The Narcissist's Mother - Narcissist's Mother Overview

Written by Sam Vaknin

Follows a matrix of possible axes (dimensions) of interaction between child and mother.

The first term in each of these equations of interaction describes the child, the second the mother.

The Mother can be:

• Accepting ("good enough");
• Domineering;
• Doting/Smothering;
• Indifferent;
• Rejecting;
• Abusive.

The Child can be:

• Attracted;

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• Repelled (due to unjust mistreatment, for instance).

The possible axes or dimensions are:

Child / Mother

How to read this table - an example:

Attraction - Attraction/Accepting

Means that the child is attracted to his mother, his mother is attracted to him and she is a "good enough" (accepting) mother.

1. Attraction - Attraction/Accepting
   (Healthy axis, leads to self-love)
2. Attraction - Attraction/Domineering
   (Could lead to personality disorders - PDs - such as avoidant, or schizoid, or to social phobia, etc.)
3. Attraction - Attraction/Doting or Smothering
   (Could lead to Cluster B Personality Disorders)
4. Attraction - Repulsion/Indifferent
   [passive-aggressive, frustrating]
   (Could lead to narcissism, Cluster B disorders)
5. Attraction - Repulsion/Rejecting
   (Could lead to personality disorders such as paranoid, borderline, etc.)
6. Attraction - Repulsion/Abusive
   (Could lead to DID, ADHD, NPD, BPD, AHD, AsPD, PPD, etc.)
7. Repulsion - Repulsion/Indifferent
   (Could lead to avoidant, schizoid, paranoid, etc. PDs)
8. Repulsion - Repulsion/Rejecting
   (Could lead to personality, mood, anxiety disorders and to impulsive behaviours, such as eating disorders)
9. Repulsion - Attraction/Accepting
   (Could lead to unresolved Oedipal conflicts and to neuroses)
10. Repulsion - Attraction/Domineering
    (Could have the same results as axis 6)
11. Repulsion - Attraction/Doting
    (Could have the same results as axis 9)

This, of course, is a very rough sketch. Many of the axes can be combined to yield more complex clinical pictures.

It provides an initial, coarse, map of the possible interactions between the PO and the SO in early childhood and the unsavoury results of internalised bad objects.

This PO/SO matrix continues to interact with AO to form the person's self-evaluation (self-esteem or sense of self-worth).

This process - the formation of a coherent sense of self-worth - starts with PO/SO interactions within the matrix and continues roughly till the age of 8, all the time gathering and assimilating interactions with AO (=meaningful others).