2024 Author: Harry Day | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 15:43
The risk of depression in narcissistic disorder is associated primarily with the breakdown or ineffectiveness of habitual compensatory strategies.
In the stereotypical life cycle of narcissistic personalities, periods of successful narcissistic activity, or narcissistic “healthy compensation”, are replaced by periods of narcissistic “failures,” narcissistic “weakness,” during which the narcissistic personality cannot maintain a sense of grandeur.
The narcissistic personality does not experience specifically depressive feelings of sadness, sadness, guilt and feelings of self-worthlessness, and the feeling of emptiness comes to the fore.
The depressed patient is worthless and unhappy, his world is black, tragic and full of pain; the narcissistic patient, on the other hand, is pessimistic, frustrated, and his world is gloomy, fictitious, and full of failures.
The narcissistic personality is not plagued by the bad-good dilemma; he sees himself as “potentially good,” but unable to demonstrate his capabilities. The responsibility for the "failures" lies with the fate and essence of the world. The pessimism of narcissistic personalities is accompanied by arrogance, views of the world are characterized by ridicule and contempt. Pessimistic narcissistic personalities tend to be very active in imposing a pessimistic vision of the world and the desire to convince others that in such a world nothing can really be achieved.
Dysphoric "splashes" are replaced by short periods of relaxation with a subjective feeling of relief. Shvrakich conducts a structural-dynamic analysis of narcissistic decompensation. He stresses that most narcissistic patients maintain normal ego functions. After a series of narcissistic cycles, normal ego functions test the inner reality and identify the inner source of constant resentment, tension, and low self-esteem that undermine the narcissistic grandeur. During the period of decompensation, normal Ego-functions direct aggression to the core of grandeur - to the “specialness” of the self. Without nuclear “specialty,” the Grandiose Self collapses, “empties”. According to Shvrakich, the pessimistic mood is a compromise way out of the conflict between unrealistic grandeur and the continued ability to test reality due to normal ego functions. The imposition of one's opinion on pessimistic patients reflects the basic activity of the defense mechanisms of projective identification and omnipotence. Dysphoria with intervals of relaxation indicates the leading role of projection. The paradoxical manifestation of feelings of superiority and arrogance reflects the fact that pessimism is becoming a new "peculiarity", a new "core" of grandeur. Although Shvrakich himself, the authors of the review note, does not reveal this, but his ideas about pessimism as a new "core" of the Grandiose Self echo the ideas of A. Adler that even the experience of suffering can be used as an excuse for feeling his own chosenness and similarity to God (by 1).
There is a point of view that the central mechanism of narcissistic decompensation and depression is narcissistic perfectionism, based on the leading motive - the embodiment of perfection and gaining recognition and admiration. The impossibility of abandoning this motive is due to the lack of replacement in the form of other motives and forms of existence. If the satisfaction of this motive for some reason turns out to be impossible, life becomes empty and uninteresting; jealousy, resentment and self-dissatisfaction ultimately lead to depression. Based on this reasoning, the authors define narcissistic depression as the subjective collapse of the main goal in life - the goal of embodying excellence and personal excellence (2).
Literature:
1. Clinical psychology of the loss of self / Sokolova ET, 2015, p. 83-87.
2. Narcissism, perfectionism and depression / Kholmogorova, Garanyan // Moscow Psychotherapeutic Journal, 2004, No. 1, pp. 18-35
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