Your experiences of emotional manipulators?

[mscolly]

My wife was a victim of a emotional manipulator over Internet last year, someone who could make you feel guilty about breathing! He has a sixth sense for knowing what buttons to press to get you to do what he wants and has little or no reguard for others' feelings. The consequences of his attentions on my wife led to an adultery which seriously threatened our marriage.

 

What are your experiences of this sort of person? What tricks do they use and what sorts of alarm signals should be looked for? Guilt and implicit blackmail seemed to play big time in his tactics, but what else do they use to manipulate more innocent and naiive people?

[Gauchori]

Well... I don't have much time but I'm going to say something. Some of them if they try to make you feel guilty about something; they may pass by you with a bad face, with a face of discuss, and thats when people start thinking whats wrong with me? The bad thing is when you try to stop this by being frieds with them. When you start talking to them, they seem more mature than other people and so thats when you start getting their advise or doing what they mostly tell you. They mostly try to twist yuor filling by something they know is going on. And they mostly watch you what are you doing and what do do when something is wrong or is going bad. Thats when they find out what hurts you and thats what they use to attack you in a way. I hope thats helped!

Got to go now. Good luck! 8)

[OceanEyes]

Hi there mscolly,

 

I can't help but wonder what he would have to say, to actually get your wife up out of her chair, get ready, and go have sex with someone else. I ask because it sounds either very very unlikely, or impossible. Some people get way too emotionally involved with people over the net, and they usually have nobody else to blame but themselves.

 

What was he making her feel guilty about? Generally when someone feels guilty, it's because they have done something wrong. What was he blackmailing her for? Usually when you have grounds to 'blackmail' someone, it means that you have some very damaging evidence or something else to cause harm to their life.

 

I guess I just don't understand the whole situation very well, it doesn't sound likely that a man could actually convince your wife to cheat on you. Why would she continue chatting with him if he was so sinister?

[mscolly]

I probably made the manipulator's part of the fault seem excessive. My wife had her own guilt in what happened too. Let's say she was primed due to long-standing problems in the marriage, a need to escape from a humdrum life at home and a work.

 

They met on an on-line fantasy game, and in the beginning, the sexual overtures seemd to be confined within the game, but there was a dangerous mixing of game and real-life feelings, that caught my wife unawares. For example, cyber sex that seemd to her to be within the game, was really a prelude for the real thing. This went on for 6 months or so, with nightly meetings on-line. They then met for real, and things then got out of hand.

 

All this I could understand. It's the next 6 months, when my wife had started to see that he didn't really for her, that he was unpopular person in the game, that he had a collection of boxes in his bedroom, with the name of a different girl on each, containing his momentoes of each one (letters, objects, MSN logs and so on). The way in which she let herself be badly treated by him, how she maintained contact with him even though there was no future in the relationship, how she debased herself to have him, was extraordinary. We've read a lot of the MSN logs, she'd told me a lot of things that happened, and I find it hard to recognise my wife in that person (we've been together 25 yrs).

 

He had certain stock phrases that he always used when he sensed that my wife was getting out of his control. And in the end, it was the control that he was interested in, more than anything else.

 

I've read about such people, they do exist. Theodor Reik's ideas about masochism being common in modern man seem to fit him like a glove (including an unusual sexual problem for a man, he was anorgasmic).

 

These people are dangerous, in that they are very capable of manipulating someone who is already weak for some other reason. They can spot weaknesses a mile, and via a medium as limited as a chat they can start pressing your buttons. In fact, the falsifying nature of a chat seems to give them a big advantage. In real life, you'd run a mile from someone like that, yet in chat they manage what would otherwise seem impossible.

 

How do they do it? What makes them tick?

[nomore]

mscolly, maybe the problem lies with your wife. I mean, she is actually cheated on you for god sake. Second, why are you trying to find out what methods he used to lure your wife to sleep with him? Is your intention to figure out how to manipulate her to stay with you? I think you should ask these questions from your wife since I am assuming you are tyring to work things out.

 

Have you ever thought that maybe your wife is actually the one who is manipulating "you" by blaming the incident on her Internet lover? You also not sharing the entire story, how did you find out that he is controlling her in the first place.

[DanRockstar]

This entire thing seems really confusing and... well, downright peculiar. It's obvious there are problems within your own family unit that need to be addressed or this would never have happened, because nobody is good enough to 'entrance' someone to sleep with them in my oppinion.

 

I believe the type of person you are talking about exist, but I don't think they can do their work without a weak opponent to begin with, and it seems that weakness stems from the relationship as it stands.

[Francis]

I believe there are a lot of predators out there: male predators are mainly sexual predators (trying to obtain what is difficult for males to obtain: sex); while female predators are out there to obtain material gain and sometimes material security (i.e. marriage).

 

Male predators know exactly what females are looking for, everything that most males are unable to give them because they are too much into themselves : emotional support (all is fake, of course), inconditional love (I love big women is one of the talks, you can eat as much as you want), you are perfect, whatever ... Sexual predators know that with women, they have to "catch" her through her feelings first. They know that once they've got their feelings, then they can do whatever: The person is hooked. Their saying is : ONCE YOU'VE GOT THE HEART, THEIR SEX IS YOURS!

 

Female predators offer men what they are looking for : sex. They are always available and pretend they like this and that, even if they hate it (i.e. many women who really want to hook a man, "train" him into anal sex or other types of "different" sex so that they will have more difficulty leaving them). A lot of them also pretend to like women, even if they hate touching women, they will do anything to fulfill the man's dreams. These women know that once the man is attached sexually, he will have major difficulties leaving her. They know they must "catch" him by the sex. Then they can do whatever. Their saying is: ONCE YOU'VE GOT THEIR SEX, THEIR WALLET IS YOURS.

 

How do I know all these things without being a predator myself??? I've seen most of my friends, men and women, all professional issued from very good background, fell into the trap of predators such as these, through the years (Just observing). I've seen most of my friends get into real bad marriages where the persons they married changed completely overnight. Predators look for certain types of persons: successful, rich, etc. and many times people who have been in school for too long, might be very innocent and naive, such as my friends.

 

I almost fell into a trap myself, with a guy who hid his true colours for eight months until I was hooked on him. It was very difficult to separate, but I managed to do so. He was nothing but a parasite who wanted to live off my back. Once emotions (for women) and sexual attachment (for men) are involved, it is very difficult to detach and to see things clearly.

 

Hope this helped.

[Scout]

I think the Internet is a prime spot for manipulative people who are very good at deceiving others. Be careful out there, folks.

[berserk]

Hi

 

I found this topic intresting and i hope that you find out something from it.

 

Well here it goes this is teh technical term for ppl like that. They are called social engineers. They use triggers of the human mind and teh way of everyday life to get waht they want. Info or just straight out mess wiht peoples minds just like in this case. I am practicly a pro at it but i never use it. My career field (IT) just uses it to stop attacks on the business i woudl be working at and i find the human mind intresting. but heres what i suggest if you are really intrested in how these ppl think which is how i got into reading about it i suggest u go buy The art of Deception By Kevin Mitnick.

 

I hope i helped u man

 

Good luck wiht your marriage and best wishes

 

Paul,

[Saj1242]

I know this post is years old but thought I would add my two cents. This is the closet I've found of anything online that is similar to my situation and I feel for the OP.

 

I could be your wife except I'm still in my 20's. I'm currently involved in a toxic friendship like this that started when I was in my teens. Another player from an online game where our relationship started out fairly abusive and morphed into something weird and I guess what you could classify as dependent.

 

I'm now married with a daughter and this guy is still in my life trying to get me involved in a sexual relationship. He's succeeded in the past for some physical meetings but now that I'm married I'm desperate to not be so susceptible to it. For some reason this "friend" knows my triggers to the point where I am currently getting treatment for sex addiction just to deal with them so they aren't used against me so blatantly.

 

Do a google search for covert manipulation that will give you a good guideline to this type of personality. This friend is not attractive at all to me physically and I'm very much attracted to my husband so the reasons why I get so turned on and tempted by what he tells me is confusing. I might as well be a teenage boy drooling and going "huh? yah uh sure whatever you want keep the fix going" and then when the arousal wears off you go through a guilt and shame spiral that just triggers the addiction cycle all over again.

 

It's sick but I'm sure your wife is addicted in someway by the fix this friend provides for her and this guy uses it to his advantage. It's the same sort of high you would get from a drug and when you swear to quit communication you go through withdrawal symptoms that can really mess with your brain. I hope your wife has gotten some treatment by now and your marriage is on stable ground. I'm working towards that myself before I get tempted to do something I'll regret.

[savignon]

With all of your wife's misgivings about the marriage, unhappiness and willing to engage in online "pretend sex", it was probably not as difficult as it may sound to have "manipulated" her. I would hold both parties equally accountable and if it were *my* husband in your shoes, he would find just the virtual sex alone 100% unacceptable and I would find myself 100% living in my car.

At some point, she got up from her computer and made a decision to betray your marriage.

[jahur]

I think the Internet is a prime spot for manipulative people who are very good at deceiving others. Be careful out there, folks.

 

totally second that!