Dark Triad abuse victims tend to feel like mutant toys after being abused and bullied. A shadow of their former selves, many are left financially incapacitated, in poor physical health, and suffering from extreme forms of social isolation after being tortured, blamed, shamed, bullied in public as well as private, sexually traumatized, and socially humiliated.
Socially outcast and abused by their Abuser’s brainwashed friends and family, many lose all social and emotional support even from members of their own toxic families. For that reason alone, believing a Narcissistic Abuse victim about their subjective impressions of trauma caused by a Dark Triad figure is crucial to helping save or treating them, noting that pervasive abuse or Aggravated Stalking victims are at risk of committing suicide or developing life-threatening stress illnesses like high blood pressure, severe anxiety disorders, C-PTSD, or cancer.
People who have been targeted for social abuse by a Dark Triad are typically too afraid to break the silence about domestic violence for their own sake. Failed by a legal system that allows clever Abusers to get away with abusing, many are seeking to protect the people they tell who happen to know their Abuser.
Effects on the life and health of an individual targeted for use and abuse by a Dark Triad are permanent and life-changing, that’s for sure. Physical health declines while mental health erodes, leaving the abuse victim forced to beg for legal protection as well as emotional support.
Flying Monkeys, Abusers, and Abuse Enablers typically strive to invalidate that the abuse victim has a sane and valid reason to have ever felt abused, taken for granted, and emotionally terrorized as they have been. Not only do they refuse to believe a victim has a right to be upset (even if they can prove the abuse), they truly don’t seem to believe that the victim is entitled to their own subjective opinion about how an abuse or trauma exposure incident personally affected them.
Validating the effects of trauma and fear caused directly by an Abuser does not mean targeting an accused aggressor for social punishment.
In all reality, confronting an Abuser tends to be the LAST thing a victim of a Dark Triad or pack of social predators wants to do.
In all actuality, confronting an Abuser is likely to make them (the Abuser, as well as the Abuser’s enablers) furious.
To advise an abuse victim to socially or publicly go after their aggressor not only terrifies the victim but if they follow the bad advice and do so they tend to only put their own life and social reputation even more at risk.
If they aggress an Abuser or anyone likely to give credibility to the Abuser’s gaslighting, the Scapegoat targets put themselves at further risk. It does mean listening to a victim and allowing them to discuss how abuse or a social experience personally affected them — preferably without offering up thoughtless, inflammatory, victim shaming advice or unhelpful comments like, “Why didn’t you tell someone, call the police, or just leave him?”
One of the biggest reasons most childhood abuse victims never talk is for fear of not being understood or believed. The same sensation of toxic shame for being abused cripples many workplace bullying targets, domestic abuse sufferers, and domestic violence victims.
If you were born into a family of Cluster B thinkers, you are likely to become either a conforming Abuser or be treated as the black sheep of the toxic family unit. Persecuted for no crime other than being emotionally sensitive, the more abusive and neglectful the parents, the more likely they are to groom their own child as an abuse target prone to enabling.
The child is likely to have problems with healthy social decision making throughout childhood and adolescence that continue to theme through their lifestyle patterns throughout their adulthood.
One of the readers over on “Narcissists, Sociopaths, and Flying Monkeys — Oh My!” (TM), the official fan page for Flying Monkeys Denied — shared a letter so succinctly describing what it feels like to be the preferred scapegoat target for a Dark Triad.
Honestly, her story speaks for literally tens of hundreds of thousands of abuse victims.
The gal who submitted the candid letter was and continues to be persecuted by her former love interest. Pervasively abused by proxy by people who have been lied to and socially manipulated into believing she was the problem in her romantic relationship. The smooth criminal used Machiavellian strategies both at home and with family members in order to undermine her credibility while putting her under extreme levels of duress. as well as on anyone willing to listen to his attention-seeking antics to dupe everyone into believing not only was he being abused but that she (as the true victim) was psychologically unstable and of poor moral character.
The smooth criminal used Machiavellian strategies both at home and with anyone mutually known to the couple in order to undermine her credibility while putting her under extreme levels of duress. Nowadays, he continues to write revisionist history while striving to poison the well against her.
We’re sharing her story in order to let HER know not only do we believe she was traumatized, but that her story is a virtual copy of so many others. Man, woman, or child — it does not matter… if a Dark Triad finds it amusing or pleasurable to destroy you psychologically, spiritually, physically, emotionally, financially, personally (meaning mentally), as well as socially, it’s truly a game-changer for even the most psychologically stable, loving, and naturally self-confident of people.
Shared with love, please do share this article or click like on social media if and when you happen to read it. It’s truly the best way to validate that a victim’s life experience happened and was indeed tragic without ever needing to turn to an aggressor to confirm a target was indeed the victim of abuse.
Take a deep breath and settle yourself into a safe space to read this story if you were the victim of LOVE FRAUD or have ever been targeted for social destruction by a Sadistic and cruel social oppressor. It’s likely to strike a highly emotionally sensitive chord with domestic abuse victims, especially those who truly loved and trusted an abusive loved one or were deeply in love with a duplicitous, controlling, and abusive love interest.
This is HER story. This is OUR story. This is a story of gaslighting and narcissistic abuse that commonly happens to the kindest and most tenderhearted, loving, and spiritually trusting people.
Believe it:
My ex was always the hero burdened with caring for his drug addicted, mentally ill girlfriend and her poor kid.
He garnered heaps of sympathetic, supportive, admiring twats, who viewed ME as an abusive and dangerous person.
His abuse was compounded as complete strangers to me made it their vendettas to “punish” me for hurting such a lovely and devoted man.
In reality, when my abuser came into my life, he was attracted to my tremendous self confidence, vibrancy, assertiveness and autonomy.
During the love bombing phase of the relationship, my beauty, passion for life, intelligence and skills were all things he openly and publicly praised, but after only a few short months of dating, my success, the fact I was incredibly cherished by my friends, and respected by my professional co-workers become nothing but sources of contention.
The abuse I endured from him during the devaluation stage of the Narcissistic Abuse cycle was tremendous.
In the years to follow he enacted insidious, systematic, and pervasive abuse techniques that left me feeling like my self esteem had been compromised by my own silencing of healthy, common-sensical intuition.
Being involved in the relationship left me feeling completely alone, broken, and socially isolated.
Forbidding contact with friends and family, making me completely dependent on him for every single thing, traumatized me through severe gaslighting, mind control and brainwashing techniques (coincidentally his favorite subject of copious hours of study).
I was repeatedly drugged, raped, beaten, strangled, then threatened with institutionalization and losing my child forever if I sought medical care or trauma victim support.
I was mentally and emotionally terrorized, and severely controlled and micro-managed to the point of slavery.
I was told daily what to wear, what to do, what to say to whom — never in a way that benefitted me… only my ex; he made it perfectly clear to me on many occasions that I was constantly humiliated and expected to take it for his pleasure.
But the abuse did not stop there.
As time progressed, I was ridiculed endlessly for little things like how I looked, sounded, or acted. If it was something I could not change about myself, it was like my ex put a bullseye target on it.
If I looked healthy, my ex would find something wrong with my appearance, I was always too fat or too thin, too short or too tall, too pretty or not pretty enough.
Nothing I could ever do was good enough.
Walking on eggshells every day, you never know what would cause the next tirade, rant, or domestic violence incident.
You are constantly told things like how to sit, walk, speak, think, and parent.
Nothing was off limits for my ex to criticize.
I used to love and like myself; now, I enter every social interaction like I have something to be ashamed of myself for, simply for having spent time in what I thought was a romantic relationship with a “difficult person”.
I was told when to sleep, when and what myself and my child could eat, when I was allowed to shower or bathe, where to go, who I could talk to.
It’s hard after listening to him ridicule me and talk me down to have enough self-confidence to even try to save myself from him, let alone to feel like it might be possible to live a life where my partner is loving and I’m myself again.
With or without permission, He read every text, listened in to every phone call and voice message, opened my mail, searched my belongings, and attended all doctor and counsellor appointments with me in order to monitor what I was disclosing.
My name and social security numbers were used in acts of identity theft.
Financially, my credit was ruined, my credit cards routinely maxed by him (left unpaid, of course, after our split), my life savings spent, and my professional reputation ruined.
I’ve been ostracized in my home town by family and friends.
Even moving away has not stopped him from smear campaigning relentlessly against me.
He swears no matter how far I run or where I go, he’s only a phone call or a road trip away from physically harming or killing me.
He’s even put guns to my head and pulled the trigger Russian Roulette style while laughing.
My ex, long before we were split and continuing now years after, would convincingly lament to helping professionals, neighbors, anyone about how crazy I was — declaring me mentally unstable, a whore, and an unfit mother.
I’ve even heard that he’s told people I was a junkie — a drug addict, schizophrenic, an alcoholic, a pathological liar, a prostitute, a sex addict, and a thief not mentally stable or ever to be trusted.
He has convinced perfect strangers that I am an insanely jealous, mentally deranged, greedy, spiteful, and vindictive monster who stalks him (rather than the other way around).
Using his harem of male and female abusers by proxy, he has used them to do things like abuse me on social media and to destroy my personal and professional reputation. The only people more toxic than him seem to be his current love interests as well as his most aggressive flying monkeys.
He has alienated me from friends, family, extended family, my In-Laws, gotten me fired from jobs by calling my supervisors and lying, and he’s even had his female mistresses and current love interest pose as me to make phone calls claiming to be me in order to do things like turn off my electricity.
He’s put bills in my name I did not know about, forged my signature on checks and legal documents (like a mortgage and handful of credit cards I had no idea he’s taken out in my name). Then he cancelled my life and health insurance policies without my knowing it, leaving my child and I at risk of financial devastation.
The best way to describe his behavior is to call it out as CRAZY MAKING.
Literally, everything I ever told him in confidence during a therapy session or in private was made public, distorted as fact, and presented to anyone willing to listen to him with a massive gaslighting strategy (meaning manipulative, lying) spin.
He would provoke then secretly record and video me losing my shit.
On the occasions I would finally crack and attempt to defend myself or my child, he would use the recordings to make himself look like the victim.
My sanity has been socially questioned (more than medically or legally), which makes the embarrassment even worse, but I live each day under the constant shadow of his accusations that have left me feeling like my name has been effectively karmically blacklisted.
My mental health has been in question simply due to his lies.
He callously manipulates career criminal personality types into actively bullying me by engaging in hostile acts of Aggravated Stalking and Cyber Bullying.
The saddest part (in my opinion) is watching him lie to his friends, our friends, my family, and authorities about not only his own actions, but mine as well.
It breaks my heart knowing otherwise good people have been gaslighted to the point they actually BELIEVE HIM and are willing to help him abuse my child and I while showering him with undeserved sympathy and emotional support.
I don’t feel sorry for them (the people who choose to believe him or who are willing to lie for him in order to remain on his good side), but I also have a hard time blaming them.
After all, when I first met him, I thought he was charming, charismatic, witty, intelligent, socially together, and a moral person.
He was morally insane, yet I have had my credibility, mental stability, personal integrity, and intentions in breaking the silence about being an abuse victim constantly called into question.
As a romantic partner I was treated like one of Sid’s Mutant Toys in the movie “TOY STORY”.
I had my very sanity , nature, and character attacked without justification for responding to his abuse.
My recall and credibility has been called into question by not only him but authority figures, our family friends, my own parents, my siblings, his friends, my friends, his entire family, and any person who does not know me personally but seems to feel it’s within their right to make that kind of moral as well as medical judgement after speaking with him.
Remember how Sid tortured his toys as well as objectifying and abusing his sister?
Then he lied about his behavior to his own mother while blame shifting, then flat out denying he’d done anything to her or his things followed by creating a gaslighting revisionist history story?
That’s my ex, complete with the disingenuous smile coupled with the hypnotic, sociopathic stare that both mesmerizes Empaths and brainwashes people who simply don’t know better.
It is terrifying knowing and not knowing what they are capable of, simultaneously. Gut wrenchingly terrifying.
As if subjecting a person to years of daily abuse and torture would not have a cumulative effect on emotional psychology, abuse is supposed to be taken daily without complaint.
God forbid you TELL anybody about Dark Triads or their situational abuse patterns — if you even breathe a word about how they treat you in private, it guarantees abuse will do nothing but escalate.
I’m not trying to tell people about my experience with him because I want to hurt HIM or because I am angry — all I am really trying to do is protect others from being duped, lied to, and conned into trusting him.
Why?
Because once he has your faith or trust after pretending to be your soulmate or “just like you” while mirroring your behavior, he’s asking probing questions to give himself a psychological advantage over his targets, marks, and prospective Love Fraud victims.
Keeping HIS secret (that he was a devious Sadist with a Machiavellian and anti-social nature) was made out to be my primary social obligation and number one personal responsibility.
No one deserves to be treated in a relationship like I have been — not by an abuser, not by his family and friends, not by the people I used to trust were on my side or in my corner, and certainly not by casual acquaintances or perfect strangers.
I alone was responsible for earning nearly all the money for the family and handed over every penny — and would have to ask or beg for food for myself and child.
We were kept on very strict rations and a extremely limited diet.
Getting child support or money from him to help out with household finances while living with him was virtually impossible, so the very thought of leaving and expecting financial assistance seemed more like the fairy tale ending for a Princess than anything truly realistic.
If he could have lawfully kept me in shackles for his deviant pleasure, I swear — I honestly believe he would have loved it.
I lived in constant terror that if I did or said the wrong thing, he’s punish me by taking away money, by abusing or neglecting our pets, or by treating our child in an abusive or psychologically manipulative and devastatingly damaging manner.
He’d cheat, then brag about not wearing a condom.
My life and personal health — as well as the safety and emotional well being of both myself and our child — was almost constantly disregarded.
Crumbs of affection or attention were thrown to me like a dog whose master occasionally tosses them a life-sustaining, soul nourishing bone.
Sex was on occasion intense, but for the most part it was awkward, clumsy, and never pleasing physically to me to have to endure, yet he always rolled off the top of me afterwards and went so far as to demand COMPLIMENTS.
He did a variety of gross things like blowing his nose on his dirty socks, then would leaving them lying on the floor for me to pick up (covered in snot); if I didn’t find all of them immediately or the next day, there was going to be hell to pay in the form of being forced to endure hours of his standing above me waving blunt objects over my head while I cried and dutifully played Cinderella while he was bellowing.
If I had a problem with his behavior, it was MY problem, as in I was the root cause for my own discomfort.
I was expected to obey any “suggestion” without hesitation or question – or he would become violent.
To further my terror, he would unexpectedly abandon me for days on end, with no explanation of where he went or any warning.
He routinely left me alone with our child with zero food, money, or transportation.
Then, he would cut off all communication with me while he was gone, pulling disappearing acts left and right while he ran off with friends, other women, and his party buddies.
If I texted, called, or in any way tried to find him, it was used to make ME look like I was controlling, irrational, and emotionally unbalanced.
Stonewalling, ghosting, and disappearing were all psychological and emotional abuse techniques he used to let me know my place.
If he happened to wander back in the door (either for dinner at a reasonable hour or after a three to five day drug binge, sex marathon with a mistress, or a drinking bender), I was not only expected to be happy about his cheating and everyday abuse of me, I was expected to service him sexually on demand, to wash his clothes, to spring clean the house, and to make him his favorite meal.
In our home, he was king and I was deemed the world’s most underpaid and unappreciated whore, “crappy housekeeper”, and “worthless” domestic servant.
If he got caught lying, there was never a sincere apology. Only claims I had a “wild imagination”, told that I couldn’t “prove it”, or if I could prove it, it would alway promote a Narcissistic Rage incident that ended with a Domestic Violence incident.
Which, of course, I was told was all my fault.
If I had only been ABC or done XYZ, he would not have to cheat, lie, steal, withhold, ridicule, terrorize, intimidate, batter.
You name it, no matter what he did, said, or DIDN’T do, I was personally held as solely responsible for it.
The list of abuse is endless… but thanks to finally waking up to the reality I was played by a Dark Triad with a Love Fraud agenda, I am now walking the long road of recovery.
I hope and pray daily that I will have the inner strength to get myself and my child far, far away successfully from my abuser… and that a person like him never darkens my doorway EVER AGAIN.
As of late, after reading your website, I have been learning how to set healthy boundaries and to reevaluate my lifestyle priorities.
I will get well, I will heal, my spirit and mind will be restored.
I will learn to trust again and I will never ever allow myself to be abused again because my abuser also gave to me the most precious and powerful gift ever given to me- for this I am thankful.
He taught me that I am worthy of so much more than abuse.
I am worthy of gentleness, acceptance, and kindness.
I am worthy of safety, respect, honesty, loyalty and loving care.
I am worth loving.
I am worth love.
And guess what?
It’s his own damn problem if he chooses not to treat me like a human being who deserves respect. I know now that my own subjective viewpoint is valid even if he and his cohorts choose to try to invalidate the fact that my fundamental human rights exist.
Thank you from the bottom of my heart for listening, for understanding, and most of all for letting me know that I am NOT the only person walking the face of the earth who has ever lived day in and day out through this kind of Narcissistic Abuse.
Honestly…
Anyone who routinely starts to question their own sanity or self worth because a person they know and trust behaves in ways that are psychologically terrifying or manipulative really needs to read up on Dark Triads, brainwashing techniques, psychological manipulation, gaslighting, and all forms of Narcissistic Abuse tactics.
The life you save, as Anonymous Jones once told me in confidence, can be your own… or that of someone in your family.
Thanks for sharing. It really helps to know there are other people out there in the world who actually understand and behave in ways that are caring.
Living with a Sid from Toy Story or a Scott Peterson personality type is never fun for any human being, especially for a woman who happens to be a mom to a child in common with them already.
You are branded a freak and people who you are only trying to help or protect treat you like one of the mutant toys from the cartoon movie.
It’s truly a spiritually and emotionally devastating life experience for any man, woman, or child to have to go through.
Time to grab a box of Kleenex and cry it out while reflecting, Narcissistic Abuse victims.
You are NOT alone, Reader. We are not alone, Survivors.
Pay close attention to the social media likes and shares on this one if you don’t believe us. If you can confirm the posts’ contributor’s notes held elements of truth you saw echoed in your own abuse, please consider this article a support post shared to validate YOU.
We weren’t kidding when we said this type of pervasive and psychologically damaging abuse happens by patterns against men, women, and children targeted by Dark Triads.
If you don’t believe us, ask ANY extreme abuse survivor about how they’ve been treated… not only by their primary abuser but by extension by the Abuser’s Narcissistic Harem of ready, willing, and able enablers. One in twenty-five people is likely to have a Cluster B personality disorder.
Among that one in twenty-five, only a small percentage are likely to be Dark Triad, but they are absolutely predictable in their abuse patterns, cycles, and techniques. Beware the LOVE FRAUD CON ARTIST and the smear campaigning person who claims to be a victim but shows absolutely no evidence of suffering from the side effects of abuse.
No matter how much they cry wolf about being abused, a Dark Triad rarely shows signs of having developed any form of Stockholm Syndrome, anxiety disorder, stress-related illness, or C-PTSD.
Why?
The answer is simple.
Ultimately, they are no more than attention-seeking, “The Boy Who Cried Wolf” types of abusers — ones who take great pleasure in abusing their victims when no one else is looking, then getting away with it by calling their target’s credibility and sanity maliciously into question.
The only thing a Dark Triad personality type can be predicted to do is to behave abominably whenever they are given the opportunity to situationally abuse.
