The Drama of the Gifted Child: The Search for the True Self, Third Edition

A patient once spoke of the feeling of always having to walk on stilts. Is somebody who always has to walk on stilts not bound to be constantly envious of those who can walk on their own legs, even if they seem to him to be smaller and more “ordinary” than he is himself? And is he not bound to carry pent-up rage within himself, against those who have made him afraid to walk without stilts? He could also be envious of healthy people because they do not have to make a constant effort to earn admiration, and because they do not have to do something in order to impress, one way or the other, but are free to be “average.”

In fact, grandiosity is the defense against depression, and depression is the defense against the deep pain over the loss of the self that results from denial.

The child, most often an only child or the first-born, was seen as the mother’s possession. What the mother had once failed to find in her own mother she was able to find in her child: someone at her disposal who could be used as an echo and could be controlled, who was completely centered on her, would never desert her, and offered her full attention and admiration.