If your new romantic interest exhibits all or most of the following behaviors, be careful. He or she might be a sociopath.
1. Charisma and charm. They’re smooth talkers, always have an answer, never miss a beat. They seem to be very exciting.
2. Enormous ego. They act like the smartest, richest or most successful people around. They may actually come out and tell you that.
3. Overly attentive. They call, text and e-mail constantly. They want to be with you every moment. They resent time you spend with your family and friends.
4. Jekyll and Hyde personality. One minute they love you; the next minute they hate you. Their personality changes like flipping a switch.
5. Blame others. Nothing is ever their fault. They always have an excuse. Someone else causes their problems.
6. Lies and gaps in the story. You ask questions, and the answers are vague. They tell stupid lies. They tell outrageous lies. They lie when they’d make out better telling the truth.
7. Intense eye contact. Call it the predatory stare. If you get a chill down your spine when they look at you, pay attention.
8. Move fast. They quickly proclaim that you’re their true love and soul mate. They want to move in together or get married quickly.
9. Pity play. They appeal to your sympathy. They want you to feel sorry for their abusive childhood, psychotic ex, incurable disease or financial setbacks.
10. Sexual magnetism. If you feel intense attraction, if your physical relationship is unbelievable, it may be their excess testosterone.
For more on this topic, see Donna Andersen’s book, Red Flags of Love Fraud—10 signs you’re dating a sociopath.
skylar:
I’m so glad we can laugh at this!
Louise-girl, I’m so tired of crying, right?
Truthspeak:
Yes! I know what you mean! Laugh, laugh! No more crying! This is a cry free zone at least for tonight. 🙂
Spaths really are humorous once they are no longer a present danger. Anybody ever watch Seinfeld? It’s about 4 spaths living in NYC and they are hilareous.
Daisy, I don’t know if forgiveness is my problem, I don’t hold grudges. It’s getting rid of the programming that I should be a scapegoat, that is my problem.
skylar:
Seinfeld is hilarious! It’s all about THEM…haha!
Louise,
I wish I could be as confident as you are about my exspath not being done with me. A part of me truly does feel he is done with me, after all we had broken up one other time before and within that month we were broke up he came back twice. Now it’s been over a month, no word from him; Last time we broke up I told him actually I pleaded and cried and asked him “WHY” would he ever pull me back into this thing knowing he would hurt me — I was literally on my knees telling him to please LET ME GO – dont pull me back just to hurt me — so for some odd reason I do feel I “Struck” a cord with him…,Either that, or he is just waiting to give me some time to heal so he can come back and try to stomp on me again – by love bombing me! Hopefully if that did happen, I will be fully equip to handle his bull crap and call him out on it – or better yet, I will hopefully be strong enough to not even bother responding. I just need to keep reminding myself of the gosh awful things he did to me – mentally! Clearing they do outweigh the good –
So strange, here I sit depressed and sad, but looking back at the time I was with my exspath, I was more depressed and sad PLUS emotionally soaked up!
Skylar, yes – I identify with that, as well. And, it takes a long time to reprogram that out of our heads, I think.
In the meantime, my son taught me a new vulgar reference for the exspath, today, that I nearly drove off the road laughig about: cock-nose! ROTFLMAO!!!! (snort, guffaw) Now, what is it about those two words in that particular order that’s so hilarious?
PPffffffft!!! (waving hand and still snorting)
Quote from George Costanza: Jerry, just remember, it’s not a lie if you believe it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vn_PSJsl0LQ
DenBroncos007, you haven’t “re-acted,” this time, sweetie. It’s not “fun” for him, anymore. Right?
If you ever DO hear from him again, you now know what you were dealing with and that anything that pours out of his face is just lies. Of course, I don’t think you’ll allow any contact, at this point. You are a MUCH different person than you were a month ago – you are. Don’t you feel it? A bit more confident? A bit more savvy? And, that you can call a spade what it is?
You’re doing fine, DenBroncos007, and you’ll keep doing fine!
Brightest blessings
Skylar, the first running of Seinfeld was hilarious, but after the final episode, I was kind of skeeved out about the types of people that they all portrayed.
Isn’t that quote in the Doctrines Of Spath handbook? YIKES!!!!