The Psychopath: A True Story(32)
In Dr Leedom’s report, Did He Ever Love Me?, the maximum score given to each of the other subjects researched was 36 – except in the case of Will Jordan. In that report, the psychologists involved unanimously gave him a maximum score, 40 out of 40 – giving my layman’s diagnosis professional endorsement.
Dr Leedom’s report also mentioned the connection for victims with Stockholm Syndrome. This term was coined in the 1973 case where bank robbers held a woman and three other people hostage in Stockholm for six days. When released, the female hostage found she had formed a strong attachment with her captor, and all the hostages defended their captors and wouldn’t testify in court against them. There are four conditions involved in developing Stockholm Syndrome: a perceived threat to one’s physical or psychological survival at the hands of the abuser(s); perceived small kindnesses from the abuser to the victim, and a feeling of dependency on them; isolation from perspectives other than those of the abuser; and perceived inescapability of the situation with little hope of outside intervention from family or friends.
Stockholm Syndrome (or traumatic bonding) can apply to any victim–perpetrator situation, including domestic abuse and child abuse where most of the above-mentioned conditions exist. When Stockholm Syndrome emerges, the victim can cling to the abuser because the victim perceives that this may be their only hope of survival. That unhealthy bond can be stronger than one that forms in healthy relationships. I experienced all four aspects of Stockholm Syndrome with Will Jordan. I felt under physical threat as he psychologically tortured and indoctrinated me into believing our lives were in danger, whilst also playing with my mothering instinct when he said that the children were most at risk from being kidnapped and ripped apart. Throughout our time together, he was showing me love and affection, as well as assuring me that he was the only person I could trust. I felt isolated because I believed that anyone I told would be put in danger as well, plus there was nothing anyone else could do to help me. All of this made my situation inescapable; there was no hope of help from outside. It all added up to make me completely dependent on Will Jordan. Towards the end of my relationship with him, when talking to social workers about his criminal past, I felt compelled to hold on to what Will Jordan had taught me – that he was the only person I could trust to keep our children safe.
Having read Dr Liane Leedom’s book, I had the great pleasure of talking to her on Skype about raising the children of psychopaths. One of the warnings she gave me was that finding empathy and emotion in your children is good but you also have to look out for signs of self-regulation and impulse control – for instance that they show compromise. There is an inner triangle of traits that cover the ability to love, exercise impulse control and demonstrate moral reasoning. She said that by definition, a psychopath is someone with impairment in all three of these abilities.
‘In the meantime,’ she said, ‘keep an eye out for substance abuse. Beware of them becoming addicted to drugs or alcohol – and be specifically aware if they show vandalism tendencies or the like.’
She explained to me that those at risk of psychopathy who also start substance abuse before the age of twenty-two are liable to end up as psychopathic (from alcohol abuse) or schizophrenic (from marijuana abuse, if used to excess).
Another point that Dr Leedom made was that we have a huge issue of tribal/family loyalty meaning that if someone is aware that a family member is psychopathic, they won’t generally tell others about it. They will support the psychopathic adult child and sometimes even be relieved when a new victim of that psychopath is found because then the family will get some respite whilst the psychopath focuses on the new victim instead. It made me think about Will Jordan’s parents again. Were they victims of his as well? Were they helping him because it meant he left them alone? Or were they instrumental in making him what he was, as well as benefitting from the money that he defrauded?
I felt like I had come so far. Not only did I now know and understand what Will Jordan was, but I was also learning so much more about psychopaths in general. My book was even being used by experts to further research the subject. But I still wanted to learn more. I wanted to understand the mechanisms that had allowed Will Jordan to control me. I now understood why he did what he did, but I wanted to know how.
I started digging deeper into the techniques that psychopaths use and came across a report by Dr Jeffrey Hancock and Dr Michael Woodworth called Hungry like the wolf: A word-pattern analysis of the language of psychopaths. It is fascinating, and I’ve included more detail about it in the Appendix, entitled ‘Toxic Techniques’. Dr Woodworth said, ‘You can spend two or three hours with a psychopath and come out feeling hypnotised.’ Psychopaths are masters at distracting their victims; they tend to use body language and movement to distract and supplement their words. Their nonverbal behaviour is often so convincing and diverting that people don’t recognise they are being deceitful. It reminded me rather like a snake moving its head to distract its prey. They are disturbingly good at manipulating people face to face, even with qualified research specialists, so although they express themselves verbally very clearly, their face-to-face and nonverbal communication is really the way they manipulate individuals.
Two of the techniques Hancock and Woodworth talked about in their report were incredibly familiar. They were called ‘reframing’ and ‘nonsensical conversation’. Reframing – sometimes called ‘projection’ – is when someone turns any flaw or situation around to make it look like the other person is actually at fault. For instance, someone using projection might accuse their partner of being unfaithful when it is in fact the accuser that is having the affair. It is used to put the victim off balance and instil a sense of guilt even though the victim has done nothing wrong. I remember very clearly the situation when I was giving birth to my daughter and my son. My ‘husband’, instead of being by my side, managed to convince me he was in a locked-down war zone, struggling to survive. Although I was going through a dramatic and painful experience needing my partner by my side, I was made to feel guilty because I was led to believe that he was trapped, starving in a war zone and lucky to be alive. Indeed, he wasn’t anywhere near a war zone and was just a few hundred miles down the road, busy wearing boots too small for him in order to persuade me eventually that he had been far, far away. He was absent both times when I was giving birth, and having me worry about him whilst going through that was the aim.