Donna Anderson’s important latest post reminds me that one topic which will never be worn out is that of the psychopath’s lies and their impact on others.
This week I want to very briefly introduce yet another take on this inexhaustible topic. Everyone lies, but there’s something else at stake in the case of the psychopath’s lies.
To illustrate: you might say about any regular (non-psychopathic) person, “Things would be better if s/he was to lie less often. Her/his soul or psyche would be healthier as would her relationships.” That’s true. Now try this on for size and notice how wrong it seems: “Things would be better if the psychopath was to lie less often. His soul or psyche would be healthier as would his relationships.”
Weirdly, this is patently not the case. The psychopath will be just as sick/evil no matter how many or how few lies he tells. It’s not a quantitative but a qualitative matter.
It is commonly said that a defining characteristic of psychopaths is that they are pathological liars. This is right if you mean that they are profoundly dishonest and not to be trusted. It does not mean, though, that psychopaths lie a lot. They do lie a lot and those lies cause havoc. But as I hope my illustration above shows, lying less will not make them better people.
So, how does this work? The thing about psychopaths is that even their truths are lies! Or rather, whether or not they happen to be telling the truth or a lie at any particular moment is not what makes them psychopathic. What makes them psychopathic is that they use and destroy people; truth or lies are for them just so many weapons for pursuing their prey.
M.L. Gallagher said a lot when she wrote this:
He is the lie….
From hello to good-bye. I love you to I hate you. You’re beautiful to you’re ugly.
It was all a lie….When friends or my family ask, but what about this, or what about that, I tell them. It was all a lie. There was no truth in him.
If I spend my time trying to figure out fact from fiction, all I am doing is trying to prove I wasn’t so stupid. See, this was true. That’s why I fell in love with him.
Truth is. I fell in love with him because I believed his lie.
When I discovered the truth, I was so enmeshed in his lie, I couldn’t find the truth in me. And so I sank.
OxD- I believe that the xmil may fit the bill for P-by-proxy. She certainly has the enabling of the bad-boy-golden-child addiction down pat. She will lie and sacrifice anything and anyone without a second thought for a son who has been nothing but a source of pain, emotional drain, and bane of her existence since his pre-adolescence. He set fires and hurt animals as a child; lied, cheated, stole, did/sold drugs in his teens, and has been markedly increasing the severity of his crimes ever since. Everything is a “misunderstanding,” and, “He wouldn’t hurt anyone,” and “He’s my SON, I OWE him.”
What IS with that Golden Child syndrome anyway? It’s actually painful (and infuriating) to watch.
He was actually labeled anti-social in 1991 (per court documents that surfaced). She was told what she was dealing with- and she’s continued to bail him out and coddle him anyway. Again, it’s painful and nauseating to watch. Her daft husband has no idea their retirement has been hit, and hit hard. She’ll bankrupt them before she denies the pedophile a thing. She lives only to serve him. He, of course, only tolerates her when he wants something.
Glinda,
Unfortunately Ps freqently in my experience target enablers; parents if they are available. Siblings or others if parents aren’t sufficient to keep the bailed out and supported.
When I was first exposed to “family role” theory in nursing school, I had little experience to identify with it, but I did SEE a few things that made me go “Uhhhhh” but I had been trained so much from childhood in how the roles should be played I didn’t actually flash on the severity of my own family’s roles until much later.
The theory back in the days when I went to school (back with the cave men) was that the fact that a child was labeled a GC and enabled no matter what he did CAUSED him to behave in bad ways….and there might be some truth to that, but it isn’t the total CAUSE as we well know now, there are some genetics involved in it. I think the “enabler” role is more the LEARNED BEHAVIOR in an effort to please mommie/daddy and keep the status quo in the family. It is true that sometimes that if a person in a particular role dies, leaves the family or whatever happens to them, that another member of the family may pick up that role and run with it in order to keep the family “balance”–dysfunctional balance but at least “stable” and knowing what to expect.
My mother was always an independent woman and the first in her maternal family to go to college and then to do well in the business world.
Her brother was a monster from a very early age, enabled by his mother by keeping his deeds SECRET. When my GM died, mom did a 180 degree turn and became the family enabler, protecting her monster brother–but she had no male child to label as the GC/monster so she “adopted”my P-son for that role.
I think if he had not stepped up to the plate and been a monster she would have focused on another grandson as the GC/monster, but because he was a P he DID step up to the plate and start causing problems as an adolescent. I don’t think she CAUSED it, but she certainally ENABLED him to continue–however, since Ps are not afraid of punishment, even going to jail, then prison didn’t teach him anything, all it did was refine his skills a great deal.
It DID very much surpirse me though how much more VIOLENTLY my mother enables my son than my grandmother did hers. GM only kept secrets, Mom is rabidly violent with her enabling and PUNISHES anyone who doesn’t comply or go along with the program.
Since I had only once before actually DEFIED her about this (years ago) and she had PUNISHED ME THEN, but I hadn’t actually defied her in the last nearly years since he was in prison continuously. But this last year when I actually DEFIED her, and went the opposite way to KEEP HIM IN PRISON she became enraged at me.
Of course now that she backed the wrong horse in the race and I am NC with her, my other sons barely communicate or talk to her, and she is having to hire caregivers and drivers, housekeepers, etc. rather than have family there for her needs, she is doing the Pity party bit, but still wants to play the “let’s pretend it never happened” game and I refuse to play. The D&D that she gave me, and the realization, finally, on my part that I am nothing to her has stripped out any vestage of me wanting to please her or caring if I please her or not. While I don’t think she is a P, except by proxy to protect her GC, she isn’t going to change at 78 yrs old. It would be more painful for her to admit than she is willing to endure. She has lost essentially everything but her delusions. The grandson that loved and respected her doesn’t trust her any more than he would a rattle snake.
The adopted grandson who loved her and respected her and that she D&D’s “because he wasn’t blood” (after years of being in our family) now has lost respect for her. He doesn’t hate her, but he sees what she is, and I am sure that he is disappointed that she D&D’s himm as well.
She has no one now and has lost face in the community, her church, and with her friends too. But we all have choices and we have the consequences to go with them. It is sad because they are not only victims, but they victimize themselves.
Ox-D:
“I wish you would not HOLD BACK ON YOUR OPINON OF HIM, LOL I think you should open up and tell us what you REALLY think about him. LOL ”
Hah! 🙂 Emotionally I’m all across the board lately. Think maybe as good as Lovefraud is to share all this stuff, it’s dredging up these memories that are keeping me mired.
Get most vocal about the evil ways he had, and most vehement, when I’m feeling most uncertain. Like I’m trying to slap myself into reality, being my own best friend, or how I’d be with any friend or loved one who went through this with someone who was so clearly bad for them. Weird. Practicing tough self-love? I still sometimes miss the “good” even knowing better. Just posted that elsewhere on here. Hope that feeling goes away and stays away, because how can you miss “the good” when you aren’t even sure the good was REAL? When you’re pretty sure it wasn’t real and even if it was, it came with a whole lotta NOT GOOD, downright rotten?
“What is with the golden child syndrome?”
No idea. For my family, I think it was patriarchal, old country ethnic behavior. The BOY child… and when he got older, and impossible for anyone to handle, well, by then they’d boxed themselves into a corner. He’d take both of my parents on, physically and verbally, and they were getting too old and weaker than him. He still bullies them, abuses them. I’ve threatened to turn him in to adult protective services…and then THEY turn around and get upset with ME for even suggesting such a thing. Yet they come to me to tell me what he’s done and how sad they are. It’s all so horrible to watch, but I didn’t create it and it’s not my problem to fix.
Yes, they victimize themselves as you later stated. But they try to drag you into it, I suppose honestly, because they’re both scared and enabling.
Lil Orphan,
I did go through a phase where I started to feel that everywhere I looked, SOCIOPATHS! I might have been reading a little too much here. It is sad to hear so many bad stories…but even that feeling passed.
And the dredging up of feelings… been there too.
It’s all passing.. just like Gas. HAHA!
Sorry.. I am working with children these days and Fart jokes are big in that crowd.
Aloha
I know how you guys feel about dredging up feelings. . . my husband commented on this lately that I’ve been mentioning things from this blog a lot and talking about sociopaths that I know and what they do. He says that these days I seem to be deep in thought much more often and I am not as cheerful as usual. That before I even seemed a little happier.
But then I told him that for me it is like cleaning the garage. It has been seven years since I was exposed to the abuse on a regular basis and just now I’m cleaning my garage out. Yes, it’s filthy, yes it’s full of who knows what living in there and yes, I need to get a little dirty myself to do it right. But once I get the junk out and make it nice in there, I’ll have more room for myself in my own mind. I don’t want there to be places in my own brain that I’m scared of exploring. I want the junk and the filth OUT!
Dredging things up is good if the purpose is just to clean them out. And even though I can see sociopaths everywhere now (they are, by the way) I know exactly how to handle them. NC or ignoring their crap as much as possible.
LilOrphan:
I also loved your description of your ex. Are you sure we weren’t seeing the same guy? I think I might have used those words to describe my ex as well, more than once, lol.
You also mentioned missing the “good” parts, and trying to remind yourself of the bad when you start feeling like you miss him. I was having this problem too, and I was talking to my counsellor about how to handle it. Her suggestion helped me, maybe it will help you too if you feel like trying it. This counsellor works with abused and/or battered women, and she recommended that I write down a list of the bad stuff I remember about my ex. It could be things he said or did to me, personality characteristics, things he did that were unethical, or whatever else came to mind. Then, when I start feeling like I missed him or missed the “good” stuff, go back and read that list.
It sounds really simple, but for me this exercise was very, very powerful. I put off doing it for the first couple weeks, because it sounded so simplistic, and I thought, “Well, I already KNOW he’s a bastard, why bother writing it down?” But, there’s something about seeing that record there in black and white that is very profound. For me, it drove it all home much more than just thinking about things in my mind.
When I did the exercise, I came up with 8 pages, typed, single-spaced, note-form, the first time I sat down to write. It just poured out of me. I’ve added other things to the list since then as I’ve remembered them. But the fact that I could come up with 8 pages without even stopping to think was pretty eye-opening in and of itself. I went “Wow, I knew there were a lot of reasons he was a bastard and that he’d been a jerk to me, but 8 PAGES?!? Wow.”
Anyway, doing this has helped me a few times when I’ve started feeling like I missed my ex. It’s also helped because my ex, like many abusers, blamed everything, including his crappy behavior, on me. And for awhile, I did buy in to his blaming me. Having that list has helped me also at times where I start feeling like maybe this was my fault. No, it was not. He is an S, end of story, and seeing things written down has helped drive that home and been somewhat healing for me.
I also put on the list ways I’ve seen him treat other people (eg. loses temper with coworkers, gets in fights), or slimy behaviors that weren’t necesarrily directed at me (eg. steals from work, drives drunk, etc.) This helped me to shatter the illusion he had tried to make of himself as being a good guy, if somewhat misunderstood. I can look at that list and reinforce “Wow, what a jerk”.
lil orphan ; i know mine told me when we broke up i dont love you and you love me more than i love you. bang take that on the chin. he is also a sexual manipulator and i do sometimes miss the good things . but he did a lot more bad things than good now when i look back the good things were just cause he was getting what he wanted out of me. also in regards to lists i could write a whole book about my ex husband s path and ex spath x boyfriend and other men who i have met who had issues and in fact probably s paths too it would be a best seller and people say to me all the time you should write a book. truth is its too sad to write a book about so much bad stuff i would rather write about something good. maybe if more good things happen to me i could write a book thats half good and half bad a bit more uplifting i think. lil orphan mine too planned he was leaving but i confronted him with something which made him dump me a little earlier but he was living under my roof and had made up his mind he was going. he just said after being confronted with another lie he told me, well you wont have to put up with my lies anymore cause im moving out. as soon as they are found out and questioned they run cant handle it. thanks for replying to my blog.
Aloha, Ariadne, Green Girl and Jules it was so nice to see confirmation of the fact that our emotions go back and forth about these guys. Some days, less and less but some, I still wonder if I’m not losing my marbles…one day I feel angry, the next I feel like I miss him, then I’m sure it all makes perfect sense from the perspective of being with a disordered person, then I blame myself, then I blame him, then I think…”well, maybe it just didn’t work out,” but then I remember some sneering, smirking comment about me, or about his lack of feelings for me, and other things he said and did, the other women he kept throwing in my face…and it’s back to square one: anger, feeling duped, feeling so many years were wasted being in love with an illusion . Deep down, I know he was The Lie, from the start. That anyone who really loves you doesn’t just go on their merry way for five years and emerge from the ether one day proclaiming they love you – the systemically try to tear you to pieces.
I love the gas analogy, Aloha and the garage, Ariadne. Both are apt. For awhile I stopped reading here and at the other N/P forums and though it seemed better, that’s when the sad feelings and uncertainty returned.
Will do what you suggest, green girl, and write it all out once more, in one place instead of spread across five journals from over the years.
Jules, I am working on a book of it, but a humorous look in some ways, really free-form and mostly just for my own eyes. Haven’t been working on it because of other freelance writing gigs that compete with a full-time night job.
The sickest thing is that deep down inside it’s true – I love him. Will probably carry that love with me for the rest of my life, and die with it. But I will never, ever see or speak with him again. Just can’t. If he has the slightest inclination towards hooking me again, I’m too worried it may work down the road.
LilOrphan,
I thought I loved the Bad Man too but I don’t and I didn’t. Once you can fully grasp that the “good things” were just manipulations, it gets easier to let go.
I would say that with the Bad Man, there was about 10 seconds in that whole relationship that was authentic… but then again, I might even be willing to let that go. *POOF*
Okay, well I did love some details about him. I loved that he was a Captain and drove big water craft. I loved that he had explored some places on Earth that I have only dreamed of. I loved that he loved the waffles I made for him. I guess those kind of things were real but what did I get out of these things? I got to make waffles. I got to be interested and fascinated by his traveles. I got a few boat rides. Still, none of these things really add up to a relationship that was worthy of my waffles. And the packaging. He had a beautiful package.. um I mean… he looked good. HAHA! That was funny.. that didn’t come out right but you know what I mean!! He was beautiful to look at.
One question I have pondered since the BadMan is this: Is love nothing more that beautiful packaging? I mean I see people fall all over themselves and put up with so much crap because they love to look at their partner. I have often felt that men are this way… and I guess I did it. I used to stare at Bad Man’s lips while he slept. They were beautiful to me. I even used to think to myself, “I could look at this face for the rest of my life.”
The funny thing is I am not a big vanity person. I am very down to earth. But the Bad Man’s packaging did have a very powerful effect on me like a chemical reaction was hitting me. I have never had that kind of chemistry going off in me just by looking at someone. The power of attraction. He was a Long Island Iced Tea… intoxicating. Even the sounds he made in the bedroom and the tone of his voice seemed to vibrate my cells. I am not trying to be steamy here.. I am just telling the truth. I thnk this is why I made the best choice and left the island. I just knew I would not be able to stay away from him if I stayed there.
To be honest, I never think about this anymore (with this moment an exception). I do have a picture of him though and I don’t feel those things anymore. I just see a sociopath when I look at it. But if I let my mind go there…
So yes, there are times when we miss them for one reason or another but think about what you would really want in a loving partner. Emotionally, he was none of those things.
I will tell you what turns me on now… SAFE AND BORING. I am just starting to see someone and so far, he is not terribly exciting. But he seems safe and I see that he is doing the right things for his children. That’s HOT. (as Paris Hilton would say) I don’t think he is really boring… it’s just that he isn’t showy and he reveals himself slowly in a good kind of way. He is being cautious and he is not rushing to give something away too soon or to take something from me. It seems like the most mature thing I have ever experienced. And perhaps, one day, I will have all the passionate feelings I had before but they will come because I feel safe with him. I do hope so.
Lastly, in time, the wavering and the waffling (hehehe) will go away. It has for me and I believe it will for you too. I am sure you will never forget your Bad Man but I think the love you feel for him may go away in time.
Remember… he is not the one that got away. He is the one you got away from. There is a very big difference.
Aloha,
I think that term “safe and boring” comes from women like us who are (were) used to men who make our hearts race and and give us goosebumps. But I think that calling that rush “love” is the biggest mistake we make. It’s hard to tell with all the romantic movies and myths in our culture telling us that romance is all those things, roses and chocolates and cheesy love ballads.
After my relationship with the N, I had no idea what love was. I lost my hope that it even existed. But I did learn what it was NOT. It is not someone “sweeping you off your feet” or surprise trips or a bottle of champagne in front of a fireplace. That can all be shared with someone who doesn’t care a whit about you. I shared things like that with him and I never knew who he was, even after three years. I felt as if we could be in the same room and talk but we never communicated as two human beings. The connection was not there. Fireworks, yes. But a connection, no.
I like aloha’s term “relationship crack.” It’s hilarious, but it is soo accurate. It is an addiction we suffer from, not only the ups, but the downs too. The ups make us feel loved (even if it’s an illusion) and the downs make us feel alive.
When I first met my husband, I thought (to be honest) that he was average and yes, boring. But as I got to know him, slowly I realized that he was someone I could respect because even when I wasn’t looking he spoke respectfully about me, he NEVER pushed me to do anything, he came through for me and took care of me when I was sick as a friend not expecting anything. It was not a whirlwind romance, it was more like a light breeze, slow and steady. I felt comfortable and content around him, not ecstatic, but content. It felt like home. For the first time in my life.
I think it was Lilorphan who just wrote that she is worried that good men aren’t out there. They are! I swear! Now you know what not to look for. That is the first step. I think all of us here have experienced non-love and even anti-love. But defining love is difficult because it is not so much an emotion, I think, but a state of being.
After living my whole life in a fog of insecurity and uncertainty, for the first time I feel like I’m about to land on the other side. It’s not as exciting as guessing what a disordered person is going to do next, but man, it’s nice over here.