UPDATE FOR 2021
To the Mom and Dad of a Lovefraud Target,
Your son or daughter has now come to the brutal realization that the entire relationship was a scam.
Perhaps you’ve had your suspicions for a while. Perhaps you’ve even tried to tell your kid that the partner was no good, but he or she wouldn’t listen to you.
Now everything has collapsed, and you can’t understand why your son or daughter didn’t see it coming.
Please understand that sociopaths are professional con artists, and they are really, really good at what they do. In fact, they spend their entire lives perfecting their craft.
Following are nine reasons why your son or daughter fell for it.
1. Your son or daughter didn’t know sociopaths exist
Our society tells us that everyone is created equal, everyone just wants to be loved, and there’s good in everyone. Perhaps you even said these things to your child. If not, the messages certainly came through at school.
Our society doesn’t tell us that there are exceptions. The feel-good characterizations simply do not apply to the approximately 12% of the population who are personality disordered.
These exploiters come from all demographic groups and all walks of life. They are not necessarily hard-core drug addicts or criminals.
What we all need to learn is that people who are attractive, educated and well-mannered can also be evil.
2. Your son or daughter is good and kind-hearted
Perhaps you taught your children to treat others the way they want to be treated. Your son or daughter may be naturally kind and willing to help others.
Usually, this is a wonderful way to live. Unfortunately, there are people in the world — sociopaths — who are willing to take advantage of anyone’s goodness, kindness and generosity.
Read more: How to spot a romance scam
We all tend to interpret the way others behave according to the way we behave. So if we don’t lie, and would never dream of intentionally hurting someone, we don’t know it’s possible for another person to do it to us.
That makes us walking targets for sociopaths.
3. Sociopaths are extremely convincing liars
It is impossible to overstate a sociopath’s ability to lie. These people lie like they breathe. They spend their entire lives perfecting their lies. They tell big lies and small lies. They tell outrageous lies. They even lie when they’d be better off telling the truth.
Sociopaths can look deep into your eyes and lie. All of those tips about how to spot a liar simply do not work with sociopaths. These people can pass lie detector tests.
If your son or daughter is basically honest, they never stood a chance.
4. Sociopaths promise to make dreams come true
In the beginning of the involvement, the sociopath likely asked your son or daughter a lot of questions, and listened very carefully to their answers. Your kid likely interpreted this to mean that the sociopath was really totally interested in them.
Actually, the sociopath was listening carefully to find out your child’s hopes and dreams. The sociopath wanted to discover the deepest place within them to set the seduction hook by promising to make the dreams come true.
And who doesn’t want to believe someone who promises to make your dreams come true?
5. Sociopaths target vulnerabilities
If we’re human, we have vulnerabilities. Sociopaths are experts at finding and exploiting them.
This doesn’t necessarily mean that your son or daughter lacks intelligence, has low self-esteem, or is a co-dependent personality. We all have desires, and what we want makes us vulnerable. We also all have emotional wounds, and those wounds make us vulnerable.
Many times emotional wounds date back to childhood. Can you think of anything your son or daughter experienced that could have created a wound?
6. Sociopaths hijack the natural human bonding process
When people experience intimacy, a hormone called oxytocin is released into the bloodstream and brain. Oxytocin is triggered by any type of intimacy — emotional sharing, physical touching and sex. Oxytocin makes us trust the person with whom we share intimacy.
Feelings of love cause dopamine to be released in the brain. Dopamine is associated with energy, motivation and addiction.
These psychological and biological changes are normal. Nature intended them to make us want to stay with our romantic partners to care for children.
None of this applies to sociopaths. They do not form bonds. But they intentionally do things — like causing fear and anxiety — that make it difficult for their partners to break the psychological bonds and escape.
7. Sociopaths present themselves as perfect partners
In the beginning, it seems like the sociopath has so much in common with your son or daughter. That’s because sociopaths figure out what their targets are looking for, and then make themselves into that person.
Then, sociopaths keep the mask on as long as necessary to get the target hooked. Once the target is committed — perhaps living together, married or pregnant — the sociopath may totally change.
I’ve heard of sociopaths who even announced immediately after the wedding, “Now I can stop pretending.”
8. Sociopaths engage in brainwashing
Cult leaders who are sociopaths in the extreme have discovered that the most effective brainwashing technique is love bombing. This means is showering their targets with attention and affection, making the target feel loved and wanted.
The sociopath your son or daughter encountered likely did this in the beginning of the relationship. That’s how they got hooked.
From there, the sociopath may have gradually engaged in mind control by manipulating your kid’s behavior, information, thoughts and emotions. The sociopath likely instilled an “us vs. them” mentality in your son or daughter, with you being the bad guy. This is a typical thought control tactic.
Sociopaths instinctively know to do this. But their targets, unfortunately, are not aware of what is happening.
9. A premeditated scam
Everything the sociopath did to take advantage of your son or daughter was intentional.
Here’s what sociopaths do when they meet a potential target:
- Evaluate the target to see if he or she has anything that they want.
- Ask questions to determine the target’s vulnerabilities.
- Use the target’s vulnerabilities to take what they want.
The entire relationship was a scam. The sociopath may have been a “make it up as you go along” type of person. Or, the sociopath may have executed a plan that was years in the making. (Yes, that happens.)
This is mind-boggling. No one wants to believe that promises of love and devotion are just a ruse. So even if your son or daughter started having doubts, they never even dreamed of the scope of the sociopath’s betrayal.
What to do now
Please understand that your son or daughter was up against a professional. The sociopath targeted your kid, and used love bombing, lies, mind control, emotional manipulation, fear and guilt to execute the exploitation scheme.
The sociopath probably did not employ all those tactics with you. Therefore, you may have been able to see what was going on, where your son or daughter could not.
Learn more: Sociopathic Seduction: How you got hooked and why you stayed
Mom and Dad, if your kid now knows they’ve been scammed, the pain of betrayal is overwhelming. The last thing they need to hear from you is, “I told you so.”
The best thing you can do is focus on your love for your brokenhearted child, and without judgment, help him or her pick up the pieces.
I lived in pure terror — then I discovered his double life
I am very glad that this article is resonating with Lovefraud readers. I also hope it helps some friends and family members understand what happened.
Thank you for all you said!
Donna,
Thanks for this vital list for parents- being believed is the difference between recovery and more trauma
My entire family colluded together to gossip behind my back, label me a failure and in my own father’s words ‘a disaster’. On top of sociopathic cruelty from boyfriend now I had more cruelty from family members even my son who refused to believe He was a sociopath, He described it as a ‘Judge Judy’ experience and get over it. It completely delayed my healing as I was plagued with self- doubt
I went no contact with my siblings, low contact with my parents and okay contact (but damaged) with my son. I seem to be battling this alone again but at least I’m not being judged again and again
It’s lonely, I’m finding it hard to impossible to trust ‘men’ in general, and this is the way it is for now. I was a happy go lucky enthusiastic player in life until the sociopath…I was with him just one and a half years and he took the complete rug out from under me in such a way, it’s hard to grasp.
I wish my family could have heard my fear, my trauma and oh if they could have reached out a hand to help me up instead o f( what felt like) losing all faith in me it would have made a huge difference.
middlegal – Welcome to Lovefraud. I am so sorry for your situation. Yes, the guy is likely a sociopath. My sociopathic ex husband also had diabetes – totally because of his poor eating habits. The boyfriend’s diabetes may or may not be Type 1 – he could be lying about it.
And, diabetes does not make you engage in criminal behavior.
Thank you Donna, One of the worst things about seeing all of this is the “talking about it” part. You can talk to family members only so much. It is risky for me to talk or write, also. I would love to write to our legislatures about the need for judges to order psychologically testing for inmates who are suspected of personality disorders but it could backfire (because I have to sign my name). I could also write to local and state officials about the need to diminish the inmate texting and phone calling (because the constant phoning and texting cripples the sociopath victim) but it could backfire. This is not just hard on parents, it is also hard on other family members (siblings, grandparents, aunts and uncles, cousins, etc.) and friends. We have to include all of these people in the list of people the sociopath affects.
I have been all over the internet researching articles about sociopaths. I am so glad that the information is there because there is very little information in any of our surrounding libraries. There needs to be more books on anti-social personality disorder (and other personality disorders, by the way)in our libraries given the fact that there are quite a few sociopaths in our communities here in the U.S.
There are many indicators of this disorder. I find many similarities to my daughter’s boyfriend. (Another similarity with owning: Soon after he started dating my daughter, he claimed that her dog was his. He calls my granddaughter his stepdaughter.) I think when many many people are seeing the same behavior, there is credence in what they are saying about what they are seeing. -just being logical, I think. Thanks again.
It is equally important that the whole legal profession (from police to judges)have some prerequisite knowledge of sociopathic behavior in order to help the victims BEFORE damage is done. How many victims seek legal affirmation of their plight BEFORE the devastating damage is done?!
Much more needs to be made public by people such as you, willing to stand up and be heard! No more hiding please!
Hi flicka, I think there is a possibility here that the police know he is a sociopath. This is interesting because my daughter is on a journey to educate police that people with diabetes can act inappropriately at times. I believe his actions are very inappropriate. I had many questions to ask the counselor on *what* I can do to help solve problems. I found out that just about anything I do can cause my daughter to become defensive and cause her to alienate me. If the relationship ends, watch out! – because I am pretty angry! Thanks for the input!
I am not addressing your particular situation. To curb general sociopahic traits from spreading worldwide, the legal profession as a whole needs far more required psychology knowledge and education (especially as regards mental evaluation.).This applies to all the legal eschelons from patrolmen to courts and judges. To me it is inexcusable that victims or families of sociopaths receive no help whatsoever from our legal system beyond worthless “protective orders” BEFORE they’ve committed their deadly deeds.
As far as I know, there is absolutely no correlation between mental illness and diabetes…they are not related!
I think it is not just the sociopath who needs to be dealt with. I look at the enablers around him. They need to be dealt with, too. It needs to be court ordered. I think it is pretty strange when they ,also, make excuses for the sociopath’s actions or even celebrate?! when the sociopath gets little punishment for a crime for which they plead guilty.
Donna, I want to apologize for posting and, then, deleting my post. I run risks of alienating my daughter which would alienate me from my granddaughter whom I need to “keep an eye on”.
If I could talk or write, I would say that judges need to order psychological testing for any personality disorder that they strongly suspect. I would write to state and local governments to urge them to diminish inmate texting and phoning which only cripples the sociopath victims more. (I had my daughter’s attention for only about a minute because she was constantly being contacted by the sociopath and his friends.)
I have come to the conclusion when thousands of people are seeing some of the same characteristics of these same type of people (sociopaths), then it is probably true. only logical
Thanks again for your service to the community.
I just wanted to clarify a statement I made about enablers. I read Martha Stout’s Sociopath Next Door book. She portrayed one particular case about a family whom was afraid of their sociopath son. I imagine there are families who are NOT enablers to their sociopath. My apologies. I am referring to the families who are enablers. Sorry.
Nothing to be sorry for; as a 40 year past enabler to my children, I certainly understand how very easily it could happen. Despite speaking 5 languages, being an Ivy League college graduate, having traveled the world etc. Love is indeed blind especially so for compassionate, peace-loving,intelligent people!
Thank you for writing this, Donna. I’ll be sending it to my family members and also some of the people in the judicial system who I know would be interested in reading it.
About education within the legal system about psychopathy, it is badly needed, at least in Iowa. At a parole hearing for the stalker who has pursued my family, one of the Board of Parole members asked which method they use when doing a psych evaluation. He asked if they use Dr. Hare’s method in Iowa, which he seemed to respect. He was informed they don’t use Dr. Hare’s method, and if a psychologist isn’t available, someone in the prison does it. My husband and I looked at each other and shook our heads. There are so many things we’ve dealt with in the judicial system that are an outrage, and this is near the top of the list for me.
I’ve dealt with many people involved with my case who are completely scammed by his charm, mostly people who can and did help him get released from prison. To listen to prison officials talk about the trouble he has gotten into and recommend that he not be released, then immediately listen to his counselor talk about how wonderful he is and recommend release is maddening.
Well, he’s out now and apparently plotting revenge, as his big mouth is spreading around “his town”. His 4 1/2 years in prison taught him nothing. If my predictions are right, as they have been in the past, he will one day be back in prison and lives will have been lost due to the people who fell for his charm and helped him get released without being rehabilitated.
I am so pleased to see such and excellent article focusing on how entire families are effected by one Sociapth. I belong to a group of estranged parents and so many of these situations are caused by a Sociopath. There is a worldwide growing epidemic of adult children cutting off non-abusive parents and the parents are coming together for support. My estranged daughter has become the target of her sociopathic father who let me raise her then fed her lies and turned her against me at age 25. It escalated for 10 years until I was totally cut off from her when I told her the truth to protect my grandchildren. We used to be very close and now I do not even know who she is, she is a shadow of her former self. Many parents are dealing with children married to sociopathic spouses, both male and female who want to cut their in-laws out of their lives and the lives of the grandchildren. There are thousands and thousands of brokenhearted parents and grandparents because a sociopath entered the picture and did what they do best. Donna, thank you for your wonderful work and I hope you will address the broader picture more often. It is not just the target who is damaged, it is enire families including innocent children.
…And I would like to add…society at large. My 5 children watched my sociopath “ex” always come out the “winner” and saw me as the “loser”; thus they eventually came to learn that being a winner (dead-beat dad, falsifying IRS returns etc.) was far more preferable to them. Thereby, society as a whole also tends to “follow” in the footsteps of the mentally ill.
The legal system is a big part of the problem. Functioning sociopaths, those with enough brainpower to not get caught, are often attracted to positions of power so they can used their job a a shield for their behavior. They seek and succeed at careers as lawyers, judges, doctors, and policemen and often the corporate executive who moves to the top gets there climbing on the backs of his coworkers instead of by his own merit. My ex was a sociopath and a lawyer, so were many of his colleagues. They are even in our highest political positions, they make wonderful candidates because they can lie so convincingly and charm the masses. Then they only look out for themselves, not the people they ore supposed to represent or the Constitution they have sworn to uphold.
I applaud all the input made by Delores and agree 100%!
Maybe he is just trying to blame the behavior on the diabetes rather than the psychopathy. No correlation whatsoever.