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Narcissistic Personality Disorder - Any Experience?
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Anonymous
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So I posted early this week about my DH and some difficult family issues he is going through. One very helpful response included some information on narcissistic persoanlity disorder and, although I hate to be a google psychiatrist, it does seem that DH's mother has many of the symptoms. The more I read, the more scared I actually became, too. The common wisdom seems to be that people with this disorder are virtually impossible to cure and just as difficult to ever develop a reasonable, balanced relationship with. I am still trying to sort through everything I read and am wondering about other people's experinces with family members with this problem. How did you get others (like my DH) to recognize what the problem was with that person? Did you ever obtain an actual medical diagnosis? Did anything help you make sure you and your loved ones survived this person? Is there an expert on this disorder in the Washington area?
I have tried three times to confront her about her actions/behavior and each time she has immediately reacted wityh full blown rage, once she became physical with me and it was in front of my children. She is a truly scary person whenever anyone tries to make her see reality and shake her out of her self-involved "dream" world. We have two young children who, thus far have not had too much expeosure to MIL, even though she lives very close by. For one, she has never really pursued any truly close relationship with them and two, I have always suspected she was untrustworthy (many many stories there) and tried to keep my children somewhat safe from her influence. As they get older, and less "needy" int he way children are, I am worried she will try to latch on to one of them. She is terribly manipulative and demanding of my DH and I dont ever want to see it transferred to one of her grandchildren (DH is an only child, too). Any insight or help would be appreciated. TIA. |
Anonymous
| Limit.contact. |
Anonymous
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For people with narcissistic and borderline personality disorders, confrontation=abandonment. So does criticism, unfortunately there is a lot of me vs world thinking and categorizing people as on my side or against me. So the manipulation is a way to manufacture closeness, and usually escalates in the face of perceived threat. If you confront or shame, she will make a play for support from DH.
Do some more reading about motivation for change and non-confrontational counseling strategies, OP. Motivational interviewng is a technique that is actually more targeted to addictions, but would be interesting for you to read about ways you can intervene without throwing gasoline on the fire. Your current approach is not working. |
Anonymous
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I am happy to talk with you. My mom has symptom of this and yes it is dificult but I don't know the scope of what you are dealing with. There is no 100% on anything so I am not sure if you recently had a fight and you are being dramatic or if this is an evolution of behavoir. What does your husband describe of his life growing up? Also, did she have something traumatic happen to her when she was young? This personality disorder is not about looking in the mirror and thinking you are great..it's about not having a capcity of understanding where someone else's opinion is coming from or caring--and usually it is because something really bad happened and set it off so to speak. My mom's sister died suddenly when she was six and her family never mentioned her name again..very very traumatic . I am not going to lie..it's a struggle and I am going to therapy to deal with this reality. But..again nothing is 100% and in my mom's case..she is caring, she just doesn't understand my feelings and I realize she isn't going to..that is hard to swallow. Again I need more info and I am happy to talk with you. As for curing..it's tough..she would have to hit rock bottom and then meds can help change her life..but you can't force her and so that is why it is dificult to cure. I am sorry..believe I am sorry.
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Anonymous
She will freak out if you cut off contact. The more freaked out she is, the crazier she will act. You want her to be as calm as possible so she can make well thought-out reasonable decisions. When she is upset, she will not be thinking clearly, and she will behave less rationally. |
Anonymous
| My MIL is a classic narcissist. It has been a continual battle to deal with her. We put up with it/confronted her before children, however, having seen that talking about things with her makes no difference, we do limit contact. We have seen them once this year and that was enough. Thankfully my husband is the one initiating the contact limitations. He talks to his dad some but his mom maybe once a month. It sucks from a family perspective, but it's what we have to do to protect our kids from unnecessary drama, lying, etc. There really is no way to win here....she is what she is and will continue to be that way. My MIL was severely abused as a child, which is very sad but doesn't change the fact that we cannot trust her around our children. It's just one of the things we've accepted and have moved on from. It's taken 11 years though! |
Anonymous
But what do you do? Cater to them? That's what my brother does, whose ex-wife is a lot like this. He is so obsequious toward her, so as not to upset her in any way. If he tried to put up some healthy boundaries, it might really make her go nuts, and there are children involved. |
Anonymous
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I'm so sorry for you and your family, OP. My father was narcissistic. He abused us all horrifically and bullied anyone he thought would take it - unless they had something he want and then he was Mr. Charming. His position as a physician really let him feed his disorder. Anyone who criticised him or called him on his behavior was shunned/dropped. Our lives were hell and as soon as I could, I left home. One I left and made it clear I wasn't taking his shit any more, he pretty much left me alone. Until he died, I severely limited contact with him and only spoke/saw my mom when he wasn't around. If I had had children while he was alive, I would never have let him see them - not just because of my fears he would abuse them but also because he would use my children as pawns to hurt my mother. If he knew something mattered to you, he would use that get to you. He would have had my mom do shit like rip up all pictures of the kids, rip up any drawings they made for her, that sort of thing. I know he'd do it because that's the sort of thing he did while I was growing up. He did it because he could.
It took me a long time and a lot of therapy to get to a good place. It's not easy and if your DH hasn't really examined this part of his life, well, it's going to be very difficult for you both to make some of the hard decisions you need to make and establish boundaries. I'm sorry I don't have anything more positive or uplifting to offer...... |
Anonymous
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Don't listen to 10:04
My mom has NPD and it is a constant struggle. The details that many previous posters gave you are correct, but the bottom line is that limited or no contact is the only tool that you have. Someone with NPD will never understand and will never change- so give up trying to reason with them. Your choices are to either put up with it, or to limit contact. There is a lot of good information here- http://www.daughtersofnarcissisticmothers.com/ |
Anonymous
| I find this very interesting because my 73-year old father, who is narcissistic borderline-personality disorder is in the midst of a nervous breakdown. He is undoing his whole will, divorcing my mom and verbally abusing us all. I don't know how to engage him to make it better. My siblings don't care because they just do whatever he wants but I am being targeted because I won't indulge his behavior. It's just horrendous how the situation has gone from bad to WAY worse in the last two weeks, too. |
Anonymous
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OP, I didn't read your original post but my father definitely has NPD, and my brother and I have been coping with his craziness our whole lives. I find other PPs' armchair psychoanalysis fascinating - agree that this is probably triggered by early trauma (like a PP my dad's sister died when he was about 6 and the family got very weird after that; also possibly some abuse by an adult they knew, but neither he nor my uncle will talk about it). At any rate, that doesn't help you. I agree with the 'limit contact' and also with the 'control contact' advice. My dad sees our kids for a few hours every now and then when he's in DC for something else (like your MIL, he's not that interested in them except to the extent they follow his mold- like his sports, etc. I dont expect that to change). We never allow him to see them alone, and he doesn't stay at our house. I have ended all contact with him for years at a time at least 3 different times throughout my life, so while his craziness will never change, he has come to realize there are certain house rules and if he doesn't play by them I will not hesitate to pull the plug on him and his grandkids again. House rules are basic - no criticizing my kids to their faces, certain topics will not be discussed (just met with 'I'm not going to talk about it'), etc. He can never be alone with them because of his tendency to play the good guy and try to turn them against us(I can already hear it - "I WAS going to take you to disney world/buy you a car/et but your mom wouldn't let me") - he played this with me against my mom so often it was ridiculous.
Unfortunately my brother is much more susceptible to my father's attempts at control and always seems willing to believe he's changed, or at least that he owes him another chance - I went through years of counseling myself to get to a place where I can say that I dont owe my father anything and I dont have to keep returning for his abuse - my brother has not had this and it shows. I think he's drawn to the potential for $$ from my dad, but it has gotten him into big jams before (such as when my dad loaned him $, then got mad for some perceived honor violation and called the loan, then sued my brother when he couldn't pay for it - yet now dad has crept back in and my brother is saying 'boy it would be nice not to have to save for college - Dad has 529s for my kids'). This causes major stress in my brother's marriage, because my SIL is very much onto my father and doesn't even want to see his face, ever. One thing we learned when reading about NPD was how hard it is to get a diagnosis and treatment because those suffering are typically insanely smart. My father has fooled every shrink that anyone (including my mom, who tried therapy before divorcing him 30 years ago) got him to see - including the so-called expert on NPD at Hopkins. I have given up on any positive outcome like that. You may want to try marriage counseling to help DH see what is going on and how it is affecting your marriage. He may do better if it's about both of you, even though it really is about him. Again, not having read your original post, but gathering from this one that DH is having a hard time getting his head around this and is still in MIL's web, my advice is this: acknowledge to DH that you know you're talking about his mother, and he loves her and is connected to her and shutting her out is not an option, but you need him to agree on certain parameters regarding her behavior: no violence, clearly, and whatever else is most important to you (for me, no criticizing the kids, never being alone with them), etc. He needs to be willing to enforce those, as in, call her on it and make clear to her that this isn't you just being 'against' her but your collective view on appropriate behavior in your house. She can visit as long as she abides by them. And I would really never let your kids be alone with her, at least until you can be sure they're old enough to understand what's going on. Sorry you're dealing with this. If you want to talk more, post an email address. |
Anonymous
I'm the PP above you and this is just like my dad! Everyone thinks he is fine because he can turn off his behavior and be insanely charming when he needs to. He abhors change and if anything changes not to his exact specifications then he starts threatening to "disown" us and cut us out of the will. It doesn't directly have any effect on my life but my siblings work for my dad and they are routinely fired and rehired so now they just tow the line and pretty much gang up on me for not dealing with his shit. |
Anonymous
11:54 here - be strong! Over the years I had a number of family members try to push me toward reconciliation (at the urging of my grandmother - dad's mom), try to convince me I was being too hard on him, blood is thicker than water, etc. Several of them have finally seen enough and given up, and even apologized to me, but not without significant emotional cost to me. It's so frustrating - like being the only one who knows the emperor has no clothes! I've been disowned so many times it's hilarious - one of the cousins who used to push reconciliation is apparently friendly with dad's estate lawyer and calls me every time it changes. Sounds like you and I made similar life decisions - priority #1 is to be independent of him (I'm a lawyer and make pretty good $, and that path was definitely motivated by a need to be self-supporting and independent). So sorry your siblings are on your case. At least my brother leaves me alone, although he hasn't heeded my warning about how is he going to deal with not having college savings when his son is 15 and my dad starts with "Joey should be in AP chemistry. I'm not going to pay for his college if you dont make him study harder. He should be playing soccer, not basketball." etc. |
Anonymous
| Boy, the two PPs have pretty much summed up my experience as well. I'm sorry I wasn't the only one. |
Anonymous
| Look around, OP. You are surrounded by by NPD. |