How do gender and birth order interact with NPD?

[roses in her eyes]

Along the lines of SunBlue's thread on sibs and how a N parent can affect each differently, I've been thinking more about not just the differences, but the patterns associated with both gender (relative to the NP) and birth order.

Some of this seems intuitive, but I don't know for sure. I'd love to hear what you guys think of the following observations & insights I've had on this topic:

When the NP is the same gender as the child, it seems to result more in abuse, either physical or emotional. Partly because it seems easier for the NP to "identify" with the child of the same gender, since in reality he or she CAN only really identify with him or herself.  My older NPD sister actually consoled my younger sister when she found out her first baby would be a boy. She told her "I'm so glad I only have girls." The way my younger sister described it, it almost sounded like my NPD sister "chose" to have girls like she had a choice. Could my sister have selectively aborted a son? I wouldn't put it past her.

One more anecdote about my older NPD sister (she's a case study by herself!).  Before she met her husband, she was actually best friends with his sister.  They appear to have a NM themselves, of course. So the 2nd born/1st daughter of a NM became close friends with my NS. It was a close, but short-lived friendship and finally ended, but not before my sister was introduced to her brother.  They were to be married shortly thereafter. 


As for firstborns, again it seems to be a critical factor in that they become the initial "experiment" of their NP's. It no doubt starts with a surge in power and self-gratification before it turns to jealousy and abuse as the child starts to grow-up.  Same gender / first-born, therefore seems like an evil recipe for duplicating a NP.

For the opposite gendered child of the NP, I think neglect and disinterest are driven by the utter inability of the NP to identify with the child. Maybe I'm being too literal, but for some N's they are so pathological that I'm really not being too literal!  In my personal case, I know that it was also my incredible ability to create my own voice at a young age in the face of such indifference and abuse. For this reason I have always seemed "inscrutable" to my NM.  My younger sister (the 4th and youngest child) is also "gifted" in terms of her ability to SEE THIS STUFF LIKE I DO, so it seems that she was able to escape my NM's influence and also became "weird" like me. When my younger sister was around 6, my NM went so far as to actually open a children's clothing boutique (that her father gave her the money to start), so that she could among other things, outfit my younger sister like an expensive doll.  It is difficult to tell whether she did it more to torture my older sister who had moved on to using the very same GF to shower herself with gifts (she was college age at this point.) My maternal GF was actually supplying 3 generations of NPD's simultaneously! His wife, daughter, and granddaughter. At least my little sister escaped the curse.

RIHE

[Bella_French]

Hi roses, That was not the case in our family of 6 siblings, but I can see how it could work out that way.

In our family, the N was our mother,and  the way each sibling `turned out'  came down to personality as well as relative isolation during the abuse. For example, my sister and I were the eldest children, and we shared a room together whilst growing up. We were fully aware that we were being abused and we supported one another through those years. Also, our mother was frequently  absent due to her affairs, and when she WAS home, she was overwhelmed with having a business to run and 6 children to care for. Her attention seemed to be scattered all over the place, so we managed to escape the full focus of her need to enmesh and abuse.

However some of my siblings were much more isolated, such as the youngest child when all the other siblings had left home, and our middle sister. Of all of us, they were the most damaged.

Only my brothers (who were spoilt, never disciplined, and treated as though they were a class above female siblings)  seem to have NPD (although one is more like a psychopath than an N).

X Bella

[roses in her eyes]

Thanks for sharing Bella. I guess the pathologic part can be passed along to any child.  My older sister was NPD from an early age, now that I think of it.  There's the story of how she actually tore off the scab from my bellybutton when I was but a day or two old! Of course, where the hell my NM was at the time has never come up. Again, you would think my NM would be EMBARRASSED to tell me such stories, but she has no clue.

[Bella_French]

Thanks for sharing Bella. I guess the pathologic part can be passed along to any child.  My older sister was NPD from an early age, now that I think of it.  There's the story of how she actually tore off the scab from my bellybutton when I was but a day or two old! Of course, where the hell my NM was at the time has never come up. Again, you would think my NM would be EMBARRASSED to tell me such stories, but she has no clue.

Dear roses, I am really sorry to hear about your N sister. Just the thought of one my sisters being an N really disturbs me, as they were such a  source of comfort and love when I was a child. You have my sympathy for what you went through.

I just had another thought about this which might fit with your theory a bit better. Something I had not considered, was the fact that although i am my mother's first born, I am not the product of my  mother's current marriage. Mum divorced my father, and I take after his side of the family, not hers.

Perhaps I remind her of `him' and thats why she rejected me as her potential clone? I know that to this day, she hates him, and even when we were youngm she made up a rude name for him and wouldn't let us call him by any other name.

 Her current marriage produced one child, my youngest sister. My mother is, and always has been, totally enmeshed with her life.

This all kind of fits with what you are saying, doesn't it?

X bella