When you first met, he was the perfect balance of danger and charm. He was mesmerizing in his magnetic energy, and you were instantly struck by lightning. He was practically exuding sensuality. He was handsome. Maybe you felt like your chemistry was off the charts. He was “Mr. Marvelous!” You had no idea that he was showing signs of sociopathy – and that you would eventually marry a sociopath. This is how things begin, slow and seductive. It was motivating. He captivated you, mesmerized you, and then captivated you. At first, it felt too good to be true. guess what? It was like that, and now you’ve lost your way and feel isolated.
Unfortunately, I learned firsthand that flirting and intimacy before marriage was one thing, but after marriage, his true colors and social markers came out. Now the former Mr. Right is reorganizing your life: controlling how you feel (that you’re a loser), convincing you what you think (that it’s your fault), and dictating how you should act (to do it perfectly next time). — to please him.) The cold, hard truth is that you are married to a sociopath. What exactly is a sociopath?
Sociopathy is the result of environmental factors, such as early traumatic experiences or a negative home life (physical and emotional abuse). Most of them are males who have acts of anger and/or violence, are impulsive, and display high-risk behaviors without regard to the consequences (criminal acts, drug addiction, etc.). However, in your own life, these behaviors may manifest in several ways, which may make identifying your spouse as a sociopath difficult.
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Here are 8 small warning signs that you are married to a sociopath:
- He uses intimacy for his gain
His demands became more in line with his desires and intimacy soon became another tool for him to communicate pain, pleasure, or stress. The magic is gone and all you’re left with is the feeling of being completely trapped in a nightmare.
- He criticizes you verbally – often in front of others
Or he sends you mixed messages, being harsh one moment and saying, “I will change” the next. But it never does, leaving you sad and confused.
- He is narcissistic to the extreme
It’s always about what he needs, what he wants, and how that affects him. He lacks empathy, has a sense of entitlement, and fantasizes about success, power, perfect love (and more). I always thought he was brilliantly successful, and I was very lucky to have him – until he wasn’t.
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- Your needs go unnoticed and unmet
It’s as if there is no space for you in this relationship, leaving you unheard, unacknowledged, hurt, and angry. You are emotionally exhausted from the mental and emotional games he constantly plays with you. At the end of the day, you don’t know what kind of mood you’ll be in or what kind of night you’ll have to face.
- Lying is as natural to him as taking a breath
He’s lying about little things in the moment, and often these are lies that don’t make sense or seem to have no reason. Then he lies about the big things. Vague answers as if he was leaving something out. He lies and abuses for profit or pleasure, whether he needs to or not. He is a big liar about everything. When she asks him to tell the truth, it turns into an argument and you don’t get any answer from him anyway. Bottom line: You feel like a nag and you feel like you did something wrong. He twisted the script so much that you probably feel like you owe him an apology. It may feel like there is a huge wall between you.
- He gets nervous when things don’t go his way
When he’s mad at you, he’s been known to stare at you: he doesn’t blink, he doesn’t change his face, nothing – he just stares. Fisheye is his blank stare meant to intimidate and control you. During these situations, you are prepared. You know that if you speak up or say the wrong thing, it will be more difficult for you later when you’re alone together. When he stares, you freeze. It’s your survival instinct.
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- It does not encourage you to spend time with family and friends
Sociopaths often use isolation to isolate their victims, and one of the most common forms of isolation is removing you from your family, friends, or social activities. He does this by offering them various forms of criticism, or acting jealous if you are going to spend time with them. In some cases, this happens even when he is invited and decides he doesn’t want to attend. He complains that you spend too much time with them and not enough time with him. His complaints will increase over time until it becomes easier for you to not spend time with them to avoid his anger.
- Control your choices with financial threats
Another form of power and control is financial isolation. If you are in a relationship with a man like this, he is likely intent on controlling your finances. Thus, he is not only concerned with how the money is spent; Maybe he asks you to hand over your paycheck every week or spends time constantly monitoring your bank account and questioning you about every cent you spend.
If he is the primary breadwinner, the amount of money he will “give” you as a bonus is always on his terms (it is minimal and never enough for food and gas facilities). Men like this will continue to wear you down mentally and physically. There’s no one to tell, who’s going to believe you anyway? You feel numb. You feel like you are living someone else’s life. Before him, you had friends, family, sports, hobbies, and a great job. What happened?
You may wonder how you got to this point, and talking to him is often not helpful. It swerves, swerves, swerves! Then he blames you for absolutely everything. He never said, “I’m sorry.” Instead, it spins the conversation around until you’re confused about what you were originally arguing about, and in the end, it tells you what you did wrong. You feel guilty and don’t know why. You hear yourself apologizing, but you don’t know what you’re supposed to be sorry for. You feel like you’ve let him down again and that you can never satisfy him. When he threatens to leave, you’re afraid he’ll do it. At the same time, another part of you wishes he would leave you. You feel miserable, but you think you’ll be lost without him (or so you think).
This is psychological abuse that he repeats over and over again in your marriage. He was most likely deeply wounded in his subconscious, which led to his low self-esteem. He does not have healthy coping mechanisms. This behavioral cycle is his way of compensating for his deep insecurities. He chooses to control and manipulate others externally because it makes him feel safe and powerful. And no, you won’t be able to talk to him about it. Mentioning this fact does not mean enlisting you to feel sorry or sympathize with him. Rather, this underscores the profound “diffusion” of his beliefs and behaviors.
These feelings will not change. If you have any hope in your heart, please keep it to yourself. As Neil Strauss says, “They say when you meet someone and it’s love at first sight, run the other way. All that’s happened is that your dysfunction has become entangled with their dysfunction.” Starting now, you’re on your way to wellness. You may wonder how a simple exercise can change your life. Once you internally change your thoughts and beliefs about your husband’s social behaviors, your external reality automatically changes too! How cool is that? The more you reinforce your guilt-free beliefs, the easier it will be to embrace them and stop giving in to his verbal attacks. And when you feel stronger and believe in yourself, you won’t have to endure the rest either.
