How to Spot a Dangerous Man - The Emotional Predator [Part 8/10]

Previous Post: The Abusive or Violent Man

The emotional predator

❋ has a natural instinct for sensing vulnerable or “sensitive” women

❋ senses women with low self-esteem

❋ senses women with weak emotional and sexual boundaries

❋ senses women who want or require relationships in order to feel needed or fulfilled

❋ senses women who are bored, lonely, or needy

❋ senses women who are on the rebound from having been recently dumped, divorced, emotionally ignored, or wounded

❋ senses women’s body and eye language

❋ listens closely to what a woman says in order to pick up clues he can use in later conversations

❋ senses unfulfilled physical-intimacy needs and sexual needs

❋ creates a sense of fun and mystique to draw you in

❋ is smooth and seems to have all the right lines and insights into you

❋ comes on fast and strong and sweeps you off your feet

❋ is overly interested in every detail of your life

❋ wants to move in together or get married quickly

❋ implies that he “knows” you well before he has spent enough time to really get to know you

❋ pushes you to quickly disclose a lot about yourself to him

❋ tries to fulfill your physical, financial, or emotional needs

❋ seeks to fill roles in your life, such as advisor, father figure, spiritual leader, mentor

❋ is overly helpful, comforting, and understanding

❋ has the exact same interests, values, hobbies, etc., that you do

❋ is a chameleon who can be all things to all people

The "Your Defense Strategy" section of this chapter recommends that instead of talking too much about personal details to a man you don't know, you "turn the tables and ask open-ended questions yourself... Monitor how he acts when you don’t give him the information he is trying to get from you. Does he simply 'work harder' to try to get you to talk about yourself?" A favorite quote of mine from this entire book is "[r]emember also that being 'swept off your feet' simply means you are no longer grounded. That is, you no longer have your feet firmly planted on the ground so you can face reality eyeball to eyeball."

This chapter mentions that a large part of why men are able to make this strategy work is that they are able to make themselves appear like high-value, emotionally attentive partners. One general point of this book is to be well-attuned to your warning system - if a man gives you the idea he fits any or multiple of these dangerous categories, get out.

To open up about my own experience, it was an emotional predator who taught me this lesson. He was the first (and to this day, only) person I ever dated. I had this book on my reading list for a long time, but finally decided to actually read it once he had expressed interest in me. I went into it thinking that he wouldn't be the kind of man this book was about, that this would just be an extra safety measure. Upon reading this chapter, though, I had the thought hit me of "oh ****, is this chapter talking about him?" Despite the fact that this book explicitly warned against this, I still proceeded. I made excuses. I thought, "well, even though the thought of him crossed this mind while reading this chapter, and he definitely seems to tick a lot of these boxes, he still said he wants to take things slowly, so I'm not sure it's fully accurate." I asked myself, "can I really judge him for his problems if he's actively in therapy?" I clung to him because he claimed to be porn-free (a clearly defined standard I've had since before I discovered FDS), and I made the mistake of letting a scarcity mentality get to me. He later would go on to literally describe himself as manipulative, along with saying other truly disturbing things to me that I don't intend on repeating for the sake of protecting my own privacy. Thankfully, I broke up with him in a whirwind of panic two days after he asked me to be his girlfriend, and I managed to get a clean break from him before he actually did anything harmful to me.

This applies to all sorts of dangerous men, not just the emotional predators (I just mention it here due to my experiences): Trust your warning system. Don't make excuses or stick around for the good when the bad is clearly present.