Dealing with a Narcissist's Love

[◊ DestinyTurtle ◊]

I saw this online a little while ago and it really spoke to me:

<https://kiddy.org.uk/i-love-you-from-the-perspective-of-a-narcissist/>

 

I've had personal bitter experiences with people I later realized were narcissists, and I think the discussion belongs were in ex-christian.net because I believe narcissism and toxic Xianity go hand-in-in-hand. Think about it - an all powerful - all confident being who promises everything and delivers nothing and it's always your fault, and somehow, albeit the supposed all-powerfulness of this entity, it is insecure enough to judge you largely on whether you validate his existence and power through perpetual self-flagelation on your part. Many pastors and authoritarian believers are narcissists - which I think is no accident. The belief system, taken in a certain way, becomes validation and rationalization for this kind of behavior. 

 

A scary part of this is that I personally couldn't identify the individuals as narcissists until many years later (although I knew *something* was wrong with them), because they trained me so well to admire them and defend them and rationalize every bad decision they made, I did so even *after* I came to disagree with their beliefs. When I explained their behavior to sane, kind individuals many years later it was almost completely obvious - these narcissists didn't ultimately care about anything more than elevating themselves.

 

When such individuals are as close to you as family members, it's not so simple as dismissing them and cutting them away. It took a lot of work for me to understand what they are, why they do things, and how to move along in a way that was safe for me. Good boundaries and good emotional support really helped with this. I once thought it was my problem for not being able to forgive them... but someone really close to me once said "Are you forgiving who they say they are or are you forgiving who they actually are?". Self-deception is not forgiveness, and it's important to be honest with ourselves about who certain people are, in actuality, in order to move on.

 

Anyways, I'm curious as to what kinds of experiences other X-Xians have had with narcissism, as I suspect it's not an unusual situation for us. 

 

-DT

[sdelsolray]

Many aspects of Christianity, as well as many other religions, enable those with grandiose or narcissist propensities.

[freshstart]

I dont know if its narcissism, but anyone who actually believes that god took the time to "bless them" with an awesome parking spot at Walmart or to make sure it didn't rain on their wedding day, if they really examine their line of thinking, how does that not appear supremely egotistical? Meanwhile there are entire continents of people suffering and dying without any intervention from god. Yet Christians refuse to see the injustice in this.

[Insightful]

I totally agree.   I am a recovering narcissist of sorts, made much worse by Christianity.  We men get especially groomed into narcissism:  our wives were created for us, we are their "head", etc

 

Also, Christianity teaches you will live forever, elevating the ego further.

[quinntar]

8 hours ago, DestinyTurtle said:

I saw this online a little while ago and it really spoke to me:

<https://kiddy.org.uk/i-love-you-from-the-perspective-of-a-narcissist/>

 

I've had personal bitter experiences with people I later realized were narcissists, and I think the discussion belongs were in ex-christian.net because I believe narcissism and toxic Xianity go hand-in-in-hand. Think about it - an all powerful - all confident being who promises everything and delivers nothing and it's always your fault, and somehow, albeit the supposed all-powerfulness of this entity, it is insecure enough to judge you largely on whether you validate his existence and power through perpetual self-flagelation on your part. Many pastors and authoritarian believers are narcissists - which I think is no accident. The belief system, taken in a certain way, becomes validation and rationalization for this kind of behavior. 

 

A scary part of this is that I personally couldn't identify the individuals as narcissists until many years later (although I knew *something* was wrong with them), because they trained me so well to admire them and defend them and rationalize every bad decision they made, I did so even *after* I came to disagree with their beliefs. When I explained their behavior to sane, kind individuals many years later it was almost completely obvious - these narcissists didn't ultimately care about anything more than elevating themselves.

 

When such individuals are as close to you as family members, it's not so simple as dismissing them and cutting them away. It took a lot of work for me to understand what they are, why they do things, and how to move along in a way that was safe for me. Good boundaries and good emotional support really helped with this. I once thought it was my problem for not being able to forgive them... but someone really close to me once said "Are you forgiving who they say they are or are you forgiving who they actually are?". Self-deception is not forgiveness, and it's important to be honest with ourselves about who certain people are, in actuality, in order to move on.

 

Anyways, I'm curious as to what kinds of experiences other X-Xians have had with narcissism, as I suspect it's not an unusual situation for us. 

 

-DT

I can't say I've come across too many narcissistic Christian's, but then I probably have and I never knew how to identify that behaviour. My step mother always says to me " You've got love yourself" yeah go fuck yourself bich!

[♦ Fuego ♦]

Yes, a lot. I had a roomie that rarely saw anything wrong with his own behavior, would get into my room and go through my stuff (likely looking for porn that wasn't there) to the point of removing insulation from my windows and putting it back sloppily. He'd had other roomies accuse him previously and he said to me "You don't believe I'd do that, do you?" I've learned over time that people who say that are typically guilty and looking for an ego boost.

 

And sometimes even normal Christians are told to become more invasive in the personal lives of others. I had multiple ones try to prevent me from marrying my wife (now of 20 years) because "she isn't ready, god wants her to be single, and we need to "counsel" her for more years until she sees how holy we are and maybe becomes married to one of us". All that last bit was silent, but I pushed one until he admitted he was attracted to her. My narcissist roomie above actually sent me a card saying I wasn't ready to get married, that I was violent, blah blah blah. I didn't give into his manipulation, so he constantly tried to gaslight me in the eyes of others that I was some kind of nut case. They even wrote to our marriage counselor trying to get him to stop the marriage. He told us that we were one of the more mature couples he'd ever known, and the letter was bizarre to him. It was a cult, and the church started taking steps to disband it. It started as a singles group, but became an oddly uber-fundy group. Glad we moved to a different city and eventually out of church completely.

 

[sdelsolray]

The Christian religion, in essence, is based on a recipe of scripture, authority and revelation.  Each component can become quite addictive for certain personalities.  

 

The scripture element provides a written source of claimed truth and encourages the believer to "accept" or "interpret" that text either (i) as stated by another believer (see authority, next) or (ii) as desired with whatever pre-existing apologetics, logical fallacies, lies and misrepresentations are available.  The believer uses the scripture to claim truth, knowledge, righteousness, among other things, all under the shortcut scam called "faith".

 

The authority element trains believers to accept someone else's claims, written or oral, with admonishment for any use of skepticism, critical thinking or original thought.  The indoctrination of the authority element is quite prevalent and pervasive.  Failure to adhere to this authority is punishable in various ways.

 

The revelation element allows believers and proselytizers to escape from reality, avoid rational challenges and feel self-important by pretending to receive special information to which others cannot have access.

 

 

 

 

[◊ DestinyTurtle ◊]

14 hours ago, sunstring said:

I can't say I've come across too many narcissistic Christian's, but then I probably have and I never knew how to identify that behaviour. My step mother always says to me " You've got love yourself" yeah go fuck yourself bich!

Many Narcissists have a honed in ability to outwardly perform sociability or kindness in order to get something specific or otherwise achieve a good reputation from people (in order to get something from them). It's only when they don't want anything from you (and that person believes there's little chance he/she will in the future) that you start to see their true colors. The result is that people who peripherally know the narcissists I know in a social or professional context often believe he's a really nice person, but it's actually a performance. 

[◊ DestinyTurtle ◊]

17 hours ago, Insightful said:

I totally agree.   I am a recovering narcissist of sorts, made much worse by Christianity.  We men get especially groomed into narcissism:  our wives were created for us, we are their "head", etc

 

Also, Christianity teaches you will live forever, elevating the ego further.

Wow. That takes a lot of balls to admit. Cudos! I myself have worked through many narcissistic tendencies that I probably inherited by imitating my parents as a child, and I agree with you about the influence of the social context for men. Sometimes people develop a personality type because that's the only template they've been presented with. 

[◊ DestinyTurtle ◊]

13 hours ago, sdelsolray said:

The Christian religion, in essence, is based on a recipe of scripture, authority and revelation.  Each component can become quite addictive for certain personalities.  

 

The scripture element provides a written source of claimed truth and encourages the believer to "accept" or "interpret" that text either (i) as stated by another believer (see authority, next) or (ii) as desired with whatever pre-existing apologetics, logical fallacies, lies and misrepresentations are available.  The believer uses the scripture to claim truth, knowledge, righteousness, among other things, all under the shortcut scam called "faith".

 

The authority element trains believers to accept someone else's claims, written or oral, with admonishment for any use of skepticism, critical thinking or original thought.  The indoctrination of the authority element is quite prevalent and pervasive.  Failure to adhere to this authority is punishable in various ways.

 

The revelation element allows believers and proselytizers to escape from reality, avoid rational challenges and feel self-important by pretending to receive special information to which others cannot have access.

I agree with your assessment. Interestingly, many denominations accuse other denominations of being authoritarian. My protestant father, for example, discussed the authoritarianism of Catholicism, probably referring to their institutional authority. He paraded his brand of Protestantism as a self-directed, critically thought approach to Xianity, and encouraged me to read the bible and come to my own conclusions about the true teachings of the bible. I did read the bible, and came to my own conclusions, but as it turned out he resented me unless I came to the exact same conclusions as him (which, apparently, I didn't). So, basically, it was about his own theological authority, and the call for me to think for myself was all pretense. I think in a similar vain many authoritarians don't think of themselves as authoritarians, they just think they happen to be lucky enough to be more right than anyone else, and that other people are morally and intellectually questionable if they don't see that. Scripture in many ways functions as background static that can be rearranged in a multitude of ways to rationalize a pre-existing authoritarian belief on the pretense of scriptural authority. A claim of Revelation is in many ways a last-resort copout that uses one's absolute self-confidence as a blunt-instrument for perpetuating their beliefs in an emotion-driven manner. 

[Intheory]

On 7/28/2018 at 7:59 PM, Fuego said:

Yes, a lot. I had a roomie that rarely saw anything wrong with his own behavior, would get into my room and go through my stuff (likely looking for porn that wasn't there) to the point of removing insulation from my windows and putting it back sloppily. He'd had other roomies accuse him previously and he said to me "You don't believe I'd do that, do you?" I've learned over time that people who say that are typically guilty and looking for an ego boost.

 

And sometimes even normal Christians are told to become more invasive in the personal lives of others. I had multiple ones try to prevent me from marrying my wife (now of 20 years) because "she isn't ready, god wants her to be single, and we need to "counsel" her for more years until she sees how holy we are and maybe becomes married to one of us". All that last bit was silent, but I pushed one until he admitted he was attracted to her. My narcissist roomie above actually sent me a card saying I wasn't ready to get married, that I was violent, blah blah blah. I didn't give into his manipulation, so he constantly tried to gaslight me in the eyes of others that I was some kind of nut case. They even wrote to our marriage counselor trying to get him to stop the marriage. He told us that we were one of the more mature couples he'd ever known, and the letter was bizarre to him. It was a cult, and the church started taking steps to disband it. It started as a singles group, but became an oddly uber-fundy group. Glad we moved to a different city and eventually out of church completely.

 

 

I’m so sorry you went through that Fuego!! Gaslighting is one of the most insidious parts of abusice churches in my opinion.  I lived for years under narcissistic, abusive spiritual authority before I was able to lift my head above the fog and see clearly.

[ag_NO_stic]

Hey, DestinyTurtle! I've been enjoying your contributions so far, keep it up!

 

As for your post, it hit me right in the feels. My mother displays narcissistic tendencies and I'm actually pretty fucked up by a childhood spent navigating her expectations. I don't have to give you some long drawn out thing, but her love was always given based on meeting her standards. My biggest problem with her is that she (no matter what phase of life she's in) always expected me (a CHILD) to see things from HER perspective. It didn't matter how my 10 year old self saw the house, if she got home and I hadn't cleaned it to HER standards....I got in trouble. I can't tell you how many times, "I should've known better" in a situation I couldn't possibly have known.

 

I think it's why I'm such an empath now. I always always always wondered why mom couldn't see things from my perspective if I was expected to see hers. There's always another side of the story, but not to a narcissist lol.

 

It's eerie how many similarities there are between a narcissist and the christian god. I got a double whammy it seems.

 

 

[◊ DestinyTurtle ◊]

3 hours ago, ag_NO_stic said:

Hey, DestinyTurtle! I've been enjoying your contributions so far, keep it up!

 

As for your post, it hit me right in the feels. My mother displays narcissistic tendencies and I'm actually pretty fucked up by a childhood spent navigating her expectations. I don't have to give you some long drawn out thing, but her love was always given based on meeting her standards. My biggest problem with her is that she (no matter what phase of life she's in) always expected me (a CHILD) to see things from HER perspective. It didn't matter how my 10 year old self saw the house, if she got home and I hadn't cleaned it to HER standards....I got in trouble. I can't tell you how many times, "I should've known better" in a situation I couldn't possibly have known.

 

I think it's why I'm such an empath now. I always always always wondered why mom couldn't see things from my perspective if I was expected to see hers. There's always another side of the story, but not to a narcissist lol.

 

It's eerie how many similarities there are between a narcissist and the christian god. I got a double whammy it seems.

 

 

Thank you for sharing your story with me, @ag_NO_stic! I suspect we've had very similar experiences. One thing my parents would do would be to punish me out of the blue without explanation or reason, because "I should know better" and "I should think about what I had done" (whatever that was). I realized at an early age I had to constantly make sure they were happy, or they would literally interpret anything as an affront to them. It sure gave me a lot of anxiety problems in the long run!

 

In a lot of ways the bible is a mish-mash of out-of-context musings and stories, with varying degrees of moral interest and relevance. I think people usually project a personality onto it that happens to suit them, for the most part. Narcissists like to believe in a narcissistic God because it presents their own behavior in a light of sanctimoniousness...

[ag_NO_stic]

4 hours ago, DestinyTurtle said:

Thank you for sharing your story with me, @ag_NO_stic! I suspect we've had very similar experiences. One thing my parents would do would be to punish me out of the blue without explanation or reason, because "I should know better" and "I should think about what I had done" (whatever that was). I realized at an early age I had to constantly make sure they were happy, or they would literally interpret anything as an affront to them. It sure gave me a lot of anxiety problems in the long run!

 

In a lot of ways the bible is a mish-mash of out-of-context musings and stories, with varying degrees of moral interest and relevance. I think people usually project a personality onto it that happens to suit them, for the most part. Narcissists like to believe in a narcissistic God because it presents their own behavior in a light of sanctimoniousness...

 

Interesting point! It also makes me wonder if that's why some of us leave....We recognize it in our parents and want nothing to do with it! They can't see it, so leaving is unfathomable and almost a personal affront to them! 

 

I'm sorry you had to go through it too. It sucks.