Murphy's Law For Narcissistic Exes and Parents

When we apply Murphy’s Law to a narcissistic ex, we find that anything they can possibly jack with they will jack with. If there is a situation that they can make more difficult in order to gain attention, then they will. If there is an obvious decision that they can draw out and complicate, then they will to get their fix.

We see this constantly. One time the narcissistic ex wants one thing when it is clearly inconvenient and impossible and then when the same thing is offered to them at a workable time, they don’t want it anymore. If there is an obvious decision that would benefit the kids, the narcissist ex finds some way to turn it into a circus with them in the center.

The narcissist’s game is to make everyone wait on them. Everyone has to wait for them to reach their big decision and announce it to the world. They need to make sure everyone is watching. No one else can plan anything until the narcissist is ready, and then if they have a chance to reverse course and screw it all up, they will!

If there is a sensible way to do things and a drama-producing way to do things, the narcissist will pick the path of greatest drama. If there’s a way to create delay and confusion, then that’s what the narcissist will unfailingly do.

Of course, the flipside is when the narcissist makes unreasonable and inconvenient demands, then they want an answer immediately. They will throw a fit if they don’t get a clear answer right now and they will set ultimatums to harass and keep the attention on themselves. They will set deadlines and threaten litigation if you do not provide an immediate response to their nonsense. Typically, when you do provide a response, they will find a way to cause problems with that as well.

If there is something a narcissist can get attention from, they will get attention from doing it. And if they can get attention from doing the opposite, they will get attention from that, too. If doing the sensible thing does not give them attention, they will avoid it like the plague.

Transcript

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This is unapologetic parenting podcast dedicated to candidly and unapologetically discussing parenting, divorce and co parenting. We take on the topics most people don't want to talk about and offer support and solutions to help you be a better parent, co parent and human being. Now without further ado, let's get right to it. Welcome back to unapologetic parenting. I'm your host Carl Knickerbocker. And in this episode we are talking about Murphy's Law. Or more specifically, when we apply Murphy's Law to a narcissist or run Murphy's Law through a narcissist, what we end up coming up with is instead of just whatever can go wrong will go wrong, is that whatever narcissist can turn into a problem, they will turn into a problem in order to get attention, if there's anything, anything that they can use to get attention, they will use it to get attention, if there is a path where they can cause drama, they will take that path to cause drama, if there's a sensible way, and a drama creating way, they will invariably take the drama creating way that's just what they do, if there is a way to complicate things, cause problems cause division, cause conflict cause anything that requires attention to be put on to them. That is what they will do every single time if there's a situation and they can make it more difficult to get attention. That's what they're going to do. If there's an obvious decision that they can draw out and make everyone wait on them and complicated. And they can complicate everything, then that is what they will do to get their fix. We see this constantly. So in our lives, we see this happen all the time. One time, the narcissistic ex wants one thing. And of course they want it when it is completely inconvenient or impracticable to do that thing, and then later on when that same thing gets offered when it would actually make sense and be workable, then they don't want it anymore. If the kids should be in a good school, then of course they don't want them to go to that school. If the kids are on remote learning, they want the kids to be in school, if we propose to put them in school, then of course, they want them to remain in remote learning. If there is some obvious decision that would benefit the kids, then the narcissistic ex will find some way to turn it into a circus with them at the center of it. The narcissists game is to make everyone wait on them. So everyone has to wait for them to reach their big decision. They have to sort through their feelings. And they have to do this. And they have to do that and boo hoo hoo, or whatever else before they can announce their big decision to the world. They need to make sure everyone is watching. They need to make sure everyone is listening. Everyone has to be waiting for the big grand reveal. And no one else can plan anything until the narcissist is ready to announce their decision. And then, and then if they have a chance to reverse whatever their decision is later to screw everything up for everybody. They will do that too. If there's a sensible way to do things, they're not going to do it. If there is a drama producing way to do things, a complicated way to do things that gains him attention. That is what they will pick. Invariably, every single time. If there's a way to create delay, if they can create confusion, if they can take shots at people if they can drag something out, then that is what the narcissistic parent will unfailingly do, of course, then the flip side of it is after they've been dragging things out and taking their time and making everyone pay attention to them. When they start making their unreasonable and inconvenient demands, then they want immediate answers. They want you to jump right now. And you have to make a decision right now or else they're going to throw a fit. If they don't get an answer right away. And then they'll start setting ultimatums they'll threaten litigation, they will just unilaterally make decisions without consulting in order to create other problems. They're going to say deadlines are going to threaten, they're going to withhold they're going to do all this stuff. If you do not provide them an immediate response to their nonsense. That's just the way they do. And then when you do provide them a sensible response, guess what, they will find a way to jack with that and cause problems with that as well. If there is something a narcissist can get attention from, they will get attention from doing it, if they can get attention from doing the opposite, then they will get attention from that too. If doing the sensible thing does not give them attention, then they will avoid anything sensible like the plague that is Murphy's Law. When it comes to a narcissist anything and everything they can do and it's opposite, usually both and then probably some third option that doesn't make a bit of sense that complicates even all those things. If it gets them attention, they're gonna do it.