Most of the people who will be bad for us are not sociopaths, and so we want our radar to be sharp, not specifically for sociopaths, but for wrong, bad people of every stripe.
True, sociopaths will be terrible people with whom to enter relationships; in the end, though, they will represent a small fraction of a much greater majority of very wrong people for us.
As I suggested in a prior post, there are two keys to protecting ourselves from Mr. or Mrs. WRONG: The first is developing intelligent radar; the second is acting wisely on that radar.
After all, good radar, no less than good CIA intelligence, is useless if it’s ignored or devalued.
Now, are there cases of sociopaths (and the lot of devious personalities) so slick as to be undetectable until after they’ve wreaked their havoc? Of course there are; to suggest otherwise would insult anyone unlucky enough to have crossed paths with such destructive individuals.
Nevertheless, in most cases, the wrong person—sociopath or not—will and does leave clues much sooner than most of us want to admit (until much later).
WRONG, by the way, for whom? The answer, of course, is, YOU!
It is tempting and, at some point, I suggest, unfruitful to get stuck on the suspected psychopathology of a partner (present, or ex). Because when you get right down to it, there are only two diagnoses that really matter: Is this person, for me, RIGHT, and GOOD? Or WRONG, and BAD?
Only we can make this assessment, and it’s our responsibility, of course, to make it as soundly as possible. By soundly I mean being as honest with ourselves as possible, and keeping our best long-term interests uppermost in mind.
What, then, is the first—and, for that matter, second—telltale sign that someone is wrong, and really bad, for you, sociopath or not? (And speaking honestly, should we really need more than a sign or two?)
The answer is, ANY EXPRESSED BEHAVIOR or ATTITUDE that leaves you feeling disarmed or disoriented by its inappropriateness, selfishness and/or insensitivity.
Take great heed of such an experience, because almost always, it is a sign that more are sure to follow. In other words, preparing to bail at this point is a wise consideration.
Specifically, what behaviors and attitudes am I referring to? For starters, how about the first, surprising flash of rage, contempt, arrogance, selfishness, coldness, presumptuousness, dishonesty, indifference, ungratefulness, even denseness; shocking acts of abuse, verbal or physical; and startling failures of empathy, or compassion.
It is really less the behavior or attitude, per se, that screams ALARMING”¦prepare to BAIL!, than the experience of it as, “Where did that come from?”
I stress: It is our job, first, to register these signs; and then immediately to register them as alarmingly ominous.
The question is, Will you be willing to see what you’ve seen? Will you be willing to acknowledge the sobering portent of the display? Or instead, for any of a hundred conveniences, will you find ways to pretend you didn’t see it, and/or minimize the ramifications of what you’ve seen?
It is perfectly fine to ask, What, in a new relationship, should I be watchful for? What are the signs that my new interest may be someone different than advertised? I hope I’ve addressed these questions.
Then again, such questions tend, I think, to promote a view of the world as waiting to unleash upon us ruinous new bogeymen and predators, instead of encouraging us to examine what can be harder, but perhaps more honest, useful, retrospective questions, like, What did I miss? Why did I miss it? And if I registered it, why did I choose to ignore or minimize it?
Insight into, and resolution of, these latter questions can confer the best insurance against future exploitation.
In most (certainly not all) cases, it may be less important to be wary of the next nightmare disguised as Mr. or Mrs. SENSITIVE, than more careful of our always lurking capacity for defenses like denial, rationalization and minimization to blind us to what we don’t want to see, and do.
(This article is copyrighted (c) 2008 by Steve Becker, LCSW.)
Hey Jen2008 – excellent questions. I have many of the same ones. Its been a while since graduate school – I completed my doctorate in 1999, but finished with my course work by 1996, so ints been over 10 years since I have taking classes in graduate school. I hope it changes. We were taught about “antisocial personality disorder” as part of training on personality disorders (Axis II disorders). Antisocial probably got one class, if even that in a whole semester. I think the thought processes at the time were that APD people don’t seek out treatment, so we really don’t need to study them too much. I think there was a substantial lack of knowledge about the damage that people with APD due to the psyches of others. I think it simply wasn’t known or recognized. Increasingly, I’ve noticed attention to battered women in hospitals and medical practices – and a slight increase in knowledge and treatment of abusive relationships in general. Unless graduate schools have changed drastically – and I don’t think they have, sociopaths are really not given the attention they merit. And sociopath survivors most definitely are not. I think survivors, like us, are just beginning to band together and get the word out. I think so many of us have suffered in shameful silence for so long that we’ve been an unrecognized group. I think we, as survivors need to speak up (though in my experience so far, people other than other survivors seem to think I’m crazy or whining), and the mental health field ABSOLUTELY has to get in gear. I’m not sure how that’s going to happen. I’m going to try to do my part.
Yes, Matt, drawing and quartering. These creatures have to be stopped. I don’t think we can rehabilitate them. Which is scary. They need to be managed, controlled, quarantined.
Jen
There is no treatment= no money in it
Matt, you forgot the HANGING (but not until dead) before the drawing and quartering. LOL
Jen, I’m not a therapist per se, but I have worked as a registered nurse practitioner in mental health clinics and in inpatient settings.
The answer is that there are so many “experts” out there who don’t know squat about Personality disorders, and some people in my estimation don’t want to “hang a label” on someone so they do NOTHING or they give it a “less damaging” label. There is also the “politically correct” idea that ANYTHING can be “managed” with “the right approach” or the right medication, etc. When the REALITY IS that some people can’t be helped.
In physical medicine as a general rule physicians are not good about telling patients “There’s nothing we can do for you, you are going to die.” When my husband was burned with third degree burns over 95% of his body and had inhaled enough flames that his tongue was BURNED, the physician never once indicated to me that my husband MIGHT EVEN DIE. He started out by telling me that they were going to send him by helicopter to Memphis (3 hrs away) to the BEST BURN hospital in the country.
Now, there was ZIP, ZERO, NADA, NONE ZILCH chance that my husband would have lived more than 24 hours no matter what was done. FORTUNATELY I looked at the doctor and asked WHY? He looked puzzled at me and said “Well, it’s the best burn center in the country?” I repeated my question -WHY? and he repeated his answer.
Finally I said “I was at the scene of the crash, my husband’s tongue is burned, he inhaled the flames, he has third degree burns, why on God’s green earth would you treat him?”
The physician looked dumbfounded. Now, I ask you, why would this man, who KNEW THE TRUTH, not tell the family the truth, why would he give them unfounded HOPE? Because even most physicians can’t accept that THERE IS NO TREATMENT THAT CAN HELP.
A physician I love dearly who saved my best friends’ life from leukemia when she was hours away from death and my friend is 9 years out cancer free now, I have gone round and round with this woman about her REFUSAL to tell even the most hopeless cases that they are going to die. I told her once that I thought if they would let her she would go to the funeral and prize open the coffin lid and say “Let’s just try one more round of chemo.”
When my stepfather was diagnosed with a HOPELESS case of cancer that NO ONE LIVES OVER this lovely and sweet woman insisted that he have chemo, I finally got him to get another opinion and THAT guy also insisted and my stepdad tried 2 rounds of it and got so sick that he said NO MORE. He was terribly miserable for two months. Fortunately, he did get over the chemo sickness and had a few months of life before he died (pain free because of hispice thank you God!)
I understand why it is a good thing to “not give up hope” on some things, but at the same time, I have fought my entire career to get physicians to be HONEST AND UP FRONT with patients so they do not lie to them, give them false hope that there is “treatment.”
My step father’s death was the BEST DEATH WITH DIGNITY I have ever been priviledged to observe….and I have been around more than a few in my career.
I honestly think that the mental health industry is the same as far as “not giving up hope” on psychopaths and other personality disorders that are just as toxic. I wish I didn’t feel this way, but I have SEEN too much FIRST HAND to think any other way.
When my son was arrested at age 17 and we went to court ordered counseling, the counselor treated me like I was Atilla the Hun and my “poor little abused” baby was in trouble with stealing because we had such a baaaaad family—sheesh!
Rune wrote…..”I think one BIG factor is that the therapist is trained to look at the person in the room as the person with the problem. ”
This is so true and I am very glad to see someone stating this problem so well! That is it exactly. Very accurate! I found going to professionals to discuss what was going on with an S/N and what to do about it a complete waste of time and money. It was discouraging, upsetting, disheartening, and expensive! I would sit in shocked disbelief at some of the things I was told. Deciding how to handle the counselor became challenging and draining. It would take me days to get over a “session” and seeing that as a big red flag was not difficult……neither was looking elsewhere for some knowledge, wisdom, and support. I’ve learned a lot from a variety of resources and I think it has served me much better in the long run than paying bongo bucks to a professional who said things like, “We have to find out why all this bothers you so much”, in addition to a long list of other gems and fad counseling cliches.
Healing Heart,……. Thank you for being open to what we are saying about this. Your path will become clear.
Tempist
Lets Start from the beginning! What is your earliest Childhood Memory ! :)~ at $ 400.00 hr I would want you to start at the Beginning TOOOOOOOOO!:)~ LOVE JJ
Indigoblue,
🙂
Eye says: “Deciding how to handle the counselor became challenging and draining . . . ” Exactly. I worked with a counselor doing her internship at a low cost/no cost community clinic. She had no clue about the disorder when we began talking, but she was at least sympathetic and she learned a great deal from me about the disorder. Fortunately I wasn’t paying, and at least she had the sense and heart to validate me in my efforts to recover. The woman was graduating from one of the “best counseling programs in the country” and she knew nothing — absolutely nothing — about psychopathy.
Regarding counselors at the battered women’s shelter, consider that 25% to 50% of battering cases involve a sociopath. That means that among the clientele, and among those calling the help hotline, as many one out of three calls or one out of two or three women asking for help was dealing with a sociopath. (Consider also that a sociopathic woman might easily manipulate the system to leech, but the statistics tend to run to more men than women being dangerous in this context.)
I find it appalling that this information is not part of the training for any domestic violence program in the country. That whole system is dedicated to “anger management” and the “hearts and flowers cycle of violence.”
In my mind, the real psychopaths are even more dangerous when they learn to control the behaviors that will get them arrested and they get more slick and covert about their predations — emotional and financial abuse, for example.
Healing Heart:
In addition to sociopaths being managed, controlled and quarantined I might add sterilized. Why we would want these vampires to perpetuate the species is beyond me.
EyeoftheStorm:
Right now I am feeling very much like you with respect to my experience with my therapist vis-a-vis my experience with my S. I’ve cut back my sessions to 1 to 2 a month for the simple reason I’m stuck with him until I finish weaning myself off the damned drugs he got me on.
Your experience made me think of a New York Magazine article awhile back on the topic of escaping from your shrink. The extent people have to go to to escape a toxic therapy relationship — moving with no forwarding address, changing jobs, changing phone numbers, changing names…
Living in a major metro area I think the ratio of therapists to citizens is probably 1 to 10. So, my theory is they’re all reluctant to admit a therepeutic relationship is not working or they can’t help you.
My therapist recently said to me “S exhibits many of the classical signs of sociopathy.” HELLO! Since I was singing the same tune many months ago and stumbling around blindly trying to get a grip on what the hell I was involved with, he didn’t think he should clue me in earlier? If he had, a whole lot of personal suffering, money and frustration could have been avoided.