i promise you, i NEVER expected that. i mean, why, i was RIGHT THERE. you know what i'm saying, why not with me. . .

then. . .we talked, more wine, more . . ..

then. . .it's really late and he indicates i gotta go. now where we were was quite isolated and dark winding roads. between being late the wine and the afterglow, i should not have been driving. i was somewhere i had never been before and was totally unfamiliar with the territory. it was Gods hand on me that night that i made it home, i KNOW it was. oh, by the way, he still does not know if i made it home safe. . .no call as yet several days later.

when i woke up the next morning i felt like i was drugged. I could barely move. Then I started peicing it all together. Did he deliberately set me out there. if something happened, no big deal. . . Nothing to tie him to it. . .if you know what i mean. And to this day, he still had not called to see if I made it safely home.

Maybe it is just a coinsidence but it has really shaken and scared me. Like I said before. . .stories inside of stories. . .

My days with this person is over. I feel like a narrowly escaped.

If my post was to graphic, I'm not sure, but I think I see the tone of the posts. I didn't know how to say it any other way. . .it was All so WEIRD and I desperately need feedback. Would you be willing to share your thoughts here. . . you really seem to have a firm but compassionate and honest grasp of this. I know I'm rambling around alot, but it's all rumbling around inside of me and I'm just trying to get it out.
gratefully,
finished

finished,

I'm sorry, but I didn't follow what happened.

"then. . . .he didn't ask. . .but wanted me to do something i was not comfortable with and didn't. then. . .oh God, this is awful. . .he took care of himself. . .violently. . . even screamed..."

I won't ask you to explain what did happen, but I will ask...was it something that made you feel unsafe? Was it an act of violence, which you felt might have gone a different way? Might have entailed physical harm to you?

I do get a bad feeling from his lack of a call as to your safety.

If this is the case, once in the situation, you played it smart and got yourself out of there intact.

I absolutely understand how traumatized you feel right now. I'm glad you found the forum. You might want to contact your local battered women's group about attending some support group sessions. And you may want to seek counseling to help you work through your stress, and loss of autonomy.

It gets better from this point. I hear in your words that you are through with repeating these types of experiences.

kris

finished, Your post inspired some additional thought which I feel could benefit all of us former psychopath's victims (me included).

I think it may be possible that, by sharing our psychopath experience with new men, we sometimes interest closet psychopaths in us.

I am reading between the lines that P#2 became interested in you during a time in which you were confiding details about your life with your husband with him.

I'll tell you something that happened to me. A few years ago I was still living with my psychopath husband, and just burning in hell, desperate to escape. I was pathetically still in love with the monster, and had difficulty imagining that I could extract myself without a very potent DIStraction from my yearning. I thought maybe a substitute man was the answer. I quickly located one on love@aol. I wasn't completely nuts. I recognized the man's name, though we had never met. We had talked because I had considered joining his writer's group several years earlier. I thought, great, he's 2 years older than me, we're both writers, we had even had the same agent at one time.

I met him for lunch, and learned he shared almost exactly the same family configuration with my psychopath husband. Same birth order, number of kids, rural upbringing. Lots of other parallels. "Somebody" was trying to tell me something. I wasn't listening. I thought it a good idea to share as much of my personal history as possible, weed him out if he wasn't going to sensitive to my special needs. I didn't have all day to find a new man.

After our lunch I had a bad feeling about him. He had flirted with the waitress in a really intrusive and obnixious way, like angry hostile flirting, He had insulted me, complaining that my hair wasn't blonde as it appeared in my picture, the moment he laid eyes on me.

But, hey...he seemed to like me...he kept e-mailing after that...and "a bird in the hand"...you know... Then came the dirty jokes. I e-mail laughed weakly. Then came the dirty pictures. I took his name out of my address book. Thank God he was neither patient nor subtle.

I have gone out one time in my year since leaving Psychopath, and engaged with a man. Dancing. I shared my background with him, too. Then I got a funny feeling about him. I stopped it before anything started.

If we do meet a psychopath, he is going to be very interested if he thinks he's found a fertile victim. I now think it is not a good idea to share this kind of history with any potential love interest. Get to know somebody first. Then share very cautiously.

This also illustrates why it is important to fully separate from a bad relationship, particularly one with a psychopath, before entering into a new relationship. As we separate and heal, we change, we grow awareness of what happened. If one doesn't do this, one often finds oneself in the same kind of relationship because it still "fits".

kris

thank you again for your response.

i apologize for my rambling.

P#2 was very perceptive. He only knows sketchy details of my life. P#1 worked in a different state and lived with me a few months a year. This went on for years. Being married but without a partner kept me from having married friends and i didn't fit with the singles either because i was married. So my life was my kids. I focused on what i had which was a lot but I longed for a friend, a soulmate someone to just share with. Most people describe me a a "chirpy, cheerleader type" . I have a lot of energy (thank you God) and try to be optimisic. My outlook on life is pretty positive. But underneath the stong exterior is a real human being who wants to love and be loved. Things I NEVER got from P#1. P#2 just started being there. I shared very little because of the shame of it all. Who wants admit to living through the atrocities I did. He didn't press and I didn't offer anymore than I was asked. Really, I enjoyed his company, being around him, talking to him. He came into my life. I did not pursue him but i didn't discourage him either. One day, i realized i loved this person. Maybe I was just grateful that somebody saw some value in me and was willing to be my friend. Heaven knows P#1 didn't. This is what was going on for almost three years before we became intimiate. That moment was the beginning of the end of the illusion.

You are correct. I need time to heal. I have been dealling with two p's for years. Maybe I over reacted to the described senerio. On one hand I'm looking for love and the other hand the evidence it's not there. I think it is a reaction to the way love is expressed through a p. . .hate.

Thank you for taking time to share.
finished

finsihed, It gives me chills that you didn't really share much about your personal life with P#2, yet he primed you for almost 3 years in order to hurt, reject, humiliate you. How do they know? Are we wearing a sign or something? Almost everyone I've ever met who has had one of these experiences has had more than one.

But we can heal and we can change. And we can attract other kinds of men. I have met women who have done that, too.

kris

kris-
because this thing was a big secret i haven't been able to share with anyone. You hit the nail on the head. That was exactly what I thought when it immediately started caving in. It was like he wanted me, but when he got me. . .he hated me for loving him. . .for expressing any feelings at all. I mean, what was the point. In another post, i read, it is all about the chase. I don't know if it is a good or bad quality to give others the benefit of the doubt. Well not good with a p. But maybe i just needed to come to this place with him that I could no longer deny the truth and keep hoping the lie would come true. The reality of this is intense.
oh how i thank you for letting me share. . .I am so relieved to get this out of my head. There was no one to tell. . .
Gratefullly
Finished

> This also illustrates why it is important to fully separate from a bad relationship, particularly one with a psychopath, before entering into a new relationship.

Wow, after reading through all these threads, I realize how I fell so easily into a predator's hands. After 23 years in a relationship with a kind person, but sexually dysfunctional, I was starved for sexual attention, to feel like a woman who was desired. I immediately attracted someone who I know now is a psychopath. I just ended the relationship after 2 months of abuse, which began almost right after the affair began. At first, I thought it was a matter of PTSD with BPD (bad enough), as his last wife commited suicide and he was severely traumatized (this was 4 years ago). But now I'm sure he drove her to suicide. My hair stands on end after reading through these threads.

The pattern fits so exactly, from sympathy for my starved sexual life, giving incredible great sex lasting for hours at the beginning (but little or no foreplay), hints about his group marriage "hippie" friends, just hang and enjoy playing, then learning about daily pot smoking, other substance abuse, no visible signs of income, lying about other relationships, hysterical jealousy if I talk even about a male friend, walking away from me or changing the subject if I talked about myself, making up illnesses so I would take care of him (and of course, not up for sex), miraculous recoveries only to ditch our date and make sure I knew he was going to spend the time with another woman.

Finding this forum is like finding the calm center of the eye of a hurricane. The pattern is so well-defined. I can begin to put the pieces of my life together again.

Thank God it was only a short time. But the intense psychological/emotional brutality shut me down sexually for good it feels like...I'm seeking therapy to understand my vulnerabilities and to close these "holes" in my personality. I went from passive abuse to active abuse. It was like taking candy from a baby.

Much love to everyone!

finished,

"I don't know if it is a good or bad quality to give others the benefit of the doubt. Well not good with a p."

No, this quality does not serve us (or anyone) with a psychopath. The challenge for us maybe was/is to develop a core strength in which we know who we are and what we stand for. As (can't think of her name, but I think is one of the women on "The View") titled her book, "If You Don't Stand For Something, You'll Fall For anything."

I fell for it, We all fell for it.

Welcome to the forum.

It is so helpful when we discover we are not alone.

kris

Kris -
The interesting thing was, I did know or so I thought. Three years of no demand attention made an inroad to my heart. I thought he loved me. I didn't need the words, his actions were all about it. But there were a few signs even then, I just rationalized them away.
Yes, I fell for it! Lock, stock and barrel!
But now. . .
finished

The first time I fled his house in the middle of the night was after an evening and night of being forced to listen to him rant and rave about his prior marriages and the intimate details of his life with the one who committed suicide. He had been drinking heavily for the past few days because of his "bad" back. This was after 3 nights prior of being awakened in the middle of the night to deal with his "bad back", giving massages, listening to his groans of pain and tossing and turning. I was becoming sleep deprived. His eyes were very strange and this scene, although new in our relationship, seemed familiar. I decided to sleep on the couch, I told him I could not have another night of interrupted sleep.
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At that point I realized where I had seen those type of eyes before and experienced this type of treatment: my father. The entire family was continually subjected to his demand for total control over where our attention should be focused: on him. He had been eventually diagnosed as bipolar, but now I know this was not true. He was in truth, a psychopath and my mother was his slave. She had no center. You would ask her something about herself, her own feelings and you would get a blank stare...she didn't know how to own herself, my father owned her feelings, her mind, her soul. She only became angry when her children grew up and we left the nest, and she became the sole focus of my father's domination. I did her fighting for her, but it could never be enough. She needed her children to be a buffer for her so she wouldn't have to bear the brunt of this alone.
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My father used to get upset because he said he could never "break me, get me to cry." I never came to him for advice or help, he wanted me to need him...I refused to need him. He told me that when I was 3, I had misbehaved and he had me in a corner and was hitting me. I wouldn't cry and every time he hit me, I tried to hit him back. However, near the end of his life, I was the only one in the family who received an apology from him. He admitted that he didn't love himself.
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The surrealness of all this is recognizing this pattern, this feeling of deja vue. And the reptilian stare of those eyes. You cannot escape the uniqueness of that stare, no matter what the color. Once you've seen it, you'll never forget it...how they drill into you, draw you in and capture you. You want them to see you, to become warm and soften. But if they do, it's only to fool you. They mete out these false drops and trickles of love so they can maintain a hook into you. And you dangle, praying for more of something, what is it? To be seen for a nanosecond, a single fiber strand of validation, a microscopic drop of love reciprocated. Not realizing that the love you pour out to them becomes the spider's web you weave and ensnare yourself in. Your love is perverted, turned inside out and wielded as a weapon against you.
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I went back to this P, thinking I was too over sensitive because of my background, but quickly realized in the past 2 weeks that something was terribly wrong and I was with someone very dangerous, who was intent on "breaking" me and "owning" me. And I broke up for good.
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This weekend I found this forum and discovered the profound truth of what my parents' relationship had really been. The puzzle pieces fit together now. The bipolar label didn't cover what was really going on. I'm in shock, shaking, but I feel waves of relief rushing through me, I understand now.
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Knowledge and truth, no matter how horrific, is better than being in the dark.

Dear I fell for it aka "Iffi" (for short, 'k?), Congratulations on deciphering your own psychopathic familiar pattern and explaining so accurately the reality of the psychopath. Your description of the way the psychopath operates:

"They mete out these false drops and trickles of love so they can maintain a hook into you. And you dangle, praying for more of something, what is it? To be seen for a nanosecond, a single fiber strand of validation, a microscopic drop of love reciprocated. Not realizing that the love you pour out to them becomes the spider's web you weave and ensnare yourself in. Your love is perverted, turned inside out and wielded as a weapon against you."

Yes, Iffi, excellent depiction of what I experienced while still ignorant about the malignant forces in my life.

It makes me really appreciate how far I've come even though the pain of the lessons has been more than I've thought I could bear at times.

Welcome to the forum. Please continue to post! I've enjoyed your honest contribution.

Cherie

finished, This man sounds especially cold and frightening. It's true, anyone would feel safe about a person after three years of kind, warm, undemanding attention. And if there were only a few signs, in those three years, of course you would rationalize them away. The healthiest of people do that...because everyone knows no one is perfect. The best of people sometimes do or say weird things. Your story gives me chills because it is atypical. It fits a more normal pattern of beginning, and middle, and then this shocking, frightening ending. It makes me wonder...is it possible to have no red flags?

I am not happy with that thought.

kris

Cherie, I am in AWE of all who have emerged from long-term relationships and are fighting to get their minds/souls back, the courage it must take. Many blessings to you!
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What scares me is that I was involved for only 2 months and I still want to be with him. I hate to admit this, it feels like I'm fighting a drug addiction. That I still want to be with him scares me to the core. It must be my family history that leaves me so susceptible.
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And people wonder how voodoo works? Using exactly these techniques, getting into your mind and controlling it. Until it happens to you, you won't believe it. But you don't need to believe it for it to happen to you.

I fell for it,

Your ability to recognize and describe your feelings will serve you well in your movement toward a healthier self. As you describe your mother's state of being...cut off from her feelings, her center, her self...you can see what is required for survival of the self, and survival of the psychopath experience.

Hearing your story, I had a bit of a deja vu. I have heard similar stories from a number of women: A psychopathic parent. Then a fairly normal adulthood, fairly normal relationships, then...BANG! A psychopath. I don't know how old you are, but I have gotten the impression that this psychopath was not your first major relationship. If this is the case, your story fits this pattern. It seems to me that those of us who had a psychopathic parent are destined to meet psychopathy, in the world, in our adult lives. Horrible as it is, I can not imagine any life experience which offers more of a challenge and opportunity for inner growth. When faced with a psychopath, it is pretty much, grow in inner strength, courage, selfhood, commitment to all that is right and good, or die. Without this inner metal, the psychopath would claim our inner beings for his own selfish purposes.

I can see how your recent experience with a psychopath has led you back into your past. Perhaps it is to reclaim some part of your self that was long ago lost. All in all, you appear to have survived your childhood very well. But anyone in that situation loses some pieces of themselves, which possibly they do very well without, for a number of years. Until they meet a psychopath.

It looks as if this adult experience is, at the very least, going to serve as a conduit, for you, to a deeper understanding of your childhood experience.

By the way, that accommodation of the psychopath "thinking I was too over sensitive because of my background" is classic! My psychopath even began to brainwash me with that nonsense, within a year of our beginning. He knew I was thinking it, and he exploited it to the max. What scheming reptiles they are. And what ripe opportunitites for exploitation they find in the adult children of psychopaths. Somebody else already did alot of the work for them. All they have to do is step in, work the victim's weaknesses, and reap the benefits.

I am wondering, how is your mother now?

kris

Oh yes... the drops and trickles of "love" so coldly meted out. The dangling carrot that is always pulled just beyond your reach. When my P decided that "he was no longer in love me me", after two months of love madness, and a marriage proposal, I felt as though I was dropped from the highest pinnacle of heaven onto sharp, jagged rocks in the pit of hell. And, despite his "revelation", he continued to live with me (he had moved in within two weeks after we met), and go back and forth... in love, not in love, in love, not in love. Then the sex stopped. We were to have sex on a "different" level. Physical/emotional intimacy was now relegated to the etheric levels, along with "promises" that this was necessary in order to "get back to where we were." Then just last week, he moved out of my home lock, stock, and barrel, and returned to his blue bus in the desert (no utilities, no water, no nothing out there). As he walked out my door, he said: We are still together. I said: If you drive away, I am done. I will not seek you out. Consequently, I spoiled his plan, refused to bite at the dangling carrot. He called me 3 days later. We met. We talked. The rules had now changed (the rules changed on a weekly, sometimes daily basis). Now we are supposed to be monogamous, yet he will stay at the bus, and I will be in my own space. Monogamous... that's a laugh... hell, we're CELEBIT! What's the point of monogamy, other than to control me without giving me anything in return? My last interaction with him was Saturday night. He came over expecting to stay for the evening, but I wouldn't allow him to do so as I wasn't feeling well. He left me with the words: We are Soul Friends in TRUTH. More of the endless "spiritual" jibberish I listened to over a 3 + month period of time. We made plans for him to come over last night. He stood me up. THAT'S his "truth". It's getting cold. I know he is going to want to come back. He doesn't seek out his victims in the wintertime. That's the "bardo" as he calls it. My P runs in seasonal cycles: He emerges in May, finds a victim, falls madly "in love" with her, maintains that stance for approximately 2 months, then commits emotional murder. He blames it on the monthly "dark of the moon", and the turning of the seasons. The "dark of the moon" (new moon) is his renewal time. During that time he would go to his bus, or lock himself in my basement bedroom for 2 days. Fall is a time of isolating in preparation for his "death", which occurs in winter. No sex or affection, because we have to "start from the beginning to truly see each other after the love madness of the spring/summer. Then in winter, I am supposed to be alone, seeing him only occasionally, most likely when he needs something. Always, sex/affection is a promise that may be, yet I am not supposed to "wait" for it to happen. When spring resumes, "so will our love". I supported this P for the most part. I opened my home and heart to him. Now I am alone, wondering what the hell happened. I KNOW he's mentally ill, and so I feel compassion. He is a tortured" souless shell. He wants what others have: Love, a home, money. Yet, he wants nothing to do with earning those things, and others have to follow his rules, which make no sense whatsoever, and make it impossible for him to get what he "wants". I have spoken with his X-wife and his X-girlfriend. They both describe the same scenario. The latter replied to an email I sent her by saying, "My experience with P was filled with extreme pain and chaos. I do not wish to regurgitate the details." BIG SIGH HERE. I still love him because my feelings for him were real. There were no huge red flags waving in the breeze at the onset by the way. No way of knowing I was about to be killed.

Kris, thank you for all your insights. Your posts are so empowering and I've learned so much!
Unfortunately, I didn't wind up unscathed as an adult, had the label of hypomanic. I chose a passive-aggressive man to marry (who was the "kind" version of my father, shared many family history and physical traits. Yikes!). I brought my dysfunction to the relationship and became his hypercritical mother, although that has eased greatly (even by his own admission) in the past years.
We kept playing into each other's screwed up backgrounds. Couples and individual therapy helped a little, but not much. This went on for 22 years.( I had many partners before we were married, he had few.) I went off the deep end in depression and extremely low self-esteem as a woman this summer when my sexual needs were rejected yet once again. I went onto a personal ads site and had no idea that I was waving a flag to "come and exploit me".
I was in a trance state, quite literally, my husband said he had never experienced cruelty like this from me, I was a complete stranger to him. We are separating quite amiably, we both recognize that we've been on a hamster wheel and may not be able to get off it after being in such a pattern for nearly a quarter century. He's definitely not a P, and acknowledges his major issues, as do I. We'll always be good friends and have much sorrow about what we've done to each other over the years.
I'm nearly 50 now. I was responsible for my mother's well-being and intervened to rescue her throughout their life. Both parents are deceased, my father went 3 years before my mother. Both were 80 when they died. My mother had 3 years without my father, she was so broken and disappointed. She didn't know why she did what she did, she just felt she "had to", she felt sorry for my father and his background. She felt she had wasted her life. God, that was so hard to hear as a daughter.
Yes, this is one heck of a conduit into the past. Again, thanks for all your kind words and support. I hope you can get your book out, you have much to give, especially hope!

> He left me with the words: We are Soul Friends in TRUTH. More of the endless "spiritual" jibberish.
Senihele: wow, I got a load of this spiritual junk also. He felt I wasn't like the other women, the "cattle", who he claimed he was going to stop seeing. Except that he lied and saw many other women. I explained to him that he didn't have to lie, but I think he did because he didn't want me to date other men, which I didn't.
This type of behavior is probably beyond treatment, so your compassion will be used against you. I hope you can find an exit for yourself, find the light, go towards it and never, never look back.

Oh honey. . .I know just what you mean. It has been fifteen days since my episode, yet I would even today appreciate a "sign" that he "cares". Yes, until it happens to you, you can't believe it. I am so glad to have the forum also, it has been my lifeline these past two weeks. My computer crashed Sunday night, I thought I'd lost my best friend. I also appreciate your posting.
finished

I fell for it:

"The surrealness of all this is recognizing this pattern, this feeling of deja vue. And the reptilian stare of those eyes. You cannot escape the uniqueness of that stare, no matter what the color. Once you've seen it, you'll never forget it...how they drill into you, draw you in and capture you. You want them to see you, to become warm and soften. But if they do, it's only to fool you. They mete out these false drops and trickles of love so they can maintain a hook into you. And you dangle, praying for more of something, what is it? To be seen for a nanosecond, a
single fiber strand of validation, a microscopic drop of love reciprocated. Not realizing that the love you pour out to them becomes the spider's web you weave and ensnare yourself in. Your love is perverted, turned inside out and wielded as a weapon against you."

I wouldn't change a word of this passage for a book. It describes the tactics of all Ps flawlessly. I had just this experience, but online. The dynamics were as you describe, right down to the most infinitesimal innuendo. Good is heterogenous, evil is homogeneous. That's all I have to say..... I am glad that comprehension has brought you some solace, as it has for all of us here.
persistent

>You want them to see you, to become warm and soften. But if they do, it's only to fool you. They mete out these false drops and trickles of love so they can maintain a hook into you. And you dangle, praying for more of something, what is it? To be seen for a nanocecond a single fiber strand of validation, a microscropic drop of love reciprocated. Not realizing that the love you pour out to them becomes the spider's web you weave and snsnare yourself in. Your love is perverted, turned inside out and wielded as a weapon against you."< I've got to print that out and keep it in my wallet!

Just today, I was thinking love was the carrot I was always going for. I thought I saw it once and I wanted it back. I distinctly remember the times his eyes softened but it wasn't often. The last night we were together, the best he could say was "it takes two" I said what does that mean? Really? It is only good when two people want to be together? He said, . . oh. . .something like that. I said. You aren't going to give me anything are you? He mumbled something vague about you know how fragile these things are. . . Me constantly trying to recapture what I thought it was. Of course, it never was. It was the bait. When I took the bait, I was hooked. . .line and sinker. Yes, that's the bait. The hope that maybe this time I'll find what I looking for.

He called last night. I finally took his call (14 days later). He was very upbeat. Hi. . .how are you?

I didn't say, in shock, traumatized, barely have my head on straight. ( I remembered what Betrayed told me, they get off on your pain). But I told him about my horrible ride home. And asked why he didn't call to inquire about my safety. He still can't give me anything. He said he was sorry I was hurt or disappointed and then said, I'll let you go. . . It was anything but comforting. And now I have a new way of thinking. I must remember, it was an inconvience for him for me to have had a problem with any of it. I'll learn.

But see, even then, I was hoping to hear some level of concern. . .Oh God, help me the pain of it is unbelievable. . .

Thanks to I fell for it for a wonderful rendition of the "Pattern".

Bless you all
Finished

Quite truthfully, the first trauma started when he didn't call me the next day after the first time we were together. This was a first for me. I felt extremely insecure and desperately needed a little reassurance. As the day passed into the night, you can imagine what I was feeling. Then about 10 that night I get a call and his gruff voice just said, I wondered how your'e doing. It was so impersonal and unemotional. Not what I was hoping for. After that, it quickly began to fall apart. We quit meeting for coffee, lunch and gradually he only called every so often. I felt the most personal rejection. Then I told him I couldn't do this anymore because it was to hard on me. We hadn't been together for almost two years. We have been in relationship thru work but that was it. He started showing interest in me again. Maybe he didn't. . .maybe I was hoping that's what he was doing (but I didin't ask to be with him, he asked me). It was the carrot. I'm always thinking, I'll get the love I want this time, or even the friendship. The loss was devestating. Will I get over this? Does anybody?

I'm spinning. .

Once again I thank you for being there.
finished

(((Finished)))) I am so proud of you. That my words helped you get through that phone call makes me feel good. If I have helped just one person through my experience, that's good enough for me. I'm so glad you have an appointment on Thursday at the womens center. No more contact. It is the only way to heal. Grieve the fact that he is too sick to love, properly. It's such a shame that they have to destroy anything good that comes in their lives. You are going to come out of all this so much stronger than you ever realized possible.
Baby step. Baby step.

Betrayed

God Bless You betrayed. Your words meant more to me than you can imagine. (((((betrayed))))) back. You HAVE helped! MORE than you could know.

>it is a shame that they have to destroy anything good that comes in their lives< Yesterday I thought, it was like if he couldn't have me, he would destroy me. p#1 was like that too. Before he left, I felt very uneasy about a few things he said. But thought, I'm imagining things. . .

Thank you SO MUCH for your words of encouragement. You will never know how much this forum and all the validation and support has kept me going. I'm looking forward (I think) to my appointment tommorrow. I find I have a hard time believing I fall into that group. . .did you experience that? The first appointment is for counseling and they also have a support group. I'll keep you posted.

With heartfelt gratitude. . .
finished

Senihele,

"He left me with the words: We are Soul Friends in TRUTH. More of the endless "spiritual" jibberish I listened to over a 3 + month period of time. We made plans for him to come over last night. He stood me up. THAT'S his "truth"."

Manipulation of spiritual truth is one of the psychopath's most insidious tools. Mine (who was in a Master of Divinity program at the local seminary) used this tool to talk me into menage a trois, 30 years ago. This was to help me free my soul of possessiveness, and to stretch my capacity for love to encompass more than one person. He also pulled the celibacy thing...you know, him being evolved beyond sexuality. The reality was, he was used beyond doing it, again, when he got home to me.

I fell for it, I'm so glad this forum is helping you.

Unlike your mother, you are taking the route to awareness, and making one whole sense and one whole reality of your life. In a way, her life won't be wasted because you are picking up where she left off, and doing the work she didn't do. We sometimes carry on the work left undone by our parents. And in generations' time, there is healing.

kris

finished,

This account of how this man operated with you gives me a thump in the stomach. I recognize the psychopath's sexual modus operendi. What grabs me is the speed with which this one moved in for the kill. The whole aim is to hook in the victim, deeply, powerfully, and then take forty steps back, and stand aloof and unreachable. They get a charge out of this. At the end, with mine, I could watch him doing it. He would dangle a carrot, then run away and hide, playing keep-away with the carrot. He wasn't very subtle, at the end, and I was able to see, in the coarser version, what he had been doing to me, for 30 years.

Yours pulled this abrupt and confusing withdrawal after his very first sexual victory over you. I guess he thought it would work given that he had spent 3 years building the house he built to tear down.

No doubt, he started showing interest in you, again, when he was no longer collecting dividends on his investment. He wasn't seeing you suffer. This helps explain to me, also, why your last time with him was so horrible. It contained his rage that you had slipped out of his control, however briefly.

A psychopath has amazing "patience" when he is in the process of torturing a victim. Mine used to sit for entire weekends, with a blanket over his head, ignoring me, never moving a muscle. I eventually realized it's not patience. The passive exercise of withholding from an emotionally starved and suffering victim is enormously satsifying to a psychopath.

He didn't call for 2 weeks, after this last episode, and then his voice was detached and cold. He called to collect some more payoff. He's a cold, dead fish, finished. He can only experience a spark of emotion by setting a fire underneath his victims.

You will get over it. Keep reading and working to understand.

kris

Kris-

There are simply no words that can convey the deep appreciation for your feedback. What a totally accurate piture of what happened. I feel I owe a debt I can never repay for the answers I have found here. Tears are stinging my eyes even now as I write this.

Who would ever know. I had a friend I shared with about the first tramua. Now, I see, she could have never known. She basiclly put it all on me and my insecurities.

I am so grateful that you are here to share your experience and insight. There are so many on here that seem to have such a wealth of knowledge on this. I appreciate that you are bring it down to where we live.

God Bless you. .
Gratefully again. . .
Finished

He said to me once, " I saw a guy on the street and he was beating a woman, and ( said very slowly ) SHE... LOOKED... JUST... LIKE... YOU. I replied, " I don't understand women who let men beat them, I don't understand why they stay with them. I'd never let a guy beat me." He continued on with this story, eventually saying he had been at the womans home with her, all the while stating, SHE LOOKED JUST LIKE YOU.

I never in a million years, figured I would be seeking help at a battered womens center. Its amazing what can be done without calling a woman names or hitting her.


I understand now.

Betrayed.

Persistent, The more I talk to people about this, the more I realize how few have any comprehension of what it means to have your mind/soul mainlined and controlled. There's more of a thrill when a P can warp an intelligent target's reality. I prefer saying "target" rather than "victim." A target can move out of the way, you have to give yourself that option.

>And now I have a new way of thinking. I must remember, it was an inconvience for him for me to have had a problem with any of it. I'll learn.
finished, don't let yourself learn to be against yourself. You have to move! And keep on moving. A moving target can't be easily pinned. I'm trying to look at this as an addiction, where you crave something that's no good for you. Even if it's gradual withdrawal, you have to do it.

>We sometimes carry on the work left undone by our parents.
kris, thanks again for putting a positive perspective on this. understanding what my mom went through is a revelation. we could never understand why she couldn't fight back against such obvious cruelty. now i know.

Betrayed-

I realized yesterday, that by staying with this, writing it down, has FORCED me to look at my own story. When I said I found it hard to believe I was going to a battered womans center for help, I realized later if I had not been posting here, I would be back in that denial, minimizing, rationaling stage. It FORCED me to look at MY REALITY, and. . .everything that has brought me to this place. I feel real shakey as I write this.

Thank you again for being willing to share you experience with me. . .I just can't say that enough.
Finished

okay. . .just an update. I had an appointment this afternoon at the Battered Womens center. I filled out the paperwork, sat down and waited to be called. i was alone in the waiting room. The staff kept coming and going from the back office and then peering at me through the glass. I felt that sob rising in my chest. I thought if they don't call me soon, i'm bolting. Which I did. I know it's me. I felt like I was in a fishbowl being evaluated for whatever. I'm sure that wasn't the case but I ran anyway. I rescheduled. Next Wednesday at 10:00am. Then about fifteen minutes later P#2 is pulling out on the same street as me at the same time about one block away. I'm know he saw me, he was right behind me. I just kept my eyes straight ahead. Then he pulled up right beside me to make a right hand turn, I was going straight. I just kept my eyes straight ahead. I could see him out of my prehiphal vision but did not acknowledge him. My heart was pounding. Not a very good afternoon. . .
Sadly,
Finished

Finished, I went to a woman's shelter when I left my psychopath. I bolted too. Go back and attend the meeting Finished. I did. I did not fit in. I did not look like the others. But I was the same inside. I went, listened, cried, and shared. And I learned. And I never went back to him.

I am remembering how I felt the first time I went. Thank god there was no one else in the waiting room. I felt in shock, embarrassed. But once I got in to see the lady, she was so kind and gentle with me.

Keep your eye out for P#2, maybe accidently seeing him wasn't an accident. It is a stalking technique, one of many. I had too many of those, day after day after day, different times, different places. It was too much of a coincidence. Sorry, your description triggered me.

Anyways, its better to be prepared with these guys, then for me to pretend you hadn't mentioned it. Its part of their profile.

Read "Gift of Fear" by Gavin DeBecker. Great stalking tips for people being stalked. And even if you are not being stalked, great tips in there for anyone, to keep safe.

You handled seeing him, exactly right. Just pretend you don't even see him. He'll do anything to get a reaction from you, good or bad. He doesn't care, as long as he gets attention.

Thank you Betrayed and Neverthesame-
It is just as you said,I felt shocked and embarrassed to be there. Then, I started thinking. . .what am I doing here. Maybe they'll think my experience was'nt that bad. And I didn't get beat up, (what I mean is my bruises don't show). They were kind. I had filled out my paperwork so they had my phone number and called. I am scheduled for next Wednesday am. Right now I feel like a frightened animal. I'm so sensitive to any sign of rejection.

I WILL get a copy of "Gift of Fear". I did think what a coinscidence he was RIGHT THERE within 1/2 block from me. He has been way to cool so aloof that's the last thing I expect. But I didn't expect the other either EVER.

Thank you both so much for you encouraging words and sharing how you felt. I am so very grateful for your kindness. I'll keep after it. I very much want to heal and learn and recover. I just can't quit thanking you all.

God Bless
Finished

>I'm trying to look at it as an addiction, where you crave something that's not good for you. Even if it's gradual withdrawal, you have to do it< I like that, that is a good way to look at it! P#1 was alcholic. I was in alanon. I never thought about doing a twelve step with this. . .that might work.

And thank you for showing me that remark. It isn't like me at all. And really, I don't even want to think like that. It's better to have the awareness and as you say, keep moving, they can't hit a moving target easily.

I appreciated that!
Gratefull to be here!
Finished

>It isn't like me at all. And really, I don't even want to think like that.


It isn't you, it isn't any of us. We can't blame ourselves, it's pointless to go there. I look at it as a particularly harsh lesson in awareness from the Universe. All we can do is create a new pattern for ourselves, which will include this type of awareness so we will recognize it instantly for what it is and remove ourselves as a target. Someone else said on another post (it was probably kris :-) that only God's love could help this type of person. She was so right. It is beyond our human help. That's the lesson we have to learn, that some people are beyond human intervention. Not what you're taught in Sunday school, eh?

>I realized yesterday, that by staying with this, writing it down, has FORCED me to look at my own story.
finished,
I think you hit on something that greatly helps to offload all that is running rampant in our minds: to write it down. That act alone creates distance, gets it OUT of our heads, and puts us in a more objective position of observing, rather than just reacting to pain. All of us reaching out and writing, to me, furthers this healing process. Thank you so much!!

I fell and finished,

That is so absolutely true. If ever there is a book about recovery from psychopathic
abuse, surely it will include this step...write it down! It's even different than talking,
though talking is important, too. But when you are not talking, when you are just writing,
you are hearing only your own voice speak. There is no distraction. As you write and
read (observe), your story reveals its kernels of truth, just as if you were reading a book.
There is a deep wise part within every one of us that knows more than we consciously do.
Writing accesses that part. I am often surprised by the things I write which I didn't know I
knew.

It is no mystery to me that I finally extricated my soul from the psychopath once I began
to write the book. Part of the psychopathic experience is that the victim is not permitted
to weave a whole cloth of her life with the psychopath. The psychopath forces a condition
of fragmentation of experience on the victim. If she attempts to talk about patterns in
order to tackle chronic problems, she is "bringing up the past", beating him up with it,
abusing him. The problem in the relationship, he never stops telling her, is her inability to
forgive, leave the past in the past.

It is mind-boggling the horror and abuse I managed to shove down in 30 years with a
psychopath. But shoving it down was a condition he continually forced on me. I was not
uniformly successful. For years and years, it would all rise up, forming a horrifying
picture, in its entirety. When I felt desperate about it, I would often think, "I should write
this. This is a book. Someday, I should write this book. If I ever worte all of this down,
it would be pure horror." And I would realize that I ever DID write it all down, in its
entirety, it would mean the end of my life with my husband. Because then I would have
the whole picture, too.

(Computer shut down, at this point, hence the formatting above.)

It took an earthquake to my foundation to finally put my hands to computer keys. I started, then stopped, reconciled with Psychopath. I desperately did not want the truth to be the truth. I wanted a different truth. But my powers of denial could not stand up to the consciousness that had come. The fragmentation of my experience had begun to made whole. I had begun to really the know the truth. Writing it is an essential step, in combatting denial and rationalization.

My p told me initially that he felt I had been "sent to him from God." One of the first things he did was bring me a small South American nativity from his mother's native country to place upon my mantle. All the while, he was being unmasked and ejected on every front. He lost his job for getting aggressive verbally with a superior. His roomate almost beat his ass, he said for borrowing a video (these guys are notorious for having no respect for other's property!), his landlord evicted him (Something I should have done a dozen times for the incense burns, ink stains, etc. that he created). Yet those words about God softened me, I thought he was a lost lamb, poor thing. In time he brought into my home morning, noon and night pot-smoking, pornography, and admiration for the life of the swingers. Still, I looked at that nativity. How ironic.

The sex with P was very mechanical, cold, unfeeling, gymnastic. He was all into "point your toes, arch your back", do this, do that. Very little, if any kissing. He was only into genitals touching. I can't remember having sex with him and our chests touching. I'd ask him to kiss me more, more foreplay and he did try once, but I could tell his heart wasn't in it. He also always wanted to give me a massage. When we broke up I found out that he had put a hidden camera in the bedroom the first time we had sex and put the pictures on a porn website he had. I am still trying to get over that by going to a therapist. My mind couldn't understand how he could do something so vile like that until I found a website on psychopaths.

Hi Jacq, welcome to the forum. What you are desribing is very familiar indeed. Without offering a diagnosis I have heard this type of story many, many times, they don't really know how to be intimate. Psychopath's learn as they grow up and my guess is sex is one thing they don't learn how to mimic. The best example is Scott Peterson who was highly socialized, they just don't know how to act at a funeral or vigil since they have never been trained how to react. Was he this way sexually from the beginning?

Did he have a certain look in his face during this time? I believe it is against the law to record someone without their knowledge, there is a website that details which States can do what. However, it probably isn't wise to put a target on your back by challenging him. The old saying, best to leave the rubbish by the curbside.

Di

As crude as this may sound.

I feel that psychopaths simply masturbate with your body.

They have bedroom eyes as well.

Hi Murray, that is an excellent description. Do you think they make eye contact or not if using your theory? Many members have said there was little to no eye contact.

Di

Di-

Not much eye during sex. Their eyes are open though--they just don't look at you.

Lizard eyes but bright and shinny.

Were they dark and evil looking eyes also when you could catch a glimpse while they were looking away and you got a peek at them?
Di

Di~

At the center is a black hole. The outside is colorful.

Sometimes the also look glassy. Like they are gazed over and bright. Like a lizards eyes.

Most people do not have these eyes.

Di~

Do you think they look in the mirror and see what some of us see when we look at them? I
would be scared of myself if I had eyes like that. It isn't very attractive. They look fake like glass eyes.

Hi Murray, no I am just guessing but I don't think they see what we see. I am guessing that anyone who thinks like they are the victim and have no conscience would see things through a different set of lenses. After all it is all about them. I think when they "unmask" is when the eyes are terrible black holes, I am wondering if they are "unmasking" during sex? Most if not all have described the dark holes and described it as looking into the eyes of the devil. I have only seen a couple during my daily wanderings with those evil eyes.

Di

Di~

It does look like black holes and I could see how someone might say a black well also for the fact that if you look down at the bottom of an actual well [that's what I see--looks like black mercury wiggling around in the center of their eyes]. A black hole eye looks different than black well eyes. I've seen them have both at different times. That is what the retina looks like. They have these eyes during sex. Their eyes also look bright. Like they glow.

I won't let anyone fix my car who has eyes like anything I just described.
Have a nice day.
Murray

Di~

Sorry if I get off topic. I have attention issues.

From my own personal experience [ex husband is psychopathic] a psychopaths eyes during sex are bright and the retina looks like liquid mercury (a black well not a black hole). It is also not like their eyes are wide open during sex either, they are slightly open.

As I stated previously, a black well and a black hole look different. I have seen psychopaths have both...only a black well during sex [the rest of the eye is very bright].

They do unmask during sex.

If you don't a conscience you are evil. How can you repent if you lack empathy...you can't.

I see these eyes a lot. On people I don't know personally. It is scary.

Murray

Hi Murray, I know what you mean, I saw those black eyes when I passed a man along a not well traveled road hitting his dog, I came just a few feet from him and coulnd't stop to help the dog. When I reported him the animal control guy mentioned the eyes also. It stops you in your steps that is for sure.

Di

Di~

That's interesting that the animal control guy mentioned the eyes to you. People in those positions must come in contact w/psychopaths quite often---like social workers as well.

Murray

WOW. Crude, yes, but TRUE. That's just how it felt. He manipulated me for HIS pleasure, not mine.

Thanks for putting it in a nutshell.

I agree - TARGET is a better word.

On My Own Again~

I agree too. We are targets. It is a better word.

Sex w/a psychopath hasn't always been bad at all. They are selfish. My favorite painting is the Harlequin by Cezanne. Sometimes the people in my family had eyes that were completely black.

Sorry,....what a strange question is this???
If you are asking bout psychopaths and agressive sex..directly, maybe you could consider people being not up to answering a question like that?
Have you got any idea what kidn of feelings are involved and how much the damage is these people suffer?
Sorry this is simply too insensetive for words!!

In my country I have several forums..one of them about incest and sexual abuse...If any one would ask a question like this on my forum I would know what to do......

From Sparkle, sorry the post went into the air. Di

Murray what do you mean by unmasked during sex?

As I think back over the years with my about to be former husband, he was having sex, I was making love; his eyes were often shining and he had this stupid smile on his face, he would wake me at 5 am and demand sex, and whine when I said I need to go to back to sleep; it was pretty spectacular at the begining and then mechanical and routine.

I think the man said I love you about 4-5 times over the course of 20 years (after the initial manipulations.)

He also got ridiculously infantile while I was pregnant with our second son, had a long affair, was jealous of the care I gave to our boys when they were infants, just whined and grouchy. He was very, very mean during my second pregnancy, saying I got pregnant using him as sperm donor, ie , he didn't count, it wasn't about HIM.

Towards the end, I experimented with not playing along with the nicey nice, oh everything is wonderful, after sex. If there was a problem, duh, I would address it, and he would go from oh, how wonderful you are into a raging fit. No wonder he abandoned me for a new target, no more fun, game over. Not quite as I didn't fully get it then, 5 months ago but I sure do now.

The information about oxytocin, sex and premature bonding has been very helpful. I hope that younger women coming up will have the advantage of this kind of knowledge.

I am so grateful to be out of this "relationship" and to have the resources to make sense of my experience.

Sparkle

Kris,

I am new to this site. Everything you have written strikes a chord of familiarity with me. I have yet to share my story because I am still stuck in it.

Welcome Takenin. I'm new also. I've known I needed to stop all contact for a long time now. It's so hard to do. Their persistence makes it seem like they love you. My Psychopath says I love you non stop. I have told him it is crossing my boundaries if he says it. His actions prove that he hates me. He's a pathological liar. I told him I will not believe a word he say's ever again. He will have to prove who he is through his actions alone. I don't know who I'm trying to kid. I just need to get away. It seems like no matter how I try to hold my own ground He somehow twists me right back into where he wants me somehow. Between the sex and and the constant I love you's. It's almost impossible to remember how he is covertly trying to destroy me and control me in any way that he can.

I am lucky I guess. I figured out my Psychopath was a Psychopath before we were married. I caught him cheating and the way he had lied strait to my face for so long. I knew he was not right. I prayed for answers and I found all this information on psychopaths. I showed it to him and he admitted it. He actually pointed out that he was so charming to women. He was proud of most of the things about him. Then he acted like I was the one who made him realize the error of his ways. That I saved his life, as he put it. I also was able to bring to his knowledge that he was a sex addict. The last year of my life has been a living hell. I just realized that his plea for help and his act of wanting to change these things about him to have a happy life and marriage someday and to be a good father to his daughters. Was all that "An Act" He instead got to know the deepest parts of my heart and soal and was trying to decimate me the whole time for seeing through his mask. In alot of ways he has been more open with me about alot of the things about himself. At least more than with anyone else. It seems like a mask on a mask on another mask most of the time though. He has told me about he eyes glazing over. He says he gets high like from cocaine or something, when he looks at me sexually and he has some incredibly perverted thoughts that go through his mind. Psychopaths can't separate porn from real life so it is a very dangerous thing for them. He viewed his "world as a porno." I have watched him try to change some things. Even try to quit the porn. It is only because he saw it was controlling his life and that it was obvious that people could tell there was something wrong with him. He has no conscience. He does care what people think of him. That's all he cares about. He spends his days seeking attention from women and anyone for that matter just to feed of the energy and to feel good about himself. But it's all lies he uses to get this this attention so I don't see how it works for him. Well dah. He thinks it's cool to be a liar. the whole situation is the opposite to the way I think or feel and I need to get away from him. He has tried to destroy me before when I have wanted him out of my life. He just made me loose my job. I'm really afraid because I do know so much about him. Being close to him was the only way I knew that would keep him from destroying me when we broke up. He will not be the one to take any blame for the break up or relationship problems. He's already got my family brainwashed. I just don't car any more allowing him the chance to try to prove he can change was the biggest mistake of my life. He is pure evil. Evil has no power over us. only the power we allow it to. accepting the fact that these people cannot care about us in any way is the hardest part. It is the only way to truly break free though I feel. This is where i am at right now. My no contact has to start today!

Dear Stephanie:

NO CONTACT is how you will save yourself and save your own life.

You can do it. I know you can. You can do more than you think you can.

You are correct. He doesn't love you, in fact, he CAN'T love you. He doesn't matter. Right now, your family doesn't matter, the opinions of others don't matter. What matters is you saving yourself from the Psychopath's manipulative ways. And NO CONTACT is the only effective way to do that, as you have learned.

Please understand that as soon as he sees that you are serious about NO CONTACT and that he's lost you as a target, he will move on quickly to the next target. Hard to believe right now, I know, but it's true. He has to have a target and if it is not going to be you because you won't put up with it anymore, then ZIP! he's off to the next target. I promise you.

You didn't marry the guy. You didn't have children with the guy. He cannot destroy you. He will try, but only for a while. He'll move on and forget you.

You can do it. I know you can. NO CONTACT!

Let us know what happens.