Research into sociopathy/psychopathy has made a great deal of progress over the last 30 years. Even so, there is much that research does not address. For example, sociopaths are described as callous, lacking in empathy and without remorse for their hurtful actions. These sterile descriptors always fall short of really conveying the evil of the disordered.
A good 6 months before the Madoff story broke, I began a project to connect with the family members of professional con artists. The purpose of this project is to document the within family behavior of con artists and to link that “profession” to psychopathic personality traits. I have had good success connecting with family members and the exchange of information has been healing all around.
One con artist is in prison for affinity fraud- the use of a church, or other social connection to perpetrate fraud. This man was good at pretending to be a great “Christian” and used his church affiliation to swindle people. There is no doubt he is highly psychopathic as this is his second prison term and the descriptions given by his ex-wife are that of a classic sociopath.
Like many con artists, this man also has children. One of his daughters is the same age (within a couple of weeks) as my eldest daughter; she just turned 18. I spoke with this young lady with the permission of her mother and have had an ongoing dialogue with her. She wanted to talk to me because she was taking psychology in high school and had figured out on her own that her father is a sociopath.
This young lady is such a gem, so I’ll call her Gem here. She is smart, lovely and kind-hearted. In her own way she has been coming to grips with the reality that her father is incapable of love. He wasn’t physically violent but he has been callous, lacking in empathy and emotionally abusive toward everyone in the family. There I go with the adjectives that describe a sociopath.
Researchers are puzzled by the phenomenon of empathy in sociopaths. Although sociopaths seem to know all too well what others are thinking and feeling, they don’t respond in a normal way to what they know. Instead, they use their knowledge of others to manipulate. When the manipulation is perpetrated on a child or vulnerable teen/ young adult it is especially evil.
Gem shared with me the birthday communication she received from her imprisoned father. With her permission, I share it with you. She and I both hope this example will help other family members heal and move on. When I read the card, I was outraged and knew immediately the effect it had on my young friend. Without a lengthy explanation, a person ignorant of sociopaths would never “get it” regarding the manipulation I saw as blatant manipulation. Here is what the card said:
” My sweet baby girl, I miss you and love you very much. Happy 18th birthday. It seems like yesterday I held this little tiny baby with the biggest most beautiful eyes. I have so many great memories of you, handfuls of dog food, pretty little dresses. You played soccer but hated it. You danced and laughed your way into everyone’s heart. You are all a father could ever ask for in a daughter. I pray for you every day. May you find the best in life as you begin your adult life. I hope your dreams come true. You’re wonderful, beautiful, and always will be my little girl. God bless you.
Love Dad”
OK an ignorant person reading this would say, “What a sweet, nice card, to get from a father.” This communication might also be cited as an example of how hard it is for the kids of the imprisoned to be separated from their loving parents who made, “mistakes in life.”
A person who really knows sociopaths would react with outrage as I did. I know that just a few short months before this card, the father in question stole money from his ex-wife. Money she was using to take care of Gem, his little girl. Furthermore, all during Gem’s childhood he was conning people including family members out of their money. He never had any real connection to Gem. She never felt he loved or wanted her. This card in my view was pure evil, why? because it preyed upon this beautiful Gem, a young lady who always wished for a real father.
When she sent me what her father had written, I responded, “I am speechless over that card, it must represent everything you wish he would have said to you your whole life. I hope you keep it and believe in your heart, mind and soul that this is what YOU DESERVE always and forever from your parents and your boyfriend/future husband.”
Here is what Gem said in response to my interpretation, “it did just trigger something in me that just made me cry. I couldn’t help but break down and cry after reading that because I HAVE always wanted to hear that from a father-figure but now… it’s too late.”
This con artist, bored in prison is writing cards, hoping for some entertaining responses, while his family is working to heal, make sense of it all, and move on. The words of the card, if left unchecked by reality, delay the moving on that is so important. Gem is off to college next fall and is moving on to a great life that she will make for herself.
It is only my personal knowledge of sociopaths and how they operate that enabled the correct interpretation of the birthday card. Please feel free to share your own examples of a sociopath’s manipulation of your emotions. Particularly useful are examples of a sociopath’s use of words that are superficially appropriate, but very inappropriate given the specific circumstances.
That is so true; sometimes the only ones that really see behind the mask of the s are the people in the family. Sometimes even the extended family refuses to see. Only the partner, child or spouse sees the real face. To society they appear desirable, healthy and upstanding citizens, holding positions of public servants, teachers, but behind closed doors is a different story. Sometimes it takes years for the person who lives with the sociopath to clearly see. S are more confusing than other type of damaged people because they make you feel good and important, good mixed with the ugly, so you cannot see straight. They go for the confusion. It’s never black and white, their techniques are subtle and deliberate. They can say the most amazingly beustiful things, write poetry about you then turn around and do the most sadistic and cruel things.
Over the years I have carried a fantasy of unmasking the S to others. I know that it’s probably not a good idea since I could be the one getting hurt. I think people would not believe. I have tried explaining to others as to what I have gone through and they looked at me as if I was the crazy and hysterical one. One person went as far as calling me toxic and cutting all contact because I spoke the truth.
I wish I could give you specific examples but I have burned everything the S has given and written to me. I had hundreds of love notes, cute notes, long adoring letters. One that particulartly stands out as creepy is a piece of paper he sent me not much after we met where he wrote my name a few hundred times. The whole sheet covered in my first name written hunfreds of times. Creepy! How could I have ever thought otherwise?
It’s interesting, after the split with the s, after all the ugliness and and the devastation left behind him, I got a b-day card 2 years later with the sweetest words and the picture of my favorite painting on it. It made me ill. The handwriting was very strange and very forced, some word were traced over and over, it was creepy. I never responded to it, I burned it also.
Next time I saw the S, he was with his new wife, he pointed me out to her, and they were laughing and pretending that I was not there. He was avoiding eye contact and laughing in the same time. I remember when I was with the s he used this same technique to shame those who were fallen fro his grace and no longer sociopath “worthy”. Later I have heard that cults often use this technique to shame and shun the members who have gone “astray”.
GREAT ARTICLE!
In the case of my P-bio-father, most people who knew him feared him, and he did not paint a picture of the “Mr. Nice Guy” so if I talked to anyone who actually KNEW him, I had no problem being believed in the things I said about him.
My mother, who I really think is a toxic enabler, rather than a psychopath, who does the damage at the beheist of my psychopathic son (or other psychopaths) I have a BIG problem getting anyone to believe me. Mom keeps up such a benign and “sweet” face in front of the world, that very few people have EVER seen her “real face” and in some cases, I think the MOST TOXIC demonstrations of her “real face” have been reserved EXCLUSIVELY for me. Even my son C though he does “get it” that she is a bald faced lair, that she is a toxic enabler, has never seen the look of total perniscious rage on her face that I have. The look that if “looks could kill” she would have struck me dead on the spot. I’m actually not sure that she (at that moment anyway) wouldn’t have killed me if she could have. I do know though that if her “dream” of my P-son coming home from prison meant my death, she would go for him coming home over my life–oh, yes, she would somehow justify my death as a “mistake” or “accident” but none-the-less, she would DO IT.
My P-son writes letters like the one the man wrote to his daughter, filled with love and sweetness that IF YOU DIDN’T KNOW THE PERSON WHO WROTE THEM you would think came from the most loving wonderful person in the world to someone they dearly cared for.
“Dear Grandma,
All I ever wanted was to come home to the farm and be with you, take care of you in your old age and live peacefully. Mom and C are trying to keep me in prison, and you are the only hope I have. I love and appreciate you so much, and BTW thanks for the money you sent. You are the ONLY hope I have of ever getting out of here or having a life when I do get out. I would love to come home and be with you, but I know mom and C will never leave me alone. They will make life hell for me, only you can take care of me.
I am praying so hard that you are healthy until I get out. I just can’t imagine a world without out you, they will persecute me to the ends of the earth, and I never did anything to hurt them. I just want to be with you. Love, P”
Yes, Greenfern, the masks are pretty good in so me cases (like my mother’s) but my son’s mask only works for my mother NOW as everyone else that knows him sees through the WORDS to the DEEDS and the evil deeds SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES.
At one time my mother saw the deeds (through the REAL letters her wrote to his confederates in planning my death) and as she read them she said “They sound like they were written by two different people” so she GOT IT THEN, but like many dupes, she has GONE BACK TO BELIEVING THE LIES, because to NOT believe them, she would have to face the truth that her grandson is a psychopathic murdering SOB without a single redeeming feature to his mind or body. She can’t face the truth, it is too painful for her, so she falls back on the life-long patterns of avoiding pain by playing “let’s pretend we are a nice normal family” and punishing anyone who doesn’t go along with the program. Sad, but that’s the way it is and I can’t save her from herself any more than I can save my P-son from himself. I have tried for my entire life it seems, but finally got through to myself that every effort I gave down to and including my life and my sanity didn’t do a bit of good, so now I am focusing on the thing I can do, and this is to SAVE MYSELF FROM THEM. To heal myself of their wounds.
Thanks for sharing this Liane, very enlightening article.
it is like a rapist sending flowers and a note after the rape- “it was lots of fun, hope to see you again soon”.
GREAT ANALOGY, Stunned.
Stunned: How true. Sad, but very true.
I am astounded sometimes when I tell people what my ex-P did to me that they don’t think it’s that big of a deal. If they only knew what we know about him. I have a note in my son’s baby book that he wrote while I was still pregnant:
“I’m proud of you! My Wife you took not only my name but my heart as well. Now we are embarking on a journey of parenthood and I can’t be any more excited than I am now to know we are doing this together. You will be a great mom! I can’t wait to see our child. I love you and I hope that everytime you see this letter you smile. Please know that I’m here for you every step of the way. You complete me. Please know that when I say I love you, I also desire you with all of my heart. Love 4 ever, P (highspeed paramedic)”
Now, reading this makes me want to hurl. After our son was born he was very ill and was in the hospital as much as he was out. My mom or I were always the ones to stay with my son while he was in the hospital. P would always gripe about having to be there, wouldn’t stay for more than about 30 min., he was too tired, had something more important to do, etc. Whatever happened to the “journey of parenthood”? I was certainly on it, but he was and mostly is not now. He said then he would be there every step of the way, but he would frequently yell at our crying newborn, and now that we have divorced he doesn’t pay his child support or use visitation (I’m thrilled about that one). He keeps telling me that if there’s anything I need to just let him know. The one time I took him up on the offer, I asked him to bring some diapers for his son. He said he would, but that was in June 2008. I still haven’t seen any diapers! Surprised? Cause I’m not!!! It’s sad that they have to twist their words to hurt everyone around them. Gosh, do I HATE him!
The XS/P is a manipulator plain and simple. He and his older daughter, 25, had a very emotionally incestuous relationship. I don’t know how else to explain it. They keep each other in tow by talking about intimate things that they “would NEVER share with anyone else” (if I had a dollar for every time he said that). They withheld affection and conversation to punish, were both childish and spiteful. The younger daughter, 22, was in rehab and he would supply her with and smoke pot with her even when she was under 21. He managed to be “friends” with his kids and today they are an emotional mess.
The older daughter orders him around and he would not DARE tell her to not cross his boundaries. he got into a fist fight with her fiance. She was supposedly “negotiating” his divorce, then raised holy hell when he didn’t give her mother everything she demanded for her. They are a sick group.
However, I can’t help but believe that they have to realize the drama and behaviors are not normal. They are not adults who still cannot support themselves or function in the world and I don’t believe they will. HE is even embarrassed by them and should be. They are a product of him.
His sister told me once that his mother told him to have his older daughter checked by a psychiatrist. SHe had beaten up a boy in school and had behavioral problems. He didn’t speak to his mother for three years. His sister said they have no boundaries and that is why their father doesn’t have a life. She didn’t know the kind of life he had….affairs, lies, women. Then when I told her about the lies, she made excuses.
I think for most, sociopathy is shameful to all. Yet no one wants to accept, admit or deal with it. Very few will. The girl in this article is on a good path. I find it hard to believe that there can be much normalcy or peace in the lives of any of the family members.
I do understand the dram a bit better. It was necessary in order for all of them to get his attention. And when things were calm, HE created drama whether it be in the form of a “heartfelt note or phone call telling his daughters how much he loves them and sobbing as he spews the lies, or even in a tantrum in the middle of a restaurant starting a fight. In the case of the S/P I dealt with, they all need each other and I don’t see these behaviors ending EVER.
here is the funniest thing of all……this man lied to meabout almost everything and in the end, he told me that I BROKE THE TRUST. You know why? because I repeated the truth about him to others. I broke the trust because I didn’t KEEP UP THE LIES, just like his family does for him. In the end, they don’t want to admit them and are blind to them and also fear embarrassment because of them.
Litterbox: Don’t ever tell him what you want, because he will make sure you don’t get it. Give him as little information as possible. Smile. Be neutral. Don’t give up any emotion that he can use to get at you. If you get angry at something, he’ll know how to use that to make you angry. If you’re happy, he’ll know what to take away to make you miserable.
I remember when I was married only about six weeks. I was 18, with my new husband, in a small mountain community on our “honeymoon.” We were roughing it in a ghost-town/dude-ranch environment. I spent most of a day cooking up a stew for dinner: scrounging spices, figuring things out. Of course he took one bite and complained, making sure to complain long and loud in front of other people. (I had borrowed a corner of the kitchen to cook for my new husband.) I was a sweet little thing, always trying to do right. I remember a huge fury welling up inside me. Something I had never experienced like that. I very sweetly picked up the bowl of stew, looked at him, and said, “Maybe you’d like it better this way!” and dumped it on his head. He disappeared for a few hours.
I should have realized I was looking at one of those big red flags. Instead, I worked hard to make the marriage work for the next 6 years. What did I know? I was 18? Now I know why his mother tried so hard to convince me NOT to marry her son. She was a good woman, but no one understood why she felt that way about her boy.
This post has me pondering memories from my childhood, living for ten years with a Psychopathic “father”.
He was controlling, cruelly critical to all of us, physically and emotionally abusive to my Mother and she would leave him many times, just pack up her three daughters, put us in the car and split. Hopefully thinking she was away from him for good.
Well, I remember a very specific occasion where I was maybe four or five, and me and my two sisters are standing outside the apartments of my Mom’s friend who took us in.
My P father is there, crying great big crocodile tears, trying to hug us, telling us how he misses us so very much. I was confused by his tears and was overwhelmed by his seeming sincerity and I looked over at my Mom.
She had this look on her face, one of so much pain and anxiety that my confusion increased because I didn’t WANT him back in our lives, yet I was swayed by his fake tears. I was a child, I didn’t know jack about what was going on. But I instinctively KNEW he was bad, bad news….rotten to the core even at such a young age.
He didn’t miss us. He didn’t love us. He didn’t give a flying fig about me, my two sisters, or my Mom. He just wanted his free rent, free food, free sex, free punching bad (Mom) back and he calculating used his children, by causing us grief and misery, to put my Mom between a rock and a hard place.
She was clueless as to his pathological personality disorder. She thought she was doing right for her children and maybe he just might change for the better.
When she finally left him for good, divorced his lying evil self, it truly was one of the happiest days of my life.
I don’t regret having a psychopathic “father”. Without his presence in my life, I may not have the insight that evil incarnate exists. It does and I am now forewarned and prepared to diligently tend to my safety and welfare as my self-preservation is paramount to me.
JS: He also wanted his “possessions” back. I think that’s really the only way they relate to their families: as possessions that they own. The S/Ps that walk away and don’t look back are probably easier to deal with. The controlling “owners” will do anything to get their “possessions” back, but they don’t actually want the people, just their ownership of the people.
I’ve said before that I think an understanding of personality disorders might be more important in high school than sex education! Your poor mother, with all the social pressure to keep the family together, and no understanding of what your father was about.