Nick Le Lievre
2007-02-01 13:10:58 UTC
I have exhibited stalking behaviors in the past but thankfully I am not
currently stalking anyone. I am 31 and 2 episodes have occurred in my life
so far where my behavior crossed the line and I became a stalker although a
number of other occasions occurred where I kept the delusion to myself and
never went out of my way to pursue my victim but the delusions were the same
and present. It starts with a chance meeting and a smile, you instantly fall
in love with your victim and think that the smile is special and means they
love you too. You start to think about the victim all the time obsessing
over them you can't think of anything else. Then you think if I am going to
have a relationship with this person I have to put myself in a position to
be in contact with them. So you go out of your way to be places where the
victim is and in the case of the last 2 episodes I approached them (my
intention was to form a relationship) and in the last case I emailed them.
Stalkers are different people and in my case I don't have a criminal
background nor am I violent even in the midst of my stalking there was a
line I would not cross that was physically hurting anyone who stood in the
way of me and the victim or hurting the victim themselves of course my
victim never knew this so I guess they were very scared but I never thought
about this at the time. I was just pursuing my love interest or so I
thought. In the 2 episodes I mention the victims were never quite sure if I
would turn violent or go off the edge and I know this can happen in some
cases but I had no intention or breaking the law, but I didn't realize my
behavior was out of the ordinary and the things that I was doing that had
innocent intentions wasn't perceived as such as times when I became
frustrated were blown out of proportion and they really thought I was
dangerous. I would say to any victims not to worry most stalkers are not
going to get violent (I never was) but I can't speak for everyone in every
situation. Stalkers do get a bad name because some cases get very nasty and
are different to my case because we are different people albeit with similar
profiles and similar behavior. I was brought up to abide by the law and not
to be violent so through everything you have to believe my intentions were
never to scare or cause harm to anyone I was just under the delusion I was
in a mutual love relationship with my victim and this leads you to do some
things which are perceived as scary. How do you know? Do you really know the
stalker?
Anyway the the last 2 cases I lost interest on both occasions after the 1st
victim got pregnant I knew then there was no space in her life for me and
the 2nd victim got a court order which I abided too once the reality of the
situation I was in hit home. Over time I lost interest in the 2nd victim and
haven't thought about her for a long time. I am now in consultation with a
psychiatrist and am one some anti-psychotic medication but I`m not sure it
works as on past averages I only stalk every 5 years so
I don't know if it will happen again but if it does I have the support of
the mental health profession and my past experiences to rely on. My advice
to other people in the same situation who probably won't see themselves as
stalkers is don't believe in the saying love at first sight, when it happens
to you be warned your heading for a lot of trouble and could end up in
prison for a crime which is made worse by the fearful mind of the victim,
but your behavior and actions can be taken very seriously and perceived as
very dangerous so be careful about what you do. Apparently there is a
delusional disorder called Erotomania
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erotomania which may explain this whole story
but it is a chronic condition and is supposed to be largely untreatable but
I am on some anti-psychotic medication but I stopped stalking because I
realized that nothing was ever going to happen between me and the victim and
therefore stopped because I wanted too not because the medication made me
think differently.
It is a big problem for both the victim and the stalker. The stalker doesn't
think he's doing anything wrong and the victim is scared shitless of
everything he does or rather might do. Sometimes stalkers
threaten the partners of the victim which is plain wrong and while they
probably don't mean to carry out their threat I cannot understand the
threats. In my case in an email I said I would "get her one day" meaning she
would be mine one day but the authorities took it to mean I was planning to
"get her" in other words physically hurt her or rape her or something. So
you have to be very careful because the authorities know about the worse
case scenarios and base every stalking case with the possibility that the
stalker will attack the victim so read this into every situation.
They say there is more likelihood of violence if there has been a romantic
relationship between the stalker and the victim but in my case I never got
that far. I`m not a violent person so I don't think it would ever be in my
character to actually be violent although I do get irritated sometimes and
lose my temper but it's a rare occurrence. I think the problem is the
stalker needs to accept that he is a stalker and take steps to change his
behavior in future when he recognizes the tell tale signs of erotomania. The
victim shouldn't have to deal with it and it causes them a lot of trauma
they often don't know the stalker after all or what he is or isn't capable
of.
Also what happens is the victim rarely has the courage to tell the stalker
that they don't want any contact with them so they get someone else to do it
but because of the delusional element the stalker doesn't believe it as its
not coming from victims mouth and even when the victim does tell them it's
usually only once and not often enough as they're too scared so it never
breaks down the stalkers delusional disorder. The victim and the authorities
think once is enough and after that the stalker what they are doing. It just
doesn't happen that way.
Really for the stalker its best to assume that the victim doesn't want to
know you - if you try in your incompetent way to get to know them you'll
only get mixed signals and won't heed the warnings when you do get them. You
can't mind read and neither can the victim so their mind will work overtime
and will assume you want to attack them and will look for it in anything you
do in order to get a case against you. So if you go a few steps further and
stupidly make idle threats against their partner then watch out because they
will take it seriously and you'll be regarded as dangerous even if you know
you're not. I never made any threats against anyone although some of what I
wrote in the emails was interpreted as threats (as per my example above
regarding the "get you" comment). I should've realized at the start trying
to get to know an attractive stranger is pointless and will only land you in
trouble.
At the end of the day you've got to look at 2 things that result out of this
unfortunate delusional disorder. 1) You could get a lengthy prison sentence
for doing nothing of any real threat 2) The victim is scared out of their
mind of what you may do to them and this makes them react to your advances
in what seems like strange ways from the perspective of the delusional
stalker. My advise is don't make any real threats, don't go breaking into
their home, don't do anything really stupid like try to beat anyone up - I
didn't do any of this but because of past cases my comments were turned
around on me and misinterpreted to read that I was dangerous just because I
persisted with my delusion in the face of what seemed like overwhelming
evidence to the contrary - I just didn't get it and you probably won't
because you are convinced you are in mutual love the erotomania disorder
could ruin your life.
What I mean to say is don't make any threats which you know you don't really
mean and are incapable of carrying out but are nevertheless issued to warn
those that you perceive to stand in your way of your dream relationship as
they will be taken far out of the context in which you originally intended.
I never knowingly made any threats but I was still perceived as threatening
in some of the comments I wrote which were taken far out of the context in
which they were meant or basically just plain misunderstood. Remember they
don't know you, they don't know your state of mind, and they don't know what
you're capable of and will expect the worst. Don't bother in the first place
it's only worth it for the experience which you can learn from in the future
that's if you escape jail.
Having said all that in defense of the stalkers character and motives it's
still important to remember that it is the victim who is most affected
because of this unfortunate delusional crime the stalker will come away from
it with little or no lasting damage (and perhaps some good life experience)
and perhaps a little bitter and the victim may be living in fear for a long
time to come never knowing if you may contact them again or turn up to get
revenge. You can't explain anything to them as they will never understand
what its like to suffer from a delusional disorder no one can unless you've
been through it so when I see that another stalker has been jailed I pity
them and I must also pity the victim. You can usually only see things from
your point of view i.e. the stalker thinks they did nothing wrong, the
victim sees them as a serious danger you can do nothing to change this, as
discussing it to a level which would remove some of the doubts and fears
never happens as the victim doesn't want to know about the stalkers motives
or delusions they just want what they see as a huge danger out of the way
preferably in prison so they can get on with their lives and the stalker is
so delusional him/her wouldn't be able to conduct a conversation without
hoping it would end in him/her having a relationship with the victim once he
had explained himself and the victim realizing that he/she really loved
him/her.
So there is no point trying to incompetently explain yourself you just have
to accept someone is living in fear of you but hopefully they will be able
to put it behind them and you can learn from this experience and be extra
careful in future episodes of your delusional disorder. I hope I can learn
from my experience and fight this terrible affliction in future so that
no-one else has to be frightened out of their mind.
I am always going to be on the side of the stalker as I know what goes on in
the mind of the stalker and I know it is not always as serious as what it is
made out to be by the courts, lawyers, police etc how can anyone understand
what it's like unless you suffer from it. I can empathize with the victim
being terrified as how would you respond if a stranger started approaching
you, emailing you or telephoning you and after initially being polite they
become a persistent problem which you become scared of. I would probably be
able to handle it as I understand what it's like to be the stalker so I
would have good insight into the condition but I might still be scared, esp.
if they telephoned me over and over again and issued threats. It would
probably only be a nuisance to me but if I recognized the condition I would
try to get through to the mind of the stalker by treating them like a human
being instead of being scared of them and what they might do and therefore
treating them like a dangerous psychopath with no emotion.
Communication is usually very poor in these situations so no one knows how
the other side is really
feeling on a human level and the stalker doesn't realize the fear he's/she's
instilling and sometimes makes it much worse - inadvertently of course
although the victim will always say the stalker knows exactly what they are
doing. The victim truly believes the stalker is dangerous by this stage so
they will never listen to reason as they are too scared. It's a shame
because I have no criminal record for violence have never been in an abusive
relationship am not promiscuous don't have AIDS nothing just a pretty normal
guy in most circumstances certainly not dangerous but people are scared of
what they don't understand.
I suppose I am always going to have the support on the guys on here who have
this delusional disorder and have been through this - but the victims of
this crime won't trust what I am saying and will see it as me trying to make
myself look innocent of any crime and manipulate the readers into believing
I am not really too blame. You cannot apportion blame to this crime, the
stalker isn't to blame for having a mental disorder the victim isn't to
blame for being scared. If anything society is too blame for the way we can
no longer treat each other as human beings and that goes for both the
stalker and the victim.
Anyway I must remember despite having a delusional disorder which cannot be
my fault that my victim is probably still somewhere suffering from the
catastrophic damage this crime does to them it may of changed them forever
but I imagine once they realized I was undergoing professional help they
felt better. On the other hand I am left to carry on as if nothing ever
happened but I must take responsibility for my actions even if it's through
no fault of my own and try to prevent it happening to someone else in the
future because another life could be ruined because my life already has been
just not as badly as it could've been had it not been for the mental health
profession.
One last thing to say is that the authorities i.e. police, courts, lawyers
believe that erotomaniacs are highly dangerous individuals this is because
of the percentage of cases that get widely reported in the media where the
stalker has assaulted someone whilst under his delusion or made death
threats to the victims family or partner so the victim is advised of this
and it makes them even more scared and the authorities treat you like your
highly dangerous and will possibly impose a stiff prison sentence.
The psychiatric/psychological profession which are experts in the field
don't often don't hold this view but the stalker doesn't think there's
anything wrong with him so he may not get a psychiatric/psychological
evaluation and receive treatment and end up in jail. The thing is it's
difficult to be objective when it happens to you and when a
psychiatrist/psychologist gets stalked they soon lose their objectivity. I
find it hard to be objective as I am the sufferer of the delusional disorder
and the victim/police/courts/lawyers find it impossible to objective when
they deal with a erotomania case. I am
probably not the best person to speak too when it comes to understanding the
feelings of the victim like they are not the best person to speak to when it
comes to understanding the feelings of the stalker.
currently stalking anyone. I am 31 and 2 episodes have occurred in my life
so far where my behavior crossed the line and I became a stalker although a
number of other occasions occurred where I kept the delusion to myself and
never went out of my way to pursue my victim but the delusions were the same
and present. It starts with a chance meeting and a smile, you instantly fall
in love with your victim and think that the smile is special and means they
love you too. You start to think about the victim all the time obsessing
over them you can't think of anything else. Then you think if I am going to
have a relationship with this person I have to put myself in a position to
be in contact with them. So you go out of your way to be places where the
victim is and in the case of the last 2 episodes I approached them (my
intention was to form a relationship) and in the last case I emailed them.
Stalkers are different people and in my case I don't have a criminal
background nor am I violent even in the midst of my stalking there was a
line I would not cross that was physically hurting anyone who stood in the
way of me and the victim or hurting the victim themselves of course my
victim never knew this so I guess they were very scared but I never thought
about this at the time. I was just pursuing my love interest or so I
thought. In the 2 episodes I mention the victims were never quite sure if I
would turn violent or go off the edge and I know this can happen in some
cases but I had no intention or breaking the law, but I didn't realize my
behavior was out of the ordinary and the things that I was doing that had
innocent intentions wasn't perceived as such as times when I became
frustrated were blown out of proportion and they really thought I was
dangerous. I would say to any victims not to worry most stalkers are not
going to get violent (I never was) but I can't speak for everyone in every
situation. Stalkers do get a bad name because some cases get very nasty and
are different to my case because we are different people albeit with similar
profiles and similar behavior. I was brought up to abide by the law and not
to be violent so through everything you have to believe my intentions were
never to scare or cause harm to anyone I was just under the delusion I was
in a mutual love relationship with my victim and this leads you to do some
things which are perceived as scary. How do you know? Do you really know the
stalker?
Anyway the the last 2 cases I lost interest on both occasions after the 1st
victim got pregnant I knew then there was no space in her life for me and
the 2nd victim got a court order which I abided too once the reality of the
situation I was in hit home. Over time I lost interest in the 2nd victim and
haven't thought about her for a long time. I am now in consultation with a
psychiatrist and am one some anti-psychotic medication but I`m not sure it
works as on past averages I only stalk every 5 years so
I don't know if it will happen again but if it does I have the support of
the mental health profession and my past experiences to rely on. My advice
to other people in the same situation who probably won't see themselves as
stalkers is don't believe in the saying love at first sight, when it happens
to you be warned your heading for a lot of trouble and could end up in
prison for a crime which is made worse by the fearful mind of the victim,
but your behavior and actions can be taken very seriously and perceived as
very dangerous so be careful about what you do. Apparently there is a
delusional disorder called Erotomania
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erotomania which may explain this whole story
but it is a chronic condition and is supposed to be largely untreatable but
I am on some anti-psychotic medication but I stopped stalking because I
realized that nothing was ever going to happen between me and the victim and
therefore stopped because I wanted too not because the medication made me
think differently.
It is a big problem for both the victim and the stalker. The stalker doesn't
think he's doing anything wrong and the victim is scared shitless of
everything he does or rather might do. Sometimes stalkers
threaten the partners of the victim which is plain wrong and while they
probably don't mean to carry out their threat I cannot understand the
threats. In my case in an email I said I would "get her one day" meaning she
would be mine one day but the authorities took it to mean I was planning to
"get her" in other words physically hurt her or rape her or something. So
you have to be very careful because the authorities know about the worse
case scenarios and base every stalking case with the possibility that the
stalker will attack the victim so read this into every situation.
They say there is more likelihood of violence if there has been a romantic
relationship between the stalker and the victim but in my case I never got
that far. I`m not a violent person so I don't think it would ever be in my
character to actually be violent although I do get irritated sometimes and
lose my temper but it's a rare occurrence. I think the problem is the
stalker needs to accept that he is a stalker and take steps to change his
behavior in future when he recognizes the tell tale signs of erotomania. The
victim shouldn't have to deal with it and it causes them a lot of trauma
they often don't know the stalker after all or what he is or isn't capable
of.
Also what happens is the victim rarely has the courage to tell the stalker
that they don't want any contact with them so they get someone else to do it
but because of the delusional element the stalker doesn't believe it as its
not coming from victims mouth and even when the victim does tell them it's
usually only once and not often enough as they're too scared so it never
breaks down the stalkers delusional disorder. The victim and the authorities
think once is enough and after that the stalker what they are doing. It just
doesn't happen that way.
Really for the stalker its best to assume that the victim doesn't want to
know you - if you try in your incompetent way to get to know them you'll
only get mixed signals and won't heed the warnings when you do get them. You
can't mind read and neither can the victim so their mind will work overtime
and will assume you want to attack them and will look for it in anything you
do in order to get a case against you. So if you go a few steps further and
stupidly make idle threats against their partner then watch out because they
will take it seriously and you'll be regarded as dangerous even if you know
you're not. I never made any threats against anyone although some of what I
wrote in the emails was interpreted as threats (as per my example above
regarding the "get you" comment). I should've realized at the start trying
to get to know an attractive stranger is pointless and will only land you in
trouble.
At the end of the day you've got to look at 2 things that result out of this
unfortunate delusional disorder. 1) You could get a lengthy prison sentence
for doing nothing of any real threat 2) The victim is scared out of their
mind of what you may do to them and this makes them react to your advances
in what seems like strange ways from the perspective of the delusional
stalker. My advise is don't make any real threats, don't go breaking into
their home, don't do anything really stupid like try to beat anyone up - I
didn't do any of this but because of past cases my comments were turned
around on me and misinterpreted to read that I was dangerous just because I
persisted with my delusion in the face of what seemed like overwhelming
evidence to the contrary - I just didn't get it and you probably won't
because you are convinced you are in mutual love the erotomania disorder
could ruin your life.
What I mean to say is don't make any threats which you know you don't really
mean and are incapable of carrying out but are nevertheless issued to warn
those that you perceive to stand in your way of your dream relationship as
they will be taken far out of the context in which you originally intended.
I never knowingly made any threats but I was still perceived as threatening
in some of the comments I wrote which were taken far out of the context in
which they were meant or basically just plain misunderstood. Remember they
don't know you, they don't know your state of mind, and they don't know what
you're capable of and will expect the worst. Don't bother in the first place
it's only worth it for the experience which you can learn from in the future
that's if you escape jail.
Having said all that in defense of the stalkers character and motives it's
still important to remember that it is the victim who is most affected
because of this unfortunate delusional crime the stalker will come away from
it with little or no lasting damage (and perhaps some good life experience)
and perhaps a little bitter and the victim may be living in fear for a long
time to come never knowing if you may contact them again or turn up to get
revenge. You can't explain anything to them as they will never understand
what its like to suffer from a delusional disorder no one can unless you've
been through it so when I see that another stalker has been jailed I pity
them and I must also pity the victim. You can usually only see things from
your point of view i.e. the stalker thinks they did nothing wrong, the
victim sees them as a serious danger you can do nothing to change this, as
discussing it to a level which would remove some of the doubts and fears
never happens as the victim doesn't want to know about the stalkers motives
or delusions they just want what they see as a huge danger out of the way
preferably in prison so they can get on with their lives and the stalker is
so delusional him/her wouldn't be able to conduct a conversation without
hoping it would end in him/her having a relationship with the victim once he
had explained himself and the victim realizing that he/she really loved
him/her.
So there is no point trying to incompetently explain yourself you just have
to accept someone is living in fear of you but hopefully they will be able
to put it behind them and you can learn from this experience and be extra
careful in future episodes of your delusional disorder. I hope I can learn
from my experience and fight this terrible affliction in future so that
no-one else has to be frightened out of their mind.
I am always going to be on the side of the stalker as I know what goes on in
the mind of the stalker and I know it is not always as serious as what it is
made out to be by the courts, lawyers, police etc how can anyone understand
what it's like unless you suffer from it. I can empathize with the victim
being terrified as how would you respond if a stranger started approaching
you, emailing you or telephoning you and after initially being polite they
become a persistent problem which you become scared of. I would probably be
able to handle it as I understand what it's like to be the stalker so I
would have good insight into the condition but I might still be scared, esp.
if they telephoned me over and over again and issued threats. It would
probably only be a nuisance to me but if I recognized the condition I would
try to get through to the mind of the stalker by treating them like a human
being instead of being scared of them and what they might do and therefore
treating them like a dangerous psychopath with no emotion.
Communication is usually very poor in these situations so no one knows how
the other side is really
feeling on a human level and the stalker doesn't realize the fear he's/she's
instilling and sometimes makes it much worse - inadvertently of course
although the victim will always say the stalker knows exactly what they are
doing. The victim truly believes the stalker is dangerous by this stage so
they will never listen to reason as they are too scared. It's a shame
because I have no criminal record for violence have never been in an abusive
relationship am not promiscuous don't have AIDS nothing just a pretty normal
guy in most circumstances certainly not dangerous but people are scared of
what they don't understand.
I suppose I am always going to have the support on the guys on here who have
this delusional disorder and have been through this - but the victims of
this crime won't trust what I am saying and will see it as me trying to make
myself look innocent of any crime and manipulate the readers into believing
I am not really too blame. You cannot apportion blame to this crime, the
stalker isn't to blame for having a mental disorder the victim isn't to
blame for being scared. If anything society is too blame for the way we can
no longer treat each other as human beings and that goes for both the
stalker and the victim.
Anyway I must remember despite having a delusional disorder which cannot be
my fault that my victim is probably still somewhere suffering from the
catastrophic damage this crime does to them it may of changed them forever
but I imagine once they realized I was undergoing professional help they
felt better. On the other hand I am left to carry on as if nothing ever
happened but I must take responsibility for my actions even if it's through
no fault of my own and try to prevent it happening to someone else in the
future because another life could be ruined because my life already has been
just not as badly as it could've been had it not been for the mental health
profession.
One last thing to say is that the authorities i.e. police, courts, lawyers
believe that erotomaniacs are highly dangerous individuals this is because
of the percentage of cases that get widely reported in the media where the
stalker has assaulted someone whilst under his delusion or made death
threats to the victims family or partner so the victim is advised of this
and it makes them even more scared and the authorities treat you like your
highly dangerous and will possibly impose a stiff prison sentence.
The psychiatric/psychological profession which are experts in the field
don't often don't hold this view but the stalker doesn't think there's
anything wrong with him so he may not get a psychiatric/psychological
evaluation and receive treatment and end up in jail. The thing is it's
difficult to be objective when it happens to you and when a
psychiatrist/psychologist gets stalked they soon lose their objectivity. I
find it hard to be objective as I am the sufferer of the delusional disorder
and the victim/police/courts/lawyers find it impossible to objective when
they deal with a erotomania case. I am
probably not the best person to speak too when it comes to understanding the
feelings of the victim like they are not the best person to speak to when it
comes to understanding the feelings of the stalker.