Healing From Complex Trauma & PTSD/CPTSD

A journey to healing from complex trauma.

Narcissism and the inability to admit when wrong, apologise and lying ~ Lilly Hope Lucario

28 Comments

There are different traits within narcissism, and we all have varying degrees of it, but the most common traits in people with high levels of narc traits, is the inability to accept they are wrong, and inability to see they need to change.

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Pride, insecurity, lack of insight and self reflection – common narc traits, along with lying, deflecting, attacking.

I have encountered so much of this in life now, that I can sense it and spot it a mile away.

My parents were narcissists, unable to take responsibility for wrongs and abuse caused to their own children. They lied about things all the time, blamed, projected issues, and chose a scapegoat, me. I was an easy target.

My mother used to say that her husband was a man of pride. He wasn’t, he was a man of deep insecurities and very questionable character, who’s group of friends were all weirdo’s – all into either guns, abusing children/teenagers, or both. Far too many perverts for friends, but of course, that would never be admitted. And my mother knew what these ‘friends’ were like. But, she would never admit she knew they were weirdo’s either. Even after she saw her husband talking with the paedophile ‘friend’ who already sexually abused her children.

My mother would ‘never’ admit her role, enabling of abuse and lack of love for her children. It was ‘all about her’ and what she needed.

The levels of the abuse I endured due to my mother and step father’s narcissism, was severe. Being blamed at 12, for my siblings abuse, by one of the pervert paedophile family friend/neighbour, was a truly severe level of abuse, that caused considerable psychological damage.

Being blamed for everything else that went wrong in my mother and step father’s life, was also due to their narcissism. Lack of ability to admit failure as business owners, lack of courage to admit working for himself was a big mistake, their business going bankrupt, home being repossessed, all my fault, according to them. It wasn’t, it was all their fault. Entirely. I know that now.

All of my abusers have been unable to take any responsibility for what they did being wrong.

Recently, a pastor at a Church I attended, has been completely unable to admit wrongs, unable to admit lies and is either clearly in such denial, or is so ‘scared’ of admitting how wrong he has been, he can’t cope. Either way, complete lack of courage, lack of decency, lack of self reflection, lack of love and huge amounts of pride, ego and preserving of image.

Him and his wife love being the ones that tell everyone what to do, that’s why he’s a pastor. They love the adoration and need people around them who ‘feed’ their ego. Their closest friends are those who tell them how wonderful they are and ‘need’ them and they lap it up. I knew this a long time ago about them and used to joke with my husband that the quickest way to get their attention, was to tell them something nice about them like ‘I need your wise advice’. They love it, revel in it. They pretend not to, but I have seen it over and over. I see most things about people that others miss.

What I didn’t know was the extent to which they would get nasty when challenged and would outright lie and attack, even when they were completely in the wrong and caused hurt and harm. But, now I do know the extent of their insecurities and nasty side.

Again, their narcissism getting nasty, like my parents.

I even see narcissism in people I know about minor things, they don’t like taking advice, and won’t admit that their chosen decision, was wrong. Instead make excuses or explain it away, which I can see straight through.

I don’t think I have enough narcissism. I don’t believe I know everything, I want to gain more wisdom, I don’t like the spotlight, I don’t have a need to tell people what to do, I don’t lie, I am honest and I can apologise, easily.

I know throughout my life, I have accepted guilt, shame and blame for many things in my life, that weren’t mine to own.

I still blame myself for things that I am told I am not to blame for.

I can apologise when I am wrong, even my husband (who admits himself isn’t good at admitting when he’s wrong either), says I am always quick to admit when wrong about something. In fact, he thinks I am too quick to take the blame for things.

It takes courage, inner wisdom, strength, lack of pride and ‘good mental health’, to admit when you are wrong.

It takes a lack of pride to own up to failures.

It takes a really strong secure person, with inner wisdom, to know they are wrong, admit it to themselves and to others. And I can do this.

Despite all I have been through, my mental health is strong, my inner security is strong, my inner wisdom, self reflection, insight, courage, honesty are all deep.

But so many people don’t have these to any depth.

So many people are shallow, insecure and have far more narcissism than is healthy.

Narcissism is a society wide issue that exists to a far greater extent than most people realise.

I have narc ‘radar’ and I see clearly how badly it affects these narc people’s ability to see themselves clearly.

Narcs, are dishonest and insecure at the root of their being.

I don’t like narcs, and yet I have to co-exist with them all around me.

~ Lilly Hope Lucario

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Author: Healing From Complex Trauma & PTSD/CPTSD

I am a survivor of complex and multiple trauma and abuse, who at the age of 40, began my healing journey. I am using my journey to recovery and healing, to help others, to help survivors feel less alone, validated, encouraged and to enable others to understand themselves more. Complex trauma, particularly from severe, prolonged childhood abuse, is profoundly life changing. Complex trauma produces complex adults. The journey to recovery is a painful, often lonely, emotional daily challenge and it is my aim to encourage others in their daily battle. ~ Lilly Hope Lucario

28 thoughts on “Narcissism and the inability to admit when wrong, apologise and lying ~ Lilly Hope Lucario

  1. I’m glad you knew to protect yourself and stood up to him. You should be proud of yourself. Narcs are very devious and manipulative.

  2. We see through the lens of our perceptions, and that lens is rarely turned inward for thorough self examination and true, honest self appraisal. Even when we do the lens of our perception never allows us to see ourselves clearly enough to recognize the self image we’ve created. This self affirming image can only survive by justifying our emotions and actions and never to admit mistakes.

    Mistakes are never seen as growing opportunities, but a mark against the self image a person has created of and for oneself; therefore ego cannot allow for mistakes and must justify them to restore the consonance disturbed by “perceived mistakes”.

    When you begin to accept that you are fallible and learn from mistakes instead of hiding from them, or justifying them, you begin to experience growing successes because you will make fewer mistakes.

    It seems so intuitive that accepting responsibility for your mistakes and learning not to make them over and over again would lead to a better outcome. But as intuitive as it may seem narcissism never allows people to see this fact.

  3. I received my 1st news post and I am so glad I am receiving these news posts now. With your insights it is helping myself even further- Not just with issues I see in others-but the issues I see in myself. I do believe that if one has been abused over a long period of time, one can go through a set of dark tunnels that can have issues of narcissism to some degree without even knowing this has developed. t find it is important to always surround one’s self with people that are highly intuitive and empathic-and get rid of those that don’t want to learn and grow to reach their greatness within. Great post- Thank you.

  4. I feel your pain, I’m sorry to hear what has happen to you, thank you for making sense for my own recent experience, I have never met a person before not to this degree, lesson learnt the hard way, still recovering

  5. I think im dealing with a Narc. He shows many signs but for some reason I continue to doubt myself and I think this doubt comes from the fact that I get emotional. to keep this post simple, I just want to ask about the silent treatment. recently, I thought the Narc did something that I later learned he did not and I apologized for jumping to conclusions. my apologies (and there were many) were ignored. total silence. as this ST continued I started to get upset and say things and only then he responded with harshness. why didn’t he respond to my apologies but was so quick to say FU to me. now he is acting like I just wont leave him alone. I went back and reread my texts, and they were nothing but apologetic in the beginning and even the last ones really weren’t that bad considering how he was treating me. does this sound like narc behavior?

  6. Gaslighting example. I confronted my sister about an incident …..her response was “That’s Hard To Believe” It was THAT moment I realized what gaslighting is.

  7. I was reading your article, and the traits you listed described my soon to be ex-wife. Pride, completely insecure (which to me, having both of those traits in abundance, is a contradiction within itself). Always telling, not asking me to do things. Never apologizing for any of her action, but reasoning them away, or making excuses why its not her fault. I wasn’t exactly sure why she was like she was, but this article has enlightened me. Thank you.

  8. I am a devoted married Christian and I don’t believe in divorce because God hates divorce. Jesus said don’t give your husband a certificate of divorced except he commits an adultery. My husband is what I believe to have a level of narcissism. He never thinks he is wrong about anything. I believe because he is a Christian and reads the Bible a lot is the only reason he apologizes to me for his wrongs. But for example this is how he apologizes, “Babe I am sorry for upsetting you.” But he NEVER EVER will say or admit he’s wrong for his actions for what he said or did. We have been married for 26 years. My whole family knows this about him. I am afraid if I stand up to him and tell him or ask him why he can’t admit he’s wrong for anything or something, his response is always, “Just because you are upset, now I have to be wrong.” Another example is he always makes me feel quilty when I tell him how I feel about anything that he does or don’t do. I just can’t stand up to him when I know for certain he’s wrong. The only time I can stand up to him is when I am pushed to the limit for his actions. Because I am an emotional person and very easy to get anger and upset, but always apologizes constantly, I just keep silent and holds a lots of hurt in, because I know he will always win the battle. We both were abused emotionally by our parents. But I was physically, emotionally, sexually and spiritually abused by my parents from the time I can remember from the age of 6-22 years of age. I left home at the age of 22 years old. I and my husband have any relationship with our parents. Of course both his parents are deceased, my dad is deceased but my mother is still alive. This year 2015 I have permanently discontinued my relationship with her now. So don’t get me wrong I love my husband dearly and I try to take his abuse from his parents in consideration. I think my husband is struggling with the abuse, but because he feel if he reach out for help, it makes him feel or see himself as weak.I have returned to Theraphy to help me deal with his narcissism. My past is very sacred with me so I stop sharing it with anyone except my Therapist. But this subject caught my attention because my husband face showed up in it, and I felt like I had to share my experience with you all. Thanks for your inputs and I will share this NARCISSIM topic with my Theraphy.

    • Please know, whilst God may not like divorce, He hates abuse more and the loving God I know, would not expect anyone to remain in an abusive marriage.
      To want someone to remain in an abusive situation – is not love. And God is pure love.
      And abuse from the past, is never an excuse to abuse someone else.
      It may be a reason, but never an excuse.

  9. Hi
    Thank you for this unfortunately i fell in love with one and was majorly conned by one.
    Have learnt since then what his behaviors meant.
    Your description is so accurate.

  10. My parents aren’t very narcissistic, but they never really admit their fault. I.E. today I was just chilling at the sofa, when my mom ordered me to make some tea for the family. I went, started to boil the water, and went back to the living room. My dad had to go and told my little sisters to go play with me. I stood up and left because I had to make tea. The sisters chased me into the kitchen. I pulled a chair and said leave me alone, I’m busy (not very good at multitasking, I admit). One of my sisters went around the chair and tripped on a pot. My parents instantly told that I’m stupid to lead the children to the kitchen, yet my dad didn’t admit it was kind of his fault when he sent the kids to play with me when I had to go to the kitchen. It’s just very annoying when your parents never accept your criticism and get all defensive.

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  12. “My mother would ‘never’ admit her role, enabling of abuse and lack of love for her children. It was ‘all about her’ and what she needed.” Right on. Same here. This article resonated with me. I am the daughter of a narc mother and narc sibling sisters. My mom would triangulate and pretend to be the victim, so one or more sisters would call the other yelling and screaming. When I was in my early 40’s I found out about narcissism. I am no contact with all of them now (from NM for over a year). I wrote a note before I moved out (as I was living with her for a few years), telling her how badly she treated me, and she needs to apologize to ever have anything with me again, but of course she didn’t. I had to see her a couple times since and still nothing. They never or rarely apologize (unless they think they can get something from it, and they still want to suck supply off you). They never accept blame either, not even for the lousy decisions they make in life, and if you had weighed in and tried to give advice about something and you were right, they’ll never say “You were right.”

    • Most abusers never admit their intentional motivations for the abuse. This is why they choose lying, denial, gaslighting, manipulation, scapegoating, minimizing and a whole load more ways they abuse us further.
      They don’t have the courage to admit what they are.
      Or they are just so devoid of any empathy and conscience, shame etc, that they truly enjoy what they do.
      Much love, Lilly ❤

  13. Thank you, Lilly! Yes, they are cowards. They start things and then run. I was diagnosed with C-PTSD once I realized I couldn’t deal with living with my narc mom on my own and saw a counselor. A few months later, I was able to get out, even though it was very hard. Knowing my mom is a narc and my siblings who used to bully me growing up, I realize why I chose relationships with men who were narcs throughout my life. Now, I’m just working on me. I’m so glad I came across this blog, because I think it will really help! Lately, I often wake up at least once at night and remember the bad treatment and get anxious about making it on my own with no family, so I started searching. Much love to you too.

  14. That was spot on. Thank you. You put into words much of what I went through. Thank you very much.

  15. These people are causing so much harm to my life I can’t escape them I’m starting to get damage mentally and emotionally

  16. I understand how it feels. I am grown, I can see how abusive it was.

  17. First, I thank God for your safety and healing. And wisdom He has blessed you with. Remember, what Jesus starts, He will finish it to completion. Amen! Thank you for having the courage to write this article as I have had similar experiences in childhood and parallel relationship with my own mother. Unfortunately, I recognize my own flaws with narcissism with my own parenting. Unfortunately, I married one and only now did I have this epiphany that he too is a narcissist, not to the extent my parents were, because t he is never, ever wrong or sorry. I’m praying for healing and for God to break these chains for each of us. Believe me, you and I were never to blame for our abuse and our parents misfortune. You sound like such an overcomes and you deserve so much love, joy and gentleness. Praying for abundant blessings in your life. God can take our worst pain and turn it into our greatest strength. Amen

  18. Oh God…it was if I wrote that myself.

  19. After giving the best 15 years of my life to my wife, I had to finally ask about her anger issues which had gotten too much for me to handle. The abuse, neglect, and silent treatment that followed were unrelenting. Vicious attacks on my personality, deflecting any blame or avoiding taking any responsibility for any hurts she may have caused me. Making me feel that I somehow wronged her, feeling like I somehow had to apologize. The pain and heartbreak is unbearable especially that I love her so much. Knowing that she’s laying on the hurt, and not caring really adds to the mix. Finally, I was driven to seek help in therapy. Further to the silent treatment; nobody deserves to be ignored, to have their humanity ignored, neglected, treated as though you’re invisible when you’re in the same room as the person you’ve dedicated your life to. My feelings, my emotions, meant nothing. I’m nothing. Meaningless, empty, dead inside.