Antisocial Personality Disorder

Photo Credit: Marco Bellucci

I'm the stepmom of a 16 yr old boy. I have known him since he was 10, but he has been out of state the last 2 years. When I first met him I thought he was a sweet loving intelligent boy that I could not wait to be a part of his,(and his 2 brothers) life.

But for the first 8 or 9 months I only spent every other weekend with my husband and his children because we were in different states.(my husband is military). His background briefly: He was born to a military single mother. He lived with a relative until he was about a year old. At which time my husband met his mother and he moved in with them.

At a young age about 3 or 4 he had occasions where he would unlock the doors and leave the house and wander the neighborhood. He also at least 2 seperate times at that young age took all the kitchen knives and put them in his bed, or under his bed (not quite sure of the exact place). When he was about 9-ish he sprayed his 6-7 yr old brother in the face with spray type paint remover (or something caustic) that caused him severe chemical burns on his face and neck.

He was caught several times in the 4th grade stealing things from his teachers desk, stealing things (money, candy, toys, etc) from his brothers. The brothers told me he stole constantly from the 7-11 but did not get caught.

He set a couple trash cans on fire. I was told that when he was about 5 or 6 he was told that my husband was not his natural father. He was then taken to see the grandparents of his natural father (who was decesased) and planned a visit with them, but at some point the grandparents stopped all contact with him.

When I moved in with them everything was fine at first. He tried really hard to make me feel welcome, but it was a strange feeling like he was trying hard to make me feel like a welcome "guest". If that makes any sense. Any change I made to furniture or decoration was resented. But I just chalked it up to the fact that it had been where his mother lived and he clearly wanted them back together. And I thought it was normal for him to be resentful. And then one day, he just changed. It was like someone flipped a switch. He had gotten in a fight with his brother and he became violent with him. Grabbing him around his neck.

I was the only one home and I sent him to his room. From that point on, he showed me very little respect. He just started to act like I didn't exist. I would speak to him and he would pretend not to hear me. He refused to do anything I asked him to unless his father was around when I asked.

When his father was around he would compliment me, when he spoke to me he called me ma'am, I think he even told me he loved me once. Then when his father wasn't around he would quietly (just as a matter of fact, not angry) say he hated me, he was waiting for me to leave, I wasn't going to be around much longer.

Then I started to find these little scraps of paper with symbols all over the house. Most of the time I jsut threw them away. Until one of his brothers told me they were codes from a codebook he had. I decipered a couple of them and they said things like, I hate you, you're a bitch, you're an asshole, I'm going to kill you...they didn't have my name on them but they were left in places like on my desk, in the kitchen, etc.

Then there were episodes where my husband and I were out for the evening and he was fighting with my daughter who is a year younger than him. He held her down in the chair and wouldnt let her move until my oldest son who is the same age pushed him off her. When she tried to go upstairs to get away he followed her and as they argued near the stairs he tried to push her down them. And again my oldest son intervened and held him while she called me.

There were certain people he seemed to adore, his youngest brother who is 6 years younger than him and my husband, and my husbands family. Everyone else he acted like didn't exist unless my husband wasn't around and then he treated like something underneath his shoe except his oldest brother, whom he truly abused and was very voilent with.

At one point an incident happened with him and his oldest brother and he was sent to his room by me. When I went to his room to ask him a question I opened the door to find him in his bed with our cat under the covers with him, with the cat's head sticking out. (at this time he was about 13) I asked him what he was doing, he wouldnt answer, so I pulled back the cover and the cat's lower half was inside his underwear.

I told him I could not deal with this, he had about 5 minutes to go and tell his father what he was doing because I coldn't deal with it. A few mintutes later he came down with a piece of paper that he had written, just matter of factly, I was trying to have sex with the cat. There were several instances where my underwear drawer was gone through, personal items of mine would go missing and were replaced we didnt know exatcly who (although I suspected) until I actually caught him in my bedroom going through my things. He was also caught several times at the age of 12-13 looking at porn online. And when caught...just walked away like he hadn't done anything.... and just did it repeatedly until we had to put locks on the computer and forbid all the kids from using it. Because if they were on and we werent paying attention...he would kick them off and get on porn. And he would show his little brothers things and try to get them looking at it with him.

And when he was caught...he would blame me for setting him up, or he would blame his brother. And it didn't matter how ridiculous his accusation was to the other people, he would refuse to take responsibility. I mean, if had a video of him doing something he swear it wasn't him or that I or his brother had somehow gotten him to do it.

Shortly after the cat incident, the cat died. A young healthy, vaccinated cat laid down one day and died. We just found him dead, no visible injury, like he just went to sleep and didn't wake up. He was just over a year old and was not in any way ill. I became increasingly concerned for myself, all the children, and the baby I was about to have. My husband and I began constantly fighting over him. He was so good at putting on his sweet, loving act for my husband and his family that he rarely was held responsible for anything. He would cry, really cry, and say he was sorry and they wouldn't say anything else.

Even when his actions were bad..It was almost as if they were afraid to punish him. No matter what the situation every one of the other children would get punished and they would literally send him out to play. My husband would do the same thing. Once he and his brother were arguing over a video game and he knocked his brother to the floor on his stomach, put his knee in his back and his hands around his neck and pulled back until we heard him scream and stopped him, the brother got sent to his room for "instigating" a fight and he went back to the video game. It was always like that. So I went and got him and told him to go to his room. My husband and I had a huge fight and I left, I was so upset and I was crying and I just went for a drive.

When I returned my youngest stepson told me that he had overheard him tell my husband that I had hit him, and I had grabbed his neck, and showed him a scratch down his neck and he said I did it. The little one told me that he had heard him tell my husband these things before. Every time I would leave the house he would tell him horrible things that he said I was doing. And he would say oh please please don't say anything to her because it will only make her madder at me. And the younger one had gotten upset because he had told him that if their dad thought I was hitting them then he would kick me out. And wanted the younger brother to scratch himself and say I did it. And the younger one got afraid when I left that I wasn't going to come back and so he decided he should tell me what he was doing. I was beside myself.

Then, he went to visit his mother for the summer. When he returned, out of the blue, he had decided he was going to move with her. I breathed a sigh of relief. While with his mother over the last few years he has been arrested at least 3 times that we know of, once for shoplifting. The other times I don't know, either no one has told my husband what for, or he just does not want me to know. His mother was stationed in Japan and they were sent back to the US because whatever he had done, he was no longer permitted to be on that military base.

There is so much more I can go on about, but this is very long. And I just wanted to touch on the major things. We really have not been kept aware of what has really been going on since he left. All that I do know is that he blames me every time he gets in trouble. Even though I have not even seen him for over 2 years, every time he's caught at something he cries and says somehow it is my fault. And what I've heard from other family members that the excuses he uses to blame me are very far fetched and outlandish....but that they think he really believes what he is saying.

He is very good at being sweet, and loving and caring and he can seem very sincere to those he wants or needs something from.