Stress Center Peer Support

their children to have anxiety, depression and personality disorders. In my case my father has a narcissistic personality disorder and my mother has a dependent personality disorder. No one could live with someone who is narcissistic unless they also had a problem. Their children cannot escape the unhealthy web of undefined boundaries that prevent a person from separating and establishing their own individuality when they live with a person who has a narcissistic personality disorder. I discovered this when I read a book called, "Children of the Self-Absorbed: A Grown-Up's Guide to Getting over Narcissistic Parents", by Nina W. Brown. This explained why I felt the way I did and how my anxiety and my own personality problems were caused by my NPD parent. This also filled in a huge gap that is missing from the program program.

Here are the symptoms per DMS IV.

Characteristics of Narcissistic Personality Disorder

A pattern of grandiosity, need for admiration, and lack of empathy which begins by early adulthood and is present in differing contexts within a person's life.

A narcissistic individual is grandiose in their sense of self-importance and exaggerates their achievements and talents. He expects to be recognized as superior without achieving any great accomplishments.

A narcissistic individual is preoccupied with fantasies of his brilliance as well as his unlimited success or power. He fantasizes about beauty or ideal love.

A narcissistic individual believes that he is "special" or "unique." He feels that he can only be understood by or should associate with other special or high status people.

A narcissistic individual requires excessive admiration and is on a constant search for admiration.

A narcissistic individual has a sense of entitlement. He has unreasonable expectations of favorable treatment and expect others to automatically comply with his wishes.

A narcissistic individual takes advantage of others to achieve his own ends and uses others without regards to the feelings of others.

A narcissistic individual lacks empathy and does not identify with the feelings or needs of others.

A narcissstic individual is envious of others and believes that others are envious of him.

A narcissistic individual shows arrogant or haughty behaviors or attitudes and does not care who he offends.

Conclusion:

�NPD is a pernicious, vile and tortuous disease, which affects not only the narcissist. It affects and forever changes people who are in daily contact with the narcissist.�

�Sooner, or later, everyone around the narcissist is bound to become his victim. People are sucked, voluntarily or involuntarily, into the turbulence that constitutes his life, into the black hole that is his personality, into the whirlwind which makes up his interpersonal relationships. Different people are hurt by different aspects of the narcissist�s life and psychological make-up. Some trust him and rely on him, only to be bitterly disappointed. Others love him and discover that he cannot reciprocate. Yet others are forced to live vicariously, through him.�

I have come to realize that one can not really have a relationship with this personality. They will not accept responsibility for their actions. They try to put blame on the other person in that relationship so that they don't have to accept their part in the problem.

My mother is 86 years old and is in a nursing home here where I live. I started out visiting her three times a week, but she let me know that that wasn't good enough as other residents had families that visited everyday!!! After several incidents with her Narcissistic ways I have cut back to one visit a week. She keeps asking me "when are you going to stop punishing me?" It's all about HER and not that she hit the CNA and then said actually she meant to hit me, as we were trying to help put her sweater on. Just one of many interactions with her. Never would say she was sorry or that this even happened. She will lie and try to say she didn't do things or say things and speak half truths to others. I spoke to her long ago about having boundaries and she just laughed. She also told me a while back when I tried to hold her accountable for something she had said, that she doesn't have to be accountable to anyone but God. Her lack of acknowledging personal boundaries along with her lack of accountability tells me WHO she really is!!! Someone I would never have a relationship with, but because she is my mother I will keep it very low contact.

I'am so sorry for what you both had to go through as children and now as adults. My heart really goes out 2 you both! My son has been said to have ADD, ADHA and ODD ( it's a new disorder they have come up with called Optionsitional deffience disorder... he doesn't like listeing or obeying me cause I'am a woman in general. ) I suffer from ADD and Depression, Anexity and to top it off I'm bipolor too and I have passed it down to him. Lord knows I feel sorry for had passing all this mess onto him!!!! But my question is this would this disorder that your mother or father have be passed down to you later on in life?