One more followup to the panel on “Dancing on his Grave” and “When Montana and I Were Young,” two books that addressed gravely abusive men from the viewpoints of their young female victims. I’ve been curious to hear about such a man from “inside” that man. Lacking a powerful novel, the closest I’ve come is a website called http://samvak.tripod.com/narcissist/ If Barbara Richard’s diagnosis of her father as a “narcissistic sociopath” is correct, and I think it is, what does that mean?
Here’s what Sam Vaknin says: “He is intimate only with his False Self, constructed meticulously from years of lying and deceit. The narcissist's True Self is stashed, dilapidated and dysfunctional, in the furthest recesses of his mind. The False Self is omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, creative, ingenious, irresistible, and glowing. The narcissist often isn't.
“Add combustible paranoia to the narcissist's divorce from himself - and his constant and recurrent failure to assess reality fairly is more understandable. The narcissist overpowering sense of entitlement is rarely commensurate with his accomplishments in his real life or with his traits.
“When the world fails to comply with his demands and to support his grandiose fantasies, the narcissist suspects a plot against him by his inferiors.
“The narcissist rarely admits to a weakness, ignorance, or deficiency. He filters out information to the contrary - a cognitive impairment with serious consequences. Narcissistic are likely to unflinchingly make inflated and inane claims about their sexual prowess, wealth, connections, history, or achievements.”
Sam goes on and on, page after page, accusing himself of the worst traits while all the time covertly assuring us that he thinks he’s perversely brilliant. The trouble is that he IS, if not brilliant, certainly impressive. So he sees through himself and he does NOT see through himself, both at the same time.
Sam’s TEN DO'S
How to Make your Narcissist Dependent on You If you INSIST on Staying with Him [or her]
1. Listen attentively to everything the narcissist says and agree with it all.
2. Personally offer something absolutely unique to the narcissist which they cannot obtain anywhere else.
3. Be endlessly patient and go way out of your way to be accommodating, thus keeping the narcissistic supply flowing liberally, and keeping the peace (relatively speaking).
4. Be endlessly giving. This one may not be attractive to you, but it is a take it or leave it proposition.
5. Be absolutely emotionally and financially independent of the narcissist.
6. If your narcissist is cerebral and NOT interested in having much sex - then give yourself ample permission to have "hidden" sex with other people. Your cerebral narcissist will not be indifferent to infidelity so discretion and secrecy is of paramount importance.
7. If your narcissist is somatic and you don't mind, join in on endlessly interesting group sex encounters but make sure that you choose properly for your narcissist. They are heedless and very undiscriminating in respect of sexual partners and that can get very problematic (STDs and blackmail come to mind).
8. If you are a "fixer", then focus on fixing situations, preferably before they become "situations". Don't for one moment delude yourself that you can FIX the narcissist - it simply will not happen. 9. If there is any fixing that can be done, it is to help your narcissist become aware of their condition, and this is VERY IMPORTANT, with no negative implications or accusations in the process at all. I
10. FINALLY, and most important of all: KNOW YOURSELF.
What are you getting from the relationship? Are you actually a masochist? A codependent perhaps? Why is this relationship attractive and interesting?
The Greek myth of Narcissus is that a beautiful young man falls in love with his reflection in a pool and gazes so long that the gods turn him into a flower (narcissus). The companion myth is about Echo, the co-dependent who cannot do anything by herself. Sam defines himself as a “malignant narcissist” and shows a painting of a young man gazing at his reflection in a pool of blood.
The suggestion of how a narcissist is created is that the mother assures the child of its perfection, its entitlement, its endlessly rewarded demands on her; but the father -- who normally sets limits and reserves some of the mother for himself -- is absent or uncaring. Such people often are capable of amazing accomplishments, often with the help of others who feel they then participate in the accomplishment. The culture rewards this and reemphasizes it again and again. Think of “famous artist” stories about “geniuses” like Picasso and Pollock, how they storm and demand and abuse -- then how they are admired as fabulous and their wives are valued as saints. Of course, every narcissist believes that they are the only person like themselves.
If they only go around bragging at cocktail parties or in bars, if they only lie about themselves and get mad if the lies are detected -- all that is one thing. If they set violently upon defenseless beings -- whether little girls, animals, milder men, or wives -- something more has got to be going on. Rage attacks are not about structure but about some kind of near-physical response that is beyond emotional. Barbara Richard’s father complained of migraine, which implies some kind of brain wiring problem. That makes us hope for a surgery, a medicine or a therapy that could solve the problem.
In situations -- like war or poverty or confinement or addiction -- where violence becomes acceptable, many people receive brain injuries (I’m talking blows and wounds here) that can affect their behavior. Strokes, infections, or maybe even something congenital can also impair the reflexes in the brain that would otherwise tamp down violence or make a person see the consequences. Of course, when the brain-damaged strike out, they often strike at the heads of others. My brother, my father and my uncle all had brain damage that caused their behavior to change, mostly in the direction of being more impatient, more exaggerated, and more physical.
None were on the scale of Barbara Richard’s father, but my own father would jump up in a rage and spank every kid in the room -- sometimes we knew why and sometimes we didn’t. He was just tired or worried or already angry about something else. My mother seemed to accept this -- in fact, she was hot-tempered herself. But I often wonder about HER father. He was a Protestant Irishman from Illinois who never quite seemed to cope with life -- made bad choices and was enraged about it, even paranoid. So maybe some of this is inherited. Red-head behavior.
Still, I think that violence, even a bad temper, is something different than sociopathic narcissism. It’s just when the two converge and then are reinforced by the people present and the culture’s permission that the result is Dear Abby’s list of the traits of abusers. She publishes it every five years or so. I always cut it out and file it. I always recognize myself a little bit. (I’m both a bit Narcissus and a bit Echo.) But check out Sam “Vac” for a far more dramatic version.
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