Trump and Narcissism

[_Jersey Girl]

Narcissist or no, Donald Trump is going through a very tough time as a human being. In one week, his brother dies and his sister's recorded voice describes him as a cruel man with no principles. The Democrats hold a convention where an unprecedented group of Republicans align themselves with the Democrats against Trump. His former campaign manager is arrested in a conspiracy to defraud a fund to build the wall that the President promised would be payed for by Mexico. And 8 years of his taxes will eventually come into the hands of fraud investigators.

I haven't kept up with the taxes thing. But yeah, you know what all of that represents to a narcissist? The one thing every narcissist avoids at all costs--narcissistic injury. That's what makes someone like him lash out and cause chaos. That's why he relies on misdirection as a main weapon.

Desperation is the order of the day. Biden hates God. Send troops to polling places. The FDA is run by the deep state. The very real question is whether Donald Trump will accept a defeat at the polls. He has not indicated that he would.

Yeah he's desperate alright. The sad thing is that he's chronically bankrupt when it comes to self awareness. He doesn't know we can all see he's desperate. He's throwing everything but the kitchen sink at everything that comes out---trying to avoid that narcissistic injury I just mentioned above.

The Pandemic has crippled the President's (second) favorite tool of communication: speaking to a rally of adoring fans. For 90 minutes at a time, he gets to inhabit a world where everything he says is happily accepted as gospel. Now adoring crowds are few and far between and the questions about 170,000 Covid-19 deaths dwarf anything he may have accomplished.

He needs those rallies like a junkie needs a fix. That's what provides his narcissistic supply. But don't go by me! Apparently half the daily keynotes for the upcoming GOP Convention are his family members. That's pretty darn embarrassing. :redface:

If I had to guess about Trump's theme (as much as it is separate from the GOP) it will be martyrdom. This monstrous injustice being done to him. How he was doing such a great job until the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune brought him down.

Yeah, probably something like that. Yet another conspiracy theory...the fix was in or something. Funny. He didn't seem worried about the fix being in with regard to Russian interference in 2016. But I think we're starting to see why.

I really do think that the guy is caving right in front of our eyes on a daily basis right now. I think we might do well to brace ourselves. A narcissist dead set on avoiding narcissistic injury and with the powers he has at his disposal can be pretty darn lethal.

p.s. And what is this stuff about withdrawing troops from Germany? Sorry...that was an afterthought not intended to derail.

[_Doctor CamNC4Me]

Huh. I just learned something new - narcissistic injury. From some link:

“A narcissistic injury occurs when narcissists react negatively to perceived or real criticism or judgment, boundaries placed on them, and/or attempts to hold them accountable for harmful behavior. It also occurs when a person does not accommodate a narcissist’s insatiable need for admiration, special privileges, praise, etc. The “injury” also shows up when the narcissist over-amplifies and personalizes benign interpersonal interactions. It can also come out when a person with no malintent does not meet the narcissist’s impossible-to-achieve desires for high levels of praise and admiration.

The “injury” is often followed by the narcissist’s loss of control over his or her emotional equanimity, and a subsequent burst of passive or overtly aggressive vindictive responses. These bouts of emotional tumult are referred to as emotional dysregulation, as the activated narcissist emotional reaction spikes and often is beyond his or her control.

...

The hair-trigger “injury” reaction is a direct result of attachment trauma the narcissist suffered as a child, often because of an abusive, neglectful, or depriving narcissistic parent. As much as I make a case for the distressing nature of attachment trauma, the agonizing experience for the child who is to become a Pathological Narcissist is far worse.”

Huh. I bet Fred Trump really did a number on the Donald. I wonder what role his mother played in Donald’s pathos... protector or enabler?

- Doc

[_Jersey Girl]

Huh. I just learned something new - narcissistic injury. From some link:

“A narcissistic injury occurs when narcissists react negatively to perceived or real criticism or judgment, boundaries placed on them, and/or attempts to hold them accountable for harmful behavior. It also occurs when a person does not accommodate a narcissist’s insatiable need for admiration, special privileges, praise, etc. The “injury” also shows up when the narcissist over-amplifies and personalizes benign interpersonal interactions. It can also come out when a person with no malintent does not meet the narcissist’s impossible-to-achieve desires for high levels of praise and admiration.

The “injury” is often followed by the narcissist’s loss of control over his or her emotional equanimity, and a subsequent burst of passive or overtly aggressive vindictive responses. These bouts of emotional tumult are referred to as emotional dysregulation, as the activated narcissist emotional reaction spikes and often is beyond his or her control.

...

The hair-trigger “injury” reaction is a direct result of attachment trauma the narcissist suffered as a child, often because of an abusive, neglectful, or depriving narcissistic parent. As much as I make a case for the distressing nature of attachment trauma, the agonizing experience for the child who is to become a Pathological Narcissist is far worse.”

Huh. I bet Fred Trump really did a number on the Donald. I wonder what role his mother played in Donald’s pathos... protector or enabler?

- Doc

I'm surprised that this is new to you. You have a far deeper understanding of psych than I do! I've been harping on his attachment issues for a good long while here, though not lately. If I owe you an apology for anything, it's yours. Yes, this is why Trump goes off like he does. It's why he cuts people off and cuts people out. It's why he stirs up humongous sh-it storms to thwart the pain of narcissistic injury and draw attention away from the matter. It's the one thing that makes him experience real pain. And you can say...like I have prior to this, that it's not his fault what was done to him as a child. You can say he's a broken man, because he is. Through no fault of his own, he was broken as a young child and on some level, we can have compassion for him or pity on him.

But he simply doesn't belong in the position of power that he was elected to and it's our job to get him out.

I think if you dig around a bit (I've mentioned these things before) there was something like a 2 year period (don't quote me on this) where his mom was unavailable to him on account of health issues. Something like age 2-4. Again, don't quote me. Cam, that is the exact time frame when personality is developing and empathy develops (around age 3-ish I'd say).

So...take a child whose emotional development isn't being addressed by a nurturing mother (I'm making assumptions) and maybe let a nanny take over. Meanwhile, let a sociopathic father like Fred Sr. enter the picture who praises the kid (who needs emotional nurturing) for being tough, for not showing emotion, "big boys don't cry", and for his external accomplishments....and let that father impact the child from birth to adulthood.

And you get Donald Trump.

Now put him in the White House. You get a President who puts kids in cages and separates them from their families--to scare the parents, who isn't ABLE to give a damn about the children whose attachment he's fu-cked with. And just add to that every other damn stunt he's pulled from the campaign and onward including using say Cohen to do his dirty work and in the next breath denying that he knows anything about it because he avoids taking negative responsibility at all cost.

He likes Putin. He sees Putin as a powerful man much like his father---who he admired and respected because he was strong and Donald damn well knew it at an early age. Not strong as in educated or insightful, or self controlled, strong as in ruthless. So Donald modeled himself to be like him...until he actually becomes him.

Well that is the best I can do on short notice here. I'm basically riffing off what I already know to be true about personality development, articles I've read, his niece's interviews, comments made by his ex-staffers, the behavior I see before me, and some YouTube psych's who do a bang up job of helping regular folks understand narcissism, of which Dr. Grande is one. There's another great psych on YouTube if you'd like the name of the channel I'm willing to share.

[_Gunnar]

Perhaps he just has good taste in the people he likes. Perhaps it's hard not to love yourself when you're Donald Trump.

I certainly love that man and always will.

Why? when so many of his now ardent sycophants were strongly and even mercilessly critical of him until he was elected, at which time their disgust for him almost instantly switched to loyalty and adoration, like flicking a light switch?

For examples: Ted Cruz, Lindsey Graham, Nikki Haley, Rand Paul, Kellyanne BEFORE Trump was paying her, and this is just a small sampling of the many Trump associates and supporters who were disgusted by him before he gained power.

Why do you suppose it is that so many former critics and haters of Trump suddenly switched 180 degrees in their opinion of him at almost the same instant he was elected? Kellyanne's case is, of course, the most obvious. She switched as soon as she became on his payroll!

[_Jersey Girl]

OOOooo OOoo! i just discovered Dr. Grande has a playlist for Narcissism! He's got 44 videos. This one is applicable to this thread. 15 minutes and change.

9 Signs of Narcissistic Rage | Reactive & Instrumental Anger
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BAcKAkV ... _&index=27

ETA: In the above he discusses what flying monkeys are and how they are used. You guys seriously need to watch this--it's how Trump functions. This term "flying monkeys" is used on youtube channels. I didn't know Dr. Grande actually addressed this. Hint: Cohen was one of Trump's flying monkeys.

[_Jersey Girl]

For anyone interested. You can just go to his channel and find the playlist. There seems to be quite a few that would help in understanding Trump and what makes him tick.

[_Doctor CamNC4Me]

[quote="Jersey Girl" post_id=1236117 time=1598228328 user_id=16]
OOOooo OOoo! i just discovered Dr. Grande has a playlist for Narcissism! He's got 44 videos. This one is applicable to this thread. 15 minutes and change.

[b]9 Signs of Narcissistic Rage | Reactive & Instrumental Anger[/b]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BAcKAkV ... _&index=27

ETA: In the above he discusses what flying monkeys are and how they are used. You guys seriously need to watch this--it's how Trump functions. This term "flying monkeys" is used on youtube channels. I didn't know Dr. Grande actually addressed this. Hint: Cohen was one of Trump's flying monkeys.
[/quote]

Holy crap. "Flying monkeys."

From Volume 5 of the recently released report:

As with other instances where he previously misled the Committee, Cohen claimed that he did so "[b ]ecause I was staying on message, which was, again: There's no Russian involvement. Minimal/no business dealings. No collusion. No contacts; That was the messaging. I was staying on it."

Cohen stated that although he was never explicitly ordered to lie, Cohen understood that by making these statements to him, Trump wanted Cohen to stick to Trump's own message relating to Russia. Cohen said: "I knew exactly what he [Trump] was saying. And he knew exactly what he was saying."

edit: I'm watching the flying monkeys thing. It's... uh... spot on.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7vbcpgoWTtk

- Doc

[_MeDotOrg]

I forgot on last tidbit about Trump's week. A court ordered him to pay $44,100 to Stormy Daniels to cover her legal fees in a Non-Disclosure Agreement case. That one headline:

US President ordered by court to pay porn star's legal fees

would have topic #1 for any candidate or President before Trump. This week it merits 'oh-by-the-way' status.

[_Jersey Girl]

Yeah I know it's spot on. I've never called them flying monkeys before here because I thought EA would laugh me off the forum or at least people would think I was making crap up. But no, that term is used quite a bit in the true crime community haunts and when I watched that one video after bringing up the playlist, I see that Dr. Grande used it, too. So I don't know if it's used at all in professional circles.

I learned about narcissism in school and then again, personality development was part of my education so there's all the reading and research that was involved in that. More recently when I got totally engaged in the true crime community, I found some really good psych oriented channels and learned more because that's part of my interest in true crime.

Anyway, flying monkeys are just what you think they are. Only Dr. Grande really nails it there in that one video. All you have to do is relate it to Trump's cronies. And you're in Oz!

[_Jersey Girl]

Hey when you get a chance, look for stuff on how narcissists discard people. It's sometimes called the "final discard". Example: When family annihilator Chris Watts in Denver killed his wife, two daughters and unborn son, that was the ultimate final discard. I'll try to come up with a video on that at some point. I'm super busy today and not doing a hot job of keeping all the balls in the air when I stop to post.

But another example is when a narcissist breaks up with their partner. They might devalue them, gaslight them, find a replacement and THEN discard them once they have a new source of narcissistic supply--new partner.

That's exactly what Chris Watts did. He didn't murder his entire family until he had his girlfriend on the hook already.

Think about that in terms of Trump and his comments on ex-staffers. Same thing.