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8 Reasons to Suspect We’re Dating a Sociopath

Sociopath is a big word.
We shy away from the idea
because it sounds like a movie, not real life.
Taking a second look at this can save us lots of pain.

Dating a sociopath, as it turns out, is something I’ve done a lot of. This wasn’t something I knew I’d done until after I’d married one, kicked him out, and gotten myself an annulment.

After this big-whammy experience with the con man sociopath who hijacked me specifically for a green card to the U.S.A. – and incidentally (as they do) – for all the money he could take, I put the pieces together. I did this with my own instinct, a bold and unwavering determination to take back my life and all he’d taken from me, and reading research. As in neuroscience and psych research.

Dating a Sociopath: The More We Know

After really grasping how their little minds operate and their quirks and foibles, I know that I’ve dated a sociopath more than once. Each of them floated to my memory over the months spent restoring my life in a flash of realization. – I understand you might be wondering what it is about me that “attracted” them, or what could be wrong with me…

There’s nothing wrong with me, There’s everything right with me. I’m a normal gorgeous inside and out living breathing fully limbic-brained human. In other words, this means that I’m normal. Many, many, many of us discover as we take in a real comprehension of what a sociopath is that more than one has knocked at our door.

Is It Raining Sociopaths?

Now I know I’ve briefly dated one of these weirdos twice. And that about eight of them, all told have tried to get into my life. This one particular one got me into a legal marriage. Maybe like me, you went beyond dating a sociopath and married one.

Chances are, you’ve known more than one as well, and certainly at least one, or you wouldn’t be here. I’m glad that you are here…I’m glad you’re seeking answers that truly fit into place. Keep going so that you can solidify a user-proof life since as strange as it is, it’s true – these human predators are out there. – I’ve heard it said that one in 25 people is a sociopath… That makes about one in every classroom.

The Truth Found in The Experience

sociopath narcissist lying

After the harrowing hideous entanglement and then the restoration of my life after the dirtbag who hijacked me for an address in the U.S. along with the legal right to be in the country, I now know one of the first times in my life I came across a sociopath was in elementary school. He was ten years old, and so was I. We were in the 5th grade.

He was super gross. Nobody liked him. He was tough and mean and didn’t fit the profile of that charming sociopath we read about at all. – But maybe crafting that smoothie exterior comes later in life for these creatures.

I was plagued by his attention. What I didn’t yet know was, that there’d been a bet or a joint plot or some such heinous thing among complicit classmates that he could grab me and kiss me on the playground. – Where the heck were the adults…?

What would it mean to feel like yourself again?

The Moment of Attack Sharpens Small Detail

As it goes down, I suddenly realize I’m all alone, sitting on a swing. There’s nobody else playing, no balls bouncing, no laughing… And no one near me. It dawns on me that the entire 5th and 6th grades are divided into two camps on opposite sides of the blacktop.

The optics of the scenario stretch and pull as they do in moments of impending doom. I see or sense one band of kids far, far away in a corner of the now ghostly playground, hovering in a flock by one of the outbuildings.

A Laser Point of Focus

The more nearby knot of whispering, heaving-with-excitement 10-year-olds backs further away as a lone figure slithers towards me. In this moment, the classical traits of the snake-like qualities of a sociopath shimmer off of this kid who’s now floating into the way-too-near-me horizon.

The dirty-haired, pale-skinned predator floats up like on a Z-axis camera dolly, sliding into a close-up position. His mouth is open in anticipation.

Emanating from him was some internal honing device that sucked at me, aligning my body, overriding my resistant mind and soul, right into his orbit. Something like polar opposite magnets that click and snap together when what I wanted to do was hurl away in refusal. I didn’t have control of my body… I was locked in place.

Primal Defenses Kick In: Trust Your Gut

A part of me actively resisted and fought to get away. Brave little me looked the prepubescent beast straight in his eyes. At the millisecond I registered his leer, his curled lip revealing tiny, pointy yellowish teeth, my right arm pulled itself back, my hand in a rock-hard fist ready to smash his face. – Something I’d never done in my life.

In addition to being deceptive about who they are and about their intention in our lives sociopaths don’t heed the natural and normal boundaries we have and that we expect others to have.

His eyes open wide from the slits of a hunter; shock replaces the cocky, shit-bag expression on his ugly freckled face. He leans back from his waist and comes closer all at once. He hisses through a clenched jaw, threatening: Don’t you hit me.

I didn’t hit him. I couldn’t really. I did look straight into his eyes scanning for a person. As in a human to connect with. There wasn’t one. But, he did look scared. Of me. Then I sent out no words, no sounds, but what must have been a telepathic, silent human-to-beast warning, in essence: Don’t you fuck with me.

Those very words weren’t in my head, but surely there were screaming from my less than five-foot 70-pound frame. He backed off. The crowds dispersed… And everything after that is a blur. I was then allowed to spend every recess for the rest of the 5th grade in the nurse’s office or sitting in the school counselor’s room. I was terrified of the playground. I had post-traumatic stress at 10 years old induced by the traumatic events of a sociopath invading my life.

How Does This Happen?

Likely, by now, you’ve heard someone say or read somewhere that you played a part in the “relationship”. That you don’t know how to pick good men or women or partners but are attracted to “bad boys”. That you’re codependent or don’t have boundaries and this is why this happened to you.

This reasoning, though a natural place for people to go with this for a few reasons, is absurd. As a ten-year-old, I guarantee I wasn’t looking for a bad boy, was not codependent, and was not in a relationship with this goober-headed ten-year-old monster. It happened because he was a monster – and I was – and am – normal.

Breaking Up With Evil

Breaking Up with Evil, by Jennifer Smith on Amazon and Good Reads

Breaking Up with Evil: Escaping Coercive Control on Amazon

Five women’s true stories of being ensnared hauled through the confusion, lies, fear, and pain, and breaking away.

Told in their own words, they leave nothing unsaid. Find validation and see new glimpses of the truth as they share their stories… Stories that could be any of ours.

Persistence of Predators: They Don’t Heed Boundaries

And then, either before or after that nice day, another fine day this grimy psycho kid shows me a messed up sketch he’d made. Presented it like a gift.

Smeared pencil on a piece of lined notebook paper; so many creases where he’d feverishly folded and unfolded the page in sweaty hands it was almost tattered. It was a crude drawing of an underground fort. Dug into the earth next to a tree, in and around its roots. He told me this is where he planned to take me…And so by implication keep me.

Sociopaths Need Normal People to Survive: They Count on Us Not Knowing What They Are

Turns out, I used to be the kind of person sociopaths really like. Someone they like to date, marry, and maybe even kidnap. A lot of us are this kind of person because we’re alive and amazing humans, this makes us someone these predators sniff out as delicious prey.

The thing is: somewhere in my body I was already afraid of this stranger I’d married. He too wanted things to seem okay, so he came into the market next door with me. It felt a lot like that encounter with a sociopath child while I was a child, that day on the playground in 5th grade.

And this doesn’t mean we’re stupid, or a doormat, or codependent. — And don’t even go down the road of thinking you’re a sociopath magnet… The very idea of a sociopath magnet implies it’s the targeted prey who are at fault for the fall down the rabbit hole. So not true.

Wanting a relationship and working for it doesn’t mean we’re codependent. Nice does not equal doormat. Dating a sociopath-con-man does not signify that we’re stupid. It does indicate our natural goodness and view of the world from the heart and eyes of normal. From our normally-wired human brain that bonds as survival.

We’re Not Stupid: We Do Need to Know and Accept That Monsters Exist

Sociopaths don’t get far or get much to support their lives out of stupid. Don’t forget, we unwittingly hold up their world; stupid can’t hold up tier own world and another grown person’s too.

Codependent simply does not apply as the case of this criminal hijacking arrangement they set up. It’s more like instant hypnosis, and unless you’ve been in it: Sit down. – That’s what you can all those people who say: Didn’t you know…? Why didn’t you just leave…?

What the Beasts Need

The more we learn about what a sociopath is and how to recognize them, you may realize you’ve known a few. Bleeping onto a sociopath’s radar screen as a potential target doesn’t mean there’s anything wrong with us.

What they do work with, and do a lot with, is our emotions. That’s what they’re after… They don’t care really about which emotion; they just want a normal human one.

Our natural normal response from the world of normal. Our human emotions are based on our ordinary and extraordinary kindness. They want open hearts, people who care, and people who don’t know what a predator is and that these revolting creatures exist… Even in 5th grade.

Dating a Sociopath: 8 Reasons to Suspect We’re Dating a Sociopath

Sociopaths don’t respond normally to normal things. For example, when something bad happens… like our pet turtle dies, or our cat gets sick, or we lose a family member they remain kind of neutral, almost bored, or say something like, such a pity and go on watching Netflix. Or, throw off a blast of ice-cold freeze out.

Narcissistic predators say things like I don’t have feelings. Or I’m going to teach you a lesson, and they aren’t talking about tennis or playing the piano. Or when we’re deep in it, as I heard one day from the nut case who hijacked me in marriage, I can’t make you do what I want you to, but I can make you wish you had.

Things Are Unclear and Foggy or Scary or Too Exciting

  • Things feel weird…like they’re lying; what they say doesn’t make sense
  • We spend time coming up with explanations for what they say and defend them to others
  • We’re not sure where they live, or where they are when they’re not with us
  • They talk about doing something for “us” that’s something we’ve always wanted and we’re excited beyond anything
  • The good stuff never happens, but weird stuff does
  • They seem mostly only semi-interested in things you say
  • Certain moments they’re riveted on you, really listening, they answer questions or say things that as “off”
  • Sometimes when you’re trying to talk with them about something important the room goes out of focus and small things come into focus

Lying is Life: Lies Are Real and Real is Made Up

Lying deceivers aren’t where they say they’ll be: We run into them when they said they couldn’t come out with us or they’d be somewhere else.

The invader parasite sociopath has a whole world going on that we aren’t in: We come across them out at a club when they said they were staying home – and then they ignore us, or tell us we should be at home. They don’t join us but freeze us out of their night on the town.

Signs of Dating a Sociopath Include Lots of Disappointment

Being used by a pathological predator involves being stood up with lame explanations or no explanation. If we’re dating a sociopath they might make a date with us and show up two hours late, or not at all. After that, they’re mad that we’re mad, and madder that we ask about it. And more than one of us has heard the sociopath we’re dating say, don’t question me or if you’d trust me everything would be okay.

Trust our gut, we’re experts now. We can see a sociopath a mile away. Look them in the eye. They’ll know that we know and it’s so delightful to watch them scurry away like the rats they are.

Sociopaths busy themselves “dating” us and and about 800 other people at the same time. They keep things close to their vest. They sleep with their phones. Lock their phone. Take their phone into the bathroom. Block us from their Facebook.

Sociopaths who are “dating” often, as in within every single moment of any encounter with a normal human being, overstep the normal social and personal boundaries we all have.

In addition to being deceptive about who they are and about their intention in our lives, sociopaths don’t heed the natural and normal boundaries we have and that we expect others to have.

They Inspire a Sense Of Unease

It’s not uncommon to have a creepy feeling like they’ve been looking through our drawers or catch them looking over our shoulder as we punch in our PIN. There always the quickly shifting and closing of the laptop when we walk into the room.

And, maybe you’ve noticed, predator sociopaths take things. Mysteriously, there’s money missing from our sock drawer, or from that envelope in between the dusty-never-used dictionary and “East of Eden” on the bookshelf. – Especially when they’re gearing up to exit our lives.

Normal Puts Things In Order

When confronted by the impossible the rational mind will grope for the logical.

~ Outlander S1:E1 Sessenach

They Come into Focus for What They Are

One day while my new husband was at a meeting, I went out to buy something delicious for his dinner. Surprisingly, I ran into him at my bank’s ATM just around the corner.

We just didn’t know such beasts existed, there’s no way to conceive of something so beyond normal; sociopaths hide behind this perfectly normal human phenomenon. We can’t know what we don’t know until we know it.

He was stunned and trying not to show it. – Caught red-handed more like. – Wary, surprised, and leering, like a cat that thinks it saw something move, but isn’t sure and so waits and watches for it to happen again, ready to pounce; he asked, Are you following me??

Feeling ungrounded, my brain spun and grasped for something that made sense of finding him, of his words, and to make things right because normal humans need that.

My mind sorted the circumstances: He had no personal bank account here, there was only my account recently-turned-joint-account. He was supposed to be in another area of town at a meeting… since an hour ago.

Their Oddness Leaves Us Without Words

Out of my mouth came a tiny, no. – This was the best answer I could come up with to his very odd question… The most normal response that made me seem not freaked out. I didn’t want him to know that I knew this was very, very weird.

The thing is: Somewhere in my body I was already afraid of this stranger I’d married. He too wanted things to seem okay, so he came into the market next door with me. It felt a lot like that encounter with the sociopath child while I was a child, that day on the playground in 5th grade.

I don’t remember grabbing the grocery items, but I do recall being at the checkout… Where I paid for our groceries while he fiddled with his phone and pretended to reach for his wallet.

Continuing the charade, he came home with me and then left eight minutes later. Truth gathering, observing as if I were a player in a scene revealed him for what he was.

Dating a Sociopath Doesn’t Mean There’s Anything Wrong with Us: Sociopaths Need Good People

Dating a sociopath was a recurring theme in my life. Emphasis on was. Previously, intermingled with great relationships with real people, I found myself dating a sociopath or about three very briefly; I only married one. — Recovery tip: Find humor wherever you can.

The more we learn about what a sociopath is and how to recognize them, you may realize you’ve known a few. Bleeping onto a sociopath’s radar screen as a potential target doesn’t mean there’s anything wrong with us.

It means there’s everything right with us. It means we’re good, kind people who trust and love as natural, gorgeous humans innately do. We have every right to be exactly what and who we are.

Knowing is Key

We just plain, flat-out didn’t know such beasts existed, there’s no way to conceive of something so beyond normal; sociopaths hide behind this perfectly normal human characteristic of not knowing that evil exists and what it looks like. We can’t know what we don’t know until we know it.

Trust our gut, we’re experts now. We can see a sociopath a mile away. Look them in the eye. They’ll know that we know and it’s so delightful to watch them scurry away like the rats they are.

Really… I did it just yesterday in the mall. Now, we can add knowledge, wisdom, and courage to the mix of our gorgeous selves!

Here’s to REAL True Love and Happiness!

Time to Thrive!

The podcast!

Have a listen: Narcissistic Abuse Unwound

Subscribe True Love Scam Recovery Jennifer Smith

As a certified coach, upholding industry standards I strive to inform, educate, invite thought and dialogue, to co-plan, co-strategize, advise, consult, refer, recommend, train, teach, guide and coach people in guided recovery and discovery specific to these crimes, and from hell and broken in the aftermath to whole again, and more. You decide what winning is.
Affiliate links are in every True Love Scam Recovery article. Clicks on these links provide minor compensation to keep the site running. www.truelovescam.com and its agents are not licensed as attorneys, medical doctors, psychiatrists, psychologists, or therapists. See the entire and full True Love Scam Recovery Privacy Policy and Legal Agreement and Disclaimer here. Thank you.

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Sociopaths Hate Us: So Does the “Narcissist”

Sociopaths hate us and at the same time
need us so desperately.
As any parasite, they can’t live without a “host”.

Narcissistic users know in their “heart-of-hearts” (so to speak) that we are the ones with the real power. We’re resilient, mentally flexible, and have nuance emotionally.

sociopaths hate us

We have the advantage of being fully-real people who can love and feel, with our souls rooted in compassion. With an unseen bond with one another. This is a potent elixir for the ills and sorrows of life and the stuff human kindness is made of.

This gorgeous human magnificence is exactly the stuff absent from the brain, heart, mind, and soul of the most narcissistic predator of all predators: the sociopath or psychopath, no matter how they got here.

The psychopath’s and the sociopath’s abnormal brain renders them loveless
and without conscience.

Time for answers. Discover the real deal.

The Narcissistic User Knows We Have the Power

Something a bit tough to take in is that sociopaths fear us even as they use us. They know that we can ruin them with exposure. And – they never, ever can understand our world. They’re flying blind. The results of their actions are uncertain and unknown to them.

When they sense that we know what they are, their constant fear – normally tucked away under the obtuse, criminal boldness born of their abnormal brains, turns to rage. It’s then their rage that exposes them further as they operate in frenzied improvisational reaction moment to moment.

Everything about the sociopath is a duality, a contradiction, and plays out in an endless tightening cycle of ruin. Their very own limited brains and closed circuit of self is the very thing that gives them away. So, sociopaths hate us, and sociopaths need us.

Breaking Up with Evil: Escaping Coercive Control
by Jennifer Smith

On Amazon, Paperback

Or for your Kindle App or Reader

Our Great Goodness is Our Saving Grace

The very qualities within us they hijack and make use of for their (temporary) personal gain, are the same qualities about us that lead us to see through them, to leave them, and to heal and recover, stronger, wiser, and more humane than before.

This makes sociopaths hate us even more. They simply have no capacity to comprehend our world or our emotions. We, on the other hand, can understand theirs and so, by understanding how their minds work, render them ineffective in their scams and harm.

Discover what’s really behind gaslighting.

Sociopaths Hate Us from Day One

So, sociopaths hate us. Even the day we met. Once we see through them the hate is let out of the cage. And so, all along and finally more so in the end, sociopaths are their own undoing.

There’s no way under the sun that they don’t give themselves away. The same limitations in their brain biology that makes them want what they want, and do what they do lead to giving themselves away.

Sociopaths Hate Us and Fear Us: The Sociopath’s Weakness

The thing they can’t get around is the constant fear of being unmasked. This and their limited minds make them predictable. They need to appear nice and upstanding to combat their fear of being caught, yet in the heat of discovery unplanned, improvised things they say and do bring them down.

Their predictability, mental limitations, transparent lies, and ranting leave gaps and leverage for our escape from these monsters. Sociopaths hate us for being what we are – human – and paradoxically hijack our humanity for their survival.

There are moments when no matter the
position of the body the soul is on its knees.

~ Victor Hugo

Climbing Up Out of The Abyss of the Sociopath’s Hatred

Ten months after marrying the man of my dreams the winding, hairpin turn, dead-drop roller coaster ride of disengaging my life from his ruination jerked into motion.

I felt every grueling, gut-punch, every head snap. Fear never left me. Grief slept and woke up with me each morning. Grief and loss are part of PTSD after a sociopath. – My grief wasn’t over lost love, but the loss of something I had thought was real. – Yours will be too.

Using our normal human point of view will take us on and on in misery, living in hurt, mistrust, and confusion under a false understanding of what happened and why and of how amazing we are.

Any care or concern for him vanished in one heartbeat. Seeing the truth behind his pretty face, I held no illusions or mistaken feelings that even a tiny breath of my life with him had been real. There had been no mutual moment of anything. He did his best to make me believe a deep vein of true love ran between us even during the ten days it took him to move out.

Those hideous moments flipped on a dime to his blatant contempt for me. As harsh as the hatred for me was – it was the truth. His fake sugar-candy sweetness, softness, and humility no longer soothed me; his false kindness was evil in disguise and held more danger than his open plots and insults.

A turn of the lens and the answers fall into place.

Narcissistic Abuse Unwound

We Decide What Winning Is

We can find value in this hell. Scrape this burning trip through pain for all the wisdom we can. Promise yourself you’ll win rather than be pulled under or scarred. Sociopaths need us to hold up their house-of-cards lives. We don’t need them.

Our brain has a center that lights up like a Christmas tree when we feel love or concern. Sociopaths’ brains do not register these feelings. They ain’t got no Christmas tree. We genuinely light up in love, joy, kindness as well as sorrow and grief. They think our emotions are ridiculous, a waste of time. Useless. They use our emotions to get what they need – so they falsely think they are in charge.

They don’t care what we think, how we feel, what we want, or need – unless it places them in a position of being exposed or loosing things they’ve taken.

Sociopaths are classified as “antisocial psychopaths”, and the last thing we want to be doing is dating one, or marrying one. They’re sometimes now referred to as having an “antisocial personality disorder,” which is not a fixable disorder. Some people call them narcissists, as borrowed from another medical, mental health classification: a malignant narcissist.

The description of a malignant, covert, or overt narcissist is, in essence, describing a sociopath. For our purposes, consider a malignant narcissist a sociopath. We aren’t doctors, insurance companies, and social services; that’s who those definitions in the DSM were written for. Base your escape and recovery on your experience, not a medical manual.

Puzzle pieces fall from the sky.

Antisocial Psychopaths Do Their Best to Seem Normal

Sociopaths mimic our emotions as best they can – which is truly not very well or we wouldn’t be reading these pages. They steal the contents of our hearts and our wallets, they borrow and hijack our lives and remain bereft of compassion and love as a desert is of water.

When it comes down to it – their only power is that we didn’t know what they were. When we see them behind the mask, they know it’s time to go. And they know when we’re seeing through long before we could imagine they do.

Pathological predators want (need) to look like the good and respectable “victim,” take our money and anything else they can, have a kid here or there, feel like they are King or Queen… and move on before being caught. Or before their boredom overwhelms them.

We Win When We Accept That They Exist

By understanding their primal, reptilian brain we can make that “going” cleaner and easier for ourselves, there are “break-up musts” when it comes to escaping a sociopath – even if you call them a narcissist.

That said: do not tempt a sociopath’s rage. It’s easy to ignite their erratic defense mechanisms. Do not underestimate the danger that a sociopath is. Without internal, self-inspired stops or controls of any kind on what they do, or say.

Entanglements of Darkness

The dark places they can take their rage is a places we never want to see. Their rage is born of the fear that they’ll be caught or have things they’ve taken, taken away. They never want to lose prey or the things they take.

It’s really important that we not argue with them, challenge them, or threaten them. This leads only to more pain and risk for ourselves.

They don’t care what we think, how we feel, what we want, or need – unless it places them in a position of being exposed or losing things they’ve taken. When you see what they are, do this: zip it. Stay silent. Get them out. Or go yourself. Hold onto what we are as gorgeous, glorious humane humans.

We Are Awesome and Our Own Angels

Use the sociopaths’ weaknesses to leverage them out of our lives and minimize the damage. Find real freedom, heal from the crime it was – there was no relationship. All the incredible innate and natural traits we possess as normal humans that render us their prey are also our saving grace.

Without our emotions we can’t build a life, love our children, or care for the real people in our lives: husbands, wives, moms and dads, our kids, or even see the beauty of a sunset. Since we’re full of complex emotional capacity, we can use intense difficulties or suffering to create depth and value.

Stand up! See the sociopath for what he or she is! The way to heal from what really went on is to reframe the entire debacle from the viewpoint of a sociopath’s mind.

Using our normal human point of view will take us on and on in misery, living in hurt, mistrust, and confusion under a false understanding of what happened and why and how amazing we are.

Find real answers… Let’s talk.

Here’s to REAL True Love and Happiness!

Time to Thrive!

Join the podcast!

Have a listen: Narcissistic Abuse Unwound

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Subscribe True Love Scam Recovery Jennifer Smith

As a certified coach, upholding industry standards I strive to inform, educate, invite thought and dialogue, to co-plan, co-strategize, advise, consult, refer, recommend, train, teach, guide and coach people in guided recovery and discovery specific to these crimes, and from hell and broken in the aftermath to whole again, and more. You decide what winning is.

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Affiliate links are in every True Love Scam Recovery article. Clicks on these links provide minor compensation to keep the site running. www.truelovescam.com and its agents are not licensed as attorneys, medical doctors, psychiatrists, psychologists, or therapists. See the entire and full True Love Scam Recovery Privacy Policy and Legal Agreement and Disclaimer here. Thank you.

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True Love Scam on the Internet and Dating Apps

True love scam on the internet is like
true love scam in person.
Except it’s laughably easier for the
life-hijacking monsters hidden by a computer screen.

True love scam on the internet happens a lot. Predators live on dating apps. – We’ve all been warned. We might think the warnings would be enough. They aren’t – and there’s a good reason for it: we’re human. It’s human nature to trust. It’s human nature to dream. It’s human nature to hope. – We’re allowed to be what we are.

Everyone hopes and dreams of a great and beautiful relationship with one true love. – And true love scams on the internet are all about using that from dating sites and chat rooms to good old Facebook.

Internet Love Scam: Shopping for Prey Online

internet love scam

Internet dating sites and apps of all kinds are big box stores to a predator of every kind. Video game and chat room chats are full of trolling sociopaths, narcissistic users, psychopaths, narcopaths, narcs, and predators (that’s pretty much all the same kind of creature). Instead, maybe go outside, take a walk. Get some fresh air.

The con man or con woman is using our beautiful human nature against us. Diabolical. The true love scammer on the internet is using our goodness, our hopes, or trust. These online scammers piggy-back onto our dreams to invade and rage through our lives as fast and far as they can, taking as much as they can. – Even if it’s just our soul.

Find the way to heal and to be user-proof forever.

Predators Hide Behind a Fake Profile Through a Computer

It’s much easier for them because we can’t see their face. We invest meaning in what they say from our perception of life; from trust, decency, and our beliefs, our desires for the future, for a family, for a partner, and for love. – These predators lie in person and lie online.

Who are these schemers? We’re talking about people with no empathy, with criminal minds who are on a wholesale hunt for goods: pawns, prey, victims – meaning you and me – or your sister or mom or neighbor – or brother. 

Like a kind of fishing trip from a Barco-lounger they throw out a net and come up with vulnerable subjects in their catch. Online predators can cast out to a few hundred or a few thousand tries at one time. And yet, they make each of us feel so special. I call that bizarre hand that they can reach into our should and twist them the sociopath effect.

Love Scam is Love Scam is Love Scam

Though on the love scammer’s end it’s an easier game than an in-person scam – which by comparison is intimate and very messy –  it still plays out in five stages of love scam. And just like when it happens face-to-face when it’s over we wonder if it even really happened.

The creep on the other side of the screen can be anywhere in the world. There’re no love scenes, no love-making, no mixing of lives, no screaming, and no tears. Far fewer questions and any questions are much more easily side-stepped. No nightly curfew. No expected Saturday night date.

Looking for real answers?
Find your way back to you.

Triangulation Isn’t As Deliberate As We Think

There’s much less chance of being busted by their other girlfriends, boyfriends or fiancees or wives, or husbands. That makes things messy when that happens and it’s not as intentional in person as some of us think. In person, it’s really just their lack of emotional concern or connection that leads them to leave that other lady’s number out in plain sight.

On the Internet, it’s even easier. The monster only has to type out a buncha of hooey. We don’t truly know their name, we don’t know where they live. – We have no idea who they are. Really.

Why do we believe the lies of a liar? Because we are awesome, gorgeous, glorious humans. Their brain is different than yours or mine. Let’s get on the other side of the equation. What does a true love scam on the internet entail?

Our Own Desires and Dreams Are Allowed

A true love scammer on the internet takes all those sweet desires and traits and tangles them around our hearts and throat strangling our lives. They’re playing our dreams all in digital messages. The breadth of the damage varies: it could be solely emotional; it could reach into our bank accounts. The depth of the damage is always, always soul-searing.

Do something good for ourselves; anything but fall for the monster on the other side of a computer screen, no matter how upstanding and honest he looks, cause more than likely that photo they sent you isn’t who’s tapping away on the other side.

Expect them to paint themselves as a victim or in need of something. They will ask you for help. When it comes time to meet they may or may not be available. If not they’ll be so, so, so sorry. Depending on their type of scamming method you may never meet them.

Left spinning in a could of confusion, we wonder if we dreamed it. While they take off with our trust, our hearts, and sometimes lots of our money. There’s no way around it: every one of us goes through PTSD just the same as if it all happened in person.

No One Needs Our Money: There is No Payroll Crisis or Ransom Note

Avoid conversations in chat rooms or video game rooms that go beyond talking about and being in the game itself – never give out our real email or number. And please – don’t open emails from people we don’t know.

There is no Nigerian Prince that needs money from a random woman in the US. There is no guy or gal who lives somewhere and wants a long-distance relationship with someone they never meet.

Or really, really wants to meet, but they’re just too busy. And is so gonna meet you one day, but they’ve been banned from our country. For sure, they’re gonna send you a ticket to come to meet them… HmmmHm.

Internet or In Person

There is something we can monitor easily. The person right in front of us. Us. Watch for the signs we’re falling for a sociopath. It is a tell-tale over-the-top emotion and a drastic throwing of caution to the wind when we are under their influence.

Let’s stay away from internet dating. Keep loving ourselves. Get out. Take classes (online). How about a walk? Reconnect with family. Stay in touch with good old friends even if they live far away.

There’s so much you could do! Start a book club. Finger paint. Do something good for ourselves…anything but fall for the monster on the other side of a computer screen, or that swiped right. No matter how upstanding and honest he or she looks because more than likely that photo they sent you isn’t who’s tapping away on the other side.

Here’s to REAL True Love and Happiness!

Time to Thrive!

Join the podcast!

Have a listen: Narcissistic Abuse Unwound

SD Voyager interview

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jennifer@truelovescam.com
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As a certified coach, upholding industry standards I strive to inform, educate, invite thought and dialogue, to co-plan, co-strategize, advise, consult, refer, recommend, train, teach, guide and coach people in guided recovery and discovery specific to these crimes, and from hell and broken in the aftermath to whole again, and more. You decide what winning is.

Visit truelovescam’s profile on Pinterest.

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Affiliate links are in every True Love Scam Recovery article. Clicks on these links provide minor compensation to keep the site running. www.truelovescam.com and its agents are not licensed as attorneys, medical doctors, psychiatrists, psychologists, or therapists. See the entire and full True Love Scam Recovery Privacy Policy and Legal Agreement and Disclaimer here. Thank you.

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20 Characteristics of a Con Man Sociopath

Sociopaths are identical and predictable.
Truly understanding the characteristics
of a sociopath changes everything.

It likely sounds dramatic, an impossibility, and maybe a bit like fear-mongering to say with calm confidence, oh that guy? He’s a sociopath. Or, she’s a sociopath. – The breaking news is, it is neither dramatic nor impossible.

It’s practical and sensible. It is scary. However, calmly knowing sociopaths exist and are real and what that means is huge key to how we unwind the damage of the sociopath-effect and unplug their influence.

Aren’t Sociopaths Only In the Movies?

I wish. The fact is, a sociopath is a real thing. A common reality. There are humans all around us who function from sociopathy. …And to confuse things even further, many people call them narcissists.

Though sociopath is a big scary word, the characteristics of a sociopath are really tiny and limited. And distinct.

There’s a good reason for this, a sociopath is a sociopath because they have a brain significantly different from the regular brain, that is from yours or mine.

Their brains under-function, so that they have no sensation or experience or feeling of connection. No sense of caring, genuine consideration, love, or even like for people outside of their own body. This pathology gives them very specific and unbelievable traits and qualities.

Breaking Up With Evil

Breakign Up with Evil, by Jennifer Smith on Amazon and Good Reads

Breaking Up with Evil: Escaping Coercive Control on Amazon

Five women’s true stories of being ensnared, hauled through the confusion, lies, fear, and pain, and breaking away.

Told in their own words, they leave nothing unsaid. Find validation and see new glimpses of the truth as they share their stories… Stories that could be any of ours.

Pathological vs Non-pathological

By now you’ve heard the word narcissist and maybe call the person who hauled you through hell a narcissist. The thing is a “narcissist” is most often a sociopath. If you’re thinking of them as a “narcissists” read about and research sociopaths for real answers.

There’s lots of material and many memes and so many Insta accounts that talk about the more mundane narcissistic person who is not pathological and who is not a scammer. If you found yourself in a life where you were working harder than you’ve ever worked to keep your life and their life afloat only to find it constantly sinking, you were ensnared by the pathological narcissist…. that is, a sociopath.

No Conscience, No Concern For You Or Anyone Else

Sociopaths are 100% narcissistic. They’re in your life for a reason that is not normal or genuine in any way. There’s no one more narcissistic on the planet than the sociopath… the antisocial psychopath aka sociopath or psychopath. Read here about why the clinical terminology uses the word “antisocial”.

The Podcast: Narcissistic Abuse Unwound

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Have a listen: Narcissistic Abuse Unwound

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Look for
Narcissistic Abuse Unwound
on your favorite podcast platform!

Sociopaths Are Real: And Simplistic in Nature

Though sociopath is a big scary word, the characteristics of a sociopath are really tiny and limited. And distinct. There’s a good reason for this: a sociopath is a sociopath because they have a brain significantly different from the regular brain… yours or mine.

Their brains are structured so that they have no sensation or experience of feeling any bondinglovecare, or consideration for other people — or animals. – They do pretend to.

The attachment or interest they display for others is where we begin to feel horrified because it’s not like ours. And it’s not good.

Other people hold no meaning to them aside from using that person for the sociopath’s personal gain. This means they’re what’s commonly called a con man or con artist, or scammer. And they come in male or female versions.

What depth of recovery do you want?

Brain Scans Reveal the Sociopath, “Narcissist”, Psychopath Brain

There’s hard science to demonstrate the difference in their brains. Brain scans by neuroscientists reveal the portions of the brain attributed to feeling love, and compassion just doesn’t function.

There’s nothing we can recognize as normal once the mask hits the floor. So what is going on inside of them? There’s basically nothing there. Where love would be there’s white noise. The connection between themselves and others isn’t made of concern or care.

There’s Nobody Inside To Connect With

Though they can create what we first feel is intimacy and deep interest in us, calling what they put out towards us a real “connection” isn’t quite the thing. This is because they see us as an object to grab-and-smash; something like a natural resource they hold the rights to.

They truly believe that they have every right to make use of humans as you or I would make use of a vacuum cleaner or a blender to get something done.

The thing is, we care more about the well-being of our vacuum cleaner than a sociopath does about us or any other human. They make use of others in absolutely any way they like. The word, “exploitation” comes to mind.

This is really hard for us to believe. It’s humanly impossible to absorb in one single moment the reality that there are people who look human, just like us, but are missing the “humanity chip”. Taking this in is a process.

Getting to the Reality of These Creatures

Find out here: The Podcast: Narcissistic Abuse Unwound

We Are Not Responsible for The Predator’s Inhumanity

People without a conscious are bereft of good as if they’ve scorched the very roots of goodness within their own lives. They aren’t “choosing” to not care; this in itself would come from a place of caring. They have no place of caring within them. These are people who embed themselves into people’s lives to take, to use, and to do whatever they want. This is their real “work” whether they have an actual paycheck or not.

Jennifer Smith, True Love Scam Recovery

How Do Sociopaths (aka Narcissists aka Psychopaths) Do What They Do?

When individuals operate without a conscience they are able to do horrible things we would never dream of doing, and there is no moral compass or guilt feelings to stop them.

Dr. Deborah Ettel, PhD Psychology

The Sociopath Effect Is Inevitable

In order to hook, use and take from targets, (that would be you or I, just regular people) every sociopath uses the same little tricks and misleads and lies. This takes effect in one-on-one relationships, in romantic or work situations, towards religious leaders or politicians; anywhere you find and admire or like someone who is a sociopath this hook will take hold.

Where ever there’s a sociopath in a group, a family, or an organization. The predator gets busy in a true love faux-lationship or superior-acolyte in any setting. The arc of hell and the crazy plays out in five stages. Always, and also in every one of these set-ups.

This Is The Only Way It Goes

There’s no deviation from this pattern of hook and use and break-away. It might be carried out over five days or 50 years with any particular morsel of prey — but there’s no variation in the way a sociopath functions or affects prey.

Everything they do and say is in an effort to make use of those around them is for their survival. We are their livelihood. This survival is dependent upon us believing they’re normal. This is not easy for us to see. It takes time and taking in a new perspective to see this thing we never imagined existed.

Our experience with them is traumatic and so is coming to terms with what they are. Not all trauma is bad!

Sociopaths are Identical, Predictable and Severely Limited

So many give credit to the sociopath as a master manipulator, a genius liar. I beg to differ. It’s time to look again from another angle, so we can stop giving them the power. They claim to be amazing and talented geniuses — and we do at first see them as masterly wizards of manipulation and at the antics that they pull.

Sociopaths are the antithesis of loving and giving; they only take and as the fallout of their taking, destruction is all they bring to the table.

In reality, sociopaths have very limited thinking. They are severely limited, have specific thinking and feelings, and have no other way to think or feel.

What they feel as raw emotions is desire or need, and then glee when they get what they want, anger when it’s threatened or taken away, rage when their scam is being seen through or put to an end, and fear. They have a great fear of being exposed which fuels endless rage at being caught or exposed.

How Would the One You’re Wondering About Do On This Test?

Answer these very basic questions that lead to an estimation of whether someone is a sociopath aka a psychopath… or that person you’re calling a “narcissist”. I

After all, never forget, understanding what you’re facing isn’t about diagnosing them… this discovery serves the purpose of finding your safety, keeping your sanity, and restoring your well-being.

They Lose it When They Lose

If they’re at risk of exposure they lose it; when exposed they risk not getting what they want or getting away with it they become wild-cornered animals.

They frantically and erratically hop from one tactic to another trying to get their house of cards back in place. They come up with elaborate stories, fake illnesses, disappear, kill, cry spontaneous sheets of tears… rage and threaten and blackmail (like, if I lose, I’ll leave the United States…). The nearer they are to losing it all, the more they lose it.

The profound fear they live with is one of the things they don’t want us to realize about them. If their fear was not incredibly deep, why would they rage so when we get close to the truth?

Confusion is The Vibe

The reason we feel so confused is that this is nothing like anything we’ve known before. And… It isn’t anything we can see by using the way we normally think to look at it.

The whole mess is a fake-lationship. A faux-lationship. We think we’re in a real relationship; the sociopath knows it’s not a real mutual human relationship.

Sociopaths do their best to embed themselves into people’s lives in order to take, use, make use of us, and do whatever they want in that person’s life. Making these attempts and making this effort is how they spend every single day; this is their “work”. It’s how they survive.

This Kind of Con Brings Post Traumatic Stress

As a confused and hurt person trying to find answers, to decipher what’s going on, understanding the characteristics of a sociopath lets us see from an angle that supports our understanding. This also saves our mental and emotional – as well as physical – health and allows for healing.

It’s not easy to fully comprehend and takes time to see it, but the fact is, we’re nothing more than a piece of equipment or an object to the sociopath. Beyond that, we’re despised and held in contempt.

This is so hard to grasp because we’re fully human. We love and support those we love; we don’t view them as expendable resources. Sociopaths are the antithesis of loving and giving; they only take and as the fallout of their taking, destruction is all they bring to the table.

A Sociopath Can Be Anywhere: The Park, A Party, at Work

Because pathological users are anywhere we might be, we need to learn how to recognize them. Their real power when you think about it is that we can’t recognize them and so not be affected by them.

Sociopaths exist in every social, regional, and economic realm. Most crave riches with insatiable desire. Paradoxically they can handle living in a box on the side of the road until the next target with a nice warm nest comes along. Why…? It’s the result of having no emotional connection to things, people, or places.

Without any emotional connection aside from holding someone up to measure if that person – seen as an object – fits into their needs – and every one of us has something they need – sociopaths are isolated and isolating in their effect.

Pathological Parasites Are Anywhere We Might Be

Predatory parasites dwell in trailer parks in Wyoming, on ski slopes in the Alps, in board rooms across the world, within the profiles of online dating sites, at church, in bars and clubs, in the grocery store, at the dog park.

Sociopaths hunt prey in the workplace, on Facebook, in chat forums, at a party. We can meet them at the grocery store, in line at the post office, getting gas or through friends.

It’s said one-in-25 people are sociopaths and are either male or female. We’ve all heard the phrase: hiding in plain sight. We’ve got to change how we “see” – our “sight” – they’re plain as day.

20 Characteristics of a Sociopath

  1. Fun, charming, and entertaining. Super polite when meeting new people
  2. Display impressive knowledge or skill at something. This proves to be limited or fake
  3. Have a primal perception as far as what concerns us, what we need, and depend upon; this is used to make false promises, to make deals, and to blackmail
  4. Are easily offended. They fluster and bluster when offended and lash out
  5. Lie about all things – except those odd moments they tell the truth
  6. Believe they’re better than everyone. Express misogynistic, racist, homophobic, or other prejudice and hatred
  7. Crave a good reputation
  8. Crave status, power, possessions, money, yet exist at any level of society
  9. Have delusions of fame and importance, though they might live in the Metro station
  10. Mimic our authentic emotions and social mannerisms as best they can
  11. Have no capacity for care, concern, or love, though it sometimes seems they do
  12. Think of themselves as victims and can cry fake tears at the drop of a hat
  13. Are sexually promiscuous and often simultaneously avoid sex with a primary prey; someone they’ve put in place as a primary “partner”
  14. Do any horrible, illegal, or immoral thing they want to do and to absolutely anyone.
  15. Think their prey (partners, spouses, girlfriends, etc.) should be grateful
  16. Take pride in their scams and run several scams simultaneously
  17. Believe everyone deserves whatever it is that they do to them
  18. Smear their targets and prey; loudly, publicly, online in court
  19. Have outbursts of rage, that can be physically violent.
  20. All of them know they are monsters; they are proud of it and enjoy it.

There’s Much More

Since their state of mind is based on the limited and abnormal brain that makes someone a sociopath, there are more characteristics that are identical sociopath to sociopath.

You wouldn’t be the only one to discover porn, beyond porn – and their participation in shocking sexual practices. They avoid paying taxes, skip paying child maintenance altogether in cases of divorce, and cheat at absolutely everything. Even if they seem successful career-wise, you’ll find they don’t do their own work if you scratch the surface. Even with seemingly legit employment they ultimately live off of others’ lives, others’ efforts, finances, respectability, and magnanimity.

Discovering the Reality of a Sociopath is Trauma in Itself

In the world of psychology, they’re called antisocial psychopaths, or sociopaths. And lately as having an antisocial personality disorder. This newer contemporary term diminishes the damage they do and casts them in the light of hapless wrong-doer.

They’re not innocents suffering from a disorder. They know they cause harm. With pleasure and pride, they do terrible things to people. – Another delay in finding what we’re really facing is getting hung up on terminology and ideas of “narcissists”.

Bragadocious: Sociopaths Talk a Lot, a Super-de-Duper Lot

Sociopaths can’t help themselves from bragging. They like to chatter about the things they do. . These elaborate boasts represent their made-up life. It’s all lies. The traits and tricks of a sociopath never waver.

They’re consistent with all their prey whether in pursuit for ten days or we’re captive for ten years or 30 years. It’s the same for each of us from the first “hello”, to the way they break up with us.

In popular culture, movies, and books sociopaths are referred to as con artists or con men. In real life, they are strictly Mr. Hyde with a very shallow cover of Dr. Jekyll.

Lies Are Real, And Real Made Up

Sociopaths lie easily. Lying is normal for them. They feel no guilt or shame about lying. If one lie doesn’t work they whip out another one. They know they lie. For the pathological, lies make up what’s real, and real is made up. How’s that for mind-bending?

Since they are not connected to the world, to their own life to anything through emotions in the way that we are, sociopaths forget what they say one moment to another moment, and can only manage the moment in front of them.

Consequently, we can lie to them, they can know that we’re probably lying, and yet, they act on the lie as if it’s the truth.

Lying is Due to Their Pathology

The sociopath (or that person you might be calling a narcissist) lies in a way that’s called “pathological”. This means that lying comes as a result of their brain. In other words, they can’t not lie. They do not get better or change.

They make off-handed comments that reveal their inner workings. Knowing the characteristics of a sociopath exposes them for what they are and includes eventually, being able to see them as boring and even laughable.

At this point in time in the history of humankind, there is no known “cure.” They wouldn’t want to “get better” or “be better” if they could. They enjoy every minute of what they are. They adore themselves while knowing full well that they’re monsters.

The sociopath’s ruse is deception upon deception. Since people are seen as objects, they are disposable to the sociopath. It’s hard to say, but not all allow their prey to live to tell the tale.

Dr. Deborah Ettel, Phd Psychology

There’s Nothing a Sociopath Won’t Do

The characteristics of a sociopath include pride in the things they do. They consider nabbing prey an achievement. They’re boastful and feel great, and an exaggerated gleeful accomplishment in scamming, lying, taking, stealing, using, and worse.

Remember the exciting, exhilarating start to all the mess? Recall when they have that grin…and are sparked and energized? – It’s an exhibit of the glee and sense of pride they feel for capturing you.

They make off-handed comments that reveal their inner workings. Knowing the characteristics of a sociopath exposes them for what they are and includes eventually, being able to see them as boring and even laughable. Only when we don’t recognize them or we believe them do we find ourselves ensnared.

Power of Influence: Truth and Lies

In these flashing moments of truth our heads spin. The truth always stands out. But in the confusing, bizarre world of the con, actual truth only cuts a fleeting crack in the lunacy and looks like lunacy itself.

A sociopath’s influence has us doubt the truth, and be soothed by their lie. Sociopaths influence us in such a way, that it’s natural for us to defend and protect their lies.

It’s All Traumatic

All in all, anytime we spent in the presence of a sociopath, wasn’t what we thought it was. There’s never any mutual moment aside from maybe sitting down to eat because both of us want a good dinner.

Any limbic-brained person in the presence of a sociopath in any dynamic such as a personal relationship of love, of family members, of neighbor and neighbor or boss and employee or coworker… they all involve sustained trauma and harm and a period of PTSD in the aftermath.

Why they’re at dinner with us, is not the same reason we’re at dinner with them. We were targeted and hijacked for the sociopath’s own use.

We Can Recover After Breaking Up with a Narcissistic Sociopath

The most devastating thing a sociopath creates is disunity. Disunity from self and from others we love…from others in general. Even a sense of separation from others we don’t know shrouds us as our life shuts down and closes into a very small thing centered on them and appeasing them. We end up in a spinning place of off-kilter confusion, more than walking on eggshells.

Like any normal human would without positive connection and unity, in isolation and separation we get lost. We can bring ourselves back. We reunite with ourselves, with all and everyone around us. Recovering from this trauma takes non-judgemental support and encouragement.

With accurate and true information and understanding of what a sociopath is – and what we are as gorgeous, loving humane, human beings, we can heal and get our lives back. We can trust again, laugh again, and love again.

Here’s to REAL True Love and Happiness!

Time to Thrive!

Answers to every question, and then some!

Have a listen: Narcissistic Abuse Unwound

SD Voyager interview

True Love Scam Recovery on Medium

True Love Scam Recovery on Facebook

Add these to your contacts
so you don’t miss a newsletter!
jennifer@truelovescam.com
info@truelovescam.com

Subscribe True Love Scam Recovery Jennifer Smith

As a certified coach, upholding industry standards I strive to inform, educate, invite thought and dialogue, to co-plan, co-strategize, advise, consult, refer, recommend, train, teach, guide and coach people in guided recovery and discovery specific to these crimes, and from hell and broken in the aftermath to whole again, and more. You decide what winning is.

Visit truelovescam’s profile on Pinterest.

True Love Scam on Tumblr.
.

Affiliate links are in every True Love Scam Recovery article. Clicks on these links provide minor compensation to keep the site running. www.truelovescam.com and its agents are not licensed as attorneys, medical doctors, psychiatrists, psychologists, or therapists. See the entire and full True Love Scam Recovery Privacy Policy and Legal Agreement and Disclaimer here. Thank you.

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