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 getting it today. And i am also reading Dr. Hares book. I will try to look at your book some more today.
Shortly after my son’s father was arrested, I sat on my bed, with our seven month old baby asleep beside me, with the psychiatry DSM manual open to the page containing the criteria for “antisocial personality disorder”. I asked myself “do any of these criteria relate to common themes discussed in the child development literature.” I had to answer that question to know how best to mother my own child.
Interestingly, all the criteria mapped onto three developmentally acquired abilities: Ability to Love, Impulse Control, and Moral Reasoning. I then vowed I would read everything there was to read about each of these.
I started with Ability to Love. In my opinion the most important book about Ability to Love is Learning to Love by Harry Harlow, Ph.D. He is the scientist who demonstrated that a baby monkey clings to his mother out of pleasure in affection and “contact comfort” not because mother is a source of food. Prior to Dr. Harlow, scientists believed that the child learned to relate to his mother because she was associated with food.
The profound conclusion reached by Dr. Harlow’s research team is that babies are born to “learn to love” just like babies are born to learn language. We don’t come into the world talking but as our brains develop and we are exposed to language we learn to talk. Similarly, we don’t come into the world loving, but as our brains develop and we receive the right input we learn to love.
There are other interesting parallels between talking and loving including the observation that both are disordered in autism and both are influenced by genetics.
My world completely changed when I read page 44 of learning to love. It is on this page that Dr. Harlow discusses a very important developmental sequence. Ability to Love starts to develop before pleasure in aggression and competition sets in:
“The primary basis of aggression control is the formation of strong generalized bonds of peer love or affection… All primates, monkeys and men alike are born with aggressive potential, but aggression is a rather later maturing variable. It is obvious that a one year old suffers from fear and is terrified by maternal separation, but the child neither knows nor can express aggression at this tender age…This lack of aggression targets accounts in part for the fact that “evil emotion” culminates during the age-mate stage, long after peer affection and love have developed. It is the antecedent age-mate love that holds the fury of aggression within acceptable bounds for in group associates.”
Love starts to develop before aggression does, and has a head start in the race for the brain connections that form the basis of our values.
Now back to our 5 year old boy. I am very disturbed by the recent trend of referring to children as “psychopathic” in the scientific literature. Not that she does not describe symptoms of psychopathy, but to call a 5 year old psychopathic, negates the importance of learning to love and acts like it is an inborn ability.
I would say that this boy is learning disabled and requires extra help when it comes to learning to love. Just like speech therapy would help him if he couldn’t speak, love therapy will help him if he can’t love. Studies of autistic children show that a mother’s love makes a big differences for many severely affected children. Why shouldn’t we at least give this 5 year old the benefit of the doubt and give him love therapy.
Many studies show that the parents of at-risk children struggle with loving them. It is hard to love an impulsive child who goes after the cat with sharp tools. These parents are also harmed by suggestions that psychopathy is entirely genetic and firmly in place by age 3.
The focus on “discipline” also hurts these families because children need to learn to love. How can they learn to love if the people who are supposed to teach them are constantly yelling at them and scolding them or spanking them?
What is the answer?
An at-risk child is a full time job! Parents have to love that child 24/7 and not leave him alone to go to the kitchen to pick up the knife and go after the cat. Preventive positive parenting means waking up before the child, being there when he opens his eyes and saying, “I love you”. It means giving him hugs and kisses, playing and having fun together.
Oh my wonderful friends…..you are so wise and so willing to extend your gracious hands to those of us who are still trying to climb out of the pit….Gem, something you said made my blood run cold..when my bio daughter was a child and I would have to spank her she would smile at me and stand there and say…”you can’t make me cry, that didn’t hurt”…..or she would run out into the middle of a busy street and sit on the yellow line daring someone to hit her…so many common threads between us all….she too was extremely popular at school….almost had a “following”…the other girl….step spath was totally a different type…sneaky, deliberate, calculated, a true master of manipulation. However she was not popular. She gave off these vibes that kind of repelled people. I guess within the realm of sociopathy there are still different tactics and personalities. Oxy, you are right about the guilt. I was thinking earlier today how she made her choices, and now is totally pissed at me because I would not bail her out or pay for her bad decisions. She too is in the process of losing a man that she has almost driven crazy. The other daughter’s husband has decided he will just stay with her because he knows his life would be a worse hell if he left her……she would use the kids against him. So he stays in the Military mostly to escape her. She truely is a slithering snake of a female. It will be interesting to see if they actually do move and how it will affect our family life. I’ll keep you all posted……I know I still sound stuck….but I have made great progress….like you said Oxy….sometimes we slide back into guilt, but have to shake ourselves back to reality. I thank you all so much….I will always believe God led me to this blog…I would cry and beg God to please give me some relief from these girls and their drama…..and I met you all………someone on here mentioned how it’s hard to find a therapist or counselor that “gets it” ….I have been myself and it was a joke…..I cried when I left her office…..it was like I was in a room screaming and no one could hear me……on this blog…..you all “get it” and you hear me….God Bless!
creampuff,
you said it all in one word: DRAMA.
that is what they want and it’s ALL they want. They are born addicted to it just like a crack baby is addicted to crack.
And immediately they learn how to create it because they can read our emotions. As time goes on and they grow up, it becomes second nature and the look of it changes depending on what they have experienced and who has been supplying them with drama.
They key is GREY ROCK. Never give them any drama. They will get bored and go away. No matter what they do, like for instance, “standing in the middle of the street waiting for a car to hit them” I mean, seriously, could you be any more clear about what she wanted? she wanted the drama of mommy scared to death. that’s why they gas light, they lie, they cheat, they kill. For you and me, the idea that all of this is just ENTERTAINMENT VALUE, seems preposterous. But if you study it, and look at each individual incident, then boil it down to what the incidents had in common, you will see it was about DRAMA. Even when it appears to be about money, you can look closer and see that they could have gotten more money, more easily in many other ways. but they needed to maniupulate YOUR EMOTIONS until you gave the right response and that response was money, or screaming or some other dramatic response. My exP even used to say: “You aren’t responding correctly! I’m going to keep this up until you respond correctly!”
The current BF is not a P, but I see many narcissistic tendencies. One interesting one: ruining holidays. Yep, birthdays, xmas, or even halloween. Because I’m on to him, I make sure that he doesn’t get an opportunity. I make him think that I don’t care about it, I give NO DRAMA, and he doesn’t bother to try to ruin the holiday. But what’s really funny, is that after the holiday is over and he realizes that I distracted him from ruining it, he also sees how much fun he had. I saw it in his face on the 4th of july and halloween.
I used to hear about family DRAMAs at xmas and thanksgiving and thought it was just people who don’t get along. Now I realize that so many of us have N’s and P’s in the family. Which is why there has to be DRAMA at these get togethers.
that’s another red flag that I keep looking out for: holiday family drama.
sky – pollyannanomore posted a good link to the charlie rose show the other day – he is doing a whole series on the mind. i think you would find ‘the decision making mind’ quite interesting:
click on the picture to start the video
http://www.charlierose.com/view/interview/11226
Dearest Creampuff,
I thank God every day for LF, as you said, no-one else “gets it”! And if I ever dare to try to enlighten the few friends I have left re my daughters Personality disorders, I can almost guess what they are really thinking, ie,”What did she do to THEM,, to make them this way?” so Ive learnt NOT to burden friends with all this, they do NOT understand, and also they get bored of hearing about it all.
I cant blame the friends, as 16 monthsa go, beforeI found LF, I had NO IDEA what I was dealing with re my daughters. Id almost started to believe them when they said it was all my fault., and I was crazy.{Gaslighting} Id never even heard of gaslighting!
Fortunatley we dont “get” it all at once, other wise I think the shock of it all would drive us into the loony bin!
Its so hard to realise that Im not able to see my daughters ever again.For the sake of my sanity, I know I have to stay NC for the rest of my life, and thats hard.Isnt it uncanny how alike these little girls were, makes your blood turn to ice!!You do your best to be a good parent, the are no rule books to follow, you have no idea what you are dealing with, ie, sociopaths in training!I stopped bailing my older spath daughter out16 months ago, before then Id shelled out well over $10,000 to help her with her own self induced debts. I wont be doing this any more! Shes on her own now. he husband{still not divorced, after 5 years,}LOATHES her now, he has FT custody of the 3 kids.I dont think hes a spath, but he may be a Narc, not sure.I havent seen the kids in over ayear now, I was hoping hed bring them over to see us, but it hasnt happened.
We have to concentrate on US now, leading a happy healthy life without these freaks in our lives. We have to ask ourselves,-If these people hadnt any blood ties to us, we wouldnt want to have anything to do with them, would we?They DONT love us, they dont even love themselves! Its so easy to start to feel sory for them, we should feel sorry for US, and stay the F–k away from them! THEY ARE BAD NEWS!!
Good luck, and stay sane and NC with these bitches!!
Love,
GemXX
Dear Creampuff,
Sugar, I know how it is to be tied to the DRAMA with them, and it isn’t easy to get loose.
Gem is right, it isn’t that we would associate with ANYONE like this if we weren’t blood related, so WHAT in the blood relationship obligates us to be treated this way? NOTHING!!!!
I didn’t realize that for a long time. LOL Now I do, and what Gem said about learning it all at ONCE is right too, if we had to “eat an elephant” in one bite we’d choke, but if we eat it one “elephant burger” at a time we will eventually get it down!
The earlier they start with the P-type behavior I think the worse they are, but who knows what makes some start at age 3-5 and others not til puberty! Not me. My little darling had a great mask til puberty, only one slip that any of us caught at age 11, but truly I didn’t really know what was going on behind the mask though he was popular with kids and adults as well. The shining star in school and at home from the time he could walk.
Well, the freedom of worrying about him, of worrying that his cellmate Bubba will rape or beat him up. I don’t go to bed wondering “It is 10 o’clock, do you know where your son is?” Yep, I KNOW WHERE HE IS, he is where he belongs. What happens to him there or anywhere else is not my concern.
gem – you’re above post seems much more grounded. I hear the sadness in it and a sense of acceptance.
oh, and y’all are just a little pithed off. 😉
Dear One_step,
Well, I finished the book and it was GREAT!!! The Night Listener. Never did know if the boy was real and died, or if the mother was the inventer of the boy. I may try to find the movie somewhere and watch it. I think Robin williams is so cool and I can see him in the part from the part of the movie I watched. As I read I visualized him in the part.
YOu sound better too, One, like you are back from Mars and getting your feet back on earth again! HOpe you are feeling better too.
We chopped down a tree in the yard yesterday that was going to fall on my house and son D and I were crippled today from excess exercise. Got to go to town tomorrow though to get the MRI results of his neck and see what is going on there and get him a new pair of glasses as his boke. Still have to cut up half the tree but will do that when we haved time and feel better. I stayed under 1300 cal today, and did 2300 exercise, and less than 1500 sodium, so that’s going to be my life for the next year or so.
There is a great site called http://www.fatsecret.com and yoiu can record your food and it puts in the calories, carbs and fats (it doesn’t put the sodium etc in automaticallyh or keep up with your BP or blood sugar but there is daily journal you can keep those in join and be my buddy, I’m OxDrover there too.
Well, off to bed! to town tomorrow and to vote! G’nite
Dear Creampuff,
Its true what they say,”A problem shared is a problem halved,”but surely knowledge shared is Knowledge multiplied one hundred fold!
I find it very comforting that I am not alone in having 2 spath daughters. I think we should award ourselves a gold medal each, for simply SURVIVINg life with these freaks of nature , and NOT going stir crazy!!LOL!!
There are several of us here on LF with spath adult kids.We didnt deserve them, we did the best we could, bottom line we couldnt have known or helped them anyway!We are only responsibe for half their DNA.So, we SHOULD cut ourselves some slack.
I had WALL TO WALL GUILT when I left that vipers nest of horror and dysfunction,{my ex and 2 spath girls}
I am very very blessed with my nice non spath husbandno.2!!
I have good health, enough money to be content, a lovely home and garden,a few good friends, my Iranian “kids’.
We have to learn how to live, survive and even thrive without worrying about these dysfunctional, horrible.l people.
Heres a n excercise for each of us to do,
a} Do they love me?Or even think about me t all, except as a cash cow?
b} If these people were not relate d to me,would I wish to go on seeing them?Or have anything to do with them?
c}Do I owe them anything?
d}Do I love, like or admire their personalities?
e} Are they habitual liars?
f} have they conned and cheate d me more than once,or several times?Or stolen from me?
g}have they shown any emotional, verbal, or Physical abuse to me in the past?
h} have they ever apologised for any of above?
i}Do they have a working consciense?
j}Can you recall any time they treate d you with love, kindness, and concern?Ie when you were sick?
k}Di d t hey ever refuse to see you or help you when you were sick and/or depressed?
l}Did you EVER once received anice gift from them, bought with love an imagination,not justa freebie?
If you answered No,{or sometimes yes, depending on the question!} to more than 2 of the above, THIS PERSON DOES NOT LOVE YOU OR WISH YOU WELL.
They may even actively HATE you. Now do you still feel a duty to go on seeing this person?
No, thought not! A good check list to look at when next we are in the throes of false guilt re these sickos!!
Love,
Mama gemXX
All I can say is Wow! All of the above is a lot to swallow, but I am going to read the above every time I feel weak. You are right…they have NEVER ONE TIME ever apologized for anything they’ve done to me or anyone else that I know of…that is a real red flag! They are takers, rarely even say thank you ….always wanting more, more, more….the only people they even treat with any respect are the ones that they think they can bleed dry…..and you know….we did survive….all of us…..I have no idea how, but here we are…girls how did we get to where we are now…….a miracle! You are right too, that no one understands…if you talk about it people start looking at you weird like you must be the one that’s crazy! If a spath is really good at what they do they know who you talk to….and they make sure that those people only see the smoke and mirrors that is their “act”. ….so when you say something negative about them, the only reference the person has in their mind is what the spath planted there. I’ve always wondered too how they seem to be so slick, they can talk their way out of anything, they always find new jobs, new friends, new people to use….they remind me so much of cats….the way they “play” with their prey…..they don’t want to kill them…it’s much more fun to drive them to the brink and then just sit back and watch..it’s the illusive nature and then always feeling like they are watching you and waiting to pounce when you least expect it……spooky stuff girls…..
thanks, onestep and also polly,
that looks like an interesting series.
I like charlie rose, but don’t have tv anymore, so that will be fun to watch.
Has anyone read the girl with the dragon tattoo? by Steig Larsonn?
http://www.stieglarsson.com/
This book was originally titled “Men who hate women” and became a world wide best seller. The authors story is fascinating. He writes about sociopathy in corporations mostly, but not overtly in those words. I think we can learn a lot from his “fiction”.