Julie Hart from The Hart Centre offers specialist services to help those dealing with Narcissistic Personality Disorder.
http://www.hartrelationshipcounselling.com.au/free-psychology-help/are-you-living-with-a-narcissist.html
The Hart Centre
Suite 32104 Southport Central Tower 3
9 Lawson Street
Southport 4215 QLD
www.thehartcentre.com.au Read more
In Kiss Kill, my latest young adult novel, the character Mat, triumphs over his abusive relationship with his narcissistic girlfriend, Elle. The following advice is taken from the web site http://www.womenabusingmen.org/whatcanido.html
A WARNING TO MEN WHO FEEL LIKE THEY ARE BEING ABUSED.
Assess your level of danger
• On a scale of 1 to 10:
(1) Everything is changed now from when things were really good between you. She is very controlling and manipulative toward you and things seem to have taken a negative turn.
(2) She is often angry with you, saying mean and painful things. She denies it, but it seems like she is sneaking around behind you, trying to catch you in lies, waiting for you to fail her.
(3) No matter what you do, if it’s not her idea, it’s wrong and causes a fight. You are seeing how angry she can get, and her reactions seem extreme.
(4) She is behaving badly, perhaps even in public now. She is falsely accusing you of bad behaviour, and some of the accusations are the very things she is actually doing to you.
(5) She is likely to throw things at the wall during a fight and be physically destructive to make her point.
(6) She is likely to throw things at you during a fight, and she has physically struck you at this point.
(7) Even during the cooling off period following a fight, she doesn’t seem to cool off. She can fly back into a rage easily and can’t let it go. Things are getting progressively worse now.
(8) When she is angry, you sleep separately with the door locked, just in case, to avoid a physical ambush while you sleep.
(9) Fights are almost always include physical attacks. She says she wishes you were dead or has threatened to kill you.
(10) She has threatened to kill you before but this time she’s acting differently; strangely quiet, smug or secretive. She may make a strange attempt to reconcile suddenly, but it doesn’t make sense and it doesn’t feel right.
These are examples of how abuse can escalate over time, bearing in mind that every relationship is unique. However, there is danger at the lowest end of the scale, and the ultimate danger at the high end. Both require a serious change of circumstances. Listen to your inner voice – what do your instincts tell you? If you find yourself at the high end of the scale, act quickly to put safety measures in place. Don’t just wait to see how it goes.
Kiss Kill is a digital only book published by Really Blue Books
Amazon http://t.co/h3XUTe5t
Abuse happens when one person uses different types of abusive behaviour to gain POWER and CONTROL over another.
Abuse can include emotional, mental, verbal, financial, physical, sexual, and social abuse.
Neglect can be abuse too.
Abuse can happen to anyone no matter what their sexual orientation, gender, ethnicity, income, education or nationality.
Behaviour Red Flags for Abuse, taken from http://www.teenrelationships.org/abuse/
1) THREATS of violence or past history of violence
2) JEALOUSY/ HYPERSENSITIVE
3) SCARES you
4) BLAMES others for problems and mistakes
5) ISOLATES you
6) Tries to CONTROL you
7) PRESSURES you for sex or is “playfully” forceful when intimate
8 ) PUT DOWNS
9) Sudden MOOD SWINGS
10) Becomes SERIOUS too quickly
Abuse can effect your feelings of confidence, safety and self-esteem.
Seek help! Contact Crisis Support Services, speak to someone you trust, visit your local doctor.
Note: In the digital book Kiss Kill, Mat survives an abusive relationship with Elle.
Amazon http://t.co/h3XUTe5t
www.reallybluebooks.com
Watch this YouTube. Is this abuse…?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=scrdqYyXMFO&feature=colike
No one broad definition covers all aspects of what constitutes emotional abuse, but generally speaking, the following types of behaviour occur with regularity in the emotionally abusive relationship:
• Attacks on personal character
• Blame and accusations
• Shame and judging
• Sarcasm and twisting what you say
• Rewriting history
• Playing the victim
• Manipulation, control and coercion
• Unpredictable explosions
• Criticism that is harsh and undeserved
• Swearing
• Intimidation
• Escalating situations or refusing to discuss a situation by not speaking at all
If you feel you are in an emotionally abusive relationship seek help!
Readers of Kiss Kill (www.reallybluebooks.com) can contact Headspace: Australia’s National Youth Mental Health Foundation at www.headspace.org.au or Mensline Australia on 1300 789978
The narcissist believes that by being perfect they will receive the admiration/love/respect/attention they crave. Being perceived as ‘not perfect’ can result in feelings of shame, anxiety, guilt or anger.
If a narcissist’s self-esteem is threatened or wounded, they may react with anything from mild irritation to serious outbursts, or even violence. Destroying the perceived threat restores their sense of safety and power and gives them total control over their environment.
The rage is not about you, it is about the narcissist.
Respond to narcissistic rage with your mind, not with emotion. Do not rage back.
Do not try to use logic or reason to calm the narcissist as this will prolong the confrontation. There is no room for your opinion or viewpoint. This is not personal, it is about the narcissist.
Establish your boundaries. Keep calm and as soon as you are able, remove yourself from the explosive situation.
Do not believe that anything you say or don’t say, do or don’t do will change the person or the situation.
Accept that the narcissist will not display this behaviour in public view. In public, they are perfect – charismatic, fun, outgoing, laid back. It is only in private that they release their rage. Expect that unless the rage is personally witnessed, no-one will understand how life is for you.
Narcissists practice projection. When they accuse you of being selfish, inconsiderate, envious, dishonest, arrogant etc what they are projecting is inadequacies they feel about themselves. The projection is not about you, it is about the narcissist.
Narcissists may claim to have said something which they did not actually say, blaming you for not listening. Alternatively, they do say something but claim to have not. Narcissists can contradict themselves in the same breath!
Les Carter’s discussion on how to deal with the narcissist in your life encourages you to focus on your own anger responses. He says anger has many faces and breaks these down into 5 types of anger response:
1) Suppressed Anger (giving up)
2) Openly Aggressive Anger (ranting and raving)
3) Passive-Aggressive Anger (going underground)
4) Assertive Anger (being firm and fair)
5) Release Anger (a state of acceptance, tolerance and forgiveness)
Needless to say, when faced with a narcissist we should be fair but stand firm, with forgiveness the ultimate goal.
In order to do this we need to remove the FEAR factor from this equation. How do we show signs of Fear?
– reluctance
– resistance
– suppression
– avoidance
– lying
– complaining
– not standing up for yourself
– second-guessing the narcissist’s preferences
– allowing yourself to be talked out of a decision.
Conclusion: The narcissist will not change, you must take action towards changing your perceptions and reactions.
Ouch!
Jeni Mawter
www.jenimawter.com
jeni@jenimawter.com
+61 407 247 032
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