Internal Narcissistic Object Relations

About the Instructor

Dr. William L. Edkins, Psy.D., Psy.D. is a Fellow of the International Psychoanalytical Association. He is a Supervising and Training Analyst at LAISPS and NPI. He has been in private practice for 40 years but teaching is a major interest in his professional life. He is on the faculty of both institutes and has been an Assistant Clinical Professor or an Adjunct Faculty member at several psychology doctoral programs.

Internal Narcissistic Object Relations: The Often Overlooked Rosetta Stone to Understanding the Patient’s Inability to Change and to be Genuinely Responsive to the Therapeutic Relationship

About this Course

Narcissistic injury can occur when reality disturbs one’s sense of well-being and personal worth. In order to escape the resulting feelings of: neediness, pain, littleness, loneliness, humiliation and shame, one creates internal narcissistic objects as protection. These work by bringing the hurtful person within so that the injured person gains the illusion of control over the painful situation. For instance, the therapist who causes hurt due to his or her vacation can be transformed into someone devalued and not helpful. The internalization can also allow the person to change the representation of himself. In the same example of the therapist’s vacation, by internalizing the therapist who leaves and the patient who is left, the patient can change the vulnerable self into an independent or all together self who never even noticed the separation. It is quite possible to conduct a psychotherapy and not even reach these internal organizations because they typically exist as a split-off, encapsulated part of the personality, even in otherwise highly functioning patients.

Course Objectives

• Describe the painful experiences that can trigger the formation of internal narcissistic object relations.
• Describe how the internal narcissistic object relations are developed as a result of the painful experiences.
• Describe ways to recognize when these internal objects are being engaged in the transference/ countertransference and how to speak to them.