Lovefraud recently received a letter from a woman who we’ll call Valerie. She met her husband, who we’ll call Dylan, at age 18, and has been with him for seven years. She thought they were happy together in their wonderful home with their family of pets.
Suddenly Dylan started acting erratically. He said he didn’t want to be with Valerie any more. He picked fights. She asked Dylan to leave, but made it clear that she was willing to do whatever was necessary to help him. So he left, and wouldn’t tell her where he was. Eventually, Valerie’s intuition told her to check her husband’s Facebook page, where she found Dylan’s love letters to another woman.
Then Valerie found how Dylan described himself on another website. Here’s what he wrote:
My name is Dylan and I believe in Chaos, destruction and murder. I will contradict myself but I don’t think that should make me a hypocrite. I hone my strengths and hide my weaknesses because only the strong will survive. I lie, cheat and steal. But only if it’s the most intelligent plan of action; & only the stupid get caught. I’m fighting a personal rebellion I can’t justify. I’m losing my mind, my friends and my morals with each passing day, but each day I pass leads me closer to finding myself. I would rather live my life in surrender to temptation than to deny my natural instincts. I never hurt those who do not hurt me first, I don’t believe in physical confrontation but as in eastern philosophy I am trained to engage in it, if for nothing more than the practice of strengthening the bond between mind and body.
I know who I am, but not where I am, or why I am here. I find Art to be the only voice of reason in a place otherwise inhabited by counter-production. I promote sex, but lack emotion, I hate addicts but I believe in drugs, I make music but I destroy everything else. I bore easily but I am doomed to repeat myself.
My name is Dylan and this is only the beginning.
Whoa! Did this guy just write the sociopath manifesto?
I don’t know if Dylan is truly describing himself—apparently he’s got some kind of hardcore band and perhaps he wrote the above statement for its shock value. Still, is it possible to even come up with these ideas if he didn’t experience the state of mind that they imply?
Fundamentally different
The truly scary thing about sociopaths is that they are fundamentally different from the rest of us. They do not want what we want. They do not value what we value.
Normal human beings want affection, cooperation and achievement. We want to care about others and contribute to life. Sociopaths want power, control and sex, and they’ll destroy anyone and anything to get what they want.
But sociopaths look like us and appear to act like us. That’s why they are so hard to identify. It’s also why people who have not experienced their manipulation up close and personal find it so difficult to believe us. The uninitiated—those lucky souls who have not been devastated by a sociopath—have yet to learn that there are people in the world for whom proclamations of love, truth and promises are nothing but tactics in a power game.
Everything changes
This is the bottom line: Dealing with a sociopath changes everything. Normal human courtesies do not apply. Social protocols do not apply. Rules do not apply. Contracts do not apply. Laws do not apply.
If we find that we are interacting with a sociopath, the best thing we can do is get the person out of our lives. When that is not possible, we need to be on mental red alert at all times and understand that anything the person says may be a lie. We need to know that for the sociopath, we are not a friend, or a lover, or a relative, or a co-worker. For a sociopath, all we are is a target.
Morgan,
I do agree with you about happiness coming from within. Though when we are in such intense pain that feels like it is just overtakes us, I think that’s where faith kicks in–that if we can just allow the pain to be and not run from it, it will eventually pass. I think it’s possible to go through stuff but still have spiritual joy. When you can laugh at your situation, or laugh in spite of it, I think you’re halfway there.
i’ve often wondered if my father who was very distant from his mother while i was especially close to her was envious. At any rate my brother seems to constantly hint that he hates me for some reason or another but i know i’ve done nothing wrong. I know he appreciated me looking after his mom when she was in the nursing home and i think he cares but as many of you mentioned and the dream in the earlier post i could certainly relate to, as my father has always been closer to others and their children while distant with his own children. Thankfully my Mom was very loving even though she was alcoholic. She loved both my brother and i equally and i think i have alot of her qualities and i’ve very grateful for that . It’s bad enough to feel rejected but then to have my brother constantly reinforce it. Then i have a sister inlaw and several other well meaning friends try to explain that it isn’t my Father doing any of this but my brother. Im not sure what i beleive anymore. I know i spent hours going through photos last week , twice taking my dad pictures up making sure he was in almost all of them and he did seem to enjoy looking at them . I try so hard to be kind , then get slapped down but i can’t tar him with the same brush as my brother for sure. I know he feels very uncomfortable with his feelings towards those he should be closest to and always has, not that it’s much comfort. Maybe i remind him of my mom, and it’s too painful . Those closest to me , my kids have said to just cut contact while my closest friends and sister in law have urged me to go and see my dad despite all of this. I am going to have to make a decision as you all have suggested but my heart aches for my dad. I feel so sorry for his condition. love kindheart
KH,
A trademark of a narcissist is jealousy and competitiveness. Also, they are more interested in having you serve their needs than trying to serve yours. In any conversation, they will always bring it back to them. If you say positive things about another person who was kind to you, they will immediately compare themselves to that other person and feel slighted, rather than be happy for you. The best way to know is to observe how you feel when spending time around that person. Do they always bring the conversation back to themselves? Can they genuinely take an interest in your life?
OxDrover:
OUCH!!! Yu got me!
Go easy Oxy…or I’ will Boink you with my Boomerang!
After all, I have only just got my sense of humour back . Rosa is teaching me how to laugh away my rage!
Alright, alright, I know, take the trash out…..
Tilly:
We can either laugh or we can cry, right?
Some days we cry, but other days we like to laugh! 🙂
Tilly,
Yes, my dear, I know! Being too hard on yourself is one of the “cardinal sins” in my book, so I WILL boink you over the head for that one! LOL Poor dear henry almost had a permanently flat head I hit him so many times for being down on himself and saying how “bad” he was…..
The goodness is in us, and that is why they took advantage of us, but like you, my cellar has a lot of TRASH in it, and cleaning it out is a BIG job, and it seems that any time I think I have ti all spick and span, I find another room down there that I didn’t even know existed and it is full of trash too!
Keep on the road though, and we are getting there, bit by bit, and step by step, and when I despair that I will never get it all cleaned out, I find some prize, some TREASURE there that is wonderful and self affirming, so stay on the path! (((hugs))))
I am turning my cellar into a SPA! 🙂
At least I am working on it.
Oxy:
You know what they say about “trash”.
“One person’s trash is another person’s treasure.”
If you did not have all of that so called “Trash”, you would not have such wisdom/knowledge to help so many of us here on LF.
Your cellar is not a “messy” as you think.
Dear Oxy – My head is round again, but I am sure you could find plenty of reasons to boink it flat again. After reading about Dylan last nite I had a horrible nitemare about you know who….Oh I always wanted to open a junk and second hand store and I was going to call it ‘Trash and Treasures’
kindheart48:
I’m typing this on my blackberry while I am sitting in the ICU waiting room, so you’ll have to forgive the typos.
Anyhow, I can understand your conflicted feelings regarding your terminally ill father and your brother. My mother underwent 10 hours of surgery yesterday and is in extremely rough shape today. Of course, in the middle of this is when my conman brother has outdone himself. Throw into that mix being out of work, health problems, etc and I am feeling overwhelmed.
I finally decided that my priority at this moment is to focus on my mother — more specifically, how I want to feel if things don’t go well and she dies. I want to feel no regrets if that comes to pass, and know that I did whatever I could for her. So, I’m shutting out the buzz from the conman. I’m shutting out the fact that he has been financially bleeding my parents. In short, I am shutting out all the nonsense.
In your case, just ignore your brother, the second wife and her daughter. They are all sideshows to the main event — you and your father. If your father chooses to accept what you are offering at this moment — you spending time with him, that’s fine. If he doesn’t, you did your best, by trying. After your father is dead, then you can turn your attention to his estate problems, your brother, the second wife, etc.
Trust me, I know it’s easier said than done. I am not happy about the conman’s financially screwing my parents and making his problems the family’s problems. But, end of the day, I can’t do anything to stop my parents’s enabling him. All I can do is focus on the one thing I can do something about — the relationship between my mother and me.