More on finding fault with the Sociopath’s Family

Yesterday’s post about mothers of sociopaths garnered lots of reaction on this blog and on the Facebook page dedicated to my book, Escaping the Boy.

First, I think it’s wonderful that everyone is sharing their specific experiences and reactions. Doing this allows all of us a greater chance of finding a story that relates to our own, which, in turn, will serve to validate us further and aid us in our healing and recovery.

One thing I did not mention about blame and fault: they are built on the same psychological premise as reward and praise.

The same way we as mothers and fathers can’t take the credit for our children when they do well and succeed, we can’t feel emotionally responsible for our children’s failures.

Do you blame your parents for your mistakes? Do you give them all the credit when you have done exceptionally well in the past?

I doubt it.

The first thing we do as healthy people with healthy egos is thank ourselves or punish ourselves when we succeed and fail.

So why would we blame the parents of a sociopath or narcissist for how they treat others?

Certainly, nurture plays a heavy hand in who and what we become. As parents, all we can do is model care, trust and love in hopes our children will become loving and forgiving adults.

However, nurturing, good and bad, only has so much impact on a person. We are each born as individual humans with the potential to mold and create ourselves in any way we choose.

It really comes down to individual choice: we can continue being a jerk or a good person or we can choose to be something else.

Once we mature, we have the ability to step back, reflect and compare our moral code against society’s and against individuals we admire regardless of our upbringing.

Each of us has the power to be better and do better. We can change!

Sociopaths do not have that power. They are not wired with the ability to step back outside of their material selves and reflect on their core.

And even non-sociopaths, people who remain immersed in toxic relationships, do not have that power.

Think back to how you were in the toxic relationship.

>>Were you able to discern between the fake and the real?

>>Were you able to logically and clearly dissect the chaos and mind games playing out in every scenario?

>>Did you have full and complete control over your own thoughts and actions?

>>Did you love and respect yourself and your ability to solve problems and set personal boundaries?

Being free from the influence of a sociopath and other pathological types is essential for healing and recovery.

The only people who are to blame for inflicting pain upon you and your children and other loved ones are those people who directly inflicted that pain.

If it was your ex and his entire family, then it’s fair to blame them individually.

Give them back the burden you’ve been carrying, even if it’s just a mental and emotional burden you are tossing aside.

But we cannot blame the dead parents or care givers who were once a part of a sociopath’s life. We can’t blame the brothers or sisters we never met.

The full accountability lies with those who inflicted the harm directly, not by proxy.

I love my son and give him lots of love and understanding. My wish is that he grows up to be a man HE can be proud of being.

His success or lack of success will soon have no bearing on whether I was or wasn’t a good parent.

The power to be kind, empathetic, loving and forgiving lies 100% within him.

If your ex is a part of a pathological and toxic family unit, he/she had a choice a long time ago to become a positive influence. Not every person within a toxic family is pathological or destined to become pathological.

But the longer and deeper the delusions run, the less likely the cycle will ever end.

I have met many people through this page who were raised by pathological mothers and/fathers and are not sick themselves. They are good, honest and giving people.

So I wholeheartedly believe the fault lies solely on the abusive person’s shoulders. Not the mother’s, the father’s, the foster parents’ or adoptive parents’.

Those people as individuals may be jerks and assholes, too. They may have been shitty parents and care givers.

But it’s the choice of the individual to continue to be hateful and harmful to victims/survivors who modeled love and honor but, in the end, failed to make an impact.

It’s no more the parent’s fault than it was your fault that the sociopath remains diabolical and unable to change.

Namaste!
~Paula

© 2013 Paula Carrasquillo and Paula’s Pontifications.

“The sociopath ADORED me so much at first!! What happened?”

Narcissistic Sociopaths need constant adoration. The sociopath primes you from the very beginning to provide them with constant adoration by adoring you first.

In the beginning during the idolization phase, everything you do and say is described by the sociopath as “amazing” and “genius” and “fantabulous!” He adores you and can’t imagine spending a night without you. You are the most beautiful woman he has every looked upon, touched and kissed. You don’t have sex; you make LOVE!! He can’t believe the time he wasted living without you. You’re a goddess.

Why does he say these things? Because you are all of those things, especially in the eyes of the sociopath who is just a dull blob of flesh next to your gloriousness. He sees it; he knows he pales in comparison. He tells you, because it’s the truth.

But you’re now scratching your head. You were under the impression sociopaths lie all the time. Well, they do lie all the time…about themselves and their feelings and their motives.

Luckily for us, sociopaths can’t create their own worlds without some truths. Unfortunately, the truths they use come from us. With our truth as the foundation of the relationship, the manipulation and mind games can begin.

(Remember, they NEED us; we do not need them.)

The sociopath doesn’t tell you these truths with the end goal to make you happy and fulfilled. He does it to make himself happy and fulfilled, because we reward him for rewarding us with such high praises.

It’s our natural default: when someone is nice to us, we’re nice in return.

Think about it—when was the last time you told someone to screw off when they complimented your appearance or your job performance? More than likely, you said “Thank you” and provided them with a reciprocal compliment either on-the-spot or later when appropriate.

We remember niceties of people, because it feels good. And we always return the niceties, because we want others to feel good, too. We don’t do it to receive more niceties in return, which is what sets us apart from the sociopath. The sociopath gives compliments with the great expectation of receiving compliments in return, a purely selfish and malignant mindset.

A great way to test what I propose is to think back (or in the present if you’re still engaged with a sociopath) to the last time you failed to return a compliment or even slightly criticized the sociopath.

How did he react? Probably with something like this:

“How can you be so cruel?! How could you say such means things to me when all I do is love you so much?” (And all you said was that you were tired of his choice of restaurants and you wanted to try something new.)

Regardless of the context of the present conversation or situation, the sociopath told you last week how beautiful you looked in that dress you wore to work, and you better not disagree or misbehave. If you fail to comply or insist on arguing, you are a selfish and heartless whore!

(Oy vey! Holy hell! Squat on the Buddha!)

And the hate-filled rages only get worse the longer you hang around. The first few times you might feel guilty that he got so hurt by a simple comment you made. You try rephrasing and even prefacing your comments with, “I don’t think you’re 100% wrong, and I don’t dislike it completely but…”

(This is called walking on eggshells. Dammit! You should be able to have an opinion about something and feel safe expressing that opinion without feeling like you’ll be instantly attacked and diminished.)

Sociopaths think the kind of love and praise they give to you is carte blanche for them to behave in any way they wish to behave. They keep a running tally of all of the things they did for you “out of the goodness of their hearts.” Since they tell you they love you and think you’re perfect, they expect you to be okay with anything and everything they ask of you.

It’s as if we’re just stupid and lost puppies stumbling around waiting for praise and food all of the time. As if we completely depend on the sociopath for all of our needs. As if all we live for is to kiss his ass and give him some ass. As if we need him in order for our lives to run smoothly and without interference, like a finely-tuned Swiss watch.

(And that’s exactly how the sociopath wants us to be. Completely dependent. But that’s simply delusional!)

And once we start displaying any kind of disobedient behavior, like expressing ourselves, the praise and adoration stops. We’re put in the proverbial doghouse indefinitely. The sociopath withholds those praises like a dog owner withholds biscuits and treats until the dog “learns” to behave better (a.k.a. listens and obeys its master.)

I have a mind. You have a mind. Our minds are our masters, not the sociopath or any other human on the planet.

The sociopath entertains himself daily performing in his one-man show. We’re just his props; he honestly believes that he is the only one that matters.To the sociopath, we are nothing unless we comply. We’re “dead to him” if we continue to “selfishly” insist on using our minds willfully and outside of his little world.

Can you imagine a cluster of these fools in the same room together? We should organize a fake event and send them all an invitation. Let them be our puppets while we sit back and take pictures and video. What do you think would happen? (Bahaha! I know. Wishful thinking, huh?)

Namaste!
~ Paula

(Image source: http://pinterest.com/pin/79024168432465186/)