Understanding Narcissism

[Edwardo Piet]

But those suffering with NPD supposedly project a false self-image of thinking highly of themselves but in actuality they consider themselves worthless and they feel lots of shame. They have a grandiose false self-image and that is why they crave so much attention and feel depleted without it. They need others to feed their own weak self esteem. They hide behind an inflated false self. They are emotional vampires. They feed off of Narcissistic Supply which they are addicted to.

That's my dad. NPD to a tee. Which is why I'm so opposed to religion. It's served as his primary enabler.

My dad too. Very very very very very very much so.

He'd have a 2 hour conversation with a plumber. And by conversation I mean monologue. And by monologue I mean his life story. He'd take credit for mine and my siblings' achievements. He idealized me as his favorite and scapegoated my siblings. But being spoiled and favored by him was not all good for me. Far from it. I'm the one who ended up on an acute mental health ward 3 times, my first breakdown being after me and my family left him. He made my emotional needs dependent on his praise. He also put enormous pressure on me and told me I could be the best in the world at everything. He pushed me so hard it was unbelievable. And whenever he was unpredictable, manic, confusing, callous and cruel he would say he was just being honest or in some cases he would say it was a joke and say his sense of humor was 'zany'. One of his favorite lines was "there is so much in me" (referring to his intellect) and another was "I've got two first class with honors degrees" and another was "You're a genius just like I am."

I haven't seen him in over 10 years. His intentions towards me I think were always good but by 'me' I mean the idea of me in his head as nothing more than an extention of his own brilliance. He liked to say he was jealous of no one whereas deep down I believed he thought he was inferior and he was always buying self help books and trying to copy successful people. His behavior did not match his words but I think he was actually so extremely honest to the point of speaking sincerely even when the result was nothing but hurting people and worsening matters for everyone including himself. Truly brutally honest but also self-decieved I think: He could genuinely believe what he was saying but it would be bullshit because he'd be in denial about who he is. I think he was a very jealous person who believed others thought he was brilliant but deep down he just wanted to be like people he thought were amazing and he pretended he only admired them even when clear resentment was present when he was frustrated that he could not be as brilliant as he believed they were.