The other day I was asked a question by a friend of mine about the age of onset for NPD.
I was pretty sure I knew the answer and trotted out the information about the characteristics as defined in the DSM and that it often begins to emerge in late teens but it essentially becomes noticeable from the 20’s onwards and as a person ages they tend to show less extreme grandiose behaviours.
Her response to my “off pat” answer was surprising and sent me back to all my favorite textbooks in total insecurity of my knowledge. She described the case of her brother-in-law:
How Sam became a Narcissist Later in Life
“Sam was a research scientist in a university geology department and had been highly successful, particularly in his teaching which he loved, and by all accounts was loved back by his students. He is a little on the short side so has a bit of a “small man complex” in that in a social gathering or event, he liked to perform in front of others and you always noticed Sam. His voice was on the loud side too. This is probably what made him such a good lecturer in that they were always a performance, whether he was talking about his passion for quaternary sub-fossils or his love of breeding and rescuing injured raptors on his farm near the city.
He had by all accounts some risk factors for a personality disorder in that his mother had been cold, distant and resentful at having to give up her life to become a mother and let her children know about it always until her death. He had also been shipped off to boarding school and was the family black sheep having chosen a career as an academic rather than becoming a surgeon like his father, and younger siblings. The fact that he had an international reputation, meant nothing. This if anything spurred him on.
Sam was happily married with 4 children who were half grown when he suffered a trauma. A student who had failed her dissertation, made an accusation that he had sexually assaulted her. He was suspended and eventually cleared, turned out she had done the same thing at school to a teacher who had befriended her. But the rumours spread around the university and he felt he couldn’t work there anymore. He left to work for an environmental archaeology consultancy.
Shortly afterwards he started drinking heavily and when drunk berated his wife, family and anyone. He became louder and more attention seeking and this thoroughly nice guy as was, appeared to fit the diagnostic criteria for NPD except for the age of onset. His condition became dysfunctional and he could no longer work and went into a spiral of decline, loosing wife, family and home. He is now living with his parents where he rages against the world and writes angry, unpublishable articles on his former specialism”
Sam of course is not his real name.
I must admit, the story sent me scurrying to any source I could find, and there weren’t many. No, whilst no one definitively states that NPD cannot develop later in life, there is a dearth of evidence to support it.
The dominance of the medical model may be in part to blame for this. In clinical terms, only young people have been studied in any great depth and the diagnostic criteria are focused this age group.
There is an old proverb that suggests that if you look for something then you will find it and nothing else.
The implication is that no one has looked for late-onset personality disorders and NPD.
What Does Research say About late On-set Narcissism?
My guess is it could be out there but hidden somewhere else.
We have so many adults now labeled with a variety of long-term mental health conditions that perhaps some people with say, PTSD, major depressive illness etc. could equally well fit the diagnostic criteria for a form of late-onset NPD.
One academic review article exists which supports my hunch Oltman and Balsis(1) attest that:
“In comparison to the literature concerned with most forms of mental disorder, relatively little attention has been paid to the trajectory of personality disorders. This is especially true about middle adulthood and later life. A few longitudinal studies have made substantial contributions to our understanding of personality disorders, but they have focused largely on the period of the lifespan ranging from childhood through adolescence and young adulthood”
The conclusion of their article advocates a need to study the course of personality disorders in middle age and older populations to gain better insight.
If, however, the clinicians who are applying the label have pre-conceived notions about the age of onset then finding that sample is going to be as difficult as finding “Hen’s teeth”.
In the less academic and clinical environment of the internet, it is possible to find posts by many people, like my friend’s sister who had a relationship with a person who has late onset personality disorder.
They alone are questioning the diagnostic processes and criteria when their lives are being ruined by proxy.
This happens when a person they once knew and loved, turns into someone they no longer recognize – a boastful, egotistical, manipulative user who may or may not have a self-sabotaging streak.
From my reading of these anguished posts, most of the partners appear to have had a predisposition to a personality disorder which may be NPD, including an abusive childhood followed by some sort of psychic trauma which has caused the full emergence.
Unlike their diagnosed counterparts, they are not taken seriously in mental health treatment because they don’t fit the criteria and are given inappropriate treatment such as CBT and then left to flounder with completely the wrong label of “recidivist” or “alcoholic”. How many families are ruined in the process? Something must be done.
Endnote: Sam’s eldest daughter is now in her 20’s. She had a traumatic relationship…. with a narcissist!
- Thomas F. Oltmanns and Steve Balsis (2011) Personality Disorders in Later Life: Questions about the Measurement, Course, and Impact of Disorders Annu Rev Clin Psychol. Apr 27; 7: 321–349.
Thanks for writing about this topic. It’s particularly interesting because of my relationship with someone who became increasingly narcissistic at midlife. I think this self-destruction has been hidden by the euphemism: the midlife crisis. Some people may indeed be in a crisis from which they’ll eventually recover with an even deeper connection to themselves and others.
Some people however, are lost in the euphemism which they happily use to disguise their illness. These are the people with pathological disorders who may have a chance of being helped IF we considered their behavior aberrant, rather than “normal.” It is not normal to leave a family of decades, end an ambitious career, seek out people who will not challenge self-destructive behaviors nor a distorted perception of reality.
Dr. Elsa Ronningstam mentions in her book “Identifying and Understanding the Narcissistic Personality” on page 65 that “NPD does not necessarily remit with advanced age. In fact, middle age is an especially critical period for the development or worsening of NPD…leading to chronic denial, emptiness, devaluation, guilt and cynicism.” She references Kernberg and Berezin (1977 and 1980).
I believe there is a great deal of evidence being shared by people who understand distinctions between NPD and normal narcissism. We loved these people, for goodness sakes! For the sake of the person with a NPD and for the sake of his or her family, I hope psychologists invest time and energy into researching late onset NPD and how families can cope with a serious crises being touted as ‘sowing one’s oats.” It is ludicrous to me that people have not taken this phenomenon more seriously.
p.s. Narcissistic traits are usually obvious at an earlier age; however, competence and intelligence mask deficits. A narcissistic person loses mastery over impulses (and status) in the aging process, lacking emotional and psychological resiliency. A young good-looking, ambitious and arrogant man has every reason to believe he IS special without realizing there are limits he will need to reconcile as he ages. I think the inability to grieve one’s losses at midlife is an important aspect of late onset NPD.
Thank you.
This was my experience with an aging man who experienced a stereotypical midlife crisis, to the point of leaving a 26 year relationship, drastically changing his appearance, and moving to Asia where his new girlfriend Ives.
It felt surreal. It’s been a year and I’m still shaking my head, while everyone around me is shrugging it off as a harness midlife crisis.
I think it’s indicative of something terribly wrong.
I too had this experience. Looking back, I’m quite sure the NPD was always there. But it manifested itself only rarely, and episodes were minor and enough under control to be brushed off (by me) as ordinary personality quirks. Unfortunately, getting old has not been kind to him, to say the least. As the brain ages, its insufficiencies become increasingly more pronounced.
I think its fairly well known that substance abuse can bring out NPD related behaviour at any age. If it is substance induced behavior, it will disappear when they clean up.
Also about 40 % NPDs abuse substances, often starting midlife, when they lose their narcissistic “touch”. They once again feel superior when high, but they behave worse then ever.
http://samvak.tripod.com/journal66.html
Thank you so much for this article. I very much needed to confirm a late onset of NPD or BPD was possible, but the literature seems to indicate that both conditions are present from young adulthood. From the day we married, my ex spouse showed signs and symptoms that I can now, in retrospect, relate to BPD or NPD. But he also did demonstrate empathy and what I believe was genuine care and concern for me and for our children. We are all intelligent and discerning individuals who trusted him implicitly and he appeared to be worthy of that trust for decades. He was a good father, involved with his children and our children valued him as their parent, even well after reaching their adulthood. However, after the age of 60 and after nearly four decades of marriage, he has gone completely off the rails, behaved treachorously and discarded all of us in the most callous and unconcerned manner possible. It was like turning off a switch. We just don’t seem to matter to him anymore. The personality of the man I now deal with is not the same personality I lived with for nearly forty years. It simply is not, because I would never have stayed married to the man I now deal with. There was a change in him and a sudden change at that. All of us, including our children now face hostility, deliberate malice and vindictiveness from him. I am attempting to finalise a divorce process that he initiated, but he appears to be just deliberately delaying finalising it. It makes no sense at all.
Hi Portia. I know exactly what you’re saying. I firmly believe NPD can appear during a person’s later years. I think the potential is there from an early age but doesn’t necessarily become fullblown NPD until much later in life.
My spouse managed to hold it all together while he was working. He always appeared to be very normal. I think he knew he had to. But gradually, after he retired, his personality changed completely. Now he’s a mean, obnoxious child in an adult body and totally unrecognizable as the person I once knew. I feel sorry for him, but I can’t live with him any longer.
“Now he’s a mean, obnoxious child in an adult body…” Yes, indeed. This could be my own story.
Portia, your story is eerily similar to mine. After decades of marriage, my husband had a sudden Jekyll/Hyde turn-about. He changed so much, on a dime, that I became frightened of him. He had always been very controlling, and there was little reciprocity in our marriage. He never thanked me, never praised any of my accomplishments, or acknowledged me. I existed as a kind of emotional slave to him, I realize now, though my upbringing had convinced me to see this as “turning the other cheek.” Nonetheless, we enjoyed working on similar projects together, we supported each other financially, I enjoyed many of our conversations, and I trusted him. I even loved him. I did. That is the strangest part of this whole scenario now. I trusted him hugely. I was the loyal caretaker, and I assumed he would be that way too, if push came to shove. However, after our children were born, I saw a very jealous side of him. My care and attention were NOT to go to THEM! The nice young man I had married had a dark side, but with young children to raise, I re-doubled my efforts as the husband-pleaser in order to keep the peace. I gave everything the children needed too. In those days, I thought of these issues as the quirks of individual personality, and certainly never thought I was dealing with a disorder in my husband. It was when he was in his 50s that I first asked to be acknowledged by him for a job I had done. That was the trigger, though to normal human beings, an expectation of a thank you sounds innocuous enough. He literally went berserk with both rage and vindictiveness. Told me that I must be punished. And he indeed carried through on this, in truly horrible ways. I thought the world had turned upside down. He toned down a bit after the initial change, so I risked it and stayed though professionals told me my husband was a danger to me. He remained intermittently abusive (Narcissistic rage), and tried to harm me or my reputation in previously un-imaginable ways. I was attempting to get all of our children to stable adulthood in the midst of this. Twice, he announced divorce. The first time, he changed his mind. This time he insists on going through with it, mainly I think because he can see it will hurt me. That awful vindictiveness. We will both lose in so many ways. But at present, he is physically abusive, emotionally abusive, and verbally abusive. I never know what the day will bring. He has enablers throughout our community and social circle believing the most terrible lies about me. One of the worst aspects of this is that he has convinced our almost-grown children to hate me, their loving mother. That was the shock of shocks. My husband, with his breakdown, had begun to spin false allegations about me, in front of our children. He spoke to them regularly and purposely in this way, in fact. Pathological lies, or in his delusions did he somehow believe these? I think of the role that Mirror Neurons in the brain likely played. Yes, I know about Attachment-based Parental Alienation, and about the fact that the alienating parent is extremely likely to have Borderline or Narcissistic Personality Disorder. Do not believe the myth that only young children can be influenced under Parental Alienation; it can happen at any age. So it has been a horror show, just when my husband and I should have been starting to consider what to plan for the next phase of our lives. I lived with a vindictive Narcissist all those years, without realizing it. I did know that his own mother had real trouble into old age with physically abusing others. And my husband had other family members who could not control themselves, often, in situations of relationship to others. I was never sure what that was all about. Now I am. So yes, out-of-control pathological Narcissism can certainly happen in middle-age or beyond. It’s just so extremely astonishing to find that a spouse of several decades changes in this extreme manner. I think that when the other spouse is a caretaking, self-sacrificing type, the Narcissist may be kept within normal bounds. The spouse pays an enormous price, of course. But then, if the spouse at long last runs out of this saintly patience, and asks for reciprocity — God forbid! — the vicious Narcissistic traits are unleashed. And these traits ARE vicious. They are tinged with evil. My husband has purposely caused as much horrific pain and damage to his own family and spouse as anyone can imagine. The more we hurt, the happier he is. He is pushing through the divorce this time, and even that is exceedingly high conflict, for reasons entirely fabricated by him. He lives in an alternate reality these days. I see no hope for a change. And to get back to the original theme here, YES, all of this began post-50 years of age (and if his mother’s behavior is any indication, it will continue through his 90s), but the lesser indications of Narcissistic Personality Disorder had been there since he was a young man. I just did not know what I was seeing in those days, and my acquiescence to him seemed to have kept his traits at bay for many years. In hindsight, it might have been better to get out prior to considering having a family with him. I love my children, but will this horror now carry on inter-generationally? How badly will it affect them? My husband changed with literally one single request for a thank you, several years ago. He was past 50 then.
Portia,
Wish I could contact you. I have a very similar situation. My husband was late 50s when this happened, with a mother and sister always suspected of having Borderline Personality Disorder. My husband, like yours, showed milder indications of NPD when he was younger, but I did not recognize them as that at the time. He had been unable to reciprocate in the relationship, and was triggered into rage when our children cried as babies, but he was not irresponsible nor otherwise cruel. Very controlling, but not vicious, as he is now. I could not have imagined him betraying us later, to the horrific extent he has. Yes, treacherous is the word here. He even smiles in a way that strikes me as distinctly evil when I mention the pain he has caused. It is like someone smiling at a discussion of the Holocaust. I realize that I have been living with a badly broken human being for decades, and that he is now dangerous. YES, full-blown NPD can indeed arrive late, but there were likely lesser signs in earlier life which were not read for what they were. I do not particularly want a divorce, but I do not wish to live like this either.
Portia, I wish I could contact you….I have the exact same problem. I was married for 20 years to the nicest man I have ever known. People that knew him before he turning Narc are in awe of my situation. And most people don’t believe me at all.
Ladies, we need a group, I was married to someone who had some issues, but was still an overall good guy, good dad, good spouse. He was a teacher that everyone loved, he ended up having an affair with a parent at his school, leaving me and 3 kids after 25 years together. He is not the man I married at all anymore. He has been absolutely cruel to me and the kids over and over, completely self absorbed. It’s so strange.
Thank you for this article. I am struggling with recent psychological abuse from my mother. I’m in my early thirties, and while there were definitely some signs of low empathy and high selfishness from my mother as I was growing up, a few years ago it hit a whole new level. She had had a car accident and a couple of surgeries, and whether it was the chronic pain, the emotional stresses (plus becoming disabled), the pain meds, or what, I don’t know, but she suddenly turned into a psychologically abusive person. She’s been behaving to me as I have never seen her do before. I think she might, now, fulfill the DSM NPD criteria, but I don’t think she would have when I was younger–either that, or it was very well hidden! Your insight that trauma (and substance abuse) can bring out NPD behaviors that weren’t previously seen in an individual is hugely helpful for me in understanding what the heck is going on!
My brother-in-law has also become a different person in his later years. He used to be a doting father and worshiped my sister. He always like to show off-the best trucks-the best home-the best kids. But he experienced a strange event where he wrecked his truck one night and drove home (a four hour drive) in the middle of the night to buy another truck and drive back only to wreck a second time! After that night, things went downhill fast. He’s lost numerous jobs. He thinks he should run the show and doesn’t mind telling the bosses all about it. He is mean to my sister who is having some serious mental and physical issues that impair her ability to work. He blames her and constantly berates her. He ignores her problems completely, even when she believed there was a deer living in her attic! Yes, attic. He completely ignored me when I was there trying to get her to understand that she was hallucinating. He was mad because the bank wouldn’t loan him more money! He has ruined them financially buying things they can’t afford. All in his late 40’s. I miss the old guy. This new one sucks.
My ex husband turned unrecognizable shortly after his father died. We were together for 26 years and then he dumped his whole life to move to the Philippines where he now lives with a woman he’d met online a week after moving out of our home. He’s been there almost a year now.
He did used to admit he liked being passive aggressive, but that’s really the only significant red flag. Now he cares nothing about anything in his former life and on his way out treated me and others like we were dirt.
It feels like he had a personality change at age 56. He fits most criteria of covert narcissist.
My husband had some traits, but the death of our son through drowning, him finding him and performing CPR, definitely triggered it into covert NPD.
Not nearly enough is known about NPD. It’s difficult to pinpoint and diagnose professionally since narcissists are extremely good at presenting a normal persona when necessary. Usually it’s the person who lives with a narcissist who sees him as he really is.
I fall into the category of having lived with one, and boy, let me tell you, there are damn few, if any, psychologists/therapists who have seen what I’ve seen: screaming rages; sobbing, howling tantrums that would put a toddler to shame; twisted truths; projecting, gaslighting, massive sense of entitlement as well as stunning gullibility, etc.
He is getting old now, and he has become many times worse in the last 15 or so years. In fact, the occasional oddities I noticed when he was younger could have easily been chalked up to personality quirks. I didn’t know what NPD was back then. It hasn’t been until more recently, when his behavior became so appallingly and unmistakably abnormal, that I’ve been motivated to do considerable research.
The overt narcissism also has a tendency to come and go. Does part-time NPD exist? Or is it more a case that the narcissist just has better control over it at times? He fits the DSM criteria perfectly, displaying 9 out of 9 of the traits–but not all the time. He once held an extremely responsible job. Now he’s just a mean bully unless he gets 100 percent of what he wants with zero regard for anyone else’s needs.
I’m leaving him, of course. I’ve had it. I’ve given him the benefit of the doubt way too many times. Now it’s time to focus on my own mental health and peace of mind.
My husband of 43 years went off to work in another area. I joined him 2 months later. He had become a totally different person in those 2 months.. I thought he had “met someone else” whilst there, which caused this total behaviour and personality change. But after researching have now come to understand that the “change of environment” could have brought on Narcissistic personality traits that had been hidden, supressed in the past. This happened 2 years ago. And continues to today. It is like being married for all these years to a total stranger…. And very confusing and exhausting. He has become controlling, wants “to be with me all the time”, abusive in words and actions, lies, lies and lies some more, violent, malevolent and very scary to live with. If I try and have a civilized conversation with him…and say this is not working. Or if anything goes out of sync to what he wants, or if I say we should separate..his immediate reaction is he will “kill himself”. “He cannot and will not live without me”….and abuse…
All the signs and symptoms of a narc.
And yes – he had a neglected childhood with lots of abandonment and trauma.
So the “research” is wrong. It does happen…(might have been lurking there for a long time)…But out it comes…at the age of 64….
Not at all what I was anticipating for my senior years.
I am seriously considering leaving quietly and in silence…..