I am no stranger to counselling. Counselling was an essential part of my work, and I had trained at university to practice counselling in a work setting.
I am a big fan of it, and when you study counselling you need to receive counselling yourself, I found that when I did this, it was hugely beneficial to me.
Things had really progressed with the sociopath in my life. After a LONG period of no contact (almost a year), life had been his greatest teacher. After being made homeless he lived in a house with addicts, alcoholics, liars and thieves. Ironically what was done to him, was what he had done to others. He became sick of it, and decided to get a job, to work and pay his way to make his own life easier. He had learned a lot of life lessons – or at least I thought he had, and his behaviour following this, for a long period of time, showed that he had learned.
Over that time I did see change, the brain pattern would still be the same, but what really did change, was his ability for personal responsibility, to see his actions. Whereas before he was always RIGHT, now he would apologise, and tell me WHY he was sorry.
With this in mind, after a rough spell again, he decided to do counselling. Of course I didn’t really believe him, and thought that this was yet again another ruse, to manipulate me. It wasn’t. He was making the effort and checked into therapy.
I wouldn’t say that things were particularly bad prior to him doing counselling. It was more to do with his insecurities, which in turn led to the usual, need for control, false accusations, needing to be the centre of attention, creating drama, attention seeking, jealousy. The usual sociopath drama, and It was draining.
Counselling/Therapy doesn’t work for Sociopaths and will only make the behaviour worse, not better
He had been doing his counselling for six sessions, prior to us going on holiday to Turkey. I was pleased that he was making an effort, but really did feel that things were relapsing and going back to how they were before, he was becoming worse after therapy, rather than better.
Only a few months earlier, we had gone to a music festival, and shortly before that had a trip to London, both times I feared that this psycho head would emerge and the trip would be ruined.
However, my fears were unfounded, and he was a pleasure to be with on those trips. As many of you will know, charismatic sociopaths can be fantastic company, if they are on form, they can be charismatic, charming, gregarious, fun. Who better to go away with (as long as the psycho self doesn’t emerge). I was really pleased, for the first time since I knew him, rather than spending the day doing ‘drama’ created by him, we were doing normal things, things I would be doing had I not met him.
It was with this in mind, that my mind was eased, and I thought that perhaps this trip abroad would also be good. After all we had came so far, particularly in the last year.
It was while I was away, in a hotel in a foreign country that he really span out of control. When the sociopath goes into full on psycho head mode, nothing can stop it, it is like a switch that switches on, and cannot be switched off (until the narc rage stops) Well, actually it happened before we got on holiday, in the airport, when he flipped. I didn’t know that he hadn’t booked leave from holiday, we were lucky that they let us board the plane. Eventually I had to sit away from him at the back of the plane on my own, while he managed to blag free food (how does that happen).
He hadn’t been full on, full blown psycho for a long time. While I knew that the potential for this to emerge was always there, I genuinely thought that he had moved on, and moved forward.
The day after we returned he went to his weekly counselling session. It is now that I can really see how and why, counselling does NOT work for a socio/psychopath and will only serve to make things worse.
Why doesn’t it work?
With a normal person, you attend counselling as there is something that is broken (you feel) within you, that you need to fix and heal, usually this is related to a past event that has affected you.
My tutor at uni had described counselling as being like a record that plays, that jumps when it hits a scratch in the record. Counselling works, by erasing the scratch, so that when the scratch is erased the record plays without jumping.
When a normal person goes to counselling, they tell the truth, they are not manipulative with the counsellor. A normal person should be able to take personal responsibility. A normal person, hopefully wouldn’t lie to the counsellor.
Sociopaths charm pretty much everyone that they meet. They enjoy the game, life to them is a game. In the last six weeks of him doing counselling, things have gone backwards. Why?
- The sociopath enjoys playing victim and the attention that they get from this
- The sociopath will lie to the counsellor. The counsellor can be manipulated
- The counsellor will not be working with the full facts and the truth, because the sociopath only gives their side of the picture, and the counsellor has no clue about the disordered mind of the sociopath
- The counsellor will empower the sociopath, which could in turn increase abuse towards the victim
- Normal people CONNECT with others, sociopaths do not connect with others in the same way. They are always focused on themselves, what is in it for them. Always manipulating, always monitoring, observing, calculating.
The last point is an important one. It is the lack of TRUE CONNECTION that a sociopath has, that makes effective counselling almost impossible. In a normal therapist/client senario, there has to be trust (sociopaths trust nobody), the client trusts the therapist, and the two work together to erase the scratches from the broken record. With the sociopath there is no real connection with the sociopath, even this is faked. At least, it isn’t the same type of connection that regular people have. Therefore the results and the outcome is never going to be the same. To work properly with a counsellor you need to have
- Trust
- Ability to allow someone else to help you
- An ability to open up, to go within yourself, and be totally honest
- Self responsibility and to be able to see your weaknesses to heal them
- To be open and not ‘hidden’
Sociopaths find all of the above very difficult to do. They are a law unto themselves. They operate although giving the impression with others, are usually operating alone, manipulating those around them.
Findings
What i discovered was that rather than behaviour improving, things became remarkably worse, in particular
- Felt a sense of justification
- Inability to apologise for actions
- Sense of entitlement
- Inability to face responsibility
- Blame towards the other partner
This was far away from where we had came to. It had taken a long time for him to
- Accept responsibility
- To see his actions and the impact of his actions on others
- To apologise
Worse was that he had returned to
- Lying
- Deception
- Manipulation
- Narcissistic rage was at a level of full blown psycho – which was scary at the time – he was once again ’empowered’
The truth is that sociopaths are beneath their bravado, quite weak people. He had made changes to manage his own behaviour, because he wanted to. It wasn’t always perfect, but it was OK, and there were improvements. Huge improvements, from what things were those first six months, when it was hell.
Counselling/Therapy can empower the sociopath
The most dangerous thing is that a sociopath can become empowered by the counsellor, who is validating and empowering the client.
Things had moved from a person who had worked hard to accept personal responsibility, to a person who was now blaming me. This was the person that I had met in the first place. The person who never did wrong, everything was everyone elses fault. He was once again returning to this person. Counselling enabled him to not take personal responsibility for his own actions, or to minimise those actions as non important (as the counsellor wasn’t paid think about the impact on me, just to make the client feel better).
I began to be around someone who became more of a liability.
Life to the sociopath is often a game, and other people in life, are merely players in the game.
If you are involved with someone who says that they will get help, get treatment, you really should know, that this kind of therapy does NOT work for sociopaths, it will only make the current situation worse, as they feel empowered.
I am unsure whether the results would be different, if he was being counselled by a therapist who understood psychopathic behaviour? I suspect not.
Have any of you experienced someone who actually did therapy? What was the impact? Did you find that it helped, or like my own experience, made things much worse, and the relationship that you were in far more dangerous?
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Dating a Sociopath 
Welcome back! I’m in complete agreement with you. I’ve known two sociopaths to seek counseling and both times they were empowered by it. It’s like it gives them excuses to behave the way they do. Counselors are trained to provide validation as well as tools to assist their patients. This validation empowers them. I’m with you when it comes to the fact that it only works when a person sees their own problem and wants to fix it; otherwise, it’s futile. With sociopaths, I think many times it’s more about impressing someone else or to get what they want. It’s definitely not about self improvement. Thanks for the post hun.
Oh exactly brioli!!! 100% that is exactly what happened. It empowered him, and he felt enabled, that he was in the right.
He had changed in that he could see his problems, he knows what they are – relapses occurred, and he apologised. What happened after counselling – is that he started to blame me. The counsellor thought he was the victim, and was as you say validating him, to stand his ground and stand up for himself (as they do come across as being weak and the victim) this made this a LOT worse, to the point of dangerous….
Yes, I think you are also right about doing things to impress someone else or to get what they want 🙂 this was fine…. but it was the psychological outcome and impact of this, what it did, in terms of empowerment that is really quite alarming.
What I witnessed was a return to the person in the beginning where he truly believed that he was in the right….. dangerous…..
Have you read Bancroft Lundy’s book: ” Why Does He Do That? Inside The Minds of Angry, Controlling Men”? He is de riguor reading in the DV world. In his book he shares a case of an abuser who was a trained psychologist and thus learned all the proper psych-speak and could feign being a sensitive, empathetic person…. and even fooled Lundy for a bit.
No I haven’t but it sounds like an interesting book. I do know that while writing this blog at least 4 people mailed me who said they were both sociopaths and also counsellors/psychiatrists, which is pretty scary really. I wonder how they work without empathy?
The sociopathic female that just discarded me has a Masters Degree in Psychology. She can mimic emotions amazingly well, however, in retrospect, I now realize she does not always know when to mimic certain emotions.
For instance, if she was not watching other people because she was distracted by her phone, and someone said something that would cause most people to react emotionally, she would look up with no emotion in her face. She would than glance at everyone in the room, and “catch-up” and mimic their emotions.
I actually poked fun at her one day about it. I obviously had no idea she was a sociopath at the time.
This was my exact situation when I moved to Denver and started a relationship with a guy I’d known and suspected was a sociopath. Hey, I was right;)! Brilliant move on my part. He used counseling to a) get attention for his issues and b) learn to manipulate me better. He wanted us to go to counseling and work things out, as his therapist had suggested it. He only went to one session with his therapist–apparently to figure out how to “keep me around.” His therapist told him to say “I am committed to this relationship” when we were fighting so I wouldn’t red flag his waffling and behavior. He told me later he just said that because his therapist told him to and he never meant it (said this when we were still together).
When we went to counseling it was “The Scott Show.” He charmed the incredibly dated, unaware and apparently easily-charmed-by-men counselor. All sessions focused on him and how he needed to take “the power back from his mother”–he was so disempowered, yeah, right. And when we did focus on me and our joint issues, once in a blue moon, he told me later that before he only knew how to land “little fish” and now he was learning the “tools to land a big fish like you.” Whatever. Nightmare. Why I didn’t leave then or many other times before I really don’t know. I did love him, but by the end he was convincing me I was the crazy one and told him our therapist even said that. So, that’s how counseling went.
Only heard of therapy of my father – my mother said that it got worse afterwards. Therapist told him to care less about others and more about himself 😀
Father is doing therapy now once again – we’ll see where it leads.
Yes Bird, this is exactly what I experienced.
Which, really is what counsellors do, they empower others….. this does work, with normal people.
With someone who is a sociopath or with narcissistic tendencies…. it can quickly empower off the scale.
Within weeks….. years of hard work that i had put in, were starting to become undone.
Thank you for sharing, as I am sure that this must be common. I had read before that it doesn’t work for them, but never really fully understood why – until I experienced it for myself.
Well, counselors should raise their awareness of what they do to others. That’s what the counselors of criminals do, and those know, that many criminals are sociopaths. So it could work, I think. I don’t really believe that it’s not possible. But I experienced myself, that therapists don’t know enough about relationship dynamics like these; mine couldn’t understand my trauma.
I guess its easier if you are counselling a criminal, as the counsellor already knows that the criminal could possibly have harmed others.
Counselling in normal society, the counsellor would just be at one with the client, not really think about any other mental health issue. (for sure its a mental health issue) I think.
I think it is incredibly difficult to understand the relationship dynamics – unless you have been there and been through it, and even then it is difficult to understand.
Great posting. More people need to understand this dynamic.
Thanks Kim.
I think it is important too, as it is natural for the victim to want things to get ‘fixed’ or ‘better’ there is no fix.
truth was that he screwed up the holiday, caused massive anxiety and tension, for no reason at all. Just his own stupid head, not wanting me to go alone (he would lose control) – of course, he presents this (I would imagine) to counsellor as how insecure he feels, and that i might run away with someone else.
Its not like that with a sociopath, they see their partner as a possession, someone that they own and control (He doesn’t control me)…. his counsellor convinces him that he shouldnt feel bad, there there, (massage ego) it is understandable that he felt that way.
No acknowledgement of me, impact on me, but it wouldn’t be – it makes the sociopath to be the victim, when actually usually they are not a victim, just a victim of the circumstances that they create – almost every single time. (sigh)
I did bring up the subject of therapy to him. His response? “What does therapy do? How does it help? All it means is someone else is also talking about it!” He also admitted that some people can’t be helped. Hmmm, he was right. You’re right Pos. They never change. Just as we can color our hair temporarily, changing our “looks”, the “roots” ALWAYS come back. PERIOD. NO HOPE.
Ha exactly Bunny, they are always this way. they will do counselling or whatever to try to be what the other person wants them to be. But the truth is that counselling just doesn’t have the same effect as it does on a normal person.
A normal person is doing it for themselves…… to make themselves feel better. The sociopath loves to have the validation — that they are right. This only serves to make them worse.
There ‘can’ be some change, but as you say, the same personality is always under that management of the personality its just who they are, the way that they think, the way that they do things.
Another issue with counseling and why it doesn’t work, in particular with highly intelligent SPs, is that they learn how to “behave” properly and so they can be even more manipulative with others, because before counseling maybe they didn’t really understand how relationships were supposed to work, but now that they have counseling, they learn the behaviors of what is acceptable and then mimic those behaviors to get what they want and manipulate others. So they become even more sneaky and dangerous….I’m glad you’re back. I too re-engaged with my SP and now am of course, reaping the negative benefits of that contact. I just blocked him on my phone this morning…all he does is hurt me over and over. No contact is hard but I have to stick to it this time.
Wishing you all the best, B
Thank you Bird. Had a hard couple of days, mostly just grieving once again, the person I thought he was. He feels dead to me now. That would probably be easier in some ways…
Welcome back B, its good to see you here!!
Lots of people return. Many are in long term relationships. Others have to have contact with their crazies for reasons of family connections or business. I think you are right though about learning about how they should behave. I didn’t find that with him, he already knew this, or at least he was learning this….. the danger I found was the validation and empowerment that it gave to him.
I dont think they have genuine true connections to others to have a beneficial client/therapist relationship. Its always feigned with them….
I agree–they have the same kind of false, lyingabouteverything, relationships with their therapist. I had a bf a very long time ago, who I now see, met a lot of SP characteristics, and he went to therapy and it’s true, he would come out of his sessions and feel all justified in how he treated me–because he lied of course, about his role in things. It made me so angry because I knew he was lying and that counselor would defend him and accuse me in their sessions–according to him–even though he was emotionally and psychologically abusing me. Later when we finally broke up (he became physically abusive, rammed my car into a pole and tried to strangle me–to my credit we never spoke again at my initiation) I’d run into his friends and they all told me how they hated how he treated me and how they’d tell him to stop it. It made me feel better, knowing they felt like I did. Now? He’s a psychologist who does “research” at an ivy league, on family violence. God help us…
Omg no way with regard to his future career!! While writing this site I did have email from quite a few people who wrote to tell me that they were counsellors/ therapists. Truly horrifying really as the one thing a counsellor needs is true empathy.
I am so glad you are back………….truly I get so much from this blog like
empathy……every place I try to get help and understanding re counseling….do not understand what these people do to us….and when I leave I feel worse……going on 16 months NC…still he is in my head…
telling me again how I just do not know how to think for myself….I souldn’t feel this way or that……thanks for this post as one of the things
my head tells me is that if he only got counseling he could be ‘cured’
the few times we went he walked out when the terapist confronted him
about any behavior….the court is going after him finally and I don’t care what happens about future support etc….as I am getting back to my own sweet, happy self day by day……..thanks again for what you are doing with this blog……I feel sort of crazy again til I read how they are all the same and will never change.
I remember asking my ex to go to a counselor with me to see if we could get our relationship on the right track. I didn’t care whether it was just me who had the problem or both of us, I just wanted things to be normal.
She told me that she already had her own counselor and that her counselor had told her that it seemed I needed to control everything (like how I spend my time, how I choose to raise my kids, where I live etc.) because of losing control over something in my past. It was totally all me and I should go speak to someone myself because I was the one who needed help. So I did.
It wasn’t until I called over her place to get a few things I had left and needed that I realized exactly what was going on. I overheard her on the phone to her ex-sister-in-law (a child psychologist), ranting about me and my kids. This was her counselor and the few things I heard her say where totally misrepresented. She had combined a few different situations into one and put it such a way, that she looked like a total innocent who had no idea what was going wrong. Which from my point of view was the total opposite. To me it seemed she created drama over the stupidest things.
So I guess in relation to this post, not only did the “counselling” empower her, but I would also say, from my experience, that socs have a tendency to shop around, looking for someone who will “counsel” them with what they want to hear. So even if the counselor did pick up on the fact tat they where a sociopath or narc, they’d just move on until they found someone who will tickle their ears.
Thanks Travis, good comment.
It appears from those of us who have experienced this, that it has the same effect, empowerment. I also found it interesting that you had overheard her conversation, how she pieced together pieces of the truth to create her own version of the truth.
Thank you.
i’ve taken my sociopathic mother to counseling before i figured out she was a sociopath. twice to the same person once to another. the first one counselor figured her out almost immediately but didnt tell me about her condition.he let me leave without telling me anything but to get away! get fr away! i thought he was nuts. how could he tell me to get away from my mother? when i went back to him a couple of years later (after i spent almost all the money i had to build her a house that she used every guilt trick in the book on me). i said to him i figured it out! my mom is a sociopath! his reply was what are you going to do about it? by then there was no hope. she had bled me for all i had. if he would have told me at the first group of sessions i would have been long gone. the second counselor was sucked in by her and almost was against me from the time she saw him. the only way counseling works is for the victim. the victim must be told about the mental state of the other!
Oh gosh that is awful Tommy. Do you still hear from her?
she is still living in the house i built for her. she wil not leave. i have a friend who is being the go between. she has an ultimatum. i will send her an eviction notice in february and if she is not out by then i will move her belongings to a storage bin and when she shows me the signed lease i will give her her stuff. to look back on my life and to see the lies, manipulation. how she’s reached out and destroyed all my dreams. i ask her about 2 years ago what about my dreams. her response i guess ive never thought of them. everyone loves her. she has all convinced that i have the problem. i just want to get what money i can back from the sale of her house and to leave. i told her when shes out ill never see her or speak with her again.
Ok, well go careful with telling her that when she is out you will never speak to her again, as she might see that as a game. Also it gives her nothing to lose, she would probably be deliberately difficult to cause you problems (she has nothing to lose)
I don’t know where you are, I am in the UK, so I know UK housing law well, but obviously legal systems are different in other parts of the world. In the UK you have to go very careful with housing – as the law is complicated, and sure if she could trip you up to punish you for removing her from her home, she likely would.
So glad you are back — you have experienced so much and you are such a help to others. In my case, I was 49 yrs old, kids leaving for college, newly separated (but b/c of economic reasons, still in the same house as my husband), looking for work, etc… My socio was my best friend from 4th grade who I had not seen since high school (we had never dated). He love bombed me with poetry, told me he loved me (but never told me he was IN love with me), classic bs. He was (prob. still is) grieving the loss of his fiancé to breast cancer (she was the love of his life, dated her in h.s. and college, she dumped him (told him when they got back together that she had been sexually abused by her father, which I have no way of knowing), they both married someone else, and they got back together in 2005. She dumped him (again) when she found out she was terminal. She died in 2008. Being the empathic person that I am, I thought I could love him out of his grief. We talked every day on the phone (I live in MI, he lives in MO). I went to see him several times (went into debt doing this, even took out 5000 on a credit card b/c he had cashed in his 401k and given it to his fiance to help with medical bills, so he said) and looked for work in his city, but in 4 yrs. never invited me to his house. Turns out that when his fiancé died, he had moved back in with his ex wife (they were still friendly). He would create drama, hang up on me, write cruel emails — when I look back I cannot believe how stupid I was. He is highly intelligent and articulate, and as a writer I loved that about him. And of course I loved the little boy I remembered from childhood and the shared remembrances of our hometown and high school days. My husband and I got back together a yr ago (I finally had the strength to end things with the soc in 2013). But my husband’s family hates me (they played a big part in my marriage troubles), and I hate myself for giving up 4 yrs of my life to a sociopath (even tho I am college-educated and well-read, I had no idea until I found this blog what was happening to me). I know this is a long post, but I am still suffering. I miss the great sex (on the cam and in person) and the “intimacy” of talking to someone every day for hours about my deepest desires, news events, etc…I have been in therapy, am on Prozac, which helps, but still miss my socio terribly. Aside from a birthday text a few months ago from him, there has been NC even tho I have emailed him a few times (usually at night after a couple glasses of wine).I don’t know why, as our relationship was such a roller coaster. I doubt my judgment in people and feel terrible for hurting my family. This blog has saved my sanity. But I feel I will never be free of him and wonder if he was a sociopath when we were young (he had loving parents and a decent family life).
I don’t know what is happening, I have replied to your comment about 3 times now, long lengthy comments, then it disappears aragh.
I have gone into comments, so I will retry to say what I was going to say.
Firstly, I can see that this is giving you a lot of pain. I want you to learn to forgive yourself for this relationship with him. It isn’t that you are stupid. It is that he was better at being manipulative and deceptive. You didn’t fall in love with someone to betray you or hut you. You believed in good faith that what he said is true.
forgive yourself for loving with an open heart. It is a beautiful thing to be able to do this.
Also you say that you miss the intimacy that you shared, how he knew everything about you and other intimacy, try to look at this for what it truly is, ‘control’ that is all that it is. He needs to know everything about you, not for interest, but for control. This is all it is, and it is a reflection of him and his disordered mind, rather than a reflection of how loveable you are, or your ability to love and be loved.
Can you begin to write a list, honestly, not about the pain that you feel, or how you feel hurt and rejected, but a list of how he lured you in, what he offered you, what you saw, what you felt. By focusing on this, and not on the pain of rejection, you might move forward to forgiving yourself.
As for you emailing him!! YES it is therapeutic to write those emails, but please don’t send. Read this post https://datingasociopath.com/recovery-and-healing-after-dating-a-sociopath/establish-no-contact/how-to-get-your-feelings-out-without-breaking-no-contact/
Thank you so much for your response. I will take it to heart and will try to forgive myself. But I fear that this pain in my heart will never go away. I thought he was my friend, we were so close as children.
Its also the sense of betrayal too. I know it is easy for me to write the words, but taking away the pain is a different matter.
Hi welcome back positiva girl ! I was so sad that your forum became closed. Really enjoy you and everyone’s insight and experience. I have broken up with my ex sociopath for close to 6 month. I was only able to maintain no contact for a month or so. She is in another relationship now, but we still text and call few times a week. I know its not good, but part of me still don’t want to let go that good feelings she gives me when things were good. My question is , is it possible to stay friends with a ex sociopath. Thanks!
I think it is complicated, as why would a sociopath want to stay friends with you, unless there is something in it for them? Usually this is to keep you as the ‘just in case’ senario, in case it doesnt work with their new partner.
How does it make you feel to be in contact a few times a week? Are you finding that you are living for that contact, or are you getting on with your own life? Who instigates the contact, you or her?
Thanks for the warm wishes its good to see you here too 🙂
I hope you are not still with this person! My ex meets the criteria for being a sociopath, and I fully agree with what you say about counseling. He was required by the court to get counseling after he pled guilty for sexually abusing our daughter–after I reported him and saw to it that he was prosecuted. The judge declared that he had to pay for his therapy, our daughter’s therapy, and my therapy. Several months after our separation (he was by then living with the woman he had cheated with), he asked me how much longer I thought I would be in therapy. I replied that I had no idea how long my therapy would last, anymore than he probably knew how long his treatment would continue. He was getting tired of paying my therapy bill, of course!
His response to what I said was, “Oh, I can stop therapy anytime. All I have to do is make a contract with my therapist, do what I said I’d do, and I’m done with therapy.” His statement was pretty revealing because he was manipulating his therapist as he had manipulated our kids and me while we were a family. A few months after that, he told me that I way overreacted to what he had done. Evidently, he didn’t believe that molesting his daughter from the time she was 11 until she was 13 was not something I should have reported to the police. He didn’t believe it was a “big deal.”
I have read that sociopaths who are clever learn to imitate normal people’s emotional responses so that they are not identified as being “different” from others. This is what my ex did. He was highly intelligent and adept at playing psychological games. Unfortunately, I was not even suspicious and accepted him as being “normal” until I caught him with our daughter. Now my daughter is in the process of getting out of a marriage where she and he use rage to control one another and also play financial games with one another–he buys a gadget they can’t afford, so she buys something they can’t afford, etc. I don’t believe either one of them is a sociopath, but my daughter learned how to manipulate her spouse by observing her father. She has finally admitted that her husband’s rages scare her and has had enough, so she is getting ready to move out and live on her own. How history repeats itself! However, I think she finally gets this and may find some peace by living on her own. Who knows? She is a drama queen, so all I can do is wish her well and be there for her if she needs me.
That must be worrying for you about your daughter. Do you think that possibly she has her father’s traits? In terms of the sociopathy not the sexual abuse? There has been a lot of research that showed genetic links. It’s not normal to play games at all in a relationship (I don’t think so). It must be upsetting for you to rexperience this?
Both my daughter and her husband were adopted and both came from homes where an adoptive parent used raging as a means to bully other family members into submitting to their control. When her husband recently added a firearm to ramp up his raging, my daughter decided it was time to end the relationship.
know this so well…I took the first gun when I woke up and he was cocking it right beside my head….when he bought 2 more I left in the middle of the night forever.
My ex had extensive therapy and basically, it turned him into someone who would never apologise, never take responsibility and would always place blame elsewhere. I think the sociopathic traits became much worse, turning into full-blown sociopathy by the time he was finishing therapy and meeting me. I saw a lot of change as he finished therapy. There was an overlap period of him finishing and me meeting him, but I know how bad it got and I remember him using counsellor language to justify his horrible behaviour towards me. You are right. It makes them ten times worse. x
My sociopath told me how he would read Psychology Today in high school. Had no idea at the time. Think he picked up a few tips even at a young age.
Positiva! Another great “Ahh HA” article. One of the things I had bemoaned with my ex was that I didn’t ever get to even try couples counseling and now I am so glad I flubbed it up ( at the time).
He & I were going to try a gay resource center’s program thru a local college. They ask extensive questions relating to your personal situation to “take you on” in this low cost therapy. I called and got the ball rolling early on ( this was like the 2nd year into our 4.5 year nightmare). He was gungho until I mentioned that the counseler asked if we used any substances ( from pot to booze to pills or whatever). I was honest and said we partook of smoke and I drank a little- more a binge drinker, he almost never does. Anyway, when I told him that he went ballistic- refused to have anything to do with program and basically made a fight so as to ruin the weekend ( to which we had many emails exchanged where I was like WTF is your problem?!).
Now I am glad, after reading all the personal glimpes above that I f-upped with my honesty! As usual, it would’ve been a waste of time ( isn’t every endeavor with these people?)! God thank you!
I am on a great new path now and have a fun new friend I’m hanging with that helps me, listens to me, laughs with me, sings with me! We arent’ being physical much, but still hug on seeing each other and you know what? That is fine for now. I so dig having a new friend that has a good heart, is thoughtful, and engaging! He’s been down a hard road too, but I think we are doing the right thing by taking our time and just having fun in the moment.
Pos I too, am in a legal battle with my step Pop. He pillaged my mom’s estate ( sold everything of importance from jewelry to car) even gave our family’s heirlooms for his own greed! Turns out mom was trying to implore me to get rid of my tainted love Spath because, ultimately, she was with one TOO! Poor dear- she trusted this man and he betrayed her own kids in the worst way. Lieing manipulative POS he is. We got the lawyer on his house sale ( which my mom paid for in cash) and have plenty of evidence to show he is lying about almost everything. He brings my sis and me some pleasure to atleast get even with him on this aspect as how do you replace family heirlooms? I have had many upset nights since all this went down a few weeks back- but atleast our lawyer is pissed now too ( he was nonchalant before) but think we can win on this one as he has nothing to stand on. Thank God mom set up the house in Will the way she did! Atleast!
PSS- I saw that bantor, Pos, on the other thread where that TROLL was trying to make you look to be the fool. Don’t fall for this putz’s writings (as I am sure you don’t)! He’s a real piece of work for posting such drivel on this important forum! You have helped SO MANY of us out here trying to understand what is going on! This guy was just trying to make you feel bad and I hoped you got a good chuckle from his stupid ramblings!
Happy Weekend Everybody! Our first Fall weather arrives to suppress this Indian Summer of last few weeks- once & for all! Goodbye heat ’14! 😛
Wow. So many months later I am about to take my almost proven sociopath to the counsellor. Well actually will take him to a personality testing centre first to identify his actual disorder. Hope he is honest there. I hav anyways told him I want out since I discovered his cheating on me with his exwife altho by chance stopped it befor our marriage. But besides that has given me a very toxic marriage. So when I found out bout the cheatin too I went berserk n walked out. Icing on the cake really! So now 2 mths later since he still hasnt managed to convince me to return he seems to want therapy..counselling. .meditation etx..the things they do to win bac an object its crazy. .as for me hav total moments of clarity whr I wanna leave him for sure but then a part og me doesnt want a divorce n still loves hom n wants him to change. Besides which my divorce can only be filed after 3 mths due to legality so m doin all this. Mayb he changes or mayb will tell myself I gave it my best sshot.fingers crossed the centre is able to identify his type! He is noe sayin he also wants to understand how he cud cheat on me n treat me so bad when he loves me so much! Uff such drama he puts me thru. Just dunno when he is telling the truth or when he is lying!
Takes one to know one…and… what comes to us always matches us…ps. there is no such thing as a sociopath, other than a theoretical concept that has been discredited as an inaccurate story/representation of the compromised/traumatized development of defense mechanisms, The Interdependent arising of all phenomena based on identity and context creates a complete whole (made up of two polarities)…with life being a mirrored projection of the I am…I am not…You are….You are not…all contractions/tensions/conceptual frames/perspectives/interpretations existing on an infinite spectrum of possibilities….in this case, a conscious thought-form solidification/manifestation of the Karpman Drama Triangle (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karpman_drama_triangle)
Oh dear…… well what came to me, wasn’t a match for me. I know that. The same for other victims, but if it makes you feel better to think it doesn’t exist… well you can crack on with that idea. It does, and there is no known cure or it either.