I would like to believe it was his conscious that was at work, I believe RA knew the State had him dead to right's after he read their Discovery Dump, and he needed to get his story out to his Wife and Mom before it became public.
"Will you still love me even though I killed those girls" codependency stuff. To do what he did and leave Abby and Libby the way that he did, it's hard for me to think RA had a conscious at all.
He had been living with it just fine for over 5+ years. Hiding in plain sight. <sigh>
JMO