By Joyce Alexander, RNP (retired)
Most of you know I have spent a good portion of my life training animals of various kinds dogs for obedience and to work livestock, horses, donkeys and cattle (oxen).
When we train animals, we “condition” them to do X and they receive Y reward. Ivan Pavlov, a Russian physiologist, conditioned dogs to expect to be fed by ringing a bell every time they got fed. Eventually when a bell was rung, even though there was no food in sight, the animals expected to be fed, and their bodies reacted by making them “slobber” at the mouth, just as they would if food were present.
B.F. Skinner, and American psychologist, observed that animals who had intermittent rewards, rather than continual rewards, would continue a behavior longer than animals who got rewarded every time they did an act. For example, a rat that pushed a lever and got a grain of food every time, would quickly stop pushing it if the food didn’t com. But a rat that sometimes got a food pellet when he pushed the lever would continue to pound on the lever for a very long time, or even never stop pushing it, even though he did not get a food pellet.
In humans, this “intermittent” rewards works in a slot machine, or in gambling games, because every once in a while you get rewarded. Therefore, you keep hoping that next time will be THE TIME.
Psychopaths and intermittent rewards
You may ask what this training technique has to do with psychopaths. Well, just as Las Vegas was built on intermittent rewards for gamblers, relationships with psychopaths are built on the intermittent rewards they give us.
At the first part of the relationship, the psychopath “love bombs” us by giving us the good things we enjoy compliments, doing things for us, great sex. WOW! We think we have found nirvana. Just as a dog I am beginning to train gets a treat every time he “sits,” then only sometimes when he “sits,” the psychopath only gives us the “loving” some of the time. Also, just as I eventually no longer give the dog a food treat any time he “sits,” and the most he will get is a “good dog” verbal compliment, or a scolding if he doesn’t sit fast enough, the psychopath quits giving us treats and gives us “scoldings.”
We have been conditioned by the psychopath to be and do what they want, because we still desire that initial “love bombing,” and we dread the “scolding” they will give us if we don’t “jump” when they say “frog.” We keep on hoping against hope that we will be able to please them again. We do whatever we can to keep the scoldings to a minimum and get them to reward us with “love” again.
Running for bread
It doesn’t make any kind of difference if the animal we are training is a dog, a parrot, a donkey, an steer, a horse ”¦ the conditioning works the same. Intermittent rewards cause the desired behavior to continue. If we give continual rewards every time they perform the behavior, it wouldn’t take long for the behavior to be extinguished when we stopped rewarding it.
My mammoth jack donkeys, Fat Ass and Hairy Ass, haven’t had a piece of bread (their preferred treat) in a year or more. But any time I go to the hangar and open the freezer, they come running up to the fence on the never dying hope that I will get bread out of the freezer and give them a piece. They are totally “conditioned” to that treat, and they know that the opening and closing of the freezer is what always preceded them getting a slice of bread.
The psychopath we have had relationships with know what “rings our chimes,” what makes us happy and what makes us sad, or what makes us angry. It is like a panel of buttons on the front of our chest. They know just the exact words to say, or the thing to do, that will press our “buttons” and get the reaction they want from us.
No Contact is the answer
No Contact keeps those buttons covered. That is why it works.
Psychopaths know that in the past, if they pressed “button A,” you would do B. So they will keep on trying because IT ALWAYS WORKED IN THE PAST. They just know if they keep doing it, it will EVENTUALLY work again. So they will press it harder and faster and longer. Just like some old lady sitting at a slot machine, plugging in quarters, she just “knows” that the very next quarter will get her a reward. Just like my donkeys running up to the fence when I open the freezer, they still hope to get a slice of bread, a reward.
Expect when you go No Contact that the psychopath will up the ante and will work harder and longer to get a reaction. If it takes 30 times for them to eventually get a reaction, THEY LEARN THAT it takes 30 TIMES TO GET A REACTION. If next time it takes 40 times, they learn that they must work a bit harder to get a reaction, so they keep on and on and never stop.
So hang in there. Once you make up your mind to go NO CONTACT, then STAY no contact, because if you give them ANY reward of ANY kind, even a well deserved “cussing,” it is still a reward. It is ATTENTION, and even negative attention is attention. Not being noticed at all is the worst punishment they can have.
If you are required by law to have contact with them, like if you share children, do it only by e-mail, so that you have a record of it. Discuss ONLY the children. Do not respond to any nasty comments they make. Refuse to discuss the other person with your children, and Gray Rock them entirely. NO emotional responses at all. If possible, get someone else to pick up and drop off the kids, so you do not have to see him/her. Or do it in a public place, a police department parking lot if necessary.
We can stop them only by not responding. So when your ex is trying to push your buttons, just think about Joyce’s donkeys Fat Ass and Hairy Ass running up to the fence for a slice of bread. Visualize your psychopath with long ears, standing there trying to get a reaction from you, and then DON’T GIVE IT. Take control and refuse to allow the psychopath to make you respond to his/her button pushing!
God bless.
Spoon, I agree with OxD – one of your best posts. The analogy of the map makes sense to me, along with removing the emotion from the equation.
It’s not that I want to go around like an unfeeling, uncaring automaton – I don’t, and I really can’t. But, I DO have the tools that I need to strain that emotion away from the experience and get down to the facts of the matter. It’s a constant effort of practice, but it’s not so stinking difficult as I once believed it to be.
Brightest blessings
Strict aside and off-topic: If I had a donkey that was prone to dry, scaly skin, I’d name it “Dragon Ass.” Gotta say it out loud for it to make sense……er…….(ahem)……right.
So you’ve seen me coming home are a long day! 🙂
You guys crack me up. That’s why I love unusual names for animals, I used to have a cat named “Chairman Meow” and I have a barn cat now named “Mouse” (she’s mouse colored) her sister was named “Cat”
Let’s carry that dragon-ass a bit further,or into a different scenario….how ’bout DRAGGIN’ ASS?!!! That’s for those of us who are just slidin’ in on our fatigued tails,lol! ‘course I could fit into both catagories!
It’s not about being unfeeling but seeing that the feeling is coming from us. The world is not making us feel. The feeling is in us. And many times the feeling that we created comes from events that we misunderstood. So we are forever reliving an event that we misunderstood.
Parents made us feel less then. The problem wasn’t the kid but the parents. But the kid grows up thinking it was him and still going through life feeling less then. Change the meaning to it was the parents lack not the kids and we can scrub the emotional crap from it and move on.
The love people still feel for the spath works the same way. They created this emotional tie of love on to someone that could never return it. They misunderstood the situation. The feeling is real because it is in us. The brain doesn’t know the difference between constructive type of being in love to a destructive type of being in love. To it, it’s just love. But in the spath situation it is destructive and damaging to the one that is holding this in love for the spath.
We judge ourselves by our intent and others by their behavior.
Many times people will get caught up in the “Intent Trap.” Our “Intent” is always positive. Non-spaths lash out because they are hurt. Their intent is to defend. Which in it’s self is positive. But the “Intent trap” comes into play when they don’t take in to account where the “intent” is coming from and the end results i. e. the behavior causes. And in their minds they are following their intent. But somewhere they lost the context of it all. And when question people will get real defensive about their intent. Those who had friends and family that spoke out about this relationship with the spath became the enemy because they where speaking out about their intent. [Judging them] Which was to have this magical relationship, a place to belong or someone to care for them etc. What they wanted was not wrong or bad in it’s self. But it wasn’t there only an illusion. But to go against it was to go against their own “intent.” And the person caught in this “Intent Trap” can not go against it because that would be judging themselves as bad.
spoon
spoon. What a POWERFUL POST!
well DUH on ME!
You wrote:
“As far as the spath “getting it” doesn’t matter. Even if they did get it. They will still do what they do. It’s who they are.”
Ya see! A few words and gosh the value is ENORMOUS. I try to thank people whenever they have blessed me. ANd gosh, this is a BIGGIE. THANK YOU!
YES! I get stuck trying to FIX the wrong conclusions b/c I am conditioned that if I don’t, HELL will reign. But b/c I got STUCK in the FIXIT mode, I failed the simple followup logic that my head knows but my heart forgot! That is they do what they do b/c that’s what they are, NOT b/c I failed to FIX their bad conclusion!
That is DEF one of the holes I dug years ago, climbed out of, and yet still found myself back in, just as I did this last Christmas. Begging the one I loved to please don’t interpret my words in the way I Never intended. When the truth is, it didn’t matter what words I used, THEIR intent was to hurt/harm. They had an agenda and I CAN’T FIX THAT.
WOW. I can’t tell you how I feel a heavy dark cloud lift off my shoulders. DUH on me for missing the simple obvious lesson that I already knew but didn’t apply when I got stung. (stripping the meaning… what I call processing the hurt, putting it into healthy context and perspective. yep i knew to do this, i just forgot to do it when i jumped back into my black hole and wanted the world to collapse in on me and end it all.)
Katy, Having the BEST day in a LONG time.
Spoon, your post above is so SOOOO right on! We respond to the “truths” we believe in….whether they are right or wrong….”there’s good in all people” “it takes two to fight” “if I just love him enough they will love me back” etc etc “ad nauseum”
We must learn what Beliefs that we are operating under as true that are really false and only by self examination can we realize these things. We must compare “belief A” to “evidence B” to see if A=B if not then we must go with the EVIDENCE not the “belief”
That’s why I belief and frequently say, healing starts with learning about them but ends up with LEARNING ABOUT OURSELVES. Focusing continually and forever on THEM will not get us to a level of healing that is very productive, it gets us STUCK in a mode of blaming our feelings on THEM which doesn’t get rid of the feelings, just IMHO reinforces the bad feelings.
Here lately while working on my son Patrick’s parole protest, I focused on HIM and what he had done, what he was and it DERAILED my healing…so now I am back to focusing on ME and what I NEED to do to TAKE CARE OF MYSELF. To hell with Patrick and every other psychopath I’ve known, they are not going to change, and what they did in the past is IN THE PAST. Today is a NEW DAY, this MOMENT I HAVE is the ONLY MOMENT THERE IS. Because the past is gone, and the future not yet come.
I am having a lot of anxiety today because I talked to my ex-boyfriend last night. I want him to really want me and to be with me. I’m the one that broke it off with him and he moved on so quickly. I started reading lovefraud and it is him, exactly. I never knew and things were just never quit right. I have posted a few times on here. But today the feeling of rejection is more than I can take. I know everyone says no contact and that too is hard, especially when I do love him.
To be free,
When you broke no contact, you allowed yourself to be hurt AGAIN. You say “it is him” (meaning I suppose that he is a psychopath) and yet “I do love him.” Yes, we do love them, but that does not mean they love us. They are incapable of loving us, or any one else.
If he fits the description of a psychopath, I suggest that no matter how much you may feel “love” for him now, there is nothing but PAIN in a future relationship with someone like him.
I suggest that you read here and keep on reading and stay NO CONTACT, and that you order Donna’s book Red Flags of Love Fraud and READ IT….and keep on reading and learning and NO CONTACT. When you feel the desire to contact him come here first. (((hugs)))