When The Narcissist Is A Child
Mental health professionals (psychiatrists, psychologists, and therapists) will often not diagnose anyone below the age of 18 with a personality disorder since the personality of a young person is still in the process of development.
Generally, a person’s environment, experiences, and inherited traits affect the development of their personality. In time, the personality develops into that person’s ways of thinking about themselves. Those thoughts can be centered around the negative or the positive depending on the person’s circumstances.
Over time, many of those traits that make up the personality will stick and become the way the person interacts with others. If those traits make it difficult for the person to connect with others or in any way deviates from what is considered the norm compared to others within the same age group, then there may be problems in the person’s functioning.
For the most part, it is not always difficult to discern when a child’s personality is disordered particularly if one has had experience with others who have personality disorders. Yet, there is the hope that a child will simply grow out of these disorders because they are ultimately, still, themselves, very much developing and changing.
I, for one, never want to give up hope, but sometimes, situations involving a child, who very well may have narcissistic personality disorder, can feel hopeless particularly when I know that the adult narcissists I have experienced over my lifetime have never changed, have never sought help for their disorder, and do not even see that they have a problem.
Inner Reflection
Currently, I find myself once again dealing with narcissistic personality disorder within my personal realm. I have a teen relative who displays what I see as not the typical narcissism that youth their age displays. Normally, teens are always about themselves. They can be selfish, behave as if the world revolves around them, and act in entitled ways.
Although narcissism itself is often displayed by all of us on a spectrum, I am pretty attuned to when the scales are tipped when a person displaying all nine of the traits of the disorder has stepped upon them. It saddens me that my relative has tipped the scales and is most likely disordered by narcissism. Honestly, however, I should not be surprised because my relative was born into a family of narcissists.
Despite this knowledge of family genealogy, it still saddens me to see the path my relative is taking even though I ponder at this stage if there is a choice. I take note of this much when I think about my own upbringing. As a child, I truly did not navigate my own way. Most choices were made for me. My thoughts were not always my own, and my will was always inclined to being bent by authority figures.
I had a lot of problems, and I battled immense anger, bottled rage, and damning depression and anxiety. Surrounded by parents who were extremely narcissistic, I was bound to display traits of the disorder myself. In fact, I was indeed narcissistic in my behaviors, but I was also still developing and forming a personality that I attempted to forge apart from others who controlled me.
So, I think on some level I am much more empathetic to the plight of youth, but that does not mean that dealing with a narcissistic youth is any easier. For me, it has been and is far more difficult because I have seen the possibility of a miserable future of isolating complexities ahead of them. That is a sad reality, and I wish that I could help more … that I could take away the pain that I see.
In some way, I fear that I know what the end will be if there are no changes in my relative’s behavior right now. They are intensely angry and have told me so. In fact, my relative told me that they were filled with anger and hatred and do not have the capacity to even want to talk about it. Hatred and anger is all they feel all the time, and instead of taking it out on the people who are responsible for the effects of that anger and hatred, the one who wants to be around them to support them and be there for them becomes the lucky scapegoat.
Aside from dealing with the normal teen stage of life changes, my relative is also navigating intense emotions that they only seem to handle by deflecting, avoiding, vaping, and smoking weed (and possibly doing other illicit drugs). When I attempt to make conversation with them, I am met with a huge brick wall of silence, glassy eyes of anger, and sneering smirks of condescension and contempt. I actually feel myself tiptoeing and tap dancing around eggshells with them. It is beyond frustrating and often heartbreaking.
Reaping What I Have Sown?
There seems to be nothing that I can say to reach my relative. I find myself repeating the pattern my father took with me when he tried to reach me as a teen during my dark times. I was simply silent and aloof, and this is the same attitude that I am met with now, and I just do not know what to do about it. No amount of schooling and being educated in psychology and child development has prepared me for this. Even my own experiences as a teen has not helped me. The times were different back then. The times are different now. It feels like we are worlds apart … that I am ancient and lack understanding even though I completely identify with my relative.
So I wait with my relative – often in sustained and painful silences. Yet, I push through and bring about conversation anyway. I focus on the mundane things of life that must illicit a response even if the responses are one or two syllables. I attempt to push through the brick wall my relative keeps up, but love is not enough. Love is just often a word. So I give of myself and my time, and I attempt to penetrate through the brick wall to get to the other side. I think by doing this I am somehow putting myself in my relative’s shoes because I want the barrier to be broken between us. I want my relative to know that I am there … that I am not going anywhere.
Yet, as I have found from my experiences with the adult narcissist, my being there for the possible teen narcissist serves me nothing but a fresh plate of scorn and contempt through a side-eye glance and smirk. Inside of myself, I seethe within my own agitation and find myself wanting to explode against my relative. I often utter to myself, “Grow up!” Still, admittedly, a few times I have released a cannon of verbal bombs my relative’s way to show them how I expect to be treated only to receive a curt but ingenuous apology regarding their misdeeds only for them to go back to repeating their narcissistic behavior again.
Am I reaping what I have sown in my past? Am I not able to blame the trauma that I experienced that ultimately shaped me into becoming the person that I was at that time? I do not know the answers. I simply ask rhetorically because these are my reflections. I look back upon my past and remember that I was protecting myself, but I was also furious with the adults in my life that I needed to protect myself from because they were ultimately not protecting me when and where I needed protection most.
But now, I also look back and clearly remember my parents looking upon me with concern because my anger was intense and palpable. Even though my parents were narcissistic and likely would be diagnosed as narcissists, I still remember a faint appearance of their own remorse or maybe even regret for the pain that I was going through at the time. Like my relative is to me now, back then, I refused to open up to my parents or any other adults because I simply felt I could not.
I felt that our worlds (those of my parents and mine) did not collide with each other, and although I remember their attempts to talk to me, I, too, was very much like the stone wall that my relative projects towards me. It is uncanny that I find myself wanting to break a cycle that I do not know how to no matter how much I pray about it and agonize over it. It simply hurts like hell, and sometimes I have to pull myself away because I want to give up and let go. Then I remember, I am dealing with a child … a teenager who still acts very much like a child but one who pushes me away the closer I seem to get to them.
When The Narcissist Is A Child
When the narcissist is a child is just as hard as when the narcissist is an adult. They both exhibit the same narcissistic traits even though the adult has matured regarding how to unleash the different tactics of manipulation. Yet, the child is not far behind in being a mastermind manipulator either, and that is often a scary and immobilizing realization. In other words, the child narcissist is just going to become an even better adult narcissist, and they will target someone they will want to support them but then keep them at bay and from becoming close.
Yet, for the time being, I hold out on a little hope unless I discern I am dealing with psychopathy or sociopathy at worst, and so far … that has not been the case. I also keep in mind that I once behaved like my teen relative. I had a lot of issues, unresolved hurt, and morphing sadness that presented as immeasurable anger. In short, I was a massive pain in the ass … at least to my parents … until I found my way, dealt with my inner darkness, and chose the path toward healing. However, for the time being, this is where I am at … being a part of a teen’s world that I can relate to even though this teen does not seem to realize my close connection.
At this point, I am open to advice or a different perspective that I may not see, but I am not at the place of walking away because for the time being, I simply do not want to. Yet, at some point, I know I must face the inevitable. Only time will tell, but until then … I am dealing with a child who is most likely a narcissist.
My Voice Unchained 