Behaviours of the Narcissist - made easy.

[Healing&Hopeful]

Hi All

I'm not sure if this has been posted before, but found this really useful.

http://www.angelfire.com/ego/narcissism/easy.html

Take care

H&H xx

[Portia]

Hi H&H

I’ve been meaning to visit Mr V’s site for some time (I think I can cope with him now without being afraid!). And your link gave me a link to him and sure enough…..Mr V is interesting. This made sad sense to me and reminded me of yours too:

http://samvak.tripod.com/objectconstancy.html
extract: Pathological narcissism is a reaction to deficient bonding and dysfunctional attachment (Bowlby). Object relations in narcissists are infantile and chaotic (Winnicott, Guntrip). Many narcissists have no psychological-object constancy at all. In other words, many of them do not feel that other people are benign, reliable, helpful, constant, predictable, and trustworthy.

To compensate for this lack in ability (or willingness) to relate to real, live people, the narcissist invents and molds substitute-objects or surrogate-objects.

These are mental representations of meaningful or significant others (Sources of Narcissistic Supply). They have little or nothing to do with reality. These imagoes - images - are confabulations, works of fiction. They respond to the narcissist's needs and fears - and do not correspond to the persons they purport to stand for.

The narcissist internalizes these pliable representations, manipulates them, and interacts with them - not with the originals. The narcissist is entirely immersed in his world, talking to these "figurines", arguing with these substitutes, contracting with these surrogates, being admired by them.
Hence his dismay when confronted with real people, their needs, feelings, preferences, and choices.

Very understandable and sad. Thanks H&H for a lateral inspiration! P

PS general info, i still find this very useful and validating: http://www.halcyon.com/jmashmun/npd/traits.html

[reallyME]

Portia,

Thank you for the re-post from Sam V.  It gave me something to comment on

Hence his dismay when confronted with real people, their needs, feelings, preferences, and choices.

I can share this from the standpoint of the N in my life and also with a little illustration.

First the illustration:

Say you have built a robot and you know which buttons make it do what.  You press blue for it to get you your slippers, press yellow for it to get your dinner, press green to have it fluff your pillow...you get the picture I'm sure...then...

one day, your robot seems to slightly malfunction.  It begins deciding for itself what it wants to do when you press its buttons.  You look at the robot in bewilderment, wondering how this machine has an abiility to operate without your manual manipulations. 

You become frantic, worried...if this machine can function without you, it might turn on you.  You begin trying to figure out ways to SHUT IT OFF.

Now, you see the terror that a Narcissist experiences.  To them, we are nothing more than a machine that suddenly refuses to respond in the "programmed" way.

Ok, now back to reality (something N's know nothing about)...Jodi had me eating out of her hand for a long time, until the 2nd week into the 6 weeks I stayed with her.  I began seeing how she treated her children and how she got what she wanted from her husband, by whining in a totally dissociative baby tone to him.  I saw how things changed between her and me as soon as her mother walked through the door..."oh everything is just FINE Mom."  (it wasn't fine at all, trust me).

I began to notice the family secrets, heard between the lines of her husband when he told me "oh yes, we are WATCHING you while you are here.  THis is a ministry family and nothing had BETTER go past these walls or ELSE!"  I learned it was dangerous and maybe deadly to talk about anything I felt or saw while I was there.

I, (Jody's robot) began to react to what was going on around me.  I began feeling trapped, smothered, abused, mocked, mistreated and finally IGNORED (Silent treatment when she realized her robot was not responding to the buttons pushed, but instead was doing what it wanted)...

Jodi couldn't handle this, and could not lash out at me because it would eat her up with guilt (another thing N's cannot handle is feeling BLAME for something they did).  So, Jodi became silent other than to her husband and children.  I was ignored while she hugged her children in front of me and her husband, while she talked TO them and AT me, while she went places and left me behind except when the guilt of doing that got to be too much for her.

This robot finally DID rise up and get in her face!  The N response was "I never meant to hurt you like this.  You don't understand how awful it's been for me.  I just was in shock when I finally saw you as you are.  I don't like you at all...in fact I can't STAND you!"

I calmly said "ok, now we are getting somewhere!  I'd rather have you tell me your feelings than say nothing!"  Then she said "yeah but I don't like to hurt you.  I can't sleep at night when I do that."

See?  subtly the N tells you that the reason they do not like knowing they hurt someone, is NOT because of it WOUNDING YOU, but because SHE COULD NOT SLEEP AT NIGHT DUE TO GUILT THAT SHE RIGHTLY DESERVED!

My point in all this is, when the robot rises and gets in the N's face, they realize "they created a self-fulfilling prophecy of a MONSTER!"

~L

[pennyplant]

You become frantic, worried...if this machine can function without you, it might turn on you.  You begin trying to figure out ways to SHUT IT OFF.

Now, you see the terror that a Narcissist experiences.  To them, we are nothing more than a machine that suddenly refuses to respond in the "programmed" way.

This example clarifies some of the odd behavior I have seen in my Ns.  It is so sad, really, that they cannot grow beyond this perception of the other people in their lives.  Or maybe chilling is a better description than sad.  The ones I know, though, keep themselves pretty busy and distracted with addictive behaviors so it probably will never dawn on them anyway.  At any rate, they seem to be able to bury the guilt pretty efficiently.

It will take me far longer to recuperate from them than the other way around  .

PP

[reallyME]

Penny

It's not unusual for the N's to see us as robots...after all, usually, that's how they were seen at one point, or their parents tried to live their lives through them...either way, they were objectified, and when they left their parent's "image" of them, they were "rewarded" with some form of psychological abuse or neglect.  To prove my point here, please check out the story of Betty Davis' Daughter or Christina Crawford's childhood.  Many child stars were the offspring of N's...sad, but true.

The thing I always keep in mind, is that N's are all business no pleasure.  They make the very BEST business people, if you are on their GOOD side.  My brother in law and his parents are N's to the core.  In fact, their entire FAMILY are N's...how do I know?  I had the entertaining moment of being at a dinner table with the whole slew of them...right down to baby N's!

What I observed during this dinner at my sister in law's house, blew my mind.  I heard them go around the table one-upping each other's accomplishments.  IT was WILD!  It was like sitting with a bunch of children in a school room, bickering over whose daddy could beat up who's.

Regarding your apparent despondent tone in your reply to me earlier, Penny, I want to encourage you.  It will not take a long time for you to break free from this, if:  you learn who you are, you begin stepping into new things, and you BELIEVE that things can be better.  With therapy or researching info and this group...you WILL make it, girl!  I have EVERY confidence in ya!

~Laura

[pennyplant]

Regarding your apparent despondent tone in your reply to me earlier, Penny, I want to encourage you.  It will not take a long time for you to break free from this, if:  you learn who you are, you begin stepping into new things, and you BELIEVE that things can be better.  With therapy or researching info and this group...you WILL make it, girl!  I have EVERY confidence in ya!

Thank you, Laura.  I am feeling pretty low this week.  I really appreciate your confidence in me.  One foot in front of the other for now, until I can fly again!!!

PP

[Hopalong]

...right down to baby N's

 

No. RM, say it ain't so.
(I think it ain't so...but I'm sure the training's begun.)

I understand your story much better now. It's amazing how when people repeat things new and helpful detail emerges. Hope it's that way for you too.

Being shunned like that for a long period while you were right there in the house,
how painful.

Hops

[Certain Hope]

Dear H&H,

  Thank you for sharing this refresher in N-traits/behavior. I stumbled across some old photos last night... wedding photos, with N-ex... and selective memory threatened to lock in on the grief, loss, and regret. It really helped this morning to review the list of impossible characteristics and remember the rest of the story. By the way, the only one on the list that wasn't a major feature of his m.o. is the sense of time urgency ~ impatience. Maybe his laziness over-ruled that one.

Hugs,
Hope

[Jade]

To reallyME:

... when they left their parent's "image" of them, they were "rewarded" with some form of psychological abuse or neglect

Exactly. To step outside of "appropriate" behavior meant one ceased to exist, and had to be pressed back into line immediately.

[Cate Finnegan]

I need help.  I am a 50 year old adult daughter of a N.  I am a Christian.  My Mother is sucking the life out of me.
Help me with a solid Christian response to a N who detests me!
Cate Finnegan

[Hopalong]

Hi Cate,
I'm not a Christian but I have much compassion...I'm so sorry for what you're going through.
I'm glad you're here. You'll find so many Nmother stories and so much support and insight.

This place is like a gathering of Wise Women and Mud (not in mud) and I hope you'll find we can listen with hearts open.

See you on the main board soon?

Hopalong