Even bad people can sometimes behave well. That seems a strange twist on the idea of “good people behaving badly.” But it’s true. Even the skeeviest personality isn’t usually spending all day long exploiting everyone who enters his path.
Now this doesn’t mitigate his skeeviness one wit. But it’s also true that sociopaths aren’t always exploiting and mistreating others, all day long. They will be taking some time off, in different contexts, from their more unseemly behaviors.
And so sometimes, sociopaths can be nice, even very nice; sometimes they may extend themselves to others. Now we can question what motivates them when they are behaving well; probably, very often, their prosocial behaviors are driven by relatively shallow, if not manipulatively self-serving, motives.
Still, it’s fair to say that most sociopaths aren’t spending their lives 24/7 causing havoc to everyone around them; and it’s fair to suggest that, sometimes, if motivated to do so, they may even bring some cheer into others’ lives.
After all, we know these personalities can be charming and engaging; and that when they are, this isn’t necessarily, always an “act.” The sociopath can be genuinely charming and engaging, and he may enjoy, genuinely on some level, being charming and engaging.
In a sense I’m suggesting that not everything about even the sociopath is fraudulent; the sociopath, like anyone else, has genuine experiences, although we are right to question the depth of his experiences; and we are right to question his motives when he is behaving himself.
But to avoid confusion, my point is this: Beware! Do not rule-out sociopathy, or a similarly exploitative personality disturbance, simply because the individual is capable of behaving well sometimes, or even, alas, often. To do so risks our missing the significance of the dangerous, always lurking curve-balls that the even sometimes well-behaved sociopath may throw at any time (predictably or not).
One may be tempted to think, “If he can behave this well, can he really be that bad?” The answer is, yes. He can behave, sometimes, this well, and yet really be that bad!
So while I’m not necessarily saying “don’t be fooled” by his better behaviors, which may (or may not) have a genuine component to them, I am suggesting the exercising of great caution not to let the sociopath’s better behaviors distract you one bit from giving full weight to, and appreciation of, his destructive behaviors.
The latter should not be regarded as one bit less menacing and forbidding by virtue of his capacity to display the former.
(This article is copyrighted © 2010 by Steve Becker, LCSW. My use of male gender pronouns is strictly for convenience’s sake and not to suggest that females aren’t capable of the behaviors and attitudes displayed.)
LETTER TO LOVEFRAUD: I fear for my granddaughter’s life
Whyme,
The shock of finding out what you have really been dealing with is a horrible stage, I have found that acceptance is the first step in healing. Watching the mask fall off of the spath and realizing that you have been deceived is such a violated feeling. I am new to this healing and I so understand how you feel. I have come to the conclusion that time, understanding, knowledge and sharing with those that have already been down this path are the best tools to start healing with. Sorry you are in pain. Just post and get it out of you! I see there are surviviors and “we” will be ok in the end.
hugs
notcrazee1
Dear notthecrazy1,
I(t seems like the MULTIPLE TRAUMAS that go along with the chaos of the s-path makes it that much worse!!! I was dealing with a whole NEST OF SNAKES AT ONCE, and I didn’t know which one just bit me at any one time. I was dancing around so crazy that I just kept stepping on them and getting bitten, falling down and breaking my neck and legs!
Remember the old deal about “it’s hard to drain the swamp when you’re up to your arse in alligators?” Well I added one to that, AND SOMEONE SETS YOUR PANTS ON FIRE while you’re trying to do it. With your pants on fire it seems all you can do is fall back into the swamp into the mouths of the alligators. I felt like that.
I lost my husband in July, the next January my step father that I adored and cared for died after 18 months of cancer, but believe it or not, it was a “good” time for him and me, we got to be so close and he was such a good guy, but after he was gone, my egg donor morphed into a monster along with all the other alligators! I just lost my strength to deal with so many alligators at once.
Concentrate on one at a time, one problem, one grief, and try to peel that one back before you move on to the next one. I know that’s hard, but it keeps it from being quite so over whelming I think.
God bless you and just keep on battling them…and being GOOD to yourself. PUT yourself first! Put the most important thing first and like Maslov’s pyramid, just start at the tip and work your way down….get air first, then water, then food, and so on, the BASICS and the other things will fall into place. If you are fighting for AIR TO BREATHE nothing else matters, but once you have that you have to have water, then food, then shelter and so on….it really does make sense. (((Hugs))) and God bless.
Oxy hugs!!!
what an insightful person you are! I needed to learn about Maslov’s pyramid. never heard about it before. i did a search and now have bookmarked it. It starts at the bottom with basic necessities and goes up in levels.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslow%27s_hierarchy_of_needs
what i am trying to express is that i thought i was at the top of the pyramid before spath and i worked hard to get there. spath brought me back to the bottom level and i can’t get to the next level. I keep stepping on the snakes and breaking my neck and legs!!!!! even though i have my blessings. my motto:” through my tears, I see my blessings”!
I never take anything for granted.OMGoodness what an eye opener you have been tonight. I have a little from each level but I do not feel at the top, there are missing pieces from some levels and it makes it all cave back to the bottom. Darn swamp and snakes! Well my pants aren’t on fire anymore and haven’t been for awhile,,,,, time to get those pants off and get a new pair that has not been burned. and go back to fighting the snakes. maslov basically expressed in that pyramid, all things in balance. I had that( or thought I had it) and have not been able to find it again yet. too many snakes.. I love your analogies……. I am on an average day a strong, intelligent and hard working career woman, who knew my life was going to cave in on me like this? Add perimenopause to that! And an ill brother that I have to deal with. Too many snakes!!!! Thanks again and God bless you! Hugsss
I’m not the crazy one after all!
Dear Notthecrazy1,
No, you aren’t crazy in the sense that you are insane, but YES, THEY MAKE US “CRAZY!” Stress is another thing that you need to take into consideration. Google “HOlmes and rahe stress test.”
It gives points to different events in your life over a 3 year period and if you score over 300 you are more at risk for illness or serious accident. I had over 3,000 points in about 18 months.
Believe me, STRESS in high levels along with the anxiety it THINK.
I was “crazy” as a bessie bug for over a year. I could not tolerate even the least amount of stress and was like a cowed dog huddling in the corner wondering where the next kick was coming from—and every day it seemed another kick came.
It has been since August 2007 when the Trojan Horse Psychopath stalker and my DIL psychopath were arrested for trying to kill my oldest biological son—and we discovered evidence that my P-son who is in prison for murder had sent the Trojan horse to kill me–but fortunately I got warned (thank you God!) in advance and literally fled for my life with my adopted son. My oldest biological son and his wife were partly in on the scheme but my son didn’t know the thing entailed murder of me, then my mother, and ultimately him and his wife, along with my adopted son…so the story is so insane I had plenty of right to be INSANE and CRAZY. Since then, there have been other things and other learning experiences, but I have been on the road to healing since that arrest, but still had a long way to go from the previous 18 months…
So if you feel crazy sometimes, don’t let it worry you. Or if you ACT crazy sometimes or cranky, or irritable, those are all part of the stress behavior that is normal. If you weren’t acting abnormal in an abnormal situation it would be abnormal. LOL
I’m glad that you got some food for thought from my posts. Believe it or not, I GET more out of being here than I GIVE and that’s why I’m still here. I learn something new every day here. I see something in someone else’s story that applies to me, to a new step I need to look at.
This healing is a JOURNEY not a destination—there are always things to learn, to grow and to improve.
We have often talked about the healing being like peeling an onion. You work through one layer and there is another one, and another one and another one….before you finally get to the core of things.
There were so many layers to my healing and I peel each one away and then the next…all the way back to my childhood which I see now was not a nurturing one. I see what about my background and my genetic make up that made me tend to react the way I did many times, why I allowed the psychopaths to suck me back in, or if I got away from one, to allow another one to replace them.
I learned to “function in my dysfunction”–I can’t remember who said that the other day but it is SO GOOD—someone remind me who said it! I have no memory! CRS!
That one phrase sums up my entire LIFE until lately. Functioning in my dysfunction. WOW! PROFOUND!
Glad you are here! Keep on learning, keep on growing, and take care of YOU! (((hugs))) and God bless.
Oxy,
Thanks again for your sharing. I think I feel satisfied for tonight. With dinner and a few glasses of red wine I am tired and ready for sleep. Hopefully true rest. It’s hard to rest when you are killing snakes and breaking your neck. Where are you on “our” planet?
Yes, I read on this site about functioning in our dysfuntion and thinking we are OK, when we are not OK. I have absored so much between here and a local support wesite, I can’t recall exactly where it was. As I said before you are a rock and have delt with much more than I have ever been exposed to. you are correct about this being a journey and not a destination…. but I want to get to my destination. My secure abode! I am a results driven person and i want to be on top of the pyramid once again!
Yes anxiety has me and has had me loonier than a bed bug! I love your way of wording the following……
“was like a cowed dog huddling in the corner wondering where the next kick was coming from—and every day it seemed another kick came.”
God Bless You, Hugs and Sweet Dreams!
Not Crazee!!!!
Where am I on our planet? I’m located in the US in the southernn/central state of Arkansas just about 60 miles NW of Little Rock our state Capitol lcity.
Born and raised in this state but lived in sxeveral cities here. Left home at 17 after 1 yr of college went with my sperm donor and did lwild life photography in south America, central america and African for a couple of years, mopved to California married, had two boys, and husband and I moved to Arkansas, divorced, then went back to college, finished up degree in advanced nursing—then 7 yrs later married a dear friend and we were happy until he died inJuly 04.
I missed him terribly and got involved for a short time with a p-BF, but it was just more drama but glad he’s gone. I’m content rigfht now to be single. It has its advantages. Focusing on myself!
Been here on LF since the summer of 07 and I’l probably hang around here til Donna runs me off!
Well, My eyes are closing so I think I will hit the hay Good nihhyt
Wow,Oxy!
What an exciting life you’ve led.
I would lov eot hear your stories from photographing wild life.
How cool! ; )
There’s a lot of interesting thins to do in this world and I’ve managed to do some of them but I can tell you right now BORING has a great deal going for it. PEACE FOR ONE THING!
wELL, i NEED TO RETIRE FOR THE NIGHT, SEE YOU GUYS TOMORROW! GOOD NITE!
wow oxy!
you have led an interesting life. and fled from murder!
You aren’t that far from me. i don’t know why i thought you were not in the US. I guess being new here and absorbing so much at once.
I feel better after sharing and getting this out of me. Thank you so much for clarifying things for me and your support. I should have gone for counseling when i left him, but i was convinced (by spath) that i was crazy and i didn’t know what to do. So i just drug myself out of bed everyday and went to work came home and repeated for 5 days a week, ( fell apart and grieved mom/went through house on the weekends).thinking that as time would go by my wounds would heal themselves. Partially denial, not knowing which wound to heal first. I fled from him on nothing but pure adreniline, raw nerves and anger. in a survival mode. now that i have been laid off my meltdown came down on me. i fell apart. i discovered LF a few months ago and could not believe it wasn’t me and i’m not crazy. what i was feeling was real! I guess that is the acceptance part and a very painful part. That I was screwed so bad!!! i remeber the harder he got on me, the harder i got on myself for making that BIG mistake in my life , both of us were beating me. as i peeled the masks off he got worse on me. before i gave up i tried everything to make it work. just too much wrong and he gave me nothing to work with. after all the poetry, flowers and promises of commitment and love, after he got me up in South Carolina isolated the masks started showing their edges. I was there almost 2 years. OMGoodness…… what a deceived person i was! I did go to Safe House up there for a few counseling sessions, i knew my copeing skills were shot. they asked if he had ever been diagnosed bipolar, i know he didn’t take meds but there was defintely something wrong with him. then i got my old job back and moved back here. running all on raw nerves and went right back into work. and here i am now, trying to heal and make sense of all of this.
Thanks for listening!
I’m not the crazy one!!!!
Dear Notcrazy,
No you are NOT crazy in the sense that we’ve always thought of it, but YES, he did DRIVE YOU CRAZY (where you saw things HIS way) and got you to accept UN-REALITY AS REALITY. That is called “Gaslighting” if you are not familiar with that term, GET familiar with it, there are books on it (amazon has great books for pennies and I order mine from there used, always get great service and cheap) It is essentially where they make us “see” black as white, white as black, up as down, and down as up. It is named after an old movie where a husband “gaslighted” his wife til she thought crazy.
There is a big difference between thinking crazy and BEING crazy. Got it? Trying to believe them and what they say, yet seeing the differences between what we SEE and what they SAY Throws reality out the window. It is called “crazymaking” by those of us who have gone through it. (most of us).
Maybe your losing your job is God’s way of giving you a break from having to get up and go to work and “pretend everything’s wonderful” (that takes strength believe me that would better be focused on getting YOU HEALED.)
I was able to retire from work during all this stressful situation, thank you Jesus, but of course retire at a MUCH LESS pension than I could have had if I could have worked another 6 years. I was 57 when I retired, BUT I also realize that Ii was NO longer safe to practice my profession. I might have hurt someone. I have limited short term memory now, where prior to this it was over the top outstanding. So though my “golden years” of retirement will be “copper penny” years of retirement financially, I am not in want at all and have everything I NEED and many things that are “gravy.” So I am BLESSED and I realize that those dollars were not nearly as important as me having the time and energy to focus on ME now instead of taking care of everyone else. So look at the lay off as an OPPORTUNITY to focus on YOU, and that YOU DESERVE this time to do that. I realize that TIME is much more important than money most of the time. So if you have a shelter, food, and enough clothes to cover your butt and TIME to focus on you, then you are RICH beyond measure.
Oh, BTW many psychopaths are ALSO bi-polar AND?OR ADHD so you may have had a TRIFECTA, who knows.