Identifying and Healing Narcissistic Wounds

Narcissistic wounds are something which not many people know by name but which many people are experiencing in their lives today. These are psychological wounds that may be inflicted upon a person in early childhood and which go on to affect their relationships for the rest of their adult lives. Like with any sort of emotional issue that arises because of a lacking experienced in childhood, narcissistic wounds are something which can be healed over time. However, to heal these wounds it is necessary to learn what they are, recognize the role they play in our lives and actively work on remedying the problem on an ongoing basis. Choosing to take these steps means making a choice to have better adult relationships as we move forward.

Defining Narcissistic Wounds

Narcissistic wounds are those emotional problems which occur as a result of the fact that a parent failed to meet the child's emotional needs when he or she was growing up. This leads to a sense of emotional insecurity which is marked primarily by a feeling of emptiness or a lack of feeling an emotional connection. The main hallmark of the narcissistic wound as compared with other emotional deprivation in childhood is that the parent may have given attention to the child only when the child was "performing" to satisfaction. In other words, the child was used to feed the narcissistic ego of the parent.

How Narcissistic Wounds Manifest Themselves In Our Adult Lives

The sense of emotional emptiness can continue to affect the individual into adulthood. This is generally seen when the adult feels a void in their lives that makes them feel desperate in their adult relationships. Essentially, the individual is continuing to seek out that old emotional connection that wasn't met in childhood and therefore narcissistically makes his or her adult relationships all about meeting those old needs. Although the individual is desperate for emotional attention, the inability to see beyond oneself often makes it impossible or difficult for the adult suffering from narcissistic wounds to have a relationship which includes actual and complete intimacy.

How to Heal Narcissistic Wounds

These problems do not have to plague adult relationships but they will continue to do so until several conditions are met. First, the individual must identify that he or she suffers from narcissistic wounds and acknowledge that problems in adult relationships have been caused as a direct result of this. Second, he or she must commit to resolving the problems in childhood in order to find a way to have healthy adult relationships. Third, the individual must actively participate in the kind of emotional healing that will allow this resolution to take place.

For most people, healing narcissistic wounds is going to require professional therapy. Locating a therapist who is familiar with this type of problem is a crucial step in overcoming the difficulties. However, for those people who can not afford or do not believe in therapy, it may be possible to work through some of the issues using reading materials and guided learning techniques similar to those that would be used in therapy.

Remember that it took a long time throughout childhood for the emotional difficulties to develop and it is going to take a long process of emotional work to heal your narcissistic wounds. However, it's something that you can do one day at a time if you focus on a commitment to yourself to create a life in which the relationships that you have with other adults - and ultimately the relationships you'll have with your own children - are healthy and mature.