2)  For years, N husband has accused me of actions that I never did or thought of doing but that he has done.  For example:  I bet you have a seperate bank account, you butter me up when you only want something,  you married me for my money...He says things that do not represent my character at all but are pieces to his personaltiy.  Does he realize this at any time of these accusations or does he truly believe this to be true?

3)  Husband acts as though he is viewing a situation as an out of body experience.  For example:  when he was no longer with other woman,  he stated,  can you image the type of woman that would sleep with a married man, or, she was so selfish.  He speaks of her in a negative way but cannot see himself as part of the action.  He speaks as though he views two other people doing an act.  Please explain!

Here are the rest of the questions Doc!

4)  Husband has told me several times that I have a strong personality.  For years he has been telling me that I am crazy and trying to convice me as such.  THe majority of the time I stood my ground and sometimes backed off for the sake of not arguing.  Why is the motive of the N so important in declaring someone else crazy?

5)  Husband has very secretive life and has isolated me from his job, co-workers, friends, etc.  He has isolated his family members (parents are both deceased, only sister and her family are survivors) from me by having them call on his cell phone and not our phone.  When he enters an affair relationship,  does he also isolate the other woman as much as his own famlily.

6) In the State of Indiana,  NPD diagnosis does not mean anything in court.  Husband has called saying he was suicial, wants to run away to a place where no one knows him and constantly wants to keep busy.  I do not respond at his suicidal calls at all.  Why does not mind need to be so busy?

7)  I have had very distinct conversations with husband and he will completely deny them in front of people.  Is it because he truly does not remember or just takes the opposite view?

Thanks,  I have learned NPD from your writings and to help of this forum, especially from CZBZ.

Is the False Self an alter? In other words: is the True Self of a narcissist the equivalent of a host personality in a DID (Dissociative Identity Disorder) �?and the False Self - one of the fragmented personalities, also known as "alters"?

The False Self is a mere construct rather than a full-fledged self. It is the locus of the narcissist's fantasies of grandiosity, his feelings of entitlement, omnipotence, magical thinking, omniscience and magical immunity. But it lacks many other functional and structural elements.

Moreover, it has no "cut-off" date. DID alters have a date of inception, as a reaction to trauma or abuse (they have an "age"). The False Self is a process, not an entity, it is a reactive pattern and a reactive formation. The False Self is not a self, nor is it false. It is very real, more real to the narcissist than his True Self.

Narcissists actually vanish and are replaced by a False Self (Kernberg). There is no True Self inside the narcissist. The narcissist is a hall of mirrors �?but the hall itself is an optical illusion created by the mirrors. It is akin to a painting by Escher.

In DID, the emotions that are segregated. The notion of "unique separate multiple whole personalities" is primitive and untrue. DID is a continuum. The inner language breaks down into polyglottal chaos. Emotions cannot communicate with each other for fear of pain (and its fatal results). So, they are being kept apart by various mechanisms (a host or birth personality, a facilitator, a moderator and so on).

All personality disorders involve a modicum of dissociation. But the narcissistic solution is to emotionally disappear. Hence, the tremendous, insatiable need of the narcissist for external approval. He exists only as a reflection. Since he is forbidden to love his self �?he chooses to have no self at all. It is not dissociation �?it is a vanishing act.

The total, "pure" solution is NPD: self-extinguishing, self-abolishing, entirely fake. Other personality disorders are diluted variations on the themes of self-hate and perpetuated self-abuse. HPD is NPD with sex and body as the source of the Narcissistic Supply. The Borderline Personality Disorder involves lability, the movement between poles of life wish and death wish and so on.

Back to the narcissist:

This dichotomy, between True and False selves creates the impression that the narcissist is different persons at different times - or discontinuous:

http://samvak.tripod.com/journal20.html

http://samvak.tripod.com/faq57.html

The narcissist is dimly aware of this schism. He often talks about himself in the third person singular, compares himself to a machine, and disavows his own actions and decisions:

http://samvak.tripod.com/journal4.html

http://samvak.tripod.com/faq49.html

http://samvak.tripod.com/faq39.html

http://samvak.tripod.com/abuse8.html

http://samvak.tripod.com/faq58.html

http://samvak.tripod.com/msla3to4.html

Take care.

Sam

Secrecy is a major weapon in the abuser's arsenal. Many batterers maintain a double life and keep it a well-guarded secret. Others show one face �?/SPAN> benign, even altruistic �?/SPAN> to an admiring world and another �?/SPAN> ominous and aggressive �?/SPAN> at home. All abusers insist on keeping the abuse confidential, safe from prying eyes and ears.

Narcissists very often feel like criminals. Being, in essence, FAKES, they are deeply convinced of their culpability. They feel as though they are constantly engaged in a major scam, deceiving their nearest and dearest. This conviction stems from the primordial sin of their emotional auto-cide. Prone to neologisms, I invented this word recently to describe the murder of the True Self by its False distant relative. The guilt fostered by this act festers and yields a rich concoction of fear and self-loathing.

Kafka described an inexplicable, arbitrary universe in which punishment is meted out for no apparent crime. The punishment is the trial itself: its indefiniteness, its vagueness, its ambiguity, the equivocation of all of its participants, its rigid structure which serves to cover a void, an emotional black hole, sucking the vitality and functionality of the defendant. This is a typical narcissistic reaction. Narcissists compartmentalize their life.

While upholding sadistically rigid and ideal moral standards in one area (e.g., money) - they are capable of behaving immorally in another area (sex, for instance) while, all the time, claiming the moral high ground.

More here: