The Truth Hits Home – A Psychopath’s Brain

Sandra Brown. Women who love Psychopaths

Written back in Dec 2016.  Publishing now August 2018.

Today marks the third day of me reading this book.  It has been a long tiresome journey of one and a half years after discovering his disorder.  I feel like I have had to read and research a million books and sites to get this this part of my journey!  This book by Sandra Brown “Women Who Love Psychopaths” was known to me at the beginning of my suspicions but due to circumstances I could not get the book immediately.  I am glad that I didn’t because reading it now is the right time for me.

Sandra’s book is gut wrenching because it hits on ALL THE POINTS for why I was such a target .. The role of what and who I am plays such an important part of our relationship. How my personality traits allowed him to get so close to me and also take advantage of all my strengths to make them my weaknesses.  In this aspect, this is the only book that I have come across that maps out the characteristics that are similar between the Super Empathic victim and the Psychopathic abuser – why the relationship works so well for both parties in fulfilling their needs.  Despite hating myself for being conned by him all these years, I felt better having read why I was so inclined to do so due to the type of characteristics I had.  It made me realise why I did not give up on him when so many others might have abandoned a lost cause.  “Women Who Love Psychopaths” also high lights the relationship patterns that are so common in all the victim’s stories.

Sandra harps on the point that a Psychopath is unable to make permanent or lasting changes to their behaviour, resulting in ineffective relationships and eventual harm to the women to who love them.   She brings home the point when she asks if one would ask something of a mentally retarded or disabled person that they are so incapable of doing  –  the SAME applies to a Psychopath.  Well .. I imagined a person with no legs – asking them to run. Well they can’t and they never will be able to – they just don’t have that piece of equipment. Whilst all this while I had read that a Psychopaths brain was different, it took this imagery in my mind to truly understand that I, in a mental capacity was asking My Love to do things he would never be able capable of doing in the first place.

This book and numerous others, discuss the fact that due to the lack of physical development in a few areas of a Psychopath’s brain, he is emotionally unable to feel Empathy.  As a result, a Psychopath does not have the ability feel the hurt he causes, and that lack of feeling means that he is able to re-offend without much thought or care. If you put your hand in fire and you don’t get burnt like others, it is inconsequential to you if you put it in fire again.  However, if you want to fit in with the rest of the crowd, then you will pretend that upon touching fire, your facial expression should be of agony, you jump up and down waving your hand in the air and you cry from the pain.  

When a Psychopath realises at some stage of his life that he is different, he learns to cope and blend in with society using  a from of detached learning.  In this way, a Psychopath has to compensate by remembering what the outcomes  or reactions are from those around him, to different emotional situations created by him.  He learns to be very observant and is constantly studying reactions and body language.  Due to the Psychopath’s innate desire to be top dog,  it will always be a game of emotions to dominate as many women as he can lure throughout his life.

Generally, their level of emotional development age stays around a biological age of a teenager – perhaps fifteen, sixteen years of age.   He may look like a man, behave sexually like a man, have the bravado like a cave man BUT every other aspect of his character demonstrated irresponsibility and recklessness similar to the level of  teenager still figuring out life.

SO … to SANDRA BROWN – A BIG THANK YOU for helping me finally get over the line.  I GET IT FINALLY !! http://saferelationshipsmagazine.com

I have read and researched SO MUCH about the brain, psychopathy and spirituality all these 18 months.  It has been EXHAUSTING and I a very tired.  But every bit of information is starting to sink in, piece together and I am actually able to stand back and look at him in a different light. Weirdly, I am also finding him a “fascinating” subject because I can now predict his reactions and movements. I feel detached from him and he no longer feels like a mystery or a wonderful human being in my eyes anymore. Merely a subject for my analysis.  I watch him with caution and detachment.  And with resentment and hatred too.

In some ways, when I look at all the helpless blubbering messes women turn into at the hands of a Psychopath, I wonder why we allowed ourselves to get to that stage and what state are we left in at the end of the relationship?  It is embarrassing, it is ridiculous.  And yet, the victims, women who are strong, women who are kind, all sorts of women with traits that “match” the Psychopath’s needs – are left destroyed and confused.  I know that Sandra Brown’s book mentions that the women who love Psychopaths generally have high functioning, have self sufficient, with good careers and back grounds – but based on the contact I have had from readings and sites, it seems that there is just as large a population of women who do not necessarily have those characteristics.  I feel that as long as there is a benefit of some sort ie. free accommodation, some cash flow support, etc the Psychopath will use anyone as convenience.  However, yes it does make sense that a more well endowed victim would be preferred if there was a choice.

From Sandra Brown’s book and others that I have read, here are the messages that I truly believe every victim who has been through a destructive Psychopathic relationship should try to understand:-

• Psychopaths can never change PERMANENTLY.  All changes are “short lived” due to the fact that their brains are built in a way that do not allow them to learn from their experiences.  Faulty wiring that CANNOT be fixed.  Any attempted changes to their ways generally they falter and they revert back to their “default” setting.   In this sense, I really saw how hard he wanted to start a fresh, be good and make something out of his life BUT he was never able to sustain it for longer than a month? two months? a week? Each woman he hooked up with offered a new promise to a normal life – but he always fucked it up. And within a period of time (generally 2 years)  the relationships were torn and tattered and he had to move  on.  Other failed lifestyle changes included – He tried to stop smoking – a billion times;  He said he was going to start saving, pay his fines on time and not live day to day – a million times;   He promised to stop getting so angry and using abusive language – a thousand times. He said he would not hurt me anymore – a hundred times.
• There is a natural tendency for a Psychopath to want to have the upper hand, to manipulate and hurt.  As long as you stay with the Psychopath, you will always be a VICTIM.  He will always cheat on you and play with your emotions.
  
• Unless you change the way you behave and think about the Psychopath, he will continue to lure you back in after each discard.  YOU have all the traits that make you compatible to the Psychopath.  Hence that is why YOU as an empathic person were targeted.  If the toy does not make a sound when the bully prods it, the bully will leave it alone.   The Psychopath needs you to preen HIS feathers!!!
• STOP believing or trying to understand if he ever loved you.  It was always a one-way relationship.  Psychopaths ATTACH and you LOVE … When Sandra mentioned this in her book, it made me think hard about the concept.  If we are referring to attachment, we refer to objects such as a favorite pair of shoes or handbag.  From his perspective,  I was just another shoe, another coat.  I may have been one of his favorite ones, or maybe not.
  

I also found Ron Johnson’s book The Psychopath Test a very good read – being a journalist, he presented the topic in a very detached manner; comical and cynical –  his book explored the subject matter in a detached manner and I started with this book at beginning of my research as it approached psychopathy in a non personal manner.

In summary – once the penny dropped and I understood the true nature of psychopathy, I decided that all the effort that I had put into the relationship over the many years was for little to no gain.  The only gain was that I learnt about me as  hyper-empath because another type of personality could take advantage of me for who I was.   

If I didn’t want to be a current or future target anymore, I had to change some things :-

• Establish some boundaries of in terms of how much I was willing to do in terms of helping others.
• Keep my core essence of being empathetic but remember save myself before I saved others.
• Not jump in too deeply and quickly when trying to help others.  Assess the person in a more critical light ie. be less trusting.
  

For all the women who ever loved Psychopaths – Do not underestimate the amount of time you needed to research the topic of Psychopathy,  the understanding required to comprehend what the disorder is all about,  the patience and acceptance of your situation to get to a calm stage in order to execute an exit plan and the strength and determination needed to survive the mind-fuck, abuse and PTSD.

I know there is the defense that due to the fact that the Psychopath has the inability to “help” himself due to brain limitations, “It is not their fault they were born this way”.  But neither is it your fault if you decide to give up and defend yourself from harm.  A Psychopath has to figure out how to survive with his disabilities and he will continue to use as many women and friends as he can to make it through this lifetime.  If you adopt a path of sympathetic reasoning, knowing full well that he is a Psychopath, you will never get yourself out of his loop of abuse.   Instead, go back to basics:  You cannot save him because he cannot be saved.    He does not need you to survive – but you will not survive if you stay.  SO SAVE YOU and DON’T STAY.

RESOURCES WORTH CHECKING OUT

• Ron Johnson – The Psychopath Test: A Journey Through the Madness Industry. http://www.jonronson.com/   ;  https://themillions.com/2011/05/mad-mad-world-jon-ronsons-the-psychopath-test.html

• Sandra Brown – Women who love Psychopaths. http://saferelationshipsmagazine.com
  
• There is a site on WordPress that is written by “HG. .. ” I am not going to promote it but when you will find it and what he writes is close to home.
• James (Jim) Fallon – a self proclaimed neuroscientist – a rather amusing character  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_H._Fallon

https://www.rd.com/true-stories/neuroscientist-brain-psychopath/

• The Mask of Insanity –  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mask_of_Sanity

 

Why NO CONTACT is important

The BRAIN is trying to logically reason with the HEART to explain why it is good to be out of a relationship with the psychopath.  There are so many reasons NOT to be involved and but deep down the conditioning done through the heart by the psychopath is even deeper.  As the Emotional energy field sits closer to the physical body, emotions will always have the final say for most of us.  So how does one break the cycle of entrapment?

The say that it takes on average, EIGHT goes for a woman to leave an abusive man – and I believe to an extent, that number of attempts is true.  Each time she makes a break for it, there will be a reason that he can give for her to return.  She will give in and take him back and the cycle repeats.

My advise – KEEP TRYING – even short breaks of No Contact help.  

[NO CONTACT is the term used for allowing victims to just do that – cut off all ties and and cease having any interest in his life.  The term DISCARD is when the psychopath initiates the action of having No Contact with the victim.]

If you falter and he manages to undo his “Discard” and some how you reacquaint yourself – when you are strong enough again, break and let him go.   All this while, the mask that he has been putting on will slowly crumble and eventually you will ACTUALLY have enough of his lies and inconsistent shit.  I NEVER ever thought that I could live without him.   I also believe that when the time is right, you will make that decision yourself.  It is so easy for someone else to just say “Go cold turkey” … But that did not work.  A breakup in a relationship with a Psychopath is not a normal relationship – the victim is still very much entangled and in hurtful love bond whilst trying to breakup.

After 3 years with My Love, it took me another year to figure out that he was a psychopath and then again, another year to be able to observe my findings and fully grasp that he was not someone I could “save” who truly demonstrated all the traits of a Psychopath.

I kept wanting to get out of the relationship desperately but there was always a lure from him to get back together.  Despite ignoring his messages after a discard and not taking his calls, he would just occasionally send a message, try to call and try harder to re-establish contact if I did not respond.  I would try to block his number for short period of times to train myself to ignore him.

I found that eventually after many attempts and self-talks,  I was finally ready to let go and it happened just after Christmas.   From that point in time, whilst I missed him, I had found that I had enough “reasons/sentences” to repeat in my head so that each time I picked up the phone to call or message, I was able to stop myself.   

During this No Contact period,  it was hard but critical to stay away – and when I faltered, I just had to  remember that IT WAS OKAY.  I would re-establish No Contact and keep with my plan to break all ties.  It started with 2 – 3 days no taking or messaging, then a few periods of 1 – 2 weeks and eventually the psychopath lost interest as his new supplies (3 other women, I think) were already throwing themselves at his feet.   

I was showing disinterest in the long text messages he was sending, I stopped asking to meet him, I stopped offering to help pay for bills and petrol, whenever he told me his weird sexual stories I stopped and questioned his “morals”  and I kept reminding him to re-pay me every time we met.  It did not mean that I stopped caring and loving him – I was just more cautious.   Eventually when I realized that when his existing girlfriend was away in London, he would go live with other women to get his variety and fresh fodder.  I was able to verify that he was not home and from those observations, I knew that he would never change.  He would always cheat.

I have read that sometimes a psychopath just suddenly discards (ie. a one time runner) and leaves you without a word (reasons being – found another woman, current circumstances present a danger to him etc) that it can be hard. These women seem to find it hard to let go as they feel they were rejected and dumped.  .. But is that worse or better that having a cycle of Discards and No Contacts?  I really don’t have an answer – it is what it is and you just have to deal with the situation you have been put in – and somehow find a way out.. But once a true No Contact platform is established, I had a chance of re-establishing a clear mind – with PTSD and all .. and re-framing how I looked at the relationship and how harmful it has been.

In my case, the Psychopath, after his final discard, actually moved on and left me alone . (I hope permanently).   THIS is the best outcome I could wish for as I got a chance to really clear my mind and analyze what happened in my conditioning by the psychopath. 

By the time I got to the FINAL No Contact stage in the relationship, I was :-

1. quite suspicious of his behavior 
2. was 80% sure from my research and support groups discussions that he was actually a Psychopath
3. seen how he operated and was able to relate his tactics and manipulative behaviour to what I had read about psychopathic traits 
4. had made him suspicious enough that I was on to him and would not be a willing “source of supply” for him anymore

He saw me withdraw my affection, my willingness to loan monies and also the mistrust I showed when he told yet another lie.  More importantly – I started to question and stick to my line of questioning – not allowing for his excuses and lies.   I even started to play detective, spy in him to verify his excuses and try to spot the inconsistencies in his stories with leading questions. 

 SO WHO CARES if he did a final discard or if I actually achieved No Contact after eight  attempts .. I am finally better and starting to living my life again.  So it has been one and half years now that I have not heard from or seen him .. Some days i do wonder how he is and if he is alive and who he is with .. and then I just dismiss the thought and say to myself – Who cares anyway?

 

ADDED Jul 2018 – I thought that I would have the psychopath out for my life for ever – but i have just found out that he is now living with my co-worker.  I am at loss at what to do as she has hidden that fact that she is now with him.  She knows that the staff in the business do not like him (he used to work here) and she is recently divorced and he has obviously homed in on her new situation. He has obviously left his recent girlfriend in Kensington and has moved in with my co-worker in Warren.  I am at loss whether to cry or cry! I feel nothing for him (thank goodness) but I worry that with a Sex Offenders Conviction – Class 2, he will prey on the teenage girls she has.  But it is my business anymore???  I am left saddened that my co-worker will have to go though the same hurt and pain that I have – But I am resolute to maintain No Contact.

Can you have PTSD after being with a Psychopath

They say after an encounter with a Psychopath the victims (can) suffer from post trauma stress disorder.  In terms of “trauma”, you expect a victim to have been physically abused, been in a car crash or been through war. But really? After being in a relationship with a psychopath?  After all – none of those events have happened to me – so why would I be so pathetic to say I am going through PTSD?

I say at this stage that I am no longer with him. We went our separate ways under a year ago. But I have been in contact occasionally and at time more than occasionally … So I am officially at the Post breakup stage. I can claim the letter P.

During after the relationship, I was in tears – a lot. I cried mainly because my love and I could not be together even though we were in love. Those tears were mixed with other emotions which didn’t help the tears of course.

Emotions such as Jealousy – because at times I felt jealous that he expressed how he would love to ** another woman he saw on the street, or how the hairdresser would press his head into her breasts as she cut his hair. 

Emotions such as Fear because at times, he would get into such a rage at others around us and I feared he would not be able to control his temper and he would act on his statements such as “Come to your house and rape you  (the person he was threatening)”.

Emotions such as Hate as he tried to break up with me one day and then say two days later “Miss you and we will always be together no matter what”- and you know you are being mind f**ked.

Oh I have to go back to the emotion of Jealousy because you can also get jealous of the lady who massaged him years ago and couldn’t help herself at the massage session; or the drug dealer’s neighbor who took a fancy to him and begged him let her be his girlfriend; or the Canadian lady who got intimate with him over the Internet [until her husband found out and put an end to it], or the special lady friend who was abused by her father as a teenager and calls him “daddy” when she declares her love for him over Skype; or even the unknown “friend who stayed over because her house was too far but nothing happened between us”. 

Emotions such as Obsession where everything you do is for or about him – Feeding, caring, nurturing, supporting (psychopath was often depressed and had no money to buy his meals)…   

A lot of people who have been in/are in/ or are now out of relationships with psychopaths would have gotten to a point in their dealings where they say “OMG WTF!! What just happened to me? Is he a psychopath? Is THAT what he is?” ……. It is like coming out of a fog. Throughout the relationship, victims lose control over the situation and are in so deep, that even IF they can see what the psychopath is doing wrong, they make excuses for his behavior. To anyone who is amazingly logical and clear headed that sounds ludicrous. Just walk away! But when one is in love – and deeply in love – and believes that one can save and help the psychopath to live a better life, ALL efforts are worthwhile. Even if you give up your fundamental value systems. Pathetic eh? I will discuss that another time.  [Ref: TRAUMA BONDING]. Remember at this stage you are unaware that what you do has little or NO impact on his life. He is always in control and plotting his next move.

So after you have hit the WTF snow storm, analyzed, obsessed, assessed and more or less assessed that your love is a psychopath, what happens? You start to feel the pain. The pain of realization that all you done for him was in vain, that you have been duped, that you realize you cannot trust that people around you are at face value honest and do not lie to such a large extent; that you ACTUALLY love(d) this disordered person.  Your days become unlivable and you spend a lot of time researching the topic, thoughts about him can trigger massive crying sprees, you lose interest in exercising, you initiate the Bridget Jones ice-cream sessions, you “day dream” a lot. The words “day dream” have a connotation of loveliness and fluffy stuff. But in PTSD, day dreams are blank stares into space, with some feeling like you are sort of in the room physically but not there. (This happened 90 percent of the time initially but it has decreased to about 40 percent.)

I spend a lot of time living in MY MIND. (And I did this throughout my relationship with him) – questioning, trying to fathom out what I did/ he did that did not make sense, hating myself for not being able to walk away and say “No more of your shit, thank you” …

Apparently with trauma, the LHS of the brain shuts down and the RHS relives the moments. [Ref: The Body Keeps The Score, Bessel van der Kolk]. And that sounds like my kind of day dreaming. When I drift off, I feel nothing (sometimes I feel a tiny squeezy grip in the middle of my chest) – and then I just break down in tears and curl into a ball. I stop driving at that stage and pull over. At least I am not cutting myself as much and I have started taking anti-depressant pills. Now, can I claim the rest of the letters Post the TSD?

Suggested reading – I found these books very effective is describing Post Trauma Stress Disorder.  https://www.psychotherapy.net/article/body-keeps-score-van-der-kolk

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=53RX2ESIqsM