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.
A Baby Bird… how cute. :o)
BIRD. HEY CONGRATULATIONS ON THE BIRTH OF A NEW LIFE – YOUR BABY BIRD (((Kisses and Hugs)))
bird,
Congratulations bird on your baby peep. I’d take a baby any day of the week over a man! Lucky you. New life is so great.
Thanks everyone.
OxDrover. It was a long and grueling process but totally worth it. My friend (god bless her) stayed with me the whole time and was the best coach ever. Sometimes I see angels in people, and she was one that day. The baby bird and I are great and our recovery is going well. I am really tired. The baby bird is beautiful.
Baby has a sociopath as a father. We will be taking it one day at a time. Baby bird fusses when put down, and is comforted when held. I think this is a good sign that perhaps the sociopath gene has not been inherited.
Dear Bird,
I am so glad that you and the beautiful Baby Birdie are doing well and that you had your angel friend there with you as a coack. That is wonderful.
Just love that baby and bond with Birdie and show that you love and are there and that is the way little babies learn to love and bond, by being comforted. Knowing that someone responds to their needs. My prayers have been for you and Birdie and I hope God doesn’t get tired of listening to me pray for you two.
Thank God that not every child born of a psychopath is one. I am the child of one, and have psychopathic genes on BOTH sides of my family, so don’t you worry about your baby, just love the Birdie and trust in God. ((((Big Hugs)))) for you both!
I think the link for this article belongs here:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080714/hl_nm/delinquents_genes_dc;_ylt=Alh1MK4AhWuoAzhZCq0sxWEDW7oF
I have 2 boys with the xs, so I worry too, Bird. This article gives me hope, I hope it does for you too.
I have been reading this blog for a long time and have yet to write anything until now. I want to thank ALL of you for sharing your stories and helping others like me along their way.
I have found such relief regarding myself on this site as I was so far into the web of the S I was dating that I began to think I was crazy. One of the most difficult aspects of my experience is that I am a mental health therapist. I was shocked that I did not see it early on, that I believed the lies I was fed by the S, and that I didn’t listen to warnings from others. I was solid in denial. But I was conned as we all were. If someone had asked me what an S was a year ago I wouldn’t have been able to say what I know about them now. We are not taught in my profession about Ss. Not in how I’ve come to understand them and recognize them. It is a travesty that MUST change.
I thank God for the truth He’s revealed and the direction He has pointed me in to find that truth repeatedly. I too did my investigating and the S got the law involved as if I was stalking him. Stalking involves some desire or delusion of a connection. I wanted no connection. I wanted TRUTH. I found it. I had been cermoniously devalued and discarded and left to die. I wanted to know why. The long distance relationship made it hard but I found out truth. Found aliases online and the truth that he lived two lives while we were together. All professions of love were a lie as he is the lie.
The S’s motive in my experiences is what is considered murder by suicide. He would have been happy had I succeeded in killing myself and I have a night of my life I will never remember. He was involved and later told me that he though I was suicidal and wanted him to kill me on my behalf. Chillingly creepy and the farthest thing from the truth. I am lucky to be alive. I am also lucky that he at least admitted to being homicidal. But he blamed that on me as they blame everything on everyone else. If it wasn’t me who made him do mean things it was his late wife or his ex-g/f or God or his father…whomever.
As a MH professional it is hard to understand why my colleagues have not understood what happened to me or why the first doc I went to diagnosed me with Bipolar d/o and not PTSD. I knew the difference but just wanted some bleeping help regarding how insane I felt and uncontrollable my thoughts were. The obsessions, that “knowing” that something is wrong, the inability to sleep, to eat, to sit still, to feel as if any moment I was going to crack. Needless to say I dropped that doc and have had a difficult time finding anyone in this field who gets it. I feel I am educating my therapist week by week. But perhaps that isn’t so bad. Everyone in my field needs to be more educated on the Ss in our society. It’s becoming an epidemic.
To at least put a good word in for those in my field, I think it is very hard to understand it if you have not experienced it yourself. The best I can tell others is that you feel you are going crazy, you feel brainwashed and you lose all sense of who you are after an encounter with an S. They are not all serial killers but they are killers no doubt. As M. Scott Peck writes in People of The Lie, evil is “live” spelled backwards. “Evil is in opposition to life. It is that which opposes the life force. It has, in short, to do with killing. Specifically, it has to do with murder, namely, unnecessary killing, killing that is not required for biological survival.” “Evil is that which kills the spirit.”
I believe that many of us have sought God to figure out what happened to us and what we were dealing with. I cannot explain it without saying that I felt as close to evil as I could get. That the only way to explain my ex is to say he is evil-incarnate. He did not hit me, did not steal my money…he tried to steal my mind with gaslighting, emotional manipulation and lie after lie after lie. He tried to steal what is good in me…my empathy, trust, love and hope in humanity. But when darkness comes and tries to decend on me I remember that which God said the moment I first cried out…”put down the guilt, the blame and shame for it is not yours to carry.” It wasn’t, it is his and he projected it onto me. I have gone through the anger and fury at what happened to me and I have gone through the grief and somedays I cycle back through it as my mind seeks understanding. I will never get that understanding though. I am not so upset by that. For I don’t want to understand something that is not in me…evil. We are of the light, they are of the darkness. They have tried to take from us and our job is to get back what was stolen. The difficulty for some of us is figuring out how to do that. But we will all find our way. I believe that this site helps us do it together. I am eternally grateful for all of you. God bless you brave souls willing to share and reach out to help your fellow victim AKA SURVIVOR!
Dear Takingmeback:
Your post has hit so close to home for me. The S. I still see (but not for long) has not physically abused me (but has killed my spirit), has not stole my money (I have given willingly), has not made me promises he can’t keep (but lies continuously), and has never told me that he was a monogomous person (but refuses to acknowledge his sexual addiction).
I sometimes think I am mistaken in labeling him an S. since he knows he has problems (many jobs-no career, no money, run down car, 44 years old and can’t find the right woman to marry) He has prayed about these things for 15 years since he became clean. Everybody loves him, he was a good child, he’s smart, he’s been honest in his journals. He truly seems to want change.
Then…I see his personality flip, realize he fits all of Hare’s checkklist except the criminal history. Has he brainwashed himself with the words? Is everything really fake? How do I know? I have been told: “He’s not an S. he’s just a selfish jerk”, “All men are like that, especially black men” , “You’re an educated, independent woman, just leave him”. All of these statements have been made by my friends/co-workers in the social services/mental heath field.
Thank you all for your posts. Thank you for your responses. Thank you for giving me your insight. Thank you for helaling. Thank you all for opening your hearts and your voices to help yourself and others. I hope that I will soon get to the point to give back and help others in the future.
Dear Takingmeback,
Thank you for your wonderful post, I am glad to know that you have found this healing place. It is difficult to be a mental health professional and get taken in. Being on the “other side of the clipboard” was a humiliating experience for me, but one I have realized was also life saving.
Lib, welcome to you as well, and thank you for your insightful post as well. This is definitely a healing place and I appreciate Donna and Dr. Leedom and the others who write here so very very much.
Its been a few days since I had time to get on here and read the posts. Its been 11 days of NC and he hasnt tried to contact me, interestingly enough. I did speak to one of his friends’ wives and finally told her what I thought of jerkboy. She agreed he was an alcoholic, but just told me to not call him for a while and maybe someday him and I can be friends again. RIIIGHHHHT…like I want that. She TOTALLY dismissed his behavior and said, “well…he never really treats us like that so we havent seen that side of him”. She didnt really disbelieve me…she just didnt make that big of a deal out of it.
WHYYYY did he only do this to me? The one he claimed to love…the one he claimed was the most important thing in his life? WHY? He goes on with the rest of his life, under his mask, and the whole world thinks he’s just a great guy. They have no clue.