From Idealization to Discard, It is All Abuse!
Channel: Prof. Sam Vaknin
Date: 2023-05-31

Watch 7 Phases of Shared Fantasy: Why Narcissist Needs YOU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kp3YFC0OQfU

Why does narcissistic abuse cease after the shared fantasy is definitely over? What in the shared fantasy triggers abusive misconduct?

The shared fantasy metamorphesizes and mutates. It can become paranoid or anticipatory or courting or nostalgic.

It is terminated only via mortification, successful devaluation (betrayal), or appropriation (introject taken over by a substitute maternal figure).

Once switched off, the abuse stop instantly and thoroughly. Why is that?

The maltreatment within the shared fantasy is reframed by the narcissist as tough love, reactive abuse, a test of loyalty and allegiance, or the outcome of disillusionment with and exposure of the partner (devaluation).

But the abuse is also a form of cathexis. It is a pattern of attempts to coercively align the external object with the idealized internal object in order to maintain the idealization. 

The narcissist mislabels idealisation as profound love because it is a reciprocal process (co-idealization) and involves maternal introjects.

But the narcissist associates love with hurt and anxiety. The abuse is a prophylactic: preemptive effort to forestall pain and, possibly, mortification by controlling and manipulating the potentially frustrating objects, both external and internal. 

When the internal object is dormant (suspended), discarded, or no longer idealised (cathected), it no longer possesses the power to hurt the narcissist. At that point, there is no longer call for abuse. Any interaction following this phase is civil, even amiable. 

Still, the minute the object is re-idealized (recathected in the hoovering phase), the abuse starts all over again. 

Abuse and idealisation are inextricably linked because idealisation is a form of abuse: it involves objectification, parentification, and instrumentalization. 

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