Reviewed by Joyce Alexander, RNP (retired)
Cold-Blooded Kindness: Neuroquirks of a Codependent Killer, or Just Give Me a Shot at Loving You, Dear, and Other Reflections on Helping That Hurts is the tongue-in-cheek title of this book by Barbara Oakley, with a foreword by David Sloan Wilson. It belies the serious research and investigation done by this remarkable, highly educated and acclaimed woman.
Oakley is associate professor of engineering at Oakland University in Michigan, and her work focuses mainly on the complex relationship between neurocircuitry and social behavior. The list of her varied experiences reads like fiction ”¦ she worked for several years as a Russian language translator on Soviet fishing trawlers in the Bearing Sea during the height of the Cold War. She met her husband while working as a radio operator at the South Pole station in Antarctica. She went from private to Regular Army captain in the U.S. military, and is also a fellow of the American Institute of Medical and Biological Engineering.
In Cold-Blooded Kindness, along with a project called Pathological Altruism (forthcoming book by the same name this year), Oakley was investigating if altruism could be taken to the extreme and become pathological and harmful.
Some “researchers” have, for what they thought was the “greater good,” slanted their research to show what they believed was an altruistic motive. For example, many people have heard about the “battered woman syndrome,” and how it is now incorporated into laws in many states as a mitigating factor in cases where women wound or kill the men who have battered (or supposedly battered) them. What isn’t known, though, is that the “research” into this “syndrome” was badly flawed. The researcher was a woman who was so intent on doing the “greater good” of protecting abused women, that her altruism caused her to slant her studies, and anyone who pointed out that her research was suspect, was in fact, “blaming the victim,” and therefore, evil.
Oakley points out that she started to seek out a person who appeared to be altruistic to the point that it became harmful, but her own research led her to see the situation differently than she had planned.
She started investigating a Utah woman and artist named Carole Alden, who had “been abused” and had killed that abusive husband, Marty Sessions. But the book really isn’t so much about Alden murdering Sessions, for which she ended up in prison, but about how Carole Alden, though presenting herself as the ultimate altruist (rescuing animals and people), was instead, the ultimate abuser.
The examination of the human brain, and the social interactions of children, and the development of empathy and altruism in children, are explored. Both the social and the genetic aspects of these are gone into in depth.
Oakley explores “co-dependency” and “enabling” behaviors and calls for more actual research into these areas, especially concerning possible sex hormone links and to genetics. She also points out while little, if any, real research has been done on “battered women syndrome,” and it is not accepted in the DSM-IV, it is accepted in many state statutes.
Oakley never comes out and actually says Carole Alden is a psychopath (though the word is used and described in the book itself), but Oakley’s book describes Carole Alden’s behavior relative to the Psychopathic Check List-Revised. It shows that while Carole presented herself to others as a victim of circumstances, and as altruistic to the nth degree, she was, in fact, a controlling, manipulative, using, abusing, pathological liar, who took in dozens, if not hundreds, of stray animals. She cared for them poorly in most cases, but better than she cared for her own children.
It is also possible that Carole is a serial killer, as there are two other deaths of men she was involved with that were “suspicious” in their very nature.
When Oakley was corresponding with Carole Alden, she was convinced by the letters that Carole Alden was the personality she was seeking for her thesis of “altruism gone too far,” and that Carole was indeed the victim of this. Upon meeting Carole though, in prison, Oakley began to see the real situation. When she investigated the family, the crime, the real history of Carole Alden, not just the self-serving tales of how everyone abused her, Oakley began to see the malignancy. Carole changed her story, came to believe her own lies, and slanted all aspects of “truth,” even in the face of evidence to the contrary.
Not only is this a history of one pathological woman who murdered one man and possibly more, and who abused and neglected her children, it is about the personality disordered in general who present themselves as victims, when in fact, they are at best—co-victims/co-abusers with their partners.
Oakley is not “blaming” legitimate victim, but seeking to find the common thread in some partners (women and men) who participate to one degree or another with the abuse they endure. She is seeking a way to educate and warn these people so that the abuse can be prevented.
While Carole Alden took in a series of ex-convict men, who were addicts, to “cure” and “fix” them, which appeared to be altruistic in nature, in fact, it was anything but altruistic. It supplied Carole with her “professional victim” and “professional altruistic” persona that she was seeking to establish. What caused this in Carole, when her parents and other siblings were apparently normal and highly functioning members of society?
I tend to underline and highlight important passages in my books as I read, and I finally gave up trying with this book, as the first 100 pages are almost all day-glow yellow.
This is a highly readable book, and I am anxiously awaiting the arrival of one of Oakley’s previous books. I will also be one of the first in line to buy her upcoming one Pathological Altruism. I highly recommend that anyone who is seriously trying to figure out how we (former victims) are alike, and how the fake altruism of some psychopaths works, read this book.
Cold-Blooded Kindness on Amazon.com
Hi Kathleen – LOL – I remember you saying one time how I could condense your long post into one sentence. Well I am still always eager to read your long post to anybody..your one of my hero’s also…..
Kathleen, Hens,
Mark Twain once said, “Please pardon the length of this letter, but I didn’t have time to be brief”.
LOL!
Superkid
SK—great quote! I love Kathy’s posts, hers usually make my long ones look short! LOL But I like them for many other reasons too! Some good stuff there.
Ox I love your novel’s, your one of my hero’s 2….
Oxy,
You are so right here about releasing our obligations, esp when the other party has not just broken, but rejected our agreement.
I am going through birthing pains with my daughter, who responds to my objections of her callousness and contempt towards me with assertions that I am guilt tripping her. I am just not taking it anymore. She is missing the empathy gene. For all the imperfect parenting… That’s NOT my fault, esp b/c I specifically raised her to know that having a good heart was more important than money or good looks.
SKYLAR:
As a woman raised on a farm and lived the ranching life for over 20 years, I like the shit on shoe analogy. There’s a name I heard years ago for hard soled cowboys boots, they were known as shitkickers.
It struck me… I’ve changed my shoes… I’ve got my shitkickers on. Yeehaw ya’ll.
Thanks for the kind words, Oxy.
You wrote: “Where do we draw the line between “X is an imperfect person but I love them” and “X is abusing and Even though I love them, I can’t have them in my life”?”
This one’s actually pretty easy. The definition of abuse is less about what someone does to someone else, but rather the harm it does.
So, if you’re in the process of retraining yourself in terms of social instincts after an upbringing in which you were forced to endure things that were harmful — when you were dependent and had no choice — it is always going to take a while before you cool out. You’re going to be prickly. You’re going to see threats in a lot of places and feel compelled to defend your boundaries. (This is the rhetoricall “you,” not necessarily you, Oxy.)
I have a friend like that, and she gets into full warrior mode for stuff that wouldn’t bother me. Because she’s still working on not internalizing things that people say and getting a handle on what it means to have boundaries at all.
From my perspective, if someone is acting out, it’s generally about what’s going on in his head and I may be interested, but don’t take it personally. My boundaries are increasingly only physical ones. If someone is physically bothering or threatening me — getting into my space, being too loud, making me frightened for my safety — that’s where I get into my abuse-defense mode.
This threshhold of where we see ourselves threatened is, of course, different for different people. Nobody is wrong about it. If we feel threatened, if we feel abused, it is true for us. And we need to take care of ourselves.
Which brings up the second principle in answering this question. Our truth is our truth. Our feelings are real and we don’t have to defend them from other people’s opinions. If we feel it, our internal alert system is going off, and we need to respect ourselves enough to do something about it.
So, if you’re dealing with, say, someone who is heavy drinker, a perfectly nice person when he’s sober but a real pain when he’s drunk. You can theoretically enjoy the company of the sober version and shut the drunk one out of your life, once you figure out that booze equals obnoxiousness with this person. Eventually you may get to the point where you realize that, even sober, this person is problematic because he’s in denial about his drinking problem or blames everyone else for the problems he has, and his demands that you agree with him are becoming a challenge to your own ethics. So you decide to end his presence in your life — the ultimate boundary.
Notice there’s no judgment in any of this about what he is. I’m not even naming him an alcoholic, just talking about his behavior. The only judgment is about how his behavior affects you, and what you’re going to do about it.
In a circumstance like this, the abuse, if it occurs, is more likely to be self-abuse. Of you on you. If you don’t ascribe sufficient value to your own feelings and allow circumstances to continue that make you feel uncomfortable or threatened, then the abuser is you.
I realize this is tough-love kind of thinking. And also that some people can’t easily extricate themselves from uncomfortable or threatening situations. But the more we recognize that it’s our job to not be abused, and our responsibility to figure out how to end it, the faster we’re going to exit from a victim mentality and into taking back our power over our own lives.
Here’s my language on why you don’t see your mother anymore. You find her language full of cognitive dissonance which is exhausting to try to make sense of, and really irritating when it involves you or things that are important to you. Beyond that, she demands that you agree with her. That alone is enough reason to cut her off, although you could probably put up with this if she had other values for you, like being funny, or clearly supportive when she was lucid, or you just felt grateful for things she had done in the past. A lot of us have relationships with crazy relatives, who have their good points.
But there’s more. She doesn’t listen to you and apparently is incapable of cooperating with you on things that actually affect your survival. It doesn’t matter what is wrong with her, or why she does it. The only thing that matters is that she is unwilling to protect you when you ask, and is probably adding even more danger to your life. So this pretty well cuts it. Unless you’re in Machiavellian mode (trying to collect information to protect yourself or give her some disinformation for the same purpose), distancing yourself from her is the logical thing to do for your psychological and physical wellbeing.
No judgment of her. Just judgment of whether she’s good or bad for you. And that’s how the decision is made.
Which is pretty much how you’ve done it. Except that, as seems to be the inclination around here, I hear you wanting to diagnose or categorize. I understand why we might do that as shorthand – “good person,” “bad person.” But I think that activity shifts the focus from where it ought to be — which first is feeling how you feel and then calculating what you’re getting back. Both of those things may be complex, but there is always a bottom line.
If you don’t like how you feel, or you’re getting less than you’re giving (and it looks like that’s how it’s always going to be), I’d vote on getting out.
And just for those of us who are dealing with relatives and children in these matters, the other party always can change their behavior. Getting out doesn’t mean they’ll never bring us a better version of themselves. We’re allowed to change our mind. But we’re smart, we don’t forget and, if we’re going to get re-involved they have to not just show up with flowers and candy, but overcome the bad history as well, before we re-engage.
With my horrible ex, for example, I’d reconsider cutting him out of my life if he showed up at my door with a cashiers check for $50,000 and a nice bit of diamond jewelry as an “I’m sorry” gift for being such a jerk. That might get him a 10-minute conversation about what he wanted, after I found out if the check was good.
We don’t have to be that hard on everyone who wants to make amends. But again, our gut reactions are our best friends. It’s amazing how smart our nervous systems can be, once we really start listening to them.
So that’s my philosophy on that. Another “book.” Sigh.
Love you, Oxy.
Kathy
Dear Kathy,
Very very good….and you are right about the reason for cutting my egg donor out of my life, ditto with P-son. As far as she is concerned, I actually don’t have a diagnosis for “what ails her” she isn’t a psychopath, and I can name a great many other psych dxs she is NOT, and it doesn’t matter. She is putting me in danger, she is aware she is putting me in danger, and she isn’t so senile she doesn’t realize that…it is all about protecting the family “bad boy” from the consequences of his behavior, just like her mother protected her brother, My Uncle Monster, from the consequences of his “bad” behavior til the day she died….then my egg donor took over that “family role position.”
As for P-son, he definitely is a psychopath, but the diagnosis, the label is, like you said, “not important” it is the ACTIONS that try to hurt me.
As for son C, I am cordial to him when we meet by chance in the community, but fed up enough with his lack of honest behavior, with his inconsistent apologies that “never stick” and of his lying, that the emotional fall out on my end is enough of a pain that it is best if he goes his way and I go mine, and we can work together on our mutual interest of keeping his P brother in jail and if and when the time comes of keeping any money out of P-son’s hands from egg donor’s estate (if we can). The grinding emotional pain from the lack of the relationship I WANTED with son C is gone, I’ve done my grieving over that one because I realize I can’t have a truly trusting and caring relationship with someone I cannot trust to be honest and truthful. He isn’t an evil person, but he doesn’t meet the criteria of honesty for people that I become intimately involved with in “inner circle of trust.” He’s my son and I do love him, and I WISH I could trust him, but I know he lies so don’t need to get too close.
The same with other NOW X “friends” that stole from me, did not fulfill obligations that they had made with me, “changed” agreements (without notice and or any agreement on my part) to their benefit, and it isn’t about the size of the agreements, but about the intent.
Son D and I live quite happily together because we are able to trust each other, and trust each other’s intentions…we have a disagreement from time to time, though they are rare, but we are honest with each other, do not lie, are open, and with the purpose of SOLVING THE PROBLEM not with assigning blame to one or the other of us.
My “boundaries” are rather rigid, but they work for me. I do not ever try to deliberately hurt someone, and I know that there are times I may by accident actually hurt someone’s feelings, but it is NEVER my intention.
I am aware that when we are raw, though, or in pain, we may reach out and “snap” at someone, even someone we love, out of our pain. So when the person snapping at me is in pain (like my best friend of 30 years who bit me severely in January) I am much more inclined to forgive the wound, (hold no grudge about it) no matter how deeply I am wounded by such a bite, but at the same time, I may very well distance myself from that person so I don’t get bitten again, until such time as they are in less pain and less likely to bite if I extend a hand to them.
I realize my friend in Texas is in very deep pain from her own abusive marriage that has recently changed with her husband’s retirement and him being around more. In fact, I really did after knowing the guy for 30+ years not realize what a verbally abusive nasty SOB he is to her. I wasn’t about to let him talk to me like that either. She’s between a rock and a hard place emotionally and financially….and I realize that she isn’t going to divorce him, she doesn’t have the strength, they’ve been together for over 40 years so she is deeply depressed, and unhappy. I feel for her, but I can’t help her, and I also can’t allow her or her husband to treat me poorly so I came home, and haven’t heard a word from her in over 4 months. But I have good memories of 30+ years of our relationship that I DO cherish, not like a relationship with a P that the relationshit itself is just one big bad memory of being conned. That’s the difference between a real relationship that for whatever reason went sour, versus a psychopathic one from which we escaped.
If that makes any sense.
Hey, Katy, yep, I’ve got my sheetkickers on every day!
Know the difference between just an ordinary cow boy and a Texas cow boy? The one from Texas has sheet on the outside AND the inside of his boots.
I told my father about the sexual assault and I feel like a large weight has been lifted off my shoulders. He was pretty devastated that I kept it inside for 18 years and didn’t tell anyone. He said that he and my stepmom won’t tell anyone if I don’t want and he is going to keep it from N mother. He understands how she is. I was finally able to focus this morning and work on the job hunt-after being in bed all day yesterday. I am going to my orientation shift on Sunday night, so then I can pick up any shifts that come available. I re-did my resume again and applied for some jobs. I also got a call from a prior employer nurse recruiter who “wasn’t aware that I used to work there until now” and was going to see if they wanted to have me back as a recovery nurse, then she left me hanging and didn’t call me back. It’s easy to see now why I’m still not working-the people in HR are incompetent and the nurse managers are disorganized. I’m trying to be positive and I am going to the sexual assault counselor on Monday morning and have managed to avoid the spath next door for days and maybe able to avoid her all weekend if I work things out right. NC makes me feel much better.
Dear Nolarn,
Good girl! Those are some positive steps….and you will find a job, I know you will….and even if it isn’t one that you really want, it will “pay the rent” and keep a roof over your head.
I’ve taken some pretty miserable jobs and stayed in them because I had no choice at the time….but eventually I got my own “dream job” and enjoyed it. Then took the weekend option job because the dream job went part time and I had to have full time for insurance etc….but actually, I took the weekend option job which left me with 5 days a week with my husband the last year and a half of his life, so I am GRATEFUL for the demise of the old job I loved….and it allowed me to be with my step father when he got diagnosed with cancer so you know, I just figure that whatever happens is going to turn out to be for my best interest in the end….sometimes things that we “think are bad” turn out in the end to be godsends because without the “bad” thing happening first, the later “good” thing wouldn’t have happened…so just keep the faith and trust that “all things work together for good to those that love the Lord.”
Glad you are feeling better! Stay strong!
Oxy-that is true about all things working out for those who love the Lord. He and I are finally having a good relationship and I finally know that my N mother isn’t the only path to GOD. You were really lucky for that weekend option job to spend with your husband. I have a new appreciation for jobs and the biggest thing that I learned is that I have to take care of myself before I become a cop, or I can’t take care of others. It doesn’t matter if it takes me a little longer to get there. I just hope that I can get some of this deep sadness/burden off me when I go to the counselor and start talking. I want this out of me-the pain that I was holding in for 18 years. That was my first spath who assaulted me and I believe that my low self esteem and shame enabled me to get involved with the others after him because I felt like that’s all I deserved-people who treated me bad. I want all of this out of me and if I release it then maybe I can start losing weight.