Friday, April 8, 2011

Money Matters

Here is an informative post on all the things a narcissist might do when it comes to money. 

My narcissistic father has somehow always managed to stash away large sums of money, while simultaneously playing the part of a pitiable pauper. He repeatedly hid money from my mother, at times allowing our family to be partly supported by charity from her aunt, and then invested large sums foolishly. At the same time, he expected her to write down her every expense - "carrots at the farmers' market", for example. Not that it really matters, but she always earned at least as much as he did.

(Once, when she found out about an investment that fell through, she was really angry. They fought for days. I was seven and frightened my parents were going to get divorced, so I talked to a friend about it. Unfortunately, the friend's mother was a gossip, so this rumor reached my father. He summoned me. Told me he'd heard about what I'd told my friend. This is where, based on what I'd seen in movies, I expected him to say "Don't worry. We love each other. We love you no matter what. We're just fighting, but we're not getting divorced."

Instead, he yelled "Never talk about family matters to outsiders again! Now go to your room!")

Now, he complains to us how he's a poor pensioner. He receives a reasonable pension, rents out an apartment and gets money from that, and lives with his girlfriend, so they split all their expenses in half. He gets more money each month than my family of choice, and we pay all the bills, feed four humans, pay for diapers and preschool and clothes for two growing kids, and he accuses us of living a life of luxury and complains to us!

And the funny thing is, before I found out about NPD, I bought it! I thought I was a spoiled brat who's always had it easy so I couldn't guess just how hard he has it and even considered giving some money to my father to help him, although we were barely making ends meet, but he did "let" me live in one of "his" apartments. And then I did the math. I didn't have to know about NPD to understand there's something not quite right about the way his brain functions.

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