admin – Page 4 – Narcissism and how to survive it

Loneliness

Feeling of loneliness after no contact or even while you are still in a relationship with a narcissist can seem overwhelming at times. You can be surrounded by people but still feel utterly alone and harboring all the raw emotional pain that goes with loneliness.

Escaping loneliness is much more difficult that you might think or that others might think it could be. The route out of loneliness is not just a matter of buying a new dress and going to a party or joining a book club. It creates profound psychological damage which is why narcissists are so keen on isolation as a manipulation tactic and is a self-perpetuating cage that can prove very difficult to break free from. Loneliness distorts our perceptions and a narcissist will encourage these distorted perceptions. So if you get invited to an event by someone the narcissist will say “So and so told me that they don’t really want you to go, they were only being polite” the reason they do this is that an isolated and lonely person who believes that people care for them a lot less than they actually do, are much easier to control. You might feel that the toxic “relationship” is the only one that you can cling on to and if you let go you will drown. That is exactly what the narcissist wants you to think. You doubt our even long standing existing relationship as the narcissist tries to get into them and either deride the relationship or try to become more important than you are in that relationship. You can often push away the very people who you could reach out to because of self-doubt and having social anxiety because you don’t know what to think or who to trust anymore. Social encounters tend to be about the weather and finish as quickly as possible, instead of having a good old chat. The brevity of these encounters means that connection with others is minimal. Which sends the message that you are “not interested” in talking to that person. A lonely person’s body language and facial expression can also give off the same “stay away from me” vibe.

To break the habits around loneliness you have to be proactive, it isn’t just a phase that will pass if you don’t do anything about it. You have to decide to take certain steps to calm the anxiety of moving out of your isolation and if you are still with a narcissist they will strongly discourage it. So, don’t tell your narcissist what you are going to do, where you are going to go or who you are going to meet. Take baby steps at first meet someone for coffee (one person at a time) instead of going to a party or a crowded club. Arrange to meet somewhere you already know with someone who you were close to in the past and haven’t seen for a while. Remember why you enjoyed this person’s company and the things that you did together and recognise the fact that this other person probably has a very busy life too and it might not only be you.

If you feel anxious about making contact send an email or a text message with a more proactive message than “we must meet up sometime” because that means the intention is there but it might never happen, give a time scale to show that you mean it. When you are out, smile at people, make a comment on how beautiful someone’s baby is and engage with the people around you. After your meeting check how you feel, you will probably feel fantastic – remember that feeling and use it as encouragement to do the same again very soon. If you slip and tell the narcissist you met someone for coffee don’t let them know that you enjoyed it. Shrug it off and seem indifferent.

This is a hard leap to make in the beginning but once you realise what has happened, why and that your perception of how others see you has been distorted by the narrative the narcissist fed you and as a result of that, your self-imposed isolation, you can push out of your cage (at your own pace) and begin to enjoy life and other people again – you won’t regret it.

Sibling bullying

Being bullied, humiliated and treated with distain and contempt is much more than sibling rivalry

Sibling bullying is an integral part of a dysfunctional family system and orchestrated by one or both parents. A narcissistic parent will enjoy seeing one of their children being bullied because it deflects the anger that the children feel towards their parents “for not doing their job properly”, so they actively encourage it. Usually the dysfunction within a family will start very early on, roles will be assigned into golden child, scapegoat and lost child as infants.

This bullying is relentless because

The narcissistic parent enjoys watching the pain that they bullying causes
The rest of the siblings are trying to secure their place within the dysfunctional family, so it will be self- policing
Frightened children are easier to control
The bullied child(ren) cannot escape the abuse, they have nowhere to go in essence they are hostage to their families.

Bullying is usually about chronic disrespect for that child’s privacy, dignity, name calling and physical abuse. Somehow the rest of the family is massively invested with what is going on with the scapegoat.

They take property and either use it or destroy it
They smear campaign behind that child’s back
They refuse to take care of their physical need such as illness or financial problems that could easily be resolved
All of the pain in the family gets projected on to this child and they are expected to “take it on the chin” even though it has nothing to do with them.

This type of bullying is extremely destructive because the “chosen” child will be expected to take on all of the pain within a family but at the same time they will be ostracized. They will always be told that they are at the bottom of the pile and that they do not belong to the family. Any child who has been told that they have been rejected from the family unit will jump through hoops in an attempt to “belong” and this is exactly what the narcissistic parent is trying to achieve. The mother of the scapegoat can often be in direct competition with her (in her eyes) from as early as 24 months.

Sibling bullying manifests itself in being hounded, they are after your humanity, your dignity and they want to harm you, yet they call themselves “family”. It is serious abuse but some people think that because it exists within the “family’ context that is justified. It is not justified – abuse is abuse and we need to call it out.

Bullies are not always obvious, they can be completely charming and affable – in fact they make a point of being so. Like all abuse, it takes place behind closed doors. However, if they are abusive in public and someone calls them out on it, they will be super charming to that person at the time, but inevitably punish the child at a later date for “showing them up”. Bullies are very good at creating fear and insecurity in their victims to keep them quiet and obedient.

Children of narcissistic parents

If you are a child of narcissistic parents growing up was never loving, supportive, fun, relaxing or safe. Since narcissists are completely self-obsessed they have absolutely no problem destroying the lives of their children emotionally and socially, they simply use them for their own entertainment or because doing things for their children such as driving them to sports practice or taking them on outings is just too much trouble. After all what is in it for them? They can control their children more easily if they refuse to accommodate their needs and desires in any way so the answer is always “no”, and after a while the children don’t even bother asking. If you are born into a family like this the abuse doesn’t stop in adulthood, if anything the disorder of the parent(s) becomes more pronounced in old age.

Many adults are afraid of and avoid their feelings and the feelings of others because they were not validated as a child. Either they were completely ignored, so expressions of fear, insecurity or sadness were not acknowledged, comforted and could have been punished. Even expressions of happiness, joy and excitement can also cause irritation/rage in a narcissist parent. Because these children were not “allowed” to express their own feelings, they have no idea how to process them or recognise them in others.

A narcissist parent will also invalidate/devalue a child if s/he goes to them with the desire to express a feeling or emotion. This sort of rejection of a child’s emotion may be done by telling the child five reasons why they should not feel a certain way, or tell the child that they misinterpreted the situation – even if the parent wasn’t there. So they might say “I am sure that they didn’t mean it like that” (how can they be sureif they were not present), or they might just be too busy to listen to the little problems that their child has and say something like “not now”, to a child “not now” means “not ever, when a child is rejected like this it is deeply hurtful and so it is highly unlikely that they will return and risk getting rejected again. We all hate rejection but it is very traumatic for a child, especially from their primary carer. When a child is rejected over small problems, they will learn that it is not safe to go to their primary carer with larger problems, which to a child feels like abandonment.

The effect of this invalidation or denial of a child’s feelings will carry through into adulthood. The adult child will feel that they are not entitled to own their own emotions as in the past they risked upsetting one or both of their parents and the adult child will certainly be self-doubting and very unsure of their own feelings. This will mean that the child will not develop a healthy model of love as the “love” they experienced as a child will have been conditional on pleasing their parent(s). Frequently the children of narcissist parents do not have more than the most basic emotional vocabulary to express themselves as they will have received a very limited scope of emotions from their own parent(s) and so they perpetuate the cycle of emotional neglect/abuse.

The child will get into the habit of hiding their feelings both from others and from themselves, since it is less painful for the child to hide their feelings (numb out/disconnect or detach from themselves) rather than to feel and be either denied or punished for what they feel.

A thing that a lot of children of narcissistic parents don’t realise is that NO ONE HAS THE RIGHT TO TELL YOU WHAT YOU CAN OR CANNOT FEEL, it is a total violation of boundaries and a sign of a very unhealthy relationship, for the simple reason that the parent is not relating or accepting the feelings of their child in any way.

A narcissistic parent might get annoyed with a child for feeling sad, worried or insecure, because s/he is anxious not to be portrayed as anything other than a perfect parent and having to deal with the emotions of a child are a burden and it means they are not playing out the assigned role given to them, which more often than not is take care of the parents needs and suppress their own.

The aim of the narcissistic parent is to beat the child (either emotionally or physically) into a state of total submission at which stage the parent will replace the child’s feelings with their own needs and thoughts. The child of the narcissistic parent will not be given any option other to comply because the alternative will manifest itself in the form of threats of abandonment, ridicule (your emotions are not good enough), sneering (your emotions are not valid), some sort of humiliation, physical punishment or a passive aggressive reaction.

Another aim of the narcissistic parent is to rob the child’s sense of personal identity or of being an individual that can operate independently within the family structure. This gives a very clear message to the child, which is to say “you are only lovable if you comply with my needs and wants” (my love for you is conditional on how well you perform in accordance with my needs and wants, if you do not comply you will be punished or ignored). This type punishment will start from a very young age, usually when the infant begins to walk and explore the world on their own and test some boundaries. A very young baby is bound to their mother for their comfort and survival. A baby placed on the hip of the narcissistic mother is perfect, she will see it as a symbol of her perfect mothering skills, a demonstration of how involved she is with her young. It will pose no threat to her superiority or control, the life of the child depends on her exclusively as the baby knows instinctively. It is only when that child tries to self-express and become an individual that the problems arise, these problems will grow in intensity as the child gets older and tries to break free of the suffocating restrictions of their family of origin.

Children of narcissistic parents will therefore have a tendency to climb up into their head space as it is safer there. The parent cannot attack “thoughts” and the child will have put the mute button on them and will try to work things out logically, rationally and silently instead. However, unexpressed feelings have a way of oozing out in some other form, it might be a mutation of the original emotion and therefore are difficult for the child to own. Especially later on in life when they emerge as emotional flash backs, the distorted emotions are evoked but not identified.

If you ask a child of a narcissistic parent how they feel about something they will probably say “I think” rather than “I feel”. Others might say “you feel frustrated when they do that” rather than “I feel”, which is indicative of detachment from their own feelings.

There are also physical signs of the emotional neglect of narcissistic parents such as children/adults self-caressing to comfort themselves in moments of stress since they were denied the security of a loving parent. The child of a narcissistic parent will find it hard to self-soothe or form strong attachments to others. Or conversely they might form very speedy and inappropriate attachments to relative strangers as a plan B in case their parents followed through on their perpetual threat of abandonment. This leaves the adult child of a narcissist wide open to further abuse of the predatorial type.

Parents are supposed to teach love, self-love, self-acceptance and compassion. This cannot happen if the parents do not provide a role model for their children. This model is parent to child as well has adult to adult. Children mimic their parent’s behaviour, much more than they listen to their words.

Children of narcissistic parents have a particularly difficult time because they will have to have lived with parents who were constantly in competition with them, and as a result, the parent being the more powerful in the relationship, constantly used that power dynamic to bolster themselves at the cost of their child’s confidence and self-esteem. From childhood the narcissistic parent was cold, indifferent, secretive, extremely critical and categorically refused to acknowledge any achievement that their child made. Narcissistic parents deeply resent any demands on them made by their children and would easily punish them if they did so. Narcissists live for themselves and do not care about the emotional well-being of their child, they will only take care of the physical well-being if they think that it is on “display” (public image). The unloved children of a narcissistic will be much more vulnerable to getting into future relationships with narcissists both as partners and friends because the narcissist will instinctively know that the child of a narcissist is very open to being manipulated/bullied and narcissists look for people like that because they are much easier to control and therefore less “work”.

Narcissists see their children as a means provide emotional security for themselves and the role allocated to them is not to make demands, for those demands will be denied, when the demands are denied the narcissistic parent will make it very clear that the “fault” lies with the child. Those demands could be anything from wanting to go to play in a football match to being physically sick. The children of narcissist parents are often so traumatised that they will vomit from anxiety, this level of anxiety creates the fight or flight response from the abuse of the parent, but in this case the child has nowhere to go and vomiting is the release that the mind/body reaction of the child will come up with. This can evoke several reactions from the parent, such as to laugh at the child for being silly, to get angry with the child for “making her feel she should do something”, or getting angry with the child for making a show of themselves (and therefore the parent).

A narcissistic parent will for example test two children to see what their children can do for them, once the roles have been allocated s/he will be determined to force them to keep playing that role, until s/he deems fit to make a change. That role could be “mummy’s baby boy”, so it is not uncommon to see a 17-year old son of a narcissist to sit on “mummy’s knee”. This type of infantilising is designed to keep children orbiting around their parents so that the parents can maintain control. Paradoxically, this infantilized child can also be given the role of “mummy’s little man” or “Mummy’s best friend”, in this projected role the child is supposed to take care of the emotional needs of their mother (and sometimes some of the physical ones too), this is very inappropriate behaviour and is a form of child abuse.

All types of abuse come from fear, fear of being physically or emotionally hurt. Narcissistic parents will continuously drop subtle and not so subtle hints of what might happen if there is any subordination, constantly preying of fear to keep their children “in their place”. Narcissist create instability, unpredictability, and behave irrationally but rarely use traceable abuse. They break your trust with yourself by telling you who you are, what is what, how things should be and denying anything that does not fit their narrative of the day. This creates doubts about family and friends, the stability and the benevolence of others. The narcissist will understand that the trust of a child is something that they can take for granted since society tells us that our parents love us, this creates cognitive dissonance in the child, but usually the child will opt to follow the cultural norm because no one wants to believe that our primary carers don’t care, and in some cases hate their children. So the child tries harder to please as it is too painful to admit to the reality and they will be more willing to follow the cultural myth (all parents love and want what is best for their children) and so they shut down and make excuses for behaviour that provide evidence to the contrary. It is very likely that you will need an awful lot of evidence before you are willing to accept that your parents do not have your best interests at heart and are completely indifferent to your needs.

A narcissistic parent will not connect with their child(ren), but will constantly act as an observer. So, a parent will ask about one of their off spring about another, and will say something like “how is your sister” (even though they are all living in the same house), they will not go directly to daughter and ask “how are you?”. They do this because they don’t want any emotional reaction from their child, they are just harvesting information to manipulate their child. This approach further distorts the already dysfunctional family unit because the sister does not get to say what she wants to say or not want to say to the narcissist parent, but her sibling gets an opportunity to put a “spin” on what is said as it might work to his or her benefit or they might not know, but will make something up to satisfy the parent. (Narcissistic parents although extremely secretive themselves, can get very aggressive if they think that information is being withheld).

An infant born into narcissistic family dynamic will receive absolutely no empathy from their parents. What is even more upsetting for the child is that they will more than likely be punished for being emotional or sensitive in response to the abuse and trauma that they are subjected to. The result of which that in the first five years of the child’s life they will have been given an extremely toxic self-image by their parents. The toxic parents will have selected their most sensitive child at a very early stage in their life to be the scapegoat and by the time that child is a toddler it will be made the target for all of the family woes.

The scapegoat child is very often labelled as the black sheep of the family. This term is often used by parents to suggest that the child is “difficult” this however is a euphemism for the child refusing to conform to or normalise the emotional abuse. The child’s needs and emotions will be ignored on purpose to shame, diminish and to break the spirit of the child, so that they eventually are too scared to ask for help in any shape or form at all. All of the children of narcissists will be expected to put the needs of their parents first and are expected to worship them too (there will be no evidence that the parent is worthy of worship, but it is a refrain that will be repeated time and time again – eventually brainwashing the child into thinking that it is true). The scapegoat child is expected to put on a veneer of normality and inclusion within the family to the outside world, which is of course absolutely false as the scapegoat child will never be let feel that they belong. The narcissistic parents will cast the other toxic siblings in the role of supporting the position of the scapegoating the child who they perceive to be their most “difficult/unworthy” child. Also perceived as the most threatening to them.

If any sibling (even a golden child) dares to support the scapegoated child, they put their own position with in the family system at risk if the toxic parent notices what they are doing. Most toxic sibling rivalry is created by toxic parents, they do this by having obvious favourites, talking ill of each child behind their back, attributing vicious comments they made – to siblings, encouraging bullying and physical and emotional abuse between siblings, this is all done as a complex web of sabotage of their own children to garner control and to be at the centre of attention in the family where all of the children are constantly on high alert and looking at their parents for cues for when the next bit of abuse is coming. For the most part siblings of narcissistic families do not realise that they have been manipulated in this way and will continue in their roles into adulthood.

Children born into narcissistic families tend to have several personality types. The rebelwho tries to seek justice and stop the abuse whenever they can and points out the injustices and manipulation (this level of indignation about injustice can be quite immature, some young children feel the intensity of injustice, it is really important to them, it is before they realise that “life isn’t fair” and it makes them feel really indignant – most bedtime stories let them down). It is for this reason they are made to be the scapegoat because narcissists are never wrong so the child that points out wrong doing will automatically be punished. That child can expect to be bullied all through their life by family members and will often be cut out of wills after dedicating their lives trying to take care of the impossible emotional needs of the parents and trying to show them right from wrong and how to be kinder and more loving. The narcissist might well mimic the behaviour of this child taking credit for their acts of kindness but it is an act and there is nothing authentic about it. There will be a lot of envy on behalf of the parent(s) of this child because they will see how non family members relate to him/her and they will punish them for being more popular than them (everything is a game with narcissists and they always have to win).

The lost child knows that there is something inherently wrong with the family dynamic but is not sure what it is. They avoid confrontation at all costs and try to win the favour of their narcissistic parents. So they ignore the abuse of the scapegoat and will very often join in as it will please the parent(s), these children have little or no empathy and are devoid of authentic emotion. They frequently have very stiff posture and find future relationships hard to manage.

The golden childhas an extreme sense of entitlement and is motivated by greed. They will sell their souls to get what they want, because they twist and contort themselves to facilitate the parent(s) by doing or saying whatever it takes to make sure that they remain the favourite. They might well be very disrespectful of their parent(s) behind their back but will be as sweet as honey and stroke the ego of their parent(s) to their face. These children take no responsibility for what they say or do and that could be absolutely anything if it means that they are seen in a favourable light. They have learnt how to work the narcissistic system and are at once extremely secretive and opinionated at the same time. The golden child will often exhibit characteristics of or be a full blown narcissist themselves.

If you have grown up in a narcissistic family you will have probably encountered the most sadistic, cruel and abusive people that you will ever meet. It is extremely alarming when you realise that characteristics such as sadism and cruelty exist in your own family of origin and are not something that “other people” whether it be in history or far off lands experience. If you go no contact with your narcissistic parent(s) (especially if you are the scapegoat) you can be confident that they will go on a smear campaign and will send the flying monkeys after you to try to hoover you back in so that they can continue to get pleasure from bullying you. They will also let you know that you will never really “belong” to the narcissist’s family you will only be welcome in your role as scapegoat.

A narcissistic parent will not support their child in anything that they do. If they have a fight at school with another child, they will support the other child. If their child is being bullied, they will maintain that they must have done something to deserve it. If their child is sick they will tell them it is psychosomatic or will just ignore the fact that they are unwell (including broken bones and high temperatures). Later on in life if the child divorces they will either take the side of the ex-spouse, or sneer at you for getting it wrong saying “I told you so” even if they acted like they adored the spouse. They refuse to support their own children because they think that it makes them look “better than” and gets them more attention if they openly support the others. Since they feel like they own their children, it really doesn’t matter to them what the negative impact will be on their children.

So how does all of this behaviour effect the child(ren)?

The child will feel devalued
Unloved
Their reality will never be validated
They will feel that their feelings are a burden on the parent and therefore unacceptable
The “love” of their parent(s) will be based on how well they perform for that parent in terms of taking care of their needs and image.
The child will grow up not knowing how they feel about anything because their feelings/emotions will have always been denied
The child will have low self-esteem and crippling self-doubt
They will have no healthy love model to follow and love will feel like a sentence of confinement rather than something positive and nurturing
They will have been taught that it is not okay to express themselves at the risk of out shining their parent, so they will try to keep their head down and not draw attention
Social anxiety will be fostered so that the narcissistic parent can maintain control of their child
The child will look outside themselves for external validation
The child will grow up feeling “not good enough”, “I can’t do that, I will make a fool of myself for trying”
The child will let themselves be chosen by future partners/friend (predators) because they are not worthy of joining in an equal relationship
They will take care of others to the detriment of their own self care

Talking to children

Most parents know that talking to their children is vital for their emotional and intellectual development, however, there are very different ways of talking to your children. They basically fall into 3 groups:

Talking to them

Talking at them

Having a conversation with them

The favourite way of the narcissist is talking “at” their child. This way they do not invite an interaction or give space for their child to hold an opinion that in any way contradicts their own or to express any individuality/independence. We know that narcissists are very competitive and so they will often use language that is too complex for the stage of development of their child. This is so that they can feel “better” than their child by confusing them with age inappropriate language.

An MIT study has shown that children from wealthy families hear far more words than those from poor families. However, it is not the amount of words that a child hears that is important it is how they hear them that matters. What matters is “conversation” speak a little and listen a lot, this has been proven to be crucial factor in their ability later on in life for inter human relationships and their ability to socialize make friends and create firm and fulfilling relationships.

The number of words that a parent had didn’t seem to matter at all to the brain development of a child, it was how those words were delivered that was crucial. It was the back and forth delivery that mattered, when a child is allowed to converse with their parents, that child feels heard and this has a huge impact on how their brain develops so as a result it also has an impact on how the child feels about themselves – self-esteem, confidence both personally and socially. The more a child feels listened to, the more confident in themselves they are. This has a huge impact on a child in later life as it has a massive impact on their happiness and success.

But that is not where it ends, because having a back and forward chat with your child also helps them to understand what other people are trying to say, which is very different from just listening and as such helps to develop their empathy and in return will help them to develop healthy relationship all through their lives. This is not just an inter human relationship because it also relates to their relationship with inanimate things which translate into addictions of one sort or another whether it be drugs, shopping, working or fitness. They are all counter intuitive for healthy inter personal behaviours, if a child does not feel that they are heard for who they or and they do not have a voice they will look for solace somewhere else, somewhere “less dangerous” where they feel “legitimate”.

This is an example of how and why a narcissist parent starves their child of freedom of expression and the consequences of such a loveless “parent”.

Projection

One of the most difficult things to understand in a relationship with a narcissist is their projection of their own dysfunctional behaviour on to you. This is particularly difficult and painful if you happen to be a child of narcissistic parent(s) because before you are developmentally mature you are being told some really toxic information about who and what you are, because you “trust” your parent you believe them not realizing that they are projecting all the thing that they do not like about themselves on to a very small, vulnerable and suggestable child. A narcissist has no boundaries so they will even consider a baby to be “bad” if they cry or won’t go to sleep. Narcissists are not problem solvers so they will never consider why a baby is crying and what could they do to remedy the situation, they will just think that the baby is doing to annoy them and will give them their “just punishment” by ignoring them, putting them out in the garden or yelling at them (narcissistic rage).

Once that child becomes able to talk the narcissist parent will start to name call such as telling the child that they are selfish (“think of all the sacrifices I made for you”), always looking for attention (“You are so needy, will you give me some space”), a horrible child, truly ghastly child, they will threaten abandonment, call them liars (if a child dare to mention that the parent’s behavior is less than perfect (such as favouritism) the will swing around and say well “if you were nicer to me I would be nicer to you” or plain “don’t be so stupid”, or that they are a failure. On a rational level the child knows that they did not do or are not what they are accused of being, but because they are hostage to their parent(s), there isn’t any way out. As a result the child either numbs out completely or becomes highly reactive and hyper sensitive trying to anticipate the parent(s) needs before they do.

What is actually happening here is that the narcissist cannot tolerate the feeling of shame that s/he has so they project their behavior on to you to protect their own very fragile sense of self and make you believe that it is your fault.

With regard to adult relationships the narcissist will try to make you feel like you have just found your soul mate (be it a lover or a new friend), that you have so much in common – you like the same everything from values, food, film, music, books and holiday destinations (what could possibly go wrong?). They will put you on a pedestal and will admire everything about you in an exaggerated way. The thing is that when you try to climb down off the pedestal, they won’t let you. So when you admit weaknesses or vulnerability they will totally invalidate what you said because s/he needs you to be perfect to reflect/mirror their own “perfection”. They believe that you are going to save them from themselves by being this perfect person that they have created in their heads and “make it all better”. When they realise that you are not going to make them feel better about themselves, the mask of the false self, slips and their true damaged self emerges. They don’t realise that feeling better about themselves cannot be sourced externally. This also is a dynamic that happens between parents and children, the parent thought that children would make them feel fulfilled and fill the emptiness that they have inside them, but the children don’t, they have their own needs (that will never be met) and therefore have failed the parent aka “bad, selfish, horrible and needy irritants.

Because you didn’t make the narcissist feel better about themselves they will consider that you just didn’t give enough admiration, money, love, attention and praise. There are a number of manipulation tactics that they will use to “make you try harder” such as narcissistic rage, silent treatment, never appreciating anything that you do for them, name calling and gaslighting etc. The once adoring partner/friend turns into a monster and they will go to extreme lengths to hurt you and everything about you will annoy them and will be “wrong”. They will criticise the way you look, the way you cook they will rant and rave at the way you speak until finally you feel like you are walking on eggshells and will tip toe around them just “to keep the peace”. It is at this stage that the person who is involved with a narcissist will deny their own self of sense of self explicitly to avoid the wrath of the narcissist for just being. Anyone with any sense of self left will leave the relationship at this stage (and will have to acknowledge that a smear campaign will be mounted against you always – because the narcissist is never in the wrong). This is especially hard since the abuse did not come from you and other people will not see the dynamic and like Eleanor Rigby

Waits at the window, wearing the face
That she keeps in a jar by the door
Who is it for?

With a narcissist, it is for absolutely everyone else. The less they know a person the harder they try to keep their mask on. So narcissists will often perform amazing acts of kindness to complete strangers and neglect and ignore their own family.

Because the narcissist cannot even consider/contemplate their own inadequacies, terrible behaviour and psychotic turns they have to make it be someone else’s fault (projection) and who better than their nearest and dearest because they can abuse behind closed doors and anyone else would just walk away (anyone who wasn’t carrying their own narcissistic childhood wounds).

A narcissist will not take responsibility for their own horrendous behaviour therefore in their mind it has to be someone else’s fault. They can flatly deny that something happened at all or someone else “made them do it” and they absolutely do not care who they might hurt in the process. They cannot bare the fact that they feel so empty inside, they constantly compare themselves to others which makes the insatiable gossips and are riddled with envy, jealousy and the constant need to “put other people down” either by going after a person’s reputation, making up lies or by name calling. All of this negative activity makes them feel better than/superior to everyone else, but only in the very short term. Inevitably it has no long term feel good feeling, they know what they are doing and it only fuels their feelings of shame and unworthiness, because they have been behaving like this since childhood, acting out comes to them on automatic pilot, they have done it before they realise what they are doing and the damage just adds to their shame which in turn has to be projected on to someone else.

One of the most confusing thing about this kind of behaviour is that a narcissist can blame someone for something when that person wasn’t even present when a situation occurred (that the narcissist refuses to take responsibility for) the narcissist will loudly claim that another was responsible and that poor unsuspecting person will be completely confused when others start to behave in a hostile way around them. You need to realise that their projection onto you was not your fault and you were not selected because you were weak, you were selected because either you don’t know what they are saying to you behind your back or because you won’t confront them out on their amoral behaviour, you know it isn’t going to get you anywhere and will only make them even more vindictive.

Einstein said that the most dangerous people are those who believe in their own lies. So it is with narcissists they will look you straight in the eye and tell a complete lie. With most “normal” people you can tell if they are lying/fabricating or exaggerating too much, because they look a little uncomfortable. Not so with the narcissist they are extremely comfortable with their lies, because if their lie backfires on them they simply flatly deny that they told it and make up another one.

In synthesis, projection is all about a narcissist blaming someone else for their own psychotic, vindictive, cruel and pathological behaviour. It is a very immature and deceitful way to behave but at this stage I hope you realise that there is absolutely no point in expecting any other type of behaviour from a narcissist and remember once a narcissist always a narcissist if they have done it once they will do it again. Don’t be lulled into a false sense of togetherness with a narcissist, they are only being “nice” as a means to an end. It is only a matter of time before the mask slips again.

Intimacy with a partner

Intimacy with a narcissist

Narcissists prefer second hand relationships, where they can feign intimacy with another person because they have harvested information about them through a third party, but they don’t actually have to have any direct contact.With a narcissist it is always all about drama and in this way, they feel involved but do not feel like they are “under scrutiny/threat” like they would do if they had a genuinely intimate relationship.
This “scrutiny” manifests itself as a potential risk to the narcissist as they interpret it as them being judged which could pose a potential threat as the person might not admire/like them or might expose them in some way, other than the image of themselves that they want to project. Which could be seen as narcissistic injury, and can create fear of abandonment or narcissistic rage.
There is also the risk that the narcissist could be held accountable for their behaviour and that would be unacceptable and another threat to them.
If you have grown up in a narcissistic family of origin, it might well be that it will be very easy for a narcissistic partner to shame you and the easier it will be for them to attack you and the harder you find it to be to defend yourself against their emotional attacks. If you are vulnerable with a narcissist they will be constantly harvesting information to use against you and the more vulnerability or sensitivity you show the more aggressive their attacks will be. This might cause an emotional flashback and make you want to pull back into your shell (remember that narcissists are cowards and the more they feel they have upset you, the stronger the attack will be)

The more “intimate” you get with a narcissist the colder and more aloof they will get. This is because they see intimacy as an attack and will start to be abusive to keep you at arms-length, this can happen in three ways:

By attacking you directly by using various forms of verbal and other types of abuse
By comparing you negatively either directly or by insinuation to other people
By moving into a state of emotional unavailability and disassociation after a period of being very keen. They will deny your emotional needs and will tell you how you should or should not feel and will not tell you how they feel themselves – so there are absolutely no foundations in the relationship with which you can work on.
The expression “familiarity breeds contempt” is very appropriate here, as the more the narcissist feels like they have “hooked” you, the less effort they make. You are no longer a valued audience and so they will drop the pretence of their projected image and show up for who they really are.
Another way that they will avoid intimacy is to put their potential new friend or partner (you) up on a pedestal (in the beginning) and they will categorically deny you any vulnerabilities or flaws and so they will not let you climb down from the limb that they have placed you. This is a very effective tool to avoid intimacy because it manifests itself as admiration but it is really just a means of blocking any emotional connection.

What “normal” intimacy looks like:

Your partner does not constantly and consistently lie to you.
Your partner can discuss issues in rational terms and not react in instant rage, change the subject or storm off in a huff over something minor.
Your partner will listen to your point of view without viewing it as an attack and will aim to come to some sort of mutual agreement.
Your partner will not start to slander you in the middle of a discussion.
Your partner will consider your emotional and practical needs and will try to support you.
Your partner will take responsibility for their actions and behaviour and will make a sincere apology if they have hurt or offend you.
Your partner does not try to get revenge if they feel that you have injured them in some way.
Your partner will have the ability to ask you for what they need in a clear, honest and direct manner. No “guess what I am feeling” games.
Your partner is actively engaged in creating a loving, caring and healthy relationship.
Your partner cares about your physical and mental well-being and would not use either any of your vulnerabilities as a whip to hit you with.