This is my first post on the LoveFraud blog. It’s a great pleasure to be part of this most worthwhile effort to teach people to recognise and avoid sociopaths. (Or psychopaths, as I prefer.)
Over at my blog – the top two inches – I have been thinking and writing about something that psychopaths invariably do to deflect things away from themselves and onto others.
Perhaps you’ve encountered it: the psychopath does something wrong, but the moment attention is drawn to this he (usually it’s he) magically causes you to feel bad.
Here are a few examples:
1. The wifebeater says: “Why are you making me do this!?”
Consequently she may think: “It’s true, I shouldn’t do X [usually something insignificant] because it makes him upset.” Do you see? Suddenly she’s the baddie.
2. “Shut up. At least I’m not as bad as OJ [or someone heinous]”.
In other words, You don’t appreciate me; you should be grateful, but instead you get upset about what I do. You, you, you (not me).
3. She (sometimes psychopaths are women) says: “Why are you so mad with me about this? Of all the things I’ve done before this doesn’t even make the Top 10!”
In other words, Hey, I’m actually improving; you’re the bad one for noticing that I’ve done something bad.
You get the picture. The moving stories by readers of LoveFraud cite many instances of this kind of misdirection.
The best technical term I’ve encountered for this mode of discourse favoured by the psychopath is paramoralism. It was coined by the scholar Andrew M. Lobaczewski
Here’s my definition:
A paramoralism is a psuedo-moral statement. It is stated in moral-like terms but with precisely the opposite intent and effect: to get what he wants and to bamboozle the other person into being unable to use their normal means of knowing right and wrong.
Keep an eye out for paramoralisms. Not because everyone who uses a paramoralism is a psychopath, of course. But I believe that we can develop our abilities to identify when someone is cleverly turning defence into attack in this way, and thus we can resist accepting moral blame that does not belong to us.
Let me know of any that paramoralisms that particularly strike you and I may write about them.
Good to be on board!
Paramoralism! Great Word! Thanks, I will add that one to my vocabulary today!
My son, a P incarcerated for murder (cold blooded, pre-planned for revenge) had pretended to be “remorseful” and would pontificate in long letters discussing moral principles that made him sound like a PhD therapist…while of course, not believing a single word of it.
Recently, after a failed attempt by him to infiltrate another P-ex Con friend of his into our family for the purpose of killing at least me, and probably his grandmother (my mother) and his biological brother, and definitely his adopted brother, for the purpose of securing his “inheritence” and after the plot was discovered and his Trojan Horse P went to jail and then prison for his part in this “plot” along with my other son’s wife, who was having an affair with this TH-P, my P-son in prison wrote to a minister friend of ours to whine that we were treating him in an UN-Christian way because we would not give him the “unconditional love” that we were required to give him as Christians. Therefore we were hypocrits and UN-Christian to him. He just couldn’t understand why we would be so mean to him. If the minister had not known the truth of the matter, he might have had some empathy for my son. Fortunately, he did know the truth.
When I look back at the paramoralisms that he has pulled over on me, I cringe in humiliation at my own vulnerability to such obvious fraud. Never more, quoth the raven!
The one I heard that got me, was when the truth finally came out and I didn’t just kiss and make up, I was asked, “what kind of Christian was I?” Like because I choose to be a Christian, that means that I’m to have no feelings and should just overlook abuse of any kind. Why should there be a separate set of rules for me? He calls himself a Christian too. I admit I did carry guilt around for sometime, because I just couldn’t get back that mushy feeling. Something died in me when my husband finally put a name to his anger, but I think he figured because I am a Christian, that we should just go on as before, but he just couldn’t understand that we were just playing house. It wasn’t real. I have chosen to forgive him, but I’ve learned from study and talking, that forgiveness is as much for me as for him and just because I forgive, doesn’t mean that things go back as before. It just means that I don’t choose to seek vengeance and do likewise to him. I’ve found that love can be killed. Love is to be nurtured and if it’s abused and neglected it does wane. The romantic love. I can still and do love his soul, but as far as being in love, that’s gone. Lots of suggestions surround being in love as opposed as to being out of love. But we all know what it means. When we commit our hearts to someone and they take it all for granted, we just quit. It’s different with our children, because there are blood ties. Even without love, I’m still a human being with feelings, whether I’m a Christian or not. When they don’t treat others the same, says the vendetta was towards me. I didn’t fulfill his expectations. Not my fault. He didn’t hold up the cue cards and I didn’t know my part. I tried to do what came naturally, but naturally I didn’t do it right.
OxDrover – Heck!
Right at the end of your post you name yet another effect of the paramoralism – a sense of humiliation when one realises how one was taken in!
apt/mgr – “What kind of Christian are you!” – that’s low. (See OxDrover above – same story.)
My ex husband hid behind that Christian plea all the while he was actively injuring his family. It was a front to keep up appearances with my family and friends.
He was basically atheist, refusing to go to my (Christian) church – the one we were married in, all our children were baptized in and where I was an active member for over 20 years. But he went with his not-so-secret girlfriend to hers, poured money in the plate and acted very pious with her. It was a whole different personality.
My Pastor called me one day for a meeting – I was so thrilled he did that! He questioned me about my beliefs – I told him how I felt and it was wonderful he was interested. I guess I passed the test because he told me why he called me in. My husband and his girlfriend had gone to a meeting at my church, where he emotionally announced to the group how he was suffering from some non-christian things I was doing. It was a calculated attempt to upset with lies.
When my pastor told me what he had said, I almost didn’t believe him. He asked me, “why do you think he would say those things? We all know you and we don’t know him!”
I really didn’t have an answer – this was the first time I had heard of my husband doing something like this, why had he not complained to me himself? And, I wondered who the woman was. (Found out later). He had been trying to create antagonism against me in my own church.
When we divorced he tried to use his “religious” life as a reason he was a better parent and even mentioned the church meeting where “everyone agreed” how bad I was. It was so confusing that people actually laughed and he smiled as if he were on stage. It was amazing. After it was over he dropped the girlfriend (after 7 years) and went on to more criminal pursuits.
I saw that girlfriend a couple years later where she worked. She called my name and said, “No hard feelings”.
I thank God for this site everyday. I haven’t written much cause I get too angry and don’t want to write how I’m finally feeling ok and healing just to have another day come along where I’m feeling so weakl…then I feel like the farse. I realize though, it is 3 steps ahead, two steps back..at least for me. I am coming along. Almost everyday for the last year I’ve been reading everyone’s story and, like everyone else i’m sure, I think we were dating the same man until I read about a specific detail… like location or something and think…oh..can’t be him. I get angry at myself for missing him. He ripped me open like a vulture tearing through my soul…feeding…feeding…and after a year and a half of my wasting soul… blamed me for eating too much. Of course…how could I have let him eat so much? He cheated on me (many times i found out) because (his excuse)I had a male freind who he thought I was cheating on him with, took money from me cause he elicited my pity so well, gave me an STD which has killed any of my future partner thoughts, tried to charge me with assault after “he” came after me..I struck him to get him away..he calls 911…a 6 foot 4 well built male! And still…still after all of this past year of what I call ‘chaotic alienish abduction’ I still miss that SOB. I call him a chocolate covered peice of sh**. Definately a vicious wolf who uses his wooley clothing so so well. I have thought so so much about what it is I miss…the intense attention, the laughter, the intimate ecstacy he was so good at…then I finally get to a point where I realized…I can give this to myself. How come I have thought he was the only one on the planet that could make me that happy? Because I never made myself that happy!
I have alot more ‘good’ days now…days where I remember myself, remember my soul, remember that I am sane, I am pure, I am beautiful, I have a great career, wonderful freinds and family.
Maybe this is their purpose on this planet…cutting the soul so deep to let the rest of our soul poor back into the lacerations even stronger. I think we probably all feel like we know ourselves now…really well, and will never allow evil weapons and firearms in our hearts or even close to it. We’ll know purity and appreciate all our planet/universe has to teach us and be a light for others to gain strength. That’s what all of you have done for me. I can’t thank you all enough for writing your stories. So many times i have been just about to call him and I think..wait…gotta go to lovefraud first.
I’m probably going to change my name to wiserandhealing.
To Wiserandhealing, :o)
I support a new name. I have been wondering if there were other people that visit regulary but don’t comment. Thanks for answering that question for me.
I can relate to that pull to miss the Sociopath and I had that too but it did pass. It started to pass about the time that I found this site. When I made my trip to Maui and I had the surprising impulse to call the Bad Man, I signed on to LoveFraud and that pulled me through.
Just like you, I wonder all the time if people are talking about the same man but my ex is 6 foot so he must be the shorter brother. I wonder often is his ex-wife is posting here. I wish I knew her story but I think I do know it without even hearing it.
Visiting this site has been so healing and I was just thinking tonight as I was reading comments how some of the people that post are sounding …. better! Just by being here, we are getting better. And also, I have gotten so much explanation here for what happened… even the smallest moments have been explained as I read the Blogs or the comments. I am thinking specifically of the “missing him” dilemna. Somewhere on here I read about the Sociopath has the ability to create an intense feeling of intimacy in a very short period of time. I describe my first two weeks with this man as the happiest time of my life. It took me so long to let go of that. I wondered if I would ever feel that again. Now, I am not sure if I want to feel that. I know it was fake. It’s like a really big sugar rush followed by a CRASH! This is not the way it’s supposed to be.
It’s late and I think I am making typos. Still, thank you for your post. You are in the right place.
Aloha… E.R.
I think I was married to a sociopath for almost ten years. Once I finally got up the courage to leave him, he sent me letters pleading me to come back. The emotions in these letters fluctuated greatly…hate, love, remorse…but there was always the underlying message in them, that I was the bad guy….I was screwing him over. Here is exerpt from one of the letters….
“I can’t control any of this but it still bothers me. I will not agree with anything if you try to screw me. You are bad, you are not trustworthy. Look in the mirror and you will realize that you are all alone. You will be alone in ten years. It’s like you are having your period every week. Please stop and rest. You are under a lot of pressure. Use your common sense. I still love you and worry about you. I am your friend!!! Trust me! I am here to help you, your family and the kids….”
Isn’t he a great guy?!?! He still loves me and is my friend even though I am so horrible…lucky me.
Here’s one.
Once when I was really desperate about his claim that I was simply unlovable for a whole slew of reasons, I said to him, “Some really amazing people have loved me.” He knew my history, and he knew that it was true.
He thought a moment, and then said, “When was the last time anyone fell in love with you?”
I had left a five-year relationship to be with him. We had been together for almost five years. I sputtered and said, “Almost ten years.”
“Well,” he shrugged, as though it should have been obvious. “You were younger then.”
I was going through menopause. He was younger than me. It was true that I was changing as a woman. But he had taken these circumstances and turned them into a horrible characterization of me. And one I couldn’t really refute. Here I was, loving a man who didn’t love me.
But the comment about “bamboozling the other person into being unable to use their normal means of knowing right and wrong” really makes me think. It wasn’t just that I had trouble knowing what was right for me. I did things when I was with him that were entirely contrary to my values and character. Things that hurt people I cared about, and can’t undo.
Looking at this has been one the hardest parts of recovery. When I argued, he seemed so logical and right. And he would characterize my way of doing things as self-defeating or naive or just plain stupid. Those other people, he’d say, were leaches on my life. Or they would take my kindness or generosity, and it wouldn’t change a thing. Or I was enabling them to hurt me in some way. So the best thing I could do would be to cut them off, take care of myself (and him, of course), and forget about it.
And ultimately I would give in, because I wasn’t sure if he wasn’t right. And besides, pleasing him would at least win me some approval and affection, however fleeting.
Isn’t that just the short course in how we isolate ourselves with the abuser? Fortunately, I’m past the stage of wanting to bang my head against the wall, or buy a rifle and hunt him down. (Well, mostly. But fortunately, according to my therapist, homicidal tendencies are okay, as long as we don’t do anything about them.)
The other thing that’s so clear in all the things he said about other people were that it reflected not only the way he operated in the world, but also what he was to me. A leach, someone who would take without appreciation or thanks, someone who used what I gave him to hurt me.
It was a very good day in my life when I realized I was “paying for pain.” It took a very long time to get there, and no question he did everything in his power to keep me from realizing that.
I’m just relieved that my critical judgment finally did resurrect itself. By that time, it really felt like it had come to “live or die.” And I wasn’t even sure that I wanted to live, but I finally decided I did, and that was the first step in recovering my sense of right and wrong. Starting the simple idea that if something, or someone was causing me continual pain, I needed to get him out of my life. As my son would say, “Welcome to duhs-ville.”
wisebut… – Sometimes we have to laugh – “a chocolate covered peice of sh**”. Good one!
Not quite ‘ruined’, methinks!
alohatraveler – Another good one – “he must be the shorter brother”!
Fran – I’ve taken the liberty of truth-ifying the vital sentence: “I can’t control any of this THERFORE it still bothers me.”
khatalyst – Good grief, this paramoralism is ingenious! Sometimes I have to admit a kind of horrified admiration (I can’t think of another word here – fascination, maybe).