Am I being unreasonable to want to hold this woman to account?

[VickyPollard25]

I met a man on Bumble. He pushed me into a relationship pretty quickly (a matter of weeks and he was wanting to get married). I was mid-divorce and would usually be stronger and have my wits about me, but was quite vulnerable with all that was going on. He ambushed me into meeting his kids - ie. Date at his place and suddenly they turn up unexpectedly to me (they don’t live at his home as they are older - he is much older than me). So many red flags and I felt unsettled. Out of the blue he goes to Hong Kong for work. He messages me a strange message saying he suddenly feels very protective of me. It was odd. He gets back and tells me he caught up with an “old friend” who says she knows me and warned him about me. Apparently she had a lot of terrible things to say, hence him feeling protective. 🙄 He tells me she says I am from the wrong side of the tracks (my parents are dirt poor, I went to the wrong schools and a bad university, etc), I have no friends and my job is a joke. This is a summary - she also commented on things based on personal info you could find out if you internet stalked me. I was actually quite devastated to hear all this. I pushed him for this friend’s details and it turns out that it wasn’t an old friend of his, but another woman he had met online and had been dating. She had never met me and I’d never heard of her. He told me he told her that he couldn’t see her anymore because he had met someone and gave her all my details. They looked up my Linked In profile together… Absolutely appalling behaviour by him.

I’m reeling from the idea that someone would say these things about someone she’s never met. I’ve skimmed over it but they are really hurtful nasty things that she’s invented. I’ve never come across anything like it. He defended her, saying she had was in her 40s and had never had a serious relationship and after several miscarriages was looking for a sperm donor and he had offered.

This was drip fed to me after a lot of lying. Then it turns out this woman has called my work (an international bank) to reach out to former colleagues of hers to pass on terrible things about me.

Clearly he has stirred up a lot of trouble and deserved to be binned. But what about her? Is this crazy behaviour or what? I feel I can’t just leave it.

Am I being unreasonable to want to hold her to account for calling my work and making about blatant lies about me?

My best friend took that view too, and feels very sorry for her. She pointed out to me that all the information about her miscarriages and sperm donors is highly confidential and confided in him as a partner and someone who dangled the carrot of babies and a life together. that’s incredibly cruel.

He is clearly the big problem. This is one issue of many involving him. He’s done worse. But you don’t seem to take on board that he has been dealt with, binned and gone. He was the first issue to deal with. I don’t think it’s so strange to direct ire at someone else’s behaviour too.

I get it, OP. He has completely messed your head around and this will take a while to get over. You keep saying that you have binned him but he is obviously still occupying space in your head. The other woman (be she real or a a fake persona) does not really matter. You need to focus on yourself and try to banish this dreadful man from your head. Bin him properly.

What was this behaviour exactly? You say you raised it with your manager - she didn't raise it with you? Surely your manager would know about it already if it actually happened? Would you have known anything about this if he hadn't told you?

Yes, you are right. I’m fuming! Absolutely fuming.

@VickyPollard25 he sounds very sadistic. And given he’s in his 50s, he’s likely an expert at love bombing and then upturning women’s lives.

I agree you should take some time to get your head together but I also don’t think you should be too hard on yourself. Yes, you are vulnerable and your flag checker might not be as strong as you’d like yet, but people like this guy are so practised that you can be swept away on a tide of red flags before you’ve fully understood what’s happening.

Future fakers and head fuckers are good at why they do!

This is really scary OP. Well done for putting an end to it.

@Over40Overdating - thank you so much. Your responses are so compassionate and insightful. My therapist said the same - a man of his age will be well practised at these games.

I will take a lot of time out. I think that’s necessary to recover from this experience.

This woman may or may not be real, may or may not have done these things - none of this matters.

The people you should hold accountable are yourself and the lunatic you took up with.

Remove him completely from your life - he is dangerous.

Cement your mental well-being and capability so you recover your agency. It's dangerous for you to just be swept along into all those things you mentioned in your OP.

I've read all your updates but still think she isn't real.
You haven't actually confirmed that anyone has called the guy at your work, just that he is a real guy because you found him on LinkedIn...as could nutter bloke.
You said the pictures matched on the LinkedIn profile of this woman and her WhatsApp. Do you mean exact same picture? Because people don't tend to use the same picture on both. They can of course but a nutter who set up a fake WhatsApp would probably use the LinkedIn pic.
You also said this whole thing came about after you had shot down any notion of getting married and having a baby. Now suddenly there is woman desperate for his sperm.

I suppose it doesn't matter either way. You are doing the right thing in blocking him etc. But I suppose if he has fully made it all up he is next level nutter!

I hope this is an end of it all for you anyway

Yeah, no way is this woman real...

Two scenarios here...

1 - He meets, at exactly the right time, a woman as utterly evil and batshit as him, who he can convince to stalk and harrass you...

2 - He finds a likely looking account on LinkedIn, nicks the photo, uses it to stick on a WhatsApp account on his spare phone and then has some 'conversations' between his own account and this invented one so he can show you 'proof' she exists.

The latter set up is mere minutes of work, the rest of what he has told you, all the details are googleable or pure invention... easy peasy and its worked to really freak you out and wobble your head.

christ isn't it obvoius the woman isn't real.

This would make a great movie plot.

He sounds truly awful! Glad you have binned him.

Run the other way fast!

I don’t think she exists and he sounds riddled with a very nasty amalgam of personality disorders and quite dangerous. Please be careful.

He's trying to demoralise you to perhaps gain control OP.

I'd suggest no more contact.

Take it as a life lesson well learnt. I’m glad you're now safe as iv heard these sort of people can groom their victims for months/years chipping away slowly. IMO start afresh forget her and him. by the sounds of it everyone who needs to know about him/her do so already and are aware of the situation. You don't know what was said or implied to this "other" women (even if shes real). iv heard many a story of someone almost starting a "bidding" war. sim cards are easy to pick up and downloading watsapp is free. you have to question EVERYTHING that was ever shown to you or spoken about. Anyway you have to let it go all of it. sending love

God you poor thing @VickyPollard25, how terrifying.

I really agree with the therapist who said you should invest in therapy yourself. There was no way you could have envisaged how this would unfold but there were so many red flags that, for whatever reasons, you ignored. This is in no way to victim blame but you are clearly quite vulnerable at the moment and consequently not making the best decisions re your own well-being. I also think it will be a useful way for you to process a traumatic and extremely bizarre situation.

Prioritise your own well-being for now and thank goodness this awful man is no longer in your life: Take care xx

You know she’s not real don’t you? Also he’s a lunatic. But you should fully understand his point of view, he needs to follow this imaginary friends advice and leave you alone, for your sake!

You are being set up for a scam!!!

This, absolutely this!!

Whoa! I would put that all in a file marked NO! and never look back tbh. This is all about a couple of boundryless nutjobs and you don't need to entertain these people a moment longer.

If you have evidence that she's called your collegues, call the police and let them deal with it. That's harassment. They probably can't do anything but it'll be on file should she continue.

Don't engage, deal with your feelings and never speak to either of them again.

And this is how you know he made the woman up. It's highly unlikely her WhatsApp picture and linkedin one will be the same.
He took her picture from LinkedIn and created her WhatsApp account. No one uses the same photo

The photos were not the same, but I think the advice to just put all this behind me and not think about either of them (fictional or not) is excellent.