Narcisism!

andygb

Dunroamin wrote: »

It does indeed sound familiar M ......... from you.

People are discussing and nobody's deriding - they just happen to be putting forward alternative viewpoints to yours.

I cannot agree with this, because I see it quite differently.
I replied to this thread, because in Meritatan's first post, I saw yet again the behaviour patterns (those well documented in people with NPD) obvious in a close relative.
I thank "M" for starting this thread and hope that it will continue, and I hope that nobody will try to get it stopped, because I think that some of you are very lucky that you have never had to deal with someone who has NPD or whatever it is you care to call it.

Person_one

meritaten wrote: »

and this isn't a 'diagnosis'? its pretty definite isn't it?

Well no, because the words narcissism and sadism aren't actually 'diagnoses' or the names of illnesses. They just describe behaviour.

Person_one

andygb wrote: »

I cannot agree with this, because I see it quite differently.
I replied to this thread, because in Meritatan's first post, I saw yet again the behaviour patterns (those well documented in people with NPD) obvious in a close relative.
I thank "M" for starting this thread and hope that it will continue, and I hope that nobody will try to get it stopped, because I think that some of you are very lucky that you have never had to deal with someone who has NPD or whatever it is you care to call it.

Without wishing to minimise your experiences, I do sometimes wonder what it would be like if we had the other side of some of these stories.

Vicky123

Person_one wrote: »

Well no, because the words narcissism and sadism aren't actually 'diagnoses' or the names of illnesses. They just describe behaviour.

Malignant Narcissistic personality disorder often involves sadism, people are given a diagnosis of narcissism as are many other conditions that cannot be diagnosed by any other means than behaviour.

Dunroamin

andygb wrote: »

I cannot agree with this, because I see it quite differently.
I replied to this thread, because in Meritatan's first post, I saw yet again the behaviour patterns (those well documented in people with NPD) obvious in a close relative.
I thank "M" for starting this thread and hope that it will continue, and I hope that nobody will try to get it stopped, because I think that some of you are very lucky that you have never had to deal with someone who has NPD or whatever it is you care to call it.

I think that any of us who've led anything like a normal life will have had contact with selfish, deeply unpleasant and often abusive people. The difference seems to be between those who seek to label these people with as having some kind of syndrome and those who don't.

KxMx

I'd say the difference is more that colleague, for example, you find selfish and nasty, can then go home and behind closed doors it's a different, much worse story all together.

So to you they are "normally" nasty but to their family perhaps it's a different picture.

Everyone of course has a different idea of where being "normally" nasty/abusive turns into being a narcissist/ narcissist tendencies.

It can also be hard to separate out emptions when talking about a loved one, whose behaviour they have been deeply hurt by, but to an outsider it might be dismissed as "one of the nasty ones". That outsider shrugs it off as part of life but to the person who has been hurt it goes much deeper.

Many who have spoken on this forum about the subject tend to be talking about deeply personal and long standing experiences with family members who they grew up with and know intimately. Not the "funny" person at the office!

Dunroamin

KxMx wrote: »

I'd say the difference is more that colleague, for example, you find selfish and nasty, can then go home and behind closed doors it's a different, much worse story all together.

So to you they are "normally" nasty but to their family perhaps it's a different picture.

Everyone of course has a different idea of where being "normally" nasty/abusive turns into being a narcissist/ narcissist tendencies.

It can also be hard to separate out emptions when talking about a loved one, whose behaviour they have been deeply hurt by, but to an outsider it might be dismissed as "one of the nasty ones". That outsider shrugs it off as part of life but to the person who has been hurt it goes much deeper.

Many who have spoken on this forum about the subject tend to be talking about deeply personal and long standing experiences with family members who they grew up with and know intimately. Not the "funny" person at the office!

I wasn't really talking about work colleagues but people you know well and have, perhaps, been in a relationship with. I just think there's something really wrong with labelling unpleasant people as mentally ill.

Vicky123

Dunroamin wrote: »

I wasn't really talking about work colleagues but people you know well and have, perhaps, been in a relationship with. I just think there's something really wrong with labelling unpleasant people as mentally ill.

Equally, it would be really wrong to label narcissists as being simply unpleasant, most especially to those who are suffering narcissistic abuse and know fine and well this is more than unpleasant and are just looking to discuss coping strategies or advice generally from others who have been through the same.
It's kind of indicative of how little is understood about emotional abuse, if someone came on here talking about physical abuse no one would suggest it was just rough play that got out of hand.

lostinrates

meritaten wrote: »

if you recognise these traits in yourself - you are not a narcissist - you are human! !

This was from early in the thread in response to me. If last nights comment is directed at me its very confusing!

The links provided which I'm agreeing are helpful suggest that narcism if behaviour ( not NPD) is something we all might buy into to a degree. It seems to me that some ( not all) people who have suffered might well risk being trapped in a cycle.

Again, for those saying that the people in dissent don't understand because the people they are talking about are distant from them,p, I was first made aware of NPD by a psychotherapist on down time who suggested ( unprofessionally) I read about it in relationship to three generations of women in my immediate family. As I have spoken about that at the beginning of the thread, then about sexual abuse ( now edited out) whose sensitivities are being trampled over exactly? I can assure you its not easy to think about the latter in relation to any member of family.

Tiddlywinks

meritaten wrote: »

I am getting tired of saying that this is a very old thread - that it followed on from another thread. some posts sound hard or weird taken in isolation. NOBODY seems to have acknowledged that! its as if this a fresh new thread and people have piled it to rubbish it!
I cant help feeling this wouldn't happen in, say, Aspergers thread - one or two people have decided this thread is contravening the rules on here.
Fine - go and complain to the forum team - because quite frankly I couldn't give a Sh*t right now if it gets deleted!

Ironic - on a thread about narcissism.

Dunroamin wrote: »

I think that any of us who've led anything like a normal life will have had contact with selfish, deeply unpleasant and often abusive people. The difference seems to be between those who seek to label these people with as having some kind of syndrome and those who don't.

I really agree with this... Not a day goes by now on this board without someone bandying the 'narcissist' label around. I find that just ignorant.

Why the need to label and judge?

Interestingly, some of those throwing those labels around should look at their own mannerisms and motivations and take the 'test' themselves. How many boxes would they tick?