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Mental Health Narcissism Support Thread

nuttynutskin

nuttynutskin

Bluelighter
Joined
May 15, 2011
Messages
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Not sure if this will work but I thought it might be good to have a thread for people who have been on the receiving end of narcissists. Whether you were raised by narcissistic parent/s, it was from a significant other, a close friend. I thought it might be helpful to have a thread to offer each other advice and support.

And for anyone interested, IMO Sam Vaknin has some of the best information on the subject although he can be a bit redundant at times...

[video]https://www.youtube.com/user/samvaknin[/video]

There's countless others on Youtube as well of course.
 
/\ Thanks for the links.

Has anyone ever noticed the narcissist's inability to be satisfied and always looking for something better? Whether it be a better significant other, better car, better place to live... You get the idea. I'm sort of dealing with this now with a family member. They basically live their life like that and will likely never be truly happy or satisfied. I don't think people should settle necessarily, but for the narcissist it's pathological imo.
 
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ime narcissists are certainly dreamers that rarely go through the necessary methodological steps to accomplish what they desire; instead expecting it should be handed to them by somebody else or whatever means possible. with zero thanks in return nor appreciation/respect for what was given/sacrificed by others.

...kytnism...:|
 
I would agree besides that they rarely go through the necessary steps. I think plenty do, they just don't care who they step on or take advantage of in the process. It's a generalization, but IME a lot of higher ups in large companies or government probably fit the clinical narcissism definition. HA!
 
I was basically diagnosed as a psychopath by a quack shrink. Anti-social personality disorder and narcissistic personality disorder. But she was some upper class townie shrink who had no idea what it was like to grow up in a piss poor rural ghetto. Her basis for the diagnoses was i didn't feel bad about the guys i smashed up in fights when i was young. I said why should i when if i backed down id be picked on constantly. No shrink i saw after aid i had any hint of either disorder so yeah bullshit diagnoses.
 
Everyone's probably narcissistic to some degree but not pathological. AFAIK it isn't widely diagnosed in the US mainly because it's mostly seen as untreatable. Also someone who's narcissistic isn't likely to seek treatment.
 
nuttynutskin said:
Everyone's probably narcissistic to some degree but not pathological. AFAIK it isn't widely diagnosed in the US mainly because it's mostly seen as untreatable. Also someone who's narcissistic isn't likely to seek treatment.
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Well everyone is narcissistic to some point. That's just evolution you would be pretty fucked if you didn't look out for yourself and your own first. I've maybe met 2 actual psychopaths in my life and they scare the shit out of me and i don't scare easy. You really can't predict what they will do which makes them dangerous.
 
One of my best friends as a teenager was a narcissist. As a thirteen, fourteen year old, narcissists are heaps of fun. They're impulsive, they have no regrets or remorse, they get what they want - exactly what every adolescent male desires. Breaking the rules, being a pest, living life without regret.

However, as we started to grow older, something odd happened; he didn't seem to be maturing. Myself and other friends took responsibility for our actions and recognized when we did wrong. We had a much more balanced view of things. We didn't lash out randomly when our egos were pricked, and we didn't take advantage of others and situations.

For this friend, nothing was ever his fault. When something went right, it was obviously because he inherently deserved it. When something went wrong, it was another persons fault, or an extenuating circumstance, or any excuse he could think of. As we reached the later years of high school, we realized something was seriously off, but we couldn't put our fingers on it. He'd single out one of our friends and abuse them verbally and emotionally, pointing out what he saw to be their flaws - basically, he shat on everyone around him. He manipulated and lied to get what he wanted, he had this insane capacity to bend and twist past occurrences where he did something wrong to seem like he wasn't at fault. He sent long, raving attacks to every person who cared about him, pointing out their flaws, and instructing them on how they could be better people.

I reached breaking point personally after one night out of no-where he sent me one of his now infamous and semi-regular character attacks which was so self-righteous, so scathing, so subtly abusive (it's called gaslighting) that I just said "enough." I sent the rant to another friend of mine, and he said, "Dude. He's a narcissist. I've known for ages." I didn't at the time know what pathological narcissism was, but I started doing some research. One of the things I picked up on is that if you ignore the narcissist (something they aren't used to and hate) they simply melt. They break down. It's as if they cease to exist. So the next day we were at his house, smoking a joint together, and he started going on like he usually did about angels and devils and such (he was a big psuedo-spiritual quack at the time, using spirituality as an excuse to "elevate" himself above others.) He turned to me with a completely straight face and said:

"I really believe i'm an angel sent from heaven down to earth to cleanse the world of it's darkness."

It hit me like a ton of bricks. The degree of grandiosity in this persons mind was beyond not normal - it was absolutely absurd. So I tried something, instinctively almost. As he blabbed on about why he was an angel, I slowly started disengaging from him. I stopped giving him eye contact. His voice started wavering. I stopped directing my attention and body posture toward him, even though it was only the two of us there. He started stuttering as he spoke. Eventually, I completely closed myself off to him. We were two people sitting in a garden smoking a joint, but I wasn't "there" with him anymore. His eyes filled with a mixture of confusion and rage. He struggled, with every trick in his little book, to regain my attention, but I wouldn't let him. This heavy weight, the realization of the years of bullshit: the idealization and devaluation, the rage, the manipulation... everything just made sense right then and there.

That was the last time I saw him.

I deleted him from Facebook, deleted his phone number, implemented a strict no contact rule, and I've never looked back. As the years have gone by, I've seen the ways I've been emotionally traumatized by him. I now know the power of emotional abuse - I feel immense empathy for those who have suffered from it. When I hear people grew up with narcissistic parents, it makes me want to give them a huge hug. Those who never come across these people are so blessed, they have no idea.

TL:DR

Had a narcissistic friend, didn't realize he was one till we got older, finally came to my senses, never spoke to him again.
 
My wife is a narcissist. I didn't realize it until a few years ago. The mental gymnastics that she plays to let herself feel like she is "right" in all situations is absurd. She badmouths and hurts pretty much every person in her life (as well as strangers or people serving her at stores & restaurants) but if you'll ask her about it, she'll tell you all the ways in which she has been wronged by these horrible people.

She has no friends. They all abandoned her. All my friends abandoned us eventually after we got together. Finally I can understand why, and I don't blame them. She's not an enjoyable person to be around.

I'm now in the relationship for my kids. It's a lonely existence. I've become angrier, but I'm mostly angry at myself for allowing this to happen. My life is the opposite of what I wanted. At some points it feels like a nightmare.

If I could distance myself from my wife's craziness (a bit like infectedmushroom describes), I would probably be in a much better position. However, this is difficult for me. I have a hard time not taking her seriously, and so I get pulled back in on a daily basis. Something has got to give, but thus far I don't know what that is.
 
Great thread hope you guys get in a better state of mind :) http://www.sharischreiber.com/articles.html this is related to bpd and narcissism(I think it's important not to see labels as people) and I would also recommend The Drama of a Gifted Child on PDF so it's easily accessible. Splitting off from a toxic relationship is tough since alot of emotional triggers have been reactivated. A somatic experience I had after breaking up was from childhood where I would get nausea so that I could get back my mother when I was in kindergarten. It eventually went away but was not pleasent to re-experience.
 
Listening, it seems you haven't quite yet come to the realization of how heavily this has impacted your life. It's not even the external things which are the worst off, and my heart goes out to you that you have children mixed up in this situation - the worst victim here is your emotional and mental well being.

If possible, the absolute best thing you can do for yourself is to implement "no contact." It's as simple as it sounds in theory, but more difficult in practice.

It means blocking and ceasing ALL CONTACT with her. In other words, never seeing or hearing from her ever again. With children this adds a whole list of complications to the matter, so I'd recommend you watch a few Sam Vaknin videos on the topic (easy to find on YouTube.)

I sincerely hope you find a solution soon, my friend. There is absolutely no reason to suffer any longer under her pathology.
 
Listening said:
If I could distance myself from my wife's craziness (a bit like infectedmushroom describes), I would probably be in a much better position. However, this is difficult for me. I have a hard time not taking her seriously, and so I get pulled back in on a daily basis. Something has got to give, but thus far I don't know what that is.
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I don't really know shit all about her, but this lady's videos might be helpful...



She's talking about ex-spouses in that video but some of it could apply regarding not engaging with your spouse and focusing on your children. I know personally how not engaging a narcissist is one of the hardest things to do.
 
infectedmushroom said:
It means blocking and ceasing ALL CONTACT with her. In other words, never seeing or hearing from her ever again...
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Just in case I wasn't clear: We are married and live together. :) Blocking all contact sounds like heaven. Instead she is pretty much everywhere in my universe. She's the type of person that dominates all mental space in a room (or house). She has an amazing ability to be absolutely controlling and demanding (everything needs to be "just so" for every minute aspect of her life), whilst at the same time making herself appear totally helpless so that the people around her find themselves doing everything they can to manage her life. It's amazing really.

As I say, I've made a choice to stay with her for the sake of our kids. This isn't ideal for anyone, but it's better (for them) than the alternative. As much as I'm bad-mouthing her here, I am still trying to find a way to live with her in some reasonable way, for the sake of my own sanity if nothing else.
 
Listening, when you describe your wife it makes me think of how much our culture is churning out people with these same narcissistic traits more and more. I feel like everyone in america feels the need to be in a constant state of righteous anger over being wronged by everyone from a store clerk to the drivers around them on the road to their spouses and coworkers. Its as if we have taken it on as a national identity or something! I started noticing this when my kids were in elementary school. Parents seemed to be in a constant state of rage over the treatment of their children by the teacher, other children, the curriculum, the system, etc. Turn on the TV and all you hear is this same level of strident outrage--everyone feels so wronged by everyone else and no one is acknowledging any commonality anymore. I have neighbors that sue everyone for what used to be common courtesy conversations (your tree is hanging over my gutters, water from your property is impacting mine, etc.) The level and tenor of their angry outlook is supported by the lawyers they hire. I guess I'm saying this because I think that whereas your wife might have been able to recognize she had a problem more easily in the past, the current culture practically demands narcissism as normal behavior. People feel rewarded by their own outrage and we have learned to call egoism and self-centeredness "standing up for yourself" and "being assertive". Those two things are great but its a fine line between standing up for yourself and standing on top of everyone else while you do it.

One of the things that was always most helpful for my husband and I when we were raising children was to examine our own behaviors and ask if this is something we actually wanted to pass on to our kids. Its easy to get defensive about your behavior when your spouse is the one criticizing it; but when most good parents (and I assume your wife is in that category) can look at their behaviors through the lens of modeling for their children, the ego gets put aside and the best self can come forward. I wonder if your wife could see herself through this different lens if it were framed that way? ("Do we want our kids to take responsibility or to default always to blaming others?"
 
Herbavore, first of all I am amazed at how eloquently you write. I aspire to such fluidity of thought and word. I'm always interested in your comments and support in these forums and I would just like to give you a general "thank you" for being here.

I think you have hit the nail on the head. Indeed, this problem is everywhere. Before I married, I dismissed the issue. I very much assumed that, at a fundamental level, all people were the same. Whatever differences there were between myself and my wife, I figured, we'd be able to get over. I thought that my upset just came from me not understanding her better. Instead, the more I started to understand, the more horrified I became. At least I'm no longer oblivious to the truth: There are indeed a lot of narcissistic people out there.

Regarding how we want to raise our kids: I think you are on to something. This is something we are still working on, but I do believe it can be a way to advance. One of the problems that I've had to grapple with, however, is that when we discuss a topic, we often agree on the philosophy and I think to myself, "oh, we our on the same page!" However, immediately following I will realize that she is acting totally out of whack with what she claims to believe. I don't think she is being consciously deceptive. She simply isn't mindful enough and isn't self-aware enough to act in accordance with her logical understanding.

As an example: We have many fights/arguments that drag on for a ridiculous amount of time. The strange thing is that they are all pretty much about the same core issues and, in the end, she always comes around to seeing it my way. She ends up apologizing and saying that she realizes and understands her mistake and can finally see what happened. Great. Except that it will invariably happen again. Not only will she act in the same destructive way but, when called on it, she will deny it until the entire fight is played out again in its full length. This boggles my mind. If she looks at her own history she should stop and say to herself, "wait, I've been wrong every previous time, maybe I'm wrong this time," but no, she needs to fight it out and prove that she's right - which she never can do because her behavior is so transparent to me now. If she had just a bit of humility, I think life would get better for her and everyone else.
 
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