Please Note: There are potential triggers in this post, on the topic of self- harm.

I'm a new member, and have primarily come here for emotional support and a sense of community in dealing with my loved one's multitude of psychological issues stemming from many years of child abuse as well as 20 solid years of incarceration on top of that. He has been diagnosed with antisocial personality disorder, PTSD, and now bipolar disorder (the latter of which I also have, but mine is very well managed).
It's been an impossible task to find reading materials on antisocial personality disorder that don't entirely demonize those who have it. As someone who deeply loves such a person (with eyes wide open... I'm not a poor naive sap by any stretch of the emotion), I find this irritating and disheartening.
I love this guy SO MUCH it seems unreal. And this is no fly- by- night thing, as we've been together for seven months now. (I realize that's not long in the grand scheme of things, but long enough for either of us to become disillusioned, if we were going to.) Together, at his own insistence, he and I are exploring all that has kept him closed off from the world for so long. He is feeling things that he's never felt before... things that the average person would consider joyous, even blissful, but which have been really scary and challenging for him.
I have recently noted a cycle of extreme jealousy and possessiveness that seems to erupt anytime I even mention talking to another male. As a result of this, we have both mutually decided to "just be friends" for now... Although what this means for a deep and passionate love like ours is anyone's guess.
Additionally, we've been talking about the "triggers of his psychopathy" (his words, not mine- I swear I'm not name- calling) and the childhood trauma that led to his extremely violent criminal past for which he's now serving 3 consecutive life sentences. He does have a therapist, and now a team of doctors working with him, but he's found it a tremendous relief to be entirely open with me about his experiences and to feel loved for the first time in his life. He has desperately wanted to share himself with someone and be understood.
However it seems that all this openness and the experience of being in a loving relationship for the first time in his life has unearthed some extremely painful long- buried trauma. As a result... he literally and completely castrated himself with a razor last Friday, and has been hospitalized ever since.

YOu didn't see that coming? Well, neither did I.

Obviously I'm feeling a multitude of different things about this, none of them pleasant. I had no idea his illness was so severe that he would be capable of such drastic self- mutilation. And he felt absolutely nothing physically while he was doing it. He was just numb, in a completely dissociative state.
I feel really guilty of course, because clearly we shouldn't have been discussing his triggers if they were putting him in such a dark place. I let him decide what to tell me, but perhaps I should not have encouraged this. I would never have wanted this to happen, and am totally horrified by the whole thing.

Mostly I'm just here to introduce myself and tell my story, in the hopes of building a supportive network of understanding friends who have been through something similar (although I suppose not much is really similar to THIS...). I do have a couple of questions for members of this forum, however:

1) What resources exist for those who love and want to understand someone with antisocial personality disorder, without demonizing them? Mostly I want actual hardcopy books, if they exist. I'm old school like that.

2) To those of you who have antisocial personality disorder... are you working to develop empathy? Do you find that your empathy and emotional coldness tend to fluctuate? Do you perceive "triggers" that provoke remorseless, even violent impulses for you? Are these rooted to past trauma?

3) Also, for those of you who have antisocial personality disorder AND have loved someone, OR those of you who (like me) love someone with this disorder: what was/ is that first experience of love like, if you experienced it in adulthood? My guy is 49 years old and has basically been institutionalized for most of his life. He's experiencing all of these loving emotions for the first time and it is really freaking him out, particularly with the jealousy issue.

There's much that I don't understand here. And while yes, my guy does have a team of doctors working with him AND he's currently hospitalized in a very safe environment, I DO think that my being here for him is important. Moreover, I love him and cannot simply go away.

Thanks for listening. I hope to find my friends here, because this is really lonely and isolating.

Loki's Iarnvidia