The seeming fashion for labelling people toxic, narcissistic etc

[Mee]

“Narcissistic” is an adjective. It doesn’t mean “NPD” or Narcissistic Personality Disorder.

It’s the same as calling someone paranoid. I can be paranoid AF but I have been repeatedly assured that I do not have PPD or paranoid personality disorder.

I think this is pretty fair. It’s similar reasoning I apply to the word trigger.

My reservation is it still means inferring motivation for actions; applying reasoning behind a behaviour that may or may not be accurate. Shrug. I still do it too, I just think it’s a failing when I do. Maybe that’s wrong though? I’m bad at getting right the line between red flag and forgiving humanity.

@DharmaGirl my example was fictional but exactly the point, we cannot know what the motivation is; ghosting, no contact. To ascribe a reason is something from OUR heads not an insight into theirs.

 

[DharmaGirl]

I’m bad at getting right the line between red flag and forgiving humanity.

Wouldn't is be easier if it were black and white? It is a life long journey. And yes, we can't know others' motivations unless we ask.

 

[mylunareclipse]

Hi @DharmaGirl

I cannot know because psychiatric diagnosis are personal for most people unless you are extremely close to them.

This does not make my experience invalid. Nor does it make me feel better. It just explains what I went through, and helped me detach myself from this person and live a healthier life, while learning my my role in it.

I wonder if it makes you feel better going online and telling other people that their experience is not true? You are not a psychiatrist either nor do you know my experience but yet you seem to insinuate that my experience wasn’t true. While I can accept that some people might use these terms and labeling to just make themselves feel better as you say, for some of us this is the truth. Just like said just because you don’t know and weren’t there when the rapist raped the victim doesn’t mean the person isn’t a rapist. We do not need to know the diagnosis of the person to learn how to heal from their behavior.

Ps. And just to add. Truth is relative. Even in physics truth is relative. Truth in relation to whom, when. What might be my truth might not be your truth. Truths, unless you’re talking about math probably, is a human constructed/accepted opinion about what happened. Some people might say why is everyone crying rape nowadays, don’t be drunk and wear short skirts and nothing will happen to you, you think it was rape but you probably asked for it, it couldn’t have been rape they were your husband, it couldn’t have been rape I know this person for twenty years and they are the most kind person. How society defines/accepts/acknowledges behavior changes what we perceive as truth over time. For many people learning that they were abused by someone’s narcissistic behavior is as valuable as someone learning that what happened to them can be labeled as rape. Unfortunately, victims have been villfied and doubted throughout history so nothing new here.

 

[Mee]

But I don’t read dharma girl as saying that, not am I saying experience Isn’t true.

Not for one moment do I castigate victims. I believe we can absolutely say that all those things happened to us without knowing why that person did it. Without understanding their motivation.

I thought for a long time if I understood my main perp I would feel better. Now I know I simply wouldn’t be able to believe him. Doesn’t mean he would not be telling the truth either. I don’t know if he would be. I don’t know if he knows he would be and it wouldn’t change what happened. It all happened. Whether he has a diagnosable something of not, doesn’t change that. My worrying about it changes how I heal. It ALSO imo, means that it restricts people who cause harm who are ‘lovely people’ , ‘all American sports scholarship college student’ types, with people in their community offering dozens of character witnesses, being seen as ‘real’ causes of harm. Which restricts progress in our society and reinforces victim blaming.

 

[mylunareclipse]

Hi @Mee
I respect your experience. Perhaps for you this is your truth.
My truth is different and that’s it. Both can exist at the same time.
For you your healing does not involve labeling or perhaps it just doesn’t involve someone who is narcissistic. I just don’t know.
For me labeling the experience was essential to start my own healing.
I don’t think that it’s trendy or fashionable to label people as NPD. Trust me i wish I never ever had gone through the experience, it nearly caused me my life. I am just saying some of us had this experience and it feels invalidating to read people saying that I could not possibly know, that it shouldn’t matter etc. I did figure out that that’s what happened to me and it did matter to me to detach from this person. That’s it.

Ps I do believe I used a poor choice of words by saying once you know you will know. I meant to talk about the aha/it all clock into place moment that many victims of narcissistic abuse probably go through.

 

[Mee]

Hi @Mee
I respect your experience. Perhaps for you this is your truth.
My truth is different and that’s it. Both can exist at the same time.
For you your healing does not involve labeling or perhaps it just doesn’t involve someone who is narcissistic. I just don’t know.
For me labeling the experience was essential to start my own healing.
I don’t think that it’s trendy or fashionable to label people as NPD. Trust me i wish I never ever had gone through the experience, it nearly caused me my life. I am just saying some of us had this experience and it feels invalidating to read people saying that I could not possibly know, that it shouldn’t matter etc. I did figure out that that’s what happened to me and it did matter to me to detach from this person. That’s it.

Ps I do believe I used a poor choice of words by saying once you know you will know. I meant to talk about the aha/it all clock into place moment that many victims of narcissistic abuse probably go through.

Yes, I think that’s a fair agreeing to disagree difference to arrive at. ?

I would, from my perspective of deliberate ambivalence say it’s where I find myself too; I CANNOT say you aren’t right, because thatwould suggest I was all knowing! ?. Frankly i’m Glad these days when I find my way out of a paper bag! ???.

The perspective I have arrived at is uncomfortable for me because it would be easier to say ‘it’s that’ . Choosing to accept the unknown and my lack of control in that is not easy; if I could arm myself in flashbacks/night terrors/ whatever with ‘bugger off you ‘disorder of choice’’ and feel I had the sum of him, it might help.

Fwiw my therapist made it very clear his situation is not her remit or deserving of space in our sessions but in one of her extraordinarily few deviances from perfection in professionalism, followed that up with that she would stake her professional reputation on him having a ‘cluster B’ ( I cannot remember the word she used after that personality? Profile? ). Not my monkey; We aren’t in the same circus anymore.



I do respect the graciousness shown in this post of yours. It’s difficult ground for us all

 

[mylunareclipse]

Thank you @Mee ?. I appreciate your graciousness as well. ?
The healing journey is not easy.
Heck I cannot imagine the abusers lives being easy either. Such behavior most likely happens from being invalidated/abused themselves.
But yes exactly what you said, it was important for me label it so that I could also accept my role in it. Why did I allow this to happen? Why did I have such poor boundaries/self respect/co dependent tendencies. How could I learn from the experience to learn how to keep myself healthier? This was hard, but empowering. I wasn’t just a victim, I could also learn to save myself. I guess perhaps I have reached a new stage of my recovery from this part of my life, where I feel like advocating for people who might have gone through a similar experience as me.
And I do truly believe that “truth” is something that we agree/fight for and change over time. There’s no upper power coming to define our truths for us, we as a society do that. Is being gay a sin for instance? How do we define the truth? It’s not written anywhere. The way we defined this truth only changed from the DSM only recently even.
I am not going to have a copy of my abusers psychiatric diagnosis history where it says labeled with NPD to know that that’s what happened to me. And that’s my truth.

 

[DharmaGirl]

That's what I have an issue with. In you opinion, this person is a sociopathic narcissist. You came by this opinion by reading stuff on the internet. It makes you feel better. This doesn't make it true. How you interpret someones actions is not the truth, it is your opinion of why they acted like they did.

This does not make my experience invalid. Nor does it make me feel better. It just explains what I went through, and helped me detach myself from this person and live a healthier life, while learning my my role in it.

I wasn't invalidating your experience. I was saying that because you believe the person was a sociopathic narcissist doesn't make them one. It does not invalidate your suffering or abuse. It just says the label you applied to your abuser is your opinion. Doesn't negate the trauma.

I wonder if it makes you feel better going online and telling other people that their experience is not true?

I never said your experience was not true. I never indicated that. What happened to you happened, but to label someone a sociopathic narcissist based only on your experience with the person does not make them one. It doesn't reduce the amount of suffering you went through. It doesn't change your diagnosis.

I've attached what I said. How is it telling you it's not your truth? Your truth is what happened to you, not the motivation of the abuser. My abusers were some of the worst, but that doesn't make them sociopathic narcissists.

Truth is relative.

That's what I was saying.

@wishforescape, I wasn't attacking you. I was stating what I believed. I'm sorry you took it to mean I was invalidating your truth.

@wishforescape, that was in no way victim blaming. Please don't read things into what I said. Narcissistic abuse isn't a diagnosis, it is pop psychology. If you want to use it go ahead, I have the right to say what I did. Telling me I am victim blaming is lashing out at me and not true. I'm done with this conversation. It isn't helpful to anyone.

 

[mylunareclipse]

@DharmaGirl
I respect you experience you were abused badly but not by someone with narcissistic traits. That’s your experience.
My experience was that I was abused, not horrifically -didn’t cause me Ptsd, by someone who is/was narcissistic. This is my experience. When you say I am reading stuff online etc etc you are making assumptions and insinuations about my experience. I just wonder why it’s so hard for you to accept that perhaps for some of us this experience is valid and true? You seem to want proof from me that this person is NPD. May I ask you how would I be able to provide this truth. Would I be able to access their psychiatric diagnosis? Heck do you think this person even went to a psychiatrist. This is where the victim blaming comes. You are putting such a high bar to me proving my experience of being abused by someone who is narcissistic. You said it was my opinion not the truth. Yet you are saying you are not victim blaming. It just rings so close to rape victims being told it wasn’t rape, maybe it was rough sex but they have no proof they said no and they didn’t want it, it’s their experience of it, it’s their opinion not the truth.
You can bow out of this conversation. I hope at one point you can come back and read that what you did was directly tell me that my experience was an opinion and not the truth, hence invalidating my experience. And if you meant to apologize a better way would be to say “I am sorry I came off that way” rather than “ I am sorry you took it that way”.

 

[Ronin]

Why borrow from diagnostic terms, seriously, though?

When one means self centred, egoistic, manipulative... say just that.
Not narcissistic.
When one means cold, cruel, sadistic, inhumane, lying 6 ways from Sunday... say just that.
Not a sociopath.

Becase it also hurts those with actual personality disorders, as was pointed out earlier in the thread.
*and* it hurts victims of those *with* that personality disorder, because that pop nonsense is absolutely useless dealing with the *actual disorder*.

It is not victim blaming to want correctness in terms.
It is not feeding victims heads with disinfo & incorrect nonsense.

 

[ChildofGod]

I can also add that our garage full of dresses and coats, enough costume jewelry and makeup. Purses, high heels, boots, all of my mother's things.
I grew up starving because of her cruelty and her neglect. I had to steal food to stay alive.

She spent whatever my dad sent her for child support, she spent on herself. The fridge was always locked and we had to go dumpster diving for food.

We wouldn't have had to except we didn't matter as kids to her. Or as human beings.

I've grown up with this person. I also know that she is a cross dressing predator.

No one is implying that every narc is bad or evil.

signed, a survivor or ritual abuse

 

[Sideways]

I respect you experience you were abused badly but not by someone with narcissistic traits.

Trying to take this conversation somewhere constructive - can you pull this statement in particular apart?

Narcissism is about being in love with yourself. Putting what you want ahead of other things. Priortising what is going to make you feel good, without regard to other considerations. That’s my personal interpretation of the adjective “narcissistic”. (Based on diction, rather than psychology, because I’m not a psychologist and have no training with how to use those terms correctly).

Abuse simply means ‘to misuse’. As a deliberate act.

So, any person who is routinely abusing another person - almost by definition the abuser is likely to be narcissistic.

Spinning that back to where you and me were before - see how that word tells me nothing about your experience? Because if a person was abusing you - of course they were putting themselves, and what they wanted, above other things that should have had importance, like your well-being.

Just following along your replies here, you’ve responded in a way to a fairly straight forward opinion of another poster as though these labels are directly linked to how you understand your abuse. When someone challenges these labels, your emotional response to that is “my suffering is being challenged”.

That’s not the case, though. Because the labels you’ve used about your abuser tell us nothing about what you’ve been through, or what was done to you.

Perhaps it might be helpful to pull that apart with your T? Healing from our trauma means healing from our suffering. But what I’m personally seeing in your posts is (I think unintentional - usually this stuff is) avoidance of your actual suffering, by attaching emotional significance to (unhelpful) adjectives for your abuser, rather than attaching emotional significance to what you actually went through.

Healing isn’t about our abuser’s personal qualities. It’s about our suffering. Identifying my abuser was “tall, softly spoken and interested more in himself than me” - tells you nothing about what I went through, and actually doesn’t bring me any closer to recovery. So, why attach so much emotional significance to those words?