Bipolar 2 From Inside and Out

Posts tagged ‘narcissism’

The King Baby and the Narcissist

Almost everyone knows a grown-up in their life who has to be right all the time, has to be catered to, and blames everyone else for failures or unpleasant events.

That person is a King Baby. (Not to be sexist. There is also a Queen Baby.) It’s someone who never grew up, at least not emotionally. King Baby expects everyone to love him, take care of him, and solve all his problems for him.

Reference.com says that a King Baby: “is typically selfish, rejects criticism, complains, is obsessed with money and belongings and doesn’t feel like rules should apply to him. In short, he is someone who refuses to mature.” Tom Cunningham wrote the book (well, the 28-page pamphlet) on King Baby Syndrome in 1986. It’s still available from Hazelden, which is good because King Babies haven’t gone away, nor are they likely to.

King Babies view the world as their plaything and other people as someone whose only function is to meet their needs. Physically they are adults, but emotionally they are still infants. Typical King Baby remarks are, “That’s not fair,” “This is what I want,” “That’s not how I do it,” “Do this for me,” and “I’m the best at everything.”

Needless to say, King Babies are very trying to be around.

I learned about King Baby syndrome from my husband. Not that he has King Baby syndrome. But he used to work as a counselor with various therapy groups. One thing he told me was that when someone was trying to pull King Baby shit, one of the others might call him on it by saying, “Wah!”

King Baby goes by other names as well. Probably best known is Peter Pan, from an 80s pop psych book, The Peter Pan Syndrome. Years before that hit the bookshelves, though, writer Aldous Huxley produced a novel called Island, which talks about “dangerous delinquents” and “power-loving troublemakers” who are “Peter Pans.” In addition, he said, they are “boys who can’t read, won’t learn, don’t get on with anyone, and finally turn to the more violent forms of delinquency.” Huxley cited Adolf Hitler as an example.

King Baby syndrome is not an actual psychological diagnosis. It is not covered in the DSM. But the DSM does include Narcissistic Personality Disorder, which sounds remarkably like a King Baby:

  • exaggeration of accomplishments
  • saying they have done things they haven’t really done
  • acting or feeling more important than others
  • believing they are special and unique
  • having a need to be admired all the time
  • expecting to be treated differently, with more status than others
  • exploiting others to get what they want or need
  • pretending concern towards others or lacking empathy
  • being jealous and competitive with others
  • thinking that others are jealous of them
  • acting arrogant and superior

Narcissistic Personality Disorder is, of course, an official diagnosis in the DSM. King Baby is only someone you perceive as narcissistic but who hasn’t gone through the process that leads to a diagnosis. I’d hesitate to call someone a narcissist who hasn’t even talked to a psychologist or psychiatrist. But I have no problem labeling someone a King Baby.

So what do you do with a King Baby? My advice is to avoid them if possible. You can, like the people in my husband’s therapy groups, call the person out for their behavior, though it’s not likely to do any good. Often it’s best just to cut the King Baby out of your life. If you do, though, expect anger, blaming, and recriminations.

If you do have to live with a King Baby, perhaps the best thing you can do is to recognize the behavior when you see it happening and not fall into the trap of trying to meet the King Baby’s every need. This won’t make any difference in the King Baby’s behavior, of course. You’ll have to deal with pouting, sulking, poor-me talk, and even retaliation.

Because just as vampires never grow older, King Babies never grow up. They can’t and they won’t.

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Mental Health

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Is It Narcissism or Gaslighting?

We know that narcissism and gaslighting both lend themselves to abusive treatment, but they are actually two different things. They’re both extremely destructive. They both have serious negative effects on the people around them. And people who are victims of narcissistic abuse or gaslighting face similar problems in determining what to do about it. Let’s take a deeper dive.

Narcissism is a psychiatric condition—a personality disorder—that’s included in the DSM and has been recognized for years. The DSM says that NPD involves “a pervasive pattern of grandiosity (in fantasy or behavior), a constant need for admiration, and a lack of empathy, beginning by early adulthood and present in a variety of contexts.” Diagnostic criteria include a need for excessive admiration, a sense of entitlement, interpersonally exploitive behavior, a lack of empathy, a belief that others are envious of them, and arrogant and haughty behaviors or attitudes. Narcissism is a personality trait, while clinically, Narcissistic Personality Disorder is a psychiatric condition.

(I will not now be discussing politics. Diagnosis-at-a-distance is not valid or desirable. Diagnosis can only be made by a mental health professional who has actually spoken to the person in question.)

Gaslighting, on the other hand, is a form of psychological manipulation that narcissistic abusers sometimes use to control another person by making them doubt their own reality and sanity. But people other than narcissists use gaslighting as well. They could simply have narcissistic tendencies but not be diagnosable or diagnosed with NPD.

In other words, narcissism focuses on a sense of grandiosity and superiority, while gaslighting focuses on the way one person manipulates another in an abusive manner.

Gaslighting gets its name from a movie that showed a husband who tried to convince his wife that she was insane, for personal gain. The term has entered the non-psychiatric discourse and is used very loosely to mean any kind of abusive tactics rather than the specific one of causing another person to doubt their own reality.

Gaslighting can be one tactic that people with NPD use when they do abuse others, but there are a number of other toxic behaviors they demonstrate as well. Someone engaging in narcissistic abuse can use a variety of techniques to emotionally manipulate another person. They may belittle and demean their victim, isolate them from friends and family, and use intermittent reinforcement (in which they sometimes praise and show love for the victim, then take any opportunity to insult and blame them).

A gaslighter denies the victim’s perception of reality. They may explain their abusive behavior as “just a joke.” They may deny that their victim’s memory of an incident is true. They create a sense of cognitive dissonance in which the victim’s lived experience is at odds with what the abuser says really happened. There is obviously a great deal of overlap between gaslighting and narcissistic abuse.

The effects of narcissistic abuse or gaslighting can be severe. Victims can feel low self-esteem, internalize the abuse and believe they are to blame for it or brought it on themselves, feel alienation from friends and family, have difficulty trusting others, be unable to make decisions, and not feel able to maintain a sense of self. They frequently stay with the abuser, unable to recognize what is happening. They may feel they can change the abuser. They can’t.

The best way to counteract the harmful effects of narcissistic abuse or gaslighting is to get away from it. Admittedly, this is difficult to do. The victim may have been conditioned to believe that the abuser loves them and not want to give up on the relationship. Even if the victim does leave, it may take a long time and most likely therapy for them to realize what actually happened and define it as abuse.

Setting boundaries can help, though an abuser is not likely to respect them. Seeking support from friends, family, a psychologist, or group therapy may well be necessary. Couples counseling is not likely to help. The abuser may not admit that they need help. Education can be empowering. Once you learn about the dynamics and techniques of abuse or gaslighting, you’re less likely to be susceptible to them.

But the best thing to do is not to get involved with a narcissist or a gaslighter in the first place. It’s a situation that’s a lot easier to get into than to get out of. Watch for red flags, then keep your distance. They may seem attractive at first, but they’re trouble waiting to happen.

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Mental Health

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The Self-Esteem Dilemma

I’ve heard that narcissists (and multiple murderers) have too-high self-esteem. I’ve also heard that they have low self-esteem. Which assertion is right? Surely they can’t both be!

Self-esteem became a big topic of conversation in the 1980s. That’s when self-esteem programs for children were beginning to be taught in schools and preschools. There were many questions about them, some of which I asked when assigning a writer to a story about them. (I was an editor for a publication for childcare workers and daycare owners at the time.) Why do children need self-esteem programs? Doesn’t daily living foster self-esteem? What can self-esteem programs do that parents and teachers can’t or don’t? The writer seemed taken aback, but bravely tackled all those questions and wrote a fine article on the subject.

Later, the self-esteem movement came into disrepute and was the subject of much mocking and more authentic criticism. Chief among the things detractors made fun of were “participation trophies” given to every participant in a game or sport, spelling bee, or whatever other sort of competition. Complaints included that this negated the idea of competition altogether, falsely inflated children’s sense of accomplishment, shortchanged children who had truly excelled, and was a touchy-feely practice that had no place in the realm of sports or other competitive areas.

It was also thought that self-esteem programs were teaching the wrong lesson. Instead of learning that effort doesn’t always achieve the desired results, children were learning that everyone was as good as everyone else, which seemed like a mistake to some. Self-esteem programs were also said to lead children to the idea that the world was a kindly place where they would be rewarded just for existing. Instead, they should “toughen up” and learn that the world would deal them harsh blows at times and that they needed to be ready to cope with them. Debate continued about when and where such a lesson should be taught and even if it should be taught at all.

How does this relate to the aforementioned narcissists and toxic people? The two theories about their level of self-esteem seem contradictory and counterintuitive. Do they have low self-esteem? It doesn’t seem like it, the way they take control over others’ lives and manipulate them. Do they have high self-esteem? This sounds a little more plausible.

Reconciling the two theories is problematic. On the one hand, these people’s self-esteem seems to be too great, so they feel they are special and entitled to control other people who aren’t up to the same standard. On the other, their self-esteem might be too low, driving them to overcompensate for their lack by acting powerful and controlling others.

It seems unlikely that both of these mechanisms could apply to a single person. How could they feel genuinely powerful and compensate for being less powerful at the same time?

But, at its heart, true, healthy self-esteem isn’t about power. It’s about loving, accepting, and appreciating yourself for the good qualities that you do have. It’s about recognizing that your place in life is to be neither a doormat nor an idol. It’s about having confidence in yourself that you can face obstacles – though not conquering every obstacle – but knowing your limitations.

Does life teach self-esteem? It can, certainly, if a child is raised in a supportive, encouraging environment; if the child learns that both effort and accomplishment are possible; if the child has role models for self-esteem; and if good lessons about self-worth are taught in the home and at school.

Of course, we know that not all children are raised in such an ideal environment. Probably far too few are. Or children receive mixed messages about self-esteem from parents, schools, religion, and other places where they get training for life events: not to be unrealistically proud but to be proud of achievements; to be humble or to be confident; to be assertive or to obey authority; to share with others or to know what’s theirs and defend it; to cooperate or to take the lead.

Self-esteem is particularly difficult for those of us with brain illnesses or psychological disorders. We may feel broken, unsure of ourselves, and clueless about where we fit into society. In the grip of mania, we can feel ten feet tall and bulletproof. When we are depressed, we can feel worthless. In bipolar disorder, in particular, the two states can be encompassed in a single individual at different times.

But this is not to say that people with psychological challenges are all narcissists. Far from it. I would say that in every person, there are varying degrees of longing to have control and desire to relinquish control. It’s achieving a healthy balance of these two things that’s the real trick.

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Category:

Mental Health

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