Understanding Narcissism and Narcissists

[Meerkat]

I have rrally learned alot about narc's. I'll be able to spot one a mile away after this thread.

 

[Peanut]

@Weedygarden I made it through 13 minutes of the video. Personally, the accent was a bit difficult for me to follow. Others may be fine with it.

On the whole there wasn't much said that I was unaware of, a lot of common sense. Yet I can see where it'd be very helpful for someone over whelmed by a situation, lost in the weeds, so to speak.

The one point that I took from the video was the inability of a narc to sincerely admit when they are wrong and apologize for their behavior. At such moments it always deflection, that's their bread and butter...

Thanks for posting...

 

[Amish Heart]

I got my mom to admit, once that she owed my sister an apology. But she never would apologize. I even told her that I knew she wouldn't, and that she would just wait a few weeks, call my sister, and then act like nothing happened. That's exactly what she did.

 

[goshengirl]

Whenever I come back to this thread I read comments that make me think, OH MY GOSH, YOU TOO? Like when Amish talks about her mom - maybe I identify with that a lot because I'm still figuring out all the stuff with my own mom. But there are several other people here whose comments give me the sense of.... I don't know... not being alone? In an unguarded moment it's enough to make me tear up.

And it's not just understanding the narc. That term, "flying monkey" - too funny! And I know just who the flying monkey is in my family. And thinking of her in such a term helps take some of the sting out.

As for the test, I got the 0-11 range (like Dade, I would have preferred a score, not a range). But it's interesting, Weedy, that you bring up the term "empath." In recent years I've been learning that I am an empath (which has created a lot of "a ha!" moments in understanding how I experience things).

As for the blackout grid, I'm right with you guys, Weedy and Amish. Just a few squares shy of a blackout.

 

[Weedygarden]

@Weedygarden I made it through 13 minutes of the video. Personally, the accent was a bit difficult for me to follow. Others may be fine with it.

On the whole there wasn't much said that I was unaware of, a lot of common sense. Yet I can see where it'd be very helpful for someone over whelmed by a situation, lost in the weeds, so to speak.

The one point that I took from the video was the inability of a narc to sincerely admit when they are wrong and apologize for their behavior. At such moments it always deflection, that's their bread and butter...

Thanks for posting...

Thank you. I posted it and I had not watched the whole video, just maybe half of it. Part of why I posted it is because I wondered how others would react to the way she speaks. She probably has much good information in her videos, but the way she speaks bothers me as well. It is interesting to me that of the people who make videos about narcissism, there is something about the way most of them speak bothers me. I think that causes me to lose out on some good information, but it is what it is.

i was 50 before I had the realization about narcissism being the problem in my family. Prior to that, I always put it on all the alcoholism. Therapy and attending Adult Children of Alcoholics didn't get to the heart of the matter, at least not for me.

Your comment on the inability of a narc to sincerely admit they are wrong and apologize is an important piece, imho. Yes, they admire themselves, how they look, thinking they are smarter than others, etc., but how in world does one carry on a relationship with someone who continues to put us down, insult us, want to fight?

 

[Weedygarden]

Whenever I come back to this thread I read comments that make me think, OH MY GOSH, YOU TOO? Like when Amish talks about her mom - maybe I identify with that a lot because I'm still figuring out all the stuff with my own mom. But there are several other people here whose comments give me the sense of.... I don't know... not being alone? In an unguarded moment it's enough to make me tear up.

And it's not just understanding the narc. That term, "flying monkey" - too funny! And I know just who the flying monkey is in my family. And thinking of her in such a term helps take some of the sting out.

As for the test, I got the 0-11 range (like Dade, I would have preferred a score, not a range). But it's interesting, Weedy, that you bring up the term "empath." In recent years I've been learning that I am an empath (which has created a lot of "a ha!" moments in understanding how I experience things).

As for the blackout grid, I'm right with you guys, Weedy and Amish. Just a few squares shy of a blackout.

In the Facebook groups about narcissism, one of the things that I have tried to have people understand is that being able to deal with the narcs is one thing. Being able to not be upset about what they say and do is better. That requires healing. The last time I saw one of my family narcs, she raged. I just was not bothered by her comments. I think that bothered her more, but that was not my intent.

I have a dear friend who adopted a girl from Korea who has always been abusive to her. It is because of reactive attachment disorder, common in adoptees. In friend's therapy, it was identified that she is an empath. Until then, I was not all that familiar with the concept. She told me that she thinks I am an empath as well. I believe that many scapegoats in narcissistic and abusive families are empaths. My narc grandmother used to tell me I was too sensitive. I was sensitive about being yelled at for things that were not worth yelling about, but rather should have been handled with love and care. What child or person does better with verbal abuse.

Want someone to be your friend, or someone who was once your friend and you want them back as your friend? Do not poke at them in a negative, fighting way. That will only deepen the divide. Look inside yourself and ask what can I do to repair this relationship? Sincerely apologize, mean it. Use kind words. What about a peace offering?
Or, keep jabbing away and see that gets you no where. And that is where narcs are. They are so angry that they no longer have you as a friend, or to be able to control and use you. They react from their narcissistic rage.

 

[Amish Heart]

Sorry to hear you have issues with a narc, too, Goshen girl. It does help to get it into perspective, though, especially if you still decide to deal with the person in your life. At mom's age (88), I am still choosing to deal with her. I moved out at 16, married at 20, and we've traveled all over, never really living where mom lived, and dealing with her for short bursts of time. So the past 4 years she's been in my care, kind of. Two sisters help with that, too. I had a hard time at first, but now I make sure I protect my own feelings first. My sisters and I laugh and laugh about the crazy stuff she does now, and that does help. We more or less can guess what she's up to, or thinking about saying. We were just talking about mother's day, my husband and I. So I decided a good day for me would be to take mom out to brunch (at a truck stop she likes to eat at bleech), and give her a gift (a footstool she says she wants, but will tell everyone she hates), and then bring her back to her place. Then husband will barbeque for me and we'll have a great evening on our porch in the rocking chairs.

 

[Meerkat]

This is just the subject you guys are talking about,maybe it will help you. Forget the messenger 'me' to listen to the message, about mothers daughters and a basically all relationships

 

[Swing]

@Meerkat.

I've listen to that book 2 times now. It's so good and easy to listen too. I'll have to list to this whole podcast later tonight. He has a good outlook.

 

[Meerkat]

@Meerkat.

I've listen to that book 2 times now. It's so good and easy to listen too. I'll have to list to this whole podcast later tonight. He has a good outlook.

He is an intellegent man and we've listened to him for a few years now,not good at reading [ partial vision loss ] although I'd love to but do watch his videos. Is it audio books you listen to?

 

[Swing]

Yes, it's out on audible. I listen to books when I'm in the car or working on the computer or just about anything else. Very very little tv. I liked him in the movie "Sahara" . It was by a favorite author of mine (Clive Cussler) and similar to the book, but it's muchly different from the book also.

 

[Weedygarden]

This is good. Found this in a group, a post by the daughter of a narcissist mother.

"My mother is now trying to get us to reschedule the birth of our first child to fit better around HER VACATION. He's had the same estimated delivery date since december."

 

[Lucky2beAlive]

@Weedygarden , thank you for this thread

I saw how his words were twisted or changed to use against him. My ex did this to me as well. It is very effective at making the victim question him or herself. Once you lose confidence that you are right, you are easy pickings and can be beaten down and kept down. Then you get the anger when you stand up for yourself or correct the narcissist for twisting your words. This is particularly brutal because this is when all the stops get pulled out and the attacks drive directly at your own self image and the things that are most important to you.

Then after all that, your competency, both mental and physical, will be put down. And your supposed incompetence become self fulfilling. You are so screwed up in the head that you actually start making all the mistakes that you're being accused of. It was at this point that my mental state really became dangerous during my marriage.

Your not alone, Spike. Weedy mentioned before how the first 6-12 months the narc measures your weaknesses to be used as arsenal later. My wife ended up doing that to me.

I’ve always dealt with low self esteem and still do somewhat. (don’t know why, so annoying) Each year of our marriage my wife would complain more and more, unnecessarily, just like spike described. It didn’t matter how good a husband and father figure I was being, she found something to make me know I’m still not as good as I should be.

After enough negativity went on I felt stuck in a bad relationship and couldn’t bring myself to leave. Menopause was an excuse for 7 years. After the menopause was over, for the next three years, I realized that’s just how she thinks she should treat me.

I felt un-worthy in my spouses eyes and bottled up my sadness. I didn’t know what to do. Divorce is a sin and living with her was breaking me down to the core. If I stayed, I was afraid of what I might do to myself, so I left.

Now, I’m afraid I committed a selfish sin leaving our covenant and that made me sad. I have an overly strong conscious and I’m usually too hard on myself anyway.

Then loneliness set in, something I’ve never felt before. I called a depression counselor to be sure I didn’t get worse. She helped me deal with the situation and feel better about myself.

I even asked my wife to go to marriage counseling with our pastor to see if we could fix our problems and rekindle our marriage. The results of the counseling just proved to me she does have a problem and I’m too weak to handle the negative emotions.

It took a year for my conscious to finally be content with my decision, which I’m convinced was one of the best decisions of my life.

 

[Amish Heart]

Glad you came out on top, Lucky. That's a hard situation to be in.

 

[Weedygarden]

These are tough situations, especially when you never want to be divorced. In the Christian world, we are supposed to forgive all people, and I try, with God's help. A former pastor said, "Turn the other cheek, but you don't have to keep that cheek around someone who is not kind."

 

[Weedygarden]

In one of the groups about narcissistic mothers, someone asked for movies that were about abusive mothers. There were close to 1000 response, and these are just some of the titles.
Movies about Narcissistic mother and their daughters. I have not seen very many of them. I copied the titles and many of the comments about the films.

Mommy Dearest

******* out of Carolina

Run – on Hulu--that was definitely a good movie.

The Parkers - Netflix

Woman Thou Art Loosed - Movie

Mom - TV show

Like Water for Chocolate

The Monster. Well worth a watch

Wild at Heart

Mommy by Dolan

Moonrise Kingdom (very artistic film about a pair of somewhat neurotic 13 year olds dealing a bunch of weird things thrown at them, choosing to run away together because both of their living situations suck)

Honestly The Visit because that batch didn’t listen to her kids at all

Also an Australian 2 part movie called Jessica. By Bryce Courtney. God that woman is horrible, its basically about a mother who frames her own daughter and steals her baby to give to her other daughter simply because the daughter is a tomboy and the mother hates it. it’s amazing

Flowers in the attic

Matilda

Sybil

Tangled (This was my first thought. The song Mother Knows Best makes me want to rage and vomit all at once.)

All About My Mother

White Oleander

Lady Bird

Spinning out

Black Swan

Firefly Lane on Netflix (show not a movie).

Lies my mother told me

The American Crime

Weeds!

*********

Precious

Frozen

August Osage County (with Julia Roberts) about a Narcissistic Mother and her toxic relationship with her 3 daughters.

The Notebook

The Act

Bates Motel

Greys anatomy. The relationship between Meredith and her mother and how it affects her is so well portrayed.

Not a movie but TV show, Sharp Objects

Also monster in law w Jennifer Lopez

Kathy Sanderson based on Carrie Fisher's mom, Debbie Reynolds.

The Mirror Has Two Faces

TWILIGHT, Renée is an awful mum and I will die on that hill

Drop dead Fred

The Glass House (Godmother but still valid)

Gifted starring Chris Evans. His sister there was the victim of their narc mother. His role there was to take care of and protect his sister's daughter, his niece, from suffering the same fate. It's an inspiring movie and I could relate so much that it pierced my heart.

Riding in cars with boys

Anywhere but here with Susan Sarandon and Natalie Portman.

Ginny and Georgia-tv show

Little fires everywhere - a tv series with Reese Witherspoon and Kerry Washington, the writer was on Brene brown’s podcast

A Little Princess, not a mother but she runs the school that she goes to. Always reminded me of my mom

Well dad and child, Chicken Little!!!

 

[Weedygarden]

National Narcissistic Abuse Awareness Day, today.

 

[Weedygarden]

 

[Amish Heart]

That is a very true quote. Sometimes they are found out as they get old, then no one wants to be around them. I feel sad for them for that, but oh well.

 

[Weedygarden]

That is a very true quote. Sometimes they are found out as they get old, then no one wants to be around them. I feel sad for them for that, but oh well.

It is sad, but it is the consequences of their own actions and behavior. It takes a while to figure out that the narcissist is one and that they are toxic. I wonder if the behavior gets worse with age for most? It has with some that I know.

 

[Amish Heart]

I don't know. I know my mom lies about what she does all day, what she eats even. She'll say she went to a meeting at her assisted living place, but can't say anything about the meeting. I doubt she goes. She'll say that she ate a good breakfast (cereal maybe), a couple of sandwiches for lunch (code for a donut), and a can of soup for dinner...she'll say, you know the expensive kind with the chunks of meat and potato in it (not. code for ice cream). She's pretty much a recluse, but has lots of opportunity to socialize with activities where she lives. And she chose where she's living, too. I think sometimes her lying has gotten worse, but then again, I'm not a kid anymore, so maybe I just notice it more.
Another difficult issue I have, and a friend of mine was going through the same thing with her narc mom...if they're getting dementia, and I can't tell if it's a lie or if they really forgot. But I do know sometimes she could make an effort to remember, but doesn't, because she's too wrapped up in herself.
So maybe I shouldn't feel sorry if no one wants to be around her. Maybe that's what she wants. Her last phone call two days ago was so draining for me, I need a couple of weeks to recuperate. Ha.

 

[Weedygarden]

 

[Weedygarden]

 

[Weedygarden]

Not at all what I originally posted because it was unavailable, but this came in one of my narcissism groups.

 

[Amish Heart]

Says it's unavailable

 

[Weedygarden]

Says it's unavailable

Thank you. I'll see what I can do about it.
Bummer, can't figure it out.

Replaced it with something else.

 

[Weedygarden]

 

[Weedygarden]

We are all good enough. Narcissists do select people who threaten them, their position, their perceived power and then they target them.

 

[Weedygarden]

Duplicity has no place with true friends. This is what makes someone a flying monkey. The flying monkey "pretends" to be your friend, but is stabbing you in the back. I told someone to take the knife out of my back. They think they are smarter and can do these cruel things and get away with it. These people are really toxic.

 

[Weedygarden]