Victims of Psychopaths Community Group
Is he or she a sociopath or psychopath? Think we're only talking about serial killers here? Psychopaths, sociopaths and even narcissists come in every walk of life, every career level, and every socio-economic category.
I saw the following post in another online forum and found it extremely insightful and wanted to share it with the people in this forum. I understand clearly now that nothing would've changed my ex N/S and only I can make the necessary changes to avoid dating another one in the future. Wisdom.
SOCIOPATHS CHEATING AND INFIDELITY
Not all sociopaths are unfaithful. But a large proportion of sociopaths are. Simply being unfaithful, is not part of the criteria for sociopathy, in fact it’s not even in the DSM checklist. But many sociopaths are unfaithful, why is this?
Why do sociopaths cheat?
Boredom
Poor impulse control
Lack of guilt
Lack of empathy
To boost narcissistic ego
Lacking in emotional connection
Opportunistic
Additional source for supply
The sociopath rarely cheats because he has met the love of his life. He cheats, because the opportunity is presented to him. The sociopath will take on the persona of people that he is around, so being close to other people, gives new dimensions to his own personality.
Quite simply, the sociopath cheats, because he can. Without guilt or remorse, there is no reason not to. He doesn’t particularly make long term plans, and tends to act within the moment, if an opportunity arises.
Remember that the sociopath does not have the same moral compass as non-sociopathic people. Other people learn that cheating is bad, as it hurts people. It causes pain. The sociopath doesn’t learn from past mistakes and will repeat the same behaviour over and over.
The reason that some sociopaths will cheat repeatedly is:
Doesn’t learn from past mistakes
Lack of guilt, remorse, shame or empathy
Boredom factor, and sometimes for dupers delight and the joy of conning
Are self-serving, motived and centred
Betrayal is one of the worst feelings in the world. You have been betrayed, you feel stabbed in the back. You can ask yourself the following questions
Did he ever love me?
Why?
Was I not good enough?
It can really impact on your confidence, and self-esteem. You need to know the reasons why he probably DIDN’T choose to cheat
It’s not personal to hurt you
It’s not because the other person is better than you
It is not because you are worthless
It is simply because the sociopath is an opportunist with poor impulse control
Why do some sociopaths cheat and others do not?
Sociopaths are like everybody else in the human population. Whilst they follow similar patterns of behaviour, they are all different. Every human being (including sociopaths) will be affected by their own environment and how they were raised.
You might ask the question, but if they do not learn from past behaviour how are they all different? Each adult human being is affected by the following:
Childhood
Environmental factors
Genetics
Current circumstances
Previous life events
This includes sociopaths too. So, for example if a person who grew up to either be a sociopath or with sociopathic traits, if in childhood the father was always unfaithful to the mother and this had a profound developmental impact on the sociopaths childhood family life, and therefore developmental learning, he might display the following behaviour (not all, it could be any of the following), dependent on the personality of the sociopath (as I said all are different) – although they follow similar patterns of behaviour, they can be different also, you could find that the any of the following is possible:
Lack of respect for women
Sadistic thoughts about sex
A sexual (common with psychopaths)
Or could equally (with or without the above traits) be absolutely faithful to one person, and feel strongly against infidelity
How to recover when you have experienced the betrayal of infidelity
When you first discover that your sociopathic partner has cheated, it can be devastatingly heart wrenching. The sociopath is a liar and deceptive and to your face will do anything to protect the lie. Often the usual signs of infidelity will be absent. This is because the sociopath is used to being deceptive and lying, and feels more comfortable with the lie than the truth. The sociopath also feels no guilt remorse or shame. So will continue to lie, and unless you are smart, will not be caught out (unless he wants you to find out about it).
This can make the betrayal feel more acute, as just when you are coming close to finding you the truth, the sociopath will lie further to distract you, confuse you, or worse still, accuse you of having an affair to cover for himself. The sociopath is a master of words, and a master of illusion. He suffers with a poor boredom threshold. He also enjoys conning and duping people and getting away with it. This gives the sociopath great pleasure.
It is likely that when the truth comes out that the sociopath will blame you (nothing is ever their fault). Making you feel even worse. Many people uncover not just one affair, but a multitude of people that the sociopath was having affairs with.
For good recovery.
Get out of the relationship and establish No Contact
Realise that this is not your fault, the sociopath would have cheated before and will cheat again.
Despite what the sociopath says to you, there is nothing that you could have done to prevent it.
Understand that not all men cheat, not even all sociopaths cheat, but those that do, will continue to repeat this behaviour.
If the sociopath makes promises that this will not happen again, this is a lie, understand it will happen again
Focus on the tips outlined in the section of recovery and healing.
If you can book to see a good therapist for counselling – do NOT attempt couples counselling with the sociopath, he cannot and will not change, believing that he can will only bring more pain for the future.
Surround yourself with good people, who really do love and value you
Take it one day at a time
Don’t focus on the past, and the betrayal, it will emotionally destroy you, let it go.
Don’t compare yourself to someone else. Remember it is NOT because the other person is better than you, in anyway, the fault is with the sociopath not you.
A sociopath who cheats and betrays will always do so
Remember nothing you do will change him, you can only change yourself!
SOCIOPATHS CHEATING AND INFIDELITY
Not all sociopaths are unfaithful. But a large proportion of sociopaths are. Simply being unfaithful, is not part of the criteria for sociopathy, in fact it’s not even in the DSM checklist. But many sociopaths are unfaithful, why is this?
Why do sociopaths cheat?
Boredom
Poor impulse control
Lack of guilt
Lack of empathy
To boost narcissistic ego
Lacking in emotional connection
Opportunistic
Additional source for supply
The sociopath rarely cheats because he has met the love of his life. He cheats, because the opportunity is presented to him. The sociopath will take on the persona of people that he is around, so being close to other people, gives new dimensions to his own personality.
Quite simply, the sociopath cheats, because he can. Without guilt or remorse, there is no reason not to. He doesn’t particularly make long term plans, and tends to act within the moment, if an opportunity arises.
Remember that the sociopath does not have the same moral compass as non-sociopathic people. Other people learn that cheating is bad, as it hurts people. It causes pain. The sociopath doesn’t learn from past mistakes and will repeat the same behaviour over and over.
The reason that some sociopaths will cheat repeatedly is:
Doesn’t learn from past mistakes
Lack of guilt, remorse, shame or empathy
Boredom factor, and sometimes for dupers delight and the joy of conning
Are self-serving, motived and centred
Betrayal is one of the worst feelings in the world. You have been betrayed, you feel stabbed in the back. You can ask yourself the following questions
Did he ever love me?
Why?
Was I not good enough?
It can really impact on your confidence, and self-esteem. You need to know the reasons why he probably DIDN’T choose to cheat
It’s not personal to hurt you
It’s not because the other person is better than you
It is not because you are worthless
It is simply because the sociopath is an opportunist with poor impulse control
Why do some sociopaths cheat and others do not?
Sociopaths are like everybody else in the human population. Whilst they follow similar patterns of behaviour, they are all different. Every human being (including sociopaths) will be affected by their own environment and how they were raised.
You might ask the question, but if they do not learn from past behaviour how are they all different? Each adult human being is affected by the following:
Childhood
Environmental factors
Genetics
Current circumstances
Previous life events
This includes sociopaths too. So, for example if a person who grew up to either be a sociopath or with sociopathic traits, if in childhood the father was always unfaithful to the mother and this had a profound developmental impact on the sociopaths childhood family life, and therefore developmental learning, he might display the following behaviour (not all, it could be any of the following), dependent on the personality of the sociopath (as I said all are different) – although they follow similar patterns of behaviour, they can be different also, you could find that the any of the following is possible:
Lack of respect for women
Sadistic thoughts about sex
A sexual (common with psychopaths)
Or could equally (with or without the above traits) be absolutely faithful to one person, and feel strongly against infidelity
How to recover when you have experienced the betrayal of infidelity
When you first discover that your sociopathic partner has cheated, it can be devastatingly heart wrenching. The sociopath is a liar and deceptive and to your face will do anything to protect the lie. Often the usual signs of infidelity will be absent. This is because the sociopath is used to being deceptive and lying, and feels more comfortable with the lie than the truth. The sociopath also feels no guilt remorse or shame. So will continue to lie, and unless you are smart, will not be caught out (unless he wants you to find out about it).
This can make the betrayal feel more acute, as just when you are coming close to finding you the truth, the sociopath will lie further to distract you, confuse you, or worse still, accuse you of having an affair to cover for himself. The sociopath is a master of words, and a master of illusion. He suffers with a poor boredom threshold. He also enjoys conning and duping people and getting away with it. This gives the sociopath great pleasure.
It is likely that when the truth comes out that the sociopath will blame you (nothing is ever their fault). Making you feel even worse. Many people uncover not just one affair, but a multitude of people that the sociopath was having affairs with.
For good recovery.
Get out of the relationship and establish No Contact
Realise that this is not your fault, the sociopath would have cheated before and will cheat again.
Despite what the sociopath says to you, there is nothing that you could have done to prevent it.
Understand that not all men cheat, not even all sociopaths cheat, but those that do, will continue to repeat this behaviour.
If the sociopath makes promises that this will not happen again, this is a lie, understand it will happen again
Focus on the tips outlined in the section of recovery and healing.
If you can book to see a good therapist for counselling – do NOT attempt couples counselling with the sociopath, he cannot and will not change, believing that he can will only bring more pain for the future.
Surround yourself with good people, who really do love and value you
Take it one day at a time
Don’t focus on the past, and the betrayal, it will emotionally destroy you, let it go.
Don’t compare yourself to someone else. Remember it is NOT because the other person is better than you, in anyway, the fault is with the sociopath not you.
A sociopath who cheats and betrays will always do so
Remember nothing you do will change him, you can only change yourself!
I was not technically cheated on, or maybe I was, IDK... my husband was still in contact with an exgf he had not properly broken up with, 3 years into my living with him before we were married. He wrote to her that he loved her only a few months before he proposed to me. Got to say, it felt like I had been made a fool of. She was overseas and they weren't meeting or anything, but that makes no difference to how I felt.
He has many of the traits you list above, but mainly, over that one situation, I felt he was simply a terrible coward. He wasn't honest with her about things from the start. He sat back and allowed things to progress far enough to hurt her if he were to pull the plug - and then he went and pulled it, claiming that he had never intended to be with her permanently.
Oh, I am firmly convinced that it's him who is the selfish, pathological sh*t in all this. That poor girl was just me, a few years earlier.
It's not us, most assuredly! Thank you for posting this, you can never read it too many times :) xx
For a period of months, my ex was having "relationships" so intense with both me and his ex-wife that he would call us both all night long sobbing that he couldn't live without us and was going to kill himself. He would call me, then her, then me, then her--same words, same "desperate love" for 2 different women. I both spoke with her and saw the phone records and heard his admission.
There was never a time in 3 years that he was NOT nurturing an obsession for some other woman or 2 or more.
When I would ask him about the last known fiasco, his answer was always the same, "I don't know. I was crazy." As time passed, I realized that, by his won definition, he was always "crazy" as there was ALWAYS another woman, at every point in time.
While living with him, I uncovered evidence that he had never been any different at any point in his life, not during his marriages, not ever.
They simply do not love in the way of a normal person wherein only the loved can satisfy the longing in one's heart. In my experience, literally anyone will do the job for a psychopath. I was with my ex 3 years. I observed him develop an obsession with literally every single woman with whom he came into contact during those 3 years, including a woman so ugly she took my breath away, and a 400-pound woman.
They do it because they must do it. They are capable of manufacturing any lie and sustain any fantasy about a lust object. My ex once told me he could fantasize about road kill. This was in the first year, when I pointed out that, nearly everyday, he typed to me, for hours, about his desires for other women. He was defending himself when he said it! He characterized it as a "rich imagination," portraying it as something creative.and positive. According to him, it shouldn't bother me because he did not have physical contact with these women.
Well, it is not normal to sexualize everyone and everything with which one comes into contact. There is a term for that mental illness and it is called "sex addiction." This sickness is highly correlated with psychopathy. Not surprisingly, as it degrades human sexuality, separating it utterly from love, or even attraction, and makes of it a god in its own right to be worshiped at all times and at the expense of every higher ideal. This is a parallel process to everything the psychopath brings to the human experience which is to dishonor everything of value and belittle human worth.
Step 1: Do not become involved with sociopaths.
Step 2: Because anyone can be a sociopath, do not become involved with anyone.
If you are worried about successfully executing Step 2 you can go ahead with Step 3, physical isolation from all other humans. Your satisfaction with this plan may vary.