I first became acquainted with the malignant form of Narcissistic Personality Disorder by reading the Brothers Grimm fairy tales. If you know the story of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, you already have a classic example of a malignant narcissist at work.

Snow White had to hide deep in the forest at the dwarfs’ house because her overly beautiful and overly competitive stepmother, the Evil Queen, couldn’t stand the idea of ​​Snow White being more beautiful than her. She demanded that her huntsman kill Snow White and return the girl’s heart in a box.

This example may be a bit extreme, as most malignant narcissists are not murderers, but it conveys the essence of malice that is often present in their interactions with others.

What is Malignant Narcissism?

The key characteristics that define malignant narcissism and distinguish it from the more common types of exhibitionist and covert narcissism are that malignant narcissists get most of their narcissistic supply by destroying the self-esteem and happiness of others. Rather than displaying themselves to an admiring audience or basking in the glow of someone else’s approval, malignant narcissists derive sadistic pleasure from controlling and hurting others.

Note: I use the terms “narcissist” or “narcissist” as a shorthand way of referring to people who exhibit the thought and behavior pattern that is commonly diagnosed as Narcissistic Personality Disorder.

Some malignant narcissists are covertly destructive.

Example: Sweet Aunt Sally

Gina’s elderly aunt Sally seemed like a sweet, harmless old lady. But somehow every time Gina visited, she felt depressed and bad about herself. It wasn’t until she brought her friend Mary to visit her aunt that she realized how malicious her aunt was. “Mary, a big girl like you shouldn’t ever wear horizontal stripes,” her aunt said. “If you ever want to get married, you need to lose some weight. More cookies, dear?”

Example: Jack’s Helpful Boss

Every Monday morning, Jack’s boss would have a meeting. He would go around the room asking everyone to talk about some mistake they had made the previous week and what they should have done instead. He said the purpose of the meeting was to improve their work by learning from each other’s failures. Instead, everyone felt humiliated, insecure, and hated Monday mornings. Jack noticed that as everyone in the meeting began to look depressed, his boss seemed happier and happier.

Some malignant narcissists are more blunt.

Example: James and His Blanket

My client James was talking in therapy about an old blanket he had been very attached to as a child. When I asked him if he still had it, he said it had been sitting unused in a closet at his father’s house. I asked him why he hadn’t gone and got it if he loved it so much. I’ll never forget his answer.

“If I told my dad I appreciated it, he’d throw it away. I’d have to find another way to get it.”

As I learned more about James’ early life, the story of the blanket became a symbol of their entire relationship. Whenever James showed he cared about something, his father would find a way to destroy it. He abandoned James’ dog while at camp, refused to let James go with the rest of his classmates on their trip to Washington, D.C., and on James’s birthday, he made sure not to give James any of the buttercream pieces when he cut the cake.

What Kind of People Attract Malignant Narcissists?

Most malignant narcissists I’ve met seem to enjoy tormenting insecure people. They’re bullies. If you’re not insecure, to begin with, they’ll try to make you insecure.

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They’re often very good at identifying people’s vulnerabilities and exploiting them—and even the strongest of us have vulnerabilities.

Related : 10 things you do that make you a value person without even realizing it

Here are some examples of two manipulative malignant narcissists and their attempts to make their therapists as insecure and uncomfortable as possible. The first example is of an overt malignant narcissist and the other is of a covert malignant narcissist.

Example1: The Humiliator

This client came in for his first session. His current problem was that he couldn’t maintain romantic relationships with women because he lost all interest in the person as soon as he had sex with her. He said he realized that this would hinder his marriage and family

I invited him to sit down and told him where I would be sitting—a big chair with a footrest. I said, “Feel free to sit wherever you want.” He said, “Really? Wherever I want?” Then he pulled a chair right in front of me, moved it close to me, put his feet on the footrest next to mine, and smiled.

It was clear that he wanted to make me uncomfortable and that this was a test of sorts. The truth is, he succeeded in surprising and confusing me—which is exactly what he intended.

I asked him to move his chair back and tell me about his last relationship. Here’s a shortened version of what he said:

I love sexually humiliating women. I especially enjoy doing it with the kind of girl who rejected me in high school because I wasn’t good enough to date. I’m a fashion photographer and young models come to test for me in the hopes that I can use them for photo shoots.

I love getting them naked for me and making them do poses that I hope will embarrass them—like getting on their hands and knees and sticking their butts up in the air. Then I make them have sex with me. They rarely say “no” because I make them think it will get them a job.

I like to hurt them during sex and make them do weird things they don’t like. Once I’m done, I tell them they’re ugly, useless, and not good enough. They usually cry at this point, which I enjoy! Then I throw them out!

Then he looked at me and smiled and said, “What do you think? Is there any chance you can help me?”

It was clear to both of us that he wanted to see how upset he was making me by telling me this. We had a few therapy sessions after that, but he left and never came back after I confronted him very honestly about how his attempts to control our sessions by making me feel uncomfortable were sabotaging his therapy.

Example 2: The Victim

One of my skilled and experienced colleagues came to me for supervision because he said:

I’ve lost my confidence. I have an elderly client, and she’s bothering me. I feel incredibly insecure during her sessions, and I don’t know what’s going on.

I asked him to tell me when this started. He said:

Well… I had several sessions with her. She presented herself as a victim. She would always complain about how cruel people were to her, especially her adult children. At first, I was sympathetic.

Then she came in for therapy and told me that I had been cruel to her in her last session. I was very surprised. I pride myself on bringing a nice guy, and I would never intentionally be cruel to any client.

I asked her to give me an example of how cruel I had been, and she told me it was because of the tone of my voice. She said I was being very harsh and dissatisfied. I didn’t think I was and I told her so. I suggested that she record our sessions in the future and then play the clips where I was being cruel.

I agreed because I was pretty sure she was imagining it. But she started playing clips and pointing out little mistakes on my part. She kept playing one clip over and over again where it sounded like I was a little upset, but most clients didn’t notice.

I started to get reluctant in her sessions and eventually, it became very ineffective. I knew I was in a trap, but honestly, I had no idea how to get out of it.

Luckily, I had seen this kind of thing before and had a simple solution. I shifted the focus of the session from her problems to his minor flaws. I told him that he needed to refocus the therapy on them. I suggested that he say something like this:

I know you came to therapy to work on your issues, but I’ve realized that we’ve gone off track and now your sessions are focused solely on my flaws as a person and as a therapist. I think we need to get back to focusing on you. You didn’t come to therapy to improve me, but because you were unhappy with your relationships outside of therapy.

As it turns out, she wasn’t interested in focusing on herself or her role in creating her relationship problems. Once this therapist stopped letting her put him under the microscope, she dropped out of therapy.

Bottom line: Malignant narcissists enjoy devaluing people and pointing out other people’s flaws. Their main goal is to destroy people’s self-esteem and control them. Their favorite victims are insecure people who can make them even more insecure, but they will try this with all kinds of people – even their therapists. Sometimes they are quite successful.