Author Topic: Do narcissists suffer?  (Read 7508 times)

Lupita

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Do narcissists suffer?
« on: November 26, 2010, 07:02:30 AM »
They always seem happy, or at least they look well. They are always busy. Do they suffer?

Do they feel pain? I mean, sadness, remourse, guilt?

M was always happy, I am always afraid. fear does not go away. M is always potent, powerful, many friends, I am always alone, lonely.

I found this in the internet about pain. I think that M does not suffer at all, just like my mother. Am I dehumanizing them? I am correct?

What do you know about this? Do narcissists suffer?

http://www.users.globalnet.co.uk/~straus/Narciss.html

Lupita

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Re: Do narcissists suffer?
« Reply #1 on: November 26, 2010, 07:15:57 AM »
From the same article, how we create people who think they need to cry louder to be heard. We do it with our children by not giving them proper care.
I know that my mother totally rejected me. I was told by my own mother, my grand mother, aunts, etc. She did not want to hug me.


But if no response came to the infant’s cries, then what? Some infants may resume their explorations and try to find a way back to safety. Others may completely go to pieces and cry in helplessness until either someone came to their aid, they became exhausted, or they shut down the feeling. In the former case the whole experience may be strengthening, building confidence for the future. In the latter case it may be severely demoralising, leading to feelings of helplessness and the consolidation of a yearning for the infant’s lost sense of safety and belonging.

In the former case the infant, confronted with an entirely new environmental demand, would have wavered between the old and the new, and then risen to the challenge, leaving the old pattern behind and incorporating her needs into a new behavioural strategy. Primal pain would have played a positive part in this example of growth by overwhelming the clinging onto the past, but not the organism as a whole. In the latter case, because the infant, for whatever reason, was unable to go forward, the primal pain just grew and grew, strengthening the imprint of the old pattern whilst at the same time engendering feelings of failure and hopelessness. The infant would have become fixated on primal pain.

In each case the different sets of feelings produce entirely different sets of expectations. The first infant becomes forward looking and adventurous. The second becomes reluctant to face the future, hates newness, and continually clings to the golden age of its past, before the pain of this world appeared. The earlier the onset of overwhelming pain the more ancient the period for which the infant yearns.


sKePTiKal

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Re: Do narcissists suffer?
« Reply #2 on: November 26, 2010, 09:38:30 AM »
Quote
The infant would have become fixated on primal pain.

This is very interesting to me, Lupita; something I know a bit about firsthand. And I think, for you, it's a huge flashing neon-sign of a clue to explore and investigate. They seem almost inseparable at times; but they aren't, really. And because they can be addressed separately - worked on separately - I think it's easier to change both, ultimately.

One thing about pain, that's occurred to me from our grieving process for MIL... it's possible to get to the end of the experience of pain and then the opportunity arises to focus all of one's self on being and choosing "something else".

But what I just wrote is: you have to experience it all - the whole enchilada - until it has absolutely nothing else to offer you, of use in healing. Even if the pain goes all the way back to infanthood... and seems to be such a fundamental part of "who you are"... it is possible to get "done with it" and then change - letting go that part of who you are. I've come to understand that this is just as natural in our growing, aging.... as the changes that happen to our body. Some of us, just never got the memo on that until we found ourselves later in life - educated, successful, responsible and completely totally miserable and feeling helpless to know "what was wrong with us". Fortunately, there is nothing wrong with US...

... we feel for others; ourselves; and we can change...

the people of this world who created those kinds of wounds - can't - or won't.

So: I think you'll be just fine Lupita. Be kind to yourself! If you can only do 1 thing a day for a while - only do 1 thing. Sleep, cry, eat... get out & enjoy the day... do whatever feels like "the thing to do" right now. Don't push yourself to study if your brain can't focus on it. Wait a few more days - then try. Don't even try to analyze what happened with M right now. Don't second guess yourself; if you felt this was the right decision - then it IS. Later on, if you change your mind - you are allowed to change your mind!

Don't make any Black & White rules about anything... realize that there's no "right way" for anything to be - and that this fact is in itself, the "perfection" of this world.
Success is never final, failure is never fatal.

towrite

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Re: Do narcissists suffer?
« Reply #3 on: November 26, 2010, 10:17:39 AM »
I think narcissists suffer from fear - the fear of discovering they are empty without a constant food supply. But I guess they sta so busy looking for a supply they don't have any down time to feel the fear. IMO.

Lup, I can relate to your fear. I am alone, lonely, too.
"An unexamined life is a wasted life."
                                  Socrates
Time wounds all heels.

Lupita

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Re: Do narcissists suffer?
« Reply #4 on: November 27, 2010, 11:49:58 AM »
No, they do not suffer. My cousin 33 years old died and my mother thought that lucky my aunt that was going to get so much attention. I said, do you want to be in her place? and she said, at least the pain would stop. I do not know what pain, i guess the pain of having me alive.

The next day she talks to me as if nothing happened.

M abandoned me for Thanks Giving, kicked me out of his house and today he wrote me that he wants me back. I said that I do not have plans to go to his house in a long time. For him, nothing has happened. All the suffering i had in my throat closing and lack of breathing for three days, were nothing to him.

No, they do not suffer. Thay always have something to do. They recover too fast from everything. They just suffer if it is something about them.

They do not feel anything. Their brain are wired in a different way. That is why they react in a different way.

CB123

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Re: Do narcissists suffer?
« Reply #5 on: November 27, 2010, 05:19:01 PM »
Lupe,

I think that the answer to your question requires a clear definition of terms:  there are narcissists who are sociopaths...and, no, I dont think they suffer--except when they have to face the consequences of their behavior (and sometimes, I am not even sure about that).  Every day narcissists (that run a gamut in terms of degree of narcissism) can suffer a LOT, imo.

They need mirroring so desperately that when they are between "victims", they are pretty miserable.  That is, when their primary "mirror" has caught on and is no longer cooperating, and they havent yet found a replacement. 

My experience has shown me that there is no way I can "read the mind" of someone else, and their attempts at looking fine and unhurt can be very effective in making me think that they are not bothered at all and that I am the only one suffering. 

The one thing I know is that you are not seeing your own status as "victim" correctly.  You already have had escorts and the prospect of escorts, friends to go to movies with, a son who loves you and was able to cause you to "forget" for awhile.  I dont see you as alone at all--and that's a GOOD thing.  The BAD thing is that you see yourself as alone, abandoned, without a friend in the world.  You are telling yourself a truth that I think you DO believe, but it isnt true.  I think the most important thing you can do as the next step in your healing is to discover what this "story" is giving to you that you need? 

I think its really, really, really important to know the answer to that question.

Love
cb
When they are older and telling their own children about their grandmother, they will be able to say that she stood in the storm, and when the wind did not blow her way -- and it surely has not -- she adjusted her sails.  Elizabeth Edwards 2010