The ACT Counselling Services Team regularly deliver several 1 day CPD events on ‘Working with Narcissistic Personality Disorder’. Whilst we thoroughly enjoyed delivering the workshops and the feedback received was excellent we did find it a challenge. The challenge lay in attempting to change the public as well as Therapist’s attitudes towards those who are unfortunate enough to have a narcissistic personality type.

They are not ‘monsters’

We found that most workshops at some point became about ridiculing narcissists. This seems to be a very common reaction. In fact, a lot of articles that we have read over the last year in magazines with a psychology focus appear to advocate how awful and damaging narcissists are. Whilst we agree that it may be the case that narcissists can cause a lot of psychological damage, we strongly express that ‘there is no point or value in turning people into monsters.’ Are we not in the profession of care and compassion?

Our conclusion…

Our team discussions have led us to the conclusion that lack of understanding is possibly a large contributor to the attitudes held towards people with narcissistic traits or indeed the disorder. As a result, we hope to provide a little information on what actually lies beneath the disorder with a view to promoting understanding, compassion and a willingness to work with people with NPD or NPD traits.

What lies behind NPD…

The common belief amongst most folks is that people with the way of being associated with NPD have had ‘too much of a good thing,’ or have been ‘repeatedly told how special and wonderful they are,’ furthermore that ‘you are better than others.’ This in our experience is not the case. People with NPD have experienced high levels of emotional deprivation and conditional approval. The reality is actually that they have been given the message by their significant caregivers that they are defective unless they meet with the conditions set by the caregivers. So in other words, ‘you are only acceptable if you are perfect, achieve, gain recognition for the caregiver, be the best, do not show weakness, do not show emotion.’

The reality is that sadness, loneliness, isolation and hollowness sums up the Narcissists existence. We would suggest that this is not something to be mocked and ridiculed but understood and empathised with. A common trait in narcissism is a lack of empathy, unless there is a shift in the public and Therapist’s perception we are treating these people in the same way that we mock them for.

Want to know more?

If this article has been helpful and you want to know more about training or treatment for NPD then please get in touch and we will be delighted to help. You can call us on 0141 554 0838 or email us here.

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The ACT Team have an up and coming CPD event on 20/02/16 titled ‘Gestalt — a way of living’ looking at Gestalt Psychotherapy. Whilst preparing the course materials we cannot help but remember the insight and power connected with this approach and its ability to help us as human beings make sense of our lives. With this in mind, let’s reflect on the connection between a family’s attitude to vomiting and the syntonic (in harmony) and dystonic (impaired) personality.

How did your family deal with vomit?

How did your family deal with the vomit? When you were young (before the age of 7) and you felt a bit unwell and were taken by surprise by a surge of vomit, what did your family members do? As you vomited all over the front room carpet, what did they do? Was your vomiting a family affair, did your siblings/cousins etc get to watch and make comment? Did Mum, Dad or significant caregivers tell you not to mind the mess, just get all that nasty stuff up? Did they hold and comfort you?

Were you reassured?

Perhaps your vomiting was dealt with differently. Did the significant caregivers reassure you, guide you to the toilet, spend a little bit of time with you and then leave. They might have come back to check on you at regular intervals. The last option the family or significant caregivers might have had was to quickly grab you when the vomit began, rush you to the toilet, sit you in front of the loo and quickly close the door. The last words you might have heard were to make your way to your bedroom once all vomiting had ceased at which point a bucket would be delivered to you and food parcels thereafter until all the messy stuff was gone.

How this links to life’s problems

However, the vomit was dealt with is probably how you now deal with life’s problems (the messy stuff). If the vomiting was shared, then you will share life’s problems with those close to you. If you were, supported and reassured to an extent then you probably share problems or the messy stuff in life to a certain extent but not the whole story. If your vomiting was a solitary affair conducted in isolation, then this is probably how you deal with life’s problems. The messages we hear and the rules we learn in childhood shape who we are today.

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