Sociopath: A Memoir

“My name is Patric Gagne and I am a sociopath. I am a passionate mother and wife. I am an engaging therapist. I am extremely charming and well-liked.”

In the memoir’s opening lines, Gagne presents herself as a paradox. By first identifying herself as a sociopath, the author evokes the negative traits associated with this disorder. However, the following statements undermine those assumptions, establishing her as a well-rounded and successful individual. The quotation establishes Gagne’s intention to challenge popular stereotypes of sociopathy through The Reframing of Sociopathy.

“The rules, it seemed, had disappeared along with the daylight. In the darkness, with everyone else asleep, there were no restrictions. I could do anything.”

As a child, Gagne often exhibits antisocial behavior at night, such as walking home from slumber parties when everyone is asleep. Nighttime is appealing because confusing daytime rules no longer seem applicable, reflecting her own lack of moral boundaries as a sociopath. Darkness also offers invisibility—a state she seeks out in response to other people’s awareness that she is different.

“I was like a blond, ferret-toting Wednesday Addams, leisurely repelling everyone in my path.”

Gagne uses humor to create the image of her childhood self as a pariah. The figurative comparison to Wednesday Addams conveys her lack of empathy and other social emotions. Meanwhile, her choice of a species of pet known for its off-putting smell completes the unapproachable portrait. While amusing, the description also represents her loneliness and ostracization.

“When trying to explain this lack of certain emotions, I’ve likened it to standing next to a roller coaster. I can hear the people on the ride. I can see the dips and curves of the track. I can sense the creeping adrenaline as the train begins its steep descent […] I get it. I’m just not experiencing it myself.”

Throughout the memoir, Gagne uses analogies to explain the experience of sociopathy to non-sociopathic readers. The simile of observing other people on a roller coaster describes her inability to feel social emotions such as empathy and remorse. Drawing on the sense of sight and sound, her description of involvement yet detachment from the experience conveys her inability to access these feelings. 

“A line from Who Framed Roger Rabbit? came to mind. ‘I’m not bad,’ Jessica Rabbit says. ‘I’m just drawn that way.’ I could relate. I, too, was just drawn that way. I wasn’t trying to hurt anyone or purposely cause trouble. I just wished I could make my mother understand.”

Here, Gagne refers to a well-known quote by the cartoon character Jessica Rabbit from the movie Who Framed Roger Rabbit? Jessica is the film’s antagonist, and the pun highlights that she cannot help being a villain as she was literally drawn to be bad. As a girl, Gagne wishes she could explain to her mother that she is like Jessica Rabbit. Her antisocial behavior is inherent and not a conscious choice.

“I thought about the men inside the prison, then remembered the day I’d stabbed Syd—how quickly the tension had faded and how amazing it felt in the aftermath—and I tried to push the temptation of that release from my thoughts.”

As a child, Patric does not know of anyone who shares her limited emotions and violent compulsions. However, on a trip to a men’s prison, she finally sees other individuals she can identify with (See: Symbols & Motifs). The author emphasizes the lasting impact of this visit, which provides a bleak insight into her likely future. Consequently, her memoir seeks to increase the invisibility of sociopaths who are not convicted criminals.

“My mother had taken me as far as she could but, like a car that hadn’t been prepared for such an arduous journey, she was starting to break down. Mom was never going to understand or accept who I was. And I could never change who I was. I would just have to hide my true self from her.”

Patric’s mother is supportive of her daughter and attempts to morally guide her with the maxim to always be honest. The analogy of a car that eventually breaks down acknowledges the strain her antisocial behavior gradually places on her mother. Consequently, Patric concludes that dishonesty is the better course of action. Despite her sociopathic traits, Gagne’s recognition of how her mother felt displays insight into her emotions and empathy.

“With so many songs written about emotion, it was often hard for me to relate. But with a switch of a few words now and then, I found that I had a much better time singing along.”

Here, Gagne describes her habit of making up new words to songs to match her general feeling of apathy. Her observation that she finds most songs “unrelatable” highlights how society and culture center on emotional responses—an alienating situation for sociopaths.

“Like me, he was quick to break the rules if he thought they didn’t make sense. But beneath his rebellious surface, he was a straight-A student, a kind and thoughtful soul unlike anyone I’d ever met. Whereas I was objective and cool, David was emotional and passionate.”

David plays a pivotal role in the memoir. Here, the author describes the qualities that make him the ideal partner for her. His empathy and well-developed moral compass complement her logic and relative emotionlessness. The author suggests their combined strengths and weaknesses create the perfect balance.

“My emotional constitution, it seemed, was a lot like a cheap set of crayons. I had access to primary colors—joy and sadness. But more nuanced hues—complex feelings like romantic love and passion—had been outside my reach.”

Gagne explains her limited emotional range using the analogy of a set of crayons. She experiences the innate, more basic emotions (compared to primary colors) but not the more subtle social emotions that constitute the scale of shades in between. For this reason, the author suggests that sociopathy is an emotional learning disability, reflecting her advocation for The Reframing of Sociopathy.

“Suddenly it was all so simple. The pressure I’d experienced my entire life was most likely caused by my own subconscious drive for feeling. It wasn’t some insurgent that needed to be eradicated. It was more like a psychological software patch my brain applied to counteract my lack of emotion.”

Gagne’s psychology classes at UCLA lead to an epiphany regarding the triggers for her antisocial behavior. The feeling of pressure that accompanies long periods of apathy is due to her brain’s inability to connect to emotions. Her figurative comparison of this response to a “software patch” suggests that her brain recognizes there is a functionality problem and is attempting to repair it. The analogy illustrates how Gagne uses analogies to reframe sociopathy.

“What I needed was diversity, personality traits I could stitch together to create a bespoke psychological disguise. And now, finally, I had the material.”

Here, Gagne describes acquiring and mimicking acceptable social behavior by studying other students at parties. She undertakes The Pursuit of Normalcy and Assimilation as she copies the facial expressions and gestures of other people to conceal her sociopathy. The author stresses her construction of a disguise is not a sinister attempt to trick other people. Rather, it is a necessary coping mechanism in a world that rejects those who fail to conform to societal expectations.

“Normalizing mental disorders—specifically the various symptoms of mental disorders—is essential to counteracting the stigma associated with those symptoms and replacing it with knowledge, understanding and, eventually, acceptance.”

Gagne agrees with Dr. Slack’s argument regarding the importance of normalizing mental disorders. Throughout the memoir, the author emphasizes how the marginalization of sociopathy as a medical condition perpetuates societal ignorance and harmful stereotypes. Thus, one of the key purposes of the book is to normalize the symptoms of sociopathy. Gagne emphasizes that while her thought processes and behavior are different from the average person’s, they are standard for a sociopath.

“Everyone else had access to hope. Schizophrenics, alcoholics, bipolar depressives—there were treatment plans and support groups for all of them. The DSM was full of mental disorders and personality types, all of which included specific information and diagnostic insights, no matter how strange. There was even a term for people who compulsively ate things like couch cushions or paper clips.”

The author highlights the lack of visibility of sociopathy as a recognized disorder, noting its absence from both the dictionary and the diagnostic manual, the DSM. She argues that this leads to many issues for sociopaths, including a lack of understanding of their condition and an absence of medical support and treatment. Gagne emphasizes the irony that the DSM acknowledges niche disorders such as eating paper clips while neglecting a condition that affects 1 in 25 people.

“Being on what I considered ‘the sociopathic spectrum’ often felt like a life sentence in emotional solitary confinement. No one could relate to me. Nobody wanted to spend time with me. Not the real me, anyway. I was utterly alone.”

Gagne conveys the loneliness of sociopathy as her traits make her socially unacceptable to other people. Her predicament is emphasized as she must choose between inauthentic interactions where she fakes social emotions and isolation. Her figurative comparison of her state to “solitary confinement” evokes the memoir’s recurring prisoner symbolism (See: Symbols & Motifs). Although she avoids becoming a convicted criminal, she suffers an emotional punishment for her condition.

“My therapist’s observation that I was an empathy-seeking sociopath was insightful, if not entirely surprising. In many ways I was like the lost duckling in the children’s book Are You My Mother? Except instead of a brave little bird with a kind heart and identity issues in search of its mommy, I was an anti-social outlier with a limited emotional range and a habit of lying in search of a buddy.”

Dr. Carlin identifies that Gagne’s desire to meet other sociopaths is prompted by a need to interact with individuals who understand her. Despite her inability to experience empathy, she nonetheless craves it herself. The author employs humor by comparing herself to the duckling in the children’s book seeking its mother. By juxtaposing her socially unappealing traits with those of the endearing duckling, she emphasizes the contrast between them.

“Because the mainstream opinion is that not having feelings is ‘bad,’ sociopaths—from a very early age—are taught to hide or deny their apathy, lest they become outed as monsters. So the emotional voice becomes a trigger for stress, for anxiety, which leads to destructive behavior. It’s a vicious cycle.” 

Here, Gagne presents sociopathy as a Catch-22 situation rooted in society’s value judgment that apathy is “bad.” Consequently, sociopaths become anxious about their natural emotional state, leading to antisocial behavior. These behaviors then seem to justify society’s distrust of an absence of emotion. The author suggests that, as a neutral state, apathy is neither good nor bad, and if other people understood this, sociopaths might be able to break this “vicious cycle.” The passage reflects The Ethical Considerations of Sociopathy.

“Sitting here, right now, and for maybe the first time since I was a kid, I like who I am. I’m at peace with what I am. And I’m starting to realize that the only thing I ever didn’t like was what I was doing. I didn’t like my behavior.”

As Gagne discovers more about her condition, she learns to separate her sociopathic traits from her sociopathic actions. She increasingly realizes that, despite societal pressure to do so, she does not perceive her inability to access certain emotions as a flaw. Gagne concludes that she wants to change her behavior but not her essential identity.

“With the fortitude of my discipline only slightly stronger than the pull of my darkness, a sociopathic battle of wills was playing out only steps from where Ginny strolled, blissfully ignorant. The heightened risk produced acute satisfaction. God, I loved how it made me feel. Power and strength and nothingness and acceptance all rolled into one. She’d never see it coming, I thought with a smile.”

Here, Gagne describes her strong urge to attack Ginny Krusi as she stands hidden in her garden. The author’s honest account of the pleasure she takes in this violent fantasy illustrates her determination to convey sociopathy’s symptoms realistically—even when the portrait of herself is unflattering. At this point, Gagne conforms to society’s view of sociopaths as dangerous individuals. However, she does not act on her violent impulse.

“Most of these patients were no stranger to the word ‘sociopath.’ They, too, had seen themselves in the pop-cultured depictions of the term and were scared of what they saw. They were afraid they were monsters.”

As a therapist, Gagne finally meets other sociopaths who, up to this point, have been invisible to her. She emphasizes the dilemma of sociopaths who require support but are afraid to be diagnosed with a condition deeply stigmatized by mainstream culture. Their experiences illustrate the harmful impact of negative stereotypes on self-perception.

“Life with a guy like him was the path of least resistance. Max did not delight in virtue but rejoiced in darkness. And there, in that darkness, I knew I could hide from the truth.”

The author recounts the temptation represented by Max Magus. Gagne feels validated and accepted by the famous singer, who celebrates and encourages her darker sociopathic behaviors. Life with Max represents “the path of least resistance” as, unlike David, he would never challenge her destructive behaviors. However, the author also recognizes that the “good” side of her character would be subsumed by this lifestyle. Ultimately, she chooses the path of most resistance, seeking to control her antisocial urges and positively contribute to society.

“People have never loved me, Everly. They love the darkness in me. They see the darkness and recklessness and emotional freedom, and they’re attracted to it. They want it for themselves. So, they take it. They use me for it. Steal my ego strength. Ride my wicked coattails.”

Here, Gagne describes one of two responses to sociopathy: People either fear the disorder or are attracted to it. People like Max and Jennifer are drawn to Gagne as her sociopathic traits appeal to their fantasies of a life unfettered by the restrictions of moral codes. The author suggests that this vicarious appropriation of sociopathy seems flattering but is, in reality, dehumanizing.

“The more I paid attention, the more I noticed just how often ‘apathy,’ ‘lack of feeling,’ and the word ‘sociopath’ were associated with evil. From celebrated books like East of Eden and The Sociopath Next Door to award-winning films like The Silence of the Lambs and American Psycho, the ‘sociopath’ character composite was almost exclusively reserved for the ‘bad’ guys (and girls).”

Gagne explores the standard representation of sociopaths as monsters in films and literature. The author points out that this trope is perpetuated in both low and high culture, including “celebrated” books and “award-winning” films. As a result, the notion of sociopaths as evil antagonists is ingrained in the public consciousness (See: Background). Throughout the memoir, Gagne argues that apathy is a neutral trait, denoting neither good nor bad motivations. However, its association with sociopathy causes apathy to be viewed as a dangerous, untrustworthy state of mind.