Once a client sat down and expressed that his unique talent was “pissing off” everyone he met in his life. Even those who grew into him soon found that he was less likeable in most interactions. The real difficulty was that he was a very intelligent and competent professional and could not understand why he repeatedly behaved in what he called a “stupid” way that guaranteed that others would have negative reactions to him. Your answer can be found in your family history and deficiencies in your ability to form and maintain satisfying interpersonal relationships that would be seen as the foundation for healthy attachment and attunement.

Attachment refers to the degree to which one feels emotionally connected to others and the predictable nature of that connection. When the attachment is inconsistent or poor, the predictable nature of the emotional connection is vague and poorly formed. This significantly reduces the confidence and quiet expectation of support that human beings depend on to feel part of a community or family. Furthermore, it is not uncommon to find people who grow into adulthood in this dynamic and learn to react with aggression and hostility, or through withdrawal and victimization of themselves. These constant characteristics are frequently associated with the pathological label of narcissist.

When family members experience unregulated interactions with each other, then person-to-person attunement is non-existent, weak, or inconsistent. This promotes a fear-based drive to gain control through negative means, such as those that are easily recognizable in the role of narcissistic personalities. Attunement is related to empathy and the ability to understand what is happening socio-emotionally in the life of another. When the attunement is not present, well modeled or consistently employed in a family, then it is possible that that sensitivity is reduced if it is not completely destroyed. When you have low levels of empathy for others, it increases the likelihood that a person will fail in trying to keep up with someone else’s dance and pick up the dance steps they need to be successful. Learning to correctly recognize and predict the interactions (dance) of others would suppose that there is an existing coherence in the behavioral and emotional environment.

Attunement and attachment are two areas of concern when it comes to family dynamics that will interfere with an individual’s relationships throughout life, if attachment and attunement are neglected and have little play, they can generate a series relational markers that can be narcissistic. in nature.

As children reach maturity in an environment that interferes with or disrupts normal emotional, social, and psychological growth, it is not uncommon to witness reactivity to this environment that can act as a guide through which some patterns of behavior and perhaps The child’s personality is filled with behaviors that stress relationships. Generally, when it comes to destructive relationship behaviors, two identical but different patterns emerge. The first is the inhibited symptoms of narcissism and the other could be considered rampant symptoms of narcissism.

Regardless of the pattern that an individual expresses in any relationship, there is a creation of interaction dynamics that are often exhausting, frustrating, personally painful, and emotionally draining. The remaining text is dedicated to illustrating the differences in the dual symptom structure of narcissism beginning with the inhibited symptoms of narcissism and followed by rampant symptoms of narcissism.

Inhibited symptoms of narcissism.

• Related to the poor quality of attachment and attunement that exists in a traumatic family environment, it can be discovered that children develop a sense of inferiority, are indecisive with powerful self-doubts, a marked propensity to feel ashamed, with a fragility and a highly defended ego structure. that can activate an incessant quest for power and control in a passive and indirect way.
• These are often combined with a marked sensitivity to criticism and a low tolerance for realistic setbacks and difficulties. Traumatogenic families have little stable predictability in their interactions, which can greatly exacerbate interpersonal trust issues and trust in others. In many traumatized families there is a genuine question about the trustworthiness of others and how much they can be trusted. In addition, this self-erosion generates envy and jealousy for the possessions, talents and abilities of others, always finding oneself lacking or not living up to a significant degree.
• Another challenge faced by members of a family that could be characterized as an orthopedic surgeon may be the lack of direction that can appear as lack of direction and poor or superficial patterns of commitment. This lack of purpose is related to inadequate reinforcement for successful performance, or a lack of faith in one’s ability to create meaningful change in a manifest outcome, along with the doubt that one can influence one’s own daily life. individual.
• When members of a trauma family operate within the inhibited symptoms of narcissism, one will easily notice a constant flow or shift in values ​​to gain favor, gain control, or protect a fragile ego structure. This highly defensive posture is recurrently associated with pathological lies, materialistic lifestyles even if the family is very poor, criminal tendencies, and a strong disregard for authority or social institutions.
• As the child grows into adulthood in the trauma family structure, it becomes clear that there is a clash between the desire for loving relationships and the ability to maintain love. The loved one is viewed as a possession, which is there to satisfy the individual’s ego-based needs, which affects one’s ability to view the romantic relationship as having separate interests, rights, and values.

Rampant symptoms of narcissism

• The separate but equally disturbing pattern that can develop in a trauma family structure is the production of limbs that possess a strong sense of grandiosity and entitlement. This dynamic can trigger a perpetual mental process in which one is preoccupied with fantasies of outstanding success coupled with an undue sense of uniqueness, an apparent self-reliance that is mostly empty and protective of a fragile sense of self.
• One of the hallmarks of rampant narcissism is found in repeatedly shallow relationships of a relatively intense nature that require others to provide emotional, psychological, or social tributes. This is associated with an emotional posture of contempt towards those who do not pay homage, a genuine lack of empathy towards those who share a relationship.
• Rampant narcissism often adopts the mask of warmth and social charm as a tool to exert power and control in the social and interpersonal environment in which they operate. There is an intense ambition that can accompany this dynamic that is coupled with a drive for psychological and social tribute to the admiration of others. There is also a pervasive idiosyncratic personal morality that can be incredibly destructive to relationships in general. This is often manifested by marital instability, seduction but unsatisfying relationships or extramarital affairs, and promiscuity.

In conclusion, it is easy to understand how poor quality or insecure attachment and attunement are adversely affected by the interaction patterns of a trauma family, as well as how narcissism can easily grow from these dynamics. Many professionals and most laypeople who come across the narcissist tend to react quite negatively and with tremendous judgment and condemnation, which has little influence on improving interactions substantially. The challenge is to create environments where true attachment and attunement can take place while unleashing old familiar and well-used patterns more than is absolutely necessary. Generally it is a matter that will require psychotherapy to overcome the weight firmly placed on the shoulders of those who never asked that this burden be theirs.