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'{{short description|Abuse by a narcissist, particularly emotional abuse in parent-child and adult-to-adult relationships}} '''Narcissistic abuse''' is a hypernym for the psychological, financial, sexual, and physical abuse of others by someone with [[narcissistic personality disorder|Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD)]]. == Types of relationships == Narcissistic abuse can occur in any kind of relationship. It occurs within families and workplaces and in all age groups{{Citation needed|date=February 2020}}. ===== Romantic ===== Narcissistic abuse may also occur in adult-to-adult relationships, where the narcissistic person tends to seek out an empathetic partner in order to gain admiration of their own attributes and feelings of power and control – [[narcissistic supply]]{{Citation needed|date=February 2020}}. The narcissist creates a dynamic abuser and victim relationship through a [[cycle of abuse]], resulting in [[traumatic bonding]] that makes it hard for their partner to leave the increasingly abusive relationship{{Citation needed|date=February 2020}}. People with [[Codependency|codependent]]-type traits may seek relationships with narcissists.<ref name="Vaknin 2010">{{cite book|first=Sam|last=Vaknin|authorlink=Sam Vaknin|date=2010|title=Malignant Self Love: Narcissism Revisited|publisher=Narcissus Publications|location=Rhinebeck, New York|ISBN=978-8023833843}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web | url=http://samvak.tripod.com/faq66.html |title = The Inverted (Covert) Narcissist (Narcissist-Codependent) - Codependence and Relationships with Abusive Narcissists and Pychopaths}}</ref>{{Citation needed|date=February 2020}} The narcissists' relationships are characterized by a period of intense involvement and [[Idealization and devaluation|idealization]] of their partner, followed by [[Idealization and devaluation|devaluation]], and a rapid discarding of the partner.<ref>{{cite book|first=G. David|last=Elkin|title=Introduction to Clinical Psychiatry|location=New York City|date=1999|ISBN=978-0838543337|page=171}}</ref> Alternatively, that scenario can loop, with [[Ghosting (relationships)|ghosting]] (ceasing communication with the former partner) and [[hoovering]]{{dn|date=October 2019}} (luring the former partner back) instead of discarding{{Citation needed|date=February 2020}}. At the beginning of a relationship (or its new cycle) with a narcissist, the partner is only shown the ideal self of the narcissist, which includes pseudo-empathy, kindness, and [[Superficial charm|charm]]. Once the partner has committed to the relationship (e.g., through marriage or a business partnership), the [[true self]] of the narcissist will begin to emerge.{{Citation needed|date=February 2020}} The initial narcissistic abuse begins with belittling comments and grows to contempt, [[Silent treatment|ignoring behavior]] (i.e. silent treatment, which is a passive-aggressive form of emotional abuse), adultery, triangulation (forming any relationship triangles), [[sabotage]], and, at times, physical abuse.<ref name="Vaknin 2010"/>{{Citation needed|date=February 2020}} At the core of a narcissist is a combination of [[entitlement]] and low [[self-esteem]]. These feelings of inadequacy are [[Psychological projection|projected]] onto the victim. If the narcissistic person is feeling unattractive they will belittle their romantic partner's appearance. If the narcissist makes an error, this error becomes the partner's fault <ref>{{cite book|first1=Cynthia|last1=Zayn|first2=M.S. Kevin|last2=Dibble, K. (2007). Narcissistic Lovers: How to Cope, Recover and Move On. Publisher: New Horizon Press</ref>{{Citation needed|date=February 2020}}. Narcissists also engage in insidious, [[Psychological manipulation|manipulative]] abuse by giving subtle hints and comments that result in the victim questioning their own behavior and thoughts. This is termed [[gaslighting]].<ref>Stern, R. (2007). The Gaslight Effect: How to Spot and Survive the Hidden Manipulation Others Use to Control Your Life. Publisher: Harmony </ref> Another common abusive tactic is underhanded public humiliation, when the narcissist says something seemingly neutral but offensive to the victim and enjoys the emotional reaction. This is called dog-whistling. Any slight criticism of the narcissist, whether actual or perceived, often triggers [[narcissistic rage]] and full-blown annihilation from the narcissistic person{{Citation needed|date=February 2020}}. This can take the form of screaming tirades, silent treatment or quiet sabotage (setting traps, refusing communication, hiding belongings, spreading rumors, making complaints to authority figures such as police, etc){{Citation needed|date=February 2020}}. Cliffhanging is a tactic to stay in control and to leave victims hanging, examples are making themselves unreachable by not responding to phone calls or respond to messages, or by giving a “strings-attached gift” only to suddenly demand that the victim must return it to them{{Cn|date=February 2020}}. If the victim refuses to comply, the narcissist claims the victim is causing an issue{{Citation needed|date=February 2020}}. Stonewalling is a tactic used by narcissists to stay in control and hurt victims by refusing to get into, or abruptly end conversations. The abuser knows that emotional isolation hurts the victim, thus will aggressively and intentionally stonewall to gain leverage, inflict pain, and also avoid “awkward” topics. When a narcissist stonewalls, they suddenly become vague, refuse to speak, shout you down, or divert the conversation into a circular argument. They will sometimes even make a point of physically getting away from you by leaving the room, or perhaps by going out for a drive {{Cn|date=February 2020}}. The discard phase can be swift and occurs once the narcissistic supply is obtained elsewhere. In romantic relationships, the narcissistic supply can be acquired by having affairs {{Citation needed|date=February 2020}}. The new partner is in the idealization phase and only witnesses the ideal self; thus once again the cycle of narcissistic abuse begins. Narcissists do not take responsibility for relationship difficulties and exhibit no feelings of remorse {{Cn|date=February 2020}}. Instead they believe themselves to be the victim in the relationship<ref>C. Bailey-Rug, Life After Narcissistic Abuse (2015)</ref>{{Cn|date=February 2020}} as of their self-debasing projections, their partner can only ever fail to meet their expectations. The International Journal of Research in psychology published a qualitative study based on the points of view of those who believed their romantic partners to be narcissistic abusers {{Cn|date=February 2020}}. The synopsis of the results is best quoted directly from the research study: "The core category/issue that emerged from the data was problems in self-esteem of the abuser. According to the data, the exercise of power, maladjustment, immorality, lack of sense of reality, and need for manipulation appeared as manifestations of serious problems in self-esteem (Määttä, 2009){{Cn|date=February 2020}}. Self-esteem is a salient part of personality affecting the functioning of one's ego. Self-esteem includes the feelings of self-respect, self-appreciation, self-acceptance, and self-proficiency. Furthermore,the desire for self-esteem stems from a fundamental need for psychological security, which is engendered by people's awareness of their own vulnerability and mortality (Greenberg, 2008)" The stories of the victims of narcissistic abusers seem to demonstrate issues in all these areas which then reflects in narcissists' behavior. Self-esteem is considered to be a core reason for their behaviors. <ref>http://www.sakkyndig.com/psykologi/artvit/marju2012.pdf</ref><ref> https://books.google.com/books?id=DV8_AAAAQBAJ&pg=PA165&lpg=PA165&dq=greenberg+2008+narcissistic+abuse&source=bl&ots=JLvWUoNKp6&sig=ACfU3U00OJOitB_o2nyPJ1zfxAt103-kaQ&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjp4_ixuZDmAhUO7qwKHZtoAzYQ6AEwDnoECAkQAQ#v=onepage&q=greenberg%202008%20narcissistic%20abuse&f=false</ref> ===== Parent-child/family ===== Parent-child and any family relationship is based on the same principles of a narcissistic abuser. The narcissist needs validation of self and feelings of power and control. Results of research show that misbehavior in their children, for example, may provoke them to physically make them believe the child's misbehavior is a direct rebuke of their authority.<ref>{{Cite journal |doi = 10.1016/S0145-2134(03)00034-6|title = Empathy and narcissism in a sample of child abuse perpetrators and a comparison sample of foster parents|journal = Child Abuse & Neglect|volume = 27|issue = 5|pages = 541–555|year = 2003|last1 = Wiehe|first1 = Vernon R.}}</ref> The same can be true for any family members, although the dynamic between siblings, for example, is different than that between a parent and their child. ===== Workplace ===== Research suggests that narcissistic abusers can and do climb the corporate ladder more readily and are able to charm and gain trust from other co-workers and management to do so {{Cn|date=February 2020}}. Narcissistic abusers charm others to climb up the ladder and undermine co-workers in various ways to push them down. They covertly sabotage others by unethical means. They may even have these tendencies in their personal relationships outside of work {{Cn|date=February 2020}}. According to the [[Workplace Bullying Institute]], harassment, intimidation, and covert coercion at work "is akin to domestic violence at work, where the abuser is on the payroll." This form of covert abuse occurs more frequently than we might assume {{Cn|date=February 2020}}. Research indicates that as many as 75% of workers have been affected by workplace bullying, either as a target or a witness (Fisher-Blando, 2008).<ref>http://www.workplacebullying.org/individuals/problem/definition/</ref> == Viewpoints == * 21st century [[transactional analysis]] has highlighted clients who suffered some narcissistic abuse as children (that is, an injury to their developing selves), examining for instance the boy in an all-female household who only survived by developing powerful [[emotional antennae]]{{Disambiguation needed|date=February 2020}} in order to respond to the emotional needs of his mother and sister.<ref>H. Hargaden/C. Sills, ''Transactional Analysis'' (2002) p. 131</ref> *[[Jung|Post-Jungians]] have explored the after-effects of an intense narcissistic wound resulting from an oppressively unempathetic parent.<ref>Andrew Samuels, ''Jung and the Post-Jungians'' (London 1986) p. 228</ref> In particular, [[Polly Young-Eisendrath]] emphasises how the narcissistic longings of mothers (or fathers) to amass reflected glory through their children can bring disastrous results for mother and child if both lose their capacity for autonomous development.<ref>Polly Young-Eisendrath, ''Women and Desire'' (London 2000) p. 198</ref> *[[Object relations theory]] for its part stresses both that the most [[Psychological trauma|traumatizing]] experience of all is the absence of emotional giving from a mother or father, and that, in an intergenerational pattern, people who have been brought up by tyrannical authoritarian parents will often parent their children in the same way.<ref>Neville Symmington, ''Narcissism: A New Theory'' (London 1993) pp. 75, 79</ref> [[Adam Phillips (psychologist)|Adam Phillips]] adds that the mother who colonizes her child and stifles gestures of autonomy and difference breeds in him or her an often unconscious craving for the dead-end justice of revenge.<ref>Adam Phillips, ''On Flirtation'' (London 1994) p. 106</ref> * In another tradition, [[Julia Kristeva]] points out how a pairing of mothers and fathers, overprotective and uneasy, who have chosen the child as a narcissistic artificial limb and keep incorporating that child as a restoring element for the adult psyche intensifies the infant's tendency toward [[omnipotence]].<ref>Julia Kristeva, ''Black Sun'' (New York 1989) pp. 61–62</ref> *[[M. Scott Peck]] looked at milder but nonetheless destructive common forms of parental narcissism, as well as the depth of confusion produced by his mother's narcissism in a more serious instance.<ref>M. Scott Peck, ''The Road Less Travelled By'' (1990) pp. 175–77</ref> * ==Theorists== ===Antecedents: Ferenczi=== {{Main|Sándor Ferenczi}} The roots of current concern with narcissistic abuse can be traced back{{How|date=February 2020}} to the later work of Sándor Ferenczi, which helped to shape modern psychoanalytic theories of "[[Schizoid personality disorder|schizoid]]," "[[Narcissistic personality disorder|narcissistic]]," and "[[Borderline personality disorder|borderline]]" [[personality disorders]].<ref>Janet Malcolm, ''Psychoanalysis: The Impossible Profession'' (London 1988) pp. 134–35</ref> In "Confusion of Tongues Between Adults and the Child", Ferenczi observed that patients often displayed "a striking, almost helpless compliance and willingness to accept my interpretations" even if he encouraged them not to agree with him.<ref name="confusion">{{cite journal |last1=Ferenczi |first1=Sándor |title=Confusion of the Tongues Between the Adults and the Child—(The Language of Tenderness and of Passion) |journal=The International Journal of Psychoanalysis |date=1949 |volume=30 |pages=225–230}}</ref> Ferenczi traced his patient's behavior to childhood trauma. He found that in cases of sexual abuse, children often misinterpreted the emotional responses of adults and responded to them by becoming passive toward the adult. The child developed an "anxiety-fear-ridden identification" with the adult, as well as "introjection of the guilt feelings of the adult": <blockquote>''"The same anxiety, however, if it reaches a certain maximum, compels them to subordinate themselves like automata to the will of the aggressor, to divine each one of his desires and to gratify these; completely oblivious of themselves they identify themselves with the aggressor."'' <ref name="confusion" /></blockquote> Ferenczi also argued that a child's tender love for a caretaker often involves a fantasy of "taking the role of mother to the adult". In what he identified as the "''terrorism of suffering''", the child has a "compulsion" to right the wrongs of the family by taking on responsibilities that are far beyond the child's maturity level. In this manner, "a mother complaining of her constant miseries can create a nurse for life out of her child, i.e. a real mother substitute, neglecting the true interests of the child." <ref name="confusion" /><ref>Ferenczi, "Confusion", in J. M. Masson, ''Freud: The Assault on Truth'' (London 1984) pp. 293–94</ref> Within such distorted patterns of parent/child interaction, 'Ferenczi believed the silence, lies, and hypocrisy of the caregivers were the most traumatic aspects of the abuse'—ultimately producing what he called '[[narcissistic mortification]]'.<ref>[[Martin S Bergmann|Martin S. Bergmann]], ''Understanding Dissidence and Controversy in the History of Psychoanalysis'' (2004) p. 162</ref> Ferenczi also looked at such distortions in the therapist/patient relationship, accusing himself of sadistic (and, implicitly, narcissistic) abuse of his patients.<ref>John E. Gedo, ''The Language of Psychoanalysis'' (1996) p. 97</ref> ===Kohut, Horney, and Miller=== A half-century later, in the wake of [[Heinz Kohut|Kohut]]'s innovative pronouncement that the age of "normal narcissism" and normal narcissistic [[entitlement]] had arrived<ref>James Grotstein, "Foreword", [[Neville Symington]], ''Narcissism: A New Theory'' (London 1993) p. xiii</ref> – the age, that is, of the normative parental provision of [[narcissistic supply]] – the concept of its inverse appeared: narcissistic abuse{{Cn|date=February 2020}}. According to Kohut, maternal misrecognition amounts to a failure to perform the narcissistic ''self object'' functions of [[Mirroring (psychology)|"mirroring"]], the cause of a narcissistic disturbance.<ref>Lior Barshack, ''Passions and Convictions in Matters Political'' (2000) p. 37</ref> Paternal misrecognition could produce the same result: Kohut explored for example a son's transference reproaches directed at the non mirroring father who was preoccupied with his own self-enhancement and thus refused to respond to his son's originality.<ref>Heinz Kohut, ''How Does Analysis Cure?'' (London 1984) p. 183</ref> [[Karen Horney]] had already independently highlighted the character disorder – particularly the compulsive striving for love and power – resulting from the childhood hurts bred of parental narcissism and abuse. She thus heralded today's work in this area by [[Alice Miller (psychologist)|Alice Miller]] and others.<ref>Janet Sayers, ''Mothering Psychoanalysis'' (1991) p. 18</ref> Alice Miller lays special emphasis on the process of reproduction of narcissistic abuse, the idea that love relations and relations to children are [[Repetition compulsion|repetitions]]<ref>Barshack, p. 37</ref> of previous narcissistic distortions. Miller's early work in particular was very much in line with Kohut's tale of deficits in [[empathy]] and mirroring, with a stress on the way adults revisit and perpetuate the [[narcissistic wound]]s of their own early years<ref>Henry Sussman, ''Psyche and Text'' (1993) pp. 83–84</ref> in an intergenerational cycle of narcissistic abuse. In Miller's view, when abused for the sake of adults' needs, children could develop an amazing ability to perceive and respond intuitively, that is, unconsciously, to this need of the mother, or of both parents, for him to take on the role that had unconsciously been assigned to him.<ref>Alice Miller, ''The Drama of Being a Child'' (1995) pp. 9, 152</ref> === Modern theories === Current point of view of modern psychiatrists {{Where|date=February 2020}} believe that today's society is at fault for the increase in narcissistic abuse because society promotes competitiveness. Many features of narcissism be sources of success in the modern competitive society. The question is that to what extent the opportunistic abilities to bring out one's own proficiency and constantly strive for the better result in trample on other people and having an irresponsible and insensitive attitude to other people (see e.g. Lucher, Huston, Walker & Alex Houtson, 2011). In 2011 Maatta, Uusiautti & Matta published a study with an indication that modern society may shape the patterns of narcissistic abuse{{Cn|date=February 2020}}. The ideas of pleasing yourself first, taking care of yourself, climbing the ladder and general success in life are desired traits. And the explanation for the increase in narcissistic disorders may at least partly be found in the societal development as competitiveness, individualism, and opportunism are admired - those exact features that are often typical narcissists.<ref>http://www.sakkyndig.com/psykologi/artvit/marju2012.pdf</ref> ===Wider developments=== Miller's work, in its emphasis on the real-life interaction of parent and child, challenged the orthodox Freudian account of [[Oedipus|Oedipal]] fantasy, in a sustained indictment of the moral and pedagogical underpinnings of the therapy industry; and did so at a point when 'the keyword of the 1980s was invariably "abuse".<ref>Lisa Appignanesi & John Forrester, ''Freud's Women'' (2005) pp. 472–73</ref> With the passing of time (and of the polemical edge), a more slimmed-down, pragmatic version of the concept of narcissistic abuse gradually came to permeate most of the wider culture of psychotherapy{{Cn|date=February 2020}}. Only in the Freudian heartland of mainstream [[psychoanalysis]] has the term retained a more restricted, pre-Ferenczi usage{{Cn|date=February 2020}}. Thus in a "comprehensive dictionary of psychoanalysis" of 2009, the only appearance of the term is in connection with misuse of the couch for narcissistic gain: The fact that it is seen by some patients and therapists as a "[[status symbol]]" lends it to narcissistic abuse.<ref>[[Salman Akhtar]], ''Comprehensive Dictionary of Psychoanalysis'' (2009) p. 60</ref> ==See also== {{Columns-list|colwidth=30em| * [[Abusive power and control]] * [[Atlas personality]] * [[Child abuse]] * [[Flying monkeys (psychology)]] * [[Healthy narcissism]] * [[Self psychology]] }} ==References== {{Reflist|2}} ==Further reading== * Angela Atkinson, Jillian Tindall, ''Navigating No-Contact with a Narcissist: A Recovery Roadmap for Survivors of Narcissistic Abuse'' (2017) * Patricia Evans, ''Controlling People: How to Recognize, Understand, and Deal with People Who Try to Control You'' (2003) * Alice Little, ''No Contact - The Final Boundary: Surviving Parental Narcissistic Abuse'' (2016) * Alice Miller, ''The Drama of the Gifted Child'' (1979) * Steven Stosny, ''Treating Attachment Abuse'' (1995) * Estela Welldon, ''Mother, Madonna, Whore: The Idealization and Denigration of Motherhood'' (1988) * Shahida Arabi ''POWER: Surviving and Thriving After Narcissistic Abuse: A Collection of Essays on Malignant Narcissism and Recovery from Emotional Abuse Paperback'' (2017) {{Narcissism}} {{Abuse}} {{DEFAULTSORT:Narcissistic Abuse}} [[Category:Narcissism]] [[Category:Abuse]] {{Domestic violence}}'