A Narcissist's Favorite Things?

[KayZee]

Hi everyone,

So I don't know whether this is therapeutic or not.  (I know part of recovering from an N parent is focusing on what you, the adult child, like and enjoy.)  Still, our preferences sometimes speak volumes about us and I find myself wondering what your N's favorite books, movies, songs etc are?  And whether these favorites are telling?

My NM loves the movie Mermaids, and totally doesn't get that Cher's character is psychologically damaging her children in it.  To NM, Mermaids is an ideal existence: stylish, sexy glamorous mother has two daughters who "adore" and "idolize" her and she doesn't even really have to share them with any sort of father figure.  NM thinks it's so wonderful and exotic that Cher's character only feeds her daughters hors d'oeuvres.  In my childhood house, snacks were revered and meals were looked down upon.  NM "doesn't enjoy cooking."  Why would she?  Cooking involves giving something to others: flavor, comfort, nourishment.  Also, NM has always envisioned herself as Cher.  This seems to be a lifelong thing, predating the births of my sister and me.

NM also loves the Dixie Chicks song "Not Ready to Make Nice," not surprising as her favorite past-time is nursing grudges.

When I was a kid, NM's favorite Christmas movie is that one with Dolly Parton in it.  What's it called?  Smokey Mountain Christmas?  Only, the weirdest part was, it was like NM identified with the witch instead of Dolly Parton.  The witch in it has this line: "And you will be mine forever!"  NM adopted this line and would say it on occasion, year round, to me.  It was always accompanied some teasing nastiness.

That makes me think of another one.  Seems like NM collected lines of dialogue from movie villains.  From the movie Annie, NM stole this line from Annie's evil foster mother: "You had better make it shine like the top of the Chrysler Building!"  NM would repeat this one whenever she was bossing me through some household chore.  If I was dusting the furniture, it was supposed to shine like the top of the Chrysler Building, etc.

Anyway, I'd love to hear your stories and experiences.

- Kay

[JustKathy]

Seems like NM collected lines of dialogue from movie villains.

My NM does this. She has no education to speak of (I don't think she even graduated HS), so everything she knows, she learned from television and movies. She would quote lines from movies as if they were her own original thoughts. I actually think she got reality confused with fiction and may have believed that they were her own thoughts. She also stole plots from TV shows and turned them into dramatic stories of things that happened to her in real life. It was not unusual to hear a story of a murder that happened in the neighbourhood, only to realize that she had stolen it from an episode of "Law and Order."

As for her favorite things, her movie and music choices were all things that made her look cultured and intellectual (they may not have been her true favourites, but she told everyone that to make her look educated). She hated popular music and would insist that we only listen to classical music growing up. I had to sneak records into my room if I wanted to listen to "evil" rock n' roll. She also had extreme hang-ups about things that are "dirty," meaning anything that had sex in it. She only watched Disney movies or "family" films. I think her favourite was probably "The Sound Of Music." Again, I'm not sure if she actually liked these movies or if she was just using them them to force "wholesome" entertainment down our throats. As for TV, again the snobbery. She's one of those who tells people, "I only watch PBS." Now, that said, I know she obsessively watches crime dramas (she once volunteered at the local police station and believed that she was a cop because she had a BADGE - look out, she was SOMEBODY). She doesn't admit to this though. She'll make a big production out of watching something educational, then run off to her room and watch CSI.

[SilverLining]

I sure see a lot of my FOO in these comments.  My father doesn't pick up dialogue from movies, but he does co-opt lines from books and present them as if they are his own ideas and thoughts.  His favorite things are all "high brow" stuff.  He claims to watch only PBS, and only reads important or classic books.  He watches a lot of movies, but then claims to hate just about every one of them because they showed something he considers "unrealistic".  He gets a charge out of being a movie critic.  Movies are an easy thing to criticize without any fear of repercussion. 

In the last couple of years, he's suddenly become a self proclaimed expert on classical music, which is really kind of weird since he's also going deaf.   

My N grandfather operated the same way.  I remember him visiting one time when I was about 11 years old.  Instead of doing things  with his grandchildren, he sat in a chair and read "important" books.     
 

[KayZee]

N-nastiness aside, it's kind of heartbreaking, isn't it?  That a person could have such scant self-worth (and so little idea how to relate to other people) that they'd spend their whole life quoting books and movies, never daring to go off-script?

My GC-sis has done the same thing since she was very small.  NM used to let 5-year-old GC spend six to eight hours a day in the basement alone, watching the same VHS tapes over and over and over again.  I suspect it turned into a kind of coping mechanism.  Grown GC-sis does the same thing today, watching box sets of Friends over and over, then working the cast's mannerisms and dialogue into her every day life. 

Silverlining, that makes me very sad to hear about your grandfather's visits.  Makes me wish I could shake these darn N's and say, "If you really want to impress little kids, don't sit around and read Tolstoy, get on the dang floor and PLAY WITH THEM!"

Kathy, your NM's failure to distinguish between real life and fantasy sounds terrifying.  Particularly the part about the badge!  Good lord!  My GC-sis is like this too; she hangs out with a lot of cops and sort of thinks/acts like she's one too.  Strange how they think aligning themselves with the law makes them above the law or something.

Anyway, thank you for the stories and the dash of humor.  These days I'm laughing to keep from crying/puking.

Kay x

[SilverLining]

Silverlining, that makes me very sad to hear about your grandfather's visits.  Makes me wish I could shake these darn N's and say, "If you really want to impress little kids, don't sit around and read Tolstoy, get on the dang floor and PLAY WITH THEM!"

Hi KayZee.  That's it exactly.  I only saw my grandfather about 10 times in my life.  Seeing and interacting with the grandchildren wasn't a big concern, until he retired, moved off into the woods and started begging relatives to come visit and listen to his accumulated wisdom.   He sat in his chair for 20 years reading important books, then died unhappy and alone.   

Here's another question on the topic of likes and dislikes.  How many find their N's turn personal preferences and foibles into absolute standards of quality?  My father only likes high brow books, music, movies e.t.c..  And in a convenient self reinforcing loop, what he likes then gets defined as important and high quality.   He'll read a book, then push it on others.   If the other hasn't read it, well then they can't possibly understand the topic the way he does.   It's part of a complex game to keep his fragile sense of superiority intact. 

[KayZee]

He'll read a book, then push it on others.   If the other hasn't read it, well then they can't possibly understand the topic the way he does.   It's part of a complex game to keep his fragile sense of superiority intact. 

God, that sounds absolutely infuriating and boring at the same time!  (Boring, in the sense, that N's just drone on and on about the same stuff every time a person spends time with them.  No real conversation, just monologue about whatever it is they think gives them importance.)  I really feel for you, S.L.

My NM doesn't really play the highbrow thing.  She actively scorns anything and anyone that's too academic.  But she's a total shopping addict, who loves to push her "sense of style and design" on other people.  Forces all sorts of hoarder-y collections, old furniture, crap laying around her house on me (in her eyes, these are "gifts of great value" or "family heirlooms," although none belonged to grandparents, great aunts, anyone but her)  Buys my GC-sis and I clothes just like hers.  If I don't fall all over myself, noticing the new things she's purchased or gushing about what a great discount she bought on heaps of clearance items, then she goes: "What do you know?  You have no taste."

This kind of behavior makes me really sad (NM unconsciously takes the phrase "I shop therefore I am" literally) and serious anxious (about the money she's spending when my father has been out of work for a decade).  But it's easy to trace back...  My NGrandmother was nasty to NM up until the day a teenaged NM began working in retail and earning an employee discount.  NM must have brought home all sorts of clothes for NGM who then gave her little tastes of "love" and "approval."

Maybe highbrow Ns had a similar childhood situation?  Parents who "loved" them on the condition that they were brainy?  On the flip side, these Ns might have used all their intellectual B.S. as a defense mechanism from family dysfunction?  I.e., "You can't hurt me because you're not as smart as I am."  That kind of thing?

[SilverLining]

My NM doesn't really play the highbrow thing.  She actively scorns anything and anyone that's too academic.  But she's a total shopping addict, who loves to push her "sense of style and design" on other people.  Forces all sorts of hoarder-y collections, old furniture, crap laying around her house on me (in her eyes, these are "gifts of great value" or "family heirlooms," although none belonged to grandparents, great aunts, anyone but her)  Buys my GC-sis and I clothes just like hers.  If I don't fall all over myself, noticing the new things she's purchased or gushing about what a great discount she bought on heaps of clearance items, then she goes: "What do you know?  You have no taste."

Ah so it looks like she pushes her junque the same way my father pushes his knowledge and opinions.  The objects used are different, but the underlying process of promoting their own superiority is the same.   Your mother shops to bolster her falsely superior sense of self, while my father reads. 

It really is sad.   Since it's essentially a strange process in their own minds, it's completely ineffective and endless.  No one in the objective real world ever validates their superiority, so they just get more and more lost in their own dysfunctional reality  My father never joins any book clubs or actually does anything constructive with his great raft of knowledge.   He just keeps gathering more information.  He's basically a mental hoarder.     

[Hopalong]

The hoarding thing resonates with me when I think of Ns but it's more about "N-supply."

My mother relayed vignettes and little exchanges, spinning and editing them so they sounded more like "connection" but clearly weren't....over and over and over. Her relationships with others were really superficial and in a way, sad.

When I was most angry with her, I saw it as near-evil voracious craving for attention (which did tend to mow children down).

Several years after her death, now, I see it as something compulsive and not really within her control.

Her anecdotes and weapons (like putting down my taste) ring a similar bell... desperation to be right, have the last word.

Hops

[debkor]

My N friends favorite thing was a movie The Stepford Wives.  Go figure.  Out of everything she had lost, car, home, jewery this is what she talks about (still) and the loss of it.


Deb

[KayZee]

Wow, Deb: The Stepford Wives thing is soo eerie.  Leave it to an N to latch onto the S-Wives impossible standard of perfection and gloss over the fact that they are zombies, dead inside.

Hops:

Several years after her death, now, I see it as something compulsive and not really within her control.

  I think this is very compassionate and wise.

I know just what you mean about the hoarding being a source of N-supply.  My NM's "collections" don't actually offer any hint at her personality or experience.  They are not mementos that remind her of experiences, trips, people she's met along the way.  I get the sense that most are things she began collecting because they seemed upscale/classy or because my N-aunt (who NM fears/loathes/admires) collects them.  NM collects Lladro porcelain figures, Madame Alexander dolls. (These, she used to "give" to me and my sister on Xmas, but then sweep them into her display case; we were never allowed to touch them or look at them outside the glass; it was pretty obvious that she'd bought them for herself.  Today, it makes me kind of sad.  NM buying herself loads of dolls, without any inkling that she might be trying to fill some childhood void.)

[SilverLining]

My NM's "collections" don't actually offer any hint at her personality or experience.  They are not mementos that remind her of experiences, trips, people she's met along the way.  I get the sense that most are things she began collecting because they seemed upscale/classy or because my N-aunt (who NM fears/loathes/admires) collects them.  

Now there's another parallel to my father's use of knowledge.  His reading has little connection with any core personality.  He doesn't read to improve his knowledge of personal interests/hobbies, or learn more about particular places, people, events.  He mostly picks up books randomly from the recent additions at the local library.  It seems an ongoing process to convince himself he is smarter than everybody else.  Then he uses his collection of factoids as weapons to beat up on other people.  Whatever he is reading today is the most important topic in the world.  

In my FOO, the dysfunctional collection of actual physical objects is on my mothers side.   My mother collects various things, and again there is no connection to any core "self".   She collects in order to collect.  

This is an interesting and helpful thread.  It seems N likes and dislikes are mostly weird expressions of the false narcissistic personality process , rather than any coherent "core self."

[sKePTiKal]

NM buying herself loads of dolls, without any inkling that she might be trying to fill some childhood void.

Hi Kay... what I think the above could be is that dolls are safer for her to have a relationship with (fastastical, delusional, as it is) than with real people. My mom doesn't fit y'alls profiles above... except the hoarding. But it was damn clear to me, that that she substituted her relationship with "things" for relationships with people. Those thing-relationships are her end-all/be-all... even now. Her raison d'etre is sorting, organizing, moving around her piles of junk - or trying to (pretending to try to) sell it or give it away. I used to be the recipient of "mystery boxes" of stuff that mom thought I would want... and don't you know that years later - many years later - she'd ask me something about where I kept it... if I'd restored it...

... because the "game" here was that by giving me her "stuff"... she believed she was giving of herself, to me. An extension of the old projection: "you're just like me", too. So, I've spent a few years now, repeating the message that I don't want her "stuff", thank you. I don't have room for it... because I'm "full of myself"... I can't be me and her too. I sure don't want to be, either!!

Because of her agoraphobia... we never went to movies until we were old enough to go by ourselves, except a few drive-in movies, before my Dad left. TV series and TV movies were all the "film culture" we got. And even that was made traumatic for me... because when I'd cry at sad parts, she and my bro would make fun of me... or if I got scared watching the Twilight Zone, my imagination wondering if such things were possible (and in N-Land, many are...) then I was supposed to grow up and act my age... because to my mom - no one could "feel" anything real, except herself.

And that's all this "thing-ism" is I think; it's a OCD distraction from feeling and interacting with other people on that emotional wavelength.

[KayZee]

TV series and TV movies were all the "film culture" we got. And even that was made traumatic for me... because when I'd cry at sad parts, she and my bro would make fun of me... or if I got scared watching the Twilight Zone, my imagination wondering if such things were possible (and in N-Land, many are...) then I was supposed to grow up and act my age... because to my mom - no one could "feel" anything real, except herself.

P.R., this makes me so sad.  Makes me want to reach across time and space, change the TV channel, tell little you that it's okay to be scared, that someone's looking out for you.  I hate that N-thing: mocking people when they're scared.  I was a really fearful kid, and instead of comforting me, NM was constantly telling me I was "being silly," it was "stupid to be scared," I was "ridiculous," and whatnot. 

the "game" here was that by giving me her "stuff"... she believed she was giving of herself, to me.

  This really resonates for me too.  Anytime, anyone tries to hold my NM accountable for her actions, she goes back to this: "How can you tell me I don't love you?  Look at everything I've given you?"  As an adult, presents give me anxiety because I associate them with NM's blackmail and bribes.  Gifts seemed like an insurance policy for NM: "Would an abusive person give you all this?"

dolls are safer for her to have a relationship with (fastastical, delusional, as it is) than with real people.

God, how right you are.  Oddly, NM also sort of views other people as dolls. My aunt always says NM used to treat my sister and me like porcelain dolls.  We were just little forms for her to dress up in ridiculous outfits, play with our hair, etc.  NM wouldn't let anyone else talk to us, telling them we were "too fragile" or "too sensitive."  If she'd had it her way, we'd just sit still in a corner with our eyes glossed over, saying nothing, until she was ready to play with us again, put words in our mouths, prop us 'round a fake tea party etc.

It seems N likes and dislikes are mostly weird expressions of the false narcissistic personality process , rather than any coherent "core self."

Thank you for all your insights, SilverLining.  Sometimes Ns seem so stuck in their ways--so frighteningly powerful in the rigid environments and routines they've created--it helps to take a few steps back and see it for what it is.  A lot of smoke and mirrors--a big distraction, so no one will sense the nothingness that exists underneath.

[JustKathy]

Hi Kay... what I think the above could be is that dolls are safer for her to have a relationship with (fastastical, delusional, as it is) than with real people.

Wow! My NM is also into the dolls, BIG TIME. Madame Alexander and American Girl. Her room is filled with them. She even sews special little outfits for them. Maybe the dolls represent the perfect child. They do as they're told, don't talk back, wear the clothing she makes them wear - all the things that I refused to do. I mean, this woman is in her early 70s, and has a room full of dolls. Not Barbie dolls and small collectibles, but large dolls that resemble real children.

[sKePTiKal]

Kind of like her own private audience, huh, Kathy? Surrounded by pretend people, with pretend feelings... so she can feel as if she's with her own kind.

[Sorry! I didn't mean that to sound as cold & cruel as it does. It was just the image of a roomful of dolls and their "curator" mom... mirroring and marking each other's "stuffing" and lack of sentience. OK, maybe it's a horrifying image, too. Calling Stephen King....]


Kay: about the mocking for expressing normal feelings as a kid. There is a sad element to it, especially when one is the kid in question! But it was a very important memory for me; an important "clue"... that contained the message that there wasn't anything wrong with me - for feeling things; and there were no good-bad feelings, as in allowed or disallowed. When I started "collecting" a list of those kinds of memories, it was like a landslide of realizations hit me. Both the old feelings of the collective "kid" mes and my perspective in the present, looking back - with my experience and acquired knowledge and the interpretative help of my T. I learned to comfort and protect my scared self from back then... cheer on my angry self (when she wasn't just being bitchy)... and shake my helpless, pathetic self out of her paralytic, dazed state. Be my own mother, in other words - my way of mothering; also known as reparenting, too.

You know, I think what it comes down to is the fact that I have an emotional "allergy" to my mom and people like her (the PDs, Ns, psychos of the world). I've made her mad with my boundaries; leaving home at 18 and progressively getting further away - and more NC over time. It doesn't take much contact at all - with her or bro - before my allergy starts kicking up again... and they start acting like nothing has changed in the past 40 years.

The last couple "mystery boxes" she sent me, I trashed without even opening them. I never told her - but magically, I also stopped getting them.