Emotional Torture

A comment was left on my blog a few days ago that deserves to be highlighted. Torienne left a comment on the blog post "When Your Narcissist Mother isn't THAT Bad". She very articulately describes the component of emotional abuse that makes it so painful and destructive. She also captures what it is that makes physical and emotional pain move from the realm of discomfort into torture. To save you a click, I'll copy and paste her comment below. Thanks, Torienne, for your well-stated insights.

Torienne said...

I once read a comment by a neonatologist, who said of his profession "What we do to these children is indistinguishable from torture." He has a point. Think about what a juvenile cancer patient goes through -the needles, the poisons, the surgeries. And yet, when they recover, these kids are delighted to return to the hospital where torture was visited on them. They run to hug the nurses and doctors who inserted needles and pumped burning fluids into their veins.

The difference between medical care and torture is intent. The doctors and nurses have only the intent to cure, and as humanely as possible. They explain what will happen. They validate the child's fear. They do their best to ease that pain and fear. They are concerned and compassionate.

On the other hand, a narcissistic mother may never have laid a hand on you, though she probably managed to arrange for at least some pain. All her brutality was in her intent. She intended to humiliate, confuse and shame. She wanted you to hurt. She enjoyed it. She even wanted you to know that she enjoyed it. She was sadistic.

Andrew Vachss has said (http://www.vachss.com, look for "You carry the cure...") that the worst kind of abuse is emotional abuse. He believes that the emotional component of physical and verbal abuse is what makes it bad. He has a long history as an advocate of abused children, and if anyone understands abuse, it is he. Even so he has a hard time verbalizing what he means by emotional abuse. Like most writers, he defaults to using examples of verbal abuse and pointing out their emotional component.

The children of narcissists endure the very worst kind of abuse because narcissists are pure emotional abusers. Their children do not know how to express what they experience, because it is so difficult to describe the agony of abusive intent. Our Nparents hurt our feelings and then reveled in our pain in such a way that it was clear that they did it on purpose and for fun. Although they certainly lashed out in anger, that wasn't what made them abusive, although as AnnaV points out, when they are called on their abusiveness, they point to things like angry outbursts, because, after all, they're just human, and you do that too, sometimes right? In reality what made them abusive was not their outbursts. It was the times they engaged in carefully planned, deliberate, premeditated cruelty and the pleasure they took from inflicting it. They know what they're doing. That's the biggest secret of all, and the one they defend with their last breath, as AnnaV's mother was doing. They claim they had no intention of hurting you, but in reality, the entire goal was to hurt you. Your pain was the payoff. They knew it. You knew it. That's what made it hurt so much. But you couldn't prove it, and your ineffectual rage and humiliation made the narcissist just giggle with joy and pride that she was so clever!

When I was 15, my father developed cancer and was given 2 years to live. That summer I became so depressed that I didn't get out of bed, couldn't eat, and did nothing. Naturally my mother didn't notice, because she was worrying about herself (she said). One night, in the grip of rolling waves of depression, I told her that I was sick and needed to go the doctor. The doctor examined me briefly, looked at me sitting slumped on his examining table and said "What's going on in your life?" I said "My father has cancer and he's going to die." He said "I see." He then turned to my Nmom and said "I think you should get her someone to talk to." She said,incredulously "You mean...like a psychologist? Oh no! Not her!"

Now, she was a nurse, and I had never before heard her directly defy a doctor's orders. In addition, she was seeing a psychologist herself, so it wasn't fear of therapists in general. She was ok with therapy, just not for me.

It took me a long time to figure out the damning truth behind this scene and why something so superficially trivial burned itself into my memory. She didn't want me to see a therapist, because she was afraid the therapist would find out what she was doing to me . Then that horrible, delicious little secret would be out: that sometimes she liked to get me alone and torment me for fun. Some of her abuse was unthinking, but most of it wasn't at all involuntary or reflexive. It was staged, planned and deeply enjoyed, and could not be explained in any other way than deliberate sadism. It was also completely hidden. She was extremely careful about her timing and her rationales. She orchestrated it for maximum pleasure without risking exposure. All of this was completely conscious, and extremely evil. And she knew all of it.

So Jordie: Look through your memory. Somewhere, sometime when your Nmom wasn't in complete control of the situation, she slipped up and gave you tangible proof of her sadism. Maybe when you realize that, it will help you understand that you have absolutely no choice but No Contact, because otherwise she will never stop tormenting you. She doesn't want to. It's been too much fun.

Are We Required to Keep a Sibling in Our Lives?

I left off the story of my sister after telling how her lying and thievery played a large role in ruining my cousin's life. For all previous installments of my attempt to describe my relationship with my sister click here.

I had limited interaction with my sister after I left my parent's home the second time. Sister went off to college; I was busy working and raising my young daughter. A year after re-marrying I was packing boxes and moved to another state about 400 miles away from my family. During the year I was gone my marriage fell apart. I moved back to the city my parents lived in after calling a close girlfriend and being offered a job where she was office manager.

Living my own life, raising my daughter, and being yet again a divorcee' I was spending very little time with my parents and even less time with my sister. Then the event that completely changed my sister's way of relating to me occurred. She became pregnant. She claims she was raped. From her description of events, a logical person can conclude she teased someone until he took what she was tantalizingly holding out to him.

Here is how she describes the event. You can decide for yourself whether or not she was raped. This male was someone she had met through her work. He lived in near-by state. She invited him to come stay at our parent's place for a visit. I was ordered (by both sister and mother) to pick him up at the airport one afternoon. I was singularly unimpressed. By the time I dropped him off at my parent's home (only about a five mile trip), I was certain this guy was not the Mr. Wonderful my sister had described him as being.

It was during this visit that the rape occurred. Sister's boyfriend was staying in her old bedroom. The door to her old bedroom was about three feet down the hall from my parent's bedroom. She admits that after she had dressed for bed (in a skimpy summer nightie), she went up to the bedroom where her boyfriend was. She laid on the bed with him. She was just being playful, says she. Not surprisingly the guy got excited. My sister had remained a technical virgin with her first boyfriend because boyfriend #1 was willing to take "no" for an answer. Apparently, my sister thought all men could be that self-controlled in the presence of a cock tease. Surprise, surprise. When this boyfriend started to aggressively go for the prize, and she said "no", he didn't take "no" for an answer. He took the scantily clad female in his bed as a sign that she really wanted it. Her actions spoke louder than her "no". Her claims to being raped get even more lame when you realize my father was only a matter of feet away from the scene of the "crime". One scream from her and it would have all been over. My father would not have hesitated to come to her rescue and my sister knew that. In fact, I know that my father always had a hard time believing the rape charge for this very reason. He directly asked my sister why she didn't call out for help. She weakly replied that she was afraid of causing a scene. That never sat well with our father. I have to admit that it seriously undercut her credibility with me as well, though I never challenged her claim to having been raped because it would have done no good. This was how she was going to maintain "face" in the situation of being unmarried and pregnant. (And, no, she never contacted law enforcement either.) Something she had haughtily told me back when I became pregnant out of wedlock that she would never do. Since she gets to call this a rape, she has still never done what I did. I was willing, she was a victim. Wish I had been so creative as to come up with a rape charge. But I wanted to get out of the house of insanity and torment, so I had no motivation to be that creative.

My sister was around 24 years old when she got knocked up. She made the decision for adoption. She and my mother informed me that it was decided that before sister would start to "show" she would go into seclusion. The private religious adoption agency found a family in a far away city in another state who would take her in for the final months of her pregnancy.

This was a lonely time for my sister. Suddenly she was cut off from everyone she knew except for my parents and me. No one else was to know of her pregnancy. The reason given for this was not because she was ashamed. No, it was only to keep the boyfriend from ever knowing of the child's existence so he couldn't have a chance at custody. Whatever. I know, at least for my mother, there was relief that no one would ever know that daughter #2 had also ended up pregnant out of wedlock.

Prior to getting pregnant, sister dearest considered herself quite the star at her work place. She wasn't shy about constantly telling us how her boss was chasing her skirt, how she was openly admired by everyone, no one had ever done the wonderful things she was doing, etc. Work had been a rich source of supply for sister. But she was now pregnant and going into seclusion; she had no one to stroke her gigantic ego and her figure was swelling up. Suddenly, her interests turned in my direction.

I went with my mother and sister when it was time to trundle sister off to her place of hiding. I don't remember calling her to keep in touch. I did make another trip up to her hiding place when she was getting close to term. I do remember her sending me a few cards while she was in confinement. Most of the communication was through the proxy of my mother. I started to hear things that left me feeling a bit confused. Things like, "Your sister loves you so much. You really should try harder to have a relationship with her." "Your sister respects and admires you so much. It is too bad you don't love her like she loves you." These declarations of love and respect were news to me. Sister's behaviors in the past didn't line up with what I was now hearing. I was suddenly re-cast in the role of the reluctant sister. The sister who wouldn't reciprocate the undying affection of her sibling. With a sudden twist of events, I was again being told that I was deficient in my dealings with the sister who had used and abused me for years. Mom and sister were acting like my sister had always loved me and had always felt nothing but respect and admiration for me. It is one of those alternate realities that leave your head spinning. I was supposed to act like this alternate reality was just as real as they were pretending it was. I was having a hard time making the leap. I was kind to my sister, but I just couldn't get into my new role by acting like we were the closest of friends and always had been.

For the next fifteen plus years I would continue to hear my mother repeat variations of the above declarations. It became a new set of "tape recordings". I did have a relationship with my sister. We would occasionally talk on the phone or visit each other infrequently. We had a warmly polite relationship. When my sister would occasionally demand a visit, I would make the effort to comply. But because I never put my sister into a position of "best friend" I was made to feel that I wasn't giving enough of myself into the relationship. My mother made it her job to make sure I knew I wasn't measuring up to my sisterly duties. My sister was not so obvious with her disappointment with me. She would always tell me how much she missed me and wished I would visit her more, but didn't directly impugn my love for her. She used her mother for that.

This is the Reader's Digest version of the majority of my adult relationship with my sister. The years were punctuated with little betrayals of my trust. Once in awhile I would confide something with my sister and it would nearly always get back to our mother. These things were not anything big because I was wise enough not to entrust her with the big stuff. These little betrayals simply told me that everything I said was being repeated to mommy dearest by my sister. The things I had told my sister would fall so casually from my mother's lips that I knew my sister was blathering everything I would tell her without a smidgen of shame, hesitation or reserve. After I would recover from what felt like a betrayal of my confidence, I would try it again to feel better about my sister, probably because I was hammered all the time about how I was supposed to have a good relationship with my sister because she's la familia.

I began a different tack by specifically stating to sister when something I was telling her needed to remain between her and me. She would still blab it to Mom. When I would confront her, she would always act so apologetic and surprised. "Oh, I guess I forgot you told me not to share it with mom." This made me feel like she wasn't all that invested in our having a friendship if my specific wishes would slip out of her head so easily. (That was the kindest construction I could put on her so-called memory lapses.) Every time I would try to trust my sister with just a small measure of fidelity, she would fail. This prevented us from having the "joined at the hip" relationship my sister was idealizing for us.

I don't think I can be blamed for not feeling close to someone who couldn't keep even one confidence. Especially considering our history together with very large trust violations that had never been acknowledged by her. The biggest problem in my life was my mother. To have a sister who would do nothing to protect information about me from getting back to my mother was not conducive to closeness. I didn't feel like being held to account by my mother for the things about my life I would share with my sister! Consequently, I would tell very little about me to my sister. The last five years of our relationship, I started to notice an interesting thing. Sister wasn't all that interested in what was going on in my life. (Frankly, I was relieved.) She didn't notice the lack of information flow from me to her. I only spoke in generalities when she would ask. This seemed to work for her. When sister would call me, it was all about her. She would talk my ear off for two hours and then, just before the call would end she would pretend to want to hear about me. Because I would share so little with her and never complained about things she liked to characterize my life as "boring", "placid", "easy". Of course, her life was filled with drama and interesting things.

The other aspect of my relationship with my sister during this time was that she would occasionally get pushy. What sister wants, sister gets. Because I was constantly cast in the role of unloving and emotionally distant sister, I would feel pressure from her and my mother to give whatever sister wanted when she demanded it. Living far apart geographically helped keep these demands to a minimum, but on occasion she would insist on what she wanted. My mother did the same thing. These two felt that because they didn't ask for much, whatever they did ask for they were completely entitled to. And if you give them what they feel entitled to then it is the very least you can do. Therefore, no gratitude. I admit that pushy people are only a problem to someone who is too weak to say "no". I was weak. So the fault lies with me that I felt pushed around. Thankfully, I'm not weak that way anymore.

There have been genuine reasons for me to have sympathy for my sister. Her delivery of the baby left her severely injured because of an incompetent boob of a doctor. Plastic surgery was required later to put her back together "down there". She had a cascade of real health problems for the next many years because of that delivery. She, of course, also had to go through the real pain of giving up a child. For all these things I continue to feel sincere compassion for my sister. As she went through her various health crises I wanted to be there for her in some capacity. I wanted to be her friend. After a number of years of her physical suffering there were signs that she might be maturing somewhat. I was able to find some genuine pleasure in her company. These realities make this story a sad one for me. My sister is not "all bad". She has some very strong narcissistic traits, but I am not convinced she is a malignant narcissist. But the combination of her strongly narcissistic traits with the fact that she keeps me connected to my mother makes a relationship with her untenable for now.

At the point in time where sister's health was the poorest, she was the most enjoyable to be around. It would seem she had little energy for manipulations. She seemed humbled by life's circumstances. Then her health turned around. I was thrilled for her. So much so that I, my husband and daughter went and visited her shortly after her improvement because she wanted us to see how well she was doing. It was amazing to see the genuine and radical improvement. It was miraculous. She had been in poor health for over ten years, so this was a joyful turn of events.

The saddest part of the story for me is what happened next. It was a very short time after the majority of her health problems resolved that my sister was introduced to a Christianized form of psychology through her church. She would monopolize our conversations by telling me about the "incredible" things she was learning. Her focus turned completely inward. Now she was spending inordinate amounts of time and energy thinking about her childhood. She would talk incessantly about things she remembered from her childhood. The abuse stories were legion. And some of them were imagined. I was there, too, and I was older...I knew what happened in many cases better than she did. Her imagination started creating "memories" out of whole cloth. She started to recount her dreams. Dreams of spiders and snakes were "proof" to her that she had been sexually abused as a child. She wasn't sure by whom. I started to worry that she would lay charges at my dad's feet. For all his faults, he never ever was inappropriate with us. I worried she was getting dangerous as it related to our father.

Sister insisted my then 19 year old daughter come for a visit. So I put daughter on a plane and let her stay two weeks with her aunt. My poor daughter was assailed with sister's psychologized view of everything. Daughter felt a bit intimidated by how her aunt was now analyzing my daughter's childhood and seeing pathologies everywhere. Sister made my daughter promise to transcribe a seminar by this husband/wife team of psychologists after she got home. (The story was that sister was now good friends with the psychologists and had offered to help them make their seminars better. Sister often talks about her associations with "important" people and her important contributions to their greatness.) I am sure sister wanted to force my daughter to be exposed to this psycho-babble by creating this "job" for her. My daughter did start to do the transcription a few weeks after getting home. She started to voice her questions and concerns to my husband and I about things she was hearing these people say. I started to get involved by checking it out for myself. I realized that my sister had greatly idealized the message of these psycho-babblers and put her own spin on what they were saying so I wouldn't find them objectionable. When I went straight to the "horse's mouth", I found out what they were really teaching. There were big problems with their ideas. Especially with how they were trying to foist off very old Freudian ideas as something new and pretending these ideas were biblical. Freud was an admitted atheist and was openly hostile to Christianity. Any similarity of his ideas to Christianity is incidental and largely imagined.

I include this bit of history because it marked the decline in my relationship with my sister. She was no longer showing those signs of maturation of previous years. She was so completely self-focused as to be a total bore. She was dwelling constantly on her "issues" even while claiming these psycho-babblers' message would free everyone forever from their "issues" once you dug down to the bottom of the well of early childhood memories and confronted everyone with how they injured you. (There was even a recommended confrontational letter near the end of the book that was a guaranteed way to make sure you pissed off whomever you were confronting. It included a large dose of self-righteous language as an added bonus.)

I wasn't seeing any end in sight for all the self-focus and all the mulling of how mistreated she was as a child. As I've alluded to before, I wondered when all these trips down memory lane would take her to the part of her life where she was the one inflicting damage on others. She never took that route. One year, two years, three years, four years. She was relentlessly self-focused and never seeming to be able to rise above the "damage" of her youth as she delightedly rehearsed old memories. She now had the perfect excuse for anything she has ever done against someone else even while claiming that this new religious psychology didn't provide people with a way out of accountability. She talked about her "damage" as she explained away her bad behaviors of past and present. The more she talked about her "issues" the less she was interested in anyone but herself.The sharp turn into her narcissistic tendencies was a hard thing to have to witness. I have direct evidence in her that pop psychology makes people with narcissistic tendencies worse, not better. This is even more true for malignant narcissists as therapists have been coming to realize.

I have a real problem with most of pop psychology. The problems increase many fold when it dresses up in Christian vernacular and foists itself off as the next best thing to the Second Coming. I watched the steady decline of my sister's character as she grabbed onto it and made herself into a perpetual victim. As an added bonus, she now felt qualified to psychoanalyze everyone else around her. Never favorably. Her sense of superiority started to take on the dimensions of her much younger self. I did weeks of research on the book written by her favorite psychobabblers. I wrote up what I found. I refuted the most objectionable of their theories with facts. I emailed her my research. No response. Finally we were reunited at my parent's home due to a funeral of a family friend in July of 2002. Sister brought up her favorite theme...psychologized Christianity...and I finally dared to try to present my views to her in person. I wasn't aggressive or "in her face". I just started to voice what I believed in contradiction to things she was saying. She got hostile. Finally, she just walked away while I was still talking and acted like I wasn't there. She left the next morning without saying good-bye.

This didn't settle well with me. Once again, when I dared to contradict one of her pet ideas she got hostile. I determined to have even less to do with her than ever. Her rude behavior was dismissive and condescending. It snapped me back many years to when she often treated me that way. I didn't deserve her condescension. I had well-thought out points that she simply was refusing to give the time of day and then treating me like a lower life form for expressing them.

The fact that my sister was reverting to being much more self-involved meant her attitude and behaviors were starting to bring up old feelings in me. I am a very forgiving person. I have been too forgiving for much of my life. What I mean by that is I would forgive when no forgiveness was asked for. To forgive someone who isn't sorry means you're going to go round and round with repeats of the same objectionable behavior coming at you. Which is pointless. These reviving feelings were reminders of my past with my sister. Being reminded of past behavior by what was going on in the present was forcing me to assess our relationship. Did I need to keep a person in my life who considered herself guilt-less when misusing me and who held herself to no account when she mistreated me?

Then my mother struck. A few months later she pulled her Thanksgiving stunt in my home on my daughter. I called my sister a few days after the event to see what version of the story she had gotten from mom. This connected us again. Some months after the Thanksgiving debacle, my sister was the one who suggested that our mother fit the profile of a narcissist. I took that ball and ran with it. I read everything I could on malignant narcissism and then would have long conversations with my sister as we discussed what I was learning.

Perhaps my willingness to accept psychology's label for my mother seems contradictory to what I've said above about my opinion of psychology. Here's the deal. Psychology doesn't make excuses for malignant narcissism. It also recognizes that a person is a malignant narcissist by choice. I can accept this premise of psychology's opinion and approach to malignant narcissism therefore I am willing to use their terms. Because the psych community recognizes that changing a person with NPD is well nigh to impossible, they tend to stay much more objective about NPD. They focus more on observable facts rather than delving into the non-scientific realm of conjecture and guesses. In other words, the psych community sticks closer to what we call science when they are dealing with personality disordered people.

For two years my sister and I were connected by discussions of our mother and NPD. She seemed interested in the subject of malignant narcissism, but not enough to read on her own. She claimed it was "too much" for her emotionally to spend time reading up on it. Doesn't that seem curious to you? I couldn't read enough about NPD when I finally figured out that there was a name for what I'd lived through. It was almost a sense of euphoria the relief was so intense. What is with my sister's reaction? Her little phone call to me asking me if I thought she might be a narcissist goes a long way to explaining it. She was seeing too much of herself in the information on NPD which is why she completely stopped investigating shortly after mentioning to me that maybe our mother had NPD.

During these two years of our discussions on NPD my sister was appearing to take in information. I think now, in retrospect, that she was mostly just enjoying the fact that I had joined her in her condemnation of our mother. Sister still like to occasionally ramble on about her childhood speaking in a way that it seemed like she was talking to someone who hadn't lived through it too. She still loved focusing on "her pain" much more than studying the objective realities of NPD. I tried not to dwell on my annoyance at this recurring theme of hers and her tendency to act like I hadn't lived through the same things. She liked to tell me how I was just different than most people in the fact that I was able to rise above my childhood and build a good life minus a bunch of hang-ups. It was an interesting way she explained away my having taken accountability for my own choices. I was just different, an anomaly. Now, let's get back to talking about my pain and my so very valid reasons for frakking up my life...so to speak.

At this time the only communication between me and my mother was in writing. It appeared my sister was honoring my demand that she not share anything about me or my family in her conversations with mom. It looked like there was hope for us to have an ongoing good relationship since it seemed she could deal with a measure of my trust. I didn't trust her completely yet, but I was trying. I had no way to verify whether or not she was not sharing things with mom since I wasn't in contact with my mother or anyone else in mom's life. I chose to believe the best of my sister.

This history is the prelude to the event that caused me to cut off my sister. It wasn't an earth-shattering event. The significance of the event can only be discerned by having some knowledge of what had gone before. It was the proverbial straw breaking the camel's back.

I'm happy to tell you that if you have a destructive or narcissistic sibling you are under no law in heaven or earth to keep that sister or brother in your life. A relationship with an adult sibling should be entirely voluntary. No one is obligated to keep a sibling in their life if they don't want to. (In a dysfunctional family the pressure to keep another family member in your life will be especially intense.) If you have come to the point where you are willing to go against your family and don't worry about their opinion of you, freeing yourself of a nasty sibling is easy. Once you and your siblings are adults, you should expect a sibling relationship to have the same elements of a friendship. Mutual kindness, respect, and hopefully shared values. If you look at your sibling and say, "If I wasn't related to this person I wouldn't have a thing to do with them." that is a sign that you don't have anything resembling a friendship with them. When a sibling uses your shared genetics as a license to mistreat you it is reason enough to have nothing to do with them. An accident of birth made you blood relations. Choice should be what keeps you together. In an ideal world all siblings would love each other and be the best of friends. This isn't an ideal world. Having the same parents and being raised in the same home does little to ensure that siblings will develop true friendship. Siblings aren't little cookie-cutter copies. They are unique individuals. It often happens that siblings take very different courses in life resulting in widely divergent characters. Not everyone can get along. Once you are an adult and have formed your own family it is very important to not keep people in your life whose influence on you is destructive or negative. What affects you affects those closest to you. Emotionally destructive siblings have no god-given right to be in your life. You have the right to chose your friends. That would include your siblings. If they refuse to abide by general rules of friendship then they are simply using your family relationship to their own ends. You don't have to put up with that.

The Narcissist's "Self-Esteem"

True self-esteem is based on something more substantive than feelings. The self-esteem movement in this country has blundered terribly by focusing on building up feelings without any basis in substance. Kids in school are taught to feel good about themselves based on just feeling good about themselves. The idea is that if you feel good about yourself then you'll proceed into life without the impediment of insecurities. Many studies have been done that have exposed of myths of false self-esteem. Insecurities end up not being the worse thing to have.

So what is true self-esteem based on?

Accomplishment. If you are able to make yourself proud with accomplishment, you will respect yourself. Self-esteem isn't what is important. Self-respect is the issue. Teaching kids how to gain self-respect should be the goal of our educational system and parenting techniques, not this silliness of telling kids to feel good about themselves based on absolutely nothing. We end up raising big, bratty weaklings who crumble at the first collision with the real world.

One of the most important areas of life to gain accomplishments in are in the moral realm. When you are able to follow a moral course in the midst of obstacles, opposition and difficulty you can gain some serious self-respect. In fact, I'll contend that the moral realm is where the most important battles must be fought and won if you want to feel good about yourself in a way that will last. Make yourself proud by doing the hard stuff. Facing ones fears is another very important way to build true self-respect. This is also an accomplishment made in the moral sphere.

Which brings me to malignant narcissists. What have they accomplished to make themselves feel true self-respect? Not a damned thing. Yeah, I agree...narcissists have "low self-esteem". But you can't build up anyone's self-esteem by being a rah-rah section telling them to feel good about themselves "just because you're you", let alone a narcissist.

What has the narcissist accomplished in the moral sphere that would make them have true respect for themselves? That, again, would be nothing. So I believe the fact that narcissists have "low self-esteem" is a condition they have completely earned. They don't deserve to feel good about themselves. This also explains why the narcissist needs constant affirmation of their wonderfulness from their sycophants. This is why they seem to be a black-hole for praise. It doesn't matter how many times you told them yesterday that they are beautiful, wonderful, amazing, wise and smart...today is a new day and they need just as much praise today to keep them going. This is because deep down they know they haven't truly accomplished anything to feel good about themselves over.

I'm not sure when I finally had this revelation about my mother. It was some years ago. One day she confessed the truth that when she felt ugly on the outside it was a direct reflection of how she was feeling about herself morally. What she actually said was, "I feel ugly on the inside" as she stood there before looking her usual gorgeous self. A shocking confession really. As I have stated before, the objective truth about my mom's appearance is that she is an absolutely beautiful woman. Nevertheless, she would regularly go through periods of life when she felt ugly no matter how she objectively looked. This went far beyond just fishing for compliments. It was obvious she was in a depressive state during these periods. When she felt this way, compliments did very little to lift her spirits.

Her behavior has consistently borne out the truth of her confession that day many years ago. I don't remember her repeating that confession. It was just a moment of truth; a rare peek into the internal world of a narcissist. What has my mother done to feel accomplished and good about herself in the moral realm? Very little. I didn't know way back then about the malignancy of my mother's character. I was naive in the extreme. I didn't know until quite recently how my mother is a constant liar and a vile hypocrite. Knowing now what she is I do not wonder as to why she loathes herself at times. I have joined in her loathing. She is right to not feel good about herself. She has done nothing to earn her own good-will let alone mine.

The narcissist's low self-esteem is not a reason to pity them. You need to recognize they've earned their bad feelings about themselves. They can feel good about themselves the day they accomplish some heavy-lifting in the moral realm...like coming clean on their many bad acts, making restitution and showing some humility.

[Icon by lvlwing]

How Evil Hides From Itself

Innocence seldom utters outraged shrieks. Guilt does. ~ Whittaker Chambers

In a previous post I asserted that evil people don't wake up each day deciding which evil deeds to accomplish. They admit to no evil because define themselves and their deeds as good and right. I'm going to explain a little more how they create this alternate reality. It is important you understand how they twist their thinking because you have probably been sucked into believing their insane logic.

I am convinced the narcissist senses deep down they are evil. Their whole existence is defined by their efforts to deny this nagging sense. Hence, the universal quality of narcissists to avoid introspection and their profligate use of projection.

It is possible, though very rare, for an evil person to admit they are evil. Evil people who admit they are evil tend toward the psychopath end of the narcissism spectrum. Even while admitting to being evil, they will justify their evil in some way in an attempt to lessen their culpability. Evil people have a hard time admitting the full truth of what they are, even if they admit it to some degree or other. Here is a hard and fast principle of human psychology: we can't survive without a sense of righteousness. Even evil people have this need which is why we see people rationalizing the worst of their behaviors in an effort to minimize, shift or eliminate guilt. Guilt is a powerful emotion and has the power to extinguish us if not dealt with. Which brings us back to the human need to be righteous. How we go about getting a sense of righteousness is what separates the decent from the evil. The definition of "righteous" is a relative thing depending on whether you're decent or evil. (Think of a prison population. No matter how bad you are, there is always someone else you can look down on.)

There is a school of thought which purports that someone can not be defined as evil if their intentions are good. As long as the person believes they are pursuing a higher good, then they can't be classified as evil even if the outcomes of their behaviors are considered to be morally wrong or evil. I completely dismiss this rationalization, for that is all it is. One big reason I reject this philosophy is because it is used every day by malignant narcissists to excuse themselves when caught screwing up. I'm convinced the bad guys have made up this silly little philosophy in order to absolve their evil deeds.

I can't tell you how many times I've had to accept as an explanation for bad acts that the narcissist "didn't intend" to cause pain. (I suspect the same is true for you.) They insist how they only meant to cause a good outcome; it just couldn't be foreseen how it would end badly. Because they didn't intend a bad outcome they expect to be not only excused but completely exonerated without making restitution. The narcissists in my life have expected endless do-overs as well as being allowed to maintain that they are "good" people by using this philosophical point as moral cover. A truly decent person would accept the responsibility for the bad outcome even if their intentions had been good. They would not use their good intentions as a way to avoid making up for their wrong.

Here are three statements my mother made in an "apology" letter:

What a cloud of unreality I have lived in regarding our relationship. I had no realization I was so difficult & self-serving & that our connection as mother & daughter was on shakey ground. I am horrified by the terrible pain I’ve caused & the wrongs committed by a seeming callous behavior. Honestly, I had no idea. I’m so sorry. The violations were not done with deliberate intent.

Emphasis mine, obviously. I highlighted the word "seeming" because it is an interesting modifier. She is not admitting to callous behavior. She is only admitting that it seemed so. Her insistence on not having bad intentions completely negates her so-called horror of the pain she's caused and the "wrongs committed". What is really being said here is that the fault is in my perceptions. By the way, I never accused her of "callous" behavior. I accused her of much worse. She is reserving the right to define her behaviors. She chose the word "callous". She isn't even owning it even though she came up with it. She modifies the word "callous" with seeming. Now, instead of the behaviors I charged her with, she is deciding what her behaviors should be called and qualifying it with a word that suggests she only appeared to be callous. **sigh** Narcissists are such slick operators.

May I say never did I do these sins against you with a deliberate thought on how to make you most unhappy.

Pure motives galore. By the way, I never accused her of this either. Another straw man she just wrestled to the ground.

Please feel free to state your disapproval if you see me act that way. It is not intentional.

Anyone can lay claim to a "good intention" after the fact. How hard is it to lie about motivations? Because of the universal human need to be "righteous", how do we give credit to an after-the-fact claim to having pure motives when the outcome is immoral, indecent or inhuman? It is profoundly naive to do so. Narcissists are not above lying in order to make themselves look better; it is their stock-in-trade. Lying is as essential and frequent as breathing. Even a non-narcissist will lie to look better as it is a common defensive human behavior. Since when do we believe that a person caught in a bad or immoral act is going to reliably tell the truth about their motives? This philosophy qualifies as one of those ideas that is so stupid only intellectuals claim to believe it.

I am sure some people feel very sophisticated and high-minded in believing that pure motives disprove evil outcomes as well as their refusal to label another human being as "evil". Many people look down on those who believe in such "simple" concepts as "good" vs. "evil". To believe in the existence of evil is not the simplistic view that pseudo-intellectuals would like to tell you it is. It is much simpler to dismiss the concept of evil than it is to recognize it. Evil is not simple. It is crafty, subtle, seductive. It hides itself with the accoutrements of "goodness". It covers up in layers upon layers of lies. Truth is much simpler. Not simplistic, simpler. Direct. But with evil you have to be a detective, of sorts, to sniff it out because it can dress itself up in many different outfits. On Sundays, it often wears a suit.

"Everyday evil" hides itself in plain sight. To quote Elizabeth Barrett Browning (a poet):

"The devil's most devilish when respectable."

This is why our devils...the narcissists...use position and title to attempt to hide the evil of their characters and their actions. Titles like: mother, father, priest, church member, volunteer, doctor, teacher, etc. provide protective coloration because society doesn't like to ascribe evil to people who fill these roles. None of us like to ascribe evil to people in these roles. But we must be willing to consider the possibility that a devil is hiding in plain sight when the evidence starts stacking up. We can't assume pure motives are always in place when the outcomes are consistently bad for you and others.

I would like to expand just a little on the complicated mental gyrations of the narcissist required to maintain this sense of themselves as being "good". It isn't necessarily an easy thing to keep perceiving ones self as good when your deeds are consistently bad. It takes constant effort to maintain the inverse reality of the narcissist.

A by-product of the narcissist's deathly fear of introspection (fear of finding out the truth about themselves), is how they value symbolism over substance. They are shallow and cursory in their thinking, as well as in what impresses them about themselves and others. They capitalize on how things look, not on the substance of what things in reality are. Since they are easily impressed by appearances, they assume you are too (projection). They assume that the appearance of perfection is what constitutes perfection. Just look the part and you're it. The narcissist who positions themselves in a role which society ascribes pure motives to is intent on fooling themselves first. They play-act the part and convince themselves they are the thing they are play-acting at. This goes a long way toward giving themselves the sense that they are "good". They assume you see things as they do, therefore you too must ascribe to them all the goodness their title or position implies. If you dare to call "foul" on something they do, they point to their "title" as proof of the impossibility of their being wrong.

All of this is the long way of saying that the narcissist is first and foremost trying to convince themselves they are not evil. Next, they assume that what convinces them should convince you as well. They hide their evil in plain sight by capitalizing on appearances. That is all they have. Appearances. Substance, reality, truth are not friendly to the narcissist because they expose the narcissist. The narcissist is always hiding from the truth of who they are. Their persistence in believing they are always "right" and "good" is coming from that human need to rid ourselves of guilt. Narcissists attempt to cheat by pretending there is no reason to feel guilty. Good people make wrongs right in order to relieve guilt. And good people are willing to live with a sense of guilt if they've earned it. They will admit their pain is deserved and learn to live with it if perfect restitution isn't possible to achieve. This helps good people to keep from re-committing bad acts. They remember how a prior bad act hurt others and themselves.

Who we are is demonstrated by what we do. The physically abusive husband may try to minimize having beaten his wife by saying, "I wasn't myself when I did it". Yes, it is like you to beat your wife because it is what you chose to do. We become who we are through the sum of our choices. We choose to do what we do, therefore we are what we do. This is important to keep in mind when dealing with a narcissist. Their constant claims of moral purity based on their insistence on having the purest of motives is nothing more complicated than a dodge from accountability. We are what we do. If the outcomes of someone's actions are consistently evil then it is correct to assume that their character is evil.

If a person's words and actions are conflicting with each other you must believe the actions over the words. Otherwise, you are guaranteed to get socked in the gut time and again. What people do carries more weight than what they say. There is a trite saying that goes, "it's easier said than done". It is an annoyingly trite statement due to its utter obviousness. Everything is easier to say than to do. Which is why actions are much more significant than words. Actions take monumentally more effort to carry out than to just sit around talking about it. Every action requires effort; even bad acts require effort. When we consistently say one thing and do another we show where our heart is by what we are willing to put our effort into. Whether our deeds are consistently benevolent and kind or consistently immoral and damaging...we reveal what our true motives are by what we do. So I make the argument that actions reveal true motives...motives do not define the actions. Once again, the narcissists have things upside down. They think "good" motives purify the bad deed. Well, screw that.

You are what you do. Period.

When Your Narcissist Mother isn't THAT bad...

Someone posted a question/comment today under the "Your Narcissistic Mother" post of 6.4.07. Since my response ended up being rather lengthy, I've decided to post it as a regular blog post where it can be found more easily by the person who posted the comment as well as the rest of the readers of the blog.

Jordie said:
My problem is the voice inside which says, she's not THAT bad, after reading some of the terrible stories of other N mothers that are out there. How do I wrestle that one to the ground?

I have actually cut her off, after 43 years of blaming myself and excusing her arbitrary, volatile, poisonous lies.

This is harder than I thought.

My mother is also far from a "worst case" example if I was to measure her by what most people think of her. She is not the "worst case" even when just measured by me. She is a "garden variety" malignant narcissist. Nevertheless, she captures the very essence of the malignant narcissist which is why I am able to describe the "beast" of narcissism in a way that many can relate to. I have distilled down the "spirit" of narcissism and described the underlying principles narcissism operates from. I focus here on principles of narcissism so that regardless of the level of abuse a person has experienced with their narcissist, they will be able to recognize from my descriptions what they've been dealing with.

One of the reasons I stated in this particular post that there are spiritual issues you are up against when dealing with a narcissist is because many of the effects of their behaviors are subtle and intangible to an outsider, yet very real when they are happening to you. This is also why I refer you, in this post, to this web page:

Characteristics of Narcissistic Mothers

"It's about disapproving glances. It's about vocal tone. It's very intimate. And it's very powerful. It's part of who the child is."

The very premise of this person's description of the N mother is how subtle the abuse is. Then the author goes on to state this:

"Everything she does is deniable. There is always a facile excuse or an explanation. Cruelties are couched in loving terms. Aggressive and hostile acts are paraded as thoughtfulness. Selfish manipulations are presented as gifts. Criticism and slander is slyly disguised as concern. She only wants what is best for you. She only wants to help you."

Does any of this description sound like overt abuse? Much of what this person goes on to describe are the very subtle ways a narcissistic mother undermines you and punches you with an iron fist inside a velvet glove. Her role as "mother" is her cover. Her protestations of undying love and devotion to her children are her ruse.

I suggest you look at your mother in terms of what her consistent behaviors over the years have indicated. An occasional misdeed doesn't a narcissist make. It is the consistency of their malicious intent as betrayed by their words and deeds over the years. The aforementioned web page states this:

"Because her abusiveness is part of a lifelong campaign of control and because she is careful to rationalize her abuse, it is extremely difficult to explain to other people what is so bad about her."

"Other people" includes yourself.

Narcissists make their "living" by covering up their malignancy. "Plausible deniability" is essential so they can weasel out of all accountability for their deeds. This makes it hard to find "proof" to issue a final "verdict" on them. This is what keeps you trapped in the relationship. The most important measurement of the malignancy of a narcissist is in the effect on you. You can accurately measure the toxicity of the narcissist by the effects on your own soul. Whether they snuffed out their cigarettes on your bare skin or stuffed you in a closet for three years, these are not the only manifestations of a malignant narcissist, nor are they the only justification for going "no contact". Perhaps the only evidence you have of their Nism is how they consistently and sneakily undermined your person-hood and stole who you are from you. The evidence of who they really are is in the effects on you. You need to give yourself permission to issue your "verdict" against your N mother based on the evidence left on your heart, mind and soul.

Malignant narcissism isn't measured by reaching a certain level of hard abuse. It is measured by certain principles. For example, the first and primary characteristic of narcissism is their insatiable need to "have it all". All of what? Attention and regard. All the attention and kindly regard in any circumstance is theirs by right, in their thinking. Since attention is essential for all humans to survive (both physically and psychologically), their demand to "have it all" is malicious. They would deprive you of any of this precious commodity because they MUST have it all. This principle explains everything a narcissist does. It is the underlying motivation, the very core, for whatever expression their narcissism takes.

Because of their need to "have it all", which means "you can't have ANY", they are predatory. They are constantly stalking their "prey". This is how they make their living. The fact that they rarely get "caught" in their mistreatment of you is because they are expert at predation. Like any predator in nature, they seek moments of opportunity. They don't pounce when by doing so there will be witnesses of their predation (witnesses whom the N thinks may hold them accountable and may try to stop them). This is why they seek out what they perceive as "weak" targets. Perceived weakness can include someone who is simply kind to the narcissist (!). A child is perceived as weak. An adult trained by a narcissist parent from childhood who has yet to stand up to the N parent's predations is considered a weak target. Vulnerability is sniffed out by a narcissist with nearly unfailing accuracy.

Their need to "have it all" and their predatory natures are two basic and primary principles of narcissism. How these manifest are different in every situation. The narcissist adapts to their environment which is why the behaviors can widely vary. The underlying principles remain the same.

To sum up:

Measure the narcissist by 1) the effects manifested in you 2) and by the principles of narcissism. The sneaky narcissist is no less guilty than the overt abuser. In my estimation, they are more evil for their sneakiness and their ability to more effectively hide their malicious predations. The more they are able to hide their malicious intent behind a facade of "goodness", the more dangerous they are. It is much easier to hold to account a person who beats you up physically. You at least have marks and bruises to bear witness of the crime. But someone who beats you up mentally and emotionally leaves no outward mark. This is why I say the sneaky narcissist is more dangerous. In my book, they are also more evil. Which is more dangerous? The snake in the open, or the snake in the grass?