How do you grieve for a narcissistic parent?

Answer 1

Is this elderly person really narcissistic or are they suffering from Dementia or Alzheimers. My bet is on the last two. These are the symptoms:

ParanoiaAccusing others of stealing or doing things they are notArguementativeCryingRagesMemory loss Regaining memory for short periods of timeStriking out at the caregiver (kicking, slapping)Abusive languageAlienating themselves from family and friends

These are only a few of symptoms. I went through this with my own mother and took it personally for awhile. Then I realized through the doctor after she had an MRI scan done on her that she was indeed suffering from Dementia. They put her on a drug called "Resperidol" and she was almost her old self. Unfortunately, this drug is not a cure, but does slow down the retardation of Dementia and Alzheimers.

I do sympathize with you, but please, if you can, have this person evaluated by their family doctor before making judgment calls against them.

Good luckMarcy

AnswerThere is no dementia present in my father. He is a classic narssist. At the ripe age of 93 he only becomes more vile each and every day. I despise him for abusing my Mother, myself and sexually abusing both my children. My father so severly damaged my son that he lives on disability after graduating with a masters degree.

As my Mother lay dying in her hospital bed, he came to visit her once, I refused to bring him, she had suffered enough. One thing my Mother despised was to have her feet touched and the first thing he did was tickle her feet. After her death and during the funeral arrangements we had agreed on mid-grade funeral. My brother had ben buried in a copper tone casket, I found it more than appropriate to bury mother in the same kind of casket. My father was all for it, later that night I overheard him speaking to another family member that he had wanted her buried in a white casket. Liar, and classic N signature. I always bought my Mothers' clothes and chose what I wanted her buried in and that turned into another war. What does a 93 year old man know about fashion and how a woman should be buried and presented at death? She wore a beautiful Calvin Klein suit, which I knew she loved. So, now I am stuck with father all the time, leaving my own home and husband. My father and I constantly fight and I feel so guilty, but I know that is all part of his game. He will not take his heart meds, he must have them delivered like Mother used to do. I will not. He complains about his menu, because it is not like Mothers. On and On he goes about everyhting, until I explode.

My son was a huge help to me at first, but then father smarted off to him about leaving a faucet dripping. The faucet has been dripping for 12 years. My son, is very verbal and really ripped into him and I thought he might even try to kill him because he had picked up a knife. This is the posistion a N puts you in after years of abuse. My son not only suffers from his grandfathers abuse, but the trauma of knowing he physically beat myself and Mother. After that incident my son had to be hospitilized for four weeks.

My whole family has suffered so much due to this horrid man. Selfish,arrogant, and so much more he was, but to everyone else we were the perfect family. I keep his secrets no more and finally expose him for what he is-NOTHING.

Answer 2

You grieve for a narcissistic parent exactly the same way you greive for a perfect one: anger at their death before you could explain to them how you felt with their treatment of you.....you, you, you....and then, you go to acceptance and you get on with that which you should have been doing before their death: living, producing and making life better for all of us, especialy you. You, who felt their pathology for your life and imposed on your existance, you now have them totally dead? Grief? If they were truly narsacisistic, it is not grief, but survival in you that you even could form the question. By now you should have gotten the idea, no real narssasistic, as described by the DSM IV as amended, has the slightest notion of another's grief, pain, nor anything else. That's why they got the lable. Total self absorption: Total discard for other's lives: Total divine rights from Total Entitlement. There is a very old concept: one does not greve for the dead, but the living... By the way, just because you might not have liked them, that does not mean your diagonisis is correct. Check out the DSM-IV as amended. And then, think about it. You might not have used the correct lable. Lableing is easy, getting it right in life is a lot harder.