Welcome...

If you have experienced an encounter with a psychopath or narcissist, a socialized or "compensated" psychopath or a violent sociopath, you have come to the right place.

You probably feel like you have been through an emotional meat-grinder, like your soul is just raw and bleeding hamburger. (This is not said in humor since one victim described how she felt exactly that way!)

You met someone who was charming, talented and eloquent who most likely made you feel like a million bucks. And then, suddenly, at some point (usually beginning at the first moment you disagreed with him or her), you were made to feel like week-old garbage.

Hoping to restore the purity of that paradise you thought you were living in, you try everything you can think of to make it work, including closing your eyes and mind to the often vicious behavior of that person who is no longer the person you knew.  You just want the original person back; you believe that he or she is there, buried inside, behind some wall of hurt that only you can heal.  You may even see this original person from time to time, when you’ve had just enough to push you away for good – for just long enough to get you to stay and try again.

Little by little, you have to admit to yourself that what you are experiencing cannot be explained away by someone who is acting out of hurt; that what you are experiencing is just pure evil.

Charming, seductive and eloquent they are, and they use all those abilities when lying, manipulating and betraying. Psychopaths and narcissists can slash a path of human misery through lives of dozens, or hundreds, and even thousands, of people. They bring pain and suffering to nearly everyone they touch. And yet, somehow, they manage to convince their victims that it is they who are being wronged.

There is a reason for that: they actually do feel that they are victims because somewhere inside, they know that they are not like the majority of the human population, and this knowledge is coupled with a fundamental need to be in control, to be in charge. That they - a minority - cannot be in charge of the majority appears to them as a great injustice, one that they will fight to the death to right!

What you - a normal person - need now more than anything else is knowledge of what you are going through, or have been through, and an understanding of exactly what you are dealing with, in order to make sense of it all.

Psychopathy and narcissism are just two of several related and often overlapping conditions that afflict a portion of the population. These people are, effectively, human beings that are intraspecies predators; they look human, but they operate on a foundation that is more akin to that of an animal than a human.

Since all creatures seek survival, these pseudo-humans learn very early what behaviors get them what they want and need, including pretense to normal human emotions and empathy. Many of them can maintain this pretense - this "Mask of Sanity" - for a very long time; others let the mask slip sooner, or more often.

What they want varies by individual, but the most persistent need seems to be control and those things that give them control. For the brighter members of this taxon (for that is what it surely is), that means power and money; for the lazier and less driven members, it can mean other things: control over a spouse, children, a family, or the maintenance of a parasitic lifestyle at your expense. In extreme cases, this urge for control can be expressed in murder.

Can they be cured?

That depends; is the individual really a psychopath - which is genetic and incurable - or are they simply emulating behaviors of society and/or their upbringing? Is their behavior inherent to their nature, or is it reactive to what they have experienced? And if it is reactive, at what age did they have the experiences to which they formed reactions?

These questions must be asked, not to provide false hope that the person in your life can change, but to get a deeper understanding of what is really going on in your particular situation.  It should never be forgotten that what really matters is who this person is now – not who they might become with proper treatment.

This website will provide you with information and links. We will collect articles that best reflect the history and the state of the art knowledge of the subject, as well as present some original research that we hope will shed light on some issues that have hitherto remained in darkness.

This website is the creation of a group of survivors several of whom also happen to be professionals in the medical and psychological fields, but we intend to remain anonymous. Most of us are women, which is why we have chosen the themes of Fried Green Tomatoes and Steel Magnolias to represent our work together. If you haven't seen these two movies, try to watch them because they express the solidarity and empathy we all feel for each other and for others who have been similarly abused. This website is not about us, though, but about you.

Are you a survivor of an encounter or relationship with a psychopath or a narcissist? Are you still caught in the thrall, engaged in the life or death struggle?

There is a way out.

We hope to be able to share with you some of the secrets of escape and healing, of becoming free of those characteristics that make normal humans prime victims of the psychological deviants that lurk in our society; monsters among us. Once you know who and what they are, what their strengths and weaknesses are, the techniques they use to paralyze you and drain you, once you know that you are not crazy and most of all, not alone, you can then begin the process of living again. The best revenge is a life well and fully lived!

It all begins with knowledge; you can know the Truth, and the Truth will set you free.