May, 2008 I brought to your attention the tragic case of Dr. Amy Castillo, a pediatrician who lost her court fight to protect her children from their psychopathic father. Unfortunately, I have to inform you that another two children have been lost and another mother named Amy is left asking how we let her down. Yes I said we let her down. The judge who allowed the children’s father, Michael Connolly to have unsupervised visitation was representing all of us.
We have to put our heads together and figure out how to change the system. Children need and deserve protection from sociopaths. Mothers and fathers like Amy made a mistake in marriage and love, that shouldn’t mean the children conceived should pay the ultimate price!
According to the Chicago Tribune Connolly, like Dr. Castillo’s ex-husband told people he would kill the children. “In court documents dating back to 2005, she (Amy) detailed her estranged husband’s threats against her family and fought unsuccessfully to keep him from having unsupervised visits with their two sons. Michael Connolly violated the orders of protection against him six times, police records said, and he often vowed to kill himself rather than be separated from the boys.”
Now I often tell people not to believe sociopaths. Here is the official Lovefraud exception to that rule: If a sociopath says he/she is going to kill someone, believe him/her.
I ask that everyone reading this blog write their lawmakers and submit editorials to newspapers about the need to protect children. Not just physically but emotionally too. I also welcome your ideas about what we as a community should do.
One other thing, let’s get the word out that family members have to stop covering for sociopaths and enabling them. Don’t let pity cloud judgment, and stand in the way of safety. The Tribune quotes Connolly’s aunt as saying, “I feel sorry for Michael”¦I know that sounds terrible, but he must have been so tormented.”
(Thank you to Rune, who brought this story to my attention)
There was recent article in O magazine that featured stories almost identical (and equally heartbreaking) to those described on the California Protective Parents Association.
No, Kathy, I don’t think you are wrong at all….the ONLY thing I see about this is that there is so much disagreement in the PROFESSIONAL MENTAL HEALTH COMMUNITY, about IF these people can be “rehabilitated”—-I don’t have enough “letters” after my name to be considered an “expert” so I can present myself to a court, or judge or anyone else as an “expert” I can ONLY present myself as a CITIZEN wanting ACTION taken by the professionals and by the legislatures to have THEM decide what to do….DUH, does that make any sense.
Even if I had 100 “letters” after my name and the degrees to back them up, there are probably others with as many letters who would get on a witness stand and also give CONFLICTING expert testimony. Since human psychology is not seen “scientifically” mostly, it is it SEEMS TO ME, more “opinion based” than say “rocket science” or “physics” in which you can experimentally PROVE that 2+2 ALWAYS =s 4.
However, as a “concerned citizen” I can raise hell about the DEATHS of children who were turned over to these predatory parents by a JUDGE’S BAD DECISION. And, not just one death, but the deaths of several children, and we also ought to do some searches on “statistics” to make this whole thing ring better as well. Anyway, just some ideas to bounce out there with for rumination and thoughts and ideas for others to knock down or build up—just brainstorming.
Leah, thanks for your input.
Journalists are on all the list groups, though not mentioned because we need a news hook for them. Just briefing them isn’t enough. It’s got to be associated with some other action or news. If and when we get active on any level at all, even a letter-writing campaign, we have something to take to them. Any educational initiative will include them.
And by that time we should have some simple, bullet-pointed background points and action points to present to them. (The less you ask a journalist to think, the more likely you’re going to get some coverage.)
I’m just staring to ready Hervey Cleckley excerpts where I can find them. I really like his writing and feel like his observations and interpretations are very compatible with the way I think. I understand his book is out of print and very expensive, but I think I’m going to set up a standing search for it on a couple of antiquarian book sites to see what comes up.
I think the failure of the psych world to attend to S/N/Ps has to do with the way they’ve described and categorized them. And the fact that, at least as a group, they don’t seem to understand these syndromes and their impact except as bad things. Which is true, they’re certainly destructive. But all the current research seems to be off the DSM descriptions, which offer nothing about the inner world or the potential causes or the emotional dynamic that emanates from them into the world around them.
Clekley really seemed to “get” them, and to me that’s a lot more helpful — in identifying and dealing with them, as well as understanding how to treat people who have by damaged by them.
BTW, did you ever stumble on an article written by a therapist named Joe Carver, about avoiding “losers” when you’re dating. It’s one of the best descriptive and cautionary pieces I’ve ever read about S/N/Ps, though he never names them. Apparently he was bowled over by the response, and has written several follow-up articles, the latest more or less based on DSM descriptions. Which is like all things based on those descriptions scary, dull and unhelpful.
Here’s the original article; it’s posted in a lot of places: http://www.enotalone.com/article/4112.html
Thanks, Oxy. I totally understand your concern about credibility And it’s true, we’re not expert witnesses in the professional sense.
But my own feeling is that we can make a case. Just going in with passion, personal experiences and anecdotal evidence is better than not going in at all. But I think there’s more than enough information out there to build a credible case for several things.
One of them is the danger presented by people who have poor impulse control and no conscience.
Another is the general agreement among the psychiatric and law-enforcement communities that these people are not only untreatable, but often progress to become more dangerous.
Another is that many of them pass socially as “normal” without major police histories, while they are wreaking havoc with individual lives and organizations.
In a general sense, it might be difficult to quantify what they cost society, but it might be easier to provide information about the social costs of child abuse, and then link that back to them.
Of course, all of this has to come from credible sources. But I believe that’s possible. We may not need all this background to start up, but we will inevitably have to build a credible case if we hope to actually accomplish anything with institutions like education, the law and the training of therapists.
The other benefit of putting these facts together is that it will clarify what we really want to say. Our first impulse is to say that we’re upset and this is wrong. But as we build our case, we can refine that language to point out how damaged children go on to create his or her own trail of social cost. And that this isn’t just the “private” business of a family, but something that affects all of us directly or indirectly.
We walk a fine line here, because we don’t want to demonize everyone with a personality disorder. But we do want to make a case for concern about a certain type, and the reason that communities, educators, law enforcement, etc. need to be aware of these patterns of behavior and their larger implications.
It’s not the only thing wrong with our society, but if we can hammer this one nail a bit in the right venues, it might have it’s own ripple effect of making people think more about systems that create or foster this type of behavior.
Child protection is a very good place to start, I think. And a reasonable simple place to document.
I think you’re right in starting with your passion. But I suspect we can also come up with good, credible, reasonable answers to anyone who wants to challenge us.
“The Mask of Sanity” is available as a free ebook. Several sites offer it. Google the title and “free download” and you’ll get a variety of options. I didn’t include a direct link because I’m not that familiar with the sites…I borrowed a copy from a college library when I read it.
The psychopaths and sociopaths Cleckley describes seem almost quaint compared to some of the folks we on this site know. It seems that, like the cancerous cells they mimic within the collective body human, they metastasize into more dangerous entities with the passage of time.
I share everyone’s frustration in trying to communicate to the uninitiated just what a P really is. Long ago, when I was still in Stage One realization (pre-child-sex-abuse revelations), I tried to warn his family members so they could protect their elderly mother. I failed. I tried to warn his boss so that he wouldn’t lose money and goods. I failed. (And later, once the boss had been ripped off, he chastised me for NOT telling him the very things I had already told him!) Once Stage Two hit and I had the sick knowledge of just how bad he is, I tried to warn cops and investigators that their case was not strong enough, that they didn’t investigate far enough, and they ignored me as “a crazy, scorned woman,” or worse yet, a mother who MUST HAVE known, and so could be consequently ignored. So I failed there too.
The only success I’ve had in communicating the P facts is toward my youngest child, who remembered what I said and got away from him in time, before he dragged her down to the pits of hell he normally occupies. But it took over a year of living with him before she saw it.
I do not understand why the human mind cannot fully grasp the concept without having been through the victim experience. Even people who think they are cynical and tough-minded don’t get it. Nobody gets it.
Isn’t it time for the 100th monkey phenomenon to kick in? Aren’t there enough of us now?
Thanks for the lead on the book.
You’re right. It’s like trying to break through mass hypnosis.
But there must be something in their experience we can anchor it on.
Here is a link to the entire book, all 485 pages on scribd:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/13484297/CleckleyMask-of-Sanity-1
Kathleen and all,
There is much I’d like to say but will have to hold off until tomorrow or the weekend but I’d like to point to Barbara Oakley’s book, articles, and interviews on Cluster Bs (mostly Borderlines). She is a systems engineer, not a mental health expert but has parlayed her personal experience with a disordered sister, keen research prowess, and lively writing style in a really compelling book and series of informative PR pieces. I think she displays a canny understanding of both PR and the zeitgeist of the times by using slightly tongue in cheek title – Evil Genes: Why Rome Fell, Hitler Rose, Enron Failed, and My Sister Stole My Mother’s Boyfriend. Despite the lighthearted subtitle, the book is very thoroughly researched and a surprisingly pleasant read despite the subject matter. Her website is worth checking out: http://www.barbaraoakley.com/index.htm I’m really impressed with the way she has marketed the book. (See the radio and tv tab.) While she does discuss the mental health and neuro-imaging research and the various labels for cluster B’s she finesses the issue of choosing a precise name for them by refering to them throughout as “the successfully sinister.”
I’ll come back to the narrower issue of custody/child safety when I’m more alert.
Regarding educating journalists (and perhaps others), I’d like to reintroduce an idea that Oxdrover mentioned (perhaps jokingly) a very long time ago…(keeping in mind this is a brainstorming session)…What about a speakers bureau to address Journalism 101 classes. It would be really fun to go through current headlines with them and play “match the behavior to the symptoms in the DSM.” There are some advantage to catching journalists (or lawyers or any other group) when they are 20 versus when they are 40, 50, or 60 and already think they know everything.
Thanks, Leah. This is good stuff. And thanks for the lead on Barbara Oakley.
You had posted in another thread, maybe Part 6 of my series, on classroom education. I almost cut and pasted it into this thread. Would you mind if I did?