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Mental health professionals: Name the disorder. Please.

You are here: Home / Explaining the sociopath / Mental health professionals: Name the disorder. Please.

July 7, 2008 //  by Donna Andersen

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Most of the time we spend with sociopaths is spent in confusion. They tell us that they love us, while they cheat on us and take our money. They tell us that everything will be wonderful while our lives are falling apart. They tell us they’re sorry and will never do it again, yet they do it again, and again, and again.

We ask ourselves—what in the world is going on here?

They explain it all away. The explanation seems to make sense. But something still isn’t right, and they still don’t stop the behavior that makes us believe we are losing our minds.

There must be a reason. We wonder if they’re depressed, or bipolar, or they have low self-esteem. We’ve been told that they were abused as children. They overindulge in alcohol or drugs, and we’re sure that if they can only overcome their addiction, they’ll change.

It never happens.

We can’t figure it out.

The words that fit the behavior

Then someone says, “It sounds like he (or she) is a sociopath.” Or maybe they even use the word “psychopath.”

Sociopath! They’re the guys on The Sopranos.

Psychopath! They’re all serial killers.

But something tells us to do more research, so we go online. We buy a book. And there they are, the people who are driving us insane, perfectly described in the symptoms of a sociopath.

At Lovefraud, we hear it all the time:

“He’s got every symptom on the list!” “The description fits her to a T!”

Finally, we have a name for that person’s problem. He or she is a sociopath. A psychopath. An antisocial.

Finally, it all makes sense. The lies, the emptiness, the remorselessness, the evil. There is a reason. It is not us. It is a personality disorder.

Naming the disorder makes all the difference. Finally, we begin to understand what we are dealing with. This allows us to begin recovery.

Learn about them in school

Why do we spend so much time in confusion? Because there is no education program about this personality disorder for the general public.

I remember a story from the tsunami that struck Indonesia, Sri Lanka, India and Thailand on December 26, 2004. A vacationing family was on the beach there when the ocean suddenly receded. The little girl of the family had just finished studying tsunamis in school, and learned that the receding ocean meant that a wall of water would soon come crashing into the shore. She told her family, and they escaped to higher ground.

Sociopaths cause personal tsunamis for all of their victims. The sociopaths/ psychopaths/ antisocials of the world cause a huge percentage of all human pain, damage and devastation, yet most of the population does not know they exist. Why? Why don’t we learn about these predators in school? If we did, when we saw the symptoms, we could escape.

Arguing over terminology

Part of the problem with trying to educate people about these predators is that the mental health professionals do not agree on what to call it. First it was moral insanity. Then it was psychopath. Then it was sociopath. Then it was antisocial personality disorder.

The professionals can’t agree on how to define and diagnose the disorder, either. The American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition (DSM-IV), is supposed to be the bible for clinicians. I find its description of antisocial personality disorder to be vague and difficult to understand.

Dr. Robert Hare’s description of the symptoms of a psychopath—the term he uses—is easier to understand, and the test he developed has been consistently shown to be useful in predicting recidivism among criminals. But Hare’s criteria and evaluation are resisted by many psychiatrists. From what I’ve heard, the basis for much of the disagreement is political.

Mental health profession should come to agreement

I believe this lack of agreement is a travesty, and the professionals are actually contributing to the confusion in which the predators operate. In a way, that makes the mental health professionals complicit in the havoc wreaked by the sociopaths/ psychopaths/ antisocials—whatever we call them.

Lovefraud calls on the professional associations to solve this problem. The American Psychiatric Association, the American Psychological Association, the American Medical Association, the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry—please, come to an agreement.

Make a decision. Define this disorder. Publicize the symptoms. Let the general public learn what to look out for.

It would help all of us keep the sociopaths/psychopaths/antisocials, the human tsunamis, from upending our lives.

Category: Explaining the sociopath

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Ox Drover
16 years ago

knowledge is POWER. Exercising that power is STRENGTH. We are all growing in Knowledge/power and exercising/strength. That is how we grow and improve ourselves, heal and move on with our lives.

Our experiences with the psychopaths will make us stronger, more powerful and more resilient. Like any strengthening exercise, it takes WORK to build power and strength—going to the “emotional gym” every day until we have the power and strength to protect ourselves in the future from ever having this experience again.

I know that if I don’t keep on exercising, my strength and power will weaken in my mind and heart, just as if I sat on the couch 24/7 my body would weaken.

If you throw a ball up in the air, as long as it is going up, it isn’t falling, but the SECOND it stops going up and stands still, it starts to fall. As long as we are growing we will keep on going UP UP UP!!!!!! Getting better and better each day.

swallow
16 years ago

I’ve tried many times to adequately describe to those that do not know what it is like to be caught up in the web of a psychopath. Listing all their evil deeds doesn’t seem to work and I’ve ended up being viewed as bitter, twisted and paranoid.
These days I tell people to think of those holograms where there is a flowery random pattern but hidden inside is an image of a T Rex. In the fairytale phase of the affair, you can only see the pattern but once the mask drops the dinosaur jumps out at you. You cannot understand why you could not see it before, it is so obvious. After that you can never look at that picture without seeing the two images but you have the almost impossible and frustrating task of trying to get others to see both of them. Some/most never do.
I would describe the psychological pain as being emotionally stoned to death. You never know when and from which direction the next blow is coming.
Swallow

Ox Drover
16 years ago

Quote Swallow:

“emotionally stoned to death. You never know when and from which direction the next blow is coming.”

WOW, what an analogy! If that doesn’t describe the p-experience I don’t know what does.

Beverly
16 years ago

Hiya dear Free. The most common reaction I have had from people, when I say I went out with a Narcissist, is :- ‘Oh a Narcissist is someone who loves themselves isnt it’.

Wrong, its someone who loves themself on the outside but loathes themself on the inside. Isnt it??

buzzibee
16 years ago

Yes, excellent analogy!! It could become the official slogan.

I concluded that my psycho was just like an angler-fish. That’s that really ugly and vicious fish that lies in the darkest depths of the ocean and when it detects prey nearby it has a little ‘light’ dangling from a tentacle and the light mesmerises and attracts the prey and… MUNCH!!!! If you saw Finding Nemo you’ll remember the scene where Marlin and Dory go deep and it gets darker and darker .. then they see the light!! The raw, unadulterated ugliness that lurked behind that exceptionally beautiful light was very accurate of my experience. My psycho practices as a colour & ‘light’ therapist, manufacturing beautiful kaleidoscopes, claiming that the natural coloured crystals reflecting the light and forming the symmetrical patterns would HEAL people of emotional/personality/mental disorders!?!?!?!?! And that she had ten years of documented study proving that this really works, even with children who have ADD/ADHD, etc. (by the way, there was no such data available) She’s arrogantly holier-than-thou and struts around like the local guru but is truly a text-book case of a psychopathic blood sucker. Imagine the shock when you’ve come to know a ‘spiritually enlightened’ person (hmmm) whose daily chant is “for the good of all, with harm to none” … oh yes!! And then the curtain falls away and you’re confronted with satan’s daughter with nothing making any sense at all!! We’ve all been emotionally stoned. We’ve all been shocked to the core of our existence… and we are ALL wiser, bearing a few battle scars, but wiser nonetheless. If you haven’t seen Finding Nemo, do yourself a favour and rent the dvd. It really is a lovely ‘feel-good’ movie.

bird
16 years ago

the baby bird has hatched:) Thank you everyone for your support during that time. This blog is great, because you just can’t explain your situation to the normal population and have them understand. Try explaining crocadile tears! I don’t even totally get those. All I know from my experience with them is that the tears come at really ackward times. The normal population just doesn’t cry at that timing. But when I tell friends he cried, they just say “ooooh, you see? He isn’t a sociopath.”

Wini
16 years ago

bird: I hear exactly what you are saying. Friends look at us, like couldn’t you tell? I have to bite my tongue when they mean well … but they really should look at the slime they are dating/married too and continue to stick their heads in the sand. It really comes down to the breakdown of the church for “normal” people. Whatever, normal is today. The anti-socials get to sit behind what guys think is their rights of passaaage … sowing their oats and another notch on the bedposts etc. It all gets tangled in together and meanwhile, those of us on this site and how many millions of other people who haven’t found this site … have experienced those that aren’t in touch with their emotions. I’m taking deep breaths now. Welcome back.

Ox Drover
16 years ago

BIRD!!! CONGRATULTIONS!!! But don’t think you are going to get away with a just “the baby bird has hatched” bit, tell us alll about it, and how the two of you are doing? We went to know EVERYTHING!!!!

swallow
16 years ago

Bird,
CONGRATULATIONS !!!!! I hope the two of you are doing well.
He/she is very lucky to have a strong, brave Mother who now has the knowledge to protect an innocent new life.
Forget what other, ignorant people say. You know the TRUTH and that is all that matters.
Swallow

newworld view
16 years ago

wow congrats bird…and welcome to the family baby bird……big kisses and bunches of love to you both terri

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