Monday, November 9, 2009

Effectively parenting a sociopath (part II)

A reader responds:
I was really glad to get your response, and thank you very much for your advice.

I love my daughter and very much admire her veiwpoint, it must be great to be able to dismiss anyone that you don't like or who doesn't agree with you. She is very bright, extremely careful to keep herself safe, yet very brave. It's been a conundrum to me how she could not care for, or even like, many of her friends, yet be the most popular child in her class. She is flying at school, follows the rules, collects the rewards for good behaviour, informs the teacher of any unfairness and I think is running rings round them without them knowing. Who cares though as she's achieving highly, the teaching staff like her and she's never in trouble. Yet she can be very sensitive and has been devastated when I have reacted harshly to her actions. This confuses me as she has been upset that I have rejected her, which I took to be empathy at upsetting me, but is more likely a reaction against rejection. Why be so upset at rejection if you don't really care about the people doing the rejection? I take your point about trust on board and have already found myself being specific about the consequences for breaking boundaries, as literal she understands, but "making me cross" doesn't affect her at all.

I suppose the qualities that attracted me to her Dad are present in her as well. She's still quite young now so not diagnosable I expect, as many children lack empathy and are self centered at that age. I shall watch as she grows up, but I already know she is her father, at least now I can hopefully encourage the favorable qualities and try instill the rules of relationships like the rules of the road. It's confusing to me how a Sociopath can choose to drive within the speed limit as otherwise they would lose their licence, yet chooses to cheat on their partner even though they might get caught and get dumped. I suppose it's the same really as he would speed if he knew he wouldl get away with it and there are no speed camera's in his bedroom to catch him out!!!

Anyway, thank you again for being so open and working so hard to prevent the persecution of a "different" way of looking at life. Doesn't mean I'd ever try and live with a Sociopath again though, it'd be like keeping a tiger in a rabbit hutch.

Sunday, November 8, 2009

Effectively parenting a sociopath (part I)

From a reader:
Thank you so so much for writing your blog. I have just found it and it has helped me infinitely. I have been involved with a Sociopath for a long time and we have several children. You have helped me to understand how he can appear to love me whilst still hurting me. Reading your blogs has been like finally learning his language. I recently ended the relationship but now that I understand him more I can communicate with him without hating him. It's not his fault I can't be with him and he has so many good qualities, i now see them so much more clearly since I don't have to wonder why he is like he is.

I shall continue reading your blog as our middle daughter looks like she will also be a Sociopath, but you have given me so much relief that I can celebrate her for the wonderful person she is rather than trying to change her (not that I think that would have been possible).

Thank you so much for sharing yourself and educating me and so many others.
My response:
Thank you for this. I'm particularly happy to see that you seem fine with the fact that your middle daughter may be a sociopath. My parents love me a lot. I am quirky, I am different, but they have learned to adapt and accept me for what I am. Trust is key with us. When I trust that they really have my best interests at heart, I have traditionally (and still do) accepted and acted upon their judgment on things even though it differs from my own. I realize that I (like everyone) have blindspots and another person's trusted viewpoint is important to me. I'm the same way with a few trusted friends. If I suspect they have ulterior motives, or seem to be overly biased by their own worldview, though, I will ignore their advice. A lot of parenting a sociopath seems to be about picking your battles. You have to be careful not to reject or reprimand them on things that are very core to their identity, otherwise they lose their trust in you. Sociopaths can feel rejection acutely. Sociopath children are very very sensitive to incentives and fairness. Make sure that if you set rules, you always play exactly by the rules and make your child do so as well. This will help train the sociopath to learn to live effectively within boundaries. She'll realize that it is possible to follow rules or maintain boundaries while still accomplishing her goals or get what she wants or needs out of life.

Friday, November 6, 2009

My story, for whatever it's worth (part 3)

So there you have it. Because I know who and what I am, I now know what I want: power, which equals freedom. Pursuing power/freedom would also provide the opportunity to play the game and a challenge. And it starts within. I see how important it is to focus on self development, to take command of myself. And to command myself, I must inevitably command my circumstances. None of this necessarily involves getting to the top of any ladder unless I decide that’s the game I wish to play. None of this need involve anything huge or historical unless I want it to. And it certainly doesn’t need to involve society’s definition of success unless it helps me achieve my objective. I want to experience the inner essence of these goals in the present and I am free to do just that. There’s also a whole world of tastes and locales and literature that I have yet to sample. I don’t have to do the so called ‘big things’. Self development, meeting and exceeding self chosen challenges and enjoying what life has to offer on its own terms really can be enough for now. I’m excited about my future, for the first time in a long time. That’s thanks, in part, to your insightful blog and the email exchanges. Even now, I don’t know if every professional would agree that I am a sociopath. What I do know is that it doesn’t matter. The label isn’t relevant; the underlying characteristics are. My detachment from emotion, including and especially moral ones, my lack of conscience, my flexible personality, my ability to manipulate at will and the profound impact these traits have on how I experience life, all of this I now understand in a way that is both illuminating and coherent, and I have your blog to thank for that.

I’m going to go play now, so to speak. Don’t worry. I won’t hurt anyone unless I’m crossed or unless I have to, so you haven’t unleashed a monster. You’ve liberated a wolf.

Thanks again!

Thursday, November 5, 2009

My story, for whatever it's worth (part 2)

A reader writes (cont.):
I make it sound easy or even simple. But it wasn’t. It was hard. It was confusing. It was painful. It was hard seeing everyone live a life that at least on the surface, made sense to them. It was painful seeing over and over again that I would never be part of their world without pretending. The fact that I knew I was pretending while they were being sincere made the alienation worse. I went through a time of hating them. I hated everything they stood for, everything they said they believed in. I also went through a time where I seriously indulged my delusions of grandeur. I figured since I could never truly be ordinary in the sense that other people were, I’d be extraordinary. I made so many mistakes during this time, so many errors and lapses in judgment. All because I didn’t know what I was. At last, I’ve figured it out.

While I was on my quest to understand what evolution made me for, to use a figure of speech, I set up a comfortable but boring life for myself. Steady work, a small studio apartment, isolation from family and friends and lots of reading, thinking, and me time was and is my life. I’m ready to change all that. Now that I understand what I am, I want to ‘play the game’. It’s time I used my instinctive psychological insight to my advantage rather than to just maintain the status quo the way I have been. I also want challenge. I want to push myself mentally and physically in ways that I never have before.

Wednesday, November 4, 2009

My story, for whatever it's worth (part 1)

A reader writes:
I wanted to thank you for the blog. It’s been very helpful. I understand what I want now. It’s what I call the inner essence of the goal that I want, the thoughts and feelings I want to experience. I want power because I want to experience more freedom in my life. I have existential freedom of course. We all do. But I have not made good use of it. What I didn’t get before was that if I cannot make use of the power I could potentially have in the here and now, then getting to the top of any kind of organization will be for nothing. You know the old saying: wherever I go there I am. I haven’t taken advantage of the opportunities all around me because I’ve been too busy figuring myself out. My life up to this point has really been designed to keep myself afloat with minimal drama and effort while I focused on unraveling the mystery of why I was so ‘different’.

My story starts like so many of the other stories that you’ve featured in your blog and in the comments. I was a typical outsider. I knew I was different from my peers and even my family. I just never understood exactly what that difference was. I was never a shy kid. I was mostly indifferent, especially after I proved to myself that popularity could be had with just the right facial expressions, words and a few well placed actions. The social scene at school stopped being mysterious and became merely boring. And yeah, I pulled a series of stunts that would have gotten me a nice stay in prison if I’d been caught. I got over all of that in my early 20’s when it dawned on me that I was empty and that I had nothing I needed to do or had to do. I was without purpose or meaning. Yeah, sex is fun, no question, but orgasms only last so long. And I still didn’t get why I was so different? Not only did I not get that I would never be one of them, I didn’t even know why. So I went searching for answers. It took a long while. There were loads of false starts, dead ends and misunderstandings along the way. Finally, I was able to discard some false beliefs, start fresh and reexamine things. When I did, I was finally able to see where the differences were. I was able to put a name to the face. Those differences eventually lead me to study concepts like sociopathy and psychopathy. I read a lot of the popular work and some interesting articles on the internet. My Googling lead me to your blog and the comments. It was your unique take on all of this as well as some of the smarter commenters that lead me to see that I’d finally figured it out.
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