After the sociopath: How do we heal? Part 10 – Forgiving
PDF This article talks about work we do when we are ready to work on clearing the influence of betrayals from our minds and emotional systems. It is about recovering our feelings of safety in the world and moving forward to create better and happier lives. Those of us who are still battling our betrayers, still clarifying our feelings of outrage or still developing our self-defensive skills may feel outraged by the very idea of forgiving. And so they should. Forgiving is something we do “at our leisure,” later when we have the time to think about restoring our emotional systems to a pre-warzone state. Ultimately we want to be positive, creative, optimistic people — without ever forgetting the lessons we learned in our histories. This article is about what we do, when we’re ready to put it all behind us. — Kathy
“Forgiveness is a dangerous passage.” This is a quote from an unknown source on the white board on my office. It’s been there for years and every time I think about cleaning it off, I think “oh not yet.” The temptation to forgive for the wrong reasons is something I don’t want to forget.
In this tenth article of this series on recovering from traumatic relationships, we will discuss the process of forgiving. It is a bridge between the grieving/letting go and the rebuilding phases.
Why bother?
A lot of people have a lot of opinions on forgiveness. Most religious or spiritual disciplines will tell us that forgiving is essential to our spiritual health. On a more mundane level, we may we aware that our friends and supporters are losing patience with our extended healing process, or may be pressuring us to get over it. On a more personal level, we may want to reenter the world without all this emotional baggage that makes us so hyper-conscious of potential threats that we have a hard time seeing or taking advantage of opportunities for good experiences.
In my mind, the only reason to ever consider forgiving is that we want to free out minds of the residue of anger that hangs on after we grieve and let go. There are other benefits we get out of forgiveness, but the first motivation has to be to improve the “quality of life” in our own minds. It’s a matter of our relationship with ourselves.
In addition, I believe there are a few prerequisites to really forgiving anything. The most important of them is that our suffering is fading. (That doesn’t mean that we’re not still dealing with repercussions of some sort, but that the level of pain has diminished to the point where it’s less important than our desire to get over it.)
The other one is that we have the stability and presence of mind to know that we can forgive without getting back into the situation that caused us all this pain in the first place. If we’re still attracted to that situation or others like it, we’re leapfrogging ahead to forgiving before we’ve done the preliminary work of getting angry at our betrayers, developing defensive skills, and facing the fact that there are things we just cannot fix or change.
What is NOT a good reason for forgiving is some sort of social expediency, because we have to deal with our betrayers or with other people who are not sympathetic or pressuring us to get over it. There are other ways to handle that situation.
Here are some of the things we may be thinking as we approach forgiving:
• These angry or frightened feelings don’t have any place in my life anymore. I want to move on.
• I’m ready to find more interests than this bitterness
• I want to clean up my emotional system so I become more positive and optimistic
• I’m starting to remember how I felt before all this happened, and I want to recover some of that joy of life.
• This just isn’t worth the energy I’ve been giving it
But to forgive, we have to overcome one major obstacle. Fear. Forgiving is actually part of overcoming fear. But we have to face it head on too.
Fear and forgiveness
The progress of healing involves us becoming more and more real about what happened and how we feel about it. In anger, we get closer to recognizing our fear, but our reaction is to throw things at it – blame, threats, vengeance, work on fixing things so it never happens again. In grieving and letting go, we accept the specific losses that we have endured. While that is good work, it also clarifies our vulnerability to random events or to specific threats in the world. We may work on accepting that vulnerability, along with our other losses, but it doesn’t change the fact that it exists.
And so now, our increasing awareness of the costs of our vulnerability raises a new issue. How do we live with the fear?
This question makes sense of all we’ve been through to process the trauma. We may have dabbled with fear in our processing. Asking ourselves “what if” this or that. What if no one ever loves me again? What if I am really too stupid to live? But we never sat down to really look it hard in the eye.
Because fear is an extremely uncomfortable emotion. In fact, if we look at all the so-called negative emotions, including shame and guilt, and do enough digging down, we find fear at the bottom of them. Other than love, it is the most fundamental emotion. And it is the antithesis of love or connectedness. We literally can’t feel love and fear at the same time. One will overtake the other.
Fear is designed to stop everything else until it is resolved. It generates the noises of anxiety and need for immediate relief, while blocking or compromising our ability to see into the future, our ability to fully recognize and enjoy what is around us, and our ability to take the normal risks involved in forward movement in our lives. It eats up our energy in a million ways and drives us toward behaviors that are about nothing but self-protection and relief from the mental noise.
This is why facing and acknowledging the fact that we are afraid can be such a powerfully transformative thing, all by itself. It is a form of clearing away all the intermediate structures of trauma-processing and getting down to the center of it in a totally authentic way. So we are no longer lying to ourselves or pretending. So that we are no longer trying to talk ourselves into irrational ideas about being stronger or safer than we are. So that we are finally clear about the fact that the universe whacked us and we don’t know when it will whack us again. It is out of our control.
This is tough stuff, the toughest of the entire grief process, and until we are ready for it, we can’t do it. Our minds won’t let us. We will slip and slide away into denial or bargaining or anger or another round of grieving and letting go, all the things that we know made us feel better than the stage before. And that is fine. Our minds have their own wisdom, and we face this issue when we have the structural underpinning in place to do this. It’s why the healing process is progressive.
But one way or another, when we come to think about forgiving, we’re going to run into this issue. How can I safely forgive if I really don’t know when I’m going to be facing the same thing again, or something worse? Or vice versa, how can I experience my fear if I’m relaxing my angry alert and protection systems by forgiving?
This trauma was nothing compared to the first one
The experience of trauma is built into our emotional histories. In a way, every trauma we experience is a replay of the primal trauma that every child experiences, the transition from life inside the womb to life out of it. It is the fundamental “expulsion from the Garden of Eden” which transfers us from a situation where we are fed, warmed, held, connected to our source to a new situation in which we are separate and dependent for our survival on things that are out of our control.
The developmental activities of the first four years are actually about the child navigating that separation to acquire certain basic intellectual perspectives and emotional skills necessary to healthy personality formation. It is our first experience of trauma processing. It occurs both on a macro level of gradual emotional acceptance of separation from the “source” and on a detail level of dealing with separate events that trigger fear, disappointment and uncertainty. If all goes well, we maintain steady bonds with our caretakers that allow us to ease into independence, self-soothing skills and the beginnings of empathy.
So we “know” what trauma means from a very early age. One way of describing trauma is that it is an unexpected breach of the rules we took for granted. Or the rules we depended on for our survival and sense of security in the world.
A whole series of emotional reactions to this breach are reasonable and normal. All the emotional stages we discuss in trauma processing, as well as others that we have not discussed in depth, such as feelings of betrayal, rejection or shame. If we go back to the nature of the first trauma, it makes sense that we would feel offended. One day our life is one thing; the next thing it’s another. What are we supposed to think? At minimum, it would be reasonable to think we are being unreasonably screwed with.
This brings us back to the primal argument. Because who, ultimately, is screwing with us? To cut a long discussion short, our big argument is not with any one persecutor in this world, not our parents, not our selfish lovers, not with the truck that hit us. It’s with God or the universe, or however we look at the overall intelligence that organizes this place. Because clearly that big intelligence has forgotten that we were previously important enough to have the suite at the center of the universe, and for reasons not made clear, we have been demoted to just one small, helpless life form in this place full things and life forms that clearly do not recognize our centrality.
Welcome to the first time we felt the fear of being vulnerable and alone. And to the basic human challenge of living with those feelings at the same time we experience love, trust, some kind of internal dignity, and the ability to risk moving forward with our lives.
There is no human being who has not been through this. And there is not one of us who doesn’t live with this challenge on a daily basis in some part of our consciousness.
It’s important to know this, because as we move forward with dealing with our own fear, we also know that some people have found ways of managing it more effectively than others.
The cost of doing business.
We have these bodies. They have their own intelligence and they want to survive. Our spirituality has its intelligence. Our intellect has its intelligence. Our emotional system has its intelligence. (See Daniel Goleman’s books on various forms of intelligence for wonderful discussions of this topic.) They are all integrated and mutually supportive, but the body is the instrument and the house where it all plays out, and one of the body’s primary vocabulary words is fear.
We cannot get away from this, but we can decide what we’re going to do about it. And that is where forgiving comes in.
There are a lot of dictionary definitions of forgiving, but for our purposes in this article, we are going to experiment with a new one. That is, making a decision about how much energy we want give to a certain source of fear in our lives.
This is not about minimizing the damage or our struggle to get over it. It is not about condoning other people’s bad behavior or the real dangers we face in the world.
Rather it is about recognizing something about ourselves. We have done all reasonable work to identify the problem, to protect ourselves in the future, to let go of what we have discovered is now gone, and to face our fear. We know what we are afraid of. Now, we consider a decision about reclassifying the issue as something we may or may not run into, something that is (to some degree) out of our control. We begin to consider whether or not we are served by continuing to let fear of this thing drain resources that could be spent on positive forward movement.
Forgiving is not the same as denial, because we make this decision with full awareness of our losses and our future risks. It involves no forgetting. We respect all the information we have gathered, in case we need it again. We respect all the feelings we have gone through, because they are part of the truth of this experience. We just decide to start withdrawing our energy, turning off that faucet, and shifting our attention to other things.
What forgiving is and isn’t
Forgiving is a decision we make and then gradually follow through, adapting that decision to our own comfort level. It is a decision we make from a position of power over the one thing we truly have power over, our own choices. Especially that supreme choice of where we place our attention.
Forgiving is something we do, knowing that we cannot totally control fear, because our bodies have their own agendas and they will generate fear if they feel it is necessary. So it also involves a deal with our bodies that we will listen to their fear, that we will not become airy-fairy pseudo-Buddhists who try to stuff their fear because they think it’s unfashionable. But we make a deal with our bodies that it’s better for the entire organism if we manage our fear, reducing our investments in fear about things we already know about, and saving our big extravaganzas of fear and anxiety for the surprises.
Forgiving is about trust at two levels. First, trust that certain bad things will happen. We can look at this statistically, if we’re inclined. A certain fraction of people we meet will be destructive emotional cripples. A certain fraction of things we buy will turn out to be unusable junk. A certain number of conversations with our relatives will include uninvited comments about our choices, our characters or our weight. Trusting that these things will happen eliminates the surprise factor and enables us to plan around these statistical likelihoods.
Second, forgiving is also a kind of trophy we get for doing the work and coming out the other side of the trauma processing. In that sense, it is about renewed trust in ourselves and in the universe. What was once a huge deal is now fully digested and just a learning experience attached to some unpleasant memories. We are whole again and on generally good terms with the big intelligence that runs everything.
In all of this, you’ve probably noticed how little I’ve talked about the perpetrator. And I’m sure you understand why. Because this is really something between the various forms of intelligence in ourselves, and it is something between us and the big intelligence that runs everything.
But still we need to get down some practicalities too. So here is what forgiveness is NOT:
• It is not condoning or acceptance of anything we find hurtful, unethical, uncaring or anything else that is bad for us. (We may find ourselves releasing negative feelings about something, when we come to understand why it happened, but we don’t have to. This is not ultimately about them. It is whether we’re ready to move on.)
•It is not about compartmentalizing or denial. We are not “stuffing” it or pretending it never happened. We’re not trying to convince ourselves that we haven’t just been through a battle or deluding ourselves that we’re more powerful than we are. We are just gradually shifting our attention away from it, as we feel comfortable doing so. We are gradually reclaiming our interest in other things.
• It is not a reason for re-involving ourselves with people or situations that hurt us. We don’t forgive so we can jump into that pool again. The only reason we would do that is if we have evolved past the point of being hurt by what hurt us before (something that doesn’t often happen) or if the person or the situation has gone through some kind of cosmic surgery and is now something else. Remember, forgiving comes AFTER we have learned self-protection in the angry phase and let go of whatever got us into this situation. If we forgive because we want to do the same thing all over again … well, you don’t need me to tell you what you’re volunteering for.
• Likewise, it is not a social cure. If we’re forgiving because we’re embarrassed about being such a bore, or because our bad feelings are alienating our families, or because we want to get along better with people who just don’t get it, we victimizing ourselves all over again. We’re giving away our authority over our own feelings, and trying to force ourselves to feel something we don’t, in order to be accepted. If it’s really important that we not communicate the full force of the outrage or grief we’re dealing with – like in a work situation or in court — we can do that. We can selectively choose where, when and how much we share, while we continue to work through our trauma privately. The ability to do this — letting some people in and keeping others out — is good practice in developing the skills of conditional trust.
• There is no reason that we have to forgive people to their faces or even let them know about it. In fact, if we’re really ready to stop wasting energy, we probably won’t. We don’t just stop bothering with them in our heads; we stop bothering with them in real life. We avoid engagement. If we have to spend energy on some kind of mop-up or dealing with continuing drama from their side, we handle it with an eye toward ending all of it, because we want to be done with it.
Finally, forgiving is not an all-or-nothing thing. Nor is it a carved-in-stone solution. We don’t say, “Oh, I’ve decided it’s not worth caring anymore about what he (or she) did to me, and now I have to not care about the new thing he (or she) is doing to me.” It doesn’t work that way. Forgiving is a way of allocating our own resources. If new circumstances require us to grab a sword and slay a few dragons before dinner, then we do it. After we come home and shower, we can decide whether we’re ready to forgive the loss of our afternoon, or if we need to spend more time processing that little irritation.
And if we absolutely feel like we must announce our decision to forgive to the sociopath, here’s a suggested forgiveness note:
I’ve decided not to give you any more attention. I’m not going to track you down, hire a hit man or sue you for theft or mental suffering. I’ve dealt with my losses by myself. But don’t confuse this with weakness. The next time you show up, it won’t be such a pleasant or profitable experience for you. I also advise you to you grow up, for your own sake. Not everyone is as forgiving as me. As Henry the XV said to a murderous friend, “I pardon you, but I also pardon whoever kills you.”
In the next article, we begin on the wonderful topic of becoming who we want to be.
Namaste. The wise emotional accountant in me salutes the wise emotional accountant in you.
Kathy
written by Kathleen Hawk • Permalink •
one/joy_step_at_a_time says:
hi sky – no, i don’t instinctively feel that forgiveness is the key. i have been working more with the idea of acceptance.
what i have come to though – is that IT’S HER FAULT. SHE did this to me. and to others.
i was trained to be the goat by my family, but that doesn’t make it my fault or even my responsibility – it’s her fault, her evil trumped my good, that’s all.
holy shit – ‘her evil trumped my good.’ whoa that felt like a hundred emotional fire crackers going off in my chest – releasing outwards. ‘her evil trumped my good.’ wow.
did you see my post to you the other day about the converation i had with the 5 year old on the bus? this kid was REALLY imaginative – well, so was the spath. and i figured i should tell you that the stories that came out of the 5 year old had the same back and forth from reality to fantasy that the spath’s stories did (i now realize), and we can add this to the basket full of anecdotal evidence for your hypothesis.
re spath’s and responsibility – again, don’t know if you saw this but the trial court decision that dropped some of the fraud charges against the spath (fraud charges brought by another woman she conned) have been reversed by appeals court. the spath’s whole line of defense was that SHE knew she was writing fiction, and was therefore not accountable for other’s believing her stories to be non-fiction, even though she lied to us and said they were true…WE are all responsible for her lies. goat goat goat. c#%$
yup – she’s not responsible for people believing her lies to be truth because SHE KNEW SHE WAS LYING.
Truly – SHE is her own worst character. all that spath word salad comes out when she tries to defend her fucked up self. she’s much better at being the broken lonely sick boy.
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Ox Drover says:
One/Joy,
YOu got it darling! You GOT IT!!!!!! “Forgiveness” does not mean that they are blameless or that there is no lasting consequence or that we trust them…it means that we RECOGNISE THAT THEY ARE RESPONSIBLE AND ACCOUNTABLE AND WE ARE NOT AT FAULT…. yep, and we can let it go, let the bitterness fade. Clean our souls!
You got it and I am glad, and yes, we do need to expand our tool boxes and our thinking! We no longer have to endure the anger, angst, rage, bitterness and self blame for the damage THEY DID!
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one/joy_step_at_a_time says:
Oxy – you said: ‘We no longer have to endure the anger, angst, rage, bitterness and self blame for the damage THEY DID! ‘
i notice that when i feel unloved, or disliked or hated (and i can only say that what the spath feels is a form of hate) i turn it in on myself. i am seeing it lately as I dealing with the db neighbour and the db landlord. I finally am not working all the time, and now there time and space for for me to feel the ugliness that these people are – but it’s THEM, not me. But same as when i was a kid, i turn it inwards. which is why it’s some important that i fight back (using legal recourse) against both of them. and i can also view it as expanding my ‘toolkit’, so that i know when to fight and when not, not because not fighting is always the best more ‘peaceful’ recourse, but because in some situations it isn’t the recourse i should take.
I see this self hate coming up in how i relate to food – i simultaneously am trying to love and comfort myself with food, overeating is a form of self hatred. the work pressure is off and this lack of self care, this self hatred (as in, not having really taken care of myself in months. i am out of balance) is coming up; instead of being gentle with myslef – which is what is most needed i am trying to both comfort myself and numb myself – to calm myself with something that is emotionally harmful. I worked so hard for all kinds of reasons, most of them out of balance in any sense of that phrase.
i am naked. the work is gone, the reason for working hard, the drive, and i feel this wild self hatred. because i have nothing to sacrifice myslef to? because i was sacrificing myself and I am angry with myself and others (and have to turn it inwards?) about that? because i was sacrificing myself and that is the only thing that feels normal to me? and now I am untethered and afraid. i harm myself when i feel afraid? when i feel overwhelming fear?
sacrificial lamb. goat.
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Ox Drover says:
Dear One/Joy,
Becoming aware of these feelings, and recognizing them if the first step in changing these self destructive feelings/behaviors.
The realization that I had also been doing things that were NOT good for me—from smoking to not eating right, etc.—led me finally to changing those things.
Today was a day I actually ate too much food. The first day in quite some time. Not “bad” food, just too much so I have to get myself in gear tomorrow and “get back on the wagon” but I am NOT and will not beat myself up for my “failure” today to stay under my Self imposed “calorie limit.” Not sure WHY I did what I did, but doesn’t matter. I did it, I’ll do better tomorrow.
Recognizing when we do things that are counter productive to our well being, and taking steps to stop ourselves from doing these things is what life is all about really. Meeting our needs like Maslov talked about….first is air, then water, food, shelter, etc. on down to LOVE AND BELONGING and “self actualization.”
Well, gang I am going to bed…been a tiring day, working outside some and my arm is tired from lifting my spoon, over and over! LOL G’nite!
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skylar says:
One Joy,
yes, I did see your post about the 5-year old. I think I responded, as did Kim.
Thanks for bringing up this thread. I really needed it. I’m going thru alot of emotional trauma again. it seems to come in cycles. it seems to come when I think of my parents. I go into crying spells. But it’s not just my parents, it’s knowing that I have never actually been loved by anyone. I’ve never been anything but a scapegoat because that’s what my parents trained me to be. it’s what the doll episode instilled in me: be responsible for everyone else’s happiness, by sacrificing your own. God it sucks.
My current relationship is my way of putting a bandaid on it by not solving it. You see, once I realized all these things about narcissists and scapegoats and my programming…I decided that since I was always going to be perfect supply, I might as well get paid for it.
That’s why my BF is perfect for me. He hired me to do what I would do anyways, which is to spend all my time and energy on his needs and wants. It works, mostly, (because it’s easy work and I need the money) but I know that I need to move forward and care about me. Each time I do, my mind goes to my parents, for some reason. When I’m focused on BF, I don’t think of them or me. That might be similar to you and your devotion to your work. It’s a distraction.
One Joy, for the longest time I thought I was the only one who had been trained to be the scapegoat, but now I see that there are many of us. It was certainly narcissistic of me to think I was the only one!
Scapegoats, UNITE! LOL! we really need to figure out how to get past scapegoat training. I’m seriously thinking about hypnosis. I want to be hynotized into not caring about my parents. Any thoughts on that?
Also, One Joy, I recently met my BF’s doctor and he is a sleep disorder specialist. Apparently his sleep clinic offers $8000 for 8 days at a sleep clinic (they pay ). Of course they may give me an experimental drug or a placebo, so it is a risk, but I could really use the money. And I have taken both Lunesta and Ambien so my mind is already riddled with drugs.
what’s one more? What do yo think? should I do it? It could really save my ass on many fronts.
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geminigirl says:
Sky darling, I thought you were going to let me adopt you online?
I need a lovely daughter like you after giving birth to 2 spaths.And its not true that no-one loves you we all do!
Love,
Mama gem.XX{{{HUGS!!}}}
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geminigirl says:
Love you too, OneJOY!!
Mama gemXX
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geminigirl says:
Sky, You dont have to STAY a scapegoat!
You have the power to say, NO!! I wont I wont I wont Play this stupid game any more! I hereby GET OFF the merry go round!
With Gods help we can all do this! We are new creations every day! We DONT have to stay stuck, we dont need Hypnosis, we need to throw away our wishbone and grow a backbone!
Sky, if your BF is NOT helping you get well, DITCH HIM, youll be OK! remember, everything has its price, the price you are paying for staying with him may be TOO HIGH.
GET REAL here, Kiddo. Do you love him? Is he good for you? Then why the F–are you with him? For the money?
Im sure the money will come if you do the right thing by yourself.
LOve,
Mama gemXX
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skylar says:
(((Mommy Gem)))
thank you for your kind words.
It’s easy for me to love anyone mommy gem. So I do love him. I believe God sent him to me at this time to give me assistance and knowledge. Yes he pays me to work for him but he is also a wealth of information. He has been studying spaths longer than I have. Mostly in the context of spaths in power and politics. THEY ARE EVERYWHERE.
The things I see my spath did to me, revealed to me exactly what our governments and corporations do to us EVERY DAY. There is no such thing as NC!! Not as long as you watch TV, read the newspaper and pay your taxes. It’s ALL spath driven.
BF is extremely generous with me, but at the same time, I feel that he is selfish. Oh well, even if I met a “normal” man I wouldn’t know what to do with him – what does that look like BTW?
Edit,
mommy gem, it’s hard to explain how deeply my sense of responsibility for other people is ingrained in me. I know it will be a long time before I get over it. As an example that I’ve posted before, when I saw a woman getting beaten on the street by her husband, I was ready to intervene and risk my own life. Why? because it’s an overwhelming feeling to do this. I know it’s stupid and don’t tell me it’s just me being compassionate because I already know it’s not. It’s my programming to sacrifice for other, which was instilled in me by the N-parents. Luckily, I was with my spath BIL who is a cop and I was able to embarrass him into intervening for me (he was willing to walk away until I used my God-given verbal tactics to manipulate him). The idiot got a fucking medal for going beyond the call of duty!!!!!! GAG ME WITH ANYTHING. it makes me sick. He was never in any danger because he immediately called 911 with an “officer in the line of fire” call. About 20 squad cars showed up in 20 seconds – fastest cop response I’ve ever seen in seattle. Nobody had a gun except the spath BIL and all the spath cops who showed up. It was just a big bully beating on his little wife. can you imagine?
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one/joy_step_at_a_time says:
sky – i cooked for my family of origin from a very early age. i was always interested in food and cooking, and my mom taught me to bake when i was quite young.
after my mom had her car accident so much changed in our household. i think this fact is important one; all the training to be supply and sacrifice was put into service and reinforced by the changes in my young life.
my sib and i took over all the house work, and over a short time i became the chief cook. One of my sharp memories from being about 10 or 11 years old was fantasizing most clearly about sacrificing my food so that others could eat. I could only access the knowledge of my sacrifice in fantasy. I was given so much approval for cooking, and for being good at it. but it was a servitude. i would spend all day baking and cooking when kids my age were spending time together. i became a loner to a large extent as i didn’t have time to be with people, it wasn’t a parental priority to take me anywhere where i could be with kids (we lived in the country, rather isolated from people who could be my peers). i was trained from a very early age to not ask, TO NOT WANT. the Sinead O’connor song that has the line, ‘ i do not want, what i cannot have’ has always resonated for me.
i used to think i was the person who was most sensitive in my family, and therefore was scapegoated – now i am not so sure that i was the most sensitive – perhaps my mom was, but she was just older and entrenched in pain and denial, maybe it was my sib, who i now know was bulimic as a teen, and a controlled drunk for many years. my n sire? nope, not the most sensitive. he’s a bull.
whether i was the most sensitive or not, i was scapegoated. but i think that scapegoating was a dynamic that was alive and roaming in our house. it was part of the repressive toolkit that i think was rooted in a fear of emotions, a lack of tools and understanding about emotions, and circumstances. where does the fact that my sire is an n fit in to the repression of emotions and the abandonment of the children’s emotional lives? don’t know. i have to examine the whole dynamic in light of that new piece of info.
i personally raised over $20,000 in sponsorship for my conference and was instrumental in another $15,000 being raised. Why am i a good fundraiser? findraising plays both to my strengths and weaknesses: i am good at building business relationships (strength), and I can do ANYTHING for others (weakness). As long as I have a cause, a reason…
but you know, i am learning learning learning how not to be a scapegoat. to refuse. to demand. to fight.
wish i could write more, longer this am….but off to work now.
((((best to you sky)))))
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one/joy_step_at_a_time says:
Gem – your 3:51 post was so kind; it made we smile.
(although i am not yellow…)
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Ana says:
Skylar,
I just wanted to mention that I did go into therapy for family of origin work. I think I was around 28 years old, I’m 51 now. I was into Scott Peck back then and I think somewhere in the book The Road Less Traveled he says that we must name names, injuries to us, and whatever to heal.
It was painful, but worth it to me. I found a good woman therapist and after about a year or so I came out the other end. I really don’t think about it (childhood) in a negative way anymore, and I thinks it’s because I did all the work in therapy.
Both my parents died young. My father when he was 55 of a heart attack and mother at age 62 of cancer. But I was able, thru therapy to get the closure I needed even though they died. In fact I started therapy while my mother was still alive, but sick. Anyway just my two cents, I don’t think there is a “shortcut” thru the pain of it.
Best to you and thanks for your post’s they are most helpful.
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superkid10 says:
I’m just hurting. I’ve been a week now with no contact (9 days?).
I know intellectually I’m doing the right thing. And if I just stop and breathe and relax other things will happen today that take my mind off my pain.
I gave this man 1000 days of my life. I loved him and every day I showed him that. And in return I took day after day of intentional, malicious abuse.
There is no logic in my sadness, at this profound sense of loss. I’m doing everything I can to prevent myself from reaching out , yet again, to ask him to absolve my pain when each time he just makes it worse.
The extent of the evil astounds me.
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Ox Drover says:
Dear Superkid,
It is like an addiction, when you are “hurting” and want to call him it is like an addict trying to kick by taking another fix of the drug…..it makes it “better” for a few minutes but then the pain gets worse and as long as you try to “cure” the pain with another fix and another, it will eventually lead to your “death.” The pain will never go away.
NC is the only way to kick the addiction, and the brain really does function like it is an addiction to a drug. Do whatever you have to in order to STOP. I kicked cigarettes the same way, one minute at a time….and even now nearly 2 years later I sometimes see someone smoking a cigarette and I think for just a second, “Oh, I could take just ONE puff” but I know I can’t and I can’t allow myself to do so. NO CONTACT….(((hugs))))
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superkid10 says:
Thank you.
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skylar says:
superkid,
It’s just your addiction to his drama. Work actively on staying calm and peaceful. Go for walks in beautiful places, get accupuncture. take yourself out to lunch, read a good book.
Books on narcissism were the most helpful to me during the early days of NC. The books underlined the REASON for going NC, so I was able to use logic to keep me from slipping back into the drama. Drama is all they provide. Nothing more. You can get that anytime of the day by watching a movie, so why submit yourself to a spath?
But right now, stay away from drama, stay peaceful until the addiction subsides.
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candy says:
Superkid10 – ‘There is no logic in my sadness, at this profound sense of loss’
Firstly anything relating to spath is not logical, it’s all an act on HIS part. Trying to work him out logically is very tricky and messes with our heads.
Secondly comes the sadness. We are sad that despite OUR best efforts the relationship did not work, we feel lost.
Thirdly the loss IS real. We feel bereft.
You have done well to last out 9 days, it’s tough, but no pain no gain so hang in there
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superkid10 says:
Thank you for your support. I’m going to buy some narc. books right now.
It seems silly to say, “just one day at a time” but I guess that’s what this requires.
Superkid
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agreenbean says:
superkid, one of the hardest things, in my opinion is trying to reconcile what we intellectually know with what emotions tell us. the struggle slowly lessens. patience is a virtue, they say.
candy is right, the logic that you and i use doesn’t apply to a spath and thats extremely frustrating. they go against everything we have learned about relating, etc.
i agree with skylar, books on narcissism have been helpful to me too. perhaps “why is it always about you?” by Sandy Hotchkiss, that one i might as well have highlighted every line i saw so much truth in it.
Also, a book that gives a lot of insight is “Emotional Unavailability : Recognizing It, Understanding It, and Avoiding Its Trap” by Bryn Collins
it has taken me months to understand that what i am so heartbroken about isn’t that it DIDN’T work out, its that it COULDN’T. there is great sadness in knowing someone cannot feel what you feel no matter if they want to. the hurt is double. you lose the person, and you lose the illusion of them as well.
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skylar says:
agreenbeen,
“why is it always about you?” was an enormous eye opener for me as well.
In that book I saw my whole life reflected. And not just my life but my friend Mary’s life, who laid down and died in a snowstorm. And my friend Mia, who told me, when we were 12 that she was molested but I didn’t believe her. And my Aunt Nora, who died of cancer caused by the hell my uncle put her through. And so many other things that I never understood in my 43 years of living, crystalized into focus when I read that book.
I had already read, Dr. Scott Peck’s book, People of the Lie (twice 25 years apart). And later, read a few others, but none opened my eyes as wide as that one.
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Ana says:
Hi Oxy,
I got the book “Man’s Search for Meaning” today. It’s a real page turner for sure. So suprising, his attitude toward suffering! I got out my hightlighter…so many great sentences to remember. Thanks for urging us on LF to get it. I said to myself, there must be a reason Oxy keeps bringing up this particular book. NOW I know why! It’s great.
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Ox Drover says:
Dear Ana,
I also highlight passages in good books and there are a few like this that I always go back and read and reread those passages.
Yes, his view of suffering, and how he coped with that HORRIBLE SUFFERING that I can’t even imagine is beyond me, but I said to myself—IF HE CAN COPE WITH THAT, I CAN COPE WITH ANYTHING I HAVE TO FACE…. the thing that really made me “get it” about suffering though was how he described pain as “acting like a gas…which will expand to fill or contract to fill the container, whether that container is large or small or the amount of gas is large or small. PAIN IS TOTAL, it FILLS the space it is in. So if we have a “small” pain it is still TOTAL and if we have a “large” pain it is TOTAL….Or as Jesus said if ONE member of our body hurts the rest of the body feels it…doesn’t matter if it is a toothache or a broken toe it is TOTAL PAIN for the body.
Dr. Frankl’s attitude had a PROFOUND AND DEEP influence on my views of my own pain and how I must gain meaning from this pain in order to endure it.
I also just finished rereading “The Hiding Place” by Carrie ten Boom, who was a Dutch lady who hid Jews in her home, and ended up being arrested and deported to a German concentration camp with her entire family. Some of her family died there but she was spared. She had a deep Christian faith that there was MEANING in her suffering and that because she had BEEN THERE herself she could HELP HEAL OTHERS WHO SURVIVED….she devoted her life afterward to helping victims of those camps to heal and thrive. It is also a book that you might want to read after you finish reading Frankl’s book. The two go together so well about that kind of suffering.
The ability that we now have to empathize, truly empathize with others who have been victims is UNIQUE I think to people who have experienced true and “total” pain and loss—and we can speak to those people who are still raw and suffering from the abuse and they hear our voices because they here the authentic voice of “one who has been there.”
How could I speak to someone who had been in a concentration camp? I’ve never been there so there is no way I could speak to that particular loss…but I can speak of TREMENDOUS LOSS and tremendous pain to someone who has been abused even if that person hadn’t experienced exactly the same kind of abuse I did, just as Dr. Frankl’s voice and Carrie ten Boom’s voices speak to us even long after they are passed away. Their voices are authentic and healing because we know they KNEW loss of the utmost kind. The deepest kind and yet they did not lose their love of selves, family or mankind even. They saw the worst that mankind can dish out to other humans and yet they held on to their empathy, compassion and humanity. WHAT A WONDERFUL BEACON OF LIGHT THEY ARE FOR US as we heal!!!!
I’m glad you are enjoying the book! It should be required reading for everyone! (((hugs)))) I won’t quit telling everyone how wonderful it is and how much it helps us to heal!
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Twice Betrayed says:
Okie dokie, I’ve got a question regarding healing. Please everyone chime in and give your opinion/feelings.
It’s been several years since I divorced the P. I was married to him over twenty years and was married to another P, prior. I had three children in all by these men. [I grew up in a home that set me up for these relationships].
I’m doing well, feeling much better, not hindered in any way by the X’s. My kids are another story…I have limited contact with them because of the way they treat me. *They are much like their father[s].
BUT-I’ve got an emptiness and a feeling of loss of identity, since my life has been such a fraud/scam with these ‘marriages’ and ‘relationships’. I’m very happy and functioning fine, except for this deep, nagging feeling.
Comments/advice? Thanks!
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skylar says:
TB,
can you elaborate a bit? How can you be happy and functioning fine if you have an emptiness and loss of identity?
I’m asking that question because I also feel an emptiness and loss of identity but not happy and not functioning fine. I want to do better even if I can’t get rid of these horrible feelings of loss.
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skylar says:
Ana,
when you went to therapy and your mom was still alive, did you talk to her about your issues? if so, did she respond?
In a way, I’m a hypocrite because when my sister tried to put my brother in jail and I had to save him, I forgave her AND I encouraged him and my parents to do the same.
But now I see that it wasn’t my place to forgive her ESPECIALLY BECAUSE SHE NEVER SAID SHE WAS SORRY, but also because I was not actually in her line of fire.
Then my brother actually put me in jail on false DV charges, which he then dropped but I was there 2 days. If he hadn’t dropped them, I could have defended myself but he knew exactly what he was doing. Now I expect my parents to hold him accountable as well as holding my sister accountable for things I had encouraged forgiveness for previously.
My eyes have been opened and I realize that forgiveness shouldn’t be given out willy nilly as if “nothing happened”. People must be held accountable or the spaths win. But I can’t seem to get my parents to see this and it’s why I can’t trust them or forgive them.
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Ana says:
Skylar,
No, I never confronted her with all the “stuff” She was too ill and I was pretty much at the end of my therapy. Another reason: my sisters totaly got it and we’d talk about it a lot. Having that support was helpful.
I had closure even though my father had died and she was ill. In fact, I think it might have been easier to get closure cause there was no argument/denial from my parents! It still took years before I came to forgiveness/peace with it. Now when I do think of childhood I don’t have those bitter/angry emotions, thank God.
I can sympathize with you about trying to get through to your parents. When they just don’t get it or are in denial. You can still recover from them, just like the spath. The work is painful but so worth it.
I remember when I was probably about 17 or so and I happened to look at my mother and thought: OMG she’s a human being…not just “MA” but a real live WOMAN. So, I started calling her by her first name…So, Marie how are ya today? Hey, Marie home from work now? She didn’t mind! It helped me to look at her as a person separate from “Mother” role.
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hens says:
Twice betrayed – I relate with your question. You say your life has been a fraud/scam because of the way you were raised, and because of the people you have attracted and been attracted too. So fast forward your life to right now and guess what? Who in the hell am I anyway. Now that we have seen the truth and got pissed about it and changed our pattern’s and behavior’s – ? – what identity? I think we have redefined who we are..alot of that refinement has been a very painful journey…so sure we feel LOSS or LOST…..I will put it this way, I will never be the same person again and I am working hard to make that a good thing…life is different now, that does not mean I am blissfully happy…..
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superkid10 says:
skylar, greenbean, oxy,
I made it through today with no contact. I am really on cloud 9!
I did it! Thank you!!!
I’m sure tomorrow I’ll have some sucky moments, but I’m on a roll!
THANK YOU
Superkid
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superkid10 says:
Skylar?
Your responses to my post were god’s gift to me over the weekend and today. I owe you big time.
I saw you wrote this “I want to do better even if I can’t get rid of these horrible feelings of loss.”
I mentioned it earlier, I can not say it enough, I’m totally with you, I too have periodically suffered with the horrible feelings of loss, for the last five days I’ve been reading THE HAPPINESS TRAP, and between your support going NC and that book, I’m starting to see things differently.
I’ll be done with it in a few days, if you like, I will ship it to you.
Superkid
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Twice Betrayed says:
Sky; I am happy and feeling good. I laugh, have fun and this year planted my flowers again. I’m able to resume writing. Life is good! But, because of the lies/fraud/betrayal I feel a huge gap in my life – my identity was wife/mom. I’m no longer a wife-and apparently was never one, really, to the men I married. They never treated me as one should a wife, so that was a fraud. I’ve invested my life raising my kids and they treat me the same way-so that’s a huge gap. I just feel as if I have NO past-that I am just now becoming alive/or finding who I am/ free to do that. I am no longer serving someone or walking a tight rope to maintain balance and peace, which I have literally done ALL my life. My brother was a taskmaster when I was a kid-so I’ve never known life w/o being in charge of ‘keeping the peace’.
hens: You are right. Good expression of the emotions!
I’m really happy, but with a gap. I have faced the fact I was never loved and my kids don’t really love me now and that I wasted my life on people unable/unwilling to share and care for anyone but themselves. It’s a really odd feeling. Sort of blank. I shut the door on the past and here I am. But, who was I and where am I? I’m no longer angry, kind of just resigned. I guess it’s what someone feels, after convicted of a crime, they didn’t commit, served a long term and then exonerated. Or say, kidnapped and held for years, and then released back into society/family. No way to make up for the gap/unreality of how they lived. Functioning in survival mode for years or your whole life, leaves you off balance, because you’ve never been able to focus on yourself, so you really don’t know how.
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hens says:
[I shut the door on the past and here I am] ….so let’s enjoy the peace and let our true identity catch up with us….sound like a plan?
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agreenbean says:
congrats superkid!!
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Ox Drover says:
Dear Twice betrayed,
Sugar, I can definitely relate to the ROLES we once filled are now VOID….I am a widow….difficult to think of myself as a “widow” and not a “wife” and not really a “mom” any more either….no little kids to BE MOM TO, they are grown up and/or gone….men, not children. I’m retired now, so not able to fill my professional role either…and no role as a “daughter” or “caregiver” and the only role I have left is as FRIEND and those are few and more distant now, and some of them are even gone now….were good at one time, but no longer work, or those close friends are dead and gone.
Life is a continual change of roles from infant to toddler, from toddler to child, from child to teen ager, from teenager to adult to nesting and parenting, to career then as middle aged empty nester, then retiree etc….and finally we come to the stage where we are preparing for the end of our lives.
I had ENVISIONED myself at this age with kids and grandkids and extended family all living around me—all one big “happy family”—and boy was that a FANTASY that never came true. Instead of a dream it was a nightmare. So now I have to adjust what my “vision” of ME at this age is gonna be. What is going to make me want to get up in the morning? What will be satisfying to me when I lie down at night? Right now, I’m working on my health and well being both physically, emotionally and mentally, and regrouping. Finding joy in small things each day, in the three little gray squirrels I saw playing and eating in an elm tree in the front yard for over an hour this morning, and an unusual sight of a young beaver sitting on the side of the highway as I drove to town to a meeting of a club I belong to.
Moments of JOY and appreciation of the good things in life, the wonderful small events that make up a day, both unusual and usual. Moments of joy will sew themselves together like the pieces of a quilt and make happiness and contentment. TOWANDA!!!!
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Stargazer says:
Twice Betrayed, I remember you and I’m so glad you are doing well. I can so relate to how you feel, too. I tried for many years to make a “family” out of my pathetic sister and mother, only to have to finally admit they are toxic for me and cut them out of my life. Now I have no family. The losses in my life have been so great, and yet I still can feel joy and have things to be excited about and look forward to. What a resilient spirit we have as human beings.
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skylar says:
TB
Your post made me bawl my eyes out. Good thing I’m sitting alone in my car.
When you said you felt convicted and sentenced of a crime you didn’t commit. and you never experienced being loved not even by your kids, that described exactly me. It’s like having been in a coma and missing out on all the milestones that mark your time on earth. It feels like such a waste of life and I mourn for that.
One thing that I do know for a fact is that the sociopaths intended me to feel this way. It was in their plans. I see this clearly.
They want us to feel robbed, impoverished, and unjustly treated.
Sociopaths take lives, sometimes through murder, sometimes by taking our time that God gave us on earth and wasting it.
I was determined to not feel that my life was taken. And I was going to do it by benefitting from all that I’ve learned about spaths.
To a point, I have been able to, but not always. I’m still mourning and go through weeping cycles.
LF has been a God send because it lets me help others get free from spaths and that gives meaning to what I endured and what I sacrificed.
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Hope to heal says:
(((Skylar))) oh my, big hugs to you dear!! You are a Godsend to all of us here.
Helping others, and venting to others in a safe place is such a healing experience. After the things life has thrown at us, we need this safe place. I feel truly blessed to have arrived here at LF.
I always find that having a good cry is like having a huge weight lifted off of my shoulders. Blessings to you Sky!
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skylar says:
thanks for the hug (((Hope to heal)))
I’m so glad we have each other too. we’re all teaching each other and holding each other’s hands. This must be the closest thing to what heaven is like, here on earth.
Superkid,
I’m proud of you for hanging on and yes, you can send me the book, I’d like to read it.
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geminigirl says:
TB darling I know exactly how you feel, like I wasted around 26 years of my life on my kids who I know now never did love me, and an alcoholic husband who was great when he was sober!
Its kind of a numbing feeling, but we have to believe it wasnt all for nothing!
Im lucky ,VERY lucky in that I now have a loving husband,but it still doesnt take a way the pain of having spaths for daughters. THANK GOD for LF,at least I am now aware of Gaslighting, etc., and knowledge is power!
After 2 years NC with older spath D I only now am starting to feel Im coming out of the FOG of fear, Obligation and guilt.At last I can see the light at the end of the tunnel and know its not a train coming to run me over!
Life DOES get so much better without spaths in your life.NC really is the key.
Like Oxy, Im just enjoying little things each day, like feeding my tame Lorikeets,{parrots }every day, watching my herbs grow, my baby eggplants are doing well, my little Poodle is such a Joy!I have to believe there with finally be a day when Im free of all these terrible emotions, fear, grief, guilt, anger,sadness, denial, etc.To reach the Nirvana of indifference. Not there yet, learning is a life times work!,If we all join hands well make a healing ring around the Earth!
Love,
Mama gemXX
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superkid10 says:
Skylar
I’ve done some research. On average, we are granted 25,000 mornings in a lifetime. I gave three years, or 1,000 mornings to my sociopath, which is 6% of the mornings that I’ve already consumed. Water under the bridge. The more important thing is that I’m giving him 0% of the 9000 mornings that I’ve yet to enjoy. F*ck him.
All,
I read some old posts last night where one of the LCWs I think proposed that most if not all sociopaths have a pre-occupation with guns (not a scientific fact, but noticed by others). My sociopath was indeed an expert marksman. He also had a preoccupation with money – I mean, WAY WAY over the top to the point it was an obsessive compulsive disorder.
These two things – guns and money – were his major preoccupation…along with meaningless, cold heartless sex of course.
Do all sociopaths share this same obsession? It would have been interesting to ask this question in the survey we all recently took.
Superkid10
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Ana says:
Superkid10,
I had a friend (female) spath. She was obsessed with money (mine), or anyone she could steal it from. She also hid knives all over her apt. I think because she screwed over so many people (history of larceny 20yrs worth), she knew someone was eventually going to catch up to her and kick her effin door in.
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agreenbean says:
i think they all have an obsession with a WEAPON. be it guns, knives, their bodies, or words. its about power.
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Hope to heal says:
Dear Hens ~
“[I shut the door on the past and here I am] ….so let’s enjoy the peace and let our true identity catch up with us….sound like a plan?”
I love this plan!!! What a wonderful mantra.
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Twice Betrayed says:
Thank you LF family for answering from your hearts! ❤
Hens: AGREE! Sounds like a GREAT plan!
Oxy: Your post made me LOL and relate. GREAT post, as always I appreciate your wit and wisdom!
Stargazer: Thank you for your kind words and remembering me! And you are so right-we are “resilient spirits”.
Sky: What an awesome post! I really benefited from your input of experience. I agree with you about the P’s. Their job is to “rob us of life”-excellent expression! Well, they can’t get our souls. LF is priceless, I so agree! Love to you, Sky! ❤
Gem: We’re kindred spirits! Yes, the little things-you’re right too, along with Ox on this. Animals. ❤
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ErinBrock says:
Forgiving……….yep……forgiving………haven’t got there yet!
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verity says:
Skylar:
“I guess it is ego to hate or to have pity. I need to rid myself of the ego. I’ve known that for a while but forgot. Ego is really hard to get rid of!”
This is so good. I know a lot of people won’t agree with this but it’s how I feel today (and my feelings are prone to change). My emotions are so much more steady now, and forgiveness isn’t what I used to think it was. I can still know a person’s behaviour is appalling, but I don’t have to take it on. That’s probably the best they can do, the same as this is the best I can do. It is ego to hate or to have pity. If we hate them they have power over us, and that means we’re still identifying too closely with what happened. We’re identifying with it so closely because we maybe still believe we somehow deserved it. We haven’t processed it or the original hurt yet. We haven’t integrated it, to use the trauma word. They’ve given us a narcissistic injury of the worst kind because it reminded us of our childhood (some of us, at least). Hate turning slooooowly into righteous, self-protective anger and then just seeing it as it is without the strong emotions, is just right.
If we pity them, maybe we’re trying to big ourselves up. We just have to know that *we* don’t behave that way and we don’t accept people treating us that way any more.
One of my spiritual gurus, Richard Rose, says we have to ‘fatten the head before we chop it off’. For many of us, our heads weren’t fat enough when we were preyed on/used/conned. By that I mean that we had low self-opinions, we were very badly broken already. We can’t drop the ego until it’s mended, that’s false forgiveness. It cannot be hurried. We don’t mean it because we still feel a lack or a loss of some kind. We possibly won’t drop the ego completely while we’re in the body because we have to move in this world, as a personality. The best you can do is to sit beside yourself and not take it so seriously any more, be strong enough to see it as the story that it is. It’s not who you really are, not all you are. It’s just the past, telling you stories.
The person I met is still writing me letters, which I don’t open. I’ve moved far enough away from my ego not to have to read him for almost a year now. His ego is still trying to convince me of something, but the past is over for me. When I don’t read his words he calls it abuse. I used to agree, but now I know it’s a boundary! Aha! Revelation! I had none, and any I did try to have were trampled over because that wasn’t feeding HIS needs.
His opinion of me is irrelevant now. My opinion of him shouldn’t matter to him. Total acceptance of who I am and who he is, that’s love (but not necessarily liking). Love is all that’s left once you stop believing the ego’s stories. I accept everybody for who they are, AND I accept myself, warts and all. But accepting BEHAVIOUR is another thing entirely. That would just be foolish.
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