How to recognize and recover from everyday sociopaths - narcissists

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LETTER TO LOVEFRAUD: Leaning on his family while battling his wife

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Editor's note: The following letter was sent by Lovefraud reader; we'll call him “Bob.” Other names and locations have also been changed. We were living in a midwest city; she moved there for her job transfer several months before the children and I could move. She had one previous affair with a co-worker in our previous city. After I discovered the affair, she sought out the job transfer. I believe the reason being to get out of town and not have to face her co-workers and our friends once the news of the affair and our failing marriage got out. She moved to the new city ahead of me, I stayed back with the children to keep them in school and sell the house. Five months later when we all fin …

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Psychopaths more likely to get out of jail

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You would think parole boards would know better. After all, they deal with bad guys all day, every day, and they're supposed to decide when criminals are sufficiently rehabilitated to return to society. But a study released in January found that when psychopaths in Canada's prisons were up for parole, they were 2.5 times more likely to win conditional release than non-psychopaths. The study was conducted by Dr. Stephen Porter from Dalhousie University in Nova Scotia and published in the Journal of Legal and Criminological Psychology. It looked at 310 men who spent at least two years in a Canadian prison between 1995 and 1997. Most had committed violent crimes. Ninety of the men were …

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Recovering from the psychopath: A New Life

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By Ox Drover Many of us here remember the pain of laboring in childbirth; we thought it was so painful we couldn't endure any more without dying. Yet, even in that all-encompassing pain that wracked our bodies and our minds, in the back of our minds we knew we were giving birth to a New Life, and we were hopeful. We knew, too, that though we were giving birth to New Life, that it would not be an independent soul. We knew that New Life would require our tender nurturing to help it grow for many years. I see our pain in recovering from the devastation of our experiences with a psychopath in a similar light to the pain of labor and childbirth, and caring for that New Life. I see that we …

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Can a 5 year old be a psychopath?

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This week while reflecting on the writings that most influenced my thinking about psychopathy/sociopathy, I received a letter from a mother of a five year-old boy whose father shows many signs of the disorder. She wrote: Do you believe that children can show signs of being psychopathic? If so do you teach them to suppress the way they really feel by masking the problems with fake feelings? Can feelings of love really be learned? Just because someone on the outside appears like they have feelings does that mean inside they have actually changed? As you know they are good actors. The skill is learned very quickly to lie to blend in with the others. I bought your book off Amazon I should be …

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Is Sociopathy A Perversion?

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Is sociopathy a perversion? If yes, a perversion of what? And if it is a perversion, does this compel us to revisit the sociopaths' culpability for his transgressions? After all, perversions imply antisocial, irrepressible impulses. If an impulse is irrepressible, or unsuppressible, how culpable is its expresser? I think a good case can be made that sociopathy is a perversion—a perversion of personality characterized by the unsuppressible tendency to exploit others. It's not so much a question of the sociopath's sanity: most sociopaths, by criminal standards, are sane. Then again, so are most kleptomaniacs. When I refer to the sociopath's unsuppressible tendency to exploit, I mean u …

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Sex differences in antisocial behavior (part 4):Personality explains it all

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Can sex differences in personality traits help to explain sex differences in antisocial behavior? Over the past month we have been discussing the results of the Dunedin Study of the development of antisocial behavior. In this study, researchers got to know over a thousand people through self reports, interviews, interviews of friends, teachers, parents and significant others, and official school/arrest records. One finding was a higher rate of antisocial behavior in males as compared to females. The study also explored the causes of the observed sex difference. The Dunedin findings Among both males and females antisocial behavior was positive associated with aggression, alienation, and …

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Why I Am Becoming an Ass

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By Ox Drover Many of you know that I have a background and interest in animal behavior, and that I look at the way animals behave and apply what I see to my own life. I have two mammoth (horse-sized) donkeys (correctly called asses) named Fat and Hairy that I frequently talk about on the blog. Someone called them the Lovefraud mascots, because I talk about them so frequently. I've ridden and owned various horses over the years and they are loveable creatures, but really not very bright. They will trust their safety to you without question once they are trained and will do what you tell them to, usually without protest, even if it gets them into a situation where they will be injured …

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Lovefraud extra: It is time for Amy’s law

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May, 2008 I brought to your attention the tragic case of Dr. Amy Castillo, a pediatrician who lost her court fight to protect her children from their psychopathic father. Unfortunately, I have to inform you that another two children have been lost and another mother named Amy is left asking how we let her down. Yes I said we let her down. The judge who allowed the children's father, Michael Connolly to have unsupervised visitation was representing all of us. We have to put our heads together and figure out how to change the system. Children need and deserve protection from sociopaths. Mothers and fathers like Amy made a mistake in marriage and love, that shouldn't mean the children …

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Identifying sociopathic behavior is easy; giving advice is hard

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Just about every day, Lovefraud receives e-mail from readers who are looking for answers about confusing, contradictory and abusive behavior exhibited by people in their lives. The new readers don't understand what they are dealing with; they just tell, either in a few paragraphs or lengthy compositions, their stories. The e-mails describe some or many of the following behaviors: Pathological lying Pity plays Shallow emotions Devalue and discard Cheating or promiscuity Addiction to drugs or alcohol Controlling demands Financial irresponsibility Manipulation of children Broken promises Claims of “you made me do it” Pleas of “I'll never do it again” The …

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After the sociopath: How do we heal? Part 7-Letting Go

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Letting go is the point at which our recovery turns around from darkness to light. In previous articles, we have discussed all the stages of magical thinking, how we progressively become more and more willing to accept reality. In a trauma or extended trauma, like a relationship with a sociopath, there is a lot of difficult reality to accept. Here is a recap of our healing stages or strategies: • Denial — the most “unreal” stage, where we say it is not important, where we are at war with our own feelings • Bargaining — we admit it hurts, but we still think it is in our power to change it • Anger — we blame the external cause, we recover our feelings of personal power over …

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