Hey guys, welcome back to the channel!
And first I want to say
thank you so much for supporting the channel.
The comments, the subscriptions,
all the input is really making me feel great,
makes me feel like I'm doing them on the right track,
with sharing this content with you.
With sharing this childhood trauma work with you guys.
And I'm really touched with how it's resonating,
and your feedback is really helpful.
I've been meaning to do this video for a while,
because throughout my career,
in both inpatient psychiatry, and in private practice,
is, I often get a common question about sort of
from a family member, from a spouse, from a child of a parent.
And the question is sort of, my dad is really narcissistic,
or my mom is really narcissistic, or my partner is, is can you see them?
Because I think they have childhood trauma.
And if it's real narcissism or NPD of that like, is I tend to sort of say,
therapy is often counter-indicated for someone who has that.
It's extremely unlikely, and unfortunately, it's extremely rare,
that therapy can help somebody
with Narcissistic Personality Disorder.
Because therapy doesn't fit into their image of themselves.
And there's a whole series of reasons why.
And it's interesting when I try to explain
the reasons why therapy with a narcissist tends to not work,
is I see the person's inner child who struggles
with giving up on people who are bad for them,
which is a very common wounded inner child thing
is to give up on somebody who's bad for you
or give up the hope of the bad person's potential,
which is a whole thing in and of itself,
is, I find that the person struggles
with my answer, or why I'm explaining it in that way.
In other words, explaining why therapy doesn't work, doesn't work.
So I wanted to come up with a video,
to show you, why therapy with a narcissist tends to not work,
tends to be counter-indicated.
And as you're watching the video,
what I've done is I've done a role-play,
with therapy with a narcissist in two quick sessions.
These are shortened sessions.
And to highlight the bullet points of having that pathology work,
trying to work with the therapist,
is you could see how the whole thing plays out.
So as you're watching, I want you to be thinking about the word 'image'.
The narcissist is totally focused on image... of their own image,
being in love with their own image.
But more importantly,
where it gets nasty, is how they are being perceived by others.
So hopefully I think you know what I mean by that.
So, session one is the first session, obviously.
Session two, is sort of the second and final session with this person,
and hopefully that this is helpful.
In a separate video after this,
I'm going to be conducting a clinical analysis,
to explain the pathology of what is going on in the session in real time.
And hopefully maybe that will line up with what you guys are thinking.
And here goes, we'll just get into it!
Well, hey, welcome. It's good to meet you.
And we spoke on the phone,
and you mentioned you wanted to do some work
around some infidelity issues that you have in your life.
And I understand that your wife recently caught you cheating,
and recommended that you come see somebody.
And I understand things aren't really going that well.
Why don't you tell me a little bit more about it?
Ach, you know, the thing got really complicated really fast, Patrick.
It just got out of hand.
And I want you to know up front, though, I wasn't just looking for sex.
I mean, sex was a part of it,
but I was really just trying to help this woman out,
like she had a bad boss.
She had a bad marriage.
She had the kids. It was a mess.
And I don't know, I just sort of fell into it, you know,
and, you know, I see a ring on your finger.
And I'm sure you understand that marriages get lonely, you know,
marriages can get barren.
And I'm sure you can understand that.
But no, things aren't really good right now between she and I.
But you know what I was thinking, like, on the way over here,
I was thinking of struggling with this is maybe
you can help me out with this,
is I'm starting to feel like I got to ask you is that:
am I a bad person in this, Patrick?
Because I feel like this thing, it just sort of took off.
It just sort of happened to me. And I feel like I'm a bad person.
Well, that's a big question, you know.
The way I tend to look at that, or a question like that,
is I try to go back and take a look at people's childhood.
And one thing I'm curious, maybe we can just jump in
about if there was any infidelity between your parents growing up?
And I feel like a good trauma therapist
will ask about that modeling, about what went on at home,
and good trauma therapist would also ask you,
what age did you start to cope with your feelings
by using things like sex or food?
Here's the whole thing, you know, I'm an open book.
I will tell you the whole thing. And my dad...my dad worked hard,
he played hard, and I felt really bad for my mom and that.
But you know, she's a very negative, complicated person.
And honestly, I would see them fight all the time.
Every other day the house was blowing up in some kind of fight.
And honestly, Patrick, I would side with him,
because he had stronger points in the arguments.
And she just tended to be really negative.
But out of that, though,
is I feel like growing up between the two of them,
I feel like I have a gift, about sort of seeing both sides of things,
looking at one person in their shoes,
looking at the other person in their shoes.
I'm sure you can relate to that, because that's a therapist.
I'd probably be a good therapist myself, because I really find that
I can see many angles of what's going on with people.
Well, that was helpful. And there's a lot there,
and it sounds like that dad, maybe didn't respect your mother.
And maybe mom,
maybe your mother had some codependency going on.
You know, I'm curious about, for kids who grow up in
that kind of constant distrust and argumentative environment,
it's kind of related to maybe the problem you came in with,
is that children growing up in that,
they don't really see parents value each other.
They don't see parents respect each other.
They don't see parents honoring each other or enjoying each other.
And from what you're describing, it's simply, the current problem might
be something that was modeled for you,
but what was going on at home is
I would file that under emotional abuse.
You know, it is what it is. And I think they were just unhappy.
And that's just how it kind of played out.
Well, sure, but I'm just curious about is,
I'm describing it as emotional abuse.
One thing that I'm curious about, is when I describe it at that,
for kids who grew up in daily fighting,
is, it is falling under that category of emotional abuse.
But, you know, to be honest (client talking over therapist)
it's a little bit creepy, I don't really like thinking about it in that way.
And I learned a lot from them, you know, they were good people.
They were just complicated in their relationship.
It's a bit creepy, yeah, to think about it, you know, to kind of go back.
Well, well we're at time,
and, you can think about how you felt in this session,
and if you wanted to book another session,
is, I would really think about that,
because you mentioned the word creepy,
about how you felt about us processing some of this stuff
or talking about it
is these sessions are hard in that way,
but like I find that they are related to the present problem,
and we try to shift, by figuring out where the problem started.
What I have people do is I have them pick up a book called
'Homecoming' by John Bradshaw, and read the first four chapters,
which are very helpful, and related to some of this stuff,
and the impact of what growing up in that environment was like.
Hmm, mmmm
And it can help with a lot of the stuff.
All right! Sounds good, I can handle it!
Okay.
Well, hey, good to see you!
Why don't you tell me how the week was?
And I'm curious about how you felt,
when you left the session last time.
You know I felt amazing, and I felt really hopeful,
and I feel grateful for you,
because you really healed that stuff about my parents last time.
Well, I'm not that good, but you know, maybe you felt good about
naming something big, that we can start to dig in and process.
But stuff doesn't really get healed in one session, in that way,
did you get a chance to get that Bradshaw book?
Yup! Got it online!
Only took a couple of days.
And you know what-gave it to my wife!
I'm sorry, how do you mean?
It's this whole thing, but you know, I know I shouldn't have,
and I know what you're going to say,
but the day after I saw you, I was going through her phone, and it
turns out that she's been talking to her mother and her friends
about wondering if she should leave me or not.
Can you f*ing believe that?
So it's like 11:00 and I wake her up and I throw the book on the bed,
and I tell her she probably has a worse childhood than I did,
and she's more messed up than I am.
Whoa....I'm a little bit confused, you know,
She's probably appropriately seeking help from her friends,
to sort of deal with... given that there was
cheating a couple of weeks ago.
NO!! Not when she's sharing our business with the whole world!
She's a very complicated, negative person,
and I have to see these people.
Well, but who should she be talking to?
Therapist!!
Trust me though, you don't want her though, because like how many
hours do you have to just have her complain about me in here?
You know..huh
Well, let's just back up a little bit, Mark, and you know,
you wanted some help about the cheating.
And now, if I have you right, you're in a very different place with her.
Totally!! You know! It's not just me in this!
Well, I'm curious about, like, you gave her the book,
but what about you reading the book, to go over maybe what
we discussed last time about your parents?
You know Patrick, I'm a little bit taken aback,
because I'm not really feeling very supported in this with you.
I have to see these people,
and they only hear her side of the argument in this.
Yeah, it's messy when a partner cheats, right.
I wonder what would make this maybe more productive between
the two of us is to ask a weird question.
I'm just going to jump in there is, how would maybe your father
handle your situation right now if he was in it?
I ask that because I'm just going to be blunt is that
I think you're minimizing your infidelity,
and switching the focus on her.
You know what? You know what, Patrick?
I think we'll be more productive in this conversation,
is to talk about... maybe where you went to school...you know
I think going to a social worker and whatever that is,
was clearly a mistake, and I should have gone to a PhD.
Well Mark, now you're switching the focus,
and trying to put me down a notch.
You can see whoever you like.
Look, look I'm sorry...you know,
I was just hoping I could find someone who could really get me.
And before I go, I should have said this upfront,
but before I go today I need a letter,
stating that I am engaged in therapy with you.
You could say I'm depressed or something.
I'm sorry, a letter for what?
That's not really that important.
You can just say... you could address it to 'whom it may concern'
Well Mark, this is only our second session,
and I would really need to know what the letter is for.
Look! That's my business, and it's easy.
You know, I can go grab a cup of coffee,
with the time left we have in this session, you can write up the letter,
I'll grab it and I'll go.
I know you're busy, so you don't have to do it outside the session.
You know Mark, being engaged in therapy,
is at least a month, or two months for me,
and I don't feel comfortable giving you a letter,
if I don't really know what it's for.
Hey, Patrick, that's fine.
You know what, then I'm just not going to pay for this session, OK!
You know Mark, I think I'm terminating you.
This is really not a good fit. I can send you somewhere else.
Sounds good to me.
So there you have it.
And as you can see, the session ended,
the last session ended, and it quickly went off the rails.
And I find that that has happened because
the therapist was challenging the narcissist about their perception,
and how they were behaving with the wife.
I could have done... it could have been a wife who had cheated.
It doesn't really matter the gender of the person.
I'm not trying to sort of, like, spell anything out about men in this case.
It really could be anybody. It could be a parent or sibling.
And I'm just trying to spell out to you,
what that person is like with the therapist.
In short, they're not that different with the therapist.
The therapist is not really going to have a lot of power,
outside of the usual, sort of, trying to idolize me
and have some charm going on.
Is it'll end up where it usually ends up,
in terms of a relationship, sort of with a narcissist.
So again in a separate video, I'll be doing a clinical analysis,
that you guys can watch out for shortly after,
to get into spelling out the pathology,
about how that was playing out in real time.
And a couple of last thoughts on it is, the letter...
I wanted to come up with something dramatic.
Because the narcissist also thrives on drama,
and I normally do happily give a letter to people,
if they're seeking that out.
But in this case,
I felt like I wanted to include a game that the narcissist was playing,
something that clinicians are wary of, is called secondary gain,
meaning that the person is coming to therapy,
not just because they want to grow and change,
and get better and look at themselves.
It's like they have ulterior motives.
And like other people, they will be using
the therapist to gain or achieve those motives.
So that letter could have been...
he might have wanted to get out of work.
He might have wanted to for, who knows, it could be a million reasons.
But that's why I was being firm with him,
is that you don't really get the letter just after a couple of sessions,
especially when you're not going to sort of explain why
you need the letter.
And the money thing is like, I think for a therapist in this position,
when it goes off the rail that hard, it is sort, you know it is sort
of a threat about the threat that he used about the money.
But most therapists are going to be happy to see this gentleman go.
If they're really boundaried, if they're really sort of thinking about like,
is this really even going to be...
..so other people are going to be wondering about the money.
So hopefully that makes sense.
Stay tuned for the clinical analysis video.
I hope this video is helpful, as always leave comments.
Ask questions if you had a lot, a lot of them,
and thank you guys so much for watching.
I hope these videos are helpful.
Take care!