The Difference Between Narcissists and Those With Antisocial Personality Disorder: Narcissists Feel Shame and Regret for Hurting Others Even When it Doesn't Have to Do with Empathy, and Antisocial Personality Disordered Do Not

this is part of the series on Shaming

In one of my last posts, I was challenged in the comments section about whether narcissists had any shame, and from there I felt that I needed to write this post, and to feature other posts by other authors and researchers (below), that differentiate between Narcissistic Personality Disorder and Antisocial Personality Disorder. 

In fact, as the title suggests, that's where the dividing line is between the two disorders: Narcissists can feel quite a bit of shame, and can even feel much more of it than other people, and their tactics and abuse don't help them diminish their shame, which increases their shame even more, but the Antisocial (i.e. sociopaths and psychopaths) don't feel regret or shame at all when they hurt other people.

Or they might feel it a little when they are being incarcerated, but it's more like they'll be telling themselves that they committed some act of abuse "stupidly" and that they'll plan it out better next time.  

Why is this significant? Because people with Antisocial Personality Disorder are quite a bit more dangerous and menacing. These are people you should not directly confront - they will never accept, or even hear with an open mind, what you have to say about their behavior. They don't care what you have to say, and they don't have the empathy to care if they hurt other people either. For most of these folks, empathy died for them in their childhood. There are a number of factors that go into why their empathy is so dead, but to keep this post relatively short compared to others I have written, I will be focusing on the difference between them and the narcissists.

One major difference is that they aren't driven by morals or ethics. While your run-of-the-mill narcissist may be low on ethics, most of them don't commit crimes against others, while the Antisocial Personality Disordered folks have no ethics at all, and are likely to be dangerous and hurt people with impunity, with no regrets because of that fact. They are driven by self-serving agendas always, period, and as simplistically as I stated it. Most of them are basically con-men or con-women through and through, exploiting who ever they think they can exploit with as little effort as they think is necessary. They don't care what other people are going through at all. 

In order to make it easier to talk about the Antisocial Personality Disordered types, I will refer to them as psychopaths. Why? Well because Antisocial Personality Disorder has subtypes: primary psychopaths and secondary psychopaths. To confuse you more, secondary psychopaths are often referred to as sociopaths. Primary psychopaths are born with their disorder, and have different autonomic nervous systems (which boils down to the fact that they don't feel fear or trauma when confronted with dangerous situations or of being overwhelmed by the enemy in a battle) and sociopaths are much more influenced by home life and the environment they grew up in, but have the same autonomic nervous systems as the rest of us have. 

Then there are sub-categories of sociopaths, mainly the functional sociopath and the dysfunctional sociopath, but even there, psychologists keep coming up with even more subcategories. 

And to confuse you even more, there is a brand of narcissist called the malignant narcissist. Malignant narcissists have a combination of Borderline Personality Disorder, Narcissistic Personality Disorder, and Antisocial Personality Disorder. They aren't likely to feel much regret or shame either if they hurt other people, though they may pretend to. And that's the problem; they are big pretenders, and they can appear very, very functional except for their rages, manipulations and very commanding, demanding natures. It is hard to tell the difference between malignant narcissists and the psychopaths, and sometimes the difference between malignant narcissists, the run-of-the-mill narcissists, and to some extent, one of the sub-types of Borderline Personality Disorder. Malignant narcissistic traits tend to stand out more than run-of-the-mill narcissists, and like the psychopaths, they don't feel much remorse for hurting others (they tend to engage in domestic violence, some crimes and bullying) and they over-react to anyone who questions their self-appointed superiority and grandiosity with incredible amounts of rage. 

Even with malignant narcissists, there are subcategories: the overt malignant narcissist, the covert malignant narcissist, the vindictive narcissist, the sociopathic narcissist, the dark triad, the dark tetrad, and the dark empath.

In some of my explanations, including the malignant narcissist, I'll be calling them psychopaths. For the malignant narcissist, it's not all that accurate to proclaim them psychopaths, only that they have psychopathic tendencies to a large or small degree, depending on the person. However, like purely psychopathic individuals, they do have traits and proclivities to do harm to others.

But I'm trying to simplify it so that you can be aware of the differences between them as opposed to the run-of-the-mill narcissists who do carry around quite a bit of shame inside them. 

THE DIFFERENCES
(simplistically covered)

Narcissists: primarily ego driven. They put enhancement of their ego above just about everything else and anyone else. A need to appear perfect and superior to others. High need for power, control and domination in personal relationships, a high need to be in powerful decision-making situations or professions. 
Tends to be emotionally abusive or dismissive of anyone who stands in their way of their agendas, including people in their personal lives.
Fairly charming. 
Feels shame and regret, but not in an empathetic way. The shame and regret comes from people finding out that they are not who they are making themselves out to be. It is expressed more as paranoia, and rage at the person who exposed them (so that the person doesn't expose them further).
While you can't appeal to them to be empathetic and to care about the feelings and life situations of others, you can appeal to them in terms of how what they are doing might destroy their reputation since they are reputation oriented. 

Psychopaths: primarily driven to take from others by force, or to bully people into submission. Some psychopaths only target people who they think are "easy" or who they deem to be weak: children, women, the disabled, the elderly, etc. 
Exceptionally charming. 
Feels no shame or regret. They are so driven to take from others, or over-power others, that regret would short-circuit their ambitions. Their attitude is that people are to be used. 

Malignant narcissists: a combination of both agendas.
If male, tends to be domestic violence offenders and child abusers. Very menacing and cruel if they don't get their way. 
Exceptionally charming, two-faced, Jekyll/Hyde personality, can fool others easily, can act the part of being fawning to get what they want.
It is very rare for them to feel shame or regret. Attaining power, control, domination, wealth, and an air of superiority is so overwhelming that they rarely, if ever, consider the feelings of others. If someone tries to get them to consider the feelings of others, they may rage like a narcissist, or punish and get violent like a psychopath. 

THE CHILDHOOD BACKGROUNDS
AND BELIEF SYSTEMS THEY ADOPTED
(simplified)

Narcissists grew up in traumatic environments where there was a lot shaming and blaming going on, and there was likely to be emotional abuse in those environments too, as well as emotional neglect at the very least, if not other forms of neglect. In other words, they tended to have a narcissistic parent with authoritarianism at the center.
     Now narcissists can be plenty exploitative of their children too, just like the psychopaths, because of entitlement issues. Both disorders display entitlement.
     But narcissists are driven by different ambitions than psychopaths. Their ambition is to be thought of as a "superior being" compared to other people around them, to be thought of as "special" with special attributes that only other special people can decipher. Narcissists want to be spoiled with constant praise. They feel they need to compete with others in terms of who can win at beauty or handsomeness, who can win at arguments and debates, who can win at "wealth games", who can win at "head games", who can win at "phoniness" (most of them believe others are as phony as they are), who can win at fooling others, who can win at work through work place bullying, or triangulation, or sweet-talking a boss, and who can win at being thought of as the most charming upstanding citizen, who can win at being thought of as a victim if they don't get their way in their relationships.
     Narcissists are basically in competition all of the time. They wake up with manipulating others in mind, and they go to sleep with thoughts of manipulation in mind too. They don't like the thought of "letting things be". The agenda, in other words, is primarily social: looking and acting superior, trying to get people to listen to them with baited breath, getting lots of positive attention. It is exhausting for the narcissist to put up this front all the time, especially in front of people or children who they deem to be weaker or voiceless compared to themselves. "The mask" falls, and they become abusive to take off steam, especially if they feel that their superiority is being questioned, and they worry that they'll get caught at being abusive, at being phony, that people will see their perfection and superiority as phony too, and that they might have to deal with community shame. 
     Narcissists in their early environment were much more likely to be expected to "fawn to power and control." If you watch them carefully, they will be exceptionally fawning to anyone who has wealth, popularity, fame, and who they believe is "superior" to them. Whereas, they will tend to be abusive to children, the disabled, females, people in poverty, people of a minority race or religion, people who have weight issues, and so on, especially in their close personal relationships. They are very dependent on societal disenfranchisements to tell them who they can pick on and who they have to look up to.
     And because they fawn to power, and were expected to fawn to power when they were children, they expect others in their close personal relationships to fawn over them too when they insist on being dominant and bully others.

As I said above, the psychopath is driven by different agendas. Again, they are con-men through and through, and usually learned to take from others or to impose themselves on others in their childhood environment.
     They tend to grow up in environments where parenting was spotty, or neglectful, or where they had to parent themselves. While some of them are taught ethics, it may have been a situation that was inconsistent, or where the rest of the environment was not particularly ethical (growing up in environments where there is gun violence, war, little adult supervision, a lot of crime, and so on). 
    They can also grow up to be a golden child, where anything they do is enabled, including hurting other people, or being violent.  
     Malignant narcissists and psychopaths tend to be very, very exploitive of children especially, expecting them to do things which take away a child's maturation process, and their dignity and individual selves, to serve the parent. They must be a pretty close version of a mini-me version of their parent to not be abused. The malignant narcissist or psychopath has the fantasy that they are a tyrant king or queen, and that their children are to be either submissive little helper servants or to be abused (and they more or less infer or say outright: "take your pick").
     For malignant narcissists, it is to make their children into narcissistic supply, to puppet them into spouting unequivocally that their parent(s) are "the grandest of the the grand", the all-superior, the all-knowing, the all-wonderful, all-superior beings. And they must promote the idea that they are the all-helpful doting parent(s) too. Or again, the child will be punished. It kind of reminds me of the Turpin family who were unchained and put in matching outfits in public and to smile for the camera, even though they were being starved, lying in their own excrement and abused at home.
     The malignant narcissist who tends to want both social acceptability and to exploit others (having others do work for them while taking credit for it, lying about workers in the workplace to get them fired so that no one will stand in their way of getting to be the boss's only reliable and knowledgeable source, winning a race by disabling their opponent, the extremes of being brought up by a narcissistic parent who put competition before anything else) will manipulate others through terror and rewards to take control of the narrative, to get others to believe them.
     Neither the malignant narcissist nor the psychopath are interested in child welfare, "good practices in parenting 101", treating children with dignity and respect, treating them in age-appropriate ways, encouraging their own personalities and interests to come forward, and unconditional love (they wouldn't even know what this is, and if they did, they wouldn't want it anyway - a mind set on exploitation can't love unconditionally).

Narcissists and malignant narcissists manipulate their children and grown children through rewards and punishments as a way to temper the behaviors and speech of those closest to them, particularly compared to those they feel hierarchically superior to.

I have talked in other posts about how fawning is incredibly unhealthy and traumatic, especially when the fawning is done because of the threats, punishments, blackmail, silent treatments, coercive control, and other forms of abuse by narcissists and malignant narcissists. It is particularly traumatic for children because children learn over and over again that they have to fawn to abuse, any abuse. With normal healthy families, children are taught to have good boundaries and self respect instead, to keep safe, to leave people who abuse. Narcissists teach their children the opposite, and many children are even exposed to narcissists who expect them to apologize to other abusers. They are also at risk of other predators: child molesters, rapists, kidnappers, child abductors and child murderers.  

In the case of the two kinds of narcissists, note that rewards are not benevolence. Benevolence is giving because someone needs help, or is hurting, or is overwhelmed with a life situation, and it requires empathy. Rewards are a manipulation: "I'll reward you for x, y, and z , but if you slip up, the rewards go away." In other words, it's transactional and dependent on something: for scapegoats, whether they can be used for blame, shame and abuse in return for rewards, and for golden children, whether they can uphold a perfect, superior image of the parent (this is what they are rewarded for). Narcissists learn early on that people, and especially young children, can be manipulated and molded very easily with the reward/punishment tactic, and they use it for the entire life of that child, into old age if necessary. This can and is of detriment to themselves, and often their images are at stake because of it too, so there is a backfire built in to all of it. Rewards and punishments are used by them for self-serving purposes only, and not for their children.

In contrast, psychopaths tend to manipulate through terror primarily. They also tend to choose victims who they deem to be more powerless than others, who are hurting, vulnerable or alone than others because they feel they are easier to prey upon, and get things from. They aren't going to reward if they can, at all, help it. They don't care about impressing unless they feel they have to in order to exploit, and take advantage of. 
     Their agenda also tends to be less about shaming than just taking, unless they are malignant narcissists. In contrast, run-of-the-mill narcissists love to shame because their agenda is more social than material, to appear as someone to worship, look up to, to have power and control so that they don't ever have to fawn to power and control themselves as they did as children. They get the feeling that power and control is all that matters. 
     Psychopaths get the feeling that only money, material things, property and forcing themselves on others are all that matter, and that they don't have to work for them because others who work are an easy mark. "They have too much and can share, so I will take ..." 

In fact, all narcissistic, malignant narcissistic and psychopathic parents will have a "me first" agenda and attitude when it comes to how they relate to their children. The psychopathic parent will just be more "me first" than the others (i.e. all of the time) than narcissistic parents.
     If you are a child who grew up with any of these parent types, you are either going to be a "hurting mess", feel trauma-bonded and imprisoned by your parent, and have trauma symptoms, or you are going to have the coping skills of another Cluster B, one being another "rewarded" immature narcissist who fawns to power, and abuses the powerless.

One reason why psychopaths become so dangerous is that they believe that by hurting others, or threatening others, that it will bring the reward of submission of the other person they are abusing every single time. They don't think of any other ways to deal with others other than to "charm and harm." And if they don't get submission, they keep hurting the other person, and escalating the pain that the other person is in, more and more and more, sometimes to the point of outright torture. 

We see this in leaders of countries who invade other countries without provocation too, who commit atrocities in order to make a population submit (i.e. fawn to being overtaken). 

They don't worry about accountability, or of getting caught, or paying for their aggressions, or even concern themselves with a societal reputation because they are so arrogant and really do believe they will never get caught, ever. They believe they will get away with their abuses and terrorizing over, and over, and over again, indefinitely. Some of them play "catch me if you can" games and cat-and-mouse games with police to assure themselves they will never be caught, that they can even win with law enforcement hunting them down, surveillance, DNA evidence, and teams of agents brainstorming where and when they will make their next move.

Likewise, tyrannical invading psychopathic leaders who commit atrocities also do not believe they will ever be held accountable either, that they can wear any opposition down. Most will always believe they have more power and destructive capabilities than anyone who confronts them.

But it is also their arrogance and the feeling they have rights to aggress upon people, and their property, that cause them to make blunders. 

Here is an illustration of what can go on:

The psychopath: "How can I get money and material things, and wealth, and servitude from this situation? How can I fool people out of what they have?"

Malignant narcissist: "How can I get money and material things, and wealth, power, control, domination, and most of all, most everyone's attention on me, and get the admiration from the rich and powerful? How can I make others serve me to these ends? What connections do I have to have, and how much do I have to lie about my status to ensure that this happens? How much lying do I have to do to remain on top at all times, or at least give the appearance that I'm on top? How much blame-shifting and gaslighting do I have to do to keep my status as 'top dog'. How much fawning do I have to do to the rich and powerful? How much threatening of the peons do I have to do?"

The run-of-the-mill narcissist: "How can I get attention, admiration, get to be known as a superior likeable charming person who would never harm anyone or compete with anyone? How can I get power, control and domination over others? How unselfish do I have to appear to be? How much of myself do I have to hide, how much fawning do people expect of me, how much do I have to reveal about myself to get what I want, how much empathy do I have to pretend to have, how many people do I have to lie to, how many people do I have to pretend to be empathetic towards, to be accepted as one of them, how many people do I have to reward for putting me on a higher hierarchy or pedestal, how many people do I have to discard or hurt to get what I want?" - you can see that this kind of narcissist would care a lot about how other perceive him or her, and why they are vulnerable to shame and regrets, and why the other two types aren't as much.

The shame and regrets, by the way, have nothing to do with empathizing. It has to do with their standing in social circles and in society, and how much their standing is rising or falling. They feel they cannot manipulate people if it is falling.

One of the reasons your plain envelope narcissists hate their scapegoats is because scapegoats are usually not so quiet and they know first hand that the grandiosity is false, and that there is an abuser underneath. Some of them do not have the incentive to stay quiet either. They know that no one ever had a law changed, or helped the abused, disenfranchised and downtrodden by being quiet. They know they aren't going to help themselves by being quiet either. Societal changes, in large part, mean going against what narcissists and psychopaths want, and are getting away with, and getting rid of their loopholes including coercive control, corporal punishment of children, silencing the opposition to abuse, and reducing or eliminating assault weapons (mass murders are overwhelmingly committed by young collapsed narcissists, malignant narcissists who are negative on others and have significant prejudices, malignant narcissists who also have other personality disorders like Paranoid Personality Disorder, obsessed psychopaths, and Paranoid Schizophrenics, none of which can easily be detected, even the paranoid schizophrenics because most of them don't get symptoms or show mental illness until their twenties at the earliest). 

Anyway, the narcissist, the malignant narcissist, and the secondary psychopath learned in childhood (from it being modeled by a parent or other authority figure) how to be this way. The likelihood that they will pass this down to at least one child is very high. 

This is very simplistic, but when I get to adding to the list of the rest of the Cluster B personality-disordered (I only have the primary psychopath at the present time), I will talk much more about how childhood influenced them.

BREAKING THE LAW

All of the types I mentioned will break traffic laws, and they tend to be obnoxious entitled drivers. Speeding, going significantly over the speed limit cutting other cars off, making dangerous moves like going from a third or fourth lane to make a quick exit on to an exit ramp, speeding on bumpy country roads where there are children and farm animals, aggressive driving, and blaming accidents on other drivers is usually par for the course, especially when they are in their twenties, thirties and forties, but it tends to still be their mode of operandi when they are older than that too, if less so. 

Run of the mill narcissists tend not to break the law when it comes to hurting other individuals. They are rarely violent, choosing to use emotional, psychological, proxy, and financial abuses to achieve their ends. If they are accused of abuse, they will usually tell others that their victims are crazy. When it comes to breaking the law, they will break laws that won't incarcerate them. Instances are: carrying illegal drugs, going swimming on beaches that have "No Swimming" signs, smoking in designated "no smoking" rooms, jay walking, purposely ignoring "no trespassing signs", nude swimming on beaches that are designated for swimsuits and families, the smaller illegal activities and crimes in other words.
     When they abuse, it is usually ego driven. They want flattery, even when other people are having issues with them. 
     They tend to be hypocrites, and will not treat others the way they demand to be treated. 
     They are "terrible listeners" because everything you say will be filtered by them in terms of how your message will influence them, what it will do for their ego and what it won't do, what is in it for them, and some childhood background issues: not believing in the truth because the truth was not practiced in the childhood home, not believing in what you say because they are so agenda driven to get power and control and figure everyone around them is too, and so on. So whether you are silenced by them, or whether they listen to you, they aren't going to hear what you have to say regardless, even if you try to get them to understand you. They live in their own reality, and they also don't care what you have to say beyond how things effect them. If you feel like you are talking to a dense brick wall, it has to do with the narcissist's selective hearing.  

Male malignant narcissists tend to be domestic violence offenders. They get in your face, they rage in your face, they grab you, they can push you around without your permission, and otherwise aggress upon you in a physical manner, which very often leads to physical attacks: punching, tripping, slamming you into the wall, and so on. They think that if they are in enough of a rage or angry, that they have a right to act in this manner even though it is against the law and you are both adults.
      If they do commit domestic violence and are confronted by authorities, their favorite thing to say is: "She made me do it."
     Some of them engage in false imprisonment or trying to isolate you from the empathetic people in your life. If they can't do it through persuasion, they will try to do it financially, or disabling your car, or losing your keys on purpose, and other kinds of motives to keep you in some sort of state of bondage to them.
     If this is a partner relationship, they are very suspicious of you, where you go, what you tell others, if you are trying to escape, if you might be thinking of an affair, and so on. This is especially true if they have had affairs on a partner themselves. Malignant narcissists cheat on you as a way to ensure they have another love relationship to go to if you aren't acting like a puppet, or if you leave. It's just one way they like rubbing your nose in the fact that they don't need you as their partner, that you aren't special.  
     Child abuse tends to be more severe than the run-of-the-mill narcissists too, with child exploitation, lots of gaslighting, absurdly long and pointless silent treatments and infantilizing lectures (lectures meant for a child much younger than the child is), and "child discipline", a lot of it lasting well past childhood, and almost always accompanied by shaming, and verbal abuse. Tearing down a child's self esteem is mostly part of the picture too with at least one child (usually their designated scapegoat child).
     Children are often "silenced" when the malignant narcissist does not want to hear anything that is not in line with how they want to see things, and what they want to believe, or that alters their perception of other people or phenomenon. They like to be the authorities on speech and knowledge, and that goes for what "the truth is" too, even if what they believe or are spouting isn't the truth. This is one reason they are prejudiced, either on a personal level against a number of people, or on a societal level. It tends to be both, each influencing the other.   
     Like all narcissists they insist that they appear faultless, except with a capital "F". They will not tolerate being blamed for anything, even when they commit illegal acts. They can and do react with violence to being blamed, especially if the one confronting them is their child or partner. You are "supposed to" believe what they want you to believe, and you are pressured via rewards and punishments to go along with their beliefs in every facet of life. And we wonder why therapists, psychologists and psychiatrists tell their patients to get away and stay away from malignant narcissists as soon as they can.
     The "you have to's" don't end there, however. Malignant narcissists also often tend to be micro-managers, and don't ask you permission to be that, even if you are both adults. They just aggress themselves upon you in that way. "Take out the garbage! Do this, do that!" If you counter them, they go into a rage. Let's say that you feel sick during one of their micro-managements, they are likely to shout, "You aren't sick! Get out there and do it now!" - and from that you can also tell that they don't deal with reality. They make it pretty clear that they can't deal with excuses, no matter how relevant the excuses are. 
     They are bullies, using their status, or power to order you around. If they fail miserably at ordering you around, they treat you with contempt or violence or a discard. 
     This means that relationships with malignant narcissists aren't really relationships. They are a drill sergeant or terrorist ordering you around, and for you it is a test of endurance only, until you either break from the trauma bond, or if you leave, or if you call authorities. 
     It is common to have trauma symptoms or PTSD if you relate to malignant narcissists in any long term way.  
     They very rarely confess their wrongs unless there are some social benefits for them in doing so. For instance, some of them start channels on You Tube because You Tube pays them if they have enough of an audience. But aside from that, most of them do not admit to any wrong, and if anything, will blame their victims time and time again.
     They tend to break other laws and codes of conduct because they are also driven by what psychopaths are driven by, plus what narcissists are driven by. If they have more psychopathy than narcissism, they will insist that joint property be theirs entirely, or mostly, and if property or money belongs to others, they will insist to themselves that they have to have it. They don't have the ethics to care how these attitudes effect others, or the empathy to care how it effects others either. They'll say things like, "All that you care about is stuff and money!" (showing projection of how they behave) or "You need to stop thinking about what you've lost and enjoy life!" (trying to persuade you not to notice what they are taking from you).
     Home invasion is not out of the question for malignant narcissists, even though it carries huge risks. It's part of the psychopathy part of malignant narcissism.
     On the world stage, malignant narcissists love to invade other countries, including invading citizens' houses, and taking their belongings and farm land. It's usually a "bloody war" where they try to take over as much as they can by killing as many people as they can too. If they succeed, they are often on to invading the next country on their list of "places to own". They really feel that this will catapult them into a "great memorable leader status."   
     They have little to no regret for hurting other people, believing that people should fawn to their authority. They will keep hurting others if they feel they can get away with it, depending on how much psychopathy they have compared to narcissism.
     They also won't care too much what their reputation is if the psychopathy is more pronounced than their narcissism. One way to tell is if they are more "loner" than wanting to be around others, and to impress others.  

Psychopaths are a lot like malignant narcissists, except that they don't really care about their reputations that much, unless having a reputation can help them acquire more property, wealth, sex and material things. Either way, they tend to be more secretive, master-minding plans to achieve more and more wealth. They are extremely driven to take from others, and to get others to serve them, with the more functional psychopaths using more societally acceptable means to get there, and the more dysfunctional psychopaths resorting to petty theft, and sometimes graduating to home invasion, grand larceny, burglary, assault, aggravated assault, rape, etc. 
     It's hard to get people to part with their money, children, property or things without crimes being committed. So the functional psychopath has thought of ways around those loopholes. And what profession attracts functional psychopaths the most?
     Venture capitalism. There are a lot of psychopaths who are venture capitalists. When big companies fail or start to falter, one of the reasons they start to falter and fail is that they have capital shortages. The owners or CEOs of these companies look to venture capital firms to keep the company going. But most often, venture capitalists try to take them over and force huge "discount sales" of inventory to raise cash. In some instances they sell merchandise at such a discount that it costs more to make the merchandise than what they are selling it for. Then the venture capitalists have a liquidation sale and close the business. The venture capitalists walk away with millions, and occasionally billions. 
     And all kinds of sectors are played with to enrich a few while destroying otherwise sound and needed businesses, and can include loaning institutions, housing, consumer goods and supplies, banks (credit default swaps, quantitative easing, and other tactics including lobbying for less regulation) ... in other words, the emphasis is on money much more than on society, relationships, and taking care of relationships.
     All psychopaths sacrifice relationships, and even benefits for the society they are living in, for an insatiable appetite for more money and property for themselves.
     So many of the shows out today glorify psychopaths including The Sopranos, Breaking Bad, Billions, and Yellowstone to name a few. I really liked Outlander until the main character, a man in this case, was tortured and raped over a few episodes by a psychopath. Television is actually so flooded with shows about psychopaths, and their sadistic acts, that you can't possibly watch all of them, even if you wanted to. And in those shows, the victims are barely considered, barely a character. Even if we look at history shows like Ken Burn's The American Buffalo on PBS, it is likely that psychopaths killed the herds down to only 27 buffalo from hundreds of millions of them through what is now known as The United States (murder and making money are very much a psychopath's calling - they don't have ethics; they don't have compassion or empathy; they don't care who it effects or if it leaves people starving; they are always going to justify taking in ways that are purely destructive, and in this case their excuse for such destruction was "to solve the American Indian problem" - horrible!).
     How can featuring and glorifying psychopaths to the extent that our media companies are, going to  lead to peace, such that invasions are intolerable, that school shootings and other mass murders are intolerable, that money mixed with murder is intolerable? Are we becoming numb to what psychopaths do to us and just accept them and their deeds forever?
     On a personal level, psychopaths threaten or practice egregious forms of abuse against their siblings while at the same time spouting false narratives about their siblings so that the parents will believe the psychopath is the victim, and leave their entire inheritances only to the psychopath. They tell bosses false narratives about anyone who they feel threatened by, in terms of dedication and talent, so that the boss is left with no one but the psychopath to lean on in making sure the business runs smoothly (but it won't). They steal money from businesses if they can get away with it. As bosses, they are tyrannical and expect people to be total puppets. They tend to fire a lot of people. They tend to be divorcees unless a spouse lets them order them around. They try to make everyone except themselves seem like money grubbers, only obsessed with what they can gain out of a situation, because they are like that.
     Psychopaths rarely tell the truth about anything because they are so focused on "getting something" out of every situation that truth is inconvenient to that ambition. 
     Are psychopaths charming? Yes, they are, probably a lot more than any of the other Cluster Bs. But again, whether it is charm or harm you are getting from them, every single conversation and encounter is going to be "me" oriented, or it is going to be fluff or fawning that they feel they have to endure until they can get "the goods". 
     
You can see why the secondary types of psychopaths might be produced by narcissistic parents who try to exert power and control via constant rewards and punishments. The rewards and punishments don't end in childhood either. 
         

LYING

Run-of-the-mill narcissists primarily lie about things that will prop their ego: that their IQ is higher than it actually is, that their school grades were more admirable than they actually were, that many men asked to marry them when only two of them did, that they received awards for good citizenry when they actually didn't, and so on. 
     They are going to be lying for ego-related reasons. 
     And they will hate and often reject anyone who finds out otherwise. This is how narcissists are exploitive. They demand flattery, and if you don't give it to them, you're "out". However, they are hyper-critical of others, and often like breaking the self esteem of others. Go figure. That kind of entitlement is part of the disorder, and everyone who is close to them will see it eventually. 
     They will lie about what great parents they are, and sometimes manufacture events that never happened. Often they put down their spouse, even when they aren't an x, to make themselves look like the hero in every situation. 
    They can't stand to be in any kind of relationship where the other person isn't flattering them constantly, or at the very least, isn't doing enough to prop them up into some superior position, whether that is at work, at home giving them power and control over you, or in their friendship circles. 
     They are so focused on that, that hardly anything else really matters to them, even their own children and spouse unless their children and spouse are acting like the flattering marionettes they were trained to be through rewards and punishments. 
     These standards were probably multi-generational. Children of narcissistic multi-generational families aren't valued or loved for intrinsic reasons (i.e. for who they are), only for extrinsic values (whether they can make the family look good, whether they have admirable professions, whether they are wealthy, whether they flatter authority figures, and so it goes down the generations).
     Most narcissistic families are also authoritarian families who tell the younger generations what to do with themselves and their lives, what to say to whom, and who to accept and not accept in terms of their relationships, and it is life-long, even if it is not in the best interest of the member. If the member doesn't go along with the authoritarian, and tries to explain why it is not a good idea (perhaps they are being abused by another family member, or do not want to be part of the family business), they can be marginalized or ostracized to teach them a lesson as to what happens if they don't go along with what an authoritarian wants, including a false narrative that an authoritarian is trying to get many others to believe. Very unhealthy, very heartbreaking, if not totally toxic. 
     So budding narcissists who are still children learn that they have to be "special" and "superior" because of those circumstances, or they won't be accepted or acceptable, thus all of the posturing, lying about their credentials, lying about how much money they have, lying about how prestigious their job is even if it is not, lying about being good friends with whoever is rich and famous, pretending to be much more than they actually are. They were not accepted by an authority figure for themselves in childhood, or their sibling wasn't, so they try to be accepted through distortions, false narratives and outright lies. 

     Narcissists are quite vulnerable to psychopaths, as psychopaths can, and do flatter them to get what they want. And since narcissists are known to need a lot of flattery, and reward for flattery, they can be caught unawares when they "get taken" and the psychopath leaves them high and dry.  
     They tend to lie less than the other two types I discuss next, however. 
     

Malignant narcissists lie out of habit to get what they want socially and in terms of wealth and property. 
     Again, it depends on whether they are more narcissist or more psychopath as to what they will lie about. 
     One favorite phrase of malignant narcissists and psychopaths is "I would never lie to you." 
     Since they are such phonies (while tearing up people behind their backs), they sincerely believe that everyone is a phony, and they often accuse others of being phonies. 
     Thus no one can get very close to them because "no one is home" in terms of them having a reliable personality type. They have drives certainly, but they use others' personalities and mirroring to get what they want. As children, they may have felt that they had to do it to survive, and when it worked to get them what they wanted, they kept using it. 
     Flattery won't necessarily work on malignant narcissists; they don't trust anyone. However, they may not show their distrust. 
     It is possible that malignant narcissists grew up in a similar style to run-of-the-mill narcissists, but I bet you anything that someone in that environment was being threatened and terrorized, whether it was another child or their other parent.
    To illuminate your understanding of malignant narcissists and their ties to how secondary psychopaths grow up, the dysfunctional types of psychopaths usually are exposed to quite abusive, traumatic, crime-ridden, or war-like environments, so this would be the added element to the way run-of-the-mill narcissists grew up. Perhaps they felt they needed to steal food, or others' belongings to sell.
     Secondary functional psychopaths can grow up in environments where "money is everything" to the point where how you attain it can be unethical. For instance, they commit white collar crimes. Or they are 22 when they inherit money, and they buy a slum apartment building and live off of the income and become quite wealthy from other people's poverty. The poverty, of course, would be blamed on the tenants solely, rather than looking into whether the culture or society contributed to it. They become anaesthetized to the suffering of others, and they learn to be unempathetic in all relationships to the suffering of others. 
     Malignant narcissists lie to aggrandize themselves, to sully the reputation of others, to get money, property, power, control, and domination over others. And they tend to lie a lot. They lose people in the process of doing all of this and move on to the next person to take advantage of them without remorse too, and without empathy for the next person's life they have destroyed. 
     Malignant narcissist men are known for committing domestic violence, and even if they have put someone in the hospital they will lie about how their partner fell down the stairs, or crashed into a tree, or hurt themselves in some manner, anything to keep from being accountable. 
     They use people, lie about people, lie to people, all with a lot of deadly charm. They can sadistically laugh at everything they are getting away with, and do. They can come across as huge fawners, flatterers, sensitive little boys or girls who cry for show when others have had enough, whereas when they are with people who they deem to be weak, they act like terrorists, bullies, tyrannical bosses, micro-managers, and insulting contempt-filled megalomaniacs, and in close personal relationships can graduate very fast into being physical abusers. 
     They don't have regrets about hurting other people because they have been brought up in a hierarchical way where the weak get abused and the powerful are the abusers. If they think they can get more power, control and wealth by being a bully, they will keep escalating bullying to get ever more power, control and wealth. Again, it doesn't matter how they get it; it only matters that they attain it.
     That's why they don't care about anyone but themselves: their whole system is about getting rewards from bullying and disenfranchising, period, by pretending and lying to get others to go along with them, including how to get help bullying others. 
     On the larger scale, this is why malignant narcissistic tyrannical leaders can go into another country and commit atrocities. It only matters that they "get" what ever property and wealth that exists in the countries they invade. They do not care about the people, or populations they destroy in the process, not even the number of people they are hurting and traumatizing - the psychopathy part of them gets off on the acquiring of other people's property and territory, and the narcissistic side believes they will be worshipped and held up as great fearless forceful leaders who got their country more territory, more wealth and who crushed a population of rebels. 
     And all of how they "get" it is based on lying about the people they are invading, and false narratives to soldiers in the trenches as well as their own country-men, and self aggrandizement that is left from their deeds. 
     Like the run-of-the-mill narcissists, they will only listen to fawning sycophants and flatterers. 

As for the psychopath, the loner types of psychopaths who don't trust people who flatter, or who fawn ...  These psychopaths know they aren't trustworthy when they fawn, so they don't trust others who fawn either. 
     "What are you trying to do here!? Are you trying to get something from me?!" - this is how some of them think, if they are flattered. So if you flatter someone and get an aggressive hostile response, consider that they may be a psychopath. 
     The dysfunctional psychopaths can be loners and tend to be alone when they plan their misdeeds or crimes because they assume they aren't liked. 
     Dysfunctional secondary psychopaths tend to grow up in abusive homes, and in crime-ridden neighborhoods, or in full time traumatic situations. Often there is very little parenting, ethics aren't enforced or introduced; it's like a free-for-all where they do what compels them to do. Without an adequate background of care and concern for their well-being, or the well-being of others that the psychopath is pursuing, they are going to choose the easiest path to obtaining money, wealth, and property. 
     The more functional psychopaths, however, who grew up in financially stable situations, but who were neglected or ignored in other ways, can also grow up with the feeling that they can do anything that compels them to acquire wealth, or what ever they want including sex by force. They are also not likely to grow up with ethics either, or they were modeled unethical behaviors so much that they don't care about how their behaviors impact others. 
     They also lie and plan to obtain what ever it is they want to attain, no matter what it does to the lives of others.  
     Because they are so singularly driven to exploit, if you confront them, and try to stop their aggressions towards others, they will project it all back on to you and use shame, contempt, rage, manipulation, abuse and sometimes even violence to get you to stop confronting them. Any time you  confront a sociopath, you will "pay" (as in their revenge against you) for having confronted them, challenged them, or questioned them and their motives. You are not supposed to see their motives or agendas, so their retaliations will be pretty extreme. 

That is all I have to say on this subject for now. I will discuss fawning to abuse more in other posts, as it causes much more trauma than other forms of trauma reactions ... It is necessary to know about in terms of healing, in terms of holding those who traumatize accountable for causing it, and hold politicians accountable for passing laws that protect its citizens from violence and abuse, so that we can all live in a world of more peace and empathy.

The further reading section below goes more thoroughly into the differences. The posts in the "recommend" categories explain some things that I have not covered in this post.  

FURTHER READING

Recommended: Sociopath Vs. Psychopath Vs. Narcissist: What Is the Difference? - by  Hailey Shafir, LCMHCS, LPCS, LCAS, CCS, and reviewed by Rajy Abulhosn, MD for Choosing Therapy

My note: this is a thorough article, and more importantly tells you how to deal with people with personality disorders: avoid, talk about "information" types of topics, choose public spaces, stay off of personal topics, etc. 

Recommended: Narcissist or Psychopath—How Can You Tell? (We hear the terms all the time, but what is the difference?) - by Joe Navarro, M.A., and former FBI Counter Intelligence Agent, reviewed by Jessica Schrader for Psychology Today

Recommended: Is There A Psychopath, Sociopath, Or Narcissist In Your Life? How To Know - by Brianne Hogan for the Scary Mommy website (includes interviews with Sterlin Mosley)

Recommended: Sociopath vs. Narcissist: What's the Difference? - by Elizabeth Plumptre, medically reviewed by David Susman, PhD for Very Well Mind

Sociopath Vs. Narcissist: Understanding the Difference - by Renee Skedel, LPC and reviewed by Kristen Fuller, MD for Choosing Therapy

Basic Differences Between Psychopathy & Narcissistic Personality Disorder [Part I] - by Rhonda Freeman, Ph.D. for Neuroinstincts

Married to a Narcissist or a Psychopath? - by the administrators of Rich in Relationship

Psychopath, Sociopath or Narcissist — How To Spot The Difference (No — they’re not all serial killers the way they are portrayed in movies.) - by Kim Mia for Medium.com

Antisocial Personality Disorder - by the administrators of the Mayo Clinic

How to Tell If Someone Is a Psychopath - by Laura Dorwart and medically reviewed by Michael MacIntyre, MD for Very Well Health

Recommended: The #1 Myth About Psychopaths and Malignant Narcissists: What People Get Wrong About These Types - by Shahida Arabi, MA, for Psych Central

Recommended: Why psychopaths cannot love their own children, according to a psychologist - by Lindsay Dodgson for Business Insider

Real-life psychopaths actually have below-average intelligence - by Jessica Hamzelou for New Scientist

How to Stay Mentally Strong When You're Dealing With a Psychopath at Work (Working alongside a toxic person will take a toll on your psychological well-being. These strategies can reduce the damage.) - by Amy Morin for Inc.com

8 Common, Long-Lasting Effects of Narcissistic Parenting (What happens when you live in the shadow of a narcissistic parent?) - by Craig Malkin Ph.D., reviewed by Kaja Perina for Psychology Today

Narcissistic Obsession with Attention (The most important person in the life of a narcissist is the narcissist.) - by Kristy Lee Parkin Ph.D., reviewed by Gary Drevitch for Psychology Today

Narcissistic Men and Their Mothers (Why selfish mothers tend to raise selfish sons.) - by Berit Brogaard D.M.Sci., Ph.D, and reviewed by Kaja Perina for Psychology Today

Subtypes of psychopathy: proposed differences between narcissistic, borderline, sadistic, and antisocial psychopaths - by by Carolyn Murphy and James Vess

How Shame is the Core Struggle of Most Narcissists. How it Gets Dumped Onto You, and How They Try to Harvest Regrets and Shame From You. Does It Work For Them?

 

THIS POST IS PART OF SERIES ON SHAMING

the first post is: shaming from abusers, narcissists

the second post is: this one

the third post is: Why Shaming Your Children Is Not Effective, How Narcissists Respond to Feelings of Shame, What You Can Do if You Are an Adult Child and Your Narcissistic Parents are Still Playing the Shaming Game,  and How to Start Healing from a Lifetime of Parental Shaming

a fourth post will show how an environment of shaming, blaming, perspecticide and fawning can produce narcissism
a fifth post will follow on the connection between shame and rage in narcissism

and probably a sixth post too, which will focus more on the trauma aspects

Also an update on 9/25/23: Five Hundred Peep (who I refer to as "Peep") commented on this post in her own blog, Shame and Narcissists or Everything You Do is Wrong to Them Anyway.

NARCISSISTS AND THEIR EXPERIENCE
OF SHAME

Narcissists typically walk around with a lot more shame than the rest of us do. And so they are constantly trying to run away from shame when it comes to their own behaviors. They also refuse to self reflect, which tends to mean that the shame within them is unaddressed. They learned in childhood that if they have faults, they are going to receive severe consequences for not being perfect, including being ostracized and condemned. It is likely their experience as a child was that an adult in their world over-shamed children, and under-shamed themselves (and often for the same wrongs).

Shame eventually, as they become narcissistic adults, tends to be expressed outwardly at other people, rather than dealing with it inwardly. It contributes greatly to their false self, their blame-shifting, their arrogance and grandiosity (with the thought: "If I can convince people that I'm better, more intelligent, more successful, more liked than others are, then they will never shame me") and why they are so rebellious but expect others to conform and submit to codes of conduct. And they have also learned in childhood that the person who shames is the dominant person, the one who punishes, and they take that and model that in their own life, and take it to absolutes and extremes.

In terms of "absolutes" it means statements like "You were always worthless", "You never really meant anything to me", "You were always a pain, and will always be that way". 

In terms of "extremes" it means statements like these: "You are ostracized forever", "You can never be part of this group again", "I'll never listen to another word you have to say". 

For the research on this, see the "further reading" section below.

Shaming for narcissists is not used for personal growth and understanding.

When they use it, it is mostly for punishment only, to hurt the other person. I tell why this backfires further in the post. 

If they aren't feeling shame (shame for them means attacking you emotionally via projection or blame-shifting when you have a grievance about how they treat you or others), consider that they may have the Malignant brand of narcissism instead (i.e. mixed with psychopathy - these people are marked by their lack of remorse for anything illegal they do, and any hurting of other people they do, no matter how erroneous or made up their reasons are). If you are dealing with malignant narcissists, they can be quite dangerous, and they won't care how they have effected you, and some of them even prefer that you are hurt by them (this is also the sign of the dark tetrad, known for their sadism). 

But to get back to narcissists who aren't the malignant brand of narcissism and those who do not have comorbidities of other personality disorders, they walk around with quite a bit of shame inside. They  have remorse for hurting other people, not for empathetic reasons, but more because it might put a "monkey wrench" in their ambition for more power and control, degrade their image, their false self, and clout, and diminish their ability to talk others into thinking they deserve more than other people do, that they are hierarchically superior (superiority complex).

Some of the things that cause them shame:
- lack of empathy. Narcissists may be born with a proclivity for a lack of empathy, but they are usually also modeled or taught to have a lack of empathy in their early environment (usually by a caretaker). In other words, their empathy was damaged in early childhood (being abused, or being around abuse can cause brain damage, something I will be discussing at a later time, or it can be the result of intergenerational trauma). Narcissists are generally faking empathy so that they won't appear heartless to others. For some narcissists, their empathy was so damaged in childhood that feeling empathy is inaccessible to them; in other words, they can't help it. But appearing empathetic supersedes telling others that they don't feel empathy, so later on, they feel remorse for having faked or lied about having empathy. 
- dysregulated emotions like rage. For narcissists, rage is usually "off the charts", and they are aware that they hurt others in the process, often to the point of violating boundaries of respect and decency, and often to the point of traumatizing individuals too. In other words, ethics and reasonableness have been sacrificed in their expression of rage, and they worry that it has sullied their reputation, and put a damaging light on their reputation. If their reasons for rage are not accepted by the other person, they can have a lot of shame to the point where they don't want to see the other person, or where they have a narcissistic collapse where the impulse to attack is even greater than before. And then those further attacks cause them shame too.
- lying, faking, spreading false narratives, and gaslighting. They worry that doing this will cause them to sully their reputation, to appear fraudulent. When these actions do sully their reputation, they worry that they will no longer feel hierarchically superior to other people, that other people will no longer respect them, or want to be around them. They get a sense of their personality from others, and without a more definitive positive personality, they often feel empty, angry and depressed. When they lash out at others for what they perceive as putting them in a place of unjust accountability (they feel that others should overlook their sins because they feel they aren't in control of themselves, that other people control their reactions instead), then they can walk around with an incredible amount of shame and feelings of annihilation of purpose and emptiness. This is when they try to get sympathy by playing the victim, which most narcissists do. 
- their superiority complex. Narcissists tend to think in hierarchical terms, putting themselves in the #1 spot in the ranking of superiority. They do sometimes have serious doubts as to whether they are as superior as they think they are. In fact, some narcissists have admitted to "splitting on themselves" (here's one instance), i.e. seeing themselves as all superior, or all inferior, and changing back and forth between the two. They wonder if their feelings of superiority are a defensive delusion (yes, they are), that they contemplate that maybe they are even "bottom feeders" (the "I am nothing" is a defensive delusion too, just as much as they are when they tell other people they are nothing). This doesn't happen often for a lot of them because they are constantly reaching for more grandiosity, but enough to cause some shame. Not being in a "winning position" shakes them up, and becomes the point where holes in their pervasive feelings and thinking that they are superior to others starts to shatter.   
- discards of other people. The discards of others usually happen during fits of rage. For some of them, they didn't mean it, or mean it to last, and now they feel they have to make up stories for why they did it because to tell the truth might put them in a more shameful position. The lying and being afraid their secret will be uncovered causes more shame. It is also why narcissists try to hide themselves (i.e. don't share, but expect you to share), why they commit so many thoughtless, hurtful acts (because they figure they can always lie, deflect and counter blame someone else for what they did), but in the end, it still causes shame. Many narcissists cannot apologize because they feel to do so would be to show too much weakness or vulnerability, and they also feel that they have superiority and dominance over you that they must maintain, so they do not apologize, and their relationships languish without satisfying resolutions.  

Shame can feel like a terrible burden to them. And what do they attempt to do when they are saddled with a lot of shame? 

They try to give it to other people so that they will feel better, in comparison, about themselves. They vilify others:

- "They should be ashamed for the way they treated me! I've never been treated so badly in my life!." - when they instigated it. We hear this from a lot of politicians these days too. It's a deflection strategy. It's about playing the victim too (and it is unethical), so it can cause more shame - they are always feeling on edge that their victim stance won't work with people they are trying to influence - thus they acquire more shame.
- "These people should not be listened to!" - they are afraid of people telling the truth, so they have to blacken their reputations so that no one listens to them, which causes more shame. 
- "I'm perfectly aware of what went on and they are 100 percent at fault!" - shows black and white thinking, something they tend to feel ashamed about too (since they will do anything not to be 100 percent, or even 50 percent at fault for anything). 
- "You are not to talk to me that way! You're a pig!" - shows hypocrisy, and therefor lack of ethics right away. This can cause shame in them too, but of course, they don't want to show you that. They want to keep giving shame to you instead. 
- "You're no better than I am!" - shows that they are not a good person, even if they think others lower themselves as much as they do, thus it breeds more shame, self-contempt, and contempt of others.

And so on. 

HOW DID THEY END UP WITH SO MUCH SHAME
TO BEGIN WITH?

Narcissists usually grow up in environments where there is a lot of "trash-talking" about other people, shaming others is one of the things that is way over-done.

The shaming statements are the "You are - " statements that describe a person, or a child, in many disparaging ways. This is one reason why narcissists don't know who they are, that their sense of self is shaky at best. They hear or are the recipients of the "You are - " statements. 

Those statements can run the gamut:
"You are disgusting!"
"You wolf down your food like you are a pig!"
"Your body is disgusting! You couldn't attract anyone if you tried!"
"You are so crazy! No one will ever love you except me."
"You should hear yourself! As if anyone would listen to you!"
"You were at fault! And stop trying to convince me otherwise!"
"I know what you feel and think! And it's not good! I can tell you that!" - and this is where they get into perspecticide, even labeling what the child might be thinking. Horrible. 
I got many of these kind of statements from survivors of child abuse and they are listed in this post.

Or they will be disparaging a child in front of another child (and on some level, the child listening will know it is not true):

"I've got the most hair-brained, crazy child! What am I to do!?"
"I can't stand to hear her talk! Who cares what little girls think! They should be talking to other little girls about make-up and hair, not their father!"
"Sometimes I just want to put my child back from where they came from!"
"Sometimes I just hate your sister! Don't you sometimes hate her too?"

In healthy families, children get to describe who they are (not the family members - they stay out of describing). Children figure out for themselves what their interests are, what they might want to do in life, what they are proud of about themselves and what needs work, and so on. The parent may model some things with their own behavior, but there is not this constant attacking of "You are - " statements.  

And it hollows out any prospective personality that the child has. The generational curse here might be one hollowed out personality tries to hollow out another personality from another generation. 

And this can create narcissism, especially since the black and white thinking does not always go internally about themselves, but goes externally towards their own children. 

Narcissists tend to have a golden child and a scapegoat child which is another form of splitting: the golden child is thought to be "all good" and the scapegoat child is thought to be "all bad." And some of why the scapegoat child is thought to be "all bad" is that they are more resistant to being hollowed out than the golden child.

The golden child doesn't get overtly hollowed out all that much by the parent - unless he strays from mirroring the parent, that is - which is how he gets hollowed out: he has to be a close version of his parent to be accepted. 

Most golden children are amply aware that their scapegoat siblings are given labels that show unkindness, unfairness, erroneous punishments, and untrue labels. It is why golden children tend to be so compliant and mirroring, to protect themselves from the scapegoat's fate.

Anyway, let's say the golden child turns into a narcissist (which happens to more than half of them - a significant unfortunate fact). All of the trash-talking gets internalized and normalized. They can even trash-talk about themselves for going along willingly with the lies of a narcissistic parent. They learn not to trust what anyone says about anyone because the judgements can be so off the wall and full of lies - and to go for power, control and dominance instead to keep from being a victim of narcissistic abuse (the thinking goes: "If I victimize like my caretaker did, I won't be the victim; someone else will instead.")  

But it also means adopting the bully's or parent's personality, disorder and all, not their own. And just like their bully or parent, they can present a surface of being totally compliant and charming, but horrifically abusive, negative and cruel behind the bully's or parent's back. So parroting can have awful consequences. This is where narcissists often get stuck - they haven't developed a personality, and may go without one for an entire life time. They have Jekyll and Hyde splitting - that is not a true personality; it is a compulsion, a way of dealing with situations when they feel frustration and rage building up inside them. 

They are aware of what they are doing when they go "Mr. Hyde" on you, but since narcissists are known for their dysregulated emotions, particularly rage, and their compulsions to "be bad" or "go evil" on others, they will feel remorse for what they did, even if they don't try to make amends. 

And how did the narcissist not make amends, and what did they do with the anger turned inward? They shamed the most vulnerable people they knew. And the mirroring child of the narcissist will do the same. 

Which brings me to the next chapter:

HOW NARCISSISTS TRY TO HARVEST REGRETS AND SHAME FROM YOU,
AND DOES IT WORK FOR THEM?

At some point in your relationship with a narcissist, they will try to elicit regret and shame from you. They will usually say things like:
"You shouldn't have said that."
"You shouldn't have done that."
"You should have done it this way."
"You should have said ______________ this way if you had wanted _____________."
"You shouldn't have done it that way."
"I can't believe that you did this! How could you think this would be okay?"
"You made a mistake. And there are consequences for every mistake you make."

Most of this is said with foreboding, as though the consequences will be severe.

And in the beginning, assuming we are talking about a close personal relationship, it works because you probably think their intentions towards you are benevolent. So you try to shift and change how you do things, and how you say things, and to some extent, you may even change how you think about things.

The problem is that relationships with narcissists aren't like other relationships. What they will glean from you making big overtures based on their wishes of "how you should behave" and "how you should do things" is that they are in charge of you. As long as you do what they tell you to do, and behave the way they want, then they either feel temporarily pleased, and some of them might even say they love you or reward you as a way of giving you positive reinforcement. 

But unlike other relationships where you make adjustments, and the other person makes adjustments too, so that you can get along and understand one another, and keep from hurting or irritating each other, narcissists expect people in their lives to do all of the bending, all of the overtures, all of the compromising, all of the "behaving", all of the changing (even when it comes to personality, dress, your interests, how you express yourself, the expressions on your face - not possible).

They don't think they should have to do any of this themselves, of course. Part of this has to do with their lust for power, control and domination in their close personal relationships, and their feeling of entitlement. They will always be going for more power, which is not what you find in healthy relationships. 

The other reason they do this is that narcissists have a superiority complex, and many of them, when the manipulations of coercing people to change for them, they can actually start to believe they are better than everyone else when everyone works so hard for them to fit into their idealized visions, and where they don't have to work hard at all in their relationships. It goes to their head, in other words, and they think it is okay to take it to the point where your thoughts are their thoughts, your feelings are their feelings, your interests are their interests - to the point where they feel it is absolutely necessary to teach others constantly how to behave too - to be as "perfect" as they try to convince you that they are.

Arrogance has incredible blind spots, and besides getting in the way of understanding and wisdom, it gets shattered more often than they would like - it has to do with their false self, the grandiose self that they prefer to show to the world, but which in reality, is hiding their shadow self and their fragile ego. It is one reason why they rage so much when you point out things like (using one from the list at the beginning of this post):

Said to the narcissist: "You have no trouble shaming me and trying to teach me, but you can't be shamed or taught anything yourself? What is going on with that? Where is this 'I'm prefect and you are not' mindset coming from? Because it isn't serving either of us very well at this point. I was okay with changing a few things for you, but you've gone too far. You want a sycophant? Because you are not going to get one out of me. I have my own personality and my own interests and you're not going to meddle or change that any more than you have." - their rage is likely to be extreme because you are challenging their false self, the mask and actor they have adopted to hide their shadow self and their dilapidated ego, who thinks they can just run rough-shod over others in this way to get more power and control, i.e. to get sycophants. They don't like strength of character and they don't like type A personalities in the long run (another link and another link and another link).

In fact, if you said anything on that list back to them, they'd probably run away like a coward and end the relationship. 

But assuming it's a one-sided relationship where they are trying to make you run through hoops to meet their perfection standards, this, in fact, incentivizes them to do more perfection standards that you must meet. I think I have demonstrated how it can get to the point where how you do simple minded chores and facial expressions will be met with impossible rage-filled standards and ridicule. 

So, what happens when you get to this point in your relationship with them? What happens when you fail to meet one of their super small perfection standards? Do they realize they are pushing for something miniscule compared to things in life which should really be attended to? And what if you laugh at the tiny issue they want you to put your attention to, and refuse to do it?

They will most likely rage, and not kidding. They will, in the end, be seething at you with contempt if you refuse to meet perfection standards on absurdly tiny issues, especially if you have done that for them many times before. They become entitled to get what ever changes they want out of you.

Once you have gotten to a point where your relationship is about meeting demands on super tiny issues, the relationship is in danger of ending. And they will certainly let you know, one way or another, that the relationship is very provisional and uncertain. 

Here are some of instances of things they say when they get to this stage (in purple):

"You never did learn how to talk to me. Now I'm going to teach you in a way that you'll regret." - and the teaching lesson will invariably be about administering pain to you. 

"You are SO inept! Just look at you!" - about trying to break your self confidence that you can do things without them, and about breaking your self esteem.

"I feel like you are wasting my time! Here I thought you really cared about me, that you wanted to please me, but now you don't?! What is the matter with you!? Get with the program NOW!!" - this about seeing if they can get their needs met by showing aggression, that "you have to" or there will be a lot of trouble or consequences between you (micro-managing is a bad sign in close personal adult relationships and is likely to escalate to abuse). 

"If you can't do what I want, you are useless to me!" - watch out for the "useless phrase" when it comes to narcissists. 

"You couldn't please a pig!"

"I hate you when you're like this! And apparently that's who you really are! A complete and utter disappointment! What's the matter with you? You used to be so nice before! You used to do so much for me? And now you can't? You're going to be recalcitrant? It's time for a separation until you can do better!" - a separation is supposed to make you think about how to keep pleasing them in a better and better way, but instead it tends to enliven the trauma response of "fight or flight", and the longer the separation goes on, most of us put up boundaries with narcissists, even when we don't know they are narcissists, so that we don't get traumatized further.

"You think it is okay to talk to others about me?" - when you are trying to get help in understanding what happened, why it happened, and in general, what happened to your relationship (narcissists use the silent treatment and discarding relationships an awful lot when they are disappointed, and so you can't talk to them and understand anything if they go silent on you, and if you do try to talk to them you'll get head games, and lots of blaming, shaming and contempt rather than a real conversation where they'll try to understand where each of you is coming from, and try to build a bridge or resolution to issues). Instead, they infantilize you and punish you to teach you a lesson, as though you are a naughty child, rather than an adult. It doesn't work.

 If they really wanted to teach you a lesson, putting you in pain tends not to work unless they are inclined to break the law to do so. As long as you have a free will, you will not be going towards pain; you will be going away from it. 

"You never could please me! Now look at you! You're just a shriveled up piece of meat! I could care less about you!" - this shows they have a lack of empathy. 

"So you think you are irreplaceable. You aren't. Let's clear that up now!" - to narcissists, everyone is replaceable in their lives including spouse, friends, children, parents, and siblings. And that says more about their character than it does about you. If you look at their history, they've been replacing and ghosting other people quite a bit before they did the same thing to you. 

So in other words, this "You've got to please me, but I never have to please you" attitude that they have is not going to change and it is likely to get worse. They will keep hammering you with how you must talk, how you must do things, how you must be a perfect sycophant for them. That becomes really obvious at some point. And in the meantime, they will be trying to teach you lessons by introducing painful situations in your life. And it isn't benevolent (that will become clear too). Infantilizing you becomes the terrible and extremely unhealthy go-to tactic and rut they put you and others through time and time again. Most of them don't know how to do anything else because it is the personality disorder at work: they feel they must always go for superiority, and what better way to do it than to insist that you act like an inept child who doesn't know how to behave. 

I'm sure if you're reading this, most of your other relationships don't look like this at all. Since no one likes to be treated that way, including them (it is disrespectful), they often lose relationships over it. 

If they really wanted to teach you a lesson, putting you in pain tends not to work unless they are inclined to break the law to do so. As long as you have a free will, you will not be going towards pain; you will be going away from it. 

If this is a partnership, they may be having affairs on you to teach you more lessons, but unbeknownst to them, it actually creates more separation and trauma for most of us. It doesn't work all that well either unless you are the type of person who competes with their lover. But competing with a lover will cause most narcissists to have more affairs, to get more competitions going, attempts to get you to be more of a pleaser puppet, and their ethics tend to spiral down pretty far as well. What this shows is a lack of empathy for both parties, assuming their lover wants them, and is willing to compete with their latest partner. But at some point, the competition ends, and either one person "gets" the narcissist, or they both decide that the narcissist is not for them. 

The reality is that neither of them may be with the narcissist because narcissists often compete with their ex-partners or partner once they have one of them. Again, they stop running a competition between two people who want them, and instead focus on competing with their ex-partner or present partner instead - whether it is who gets the attention of their joint children, or the attention of their stepchildren, who wins the dominance game once they set up house together. 

Most people do not like being in constant competitions in their relationships unless there is nothing better to do with their time. So a lot of the people who won them, walk away from them too. There are exceptions, but not many. 

The exceptions tend to be that the partner is another narcissist.  

For children, narcissists set up competitions too, because they are not capable of caring, compassion, and love. So they make their kids compete for small morsels of affection and attention. But, as we know, narcissists usually have a golden child, and they will make sure that child wins all of the competitions. And they also have a scapegoat child, who they will make sure loses all of their competitions. 

What happens is that scapegoats begin to wince at competitions, and they don't believe the parent loves them anyway, even when the parent says they do. Most scapegoats who have become adults will say that their parent never loved them, or understood them, but that the parent put them in competitions with their siblings instead, to constantly humiliate them, destroy their self esteem, and that the narcissistic parent eventually wanted to destroy them altogether (i.e. they resent scapegoats who continue to live). I'm not sure all narcissistic parents resent their scapegoats living, but I would have to agree with most of this perspective because it's the overwhelming scapegoat experience - there aren't good endings for scapegoats in terms of parental love or compassion, as there were never really any "winning" moments for them in childhood either.

In studies, narcissists will usually choose the child they see as dominant and/or male to win the competitions, as though it is still tough-it-out cave-man days, and you needed the one with the most imposing physique, the lowest voice, to deal with the Wooly Mammoths and the saber-toothed tigers, lest the narcissist not survive. This is probably how it is even when they have set up one child to fail, to be less dominant. So the competition, as you can see, is just a farce, just as most of the narcissist's relationships are. It is to see what children will do to each other to get the attention of the parent, and so that the narcissist can get ego strokes - tears mean a child cares that they are losing the narcissistic parent's game (ego stroke for the narcissist), and winning, flexing muscles, laughing and being grandiose means the child likes playing the game (ego stroke for the narcissist too). 

It is why domestic violence therapists and psychologists who specialize in the Cluster B Personality Disorders heavily suggest not taking what any narcissist does and says personally, or seriously. If you look at what narcissists say and do it is usually a mind game, a manipulation, an attack, a love bombing episode to get you to give up your personal power to their control and domination. They may ask lots of questions to get an idea of where your vulnerabilities are (so that they can attack you with those things later), or attack others behind their back, but conversations with narcissists usually do not deviate from these motivations and topics most of the time (that's also been my personal experience with narcissists too).   

Which is why, when scapegoats are still alive, but rejected by the narcissist in favor of the golden child, the narcissist will constantly be checking up on the scapegoat ("tragedy hunting" is a term my friend and fellow writer, Peep, used in one of her blog posts, and I like that fitting term for when the narcissist is constantly checking on how well or how miserable a scapegoat is). If the scapegoat is succeeding, the narcissistic parent has a crisis, a melt-down; if the scapegoat isn't doing all that well, the parent breathes a sigh of relief (and some of them get happy - it shows sadism).     

And by the way, all of this shows they are much worse and unlearned in the "behavior department" than you probably are. Most narcissists have very few ethics and morals, and they care very little about other people beyond how much power, control and domination they have over others. That's why discards are so rapid and easy for them: "They aren't going to let me dominate them? Okay, then, I will have nothing to do with them again!" 

So here is something to take away from this: Haven't they been busy trying to change you since the beginning of your relationship to mold you into who they want you to be, rather than trying to understand who you are?

If you are so imperfect for them, then they don't want to take the time to know who you are beyond you twisting like a pretzel to please them, right? The more imperfect you seem to be to them, they are never going to accept who you are: your strengths, weaknesses, your happiness. If you can't please them, you are allowed to stop trying to please them. Most of us do (especially those of us who have been scapegoated by them and who get more negative feedback from them than positive feedback). 

Most relationships aren't that much work and aren't fraught with that much pain, sadness, grief, denying of your needs to fulfill someone else's exclusive needs, dealing with crazy-making punishments, and all of the rest of what goes into dealing with narcissists. You are allowed to be happy, to be in relationships where people care about you, to be experiencing joy without someone nipping at it to take it down, and to forsake being close to people that live in idealize, devalue, discard cycles over and over again in their relationships.

If they sleep well at night when they put you into an idealize, devalue, discard cycle, while you are traumatized, and they don't care about that trauma when you tell them that your symptoms are through the roof, then they are showing you they have no empathy. Do you really want to be in an intimate relationship with someone that devoid of empathy? Think what would happen if you were sick, had an accident, were diagnosed with a serious or terminal disease. They aren't just going to "grow some empathy" in those situations; they are going to be relating to you in ways they have done all along. It's not going to get better, it's going to get worse because narcissists are generally only going to want parentified or infantilized relationships where their needs always come first.        

If they can't care about you in these kinds of situations, and when they are so one-sided in their ambition to have "pleasing behaviors" go to them only, and to be so calloused about causing you and others pain, they are pretty much capable of anything in terms of how they hurt others, and how much they are willing to go in hurting others. Empathy keeps most of us from going as far as they are willing to go in terms of causing pain. 

Trying to harvest regrets and shame from you basically means that they are trying to turn you into a "pleaser puppet", devoid of your own needs, personality and ambitions. If they are at a stage where they are screaming at you about the smallest things, they are just testing to try and see how far they can go with their power, control and domination agendas. And if part of that test includes any kind of threat or abuse, you know that they are willing to take their agenda much farther than you will ever be comfortable with. You will likely suffer and develop a host of symptoms.     

Eventually what you will find is that the narcissist will be like this rigid unmovable, unchangeable, immoral person screaming at you to keep changing. Most people can't handle it when the narcissist gets to that point, and most people either leave the narcissist or work hard to get out of the relationship. 

In the end, the narcissist may make it clear that it doesn't make any difference to them whether you stay or leave: "So you think you are irreplaceable. You aren't. Let's clear that up now."

So does trying to harvest regrets and shame from you work? For awhile, but only if you believe they are truly benevolent and have better ethics than you do. Once they turn on you, you see that they aren't benevolent as they punish you, and put you through cycles of love bombing you then more punishments, that they are downright hypocrites with way fewer ethics than most people. Then when we are fully aware that they severely lack empathy too, it becomes a way out: and this is our chance to heal.
  
What are we healing from?

A love bomber that came in disguise (under the disguise was a shame-based, shaming, "destroyer"). 

Can we ever trust a person who tried to destroy us again? And who tried to do so at the most vulnerable time of our life? 

Not likely. 

FURTHER READING

Regret Is Painful. Here’s How to Harness It. You might even find it leads to some new insights. - by Jancee Dunn for The New York Times

THE NARCISSIST’S SHAME AS A “PREMIER SOCIAL EMOTION” - by the administrator of NarcissisticBehavior.net
excerpt:
     The narcissist’s excessive self-worth does a great job of chasing off their inferiority complex and replacing it with an outer veneer of superiority through their False Self.  This goes a long way to disguising their inner sense of vulnerability that is far too shameful to be seen by others.
     This, to a large extent, creates the narcissist’s typical arrogance that is all too apparent.  Narcissists are plagued with feelings of envy that are born out of their deep, emotional insecurities and poor sense of self-worth. It is important to know that their shame and envy are inextricably intertwined.
     Unable to form their own ideas and ideals for themselves, the narcissist latches onto others out of envy, especially those who they respect as being superior so that they can get that same sense of self from them. Unfortunately, those who are superior to the narcissist will eventually unintentionally trigger the narcissist’s feelings of lacking, causing them to feel shame.  They just cannot abide or tolerate feeling less than anybody else, so when someone possesses something that they do not have, it provokes feelings of inadequacy and triggers their shame and resentful longing.
     It is the narcissist’s envy that causes their constant denigration of others. ...

Narcissism and Shame Treatment in Philadelphia, Ocean City, Mechanicsville - by The Center for Growth (a therapy service in a number of states in the USA - the premise here is that they can help narcissists deal with their shame in order to have more fulfilling relationships)
excerpt:
     Narcissism and shame go hand in hand in so many ways. Narcissists carry a LOT of shame. From mistakes made in the past, fear of not being enough, to fear of criticism in the present and future. For many narcissists their lives are rather shame-based but, they will never admit it. Facing shame is something incredible uncomfortable and difficult for most narcissistic individuals. To admit to shame means to become vulnerable, to let go of control, and to face the fear head on. These 3 tasks are not in a narcissist’s skill set. Shame is an essential emotion, we all have it, and it is often misunderstood. Facing one’s shame is necessary in creating meaningful and intimate relationships. Narcissist’s issues with shame is a major reason narcissists struggle to maintain friendships, experience true intimacy, and struggle with self-esteem.
     Narcissists fear and despise facing their shame so much so, that their way to survive is to project their own shame on to those around them. As they continue to blame, shame, and criticize those around him/her, they are able to distance from their own shame as well as feel better about themselves now that they can view those around him/her as flawed. ... 

11 Ways Narcissists Use Shame To Control You (Narcissists are unable to deal with their shame, so they project it onto you.) - by Christine Hammond, LMHC, NCC for Your Tango
excerpt:
     A weakness of a narcissist is their extreme hatred of being embarrassed. There is nothing worse for them than having someone point out even the slightest fault. Ironically, they have no problem openly doing this to others.
     Narcissists often have a complex relationship with shame, as they strive to maintain a grandiose and perfect image of themselves. They are highly sensitive to criticism or any perceived threat to their self-esteem, which triggers deep feelings of shame.
     However, instead of confronting and processing their shame, they tend to project it onto others by belittling or shaming them, in an attempt to protect their fragile ego. Paradoxically, this avoidance of shame can further isolate narcissists and perpetuate a cycle of unhealthy behaviors and relationships.

The Role of Shame in Narcissistic Abuse (The narcissist’s projections and intentional infliction of shame) - Stardust Musings for Medium.com

PEOPLE WHO ARE DIAGNOSED WITH NARCISSISTIC PERSONALITY DISORDER
WHO HAVE COME FORWARD TO TALK ABOUT NARCISSISTIC SHAME 

Professor Sam Vaknin (diagnosed with Narcissistic Personality Disorder, studied psychology, particularly the Cluster B personality disorders, earned his doctorate in psychology). Videos:
- Narcissist's Shame and Guilt - by Professor Sam Vaknin (2010)
- Shame, Guilt, Codependents, Narcissists, and Normal Folks - by Professor Sam Vaknin (2015)
- Narcissistic Mortification: From Shame to Healing via Trauma, Fear, and Guilt - by Professor Sam Vaknin (2020)
- Shameful Core of Covert Narcissist: Inferior Vulnerability Compensated - by Professor Sam Vaknin (2023)
- Narcissist's Never-ending Vengeance (Redemption: A True Story) - by Professor Sam Vaknin (2023)

Jason Skidmore, of The Nameless Narcissist channel (diagnosed with Narcissistic Personality Disorder, and in therapy to learn about the disorder). Videos:
- How shame RULES the Narcissist - by Jason Skidmore
- Jason talks about living with a lot of shame in this video: Talk at Northeastern University about Narcissism by Jacob Skidmore (The nameless narcissist) - by Jason Skidmore
- Do narcissists really hate themselves? - by Jason Skidmore 

Lee Hammock, aka MentalHealness - diagnosed with Narcissistic Personality Disorder, also in therapy
- Compounding Shame as a Narcissist - by Lee Hammock
- Some narcissists are ashamed of the younger versions of themselves - by Lee Hammock
- How to deal with shame as a narcissist | Self Aware Narcissist Sundays Ep 15 - by Lee Hammock  

PSYCHOLOGISTS TALK ABOUT SHAME AND THE NARCISSIST TOO

A Narcissist's Profound Struggle With Core Shame - by Dr. Les Carter

Rethinking A Narcissist's Shame Messages - by Dr. Les Carter

3 Reasons Narcissists Develop Authoritarian Patterns - by Dr. Les Carter

How shame molds the narcissist - by Dr. Ramani
This video is about how not to raise a narcissist. 
Excerpts from the video:
     ... if you're the parent, and you're saying I do not want to raise a narcissistic child, what can you do? 
     Number one: Never, ever use shame as a means of addressing behavior or communication with your child. It is not good for them; it is not good for you. And to shame a child will never result in any kind of sustainable or meaningful change or improvement. If a child's behavior is an issue, address the behavior. Shaming or humiliating a child has no place in parenting. 
    Number two: You don't want to compare your child to other children. Not your own, not others. Because, as you can imagine, that is certainly going to foster a sense of shame or inadequacy about not measuring up. It's a set-up for the child to always feel that they need to look outside of themselves, and to compare themselves, instead of learning to internally manage who they are. 
     Number three: Never mock, or ridicule, or belittle, or use any form of defamatory language against a child. Now this should be "Human Being 101", but so many parents do it, and so many people grew up with it happening to them. Ironically having this happen to you as a child, hearing these kinds of things said to you, may be more likely to make you become vulnerable to a narcissist than to become a narcissistic person. But I would be willing to bet that for a child to be on the receiving end of really defamatory cruel language, is either going to end them up as a narcissist, or as an experiencer of narcissistic abuse. There really isn't a healthy path forward from that. 
     Number four: Remain aware of how your child's school manages comparisons between children. And how your child's school is able to talk about both strengths and deficits. A child who regularly feels shamed and ridiculed and humiliated at school, can be really rendered quite vulnerable to those exposures even if things are supportive at home. ... 
     ... The childhood risk factors for a child developing a narcissistic personality are interestingly quite similar to the risk factors for being vulnerable to narcissistic abuse ...  

OBVIOUSLY SHAME EFFECTS
THE VICTIMS OF NARCISSISTIC ABUSE TOO
ESPECIALLY CHILDREN
OTHERWISE THEIR BUDDING PERSONALITY WOULD NOT BE
CONTINUALLY CHALLENGED
AT EVERY STEP WITH "YOU ARE -" STATEMENTS 
(and if you are the child, you will eventually realize the "you are-" statements are holding you back from a fulfilling life and self discovery)

Learning not to take the shame that narcissistic parents should be dealing with themselves is part of healing from child abuse. You work on your ethics and integrity, and you let your parent decide what they are doing with their own ethics. If they are getting worse by putting you in a smear campaign, it's all the more reason to keep walking away from them.

By working on your own ethics and morality, their shaming sessions won't work. 

It is easy to lie to and for narcissists when you are a child, because there are incredible consequences when you don't lie for them (even children know that the narcissist "has to" present a false front in public and with their friends). And a child knows they too are pressured to be invested in propping up the parent's false front too ... or else ...  

In high school, some children become disgusted by the front, the phoniness, the false love, especially if there is openness and real love being expressed in peer relationships. Whether they rebel against their parent's false self has to do with how safe they feel in rebelling. If they don't feel safe, they feel there is no other choice than to lie for the parent, or to keep the relationship very, very superficial. But if you choose to lie for them to save them from themselves, parents also can tell pretty easily that you are lying for them out of fear. Lying is unethical, so it catches you, and makes you feel ashamed. 

Parents know that they can scare the living daylights out of their children, and if they are narcissists, they abuse that power over and over again. 

In adulthood, if they give you the silent treatment, that is their decision, and they have excuses for their decisions, or ways that they try to make those decisions your fault, always, no matter how much it hurts others or themselves. 

But most of us who receive the silent treatment from a narcissistic parent are scapegoats. Let's be real about that. We've never been liked, otherwise they wouldn't have tried to change us so much, or disparaged us so much over all the little things they tend to do. Most likely they didn't even like our appearance, looks, or style of dress either, or it challenged them too much in terms of what they thought we should be for them. 

A lot of scapegoats don't know who they are either, even if they have a greater sense than other children in the household. They've been listening to so many disparaging "you are -" statements since they were toddlers, and they never try to correct the parent because they can get pretty badly punished for that too. Arguing with narcissists is often pointless, unless there are, again, safe ways to say, "Stop defining me. I don't prescribe to your opinions." "Leave me alone, please. I am not who you think I am."  

Narcissists are likely to rage if you say that, and unless you don't care whether they rage or not, you are likely not going to challenge them in that way. 

And many scapegoats can struggle with an identity too. The disparaging "You are -" statements don't ring true to most scapegoats (they are often the first child to notice the coldness, the lack of empathy in their parent), but scapegoats also get so used to the "You are -" statements that they stop defending themselves to anyone who uses them, and life can become like Chauncy Gardner's in the novel by Jerzy Kosinski, "Being There" (link takes you to the movie version). You are an echoist, letting everyone you meet describe you, whether good, bad or indifferent. And you don't try correcting them - and that can, and does attract, other kinds of narcissists, and even psychopaths. 

So it is important to find out who you are, and what your strengths are, how you need to protect yourself and how you don't. And in many ways, that journey never gets a full launch unless you go completely "no contact" with the narcissistic parent.  

You might be attracted to people who describe you in better terms than your parent did (which most people probably will be doing because most healthy people don't need a scapegoat, and they don't feel compelled to be constantly negative about others either). 

In my own life, I was much more of an echoist than I wanted to admit to myself. I was in a college art class one day, and my teacher asked me what I wanted to do with my life, and I said, "Write. Write books. Fiction and non-fiction." And he said, "That's interesting! A really talented visual artist like you wants to be a writer instead of an artist!" I changed my major to visual arts that day, and made him my career advisor.

And then I spent more than a decade afterward trying to decide whether I did it for him or did it for me. 

So anyway, to get back to the narcissist going silent on you ... you take their silent treatment and you break the trauma bond. Unless they are an awfully aware narcissist, the relationship will always be a trauma bond. You grieve, you pound the desk, you do what you need to do to stop living your life to feed the narcissist's grandiosity fantasies. 

And then you live life in the truth. You do not tie yourself to the narcissist's opinions of you (because they are just projection any way, and you are just being used because they can't deal with their own shame). You live in peace, because after living with a narcissist, you need peace, lots of it, way more than you have ever had in your life. You surround yourself with truth-tellers and empaths, and you speak and act authentically - always going towards the light of understanding and wisdom.

You figure out where your true interests lie, without input from others, at least for a couple of years or more, and you put your effort towards reaching those goals. 

You give up on listening to them.  

You discover who you really are without someone "shorting" you at every moment, keeping you from pushing forward into your true identity. 

Hopefully somewhere along the line, you get domestic violence therapy or police interventions for the smear campaigns, or stalking, or continued attacks from the narcissist, and trauma therapy for all of the symptoms you experience from being in a narcissistic relationship.  

But first you must heal:

Healing from Narcissistic Abuse is Possible! Narcissistic Abuse Survivor Story Podcast - by Lisa Romano

Effects of Narcissistic Abuse - by  Arlin Cuncic, MA, reviewed by David Susman, PhD for Very Well Mind

Signs of a Trauma Bond; The Things You Say that Proves You are Defending a Narcissist - by Lisa Romano

Validation and Approval: Stop Looking Outside Yourself - by Lisa Romano

Childhood Abandonment Issues: Healing Feeling Like Everyone Will Abandon You/Life Coaching Tips - by Lisa Romano interviewing one of her patrons, Holly

Codependency Recovery with the Help of Brain Exercises - by Lisa Romano

NEVER BE NEEDY AGAIN/CO-DEPENDENCY CURE - by Lisa Romano

How To MOVE ON From A NARCISSIST & Get Over The End Of A CRAZYMAKING RELATIONSHIP - by Lisa Romano

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