Who is redeemable?

Discussing Shitlord with a good friend who has had some experience dating a psychopath and he made the observation that I am entirely cut-and-pasting without crediting him:

Well, the two likely scenarios I am entertaining are; 1) Full blown manipulative sociopath 2) Stacked Pavlovian responses - he knows that an action often gets him the desired result, but not why

He leaned slight toward the second.   I lean rather strongly to the second.  But I am too full of affection for Shitlord to be a fair judge.

I really want there to be a redeemable person behind all the very shitty behaviour inflicted on me.