Tuesday 14 February 2012

Deceptive Liason

Have you ever been in love with someone you thought you knew...only to discover that the object of your affection turns out to be nothing more than a stranger?

I was reading Vogue's First Person feature, "An Old Flame Flames Out" where the author Leslie Camhi, encounters her first love several decades later. After a whirlwind romance and what she believed to be a second chance with the one she never forgot, she discovers that their life together was nothing more than a mirage - a web of lies - and she was but "one of many storylines" in his life.

Leslie Camhi's story struck a raw nerve in me. Eight years, a lovely marriage and a beautiful son later, this article triggered feelings in me that I thought I had long since buried, along with my feelings for a man who I thought at the time was my world. But he had deceived me so completely, that I was blindsided by his duality and betrayal.

My experience brings to mind an excerpt from the Danish philosopher Soren Kierkegaard's book The Seducer's Diary, where the protagonist Johannes carefully plans the seduction of a young woman Cordelia, only to break her heart after capturing it completely. Despite discovering his manipulations, Cordelia cannot let go of her feelings for Johannes and returns to him, which was all part of his scheme.

"Never will I call you 'my Johannes,' for I certainly realize you never have been that, and I am punished harshly enough for having once been gladdened in my soul by this thought, and yet I do call you 'mine': my seducer, my deceiver, my enemy, my murderer, the source of my unhappiness, the tomb of my joy, the abyss of my unhappiness. I call you 'mine' and call myself 'yours,' and as it once flattered your ear, proudly inclined to my adoration, so shall it now sound as a curse upon you, a curse for all eternity. Do not look forward to my planning to pursue you or to arm myself with a dagger in order to provoke your ridicule! Flee where you will, I am still yours; go to the ends of the earth, I am still yours. Love a hundred others, I am still yours - indeed, in the hour of death, I am yours. The very language I use against you must demonstrate to you that I am yours. You have had the audacity to deceive a person in such a way that you have become everything to me, so that I would rejoice solely in being your slave. Yours I am, yours, yours, your curse." -- letter from Cordelia to Johannes

It's ironic that this book was my Deceptor's favourite work by Kierkegaard. It's ironic that the scheme Cordelia fell victim to, was not so different from my own predicament. It's not that I wasn't aware of the nature of this book, and it never escaped me that despite the disquieting story this book tells, it was literally an obsession to him. Dog-eared, marked up and highlighted, I had thought it was but an academic venture of his. I had read and thoroughly enjoyed the book myself - as we all enjoy and ponder the tragedies of others - and took my Deceptor's fascination with it as nothing more than a healthy worship for a beloved philosopher, the "grandfather of existentialism". I now wonder how I could have been so oblivious to the fact that life had eerily mimicked fiction.

Did he truly love me? Or was I just one of his many conquests? Had I too, like the author of the Vogue article been but "one of many storylines" in my Deceptor's life? How did he manage to maintain these separate lives and storylines for a period of almost five years? Was he really a Master of Deception, or did I play into it as well? The fragile existence of our relationship was nothing more than a castle built in the sky and a carefully woven web of deceit...I had lived a lie for five years and felt utterly cheated of a "real" existence.

Deception is a multi-faceted monster. I recall once being told by him that the most convincing lie comes from half-truths and sticking as closely to the truth as possible (straight from the horse's mouth!!!). Perhaps he was such a great deceiver that he had even fooled himself into believing his own lies...something that I was only too familiar with. Throughout our relationship, I had niggling doubts of him that would surface in my mind. Certain things did not add up, and other "truths" seemed too far-fetched. Yet I deliberately turned a blind eye and made excuses for him. I lied to myself so well and believed my own lies so wholeheartedly that I truly was in shock to discover his duplicity.

At the time, I wondered if I had really "caught" him, or if he had merely tired of his own games and allowed himself to be "caught". I never really had a chance to go through the proper stages of processing and mourning after that relationship ended as life threw a few curve balls at me and took me in a whole new direction.

I'm not sure how I got through that time in my life. Perhaps it was the distractions of the daily grind, or perhaps (more likely) it was a special person I met shortly after who literally swept me off my feet and spirited me away from those dark times. Regardless of what it was, the memory today feels as fuzzy as that of a long forgotten dream.

Perhaps it was a blessing that I never had the chance to "mourn" the relationship because I never had the opportunity to develop any deep rooted hatred towards him. All that was left was forgiveness. I won't deny that he has shaped who I am today - teaching me things about myself and the world - and for that I am grateful.

Did the love for him just die? Or did it get diverted to the next person? I have been in love several times in my life, and each time, it was a completely different experience altogether, so I do not believe that the love merely gets transferred from person to person. I believe it gets packed away in our memory box as something from the past that once in a while, when the fancy strikes, you take out, dust off and contemplate for a while.

Despite swearing to myself that I would never forget him or our "out of this world love", the memories are fading now...I can't quite recall that manic feeling of passion that I had for him. Nor can I remember the hurt or betrayal. Only a few fond memories here and there that may dance in my mind as I contemplate the youth that I was at the time of that relationship.What this has taught me is that the world is constantly changing, in flux, and so are we. Nothing is permanent. I shake my head and smile at the girl I once was, fearful of a future without this man, unable to envision my life beyond him and I. Yet here I am, several "Loves" later. The future without him that I once could not imagine, upon me. And it's not so bad. In fact, I'm quite thoroughly enjoying myself! :)

Not a traditional Valentine's Day entry I know, but it's about affairs of the heart none the less...Happy Valentine's Day!

XO,
Amy








5 comments:

  1. "Throughout our relationship, I had niggling doubts of him that would surface in my mind. Certain things did not add up, and other "truths" seemed too far-fetched. Yet I deliberately turned a blind eye and made excuses for him."

    Right. And you tell yourself "I'm being paranoid/ WHO DOES THAT?, and I am too smart and too wonderful a woman that anyone would do that to me, he must know how lucky he is to have me."

    I think what finally set the ball rolling (and by that I mean I quit him cold turkey and let him wonder why I never answered his many emails and such) was when we were sitting across the table from one another at dinner at a cozy restaurant. He took my hand, smiled and said, "I don't deserve you." For days and weeks I kept asking myself, "why did it not feel wonderful when he said that to me?" and then I figured it out -- because he was right --- he did not deserve me and more to the point, I deserved better.

    When a friend asked me weeks and months later why I had not shed a tear over his deception (unsubstantiated, but well, we women just KNOW, don't we?). Did I not miss him? I told her no, because it reminded me of something I read in a magazine about the teenage girls going crazy over Robert Pattinson in the Twilight movies. Someone pointed out, "the girls love EDWARD, not Robert.": I had loved a character my boyfriend had created. The "person" I loved was an actor simply playing a role he had created.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you for sharing your story...I love how you expressed, "The 'person' I loved was an actor simply playing a role he had created" - well said!

      It's nice to know that there are others out there who have had similar experiences. It takes the bite out of that feeling of being extremely stupid for being so easily duped. XO

      Delete
  2. I just turned to this blog after reading the Vogue article and then read the above two comments. I went through something similar several years ago and although I've moved on from that part of my life, I think it's completely normal to take it out and still contemplate it once in a blue moon. We're human..are we not?
    I do this once in awhile and then make myself feel badly about it. I am now with a wonderful man who does not lie, manipulate, etc. and one whom I do not find myself making allowances and excuses for. Why then do we still think of these people from time to time who deceived us so? I know that from my experience and from the woman in the Vogue article, that comes from lack of closure. In many of these kinds of experiences, they often end abruptly or in an erratic way that mirrors the relationship. The idea that someone could be totally and completely in your life and then vanish more or less is a tough one to grasp. My Deceptor wouldn't let me have closure. We ended it over the phone abruptly and I've never seen him since. I thought that only happened in the movies. Maybe I am giving him too much credit when I say he planned it this way all along. Maybe he was never really that smart. But my instincts told me that this was his way of now allowing me to have closure and in this way, I could still perhaps be enslaved to him in the mind? It worked for a little while. Eventually, I formed closure on my own. However, it sure would have been nice to have some help from him. Once we learn how to create closure on our own, we no longer need the other person to participate in that so that we can move on with our lives. Once we learn these powers that the self has and how to use them, we have more power over ourselves and fewer can harm us. And we will win.

    My advice to anyone out there who thinks they may currently be in a relationship or situation such as this is to get advice from a friend because it always helps to see things objectively. We, the victim of the Deceptor are in too deep because we have feelings.
    Also, to some degree you have to trust yourself and your instincts. There is a sharp distinction between being paranoid and noticing a pattern of things just not adding up. If you have a sick feeling in your stomach, chances are you're in love with a character and not a person. I still think of him from time to time because we had so much fun together and more in common than I've ever had with anyone. But the rose-colored glasses will come off. Work had at it and have faith in yourself.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you for being so candid in sharing your experience. Like you, I still contemplate my Deceptor from time to time as I too had more in common with him than anyone else. It is true that perhaps I think about him from time to time because of the lack of closure. I make myself feel guilty about it because I am now happily married to a wonderful man. Yet I cannot help myself...my thoughts just wander there. Things ended for us abruptly when I found out through a third party that he was getting married!!! Meanwhile, I had thought that we were just going through an "off-again" phase as our whole relationship was on and off. I called to confront him when I found out and he denied it to the end, still trying to string me along despite being engaged! So no, I didn't get any closure. Writing about it is the best I can get!

      Delete
  3. P.S. I love the Kierkegaard comparison. Very evocative and right on the money! There was something eerily sociopathic in The Seducer's Diary.

    ReplyDelete