I’ll start by saying that the “his” in my title comes from the fact that this story is about my sociopathic male ex. That being said, I’m sure many of you can think of women who fit this unique description of an “animal lover.”
So let’s begin.
My ex loves to tell people how much he loves dogs. He’ll also say he loves horses and sheep and cows and chickens and all other sorts of farm and wild animals, but dogs are tops.
And there’s something really unique about the way a sociopath “loves” a vulnerable creature. It’s confusing, wonderful, horrifying, and most often blindsiding. Sometimes, it’s even used to shame others. Like me.
You see, a couple years ago, I had a little Frenchie-bulldog who was so gentle she wouldn’t chase our house rabbit but so aggressive that she often tried to bite our neighbors. I lived in a row-house of sorts with a shared yard, and she never quite got used to any of the people who lived around us. We tried all kinds of techniques with her, but she still chased our neighbors and bit their clothes.
They were scared to death of her.
She would also try to attack any dog of any size that came within 50 feet of us. I was a single mom of three in grad school with no money for a fenced yard even if I was allowed to have one, so I started to think that maybe our beloved Sadie would be happier or at least better off in a home with a yard and a bit more privacy.
So after much thought and heartache, I placed her with a group of trainers who specialized in rehabilitating little dogs and placing them in ideal environments for their needs. They’d work diligently to do the things I didn’t know how to do, and then they’d find her a yard with a fence.
These trainers were mad at me for having Sadie in the first place, given that I was busy with grad school. She wasn’t trained well enough. I felt ashamed and worthless and terrible. My kids cried and sobbed and yelled at me for placing her.
Our house felt empty.
I still miss her today. I still wonder whether it was a mistake, and it always makes me cry.
Like right now.
But then in comes my ex. Always one to capitalize on any opportunity to make me look even worse, he joined my kids in their crying even though he hadn’t been with me for years and never knew Sadie at all.
He’d tell people that I must be “heartless,” and that he couldn’t understand people like me who would just “throw away their family pet like that.”
At our son’s game, he asked publicly (as a self-appointed representative for our children) how I could do such a thing. He told me that “dogs are kind of like a member of the family.”
Everyone thought I was heartless.
He’d talk endlessly about how much he loves dogs.
And he “loves” dogs.
So let’s talk about what that love looks like.
A Sociopath Expects No Expectations
Most dogs I know will love you no matter what. Even more, dogs that are abused seem to show a pattern of trauma bonding that may be similar to people—something that looks like submission and adoration and begging and delight all at once.
So my ex rescued a dog long ago, before we were even together. He and his girlfriend-before-me went to a shelter and found a shiny black lab with scars all over her face and a sweetheart nature. No one knew much about her, but he took her everywhere and loved to tell the story about how he saved her from “the pound.” He’d say, “I saved her life.”
“She looks pretty good now, but you should’ve seen her. She was covered with scars—all over her face. I don’t know who could treat such a sweetheart like that. Such a sweetheart. Now sit, Rosie. Watch this, watch her sit up. It’s hilarious.”
And he’d tell her to sit up, and she’d be so excited to please him that she’d throw her front paws so high in the air that she’d fall over backward or sideways every time. She never tried to catch herself—she’d be so focused on watching his eyes.
She was a wonderful dog. Long after he split with his girlfriend-before-me and long after we got together and married, that sweet-hearted dog would flop in the kiddie pool with our tiny children and never step on their feet.
I loved her. She’s lay so close to me while I stood at the kitchen sink that I often tripped backward over her. She loved her people.
But sometimes she would pee on the rug.
And that would mean a beating from my ex. If he caught her. With fists and feet and all.
Because rules are rules, and dogs don’t pee on the rug. Not in his house.
If I was there, I’d stop him. I’d yell at him. We’d fight. And then he’d love on Rosie all over again, calling her to him as he lectured and yelled at me for stopping him. He’d rub her ears. She would lay at his feet. He would start gushing about how she was a sweetheart. The one-sided, unconditional dedication seemed to thrill him.
And he demanded it.
He had another dog, too, when we got together. Because he “loves” dogs so much. And this one liked to chase buzzards in the sky, so sometimes he would wander away. This was unacceptable, sure, but I watched my ex hold him by the collar and kick him repeatedly in the stomach and ribs when he finally got him back. Which I didn’t think was an ok way of teaching him that lesson.
So I’d run out to them and ask him to stop.
Tell him to stop.
And then he would. And he’d flip right into loving on that poor, limping dog. I’d often wonder what would happen if I hadn’t made it out there to help.
The Sociopath Loves to Make You Do Tricks
Both of those original dogs are long gone. One to a car and one to old age. And how a sociopath deals with old age is to turn you out into the snow because he doesn’t want to take the chance that you’ll throw up on his rug.
So when Rosie died, she died alone. Out on his deck in a January blizzard, begging at the back door to be let inside to lay by the fire she loved so much.
My daughter cried and cried over the loss. She was infuriated that her dad wouldn’t let Rosie in like normal. Her brothers had learned by then to sit silently and say nothing.
And then Rosie was gone.
I still cry over that one, too. I loved that girl, and I always wonder if I should’ve taken her with me when I left.
She was like a member of the family.
But then she was pretty easily replaced. He quickly got an American Bulldog who looks super scary when you pull in his driveway but who generally puts her belly to the ground and will do pretty much anything you ask of her.
Her name is Bailey.
And Bailey can sit, lay down, stay, and play dead if you act like you’re shooting her. My ex loves to show people this trick. Teaching dogs tricks is a joy to him. He loves to make them run through each one. He tells our children all the time that Bailey is the best dog in the world. That she is far smarter than my stupid dogs who in his opinion know nothing and are pretty much a waste of human time. He talks about these things. Incessantly. It’s critically important to him that our children love Bailey and think little of any pets we now have at our house.
Because he loves his dog so much. He loves Bailey to pieces. He shows her off, he takes her places, and he loves to make her play dead for people. He loves how much she loves him. He adores her unconditional affection. He claims she’s like one of his children.
And then he leaves her locked outside with no blanket during the coldest weather in fifty years.
He throws her out of second story windows if she happens to pee on the second floor.
He holds her by her collar and kicks her body repeatedly if she does wrong.
He beats her with his hands.
And then he rubs her all over.
He tells her she’s the best dog on earth.
And he does all this in front of our kids.
Which always makes me wonder:
What does he do when no one’s there?
(This post can also be found on hgbeverly.com.)
while I was married, I watched my spath literally nurse baby bunnies because he accidentally destroyed their warren while mowing the grass….I remember thinking, wow.. how sweet, that he would do this, put in the time..effort… THEN I watched as he let them go, back into the yard, from the little box he’d built for them, only to use them as target practice from a bathroom window! I have long since removed myself from this jeckel n hide… but mistreatment of animals is probably a hallmark for spaths because they’re easy targets…literally.
Oh how i’m sitting here in TEARS over this. That poor dog freezing to death outside, OMG, I just dont’ know what to say. But, like you, i’d have done the same with my ex sociopath. sat there and done nothing 🙁 They are so powerful over the rest of us when we are still in their power and control. My ex used to beat our male pitbull Jake. My mother saw it once, and told my ex’s mother what her son had done! PURE EVIL…..so sorry…
Hi H.G,
Admittedly, I’ve not read your work before, yet I recognize you as a follower of my blog (the ability to love). What a beautiful writer you are…
I received this post in my email. I don’t come here often anymore, but the title had me very curious.
I lost my boy (a dachshund) in March to lymphoma. It was devastating and traumatic for me. You seem to share an overwhelming love for animals, that many empaths do and so stories like this are heart wrenching. I’m crying with you and I’m so sorry you were exposed to such cruelty of your loved ones.
My ex-psychopath attempted to kick my dog several times, but I would quickly pick him up as I saw my ex’s foot moving toward my boy’s body. The last time he tried it, I didn’t make it in time to move him away.
I came completely unglued. You see, my psychopath very much enjoyed my reactions to his words and behavior. He would try to injure my dog, for fun. He knew I loved him, protected him and that my boy was my heart. Anything I loved, my ex psychopath immediately hated.
It took me many years to not only understand how psychopaths think and what they do, but also to understand that all shows of affection are all about them. They exploit animals to have power over. Just like they do people. I’m inclined to think that those who abuse animals are all on the spectrum somewhere. I’ve seen two people in my life who have beaten their animals and both are narcissists.
There’s nothing more power inducing for a psychopath than causing pain to an innocent who cannot fight back, or in causing pain to others who love that innocent. The pain he caused, is pain he is aware of and the perceived unpredictability in what he ‘might’ do if your loved one ‘peed on the rug’, is calculating, forcing those around the dog to live under intense stress, waiting for next abusive event. Abuse of animals, is indirectly abusing the people that love them when it comes to a psychopathic parent, spouse or child, just another tactic to power and control. They know exactly what they’re doing.
Last summer, while reading the lost and found section on our local animal shelter website, I noticed that my ex’s new victim (wife) had posted that her beloved chihuahua mix managed to get out of the yard somehow and was lost. I could not help but wonder if my ex had purposely allowed this to happen. He had his own dog, a lab mix, that he neglected, and abused, the same way he neglected and abused humans. During luring, he used his dog as a tool to manipulate potential victims. He religiously kept his dog tied up all day while he was at work, otherwise fanatical about keeping her inside when he was home.
Not so with the chihuahua mix. Somehow, given his calculated abuse, I feel that the new victim’s dog running loose was not an accident. It was apparent that she loved her dog.
And with a psychopath, loving anything is always a ‘mistake’ for the victims of his abuse. My ex was quite stealth, leaving me a lot of room for observation of his behavior and the motivations behind it. Animals are tools and weapons in the psychopath’s arsenal. Nothing more.
I feel so much for you…I can imagine the intense pain your ex’s cruelty caused you and your children in abusing your loved ones.
Your story of Rosie is particularly heartbreaking, for just as it is with the psychopath’s victims, when a pet can no longer be utilized for the psychopath’s pleasure in exploiting or manipulating his (or her) victims, it is discarded, just like we are.
Your babies are playing free, without abuse, at the Rainbow Bridge. I do believe we will see them someday and when we do, there will be no more pain and you’ll be able to love Rosie again freely…without the interference of evil.
Big hugs to you, H.G. Your loved ones were lucky to have you and the measure of your love and mercy when your ex had none of it. They knew they were loved by you and your children.
Peace…
H G Beverly, I’m so sorry for your loss and the way that those beloved pets passed away. Know that they are on the other side of life, still by your side in spirit and they know that you continue to love them. Unfortunately, many of us have experienced the same horror that you have, but I just wanted to say how sorry I am for you.
Honestly this guy just sounds like another stupid pet owner who ‘thinks’ they know everything about dogs, but doesn’t. He probably never read a book on animal behavior or perhaps never understood what he read. I’m not sure that makes him a psychopath.
I’ve got a different story about dogs and tying personality behavior how someone treats dogs and those around her. One day my wife came home with the kids with a decorative plate with a cute picture of dog on it. I used that as an opportunity to talk about bringing a dog into the house and she was open to the idea. So right here, I’m indicating that I wanted my wife’s approval or acceptance for getting a dog and didn’t just force one on her against her desires. As parents, we’d have equal, buck stops here responsibility!
We started looking for dogs and found a beautiful, Belgian shepherd mix dog at the local Animal Care League. We bought a few books on dog training and the kids loved the dog and she was very gentle with them.
The dog had not been trained to walk well on a leash and always pulled, but was super well behaved in the house.
So, my wife who is an avid reader presumably read these books she bought. Now one of the most basic things is “don’t leave food out all day” for the dog. This is easily understandable as the dog will get overweight and will have to poop several times throughout the day and you’ll never have a consistent walking schedule. What does my wife do? She leaves food out all day. I point out that this is making care for the dog harder. She ignores me and continues doing it, it would seem just to spite me!
We take the dog for a walk, the dog tries to lead and I remark that the books instruct to stop every time the dog pulls. It’s pretty obvious, the dog then learns that a pull on the leash means to stop! what does she do, she chokes up on the choke collar and walks the dog in a constant choke hold! Very nice. Every time I try to address anything like this, the response is, “oh, Mr. knowitall, Mr. DogTrainer is telling me how to train the dog again”. Now, I don’t know about you folks, but I read books for advice and try to use that advice, I don’t just discard it and I don’t pretend to have not read them and claim the information as my own.
So, despite problems with the current dog, my wife is now obsessed with getting another Belgian shepherd. These dogs are very high energy, high prey drive, strong, and very smart animals! Well, at this point in our marriage I know that when my wife is obsessed with something, there is no changing her mind. She finds a puppy at a shelter about an hour away that ‘LOOKS’ like a Belgian shepherd. We go to look at the pup and my son falls in love with the dog. They are all over each other like any puppy and little kid should be. The dog licking his face up and down and my son loving it!
We get a call two or three days later from the Shelter stating that the dog has worms and that nobody could get infected unless they ate the dogs feces. From this point on the puppy was separated from the kids and kept in the kitchen. Every time my son went near the dog, she’s freak out, then the dog would get stressed and my son would get bummed out, because he was now NOT allowed near the dog.
The dog very quickly started doing the same thing. Every time my son went near him, the dog would get stressed, until finally the dog would growl at my son. Next the dog started growling at my step-daughter and wife. The only person the dog did not grown at was me! Why, because I recognized this behavior and never approached the dog with anxiety and would just sit in the kitchen with the dog playing and petting him. This is proper socializing of a dog. I wanted to bring my son into the kitchen, but my wife would not allow it.
As soon as the dog started growling at the family, my wife called someone to do a temperament test. It took a very long time to get the dog to bite the fake, antagonizing hand they use to provoke the dog to bite, but he did eventually snap at the fake hand. I just figured the dog was not going to get socialized properly in our house now anyway so I agreed that we should bring the dog back to the shelter.
From this dog my wife moved on to looking for another dog again. She signed up to foster Belgian Malinois and lied stating she was an experienced dog owner. She came home with a beautiful, emaciated dog one Saturday. I would never turn away a sick dog and we fed him until no ribs showed. He was a great dog that had failed the temperament test for police work, but had been through a bit of the training. He was extremely well behaved and walked perfectly on a leash. My wife now strutted around the neighborhood like she was a dog expert, talking to people about dogs and Belgian Shepherds as if she was a veteran dog handler.
It was amazing because what they didn’t know was that she could not even have the two dogs in the house together without having all kinds of gates setup. I told her several times, that we needed to just put them in the backyard and let them work out who was the boss. The anxiety over the dogs was untenable for everyone in the house. Two very good dogs and yet, they could not get to know one another because she envisioned a blood bath!
We finally got some other experienced Belgian shepherd owners to come for a visit and of course, they said the same thing I did. Put them in the yard and see what happens, we’ll just have to be ready to break up a dog fight. Gee, isn’t that what I had been saying all along?
Now my wife’s behavior may seem like nothing, however when you apply that behavior to everything that happens in the household for years on end, you may get a picture of the anxiety and frustration the family was under. Her behavior has all the signs of OCD and NPD, she’s obsessive, has grandiose ideas about her ability, ignores people close to her and even mocks them, repeats the same failing behavior over and over again and rejects any advice from those close to her.
So, you could actually show her in a book that she bought, that she claimed to read, what it says and she’ll mock you and tell you that you’re being a know it all! This same thing happened with the children, where she would repeat the same behavior for years on end and expect different results. She would call me for help, I’d resolve the situation or provide input and she’d mock me (usually because I was correct) and then scorn me for resolving the issue.
This is a woman who slept with my son for 6 1/2 years because she either enjoyed having him suckle to get to sleep or could not simply break free from sleeping with him. To this day, I don’t know and because I’m a man, my pleas for help to marriage counselors were ignored.
I’m pointing this out because a person does not have to do obviously terrible things like kick a dog to show signs of mental illness. Mental illness is mostly undiagnosed because sick people often will only see therapists that they can lie to. This happened in my marriage and because of the lack of ethics and professionalism and perhaps ego, many, many LCSWs and Psychologists simply believe women and ignore men. The man is then left without help and ends up with GAD and depression like myself.
In fact, not only do I have GAD and depression, I’m financially destroyed after going through the divorce and believing that someone would eventually do the one thing I asked and that was to require her to have a full psych evaluation. Never happened, I wasted my son’s entire education fund. My 401k and pension was given to my wife because our society is so quick to believe the man is always the abuser, a guy cannot get help even when he’s open to it and asks for it!
So, my advice to men is that there is no help at all for them as they’ll be treated with gender bias and their concerns for a healthy life will be dismissed. There is no reason to submit to marriage counseling or therapy as nobody will listen to your complaints or experiences and even give you credit for communicating and participating! Instead, they’ll criticize men for saying anything at all! So, why should a man participate?
Now I never see my son even though there was no violence ever between my son and I. There are no police reports of brutality in my house. When my step-daughter became a teenager and just after I accused my wife of abusing my son by sleeping with him for over six years my wife then embarked on a mission to destroy my relationship with my step-daughter. Ignoring all reasonable and proper parenting concerns I had and then twisting them around by filling my step-daughter’s head with inappropriate knowledge and ideas about me.
A mother and wife should never talk about her husbands sexuality with her daughter, should discuss parenting concerns with her husband and should not use her kids as pawns in her relationship. All things my wife has done, but because she’s a woman, it’s presumed that I’m lying about these things and she is not.
This is a woman who cheated on her first husband while he served in the military and got pregnant with her daughter by another man before her divorce was finalized. She then just over two and half years later meets me and starts the cheating cycle again. Lying to me about her daughter’s father, telling me she was married to him (she wasn’t), telling me he as abusing and an alcoholic. We date for four years after we’re married I find family pictures with her, my step-daughter and her father that could have only been taken a month or two before I met her! So I end up feeling like I contributed to breaking up the relationship between father and daughter.
The lies continued and I got worse. I provided the best I could, home in the best neighborhood, best schools, house cleaner, generous budget, private school for the kids, tutoring, 2k a year for karate lessons for my step-daughter. My son though who was offered free karate lessons was never brought to karate just to spite me, just because she wanted to!
I am so demoralized and broken because of this marriage and now the divorce, I think of suicide every day! I have no job, no money and nobody but my family and my therapist believes me (well they know me and they know her). I have no confidence in myself or the future or in our society’s ability to treat men fairly.
The divorce system steals money from hard working men and then labels them as bad without even doing their due diligence for the money they just stole from him! Our divorce system is nothing more than a veil of justice over ignorance, bias and various social agendas.
This is what happens when a man stays in a relationship and tries to bend like a reed in the wind, be cooperative and patient and a father to his children, he gets destroyed because nobody will listen to him!
Hate to tell you this but the legal system is AGAINST all victims of psychopaths, irregardless of gender! My suggestion is pick yourself up and start all over again. Forget the ex-wife (and kids if necessary) and plan for a better future without them. It will surely come as soon as you drop the “woe is me” attitude…I promise! Good luck and best wishes for a happy future that you can’t even imagine right now.
Woe is me has nothing to do with my situation. It’s being controlled by a faulty process that determines the outcome of my life that is the problem. And if people just move on without complaining, it won’t change!
I think jmmira is just needing to feel heard….like all of us….this site gives us a place to get out the experiences …..and to somehow feel heard and believed…..here is a person who has experienced a lot of crazy making and lost everything….even hope…..I think we have each dealt with similar stuff and know the time it takes to recover…and the pain of it all…..
Jmmira……take the time you need…….there is hope……this site is helpful….understandable you feel the system is against men in general…..as a female it seems like I was not supported or heard in my situation….but it is probably the fact that there is so many lies told…….the system does not get the psychopath and the twisted mess it creates
I almost lost our dog to rat poisoning by the ex-path. He of course didn’t get caught red handed, but I know. My dog did survive, although still suffers abdominal pain (from having her stomach pumped) & vomits after meals, which unfortunately is a reminder of his cruelty and a blessed reminder of the strength it took me to leave with just our clothes a year ago this week. We (my daughter/his step-daughter) and I are no longer in survival mode, but thriving mode!!! Happy to be free physically and emotionally.
Dogs are loyal and can be trained. They do take up much of your time as you care for and enjoy their company, as does any lovable pet.
Psychopaths and sociopaths are not loyal and can’t be trained. They are obstinate and will betray you as soon as look at you. Enjoying their company is a stretch and they do require a mountain of care. And time.
They waste your care and time by being what they are.
Dogs, and cats, too, are far more reliable and worthy of one’s love.
Given the choice, it’s not rocket science to see that socio and psychopaths, plus the malignant narcissistic haters, are not nearly as worthy for companionship as these other species.
Don’t feed the kooks. Run away and don’t look back!! Unless you have lots of time to WASTE!!! And who does??
1) ID kook. 2) Limit their influence in your life. 3) Get away and stay away!! 4) Live WAY WAY BETTER!!!
This post was painful for me to read. I had a dog as a child that I loved very much. Her name was Penney. She was a beautiful long haired dachshound the color of a penney, and she loved me. Penney protected me when I did something wrong that upset my stepfather. She would bark and try to stop “Rudy” from beating me. Penney would end up getting the beating intended for me. Penney would also get beat because she liked to dig holes in the yard. Rudy would kick her and throw her and hit her with sticks, rocks belts or just about anything that was handy. I would try to save her which meant I would get beat too. Sometimes my mom would see what was happening and tried to stop it, which meant she got beat too. My mom was a good woman who did nothing wrong, but Rudy beat her too and for no apparent reason. See, Rudy just liked to be in control of everything and everybody. Rudy later died from prostate and anal cancer. I figured thats what happened to people for being an ASSHOLE their whole lives, and karma found a particularly appropriate payback for Rudy. Later when I grew up I found a man who I thought was great and who I thought was the love of my life.
“Sonny” hated my cats and did little mean things to them. This behavior brought me back to uncomfortable memories and was the first indicator that I had a sociopath on my hands, and I ended up being right. Cruelty to animals is a common denominator with Spaths and many times manifests itself very early in their lives. Cruelty is something they enjoy. Cruelty is something they have practiced on innocent creatures for a long time. When someone is cruel to an animal its a good indicator that person will be cruel to you and one should run away from that person as fast as you can. I wish my mom had run, I wish I had run FASTER.
This post was so painful for me to read as well. Really horrific. I love animals. And maybe after being a victim of a heartless cruel sociopath. I have taken to animals even more. I do not trust people as I use to.
I barely speak up for myself. But a fire is lot inside me when animals are being abused. I have a loud voice then. It seems almost as someone strong takes over my body, and is ready to fight for animals who are being abused. Yet when it comes to my own rights or defending others I seem to shut down and hide.
I don’t know if it is because of the abuse I have endured by a sociopath or what. But I have compassion for people. But I have over compassion for animals. I feel great pain when I see an animal suffering. And I will do whatever is necessary to end the suffering and see that justice is served.
The narc had a dog. One time I left I thot I’ve got to get that poor dog rescued. I’ve just got to. She’s a huge Alaskan malamute. He will hit her if she’s bad. He yells at her. He will get her all riled up and then expect her to just stop. Bam. She’s old and only knows him. She’s loves him utterly. So this time when I left, I just gave up. And I hope she dies soon. A sweet dog and he’s an ass to her also. A shelter would just kill her so as long as the kids aren’t there to make her excited she stands a good chance of just intermittent abuse. He does love her to death but only if she follows his godship of course. He will fall apart when she dies. I hope he falls into chronic depression and never feels hopeful again.
Cuz I’m that evil lol
No, rly, i don’t even bad about wishing he’d hurt. I just don’t.
Honestly, so many, many people hit their dogs it’s not funny. This fear and dominance in dog training is an old tactic. They used to throw (some still do) a chain at their feet to startle them. The new methods and science is so much better.
Most people really have no idea how to train dogs. Look at the number of dogs on retractable leashes. That is not training and not safe for dogs. If the dog can run into the street suddenly and the leash is extended, end of story.
There is just a proliferation of non-working dogs in this country because of over breading and little need for actual working dogs. Dogs are a complete luxury, people are irresponsible with them whether they hit them or not.
EDIT – I had to edit this as Dogs are wonderful company. I have had dogs most of my life and used to lay in a field next to my dog and stare at the sky and talk to him. He was probably my best friend at times. I have two dogs now, both Dutch Shepherds, high energy and prey drive. They sleep with me and jog with me. Now I will probably lose them due to divorce. I’ve already lost my other dog, the wife has her and my son. Of course I miss my son more!
It’s really another sign of how spoiled our culture is. I don’t like to be negative, but there are just so, so many dogs without homes it’s really very sad!