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.
Truthspeak – “mine” didn’t need to hire anyone – he was arrested together with alledged syndicate members sitting on almost 2 tons of pure cocaine in Knysna in Dec 2010…. He just quite simply told his co-accused that they couldn’t let me take the stand as a state witness as he had no control over me anymore and I knew too much and would “sink them all”…..
But yes, here especially you can have someone “hijacked” for next to nothing. Just look at the recent Dewani case…
It’s terrifying..
It is kinda gut wrenching to read these last few pages of posts.
I though that my situation was complex! Not so – compared to what I am seeing here.
You ladies have REALLY been crapped on!!!
Friends say to me: ‘There are plenty of good women out there! You deserve better!’
Yeah – but I am beginning to think that many of them are so attached to other guys or chasing the ‘one’ that has the right combination of ‘stuff’ that the rest of us might as ‘retire.’
Please don’t take it the wrong way – but I am beginning to think that the attachment that women have for a man – or a particular kind of man – goes way beyond what guys experience. And I thought that I was ‘too intense.’ Afterall, that’s what my ex-gf kept telling me. And all I wanted was to be close to her a day or two a week and build a relationship.
My feelings are still strong for the ex-gf but I recognize the lies and manipulation more and more.
Fixerupper,
I don’t disagree but I don’t agree either. I do think there are good women out there who aren’t chasing or needing the “bad boy.” I think I stated in a previous post somewhere that my whole like I had been more attracted to the “exciting” risk taker type of man… Someone who I felt was stronger than me, not in a sense of me needing someone to take care of me though. All the men I’ve dated have not been spaths just my first husband and my latest ex… In between I’ve dated men who were strong but not in a good way…. These men disrespected me, controlled me, didn’t provide much nurturing / care at all, yet being treated that way kept me wanting / needing them more! How delusional I know!!!
Then I met me second husband (before my recent exspath) and he is the most caring, loving, hard working, genuine, honest, loyal man I’ve ever come across. He would so anything for me and I knew without him ever uttering a word that he loved me…. Yet why was that not good enough? He wasn’t an extrovert like all my other idiotic mates, he was more an introvert but he enjoyed excitement- wake boarding, snowboarding, quad riding, driving his race cars , etc yet he was very mild mannered, never yelled, never cursed, just very quiet…. And here I found that “boring”…. He has the qualities every woman dreams of and tells you we want in man, yet when we get those qualities we find out they don’t possess that other quality that some woman enjoy that’s in the “bad boy.” The bad boys ( in my life) have created nothing but havoc and drama in my life…. Hence, prime example my exspath! Bad boy, jerk, spath, and every other horrible name you can think of was him…. I allowed him to degrade me yet I stayed… I need to teach myself that men like this aren’t for me…. Boring men ( I don’t mean that in a bad war) are NORMAL, they provide normalcy in my life and that’s not anything I’m used to ( 2nd husband) so I withdrew and buried myself in work and we started drifting apart. He and I still talk, I miss him but can’t decide on being with anyone until I can heal myself.
I think people can learn from past “mistakes” – I’m learning at 38 but I’m really wanting and need normalcy although I don’t know how to handle it because all I’ve been used to is chaos. You just have to be selective and there are a lot of woman out there who will love and value you for the person you are……. I honestly believe women are more attracted to excitement/ bad boys than Mr Nice /Boring man… Yet the nice guy is really what we want but when you have it, it’s not good enough… Why is that??
I’m not implying that ALL woman want this, just been my experience with most of my friends. They are married to jerks and not a users but men who just don’t show their wives any respect….
I do have a few gfs who are married to wonderful men… You can just look at the diversity in the couples and see who’s really happy and who’s not!
I wish I had realized all this before my 2nd hubby & I split; he’s such a good man and I took his kindness for granted 🙁
Fixerupper, Here’s my take on it. Am I right that you are in your 50’s? I am as well. To begin with, at our age, most of the singles out there, are single for a reason….myself included. We have issues. Most of the single women don’t trust men, yet, are the walking wounded, trauma bonded/bonding left overs from childhood abuse and neglect, and/or traumatic relationships etc. One of the issues we face is mistaking intensity for intimacy. Huge. And very toxic.
Single men have their own toxic issues. Most fear intimacy and commitment, still believe they SHOULD be with a 23 year old sex-kitten, and aren’t interested in a real flesh and blood good woman who can love them. Just sayin’.
Darwinsmom,
interesting that you’ve figured out another piece of the puzzle. His modus operandi is standing out in stark relief. He likes to build up the expectations and then see them dashed when he doesn’t show up. That’s typical spath control over our emotions.
I love how the other Belgian victim retaliated: hooking up with the cousin. Payback’s a bitch! lol! Perfect.
Funny thing about how long it takes us sometimes to see an obvious piece of the puzzle. Like how I only recenty figured out that he would poison other people, in addition to myself. I figured it out by watching the TV show “Breaking Bad”. If you want to see a show about spaths, that is the one to watch.
Today, I had another revelation. It’s one that is huge IMO because it’s at the root of my impediment to healing.
Spaths’ main goal, in their attacks, is to destroy our ability to trust. They know that this is the secret to our ability to function and without it, we don’t want to do anything.
Today, I can trust myself that I know a red flag and will spot a spath pretty quickly. But that’s not enough. There is still that vigilance that creates the PTSD, the need to be constantly on alert. It’s very sad because it’s interfering with my memory and ability to concentrate. It feels like ADHD, sort of.
Spaths are pretty numb and their amygdalas don’t process fear like ours do. They don’t have a sense that warns them of danger. For example, I can sense things like a spider walking on a darkened, high ceiling at night, while watching TV. Or birds camouflaged in the trees high above, that the spath couldn’t see even after I pointed them out to him.
I think that my amygdala is pretty normal, and that it protects me more often than I realized. For example, I developed a horrible fear of heights after meeting the spath. Before that I had no problem jumping from second story windows. Now I know that spath liked to kill people by bringing them crashing down from the sky and my amygdala sensed it.
This ability to trust, is what spaths envy about us. It’s what gives us confidence in ourselves and they want to take it away. So they set us up and pull the rug out from under us.
I think that I need to work on allowing my gut instinct to protect me and learn to trust it again. After all, it wasn’t the gut that betrayed me. It had tried to warn me over and over again, it was my left brain that wouldn’t listen.
We all need to examine our hooks.
Yeah. The gut instinct that something isn’t right.
The first year we were married we lived in a little military housing community out in the middle of nowhere. It was not a military base. It was 12 little houses, identicle lined up on a hill in the country. We lived so close together, you could talk to eachother through the open bed-room windows. We were all branches. Army, Navy, Marines, and Air-force. We were all recruiter, families.
My X’s boss lived at one end, and we, on the other.
Bosses wife told me, that for a couple of weeks, her husband would get up in the morning, eat breakfast, and leave for work…..before he was even out of our little community, her phone would ring, and someone would breathe heavily on the other line.
My gut reacted….then my mind….No. Couldn’t be…..Now, knowing how perverted my X was, I know.
The point is, if we have doubts, there’s a reason. Period.
Yep, Kim, our guts have an intelligence way beyond what our brains can know. We need to listen to that intelligence and even more, we need to cultivate it. That is going to be my next step, I think. Learning to feel what my instincts are telling me.
Kim
You are making an excellent point on two threads. Hope you expand more of this discussion. (see time as a factor in healing). I think it SO important to know our buttons, our hooks, our triggers in order to avoid being duped again.
Fixerupper,
Well, I disagree somewhat. I think alot is in society’s gender roles and how humans are buildt ( all the pretty bee’s wants the same flower). I’ve seen men run after the “perfect wife” and “bad girls” always looking for something better no matter what perfect girl they find. The meaner the girl, as long as she’s pretty, the more men she’s got. Maybe this is just something that regards people under 30 (in my country?) I don’t know.
My own perception of men is that men no matter age are still very egosentric and are still raised in different ways than girls. I’m specificly thinking about Jean Jaques Rousseaus “Emile” and the Enlightenment in eighteenth century Europe which influenced my country a great deal. If we also take a good look at religion, women have always been suppressed men’s dominance. If I look back how my brother was raised, it’s a completely different story from mine. Please don’t get me wrong, I’m not attacking men or religion. Please don’t be offended, I’m just saying that old attitudes are still inprinted in our perceptions even if we’ve become more equal and modern.
When I went into my relationshit I was very clear of what I wanted. I did not want a man to run and clean after, being his little obedient housewife. I’m very tired of honkey donk men beating their chests thinking they are the king of the world while they have no clue how to operate two simple buttons on a washing machine. I’m sick of men who wants me to be Dramalama dingdong and cry each time I break a nail so I can attract his heroic self to me. I wanted a man to SHARE life’s experiences with, to grow and develop toghether as EQUALS. However I tend to end up in relationships where my boys are trying to dominate me into those gender roles. Once I will not submit all hell is loose. I’ve never run after a man like my ex “made me” do with his abuse and violence. Love is a choice and I want a man who chooses to be with me without any social games. I want him to choose freely.