Narcissistic personality disorder

Your children are young. They will become more aware as they grow.

I think what a lot of people don’t understand is that you can’t and don’t always want to abandon your loved one with a personality disorder. I have experience with this and have minimal contact with one PD person and actively have a relationship with another. I would not have chosen to have them in my life but here we are. There is a good book by Valerie Porr on BPD with much great material on validation and radical compassion; and therapeutic modalities. I will say that you need a lot of inner strength and to find emotional support from other people (friends and family) as it doesn’t work to lean on them for support as a general rule.

And this ‘protection’ of you manifests as angry controlling behaviour, yes?

You leave him. He’s abusive and your children are being affected, despite the delusion that they’re not.

In my experience and research NPD can’t be cured. It stes from some kind of deep psychological childhood trauma in most cases and occasionally people have a predisposition to it. I wasted 30 years of my life on a Covid narcissist who appeared to be a wonderful father, but spent his life Manipulating diminishing and gaslighting. I’m so glad I threw him out and got free..
The damage done to children brought up around this kind of character is horrific honestly if you believe he’s narcissist you know stop enabling him and get free
my ex presented as a lovely father looking back now I realise how controlling manipulative and diminishing he was , the act was of caring etc I didn’t see it when in it years of coercive abuse now trying to pick up the pieces with 20 year old who’s completely broken by the whole thing to say nothing of the wasted years of my own life get off rid of this arse hole trust me it always gets worse arsehole live free

Hard agree. They'll keep dragging you through the courts to punish you though, be prepared. Protect your peace.

I wish my Mum had left my narcissistic Dad. It didn’t end well for either of us.

What will happen is he'll find a replacement for you, probably very quickly - this type always do. Probably one who considers herself to have an extremely caring personality, and thinks only she can save him, and doesn't stop to consider that if there's no-one else who wants anything to do with him, there's probably a reason.

For the genuine narcissist man, women are basically interchangeable, as long as it's the right kind of woman. And they can spot the right kind at a hundred paces.

Your husband needs therapy.

This is going to get a lot worse as the children reach more oppositional teenage years.

It sounds like he won't go.

You aren't going to be able to stop the impact he has on them just by splitting up. He will still see the kids and in fact will be more inclined and able to manipulate them without your presence.

You need to read up on code pendency. You seem to think its your role to fix him. It isn't. And that attitude is likely enabling him.

What contact do kids have with aunts uncles and grandparents?

You can stay with him but you need to build for yourself and kids a broad and deep network of people who aren't connected to your husband.

Narcissistic parents don't struggle with little ones. They tend to kick in as children achieve teenage years and are making their own decisions and existing as their own people. So you need to start planning for that whether or not you stay with him.

After many years, I realised that my STBEXH saw me as a piece on his chess board. I certainly wasn't his queen. I was his property. Think about his behaviours from this point of view.

Once you tow the line and behave correctly to facilitate his life, then all is well. When you exert your own feelings, opinions, then these types don't like it.

Be very careful OP.

What ever the diagnosis - as some opinions differ on here - it's hard continually walking on eggshells.

Reading comments from those involved in working with people with particular personalities diagnosis isn't an exact science.

Curing them - the first part of any personality modification is the realisation that there may be a problem.

I think you need to ask for professional advice as to how to approach suggesting therapy.

What was his reaction on losing his best friend? Did that cause any reflection on his part?

Your husband has been diagnosed with NPD. You need to understand he isn’t a “great dad” or a very caring person. He hasn’t got the capacity to care about anyone other than himself.

What he will be expert at however is lying, pretending and FAKING being a ‘great dad’ - and you admit “when the kids are around it's almost like a show”.
This is because it is a show.

Narcissists are imposters, playing a role, pretending to be caring, charming people. They are devoid of empathy. He will see you and his children (and anyone else in his life) as a player in his fantasy. A cardboard cutout of who he needs you to be, not who you really are.

While you and your children play the roles he has assigned to you things will be relatively ok. But any deviation from the required behaviour will be taken as a massive hurt, threat, and above all disloyal insult to him at the very core of his being. You will be severely punished.

A family member of mine has the misfortune to be co-parenting with one of these creatures and it is a constant living nightmare. He has charmed SS so has lots of unsupervised contact with his children and free rein to emotionally wound them with impunity.

You can’t fix him, he won’t change and as you have already noted, he is getting worse. That is the only change he is capable of, further deterioration into his disorder.

Find out all you can about NPD and be ready to take any action you can to protect your children. With a formal diagnosis you might be able to ensure he gets minimal contact.

Imho he shouldn’t be anywhere near them. Ever.

I would leave OP. It takes a lot to get a diagnosis of NPD in the UK because there are no treatment programmes. I am interested in this area and there is some promising results in treatment in the US, for which I have received training, but frustratingly there are no programmes being run in the UK. He isn’t accepting he needs help and he will just get worse.

Caring people have a need to be a ‘rescuer’ which ultimately makes you vulnerable to this type of abuse. I recommend therapy.

This!

i spent 26 years with narcissistic H. like you I’m a really caring empathetic person. I was so convinced that with my love, understanding and help I could ‘cure’ him. I wasted the best years of my life trying and failing. I now see how arrogant I was to think I could have any influence over someone who has a deeply entrenched personality disorder. Counselling is ineffective and can often make them worse. Research anything by Dr Ramani Durvasula and Sam Vaknin. There’s many other experts.

Everyone who is saying LTB…I left a narcissist (not diagnosed but showing every classic sign). Be VERY careful. It’s very likely that once you leave, he will show his true self and unleash hell. Once he can’t touch you anymore (controlling you financially, via protracted divorce proceedings etc etc) he will use the children. He will likely go for 50:50 time with them, which means they are exposed to him without your protection.

I would get some support for yourself from someone very experienced in NPD and get prepared to leave. Line up therapy for the children. Leaving is not an easy road but it may be the right one ultimately.

Well in that case why on earth are you staying with him. With an official diagnosis he's not going to change is he? Get the hell out before yoy and your dc get really damaged.

Oh, and make sure you and the DC are protected financially. He will use that against you both.

If he really is a confirmed narcissist, then you need to be researching narcissism, not posting on here. The reality is that as personality disorders go, narcissism is one of the most difficult to deal with because the fundemental thing that makes someone a narcissist is an inability to take any responsibility or accountability for their actions and a disordered way of viewing the world and the people around him.

Narcissists often land up with very emphathetic and caring people whojust want to help them. But rational discussions and arguments will not have any impact. You have said it yourself.... he sees himself as very important, very valuable, and basically perfect.

Your children will be impacted by him. It may start by using them against you .... so you annoy him or chalenge him and he will punish you by acting in a way that is harmful to the children (saying things that are inappropriate, refusing to take them to their football match and blaming you, "well, mummy has a lot to say about everything so obviously i can't be trusted to take you to football, she will have to do it") and over time, hurting them more when they cannot live up to what he wants. When they stop adoring him and taking everything he says at face value.

Wow a lot of brutal replies so far.

I work in this field. NPD is rarely diagnosed in the NHS so I’m surprised that he got that diagnosis. Most “difficult” personalities are just labelled BPD in women and often antisocial PD in men (though a lot of men also get it he BPD label). I’ve rarely seen clinicians properly diagnose personalities disorders and just do it off their gut instinct but that’s a separate topic.

True NPD can indeed be treated. It’s tough because it requires the buy in of the patient but there’s studies showing decent success rates with things like mentalisation based therapy.

Often, people with NPD strongly desire an attractive partner as that is a way of showing others that they themselves are amazing if they can have an attractive partner on their arm. This can lead to them manipulating their partners into feeling that they must stay with them. It sounds like that might be happening with you on a subconscious or unconscious level.

Other posters are right, your kids will be affected. The rates of personality disorder in children with a parent with a PD is very high. It is important to be mindful of this and if you choose to stay with him then please make provisions to offer your children early support should they start to struggle. Be vigilant for their sakes.

Huh? Why would the diagnosis have been in the 90s? Where does it say OP's husband is 50?

This just sounds like an entirely dysfunctional relationship. You got together and had children very young in a relationship which sounds immature and problematic right from the start and come across as co-dependent. You don’t need to come up with various diagnoses you think he has: you’re both miserable and your relationship isn’t working any better now than it ever has. You don’t need any other reason to end a relationship, you really don’t. And he’ll be absolutely fine if you leave. Lots of people say that their life will be over and they won’t cope if their partner leaves - but guess what, virtually all of them do. They get over it, they move on, they meet somebody else. Stop centring yourself in this mess and do what’s best for both of you and your poor children.

Yeah I had to leave because it was affecting the kids badly from about the age of 8 or 9. @Lolapusht ‘s post was spot on.. They are not capable of being parents and in fact they see the kids as simply extensions of themselves.

You don’t help him. You can’t. As far as he’s concerned, he’s perfect so why does he need to change.

Read this:

“Signs of a Narcissistic Father
A narcissistic father isn’t capable of a traditional parent-child relationship, as they lack the capacity to offer their children consistent encouragement and support. They are far too focused on their own needs to be attentive to their children’s.
Some of the most common signs of a narcissistic father are:

• Exhibiting charisma and relishing the spotlight
• Not being home a lot, due to needing more attention and admiration from strangers, acquaintances, and colleagues than from his family
• Displaying a preoccupation with success or power
• Doing activities that he enjoys, but taking little interest in what the family enjoys
• Disregarding others’ boundaries
• Reacting to even slight criticism by shaming, humiliating, or raging, sometimes to extremes
• Being aloof and unsympathetic, but highly sensitive to his own pain
• Taking advantage of others for his own good, even* *exploiting them when it suits him“

Then read this:

Growing Up With A Narcissistic Parent