My father was diagnosed as anti-social personality disorder, in other words he's a sociopath.
He's a functional human mostly. When he first started developing symptoms he basically ruined what at the time was a happy life, successful business owner, married with kids. I'd love to give you the gory details but this isn't the story of my childhood but he made some poor business decisions and got into debt but went to great lengths to hide it. Lengths such as cutting the phone lines so creditors couldn't call (this was the 80's you could literally cut phone lines), using the same car as collateral on bank loans and personal loans, having my mothers signature forged on mortgages, if there was a lie he could come up with he used it. This didn't end well, bankruptcy, divorce, no friends or family speaking to him, oh and the biggie, felony tax evasion.
He avoided jail time by agreeing to inpatient mental health treatment as he was also suicidal. For the first week or so even the doctors thought he was perfectly fine and just "stressed". Then they realized he was also lying to them. That's when he got the diagnosis. He never received any follow up care after he was released, has never taken meds.
He got his life together and has another successful career and has remarried. Has lots of friends. He's very charming and charismatic which was actually part of his diagnosis, it describes him saying "manipulates with wit and charm". I see it in my relationship with him which is strained. He's estranged from my sister and she quit speaking to him several years ago, it was the second time she cut contact with him. My brothers relationship with him isn't much better than mine. He's either happy with his life or has convinced himself he is to the point he believes it.
In other words being a sociopath has had a very negative impact on him. He lost a business, his family, he had friends who died without ever speaking to him again. However he's high functioning and uses certain sociopath tendencies to his advantage. He can lie better than any politician. Sometimes even I still fall for it. I also think he's capable of deluding himself to the point of ignoring anything negative in his life. He also pretends like he isn't a sociopath. The one time we discussed his inpatient treatment he said he told the doctors what they wanted to hear to stay out of trouble. But I've read the file when I got a copy for my psychiatrist to show the family history of mental illness and he was clearly unstable at the time and very suicidal.
