How to recognize and recover from everyday sociopaths - narcissists

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Black couple 300x200Most of us want to have a significant relationship in our lives. Even when we have plenty of friends, a wonderful family and a fulfilling job, without a partner, we often feel lonely.

Sociopaths specialize in targeting loneliness. Anyone who is looking for a romantic partner is, by definition, vulnerable to being targeted by a sociopath.

So how do you protect yourself from predators AND find real love? By following Lovefraud’s 3 Rules of Dating. Here they are:

Rule #1: If they lie to you about who they are or their life story, dump them

The whole point of an intimate relationship is to be authentic and honest with someone, to reveal your true self, and to be loved for who you are. Partners who lie about any aspect of their identity, including their histories, are flunking this basic test of relationship.

Read more: With sociopaths, words and actions can both be lies

Lying about oneself isn’t always malicious. Sometimes it’s the result of self-doubt, or a feeling of inferiority. But if that’s the case, you don’t have a partner, you have a project. You’ll be taking on the burden of supporting the other person, rather than the two of you supporting each other.

Then, of course, there are the sociopaths who lie about themselves so that they can reel you in and exploit you. When you catch them in lies, they may apologize and plead, “I only said that because I was afraid you wouldn’t accept me.”

They’re right. You shouldn’t accept them.

If you discover that your partner has lied to you about his or her identity or history — including being married and not telling you — end the involvement immediately. The person is either poor relationship material, or an exploiter.

Rule #2: The most important decision of your life is whom you have children with

When you have a child with someone, you are tied to that person forever.

Hopefully it’s a good experience, you become a happy family, and your children are blessings for both of you.

But many romantic involvements end. If you have children together and split up, you’ll probably face one of the following scenarios:

  • You manage to co-parent amicably
  • You tolerate each other, but the kids are caught in the middle
  • You hate each other, and the kids have to deal with hostility
  • If the partner is disordered, he or she uses the kids to control you
  • If the partner is disordered, he or she abuses you and the kids
  • The other parent abandons you and the kids, and you’re left to raise them alone

Even if the other parent disappears, when there are children, you are forever tied to him or her genetically. This could be really bad if the other parent is a sociopath.

Personality disorders are highly genetic. Therefore, your children may inherit a predisposition to become disordered. It’s possible for proactive parenting to prevent a disorder from developing, but this is really hard work. Many parents who’ve had children with sociopath have had to accept the fact that their children are also sociopaths, and it’s unbearably painful.

So think carefully about whom you have children with, which means you should think carefully about whom you have sex with. Even if you don’t intend to have children, sometimes it happens.

Rule #3: Be the love that you want to find

Here’s a vital concept about looking for a life partner: The person who comes into your life is a reflection of what’s going on inside you.

If your internal state is characterized by fear, doubt, grief, betrayal, disappointment or any other negative emotion, you’ll likely attract someone who is either similarly unhealthy, or an exploiter.

Sometimes your negative feelings can be subtle, hidden under an outgoing, successful public persona. You might need to be really honest with yourself in order to spot them. If you do, the best investment you can make towards finding the love that you really want is self-healing.

This could be a lot of work, depending on your history. For run-of-the-mill doubt and anxiety, self-help programs may be enough. But if you’ve experienced severe trauma or betrayal, such as child abuse, you may need professional therapy.

Healing is always the answer.

You don’t have to be perfect to find love. In fact, one of the great ways that we grow is through our relationships. As you become healthy and whole, you will draw people to you who are also becoming healthy and whole. Among them may be a partner to share your journey.

Learn more: Survivor’s guide to healthy people and healthy relationships

Lovefraud originally posted this story on April 18, 2016.

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AnnettePK
8 years ago

Excellent points, thank you.

Lies about anything can indicate a problem. I’ve heard the rule of three: one lie can be a mistake, a second lie may be a misunderstanding, but a third lie probably indicates a pattern of behavior.

A habit related to lying, but maybe not technically a lie, is not keeping promises or not following through with plans and with whatever one says he will do. My ex psychopath would say he would do something and then not do it a lot. I wish I’d known about and followed the rule of three on that point and left the third time he didn’t follow through with something he said he was going to do, especially in honoring my requests.

Here is a short article which has some good advice about the pace of new relationships which tend to move fast these days and which spaths try to rush. http://saferelationshipsmagazine.com/the_gift_of_time_managing_the_pace_of_a_new_relationship_0316

Redwald
8 years ago

I hope I’ll be forgiven for what I’m about to say, but there are certain things I must point out. One of them at least is important, if not the other!

With the wrong kind of partner, QUOTE:

If you have children together and split up, you’ll probably face one of the following scenarios:

• You manage to co-parent amicably

• You tolerate each other, but the kids are caught in the middle

• You hate each other, and the kids have to deal with hostility

• If the partner is disordered, he or she uses the kids to control you

• If the partner is disordered, he or she abuses you and the kids

• The other parent abandons you and the kids, and you’re left to raise them alone

That’s only too true! Yet considering what came before it, I’m afraid that last line struck me as a classic example of the “unintended anticlimax.” Rather like that celebrated quote from Chicago’s controversial mayor of years past, Richard J. Daley:

“They have vilified me. They have crucified me. Yes, they have EVEN CRITICIZED me!”

(How dare they?)

In the same way, being left alone to raise children in peace, free of interference and harassment—though it’s far from ideal compared with joint parenting by two loving and mutually supportive partners living together full time with their children—must surely be one of the more benign outcomes when contrasted with some of the others listed above. Especially the one immediately preceding it!

However, I didn’t write this just to pick holes in the ordering of that list. What initially drew my attention to that last line was not its positioning, but the way it highlighted what I have to call the most shocking omission from the list. It struck me the same way it would if someone told us to

“Drive safely. It’s very important. If you have an accident, you might damage your car—or even wreck it!”

That’s true enough. If you do damage or wreck your car, that’s a very bad outcome. It’s inconvenient or worse, especially if you’re as fond of the car as I am of mine, as old as it is. Even if you’re not, it could end up costing you a lot of money. It could have worse consequences besides, like preventing you from driving to your job. There can also be serious legal ramifications.

However, most of those problems are at least somewhat temporary, and usually recoverable in the long run. What’s conspicuously missing from that admonition to “drive safely” is any mention of the worst consequences of all! Namely, that if you fail to do so, you could end up damaging or wrecking yourself, possibly crippled for life, or even DEAD! (Not to mention killing or maiming someone else!)

In the same way, that list of consequences of picking the wrong partner to have children with culminated with “being left to raise them alone.” As disappointing and difficult as that can be for many people, it’s the OPPOSITE outcome that’s far worse than any of those listed!

Namely, that you might lose custody of your children altogether to a hostile ex-partner who not only abuses them but turns your own children against you—and to make matters worse, forces you to pay them crippling amounts of money for the next twenty years or so for the dubious “privilege” of watching this happen!

Considering how much we all treasure our children—those of us who are human, I mean—it’s hard to imagine a worse consequence than this. It’s easy to see why some people are prepared to commit murder to stop it from happening! Yet it happens to too many people all the time—far more of them men than women. And the worst of it is, you don’t necessarily have to have a “personality disordered” partner to get shafted this way. Just one who’s incompatible enough, or bloody-minded enough, or both—even one who’s weak-minded enough (which I suspect was the problem in one case I know of). That, and bad luck, is all you need to end up getting screwed.

But the lesson remains the same, exactly as Donna said. Take the greatest of care when choosing a partner to have children with!

Oh, and I will echo Donna’s last thought, which despite the many hazards life can hold is so warmly reassuring. No, you don’t have to be “perfect” to deserve love—or to find it!

justkeepwalking
8 years ago

Somebody who lies about themselves while developing a relationship with you is stealing your ability to choose. They are depriving you from being able to make an informed choice, and hoping that by the time you find out, you’ll already like them — meaning, that you will have formed your view of them without that information, and thus choose to ignore the truth so you can keep that view. That you will have already bought into “love” with the person you thought they were, and so further buy into a fake need to forgive them for the lie, and still treat them as though they were the person they pretended to be.

It is manipulation, plain and simple. And what you get is someone who thinks it’s okay to lie to you in order to get you to do what they want. Why wouldn’t they do it again, since it’s worked so far?

Hope Springs
8 years ago
Reply to  justkeepwalking

Perfect. Exactly.

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