Therapy is completely worthless.

You're cracking me up as usual. LOL. I do love Narcissist humor, of course I do, it's the same kind of humor as mine! HA HA HA!

And i'm a little bothered that you have 6,464 more hug than me... WTF!!!! Probably because your a young one, hugs may be something people feel little girls need and not old men!!!

I am laughing so much right now, I needed your humor today!

Why I use the hug button? Because I can, I don't think about it at all. HA HA HA!

Oh you mean that is the hugs you have given??? Well then I really don't care as I thought it was the amount given to you!! HA HA HA

Oh god, HA HA HA. I think you can see how many times my posts have been "hugged" if you look at my profile statistics. It's a ridiculously high number too, makes me laugh!

The People Of Psych Central really love to hug THIS Narcissist RIGHT HERE! Hahahahahahah!

I have been hugged on here 2,788 times!

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHHAHAHA, just,

HAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHHA. IRONY!!!

Wow I really am a loser as I have only been hugged 78 times!!!! I SUCK..... Or maybe it's because I am so inferior that I don't need hugs. Yeah that's it, I am no longer a loser that sucks but rather a winner and one who is great once again!!!!

Underground, just damn you I totally spit out my water when I read this!

Thanks for your feedback. Just recognizing others for any unique contribution they may have is a move in the right direction. You're clearly in a better place than you might imagine on this journey. Kudos too for self-policing, however confounding or short-lived. Rome wasn't built in a day. It's working against the grain that's important.

I completely identify with the "all eyes on me" feeling that I've come to realize has been part and parcel with NPD defenses. More in the past, I'd often assumed, erroneously, that when I'd walked into a store, or boarded a train, or went to work that I was somehow being judged by everyone far more than I actually was, or as if everyone's lives were so petty that I must have been the interesting thing that happened to them that day. I assumed I was the center of attention. And I worked to ensure I lived up to strict self-imposed expectations for how I 'appeared'. It turns out this was an engine for so much of my life stress it was hard to keep up with, and often all consuming.

Mindfulness meditation, and the overlap of that into conscious living has really changed my behavior in this sense. Since employing it, this mindful awareness that lets me occupy a non-judgmental head space of the present moment, not distracted by thoughts of the future or past, has lifted a lot of weight off of my shoulders. Ironically, it's not "trying" to reach some zen state, or expecting some relaxation to come that ultimately gives rise to these relaxed states. It's stopping your doing or expecting or trying that lets yourself just 'be' I've noticed I can go places without the gnawing stress of caring how people perceive me, and experience life more vividly. This has even had a domino effect in that it puts others at ease, just this silent energy that you are in a non-judgmental space, comfortable with all of your and everyone else's flaws permeates your surroundings, dialing down unnecessary stress.

Yes, I was diagnosed with NPD a few months ago. I actually don't prefer that language, though. It's more accurate to say, I was diagnosed as being someone who is currently using a lot of NPD defense mechanisms. I'm a work in progress like everyone else. I hope I didn't imply I have it all figured out, because those are shoes I'll never fill. I only know that everything I do now, every decision and interaction, has to go through a second screening process before it's put into action. As will come as no surprise to anyone using, NPD defenses worm their way into virtually every process we have. So we have to be proactively mindful of how our decisions and reactions are processed.

It just makes intuitive sense that it will take being uncomfortable, and working against the grain, doing what feels unnatural to replace a lot of these hardwired habits. Recent neurocognitive research on empathy shows it can be "trained," showing people can "rewire" their brains to automatic empathic responses. This might not sound as revolutionary as it is, but it shows that simple low level conscious mental processes can be rewired to change higher processes like empathy. I highly recommend Googling "Sukhvinder Obhi narcissism" for more.

One of the books that has been extremely helpful in this arena is titled Rewire Your Brain by John Arden Ph.D, which doesn't look so much at repressed psychic memories, as it does on the mechanical functioning of things we've all learned to habituate. It talks about how our brains are actually "softwired" by experience, and how that can be changed.

Another book that I've only recently gotten into but consider essential is titled, Why Do I Do That?: Psychological Defense Mechanisms and the Hidden Ways They Shape Our Lives Paperback – by Joseph Burgo Ph.D.

Yeah, I'm convinced this is a gauntlet of trial and error for everyone. It's not like regular docs where they all usually have some comparable ability to fix what's broken. No one ever tells you that you really have to go shopping when it comes to therapists. My first guy was a serial clock watcher. He had this whole schtick down with dolphin art, wall crystals, audio of a waterfall going (I actually did enjoy the audio), and wore what I'm going to pretend was a hemp sweater, but he never felt engaged or committed. It's usually not good when the person on the couch feels smarter about particular disorders than the therapist sounds. I prefer an open and active dialogue.

I'm guessing that guy is great for certain types of people, but I'm way past needing anything teased out of me. I talk fast and hide nothing. I prefer utility. I don't need prompting like a lot of people may. I just go in and nakedly dump my guts on the table, full disclosure. If I pay you $150 an hour, why would I clam up? I'm not interested in prolonging years of therapy. I go in there to do work, even if that means occasionally crying. Probably especially if that means crying.

I'm glad to hear you're getting into Mindfulness. Don't give up on it (I made that mistake a few years ago before I came crawling back after realizing how important it was). It gets even better with time. The bonus is that it's free. It's radically transformative brain "magic" and you can do it anytime you want, free of logistics and overhead (obviously more concentrated sessions might require some spot of a privacy and peace for a bit). The science behind it is staggering. Like what was the West sleeping on this whole time? Longer telomeres, longer lifespans, better perception, improved creativity, lower blood pressure, lower cortisol, better emotional IQ, peace with out own mortality, neurogenesis, etc. I like to fire up Jon Kabat-Zinn's guided sessions on Youtube occasionally. That guy could steer a skiff through a tempest.

It's quite intense when you become acclimated to giving yourself over to it. Especially if you're concomitantly addressing repressed memory stuff.. With time, it's like if Extreme Makeover Home Edition did an overhaul on a neglected empathy control room. That's probably hyperbolic, but you get the point.

This is a decidedly more encouraging picture than the thread title suggests. I'm glad you found someone who works. We're absolutely on the same page about long-term the fear of isolation. You'll be glad to know hard work does make this better. Just a week of intense inner-child reparenting, habit rewiring, radical vulnerability (with accompanying flaw acceptance), and LKM mediation made me open up to long lost friends in a way I haven't felt for years. It's a kitchen sink approach. NPD (and probably several other cluster B issues) isn't stubborn enough for a long-term kitchen sink approach of several efficacious methods.

Thanks. I'm on this journey along with everyone else. I hold no illusions that every day will be peachy, but with work it gets much better. I can attest to that. We're all empowered in amazing ways by a cornucopia of new therapies and disciplines. The point is, being self-aware, and not being okay with NPD defenses is dangerous for NPD defenses. Its time is limited.

I suspect that it's not therapy you dislike but the therapists you've encountered. There ARE good ones out there, but sometimes it takes time and effort to find to right one for you.

Personally, I always liked therapy because I found it interesting. But I also discovered that I didn't usually gain anything significant from the experience unless the therapist was either smarter than me (hasn't normally been the case but did happen once--but then I moved) or were very well-trained and stuck to their training, as in goal-setting and progress towards those goals.

You said that there were some aspects of your life that you'd like to change. Rather than waste your money on games, why not ask your therapist if you could focus of that and how they can help you attain those goals. Maybe you enjoy wasting your money, but that seems like a pretty daft way to have a little entertainment, don't you think? Try to get them to help you the way YOU want to be helped. Tell them what you want and ask if they can and are willing to help you. Get your money's worth. Assuming your goals aren't something illegal!

You gotta shop for a therapist as you'd shop for a car. It's a huge investment and you are (supposedly) letting them in on the deepest and darkest areas of your life. For some people, therapy can bring about unintended consequences. Some therapies like Cognitive-Behavioral, Dialectical, etc. offer practical and concrete skills that can be used to deal with matters at hand. Others like psychoanalysis are a complete waste of time, IMO. But then again, they work for some people. IMO once you're past insight, it's about handling things that are problematic today. These things can reopen old wounds and bring back repressed memories. It can be retraumatizing for some. I'd take a good, sharp therapist that lets me vent and helps me realize practical solutions over one that makes me sit on a couch and spins some pseudo philosophical ********. But then again, I'm in school for clinical social work and am a substance abuse counselor, and I'll tell you first hand, we are not supposed to tell you anything, merely help you develop the tools to judge for yourself. In regards to personality disorders, I'll be honest- most clinicians aren't up to the task. Especially with Cluster B's. There's a tendency to see the person as the diagnosis and some therapists can't get past that. My current therapist sees me as a human, and I appreciate that. Before I had a therapist who was moving to another state and spent a session trying to reassure me that it isn't "abandonment". I wanted to smack him with a used dildo, it was so dehumanizing.

Some therapists will intentionally sabotage your progress or withhold necessary insight to keep you coming back. After all, if their referral network isn't strong and they are particularly thirsty, a lifer or two can help pay for that beach house. I personally dig self-awareness, but at some point therapy becomes navel-gazing self indulgence.

I am sure there are some very helpful therapists out there for people like "me". I am also sure that the percentage of them are very small. I have always enjoyed the specialties list that many have. I know what I specialize in and that if you broaden your abilities it falls in the category of jack of all trades but master of none. It seems that if you are having marital issues, anxiety and the normal issues people fall under that most therapists are well equipped to handle. To understand people like "me" thought processes takes much more than how to be a better husband or coping with more simple issues. I spent over a year with two therapists that couldn't even begin to have any "empathy" for me all because they could not understand. Now I do believe that if I was lucky enough to have one that did understand my thoughts and why I have them than they would of helped me reach a better place by being in their care rather that a complete waste of time. With that though has brought me to feel as if I really would never want to go through the time wasting it felt like for so long again. I guess this brings me to the side of therapy being a complete waste of time. Not really an important passage here but I suppose I felt the need to add!!!
Most sincere,
The "Underground"<~~~~

Thankfully since I wrote this post I have found a truly excellent therapist that is working with the "real me" and isn't trying to force me into a preconceived notion unlike all the other therapists I've had. It has been one hell of a ride, but I am growing as a person and modifying the not so stellar aspects of my personality so it has definitely been worth the fight of finding the right therapist that can "take the heat" as it were. The posts here have turned into a fascinating discussion, thank you all for sharing your thoughts!