missy1632
Nov 10, 2011, 08:51 PM
Hi Guys,
I stumbled upon this site while searching for the definition of a sociopath. Believe it or not, I became aware of a correlation between my sister's behaviour and the term sociopath while watching an episode of SVU.
I am from Australia, by the way.
Now, I am pretty sure my sister exhibits traits of a sociopath, but what good is the term sociopath when there is no cure or medication? I swear it's like talking to a brick wall.
I have been under my sister's thumb for my whole life. I am now 29, and as stupid as it may sound, I have only just become aware of her control over me. In short, I am scared of her--but always believed things would get better.
The whole situation is extremely hard to explain, but basically for the past 5 years I have been living with my sister (41), her 2 sons (8 and 11) and our father (70). I have only just come out of the haze and realised that my sister's actions are not my fault and have now told everyone that I am moving out. My father now thinks I am the "bad" one for abandoning them, but reality is, I am extremely unhappy living there and, no matter what I do, the situation never improves.
Not to say that I don't have my own issues. Hello? I'm 29 years old and living with my dad! And my only escape is going to live with my mum! Yep, I am pathetic, but now that is out of the way, we can move on.
In my opinion, she's either a sociopath or bipolar or I don't know? One minute everything is great and fine and the next she is flipping out and threatening me with physical violence. Then later, seeming to forget all the hurtful and horrid things she has said and done, she even makes jokes about it. Just an example was this past weekend, after she flipped about me pleading with her not to drive drunk with her 2 sons, she threatened to smash my face in, while have a clenched fist hovering in front of me. Instead she picked up a cup and threw it at my face. She later made a joke about it and compared it to an incident involving someone completely irrelevant to this situation and said "at least I don't go around punching holes in the wall."
Usually I would have just be quiet, but this time I said, "Maybe not. But you wanted to punch a hole in my face." Her reply was, "I would never hurt you." Well, try telling HER that when she gets in a state. Yes, something definitely holds her back from actually punching me in the face, but it isn't compassion for me; it's fear of the repercussions she would face by doing so.
About 10 years ago, she was in a drug-affected state and slept through an important appointment. It was NOT my job to wake her, but I was there and was busy playing with one of her sons who was a toddler at the time. When she finally woke (after I had been watching her son, changing his nappies, feeding him etc), she blamed me for missing the appointment and again threatened to smash my face in and said the only reason she won't was because of our dad.
Recently I have lost a LOT of weight and I do struggle to keep it off. But anyway, when I had lost heaps and was looking really great, she was parading me around and telling people how proud she was etc. Turn the tables to when she is not happy, she's calling me a fat lazy c-word. In my opinion, she was never proud of me and only pretended to be in order to get recognition for her part in my weight loss (which by the way, was none). All she did was complain about me using the oven or make snide comments about me never cooking so much in my whole life, blah blah.
She is always playing the victim, but never makes any attempt to make anything better. She just complains about her situation -- that situation being that she has 2 sons by a man who isn't really all that great.
I could list a million examples, to be honest. But just to summarise: She lies with ease and often forgets her lies or varies them so much between one person and the next that she spends all her energy keeping up with them, or trying to hide her lies. And, when she is found out for lying, it's deny deny deny, or blame someone else. EXAMPLE: We rent the house we live in, but she was telling people we own it. Was that her fault? Nope, it was the house's fault for it being semi-well known and people knowing the real owners or it was the people she lied to's fault for being busybodies. Amazing.
She will b!tch to me about some of our half-sisters, but then to their face be all lovey-dovey and be sympathetic to their woes. Behind closed doors, she whinges and belittles their problems--as if NO ONE has problems bigger than hers! And if I dare nod at anything she says (usually just to pacify her), she will go back and tell the people I was the one who said x, y, z.
Also, I understand that raising children is a big job, but I don't think she takes it seriously or even really cares. She never disciplines them, but when they are really bad and out of control, or making too much noise for her to continue on with whatever interests her, she will yell and scream at them. In the same breath, she tells them to be quiet or to SHUT UP and to stop telling each other to shut up or to speak nicely to each other.
An example last night was the 2 boys fighting. She let them go on for quite some time, until one was crying hysterically (also because it was late at night), and then she was yelling at the older one for hitting his brother, saying, "You have no right to hit anyone. Do it again and I'll give you the best beating!" or "Do you want a slap?" etc etc. After she has yelled or maybe even hit them, she will shower them with "love" or gifts or make promises about what they will do "tomorrow" and when tomorrow comes around, it's "I don't have time for that" etc. It's easy for me to say this, not having children, but I actually live with them and can see how much easier raising them would be if a little bit of effort was put in first.
I must also say, there are drugs involved. I myself used to smoke marijuana with her, and for a long time too after this most recent fight and her telling my father that I smoked and was "covered in tattoos" (I have 3 small ones), I have stopped. Completely. It was a lot easier than I thought and I feel so much better. And this has helped my realisation.
I had wanted to quit for a long time, but I was often the one who was getting it for us. And believe me, if there was none to be had, it was a horrible time. And I believe that is what was keeping me on it too. I actually felt that if I was paying for it, I didn't want to "miss out." Now that I feel so detached and "free," I couldn't care less if she has it or not. She's bad with it or without it.
Other things she complains about, are things like me "not doing anything around the house." It is just not true. I firmly believe that sometimes when I do something, it was a) about time or b) I think she thinks she was the one who did it? I often eat frozen meals and therefore have barely any washing up to do, yet I still do her dishes. If I don't, they stay in the sink for days and days. Attracting flies. She also complains about the electricity bill or the water bill, yet puts the same load of dishes through the washer over and over, because she doesn't empty it, and maybe adds one dirty dish, so re-does the load. Or she won't bother to scrape off the food, so when the load finishes it's not completely clean. It's madness! Same goes for the washing machine. She will put a load on, forget about it and have to re-do it, as it has gone smelly (if you know what I mean?). I often take my laundry to the laundomat as the machine is never empty. It's my machine by the way!
I'm sorry I have rambled on. But really, I just wanted to say that now I have seen light I am moving out and moving on. Trying to actually have a life. But not without sacrifice. I am leaving my father, my nephews and my beloved pets. My father will be fine, although I have tried to be close to him (literally) my whole life and he has tried to guilt me into staying, which makes me feel as though he favours her over me. My nephews are quite resilient and they are her children, so what can I do? They also have each other and when I try and help, it falls on deaf ears. I love my pets and I will miss them dearly. It really hurts me to leave them. But I feel this is irrational thinking. *sigh*
Everyone who knows me, says I should leave (other family and friends). Including my mother. She often tells me to remember that they are not my children etc. I do feel a moral obligation, as even though I don't interfere too much, if anything were to really get out of hand, and it has before, me being there keeps her a bit in line.
I also sometimes think she thinks of me as being "nothing." Like sometimes she is so consumed in talking about herself-- how good looking she is, how beautiful her eyes are, etc. But then she will remember she is actually talking to me, so she will add, "Oh you are beautiful too" or mention that we have the same eyes. I guess charming me? I fell for it. Idiot I am. Or she will often compliment other people just so they will do the same to her, but behind their backs she says horrible things.
Also, she is the first one there if something bad happens to someone. Anything, a death, a car breaking down, etc etc. And she will bend over backwards, then later complain when people take up her offers for help. She treats complete strangers better than me or even her own children. She also plays happy families when others are around, and allows my nephews bad behaviour, but then gives it to them in private, telling them how embarrassing they were etc.
She'll moan about how much she has to do, but spend hours in the bathroom taking care of her appearance, or spend 2 hours sunbaking after just telling her kids she has "a million things to do" when they ask if they can go somewhere, or do something.
Anyway, my plan is to move in with my mum, but tell my nephews they can come visit anytime, so they know I'm still there for them. I just feel like I am not really helping being there and being so involved.
Any advice? Do you think she is a sociopath?
P.S. Sorry my post was all over the place. As you can see, I have bottled a lot of things up and even allowed things to go unnoticed, but now, since thinking about it, everything makes sense.
I stumbled upon this site while searching for the definition of a sociopath. Believe it or not, I became aware of a correlation between my sister's behaviour and the term sociopath while watching an episode of SVU.
I am from Australia, by the way.
Now, I am pretty sure my sister exhibits traits of a sociopath, but what good is the term sociopath when there is no cure or medication? I swear it's like talking to a brick wall.
I have been under my sister's thumb for my whole life. I am now 29, and as stupid as it may sound, I have only just become aware of her control over me. In short, I am scared of her--but always believed things would get better.
The whole situation is extremely hard to explain, but basically for the past 5 years I have been living with my sister (41), her 2 sons (8 and 11) and our father (70). I have only just come out of the haze and realised that my sister's actions are not my fault and have now told everyone that I am moving out. My father now thinks I am the "bad" one for abandoning them, but reality is, I am extremely unhappy living there and, no matter what I do, the situation never improves.
Not to say that I don't have my own issues. Hello? I'm 29 years old and living with my dad! And my only escape is going to live with my mum! Yep, I am pathetic, but now that is out of the way, we can move on.
In my opinion, she's either a sociopath or bipolar or I don't know? One minute everything is great and fine and the next she is flipping out and threatening me with physical violence. Then later, seeming to forget all the hurtful and horrid things she has said and done, she even makes jokes about it. Just an example was this past weekend, after she flipped about me pleading with her not to drive drunk with her 2 sons, she threatened to smash my face in, while have a clenched fist hovering in front of me. Instead she picked up a cup and threw it at my face. She later made a joke about it and compared it to an incident involving someone completely irrelevant to this situation and said "at least I don't go around punching holes in the wall."
Usually I would have just be quiet, but this time I said, "Maybe not. But you wanted to punch a hole in my face." Her reply was, "I would never hurt you." Well, try telling HER that when she gets in a state. Yes, something definitely holds her back from actually punching me in the face, but it isn't compassion for me; it's fear of the repercussions she would face by doing so.
About 10 years ago, she was in a drug-affected state and slept through an important appointment. It was NOT my job to wake her, but I was there and was busy playing with one of her sons who was a toddler at the time. When she finally woke (after I had been watching her son, changing his nappies, feeding him etc), she blamed me for missing the appointment and again threatened to smash my face in and said the only reason she won't was because of our dad.
Recently I have lost a LOT of weight and I do struggle to keep it off. But anyway, when I had lost heaps and was looking really great, she was parading me around and telling people how proud she was etc. Turn the tables to when she is not happy, she's calling me a fat lazy c-word. In my opinion, she was never proud of me and only pretended to be in order to get recognition for her part in my weight loss (which by the way, was none). All she did was complain about me using the oven or make snide comments about me never cooking so much in my whole life, blah blah.
She is always playing the victim, but never makes any attempt to make anything better. She just complains about her situation -- that situation being that she has 2 sons by a man who isn't really all that great.
I could list a million examples, to be honest. But just to summarise: She lies with ease and often forgets her lies or varies them so much between one person and the next that she spends all her energy keeping up with them, or trying to hide her lies. And, when she is found out for lying, it's deny deny deny, or blame someone else. EXAMPLE: We rent the house we live in, but she was telling people we own it. Was that her fault? Nope, it was the house's fault for it being semi-well known and people knowing the real owners or it was the people she lied to's fault for being busybodies. Amazing.
She will b!tch to me about some of our half-sisters, but then to their face be all lovey-dovey and be sympathetic to their woes. Behind closed doors, she whinges and belittles their problems--as if NO ONE has problems bigger than hers! And if I dare nod at anything she says (usually just to pacify her), she will go back and tell the people I was the one who said x, y, z.
Also, I understand that raising children is a big job, but I don't think she takes it seriously or even really cares. She never disciplines them, but when they are really bad and out of control, or making too much noise for her to continue on with whatever interests her, she will yell and scream at them. In the same breath, she tells them to be quiet or to SHUT UP and to stop telling each other to shut up or to speak nicely to each other.
An example last night was the 2 boys fighting. She let them go on for quite some time, until one was crying hysterically (also because it was late at night), and then she was yelling at the older one for hitting his brother, saying, "You have no right to hit anyone. Do it again and I'll give you the best beating!" or "Do you want a slap?" etc etc. After she has yelled or maybe even hit them, she will shower them with "love" or gifts or make promises about what they will do "tomorrow" and when tomorrow comes around, it's "I don't have time for that" etc. It's easy for me to say this, not having children, but I actually live with them and can see how much easier raising them would be if a little bit of effort was put in first.
I must also say, there are drugs involved. I myself used to smoke marijuana with her, and for a long time too after this most recent fight and her telling my father that I smoked and was "covered in tattoos" (I have 3 small ones), I have stopped. Completely. It was a lot easier than I thought and I feel so much better. And this has helped my realisation.
I had wanted to quit for a long time, but I was often the one who was getting it for us. And believe me, if there was none to be had, it was a horrible time. And I believe that is what was keeping me on it too. I actually felt that if I was paying for it, I didn't want to "miss out." Now that I feel so detached and "free," I couldn't care less if she has it or not. She's bad with it or without it.
Other things she complains about, are things like me "not doing anything around the house." It is just not true. I firmly believe that sometimes when I do something, it was a) about time or b) I think she thinks she was the one who did it? I often eat frozen meals and therefore have barely any washing up to do, yet I still do her dishes. If I don't, they stay in the sink for days and days. Attracting flies. She also complains about the electricity bill or the water bill, yet puts the same load of dishes through the washer over and over, because she doesn't empty it, and maybe adds one dirty dish, so re-does the load. Or she won't bother to scrape off the food, so when the load finishes it's not completely clean. It's madness! Same goes for the washing machine. She will put a load on, forget about it and have to re-do it, as it has gone smelly (if you know what I mean?). I often take my laundry to the laundomat as the machine is never empty. It's my machine by the way!
I'm sorry I have rambled on. But really, I just wanted to say that now I have seen light I am moving out and moving on. Trying to actually have a life. But not without sacrifice. I am leaving my father, my nephews and my beloved pets. My father will be fine, although I have tried to be close to him (literally) my whole life and he has tried to guilt me into staying, which makes me feel as though he favours her over me. My nephews are quite resilient and they are her children, so what can I do? They also have each other and when I try and help, it falls on deaf ears. I love my pets and I will miss them dearly. It really hurts me to leave them. But I feel this is irrational thinking. *sigh*
Everyone who knows me, says I should leave (other family and friends). Including my mother. She often tells me to remember that they are not my children etc. I do feel a moral obligation, as even though I don't interfere too much, if anything were to really get out of hand, and it has before, me being there keeps her a bit in line.
I also sometimes think she thinks of me as being "nothing." Like sometimes she is so consumed in talking about herself-- how good looking she is, how beautiful her eyes are, etc. But then she will remember she is actually talking to me, so she will add, "Oh you are beautiful too" or mention that we have the same eyes. I guess charming me? I fell for it. Idiot I am. Or she will often compliment other people just so they will do the same to her, but behind their backs she says horrible things.
Also, she is the first one there if something bad happens to someone. Anything, a death, a car breaking down, etc etc. And she will bend over backwards, then later complain when people take up her offers for help. She treats complete strangers better than me or even her own children. She also plays happy families when others are around, and allows my nephews bad behaviour, but then gives it to them in private, telling them how embarrassing they were etc.
She'll moan about how much she has to do, but spend hours in the bathroom taking care of her appearance, or spend 2 hours sunbaking after just telling her kids she has "a million things to do" when they ask if they can go somewhere, or do something.
Anyway, my plan is to move in with my mum, but tell my nephews they can come visit anytime, so they know I'm still there for them. I just feel like I am not really helping being there and being so involved.
Any advice? Do you think she is a sociopath?
P.S. Sorry my post was all over the place. As you can see, I have bottled a lot of things up and even allowed things to go unnoticed, but now, since thinking about it, everything makes sense.