People with narcissistic personality disorder, what were you

xdude wrote:I can write that reading that was triggering. Very hard to finish reading that story.

5 Types of Narcissistic Childhoods

My clients with Narcissistic Personality Disorders tend to report five different types of childhood situations.

I will list them in approximate order from highest functioning and least abusive to lowest functioning and most destructive.

Type 1—The Narcissistic Family

In this family everyone was expected to be a high achiever. The children were rewarded with praise, attention, and generous gifts whenever they did things that the Narcissistic parents felt reflected well on the family. The children were not unconditionally loved and the parents were basically uninterested in them except for their potential to enhance the family’s image and status in the world. The children were trained to be high achieving Narcissists and taught a Narcissistic value system.

In their world: Achievement = Love

If you were one of the “Golden Children” who got great grades, were handsome or beautiful, starred in the school play, or were great athletes; you were treated well. If you did not measure up to the parents’ standards, you were either ignored or shamed. “Why are you so dumb? All your sisters made the honor society. What’s wrong with you?” “I was much more athletic than you at your age.”

Family Motto: If you can’t be the best, you aren’t trying hard enough.

Type 2—One of the Parents Was a Dominant Exhibitionist Narcissist

Everything in this family was designed to please and pacify the dominant Exhibitionist Narcissist. He or she made all the rules and the less dominant spouse (often a Covert or Closet Narcissist) went along with whatever the dominant one wanted—sometimes simply to avoid a fight or out of fear.

The children, like the less dominant spouse, generally try to please the dominant parent and get the parent’s approval. I think of that parent as the “Alpha Parent.” If this were a dog pack, everything would be simpler. After the initial dominance challenges, everyone would fall into their appropriate pack position.

Some of the downsides to being raised in this family:

You get devalued and punished if you challenge the “Alpha parent” in any way. You always have to be subserviant.
You are trained to admire and give the parent attention and basically only get praised for making the parent feel good.
You are never allowed to surpass your parent. That is considered to be a dominance challenge and will lead to a dominance fight, not praise for you.
All children go through a normal phase of wanting to exhibit themselves and get praise for their growing accomplishments. In its simplest form, the child does something and says, “Look at me!” This is stifled in this type of family, which prevents children from getting their normal stage appropriate developmental needs met. This tends to negatively affect their self-esteem, makes the exhibitionism go underground, and it is likely to pop up later in less appropriate ways.

Type 3—Covert or Closet Narcissist Parents

This can play out in different ways, depending on the parents’ motives and personalities.

Child Worshippers: These parents feel too vulnerable and insecure to call attention to themselves directly. Instead the idealize one or sometimes all of their children. They brag about their children’s achievements, show you pictures, and in general use their children’s achievements to feel special by association.

Their children are pushed to excel in every activity that the parents wished they had been better at during their childhood. As with most Narcissists, they blur the boundary between self and other. They are less interested in who the children actually are, than what they want them to be.

If you are one of the children who excel, you are likely to get worshipped and catered to. If you do not, the best you can expect is to be ignored.

“Missionaries:” This is my name for a subgroup of Covert Narcissists who are pro-social and who devote their lives to serving a religion or social movement. They raise their children to supress any overt expressions of egotism and channel all their energy into being perfect servants of “The Cause.” Your status in the group depends on how well you serve and how much you are willing to give up. Martyrdom is the ultimate status symbol.

Type 4—Malignant Narcissist Parents

These parents enjoy dominating and depriving their children. Their self-esteem goes up as their childrens’ go down. Punishments do not fit the crime. Physical punishments and verbal devaluation is the norm. The children usually either identify with the aggressor and become mean Narcissists or they give up and become failed Narcissists who hate everyone. As adults, they tend to see the world starkly in terms of victors vs. victims. Their motto is: Do onto others before they can do onto you.

Type 5—Failed Narcissists

These parents have the lowest self-esteem of all Narcissists. They cannot mobilize enough defensive grandiosity to ever feel good about themselves. Think of the prisoners who tattoo: “Born to Lose” on themselves. They resent everybody and want to see their children fail as well. Their motto is: Don’t think you are better than me, you piece of worthless garbage!

Punchline: There are many different types of Narcissistic parents and, therefore, many different types of childhoods that create adults with Narcissistic Disorders. Some childhood scenarios are definitely worse than others.

Elinor Greenberg, PhD, CGP

Cassandre wrote:I'm confused ... is my link broken for you guys?

ZeroZ wrote:I was probably a pre teen when I figured out I could manipulate him and weaponize him against other people I was mad at. I didn’t realize this was wrong at the time it wasn’t until it started becoming clear what I was doing to other people. It was all about survival to me at the time

Akuma wrote:In my case I dunno I was rather neglected, no father, mother working, grandmother was more schizoid and never played with me or something, grandfather was a fundamentalist christian.