Is your family member.....

[bostonbound]

...always angry at someone (multiple people)?  Do they always mention how lonely they are and that they have no friends.  Wondering if this is super common or not.

[Cat of the Canals]

The "I'm so lonely"/"I have no friends" bit is classic waif behavior. So manipulative. The implication, of course, is that you should swoop in and fill the gap. Don't fall for it. Their life. Their problem. Their responsibility. If they want companionship or some sort of social outlet, there are a hundred different things they could do to get it. Go to church. Join a club. Play bingo.

PDmom often has an "enemy of the month." If she runs out of those, she has this particular neighbor she just hates with every fiber of her being because he had the audacity to build a large dock. 

PDmil is insulted by just about everyone she meets (gee, I wonder why she has no friends?), and the insults range from totally benign to completely fabricated. We are often at a loss as to what she's even angry about in the first place, even after her lengthy explanation.

[Sneezy]

Yes, although my mom will sometimes go on and on about how busy she is and everything she is doing and how everyone just loves her.  To hear her tell it, she practically runs all the activities at the senior living center.  And then she will shift gears and tell me that everyone is mean to her and she is just the most misunderstood and most unappreciated person ever.  And then most phone calls and some visits end with her reminding me that she is bored and lonely and oh so miserable.  The fact that none of what she tells me is consistent doesn't matter.  She shifts from being popular and busy to being bored and miserable in the blink of an eye.  And someone is ALWAYS mean to her.  Which, depending on her mood, will lead into a story about how she told off this mean person, or it will lead to more crying  about how awful the world is and how miserable she is.

The thing is, everything must revolve around mom and how she feels at that exact moment in time.  Which could be good (everyone loves me) to bad (everyone is mean to me) to bored (why won't my daughter drop everything and entertain me) to miserable (the world is an awful dark place and I will never find any joy in anything).

It's hard to keep up.  But as Cat says, you are not responsible for filling in the gaps for your relative.  It is their life and they must take responsibility for their own happiness.  Everyone gets bored and lonely at times.  It's part of life.  And adults need to figure out for themselves how to handle life.

[bostonbound]

True....my dad does the same thing.  One minute he has no one, then he's talking about going out with friends.  I always feel like reminding him about his "friends" when he complains again about having no one.  It's maddening.  When you mention that everyone must revolve around what your mom needs at the precise moment really hit a nerve with me.  My dad is the same way....AND your personality has to be just what he needs as well.  God forbid you actually have your own thoughts that could conflict OR not be there at any given moment.  It doesn't ever matter what YOU need...

[wisingup]

Yes for my ubpdM - no friends, no hobbies, no interests. 

She also likes to bring up how much time her sister's kids & grandkids spend with her and how much they do for her, to make us feel good & guilty about not doing the same for her.

[LemonLime]

One thing that's struck me since joining this forum is how PDs can present in so many different ways.

My uPD sib is so so covert in her narcissism, at least 99% of the time.  Her narcissistic rages are classic.  But she is otherwise very bright and genuinely fun to be around.  Very creative and inclusive in many ways, loves kids and animals.  She doesn't complain about having no friends or being lonely.   However she has always, as long as I can remember, had an "enemy".  All the time.  There is someone who has wronged her in a big way.   As a kid she was wronged by my parents, as a teen it was by friends, as a college student it was by a roommate.  Then ex-husband, then friends again, then boss, then coworker, then neighbor.   She would go on and on and on about these people, giving her audience the "next chapter' in this soap opera, whenever we would see her.  Oh my gosh, my eyes would glaze over and I felt so icky by the end that I felt like I needed a shower.  Of course these people started out as the "best thing since sliced bread", before they "inexplicably" became the Devil's spawn in her eyes.

It took me so darn long to realize this for what it was.   It took me so darn long to realize that the rages and the character assassination go hand in hand.  My mom loves "drama" so she welcomed the "fun" stories that my sib told about "what this awful person did next" to my sibling.   Like she was tuning into the "Maury Povich Show" or something.  I didn't realize it's not good or healthy or normal to enjoy such negativity.   Once we had a guest over who had just learned she had metastatic cancer, and after brief condolences my sibling proceeded to complain about "so and so Awful Person of the Month" for the next 45 minutes.  It's astounding the lack of sensitivity and the self-centeredness.

One thing that I finally realized after so many years is that she seems incapable of simply complaining about a particular behavior and then respectfully requesting that a person change that behavior.   She must annihilate that person's character.  They must be completely demolished, shamed and destroyed for their actions or words.  There is no such thing as a person being imperfect and making a mistake.  Being redeemable.  This is so very very sad.

I will say that when she is focused on how awful someone else is, I'm more safe from being the target of her attacks.   Sort of cold comfort but better than being excoriated. 

I found Eckhart Tolle's work on the Ego and Pain Body very very helpful in putting this stuff into context.   Eckhart would say that the Ego loves it when we demonize others, because the Ego feeds on negativity and needs to feel "better than".   So the drama and hating and demonizing allows the Ego to eat and to grow.   It we are aware of our Ego we can acknowledge it and keep it in cheque.   The Pain Body is very very strong in PD folks.   They were probably born with a strong Pain Body (everyone has a pain body but at different degrees).   And the Pain Body continues to grow in them because they don't address it.   They don't work on themselves.  They are not aware that they are being controlled by their Pain Body.  I do have compassion for the PDs in my life and understanding why they are as they are gives me quite a bit of comfort and a feeling of some control.   But of course they cannot really be helped and it's not my job to do so.  So I stay away.

[Cat of the Canals]

Her narcissistic rages are classic.  But she is otherwise very bright and genuinely fun to be around.  Very creative and inclusive in many ways, loves kids and animals.  She doesn't complain about having no friends or being lonely.   However she has always, as long as I can remember, had an "enemy".  All the time.  There is someone who has wronged her in a big way.   

This sounds a lot like my PDmom. She has lots of friends, doesn't complain about being lonely. She's very much a social butterfly. But behind closed doors, she rages and holds huge grudges, often over completely trivial things. It took me a looooong time to put two and two together, too, because she can appear so "normal."

[SunnyMeadow]

Yes, my uNPD mother is always angry with someone and discussing these hurtful times and people constantly. Someone here commented how her mother would drag out her Bag of Antique Injustices quite often. That sticks with me because my mother does the same. If she isn't getting enough attention from recent events she will drag out OLD perceived slights from former neighbors, long discarded relatives or even a car salesman from years ago.

She also talks about how lonely she is but doesn't mention she has no friends even though she doesn't have any friends! She finds fault with new people she meets so "friends" don't last long for her. I can see how she discards people and always has so a "no friends" discussion with me wouldn't go well for her. I'd give it right back to her.

I agree with Cat of the Canals, don't fall for the No Friends thing. They do want you to swoop in to fill the gap because they are so lonelyyyy  . It is their life and their problem. It took me a long time to come to this realization. She's an adult and apparently this is how she chooses to live life. I'm filling my life with good and kind people so she is fading into the background now.