How do you get the Narcissist out of your head???

This is a bit from a Q&A session with ole Sam Vaknin, the self professed NPD who wrote "Malignant Self Love"

Question from Aria

How do you get the narcissist to abandon your memories, the lurking, waiting to get you, I don't want to be modified by him and want those feelings gone.

Sam Vaknin

How do you get the narcissist out of your mind? That's what you mean?

Aria

You mentioned it above.... Yes....they cause so much damage, how to get beyond it?

Sam Vaknin

Living with a narcissist - or interacting with him for a prolonged period of time - is a trauma. The result is a post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
Allow me to quote one of my favorite FAQs - http://samvak.tripod.com/faq68
Also see: http://samvak.tripod.com/faq80.html

"At the commencement of the relationship, the Narcissist is a dream come true. He is often intelligent, witty, charming, good looking, an achiever, empathetic, in need of love, loving, caring, attentive and much more.
He is the perfect bundled answer to the nagging questions of life: finding meaning, companionship, compatibility and happiness. He is, in other words, ideal.
It is difficult to let go of this idealized figure. Relationships with narcissists inevitably and invariably end with the dawn of a double realization.
The first is that one has been (ab)used by the narcissist and the second is that one was regarded by the narcissist as a disposable, dispensable and interchangeable instrument (object).
The assimilation of this new gained knowledge is an excruciating process, often unsuccessfully completed. People get fixated at different stages. They fail to come to terms with their rejection as human beings - the most total form of rejection there is.
We all react to loss. Loss makes us feel helpless and objectified. When our loved ones die - we feel that Nature or God or Life treated us as playthings.
Losing the narcissist is no different to any other major loss in life. It provokes a cycle of bereavement and grief (as well as some kind of mild post traumatic stress syndrome in cases of severe abuse). This cycle has 4 phases: denial, rage, sadness and acceptance."
Some people, however, cannot get past the denial, or rage phases.
They remain 'stuck", frozen in time, constantly replaying mental tapes
of the interactions they had with the narcissists.
What they don't realize is that these tapes are "foreign objects"
implanted by the narcissist in their mind. Time bombs waiting to explode. Kind of "sleeper cells" or post-hypnotic suggestion.
If you find yourself in this situation there is little you can do to help yourself. You need professional assistance.

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Vaknin touches on "cognitive dissonance" but doesn't use the term. He uses the term "double realization" which I interpret as being the awareness of having two conflicting sets of thoughts in your awareness at the same time.

As far as planting crap in your head like evil "sleeper cells" . . . man, I just wanted to throw that in the TRASH.

But I can't. It's exactly what happens, so a damn good explanation for what it feels like.

That must be where NLP comes in to play. This too is something I am superficially familiar with. I need to get more familiar with it as it applies to the trauma experienced by victims of NPDs.

I agree that professional help is needed. But his turn of phrase turns me OFF, IMHO, he is a NARC after all, and gives his precious little "sleeper cells" a flourish of importance that I don't think they deserve.

Yes, the Narc "gets in your head". No duh. But simply getting educated and aware is enough to uncover those "sleeper cells" and dig them out. Therapy with a person who is experienced with traumatic, abusive relationships is also very effective.

In my experience, I didn't even know these "sleeper cells" were there. They operated as a part of my own mind. They were parasites that my body was fooled into thinking were "self".

The more I read about NPD, the literature as well as the experiences of it's victims/survivors, I began to recognize the "sleeper cells" on my own.