Re: I don't know how to get better
My 'former' half was able to express emotions and unusual behaviour not in line with her age, I now realise that age does not define how mature you are.
I suppose (having thought about it a bit more) I could never differentiate whether her behaviour, reactions and emotions were coming from either her a) ability to express them from her heart or b) whether she was using rationale to make it look like a human response or human behaviour. (this is the scary part now).
I now ask myself,,,,, how do you judge whether someone is genuine and 'from the heart' instead of them putting on a act to make it look like some kind of 'expected human behaviour'?
It is really difficult to lean over mental illness with my ex, it really is but considering everything thats happening, someones wires are crossed really badly because normal 'sane' people don't do these things.
I see what you're asking and that's actually a really good question.
Before I state my answer, I do want to mention something about your ex. I honestly believe that she was more of a really misguided cruel oppressive manipulator rather than a sociopath and here is why I say that. I think from the start, there was something off to begin with. Generally when it comes to people with ASPD it takes time to start noticing things. There were also two other things, it wasn't just her, but her family was very off as well. It seems like they all have a similar oppressive wrong mentality. Of course I wouldn't know what goes on in their head. The last thing I wanted to mention was the whole dark taweez, ayn stuff. That family clearly went against the law of Allah. People stepping across the limits are bound to have serious issues going on with them. You said that you had found taweez in her purse and that her family had gone to visit magicians that told them that your mom did something with magic(i forgot what it was smth like that).. This already shows that they were involved in dark things that went against the limits of Allah, and it really isn't safe to be around people who deal with these things. Even then on top of that, a raqi diagnosed her with ayn to make things worse on the relationship.. I am not blaming her for getting it but how do you expect Allah to protect you from this stuff when you have already been involved with this dark stuff? I really do believe that this dark magic stuff, especially ayn, played a major part in this. Because ayn can completely tear marriages up and make things so different. But obviously, if she had a truly believing character as a Muslim, it wouldn't have got this bad. She wouldn't have become this oppressive and she would've made a great effort to get rid of the issue
Now as for the question.. Its honestly something that takes more time to understand. You may never spot one so easily, but eventually with time you'll notice. Generally you may not be able to tell if the person is a sociopath just by guessing whether they are faking emotion or not. You have to look for other things first then look for more signs of them being fake. They radiate off differently than your extremely abusive person. You get angry, hurt, and confused from someone who oppresses you. But when it comes to people with ASPD, yeah you'll be angry and hurt but you'll also be more creeped out because something feels off.. Especially when they become cold and cruel without any anger.. Anyway, here are some signs that I have witnessed from personal experience and also clarified with others who have knowledge
-One thing to think about is that many of these people are very good charmers (not all, but they can be manipulative).. They can seduce and capture your heart and seem very warm but also very charismatic and confident
-Tend to be narcissists. Narcissists are people with an extreme sense of self importance.. They don't feel empathy for others.. They feel above everyone else. They cannot handle criticism
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Some have extremely violent/anger issues depending on their past. They especially like to take out their anger and bully animals and little children. Unfortunately, anger is the one emotion some of them genuinely feel, if not, probably much more than us for some cases. These ones especially have a strong, extreme hatred for betrayal. They don't feel hurt about it, but rather angry. It's funny because they do it themselves all the time
-always needing something to amuse/entertain them due to constant boredness
-Tends to switch jobs very easily
-Some tend to not care about life at all. Skipping out on responsibilities, not caring for the consequences
-Always breaking promises
-Can be very impulsive (by this I'm not just talking about anger). They can be impulsive with random decisions they want to make, it can happen often. Even if these decisions fail often. This can be whether its to start a random business or ways to handle certain situation with issues, etc.
-finding good ways to manipulate you into believing them again after you've been hurt
Now obviously, normal cruel/abusive people can have these traits so its important to differentiate between the two which I'll give you an example that'll hopefully help
-Last sign (which really isn't a sign because you will never tell). Always being fake due to the inability of feeling emotion
I wanted to bring someone up, I'll call him person X. . Here is one example, he isn't so much of a charmer because he's lucky to get whatever he wants without putting more effort into it. I believe he has ASPD, along with others. On top of that, he is an extremely angry and violent person. Now I'm only going to briefly describe his own signs because I don't want to write a whooooole story about it.
I can tell this message is already going to be long though. Lol. I think I tend to write longer messages, but I think everyone enjoys it I hope. Better for discussion eh?
Many of us always thought person X was a horrible angry person with issues, but we never put thought into what it could be because we were more focused on our anger towards him. Until one day someone else and I really put thought into what he could probably have, so we did much research and examined his behaviors for awhile and made connections. After awhile we decided there is a high chance that he has ASPD, we leaned more towards sociopath rather than psychopath(
btw psychopaths are worse, and it is genetic). After much research, looking at interviews, etc.. I finally found a good sociopath to talk about it with. At this point I wasn't focused on being angry at person X, but I had become extremely interested in his behaviors and interactions. After talking to this new sociopath man, I learned a lot more about ASPD and a lot more about person X. It was actually amazing because this sociopath knew so much more than me about person X, whom he never met.. On top of that he told me about X's specific manipulation tactics and what his thought process is behind it. After hearing about what X's past probably looked like from this sociopath man (
this guy could tell by X's compulsive behaviors and triggers that correlated to his past. It happens to some sociopaths) it kind of did make me emotional and realize I have to understand X when dealing with him. This is all legit info as well, I had predicted something similar to this man, but he did it much more in detail with explanation. I don't think anyone could have explained it better. I pray for people like this man to be guided to Islam, although he cannot feel bad for his actions and he manipulates often, hes trying to change. His past was very bad as well, been oppressed very intensely, sexually, physically, mentally. His past doesn't even bother him though as he cannot even sympathize with himself or feel hurt.
Person X's signs:
- physically abusive to pet animals (such as cats), especially the ones that are more scared and fragile rather than the more angry annoying ones. Constantly bullying and scaring them too. Physically/mentally abusive more to children. Abuse itself doesn't mean that a person is a sociopath. Extremely abusive people aren't necessarily sociopaths, but it is all about the patterns and the other signs combined. People with ASPD generally go for those who are weaker and can't speak out so that they don't have to deal with irritating consequences. Even if they faced consequences and people figured out about these nasty abusive actions.. They wouldn't feel guilty or ashamed/embarrassed/nervous about people figuring out this person's darkest sides. This person would just be irritated by the consequences (jail, etc.). Keep in mind since sociopaths develop ASPD based on their history, not all have extreme violent issues.
-X's physical abuse, especially towards his children, were in pretty creative ways. But it was more for his own sadistic desires rather than the child being disobedient/bad (
I know many mean parents usually only abuse their children when they aren't fulfilling their expectations). Even looking at him at the wrong moment could cause him to hurt you
- There have been times where hes pulled crazy stunts with his abusive but not care right after and be collectively calm. One time his daughter said something rude to him so he calmly walked up to her and pulled a stupid stunt that hurt her. Right after he walked back to the couch and started watching TV without any expression. I'm pretty sure her mom and siblings were freaking out because they thought they'd need to take her to the ER, her mom was crying to her dad calling him cruel but he didn't care.. Didn't make any expression and he never even cared if she had to go to the ER. He kept ignoring everyone and calmly watching his show while everyone was freaking out. Its quite strange to hear that someone never had any reaction after taking something too far. X is generally impulsively angry and mentally abusive but sometimes he can do cruel things without caring and just remaining calm
-Hes gotten away with evil things even outside of the home.
-He always talks about how he'd never kill someone because he'll burn in hell.. Of course that isn't a bad thing.. But that really sounds like his only reason if you also got the same vibe from the sentence.
-His ex wife had an affair. His wife (the one he is with now) told me that he would've set his ex's garage on fire while she is in it to kill her if it WEREN'T for the consequences (he's probably referring to hell).. That's a pretty smart way to kill someone and get rid of evidence huh?
- He's constantly always on his own. He has no desire to talk to others be be around others, he has no interest in anything at all. He'll use his phone all day watching random things that kill his time. His expression through out the day is lifeless. Unlike other sociopaths, he isn't really charming, but most probably for the reason that he is old and there is nothing more for him to achieve because he gets his basic necessities and what he wants. He doesn't really communicate with anyone unless he needs something OR he'll talk to his wife
sometimes but only to talk about who he hates so much. Often he'll ignore her when she wants to genuinely talk
- He doesn't care for his health issues. Whenever he gets SERIOUS health issues, like im talking about ones that need treatment asap, he will not even care at all. He won't even do anything about it until his family members keep bothering him and end up forcing him b4 it gets much worse and chronic.
- He is never loyal with his job, sometimes he even leaves because he has issues with people. Switches often
-This is a really interesting one that we've examined. When he sees people in unfortunate condition he pities them by expressing his hate to those who hurt them. We would do the same, but mostly because we are angry that the person would oppress another.. We'd also feel bad for the oppressed. But it seems like X just hates the oppressor for his own reasons (such as them being able to do what they want)... Even when he does the same
- Person X doesn't do a very good job at acting normal.. rarely see this, but when he smiles, it looks very off and fake.. He can never apologize and make it look sincere. After hurting someone, he will start laughing it off/acting silly when he is saying sorry because it seems like he can't even fake a sincere apology.
- He does laugh and find amusement in things, but many times he laughs about abusive actions hes committed against others from the past
-He doesn't really enjoy the same things as those around him, he may look dead and lifeless while everyone else is laughing together
-His siblings are completely different.. As in happy and outgoing. Some of them are serious and more negative but in different ways and not like him
-He only praises and gives his children affection on rare occasions generally when he wants something.. It looks completely fake and cringy though.. He'll especially do it in front of his wife in order to please her so he can get a special something in return...
- Generally he will say things that sound off. One time X's son was talking to X about a terrifying experience when someone was about to die right in front of him (from a stroke, poor man). X chuckled as if his son was saying a joke when he talked about the story but his son was like "Im being serious! It was scary!" X asked him why he was scared.. He replied "because someone was about to die in front of me!".. (after listening to his story, we all understood that it would be pretty scary to see someone have a stroke right in front of you).. X replied with " But it's not your fault" with a complete dead face throughout the whole conversation. Everyone got quiet. That was one example.
-It gets more complicated when they believe in a religion. There are even signs that show up in their religious practices and behaviors, especially with X. The man I've talked to also explained about this part as well and he was surprisingly accurate although he doesn't associate himself with a religion. I'm not going to get into that one, its a bunch of more observations as well
This one seems like a good example overall I feel like
See, there are little weird interesting behaviors that build up... It makes me interested in psychology. Heh, I get to take it next SEM.. I hope it'll be interesting. Its really interesting understanding the way others perceive and react to situations
Sometimes I have always thought of pursuing a career in that field but it may be hard if I want to focus more on raising good Muslim kids.... I think maybe when I get older and my future children get old.. Thats actually the perfect time since you have more leisure time. Of course there may be some extra time for Muslimahs to be studying a little bit even when married, but they can really donate time when their children grow up because thats when they start to get more leisure time. I was actually watching this video once by Daniel Haqiqatchou. He explained this stuff in a very interesting way about muslim women working
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can tell this message is already going to be long though
oh lord, I finally sent the message and looked at it. I knew it was going to be long again