Nine Inch Nails

The Ultimate Soundtrack for Narcissistic Abuse Recovery

Narcissistic abuse is the nuclear fallout of all abuse, and no other band in my estimation comes close to capturing the sadomasochism, dance macabre, and death by a thousand cuts of narcissistic abuse than Grammy award winning, Nine Inch Nails. Both the suffering and recovery involve a mental tearing out of one's hair to try to make sense of the senseless in what is psychologically one of the most anguishing, wrenching, tormenting, and excruciating forms of all abuse. It is ongoing psychological rape. Even when you finally leave your abuser, the abuse continues in your head for years.

No music has ever made me feel more seen than the industrial rock band, Nine Inch Nails. While I have combed the Internet to substantiate my hypothesis that narcissistic abuse is an enduring theme of NIИ, never is it given voice explicitly, though the lyrics belie this truth, whether conscious or not by frontman Trent Reznor. Some victims are intuitive in this respect without understanding the mechanics or terminology of narcissistic abuse. That being said, Reznor was suffering from his own drug and alcohol dependance, critically during his sophomore album, The Downward Spiral, released 29 years ago in 1994. Similarly, narcissistic abuse induces a neurotransmitter chemical dependency to the abuser through manipulations such as intermittent reinforcement and trauma bonding.

The phrase “narcissistic abuse” wasn't coined until 1995 by my teacher of narcissism, Professor Sam Vaknin, who also coined ghosting, flying monkeys, cerebral and somatic narcissists and no contact, amongst a panoply of other linguistic contributions to the lexicon of narcissism and narcissistic abuse, bringing into the light what had only previously been known in the shadows. Accounting for the origin story of this lexicon, as Vaknin puts it, “language began to break down” when you started to talk about what a deficit, zero-minus, and non-presence the narcissist is, as we are accustomed to talking about life in the affirmative, as existing. While extremely damaging, the narcissist is also paradoxically, simultaneously, a figment of the imagination. Vaknin has said of being in a relationship with a narcissist that “being in a shared fantasy is the worst thing that can happen to you."

Here we can start to understand a motivation for the severity of the soundtrack to narcissist abuse through key NIИ songs I would like to explicate below.

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Intro is of a sound of a prisoner being flogged, sampled as percussive element (hence, industrial rock) from George Lucas’ THX 1138 science-fiction movie:

Mr. Self Destruct

I am the voice inside your head (and I control you)

Through mechanisms such as entraining (akin to hypnosis), the narcissist becomes an introject (voice inside your head) who hijacks your mind over time and controls you. The repetition of the refrain (and I control you) speaks to entrainment.

I am the lover in your bed (and I control you)
I am the sex that you provide (and I control you)

^^^Merger/fusion of narcissist and victim. You are merely a service provider.

I am the hate you try to hide (and I control you)

I take you where you want to go
I give you all you need to know
I drag you down, I use you up

Gradually, the narcissist will turn you into a narcissistic corpse who solely has an external locus of control to the abuser/narcissist.

Mr. Self Destruct

I speak religion's message clear (and I control you)

You will end up worshiping the narcissist in a cult of one.

I am denial, guilt and fear (and I control you)
I am the prayers of the naive (and I control you)
I am the lie that you believe (and I control you)

The lie is that the narcissist is ever capable of reciprocating love.

I take you where you want to go

Here the narcissist is telling his victim that she is a co-conspirator in a sadomasochistic dyad.

I give you all you need to know

All of life is interpreted through the eyes of the narcissist who has all of the knowledge and control.

I drag you down I use you up
Mr. Self Destruct

The narcissist exploits his victim for all that she can give and more. Narcissists are after the 4 S’s: sex, (narcissistic) supply, services and safety.

You let me do this to you (I am the exit)
You let me do this to you (I am the exit)
You let me do this to you (I am the exit)
You let me do this to you (I am the exit)
You let me do this to you (I am the exit)
You let me do this to you (I am the exit)
You let me do this to you (I am the exit)
You let me do this to you (I am the exit)

Sadomasochism is the prerequisite to exit from the banality of sepia life to enter a fantastic technicolor life with the dramatic and exciting narcissist.

I am the needle in your vein
I am the high you can't sustain
I am the pusher, I'm a whore
I am the need you have for more

The narcissist is a human shaped drug. The narcissist, as a whore, is also a form of codependency himself, trapped in the shared fantasy with you. He needs your narcissistic supply.

I am the bullet in the gun (and I control you)
I am the truth from which you run (and I control you)
I am the silencing machine (and I control you)
I am the end of all your dreams (and I control you)

The narcissist is a form of interpersonal violence, a bullet, a threat to your own sense of being. The narcissist invites you into a malignant fantasy defense writ large and gone awry called the shared fantasy/Paracosm which will shield you from unsavory truths as long as you silence your true self and preserve the shared fantasy, which in a Faustian bargain, will end all of your dreams.

I take you where you want to go
I give you all you need to know
I drag you down, I use you up
Mr. Self Destruct

I take you where you want to go
I give you all you need to know
I drag you down, I use you up
Mr. Self Destruct

Terrible Lie

Why are you doing this to me?
Am I not living up to what I'm supposed to be?
Why am I seething with this animosity?
(Hey god) I think you owe me a great big apology

God-like narcissists are predators and reflexively act the way that they do, just as a tiger would. You will never live up to what you are supposed to be in the shared fantasy; it's rigged! The narcissist snapshots an introject of you/internal object during the idealization phase that you are not meant to deviate from, thus rendering you into a two dimensional cardboard cut out version of yourself. Any deviation is risking the narcissist’s ire. When you enter the shared fantasy, you are assigned a role in this theater play; it's tightly monitored. Realizing this, you seethe with animosity as the shared fantasy, which initially suspended your worldly concerns and regressed you to infantilizing defensive posture, then put a vise grip on your autonomy. Initially, there is a warm glow with being regressed to childhood, but it comes at the cost of personal agency. Both you and the narcissist are dual mothers for one another, offering “unconditional love,” until the fantasy breaks.

Terrible lie
Terrible lie

Terrible lie
Terrible lie
Terrible lie
Terrible lie

The shared fantasy is a terrible lie. But more to the point, it's a terrible lie that the narcissist is fully human, capable of warm empathy and caring.

I really don't know what you mean
Seems like salvation comes only in our dreams
I feel my hatred grow all the more extreme
(Hey god) can this world really be as sad as it seems?

Emphatically, yes!!!

Terrible lie
Terrible lie
Terrible lie
Terrible lie

Don't take it away from me, I need you to hold on to
Don't take it away from me, I need you to hold on to
Don't take it away from me, I need you to hold on to
Don't take it away from me, I need someone to hold on to
Don't tear it away from me, I need you to hold on to
Don't tear it away from me, I need you to someone on to
Don't tear it away from me, I need you to hold on to
Don't tear it, don't tear it, don't tear it, don't tear it, don't

This section of the song speaks to the anguish of a relationship with a narcissist, clutching at mommy's apron strings, not wanting to separate and individuate yet again from a regressed childhood mental state, induced by the narcissist.

There's nothing left for me to hide
I lost my ignorance, security and pride
I'm all alone in a world you must despise
(Hey god) I believed the promises, your promises and lies

Terrible lie
Terrible lie
Terrible lie
Terrible lie
Terrible lie

You made me throw it all away
My morals left to decay (terrible lie)
How many you betray you've taken everything (terrible lie)
My head is filled with disease
My skin is begging you please (terrible lie)
I'm on my hands and knees, I want so much to believe

I wanted so much to believe in the shared fantasy that you made me throw away my life for, and now my head is filled with your disease of pathology.

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The Becoming

I beat my machine
It's a part of me
It's inside of me
I'm stuck in this dream
It's changing me
I am becoming
The me that you know, he had some second thoughts
He's covered with scabs
He is broken and sore
The me that you know
He doesn't come around much
That part of me
Isn't here anymore

The narcissist has co-opted you and has turned you into some sort of automaton. The role in the shared fantasy is stultifying and is squeezing out the real flesh and blood you. You are being replaced with a narcissist’s apparatus of cold machinery.

All pain disappears
It's the nature of
Of my circuitry
Drowns out all I hear
No escape from this
My new consciousness
The me that you know
He used to have feelings
But the blood has stopped pumping and he is left to decay
The me that you know is now made up of wires
And even when i'm right with you I'm so far away

I can try to get away
But I've strapped myself in
I can try to scratch away
The sound in my ears
I can see it killing away
All of my bad parts
I don't want to listen
But it's all too clear

Hiding

Backwards inside of me
I feel... so unafraid
Annie, hold a little tighter
I might just slip away

It won't give up, it wants me dead
Goddamn this noise inside my head
It won't give up, it wants me dead
Goddamn this noise inside my head
It won't give up, it wants me dead
Goddamn this noise inside my head
It won't give up, it wants me dead
Goddamn this noise inside my head
It won't give up, it wants me dead
Goddamn this noise inside my head
It won't give up, it wants me dead
Goddamn this noise inside my head
It won't give up, it wants me dead
Goddamn this noise inside my head
It won't give up, it wants me dead
Goddamn this noise inside my head

Misery loves company, and the narcissist wants to convert you into a narcissist to keep him company. The noise inside your head is his controlling voice, the introject. This is the death drive, destrudo, in motion.

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Wish

This is the first day of my last days
I built it up, now I take it apart
Climbed up real high, now fall down real far
No need for me to stay
The last thing left, I just threw it away
I put my faith in god and my trust in you
Now there's nothing more fucked up I could do

Wish there was something real
Wish there was something true
Wish there was something real
In this world full of you

The narcissist demands your perfection in this tightly scripted role in the shared fantasy. There's no room for one iota deviation from your script. As a victim, there is a certain high that comes from achieving this level of movie-like romantic perfection, and it's easy to “fall down real far” and throw it all away. If you believe the fantasy is real and you put your trust in something as ephemeral as a fantasy, yes, there is nothing more fucked up you could do. All this leaves you pining for something real in the aftermath of such violent artifice.

I'm the one without a soul
I'm the one with this big fucking hole
No new tale to tell
Twenty-six years, on my way to hell
Gotta listen to your big-time, hard-line, bad-luck, fist fuck
Don't think you're having all the fun
You know me, I hate everyone

The narcissist is an empty shell of a person, what's called a schizoid empty core. There's nobody home, no “soul”. The true self died long ago in childhood for the False Self of the narcissist, and he has asked that you become a human sacrifice as well.

Wish there was something real
Wish there was something true
Wish there was something real
In this world full of you

I want to but I can't turn back
But I want to, but I can't turn back
I want to but I can't turn back
But I want to, but I can't turn back

Wish there was something real
Wish there was something true
Wish there was something real
In this world full of you
Wish there was something real
Wish there was something true
Wish there was something real
In this world full of you

This world full of you
This world full of you
This world full

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Gave Up

Perfect little dream, the kind that hurts the most
Forgot how it feels, well almost
No one to blame, always the same
Open my eyes, wake up, wake up, wake up, wake up, wake up in flames

When you wake up from the dream, the hangover hurts the most, that you let yourself get so far gone into the shared fantasy.

It took you to make me realize
It took you to make me realize
It took you to make me realize
It took you to make me see the light

Smashed up my sanity
Smashed up integrity
Smashed up what I believed in
Smashed up what's left of me
Smashed up my everything
Smashed up all that was true
Gonna smash myself to pieces
I don't know what else to do

Detox from the cult is brutal! That you were coerced and let yourself get smashed up to this extent is disturbing.

Covered in hope and Vaseline
Still cannot fix this broken machine
Watching the hole, it used to be mine
Just watching it burn in my steady systematic decline
Of the trust I will betray
Give it to me, I throw it away
After everything I've done I hate myself for what I've become

It took you to make me realize
It took you to make me realize
It took you to make me realize
It took you to make me see the light

Smashed up my sanity
Smashed up integrity
Smashed up what I believed in
Smashed up what's left of me
Smashed up my everything
Smashed up all that was true
Gonna smash myself to pieces
I don't know what else to do

I tried
I gave up
I tried
I gave up
I tried
I gave up
I tried
I gave up
I tried
I gave up
I tried
I gave up
I tried
I gave up
I tried
I gave up

Smashed up my sanity
Smashed up integrity
Smashed up what I believed in
Smashed up what's left of me
Smashed up my everything
Smashed up all that was true
Gonna smash myself to pieces
I don't know what else to do
(Throw it away)
Smashed up my sanity
Smashed up integrity
(Throw it away)
Smashed up what I believed in
Smashed up what's left of me
(Throw it away)
Smashed up my everything
Smashed up all that was true
(Throw it away)
Gonna smash myself to pieces
I don't know what else to do
(Throw it away)
Smashed up my sanity
Smashed up integrity
(Throw it away)
Smashed up what I believed in
Smashed up what's left of me
(Throw it away)
Smashed up my everything
Smashed up all that was true
(Throw it away)
Gonna smash myself to pieces
I don't know what else to do

Throw it away

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Eraser

Need you
Dream you
Find you
Taste you
Fuck you
Use you
Scar you
Break you
Lose me
Hate me
Smash me
Erase me
Kill me
Kill me
Kill me
Kill me
Kill me
Kill me
Kill me
Kill me

The narcissist aims to emotionally and psychologically kill you and sometimes literally, aims to kill you. You will continue to be mummified, put into a box, vanished and erased.

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I Do Not Want This

I'm
Losing ground
Well you know how this world can beat you down
And I'm
Made of clay
I fear I'm the only one who thinks this way

In a world full of mechanical narcissists, it's easy to think that you're the only one who is still human, sentient and caring.

I'm always falling down the same hill
Bamboo puncturing the skin
And nothing comes bleeding out of me
Just like a waterfall I'm drowning in.
Two feet below the surface I can still make out your wavy face
And if I could just reach you maybe I could leave this place.

Residing in a narcissistic pathological space is deadening.

I do not want this
I do not want this
I do not want this I do not want this
Don't you tell me how I feel

Don't you tell me how I feel
Don't you tell me how I feel
You don't know just how I feel

The narcissist interacts with you only as an introject/internal object in his head, never you as an external object with autonomy. The narcissist has merged and fused with you as an internal object and is unable to comprehend that you may have feelings that are different from his and want different things. This dynamic is infuriating.

And I
Stay inside my bed
I have lived so many lives all in my head
And don't
Tell me that you care
There really isn't anything now
Is there?

The narcissist is incapable of truly caring about you, and once you realize this, there isn't anything left to discuss or consider with the narcissist.

You would know, wouldn't you?
You extend your hand to those who suffer,
To those who know what it really feels like,
To those who've had a taste, like that means something.
And oh so sick I am.
And maybe I don't have a choice,
And maybe that is all I have,
And maybe this is a cry for help.
I do not want this
I do not want this
I do not want this
I do not want this
Don't you tell me how I feel

Don't you tell me how I feel
Don't you tell me how I feel
You don't know just how I feel

I wanna know everything
I wanna be everywhere
I wanna fuck everyone in the world
I wanna do something that matters

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Something I Can Never Have

I still recall the taste of your tears
Echoing your voice just like the ringing in my ears
My favorite dreams of you still wash ashore
Scraping through my head 'til I don't want to sleep anymore

Part of the anguish in releasing the narcissist in your life is releasing the magical elements of the shared fantasy.

You make this all go away
You make this all go away
I'm down to just one thing
And I'm starting to scare myself
You make this all go away
You make this all go away
I just want something
I just want something I can never have

This is a plea that if a narcissist can create this fantastic space, why can't he fix it??

You always were the one to show me how
Back then I couldn't do the things that I can do now
This thing is slowly taking me apart
Grey would be the color if I had a heart
Come on and tell me!

The narcissist shows you how to enter into this pathological space of fantasy, but it comes at a cost of dismantling who you are.

You make this all go away
You make this all go away
I'm down to just one thing
And I'm starting to scare myself
You make this all go away
You make this all go away
I just want something
I just want something I can never have

In this place it seems like such a shame
Though it all looks different now, I know it's still the same
Everywhere I look you're all I see
Just a fading fucking reminder of who I used to be
Come on, tell me!

During the course of narcissistic abuse, you supplant your true self with an idealized false self, but you know on other levels, that you are deluding yourself. Even though the Paracosm has the trappings of making the world look different, it's all still the same, and worse, now you run every thought past your narcissist’s introject for approval, constantly asking the question, “are you good enough”?

You make this all go away
You make this all go away
I'm down to just one thing
And I'm starting to scare myself
You make this all go away
You make it all go away
I just want something
I just want something I can never have
I just want something I can never have

All you ever wanted was unconditional love that you never had.

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