Cannabis Science Inc. (NASD OTCBB: CBIS), a pharmaceutical cannabis company in the US, is pleased to announce that it now has the results of its survey of more than 1,300 individuals with PTSD, including a large cohort of veterans. The survey was conducted by Cannabis Science Advisory Board member Dr. Mitch Earleywine PhD. of the State University of New York (Albany).

The Company has reported several prospective drugs for FDA clinical trials. Based on extensive studies and this survey, the Company now has the substantiated data to for its first application for a PTSD drug for FDA clinical trials. The Company will now sign a pre-negotiated contract with a group of FDA specialists based in Colorado to handle the Company’s first FDA filings.

Dr. Earleywine explained, “Veterans reported that cannabis helped nearly all symptoms of PTSD, with special emphasis on three important components: sleep disturbance, irritability, and disturbing memories. PTSD is notorious for leading to difficulty falling and staying asleep. This insomnia can make other mental and physical symptoms worse. The import of the cannabinoids in sleep is well established, so the idea that it should aid this aspect of PTSD is no surprise. Irritability in PTSD is quite common. It can precede incidents of domestic violence, aggressive driving, and other troublesome behaviors that frequently occur in the disorder. The disturbing memories often include alarming, rapid thoughts as well as distressing images that are difficult to shake. These can be particularly resistant to treatment with other approaches, but respondents reported that medical cannabis helped minimize these experiences dramatically.”

Dr. Robert Melamede, PhD., Cannabis Science Inc. President and CEO added, “This survey demonstrates a huge advantage over conventional pharmaceutical research companies that Cannabis Science enjoys. As a patient-oriented company we know that real people with real problems are getting real relief from cannabis. We are now in a position to contract with experts in the FDA processes to use this data to apply for Investigative New Drug status for our products, which we will be announcing soon. Also, it is important to note that insomnia is a very widespread problem in the general population, especially senior citizens, so the need for cannabis based medicines for sleep is not confined to people with PTSD. In fact, it is a multi-billion dollar a year market.”

Source
Cannabis Science, Inc.

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/180917.php

 

By Rick Nauert PhD Senior News Editor
Reviewed by John M. Grohol, Psy.D. 

Everyone knows someone who has a narcissistic personality. Athletes, actors, politicians and other high-profile, typically wealthy individuals, often fit the bill.

Some aspects of narcissism help individuals gain success. A new study reviews business executives with narcissistic personalities: In the long run, do they do more harm than good for an organization?

Narcissists, by definition, are arrogant, have grandiose visions about their own importance, believe they are special and have unique gifts that others do not, have a sense of entitlement, are exploitive and lack empathy. In short, everything revolves around them because they think they are better than others.

Those are not the kinds of qualities that most people consider to be desirable leadership traits.

Kathy Schnure knows. While working in the corporate world she learned firsthand about toxic leaders and the detrimental effect they can have on an organization.

She had a boss who exhibited all the characteristics of a narcissist.

“I once completed a project in which I did 90 percent of the work and sat in on a meeting in which my boss gave a report and took complete credit for doing the work,” she recalled.

“I was stunned that she did not at least acknowledge that I had a hand in developing the report. She really believed she had done all the work. She figured she was the boss so everything that was accomplished was something she had done,” said Schnure, now a doctoral candidate at Georgia Tech.

Because she bears the scars of working for a narcissistic boss, Schnure is focusing her research on toxic leaders.

In her work, she compared ratings of leadership potential for those who have high levels of narcissism to those who show low-to-average levels on the narcissism scale. The results showed that narcissistic leaders have both positive and negative qualities.

She found those scoring highly on a narcissism scale had a significantly higher rating of potential leadership abilities than those with low-to-average scores.

“Those results would indicate the vision, confidence and pride in their own accomplishments could presumably translate into effective leadership in an organization or team,” she said.

On the other hand, while narcissists do gain leadership roles, often based on their charisma and ability to persuade others to accept their point of view, some of the underlying traits, or “dark sides” will eventually surface, preventing any “good” leadership,” she added.

But how is it possible to tell if a person possesses narcissistic tendencies?

There are several valid tools that measure narcissism, the most widely used being the Narcissistic Personality Inventory (NPI).

Schnure incorporated NPI measurements in her work, including exploitation/entitlement, leadership/authority, superiority/arrogance, and self-absorption/self admiration.

“A person who rates high on these four factors can be described as narcissistic,” she said.

Some might consider narcissists as having strong and confident self-images, which is generally thought to be a favorable characteristic of effective leaders.

However, narcissism is more than a positive self-image, said Timothy Judge, an industrial organizational psychologist at the University of Florida. “It goes beyond positive to grandiose.”

“Narcissists are intensely competitive, self-centered, exploitive and exhibitionistic. They tend to surround themselves with supplicants they see as inferior.

“When they are challenged or perceive competition, they often derogate and undermine anyone, even those closest to them, they perceive as threats (and unfortunately, they are vigilant in scanning for threats),” he explained.

However, he pointed out that “while most narcissists probably have a positive self-concept, most of those with a positive self-concept are not narcissists.”

Narcissists are often referred to as charismatic, yet those two traits are not the same.

“A charismatic leader shares some traits of narcissism. Both can attract people and in that sense narcissists are charismatic. But a charismatic leader is not necessarily a narcissist.

“Charismatic leaders are not exploitive; they do not trample others to get what they want. Rather they display empathy toward employees,” Schnure said.

“Gandhi was a charismatic leader and cared deeply about others. Narcissists do not care about others unless they are helping advance their goals,” she said.

Nevertheless, some narcissists are considered productive because of their ability to inspire others with their visionary and charismatic personalities that are effective in environments that call for strong leadership.

However, says Schnure, while narcissists do see the big picture and have a strong vision, research shows they are not good at working with other people and eventually they become detrimental to the organization.

“They make good figureheads, in part because of their ability to articulate goals and attract people to their way of thinking. But in terms of day to day leadership, they can be toxic with subordinates.

“That becomes especially apparent after their employees get to know the way the narcissistic leader operates. The favorable first impressions they make are not sustainable over a period of time,” she said.

“One of the points of my study was to show that narcissism can be measured outside a clinical environment and that hiring managers should be more aware of this personality trait. While initial appearances may be favorable, they should do their due diligence before hiring a person with narcissistic tendencies.

“More organizations should attempt to assess narcissism pre-hire or pre-promotion to avoid them,” said Judge. He added that it was a “fool’s errand” to think that narcissism can be corrected as a result of an organizational intervention.

“At best, organizations can try to contain and control a narcissist,” he said.

However, for hiring mangers it’s a case of buyer beware because, as Judge points out, “no small amount of research suggests narcissism is a pretty toxic trait.”

Schnure says another strategy to avoid hiring a narcissist is through references.

“Hiring managers shouldn’t just talk to those on the applicant’s reference list. Talk to people who worked for the person and a more accurate picture emerges. Also, be alert to how the applicant talks about achievements and successes.

“Does he or she say ‘I’ did this or did that, rather than ‘we’? That’s a tip-off to the person’s ego and self-interest,” she pointed out.

“The people who work most closely with narcissists know them best and, for the most part, give them low grades on leadership skills and say they are poor at developing teamwork among workers. In fact, they can be divisive,” she said.

She likened narcissists to chameleons, which can blend in with their environment.

“They are good at taking on different appearances. They will do or say what other people want to hear and then often do the opposite.”

“They are seldom stopped at the gate, but they can do a lot of harm to an organization once they are hired,” she said.

Source: Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology (SIOP)

http://psychcentral.com/news/2010/04/01/is-narcissism-a-leadership-trait/12521.html

Related News Articles

• Narcissistic Individuals Are Often Leaders
• Narcissism Examined
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• Pushing Boundaries May Be Leadership Training
• Leadership Skills Reduce Job Stress

 

By Rick Nauert PhD Senior News Editor
Reviewed by John M. Grohol, Psy.D. on April 5, 2010 

Conflicts in dual-earner families continue to exist as women are asked to perform more of the at-home duties even when they work long hours.

Youngjoo Cha, Cornell doctoral candidate in sociology, finds that having a husband who works 50 hours or more per week can hurt women’s careers.

Women have less time available to do paid work because they still are expected to do more housework and perform most of the caregiving responsibilities.

The findings are reported in the article, “Reinforcing Separate Spheres: The Effect of Spousal Overwork on Men’s and Women’s Employment in Dual-Earner Households” found in the journal American Sociological Review.

Cha’s work looked at 8,484 professional workers and 17,648 nonprofessional workers from dual-earner families, using data collected by the U.S. Census Bureau.

Her analysis shows that overall, having a husband who works 60 hours or more per week increases a woman’s odds of quitting by 42 percent.

However, for husbands, having a wife who works 60 hours or more per week does not significantly affect a man’s odds of quitting.

The odds of quitting increase by 51 percent for professional women whose husbands work 60 hours or more per week, and for professional mothers the odds they will quit their jobs jumps 112 percent.

By contrast, for professional men, both parents and non-parents, the effects of a wife working long hours are negligible.

“As long work-hours introduce conflict between work and family into many dual-earner families, couples often resolve conflict in ways that prioritize husbands’ careers,” Cha said. “Having a husband who works long hours significantly increases a woman’s likelihood of quitting, while having a wife who works long hours does not affect a man’s likelihood of quitting.

“This effect is magnified among workers in professional and managerial occupations, where the norm of overwork and the culture of intensive parenting tend to be strongest. The findings suggest that the prevalence of overwork may lead many dual-earner couples to return to a separate spheres arrangement — breadwinning men and homemaking women.”

Source: Cornell

http://psychcentral.com/news/2010/04/05/women-face-inequality-in-professional-family-lives/12591.html

 

UK scientists have cracked the genetic code of a songbird for the first time with the aim of finding clues to the nature of human speech.

Scientists hope their findings will provide them with a window into the origins of a wide range of human speech and communication disorders from autism to stroke and Parkinson’s disease.   

Source:  http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=122450&sectionid=3510208

Treatment Options For Generalized Anxiety Disorder

A little worry is normal, but people who constantly worry about daily concerns, even when times are good, may have generalized anxiety disorder (GAD).

GAD is excessive worry that lasts at least six months and disrupts daily activities, according to the March issue of Mayo Clinic Women’s HealthSource. Typically starting during middle age and more common in older adults, GAD affects an estimated 4 to 7 percent of adults 65 and older and often goes hand in hand with depression or other anxiety disorders, such as phobias.

It’s believed that people with GAD have abnormal levels of brain chemicals that affect the response to stressful or uncertain situations. This overactive fear circuitry in the brain can cause a person to view many situations, even harmless ones, as threats.

Other signs and symptoms of GAD include irritability; inability to relax; difficulty concentrating; muscle aches and headaches; trouble falling or staying asleep; gastrointestinal discomfort or diarrhea; trembling or twitching; sweating, light-headedness or shortness of breath.

Several treatment options are available, but finding relief may take some time. Treatment options include:

Cognitive behavioral therapy: This type of psychotherapy focuses on identifying and changing the thinking patterns that reinforce anxiety or reactions to stressful situations. Short-term treatment usually lasts about 12 weeks.

Medications: Several categories of medications can effectively treat anxiety. Some medications may not be fully effective for up to two months. Often, medications are used in combination with cognitive behavioral therapy. Antidepressants considered for GAD treatment include venlafaxine (Effexor), duloxetine (Cymbalta), paroxetine (Paxil), citalopram (Celexa) and escitalopram (Lexapro). The anti-anxiety medication buspirone (BuSpar) can be effective for GAD and can be taken with antidepressants.

Other medications, called benzodiazepines, may be prescribed for short periods. Options include clonazepam (Klonopin), lorazepam (Ativan) and alprazolam (Xanax).

Self-care: Exercise produces chemical changes that can calm the body and combat anxiety. Meditation, yoga, music and massages promote relaxation and can ease anxiety. Healthy eating, with regular meals and energy-boosting snacks, is helpful, as is avoiding caffeine and nicotine.

Source: Mayo Clinic

 

We trawl the world’s journals so you don’t have to:

Personalistic thinking (New Ideas in Psychology).

Psychological Consequences of the Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan (Journal of Traumatic Stress). [open access]

Source:  http://bps-research-digest.blogspot.com/2010/04/special-issue-spotter.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+BpsResearchDigest+%28BPS+Research+Digest%29

Reach For The Sky For Positive Thoughts

Article Date: 02 Apr 2010 – 0:00 PDT

When people talk about positive and negative emotions they often use spatial metaphors. A happy person is on top of the world, but a sad person is down in the dumps. Some researchers believe these metaphors are a clue to the way people understand emotions: not only do we use spatial words to talk about emotional states, we also use spatial concepts to think about them.

Motion and emotion

To test this link between vertical space and emotion, in a first experiment Casasanto and Dijkstra asked students to move glass marbles upward or downward into one of two cardboard boxes, with both hands simultaneously, timed by a metronome. Meanwhile, they had to recount autobiographical memories with either positive or negative emotional valence, like ‘Tell me about a time when you felt proud of yourself’, or ‘a time when you felt ashamed of yourself”.

When prompted to tell positive memories, participants began recounting their experiences faster during upward movements, but when prompted to tell negative memories they responded faster during downward movements. Memory retrieval was most efficient when participants’ motions matched the spatial directions that metaphors in language associate with positive and negative emotions.

‘Meaningless’ motions modify memory

The second experiment tested whether these seemingly meaningless motor actions could influence the content of people’s memories. Participants were given neutral-valence prompts, like ‘Tell me about something that happened during high school’, so they could choose to retell something happy or sad. Their choices were determined, in part, by the direction in which they were assigned to move marbles. Moving marbles upward encouraged students to recount positive high school experiences like ‘winning an award’, but moving them downward to recall negative experiences like ‘failing a test’.

‘These data suggest that spatial metaphors for emotion aren’t just in language’, Casasanto says, ‘linguistic metaphors correspond to mental metaphors, and activating the mental metaphor ‘good is up’ can cause us to think happier thoughts.’

Since simple motor actions can trigger this mental metaphor, could there be practical implications? ‘Who knows’, says Casasanto, ‘it would be great if this basic research can help people think more positively in the world beyond the laboratory – marble therapy?’

Source:
Daniel Casasanto
Max-Planck-Gesellschaft

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/184213.php

Elisha Goldstein, Ph.D. Updated: Mar 29th 2010

Since World War II when so many Veterans came back with major traumatic stress, the world of psychology has been focused on the pathologies or illnesses of, well…most of us. The Humanistic movement came out in the 50’s, known as the third force in psychology, but really blossomed more a decade or so later focusing more on the entire human experience including all of the comfortable feelings like awe, gratitude, and joy. Transpersonal Psychology, known as the fourth force in psychology, came shortly after and began looking into the spiritual aspects of psychology. But then someone came along and killed happiness, how did this happen and where do we stand now?

In the early part of this century when Positive psychology came out with their handbook, they began putting academic and research-focused rigor to the work behind humanistic psychology. This catapulted the “happiness” movement with Martin Seligman’s book Authentic Happiness and gave people more permission to focus on “the good” in their lives.

However, like with anything, this process can become commercialized and then leave a sour taste in people’s mouths. Why the sour taste? Because we all have a barometer to know when we feel like we’re being sold a bill of goods without the substance behind it. Too many books, too many self-help “gurus” came out of the woodwork claiming to put perma-smiles on our faces. The promise of permanent happiness is a complete illusion and we know that. This is what Barbara Ehrenreich talks about in her book Bright-sided: How the Relentless Promotion of Positive Thinking Has Undermined America.

However, that does not mean that a greater life filled with more calm, ease, love and joy is not out there. However, like with anything worth doing, it takes effort and discipline to incline our minds toward the good.

Here are four words that I have found helpful in reminding me how to cultivate more gradual happiness in my life.

1. 1.  Incline – this word gives a visual representation of tending to actively lean toward what I consider to be good things in my life. I may actively look for pleasant things in my environment or actively take action on things in life that are healthy for myself and others.

1. 2.  Invite – It’s important to not push our minds toward this way of being, that only creates resistance and feels inauthentic. We can invite our minds to be open to “the good” in our lives.

1. 3.  Intend – Intention makes all the difference. It’s important to set the intention to do incline and invite. Without intention, we get too easily drawn back into the gravity of our neurological automatic negativity bias and get caught up in old habitual ways of seeing and doing things.

1. 4.  Patience – Here it is. This does not happen overnight and we can often experience two steps forward and one step back. Or maybe two steps forward and three steps back sometimes. That doesn’t mean that we can’t keep stepping forward. Be patient and gentle with yourself.

Enjoy!

Source:  http://www.mentalhelp.net/poc/view_doc.php?type=doc&id=36382&cn=5

Will Joel Friedman, Ph.D. Updated: Apr 2nd 2010

After more than three decades of being thoroughly engaging in the therapeutic enterprise, it is exceeding clear that building strong internal resources is a core competency to build within therapy. I was first alerted and sensitized to the importance of developing strong internal resources through reading a one-page summary of a huge multi-factor analysis research study on satisfaction in married couples. It presented the case that only 35 percent of participating couples were satisfied, and further that only nine percent of couples, or one in eleven, were in the top category of couples, across seven groupings, that were highly satisfied or “vitalized” across all dimensions. I remember being impressed that one critical descriptor that distinguished these “vitalized” couples from the other six categories was having built strong internal resources.

Specifically, Marriage researchers Yoav Lavee and David H. Olson, in their 1993 study of married couples, found four distinct profiles of satisfied couples. These satisfied couples included the four groupings and percentages of “traditional” (10%), “balanced” (8%), harmonious” (8%) and “vitalized” (9%). Even here, traditional couples showed low-to-moderate adjustment in several dimensions of their interaction. Balanced and harmonious couples experience a positive, strong relationship, with vitalized couples having the highest satisfaction across all measures.

Couples in the “vitalized” group were characterized as highly satisfied across nearly every dimension of their relationship, interacted well and constructively resolved difficulties. These best adjusted, most satisfied couples had models of each of their parents staying married. Beyond this background of having extended stability and security with their parents, they also agreed in most external areas and tended to be in their first marriages. Most crucially, these vitalized couples had built strong internal resources and were personally integrated. Thus, members of “vitalized” couples group had built strong character qualities and had integrated them inside themselves.1

Consider a key distinction between couples in genuine relationships, deriving from the word related meaning to be deeply connected like brothers and sisters, and involvements characterized by being complicated, mutually entangled, enmeshed, and using each other. It would appear highly probable, reasonable and fitting that the 25% of couples described as balanced, harmonious, and particularly vitalized, would qualify for being in relationships and not merely involvements.

What does it mean to having built strong internal resources? Ego strength is competent adaptation to the environment, that is, build strong internal resources or being highly resourced in the fulfillment of this vision. The peak is Abraham Maslow’s self-actualized person who regularly experiences satisfying peak experiences, has strong internal resources and a highly well functioning, adaptive and healthy personality in the relative world. This is a functional healthy ego as a set of skills, abilities, tools and strategies to appropriately use in adaptively working well in the world, or “self-mastery.”

One can build resilience, hardiness and character, much like one builds antibodies by being inoculated with a small dose of an illness, by exposure to mild to moderate stressors and experiences of disillusionment that do not overwhelm the person’s ability to face, cope and adapt. Resilience brings adaptive flexibility along with strong persistence in the face of apparent obstacles. Resilience researchers have distilled ten psychological characteristics or markers that can aid people to increase their resilience: optimism; cognitive flexibility; a solid moral compass of core values; altruism; a mentor or heroic figure or role model; facing one’s fears; active coping skills; a supportive social network; physical fitness; and a sense of humor and to laugh often.2

Resilience is closely related to the positive psychology concept of flow coined by psychological theorist and researcher Mihály Csíkszentmihályi. Flow is sometimes referred to as being in the zone, on the ball, in the groove and the inner game. At root, flow is conceived as an optimal behavioral fit between the skills, abilities, talents and intelligences a person brings, and the demands and challenges environmental tasks require. He has identified nine factors that describe an experience of flow: clear goals; a high degree of concentration and focus; a loss of feeling self-conscious; an altered subjective sense of time; direct and immediate feedback; balance between ability level and challenge; a sense of personal control over the activity/situation; an intrinsically rewarding activity; and being absorbed in an activity yielding action awareness merging.3

Equanimity is the outstanding attribute for having grown emotionally into true maturity. One who has built strong internal resources, adaptive capabilities, and the ability to keep their emotionally-grounded balance, throughout life’s up’s and down’s and ever-changing stressors, has built true equanimity. When essentially nothing can shake, quake or bake you, blow, boil or bowl you over, split, hit or have a fit over, then you stand your ground whatever may come. When you surrender your imaginary ego as a false identity and ever more inhabit your True Nature or True Self, you are imperturbable since nothing can throw you off course. This puts the disciple and the discipline into discipleship. When you embody in action what you espouse, then you are impeccable, beyond reproach. You exemplify and embody a whole being—yourself. You’re free.

Read in Full: http://www.mentalhelp.net/poc/view_doc.php?type=doc&id=36427&cn=110

 

By Samuel López De Victoria, Ph.D. 

Have you ever noticed that when you have gotten very sick or hospitalized the person you thought was your friend never asked or called? When the same situation had previously happened to them, you were there for them.

Many of you have been in a relationship or been a friend with someone who was an extreme narcissist. These types of relationships are filled with drama unless you totally please the narcissist, which is impossible. The typical extreme narcissists are full of themselves and are overtly pompous. I would like to focus on a kind of extreme narcissist that most people fail to recognize. First, let me explain what extreme narcissism is all about.

Extreme narcissism is an egotistical preoccupation with self. It focuses on personal preferences, aspirations, needs, success, and how one’s self is perceived by others. Some basic narcissism is healthy. This kind of narcissism is better termed as responsibly taking care of oneself, or what I would call “normal” or “healthy” narcissism.

The egotistical narcissists are typically created in one of two ways. One way is through excessive pampering on the part of the parents. Parents create an attitude in the child that he/she is better than others and entitled to special privileges. This creates an arrogant child who lacks a healthy dose of gratitude and humility. It describes the proverbial brat that no one likes.

Another way that extreme narcissists are created is when a child receives a significant emotional wound or a series of them culminating in a major trauma of separation/attachment. This can happen when the parents, as narcissists themselves, are emotionally disconnected from their child. It creates a dysfunction in the ability for the narcissist to connect emotionally to others. No matter how socially skilled an extreme narcissist is, he/she has a major attachment dysfunction and wound. This wounded person constructs one or more false fronts in order to survive and insulate themselves from people because of distrust and fear (Lopez De Victoria, 2008).

A narcissist is a completely self-absorbed person. There can be no other gods in an extreme narcissist’s world, regardless if they say they believe in God or not. In practical terms, a narcissist is God in his/her own imagination. Ego rules supremely in the narcissist’s life. In light of this, what energizes a narcissist is whatever fuels the ego. Ego loves pleasure and gain. In most cases, these can come from one of two ways of feeding the ego. One way is through aggrandizement, which means “to make bigger.” Ultimately the extreme narcissist feels he/she is most special and, therefore, entitled. To the extreme narcissist, people are actually things to use.

Another way that the narcissist’s ego gets special attention is through the role of being a victim. Welcome to the victimized extreme narcissist. Most persons recognize ego as arrogance. At the same time they fail to see the subtle deception of ego when it takes the role of a being a victim. As kind and compassion-driven human beings, we easily are fooled by this form of extreme ego. We are constantly hearing the voices of the needy in the media through a variety of forms. The disenfranchised, the poor, the homeless, the hurting, the refugees, the abused, and the list goes on. What we often do not see is that we are many times shamed by these voices for not doing enough for them. All along it is easy to be manipulated as we respond from our hearts. The deception of the ego is that the narcissist can hide behind misfortune and victimization in order to shame you into feeling and believing that they suffer more than you do. They will say that you don’t care enough for them. They will make you feel that you have not done enough to help them. The ego wants attention, control, gain, and power over others by positioning itself as a “poor and helpless” victim. It does this; all the while it soaks up the attention and control over others. In the eyes of an extreme narcissist, their situation is always right and totally justified. Instead of taking responsibility for self and consequences, the extreme narcissist tries to make others feel responsible for their plight. Because extreme narcissists are incredibly adept at the game of manipulation, they will always find a way to turn the tables on you. They will try to make you responsible and feel guilty for not helping them or taking their side and cause.

Extreme narcissists often shift gears from visible grandiosity to acting that they are better than others because they suffer more than others. You can see an extreme narcissist who hogs the limelight and credit from achievements and self-praise also getting similar recognition from milking an injury or a seeming misfortune that has occurred to them. Victimized extreme narcissists are on the constant prowl looking for any gullible soul that will believe their version of calamity whether it is real, exaggerated, or fictitious. What they claim that makes their calamity different is that it is worse for them. Beware of this kind of extreme narcissism. It is just as selfish and manipulating as that of a pompous egotist. The moment they see that you don’t “fully” cooperate and act with extreme concern for them, serving and pampering them, they will eliminate you from their list of “loving” folks. They may even badmouth you and gossip or slander you as being selfish and uncaring. Imagine that! I have seen these types over and over again in work I have done in the field of pain medicine management. It is usually the individuals who are humble, full of gratitude, and joyful who are the ones most capable of coping with their injuries and pain. Those who are selfish, moaning, and full of self-pity take much longer to heal or sometimes never heal but go further downhill in their health. My recommendation is to avoid treating this person’s misfortune as the ultimate suffering of all humans. Be polite. Recognize their pain and no more. Don’t be pulled into their web of emotional manipulation. Stay away from extreme narcissists.

References

Lopez De Victoria, S. (2008, August 4). How to Spot a Narcissist. Posted on Psych Central Web site.

Source:  http://psychcentral.com/blog/archives/2010/03/29/narcissists-who-cry-the-other-side-of-the-ego/

 

By SEAN KIMBALL
CASA GRANDE HIGH SCHOOL, 17, JUNIOR

Published: Sunday, March 28, 2010 at 4:03 a.m.

( page 1 of 2 )

“Autism is a brain-based disability which primarily affects a person’s ability to learn social skills,” said Casa Grande High School speech therapist Babs Bryant. In many cases of autism, it also can result in learning disabilities.