Sociopath: A Memoir by Patric Gagne, Ph. D.

Sociopath: A Memoir by Patric Gagne, Ph. D. is a remarkable memoir of one person’s journey into fulfillment … It was educational, in the richest sense of the word.

Sociopath: A Memoir by Patric Gagne, Ph. D. is a remarkable memoir of one person’s journey into fulfillment. In reading, I was immediately immersed in her highly personal, conversational narrative — one that guided me through Patric Gagne’s feelings, perceptions, and discoveries in the area of sociopathy, and challenged me to re-evaluate my own thinking. It was educational, in the richest sense of the word.

From the beginning, the author challenged popular perceptions of sociopathy — the image we might hold of an unfeeling, uncaring individual, someone who acts out and is potentially dangerous. We were soon led into the world of a child who was trying to “replace the nothingness with … Something.” This child did things like lying and stealing, perhaps to replace lack of feeling with feeling, to replace apathy with emotion. She vividly describes the need to do something to ease the pressure in her head, to do something to make that nothingness stop.

She writes with surprising candor as she describes events of her childhood and her perceptions of those events, and explains how social conventions needed explicit teaching. She found doing the things that weren’t “right” countered her sense of apathy, but noted that the urge to do the bad things became more extreme as her random acts no longer released her tension. She describes the compulsive need she felt to act out in response to internal pressure building, the inner conflict she experienced as she learned self-regulating mechanisms to establish limits on her behaviour, and the outer conflict as others withdrew from her unconventional behavior.

She recognized emotions, such as sadness, but was unable to express them. When, for example, her beloved pet ferret died, she was shocked, but was unable to generate a socially accepted emotional response. As an adolescent, she noticed increasingly that she responded differently than others and learned to imitate or mirror the social expressions of those around her.

In college she learned that sociopathy did not have a therapeutic or medicinal treatment, but was something she must manage for the rest of her life, and her commitment to figuring it out began to take shape. In her studies, she learned that empathy and remorse, the learned social emotions, were difficult although not impossible for the sociopath to internalize. There was a growing sense of urgency, a passion to learn all she could — not just to help herself but to help others who struggled as she did.

In time, she realized that the inner pressure and the corresponding need to act out were a response to anxiety and apathy. She became skilled at anticipating her anxieties and practicing controlled “bad behavior” to ward off potential boats of anxiety, but through continual learning and reflection, came instead to a level of self-acceptance that carried her forward.

Throughout the book there is the sense that others used her sociopathy for their own gain. During her time in the music industry, for example, she encountered many false sociopaths — “fauxiopaths” – who excused their narcissism, selfishness, and irresponsibility as the outcome of sociopathy, and at times manipulated her, exploiting her sociopathy for their own ends.

In her teen years, she discovered the tenderness of love, of finding the person who accepted her as she was, who sought to enter her world and understand her. It occurs to me how often we think of sociopathy in terms of possible criminal behaviour and accept the popular culture version of sociopathy. As this love story evolved through her adult years, I began to realize how important it is for each human being to find affirmation — to be loved and to love. It is not an easy love story, and she is honest as she examines the evolution of her relationship with all its challenges, but it is a genuine love story, one that educates us and will bring hope to many.

The author manages that rare balance of clinical accuracy and conversational tone, leading to an educational experience that is easily received. It makes good sense, and it is never boring or pedantic. As a retired educator, I feel that this book would be an excellent resource, one to open our eyes anew to the unique ways in which our students speak to us. I would like to think, too, that this book, like the author’s therapeutic work, will be a source of encouragement and hope to those who struggle with sociopathy.

I would like to think that this book will be uplifting and fulfilling to all who need its hope.

Patric Gagne is a writer, former therapist, and advocate for people suffering from sociopathic, psychopathic, and anti-social personality disorders. She earned a PhD in clinical psychology with a dissertation that examined the relationship between sociopathy and anxiety. This research became the groundwork for her continued studies on sociopathic disorder, as well as the foundation for her memoir. She did her undergraduate work at UCLA and earned her masters and doctorate at the California Graduate Institute of The Chicago School.

Publisher: Simon & Schuster (April 2, 2024)
Hardcover 6″ x 9″ | 368 pages
ISBN: 9781668003183

Anne Smith-Nochasak

Website

Anne M. Smith-Nochasak grew up in rural Nova Scotia and taught for many years in northern settings including Northern Labrador, the focal setting for her second novel. She has retired to Nova Scotia, where she enjoys reading, writing, and country living. She has self-published two novels through FriesenPress: A Canoer of Shorelines(2021) and The Ice Widow: A Story of Love and Redemption (2022).