Caring for a Narcissitic Parent
http://caregiverrelief.com/narcissism... Narcissism is a personality disorder that goes unrecognized by the individual and therefore goes untreated. A narcissistic individual is all about controlling everyone in their life. IT is not easy when caring for an aging parent with narcissism.
Welcome to aging home health care course on caring for a narcissistic parent. The survival guide let's first address. What is narcissism? A narcissist is a pur narcissism is a personality disorder that goes unrecognized by the individual. And therefore goes untreated. The person with this disorder feels they're superior to others.
They are self centered. Self-involved people in a very extreme way, their problems, their emerge emotions are the center of everything, the emotions or feelings of others do not matter to them. Narcissists have a difficult time in relationships. They feel victimized by everyone. They have a difficult time having compassion.
Or even empathy for another, a narcissist wants to control everyone in their life. You can never make a narcissist happy or even satisfied. They have an overall sense of self-importance in every aspect of their life. And they respond with extreme anger. If you criticize them. Now let's discuss children of narcissists, narcissists attract other narcissists.
So usually both parents have some level of narcissistic characteristics, children of narcissists grow up, never knowing how they feel about anything. This is because their experience has been that the parent's feelings were the most important. This causes a child of a narcissist to always feel like an outsider in the family, the children, the narcissists become people, pleasers children, no narcissists are also self sabotaging or me having a problem meeting their own needs in order to please others, because they learned that the needs of the parent were more important than anything.
They lose their sense of self as they learned to survive, they must cater to the needs of the parent in order to get attention, they are often mocked or criticized by the narcissistic parent, many begin to feel invisible. So let's talk about the caregiver survival for caring for a narcissistic parent.
It's important that you realize that you are no longer at the mercy of the narcissist, many feel guilty for feeling like a reluctant caregiver, understand you are not alone in those feelings, except that your narcissistic parent is a master manipulator, and you're not going to change them. Understand that the narcissistic parent is on a quest for undivided attention.
And has a way of getting individuals to continually try to meet their unrealistic standards. Realize the only thing you can control is your own emotions and your own responses. Consider learning, mindful, caring as a teaches you how to respond logically versus emotionally. Realize that when interacting with the narcissist.
You need to take some deep breaths when you start to feel anxious and this will help you to remain calm, do not allow yourself to take on the role of a victim. You may have to provide care for this individual, but you do not have to tolerate the verbal and emotional abuse tactics used to keep you in their control.
The hardest thing that you need to learn. And the biggest thing you need to learn is to not take anything a narcissist says, do you personally communicate to the narcissist by asking leading questions to diffuse their perceived power? An example would be,
I know that you like things a certain way. Could you show me what you want or I think use, could you explain to me that one more time? Or could you please clarify what you are saying another way to handle it is to say so help me understand. You said and repeat back to them what they just said to you never, ever take anything.
A narcissist says personally, that's a hard. Thing to, to learn to do, but you need to do it. Do not allow them the power to hurt you mentally or emotionally set emotional boundaries and stick with them. You are in control of your own emotions and how you respond. Try to overcome your approval seeking behaviors as you will only be disappointed and feel rejected.
Your gifts, your efforts, your actions will never be good enough to please an individual plagued with narcissism. Understand that a narcissist is incapable of change. Only you can change how you respond and react to their behaviors. Practice, mindful, caring, and utilize stress management techniques.
Caregiving is the most guilt producing role. Any individual ever experienced the narcissist will take advantage of that guilt and use it in their arsenal of skills. If you are an adult child of a narcissist caring for a parent, it is really better to allow someone else to deal with them. A narcissist does not have a sense of balance.
