To Aid Your Recovery: Write A Letter That You Never Intend To Send
One of the great challenges of scam victim recovery is resolving those unresolvable conflicts, and one of the greatest is never really being able to tell your xriminals how much they harmed you.
NOTICE: We DO NOT Recommend You Reopen Communications With Your Scammer
This Is For Your Benefit, Not Theirs!
You Have Things You Want To Say
Remember, this is about your recovery! This is not about their reaction, this is about yours. This is about you being able to privately and safely express the terrible feelings of hurt and regret and shame that you feel after being violated in a romance scam. This is about saying the things that you could never express to them directly, or anyone else for that matter – just between your heart and the words.
It does not matter how long it is as long as you get everything down that you feel. This is not a dialog, this is a one-time statement of your pain and the frustration you feel after the scam.
Why It Matters For Your Recovery
Writing a letter to your scammer and expressing the pain you feel can be an important step in the healing and recovery process for scam victims.
Here are some reasons why it can be beneficial:
- Emotional Release: Penning down their feelings can provide an outlet for victims to release pent-up emotions. Expressing the pain, anger, and betrayal they experienced during the scam can be cathartic and help them come to terms with their emotions.
- Closure and Empowerment: Writing a letter allows victims to regain a sense of control and empowerment over the situation. By addressing the scammer directly, victims can assert themselves and refuse to remain silent or powerless in the face of deception.
- Self-Reflection: Writing a letter can prompt victims to reflect on their experiences and the factors that made them susceptible to the scam. This self-awareness can be valuable in identifying vulnerabilities and taking preventive measures in the future.
- Breaking the Emotional Bond: Scammers often establish emotional connections with their victims. Writing a letter can be a step toward breaking this bond by expressing the victim’s decision to detach from the manipulative influence of the scammer.
- Validation and Support: Sharing the letter with trusted friends, family, or support groups can provide victims with validation and empathy. Knowing that their feelings are understood and acknowledged by others can be comforting and aid in the recovery process.
- Warning Others: Some victims choose to make their letters public as a cautionary tale to warn others about the scammer’s tactics and protect potential victims from falling into the same trap. If you would like us to share your letter with others, please send it to us at contact@AgainstScams.org
How To Begin
Just begin in the usual way …
Dear Scammer,
I know that you will never read this but you hurt me and I need to tell you …
Remember, this is not a journal of your day-to-day life and feelings. This is your one chance to put down on paper or the screen your true inner pain and anguish – but do not send it, because your fragile emotional state would not respond well to what the scammer might say in reply.
Full Template (Example):
Dear [Scammer’s Name (if known)],
I am writing this letter to you with a mix of emotions—anger, disappointment, and sadness. When we first connected, I believed that you were someone who genuinely cared about me, someone who offered an opportunity to improve my life. Little did I know that your intentions were far from benevolent.
The pain I feel is immense, knowing that I fell for your lies and manipulations. Your promises of financial success and a better future were enticing, and I allowed myself to be drawn into your web of deceit. I invested not just money but also my time, trust, and hope, only to discover that everything was built on a foundation of lies.
You took advantage of my vulnerabilities, exploiting my dreams and desires for your own selfish gains. The emotional bond you established with me, the constant reassurances, and the illusion of a supportive community were all part of your strategy to keep me under your control.
Now that I see the truth, I want you to know that I refuse to let you define my life. I am reclaiming my power and breaking free from the chains you wrapped around me. You may have deceived me, but I am determined not to let your deceit define who I am.
While your actions have caused me great pain, I want you to understand that I am more than just a victim. I am resilient, and I am learning from this experience. I am seeking support from people who genuinely care for my well-being, not those who exploit vulnerability for personal gain.
I will use this painful lesson to grow stronger and wiser. I will become more cautious and discerning in my future dealings, ensuring that I never fall for such deceit again. Your scam may have left scars, but I will not allow those scars to hinder my progress.
This letter serves as a declaration of my independence from your manipulative grasp. I am breaking the emotional bond you tried to establish, and I am taking back control of my life. Your scam may have caused temporary setbacks, but it will not define my future.
Consider this letter a warning to others who may be tempted by your false promises. I hope they will read my words and think twice before falling into the trap you set for so many innocent people.
In conclusion, I hold myself responsible for my decisions, but I also recognize your culpability in this deceptive affair. I am on a journey of healing, and I will emerge from this stronger and more vigilant. You may have been a scammer, but I refuse to be a perpetual victim.
Sincerely,
[Victim’s Name]
If the scammer were to get this and reply, they would either ridicule you or apologize in an attempt to get more money from you. So DO NOT ever send this to them.
You Can Write More Than One
If you feel the need, you can write more than one. Although you will need to be careful here since too many can turn into an obsession. You can also write one every few months as your perceptions change!
It Serves Another Purpose In Your Recovery
This letter can also serve another important purpose for you in your recovery in the days, weeks, and years to come. This is your own personal time capsule. It is a record of how you really felt at a singular moment in time.
As the months go by and you slowly recover you can look back at this after 6 or 12 or 18 months and see how far you have come from those feelings that you wrote about compared to where you are then.
Most victims that use this process find it gives them an incredible boost of confidence to realize just how much progress they have made in recovering. When you begin, you have real doubts about if you can survive this, but as time goes by the pain and anger loses its control over you. Months in the future will come to a point where you can go a whole day without thinking about it, and when you look back you will be able to remember the pain as a distant memory like a childhood cut and amaze yourself with how well you have survived.
Helping Other Victims
After time passes, another use for this letter may be to help other victims understand how profound their pain is but that they will get through this. When you are substantially down the recovery path it is difficult to share your original feelings with other victims – you may want to help, but sharing your letter may be a perfect way to express that you also felt exactly the same way. This kind of victim-to-victim connection can help newer victims truly understand that others have been in their shoes. We suggest that you share your letter in any support group that you belong to.
Please Remember!
Remember that you do not want or need to send this letter to your scammer. It is just a way for you to express your true feelings. You can burn the letter or tear it into little pieces after you are done with it if you want, though we encourage you to keep it as a milestone and message to your future self!
Recovery Is A Hard Process
If it were easy everyone could do it. Only about a third of victims make the decision to recover, the rest deny or are so angry they cannot see the need. On average they take many times longer to recover, assuming they ever do. You have the choice, right now, right here, to return to something close to your old self. You will never be quite the same – you will be more knowledgable after this, wiser and with scars – but you can get through this.
Resources:
- Sign up for SCARS Support at support.AgainstScams.org
- Find trauma counseling or therapy at counseling.AgainstScams.org
- Find how to report scams & scammers at reporting.AgainstScams.org
More:
- Telling Your Story – Especially When It Is Hard [VIDEO] (romancescamsnow.com)
- What Really Are Vulnerabilities That Lead To Scams? (scamsnow.com)
- What Drives People To Be Scammed? (romancescamsnow.com)
- Why Victims Prefer To Believe Scammers Are Evil Demons! (romancescamsnow.com)
- Changes In A Scam Victim’s Life (scamsnow.com)
- Scam Victim’s Learning Process [INFOGRAPHIC] (romancescamsnow.com)
- Scam Victim Resiliency – Why It Is So Much Worse After The Scam (scamsnow.com)
- Suggestibility – A Victim Vulnerability (romancescamsnow.com)
- Scam Victims And The 9 Circles Of Hell After The Scam Ends (romancescamsnow.com)
- Scam Victims’ Recovery – Acknowledging The Harm Done (romancescamsnow.com)
In my situation, I was able to discover the real identity of the two scammers, through google inside picture. I wrote messages and attached pictures to each of them unmasking them as scammers. I even requested my money back. Served me as a closure in a way. This was before I found SCARS, and even before I started therapy.
That was the last communications I had with both scammers, even though they responded to my text. One said, his account was stolen and asked my why I had so many doubts. The second scammer said that I was nuts, and that he was done talking to me.
That was not the purpose of this letter. This is a recovery technique and is never sent to the criminals.