How to recognize and recover from everyday sociopaths - narcissists

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RESOURCE PERSPECTIVES: Everything about the sociopath invites us in

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Editor's note: Resource Perspectives features articles written by members of Lovefraud's Professional Resources Guide. Gary Cundiff is a marriage and family therapist based in San Diego, California Through deception and mirroring, the sociopath exerts control By Gary Cundiff, MFT Gary Cundiff profile in the Lovefraud Professional Resources Guide Having fallen victim to the very thing I had dedicated my life to protecting others from is my reason for writing. To warn others and feasibly aid some. The inevitable harm from interacting with a sociopath is definitive. For some, years have been spent recovering. I am a mental health professional with years of …

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The Bachelorette and the sociopath

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Last week, Lovefraud received the following e-mail from a reader: Not sure if you ever pick up on things that go on in the television arena, but Hollywood hit a new low this week with the third installment of The Bachelorette. The producers are supposed to pick fabulous, eligible bachelors, not sociopaths who set out to do psychological harm. As soon as it became evident that Bentley was without a conscience, purposely setting out to hurt Ashley Hebert, lure her in with false words while telling the cameras (behind her back) that she was ugly, not his type, blah, blah, blah, the producers had an obligation to tell Ashley the truth. But they chose to let Bentley ambush her and break her …

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LETTERS TO LOVEFRAUD: I got out before any damage could be done

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Lovefraud received the following email from a reader whom we'll call “Lorna.” I thought I'd write and tell you a success story, thanks to all the information you provide to help people to survive a sociopath. I've met them at various times in my life, however, I was lucky that I never married or got pregnant or lived with one. A couple of years ago, one crossed my path, and in a short time caused a lot of disruption before I dumped him. I pretty much forgot all about the narcissistic sociopath since then. I wanted to watch the Will and Kate wedding live, but didn't have TV, and on the West Coast it would be shown at 3 a.m. I posted on the activities partners section of Craigslist hop …

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Sociopaths and sex

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Aren't you getting sick of hearing about all these politicians and other powerful people who can't control themselves? Are you wondering if they are all just sociopaths? Are all sex addicts also sociopaths? In the wake of my own dismay at the sheer number of sex crazed politicians, I wanted to share some thoughts with you. First of all, one of the psychopathy researchers I respect the most is Dr. Grant Harris. He has written a seminal paper COERCIVE AND PRECOCIOUS SEXUALITY AS A FUNDAMENTAL ASPECT OF PSYCHOPATHY He says that promiscuous, coercive and precocious sex is central to the psychopathy syndrome. However, if you look at the statistics on the PCL-R the most studied method of …

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More on powerful men behaving badly

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John Edwards has joined the parade. The former North Carolina senator and presidential candidate was indicted last week for using campaign contributions to keep his mistress and their baby in hiding during his 2008 run for the White House. He follows former California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, who admitted fathering a child with a member of his household staff, and Dominique Strauss-Kahn, who had to resign as head of the International Monetary Fund after he allegedly tried to rape a hotel maid in New York City. A lot of people are asking, why do they do it? Why are these rich, powerful men willing to chance ruining everything they have achieved for momentary pleasure? Psychology …

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Powerful men and sexual impropriety

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Time magazine writes about Dominique Strauss-Kahn, accused of assaulting a hotel maid in New York City, Arnold Schwarzenegger's child with an employee, and how society views powerful men taking advantage of women. Read Sex, lies, arrogance: What makes powerful men behave so badly? on Time.com. Link supplied by a Lovefraud reader. …

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Society for the Scientific Study of Psychopathy, meeting highlights: Researching victimization

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Having spent time listening to many psychopathy researchers, I can attest to many times coming away with the feeling that very critical insights are being missed. An appreciation for the bigger picture just isn't there yet. For me the bigger picture always includes the family. A sociopath may prey on strangers, but usually that is after a lifetime of practice on family members. The reason this piece is so critical is that the personality disorder, psychopathy is a pervasive disorder of human social behavior that affects every relationship the disordered person has. Considering what this disorder actually is- a pervasive disorder of human social behavior, the perspective of family members …

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LETTERS TO LOVEFRAUD: He is forbidding me to see my son

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Editor's note: Below is an email exchange that I had with a reader whom we'll call “Vera.” Her ex-husband is a sociopath and a lawyer. I am co-parenting with a sociopath and I am at my wits end. He is constantly using our son in his ongoing battle to torment me. The boy is still in elementary school and spends time with him alone at his mountain home. I am concerned that besides being emotionally abused as he is, he will be physically harmed. I am in a terrible bind though. Being a lawyer and a sociopath, he conned his way into custody by paying over $100,000 to hire the best divorce lawyer in town. Without a six-figure retainer or his manifest abuse of our son, I cannot amend the custody …

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The special problem of the “sort of” sociopath

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We tend to speak of sociopaths versus non-sociopaths in pretty much either-or terms, despite recognizing that we fall along a spectrum of behaviors and attitudes that range from extremely unself-centered (even to self-sabotaging levels, reflecting poor self-esteem and weak self-protective defenses); to levels we would describe as dangerously exploitive (moving into the range of full-blown sociopathic personality, characterized by a troubling indifference to, and disregard of, others as separate human beings whose dignity deserves to be respected). At bottom, as I have elsewhere written and stressed, the sociopath is a remorseless, chronic boundary violator; his regard for others' dignity …

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