Narcissist: Accountable for His Actions?
Narcissists can control their behavior and actions, but they don’t care to. They feel superior and entitled, and others are inferior and there to cater to their needs. Narcissists lack empathy and are insensitive, but they can tell right from wrong and should be held accountable for their actions. They simply don’t care enough about others to refrain from acting abusively.
Narcissist Reacts to Criticism, Disagreement, Disapproval
Narcissists are hypervigilant and perceive every disagreement as criticism and every critical comment as complete and humiliating rejection. They react defensively, becoming indignant, aggressive, and cold. The narcissist minimizes the impact of the disagreement and criticism on himself by holding the critic in contempt, by diminishing the stature of the discordant conversant. When the disagreement or criticism or disapproval or approbation become public, the narcissist tends to regard them as narcissistic supply.
Narcissistic Defences and Personality
Narcissistic personalities are prone to depression, anxiety, shame, self-destructiveness, or rage when their habitual gratifications are threatened. Narcissism is an evolved version of the psychological defense mechanism known as splitting, where the narcissist either idealizes or devalues objects. The narcissist is obsessed with securing a reliable and continuous source of admiration, adulation, affirmation, and attention, and will become an evil person if they cannot secure positive supply. Narcissistic personalities slide the meanings of events to place themselves in a better light and maintain logical consistency while minimizing evil or weakness and exaggerating innocence or control.
Cope with Somatic Narcissist’s Infidelity
Narcissists who are somatic tend to have extramarital affairs as it sustains their grandiose fantasies and unrealistic self-image. It is difficult to alter this behavior, so setting up strict rules of engagement is necessary. If you insist on staying with a somatic narcissist, you must be prepared to serve as a source of narcissistic supply, which is an onerous task. If you find it difficult to confront the fact that your relationship is over, seek help from professionals and friends.
Narcissist’s Constant Midlife Crisis
The midlife crisis is a much-discussed but little understood phenomenon. There is no link between physiological and hormonal developments and the mythical midlife crisis. The narcissist is best equipped to tackle this problem as they suffer from mental progeria and are in a constant mid-life crisis. The narcissist’s personality is rigid, but their life is not. It is changeable, mutable, and tumultuous. The narcissist does not go through a midlife crisis because they are forever the child, forever dreaming and fantasizing, forever enamored with themselves.
Narcissist’s Insignificant Other: Typical Spouse or Intimate Partner
Living with a narcissist can be exhilarating, but it is always onerous and often harrowing. Surviving a relationship with a narcissist, maintaining a relationship, preserving it, insisting on remaining with a narcissist, indicates therefore the parameters of the personality of the victim, of the partner, of the spouse. The partner, the spouse, and the mate of a narcissist who insists on remaining in the relationship and preserving it is molded by it into the typical narcissistic mate, spouse, or partner. The two, the narcissist and his spouse, collaborate in this dance macabre.
Mourning the Narcissist
Victims of narcissistic abuse often struggle to let go of the idealized figure they fell in love with at the beginning of the relationship. When the relationship ends, they experience a cycle of bereavement and grief, including denial, rage, sadness, and acceptance. Denial can take many forms, including pretending the narcissist is still part of their lives or developing persecutory delusions. Rage can be directed at the narcissist, other facilitators of the loss, oneself, or be pervasive. Sadness is a paralyzing sensation that slows one down and enshrouds everything in the grave veil of randomness and chance. Gradual acceptance leads to renewed energy and the narcissist being transformed into a narrative, another life experience, or even a tedious cliché.
Eating Disorders and Personality Disorders
Eating disorders are impulsive behaviors that can exist with cluster B personality disorders, particularly with borderline personality disorders. The key to improving the mental state of patients who have been diagnosed with both a personality disorder and an eating disorder lies in focusing it first upon their eating and sleeping disorders and only then on their personality disorders. The treatment of personality disorders requires enormous, persistent and continuous investment of resources of every kind by everyone involved, especially the patient. Patients with eating disorders may be in mortal danger, and the therapist’s goal is to buy them time.
Abolish Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD) in DSM V?
The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM) is criticized for its inadequate classificatory model and diagnostic criteria, which are vague and equivocal. The DSM-5 committee proposes to abolish some personality disorders and merge them into a single diagnostic category, using a dimensional approach that reflects reality better. The DSM-5 is expected to address the longitudinal course of disorders, genetic and biological underpinnings, and effectiveness of various treatments. The DSM-5 is expected to be a significant improvement over the DSM-4 in addressing personality disorders.
Pathologizing Rebellious Youth: Oppositional Defiant Disorder (ODD)
The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM) labels rebellious teenagers with oppositional Defiant Disorder, which is a pattern of negativistic, defiant, disobedient, and hostile behavior towards authority figures. The DSM’s criteria for this disorder are arbitrary and subject to the value judgments of adult psychiatrists, psychologists, social workers, and therapists. The diagnosis of oppositional Defiant Disorder seems to put the whole mental health profession to shame, and it is a latent tool of social control. If you are above the age of 18 and you are stubborn, resistant to directions, unwilling to compromise, give in or negotiate with adults and peers, you stand a good chance of being diagnosed as a psychopath.