Damhán was physically and sexually abused by her alcoholic father for years growing up. She brought it up as a child on a few occasions, but her mother didn’t want to hear it, and pretended nothing was wrong. When Damhán became an adolescent she began acting out and seeing boys and her mother sent her away to a all girls behavior reform boarding camp in Alabama, rather than addressing the problem. Damhán left the camp and had a series of abusive relationships with boys, mostly sexual and physical in nature. She was estranged from her mother and got odd jobs before getting into promotional modeling.
She eventually found herself working as an escort, and eventually courting sugar daddy’s. This is where Jonn Palmer (alias of a deranged, mentally and emotionally unstable predatory named Ed Long) and Ed Schoff enter the picture. These men would support a well to do lifestyle for a number of years. Eventually the partying and loose lifestyle started to unwind and Damhán began to distance herself. She moved back in with her mother, continuing to see a few guys. Eventually Jonn and Ed encouraged her to enter real estate, a field both of these wealthy gentlemen worked in (Jonn, however, fabricated his entire story. He is not wealthy, nor is he an investor. He has a wife and two children in college). Ed has provided her with a main source of income for the past 5 years. Over the past year and a half Damhán has worked as a realtor for a firm, taking care of the real estate aspects for Ed when he invests in properties to build. Their sexual relationship (according to her) has transitioned from sexual to more business over the past year, although they’ve always been mixed. She cut Jonn out of the picture after he meddled in her personal life, and continually lied about his intention to give her money for various things.
Ed currently pays Damhán between 1,000 and 2,500 a month for various favors and errands. He sends her homes to purchase and sell, which earns her anywhere between 1,000-5,000 per closing, averaging about 1-3 a month from him. Her personal real estate business is slow, but growing. He provides her with an apartment to live in at a discounted rate, which she just moved into this month. She is very much financially indebted to Ed.
Damhán says she loves me and wants to marry me and be with me and will do whatever it takes. She says she recognizes the unhealthy relationships, and she wants a healthy one, but her actions never coincide with her words.
Last night she says if our relationship doesn’t work out, I lose nothing. (She doesn’t appreciate how much I am putting into this relationship, feelings, time, humiliation by going back to a girl who cheated and lied to me and my family and everyone I know throughout our entire relationship). She says she will lose much more, financially and friends. I said it’s upsetting to think she has more to lose than to gain.
Damhán and my relationship
We began talking in April 2014. We met on okcupid, and she catfished me, posing as another person with a fake profile. But after I messaged her she came clean and told me she was attractive and provided me with her number. I was dating many women at the time, but when I decided to be exclusively with Damhán, I cut off all relationships. Within the first two weeks I found out she was talking with Jonn, her 50 years old millionaire ex boyfriend. She was also friends with his 25 year old daughter, and his 50 some year old sister. But that she was just friends. This left me feeling very uncomfortable, but I trusted her. As a defense, or precaution, I began chatting anonymously with other women, as a protective mechanism.
She also had no job, and was just starting real estate, and worked with this guy named Ed. When asked about their relationship, how they met, whether they were ever sexually involved, whether he wanted to be sexually involved with her, the nature of their relationship, she completely lied to be an assured me they were totally platonic.
Damhán was not a typical girl. She was very guarded, and very emotionally distance. Sex was very mechanical and cold. I wondered about the father she never spoke with, and over time began asking questions that caused Damhán to open up about the sexual abuse that occurred. She informed me she had never spoke to anyone about it in 20 years, and that her talking to me was the first time she verbalized it. We had many conversations, and I encouraged her to see a professional to deal with this trauma.
Three months into our relationship she sat me down and told me a confession: she had Herpes. I was devastated, but I loved her, and told her I was upset she didn’t give me the option to deal with that information before we had sex. We continued to be together. A month or so later, we find out she has Chlymydia. She got tested and wasn’t that upset, although I was very upset and curious how this could happen. I mentioned to her I had it in the spring, but I was treated. She immediately raged on me and laid into me that I had risked her health and I was cheating on her and all this. I know I could not have given it to her, because after I was treated in the spring I had slept with other people, and they had been tested since, and did not have it. Also, the symptoms did not materialize until 4 months into our relationship, and I had not cheated.
Towards the end of our relationship she because increasingly paranoid of my cheating, accusing me of all kinds of things without proof. I would cry to confess that I had nothing to hide and was not cheating, and ultimately say that I can’t be in this kind of relationship, in which case she was stop, console me, and all would return to normal. This behavior increased and I told her I could not do this and that we needed counseling to address these issues.
During counseling the entire therapy was focused on me and my problems. I was so guilt stricken I slowly began admitting every little fault, every conversation, I gave her my phone, told her everything. She saw the texts and sexting and was outraged.
She admitted “I fucked Jonn” in a smug way and I was devastated. A week before my birthday, the week I took her to a concert, the week before she took me to a spa for my birthday and organized a lazer tag trip and cooked my friends and I dinner.
After a day of emotional devastation she said she was just kidding and “wanted to give me a taste of my own medicine”. I told her I couldn’t deal with jokes like this and we couldn’t be together. She was relentless in her desire to work things out. I was emotionally wrecked. I took off from work and drank all day Wednesday. I told her I wanted to know everything. She said she’d come over and tell me everything. When she sat down on the couch I immediately asked for her phone and password. She gave it to me. I immediately found sexting messages and pictures to Ed and Jonn and snap chats to other men and pictures of her naked self that were saved on her phone that I had never seen. I was devastated. She admitted to sleeping with them both. I began crying and wailing and being a drunk wreck. I took her phone and screen shot the phone and send pictures, and texts and sexts, to her mother, her sister, her brother in law, her boss. I was drunk and almost blacked out and emotionally devastated and wanted everything to know the horrible things she did. Her mother and sister did not take too kindly, and they hate me. The next day she says she wants to work through it.
Her best friend Megan’s boyfriend, John, hears what happened between Damhán and I, and breaks up with her. Megan calls me upset and tells me everything about Damhán in exchange to have me talk to John.
With this new information I ask Damhán questions and learn about her sex work past, her escorting and sugar daddies. She told me a lot. According to her, she told me more than she told anyone. She begged me to stay and work it out. I said I would, under the condition she cut off all ties with Ed and Jonn. She said she couldn’t. I said I can’t subject myself to that kind of hurt and abuse. She was outraged and said I abandoned her and rejected her at her weakest.
In Summary
I think Damhán suffers from serious trauma. I believe she falls on the spectrum for various personality disorders, such as Narcissistic Personality Disorder (Vulnerable Narcissist), or even possibly Sociopathy.
I believe Damhán love’s me very much. I also believe she has had no healthy male relationships in her life, and that she has serious trust issues. I believe she’s always depended on herself to protect her interests, despite anyone else’s feelings. She copes by guarding herself, being emotionally unaffected and distant. Her capacity for empathy, or to think about the consequences of how certain actions may directly hurt others is severely limited.
I believe she wants help, and I believe she’s willing to do the work. I believe she is in serious denial about many of her coping mechanisms, such a pathological lying, and being defensive, and seeking intimacy and validation through other men outside of her primary relationship. I think she’s developed a dependency on older men with money to support her lifestyle, and this is not something that can easily be undone, despite her desire to do so.
Damhán and I have an amazing relationship one-on-one. However, I do not believe it’s entirely authentic. We are extraordinarily compatible in interests, chemistry, intelligence, attraction, activities we enjoy doing together, life goals such as marriage and a family having a similar vision for our future. We have amazing conversations, very similar tastes, we make each other laugh, we support each other, we’re very thoughtful and caring for the other personal happiness.
However, issues arise when we are not together, the alternative relationships, the deception and lying, the intimacy with others, the poor communication. Damhán is not a good communicator. To get her to really speak about her feelings, you must probe and pry and not judge and accept her. She shuts down very hard and very cold. She can be very defensive and aggressive, and immediately deflect the conversation and blame to something else.
I believe when you talk things out, and ask her to reverse situations, and put herself in the other person’s shoes, and ask her what she would do or how she’d feel, she almost always arrives at the correct conclusion, and would not tolerate someone doing these things to her. But the fact that she doesn’t arrive at these conclusions ahead of time on her own is very concerning.
I love Damhán, and I have told her I will continue to love her. I have told her that I will be patient and understanding, but that I must consider my health, and that if actions are not taken, and circumstances do not improve, and she continues to hurt me and push me away, that I will ultimately be forced to walk away. But for now, I trust her words, and I believe that with therapy, we may make some progress.
It’s important that I see that she’s proactive. That she is making steps. That she is moving forward, and wants to, and doesn’t want to internalize, or ignore, or mask the problems and challenges because they are uncomfortable.
Below I have listed a few major concerns in our relationship.
Major Concerns in our Relationship
Lying (lies by omission, deception, creating a false sense of reality)
• Almost pathological pattern of lying. Mostly by creating false realities, by not mentioning important details, lying via omission, or creating convenient illusions
• Insisted her ex Jonn and her were strictly friends when asked, but later had sex with him.
• Insisted Ed was strictly platonic, even though she slept with him weekly throughout our 6 month relationship. When recently asked if she was still seeing Ed, she said yes, only professionally. When asked if she was sleeping/ having sex with him, she adamantly said no, we’re just professional. After our falling out I told him we needed to stop sleeping together. When I asked further the last time she has slept with him, she said May (3 months ago, and when she was speaking with Dillon). She said she was lonely, and he was there, and she “didn’t care about him” like that, but he was always a friend, and it was convenient.
• When we began talking seriously again, I assumed she would distance herself from her other romantic relationships. Especially before we got intimate and had sex. A week after we had spent every day together, she divulged that she was still speaking to her last “boyfriend” Dillon (who lives in spain working in the Navy with her brother in law). She explained should “could not” stop talking to him until another week and a half, because he was under a lot of pressure to take his test and regain his rank in the navy, and if she broke up with him, he might have a melt down and she must think about her brother in law and sister and consider how it may affect them, as well as his ability to earn his rank.
• She has been lying and misleading Dillon, leading him to believe that she is exclusively involved with just him, while we’ve been spending every day together and sleeping together. She will not tell him why she is breaking up with him.
• When asked about her new apartment, she told me she was renting from a property rental company, and gets rental discounts by showing other apartments for them. She omitted that this rental property was owned by Ed, the sugar daddy/man she works with and cheated on me with throughout our relationship.
• She has not told Ed that we were seeing each other.
• She has not told her family that she intends to see me and work things out.
• She has said if she had to stop seeing Ed, and stop working with him, she would have to work harder, but she would do it. This was before she informed me that she was living in his property, and after she told me she would do whatever it takes to make it work with me long term.
Being intimate with other people:
• On one hand she says she’ll do whatever it takes to be together, and cut off all contact with Ed, but in another breath she “hopes that we can get to a place where she can work with him and be in a long term relationship with me”
• She says she doesn’t care about Ed at all, then tells me how I don’t know her relationship, and he’s a friend, and he’s been there when I was not, and its nice having him around.
Being financially dependent with other people:
• She’s been financially dependent on Ed for the past five hers. Initially as strictly a sugar daddy, eventually working for him in real estate and continuing a sexual relationship with him.
• I believe this is a huge issue.
• Not only does he pay her for sex (in the past), but he pays her for errands like showing houses and doing things for him, as well as getting money for any houses he sends her way. I estimate she makes about 30-40k just from having a relationship with Ed. She said she is willing to end it, but she currently lives in his property, and just moved in, and just bought all this furniture.
Relapsing into old relationships
• She has a tendency to keep old relationships alive, be it Ed (5 years), Jonn (5 years), Patrick (3 years), and I’m sure others.
Gas Lighting:
• Ex: in our previous relationship, she was intent on highlighting my faults, and downplaying any of her own. Such as, she flipped out when she scrolled through my pictures and found pictures of my Ex. Meanwhile, she was maintaining a constant relationship with her ex. She would ask me to eliminate all contact with girl friends, and yet she still maintained a relationship with her ex. And she was cheating on me with ed.
Moral Outrage:
• In the beginning of our relationship she was morally outraged when people cheated, and she advocated fierce monogamy
• She will devalue and harshly criticize others for cheating and lying, as if she was above it. Even though she is doing it at the very moment.
Un-empathetic; incapable of considering my feelings, and how actions may hurt my feelings
• Ex: Maintaining an intimate relationship with Dillon, the guy she insisted she would stop speaking with and break up with after his test. After Damhán and I had begun seeing each other daily, and sleeping together, I asked if there was anything I would find upsetting in her phone. She explained her text messages with Dillon. I asked if I would be upset by past or recent conversations, she said both. I asked if I could read, she said no. She is either misleading Dillon and maintaining a romantic, intimate relationship. She is being duplicitous. Maintaining two romantic relationships. I cannot fathom how she can justify doing this to either of us.
• Acts in ways that totally disregard my feelings, and believes it is okay, until we ask her to put herself in my position and reason from there. Such as lying.
• During our breakup we both divulged everything (I assume) about our past and current relationships. She said she told me things she never told anyone. She said she wanted to work through it and wanted to be with me. I told her I wanted to be with her, but I could not be with her unless she cut off all contact with Jonn and Ed. She refused. I said I can’t subject myself to that kind of hurt and abuse and debasement. She has said ever since that I abandoned her, and she trusted me and told me things and I rejected her.
Accepting responsibility:
• I’ve heard her apologize twice to me. Once I asked if she was sorry for cheating and lying, and told her I wanted to hear her say she was sorry. It was like pulling teeth. The other time was on her own volition; she had wrongly accused me of doing things for months, and realized that I was not at fault. She told her that she found out who did it, and was sorry she thought it was me.
• When she tells her friends why we broke up the first time, she tells them I cheated on her (I never physically cheated, and any girls I was talking to was in response to protect myself from the fact that she had an ongoing relationship with her ex which concerned me deeply) She does not find it necessary to elaborate on our falling out, and explain her own role. Her family only knows all the bad she tells them about me, and never elaborates on her role.
• She highlights all my faults, and never her own.
Talking points:
Dillon: Past and current relationship
Ed: Past relationship, current relationship, future relationship
Jonn:
Patrick:
Our past relationship
Our future relationship
Things we think we’ll struggle with:
How we cope with insecurity/ fears
Things we agree on:
Things we want for our relationship:
What is does a healthy relationship look like?
What does an unhealthy relationship look like?
Fears:
Abandonment
Rejection
Infidelity (intimate or romantic or sexual relationship
Lying (omitting, half-truths, deceiving)
Three C’s
Communication
Commitment
Closeness
Transparency: Open social media access; open facebook access; open phone access; open computer access; etc.
Maintaining the self/ loss of identify:
How to spend time apart and trust eachother, maintain sense of self
Control issues: how to trust with the opposite sex
When do you feel these things? Why do you feel them? What do they feel like?
Guilt
Remorse
Regret
How our relationship started:
Online
Her talking to her ex Jonn
Her sleeping with Ed
Etc
How to create open environment for discussing any and all fears, insecurities, concerns, problems, thoughts— without being judged, rejected.
How to create healthy partnership based on compromise
Pre-marital Counseling
Necessary? Things we need to agree on
William Dare 