In the past few years, there has been a great deal of interest in Frida Kahlo. There were Kahlo exhibitions in Los Angeles, London and Rome in 2014; In New York in 2015; in Tucson in 2016; One will open in Philadelphia in 2017. Why is there such a growing interest in Frida Kahlo? Maybe it’s because of her Latina, lesbian, gay and femme fans? Or perhaps it is due to the fact that 50 of Frida Kahlo’s 143 paintings are self-portraits. Some people call Kahlo the inventor of the selfie! After all, people on Instagram and Facebook provide the world with still images of themselves. Maybe they sympathize with Kahlo. Was Frida Kahlo a narcissist?
Kahlo contracted polio when she was 6 years old. As a result, one of her legs became thinner than the other and she developed a deformed foot. Then, when she was 18, she was riding a bus in Mexico City when she collided with a trolley car. Her spine was shattered, and her pelvis was fractured, forcing her to spend the next three months in a body cast, and she was bedridden for a year, completely unable to move. Since she had nothing else to do, she started drawing because she could do it lying down. She probably started using herself as her main subject because she could look at herself in the mirror while lying on her back. Kahlo once said: “I am broken. But I am happy as long as I can paint.”
Returning to the question, did Kahlo suffer from narcissistic personality disorder? Narcissism is a continuum that can range from healthy narcissism (1,2,3) to narcissistic personality disorder (8,9, 10).
Everyone craves approval and attention, and this is healthy narcissism and an important component of self-esteem. Unhealthy narcissism is when others are used only to perform a function, to reflect the narcissist’s idiosyncrasy. If other people don’t do this job, they are discarded (usually with contempt). – His inability to reciprocate the relationship due to his lack of sympathy and interest in the other person from whom he is separated.
Related : Can We Teach Narcissists to Care?
Unhealthy narcissism often develops as a defense against narcissistic injury. (For further discussion of this topic, click here.) Narcissistic injury is a major component of the trauma to a person’s body caused by polio or a near-fatal accident. Frida has seen both! As a result of the accident, she was unable to have children, which is another narcissistic injury.
Physical trauma can destroy the feeling of being loved, especially for children who previously lacked empathic communication. In her painting “My Nurse and I,” Frida shows us that this was the case for her. The painting depicts Kahlo being breast-fed by a cold, uncaring native Indian nurse. There is no warmth or affection, no emotional bond, just the practicality of breastfeeding. The child has an adult head as if Frida had never been a child. Her mother was unable to breastfeed her because her younger sister, Christina, was only 11 months younger than her. She literally displaced her sister, Frieda.
