Roots of narcissism

[Ami]

When people are new on this forum sometimes they can't take the fighting that we who have fought many fights can. He is a big boy  but in a lot of pain, too, so I said what I felt, Izzy.                         Ami

Duly noted Ami, so stay out of it!
Izzy

Izzy,  If you want me to stay out of stuff that I don't think is right, you will have to get a No Contact with me.  Until then, I will give my opinion as respectfully as I can.       Ami

PS I really don't like No Contacts and I hope you don't do that!

[CB123]

Poly,

You are very honest about your feelings about your wife and why you think you are married at this point, and you obviously think it was a huge mistake.  Do you know what she thinks of the situation?  Has she ever expressed unhappiness with your marriage or a wish for marriage counseling?  Does she know that you do things pretty much just for sexual favors with her?

Does she, or anyone, know that you are suicidal?  Have you thought about calling a suicide prevention hotline just to talk to someone about how you feel?  I agree that you need a long term plan, but can you create a short-term intervention that would give you some face to face interaction and a place to express yourself?

When you come up with a diagnosis of narcissism for yourself, how did you arrive at that conclusion?  Did you do your own reading on the internet or did someone diagnose you?  If you diagnosed yourself, did you look at the other possible personality disorders?  How did you decide that none of those fit and that narcissism does?  Have you thought about the possibility of an organic problem such as bipolar?  Would you consider being evaluated by a professional to see if there is an organic solution to the way you feel?  I just wonder if you have been exhaustive, or allowed someone else to be exhaustive on your behalf, to see what is really going on. 

I think you may have arrived at a conclusion to quickly--my computer is being wacko, so I will end here...but would like to see you respond to my questions.  CB

[Ami]

Just my thoughts, CB and you can get a No Contact with me if you wish, but did you ever think a person on the brink of suicide MIGHT not want to be interrogated like that?         Ami

[CB123]

Ami,

It wasnt an interrogation.

My understanding of Polymath is that he appreciates the opportunity to explain where he is coming from.  He also has had it up to here with hysterical mother-figures.  I could respond to him in a way that expresses my fears and issues, or I can respond in a way that (I hope, if I am understanding him correctly), feels good to him.  I have complete confidence in his ability to let me know if I am in left field.  I have found his writing to be insightful and direct.

I guess my question for you is why you feel as though you need to protect him from so many people on the board?  Polymath is troubled, true, but he is not a little boy.  He has communicated with us in a way that belies his feeling that he is inadequate as an adult male.  Treating him like a child seems, to me, to be perpetuating the kind of treatment he feels he has received from his mother.

I am confident that Dr. G. is watching this situation carefully and that there is much more going on behind the scenes than we are aware.  I dont pretend that I can be the perfect counsellor, I am not trained for that.  I am simply giving a troubled person a chance to express himself more fully--the whole point of the voicelessness board.

And no I am not interested in going No Contact.  Not my style.

CB

[polymath]

Its like this guys, when a child is forced to go into the adults world to find recognition, when the adults in the child's world do not have the ability to go into the child's world, for whatever reason, it tells the child they do not matter. If not one adult goes into the child's world, the child feels invisible. And I don't mean feels like emotional feeling but a deep psychological wound that says 'I do not matter to anyone in this world'. That is what an only child with no father or extended family males around and a self-absorbed mother gets stuck with. Most overdoses, alcohol-related deaths, and other deaths that aren't labeled 'suicides' are this. If a child can just have one person who has the ability and desire to enter the child's world, they can make it. Richard Pryor is a great example. The product of prostitute and her pimp, his parents were not at all 'there' for him but his grandmother who ran the whore house took just enough real interest in him to give him that light in his soul. We almost lost him to drugs and that burning incident but he had just enough light to survive that period and thrive.

Those of us who didn't have a single person to do that are doomed to end their life tragically. For those cases, there is no conversation, drug, therapy technique that will take that tape out of their head and replace it with something more sane. I know this all is very hard to believe but is the way it is.

[polymath]

No offense Ami but CB is exactly right. The maternal "let me take away your pain for you" doesn't work with an N. We see it has weakness and prey on it. Many times I, an thousands of other men have used that behavior against a woman just to get them in bed. It feeds a woman's ego to think she can 'save' a man and an N will use that as a tool against them.

I'm sorry to sound so harsh, its just where I am right now.

[Ami]

Dear RS
 It is TOTALLY OK. I am glad you were honest with me. I felt unsure of what to do so was following my gut but now I will back off.
                                     Ami



PS It was not harsh just honest and that is the MOST important thing for any of us!



                                                                         

[polymath]

Thanks Ami. You get it.

CB, thats exactly what I'm saying and not its not a problem. I'm losing hope that what was done can be undone. I went through a deep depression at age 19 when a girl I was dating broke up with me. She made the statement "your just kind of there." That statement was right on and it sent me spiraling. I then let my grandmother and mother push me toward a Christian counseling center. Imagine them telling me that I needed counseling but it just had to be religious because only God could save me. While in an inpatient center I saw people with what I thought were much bigger problems so I told them to let me out, I was OK.

Imagine obsessively idealizing every other human on the planet, wishing to be them, seeing the personality they have, the light within them, the balance they have between your OK and I'm OK. That is deep N. As I age and sink in this depression, the energy to just keep my eyes going is fading. My daughter will ask my why I'm staring at her. Its not because Im so sick I want to have sex with her, its that my energy is do depleted, when I get to a persons face I just want to stare and nod and agree, with no energy to put forth to the interaction. That equals withdrawal.

I know I'm not the only one and there is nothing at all new under the son, that little boys have had this done to them since the dawn of recorded history. I just cant find one who made it through. Howard Hughes and Elvis are the most famous examples of what this is all about. They fit my childhood profile perfectly and look what happened to them. They faded away around age 40 because they were half a man with no father figure at all and a mother that held on to them for dear life. A six year old boy in our neighborhood has the same problem. I stepped in last week and taught the poor boy how to ride a bike. He is afraid of his own shadow and talks about himself all the time. I see me perfectly in this boy.

Man I sure can go on and on, huh?

[Izzy_*now*]

Hi polymath

That is wonderful that you spotted problems in that little boy, and set out to help him. How did that make you feel? So he isn't voiceless and talks about himself. Is it good talk or is he self-depracating? Are you able to allay some of his fears? or is he not aware yet?... if you feel he is a 'much younger you', can you find words to help him feel worthy?

You express yourself so understandably here, so can you do it in person about preferable thoughts?
Izzy

[Ami]

Dear Polymath
 You really helped me by telling me to back off. I was getting you confused with Scott and was trying to save him by saving you.
  I feel much better after what you said!          Ami

[Ami]

Dear CB
   I guess we have s/thing in common. No Contact is not my style either.                 Ami

[Hopalong]

Hi Poly,

Try clinical hypnotherapy? I believe part of what's tormenting you is your belief that you can't do anything about what you think.

You have a chain of obsessive, negative, self-loathing thoughts and you believe they're like rain, you can't stop them from running endlessly through your mind.

I believe that's not true. Actually, I know it is. But I didn't discover that until I was in my 50s.

You could find out about this. It is hope.

No matter how convinced you are of your formula (the specifics of Poly's childhood + this + that = no hope), you are intelligent and imaginative enough to know you could be wrong.

And intelligent enough to persist. If you investigate methods of literally changing your thoughts, and do the practice that is known to work (hopefully with a trained certified hypnotherapist) ... you will change that script.

You won't just save your life. You'll save your mind. And once you begin, you will get a breath of hope. And that keeps you going. And in time, you look back, and you see how disordered you were (in your hopelessness), and you are so very glad that you stayed alive.

I hope you will, Poly.

(If you are addicted to pornography, there is help for that. So many good human beings've had -- and be helped out of -- that addiction and are still good human beings. It's a strange set of forces, and absences, and cultural messages -- and they have overwhelmed many men. Even some women.)

If I guessed wrong about that, forgive me. But I though it was worth saying to you, just in case that's it, I do not devalue you for it. (I loathe the pornography industry but have no loathing for the humans who get stuck in it.)

Hops

[polymath]

Thanks hops, I'll look into it. I would think if it worked so well many more people would be OK but again, thanks.

About porn, I rarely seek it out. If it is put in front of me I will fixate on it for a few minutes (much longer as a younger man, but less so now).

One positive, I seem to be getting a sense that yes, this body, this life, this person, has value in the eyes of God. My intellectual dilemma is becoming one of, "OK God, if your real, you've got to have something better in store for tormented souls like myself so I'm coming to see you." But yes, I get that as very selfish, as opposed to trying to correct the wrong and stupid beliefs for the benefit of my children. That is the quandary I'm in.

[polymath]

but the negative ying to that yang is my study of Howard Hughes, the most famous man I've found who shares my background. Yes his father was more in the picture than mine but his dad was consumed with running a billion dollar business while his mother was way too close to Howard, bathing him when he could bath himself for example. I don't have any memories of anything that wierd but the basic template is the same. I'm slipping into that same abyss of movies and television, agorophobia, focus on my own bodily functions, no energy, etc. If a billionaire like Hughes couldn't find away out, whats the chance there is one.

[Hopalong]

Hughes' money and lifestyle isolated and trapped him more deeply.

(Like Jackson's.)

Seriously. Money doesn't give mental health.

It reduces stress, for sure.

But on the other side of the coin, the needs of your family are an enormous reason for you to be here.

There are methods. You can find them. Keep fighting.

You've got some spirit.

Hops