How to recognize and recover from everyday sociopaths - narcissists

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LETTER TO LOVEFRAUD: Can you count the love bombing red flags?

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Editor's Note: This Letter to Lovefraud was submitted by reader whom we'll call “ProudMom.” This was a text conversation between my 19 yr old daughter and a guy she'd only known at work for like 2 weeks. He's already gotten her flowers, a wallet from her favorite superhero and it contained a special $2.00 bill inside of it. She saw the red flags but after making up excuses 3x previously, she was kind of worn down and was going to just humor him with one date so there wouldn't be gossip. She only saw the red flags because her sociopath father tried to kill both of us and we took classes. The creeper reminded her of her father, who was also pushy and also always carried the coveted $2.00 bi …

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Mischele Lewis receives ‘Nicole’s Law’ restraining order against William Allen Jordan

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Editor's note: Joyce M. Short is the author of “Carnal Abuse by Deceit How a Predator's Lies Became Rape.” Our Unity Has the Power to Make a Radical Change By Joyce Short Although Judge John Tomasello flatly refused to issue a restraining order to protect Mischele Lewis, a victim of sexual assault by coercion, his absurd, misogynist decision was rendered to the trash heap where it belonged. As a result of the media exposure on the issue, through this blog and additional coverage, I was contacted by Michelle Noberto, the outraged mom of a prior sexual assault victim.  ”Nicoles Law,” named for her daughter, which makes restraining orders automatic in sexual assault cases, had been gross …

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BOOK REVIEW: The Sociopath at the Breakfast Table

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I recently received a review copy of The Sociopath at the Breakfast Table Recognizing and dealing with antisocial and manipulative people. The book was written by Dr. Jane McGregor, a lecturer at Nottingham University Institute of Mental Health, and Tim McGregor, a consultant, writer and mental health practitioner. This is a slender volume, only 111 pages, plus appendix, index and resource listing. It provides a good overview of the sociopathic disorder, how sociopaths affect their targets, and what targets can do to recover. However, if you're looking for a thorough discussion of these topics, you'll need to augment your reading with other sources. The sociopathic transaction One of …

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Why we need to talk about our experiences with sociopaths

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Most of us at Lovefraud are here because we've been conned, duped, deceived and betrayed by a sociopath. Once we finally figure out what we are dealing with, many of us do not tell other people what really happened. We do not talk about our experiences with sociopaths. After all, it's embarrassing to admit that no, we didn't see it coming, and yes, we fell for the scam. And if we do venture to describe the sociopath's true behavior, we may be met by disbelief. "What? That charming person couldn't possibly have done that. You must have misinterpreted." We quickly learn that people do not understand what we are talking about. Either they don't believe us, or ostracize us. So we stop …

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LETTER TO LOVEFRAUD: My sociopathic ex left me with only a bare grasp on reality

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Editor's Note: This letter was submitted to Lovefraud by a reader whom we'll call “Dolina.” The best way to deal with a sociopath is to avoid them altogether but that isn't always possible and of course, you have to realise that is what he is before he takes your brain and turns it into a bouncy-ball. And that they're not really as fun as the TV makes them look. It might be you. It could be even now, you realise something is horribly wrong with your relationship but you can't exactly think what it is. That even though he never outright says anything concrete, he has a way of showing you how useless, helpless, stupid and ugly you are. You're lucky to have him, he knows that and makes sure th …

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Devaluation and the Inability to Form Emotional Attachments

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I'd like to start this post with a passage from the author Jesmyn Ward in Men We Reaped. Here, she talks about how she learned to undervalue herself when her dad left their family: "I looked at myself and saw a walking embodiment of everything the world around me seemed to despise: an unattractive, poor, Black woman. Undervalued by her family, a perpetual workhouse. Undervalued by society regarding her labor and her beauty. This seed buried itself in my stomach and bore fruit. I hated myself. That seed bloomed in the way I walked, slumped over, eyes on the floor, in the way I didn't even attempt to dress well, in the way I avoided the world, when I could, through reading, and in the way I …

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Friday June 20, 10 pm: Katherine Underwood story on ABC 20/20, with commentary by Donna Andersen

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Finally, some nationwide exposure to the problem of sociopathic con men. On Friday, June 20 at 10 p.m. (Eastern), the ABC 20/20, the network's news magazine, will tell the story Katherine Underwood's campaign often in disguise to collect the money owed to her by her former boyfriend, Budimir Drakulic. I am interviewed in the show explaining how it's possible for someone to give her partner more than $410,000. I broke the story back in April in an article for the Daily Mail: I'm not done wig you! The many disguises woman wore to spy on an ex-lover who owes her $1.6 m after 20 years. Like a true sociopath, Drakulic never paid. But maybe he will now. ABC News hired a private …

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Prolonged stress damages children’s learning, behavior and health

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Extensive research on the biology of stress now shows that the healthy development of children can be derailed by excessive or prolonged activation of stress response systems in the body (especially the brain), with damaging effects on learning, behavior, and health across the lifespan. This topic will be highlighted at the National Coucil of Juvenile and Family and Court Judges in July in Chicago. According to the National Scientific Council on the Developing Child at Harvard University, it's important to distinguish among three kinds of responses to stress: positive, tolerable and toxic. "When toxic stress response occurs continuously, or is triggered by multiple sources, it can have a …

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Restorative images and recovery from betrayal

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"When we focus on something repeatedly, the brain forms a habit," says Steven Stosny, Ph.D., author of Living and Loving After Betrayal. "We have to be careful on what we focus on." When we discover that we've been betrayed by a sociopath, for a long time that's all we can think about. Although this is a typical response to the betrayal, it also has the effect of keeping us mired in our pain. Stosny suggest replacing the memories of the deception with restorative images, which he defines as "any emotionally laden bit of your imagination that eases pain by shifting mental focus from loss to growth." He explains this approach in an article on the Psychology Today blog: Healing from …

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Why I wrote ‘The Muslim Romance Trilogy’

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 By Juliet Montague Parts one and two of Juliet Montague's Muslim love story trilogy. Part One: THE YEAR I LEARNED TO TEXT — Why Am I Having Sex with a Muslim in My Basement? Part Two: JIHAD HONEYMOON IN HOLLYWOOD — Not Without My Dogs I had not before kept a detailed diary. Looking back at previous journals, one would simply find a note here and there reflecting a doctor's appointment, a luncheon date, an audition, a listing appointment, a reminder to call my mother. My realization that I was into something profoundly foreign, intriguing, and sexually awakening, I began documenting each and every phone call, text message, and encounter with my own personal Aladdin. I had truly nev …

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