I was going to post this under my own thread but I thought it too startling to hide. I also thought of titling this topic "Holy S**t!" but I knew the censoring 'bots would nail it.

As those familiar with my story know, I have been very confused about my WW's actions and behaviors. Sure, at times she has exhibited the familiar "fog" symptoms we all come to know and hate, but there's been another aspect about her that her history and background suggest.

Some of the regulars here have steered me into looking at disordered personality types, but the common Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) and Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD) just didn't seem to fit. It was like trying to put the proverbial round peg in a square hole.

Last night we had a brief exchange where the topic of "conscience" came up. That resonated with me, so I did some more research. Here's the reason I think this deserves its own topic:

Protect yourself from sociopaths--Learn to recognize the traits�then stay away

I'm sure we've all heard the terms "sociopath" and "psychopath" used, usually in cop shows and the like. But psychopathy has a wide range and depth of symptoms, and after I started reading them, my jaw literally dropped!

The entire site LoveFraud.com is all about recognizing sociopaths and psychopaths. And I'd venture to say we have had more than our share here!

More reading, but this so closely identifies my WW, that I'm beginning to believe I'm much better off without her...

Yeah, it's a cluster B disorder, as well. Lots of overlap in the behaviors, but the underlying motivation is different. The NPDs and BPDs are capable of remorse and some empathy.
I think it is kind of a continuum, Fred.
Read "The Sociopath Next Door". Very few are serial killers. The bulk of them pass for normal but they leave a wide trail of destruction.
Life as a sociopath must be sort of easy. Imagine all the stuff you could get away with if you do not have a conscience, little everyday things, like not returning a lost wallet, or keeping incorrect change, or just pocketing some item somebody left laying around etc.
The reason these folks go relatively undetected by many is that most folks simply could not imagine doing the things they do. So, they do not look for it, or assume the wrongs are oversights or imagined.

It's been two months to the day when my WW informed me that she wanted out of the M, and then shortly after admitted to her A.

Reading this site has simply stunned me. All of my questions have been answered. For example, in The Inner Triangle, there is this snippet:
And there's more. So much more.

The desire to salvage my marriage has all but disappeared.

Fine. You have a label.

Zelmo - you happy??? You must be in heaven to have a convert!

Fred, - excuse the little bit of side-talk there. Zelmo and I go way back on this discussion, so you just arrived a little late on the scene.

Back to you. You work the steps and traditions right?

So how about focusing on your own inventory.

If you must bring some kind of diagnostic label into your evaluation of a recovery potential, then focus on your own woman-picker skills.

Because if what you have read is in fact, true, then it was there before you married her and you have to figure out what was in you that marrying her allowed you to ignore.

See, the beauty in Harley's methods is that they focus on personal recovery - owning your own behavior in the marriage. It isn't about blame. It isn't about labels. It isn't about "delving into one's past" or the past of your spouse. No inner childhood wounds.

It's a very straight-forward, behavior changing focus.

If you were going to recover your marriage, your wife would have to BEHAVE differently. Walk the walk. That hasn't changed just because you've done a little research.

But what will change if you let it, is that you take your eyes off the goal because now you can BLAME the diagnosis instead of work on your own BEHAVIOR. Your ability to pick a quality relationship based on openness and honesty, ability to agree and negotiate, ability to surrender independent agendas - I hope you get what I mean - these are all things you did not require in the woman you married.

That would be so very sad, considering the personal growth you've experienced so far, and what you could yet discover to appreciate about life, yourself and your future, regardless of who is with you or not with you.

Zelmo is stuck in the diagnostic phase because he has something to blame - a psychotic WXW. If you want to be where Zelmo is now, two years or three years after the ink on the divorce is final, you get to choose.

I highly recommend leaving the diagnoses up to the professionals and get back to work on yourself.

Yeppers!

Very much agree with Kayla...

All the diagnostic materials out there indicates that addictions need to be ruled out first prior to analyzing the diagnostic criterea. They are generally speaking of drugs and alcohol addictions but, to me, this includes an affair addiction (the wayward mindset). Just like drugs and alcohol...the wayward mindset can and does mimic a mental disorder making diagnosis impossilbe for the time being.

Now...IF you divorce, it certainly can be appealling to toss that label upon your ex-wife. It's comforting to think that there is and NEVER was anything you could have done prior to and after your wife had her affair. That MAY be reality to some extent depending upon how good of a spouse you were; however, the label likely has NOTHING to do with it. You don't deserve what she's done either way...but I do hope you avoid attemting to use a label crutch to avoid continuing your efforts at individual and potential marital recovery.

Your wife and marriage (and family) MAY be "curable". You don't know unless you work the program (and you'll regret flippantly reaching conclusions you can't be certain of). You don't HAVE to save your marriage to be a success here, but working the program without deviation is the surest path to recovery graduation.

Godspeed,

Mr. Wondering

KaylaAndy, PepperBand and MrW, thank you for your insights. Almost from the beginning I questioned my "picker," and even had my daughter suggest the same thing. I don't think I've taken my eyes off that goal. Yesterday I ordered HNHN and LB, which will bring my total of MB books to 3. In fact, my xW is loaning me three additional books all focused on looking within.

Yes, I have three pages of Fourth Step work on this one facet of my life. I've done an Eighth Step and a Ninth Step with WW, because I most certainly recognize and own my 50% of the breakdown in our M. That doesn't mean that identifying the source of my WW's past behaviors (I'm the fourth husband she's left), and the other behaviors that are described so dead-on target in the LoveFraud web site are invalid or not helpful.

If I keep the same blinders on that I had going into the M, I'm dooming myself to stay in the same kind of fog that we speak of when we refer to our WS. It's very useful for me to understand and recognize what attracted me to WW in the first place, and that's what helps me repair my "picker."

If my WW were to make the necessary changes to recover the M, would I be up to it? Yes. But I've been able to replay the last 7-8 years better than I've managed to describe in a few short weeks here. I re-read my thread last night, and was astounded to realize I hadn't mentioned WW's three prior marriages until Page 49 (and there are some 55 pages as of this writing). That's on me, and I can't explain why I didn't mention it sooner. I actually thought I had (and I'm pretty sure I did -- just not in my own thread).

So, if it sounded like I was tossing WW and the MB principles under the bus, then I failed in my purpose. No one knows what the future holds. And as it's been said, MB success doesn't always result in a saved M. However, if my knowledge and understanding is improved, then I consider that a success.

I's be happy, KA
I agree. One who marries a disordered spouse needs to look within. I have never debated that. Although, if you were never aware of this stuff and were relatively unsophisticated and trusting, the disordered can easily take you in.
FWIW, my life is quite full and pleasant these days, KA. My work is going well. I have many friends. My kids love me. I am quite happy, for the most part.
But, I do sympathize with those who have been involved with a disordered spouse and I do think it is a good idea to point out that MB will not work with such a person.
Having this knowledge in no way hampers a person from working on himself.I can see no logic in your fear that Fred will somehow be dissuaded from improving simply because he realizes his spouse may have a personality disorder. Where did you come up with that idea?

Fred can correct me if I am wrong, but I think he is looking at pre-A behavior to form his impression, or at least a substantial part of his impression.

T.J.
Zelmo - I don't know about IRL, but here, you distract people with websites and psychological diagnoses and labels, when they have work to do - you seem obsessed with the "psychosis" of your X.

If you take your posts, and count a ratio of good solid behavioral change encouragements that follow the marriage builder methods, and compare those posts to the number of posts that are "excuse-by-way-of-diagnosis", you'll find that the "excuse" encouragements heavily outweigh the "behavior" guidance posts.

Well, I disagree, KA. I feel that it is good for folks to know what they may be dealing with before making a decision to reconcile.
Typically, the advise is to wait 6 months to a year before making a firm decision on divorce or reconciliation. That
time can be spent working on oneself and trying to determine if the cheating spouse is salvageable. These are not mutually exclusive.
Many folks have mastered walking and chewing gum at the same time. You might try it.

I'm not surprised that we disagree. But most betrayed spouses cannot "walk and chew" at the same time. Few can chew at all, at least at the stage they're getting distracted by you; and getting them to put one right step in front of the other may be all they can do....

I'm not selling them short - just think back to your days of raw pain and remember and empathize a little bit and allow people to focus on next right actions.

They'll have time to learn what they are dealing with once they have their own behavior nailed down.

Oh - and since it usually takes 6 to 12 months to fast track a divorce, they have plenty of time to do that.

But bottom line, if one has a hope of reconciling a marriage to a once-wayward who shapes up and works a recovery program of their own, one cannot have the disrespectful judgment of a misapplied diagnosis that was encouraged by a non-professional to affix.

Right there is the crux of my disagreement with you - a label IS a disrespectful judgment and a direct distraction from the principles taught on this website.

end of T.J.

Only if it is inaccurate, KA.
Fred was able to work theMB program quite well, by your own admission, yet he was also able to research. And, his d-day is quite recent. Your allegation that this distracts would seem to be refuted by Fred's ability to do both quite well.

But Z, you are assuming that everyone who comes here can accomplish the same thing as Fred.

ALL waywards are narcissists during an affair. It's a prerequisite for cheating. You can't rationally arrive at a decision to cheat on your spouse.

To point someone to a list of symptoms and point out how their wayward spouse fits the list so nicely does a great disservice to those who are actually married to someone who is not truly disordered simply manifesting the same symptoms during an affair.

The fact that Fred could pull off Plan A for a couple of months, though not without starts, stops and hesitations along the way does not indicate that others can accomplish the same thing as easily.

Since seldom does Plan A bring about the end of an affair anyway, to now say that Plan A was a waste of time and claim that it proves that the wayward is disordered muddies the expectations of those still struggling in the beginning phases of Plan A. Most affairs end during the time allotted to Plan B, which can last up to two years by Dr Harley's reasoning since most affairs end within that time frame and any that runs longer than that by very much risks being a statistical outlier and might last forever.

The fact that the wayward did not respond to Plan A cannot be counted as one of the indicators that they are incapable of a loving relationship or even that a loving relationship with their spouse is impossible. It simply means that they are locked in an affair. Those having affairs are NUTS while in the affair. They have to be nuts. It's crazy to hurt someone you promised to love like that.

You don't buy into Dr Harley's methods 100%. You haven't used them in a marriage. You haven't read any of his books. Your first order of business with any BH who comes here is to point him to the list of things that all wayward wives do and show how that means they are either a narcissist or a borderline. You crack jokes meant not as humor but as shots at FWS who are struggling to regain their self respect. You bring your disbelief of statistics into every conversation that involves even something as simple as what percentage of people have affairs or how many marriages experience infidelity. You use samples of ONE to prove YOUR (you've attempted to do that very thing here) point and yet refuse to accept research done by professionals, reported in pear journals and still you remain to "help" those who are experiencing the worst thing that will every happen to them in their entire life. WTF?

If nothing else, you're predictable...

Let me put it to you this way...

If a person's cheating spouse is really a diagnosable NPD or BPD, does trying Plan A for six months negate that fact? Is there any reason that narcissists MUST be divorced without trying to save the marriage first?

What if you dissuade even one man from trying to save his marriage and then he discovers later that his wife was acting like that simply because she was having an affair? Would that even bother you?

And shouldn't narcissistic behavior or BPD show up before marriage or at least within the first year or so. How can someone so disordered lead a normal life for 5 years? Ten? 25? 30 or more and then suddenly manifest the symptoms of a disorder that exhibits all the same symptoms as anyone having an affair with an emotional component. We aren't talking about a guy seeing a hooker once a year, once a month or even once per week. We're talking about folks who fall in love with someone else. The guy seeing the hooker once per week is more likely to be a narcissist than the woman who falls in love with her boss. That's what MOST affairs are, Z. The causes are many but the symptoms are all the same. Cheaters act irrationally because cheating is irrational behavior.

Just because Fred worked Plan A for six weeks or so in spite of your steering him toward searching for a personality disorder to label his cheating wife with does not mean that every case that comes here should be told to look for personality disorders before attempting to learn what Plan A is really all about. Finding a label makes it too easy to blame the label and that, my friend, lets the cheater off the hook for his or her actions.

It also lets the BS off the hook as far as examining his or her own actions.

It tells a man who feels hopeless that there will never be any hope. Folks have been known to do all sorts of silly things when they have lost all hope...



You aren't really Kevin Trudeau, are you?

Mark

Gee Pep, sort of makes mine anticlimactic...

???

Fred, you might want to figure out if your wife was a psychopath BEFORE you married her or if it was just the affair. I know that my sister was crazy way before she got married. But marriage made it worse. Her affairs came AFTER she was already crazy.

Bubbles, both you and Zelmo seem to have grasped the concept that I have been researching WW's past behaviors and the I seem to have ignored or been blinded to. To wit:

• WW was married thrice before and left each M.
• WW left (in effect, abandoned) her children; her XH is the custodial parent and she is required to pay child support.
• When her children visit, she exhibits pitiful parenting skills. Yet she grew angry when I attempted to become their stepfather.
• WW is an alcoholic and a binge eater. And has returned to smoking.
• WW grew up in a dysfunctional home; a child born out of wedlock, overweight and unwanted.

I can go on, but all of these items are pre-affair. She has never expressed any remorse for her actions (save some lip-service about leaving her kids). She has never owned up to her own part of her life's failures (an important part of A.A.'s Fourth Step).

Everything I read about sociopaths on LoveFraud identifies WW pre-affair. And as had been written on this thread, I have to find out what in my "picker" is/was broken and fix it. Because one of the first things we learn in A.A. is that we can't fix others, we can only fix ourselves.

I'm a bit frustrated because I'm usually pretty good with words, yet I seem to have failed completely in my attempt to point out that the prevalence of sociopaths runs about 3%-4% of the population. Which means there is a statistical probability that we will encounter one some time. And because they ARE sociopaths, the unaware are very susceptible to marrying them.

Fred I feel that even if she is not a certified sociopath, she had enough problems and there were enough red flags.... that, looking back, you perhaps should have thought twice about marrying her.

But we cannot look back. Only forward. You have not wasted too much time with her yet. You can still have a great life for yourself. MB might not work well with a person like her. You can try and if it does not help get out of the marriage.