Hello and welcome to Narcissist Danger.
I’ve spent almost a decade trying to learn how to safely interact with narcissists. During this time, I’ve accumulated a vast resource of information and want to share it with the world. The goal is to have my research help someone else going through a similar situation.
I come from a background of Computer Science so I am compelled to really figure out how things work. Just like computer’s, the brain is a really complex machine that sometimes doesn’t act as expected. To fix a computer you have to understand the core problem before you can compose a solution. Understanding more about how mental disorders can negatively affect your life will help you improve your life and change your behaviours in order to help protect against toxic abusers.
I’m not a doctor or psychiatrist, my goal isn’t to treat you, it’s to research and bring you expert information and add my experiences to help with your recovery or research. If you are suffering mentally from narcissist abuse, please check out the resources section of Narcissist Danger for professionals that can help.
There are a number of cluster B personality types such as Antisocial personality disorder, Borderline personality disorder, Histrionic personality disorder, and Narcissistic personality disorder but then there are also other problems such as Dissociative identity disorder as well as psychopath and sociopath behaviours that could appear to be cluster B.
If you are not a medical professional you should not be diagnosing Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD). Name calling and degrading people is the narcissist’s calling card, don’t stoop down to their level, it’s embarrassing. Labelling someone puts you at a disadvantage as well, if you get it wrong.
It’s always best to focus on solutions to the problems other people create, rather than worrying about labelling them. Concentrate on handling the situation, not the person. Gaining knowledge about how these mental issues can affect others gives us a tool kit we can use to find problems. Then we can use these tools to solve or avoid toxic behaviour to make the world a better place.
My research is mainly focused on narcissists who are also separated or divorced parents as that is where my interest and experience has been. With most narcissists, you can use the no-contact strategy to quickly correct their abuse, but when children are involved you have to adopt more complex strategies, such as grey rock and parallel parenting. No matter how much the Narcissistic parent has abused you and possibly your children, you can only control how much love and empathy you show your children.
If you can show others that all you care about is your children and you will love them unconditionally, the narcissist’s projection of all their problems onto you will seem ridiculous to any onlookers.
So the best advice I can give is: Live every part of your day expressing your love for your children in everything you do. It will open new doors, get you support and build a community around the most special people in this world - children.