Sociopaths In Divorce

Divorce is no one’s idea of a good time.
Divorce is hard, exhausting,
and in the case of a sociopath,
narcissist or psychopath in divorce, it’s treacherous.

Sociopaths in a divorce go on a rampage that boggles, frightens, and brings the normal spouse to their knees physically, mentally, and emotionally. You might feel you want a protection order. Not to mention the financial blows during your time with them. In the divorce process, there’s more to come.

What the heck is happening? Why do they do this? I can tell you, it isn’t just to make you suffer, though it does. The sociopath, or the narcissist, has an entirely more important and self-focused need to act upon than your feelings. Let’s talk about what that is, and see how we can minimize this damage and distress.

Divorce is Never Nice

First, in the normal divorce scenario, between two regular people, divorce is one of the most stress-inducing and life-changing events that humans undertake.

And yet, lots of us embark on this path, as statistics show that half of all marriages in the United States end in divorce.

Nothing about normal divorce comes anywhere near the mystifying, terrifying, ruinous experience of sociopaths in divorce.

While divorce is nothing new, it might surprise you to think about how divorce happens, or that is, who makes divorce happen. It’s the women. Women file for divorce far more often than men do.

This is the case since divorce rose up as a part of our social fabric in the 1960s. It’s the wives who file the papers and initiate divorce as the “petitioner” in two-thirds of that 50% divorce rate. So, the husband is typically the “respondent” and therefore, in legal language – the party you sue for divorce. – Did you know divorce is a lawsuit?

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Why Do People Divorce?

The fallout of a normal divorce brings a sense of shame and failure. The children if any, are affected with split families and holidays and shuffling back and forth. Under the best of scenarios, a divorce is a disappointment and a hardship. Financially, women lose more than men in a divorce by 41%.

The standard reasons for divorce are…

a cheating spouse
alcohol or drug abuse
emotional or physical abuse
financial issues
lack of romance or intimacy

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Divorce At Its Best

In a divorce involving two normal people, as in nobody in the equation is a pathological user, things can come out okay in the end. The former spouses can be friendly in some of these endings, kids can feel supported and life goes on. I personally know of this in a few instances. Some remain bitter… I think we all know someone with this story.

The thing is, nothing, nothing, nothing about normal divorce comes anywhere near the mystifying, terrifying, ruinous experience of sociopaths in divorce. And I can’t help but think that a hefty portion of the 50% divorce rate is the escape from the entrapment of one of these monsters.

Why We Divorce a Sociopath?

Anyone about to divorce a sociopath is doing so for one reason only. This reason runs beneath all the other reasons. It’s a very simple and all-consuming and laser-focused reason. Simply put, the spell has broken. This moment is the moment that you can no longer stay because a towering, penetrating fear of staying swells to fill the room and spill out the windows.

Believe it or not, for a sociopath divorce is traumatic and terrifying! How hilarious is that?

Along with this bone-shaking fear, it looms into your awareness that you’re terrified of this person, maybe that you always have been, and that you fear what they’re going to do – to you – when you leave. The walls and floor and ceiling have flown away and caved in at the same time. The fear of staying pulls up stronger. – This is when we leave.

What Breaks the Spell of Coercive Control?

How do we know what will break the spell? We don’t. It could be the smallest moment that shatters the trance of coercive control. It takes as long as it takes.

The moment will arrive, but there’s no way to know when and what will crack open and break apart that weird-weirdness you’ve been engulfed in.

Surprisingly, that flash of a second when the spell breaks can be as small and insignificant as the way they sneeze one day, walking in from a two-day absence. This is both traumatic and the beginning of your freedom.

Here are the reasons that add up to the end. Anyone of these contributes to that tiny breath of a moment when everything changes and there’s no going back… that second that the spell breaks.

The things that lead up to the end:

finding that there’s someone else or multiple other “relationships”
unknown divorces come to light
discovery of previously unknown children they have
hidden or outright drug use and alcohol consumption
rage, anger, emotional or physical assault or control
forced sexual situations, marital rape or refusal of sexual intimacy
financial abuse or control or theft including secret credit cards, loans or liens
refusal to work or lack of employment
forgery on documents leaving you holding the bag for something, or identify theft
disappearing for days or weeks at a time
passing on a venereal disease
prostitution – as the sex worker or as the client
rampant pron use
the discovery that they aren’t who they said they were
aliases come to the surface; swapping middle and first names
social media and other online presences packed with contradicting information

Divorce is the Fire You Walk Through

Divorce from a sociopath is hell on steroids. So, what is it? Why does a sociopath or what you might be called a narcissist, strike out with such a vengeance at the first hint that a divorce is on your mind? And once it’s underway, why do they hang on, and why do they attack?

To answer that, we go back to the basics about any sociopath or what you might be calling a “narcissist”. Here are a few reminders, the touchstones of a sociopath’s life and what they aspire, strive, and sweat to do:

to make use of others
an all-consuming drive and desire to do whatever they want and not be stopped
to attain and maintain a facade of normal (marriage and kids fill this bill often)
to seem to be the “good guy” (required in order to get away with things)
manage the fear of being discovered for what they are
strike out in indignation when anyone takes away what they’ve taken into their possession

Divorce from the Sociopath’s, the Narcissist’s POV

Aside from wanting to avoid alimony and child support orders, there are other reasons a sociopath fights a divorce. In a divorce, they lose much… us. We’re the portal to everything. After all, as they siphon their existence off of others when we remove ourselves, what’s left?

Along with giving the sociopath a facade of normalcy, marriage provides the sociopath not only physical shelter and a place to hide, but legal shelter. When we divorce a sociopath, we’re blowing up their world.

For many sociopaths (narcissists), aside from appearing normal as a married person, getting married is their focus as their big-time bread and butter. Their purpose in marrying – marrying again – is so that they can legally drain bank account after bank account. In this way of fraud as a livelihood, there’s the added possibility of collecting real estate, businesses, property, windfalls, pensions, family heirlooms, inheritance, or life insurance.

Sociopaths, Narcissists Fight Divorce

Bottom line, if you’re going for a divorce from a sociopath or that beast you’re calling a narcissist, they see it as you taking away their property. That is, he – or she or they – loses you as an object to make use of, and all that he’s gained or enjoys through you as his prey.

In his eyes, you’re making him a failure. You’re pulling his world from under his feet. – And at the same time, you as an individual are nothing. You’re worthless fundamentally in their minds in comparison to their own superior gloriousness. If you’re destroyed as they fight for what they see as theirs, so be it. That’s how the sociopath – the narcissist – feels. It’s how their brain works.

Divorce is Traumatic for a Sociopath

On top of tearing their painstakingly hijacked life apart, they fear that divorce puts them at risk of being caught out for all the things they’ve done.

The sociopath’s brain is specifically limited so that they don’t comprehend that a divorce is just that, a divorce. It’s out of their scope of realization that going before a judge to attain a divorce doesn’t mean all their past offenses, warrants, and heinous deeds will be brought into question.

A pathological user would prefer to stay married, to disappear, and then boomerang back to use you as a port in a storm.

When going to court, the sociopath aka narcissist thinks their entire fraud schematic since the beginning of time will come out in the open, and the judge will lock them up. – In other words, divorce for a sociopath is traumatic and terrifying! How hilarious is that?

Some of them are so terrified they run instead. Lots of sociopaths are bigamists. But, even when they run, you can get a divorce once you file those papers… be sure you know how to take those steps.

Sociopaths and Their Children in Divorce

When children are a part of the divorce, please keep in mind, that the sociopath feels no love for them. As appalling and sickening as this is to understand, please step away from believing that for even one second they genuinely care about the kids or the family dog.

Divorce is a time they’ll pretend to love the kids. The pretense is to create the things listed above, to seem normal, to seem like “the good guy” in order to keep what they’ve gained in “respectability”, property, and a livelihood.

The real reason sociopaths pretend to love their kids is very simple. It goes back, just as all things about them do, to their basic needs. The basic way their psyche operates.

They want to hold onto what they’ve taken, the kids are part of their pack of prey
Their main drive and sole motivation is to do whatever they want
And to stop anyone who tries to interfere with them from doing whatever they want

Money Trumps Kids

It isn’t the kids they care about… it’s wanting to avoid being ordered to pay out child maintenance. They are dumb enough to think that taking the kids will be better than paying out child support. The irony is, that they have no intention of paying the child support anyway, and most don’t.

The sociopath is mad and enraged because you’re taking their stuff. This divorce could get them in trouble because they assume that you’re going to yammer to everyone about what they’re really like.

Divorce makes them look not-normal. The kids being taken away makes them look not-normal. – This is bad for business; you and what comes along with you are their business.

The Children Leave The Door Open

So, if they don’t love the kids, why do they have them? Well, children adore their parents. It’s natural, it’s innate for a baby, an infant, a toddler, and young, sweet non-questioning children to worship their parent. A few years of blind adoration from a cute kid boosts the sociopath’s (narcissist’s) normal score to the outside world.

And, not to be overlooked is the very important thing that they hope for…that being the biological parent of the children functions as a wedge that leaves the door to you: open.

Forget Monogamy, Bigamy is More Like It

A pathological user would prefer to stay married, disappear, and then boomerang back to use you as a port in a storm. Kids are a reason to be able to show back up in your life and take more, to make more use of you, and to use your home as a hideout when others are blowing up their world.

Later on, another big benefit of the children comes into the picture. Popping back up into the kids’ lives once every three years or so is an investment in this. It’s as if those cute kids are like baby livestock. Their value increases as they grow. Because children grow up into adults with bank accounts to raid and houses to crash in.

Self-Defense During Divorce

After all the “just trust me” speeches, the threats, the promises of a house and, I swear, I’ll change hasn’t swayed you from filing for a divorce, the sociopath kicks into high gear. Their efforts now escalate to their best attempts to preserve themselves.

Their job now is to turn this around, to make you look bad so that they can keep looking like the “good guy”. And you? You’re now a threat to them. In other words, drumroll… From the genuine and authentic point of view of a sociopath or narcissist, their vindictive behavior during a divorce is an act of self-defense.

Divorce From a Narcissist, a Sociopath

While if we’re seeing clearly we can think of it as a chess game, make no mistake – this is not a game to the sociopath. It is literally their livelihood and freedom they’re fighting for. Their fight is from a primal and dark place.

Decide what you want: you get to write the ending to this saga. You get to win your life back. Know what you’re facing. Knowing how to maneuver and navigate them out of your life is critical.

Start on your ability to gain that vantage point. Take in that understanding, and the skills to decipher the sociopath’s mind before the divorce is filed. Demystify the terrifying, ruinous experience of sociopaths in divorce. Shift early into your primal place in order to match their level of effort, and then fight for good. Take back your life.

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As a certified coach, upholding industry standards I strive to inform, educate, invite thought and dialogue, to co-plan, co-strategize, advise, consult, refer, recommend, train, teach, guide and coach people in guided recovery and discovery specific to these crimes, and from hell and broken in the aftermath to whole again, and more. You decide what winning is.