The Object of My Affection Is in My Reflection: Coping with Narcissists

228 Pages·2008·2.92 MB·English

by  Rokelle Lerner

Other Books by Rokelle Lerner
Affirmations for Adult Children of Alcoholics
Affirmations for the Inner Child
Living in the Comfort Zone:
The Gift of Boundaries in Relationships
Building Relationships That Work
Health Communications, Inc.
Deerfield Beach, Florida
www.hcibooks.com
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Lerner, Rokelle.
The object of my affection is in my reflection / Rokelle Lerner.
p. cm.
Includes index.
ISBN-13: 978-0-7573-0768-3 (paperback)
ISBN-10: 0-7573-0768-X (paperback)
ISBN-13: 978-0-7573-0776-9 (ePub)
ISBN-10: 0-7573-0776-X (ePub)
1. Narcissism. I. Title.
BF575.N35L47 2009
158.2—dc22
2008033964
©2009 Rokelle Lerner
All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. No part of this publication may be reproduced,
stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical,
photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the written permission of the publisher.
HCI, its logos, and its marks are trademarks of Health Communications, Inc.
Publisher: Health Communications, Inc.
3201 S.W. 15th Street
Deerfield Beach, FL 33442-8190
R-06-12
Cover design by Andrea Perrine Brower
Inside formatting by Lawna Patterson Oldfield
ePub created by Dawn Von Strolley Grove
In loving memory of my father
Dr. Raphael Weisberg
Contents
Acknowledgments
Introduction
PART I: The Roots of Narcissism
1 Entitlement, Rage and Contempt: The Plight of Narcissists and Their Victims
2 Narcissism Versus Narcissistic Traits
3 Everyone Is a Little Narcissistic
4 The Phenomenon of Healthy Parenting
5 How the Narcissistic Personality Is Formed
6 The Care and Feeding of Narcissists
PART II: The Impact of Narcissism on Personal and Professional Relationships
7 How to Recognize a Narcissist
8 Dealing with the Narcissist in the Workplace
9 Narcissists and Intimacy: A Contradiction in Terms
10 The Narcissist Woman
PART III: The Narcissistic Client
11 Narcissus in Wonderland: The Narcissistic Addict
12 Narcissism: A Difficult Diagnosis
13 The Narcissist in Therapy
PART IV: Surviving a Narcissistic Relationship: Breaking the Spell and Coming
to Life
14 Trapped in a Narcissistic Relationship: Why You Can’t Help Yourself
15 Strategies for Maintaining Your Sanity with a Narcissist
16 Building Your Psychological and Spiritual Immune System
17 The Light at the End of the Dark Tunnel
Epilogue
References
Acknowledgments
M
y heartfelt thanks to the following people: Mary Stangler for her patience
and support; Jason Aeric Huenecke for his encouragement and insightful
perspective; Mary McGuckian for her generosity, friendship, and sense of
humor; Patricia Broat for her faith in me and her ability to motivate others; Gary
Seidler, the coach; Cottonwood de Tucson, who allows me to continue to create
and do the work I love to do; Lois Weisberg for her unwavering encouragement
and her fantastic job as a proofreader; Sam Vaknin and Sandy Hotchkiss, whose
work is an inspiration; Bonnie Burg for her expertise and guidance; Linda
Bylander for her generosity of spirit and support; and to the men and women
who have allowed me to witness their struggles and be a part of their healing.
Introduction
T
his book is based on the premise that good relationships are the foundation of
emotional health. Professional success, loving children, and loyal friends can’t
make up for the loneliness and pain of a primary relationship gone wrong. When
that relationship is with a narcissist, your emotional health becomes so eroded
that your sanity and your dignity disappear. No matter how hard you try, there is
no way to apply a tourniquet to the perpetual drama and agony of living with an
individual who is as wounded as the narcissist. The pain you experience living
with a narcissistic partner bleeds into every aspect of life and robs you of your
equanimity and your soul. My goal is to help people whose lives are impacted by
this disorder and assist those professionals who treat these men and women.
Narcissism is most often defined as excessive self-love and grandiosity, but in
fact, narcissism is better viewed as a continuum of emotional states from
adolescent self-interest to romantic love to excessive self-absorption and
entitlement. For example, when we fall in love we often worship or idealize our
beloved and experience that idealization in return. Romantic love (which has
been called temporary insanity) is a narcissistic state where we can become
focused on our relationship and ourselves to the exclusion of everything and
everyone. In addition, adolescents experience a predictable stage of narcissistic
development that passes with time and maturity; or so we’re told. However,
pathological narcissism develops from early childhood wounds that manifest in a
hunger for perfect attention and admiration that can never be satisfied. For the
narcissist, these childhood deficits create a distorted worldview that they are
entitled to adoration simply because they exist.
One of the challenges in describing narcissism is that it is often associated
with the sense of self-entitlement that has become such a part of our culture that
makes it difficult to discern narcissistic tendencies from pathological narcissism.
The messages we receive from society, the emotional failure between parents
and children, and the history of failed relationships that have become the norm,
all contribute to this phenomenon. Sadly, we have a population of five-year-olds
acting like they are forty, and forty-year-olds with the emotional maturity of five
years old. From drama queens to bullies, our culture permeates with self-
indulgence and a “you owe me” attitude that cuts across all socio-economic
barriers and exists in all walks of life.
Throughout my career I’ve worked with many partners of narcissists who
wind up feeling crazy and desperate—and with good reason! It’s baffling when
the person you fell in love with, who used to treat you so lovingly and
thoughtfully, suddenly acts like you are an annoyance—or worse, the enemy. It’s
painful to watch this person in public, treating people with respect and
generosity and doing nice things such as acknowledging their birthdays—while
consistently ignoring you. Your friends may think he’s quite a catch; people may
adore him. And you may begin to feel as if there’s something desperately wrong
with you.
This scenario could also describe the narcissistic parent who is held up as a
model by friends and acquaintances who tell you what a lucky child you are! In
the privacy of the home, however, the narcissistic parent becomes uninterested,
rude, critical, and demeaning. He or she picks at your faults, and there’s nothing
you can do to win favor. Through this book, I hope to provide some comfort to
those who have lived in this unending cycle of idealization to rejection,
adoration to hatred, and respect to disregard.
The purpose of this book is not to vilify narcissists. My purpose is to shed
light on the destructive dynamics that occur in relationships with narcissists. We
must have compassion for the wounded narcissists who suffer incomprehensible
agony. The survival mechanisms narcissists develop were created as a defense
for repeated emotional injuries. These defenses allowed them to endure the pain
of a childhood filled with abandonment and shame. Narcissists are not inherently
evil. Unfortunately their wounds compel them to act in ways that are
unconscionable, damaging, and ultimately tragic. Beneath their façade of
grandiosity, narcissists are anguished, tortured, and angry people. The purpose of
this book is not to judge the morality of narcissists, but to help you cope with
them in your life.
It’s important to keep in mind that narcissists desperately long to be involved
in a relationship but have expectations that inevitably cause misery and
disillusionment in themselves and in their partners. Their wounds prevent them
from experiencing human intimacy because their primary attachment is not to a
person but to the procurement of adoration and attention. This doesn’t make
them bad; it makes them tragic and emotionally unavailable in relationships.
And since narcissists often choose mates with narcissistic wounds, it’s
imperative that we focus on ourselves first, and resist the urge to diagnose our
friends, lovers, or coworkers.
Several years into my practice, I began to see a disturbing pattern in many of
my clients, particularly among recovering alcoholics and addicts. Well into their
sobriety, these people continued to display grandiosity, entitlement, anger, and
extreme sensitivity to the slightest suggestion of inattention. The interesting
thing was that these men and women also could be disarming, gregarious, and