#1 NARCISSISM Expert: Are You Dealing With A Narcissist!? Watch Out For THESE SIGNS! w/ Dr. Ramani

We let toxic people in so close a lot of the work is a fine art of discernment. Everyone talks about wellness, wellness, wellness, drink the right juice, drink the right tea, eat the right kale, do the right workout. I'm like people, I get it, you do you. But can we bring that kind of discerning awareness to people? The leading expert on narcissist, clinical psychologist, and best-selling author, Dr. Ramani. Chemistry and connection are really dangerous words to me because they can be trauma bonded words. The hack I have for figuring out whether or not someone's in a trauma bonded relationship, I'll say, Tell me why you love them. And you know the answer I get when people are trauma bonded? The answer I get is, how do.

We forgive someone who's hurt us so badly as a narcissist?

Maybe we don't. Maybe we don't. Something that's very important to me is that no one ever feels that they have to forgive someone for hijacking their soul.

How can you know if someone's a narcissist on the first date? So, welcome back, everyone, to the School of Greatness. Very excited about our guest we have back. Dr. Ramani in the house. So good to see you. Welcome back.

Thank you, Louis.

Our last interview, I think, had millions of views and listens, and I think this is gonna help a lot of people. So, it's not you identifying and healing from narcissistic people. Is it even possible in your book, you uncover all these different ideas, is it even possible to not only heal after narcissistic relationship or abuse that you've experienced in a narcissistic relationship intimacy, but also to trust yourself again that you can choose someone who isn't a narcissist.

100% it's possible. I see love stories after narcissistic abuse for people all the time, but let me tell you, it's a bumpy road to get there. And I think that, so what I want to tell people is, It's possible. It's not easy. I read this, someone in my healing community brought this interesting line from David Kessler's work. I'm sure you know David Kessler. If you don't, you should. You gotta have him on. He's great. He is, to me, one of the best voices in grief that's out there, right? He worked with Kubler-Ross back in the day. Like he's that guy. And he had this beautiful passage in a book. Like I said, someone in my healing community was sharing it just in terms of trying to understand the grief from narcissistic abuse. And he said, loss is optional. And what he meant by that is he was talking about his own process of grief. And he said, I could choose, as one way to avoid losing, is to never love again, to never have a pet, to never have a lover, to never have a partner, to never have a friend, and to not have a family. And then you won't experience loss. But you won't experience life. And I thought it was so beautiful because it was that idea of loss is optional. These do at some level do become choices. And I think for me, for survivors of narcissistic abuse, feeling the sense of autonomy, which tends to be stripped away by these relationships, grief is a process you go through. And during grief, it is, and I've been working with several grief stricken clients recently, either through death or through Or through the loss of these relationships. And it is such, it is the most human of experiences, like birth and death. Grief is the experience that unites everyone. And we have some pretty universal reactions to it. And the big mistake we're making now in modern times is we believe we can rush through grief, that we can control our emotions.

Get over it quickly.

Get over it quickly.

And it does- Find someone else quickly.

Get over it quickly, move on. I'm not thinking about it anymore. I'm back at work. I'm good. I'm back in my routine. and grief is a funny thing because it's gonna come for you. It might be sitting in the back, it's like, be careful. And I can't tell you how often people say, and because people who go through narcissistic relationships become masters of dissociation. And I don't mean sort of the full-blown traumatic dissociation, but like, I'm not feeling that. I'm not seeing that. They're very good at pushing everything away because that's the only way to survive in these relationships, but you also get good at cutting out the pain, right? Going through in this world in this numbness, but going back to this idea of loss is optional. What you'd have to live, no partner, no nothing, I guess you wouldn't go through that same breach of trust or betrayal and all the pain we go through when we love, but then you wouldn't have love. And what else is the experience of being a human being but to connect to other people? And the reason I say this is that when you're in those acute stages of grief, you're not thinking about like, good, let loss be optional. I am not signing up for it. Thank you, But then there's a point at which you say, but I wanna feel again. And there's nothing more beautiful to me when I'm working with a survivor when they do say, I think I'm ready to start feeling people again, but I'm so scared. And I, first of all, I remind them, girl, you survived that. Anything else someone brings new, you're gonna be fine. You got this, right? But that fear, it is overwhelming for people that how will I survive if this is done to me again? How will I ever have faith in any human being again? And above all else, the point you made, how will I ever trust myself? And that loss of trust in the self is what really bums me out. Because now these are people who are saying they're still having trouble making decisions, or I've got bad judgment. And so a lot of the work and a lot of what I talk about in It's Not yout is the fine art of discernment. And my big point there, okay? Everyone talks about wellness, wellness, wellness. Eat, drink the right juice, drink the right tea, eat the right kale, do the right workout, do the right disc, discern, discern, pick, pick, well, wear the right workout clothes and cotton and all this. I'm like, people, I get it, you do you, but can we bring that kind of discerning awareness to people? We're not discerning when it comes to the people we let in our life. Oh, you're gonna abuse me, come on in. I'm like, you might as well smoke a pack of cigarettes at that point. Wow. You're so careful about what you eat, Stop doing that. Eat junk food for all I care. Just be careful about who you let in.

Don't allow emotional abuse to come in.

Exactly, and don't enable, and don't keep making those excuses. Like we let toxic people in so close and fast.

Why is that so common for people to make excuses for their partners' bad behaviors consistently for how they treat them? Why do we allow that? Why do we excuse that? Why do we continue it?

You love them. I mean, you love them.

But do we love them or is it a false sense of love?

I think that when then we get into a philosophical discussion, you- think chemical.

Bonded, is it, you know, is it...

You think you love them. Yes. You know, it's, listen, if somebody behaves badly on a first date, they try to grab the waitresses and they, and they yell at you and they scream at you and they curse at you.

You'Re like, okay, you're probably not gonna.

Be in a second date with that. I'm gonna be a second date. Second date, third date even, you probably won't put up with it once you get deeper into it.

Why though? Why do we put up with bad behavior after three, six months to three years and then we stay in it when we wouldn't have been in that relationship early on if they did that?

One, I'd almost say, is more cognitive and almost behavioral, economic and sort of sunk cost fallacy stuff. I've already put in three months into this relationship. I can look at more dating profiles like, oh, I gotta make this one work. It's like you, you don't wanna return the thing to the store. I'm like, we make this one work. Okay, there's that. Okay, that, but that's very cognitive. That misses what I think is more powerful, which is the somatic, physical things that happen in us. Old scripts get evoked. If you were a child who made excuses for an invalidating parent, if you were a child who had to cater to the needs of a parent, all those accommodations in you, those start, intimacy brings that out, right? Because a parental relationship has its form of intimacy, it's a closeness, it's a attachment. So those old scripts start getting activated and our natural tendency to fix, to rescue, to excuse, to justify in the name of attachment, all of that kicks in pretty quick. So by the three months in, especially if there's things you like, you're attracted to the person, they're smart, they're clever, you have fun, you've gone on a nice trip, you like the sex, All of those things, which at some level are kind of superficial, they keep someone in the game, right? So in order to keep attached to this person that you're feeling, that you're enjoying, some of us are really good at those trauma bonded justifications. There's people out there, frankly, Louis, who are actually good at three months out to say, this isn't healthy and they can step away. They may not be as vulnerable to those internal accommodations made in Family of Origin.

How do we become more discerning? Like, what are the qualities of a discerning person? How do you know? I have the skills, the tools, the emotional strength and courage to be discerning. What do those skills look like? What do those emotions look like? So let me tell this, I'm going to go backwards on your answer here.

I'm going to get to that sort of the nuts and bolts. I was recently talking with someone who said something so interesting to me. A lot of what her and I talk about is discernment, discernment, discernment, right? And she said, you know, I become more discerning because I'm working with you and talking with you, but it means I'm slower. Like I'm very, I deliberate on things and I'm very aware of the trauma wounds that are brought up by big ticket decisions.

-In relationships.

-What? Everyone around her is like, what's going on? Like, why are you taking so long? Hurry up and make a decision. We like decisive people in our world. We view decisive people as together.

As confident.

Confident. So the discerning person can sometimes feel like a waffler, when in fact she's like, and I, again, I really believe in somatic, physically held work. I really believe in that. I think that we feel things when they're right, however that there's a wholeness, there's a sensation of wholeness, right? Discernment number one means slow the hell down. You have to go slow.

But don't have sex on the first night.

Don't have sex. As tempting as it is, I mean, go home, take care of yourself, but not with them. For no other reason, this is not a moralistic thing at all. It really is not. It is more of a, it muddies up the decision making waters. Of course. It creates a different kind of an investment and it even brings up for some people emotions such as shame, which also muddies the waters. Keep it clean. And then you wanna stay, you wanna.

Like stay with that person because you've already had sex with them.

And you wanna prove them wrong that you're not that person.

So you see what I'm saying? All this stuff. Speaking about that, What is the biggest, I guess, what is the biggest challenge that a woman may have sleeping with a guy on the first date? I'm not saying it couldn't work out.

And it may be in their favor. Right. There are plenty of people out there who are listening and saying, I'm married for 20 years and I'm like, one.

Night stand, yeah, exactly. What is the biggest, I guess, challenge that could come if a woman sleeps with a man on the first date?

I think that the expectations shift immediately, right? So it's a, you know, Matt Hussy, dear to both of us, talks about standards, right? And I love his work on standards, but it gets real tricky when we talk about narcissistic relationships. That's when him and I kind of like, were sort of like in this interesting dance because none of that standard stuff works in a narcissistic relationship. I'm not saying that only a narcissist has sex with you on the first date. You might meet a really sweet person and you're a sweet person and two sweet people have sex on the first date, right? But what it's done though is, because ultimately, Louis, the connective tissue of a long-term committed relationship is respect, compassion, safety, a growth orientation, attunement. Those are the things I come back to every time. That's it. That's safety in a relationship. And getting to that, like ensuring that you almost have those active ingredients, Because sex is such an emotionally laden space for people, some of us have heard very moralistic, stigmatizing stuff about it. Many people have histories of sexual abuse or other sort of unwanted or coerced sexual experiences. That muddies the waters. It leaves both people sometimes even sort of confused. What is this about?

What are we doing?

Right, what are we doing? Right? For what I do believe in a gendered frame and a binary gendered frame, women get more shamed and feel more shamed for that. They feel as though, okay, well that's how this person sees me. And so there is that, there's, I still think even though that feels so patriarchal and throwback-y, I think it's sadly still part of the conversation for how women experience it subjectively. Like did I just sort of throw myself under the bus here? Or have I just made this into something that's not gonna last? I don't think that's necessarily so. I think a good partner would not discount a partner for doing that. But I do think it muddies the waters. And if you have sex with a narcissist on the first date, forget it. Forget it. It's gonna, well, because now what's happened is they have, in a way, They.

Have like power and control and manipulation.

They've given them the ultimate supply. They're not even gonna love bomb that much anymore. They're like, okay, Great, got what I need. And I hate to say this, Louis, because narcissistic people can be very cruel in relationships, they will actually use that as a tool of punishment and manipulation down the road.

How so?

Forgive me for using really bad language, but like you're a slot.

Oh, wow.

Look what you do with your down market. Like who else you do this with? Or what are you gonna go do that with someone else? And so now the person feels shamed in the relationship. But the shame feels plausible because they're hearkening back to an event which might have actually felt connected and intimate at the time, but a narcissistic person will always weaponize those experiences. So it leaves a person often questioning themselves. They're like, I don't think of myself as sort of a sexually wanton person, and they're not. They just felt some sense of trust and connectedness that particular time, but the narcissistic person will run with it. So that's why I'm saying, since you don't know the person's a narcissist on the first date, Best not have sex with them.

How can you know if someone's a.

Narcissist on the first date? You can't, I mean, unless it's glaring. I mean, the only giveaway, and I would never want anyone to get into a car with someone on a first date, 'cause I actually think that's dangerous. I think it's too closed in, and that's me in the sort of scary world that Dr. Romney occupies. But if you were in a car or watching them drive, I don't know why you'd watch them drive, but narcissistic people drive quite dangerously. It's often an interesting tell. I'm not saying, Every dangerous driver is narcissistic, but if you ask me to put $100 down, I'll take the bet every time.

Wow. So what's dangerous mean?

Like the reckless or the reckless? Screaming at people. Reckless, coming, you know, driving too fast, swerving in and out of traffic, driving faster than the other cars on the road, beeping, honking, giving them the finger, but like in a rageful way, like that, researchers, this has been, I can think of a dozen published empirical articles from around the world, driving simulator articles, observation articles, you name it, that have all shown that narcissistic people drive more dangerously. So if you, let's say by day three, you're in a car with them and they're doing that whole, I drove here, right? Took me an hour to drive here. And in that hour, I'm like, narcissist, narcissist. They were cutting me off. And I actually never get into it when that happens because if they are in fact narcissistic, I know they're gonna be short fused. and it could cause me more problems. So I cut them a wide berth. I'm gonna get there when I get there.

Right.

And, but that's often a tell. But other than something that glaring, I mean, sure you could watch how they treat the person who valet parks the car, or the server in the restaurant, or the bartender, or if they're really that unhinged and they're that disinhibited on the first date, that they're rude to these folks, or inappropriate, intrusive, flirty.

Yeah, yeah.

Listen to that. A lot of people say, well, maybe they were a little anxious. I'm like, well, this is how they behave when they're anxious. Do you really want a relationship with this person? That's so I would say that those kinds of tiny tells might come up. I would say that it would be, this is a great one, actually. This came up. Someone I was talking with recently, it was a first or second date, and at the end of the date, it was like one of those times where in a neighborhood, there's lots of stuff to walk to. And the person, the guy said, Hey, you wanna go out to this other place for another drink or whatever? And she said, and she's done the discernment work with me. And she said, and she said, I wasn't, she said to me afterwards, I wasn't feeling it somatically, right? And she said, no, yeah, I've had such a great time. And, but I, and I'd love to see you again. I just, and she said, I've had to work early. And he got really cold and a little bit angry. and she wondered if she was being too sensitive. I said, no, that's a red flag. Because I said, if you just had a lovely time and a lovely dinner and you were to work right, whatever you were to do the next day.

You know, you should respect that.

But you said, I don't want to see you next week or something. Yeah. And the person, what she had said to me is like, I kind of felt like I'd hurt his feelings. And I said, if this is how he's responding to hurt feelings, that level.

Of reactive sensitivity, that's a red flag to me. Wow, yeah. Those are the kinds of early tells that might be.

It's a lack of emotional, I guess.

Awareness or lack of emotional maturity or whatever it might be, right? Yeah, but it's also a dysregulation.

It's a reactivity.

I mean, from the guy, it would be that person.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Dysregulated. Which means he's not emotionally safe himself, I guess.

Maybe insecure or he needs something or whatever. Maybe, and you know what?

I'm sad for him. Go find a shrink. But this isn't her problem. Right, exactly.

No, I get it.

No, more of a sign for her that he's in that state. Correct, correct. That's fascinating. So what I'm hearing you say is one of the greatest skills you can have in spotting Or saving yourself from a potential narcissism.

Or unhealthy relationship.

Or an unhealthy relationship is discernment.

Discernment, slowing down.

Slowing down.

Paying attention.

Paying attention. And really feeling it in your body.

Feeling it in your body.

Now here's something. How do you know when you're feeling something in your body that feels exciting and wow, I have this butterflies and chemistry and connection. How do you know if that's a bad sign or actually something to lean into because you're feeling good as well in your body. Not like, oh, this is exciting and dangerous, but this feels right.

So here's, it's funny, in one of my prior books I write about this at length, but chemistry and connection are really dangerous words to me because they can be trauma bonded words. People say, I don't know what to say, it feels familiar. I'm like, familiar is not good because Again, that's a great example of the body holding something. Now listen, I'm not saying everyone should go date someone they think is a dud. Or like, I felt nothing, so I'm gonna go on a second date.

I'm gonna go right into it.

I'm gonna go right into it. It's more of a, I understand, so what do we mean by connection? I guess that's the problem is when somebody says to me, I feel the sense of connection, my question is, Shrink's gonna be, What does that mean to you, right? Because what you call connection, what I call connection, what a random person on the street calls connection, may be very different things, right? There's healthy feelings of connection, feeling attuned to, feeling seen, feeling heard, a conversation that seems to just flow effortlessly. You don't feel judged, you feel safe. I'll buy that as connection. But connection, when it's sort of like, You kind of feel like you're on your back foot that now you're sort of game on. And how do I win this person over? And it's a little bit of like, you're almost like it's almost like a match. Like how do I sort of, mm-mm-mm. Like it's a little bit gamey. That concerns me. Wow. Because that to me could actually be a throwback to somebody feeling as though I have to win this person over. What are the tricks? And you'll see this in people who have sort of a sympathetic nervous fawn response. Like, How do I have to modify myself to win them? That familiarity, especially if that's how somebody had to go through childhood, can actually feel like connection.

Wow.

Because it's work, it's exciting. Oh my gosh, there's something I need to do. But if one doesn't feel worthy of being loved as who they are and somebody comes and just likes you for who you are, well, that's not very fun 'cause I don't have a template for that. You're almost like, what? Why are you like, mm? But when you're feeling you have to win someone over, that becomes exciting. So I think that that idea of chemistry can make people irrational. Listen, if you have chemistry with somebody who is empathic, compassionate, kind, and respectful, you won the lottery. We call it what it is. You're just a lucky person.

Wow.

Okay. And that's great. And there's people out there who have connection and all those goodies, and they are as blessed by the heavens as a human being can be, right? The majority of people who have sadly, we'll say we had this kind of connection. And that's why I excused the this and excused the that and the this and the that. And you know, it's funny because when I have worked with people who are in more trauma bonded relationships, this idea where it's days hot, cold and hot and cold and back and forth and you keep having the same arguments and you're always justifying. The hack I have for figuring out whether or not someone's in a trauma bonded relationship, I'll have a client who's in a chaotic dating relationship or like a really unhealthy relationship and will sometimes hit the wall is like, I know this is an unhealthy, I love them. And I'll say, okay, right now, take a minute, tell me why you love them. And you know the answer I get when people are trauma bonded? The answer I get or with chemistry, the answer I get is, okay doc, give me a second. Well, You know what? It's, I don't, it's this, I don't know how to describe it. It's like this, I don't know. It's just sort of this, it can connect, that's not an answer. They can't clearly define why they're like- Because it see, and whereas I asked that to healthy people, because I have friends whose marriages are just, they're for the book, they're beautiful. And I'll say to my friend, what? Tell me why you love her. And she's like, oh please, it's my best friend. Like, I love him. Like we've got each other's backs. I feel like, We kind of almost read each other's minds. We do stuff together. He's the first person I want to see in the morning. I look forward to landing on my flights because he's the first person I text. I miss him when I'm not. Those are answers. Nothing trauma bonded, but the whole like, I don't know. That's not good.

How do you know if you're entering in a relationship through trauma bonding?

So I don't think anyone enters in that way, Louis. I think that we are Attraction's a pretty universal phenomenon, right? Although we might find different things attractive, right? Not, I mean, different people find different people attractive. Attractiveness, you know, there's something that sort of, we're attracted to what we're attracted to. We're attracted to whatever is aesthetically pleasing to us, what might feel so much familiar to us, what is sort of normative for our culture. Attraction's attraction. Now remember, narcissistic folks are charming, charismatic, and confident and successful, right? So that is attractive to everybody. which is why everyone's attractive to narcissism. Narcissistic people are attractive to everyone. But trauma bonding is not what gets people into relationships. It's what gets them stuck. So a person might be drawn, for example, in a narcissistic relationship, to the charm, the charisma, the confidence, the attractiveness, the smoothness, the whole thing, the whole package, and say, whoa, wow, whoa. You know, I wanna meet them and you meet them and they're every bit as charming as they were across the room. That's attraction. When you're three months in and this person's gaslighting you and manipulating you and doing shady stuff and invalidating you, and you're making excuses for that, that's trauma bonding. So someplace between attraction and trauma bonding is a process. And that's the process we'd love to be able to short circuit. But the problem is most of that process is something we call love bombing.

No, and it just like brings you into the relationship and makes you feel like you're thinking about them all the.

Time or, How do you pull someone out of a fairy tale?

It's not easy. How do you?

And this is why I'm the last person anyone wants to spend Valentine's Day with. Interesting, it's my clinical day. I'm like, it's best that I just stay locked in with my clients on Valentine's Day and be kept away from everyone else because it's not easy. So when people in the fairy tale, I say to people like, listen, if any of you have the discipline to just eat the top off the cupcake, Do it. But then don't get involved in the stumpy bottom part. Like we don't need that. You want to ride it out? Ride it out, have some fun, do some fun things.

But it's pretty- Two to four weeks and then stop.

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, it's pretty rare for a person to say, okay, I'm- or to leave after the third invalidation or the third shady thing. I'm a big fan of threes. First time happens, it happens. Second time it happens, the coincidence, third time it happens, it's a pattern. And that's when you're like, what's happening here? But that overlap, that overlap period where love bombing turns into devaluation is this demilitarized zone. That's a really dangerous place because it's a, it's where the good stuff is still happening at a pretty good frequency, but the devaluing is starting to kick in. Yeah. And you're now trying to- you- just.

Want the good stuff.

And you want the good stuff.

Go back to the good stuff.

But it's happening enough. You're still getting enough good stuff. It's almost like you're with this. Again, it's all intermittent reinforcement, all trauma bonding. It's not consistent.

It's not consistent. It's a slot machine. I think the last time you were on here, or maybe it was the first time you were on, I didn't really know what narcissism was fully. I was kind of like, and I remember just having all these gasping moments where I was just like starting to realize more and more about the pain of experiencing a narcissistic, either person or narcissistic tendencies from a person. where I had once in a relationship felt so much love for many, many months, and then this intermittent make wrong or you need to change or whatever it was, like this less accepting of me, more shaming of me, diminishing me, trying to change me, but still bringing some of the love, but then it just faded all the way into, you know, 5% of the love and all blame, make wrong, gaslighting type of experiences. and when you first started telling me about this, I was just like, man, this is a, it's a pain. It was, because it's so painful to experience.

It's painful.

And so many people have experienced this in some way, whether it's intimate relationship or friendship or our parents, and it's painful to be in, it's painful to try to get out of, it's painful to heal from. The whole thing is painful.

It is painful. And I'm so glad you brought up that painful part because The simplistic view is this person's mistreating you step away. But for some people, they'll say it feels like cutting off my own arm. And many people, when they're a trauma bonded, will say, I'm feeling like a panic attack at the idea of even considering leaving this relationship, not even having the conversation or considering doing it. And so we can't live in tension all the time. That's not how the human The human nervous system set up and the human psyche is not set up that way. So how do we dissipate that tension? That cognitive dissonance, we call it. We on dissonance it, right? And we make the justifications. So the justifications make us feel less tense. And now we've bought another month, six months, 10 years, you know? And when life gets busy, right? Which is where when people might get married to a narcissistic person, and then there's wedding, wedding, and busy, busy, instead of a honeymoon. Distraction, distraction. Then you have kids. I've worked with so many people. That's why 20 to 25 years is not an unusual time for a marriage with a narcissistic person to break up. Because around that time, everything, like there's no more, there's not so much activity to pay attention to. You're like, I hate this person. I hate them. I don't wanna be in this house with them anymore. But there was so much activity, distractions, or things before.

Work, whatever it was.

You just dealt with it enough, right? Yeah.

Yeah, this is, you know, I have a lot of compassion for people that have experienced this because I just remember thinking, like I would think, how do I get out of this relationship? But it's almost, but I didn't have the courage. Now, I had the courage to do everything else in my life and achieve and go after my goals and have challenging conversations and succeed or whatever it might be, but I lacked the courage to have tough conversations in a previous relationship that kept me in. I lacked the. And when I would think about ending the relationship, I would have heart palpitations.

So what were you afraid of?

Oh, man. Let me go back to this state now, because I feel like I'm in a healthy place now.

Right. Sorry.

But I think I. I think I felt like I was a failure if I couldn't make the relationship work. I think I was thinking. something's wrong with me if they're not accepting of me or loving me, or if they're mad or angry with me, or if they're, I was thinking, how come we can't just go back to the first few months when it was just like, everything was amazing. There was never any stress. There was never any like, make wrong or blame, or you need to change, you can't do that, or you have to do this. None of that. I was like, why can't we just go back to that experience again and have that more continuously? So, but I just also didn't know what a healthy relationship looked like ever. So I never experienced that from the model of my parents.

That's right. that's right.

I never experienced that from all the relationships I had. So I was unable to know somatically, this is healthy, this is the way it's supposed to look, whether we work out or not, you know, based on our values or our vision or whatever. But this feels healthy. Yeah. I never felt healthy in any relationship.

Yeah.

And so I just didn't know.

No, you don't know. And in some ways, ending, so being honest with yourself about that moment in a relationship where this is not good for me. I'm afraid, like you said, I felt a lack of courage, as it were.

And I was also afraid, like, if I end this, this person's gonna go out and try to ruin my life.

Okay, well then, but see, the thing is, that's a real, so those fears, some of those fears are fears based on history, some of those fears are fears based on identity, I'm a failure, Some of them fear is based on potential reality.

Right.

Because if there's one thing anyone, because this is what's challenging about narcissistic relationships, it's actually great when they break up with you. And all my clients will say, what are you talking about? My heart's broken.

I'm like, you,'re gonna be so glad.

About this at some point.

That didn't happen, though. I had to end it.

You had to end it.

So when- They kept saying, Please end this. But they wouldn't do it.

They wouldn't do it. Okay. And then they were like, you,'re breaking everything up. It's your fault. And I'm like, oh my gosh. But when you end it, then something that often happens is a period we call post separation abuse. Oh, okay. And post separation abuse can be everything from stalking to incessant text and email messages to talking badly to you about your friends. Tell your friends reaching out to your phone. Putting on passive aggressive posts on social media when they clearly everyone reads it, knows it's about you. Yeah, of course. And all of that stuff, large or small, I mean, some of the stuff can be, I mean, obviously the most horrific cases, it's physical violence afterwards. But in, you know, what we're talking about is that not as dangerous, but still psychologically dangerous, people kind of know that's gonna happen and they don't want that to happen. And so they say, well, there's one way to avoid this from happening, is to stay in it. Right? But to see one of these relationships, so partly that courage piece is to see a toxic relationship clearly, intimate relationship clearly, especially when we've had no template of healthy relationships or A history of relationships where we've made the accommodations in ourselves to make them work, is that to see, to come into that place of courage, to see clearly that it's not okay and something needs to be done, can give people this tidal wave of terror of, that means all this other stuff in my life was a mess too. And it's terrifying. It opens up this sort of door on our narratives that we sometimes don't wanna look at and examine how these other things have shaped us.

Or examines our parents.

Our parents, exactly. That's my point, is that it feels like too much. But I have to say that, and the other fear that I hear a lot of people have is regret. What if I'm wrong? What if I'm reading this wrong? Those first three months were good, and maybe this is just a bump in the road. And if I walk away from this, and in fact, and I'm out there in the desolation of dating profiles and people's puppy pictures, What am I gonna do? And now, and they will never find.

Someone as good as you.

And the next person's gonna get the better version of them. And so then people go down that rabbit hole and it's almost like that, you know, it's almost you, it's like a kid with a toy. They're like, I don't really want this toy, but I don't want you to have this toy. If you've ever had a sibling, you know, the sibling doesn't give up the ball, but like, you don't want the ball, but I don't want her to have the ball. Right, right. It's that. So they want, so people, that fear of regret, What if I'm wrong? What if they change? What if they change for the next person? What if they move on quickly? They're gonna move on quickly. That's what they do. And all of that. And then I've got a bird in hand and it's so hard to date and all that stuff.

I'm invested a year or two years or four years, 10, whatever it is, right? Okay, gosh. How do you know when you know?

That someone's narcissistic?

That someone's the right person.

The right person.

You know, they say you know and you know, but how do you fully know mentally, spiritually, somatically, this is healthy, this is, or could be the right person for me?

You're, so you're neither indifferent nor ruminating. Does that make sense? And the reason I'm making that distinction.

What does that mean?

Okay, so you're ruminating when it's unhealthy, like you're ruminating the whole drive to work, like, how could he be so, how could he be so, you're asking.

People, all your friends, like, why is this happening and shit?

Right.

What do you think about this and asking for advice?

All that. So that's bad.

Ruminating, yep.

Indifference is bad, because I was gonna say, 'cause you're not thinking about it all the time, but I don't mean not thinking about it all the time, 'cause you're literally indifferent to someone and you're like, if they never call me back, I don't care. Right. I would say that in a good relationship, you are looking forward to seeing them. They're the first person you wanna tell good news to, because you feel validated, that they see something in you that you don't see, that they're genuinely proud of you, that they are, but it's more of the looking forward to them. Like, even at the end of the day, I think I'm always amazed when I was, I have a friend of mine, she's been married for about 30 years, 25, 30 years, and she was visiting me over the summer, And I was listening to her talk to her husband on the phone. And they, I mean, they're an old married couple. Sorry to friend if you're listening to me. You know I'm talking about you. But I was overhearing their conversation and it was so beautiful. It was, he was so solicitous. He works very hard in the summer. She works very hard during the school year. And she wanted to go do all this stuff. And he's like, sweetie, sweetie, you just need some time to yourself. Like, don't put so much on the day. Like, go out there, go with the kids, enjoy the beach. So it wasn't like, oh, you're having a vacation and I'm not. and he's like, I miss you so much, but I'm so glad you're having a good time and can't wait to see you. And she was the tone of their voices. But I'm like, oh my God, after over 25 years, she is as looking forward to talking to him as she probably was when they were first dating. There is a, I have several friends in these situations and there is a, you feel like you sort of, you don't feel like you're looking at a friendship. You feel like you still feel like you're looking at something Special. And I have to say that there's a fantasy of like, imagine if you grew up with parents who had that kind of a marriage, what that does for you, what that does for your heart. But you know what, Louis? There's people out there whose parents were happily married and they end up with narcissistic folks. And that's its own whole kind of.

Mess of a situation.

Whose parents are- Super happy. Whose parents were like, love story. But the what? The kids are narcissistic. No, the kid marries a narcissist. Why? That's a great question.

And I'll tell you why, because I've seen it happen many times. So they're just so compassionate and loving and accepting or how's it work?

So go back to the charm, charisma, confidence, success, all of that stuff, right? So the person's shiny and cool and neat and not, and sometimes that narcissistic person not only love bombs person, they love bomb their family.

Oh yeah.

Right? And so especially a close-knit family where everyone's doing stuff together and so they ingratiate themselves into that system sometimes, right? Especially the happy family that's clearly a united front. But they're not a difficult front. And since they love each other and they love their kids, they believe in love, right? So that kind of cynicism that you'd see in most of the dysfunctional families I know, that they're like, who is this guy? Is more of like, come on in, like, welcome in.

Yeah, they're welcoming.

Yeah, come on in. So much validation, right? So then when things start going wonky, talk about the lack of a template. At least those of us from dysfunctional families were like, I know from messy, okay? Something messy is happening. I don't have a name for this, but they literally have not been to this planet before. They're like, what is this place? They're speaking the language I don't understand. And I'll tell you, this actually can be quite tragic. I consulted once. There was a couple of times, actually, not even once, a few times, with families where, when I remember so well, the parents had been married like 48 years, 45 years, really healthy, did all kinds of wonderful stuff together. and daughter married a narcissist, right? And the parents were almost coming to me like, we don't get this. And they said, we're devastated because these parents literally believe that like, well, he's not a very nice guy. So family court is just gonna give the parents to the nicer person. I'm like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. This is not how this works. Your daughter needs an attorney like yesterday. And they said, well, no, we're already learning this because this process has already begun and we're watching our daughter fade in front of our eyes. And so they said, we did, and they felt very guilty because they felt like they'd given her terrible advice because they kept saying, Trust stay in the house.

Love him more. Love him more.

That's what we do in our family. We just love more. And sometimes that would come in the way of giving him more money. That would just be like, you guys go, go away to the Bahamas for the weekend. We'll watch the kids. Like, so it was just like they were basically giving him supply and he was getting worse and cheating on her more and it was just getting worse and worse and worse. But the family really, they said they were so, and they felt almost a sense of moral injury that they had done something wrong to their child by not seeing this. But Louis, they had no template. And there are people out there who are like, I, they don't know this. They really have this joyful, happy, happy life.

And you wanna trust the people. You wanna trust the world. You wanna be open. You wanna be, you know, vulnerable, all that stuff.

But the good thing is, but there's a good thing is that the woman, did have this happy family who was this tremendous source of support.

That's good.

So as the whole thing fell apart, whereas most people who go through this don't have that. That I was so... so they're not only do they, are they going through this nightmarish divorce or something like that, they don't have a family of origin they can turn to, or the family of origin blames them, or the family of origin was half their problem. So they really, it can sort of.

Double down on their grief.

Man.

Now this thing, four things you said about a narcissist, they're charming, Charismatic, confident and successful, is that right?

Charming, charismatic, confident, successful, curious, attractive. I mean, we can keep going.

Shiny.

Shiny.

Now, is it possible to be charming, charismatic, confident, successful, attractive, and not be a narcissist?

And please- How do you know the.

Difference between the two?

Well, you know, here's how you know the difference. It's, here's the thing. Charm and charisma get supply.

Right?

They're like the fancy pollen-y thing that sticks out of a flower, right? They attract the bees and the birds, right? So there is a, there's an interpersonal skill that's cultivated in the charming and charming and charismatic person. It can happen, right? So how do you know? Because the charming, charismatic, successful, attractive person who's not narcissistic is empathic. They listen, they're warm, they're not, you know, there's always that sort of that vision of the person who's at the cocktail party that is talking to you, but they seem to almost be looking through your head at the door behind you to see if something better is coming in. They don't, you don't get that vibe from them. There is a genuineness. They don't monopolize the conversation. They are, there's a genuine warmth to them. You feel it. I mean, you definitely feel it. and it takes a few hits, you know, sort of a few times up at bat to be sure that that's what you're dealing with. It's a, I mean, listen, I've met charming, charismatic people who are nice, but I've met more that are narcissistic.

It's a pretty rare combo.

Right. Yeah.

Oh man, it's probably rare depending on where you are located in the country as well too, where there might be more. LA is LA, right? Yeah. What is the percentage of narcissists in the country right now, do you think?

This is a number, I mean, I'm going to spitball a number because we have never gotten good prevalence statistics. Here's the problem. There's this thing called narcissistic personality disorder that I don't even concern myself with. It is a clinical diagnosis that can only be issued by a mental health practitioner who spent enough time with a client to actually unfurl these patterns. And no narcissists are going to a therapist. They're often not, and when they do, they're going in for a backdoor reason like addiction, depression, optics, court order, court order, being forced, ultimate them by a spouse, that kind of thing. So, and a lot of therapists don't issue it because it's stigmatizing diagnosis and insurance. You know what I'm saying? It's like the whole world of diagnosis is messy. And usually the way we figure out the prevalence of a disorder is what we call epidemiological studies, where people are brought in and like they're actually just put through the interviews and they're anonymous and it's not going on any record. Right. Those studies of NPD, show one to six percent prevalence, right? But again, in the country. In the country.

Which is like the strong, on the spectrum of narcissism, they're at the highest.

They're at the most, they're in the research studies. I can't even say they're at the highest. And it's one thing I do want to correct, is that just because someone has NPD doesn't mean they're more severe.

It merely means they were diagnosed. That's it.

Does that make sense? It might be others who haven't been diagnosed. We never diagnosed, but they're way worse, right? But if we were to look at across From mild to severe narcissism, because it is on the spectrum. So mild to severe across the population, the spitballed number that I think most of us in the trenches would probably agree with, enough narcissism that it's causing other people problems, 15%. That's my guess. Somewhere between 15 and 20. I say certain parts of LA, 20. Certain industries.

Right, right, right.

But I would say on average somewhere around 15, and that's all types of narcissism too. Which mean 85% of people aren't, which is good.

That's good.

Yeah.

And there's what, four different types of narcissism?

I'd say probably closer to six, but we can go to four. Yeah. What are the- so for, I would say grandiose, which is a traditional, arrogant, pretentious, charming, charismatic, you know, kind of shiny narcissist. That's your kind of prototype of the narcissist. There's the vulnerable narcissist. This is probably, to me, the most compelling form of narcissism because this is where you see The sullenness, the petulance, the passive aggression, the chronic victimhood, the social anxiety, the failure to launch. These are people who live in fantasies of the great things they're gonna do, but they never do them. Wow. The grandiose people actually often do get them done. They will talk the big game and they'll kind of do the big game.

So the vulnerable doesn't mean they're actually intimate and vulnerable with you.

No, no, no.

It means that they- They themselves are vulnerable.

But they don't actually take action.

Correct. And they- And- And- To tell everyone.

I'm gonna do this project or this thing. And you know why I couldn't do it? because that guy didn't give me the money and that guy was scammed me and that, you know, everyone takes advantage of me and that person stole my idea.

That's that.

The vulnerable, okay. The vulnerable, okay. Then there's the malignant. Now to me, the malignant narcissist is the most severe form of narcissism and that's when we talk about stuff like the dark tetrad. And the dark tetrad is composed of narcissism, psychopathy, Machiavellianism, the willingness to take advantage of other people, and sadism. And I also believe paranoia sits in there too, right? So in malignant narcissism, we're talking about people who are more coercive, who are more menacing, who are more isolating. This feels a little bit more like psychopathy, but it's still narcissism and that's much more severe. Okay? Then we have the communal narcissists. Communal. Communal. And these are the folks who get, so all narcissistic folks need validation. The communal narcissistic folks are interesting. 'cause they get their validation by being perceived as saviors, rescuers and do-gooders.

Like cult leaders or more?

That's a severe- so a cult leader would be a communal malignant narcissist. That would be- okay. These are like cocktails, right? These are like you move every, you put it all together. At the extreme, a communal malignant narcissist cult leader. But some communal narcissist could be a mother who does all the activities and the PTA and is the helps the little league and raises the money and goes to the galas and goes home and screams at her kids and is horrible and abuses her partner.

But on the surface, it looks like.

She'S- They think she's a saint amongst us. It's the person who walks around and everyone thinks they're humanitarian and people are like, no, no, no, I worked for.

Their nonprofit and like they were with the hellscape, right?

When you look behind the curtain, you see- Bingo. So that's the communal narcissist. So they get validation. by being, by the sense of look what a good person they are. They're rescuing puppies and they're doing this thing and they're raising all this money and they're so good.

But behind the scenes, they're not.

Not. So it's not saying if people do nice things, they're communal narcissists. It's that they continue to have the lack of empathy, entitlement, all that other stuff.

So it's like you can, you know, 'cause I'm like, okay, well, you know, I wanna build a community and serve people. So how do you build a community? You've got a big audience. How do we build communities without that becoming a thing? Is it just because if you're not consistent with service all around you and your relationships, then you're more so, I.

Mean, are you being mean to other people? So if I was public facing, you.

Look like the best thing ever, but behind the scenes, you're mean to your.

Partner, you're mean to your family, you're mean to your people who work with you. You're inconsistent.

Well, you're consistent.

You're consistently mean to the people who are behind the curtain here. Consistently sort of putting on a show in front of the curtain.

Yeah, but you're not consistent on both ways. No, no, and that's the service mindset.

Okay, commute. No, communal. And then there's the self-righteous narcissist. And the self-righteous narcissist is judgmental, moralistic, rigid. They're often funky with money. They will, like, they will, this would be a kind of person who has so much money and someone in their family has a hardship. They had a job loss and then their kid needs medical care and they'll say, well, I didn't create this situation, so I guess you'll have to figure it out. They have no heart. Like this is, it feels like no heart, but there's also this really rigid judgmental, and they judge people from the sense of, well, look at all I built. I guess I must have worked hard. They'll never account for their luck, right? Or sometimes their absence of bad luck, that kind of thing. They will say, if they say dinner's at six and you show up at 6:30 because your kid got sick, they'll say, I'm sorry we already ate. So it's very, it feels very rigid, cold, moralistic, miserly, obsessive. These are people who are often workaholics and with little care for how it would affect anyone. And it was like, there's workaholics out there who check in on other people, like, I'm gonna make time for you. Sure. Or once, and we're gonna do, we're taking a vacation when this is done, whatever, and they're communicating and people are.

Aware, okay, they're doing this so we could buy the house or whatever.

So is it possible to be self-righteous and not be a narcissist in them? I don't think you can ever be self-righteous and healthy. Because I think if you're self-righteous, you're like, I'm better than you. Ah, gotcha. Right, so you'll even see self-righteous narcissism in some of these kinds of exercise zealots who are like, I wake up at 4 a.m. and then I milk my goat and I make a smoothie and then I do raw thousand crunches and run 10 million miles and then I work and then I journal and then I this and I sleep at eight o'clock and I'm like, what are you talking about? Is there no other human being in your life? How do you deal with a crying sister? I tell her to go to hell and I drink more goat milk. You know, I mean, it's that, that can be sub, like, and the reason I'm in shape and I'm gonna live to be 179 years old is because I do all this and you don't, you lazy, awful person.

That's self-righteous.

Lacking compassion, lacking understanding. It's lack of awareness of others. So that self-righteousness is sort of where the lack of empathy sits, right? So I don't think you can be self, I don't think there's good self-righteousness. I don't think all self-righteous people are narcissistic, but many people said to me that self-righteous narcissism is really what happened in their family of origin. It was apparent. So there would almost be this unrealistic expectation that the child would adhere to rigid, obsessive rules like, Don't touch this, don't do this, don't sit there, eat like this. And so the kid never got to be a kid.

Okay, number six.

And number six would be more of a neglectful narcissist. So these are the people who They will not, they view everyone as object, so coffee cup, whatever, and they just neglect them until they need them.

They just discard them. Or they just don't give them attention.

Or energy, or- They don't attune, they don't have to give them attention, they don't attune to them. They don't, they, when a person around them is struggling, they won't care.

It's a lack of empathy.

It's a lack of empathy, but it's a lack of, like for example, a malignant or a grandiose narcissist might actually get mad at someone. Like, oh my gosh, why do you keep talking to me? And people in relationships with neglectful narcissists will say, I'll take it, because at least that person was listening. But people in these relationships will literally feel like they're losing their minds because the person with them is literally not noticing them. Unless they need something from them.

Wow. So they're giving the cold shoulder. They don't speak to them for days, whatever.

Yeah, whatever. They just don't notice, they don't care. They won't know. Like you might say, like, I have the biggest presentation of the year next week. They won't even ask. Wow.

It's all about them.

It's all about them, but in this weird way. And they don't even take notice of other people. So it is a people, I've known clients in this experience and they'll say, It's as though I didn't exist. But then when I had the piece of information or something they needed, I existed. So you feel like a really neglected personal assistant.

Oh my gosh. Now, have you seen any research on if men are more narcissistic than women?

So it depends on the type of narcissism. Malignant and grandiose, definitely more men than women. vulnerable narcissists a dead heat.

Really? What about just in general, are women more narcissistic than men or is it?

I think in general, we're at a time.

And a social media and you know, the self-ication of everything and the filter-ocation and constantly showing yourself. A lot of men are doing that, but it seems to be more women are doing that because they're getting validated on social media.

Correct. So the question becomes then, what we have to be careful is if a person's posting a lot to social media, getting the likes, influencer, all that, can't assume that every influencer is a narcissist, right? So I'd have to talk to them and say, are all influencers narcissistic? No, put them in front of me and I wanna see what kind of human being they are. Let me spend a couple of days with them, I'll tell you then if they're narcissistic or not. I definitely think a narcissistic person would be a better influencer because they'd be able to do the job better because of what it requires, if that makes sense, right? because it's very performative. It's very, how do I get the most validation? It's, it's, it, that's the outcome variable. So they're going to be stronger, just like a strong person would be better at loading trucks. I would not be good at that job. I could do it, but it'd be really slow. Sure. The same thing with a really nice person's like, oh, I, this is why I'm so bad at book promotion. I'm like, I feel bad asking people to spend money. They're like, no, no, no, it's a good book. It's okay to ask them, but like, I'm just not, I'm not good at that. So I just wouldn't, I'm saying some people are really good at that because that narcissistic quality, that's why narcissistic people are great salespeople and that's why they're so successful. In fact, that's why they're overrepresented in CEO ranks because CEOs often come up through the sales kind of model, right? So the, but the, it is, I still think at this point in history, Louis, it is more men than women for a couple of reasons. I think part of it is how men and boys are socialized around emotion. They are taught emotion is bad, emotion is ridiculous, emotion is weak, emotion is vulnerable. In 2024, I recently saw a, there was, I was in a Target or store or something like that, and I was watching a mother interact with her son and the son was flossing or he'd fallen on the floor or something, and she's like, stop it, boys, don't cry, stop it. I was like, I almost started crying in the store because I'm thinking, if this is what I'm seeing in the store, this poor boy is hearing all day. His emotions are not okay and he's weak. And I still think boys are told to toughen up. Girls will cry after a soccer game. My girls cried after their soccer games, right? There are lots of cry and we're fine with it. We comfort them. But if a boy does that, they might have to face the humiliation with their peers. They might have to face anger from a parent. And so I think boys and men are still not, I think we've come a long way, don't get me wrong, but we've got a ways to go. and because of that, that emotion's gotta go somewhere. And I think that can often become a core wound that can show up as narcissistic defenses. So I think women are allowed to do that. Women also are socialized for more sociality. They're trained more, if you will, not trained, raised more, socialized more to turn to others for support and help. And men, what did the whole colonoscopy test? Ask a 50-year-old guy if you've got someone to drive you home from your colonoscopy who's not your wife. and a lot of men say, I don't have that one. And that's a bad, bad answer. So the colonoscopy test is a great example of how, so, and I have like, and I know most women say I have like 15 people I could call. Lots of people would bring me home from my colonoscopy.

Who's to blame for creating narcissists?

I mean, it's, listen, this is a social developmental phenomenon, right? They're not born, no one's born narcissistic, right? If you want to use that definition, if a baby's narcissistic, they are not helping and they're not paying attention to your feelings, but they're expecting you to do all this stuff for them, right? But it's a babies are born, children are born, small people have temperaments, right? You had one. I had we. And we ask your parent about what your temperament was like. Some kids are. And if you have siblings, you might have all had different temperaments. Okay. And some kids are easy and they soothe easy and they laugh a lot and they go to sleep and you could take them anywhere and they're just. lovely. And that's just, and they often grew up to be lovely people. And then some kids are just tough. They're just like a screwed up tantrum ready to happen from the day they're born. They don't soothe easily, they don't sleep well, they're fussy. And then as they grow up, they might be more externalizing, they act out more, they get in more trouble in school. Those are, in fact, when those, they're often the kids, I'm always like, get this kid into sports, because this is gonna be such a great channel for this kid, like something physical. Just something, just the energy, just the vibe, something. And so they'll get that validation, but sit in school at a desk all day, it's tough for those kids. And so they get a lot of invalidation, kids that are more externalizing, but there can be kids who have that kind of go, go, go temperament, but who aren't difficult. There were sweet kids, but they just wanna move, right? But that more difficult, antagonistic, it almost feels like a four-year-old who's gone in for a fight. Sure. Sure. Those difficult temperaments, when they come up against invalidating environments, parents who aren't available, parents who are cruel, parents who are rejecting, parents who are abusive, that combination can be a setup for that kind of narcissistic personality. Doesn't always end up that way, but that's definitely sort of a setup for it. So that then becomes, yes, there is a familial origin to this. There can be chaos. Now, This is why in the same family, say there's two or three siblings, one sibling may be narcissistic, but the other siblings aren't. And it might have been a very similar family environment for all of them. -How does that happen? -Temperament, that different temperament in that one kid. And so it could also be that the age at which a seismic event happened in the family, a divorce, a death, something like that, domestic violence might have been observed by one child, but not another child, that kind of thing. Those things might have been differential. depending on the age gap. But this is developmental. Now, the challenge is too that parents, while probably most central and significant, there are other people around the kids. They're beyond parents. There's other caregivers. There's grandparents.

Coaches, teachers.

Coaches, teachers. And so all of those people shape that in the kid. But in some cases, it's not just a neglect pathway. There's also parents who tell their kids, you're more special than anybody else. You're the most special kid. No line for you. No waiting for you.

Parents, Do that to their child where they tell them you're the most special thing in the world. You deserve everything you want. I'm gonna give it to you and you deserve to cut the lines or whatever. What are you saying to that child?

You're telling them, so these kids go on one of two very different pathways. One group of them go on to become narcissistic. Well, I am more special than anyone else. So, my mom is the most special. That's how I am. And so they'll be very demanding in the classroom. They'll be demanding with peers. They'll be entitled. They'll walk through life entitled, right? That sort of spoiled little rich kid kind of model, right? But another group of them who may not have shared that temperament, this different group, will grow up with a tremendous sense of shame. You know, that like, I'm not more special. And so they'll feel there's this sort of inner conflict that happens. You know, like, I'm not as smart as this person. Or I better perform in a way that shows that I'm special. So if things don't go the way they want, then they feel bad. And there's a new phenomenon I saw documented that with all the sort of, helicopter-y over parenting we're seeing that some of these kids who are like, okay, my parents kind of did everything for me. I kind of can't do not much for myself. You're seeing a vulnerable narcissism form in them where they're almost angry at the parents who made it too easy. So nobody, no parent wins at this, I can tell you now. And it's very painful for parents whom I'll tell you where this is the most painful, because I always, I know how painful it is for a parent who has an adult child who's narcissistic, right? Because those parents will often sit and say, I know something in that early environment had something to do with it. And the most painful cases, it's when a person, a lovely person, was married to a narcissistic person and that toxic environment against that kid's temperament or the narcissistic parent really indoctrinated that child. And I've watched parents go through this and it's really a living hell because it's really where you have some of your most unconditional love and it's your kid and your kid hates you and is behaving in this terrible, manipulative, entitled, brutal way. It is absolutely awful. I have to say that is the clinical population. The group of clients that's the most difficult and heartbreaking for me are the parents of adult children with narcissism. Because they have to watch their kids-.

And they feel partly responsible. And they're like, oh, I raised that child.

I raised that child. What did I do?

What did I do wrong? to cause this.

So there's a tremendous sense of moral injury. And shame and guilt and everything. There's shame, there's guilt, there's loss, there's grief. It's terrible.

It's the worst. You have to live with that for.

The rest of your life. You have to live with that the rest of your life. It's almost like being married, I guess, to a narcissist. It's even worse because there is a devotion you feel to a child in many ways that for these folks, they've had to say, I have to step away from my own child. Devastation. It's devastation.

What are three things that you think a parent could do when they have a child to set themselves up to raising a healthy, non-narcissistic human being?

Attune to the child in an appropriate way. Not, you,'re so great, but like, Hey, sweetie, what are you doing? And listen to the answer. You know, I know you've talked, I believe you have talked, I shouldn't assume, Here I've listened to enough of your episodes, but not all of them. Is have you ever talked to anyone like from the, who does a Gottman.

Therapist or does Gottman-esque work? I love those guys. Yeah, the two, the Gottmans. I want to have them on.

I haven't had them on yet. Okay, so you should have them on. Yeah. What's interesting is, you know, because Gottman's work actually doesn't always work well with narcissistic couples. But where, what I, one thing I do like about the Gottman model is he talks a lot about attunement, right? And I think that that model of attunement matters even more in parenting. So what Gottman talks about is that how important is, for example, in a couple, you know, and I'm sure you saw this whole phenomenon on TikTok play out, which was this idea of the bird test. Did you hear about the bird test on TikTok?

Yeah, where it's like someone's paying attention.

Or asking about the birds or, yes, and you have to attune. So the whole idea is like, if you're in a relationship with someone, even if they're asking you to pay attention to something as trivial, it's like, look how pretty that bird is out the window. That was the whole TikTok trend was, that the partner would actually lift from what they're doing and doing. Oh yeah, that's attunement, right? That many times when you're in relationships, you're saying, how do we know a relationship is healthy? That you don't keep scrolling on the phone. Like you even say, like, you might turn to your partner and say, oh my God, that is so cool. Give me one second. I really want to come pay attention to that. And maybe you have to turn off a button so you don't burn down the house. And you're like, okay, let me come see this. That's attunement. Children need that more than an adult does. So, for the child to know that when they make that call to the parent, that the parent responds to, may a parent doesn't mean, may a parent drops what they're doing, but the parent will be like, hey sweetie, oh, give me a second, I'm gonna come right over and see.

And then you do go and see.

As opposed to neglect constantly. So like, you know, either literally ignoring them or continuing to watch the TV.

Or this is the one I see all the time is the parents on the phone. Parents in front of kids looking at.

Their dad or their mom saying, hey, look at me. And they're just ignoring them. And the parents are on the phone. I mean, I've seen parents walking their kid in a stroller and the stroller literally has a thing that allows them to be on their phone. And I'm like, no, this is such a good moment to stare at the baby.

Be present.

And be present. So attunement and so that the child knows that with number one, number two, listen to their needs without judgment.

So I feel like I know that they don't need this.

Okay, so but let's say the child says, I need three new video games. Okay, it's like, okay, let's talk about that. You got one video game and that video game's working fine. you might want to talk to them and say, like, listen, you know, we can talk a little about how we got that video game.

Right, right.

But my point is that you're not saying, you spoiled piece of you know what, how dare you ask me for a video game. But that's usually not what kids are asking for. You know what? When a kid is expressing a need, mommy, will you come, you know, read.

A book or something?

They're like, bored. Not even bored, it's more than that. Children, attachment is a survival need, right? So children are always making these plays for attention to their parents because They want to feel secure in the world.