“How did he really feel?” and “What did he want from me?” are two questions that often haunt victims of sociopaths. The reason we are haunted by these questions varies but often stems from the habit of over-focusing on the sociopath instead of ourselves. That being said, victims also have a healthy ”˜need to know’ that can help with recovery and healing.
I struggled with these questions in my own healing. I remain baffled by my observations of enjoyment of affection on the part of sociopaths. Early on, I told my own therapist that I had come to the conclusion that sociopaths exploit those close to them to the point of death, then, cry at the funeral. At the moment the tears are shed, I believe they do represent a grief of sorts. The feelings of loss experienced by sociopaths are however, short lived. Victims also have to beware because, although sociopaths are said to be incapable of feelings for those in their lives, they do become obsessed with them. Psychologists have not yet explained this obsession. If they don’t attach, why are they obsessed? Those who have read my other entries know that I believe that sociopaths do attach. It is what they do with attachments that is disordered.
How did he really feel?
In response to the picture of a sociopath crying at his victim’s funeral, my therapist said, “He feels what he tells himself he feels.” To help you understand what my therapist meant, I will explain what is known about how people usually experience feelings.
There are two components to feelings. The first is a physical sensation. When we experience a feeling we feel something in our bodies in relationship to that feeling. Think about loving someone close to you and sense how your body feels. Is it warmth in your heart? That is usually what people report.
There is much evidence that these physical sensations are disordered in sociopaths. Sociopaths do not generally experience the physical and hormonal changes that go along with feeling emotion. If they do experience them, it is to a lesser degree. Physical responses are blunted.
The second component of feelings is called attribution. Attribution is a cognitive process. When I feel that warmth in my heart as I see my children, I attribute the sensation to my love for them. Thus the physical sensation alone does not make emotion. Emotion is physical sensations and our interpretations of these sensations. There is also evidence that the parts of the brain responsible for attribution do not function properly in sociopaths.
There is one emotion that many sociopaths experience in a not so disordered way. This emotion is anger. Sociopaths do have blunted physical responses to anger. Despite this blunted responsiveness, they seem aware of angry feelings and make correct attributions about what makes them angry. Again, science has not even addressed, much less explained this observation.
Since the physical sensations and attributions that allow for the experience of emotion are disordered in sociopaths, their inner world is very different. They are left to make sense of themselves and others without the tools most of us use. Other parts of the brain fill in the missing processes. The person who is credited with first describing sociopathy in depth is Hervey Cleckley. He proposed that sociopaths are at least of average if not above average verbal intelligence. This makes sense because they have to use their verbal intelligence to make up for their lack of emotions. They do indeed feel what they tell themselves they feel. Scientists say they mimic other people’s emotions, yet again there is no real proof of this.
What did he want from me?
This question is easy to answer intellectually, but very hard for victims to accept emotionally. There are three pleasures we get from our love relationships. The first is pleasure in affection. The second is sexual pleasure. The third is pleasure associated with dominance and control. Sociopaths experience sex and dominance as enormously more pleasurable than affection. Therefore, they are in relationships to get sex and power, pure and simple.
If you love deeply and feel affection for others, you cannot fathom the inner world of an emotionally disordered person whose primary pleasures are sex and power. To understand another’s world you have to imagine yourself experiencing what the other experiences. You can’t do this with a sociopath.
Louise Gallagher said in her post The six steps of healing from a psychopath that the first step is acceptance. We have to accept that we can only know in part how sociopaths really feel and what they want from us. We can understand intellectually, but never emotionally.
Well I did it again, wrote a nice post and hit a key with my pinky and it was gone so I’ll make a long story shorter.
Dupey, listen you don’t know me from a hole in the wall. I am new here. Fortunately, my experience with a path was short – as I’ve said here before, you folks with long-term experiences rock my world – if you have come out the other end of this, even though affected hugely, you have to admit you are one hell of a strong woman.
We have much in common. I have suffered from severe anxiety and panic since my 20’s. Many, many therapists later, I use Klonopin (don’t know if you can use it since it is a benzo and you said you can’t use Xanax) but it does help. And hell, at my age, I use it when I want to. Why suffer more than you need to? I have even tried specialists and they have not been helpful (snapping a rubber band on the wrist and all that garbage). If it worx for anyone, great, but relax. exercises, etc, just make me more anxious.
I, too, over the last several years, have contemplated walking 20 feet to the RR trax and just lying down. It would be ever so easy. If I wasn’t convinced I was going to hell (and I’m not even religious/admittedly very skeptical of all things religious, even a little scared of all of it) I would probably do it but I fear since I have been self-involved in my life and also almost cheated with the path, I deserve to go there if, in fact, there is a hell. And for me, I am sure it will be an eternal panic attack. Talk about a lose-lose! I won’t even allow myself a decent afterlife or plain old oblivion.
Dupey, I also have lost interest in so many things I used to enjoy…just simple things like stupid lightening bugs, a rainbow, butterflies, quaint little shops, eating out, even seeing a friend for a movie and some great conversation, my dog!! I feel you Dupey. I feel you. The tremendously intelligent and aring people on this forum love you very much. That alone is nothing to sneeze at.
You said, “Yes, I have family but my children shouldn’t have to support me nor pay for my funeral. I should be able to do these things for myself and as it is turning out, I can’t even do that for myself right.” You must get rid of the “s” word (should). It’s time, Dupey. Your kids will help you out. I know how you feel. I have the same concerns about my daughter but I’m trying to get rid of all that excess thinking *and* deciding how others feel! That is not fair to you or to them!!
I worry about everything Dupey and feel like I am worthless so much of the time that it downright angers me for attaching such bad feelings to anyone, even myself! I worry every day about everything from the coffeepot leaching plastic into my coffee (so can’t even enjoy my AM cup anymore and my extensive research has yet to show me a steel or glass lined c.maker) to the fumes I ingest on the road. Life is one freaking worry after another. Obsessive worrier along with the anxiety and panic. I worry that my husband will die before me and I can’t afford the kind of funeral his huge Cath family will expect. How pathetic is that? VERY! How helpful? NOT AT ALL!! Right now, if we aren’t going to get on the stick and make decisions for our future, there is no reason to think/worry about it.
I’ve always felt that with youth came hope. All through my younger years, when I felt ripped up emotionally, the promise of a future got me through it. Now that I’m older, I feel like you do…everything is going downhill and there is NO hope at all. But, Dupey, I meet people every day who are older than we are and they don’t feel like that, not one little bit! Many of them have physical problems they have to deal with and they are so filled with gratitude about life.
We need to get there. I know we can. Don’t run off and end it when you know that your feet still hit the ground every day. As Star said, it’s your thoughts that are messing with you and you have to pull yourself out of the thinking and live what is + in your life, the simpler the better! Those are the things that matter. I hear you, I hear you, I hear you, I feel you…most everything seems negative and hopeless but it’s all about the way you and I are thinking about it…thinking is dangerous. Come on, Dupey, let’s take a break from all that and just try little by little to look at what we still have, not what we no longer have. And cling to the fact that many, many people do this every day.
Your path, his stalking, 10 yrs of your life lived with an indescribable monster, all terrible. I don’t know if you have legal recourse regarding the stalking, but anything you can do to blow his worthless a** off has to make you feel better. He is a just a dust mote in this world and a worthless one at that.
You have better, more productive things to think about. Heck, with all the different ways to meet people these days, there’s probably a site for people with heart problems to meet and maybe share some good times in the moment. Reach out, Dupey, reach out.
Over the last year, I have developed a string of bothersome physical problems since I had a hysterectomy last summer…my mantra is “Getting old sux.” Over the last couple of months, my eyes have been getting smeary and blurry at ONLY at work…just what I need. Of course I panicked and thought I was going blind, saw a couple of drs, (one specialist) and even though they all had different treatments (which is blowing my mind because who has time for all that and none of them work anyway) they assured me my eyes were healthy…I have a box full of washrags, rice baggies, different eye drops, eye masks, pills, you name it! I hate how bad it feels at work when the schmear sets in but I am so glad I can see and am not (at least not now) going blind! These are the things you have to concentrate upon.
This post is nowhere as good as my first one and once again, I know you don’t know me, but I do feel you, Dupey, and am here for you. I see you have many loving, giving friends. Do not give up!! Try to find a few simple things that give you a warm fuzzy and hold on to them. Do not discount your kids…
I say these things because I am where you are and I am trying to get out of my head and into a place that allows me some peace and well-being, a different place for all of us.
Dupey, you deserve this.
Many newbie hugs!!! I’ll be reading and pulling for you to get better.
Truth, your posts to Dupey must be read and re-read….by her, my me, by all of us. Truly, you nail it *all* the time.
Darwinsmom, star, also so much for Dupey and for all of us in your posts…wish I could just somehow put all your posts into my head and call upon them for strength as they are SO full of workable wisdom, not just the old mental masturb…well you know.
You guys…just unbelieveable. I feel honored to be here.
Truth, on Being There…yes you are correct…Chance was an innocuous being, and hugely mentally/emotionally limited. But, no agenda…yes, absolutely innocent. Basically there was nothing there.
His character, however, (irrespective of the move and its meaning which was yes, very poignant and extremely well-done and clever – I saw it about 5x but so many, many yrs ago…will netflix it today!) kind of makes me feel sick inside because it does remind me of Godzilla and just paths in general in their vast emptiness of their very being all the way to the core. In the case of the path, ugliness and vile motives lurk to reel in special types of people, ones they can use and abuse…as Darwinsmom’s post above so well illustrates.
I, like you, Truth, knew something was wrong with this guy and told him so. He was an “I’m sorry” boy. He said it so often, it just got stupid…I fell for it, but realized after full knowledge of his brutal and vile nature, that it was just a phrase for him. I see him as a hollow tube, spending his days manipulating, lying, pretending, “living” life as a robot, agenda after agenda after worthless agenda. Again, I only wish I could get revenge upon his pathetic soul-less lying a**. But that has to be allowed to run through the fingers like water. It won’t be happening as, much like the innocuous Chance the Gardener, who just doesn’t get it, they get it, they just don’t give a rat’s a**.
Some socios will tell you they like being as they are. They can do what they want and nothing affects them. They don’t know what compassion, warmth, emotion or conscience feels like so they are the perfect hedonists. They just enjoy the taste of food, the control and physical sensations of sex, liquor, etc. I vote for an open pit to dispose of these maggots and let them just cannibalize each other…the destruction they cause. They do not deserve to live.
Sorry to be a pita (while cleaning toilets, I had a thought I wanted to share, once again).
For me, Godzilla was a huge distraction. I still think about him because I need that focus big time to keep my worries and anx at bay. Work used to keep me focused and I’ve always loved work but my last company decided to end a great career for me using slander, libel and other actually sociopathic type methods. The job I have now is a crashing bore and of course, the ghost of Godzilla is everywhere. My triggers for anx are health issues, mine and my family’s and he was a real go-to for me when these occurred. He always spewed some sothing Biblical type phrase at me or got me going on music or movies…it was good in that way. I was NOT in love with him. I was attracted to his looks and power , fake serenity and one of his personas. That’s it.
Truth, I did not mean to say that Chance and Godzilla or any socio were anything alike except for the fact that they are both hollow tubes.
I knew Godzilla was messed up w/in seconds. The first thing he said to me when he met me at the entrance for the first time was kind some mumble about me using the back instead of front entrance…he was smiling but prob thinking, “What a simpleton.” I hooked into that immediately and thought it very condescending and unattractive.
Duped, you ARE on the verge of a breakthough but you can’t see it. You cannot see the forest for the trees. And yes, I have been where you’re at. Many times. Personally, I don’t think suicide is any kind of sin or evil, though many will fault me for saying that. People get to that point when their pain outweighs the resources they feel they have. I don’t fault anyone for that decision. HOWEVER, if you do it, you will never know what is on the other side of this pain and torment. You have another choice. There IS a way out, but it is not at the level of your thoughts. You cannot think your way out – that will just be a temporary fix.
All of the things you mentioned are material things. Happiness from material things is only temporary anyway. It is not the truth of who you are and why you are here. We all get old; material things come and go in all our lives. I don’t have anything either. I lost my home; have a 15-y.o. vehicle, no family, and no money, and my youth is gone. But I can sit here and tell you that being at peace has NOTHING to do with those things. Being identified with those things is what makes us miserable. You are in great pain. But it is not who you are, and it is not a life sentence. You CAN get through it. I know this to be a fact, and I would bet everything I have on it. You just haven’t found the way out yet. All of these things you have gone through SEEM like a hindrance. But they are really a great gift when you get to the other side of the pain. You don’t yet see what gifts you have to offer. But that doesn’t change the fact that you DO. If you opt out now, you will never know.
If there is anything I can do for you – if you need to talk – please email Donna for my email and I will send my phone number. I don’t post here often, but I care a great deal about what happens to you.
Dupey,
((hugs))
Addiction & Depression is a demon. The demon is relentless. 24/7. It messes with your brain. The thoughts that you are having are no longer your own thoughts. That is how the addiction TORMENTS you. By trying to over-ride your logical thinking, realistic thinking, survival thinking.
When you start to think about exiting this world this is very serious. PLEASE call someone for help. Suicide hotline. Domestic violence shelter. Reach out & TALK to someone in the real world.
My husband took his own life. 15 years ago. And when he made that decision he could no longer fight the demons……My world turned upside down.
His demons essentually became my demons.
I can’t even put into words how those that LOVE YOU and those you leave behind will feel. The burden of this is indescribable…..They will blame themselves for not knowing….Not seeing the signs…..They will FEEL REJECTED by you, beyond any other kind of rejection.
This is really intense RAW stuff. But that is exactly how I felt when my husband took his own life.
The ultimate “f**k you”.
His ending his life became my burden to endure in my daily existance and I had to fight the slippery slope of my own depression to stay alive myself.
There was only ONE reason I chose not to end my pain. And that was my kids. I could NOT put them through that.
You have something to live for. Your kids. REACH OUT. HANG ON. YOU are worth it.
Dupey,
it has become painfully obvious that you are addicted to the drama and that’s why you keep going back to him.
Yes, Dupey, you are an addict. You have all of the same problems that an addict has, except your drug of choice is drama. That is what made you vulnerable to the spath.
Everytime you go back you get a hit of drama, and then you go through withdrawal.
This might have something to do with your birth to a heroin addicted mother. I don’t know. It might be something you will have to fight all your life.
Or you might find a way to stay in balance by finding a safer outlet – such as joining a theatre company. Creativity in all its forms is very helpful for filling that empty hole. And yes, you did name it correctly. You said you have an empty hole. That’s what addiction feels like. That’s what addiction is.
There are people who would recommend 12 step program. It might be a good idea but I’ve never done it so I can’t say.
I’m not judging you, I think most people have drama addiction to some degree. That’s why we are attracted to scandal. For some people though, it becomes a type of sustenance.
I hope you feel better.
Duped,
I know your getting lots of good, caring advise here. I just wanted you to know that I’ve missed you on the blog. I know you can pull through this. You are strong Dupey!
I hope to see your replys when I get back home tonight.
Take GOOD care of yourself.
Thank you to all of you who have responded to me…I took a bunch of meds last night and finally fell asleep but when I woke up, it sure doesn’t look any different.
I can’t see the forest for the trees but I am not allowed to see anything different, Star…every waking moment, my heart condition plagues me. Constantly. It’s so bad now, even the doctors won’t tell me how bad anymore. In the beginning, I was told I had sudden cardiac heart failure and could drop at any moment. I want to know and need to know so that I can ‘make arrangements’ but as it turns out, I don’t have anything to make arrangements with and for.
No, it’s not about ‘material things’. It’s about ‘soulful things’…I have never met anyone romantically, in my life, that has been the kind of person I felt I wanted for my life. Sure, I have trusted many and been left laughed at and beaten down, just like I have with this ugly, ugly, spath. It’s not the material things, it’s the point. I have worked hard my entire life, taking care of other people. “IT” reaped MORE of my life and time, the past ten years, than I have. Yet, that goes unrecognized and unappreciated and my heart condition has been laughed at, ridiculed, thrown in my face: “Why don’t you just die you old bitch!” And, honestly, all along the way of this medical journey, not to mention the spath experience, my medical people just haphazardly brush me off and don’t really care. I am tired of fighting and plugging along. It’s just a matter of time before I am gone now and I had thought that perhaps I could leave this life in some state of ‘peace’ with others, but it just doesn’t look like that is going to happen.
I allowed ugly people to snuff me out and now I end up with nothing and I have never been in this spot. I made my life what it is and now it seems like that is being taken from me too.
I hear everything that you all are saying. I just can’t ‘relate’ anymore. My desire and my will are so totally broken and I don’t know how to fix it anymore. I am back in the sobbing all the time and I just so hate feeling this way anymore. It just goes on and on and on and there is no relief in sight.
Suicide isn’t a sin or evil. It is, though, FINAL. If I could sit and adequately explain and/or describe to you all of the things that have happened along the way throughout my life, you would see and understand why I feel the way I do. Unfortunately, there is just too much to explain and or write about anymore. It’s all like some kind of sick ‘stew’ that circles around and around inside my head and I don’t feel well, at all, physically and/or emotionally. My life is just over and I would rather have dying ON MY TERMS and not left to wonder ‘when’, ‘how’, or around ‘whom’. Living like this is like a person living on deathrow, not ever really knowing when it’s coming, although you know it is coming…you just don’t know when. And then, with spath, him being so violent, well, I managed to survive all the ‘shocks’ he has thrown at me, since my heart attack, but it sure has taken a huge toll on me all the way around, physically and emotionally. I am just ‘tired’. Real tired and since my insurance people and my medical people seem to think I have ‘all the time in the world’ to play around and be their ‘experiment’, well, I may as well just give up the ship. At least it will be on MY TERMS.
I have no money; I have a car, 15 years old, that I can’t even afford to keep gas in anymore. I just am not making it in this life anymore, where before I was determined, strong and vibrant and dynamic. I raised and supported my four children, almost entirely alone….where are they now, when I need them? They SAY a lot of things, just like the SPATH did, but when it comes to following through, that is another matter.
My mind is slipping into that ‘older age’ pattern now too. I am, sooner or later, going to need a guardian, to take care of me and my matters. I don’t want to be lead around by the hand, by someone and have it told to me, when I can eat, when to bathe and have no more freedom to be what I wish. SPATH contributed to all this MORE THAN A LOT. In more ways than I could possibly ever explain. I am not just ‘throwing’ everything into his soup cauldron…life hasn’t been kind along the way. But it has been (the majority of it) given to others in love and in kindness and I am devastated now that I can’t find any of that back. My entire life, I have heard LOTS of “I love you’s” but none that has withstood nor still stands. I have been used for all and everything I have ever had, inside and out.
Thoughts? I have no more thoughts about anything. PTSD has managed to rob even those inner emotions from me now. I exist daily on a moment to moment basis and feeling the way I do, physically, keeps me down. There is NO coming back from this. There just isn’t.
There is no breakthrough, My Dear, Dear, Star…
the only breakthrough I see coming is meeting my maker.
I don’t want to die in my bed, at night, while asleep, so someone has to ‘find me’. I don’t want to be driving down the street, have a heart attack and take out a bunch of people that don’t deserve it, so I stay home, all the time, locked in my little inner sanctum, and now I am on the verge of even losing that. My one little spot in life that is all or has been all mine. I am going to end up without even that.
I have lived my life in the kind paths; I have given and given and given and I don’t understand why this has all befallen me. If I had or do DESERVE all this, that would be one thing, but I don’t and never have. If I DID deserve it, at least I would have THAT to tell myself; know what I mean?
I am tired of this life, completely and totally.
The only thing I have now is GOD and although he has spared my life, more times than I could possibly explain, it’s time for me to go now. My time is up; my ticket has expired.
Yes, I know I am very depressed but I have been this way my entire lifetime. I always forged ahead and over the hurdles and I did so for my children, whom I have always loved so much, but who now don’t even have the time to sit and talk with me or listen to me. I have exhausted my counselors, one by one and I have been on drug cocktails, just one right after another. I can’t go through this anymore. I just can’t. I am tired. And, I want peace now and the only place I know to find that is in that eternal hereafter. GOD KNOWS what my heart is. HE knows. I don’t need to justify that or explain it to anyone because HE knows.
Any friend that I have ever have, has let me down and I don’t know or understand why other than I must have been and am quite the limerick and ‘joke’ for people…I must be quite a vision to behold, standing there, all my life, with my heart in my hand, as it drips blood from it, while everyone stands there laughing at how foolish I am for caring.
I emailed Donna Star and asked her for an introduction.
I am so happy to see you! I haven’t found the way out and I don’t think I am ever going to, not this late in the ‘game’. There is a lot behind me and there just isn’t time to share it all. Just know I love you.
Thank you to all of you who have responded to me.
I will remember you always for your caring and consideration and your support. You are all in my thoughts and prayers.
Dupey
Dupey:
I am here for you…
Dupey, I just lit my candle for you. Night is darkest just before dawn. (((((((Hugs))))))