lost love

i got a friend request on Facebook from Nicholas Ryan. HIs profile said he was a Major General in the US Army in Kabul, Afghanistan. I accepted, because he was nice looking, and I happened to have a family member in Kabul. I wasn't looking for love, wasn't expecting anything. He used Facebook Messenger over a period of 17 days to steal my heart. Every time I mentioned the possibility of fraud, he had a convincing answer for it. His messages evoked sympathy, tenderness and trust in me. I fell in love with him, even though I am married already. I was unaware of the romance scam business. I have never used Facebook as a dating site. I happened to google a few words from the military service record he sent me. It had been one of the most convincing items to make me trust him. This website came up. The exact same service record came up. Stolen. I knew it was too good to be true. I ended it. He never got around to asking me for money. It has been over a month since I ended it. I miss him every day. I haven't felt that happy for many years. I haven't felt that sad, either. I tell myself there's nobody to miss. He didn't exist. I was in love with a fiction. But my heart still wants to love him. Crazy.

Sorry to hear this happened to you. Please post his Facebook URL, email address, photos (fakemarked), phone number, and any other identifying info so that other victims can recognize the scam.

His Facebook page was disabled after I unfriended him and reported it. There are other fake Nicholas Ryans on facebook with different pictures. I saved some of his pics, but I don't think they are actually of the scammer. I am having trouble uploading them to this site.

The pictures are not of the scammer as he is probably an young African male that has never been in the military and everything that he sent to you was probably copied from the internet.
Please post any emails, email addresses or telephone numbers that you have from this scammer.

The pictures are jpeg files. I can't get them to upload or paste here. I deleted most of his messages, but I retrieved a few messages from the first week of our correspondence in a facebook download. If I can figure out how, I will post them here.

Upload them to http://scamwarners.com and post here the links in [img] tags. Mark them "fake used by scammer" so that the next scammer who comes by can't reuse them.

The first few messages would be great. They are script; scammers send the same messages to lots of people, so anyone else who's targeted by the scammer will be able to search for text in them and recognize the scam.

"thank you so much for accepting my request on here, you look like a happy person from your picture i can tell that well, would be looking forward to knowing you better...have a nice day

aww that is so kind of your warm response, i like your smile, because it takes only a smile to make a dark day seem bright, the happiest of people don't necessarily have the best of everything; they just make the most of everything that comes along. Am please to have you as a new friend. tell me little about your self, I don't come on here often due to the nature of my job, got a notification from Facebook that you are someone I may know, when I checked you out, found your profile interesting...that was how I found you...nice to know you have a son here what is he doing here?"

"well i must say you are a gorgeous woman and will love to know more about you. i own my own home in San Jose California, but am originally from Warren, Michigan, am a special Oops in the Us force, currently assigned on peace keeping tour, am 59 years old, a widower, how old are you. This social network is new to me and due to the nature of my JOB (ARMY-COMMANDER: SPEC-OPS COUNTER-INTELLIGENCE, DIPLOMAT) cant really say much about me on here also would have love to share more about myself to you and get to know one another as friends if thats OK with you, i believe we cross part for a purpose in life"

"as for the fake account you said i don't know much about it and i don't understand what you mean by that?

Your profile is certainly one of the most interesting I have seen. Of course the photos are not bad either, I consider myself a simple man, No drama (Definitely not an actor). My work requires a lot of confidentiality but would like to write some more to you everyday in my free time
I believe a good friendship is all about communication do you agree that?
Thank you but sorry what do you mean by carefully?
am very happy to be protecting the citizen of the world, I am working for everyone"
(at this point I thought, why am I so worried about messaging him, while he is being shot at?)

After 17 days of trading messages and getting emotionally involved, I googled a few words from the military service record "Nicholas Ryan" had sent me, and it exactly matched the one quoted in Scamwarners under "military satphone scam" topic #151509 by BittenbyScam Feb. 19, 2013. I later found out it was stolen from Col. John M. McHugh who died in 2010 in Afghanistan.

Thanks, scamwarners.com for being here and being free. Fortunately, I found out my guy was lying before I lost any money. I'musing you as my support group. I can't talk to my husband or my friends. It's embarassing. I can't be angry at the guy, because everything he said to me was so damn nice. I know it would have ended badly. I know I can't love somebody who doesn't exist. But it's hard to dismiss and forget somebody who had such a profound effect on my emotions. It gets a little easier, day by day.

No your not crazy - I feel the say way. Not only lost with money but lost in heartbreak. It seems that every guy that even talks to me on the dating sites are scammers - or want money. It sickens me - I just want to be happy again. Sorry new to this and your post is the first I have read but I totally understand. Hope your current mate wakes up and realizes how important you 2 are to each other. Life is short - what I would do to get my guy back.

Thanks for posting. It is a very weird experience, loving a fictional person. I don't think anyone can understand it unless they have been scammed. Most of the time, I am OK with my reality. There's no romance in my reality. But I am very blessed. I had thought I was better off without that feeling of being in love. Maybe I am, because it's always temporary. But there's nothing else like it in this life.