Comments

1
Jesus monkey fucking christ.

Run fast.
2
Dan, you should recruit for Amway. You'd make a fortune.
3
ha ha...She won't run, though. She's real real dumb, and that's what happens to real real dumb. That's why she's with this guy...because she's basically retarded.
4
This has to be fake. No one is that stupid - or at least no one who is smart enough to use birth control and write to Dan.

Run the fuck away. Just because you should have done it months ago doesn't mean it's too late.
5
I've met guys like this. Here's some simple steps to resolving this issue.
1. Run
2. Block his number
3. Tell friends and family about the situation for backup, just in case.
6
Oh brother. Do not pass Go, do not collect $200, just get the fuck outta there.
7
Whoa.

The only way my advice would differ from Dan's is three extra words and an exclamation point:

Oh my God, run!
9
How the fuck do people this stupid make it to 21 in the first place?
10
Holy crap. DTMF past-haste.

Off-topic: You were excellent at the Solid Ground luncheon today, Dan. Most affairs like that trot out a couple of speakers with tearjerker stories, with the goal of "inspiring" you to fork over lots of cash. This isn't always a bad thing, of course, but it does sometimes feel manipulative... And it certainly gets old.

You were funny and direct, and the IGBP story is truly inspirational in that it shows one can make big difference in the lives of others without a lot of money. Sometimes a single Youtube video is all it takes! Noble deeds have a snowball effect.

(I probably shouldn't use "snowball" in a SLLOTD thread to describe noble deeds, but there it is.)
11
She isn't necessarily dumb. This guy most likely played the "I'm a sweet guy stuck who has had some bad luck with women" card. She becomes emotionally attached, and BOOM!

In comes the abuse and cruelty.
Anyone can fall for it.
12
Great advice. Run. What is there to hang around for? Are you a glutton for punishment ... or maybe for baby #7? Then you'll be tied to him for 18 years, along with 5 (or more) other women. Imagine that nightmare!
13
Obviously, DMTMFA (as fast as humanly possible). Also, to the first point in the letter, please watch Law and Order SVU's most recent episode which guest stars Uncle Jesse. I mean John Stamos. If I remember correctly, detective Olivia Benson called it "reproductive abuse."
14
"This guy most likely played the 'I'm a sweet guy stuck who has had some bad luck with women' card."

Except SIX children with FIVE women by age 26 makes this an immediate and obvious lie

She's dumb and he targets dumbs
15
Honey. You are 21 years old. You have your whole life ahead of you. If your best friend came to you and said "so I'm dating this guy who has six kids by other women, is vehemently anti-choice, wants me to have his baby, oh and wanted me to sleep with him and his ex," what would you say? I know my answer would be "get the fuck out or I will MAKE you." Seriously.

Getting into this relationship may or may not have been a mistake; staying in it definitely will be.
16
Three word follow-up:
Don't look back.
17
I'm curious how that other woman died, a month after giving birth. Violent death, maybe?

I was also struck by the LW's tendency to blame herself for the apparent "miscommunication", saying "I missed many opportunities to speak up or ask her to leave us alone."

Finally, she should learn the meaning of the word passive. Passive is her not telling the asshole and his live-in to fuck off. This is NOT passive: "both passively propositioned me the next morning, as he grabbed both of us to him and she asked me whether I was down or not."

18
One wonders what the fuck her father did to her.
19
@ 4, 8, and elsewhere: If you think it's fake only because of how "stupid" you judge this letter writer to be, then you really have no idea about people. None at all.

I'm with everyone else (including 4): Get out of there, and NEVER speak to this person again. Get a new phone, move back to your parents' home for a while, brush up on self defense, and don't ever allow yourself to be in the same building as this man.
20
There needs to be a new acronym, because DTMFA doesn't quite fit the bill on this one.

DTMFBNBCHBOF.

Dump the mother-fucker but not before cutting his balls off first. These are the people who spread their genes in the world, no wonder it's so fucked up.
21
hahahahahahahahahahah!!
hahahahahah!!!!

hahahah!!

hahahahahahahahha

this guy sounds AWESOME are you crazy?! hes already 26 so you probably want to get on that train because he's probably only got another 35+ years left of this. you can have babies 7+8 if you play your cards right! jump in!

i once got two feeder mice as pets and in a few weeks the cage had about 15 mice running around. they were so cute! yeeeeee!
22
@20 I thought the same thing. I was going to add "As fast as humanly possible" to the acronym, but instead just added it afterward. DTMFAAFAHP
23
ARE THESE RED FLAGS OMG YES RUN.
25
If it's not a fake, the general setup of "I've knocked up a lot of women and don't do much to raise the kids, but you're special so lets make babiez!" is absolutely a freaking red flag.
26
Oi Gewalt...This is an extreme case, but I am quite honestly amazed how many women seem to fall for the "good dad at heart trapped with an evil ex" schtick. I've seen this play out several times with friends, and it inevitably ends with the somehow SHOCKING revelation that Good Dad is exactly as big of a flake/ gold-digger/CPOS/ as he was with his baby-momma.

I'm not saying honest-to-god nice fellas don't occasionally get saddled with the unplanned loin-product of crazy-exes. But seriously ladies: the real good guys? They are the ones who were demanding two different kinds of birth control before they stuck it in...
27
wurm@26: I'm willing to allow that a good guy might get saddled with a kid by a crazy ex... once. But SIX TIMES? Hell to the N-O-O-O.
28
Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how was the performance?
29
Sweetie, if you don't get away from him as quickly as possible, within three years you're going to be living with your children by him in your car.
30
I had the exact same thought before I pushed the after the jump button.

I've met many girls this naive, and many boys this predatory. It's what you get when you don't teach children critical thinking as a skill, and appeal to authority for everything you tell them to do. They end up believing everything anyone says so long as it's said with authority. The girl isn't dumb, she just hasn't been taught how to think critically.
31
I'm with #20. This asshole needs to be sterilized before he brings any more kids into the world. Fuckinggoddammotherfuckingfuck I hate stories like this and sadly I know they are horribly common.

Seriously: two men committing to each other in a loving relationship is somehow immoral, but some asshole impregnating 6 women and never taking one single bit of responsibility for any of it is OK?!? GODDAMMIT!
32
Unless Dan edited the hell out of this letter, the grammar and spelling are too good for her to be THIS dumb. There are only two possibilities left: either it's fake, or she has fairly serious psychological problems if she's in this kind of denial about what an obvious low-life psychopath this guy is.

Assuming the latter is the case, yes, run. But run to a therapist.
33
Please, please, please back away from this situation. And I would start laying down boundaries right away, because he may decide to come after you if you dump him instantly. Be very careful. All my alarms went off when I read the part about how he would never allow a woman to have an abortion. Allow? Whoa. Allow? OMG. Are you listening, dear letter writer? Allow. Allow. You actually DO know what to do.
34
You've dated him for four months, are considering starting a family with him, and he only JUST NOW let you visit his apartment?
35
You are incredibly stupid or you would have run a long time ago and you would never have had to ask for advice.

Have yourself fixed.

You are too fucking stupid to risk having kids. It would be cruel.
Unless you receive a brain transplant your next hookup is not likely to be any better.

36
This was Wednesday night's Law & Order SUV, only it was John Stamos spreading his seed worldwide(the last time to the girl from Footloose, over 50 yo now).
37
I wish I believed this were fake. But it's me, oh, 17, 18 years ago. There were only 3 kids by 2 women, plus there was jail time, and he pressured and pushed my sexual boundaries. He never kept a job any amount of time, but he wrote poetry and made me feel beautiful and wished he could only have kids with me and had a long sob story about his exes and how the world had conspired against him. I was a good girl, a star pupil with excellent grammar skills, thank you very much @32, but very sheltered by evangelical parents and very naive.

Please run. By providence or luck I never got pregnant in 5 years, so thankfully I never, ever have to see or think about him anymore.

"It's what you get when you don't teach children critical thinking as a skill, and appeal to authority for everything you tell them to do. They end up believing everything anyone says so long as it's said with authority." @30, you nailed it so hard with this. That is exactly what happened with me.
38
Even the brightest of us can get into situations where we think we're being good partners to people who we think love us, when really we're being duped by psycho creeps. It's a hell of a lot easier to see from the outside than from the inside, it always is. This girl made a big step recognizing the problem, was lucky to be saved from the reproductive abuse, which can be rationalized away, by the more glaring offense of that fucked up threesome plan.

Girl, get OUT. Tell as many people as you can, and make sure you're sleeping somewhere safe. Whatever support network you can cobble together before making the jump will save your life, at least emotionally, at worst physically. No good relative or friend would NOT want to get you out of this place you're in.
39
@14: It's even worse. If his youngest is 3, then he had six children by five different women by the age of 23. How can you have that many children that young and still want more?
40
just another day in Moss Side, eh, fnarf?
41
Holy shit!

Yeah, run.

Honey, he's lying. There are guys out there that are really good at lying, and they love the idea of knocking up as many naive girls as possible. To them it is a joke and a challenge. Nothing more. The minute you are pregnant and it's too late to abort, he'll dump you and move on to the next conquest, and you'll never hear from him again. You are nothing but a prospective baby-momma #6.
42
only if perhaps she (and all of his other baby mommas) would have just followed this sage advice from those paragons of virtue ---MTVs teen moms, and had only cuddled w/ this douchefuck?

http://www.mtv.com/videos/?id=1663278

right?
43
Yeah, this is called Reproductive Abuse. A guy who is obsessed with his own progeny regardless of the women carrying his babies.

And, Law & Order SVU covered this JUST LAST WEEK with John Stamos. Look it up, watch it, breakup with this fool.
44
@37 & 30. Agreed.

And while my first response to this letter was "run" just like everyone else, memories of my younger, stupider self are resurfacing. I remember a time I might not have been so quick to say “run.”

As a woman in my early twenties who was yet to analyse and challenge the harmful socialisation which had lead me to become a passive person who was programmed to put up with unfathomable amounts of bullshit from men if I happened to be attracted to them, I got close to making some pretty dumb choices in the name of "staying with the man I loved," too.

I look back now with horror, but at the time I was under a cloud of stupidity. For some of us gals, learning not to put up with bullshit from men is something we have to learn the hard way.

For me, I self destructively pursued a relationship with a man who treated me like shit, and it was only after I became so fed up by the mind fuck, combined with one friend mentioning to me that I was not handling the situation in a sane way that I made a turn around. If it wasn’t from the advice of a friend, combined with reading lots of books on how women are socialised to put up with shit from men, I might still be where I was.

Some women unfortunately need some event or crisis to happen in order to learn to respect themselves. It’s not always instinct for all of us.
45
I work in a high school. One year, my valedictorian became pregnant in the fall of her senior year. By spring, she'd run away from home and ended up finishing her diploma at PCC. (Her home parents were not crazy evil people, either.) My point is, even girls with excellent academics can make horrible life choices. LW's spelling, grammmar and punctuation do not rule out her being in the relationship as described.

Honey, if you are in the relationship as described, tell the guy you're thinking about your future. Start taking community college classes (if you're not already in school). Dropping him quick might set him off, but definitely start phasing him out. You need to study. You can't go out; you have an 8:30 class next morning. Get involved with a campus group or two, and talk about it to him a lot. Pretty soon, you'll just have no time for him. Or he'll start seeing you as 'lame' or 'boring' and drop you. Problem solved!

Of course, the above plan takes some time. You may prefer to go the shorter route others have suggested.
46
How does this guy support his kids? Are all of his ex's on assistance, cause it aint cheap to pay child support for 6 kids? For 18 years each? What does he do for a living? Finally, he hasn't contacted you since the incident?

HELLO? Knock, knock? Anyone home? That red flag just went up in flames!
47
Lance @32 pointed out that this allegedly clueless lady is perhaps a bit too grammatically-correct to be so transparently stupid.

So I'm leaning toward this letter being a fake - though a pretty good one at that! Otherwise, as Lance astutely says, she is as whacked as he is psycho. I *hope* it is a fake.
48
My immediate reaction was "fake". But then I remembered my asshole cousin who had three children (that we know of) by two different women (both with college degrees) and dated several others while living at home with his parents. He could never hold down a job because eventually he'd end up being supervised by a woman and, in his own words, "no bitch is going to tell me what to do". But he could be a charming and sexy asshole and there was never a shortage of women willing to believe his sad-sack of horseshit.

Eventually he vanished to avoid paying child support. After five years with only a couple of calls home to my aunt on Mother's Day, his parents got a phone call from the police in Calagary saying he had dropped dead of a stroke while jogging. Good fucking riddance was all I could say.

My aunt and uncle have spent their retirement trying to raise his kids -- the girls are doing ok, but his now 18 year old son has only completed 10th grade, does drugs to numb his pain, is in and out of jail and is basically a bigger fuck up than the dad who abandoned him.

So sweetheart, take everyone's advice and run. Do not let this guy charm you into doing something stupid with your life. Don't let his bad choices and manipulation overwhelm you. You deserve better and at 21 there is every likelihood you will find a much much better guy to share your life and have babies with -- when you are ready to in 5-8 years.

Run and don't look back. Good luck, kiddo.
49
Honey,

There are more red flags flying here than in China on a national holiday. Separate yourself from this individual as soon as possible.

Try this working definition of Domestic Violence: Coercive behavior used by one person to control and subordinate another in an intimate relationship. These behaviors may include physical, sexual, psychological and economic abuse."

Can you recognize your relationship here? Your gut is talking to you and it is telling you to get away. Don't silence it, listen to it and love yourself.
Good luck.
50
For heaven's sake, people, everyone was stupid at 21. It's only slightly less stupid than 18.

I was screaming "RUN" at the 6 kids portion.
51
JESUS FUCKING CHRIST.

RUN RUN RUN RUN RUN.

RUN.

Keep yourself safe from this man and RUN RUN RUN.
52
Seriously, though. Where does he fish to find women this consistently stupid? Does he post on a Jersey Shore webforum or something?
53
I stopped reading after "are these red flags?"

Yes, you clueless ninny, those are red flags. Those flags are so red, they're on fire. Why do you assume that you're somehow different than the FIVE other women this man "started a family" with? You're not. Get out.
54
Either total SVU ripoff, or somebody in the PR department at NBC hoped to get this in just BEFORE the episode came out on Wednesday.
55
fake, come on
56
This is insane, this is insane, this is insane, this is insane. Run run run run run!
57
Also, in case this isn't instantly crystal clear, he's been living with his latest baby mama for the entire time. So yeah, they are fucking. Which is by far the least of your problems. And no, you cannot trust this, I hesititate to call him a man, this guy, at all. AT ALL. RUN.
58
"There are more red flags flying here than in China on a national holiday."

Kim, that's a fantastic turn of phrase.
59
@55 Have you read any of these comments from women who found themselves in remarkably similar situations? Truth is sometimes stranger than fiction...
60
Oh girl, trust your gut. It's telling you the truth: this guy has danger written all over.

I used to tolerate incredible shit from partners, because I didn't think I was valuable enough that another person would wanna fuck me. This was before I realized that I was the Keeper of the Magic Pussy. Men are not difficult to get in the sack. Therefore, there's no reason to tolerate bullshit just because it's attached to a cock. There are lots of cocks, and many of them are attached to actual nice people who will treat you with respect. Might as well get rid of this cock, and wait a little while for a better one to come into orbit. They always do, even if you don't look like the girls in the magazines. Hell, none of us do.
61
tvdinner you have a pussy?? and you are on slog on a friday night? and dont appear drunk? tvdinner, i never would have imagined you so.. real. stopit
62
@60 and @58, matt too. i think the correct way to think about men is how 60 begins to see the penis, attached, not attached, an animal with a mind of its own. half of humanity is a swarm of penises, flying around like flies. swat it away if you dont like it, or remember there will be LOTS and LOTS more flies, endless even, that you can eat or swat away another day. no rush! learn to love yourself first!
63
Jesus Christ, run. This sounds like the setup to a crappy slasher flick.
64
are you fucking retarded?!
65
Hold on. You're fucking this guy without a condom? At four months? After he's impregnated five women? After he asks you to have a threesome with his live-in ex?

How did it feel to type out that letter? If there is a brain in that head of yours, you must have come to your answer by the very last word, right?

If you needed Dan and a few dozen other people to tell you how crazy you were acting before you could move on, well, there you have it. Do not walk. Run.

And get tested.
66
My nice response: He cannot POSSIBLY be paying child support to all of these women. Think about why he actually wants to impregnate you. I'm wondering if he maybe has some sort of STD that he's trying to spread intentionally, or some other nefarious reason for taking young and presumably attractive women out of the dating pool.

My honest, lizard-brain response: There are so many red flags in this story that there is no way any reasonable person would be able to see past them to a good guy. I am honestly flabbergasted. OP yes, you sound quite leotarded. Why didn't you leave when he asked you to stop taking birth control? FUCK'S SAKE!
67
What makes the LW think she's any more special to this lying, abusive POS breeder than all the other woman he's fucked and fucked over? Just how is he supporting the children he's already fathered and how much time does he actually spend with them? I mean, a great father, get real. What does he do, gather all of his spawn together so play daddy? I can just imagine well imagine how thrilled the mother's would be, assuming they even exist. The logistics of being a father to six kids, much less six kids by five different women, is mind boggling. What's her life going to be like after the POS dumps her for another woman or other women who eat up his line of BS with a spoon? She'd wind up a single parent with this joker, he being such a great father and all, continuing to drop in now and then. What sane man would want to deal with the drama and complications of her existence? It may be only a urban legend or movie plot, but I understand that single mothers have a hard time finding someone who wants to be in a committted LTR. I'm in no way an expert in this area. Even if you are already poly, the existence of someone else's offspring complicates life. You'd be entering into a relationship with not only mother, but the child(ren) and their father(s). This may make me a bad person or not, but I'd never enter into a serious LTR with a single mother if the father(s) were still alive. No problem with NSA sex, but that is a completely different dynamic. In nature, one of the first acts of a new alpha male among pack/pride animals is to kill or chase off the offspring of the old alpha male. That's what Hamlet's uncle, the king, tries to do. Just some late night thoughts with no real purpose.

Some women are so naive and gullible (men as well) that they shouldn't be allowed in public without a keeper.
68
And after reading all of the comments, I see that the male's desire to spread his seed far and wide is actually a recognized pathology! That makes sense.
69
Wow, this girl is actually clinging onto Dan's statement that sometimes men should get input into whether or not a woman decides to get an abortion - to justify her boyfriend being the type of asshole who says he'd never ALLOW a woman to get an abortion! Wow.

Also, the LW should know that abusive partners often want their victims to get pregnant, and will use a variety of tactics to sabotage or withhold birth control: http://abcnews.go.com/Health/Wellness/do…

What I'm saying here is you better make sure as shit he has no access to your BC. In fact, get a new package right now - you think 6 unplanned pregnancies were actually all accidental? He is either outright forcing his girlfriends to stop taking the pill, or he is poking holes in condoms, or switching out women's pills for aspirin.

Run away, run away!
70
geez you people are prudes.
this dude is just a typical upstanding citizen of Gommorah.
bzness as usual in the Land of Depravity....
71
This is very Murdochian - the unicorn girl, raised on Love Conquers All and believing in the power of virginity (often remaining virgin in soul even after much experience), goes and persecutes the dragon with her own ideas of redemption until it has no recourse but to eat her.

Do not be that girl. You do not have the power to transform dragons into princes (and would not know what to do with one if you did). Stop trying before you are eaten. Learn this thoroughly and develop a chooser that can find you a prince. Then try again.
72
Haters need to shut up. Look, hon. We've all had lapses in judgment--I don't think I want to know anybody who hasn't--and creeps like this guy specialize in taking advantage of your shame and insecurity. In the infatuated period you considered the idea of making babies with him, but now that you've seen his apartment and been propositioned by his "ex" you're thinking twice about it. Maybe just the process of writing this letter has made you realize you want out of this situation. Turn around and walk away, knowing that you were able to shake off your confusion and get out when things got too fucked-up. Ignore the jerks in this thread who are tearing you down--let them choke on their own self-satisfaction. You're lucky you had the judgment to question the situation and get out when you did.
73
Um, fake.
74
"But we have such a solid relationship despite the fact that he is pressuring me to become pregnant, already has 6 kids with 5 other women, and is living with one of them who along with him attempted to pressure me into a threesome despite my visible discomfort."

Such a solid relationship. Such "good" communication. And 4 entire months of proof of his reliability and maturity? What a shame to see something so worth saving on the rocks.

I take two things away from this: 1. People who have low self-esteem and/or terror at the thought of being alone will rationalize anything away; and 2. We need national bullshit-detector training.

75
It's me, the LW. Just to set the record straight, he is employed; has a great job (although he has a GED -- very intelligent though), makes probably more money than I (with my impending bachelor's degree) could hope to make anytime in the near future, is extremely successful for his age. No this is not fake, although I wish it was.

The details of his bm-situation were revealed to me piece by piece as time went on. It's easy to believe someone when you've gone to work with them (which takes up a lot of their time and often takes them out of town), spoken to their family members, hung out with their friends, go to school over an hour away from where they live, etc.

I do have great critical-thinking skills, just not where matters of my heart are concerned, and I did not grow up with any positive examples of relationships; yes I will be starting therapy next week. & as someone who had an abortion as a teenager, I had mixed feelings on his convictions about the subject; thank God I at least felt the need to finish school before I entertained the idea of kids with him, and at least this situation happened sooner rather than later so that I had no choice but to step back and see what is going on for what it is rather than what I wish it to be.

I appreciate all you guys have to say and am taking it very seriously.
76
@14 - But at least 3 of them were conceived after just one sexual encounter! So they hardly count at all! Right?

Heartbroken, if the message hasn't got through yet - run so fast you leave scorchmarks and a Roadrunner dust trail. NOW.
77
Ha! Just beaten past the post.

LW; his intelligence and money just make it easier for him to manipulate you. (And no doubt others.) Keep running.
78
I might have thought this letter was fake. Then I remembered that one of my best friends, a smart, educated, tough woman was involved with a guy like this when she was 20. LW, please oh please believe me that the best thing she ever did in her whole life was get away from him. It wasn't easy. When she told him they were through he assaulted her. She hid at my house for days. We were so young I don't think we really understood the gravity of the situation. LW, this guy will not be there for you. He will not provide for you or your kids. He will treat you like property and then move on as soon as he sees the next shiny thing. Leaving you to spend your entire youth raising a kid (or two!) with no help. Get out NOW. (and get an IUD. They are cheap, better than the old kind they used to have, and it can be your little secret.)
79
LW, it doesn't surprise me at all that this guy is able to make a lot of money with only a GED. He sounds like a very accomplished con-artist.

Do not think he is anything else. This is the worst case scenario that Imma lay out for you and it is a distinct possibility.

The most likely explanation for his situation is that he gets off on getting people to do crazy things for him.

If he is intelligent, how did he manage to accidentally get a girl pregnant the first time he had sex with her on three separate occasions?

Doesn't it make more sense that he pulled the same shit on them that he's pulling on you? He made them feel like they were special and had a great connection....they agreed to stop using BC.....they got pregnant...he lost interest.

That's the biggest thrill he could get from you, getting you to have his child. That would be you changing the whole rest of your life for him.

But, you're obviously not going to so he tries something else. How about a threesome? Fuck! You're already open to the idea? That's no fun. How about we raise the stakes? Let's see if you'll agree to a threesome with the woman who had his child.

He can't let you think about it, though. He'll have to spring this on you or you'll just refuse.

That is how dark and twisted this situation might actually be. People like this exist.

RRRRRRRRUUUUUUUUUUUUNNNNNNNNNNNNN.
80
Lemme just add, this guy managed to convince his ex-girlfriend and mother of his child to help him seduce his current girlfriend.

This is a talented manipulator and you haven't given in to any of his crazy requests. That's a job well done.

I wouldn't take the insults you're getting in these comments too much to heart. They are intended to slap sense into you before you ruin your whole life, not to make you feel like an emotionally crippled idiot.

You probably could benefit from some therapy. We all could. I'm just saying, you're not a basket case or anything. This guy is obviously really good at getting people to trust him and feel safe and connected to him. You have kept yourself protected so far. Well done.
81
@75 You did not answer the most immediate comment made to you. Did you leave this guy or not? If you come back and say that you are still with him, then I'm sorry; You're a fool. Stop rationalizing his behavior by returning here to make excuses about how educated he is and GET THE FUCK OUT of that relationship. You aren't using your critical thinking skills for this situation, and have ASKED OTHERS to use their critical thinking skill FOR YOU... and then you return to excuse your "partner" some more. Get out, you idiot.
82
Oh, and LW? Do you even know where this guy works, or does he keep that a secret from you as well? You keep raising more and more flags each time you come back to defend him. And why exactly are you still defending this creep? Run.
83
Agree with post @38. Being emotionally manipulated isn't the same thing as being stupid. When people are lonely or in a vulnerable position they sometimes make stupid choices they wouldn't normally make. At 21 this girl is probably still on the naive side and makes excuses for this guy b/c she wants to believe that she's in love. And it's always easier to see it from the outside, when you're not the person who's vulnerabilities are being exploited.
84
@79 spot on. Great statement-People like this exist. I didn't fully understand or appreciate that till my best friend of 17 years went bunny-boiler psychotic on me. But until you have a bad experience with a bad apple, you don't really recognize it for what it really is.

Most normal people tend to give psychos the benefit of the doubt, because they assume that the psycho thinks just like they do. They don't think like you at all. They're constantly manipulating and purposely wearing your defenses down so they can control you. A lot of people will often assume that you can give others the benefit of the doubt, even if there are some glaring problems, as long as everything else seems on the up and up.

The rationale goes something like, well, he has a great job and I've met all of his friends. Or, she went to college, is articulate and seems stable enough. You don't really learn to see all the signs until you've seen them a few times and know what to look for. It's easy to make excuses for the red flags if everything else seems ok.

It's especially difficult as a woman, because you are taught to be nurturing from a young age. Women that get taken advantage of or wind up in abusive relationships aren't stupid- it's like what @78 said: "People like this exist." And they know exactly what they're doing when they manipulate, because most of them have been at it a long time and gone through a lot of people before you. They're good at lying and cheating.
85
@82, the LW does know where he works, she answered that question when she wrote back @75: "It's easy to believe someone when you've gone to work with them." She's not an idiot, she just fell in with a con man. Con men are successful because they are really charming,a and they don't make it easy to see through their bullshit.

And if you read @75, it sounds like she is preparing to leave him. Which makes me so so so happy! Good morning, everyone!
86
If she really is this clueless, I doubt she will listen to anyone's advice.
87
It's LW again... To answer @81 I haven't even been able to speak to him since he dropped me home later the morning of the incident so it's not as if I've had the opportunity to take much action. From reading some of the comments (especially @79/@80) it seems like he may have realized that I'm not quite as dumb/easy to manipulate as he would prefer so he is just abandoning ship, which is fine with me. Will I answer if he decides to call again? No. And I wasn't offering excuses for him, just felt defensive at the accusations of how idiotic I am and was trying to put things in a broader perspective as far as what other things attracted me to him/diminished the blow of various warning signs.

And it's definitely much easier for you guys to judge from your outsider vantage point. I definitely know what I have to do to save myself but that doesn't mean this is easy for me emotionally. And yes, again, I am starting therapy soon.
88
She should also have her tubes tied. Or removed or whatever.

Also, don't operate heavy machinery.
89
You know how we breed intelligence out of our dinner animals: cows, chickens and the like?

sometimes I think our culture breeds out intelligence in straight women.
90
@75
I do have great critical-thinking skills,

NO YOU DON'T. What you have is hubris.
91
@90 - You, sir, have hubris. It is hubris to think that if you were faced with a con man/woman, you would not succumb to his/her charms.

I have met one amazingly talented con man. I opened the door one day, to find him there, on my door-step. He was all of 20 years old, and I was 35. I never give money to door-to-door solicitors. Never. I don't even listen to their story. I say politely, no thank you, and I close the door. But I gave him $40 for his purported school trip to Spain (yeah, right), even though I knew his story was ridiculous. I was lucky he was only asking for a small amount of money. And I fantasize about him, to this day.
92
LW again

...Thanks to all of you who actually bothered to read the entirety of what I had to say and offer actual insight rather than simply leaping at the opportunity to tear me down. I truly appreciate it and like I said, I'm taking this all in and taking steps to separate myself from this situation and better myself as a person.

Peace
93
She is a fucking idiot. DO NOT REPRODUCE!!!!
94
LW, sorry, some people get a charge out of piling on - and clearly don't read anyone else's comments. There is a big difference between being dumb and being inexperienced. And this culture needs a serious change in what we teach our children about love. So we're surprised to find teenage boys who think stalking = romance? And girls who think that love = being "the one" who will "believe in me" no matter what manner of bullshit gets piled on?

One thing I want so badly to do, and I'm not sure how, is to give my daughter a bullshit detector. When I was that young I believed everything people told me. I had no way of sussing out con men, fabulists, or just (as in the case of my ex) people with no connection between their vision of themselves and reality.
95
@92 - My aunt got pregnant by a guy like this and married him (she was his seventh wife, the others had restraining orders). He moved his mistress in to raise her children (thank god) a week after the car accident he caused to remove her from the picture because she told him she was leaving (oh, don't worry. He took out a huge life insurance policy first.). She was magna cum laude at a top tier university and had a high paying professional job until he convinced her to quit it. She also had no model for what a good relationship was. She and her kids paid the price. You'll usually never see the real side of a sociopath until they've really really got you for good. They are flawless reproductions of the best a human being can be, better than real normal people. They find out what you want, and become everything you've ever wanted in personality, interests, they create themselves to match what you need better than anyone really could until they own you and then, well, that's it. You're fucked. They often have a lot of people on the hook - you were shown these people (co-workers, baby mama, friends, even relatives - who by the way you shouldn't rely on in general to warn you off) in order to make you trust him more. It's unlikely he's ever actually truly real and genuine with anyone, because he is not capable. There is no cure for this. Nothing you or anyone else can do will change what he is. It is likely he was the victim of abuse when younger and trots that out slowly over time to make it feel like you're the only one he's ever truly trusted/loved/etc. He's had a lot of practice with that spiel, so he's very good at it. People like this are incapable of love, incapable of caring. They are really truly monsters. They can mimic true love flawlessly, but it is not real. It won't hurt him a bit to find another young, inexperienced, willing to ignore the massive warning signs girl to take your place. If he's out of town a lot, a lot of traveling, hell, even if he's not, he's probably got a few lined up already. He feeds off the ownership and misery of women, that is all he has and all he wants. If you've had no model for what a good relationship is, it sounds like your childhood may have been a bit rocky. For the sake of yourself and your potential future kids, please get some serious help now when you are young. You will be so much better off for it. And use that therapist to not only get into those issues, but run any future boyfriends by them, and whoever else you can find who you feel has good solid judgement (generally older women, probably not your mom if she didn't do so well for herself). Then listen to those people, until you can make these kind of judgements for yourself. This will take years to learn, possibly years of therapy. But you have to, if you want to avoid situations like this. People are calling you stupid because it is so obviously a terrible situation, but if it is possible for you to ignore the most obvious warning signs because of emotional entanglement you need to be very careful for the next several years at least at who you choose to get emotionally entangled with, because it seems like you are dangerously vulnerable. Life alteringly dangerously vulnerable. Please get help and be careful with yourself. You deserve a lifetime of better relationships than those who raised you, you don't have to keep on paying the price of a rotten childhood forever. These are learned skills, you are smart and you can learn them. Good luck.
96
LW - good for you, honey. Keep on not picking up that phone, and emphasise getting out of the situation *fast* - it's easy to draw things out because you don't want to hurt people, and you don't want to feel like the bad guy. Don't; it won't salve anybody's feelings, and you absolutely don't *owe* this guy an easy or pleasant end to things. And the therapy you're having should help you to see that you you're doing the good and healthy thing.

It sounds like you were on the pill and not using condoms before you found out about his sexual history. I hope you decide to get tested. It will help draw a line as well as setting your mind at rest; it's also a rather unpleasant but useful lesson in how to approach protection with any partners you have later on. Best of luck, and chin up.
97
P.S. Keep in mind it's likely that you are obviously visibly vulnerable - guys like him can see it and will seek you out. It wasn't just a bad decision on your part to date him - he went after you - they are looking for girls like you, so you'll be exposed to a higher percentage of guys like this than the average population until you are stronger, at which point they won't bother you anymore (so many other fish in the sea, he's found at the very least, what five or six other women who were so willing to believe him they had his child??? - No way he got three women pregnant first try by the way - statistically almost impossible.). Not only will you attract them like flies, but bastards like this will also be more attractive to you than good guys until you learn better life skills. That's how some women get stuck in a lifetime of dating nothing but bastards. It's ok though - most guys aren't like this, you'll find one eventually, but for now I'd steer clear of relationships until you're a bit stronger.
98
The only thing I would mention, since everyone has done a great job, is that at any time all these women can sue him

How are you going to like living in poverty and your man can never afford to take you out or buy you things?

(maybe that will get her attention!)
99
Yeah, fake. Six kids with 5 different women by age 26 and pressuring his current gf to go off birth control? Sounds fake. A woman silly enough to ask if any of these details are "red flags"? Fake.
100
@ 99, and those who made similar leaps, just shut up, please.

@ LW, glad some of us could be of service, and thrilled to read that you're moving in the right direction.
101
@91 That's the old "it could happened to anyone" bullshit. It's when you don't think yourself smarter than you really are that you're cautious about manipulators. You can't make me feel bad for not being a victim like she is.
102
@101 - Luck has had nothing to do with your success in life? You are completely safe from con men and other dangers, due to your excellent self-knowledge? That's your hubris, right there. The LW is learning from her mistakes, while you, sir, seem incapable of the same.

    Please wait...

    Comments are closed.

    Commenting on this item is available only to members of the site. You can sign in here or create an account here.


    Add a comment
    Preview

    By posting this comment, you are agreeing to our Terms of Use.