It was written under extreme conditions of duress. It was composed in jail
as I was trying to understand what had hit me. My nine year marriage dissolved, my finances were in a shocking condition,
my family estranged, my reputation ruined, my personal freedom severely curtailed.
I wrote the first draft of the book in prison, by night ...standing. Then
I re-wrote my scrambled notes, uploaded them and, presto- there was a website. The book came much later when I realized the pent up pain and solitude that narcissism
wreaks upon its sufferers and victims. It is a pernicious condition, the root of many mental health disorders, and very poorly
understood, diagnosed, reported, and studied. It was recognized as a mental health category only in 1980 (DSM III).
Vankin writes, " Most abusers and batterers are males –
but a significant minority are women. This being a "Women's Issue", the problem was swept under the carpet for generations
and only recently has it come to public awareness. Yet, even today, society – for instance,
through the court and the mental health systems – largely ignores domestic violence and abuse
in the family. This induces feelings of shame and guilt in the victims and "legitimizes" the role of the abuser.
Violence in the family is mostly spousal –
one spouse beating, raping, or otherwise physically harming and torturing the other. But children are also and often victims
– either directly, or indirectly. Other vulnerable familial groups include the elderly and the
disabled.
Abuse and violence cross geographical and cultural boundaries and
social and economic strata. It is common among the rich and the poor, the well-educated and the less so, the young and the
middle-aged, city dwellers and rural folk. It is a universal phenomenon.
Abusers exploit, lie, insult, demean, ignore (the "silent
treatment"), manipulate, and control.
To embark on our exploration of the abusive mind, we first need
to agree on a taxonomy of abusive behaviours. Methodically observing abuse is the surest way of getting to know the perpetrators.
Abusers appear to be suffering from dissociation (multiple personality).
At home, they are intimidating and suffocating monsters – outdoors, they are wonderful, caring,
giving, and much-admired pillars of the community. Why this duplicity?
It is only partly premeditated and intended to disguise the abuser's
acts. More importantly, it reflects his inner world, where the victims are nothing but two-dimensional representations, objects,
devoid of emotions and needs, or mere extensions of his self. Thus, to the abuser's mind, his quarries do not merit humane
treatment, nor do they evoke empathy.
Typically, the abuser succeeds to convert the abused into his worldview.
The victim – and his victimizers – don't realize that something
is wrong with the relationship. This denial is common and all-pervasive. It permeates other spheres of the abuser's life as
well. Such people are often narcissists – steeped in grandiose fantasies, divorced from reality,
besotted with their False Self, consumed by feelings of omnipotence, omniscience, entitlement, and paranoia.
Abuse is bred by fear – fear of being
mocked or betrayed, emotional insecurity, anxiety, panic, and apprehension. It is a last ditch effort to exert control – for instance, over one's spouse – by "annexing" her, "possessing"
her, and "punishing" her for being a separate entity, with her own boundaries, needs, feelings, preferences, and dreams.
The narcissist's behaviour is experienced by his mate as
frustrating and growth-cramping. To live with him is akin to living with a non-entity, with dead or dormant qualities. The
partners of the narcissist often describe an overwhelming feeling of imprisonment and punishment.
The psychological source of this kind of behaviour
could well be a kind of transference relationship. Most narcissists have unresolved conflicts with their Primary Objects (=parents
or caregivers), especially with the parent of the opposite sex. The development of intimacy skills was hindered at an early
stage. Punishing and frustrating the partner or spouse is a way of getting back at the abusive parent. It is a way of avoiding
a grave prospective narcissistic hurt brought on by being abandoned.
The narcissist, it seems, is ever the
hurt child. His attitude serves a paramount need: not to be hurt again. The narcissist anticipates his abandonment
and, paradoxically, by trying to avoid it, he precipitates it. Maybe he does that on purpose: after all, if he is the cause
of his own abandonment – surely he is in control of his own relationships.
To be in control – this unconquerable
drive – is the direct result of being deserted, neglected, avoided, or abused at an early stage in life. "Never again"
– vows the narcissist – "If anyone will do the leaving, it will be I."
The narcissist is devoid of empathy and incapable
of intimacy with others as well as with himself. To him, lying has become a second nature. An alter (False) Ego soon takes
over. He begins to believe his own lies. He makes himself to be what he wants to be and not what he is. So, he measures life
by events, difficulties, negative externalities and predictions and projections related to them. He prefers this "objective
and quantifiable" mode of treating the world to the "softer" version of his feelings. The narcissist is so afraid of the cesspool
of negative feelings inside him – that he would rather deny them and thus refrain from being intimate with himself.
His predisposition would be to maintain asymmetric relationships, wherein he both maintains and displays his superiority.
Even with his mate or spouse, he is forever striving to be the Guru, the Lecturer, the Teacher (even the Mystic), the Psychologist,
the Experienced Elder.
The narcissist never talks – he lectures.
He never moves – he poses. He is forever patronising, condescending, forgiving, or patiently teaching. This is the more
benign form of narcissism. In its more malignant variants, the narcissist is degrading, humiliating, sadistic, impatient,
and full of rage and indignation. He always is critical and torment all around him with endless, bitter cynicism and with
displays of disgust and repulsion.
There is no way out of the narcissistic catch:
the narcissist despises, in equal measures, both the submissive and the independent, the strong (who constitute a threat)
and the weak (who are, by definition, despicable).
Asked to explain his lack of ability to make
contact in a true sense of the word, the narcissist comes up with a host of superbly crafted explanations. These are bound
to include some "objective" difficulties, which have to do with the narcissist's traits, his history and the characteristics
of his environment (both human and non-human). The narcissist is the first to admit the difficulties experienced by his human
(and, sometimes, physical) environment in trying to adapt to him. These difficulties make him unique and explain away the
gap between his grandiose theories about himself – and the grey, shabby pattern that is his life. The narcissist has
no shred of a doubt who should adapt to whom: the world should adjust itself to the narcissist's superior standards and requirements
(and, thus, incidentally, transform itself into a better place).
Inevitably, the sexuality of the narcissist
is as disturbed as his emotional landscape.
People often mistake depression
for emotion. They say about the narcissist: "but he is sad" and they mean: "but he is human", "but he has emotions". This
is wrong. True, depression is a big component in the narcissist's emotional make-up. But it mostly has to do with the absence
of Narcissistic Supply. It mostly has to do with nostalgia for more plentiful days, full of adoration and attention and applause.
It mostly occurs after the narcissist has depleted his secondary Sources of Narcissistic Supply (spouse, mate, girlfriend,
colleagues) demanding a "replay" of his days of glory. Some narcissists even cry – but they cry exclusively for themselves
and for their lost paradise. And they do so conspicuously and publicly – to attract attention.
In many respects, narcissism
can be defined as an obsessive-compulsive disorder gone berserk. Like the magician's apprentice, it did not know where and
when to stop and it took over the whole edifice. The narcissist's original personality was consumed by it.
His compulsive acts are part
of the much larger, much more complicated picture of his personality. They are the sick tips of very abnormal icebergs. Shaving
them off does nothing to ameliorate the narcissist's titanic inner struggle.
financial consultant to leading businesses in Macedonia, Russia and the Czech Republic.