Today I am thankful that I am finding new ways of spotting psychopaths before getting into relationships with them.
There is a recent study that I thought I should share. It is that researchers at Ohio State University found that men who post a lot of selfies tend to have cluster B Personality disorders and score higher on tests for psychopathy.
Steve took a lot of selfies. There were times when he'd take a selfie with me far off in the background. That should have been a tip off of where I stood in the relationship.
He liked to tell everyone that I was a sociopath. Maybe that was a little bit of projection going on....
Here is a newsletter from Ohio State describing the study:
http://news.osu.edu/news/2015/01/06/hey-guys-posting-a-lot-of-selfies-doesn%E2%80%99t-send-a-good-message/
This certainly explains a lot.
Posting selfies points to a cry for attention, especially if they are numerous. He did need attention from other women.
He would also make videos, akin to what a rock star would have created for the MTV of old.
I never had the heart to tell him that he couldn't vocalize satanic metal grunts very well. I tried to get him to visit with my vocal coach but he wasn't interested. He tried to do the death growl....those cookie monsterish, monotone, black metal, demonic, gothic sounds. His came off as a whisper. I know they are hard to do and sustain. Still.....it was hard for me to listen to his recordings.
This is one of the better gothic metal bands, so I'll share so you can hear a sample of the death growl.
I felt embarrassed for Steve. He is a talented drummer but needs more experience with vocals. More than that, I truly wanted him to get vocal training because I feared he'd lose his voice.
The graphic effects of his videos were superb, though. He could have easily had a second career.
The few people I know who can do that well are classically trained in Opera. I have heard stories of a local singer here ruining his voice doing death grunts improperly. I am told that he needs surgery now.
Truth be told, I probably shouldn't critique Steve. The only thing I can sing is Happy Birthday and I can only do a fair job of that. Friends don't let friends embarrass themselves or ruin their vocal cords. I must not have been much of a friend because I couldn't get him help.
I should have realized that a man who puts together self-serving videos and tons of selfies to Facebook could have a problem with narcissism. This could especially be more true if he truly believes that every post you make is about him.
I only share this because I think it will prevent other people from suffering a similar fate. If you're dating a guy who takes a lot of selfies and can't part from his phone, you may be dating a psychopath.
Love ya,
S.
Edit: Now, just to be sure I make it clear....
Three of the four Cluster B personality disorders tend to be fixed in stone; anti-social, histrionic and narcissistic,
There has always been controversy about Borderline Personality Disorder. It does mirror narcissism but is caused by someone being is so much psychic pain that they cannot consider the needs of other people. People with BPD who have not been adequately treated, will act like narcissists until they learn to manage their deep psychic pain. They will nit-pick others. They will act out for attention. They will find joy in attacking their partners and friends. They will cheat. They will play games to test the love and loyalty of their partners. They will lie but will not necessarily know they are lying. They are delusional and will walk a fine line between neuroticism and psychoticism....unless they seek treatment.
They will pull what I call the "not everybody with BPD card" ....people with this disorder who have not finished treatment tend to be ignorant of their behavior and the impact they have on others. They swear that they do not do these things UNTIL they look within, find the reasons for their behavior, step out of their delusion and STOP the behavior.
Until they get help, the only thing they are about is whether or not people like them. They do anything to be noticed and be liked - hence the selfies and the MTVish videos.
It used to be seen as a misdiagnosis for people with bi-polar disorder who self-harmed. Now, it is seen more as an emotional dysregulation disorder than a personality disorder. This....in short...means that there is hope.
It is now seen more as a poor coping mechanism rather than a personality disorder. It can be curable with years of Dialectical Behavior Therapy (a form of CBT specifically designed for Borderline).
There is hope for people with Borderline Personality Disorder but they have to reach out for it.
Edit2: Oh, I should point out the difference between a sociopath and a borderline. Borderlines engage in sociopathic behavior....but NOT for the same reasons as a sociopath.
And, I'm old school. There is little difference between a sociopath and a psychopath. Psychopaths are born messed up. Sociopaths are made. Basically, sociopaths are socialized psychopaths.
I promised to explain the differences between BPD behavior and sociopath behavior. Both conditions lead to promiscuity, manipulation, impulse control problems and a poor ability to maintain relationships, but for different reasons. A person with BPD desperately seeks to control others to avoid feeling depressed and to keep people from leaving him or her. In contrast, a sociopath manipulates dispassionately for his own gain. Relationships with a BPD partner tend to be turbulent and often end dramatically because of the borderline's splitting (alternating between seeing things and people as either all good, or all bad), extreme (and often irrational) fear of rejection, and excessive mood swings. The sociopath generally does not care about maintaining the relationship or whether or not he hurts his partner. Sociopaths lack empathy where people with Borderline have empathy, it just seems to be buried deep beneath their insecurity.
Either way, it is impossible to remain in a relationship with someone with untreated BPD.
Edit 4: I never explained how I was able to clue in to the problem. This man stated that he had a personality disorder label but wouldn't tell me. He started to send me abusive emails and ran around triangulating to third parties with obnoxious lies and some went as far as to confront me over his bullshit.
He would talk about fantasizing about 20 year old women (turned out he slept with a 27 year old acquaintance of mine who he put up to calling me for a couple of years after the relationship ended). He complained about me constantly and sent me numerous abusive emails. He threatened to lie to the police in order to try to get me to do stuff for him (like that would work...lol) and threatened to stalk me in an effort to piggyback on the fear my ex-husband's stalking created in me. He also sent himself to the hospital several times after breaking up with me in a bid to get me back. It got to the point my friends could predict his next hospitalization (nothing was ever diagnosed).
Those are all manipulative things that psychopaths, sociopaths and other narcissists are prone to doing.
How did I know he was Borderline?
It wasn't enough that he tried to use DBT on me. He would literally become violent if he thought I was going to leave him. In those moments, he'd take on the demeanor of a child before lashing out.
That wasn't the clincher.
Every single day he'd complain about empathy and how no one had it. He would say that he wanted to start a database to report people with no empathy to ridicule them publicly. He had that complaint about his mom, his boss, me and just about anyone who crossed his path.
He didn't need to have empathy. Everyone else needed to have empathy in order to fill the void in his childhood development.
The empathy rant is common among people with Borderline Personality Disorder. I've heard it a lot in borderlines but never have I heard it from a narcissist.
I recently spoke to a young lady who wanted to know if her ex was a narcissist or a borderline. I'll share my advice.
It doesn't matter. If someone is abusive towards you and you are pained by being in a relationship, it doesn't matter what label they have.
Get away.
It's up to them to fix their demons. It takes a lot of motivation and work but people with these issues rarely want to do the work. Don't put yourself on hold waiting for them to heal.
Hope this helps someone,
S.