Narcissism In A Bottle: The Self-Centeredness Of Addiction

Over the years I have listened to a sort of running monologue from clients who grew up with an addicted parent. It goes something like this: "I felt like it was all about them, like what was going on inside of me was sort of invisible, like what they wanted or needed always came first." They go on and on describing a family dynamic that circulated around the immediate needs of the addict. They talk about how they often found themselves staying quiet and "well behaved" so as not to disturb a drunk or hung over parent or bring a torrent of anger down on them. They also describe a world in which their other parent was constantly over burdened, hiding the extent of the problem and working double time to make the family seem "normal." Both parents became absorbed by either addiction or the problems surrounding it.

In this family children tend to fit in or not fit in according to their ability to meet other people's needs. These kids often experience their parent's needs as more immediate and important than their own. And to further complicate this dynamic, children of addiction COA's may experience relief and satisfaction by meeting another person's needs while remaining somewhat unaware of their own. Their own inner worlds can feel somewhat hazy and confusing to them while the worlds of others seem clear and distinct.

Why Living with Addiction Feels Like Living with Narcissism

The narcissist tends to view other people, not necessarily as individuals in thier own right, but as extensions of himself. A narcissist often prefers to have people around him who behave in such a way as to meet and gratify his own needs or enhance his own vision of himself. If they act separately, have too many of their own points of view or their own opinions they threaten the narcissist's equilibrium.

How does this mirror addiction? The addict is ever absorbed with getting their next fix; that's how they maintain their equilibrium, albeit very dysfunctionally. Their needs come first.

The narcissist also tends to be absorbed in themselves and in meeting their next need and rather unaware and even uncaring of the needs of those around them.

Same with the addict: the needs of those around them have to come second to their meeting their own, often overpowering desire for their next "fix" whether it be a drink, drug, food or sexual encounter. Both the narcissist and the addict are first and foremost self absorbed. They come first.

Addiction creates a kind of narcissism. It is constantly preoccupying; it takes a person over body, mind and soul. For those who live with an addict, love them and depend on them to be at the other end of a relationship, life can be discouraging. It's a lot like living with a narcissist because no matter what you do or how hard you try, you will always come second; second to the addict's pressing needs, second to their constant preoccupations, second to the disease.

Freud said that we become jealous of the narcissist because they seem to be so pleasantly oblivious to the feelings of accountability to others that the rest of us are plagued by. "Wouldn't it be nice," we think, "to be free of this burden of awareness of the needs and feelings of others and simply ask ourselves one question, what do I want?" But if you could drill a hole into the inner world of the narcissist or the addict and peek inside you might be startled at the emptiness and loneliness you'd find. Because ultimately being oblivious to the cares and needs of others leaves us feeling like strangers in our own relational worlds. Whatever they are doing to meet their needs isn't working all that well for the long run.

How In Recovery, We Sometimes Misinterpret the Concept of Self Care

Recovery and pop psychology are famous for telling people to "take care of themselves." I see a lot of people in the addictions field confused at just what this means because the models they have seen "taking care of themselves" have been unhealthy ones. COAs don't necessarily learn the difference between healthy self care, the kind that recognizes that you won't be any good to anyone, including yourself, if you let yourself fall apart and the selfish, narcissistic models they have grown up with. They confuse healthy self care with the selfish variety that discounts others. Frustrated and disheartened from years of feeling unseen and unheard, they grab onto the concept of self care and use it to justify gratifying their own needs in the same selfish way that they have seen others do and then wonder at why they feel so lonely. And their self care can be so mixed up with the kinds of fear, guilt and pain that we discussed in our previous two blogs on codependency that they really can't figure out how to take care of themselves and still be well-related and aware of the needs of others.

One of the important tasks of any person is to learn how to be well related to others. Humans are tribal at heart, pack animals if you will. We are always in relationship to someone, it's part of who we are and how we got here in the first place. Learning what to let metter and what to let go of, and how to hang onto our own sense of self while in the presence of others is one of our most important developmental tasks. This is challenging in the most perfect of circumstances but for those who grow up with addicted or narcissistic parents who aren't good at fostering self esteem in others, developing a secure sense of self can be challenging. This delicate process of untangling of conflicting needs and emotions will be the subject of my next blog; "Emotional Sobriety in Relationships".

For further info see Emotional Sobriety: From Relationship Trauma to Resilience and Balance by Tian Dayton, PhD.

Follow Dr. Tian Dayton on Twitter: www.twitter.com/tian dayton

Comments

[zenrin]

Developmentally, the personality disordered person (in this case, the narcissist) has the exact same difficulty as the addict. They both have an inability to self soothe.

The addict is acting out his or her emotional pain through addictive behavior; the narcissist is acting out his or her emotional pain through overcompensatory behavior. They both try to repeat what is emotionally sensed as a "repair" for the pain that doesn't really work. In fact, it most often makes things worse.

Both use externals to bolster their poor self-esteem and soothe uncomfortable affect: shame. Most...if not all... addicts have not developed the ability to self soothe or manage their uncomfortable affect.

This means that they are using external means to try to soothe internal pain. This is, in the long run, impossible. One can't mix apples with oranges. One must heal internal wounds by doing internal work, such as therapy, or a spiritual path to address the root of the problem.

Developmentally, they are in the same stuck place.

[Darren Littlejohn - Huffpost Blogger]

Great article! See my new column on a method to address the narcissistic addict voice:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/darren-littlejohn/cutting-through-the-narci_b_262712.html

[MassInsanity]

Could narcissism be misdiagnosed as addiction? And are the treatments for the two the same? I hope I'm not taking this discussion out to left field.

Here's the thing, if a narcissist craves attention and feels most comfortable when everyone in their life is working around the needs of the narcissist, what better way to do that, but to (subconsciously) feign an addiction? And without treating the root cause of the addiction, which is the narcissism, you never really cure the "addiction." Wouldn't the best way to get around the addiction be to stop feeding it the attention it craves, especially the addictions that stem from narcissism?

Anybody that knows anything about the two feel free to respond.

This article was a total eye opener for me, thanks for the insight!

[outnow]

The money addicts are also narcissitically deprived. Children are being brought up in a culture where the books are cooked as a matter of "national security." Wall Street is a giant casino with numerous ego maniacs who are dishonest. These ego-centered narcissists lack empathy and are uable to be honest. In fact, they circulate into government where they acquire another addicting element- power!

From the parent secretly injecting a drug, to the masters of the universe who cook books, take bailout money, and corrupt politicians, America has become the center for narcissism and capitalis.

Mankind was originally a communal animal. The attitudes, values and beliefs supported sharing of fungible food supplies because you had no ice box to hoard food; you were forced to share.

Now with freezers and individual retirement accounts, people can hoard and not have enough empathy to share. Alcohol reflects similar values - it's all about me and how I feel. Children are being damaged by their addict parents and the narcissistic culture in which we live.

[Grada3784]

Sounds like the shrink who decided that homosexuality was a problem because all his homesexual patients had problems. Until he ran into a shrink whose heterosexual patients all had problems too. Or like Walter alvarez back in the 70's who wrote a book linking addiction, epilepsy, homoseuxuality and other things: if you had an ancestor with one, you could possibly have or be any. Unfortunately for Dr. Alvarez, he didn't realize that if we go far enough, we all have such relatives: A=A.

Narcissism undoubtedly plays a part in addiction, but it is hardly the end-all and be all of it. I think it's call self-centeredness; the world revolves around me; my way or the highway; you're either for us or against us.

As hard been said previously in recovery literature: There's nothing worse than a confused psychologist.

[monsterofNone]

spoken like a narcissist.

[Grada3784]

How so?

Of course, as an alcoholic and drug addict, even in recovery, i do have to watch out being self-centered.

[NoFooling]

Thank you for this most insightful post. After 40 years of trying to come to grips with this subject, this is the first perspective that has made both intellectual and emotional sense to me in such a way as to be useful and applicable.

[Gregorio]

Functional narcissism, i.e. induced by addictive processes over which the addict has little or no control, is not the same as a narcissistic personality disorder. Addictive disease is real, multidetermined but following a course that leads to destruction of the addict and those who love them. For the child, perhaps, there is little difference, but there are also children of schizophrenics, of bipolars, of brain injured, etc. These difficult situations also impair developmental social relationships, and could also be labeled (functional) narcissists, i.e. unable to establish and/or sustain a reliable empathic connection. But I would argue that any such formulation, while useful to the psychotherapy of a COA or ACA for example, reverts to a moral view of this debilitating predicament and is not useful to deconstructing the addictive process. Most addicts are not REAL narcissists when they get clean and sober, maybe retaining certain emotional impairments, but also by and large able to maintain healthy relationships in their sobriety. What is needed is a serious national commitment to addictions research. Brain chemistry, stress related dysfunctional behaviors, adverse childhood experiences, all contribute to the outcome, but this is a problem than cannot be addressed with just labels. If I have misinterpreted your article, I would be interested in any elaboration.

[maxfax]

I believe you hit the bullseye.

[HeyHey09]

I agree that most sober addicts probably aren't true narcissists, but when an addict refuses to seek treatment and stubbornly defies everyone, would rather face prison time than rehab, then who cares if the person isn't a true narcissist? The wake they leave behind feels and hurts just the same.

[dieselis]

Generally speaking when it comes to looking out for others well being, were all with few exception fall in the arms of me first. Its not what you've done for me. Its whats the next thing on deck. That you'll do. Takers out weigh givers by no small amount. Some dude named Maslow a higherarchy of needs. Basically were just selfish to no end or the end. Which ever comes first.

[maxfax]

I don't believe you know very much about addiction at all. The largest number of addicts are alcoholics, because it is the easiest drug to legally obtain, and those alcoholics have ruined families for hundreds of years, and continue to do so. Addiction is a family disease, in case you weren't aware of this. People who are addicts, and I'm certainly not advocating for them, but they are very sick individuals who need an intervention and treatment, but generally unless you can come up with $30K or more, treatment is a fantasy for most families. Self-centeredness is the least of their problems.

[proudem]

The author did not discount nor lessen the addiction disease. He was simply making a comparison between narcissism and addiction. The more we understand addiction, the better we are able to treat the condition.

[ubeman]

What addiction is is hating yourself and feeling overwhelming guilt and shame that you put your drugs and/or alcohol first. You think about what you have to do to get more, hide it, and pay for it. Gotta watch the kids for a weekend? You think about what your gonna need to feel 'ok' so you can attend to them. You try and act sane/sober. You can't do the things you know you should because you spent all the money on drugs/booz­e...again, so you lie to them...again, and make promises...again. Getting sober does not mean thinking of yourself. It means thinking of others needs in all you do. It also means you put your recovery first.

[ctdemocrat]

Could we *please* stop tossing around the "narcissist" label? It's actually very difficult to meet the clinical definition -- & if we ignore the clinical definition, applying the term to everything from addiction to celebrity, what the hell is the point of having it in the first place? Don't we just mean "self-centered?" Granted, "narcissism" gets more blog readers because it's the hipster psycho-label of the moment, but that doesn't seem like much of a justification to me.

[Montgriz]

I disagree. Narcissism is a more clinical term used in a highly charged atmosphere of addiction studies. Self centered is the generalization of what could be narcissistic but merely a facet of narcissism. However, the point you seem to miss is that addiction is more than a sum of its parts....

[Goosed]

The word has been around far longer than the DSM. You can be obsessive without having OCD. You can be paranoid without having Paranoid Personality Disoder. ..and you can be a narcissist without having Narcissistic Personality Disorder.

[HeyHey09]

I don't think the author is throwing around the label. I think there are true eye-opening correlations between narcissism and addiction, especially when it comes to being interpersonally exploitative, unable to feel empathy, their needs coming first, and so on. At least, it feels remarkably the same. I think addiction rises to much, much more than simply being self-centered. That is just too weak of a word for it.

[blastocyst]

Triangulates my perception precisely.