The Lifeworks Group, Inc.

By Christine Hammond, MS, LMHC The moment Brian first really understood the term Narcissistic Personality Disorder, a light bulb went off in his brain. He spent most of his life thinking he was crazy, lazy, and stupid – three words his father often said about him to other family members and friends. His father also severely and harshly discipled him, set-up unnecessary competitions in which his dad was the winner, never apologized, showed no empathy even when Brian was hurt, and treated everyone like they were inferior. For years, Brian struggle with insecurity, anxiety, depression, and feelings of inadequacy. After his business failed, Brain decided it was time to rethink his life, so he began therapy. It didn’t take too long before the therapist identified narcissistic characteristics in his father. Suddenly, everything became clear that the very issues he struggled to overcome were a direct result of having a narcissistic parent. But knowing this informati

By Christine Hammond, MS, LMHC Megan and Ryan decided to go to marriage counseling after their last fight resulted in the police being called. After being married for 7 years, the marriage was falling apart, and Ryan now had a police record for domestic violence as a result. The conflict did not start with Ryan hitting his wife, as the arrest record portrayed. Rather Megan was aggressive towards him – throwing things, hitting him, and physically blocking his only exit.   In an effort to defended himself and get away from her, he shoved her. But when the police arrived they saw a 6’ tall man, Ryan, and a 5’ tall woman, Megan, so he was arrested. Desperate to make his marriage work, Ryan reached out for help from a therapist. Megan was more than happy to go to a therapist now that Ryan had a police record as she believed that inoculated her from any wrong doing. But it wasn’t too long into the session that the therapist identified Megan as a narcissist and Ryan

By Christine Hammond, MS, LMHC Looking back over their 15-year marriage, Andrew began to see the early signs of paranoia in his wife not long after they met. She was overly fearful of new environments, believed her boss was secretly out to get her, and constantly worried that he wasn’t being loyal to her. But he loved her and thought that by marrying her things would get better and her fears would subside. They did not. Instead, they got worse. To appease her fears of his accused infidelity, he would call her several times a day, allowed her to track his location, gave her his phone to review text and phone messages, let her read his emails (including work related ones), and tolerated random sniff tests looking for scents of another woman. Yet these efforts did not calm her, rather, things seemed to escalate. Andrew noticed his wife’s fears intensified exponentially after the birth of their first child. Their son was not allowed to play at neighbor’s houses b