The Pathological: The Child Prodigy-Savant–All Grown Up, Part II

Last week I started talking about this natural ability that pathologicals have when it comes to reading human behavior. Last newsletter we talked about how the child’s emotional developmental deficits actually spur them towards compensation in these areas by trying to hide their lack of a full emotional spectrum, lack of insight, and lack of ability to sustain emotional and behavioral changes.  They learn to compensate by studying human behavior and ‘mimicking and parroting’ when they want to fit in. But what about when they DON’T want to fit in, or when they become adults?

Erik Erikson studied human development and his theory says that there are ‘emotional tasks’ that must occur before the next leap of growth can occur. These are building blocks of emotional structure of development.

The first task as a baby is to bond. After that come the tasks in this order that must occur to be a healthy and normal person:

Trust builds on bonding

Autonomy (or independence) builds on trust

Initiative (or leadership) builds on autonomy

Industry (or pride in ones accomplishments) builds on initiative

Identity builds on industry, etc.

There are more developmental aspects all the way through old age. But these give us something to look at–all the aspects of emotional development that must occur (and did not occur somewhere in the list) for the pathological– Bonding, Trust, Autonomy, Initiative, Industry, Identity.  When these building blocks of character were being laid (and mislaid), holes in the soul develop around those building blocks that were not laid.

Instead of learning trust, they learn to con other people’s trust and yet mistrust everyone. Instead of learning independence they are either horribly dependent and parasitic or aloof and not the least bit interdependent within relationships. Instead of initiative (or leadership) they either feel inadequate or superior or con others and the only place they lead others is ‘astray.’ Instead of industry and finding meaning and pride in their accomplishments, they see their accomplishments highly connected to the ability to superbly manipulate and con others. Their pride about their abilities is more related to the ability to manipulate than it is any other abilities they may have. Instead of a healthy self identity, their identity is highly connected now to their choices. Since many of them are delinquent and deviant, their identity is connected not with something positive but with their darkest character flaws.

All of these developmental tasks that should be completed: bonding, trust, independence, initiative, industry, and identity are the building blocks established by teen years. We can easily see how and why their adult years are filled with problems and anguishing relationships. If you don’t bond, trust, have interdependent relationships, your idea of accomplishment is conning, and your identity is linked to your bad character–THERE ISN’T MUCH TO WORK WITH!

Pathologicals have difficult adulthoods AND they make everyone else’s adulthoods difficult too. The child prodigy studying what works with humans is largely squeezed down to “WIIFM” (What’s In It for Me). Studying others to ‘fit in’ gets replaced by the adult skills of conning, manipulation, lying, embezzlement, and other honed arts. By the time the emotional development of the teen years have hit, the bonding, trust, interdependence, accomplishments and lastly identity—are long tweaked into pathological dynamics. Oddly, the personality ‘age’ stops growing and you rarely see pathologicals emotionally older than 14 but the behaviors get tweaked up a notch to adult skills of adept conning.

What was once a science project of ‘Why am I different?’ as a child becomes ‘Cool, I’ll use it against them” as an adult.  The child prodigy who studied human behavior so well is the relationship idiot savant. It just takes women a while to figure out that what he espouses in the beginning isn’t really what he’s all about. What didn’t happen in his emotional development will ruin their relationship and her, personally.

External Locus of Belief: Is it True, is it REALLY True?

In psychology, we refer to the belief about where control over events in our lives resides as internal and external locus of control. This means we see our behaviors either generated by personal efforts or by destiny. We believe that we make things happen or we believe others do it for us whether we like it or not.

But also related to to internal and external locus of control is it’s effect on impulse motivation. This means that a person who has internal locus of control can self regulate their impulses and desires themselves. They find their motivation for behavior, choices, and reactions inside of themselves by themselves. (By the way, pathologicals normally have poor internal locus of control except for brief periods of time when they are conning someone).

Other people who have external locus of control (like the pathologicals) are not self regulated in their behavior, choices,

and reactions inside of themselves. Instead, they look outside themselves for motivation and consequently since they don’t regulate themselves well, outside themselves for limits on their behaviors. People with poor internal locus of control often need the external world to regulate themselves for them—unfortunately this is often the legal system, jail, or some kind of negative consequence.

But today, I am talking about internal and external locus of belief systems. Where is your belief system (especially about the pathological) located? Inside you or externally in others? Do you come to understand, see, and accept his pathology within yourself? Do you read materials, go to counseling and then come to believe and hold that belief in you that he is pathological, can’t change, and destructive to your own future? Are you able to pull up inside of yourself the facts of his dangerous or misleading behavior in your relationship? Are you able to point to the ways in which he has been destructive to others? Are you able to latch on to his diagnosis and use it as a life raft for yourself to drift away from him?

OR, are your beliefs externally hinged? “If you say so Sandy–if you say he’s pathological, then I guess he is.” “If he scored high on the P-scan (developed by Dr. Robert Hare) then I suppose that is correct….” Statements like these are related to people who have external locus of belief. They don’t really believe it themselves, they are hinging their belief system to someone else’s belief systems–usually mine or another expert in pathology. Somewhere along the line they haven’t really ‘come to believe’ that the pathology is his. It’s still some distant reality ‘labeled’ by a therapist but she doesn’t own it inside herself. This makes accepting it, reallllyyyyyy accepting it, hard for her because she then needs to be reminded every 30 seconds that he is in fact, permanently pathological. Once she is out of ear range of a therapist or some other external validating system (books, dvds, cds, etc.) will she still accept his pathology?

‘Coming to believe’ pathology is a hard thing. It’s a shock to learn that someone you thought was the most wonderful person in the world is secretly very, very (did I say very?) sick. NOT only do you have to believe that the person is very, very (did I say very?) sick, but that sickness has no cure. Not only are they sick and have no cure, but staying around them is detrimental to your own (and your children’s) mental health. Not only that they are sick, have no cure, staying around them is detrimental to your own mental health but they have all the capacities of breaking both your knee caps–either financially or even physically given no conscience. This is a big wad to swallow all at once with no chaser of hope.

Most people need a time of ‘coming to believe’ — it’s like building faith in anything else–we study and come to believe. Pathology is the same way–you need some education, some time to digest this big wad of bad news, and some time to work a plan of ‘accepting the things I cannot change.’ Almost everyone who faces the fact of pathology in someone else has this same ‘coming to terms’ process. We expect it.

But, there is also the problem of when you don’t ever come to truly accept it and then hinge your belief system about his pathology on some external person, organization, or book. The Institute can not be your belief system (He’s pathological because Sandy says so). If after a few months, that belief system doesn’t become internal for you (I know this to be self evident, that he is pathological and for all of these reasons….) then you’re in trouble of relapse.

Just like in external locus of control explained above, external locus of belief stands in the same jeopardy–that someone else can’t be responsible for what you do with what you know (or what you don’t come to accept). That your pathology destiny is not in The Institute’s hands–it’s in yours. That whether you ignore the info and go back is entirely up to you—not a support group, not a book, not a program or a retreat–just your destiny in your hands.

If your locus of belief is still external and it doesn’t shift and become internal–just know this is a risk factor for you. Holding the belief system steady is the challenge of overcoming cognitive dissonance. When it doesn’t get over come eventually, either you learn to do what the 12 Steppers call ‘Fake It Til You Make It’ (do it til you believe it) or face the rising statistics that you’re likely to believe the internal chatter and make a Bee line back.

The Pathological: a Child Prodigy-Savant of Human Behavior

People often want to know why people with personality disorders (pathology) often have the worst and most inappropriate behavior indicating they are clueless about others feelings AND YET they are often enabled with the uncanny ability to so know human behavior they con even the most knowledgeable of people.

This ‘savant-like’ experience with human behavior reminds me of the Scripture that says, “The Lord giveth, and the Lord taketh away.” Cluster B Personality Disorders no doubt, rack up their miles in huge emotional and behavioral deficits. (The Lord Taketh Away). I’ve discussed this in length in the newsletter and books–that what causes a personality disorder has to do with what DOESN’T happen when the personality is forming from 0-8 years of age.

Deficits = Disorders.

Not getting what a child needs WHEN they need it can be the beginning of a personality disorder. Normal childhood development does not include severe neglect, being raised by a pathological and learning to see the world through the eyes of a narcissist or sociopath, or being abused.

Whatever the ’cause’ of the personality disorder, (exposed to pathological parents or being born with neuro-abnormalities) let’s consider the budding-pathological child for a moment. Let’s put out of our mind just for now the disordered adult he grows into. Here, we have let’s say, a 9 or 10 year old child who through no fault of his own, has a personality disorder.  That means that the child does not have the full spectrum of human emotion, has blunted feelings of love/compassion/guilt/remorse, has impulse control problems, has difficulty being able to know right from wrong, is not motivated by punishment when he does wrong, and is tantalized by risk and reward.

His friend across the street is the same age and not personality disordered. His friend has a full spectrum of emotions, feels bonded, love, compassion, is motivated by punishment so he feels guilt and remorse, he has impulse control over many of his actions, and understands the basic concepts of right and wrong. Although he likes risk and reward, he has enough impulse control not to be led consistently by pleasure.

One day Pathology Pete is over at Normal Ned’s. While playing in the house the boys knock over a vase and break it. Ned knows the story behind the vase: it’s the only thing his mother has left from her mother. His mother got it as a gift on the death bed of her mother. She always prized it and felt her mother’s presence when she looked at it.

Ned’s mother begins to cry and Ned has empathetic feelings that his mother is sad and experiencing loss because of the broken vase. Ned goes to her and tries to comfort her while Pete looks on.

Pete has NO idea why Ned (a) feels bad that the vase was broken (so what, go get another one), (b) why Ned would go to his mother and hug her and pat her (why does she need that?), (c) why Ned offers to replace the vase, (d) and why it was even wrong to be playing with a ball by the vase.

Pete stands off to the side watching this ‘unusual’ reaction and interaction between Ned and his mother.  In comes Ned’s brother, Normal Nathan. He sees his mother crying and goes to her too to comfort her. Pete wonders “Why? He didn’t even break the vase?”

Pete stands awkwardly off to the side watching what is like a Sci-Fi movie to him — all these feelings, actions, behaviors, and motivations he doesn’t understand. Over and over through out his childhood and into his adolescence this incident is repeated over and over again.

Pete witnesses people having feelings he doesn’t experience. They have emotional reactions that he doesn’t understand. They have reactions, behaviors, and motivations that are foreign to him. Pete’s bright–he is a smart child and can’t figure out why he doesn’t ‘know’ what other kids know—how to act, how not to act, how to feel certain emotions and when and why. Pathological child figure out early they are ‘different’–they just don’t know why.

Having a need to appear normal and fitting in like everyone else does–he watches. When someone cries, this is what other people do in response to the crying ___________ (behavior). The person who made the other one cry has a facial expression like this ___________ (I’m sorry look). People appear to cry for these reasons: ____________________ (motivations/consequences).

Children who grow to be pathological are little psychologists by the time they are teens. They have so watched other people that they understand (on a manipulative level) what makes people hurt and how to get out of consequences for having hurt others. These little child-prodigies who have studied human behavior since they were 5 or 6 years old, are emotional savants. On one hand, they do NOT have the full spectrum of emotions and so are sort of emotionally retarded towards the experience of others.

On the other hand, they are so bright and have so honed in on studying others, they have learned how to develop a mask for any occasion. This is the Lord Giveth part—they have such a knack for paying attention to others reactions so they too can learn that they learn to mimic other people’s facial gestures and behaviors and parrot the language and lingo of what others say.

This is why they are a mirror-image of you in a relationship. They watch and listen and mimic and parrot back all you do and say. This is why they feel like a soul mate–because you are essentially looking at a mask of yourself.

These skills are then polished over years of use—using them on his mother, sister, Sunday school teacher, girls at school, bosses…any where he can tweak the manipulation and look normal enough to fit in.

What began as a simple adaptation in a child–learning to understand how normal people relate and behave–turns into manipulation later. At some point, the child/teen must come to the conclusion that they DON’T have these feelings, limits, boundaries, and experiences. What the hell…just gotta go with it is the normal reaction from them.

The adaptation is no longer simply to understand normal people and compare/contrast them to his own experiences. It is now a survival behavior that helps him to get what he wants since his deficits will now give him the skills that others have to get the same thing legitimately.

Pathology Pete simply produces more masks–one for every emotion he doesn’t sincerely have.

Characterlogical Disorders: He is What He Does

Personality disorders are those permanent disorders that mar a soul. They impair a person’s ability for emotional growth, to sustain enduring positive change, and to develop insight about how their behavior affects others. This is the path of pathology–when disorders so affect a personality that it leaves them impaired that it disengages their character switch.

Personality disorders are often referred to as Character Disorders. No wonder! The problems associated with personality disorders largely manifest as inappropriate behavior associated as negative character reflection. We now know some of this inappropriate behavior is associated with poor impulse control. When low impulse control is not managed, the results begin to look like someone ‘characterlogically challenged’ such as lying, conning, manipulation, overt or covert stealing, sex addictions, infidelity, violence, drugs/alcohol abuse, etc. . . These all are reflections on someone’s behavior which can reflect character.

Why would someone want to be with anyone whose character is ‘suspect?’ Finding out about consistent lying or chronic cheating are all character red flags that when heeded could reduce the relational harm you experience. But ignored, it becomes a path of pain. Character red flags are usually related to CHARACTER DISORDERS which are associated with personality disorders which are permanent.

People responding to a two-strike rule about character infractions could help reduce the number of people in therapy today because of pathological love relationships. Behavior is often a reflection of character. What are you accepting as character and why are you shocked when they do more of the behavior?

Over and over again I hear women of all ages say, “There isn’t anyone decent out there.” It seems to be especially said of this current 20-something generation in which “It’s all about me” has become a significant icon of the decade. Women give up and give in to the common dating practices that are prevalent right now only to cycle thru relationship after relationship not only not getting her needs met, but being damaged by the relationship as well. There HAS to be something better out there for women–but is that what you REALLY want?

Why do I ask that? This week I have had painful contrasts…I got a letter from a previous client who discussed the latest relationship she was in. While she was hoping she had overcome her previous relationship choice patterns, she was shocked to find herself in yet another relationship because ‘she didn’t want to be alone.’  It wasn’t a crushing kind of loneliness–but a general ‘wanting to find the right guy.’ She thought it started out well–and when problems arose counseling was sought from several sources. Feeling like she had gotten a handle on what the issues were and he had ‘voiced’ his desire to work on the problems, she stayed trying to find ‘that love’ that she was seeking. But after emotional and verbal abuse, a threat with a deadly weapon, a display of alcohol abuse, and some physical assaults–she decided the relationship was probably ‘dangerous or deadly.’ Another couple of years down the tubes–another guy simply ‘a dangerous man’ and her emotions dashed against the trigger of a deadly weapon.

In contrast, this week was Cody’s birthday. I am reminded of my foster son Cody’s character that died at the ripe old age of 25. He was a young guy who ironically in this day and age, never succumbed to the sex and drug culture.

He was gentle–with nature, with feelings, with people. His integrity was thorough, weaving a rich and deep seam thru his character. In a blazing black and white contrast to what women have been selecting, I wondered why it’s so hard to ‘see’ character. Yeah, yeah, I know they ‘hide’ and ‘mask’ and do all the other subversive types of behaviors that don’t allow you to see. It’s often said that “Character is who you are when no one is looking.” Well, a pathological could careless about that! They only want to fake character when someone IS looking.

But just knowing that character and its glaring deficits are often related to pathology should be enough to make people sit up and take notice. We live in a world that is numbing itself against any moral and behavioral absolutes. This numbing causes people to accept pathological behavior as the norm. “There aren’t any good ones left” is an excuse to accept the pathological culture that is developing before us.

It takes someone like Cody to make us realize that good people are worth waiting for. When you accept bad character, you get bad behavior. When you accept bad behavior, you accept being hurt because it’s inevitable. Thank you Cody for being a teacher to me about what good mental health looks like in a young man. I miss you but always remember what you taught me. Character counts ladies. Don’t sacrifice.

Chronic Personality Problems in Problem Relationships

A large portion of emotional and physical abusers (although not all) have some similar identifying disorders, traits, or diagnosis. They are not all created equal. That means, each one of them brings a unique combination of traits, challenges, and problems to the equation of the relationship and even therapy. Therefore, not all abusers treatment is going to be effective because not all psychological problems are treatable. For instance, batterer intervention has often failed to make this distinction and lumps all violent behavior or psychological problems together
as if they are not differentiated by their differences.

Some of the disorders have biological and neurological root causes that are not curable. Ultimately, not all problem relationships have a solution especially those that have biological/neuro problems at their basis. That’s not popular to hear. We live in an Oprah-age of psychology that believes all disorders are curable
and if not curable, at least highly treatable. ‘Law of Attraction’ type thinking pulls many people into believing ‘if they think it, they can make it happen’ (their relationship will work, the pathology will be gone, or something curative will happen that will drive away the symptoms.) Like medicine, psychology faces the same challenges that not all disorders have a satisfactory treatment, or a cure.

If people who are in problem relationships want to avoid future problem relationships, they have to understand what contributes to some of the disorders and the signs within the behavior.  There is no doubt that chronic personality problems wreak havoc in relationships and the worst of these do have commonalities related to impulsivity, emotional dysregulation, and violence. (No abuse is mild. I’m not suggesting that. What I am trying to hone on is the chronic and lethal nature of some of the
relationships and what some of the contributing factors can be to those problems).

Some of the more recent research in neuroscience helps us to understand the problems related to what Otto Kernberg (one of the renowned writers and researchers of pathology) wrote about as
‘severe personality disorders’ related to Cluster B disorders (see his books Aggression in Personality Disorders and Perversions; Severe Personality Disorders; Aggressivity, Narcissism and Self
Destructiveness in the Psychotherapeutic Relationships–to name a few).

However, neuroscience over the past few years has helped us understand the additional possible biological and neurological roots of some of these severe disorders as well as the disorders of sociopathy and psychopathy. MRI’s of various Cluster B disorders and sociopathy/psychopath have lead the way noting
similarities in brain formations, brain activity, brain circuitry, brain chemistry and it’s relationship to the severe disorders, impulsivity, poor treatment outcomes, and poor relationship outcomes. Where therapy has spent decades (if not a century)
focused on the very psychoanalytic and behavioral approaches, we have missed the very real potential of neurology and brain functioning challenges.

While the origins and etiology of these disorders has been widely debated for decades, neuroscience is providing many of the answers to biology that we previously didn’t have. This helps us delineate
between the mind as a structure and process and the brain as an organ. The brain as an organ has all the proclivity of being born with differences, challenges, and problems as any other organ in the body. Unfortunately, up until now, the view has been a very
‘psychological’ approach to the brain and its disorders without looking at the possible contributions of ‘nature’ such as being born with physical predispositions. While we don’t question that
when it comes to the heart or immune system people can be born with abnormalities, people certainly have a BIG reaction to that at the thought as psychology being related to brain organ issues and not merely emotional issues.

When looking at the behaviors associated with problem partners with what is referred to as ‘severe personality disorders’ and the problems of sociopathy and psychopath, we have to look broadly at the symptoms, but not so broadly that we find loopholes.
Normally, one symptom off a behavioral list does not constitute one of the ‘severe personality disorders’ or even the no/low-conscience disorders of sociopathy or psychopathy. However, they don’t need to have ALL of these traits in order to be problematic in a relationship.

Those in relationships with problem partners often fail on the side of ‘too much empathy’ and give them more credit for not having these symptoms than what is warranted. Somewhere in the middle of one trait-too-many/and no-they-don’t-have-problems-at-all,
is a snap shot of relationship problems and problem partners. Here are some of the behaviors associated with what is referred to as some of the severe personality disorders and also sociopathy and psychopathy. (Taken from the Diagnostic Statistical Manual–DSM IV)

___Disregard for, and the violation of, the rights of others
___Failure to conform to lawful social norms
___Deceitfulness Impulsivity or failure to plan ahead
___Irritability and aggressiveness as indicated by repeated physical fights or assaults
___Reckless disregard for the safety of self or others
___Consistent irresponsibility as indicated by repeated failure to sustain consistent work behavior or honor financial obligations
(Above are related to Antisocial Personality Disorder)

___ Lack of remorse as indicated by being indifferent about having hurt, mistreated or stolen from another
___ Glib and superficial charm
___ Grandiose (exaggeratedly high) estimation of self
___ Need for stimulation
___ Pathological lying
___ Cunning and manipulativeness
___ Lack of remorse or guilt
___Shallow affect (superficial emotional responsiveness)
___ Callousness and lack of empathy
___ Parasitic lifestyle
___ Poor behavioral controls
___ Sexual promiscuity
___ Early behavior problems
___ Lack of realistic long-term goals
___ Impulsivity irresponsibility
___ Failure to accept responsibility for own actions
___ Many short-term relationships
___ Juvenile delinquency
___ Revocation of conditional release
___ Criminal versatility

(Above are related to Sociopaths/Psychopaths)

___ Frantic efforts to avoid real or imagined abandonment
___ Intense and unstable personal relationships that over idealize and devalue
___ Identity disturbance with unstable self image or sense of self impulsivity in at least two areas (spending, sex, substance abuse, reckless driving, binge eating)
___ Recurrent suicidal behavior, gestures, threats or self-mutilation
___ Emotional instability due to a marked reactivity of mood (intense episodic irritability or anxiety)
___ Chronic feelings of emptiness
___ Inappropriate intense anger or difficulty controlling anger

(Above are related to Borderline Personality Disorder)

___ A grandiose sense of self importance
___ Exaggerates their achievements and talents
___ Expects to be recognized as superior without commensurate achievements
___ Is preoccupied with fantasies of unlimited success, power, brilliance, beauty, or ideal love
___ Believes that he is special and unique and can only be understood by, or should only associate with, other special or other high-status people or institutions.
___ Requires excessive admiration
___ Has a sense of entitlement, unreasonable expectations of especially favorable treatment or automatic compliance with his expectations
___ Is interpersonally exploitative within relationships and takes advantage of others to achieve his own ends
___ Lacks empathy and is unwilling to recognize or identify with the feelings and needs of others
___ Is often envious of others or believes that others are envious of him
___ Shows an arrogant, haughty behavior or attitude

(Above are related to Narcissistic Personality Disorder)

This list is not mild relational infractions or merely what Dr. Phil refers to as ‘deal breakers’. In some of the more chronic features and behaviors, this pathology causes debilitating partner aftermath
symptoms. The Institute is involved in offering recovery to those coming out of relationships with narcissists, antisocial, sociopathy and psychopaths. That’s because the chroncity of their disorders often causes chroncity within their relationships. If that wasn’t true, 60 million people would not be negatively
affected by someone else’s pathology. We wouldn’t have support groups for “Partners of Narcissists” or “Adult Children of Narcissistic Personality Disorder.” There wouldn’t be self help books for those harmed by antisocials or psychopaths. The Institute wouldn’t have felt it necessary to write ‘Women Who Love Psychopaths’ and offer counseling for the survivors.

Some of those listed above on the check lists are the abusers who are not created equal, who have permanent neuro, emotional, behavioral and psychological disorders that bypass what psychology
can do for them. Anger management–nope. Batterer intervention–nope. Intensive psychotherapy–nope. The permanent forms of pathology are noted for it’s Three Inabilities (Brown, 2005):

* Inability to grow to any authentic emotional or spiritual depth
* Inability to sustain positive change
* Inability to develop insight how their behavior negatively affects others

These inabilities are the hallmark of chronic disorders that create chronic problem relationships. Lacey, Staci and Nicole bear witness to the un-diagnosed problems of problem partners.

** Footnote: Research articles related to this topic: ‘Neural foundation of moral reasoning and antisocial behavior;’  ‘Into the Mind of a Killer: Brain imaging studies starting to venture into the research of criminal psychopathy;’ ‘Tridimensional Personality
Questionnaire data on alcoholic violent offenders: specific connections to severe impulsive cluster B personality disorders and violent criminality” ‘The Relationship Between DSM-IV cluster B personality disorders and psychopathy according to Hare’s
criteria: Clarification and resolution of previous Contractions;’ ‘Brain imaging abnormalities in borderline personality disorder’ (video)’ ‘Potentials implicate temporal lobe abnormalities in criminal psychopaths;’ Hypomanic symptoms predict an increase in
narcissism and histrionic personality disorders;’ and ‘The Brain and Personality Disorders.’

Am I a Pathological Too?

People who were raised by pathological parents or with siblings who are pathological are more likely to date pathological men repeatedly. Some of the patterns of partner selection has to do with learned conditioning–learning to normalize abnormal behavior until that is the norm.

Some of pathology can also be genetically transmitted so people are often concerned if there are down lines in their family tree where pathology exists. For instance, one of the Cluster B’s that got a fairly high transmission rate is Narcissism. Psychopathy too is also genetically transmitted way too often!

Clients have two concerns about pathology and its effect on them:

1. If pathology can be genetic and my parents were pathological, am I PATHOLOGICAL TOO?

2. If damage can be done by being parented by a pathological, am I DAMAGED?

Pathology ‘can be’ genetic. There are many people who are born to and raised by pathological parents who are damaged by this pathological parenting but do not grow up to be pathological themselves. There has been a lot of research and study about this issue of ‘resilience’ in people and why some do become pathological and others do not. Nonetheless, there are about 50% of the people who do NOT become pathological from genetic transmission or from pathological parenting.

However, lots of these 50% who do NOT become pathological from genetic transmission or pathological parenting ARE STILL negatively affected by the parenting they did receive. The may carry aftermath symptoms such as that effect their choices, patterns, feelings, and behaviors. You may be plagued with self doubt, low self esteem, chronic care giving of others, a total disregard for your own needs or self care. You could battle depression or chronic anxiety, or fight nagging pessimism about your future or the world around you. You might be dangerously naive never trusting your own instincts and being constantly taken advantage of.

You could have eating disorders, sexual addictions/other sexual disorders, or obsessive compulsive behaviors; you could medicate your feelings with drugs or alcohol or find abusive religious affiliations to take up where your pathological parents fell away. You may have emotional intimacy problems or jump from relationship to relationship fearing abandonment or being alone. Or you may engage in what they now call ‘sexual anorexia’ — the forbidding of yourself to ever be intimate or loving with someone else.

While you may ‘understand why’ your parents (or siblings) behaved like they did or you are engulfed in compassion and pity for their illness, the rubber meets the road at the point where your needs went so chronically unmet that you now have your own emotional problems because of what you didn’t get at those crucial developmental points of your life. Compassion, pity, forgiveness and understanding don’t help you with what you never got from the most important people in your life.

If you recognized those symptoms in yourself you probably were/are affected from pathological parenting.

If you learned to normalize abnormal behavior, no wonder dangerous and pathological men look like a pretty normal person for you to date! Pathological parenting instills a pathological world view about yourself, others, and the world around you. The ‘others’ part of the world view is how you keep ending up with pathological men–narcissistics, sociopaths, and other dangerous types. What you learned at the feet of your parents was that black was white and white was black. So many women find that their level of attraction to pathological men was largely generated and supported within the pathological family.

This is a complicated issue that has its roots in several factors related to your adult life. Some of these patterns are related to:

* Your chronic pattern of selection in men

* Your inability to recognize and respond to red flags

* Your nonexistent boundaries in intimate relationships

* Your pathologilized world view that sees black as white and white as black

* Your ongoing symptoms of relationship confusion, PTSD symptoms or other symptoms you might be having

Reading relationship books or going to relationship counselors is not going to address your pathological world view and your corresponding symptoms and patterns of selection in men. Your unique family system and relating difficulties need to have the specific understanding and treatment associated with adult children of pathological parents.

We do recognize your unique needs. And we also understand your concern about having been so chronically exposed to pathology through your early years and now its devastating results in your adult life. Rest assured that if YOU were pathological you would most likely NOT be reading this newsletter or seeking out treatment for your symptoms. Pathologicals don’t stay in counseling or treatment. If you see yourself in the list of symptoms from pathological parenting in this newsletter rest assured they are VERY treatable! You can recover. That’s the good news! Get the help you need in order to stop the cycle of pattern selection and the aftermath symptoms that plague you!

The Predictability of Pathology

Women say “You are describing my relationship EXACTLY” or “He has said those exact words to me” or “How do you know what my relationship is like–how can you know this?”

Contrary to some beliefs, I’m NOT psychic!

I accurately describe people’s relationships because to a certain extent, parts of pathology and their behavior are predictable. Pathology is related to certain personality and psychological disorders. Each one of these personality disorders has its own set of behaviors, dysfunctions, and for some of the disorders–neuro abnormalities. To know the personality disorder is to know the behavior–either now or in the future. This is why Public Psychopathy Education is information for everyone because anyone can learn to predict, to a certain extent, the kinds of behaviors that are likely from the pathological in their life.

Criminal profiling to a large extent is exactly that–knowing what the behavior is likely to be given their probable diagnosis of anti-social, socio or psychopath. Although your pathological might not be criminal, this approach still applies. His behavior is predictable.

Each personality disorder has its own set of behaviors. Pathology is related to:

a. The inability to sustain positive change

b. The inability to grow to any authentic emotional or spiritual depth

c. The inability to develop deep insight about their negative behavior affects others

So once you understand the behaviors related to the personality disorder then you apply the ‘Absolutes of Pathology’ — the inability to change, grow, or develop insight and you can pretty much take his behavior now and apply it to the future in ANY relationship. His behaviors related to his specific personality disorder are permanent. The neuroscience that now supports abnormalities in Cluster B disorders and psychopathy also highlight the issues that since these are brain region problems (not just brain chemistry/medication problems), their permanence is much more a factor.

If someone can not grow or change then his behaviors aren’t going to change. If his behaviors aren’t going to change he will be the same today as he was 10 years ago in a relationship, career or interaction and will be the same 20 years from now. If he doesn’t have the ability to develop insight about his behavior then I can tell you what it’s like to communicate with someone who can’t ‘see’ his own faults. If his brain regions that effect impulse control, bonding/attachment, and the inability to learn from past mistakes are faulty, we know what the future will be like for him.

Our goal in Public Psychopathy Education is for others to understand that you TOO can learn to loosely predict pathological behavior based on past or current behavior. Once you understand the symptoms of the personality disorder you can expect these behaviors to continue. The more you understand the Absolutes of Pathology the more clearly you can understand what his future is likely to hold for himself and others in his life. It isn’t hard to predict something that doesn’t change!

The exception to that rule is when violence is or has been involved. Pathologicals with violence issues can be erratic and unstable. Predicting their ability to be currently non-violent based on past non-violent episodes is too risky and may not follow the patterns he normally follows. Pathologicals who are addicts are hard to predict because of the instability of the person in an addiction. With violence, sexual offenses or addiction the rule of thumb is that the predictability factor is likely to be too risky to judge. When in doubt–doubt his predictability in violence, addiction or sexual offenses.

Otherwise, pathology is fairly easy to call. When someone doesn’t change, the best predictor of future behavior is past behavior. If you’re wondering what you’re pathological was like in the relationship before you or will be like in the one after you, just gauge everything from where he is today. It’s that simple and that sad.

REALITY + EXPECTATION = HAPPINESS

William James, an early writer on psychology from the late 1800′s wrote about happiness and reality. I think what he has to say applies a lot to the issues that women face in pathological relationships. Let’s see how…

The crux of James’ pragmatic approach to happiness was rooted in his belief about expectation and its effect on how we come to feel about whether we are happy or depressed. The shortcut to his analogy about beliefs and happiness is:

‘If your reality lives up to your expectations, you experience happiness. If it doesn’t, you are depressed.’

Women who enter into relationships with pathologicals who are notorious for their hidden lives and covert disorders are not dealing with his reality. In her defense, how could she be? She doesn’t even know what his reality is–his disorders, his hidden life, or his pathology that is yet to annihilate her. His charming presentation is anything but real but is effective because it simply hands back to her a mirrored image of all her desires. This mirroring back increases her sensation of attachment because it comfortably reflects herself. Humans feel most at home with the traits that are most like them. However in a pathological, the mirroring, the traits and the resulting connection are not authentic–it’s merely her reflected traits she is attracted to IN him. His mirrored traits are nothing more than a magician’s illusion.

But what impacts her most is not that it is a sham–it’s that she believes it IS real. William James said “The value of any truth is utterly dependent upon its use to the person who holds it.” The value of him being normal is critically important to her in the beginning of the relationship. She will be relationally dependent about his portrayal of himself as true and real. Why? The women we surveyed tested extremely high in relationship investment. What she puts in and gets out of her relationships is almost the single most important thing in her life. The value of the psychopath’s truth is dependent on how much she wants it to BE true. In essence, she sees what he portrays AND she sees what she is invested in: this relationship.

What this creates with a pathological however, is that the first brick laid in the building of this relationship is flawed with all the corrosiveness of his disorder but pressure washed with the glow of his impression management. His mask and skillfully skewed image is built on sand with nothing to build off of. Upon that first brick of reality (or in pathology’s case, unreality), her next brick, which is expectations, is laid.

Her concept of reality about him and the relationship, in the end, can never live up to her expectations she has for them as a couple. Her foundational belief upon which all of this is built is that he is who he says he is, and that he is normal. Her expectations are based on normalcy. Such as–the relationship is going to bring the love, attachment, and joy that she perceives she is experiencing. What woman doesn’t expect that there isn’t potential in the relationship initially? After all, his best performance is always his matinees! Expectations are of a shared life, building a business, buying a home, raising children, growing old together–normal life stuff. Except–the first brick of reality wasn’t what it seemed.

What are realistic relationship expectations for covert pathology? How DO you build a healthy relationship with a narcissist or psychopath?

Most women will never choose in-your-face-pathology for a partner. However, not consciously choosing pathology still does not deter what she ends up with. Her expectations for their relationship are eventually pitifully ignored if not sabotaged. Her time, youth, love, loyalty, finances, trust, and sexuality were all poured into an expectation of a life together. None of this, of course happens for long.

Instead, pathology produces what it always produces: infidelity, a thief of all things sincere, loathing, financial disaster, distrust, and robbery of sexuality and spirituality. As its psychological signature and imprint, it marks her with the all the signs of Aftermath symptoms. Intrusive thoughts, flashbacks, obsessive thinking, stress disorders/PTSD, cognitive dissonance are her hallmark signs of having truly experienced a pathological love relationship.

In retrospect, it is easy to see in pathology how expectations have everything to do with the eventual outcome of unhappiness. When reality is skewed and he is not as he seems, and normal expectations for happy life are unfortunately with an abnormally disordered person, the outcome is misery.

Skewed reality + Unadjusted Expectations = Misery!

Pathological relationships always end in this way. It’s their trademark. While you can’t adjust what their impression management did to you initially, you can adjust what you come to expect from someone this disordered. When he lies, does it one more time, steals, cheats, hides his life—the only adjustment that can be made is ‘were you expecting normal behavior from an abnormal disorder?’ What part of him ‘doing it one more time’ is really a shock? The expectation (once you know his pathology) is what keeps you stuck in the cycle of your intrusive and obsessive thinking. If you dig down into what you are really thinking, you are expecting ‘this time’ the pathological will be different. He will be honest, he will tell the truth, he will pay the taxes, he won’t cheat, he’ll stop porn, he will stop splitting the children against you….

Your expectation of a permanently disordered and low-conscience abnormality is creating your continued depression. Adjust your expectation and you will adjust your future.

If your reality lives up to your expectations, you experience happiness. If it doesn’t, you are depressed.

Finding Competent Help for Your Recovery

By now if you have been trying to heal from a pathological love relationship and can’t find effective and knowledgeable counseling you have probably figured out what we have…that the pathological love relationship is NOT widely understood.

Frustrated women hear unhelpful advice from family, friends and even therapists who label their attachment to pathological men as “codependent” or “mutually addictive” or merely “emotional abuse.” Women jump from counselor to counselor and from group counseling experience-to-group counseling experience looking for someone, ANYONE, who understands this intense attachment to a dangerous and pathological man.

She looks for some understanding at ‘what’ is wrong with him. Labeling him an ‘abuser’ doesn’t quite cover the extensive array of brilliant psychopathic tendencies he has. Why was SHE targeted by him? Why does she feel both intense attachment and loathing for him at the same time? Why do her symptoms more resemble ‘mind control’ than mere ‘abused woman syndrome?’ Why is the bonding with this man more intense and unshakeable than any other man? Is it abuse if he never physically harms you but has the mental infiltration of a CIA operative?

What we are finding out from our research about women who have been in pathological love relationships is that all the normal dynamics of regular relationships DON’T apply to these types. All the normal dynamics of addictive relationships, codependent relationships and dysfunctional relationships DON’T apply to these types either. No wonder women can’t find the help they need…it hasn’t been taught YET! Our research is pointing towards women who DON’T fit into the stereotypes of women we normally see in shelters, counseling centers and in other abuse situations. These are not women who have the kinds of histories we normally associate with abuse nor do they have the kinds of current lives that fit the demographics of most counseling programs and shelters. Their personality traits and behaviors fit no other ‘typologies.’ And their current symptoms don’t match the simply ‘dysfunctional’ love relationship.

Could it be that the dynamics in a pathological love relationships really ARE different than other types of relationships? Could this be why women in these types of relationships aren’t helped by the more prevalent types of intervention offered to other types of abusive relationships? Why does the Power & Control Wheel model seem ineffective with these types of women? Why are these women LESS likely to seek traditional counseling? And if they do, why are they less likely to be helped by it? Why are these women’s personality traits so vastly different then shelter women? Or abused women?

Too many women have been through the ringer of counselors-not-understanding-psychopathology/family-lumping-all-relationship-types-together/ friends-saying-’just-get-over-it’/ and counseling-programs-telling-she’s-just-codependent. Too many women have stopped seeking help because they are tired of too many people ‘not getting it.’ Psychology has to allow itself to grow beyond a one-size-fits-all approach when dealing with women emerging from pathological love relationships because all relationships are not created equal. Especially when one of them is pathological. Not understanding the effects of pathology on relationships, self concept, and recovery deters a woman’s ability to heal. Understanding the DIFFERENCES in these types of relationships is critical.

The Institute developed programs and materials exactly for this reason. We developed our telephone counseling program for women in immediate need of validation of their experiences, our retreat programs specifically geared to ‘Healing the Aftermath of the Pathological Love Relationship,’ our Therapist Affiliate Program training which provides other therapists nationwide the clinical training to help women heal from these types of relationships, and our 40+ products all developed to teach pathology to others.

Why? Why all the effort in treatment related issues? Because the absence of trained counselors is screamingly evident. Our mailing list writes us week after week asking “Can you recommend someone in Florida, Michigan, the United Kingdom, Canada, California, Oregon…? Why don’t other counselors understand this? Why can’t anyone explain to me what is going on! If one more counselor or family member suggests I am codependent or a relationship addict, I’m going to scream! Why is this so hard to understand?”

Much like the beginning phases of the addiction field, the pathological love relationship field is feeling the same ‘misunderstanding phase’ that other theories of counseling have gone thru. When the field is new or the knowledge is groundbreaking, there is an overt lack of trained responders. Unfortunately, those that suffer the new phases are the victims/survivors that wish there were more trained service providers.

The Institute operates as a public psychopathy education project which means we try to train anyone and everyone in the issues of pathology–that includes the women in the relationships AND those who are likely to be emotional supports to women recovering from these relationships. Please bear with an entirely new emerging field of psychology that is trying to race to catch up to the knowledge of what is needed for this population of people. After all, until us no one had even bothered to STUDY the female partners of psychopaths and partners of other pathological types. No one created research projects to study the personality traits, histories and chronic vulnerabilities of women who have been in these relationships. So to that degree, we are virginal in our exploration of these issues.

As an Institute, we try to be immediately responsive to needs. In the last year we have exploded in growth in our outreach–our weekly newsletter continues to reach more and more people, our blogs we write for other websites such as Psychology Today and Times Up! helps us to reach an even larger audience with the educational value of our expertise, our list of books, CDs and DVDs that are in every country of the world, our expanded retreat format, private 1:1′s with Sandra, our telephone assessments and counseling which doubled in size this year, our weekly teleconferencing support groups, and our Therapist Training Program–all are born out of our desire to reach YOU! As needs are repeatedly identified by our mailing list, we try to quickly ascertain how to develop a program to meet the need. That’s because we recognize that the services available out there are slim. We provide what we can knowing that we are a drop in the bucket to the need that exists. So unless we duplicate ourselves through products and services many women will go untreated.

I know for many women who are struggling to recover from the diabolical aftermath of a pathological relationship that it seems that too few services exist. Please remain hopeful that not only this Institute but other therapists and agencies hear your cry and are reaching out for training so they can help you. We too are always looking at how we can expand our scope and reach.

Over the past year or two there has been a proliferation of survivor-based websites, blogs, newsletters, blog radio shows, and chat forums that have jumped in to fill the need between what you need and what ‘is’ out there for support or assistance. (We appreciate that every new blog is pathology information reaching new victims!) Lately we have been asked what constitutes effective help for the aftermath symptoms. Those suffering with stress related disorders, intrusive thoughts/obsessional thinking as well as PTSD and other anxiety-based disorders are often surprised to find that chat forums INCREASE their symptoms. It seems counter-intuitive that the thing you want most to do (process it, talk about it, and roll it around in your head) may be the very thing that increases intrusive thoughts and autonomic adrenaline response in your body. “But it’s the first time someone has understood” or “I feel so at home with others like me” is a common feeling associated with the huge relief after finding a forum that you resonate with. And I am sure lots of people will disagree with me about the use of chat forums. Unfortunately, we have spent a great deal of time ‘cleaning up’ symptoms that have increased in survivors while surfing the net, chatting in forums or finding survivor-support blogs that don’t clinically understand PTSD or what helps/hinders it.

While survivor blogs and websites may have the ‘right heart’ when it comes to offering a ‘place for survivors’ please be aware that these sites are not professional clinicians. They may have lived through a pathological relationship, but it is questionable if they are competent to offer guidance on your array of mental health problems. In fact, if what they do offer triggers you, they are not likely to know what to do or be able to provide it.

While we exist to help all survivors, it is increasing difficult for us to clean up the emotional meltdowns caused from too much exposure to things that trigger your autonomic response of adrenaline, depression or anxiety generated from non-clinical websites. It’s also a reason we only used master degreed professionals for our phone support.

Here are our recommendations:

We suggest that you find a trauma therapist skilled in PTSD. We are happy to provide a training DVD to her that helps her get up to speed on Pathological Love Relationships so she can understand why your aftermath is so severe.

Finding an EMDR or Hypnosis Therapist are considered ‘gentle therapies’ and easiest on your own biological system as you can work through your symptoms.

When your symptoms have minimized, consider finding a support program (phone group or in person group).

STOP group whenever/if ever your are re-triggered (recovery is about pacing your level of exposure to things that are triggering).

Limit your exposure to triggering events such as chat forums or too much ‘other victim-oriented’ story sharing.

Practice a stress relieving lifestyle (you have a stress disorder!)

Find beauty in things that instill hope for a future.

Most of all, don’t give up hope. We are an emerging new psychology field! We are where Domestic Violence was in the 1970′s and 80′s–we are blazing a new frontier!

Hopefully these tips will help you select competent services for your own recovery. Let us know how if we can be of help.

When a Pathological Dies

If you have been reading our magazine site, then you probably have read why and how I got started in pathology. Like you, so many years are initially spent not knowing what is wrong with the pathological. Since part of pathology is the ultimate in projection (taking their traits/behaviors and saying they are your traits/behaviors), most people walk around believing they ARE the problem. Sometimes the pathological is charismatic, successful and well liked by others so others also look at you as if you ARE the problem. Eventually, you believe it too! Cognitive dissonance sets in (they’re good/they’re bad, I’m good/I’m bad), obsessions about proving they really ARE the problem, and constant intrusive thoughts replaying their statements to you and your mental health begins to tank! It makes you feel vulnerable and crazy. It only proves to you that what they pathological said about you is true. You and your mental health are the problem.

Somewhere down the line, you eventually stumble on some miraculous gift–something that makes you rethink your own mental health in light of their pathology. Maybe you found our site or books and you begin to recognize the problem is not you, or even the relationship—it’s the disorder in them. Much like a medical disease process, pathology is just being/doing what it is—hurting things in its path. Although it sounds personal to you, it isn’t. Pathology does this to everyone, eventually. So you get a clue that maybe what has been occurring in the relationship has something to do with something bigger than you, bigger than them, bigger than what counseling can do for your relationship. The spark has been lit in you to find out more. However, “the best time to see the light is as soon as you can” might be years down the road. You might have had a lifetime with this person as the pathology continued to damage you. Seeing the light, recognizing and even being able to ‘name/diagnosis’ them, isn’t always initially enough to emotionally help someone out of the pit of pathology. You stay and watch, and confirm in your mind, and find resources, and plan, and eventually you get the hell out of hell.

You’re out of hell–now what? Why don’t I feel better? Why are my symptoms even worse now. Why isn’t getting away and cutting off exposure to them enough to kick-start my recovery? When you peek inside yourself you find fragility & fractured-ness, distraction & dissociation, dissonance & disgust, obsession & objectification, Post Traumatic Stress & Preoccupation. Good Lord, I AM SCREWED UP you think. Assessing your inner damage, you calculate you have at least 25 years of therapy ahead of you and you’re 42 years old! I won’t live long enough to feel well is your biggest fear. So you dive in–self help books, group, Ala-non, self esteem programs, Boundaries books, therapists, coaches, retreats, inpatient care, medication….

The damage is huge and the path to recovery seems long. You tally up everything a few years with a narcissist or psychopath has cost you: Friends, family, health, career, promotions, mental health, spirituality, sexuality, finances, your home….and the list goes on. Thousands of dollars later, you sort of feel less depressed. On good days you can actually take hold of your own obsessional thinking and control it for 5 minutes. That’s progress you think.

You have fought tooth and nail to understand pathology, save yourself, and then heal. You feel justified in your feelings of loathing for someone so harmful, dangerous and disordered. You see the years it has taken from your life and your children’s lives. You see the countless ways others and even society is harmed by their disorder. No one would ever blame you for loathing them or their disorder. You finally feel some power in your ability to be rightfully angered, even indignant to the damage done.

And then they die.

Relief? Yes. Safety? Yes. Justification? Yes. Restitution? Yes. God finally answered? Yes. The playing field has somehow shifted–just exactly how, we are often unsure. Their death feels like a flood–waves of discordant feelings. Shouldn’t you rent the Hyatt and have a party? Why are you so sensitive when people tell you ‘You should be glad they are gone now.’

Last week, one of the pathologicals in my life died. I watched her horrendous death from the sidelines of a hospital chair. I coordinated her care with hospice, spent hours on the phone with doctors, advocated for her care without insurance, sat commode-side in a urine soaked nursing home, and held a yellow-green hepatitis-infected hand as she drifted in and out of consciousness.

After all, she was my sister. It took me years to get to the place of recognizing her pathology and accepting her disorders. I have spent enormous time in research and in therapy ‘coming to accept’ this insidious pathological disorder. (How else do you think I became so skilled at recognizing pathology and running a clinic based on it?)

There I sat staring at death-dulled eyes watching her slip from this world into the next and hating pathology again, for the millionth time in my life. I hate what it did to me, to others. I hate what it took from her life. She never, ever had a normal life or felt normally about others. She missed real love, real joy–a whole spectrum of feeling she could never experience because of her own pathological neurology.

Can you miss what you never had? I asked myself as I watched her die.

Inevitable flashes of our lives together—a bedroom shared but no conversations, her never-ending problems with drugs/alcohol, men/violence, homelessness/mental illness, her empathy-less smirk when others were hurt or when she hurt others, her parasitic lifestyle milking my mothers money and energies, her narcissistic investment that her chronic drama was always first place in everyone’s lives, the Jekyll/Hyde of a manipulator and yet a child.

The playing field of her death felt like standing on the vault line of an earthquake.

FLASH: She cracked my head open throwing me down the stairs at age 5.

FLASH: She never belly laughed.

FLASH: She pushed me down a big hill into traffic the first time on my roller-skates.

FLASH: She was scared of the dark.

FLASH: Drugs, alcohol, arrests, legal problems that never ended.

FLASH: Her empty heart and life and lifeless eyes.

FLASH: Me coming to know her pathology after years of studying to find out what was wrong with her.

FLASH: Her huge bloated cirrhosis-filled belly — unrecognizable to me.

FINAL FLASH: She’s gone.

Even when the pathological crosses over out of our personal space of potential harm, they leave behind their own legacy. Nothing really changes when they cross. The cognitive dissonance of their pain caused/pain received lingers on. It doesn’t change because that’s what pathology is—a heaving vault line of the uneven feelings about the good and the bad in those with the disorder.

I am reminded I don’t have to choose one side or the other in how I remember her. She was after all, Jekyll & Hyde. And those uneven feelings and memories reflect her disorder and the relationship I had to establish to have a relationship with someone who was split in two halves of harm and need.

I have come to accept pathology in all its ugly forms and with all its hard wiring that I realize she never asked to be born with. I always thought I would feel differently when she died. But I recognize now that I SHOULD feel conflicting feelings reflecting her own nature as Jekyll & Hyde. Rest in peace my sister. There was no peace for you on this side.

Intense Attachments

Women in these relationships and their family members who watch her relationship dynamics all wonder about **why** this dangerous guy is so hard to leave. While all the people around her have the easy and rational answers of how and why she should leave, the disengagement and detachment is harder with pathological persons than anyone else.

No one knows this better than her. At the heart of the attachment is the intensity of bonding produced in a relationship that has an ‘emotional vortex’ pull. Much like magnets pointed towards each other, the draw and pull and staying power of pathologicals is not like other relationship dynamics. As we study these particular attachments we see that there are unusual qualities to the relationships that even the women can’t define or adequately describe. This includes the dichotomous thinking often seen in ‘mind control,’ the hypnotic engagement often seen in trauma, and the betrayal bonding often seen in sexual addiction. Combined, this power cocktail renders her not only entranced by paralyzed from action.

Normal motivations do not motivate her. Not her current roller-coaster mental health, her other family relationships, her declining health, her children, her

job or any other force that would usually rally her to her own self care. No wonder people who care about her are baffled that a high functioning, bright, proactive woman has been reduced to a catatonic/hypnotized/brain washed version of her former self.

An hour a week at the counselor’s office has done little to unwedge her from this super-glued relationship. It hasn’t recognized the hypnotic en-trancement, the growing PTSD symptoms, the cognitive loops and entrenched dichotomous thinking. It hasn’t unveiled the death grip that pathologicals can have on a squirming victim. Or the mind control that sucks the willpower and brain function from her.

Physically and emotionally exhausted from the too-many-go-rounds with him, there isn’t enough left of her to fight her way out or even think her way out. Many women now suffer from Chronic Fatigue from the wearing process with the pathological. Without the emotional resources and physical strength, her lethargy just ‘allows’ the relationship to roll like waves over the top of her. Without help or intervention, she is likely to have a complete physical break down including severe medical problems, sleep disruptions, mental confusion, panic attacks, anxiety, depression and more. Women have developed auto immune disease and cardiac problems in the middle of these acutely stressful relationships.

With all of their resources sapped and their concentration at a near record low, many have had to quit their jobs, have been fired, been in car accidents or sporting injuries because of the inability to concentrate. Taking an inventory of just ‘what it has cost her’ to be in a relationship with a pathological is often the first step towards education.

The disengagement process is a supported function often by counselors or The Institute in which education, acceptance of his diagnosis, self care reinitiation, symptom management and then the full recovery process is necessary. Some need short term programs that help them kick start their own recovery such as our retreats or intensives with Sandra.

Many of the women have PTSD now from the exposure to the pathological. PTSD worsens without treatment, with added stress, and with time. Some where she has to find the counseling resources in order to return her to a life she use to know before the pathological. This includes finding support people, support groups, counseling, specific focused books and audios on the subject, and if needed, retreat or residential programs. If this describes your current situation, get what you need to heal now–to minimize the effects of the growing PTSD and the intrusive and ping ponging thoughts. Most of all, the intensity of attachment in order to be broken must first be understood. Healing the Aftermath of Pathological Love Relationships is a great tool for loosening the pathologicals emotional death grip.

My Anniversary of the Plunge into Pathology

The month of May which we just exited, marks my fairly ‘official’ date (at least in my mind) in which I was thrusted into the field of pathology–totally without consent, without warning and without return to the normal life I knew before May 13, 1983. 27 years ago my father bled out in a grungy gutter in Cincinnati after a psychopath plunged a knife into his aorta outside of his jazz club. I was initiated into a victim-hood that would turn my life and career in a direction I hadn’t much interest in on May 12, 1983.

Much like pathology in anyone else’s life, you don’t get to pick how it plays out. The best you can do is to learn how to ride the rollercoaster that goes along with the serious group of disorders in pathology. And so I did.

27 years later I still feel like I am just skimming the surface of what can and should be done in education, awareness, survivor services, and advocacy. Thousands of pages later of writings (books, newsletters, websites, workbooks, e-books, quizzes), hours and hours of lectures ad nauseum, over a thousand hours in broadcasts (radio and TV), stacks of cds and DVDs created—and still we are in the infancy of a new understanding about pathology–the virtual edge of just starting what one day will be a momentum marker that shows ‘when’ the world turned a corner in a better and very public understanding of pathology.

We’re not there yet, but the day IS coming. Every new blog that goes up, every newsletter, every website, every talk, every social networking post, every private moment of your knowledge shared with another victim, every coaching session, every class taught, every therapy hour, every group gathering, every prayer muttered, every radio show aired, every celebrity living it and bringing notice, every TV show about it, every newspaper or women’s magazine article taunting it, —is another message to another ear that has heard the message. You learned it because someone cared enough to make sure you learned it.

Every May 13 for the past 25 years I have halted my life to remember that life altering second when my life went from normal everyday life -to-a homicide survivor. This is when my reality was ripped through by pathology–a disorder so conscience-less that altering history is just another day in their lives. While my pathology story includes a brutal ending, yours no less includes something similar–all the things lost in the moment of deep betrayal–the kind of betrayal that only pathology can bring.

(If I don’t brighten this newsletter up, I’ll get complaints about ‘too much reality’ or ‘too much negativity’) So, I will say this–while none of us ‘choose’ to become survivors at the hands of very disordered pathologicals, what we ‘do’ with what we were dealt is up to us. Every so often I like to send a message to you that encourages you to ‘pass it forward.’ Whatever you have learned from the magazine, the newsletters, or the books is probably more than the woman who is sitting next to you knows. You don’t need to wait until you ‘understand it more, take a class, get a degree, read one more of our books, take the coaching training. That doesn’t help the woman you sit next to at work. The knowledge in your head is life saving to her. Next year ‘when you get better trained’ isn’t the year to share what you know. Today is!

If we want to move from living on the virtual edge of changing pathology education in the world, we have to open our mouths and tell what we know. Every pathological out there hopes you DON’T do this–they hope you keep what you know to yourself. So many women with so many tears had said “If I had only known….I would have left earlier, I wouldn’t have left my children with him, I wouldn’t have _______.”

Every May is a time I renew my commitment to what changed me. Every May I bother people with my message and prod them and push them to make victim’s rights and survivor education important in the world. If I don’t, the image of my dad laying in that gutter haunts me. His death should never have been for nothing–and as long as people have been helped, it hasn’t. Frankie Brown has touched so many lives with his death through the message of psychopathy. You’re one of them! Help me celebrate my father’s death anniversary in a way that brings meaning and hope to many. Tomorrow, share what you know with just ONE person–someone that you have felt in your gut needs to know about the permanence and the pain of pathological relationships. Then email me and say ‘I passed it forward’ so I can count up how many people celebrated Frankie! If this email offended you, I’m sorry. Pathology offended my entire life.

Thank you for growing in the knowledge of pathology so you are prepared for the day when you can give someone the life changing information that you’ve come to know!

If we can help you with your healing, please join us for our next retreat June 7-11. Healing is possible and we can help lead you there.

The Illusion of Management

A part of how people convince themselves to stay in the pathological love relationship is that they think they are making ‘progress’ by managing the pathological’s behavior. Once there is a glimmer of doubt about the pathological’s behavior, the partner begins to do one of two things: they either change their belief system or they change their behavior. Most of them will change their belief system. That means, they will tell themselves there are ‘ways’ to manage the pathological’s lying, infidelity, addictions, sexual acting out, or whatever negative behavior they bring to the relationship. If they can manage the behavior, they can change the person. If they change what they don’t like in them, they have a shot at ‘being happy.’

That means they will change how they see the pathological. If they are ‘noticing’ too much negative behavior they might look the other way, rename it, minimize it, deny it, justify it, or use any other defense mechanistic way that allows the partner to change how they see the pathological.

When there is the thought that by enforcing strong ‘rules’ for the relationship or by ‘demanding’ their own rights that the pathological will ‘stop’ the behavior, the belief is based on the illusion of management.

When there is the thought by enforcing the ‘three strike rule’ for the relationship or by ‘demanding’ the pathological attend church, counseling, or treatment which will ‘stop’ the behavior, the belief is based on the illusion of management.

When there is the thought by ‘putting the pathological on a short leash’ and checking on them frequently, calling the cell, sending people out to find them, breaking into the pathological’s phone or computer, that the fear of being caught will ‘stop’ the behavior, the belief is based on the illusion of management.

When there is the thought that the pathological is “now working” or staying at home more or being kind, or saying the kinds of things you always wanted to hear and that the previous ‘behavior’ is now gone, the belief is based on the illusion of management.

Pathologicals and/or addicts are not managed. Shortening the leash, making demands, watching closer, hiring a P.I. is not managing a person’s acting out. Pathology is noted for its inability to grow to any emotional or spiritual depth, the inability to sustain the changes that you have demanded, and the inability to develop insight how their behavior harms others. People with pathological disorders are not managed—not by you, jail, prison, or church. The inability to sustain change means that the pathological will APPEAR to do whatever it takes to stay in the relationship, but the disorder itself means they cannot sustain the change that will please you.

People embrace the truth of pathology when they realize that the idea they are ‘managing’ the pathological’s negative behavior or addictions is simply an illusion. Jails and prisons are packed full of personality disordered and pathological individuals because probation ‘management’ or ‘psychological management’ did not work. As they say in 12 steps, ‘When nothing changes–nothing changes.’ Pathology has an inability to change which means nothing consistently changes in the pathological individual except maybe new ‘ideas’ about how to con others.

Managing manipulative behavior, drugs or alcohol, porn or sex addictions, infidelity, lying, and conning are an illusion used by the partner in order to ‘buy a little more time’ to try to figure out how to make the pathological be ‘more normal.’ In the end, it’s your defense mechanisms telling you that by changing your belief system (he can be different, he can do better) that you can ‘help them find the resources they need in order to grow into their full potential.’ If you’re over 30, falling in love with ‘potential’ is a crap game risk. People not living up to their potential in adulthood are called–pathologically disordered. By adulthood, either you ‘have the ability for life skills and success’ or you are ‘life challenged’ by addictions or pathology. In either case, partners need to understand there is no ‘managing’ someone else’s negative and pathological behavior. That is an illusion!

Additionally, playing with the ‘illusion of management’ increases cognitive dissonance in you. It causes a miserable symptom of your thinking ‘ping ponging’ back and forth between “He’s good/he’s bad.” This is simply responding to both sides of his Jekyll/Hyde nature. The longer you play with the illusion, the more cognitive dissonance (C.D.) you overload your mind with.

That’s why The Institute always treats the cognitive dissonance–in our retreats, 1:1s, or phone coaching–the issue of cognitive dissonance is always addressed. We are the leading provider of C.D. treatment for Aftermath Symptoms in Pathological Love Relationships. If you have C.D., make sure you get treated for it. It increases over time and makes the symptoms worse. Getting a handle on the ‘illusion’ is a first step towards managing your C.D.

Am I Under His “Spell?” – Part III

The past two weeks we have been talking about trance states, dissociation, hypnotic suggestion, and mind control…all ways the pathological controls your mind, thoughts, feelings, and ultimately your behavior.

This is not hocus pocus stuff. Trance states, dissociation and hypnosis are all normal parts of the way our body and minds respond to certain conditions. The only argument is if these pathologicals KNOW they are doing it to others! My answer would be yes: they are masters at noticing what works on other people. So to that degree, they tweak what works.

Additionally, many of you may be aware of the seminars, books, websites and now TV shows about ‘seduction’ and the techniques that are taught men about coming in under the radar in seducing women through hypnotic methods. My guess is that the pathologicals are teaching their findings to others…passing on the horrid knowledge of their own disorders and how to covertly attract women subconsciously into sexual relationships. Appalling? You bet. Just one more big WAKE UP CALL to women–pay attention and guard your minds.

Trance, mind control and hypnotic suggestion also are based on one’s own level of ‘suggestibility’. This is related to how responsive you are to the suggestions and opinions of others. The more responsive you are the more suggestible and more easily you are mind controlled or hypnotizable.

A women’s suggestibility is often influenced by her biology. Women who are highly cooperative and value how others perceive them are likely to be more suggestible.

Also, women’s fatigability highly influences her suggestibility.

Almost all women report high levels of emotional, physical, sexual, financial, and spiritual fatigue with pathological relationships. They take a toll on her–wearing her down until her emotional reserves that would normally not give in, are repressed. At that time when her fatigue level is high, her suggestibility is also high. Tired and spaced out, it’s easy to get controlled by him.

Messages that are told to her during tired and spaced out times are recorded deeply and yet often subconsciously. “Can’t get him out of your head?” is very real.

The women who participated in our research survey on ‘women who love psychopaths’ showed us just how susceptible you group of women really are to suggestibility, fatigability, and the resulting mind control. Almost all of the women experienced some form of trance, hypnosis, mind control of ‘spell bound’ symptoms.

Women must understand that ‘staying in the relationship to figure it out’ or ‘see what happens’ or ‘wait until he works on himself and gets better’ is absolutely risky for you. Your ability to be controlled covertly by him is significantly higher than other females.

Until women really understand their ‘at risk’ temperament traits and how they affect her choices in relationships and TOLERANCE in relationships, she remains significantly likely to either not leave or pick the same way the next time around…

Ladies, hope and healing are available. We really UNDERSTAND the dynamics involved in what you have lived through. Our research has opened up incredible insights into your temperament and your relationship dynamics. Now specific and uniquely targeted treatment can begin! Please, let The Institute be part of your recovery.

Am I Under His “Spell?” – Part II

Last week we started to talk about the very REAL issue of trance in relationship with pathologicals.

Women feel ‘under his spell,’ ‘spell bound,’ ‘ mesmerized,’ ‘hypnotized,’ ‘spaced out,’ ‘not in control of their own thoughts….’ All of these are ways of saying that various levels of covert and subtle mind-control have been happening with the pathological. And why wouldn’t it be happening? These are power-hungry people who live to exert their dominance over others.

That includes your body, mind or spirit. Mind Control techniques are used on prisoners of war, in cults, and in hostage taking. It obviously works or there wouldn’t be ‘techniques’ and bad people wouldn’t use it.

Mind control, brain washing, coercion…are all words for the same principles that are used to produce the results of reducing your own effectiveness and being emotionally overtaken by someone intent on doing so. Here are the conditions of mind control:

• Perceived threat to one’s physical or psychological survival and the belief that the captor/perpetrator would carry out the threat.
• Perceived small kindness from the captor/perpetrator to the captive.
• Isolation from perspectives other than those of the captor/perpetrator.
• Perceived inability to escape.

Mind control then produces dissociation which is a form of trance states. It’s when your mind becomes overloaded and you need to ‘step outside of yourself’ to relieve the stress. Dissociation and trance happens during abuse in childhood as well or adult rape. Prolonged mind control in adults will even produce trance states where adults begin to feel like they are being controlled. And they are…

Treatment and recovery for mind control includes:

• Breaking the Isolation – Help the client identify sources of supportive intervention; Self-help groups or group therapy (group needs to be homogeneous to needs), also hotlines, crisis centers, shelters and friends.
• Identifying Violence – As victims in abusive relationships minimize the abuse, or are in so much denial it may be necessary to ask directly about the different types of violent behavior. Many woman (and children) are confused about what is acceptable male (parental / authority) behavior. Journal keeping, autobiographical writing, reading of first hand accounts or seeing films that deal with abuse may be helpful to clients.
• Perceived Kindness – Encourage the client to develop alternative sources of nurturance and caring other than the captor/perpetrator.
• Validating both Love and Terror – Helping the client integrate both disassociated ‘sides’ of the abuser, will assist her in giving up her dream-like state in how she sees him.

Next week, we’ll continue our discussion on other forms of trance states and spellbound conditions.

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