Harness Your Inner Sociopath?

[Philippa]

My f*ther did, and my m*ther... This point is so hard for me to deal with. I can't even begin to explain.

I'm aware that some parents do intentionally cause suffering, yes, but I think there are many who don't mean to or realize they are, they are just operating the only way they know how to as taught to them by their parents and their parents before them.

My m*ther owns a fricken PhD in Educational Science. She knows so much about child psychology and about the consequences of abusive and especially ambiguous parenting (daddy didn't always hate me). She used to beat herself up because she didn't manage to perfectly implement the educational principles of Maria Montessori into her children's lifes. She knew what bedwetting means, what reclusive behaviour means, what constant headaches mean...

This doesn't surprise me at all. I think it's common for children of people like this to experience the exact thing the parent is supposedly an expert in trying to prevent and understand!

Same goes for other fields. My father for years was part of the Brian Tracy Self-development system that was all the rage in the PD world a few years ago, and spent his days out there helping strangers get their lives together whilst his own family were falling apart right under his nose, and he didn't even notice...he was too busy saving everyone else! IDIOT! And he had the GAUL to call me a fool!:rolleyes:

And what did she tell me? She said: "I knew you weren't well, but I didn't know you were suffering that much. You didn't communicate it enough."

Not trying to sound unsupportive here, but, is it possible that you may not have expressed how bad it was? I only ask because I know that when I was really unwell, I had a terrible time actually feeling like I could adequately express it. It's nobodies fault, I think it's just the nature of depression and these illnesses that make it hard for the sufferer to express what they are going through.

Is it possible that your mother really didn't know how bad it was?

My father said the same thing to me btw, recently in fact...after ten years of being unwell, he waited til I was back on my feet to express to me that he had just come to realize how bad it was for me, and that he really didn't realize (mainly because he was running around with his head up his own arse and caught up in his own stupid life to notice.) It was not at all helpful...but I got the sense that he really meant it, that he didn't know how bad it was, and didn't want to. He's an idiot, that's for sure, but I don't know that he was being deliberately malicious? I realize your mother is a totally different person to my father though, and I hope it doesn't sound like I am trying to take her side, because that is definitely not the case. I'm listening to you, I just felt I needed to express this.

I'm not saying it to invalidate your experience, just that people aren't mind readers, and they usually do need to be told or they won't know. I know that it feels like they 'should' just be able to tell...but often people just aren't able to see what's going on beneath the surface for someone who is unwell. People are mainly superficial, and keep everything at the surface, never wanting to look too deeply into things...for their own comfort. It's selfish, and I'm not trying to make excuses for your mother...it sounds like she caused you a terrible amount of pain...as did mine.

Just offering this as a gentle challenge so you can maybe empower yourself in the area of communication, if you so choose. I know it's an area that I need to work on as well.

How about that, eh? So a bit of suffering is okay? I should have just told her that I'm really really unwell?
God, the more I think about this, the more I feel that my mom is one sick bitch.Heh, my m*ther's parents are totally into that. They wrote me an e-mail, detailing how much my p*rents suffer because I cut them off.

Guilt trips don't help anyone, and they obviously aren't aware of how she has treated you, so it's very one sided and unfair of them to do that.

Awwwwww, do they? Now, what a shame. I hope they feel as f*cking disgusting as I feel most of the time.It's just a detail, but... I'm actually an incorrectly applied method of contraception. It's nice growing up knowing that you're constantly being on a party you weren't invited to.

You're feelings are understandable. I'm just wondering though, does wishing that make YOU feel better, or worse?

I am hoping you feel better soon, and again, I hope you are in a place where you can receive this post in the spirit it was meant, without feeling attacked or unsupported in any way, as that is definitely not my intention here...just to offer some food for thought? I may be totally wrong? You know your mother way more than I ever will, so feel free to take what you need from this and leave the rest if it isn't helpful.

 

[freakofnurture]

I know you're trying to be helpful, Philippa, and I appreciate that a lot.
If my replies sound in any way disgruntled, please don't take it personally, it's all really directed at the topic and my elders, not at you :)

... they are just operating the only way they know how to as taught to them by their parents and their parents before them.

Yep, violence is highly inheritable.

This doesn't surprise me at all. I think it's common for children of people like this to experience the exact thing the parent is supposedly an expert in trying to prevent and understand!

Do you have a hypothesis how this comes to be? I could only imagine... uh, in German it's called 'Betriebsblindheit'... that you don't see what's going on because you're so immersed in your daily routine and have stopped questioning what you're doing.

Is it possible that your mother really didn't know how bad it was?

Of course, she could have been genuine with that remark, just like you say about your father. I don't believe she was malicious, too.
I am, however, rather certain that the was overly neglectful, and irresponsibly so. According to my paternal grandma, my m*ther more or less dumped my f*ther several times for being a d*ck towards his own daughter, but she always forgave him after he promised that it wouldn't happen again. How often do you allow someone to break the same promise? She finally stopped the dumping strategy since it didn't work and instead stettled for the idea that 'He's not always a d*ck, only when he's stressed and needs a small, helpless victim to act out his aggression'. She told me herself that she stayed/stays with my f*ther in spite of him being a *$§%&& because she wanted/wants to protect her 'happy family'. What happy family??
I would diagnose Battered Wife Syndrome, but although my f*ther dealt her a considerable amount of overt psychological abuse, too, he never tried to regulate her contact with other people, never threatened to leave her or act out when she left him, and he allows her to pressure him into all kinds of chores or other activities even though he's tired, overworked, unnerved etc. He's as much a victim of her as she's a victim of him*, and if she realised that him being stressed results in me being abused, then she carelessly aggravated the situation for me. Funny thing is, she told me, that she now thinks, maybe she shouldn't have taken my side during the 'arguments' between my f*ther and me, because her being angry with him likely scared him so that he got even more jealous of me and more stressed, and thus abused me even more.
I don't think she was ever unconscious of the fact that my f*ther behaved horribly towards me. And I don't buy for a second that merely ordinary, everyday protective mechanisms prevented her from realising how it affected me. Endless bedwetting, unfailing inability to fall asleep, constant headaches, unwillingness to be hugged und dozens of other symptoms and signs, they were all conscious and faked and due to me being lazy, antagonistic, willfully demure and wanting to skip classes? Really? I think she pondered all the possibilities, and I think, the implications didn't fit her family ideal, and she acted** to convince herself that I was just born a slightly dysfunctional brat.

Just offering this as a gentle challenge so you can maybe empower yourself in the area of communication, if you so choose.

I appreciate that, and I do, in fact, need further practice in communicating how I feel. I still have problems to mention my mood/feelings as long as there is no concrete conflict going on or another random reason - like my husband picking on me in a 'let's have funny time together' way when I'm feeling vulnerable or aggressive.

Guilt trips don't help anyone, and they obviously aren't aware of how she has treated you, so it's very one sided and unfair of them to do that.

I actually took the time to write them a comprehensive list of childhood/adulthood symptoms, some examples of how my f*ther treated me and what my m*ther contributed. They initially appeared to be very sympathetic (called it 'horrible' what happened). They even felt compelled to push the guilt for not helping me aside by informing me that they did notice that something was wrong, but that they (justifyably) feared, interfering would aggravate the situation (because they openly disapproved of my f*ther marrying my m*ther) and that they thought, my paternal grans had so much more contact and would surely do something if there were actually something very wrong. Hello bystander effect. How's your day been?

I'm just wondering though, does wishing that make YOU feel better, or worse?

Interesting question. It makes me feel better.
It would in fulfill my prehistoric need for vengeful justice. But the main reason is that the only way they can not feel as bad as I do is if they minimise what happened, keep on the rose tinted glasses, blame the victim, invalidate what I feel etc. and I do absolutely positively not want them to do that. They don't have the right to do that. It's not fair to do that. It's not loving to do that. Maybe self-loving, but not loving towards me. Yet they both claim to love me. This makes me angry.

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* She is a victim of an unkind husband and a constantly disgruntled son, but there is a huge amount of passion and skill in the way she's living that role. She genuinely loves to complain, even if she doesn't have a reason. She loves to protest against her perceived victimisation and her needs being ignored; she's always maltreated by her kids and her husband, nobody ever thinks about her, ever, and she knows the most subtle and innocent ways to guilt trip you - when confronted with this (which happens often since my brother really hates her) she reacts like a wounded deer. How can you interpret her openness so negatively? If you feel guilt tripped, maybe it's genuine guilt? After all, how you react to what she's saying is 100% up to you! So, she's always so poor and tired, and nobody really appreciates what she does, although she's so brave and works so hard. And she never apologises. Ever. Even if she treated you unfairly or based on false information. That's because she's always right and you're always wrong.
She has overdone it so much that her friends have long ago stopped taking her complaints seriously. All of them. So, even when she has a legitimate complaint, she doesn't get support anymore. She's the girl who screams 'Wolf!'.

** She got the idea that I just was to lazy to get up to pee during the night, so she instructed my f*ther to wake me before he went to bed himself and put me on the toilet. Great plan to exclude my f*ther as the cause for the bedwetting. Punishing me by having him wake me in the middle of the night.
She also took me and my headaches to the doctor at least once every two months for about two years. Because, maybe he'll find something physical this time, and than the problem will disappear.

 

[Philippa]

I know you're trying to be helpful, Philippa, and I appreciate that a lot.
If my replies sound in any way disgruntled, please don't take it personally, it's all really directed at the topic and my elders, not at you :)

Gotcha!;)

Yep, violence is highly inheritable.Do you have a hypothesis how this comes to be?

I think consciously, people like your mother have the best of intentions to help, and unconsciously, they have not yet addressed their own issues thoroughly enough to become aware of their own patterns and tendencies towards minimizing and abuse?
It's possible your mother was treated terribly as a child by her own mother, and this spurred her on to become ambitious in the field she chose, to learn about why her mother treated her this way (again, keeping in mind this is just a guess, I don't know anything about your mother.), and somewhere in the process of her becoming learned about this subject, and as immersed as she became in studying it and earning her qualifications, the part of her that is her mother...that is, we all become our parents at some point, and act out their behavior unless we become aware of it.
Violence begets violence, so it's possible that her mothers actions are being mimicried through her onto you...if you catch my drift. She may be genuinely unaware of this, OR she may actually realize she is doing it, but is so horrified at the way she has become everything she hated in her own mother, that she chooses to go into denial about it and pretend it isn't happening?

Does this make sense?

I could only imagine... uh, in German it's called 'Betriebsblindheit'... that you don't see what's going on because you're so immersed in your daily routine and have stopped questioning what you're doing.

This is highly possible as well, and I think it's the same for my father.
On some level though we all know deep down what we are doing, because we reflect each other. We are all mirrors of ourselves, so when we hurt someone else, we are really hurting ourselves, and on a feeling level we know this, unless we are numb and disconnected from our bodies and from our empathy, which many people are, in which case, it becomes very easy to inflict pain on others without acknowledging how it feels in us, as we are cut off from our emotional realm, and disowning of that vulnerable aspect in all of us.
Many people can kid themselves their whole lives, but it is my belief that on our death beds, the truth will out...much to the horror of the person about to pass.

.

I am, however, rather certain that the was overly neglectful, and irresponsibly so.

It sounds like it. It's the same for my parents. They genuinely think it is me that is the "ungrateful, overly sensitive" one, because they really can't see what they are doing, though they also don't want to look at how their actions have affected me too closely.

According to my paternal grandma, my m*ther more or less dumped my f*ther several times for being a d*ck towards his own daughter, but she always forgave him after he promised that it wouldn't happen again. How often do you allow someone to break the same promise? She finally stopped the dumping strategy since it didn't work and instead stettled for the idea that 'He's not always a d*ck, only when he's stressed and needs a small, helpless victim to act out his aggression'. She told me herself that she stayed/stays with my f*ther in spite of him being a *$§%&& because she wanted/wants to protect her 'happy family'. What happy family??

Yes, this sounds all too familiar to me as well. What family? To me they are strangers acting like my family and expecting me to play along, more content in keeping up appearances of their fake family, than working towards having a REAL family! It never made any sense to me, but then...that's the dysfunctional family unit for you. It's based on a foundation of lies, so how can we expect anything more?

I would diagnose Battered Wife Syndrome, but although my f*ther dealt her a considerable amount of overt psychological abuse, too, he never tried to regulate her contact with other people, never threatened to leave her or act out when she left him, and he allows her to pressure him into all kinds of chores or other activities even though he's tired, overworked, unnerved etc. He's as much a victim of her as she's a victim of him*, and if she realised that him being stressed results in me being abused, then she carelessly aggravated the situation for me. Funny thing is, she told me, that she now thinks, maybe she shouldn't have taken my side during the 'arguments' between my f*ther and me, because her being angry with him likely scared him so that he got even more jealous of me and more stressed, and thus abused me even more.

It sounds so complicated. Families always are aren't they!

I understand what you mean about them both being victims and aggressors to each other, and I think it's the same for my parents, though they are now seperated, so it's all different now, except mum is now acting like the evil, narcisisstic one, and dad seems to have either gotten better at acting like a nice person, as part of his facade, OR he has actually healed a lot and become a nicer person who is still capable of regular bouts of intense assoholism? It's confusing.

Adults in general are egomaniacal, self-centred, unpleasant fools who run around making everyone elses life unpleasant, seemingly oblivious to the harm they cause.

I prefer animals personally!:D

I don't think she was ever unconscious of the fact that my f*ther behaved horribly towards me. And I don't buy for a second that merely ordinary, everyday protective mechanisms prevented her from realising how it affected me. Endless bedwetting, unfailing inability to fall asleep, constant headaches, unwillingness to be hugged und dozens of other symptoms and signs, they were all conscious and faked and due to me being lazy, antagonistic, willfully demure and wanting to skip classes?

Yes, that sounds really awful. I have a hard time believing none of them know what they are doing as well, or how it affects us...and yet they still will turn it around and blame us for their bad behavior?

Really? I think she pondered all the possibilities, and I think, the implications didn't fit her family ideal, and she acted** to convince herself that I was just born a slightly dysfunctional brat.

It sounds highly likely. People seem to always prefer to go with the illusion their egos present to them, than the reality that is right in front of their faces!

I appreciate that, and I do, in fact, need further practice in communicating how I feel.

No problem.:)

I have the same challenge to improve in this area. I make some progress, and then can find myself back at square one at times. That's life.

I still have problems to mention my mood/feelings as long as there is no concrete conflict going on or another random reason - like my husband picking on me in a 'let's have funny time together' way when I'm feeling vulnerable or aggressive."

I think men especially aren't very good at seeing the woman they love feeling vulnerable, or anything other than happy (which is how we are supposed to be all the time apparently, according to society), and want to make it better..."Cheer her up", which is sweet in one way, but it also invalidates where you are at, and what you are really feeling in that moment, which doesn't help.

I actually took the time to write them a comprehensive list of childhood/adulthood symptoms, some examples of how my f*ther treated me and what my m*ther contributed. They initially appeared to be very sympathetic (called it 'horrible' what happened). They even felt compelled to push the guilt for not helping me aside by informing me that they did notice that something was wrong, but that they (justifyably) feared, interfering would aggravate the situation (because they openly disapproved of my f*ther marrying my m*ther) and that they thought, my paternal grans had so much more contact and would surely do something if there were actually something very wrong. Hello bystander effect. How's your day been?

Classic.:rolleyes:

Interesting question. It makes me feel better.
It would in fulfill my prehistoric need for vengeful justice. But the main reason is that the only way they can not feel as bad as I do is if they minimise what happened, keep on the rose tinted glasses, blame the victim, invalidate what I feel etc. and I do absolutely positively not want them to do that. They don't have the right to do that. It's not fair to do that. It's not loving to do that. Maybe self-loving, but not loving towards me. Yet they both claim to love me. This makes me angry.

It's good you have an understanding of this...though I think it's hard to not understand it if you are aware. That's exactly what happens, and I find it so unfair and infuriating that we are the ones who are forced to be on the receiving end of their crap AND on top of all that, they get to get away with pretending it's not so bad, so they don't have to take responsability for the way they have hurt us, while we don't have a choice, and have a double scoop of suffering, (for no extra charge). I resent them so much for this. Any attempt to try and point out the truth of it to them is met with a cold wall of denial and lies which then deny your reality and experience as well...triple scoop anyone?:mad:

---------------

* She is a victim of an unkind husband and a constantly disgruntled son, but there is a huge amount of passion and skill in the way she's living that role. She genuinely loves to complain, even if she doesn't have a reason. She loves to protest against her perceived victimisation and her needs being ignored; she's always maltreated by her kids and her husband, nobody ever thinks about her, ever, and she knows the most subtle and innocent ways to guilt trip you - when confronted with this (which happens often since my brother really hates her) she reacts like a wounded deer. How can you interpret her openness so negatively? If you feel guilt tripped, maybe it's genuine guilt? After all, how you react to what she's saying is 100% up to you! So, she's always so poor and tired, and nobody really appreciates what she does, although she's so brave and works so hard. And she never apologises. Ever. Even if she treated you unfairly or based on false information. That's because she's always right and you're always wrong.
She has overdone it so much that her friends have long ago stopped taking her complaints seriously. All of them. So, even when she has a legitimate complaint, she doesn't get support anymore. She's the girl who screams 'Wolf!'.

I hear you. It's bloody infuriating. If they only knew how close to being murdered they come at times...it might make them think twice!:D

** She got the idea that I just was too lazy to get up to pee during the night, so she instructed my f*ther to wake me before he went to bed himself and put me on the toilet. Great plan to exclude my f*ther as the cause for the bedwetting. Punishing me by having him wake me in the middle of the night.
She also took me and my headaches to the doctor at least once every two months for about two years. Because, maybe he'll find something physical this time, and than the problem will disappear.

I just think it's this crazy loyalty thing, whereby, even though they are totally toxic towards each other, they get so wrapped up in the dramas they create to give their lives more meaning or excitement or something, that they will go against everything they know to be true, and protect the predator. Is it stockholm syndrome?

Your mother has probably dealt with clients in her professional life who mirror her own behaviors as well as your fathers, and been deplored at the situation and helped those people, without seeing for a minute how similar it all is to her own family dysfunction. It's comical really...though not when you are the one caught up in the middle of it of course.

 

[Deleted member 487]

Harness Your Inner Sociopath

I like that title and I feel it would fit a book I have been writing on the abuses I endured. I'd like to use it, if you don't mind....?

The thinking goes like this:

1. I don't actually care what other people think or feel; I only fear that they'll hate me and I usually feel like I have no control over their like/dislike of me.

I have felt similar to that in the past, but while other's feelings really do not register with me, I still try to exhibit some sincere concerns for others. It's tough, because I really don't care. But it's easy because I learned how to care about someone I don't like back when I was a firefighter.

3.1 I am psychologically ill, always have been and (likely) always will be, because no one in my f*cked up f*mily got off their fat asses to protect me - they knew something was wrong, they only thought someone else would take care of it, they told me so themselfs.

It will only be as bad as you wish it to be. I know that bothers some people, but what I learned is that sometimes you just have to let other peoples bigotry roll off your back like water on a duck's back. I know how it feels for people to make fun of issues you/I cannot control. It's really demeaning. All you can do, in my opinion, is let it flow.

3.2 I don't owe anything to anybody, especially not to people whom I don't even know; if they're easy to manipulate, it's a state of affairs that I encounter and can deal with at my own discretion.

I'm a bit lost here...?

From this follows:
1. I need to take control of social situations by consciously influencing other people's emotions and behaviours in a way that makes them not dislike me.
2. I need to learn to take, claim and value what's rightfully mine.
3.1 I have every right to take from my extended family; especially when they even make offers.
3.2 Nothing prohibits me taking from aquaintances.

But when you take, I think some discretion is best. Hard to explain right now, so I'll try that later.

 

[freakofnurture]

Violence begets violence, so it's possible that her mothers actions are being mimicried through her onto you...if you catch my drift. She may be genuinely unaware of this, OR she may actually realize she is doing it, but is so horrified at the way she has become everything she hated in her own mother, that she chooses to go into denial about it and pretend it isn't happening?

That sounds about right.
I don't know much about my mom's bio-m*ther; she died when my mom was 12. But her f*ther did treat her older brother (the narcissist) pretty nasty, punishing bad grades, constant nagging etc., and obviously her m*ther never effectively protected him. Or my m*ther's little sister for that matter, since she was the one on whom her brother acted out his anger.
Maybe she didn't want to admit that she basically married her f*ther. And maybe she didn't want to go through with leaving him since that would implicate that her own m*ther wasn't as caring as she could have been for not leaving.

The interesting thing is that during my last phone conversation with my m*ther - during which I told her in ever stronger words that I never loved her and that her telling me she loves me doesn't touch me at all - she only once showed emotion: When she told me that she had felt like a bad m*ther because she had been mean to me when I was the age she was when her own mom died (she felt guilty for her mom's death and punished me for that).
It was actually kind of creepy. She always acts like such a loving, attached person, but she only sighed a lot, even when I told her the absolutely worst and most hurtful thing a child could ever tell their p*rents (I never loved you, I don't care if you love me). Sighs upon sighs, no shaky, pressed voice, no hoarse throat, no stuffy nose, just the worry that she might have caused me thinking bad about my dad because she told me many bad things about him in the form of funny f*mily anecdotes.
Yeah, sure. The events themselves were harmless, but your light hearted retellings… man, they really got to me ô.o

It sounds like it. It's the same for my parents. They genuinely think it is me that is the "ungrateful, overly sensitive" one, because they really can't see what they are doing, though they also don't want to look at how their actions have affected me too closely.

Damn you, positive self-image that's protected to ward off depression, regret and self-disgust.
I wonder if vulnerability to depression - in the sense of a reduced ability to utilise self-serving biases and mechanisms - plays a protective role when it comes to reenacting your childhood with other people.
That would kind of up the value of depression…

It's based on a foundation of lies, so how can we expect anything more?

So true. When I hear the word 'f*mily', it sounds like hateful pseudo social propaganda to me. It sounds like slavery of the mind. Good speak. F*mily is super plus good. Yeahyeah.

OR he has actually healed a lot and become a nicer person who is still capable of regular bouts of intense assoholism? It's confusing.

Holy… I swear, I'm in a pretty much similar situation.
I don't think my mom's a narcissist (at least not the 'typical' type which springs to mind when you hear the word), but I ask myself the same questions about my f*ther. Maybe he healed, but if he'd *really* understand what he did to me, he wouldn't have said so many minimising, invalidating things about my feelings towards him when we still had contact.
Maybe I'll ask them both for an update on what they think on the 1 year anniversary of me cutting them off.

I prefer animals personally!:D

Animals rule.

I have the same challenge to improve in this area. I make some progress, and then can find myself back at square one at times. That's life.

Yup. Practice makes… uh… something.

"Cheer her up", which is sweet in one way, but it also invalidates where you are at, and what you are really feeling in that moment, which doesn't help.

My husband occasionally tries to help by telling me what I should do and think. It's still hard for me not to feel offended and to respect his need to be active and fight for my wellbeing, and somethimes I just don't have the energy to distance myself from my initial emotional reaction. When I'm well enough, I try to imagine him as a little boy with a cooking pot on his head and big stick in his hand explaining me how I have to use it to kill the dragon :)

Any attempt to try and point out the truth of it to them is met with a cold wall of denial and lies which then deny your reality and experience as well...triple scoop anyone?:mad:

Yeah, it's unbearably unfair.

I just think it's this crazy loyalty thing, whereby, even though they are totally toxic towards each other, they get so wrapped up (…), that they will go against everything they know to be true, and protect the predator.

Habits, routine… deadly.

I like that title and I feel it would fit a book I have been writing on the abuses I endured. I'd like to use it, if you don't mind….?

Sure :) Use it.

I still try to exhibit some sincere concerns for others. It's tough, because I really don't care.

And if they happen upon you in a bad or impatient mood your cover blows, much to their amazement; been there, done that. It sucks.

I'm a bit lost here…?

Eh, maybe my English skills weren't up to the task here *blushes*
I basically say that if people are easy to manipulate, I can exploit that if I like, because it's not my job to protect other people from their own naivité.