Manipulation Tactics of a Love Fraud
The Devil Is In The Detail
This blog is written for female survivors of male perpetrators.
TRIGGER WARNING: Descriptions of the ways we have been manipulated can be extremely distressing to read. Please be careful how you take in the information in this blog – and how much you take in at one sitting. It is absolutely not my intention to make you afraid and distressed and then try to sell you something – which is how some narcissistic abuse recovery experts operate. Read or listen, and be very mindful of how the information is affecting you emotionally and physically. Please. Stop when you find it too distressing to take in all at once.
The sophisticated shallow charming persona of the psychopath whitewashes over the - dare I say it- sinister tactics that actually operate their day to day lives: the covert (some unconscious) manipulation of the truth, the target's emotions, other people's perceptions of the target and themselves. The things they DO for their self- gratification and aggrandisement, counter to what they SAY to win hearts and minds.
Remember, we are not talking about a macho aggressive overtly racist sexist pig here. We are talking about a smooth talking glib easy-going charming people-magnet. We are talking about behaviour that no one else can see but those they prey on, or those outside the charm circle, and few would believe if they could see it anyway!
Here are some manipulation techniques that fly under the radar for those trusting souls amongst us. In order of escalation - as the narcopath tightens the screw.
Hypnotic Charm
The most charismatic person in the room, he focuses the spotlight of his full attention on you. With large doses of direct eye contact, he is totally fascinated in whatever it is you have to say. If he is a celebrity narcissist, he appears utterly fascinated by the story of how you listened to his music/ saw his movie/ watched him play footie when you were a kid, but it will seem as if you were the first person ever to have told him this, and he is utterly flattered and humbled by such a revelation. You walk away proclaiming, “Wow, he is such a nice humble decent down-to-earth guy!” ten minutes after you have met him.
Love bombing seduction
Excessive attention in the form of emails, texts, letters, flowers, gifts, dinners out, sex, good times and fun. Has to be with you every minute of every day 'for the rest of his life'. Like no other seduction you’ve experienced. (Believe me, he is not “the one”!)
Flattery
Extreme validation about your appearance, your personal qualities, your competence, your intelligence, your environment, your social and professional prowess. (The very things he is compelled to undermine and destroy once he has the power to do so).
Mirroring
The coincidences are extraordinary. He professes to share the same beliefs, politics, spirituality, tastes, preferences, likes and dislikes as you. You were ‘made for each other’. (NOT).
Hurried Intimacy
He progresses the relationship quickly to sharing his innermost insecurities desires ambitions and 'shame' in an effort to have you reciprocate. When you do, as is natural, he will later use his knowledge of your intimate secrets as a tool to control and manipulate you. Quick to move into your home. Quick to talk about a shared future. Quick to propose marriage. “Whirlwind romance”.
Lying
Outright lies whilst looking you straight in the eye.
Huge omissions that leave holes in the jigsaw. Over time, you will find you have an increasing pile of jigsaw pieces that don't fit into the picture he has painted.
Twisted truths. Embellished truths - a tiny truth at the centre of a Russian Doll wrapped in layers of lies.
Rationalisation
Clever and plausible stories to explain why he lied to you. For example, the reason he didn't tell you he was married was that he couldn't bear to lose you and he wanted to leave his wife without causing any moral distress to you.
Playing the Victim
More lying to gain your sympathy and support. For example, he had been trapped in a loveless marriage for years or was the victim of abuse from his mentally unstable wife, or had done everything in his power to support his violent drug addicted child before it all got too much for him and he was forced to abandon them.
Word play - Empty or Loaded Words - 'Word Salad'
Practiced yarn-spinners, a manipulator knows exactly the right words to choose to:
put a convincing argument,
induce an emotional reaction (flatter, confuse, stifle, insult, defuse, inflame), or
paint a picture (impress, insinuate, suggest, plant a seed of doubt, build on commonly-held assumptions or cultural biases).
Telling you exactly what you want to hear, they will make promises, commitments, vows and oaths they have no intention of fulfilling. "I love you. I've waited my whole life for you. I’ve finally met my soulmate. I'll never leave you," are uttered easily and frequently (and to many targets over a lifetime). Over time, you will notice that their pledges and self-professed image of themselves does not match up with their actions. They continually break promises, let you down, are never there for you when you need them.
Masters of the double-entendre, they occasionally utter words that seem nonsensical or out of place. Because these utterances are so odd, we can let them through to the keeper when in fact they are glimpses of true intention. Expert lie-detectors call them, "tells". Often in the form of black humour. For example, "we can get married, settle down, have kids and drive each other nuts!", or, “Now we are married darling, it’s all downhill from here. Ha ha ha”.
Backhanded Compliments
Barbed comments in which a derogatory observation is disguised within an apparent compliment. " You handled that really well, given that you are so weak and sensitive. You did a good job on the books, especially when you are so bad with figures. Doesn't this dress make my wife look slimmer than she is?"
Belittling
Behaviour such as rolling eyes, tut-tutting, talking 'down to', mocking, scoffing or teasing. Demeaning the target’s opinions, achievements, and abilities in both a private and public context. Induces or increases low self-esteem. Such a common socially-acceptable male treatment of women in this culture that it flies under the radar for many of us.
Intermittent Reinforcement
A proven method for increasing 'trauma' bonds with a person or animal. Used by cult leaders. Alternating 'reward' for desired behaviours with punishment for behaviours deemed 'unacceptable' by the manipulator. Experts speak of 'dosing' - that is providing periods of love-bombing to induce euphoria and bonding in the subject. Followed by periods of ignoring, neglecting, punishing the subject by withdrawal. Creates enormous confusion and co-dependency - that is, the subject's happiness becomes dependent on the positive or negative treatment by the manipulator. An actual physical addiction to the dopamine released in happy times results in a craving to repeat the positive experience during times of neglect. Makes for extremely loyal and obedient dogs and children. Breaks their spirit.
The Silent Treatment
Stonewalling, refusing to engage, leaving the room or the home for hours or even days at a time. The target has plenty of time to question what it is they said or did that caused the emotional and physical withdrawal of the manipulator, and becomes conditioned to avoid certain subjects, hide certain emotions, adjust certain behaviour as a result. It becomes patently clear what is "off limits", and important issues slowly become a simmering volcano of unspoken concerns underlying day-to-day ife.
Goading
Commonly referred to as "pushing someone's buttons". Deliberately putting you on the defensive by lying, ignoring, accusing, belittling to provoke a reaction. This goading - testing your patience - can occur over hours or days. For example; making and breaking promises over and again; stringing you out by saying one thing overtly and doing another covertly; not turning up at appointments; going 'AWOL' when you need him most, then switching the conversation to phone or email and continuing to ignore increasingly urgent requests for explanation or action (stonewalling). If, in response, you text or leave an angry voice message, this evidence will then be used to alienate anyone who might be left to support you (triangulation) by him claiming he is the victim of unprovoked abuse (playing the victim).
Once it starts, it means he has found his new supply, decided to leave and flip the blame onto you. All the while gathering support and sympathy from the community. He WINS. Again. Game over. New chapter begins.
Flipping the Blame
Goading, then making the story about your bad temper. Having an affair, then making the story about your jealousy or paranoia. Triangulating, then making the story about your low self-esteem. Co-ercing you to stretch a moral boundary, then making the story about your prudishness. Breaking the law, then making the story about your restrictive religious or moral sensibilities.
There is the unconscious process of 'projecting' their own faults onto others that is a common human tendency. Then there is the sinister, conscious escalation of shaming and scapegoating that leads to the inevitable discard/destroy phase.
Triangulation
Stimulating uncomfortable interpersonal relations (jealousy, suspicion or dislike) with another person - frequently an ex or possible 'next wife'- by defaming that person to you or defaming you to that person. By claiming you or they said or did something neither of you said or did.
Conducted on a broader scale, it can take the form of sly and insidious remarks dropped into 'public' conversations in the form of total fabrications that cast the target in an unflattering light such that the listener will judge them (or you) harshly or confirm an already-held bias. It relies on our natural tendency to gossip. For example, " I heard from a reliable source that so-and-so is a closet alcoholic/mad bitch/compulsive spender/adulterer ".
Financial Sculduggery
Hiding (or ‘keeping private or separate’) his financial situation; denying access to accounts; controlling your earning potential (by suggesting you leave your job so ‘he can support you’ or you can ‘take care of the kids’); justifying his spending decisions and invalidating yours; running up debts; taking loans in joint names without your permission; claiming it was you driving the vehicle when the traffic infraction occurred; borrowing and never repaying; treating mortgage accounts like a Ponzi scheme (you deposit, he secretly withdraws).
Hero Complex
Having very shallow "affect", (emotional experiencing), psychopaths get a buzz out of risky or dangerous situations. They enjoy instilling fear in those around them so they can observe the discomfort of fear in a normal person, and then present themselves as a rescuer Hero.
Machiavellian psychopaths will use this technique with large groups of people. Think of Fascist leaders, doomsday cults, Brexit or the recent US Presidential Campaign.
Gaslighting
Claiming that a mutual experience did or didn't happen such that you begin to doubt your own perceptions. "I never said that. You are imagining things. You are over reacting. It's all in your head. My wife has a very bad memory. Ha ha ha." Gaslighting begins spasmodically and increases in frequency and weight as the relationship progresses. Used with other manipulation tactics, gaslighting has the effect of denying a target's reality. This is deeply damaging over time.
Convenient Memory Loss (Toxic Amnesia)
As above. Swearing to the fact that he has no memory of a certain event, such that observers must decide who to believe. He forgets agreements, promises, appointments, contracts that were only ever made to secure your loyalty or trust, but are now inconvenient truths. Not just a lie of omission, but a sworn oath to no memory of a significant truth.
Invalidation
Subtle covert behaviours that indicate a total lack of respect or callous disregard for the rights of the target. Behind-closed-doors behaviours and speech that clearly indicate that the target's ideas, beliefs, boundaries, needs, goals simply don't matter. Treating the target like a convenience or a burden.
Humiliation
Giving the public impression that the target is a lazy incompetent 'lame duck' that offers nothing to the manipulator but is the beneficiary of tremendous support, kindness, generosity or loyalty from the benevolent abuser.
Shaming & Blaming the Victim
The psychopath holds the target responsible for everything that is wrong with the relationship. He can blame his adultery on his wife's unattractiveness or illness, his professional failures on her lack of support, his financial irresponsibility on her ‘being high maintenance’, his sexual dysfunction on her lack of libido, his stonewalling on her being too demanding, his dishonesty on her suspicion or paranoia, his incompetence on her unrealistic expectations, his alcoholism on her enabling. Over time, this can lead to a victim mentality and deep personal shame in the target.
Coercive control (as understood by police, lawyers and others)
“No wife of mine is going out to work!”
“I forbid your friend from ever coming into my house again!”
Persuasive control (the more insidious form of control used by manipulators)
“You know you don’t have to keep that job if it’s upsetting you. I can support us both.”
“I don’t know why you keep seeing that friend. He/she really doesn’t have your best interests at heart. They are just using you.”
NOTE: A narcopath will never admit to any of the behaviours above, and doesn’t see anything wrong with them anyway.
You survived all or some of that. Despite being scammed, used and manipulated, you are still here. Inside you is the courage to endure, the resilience to overcome, the tenacity to hold on until your journey through Hell eventually ends. And it will end. You will emerge into the light wiser, more compassionate and more free than you ever thought possible. You have been through a trial by fire that not every human being will experience or understand. You can and will recover. Have faith in yourself. Your beautiful spirit was broken, but you will rise again like the Phoenix from the ashes of your previous life. You have everything you need inside of you, even though you may feel weak and exhausted and lost right now. With rest, patience, simplicity, silence, contemplation, self-compassion, discernment and NO CONTACT, you will emerge like the lotus with its roots in the mud.
He is not an omnipotent being who has supernatural powers over you. He is a disordered person who has developed this personality strategy of manipulating people and impressions to get what he wants out of life, that’s all. He wanted you. He got you. He took everything that was useful to him, and discarded you, with a callous scorched earth policy – leaving nothing intact – from which you can rebuild. But you will be reborn.
Be strong. Be brave. Be kind to yourself. Wrap yourself in your own tender loving embrace and nurture the little tortured soul that feels as if it has been thwarted. You will fly again beautiful soul. Take heart.
Important Note:
You might feel like your experience is nothing like 'abuse', 'sexual abuse', or 'domestic violence'. You might be feeling used and abused, but can't explain it or express it. So portals for finding support don't apply to you.
Rest assured that most women’s domestic abuse organisations, some police, some lawyers and most mental health professionals (definitely not all) now understand the signs of covert coercive control. In Britain, it has now entered law. Australian States are still catching up.
If reading or hearing this has triggered you, please reach out to me or one of the following organisations:
