Funny how I’ve had all these exact experiences with the narcissists I’ve had in my life. Even when I think two steps ahead (because I’m very stubborn and strong willed), they usually find a weak spot that I didn’t pay attention to. I used to keep receipts because that’s my nature and it would piss them off so bad, but even with my smartness they still got through to my insecurity.
Not until one day, I realized the reason they are still getting me is because I had something in me I hadn’t worked on. It was my fear of abandonment, after I worked on that, I got my power back.
Been planning to post a piece on my experience with narcissists. I like that you hit the nail on the head. Most times they feed on our insecurities, that’s where they get power, Insecurities that you don’t even know you have.
Not only that, what I found out through ending a friendship with a narcissist is that they’ll try desperately to ‘trigger’ us by pointing out our most vulnerable parts of ourselves. I’ve learned to say “Yes, I’m insecure and have low self esteem. And? What’s your point? What is your intention in pointing this out?” Sometimes it works, but disarming them by saying “Yes, And? So what?”
“Yes, and” — it’s so freeing. The addition of “What is your intention in pointing this out” is a next-level brilliance I hadn’t thought of! Thank you for this. I will absolutely use it.
Life with a covert narcissist doesn’t feel like chaos at first. It doesn’t come with shouting or slammed doors. It’s not a storm that shakes your house. It’s more like a soft, persistent fog that slowly seeps in and blurs everything you once knew about yourself.
In the beginning, it feels like you’ve struck gold. They tell you y...
Life with a covert narcissist doesn’t feel like chaos at first. It doesn’t come with shouting or slammed doors. It’s not a storm that shakes your house. It’s more like a soft, persistent fog that slowly seeps in and blurs everything you once knew about yourself.
In the beginning, it feels like you’ve struck gold. They tell you y...
I’ve got my own narcissists in my life…same story…maybe if we looked at them as those who can sniff out those insecurities we don’t know we have, we could appreciate them for at least something!😱
Life with a covert narcissist doesn’t feel like chaos at first. It doesn’t come with shouting or slammed doors. It’s not a storm that shakes your house. It’s more like a soft, persistent fog that slowly seeps in and blurs everything you once knew about yourself.
In the beginning, it feels like you’ve struck gold. They tell you y...
“YOU DON’T EVEN KNOW YOU HAVE”. Sometimes we have insecurities we don’t know about until a situation happens that causes us to look inward, and then we find out that was an insecurity.
A lot of people carry insecurity they don’t know about, they see it as normal.
Yes. I was able to walk away from some members of my family when I lost the fear of abandonment, when it came to the point that I didn’t care if I lost them.
Life with a covert narcissist doesn’t feel like chaos at first. It doesn’t come with shouting or slammed doors. It’s not a storm that shakes your house. It’s more like a soft, persistent fog that slowly seeps in and blurs everything you once knew about yourself.
In the beginning, it feels like you’ve struck gold. They tell you y...
Excellent article! It took me a couple years to understand this and that I was in a deeply covert narcissistic marriage. It was the last time the mask dropped I determined I was done. But it was only because I had educated myself and done the heavy lifting in counseling. While it’s sad my marriage didn’t survive, the relief is amazing. The freedom from tyranny intoxicating! Thanks for getting this type of message out there!
I've experienced both. The covert narcissist type is the worst in my mind. Only in retrospect do I see the behavior in other relationships as well. For me, the tell tale sign is the inability to treat you as an equal. I had a friendship like this as well. She was so sweet. But, now looking back at it I realized her intense jealously as well as her inability to ‘show up’ for me. Everything was amusing. Everything was a joke. It’s sad looking at the relationship now. She would never admit there was anything that required self examination. There was never apology or repair. Total mind f’ing confusion as the behavior never makes sense. I readily recognized narcissism in men. But, I didn't expect it from a friend. I felt blindsided.
I can’t imagine it in a friend. I felt blindsided after 20 years beginning to figure it out. I can’t believe it took me so long. I was always told I was amazing and beautiful, etc., but no mutuality. It was control and manipulation and gaslighting. It was so freaking hard to figure it out and see. I can’t imagine it in a friend. Blindsided is a good word. It would be nice if all narcs had to walk around with an N on their forehead.
That's the problem. You are so amazing and beautiful, etc. Lol. You probably truly are all of those things. But, how often do we receive validation from other people in the world? Most people are preoccupied by their own pursuits. They’re not spending their time building others up. Maybe the world would be a better place if we could do this for each other in a sincere manner. But the world has become almost exclusively transactional. We've all become ‘extraction machines’. What can I take from you? What can you take from me? Grabbing hands. It isn’t easy to trust under these conditions. Whenever anyone reaches out to me, in the back of my mind, I’m thinking, What do you want from me? Unfortunately, I feel I need to question motives. But this is what our world has become.
my issue with this is like with most pop psych stuff it reifies the false notion that there’s a binary between narcissists and non-narcissists, which is also more simply good vs bad people. everyone has narcissistic traits and defenses, and most people have a narcissistic ‘part’ of them that’s brought out in certain ways. so in the standard parasocial way we’d predict, everyone identifies as a non-narcissist ‘good’ who reads stuff like this, thinks of the narcissistic ‘bads’ in their lives, and then goes on avoiding looking at their own narcissism. what’s more interesting to me is looking at our own narcissism. it’s much harder to do than pointing out the bad narcissists all around us, all these people trying to control and manipulate us. they’re around, but we’re also them.
Yeah, it’s one thing being able to identify and respond to narcissistic behaviour in others, altogether another level with yourself. One of the things about being a narcissist is that you’ve got a great big engine in your brain telling you you’re in the right about everything.
And if you start finding you’re surrounded by narcissists… yeah it might be worth asking a few self-critical questions!
Good point! Yes…we need to be looking at ourselves FIRST. I went back through this article and replaced every “narcissists” with “I” or “sometimes I”. Shocking and it’s what I needed.
That first quote in the article reminded me of every troll online. And not just the trolls, but how a lot of people act online. I really do think narcissism is a baseline in US culture.
There IS a binary and it’s an extremely important distinction.
“Narcissistic traits” is not what the author is addressing; it’s the pathological variety like we see in the felon and rapist global terrorist. You also left out healthy narcissism, like the kind that propels us to leave an abuser. I am trolled with death and rape threats daily by sadistic Nazis with the pathological variety. No, this is not a “both sides” scenario and no self-evaluation is required on my part. Do your research on the clinical version of narcissism. It has nothing to do with “pop psychology.”
Life with a covert narcissist doesn’t feel like chaos at first. It doesn’t come with shouting or slammed doors. It’s not a storm that shakes your house. It’s more like a soft, persistent fog that slowly seeps in and blurs everything you once knew about yourself.
In the beginning, it feels like you’ve struck gold. They tell you y...
Most people don’t realise how many predators go into the helping professions because they know they’ll have a never ending stream of supply. It’s absolutely stomach turning. I’m sorry this was done to you. It should have never happened. Well done for turning your trauma into something that helps you and others.
I know all too well. I experienced a covert narcissist psychiatrist. It was not fun. It required a psychotherapist and EMDR to undo the damage. After that experience, I can readily see through the charade. Cody’s articles are helpful. I also appreciate Ross Rosenberg’s work as he calls out covert narcissist mental health professionals. It’s so much more common than people realize, especially in psychedelic field.
I've run into a number of psychedelic faciltators high on their own supply. The fact that counseling M.A. programs do very little screening coupled with the fact that there's a desire to do cutting edge psychedelic work is a recipe for disaster. Psychedelic healers use the mantra ‘trust your inner healer’ as an excuse to abdicate themselves if responsibility for facilitating integration. They just to bask in the knowledge that they've become enlightened. All they need to do is show up with incense and a Buddha with some Native American music playing in the background. Those poor souls who haven't quite figured it out is the mentality. New Age is often a front for all kinds of ethically questionable behavior. When you've been ordained to save humanity what accountability is required?
I’m sorry this happened to you, Anna, and I can well imagine it was a nightmare. I’ve encountered some questionable characters in the field myself and I’m very careful around anyone calling themselves enlightened, or displaying signs of spiritual / psychological / emotional bypassing. ‘Poor souls who haven’t quite figured it out yet’ is a classic example.
Thank you, Jasmin, for listening. Even though I've done a lot of processing around these relationships, I can still feel anger and disappointment for the way I was treated. I truly appreciate your support and validation.
There are multiple points with this one: first, as always well done. Second, I hope this “therapist” is disbarred or whatever you call it in therapy land. Third: I’ve spent a lot of time researching this and THE MOST compassionate book I found on the subject was called Rethinking Narcassism. Extremely empowering book! Most people aren’t actually narcissists but we label them as such and there’s such a thing as healthy narcissism. Good self esteem, confidence, proper boundaries. It’s a scale and unless someone has actual NPD most are just narc tendencies. I very much leaned towards narcissism before I began healing. No joke. Was I a narcissist, no. But I clearly had tendencies towards such. Most of us do. Either echoists or narcissists… we make this such a black and white issue without realizing or taking responsibility for how we contribute to it. With all that said, Cody, I’m really sorry you experienced this from a therapist especially…
I'm glad you and others are saying similar things. We all need to keep firm boundaries in the right place. Otherwise we enable bad behaviour from ourselves and those around us.
I have come across a narcissist only once, after a workshop I led. She was a participant and She had attempted to "take over" the workshop and tried to turn it into an invidual session. I had not let her, and god was she unhappy about it !
afterwards started explaining to me how terrible I was at my job, all the things the people there actually needed and that (off course) I had absolutely failed to address.
As she was telling me what a failure of a sophrolgist I was, I looked at her in the eye, not displaying the least emotion.
The moment she understood she had no way to induce a reaction from me, she stopped.
Very well written and clear guidance, Cody. You are a healer. Thank you for helping others. And my empathies for experiencing this horrible therapist. And congratulations on being wise enough to get out of a bad relationship. Did you report her to local, State and National agencies that licenses therapists?
My experience has also led me to the same conclusions about narcissists’ motivation and behaviour. Thank you for writing your observations for everyone’s benefit. I’d just like to add that some of the phrases in your list can only be said when the narcissist doesn't have power over you (e.g., is not your boss).
This is simple enough. Just say no to drama. An essay or more feels good and validating to me. Did not realize it was fuel for their fire. A different reality they are experiencing at someone else expense. It never stops until they have no one to play the game.
Very helpful article Cody. I don't know if you remember me telling you about the guy who studied me inside an AA meeting, "love-bombed" me and got me addicted to his affection? After a couple months, he texted me to never contact him again and showed up the next morning to my AA home group. Knowing nothing, I took it as abandonment. I was devastated and then humiliated as he played my emotions in front of all those people. But, thanks to this article, I understand he had lost control and was trying desperately to regain it. That's what is was, right?
Thank you for this article. My boss is a narcissist, and I followed a similar journey discovering that’s what she is. When I lodged a formal HR complaint, is when I first really challenged her and I saw the manipulation, guilt, making herself a victim all intensify. She was eventually ordered to apologise to me, which, I requested in writing - can you imagine how much that stung! Even after being told to, though, she still couldn’t offer an apology, just talked of how it had been stressful for her also! So narcissistic! Since then, I refused to enter into mediation as she wouldn’t apologise and remain at the workplace, but only speak to her in a professional capacity on only topics relating to my work. She has tried to regain power by attempting me to talk casually, but I do not respond, and as it’s not a requirement of my job, she can’t do anything about it. She is quite lost, but it feels nice to finally have boundaries and some control at work again. This article resonated with me so much. I’m glad you too, have been able to identify and manage the narcissist in your life. A narcissist as a therapist sounds horrific!
This is great. I was married to a narcissist, I was fortunate to get sick of it and leave.
I never really thought about a friend being this way, but make sense.
I have a neighbor that I enjoyed being friends with but it was always all about her, and her constant drama. She would always ask for favors and how she owed me and never reciprocated.
The day came when I put my foot down and told her I was not able to help her with all her favors any more and that was it.
Never heard from her again and avoids me at all cost.
My mom had a shocking break with a friend of something like 40 years when, apparently for the very first time ever, mom disagreed with her friend. Her friend made it sound like my mom was mean to her, and never spoke to her. I think friend may have been a low-level narcissist?
I’m saving this so I can review it often until the phrases become automatic in the heat of the moment. Thanks so much from a little stranger out in the universe who really needed this today 🩷
Funny how I’ve had all these exact experiences with the narcissists I’ve had in my life. Even when I think two steps ahead (because I’m very stubborn and strong willed), they usually find a weak spot that I didn’t pay attention to. I used to keep receipts because that’s my nature and it would piss them off so bad, but even with my smartness they still got through to my insecurity.
Not until one day, I realized the reason they are still getting me is because I had something in me I hadn’t worked on. It was my fear of abandonment, after I worked on that, I got my power back.
Been planning to post a piece on my experience with narcissists. I like that you hit the nail on the head. Most times they feed on our insecurities, that’s where they get power, Insecurities that you don’t even know you have.
Not only that, what I found out through ending a friendship with a narcissist is that they’ll try desperately to ‘trigger’ us by pointing out our most vulnerable parts of ourselves. I’ve learned to say “Yes, I’m insecure and have low self esteem. And? What’s your point? What is your intention in pointing this out?” Sometimes it works, but disarming them by saying “Yes, And? So what?”
“Yes, and” — it’s so freeing. The addition of “What is your intention in pointing this out” is a next-level brilliance I hadn’t thought of! Thank you for this. I will absolutely use it.
Life with a Covert Narcissist
The Slow Disappearance of Self
Life with a covert narcissist doesn’t feel like chaos at first. It doesn’t come with shouting or slammed doors. It’s not a storm that shakes your house. It’s more like a soft, persistent fog that slowly seeps in and blurs everything you once knew about yourself.
In the beginning, it feels like you’ve struck gold. They tell you y...
Read more on:
https://thedeadpoetssociety.substack.com/p/life-with-a-covert-narcissist
Subscribe to The Dead Poet Society here:
https://thedeadpoetssociety.substack.com/embed
Life with a Covert Narcissist
The Slow Disappearance of Self
Life with a covert narcissist doesn’t feel like chaos at first. It doesn’t come with shouting or slammed doors. It’s not a storm that shakes your house. It’s more like a soft, persistent fog that slowly seeps in and blurs everything you once knew about yourself.
In the beginning, it feels like you’ve struck gold. They tell you y...
Read more on:
https://thedeadpoetssociety.substack.com/p/life-with-a-covert-narcissist
Subscribe to The Dead Poet Society here:
https://thedeadpoetssociety.substack.com/embed
I’ve got my own narcissists in my life…same story…maybe if we looked at them as those who can sniff out those insecurities we don’t know we have, we could appreciate them for at least something!😱
Life with a Covert Narcissist
The Slow Disappearance of Self
Life with a covert narcissist doesn’t feel like chaos at first. It doesn’t come with shouting or slammed doors. It’s not a storm that shakes your house. It’s more like a soft, persistent fog that slowly seeps in and blurs everything you once knew about yourself.
In the beginning, it feels like you’ve struck gold. They tell you y...
Read more on:
https://thedeadpoetssociety.substack.com/p/life-with-a-covert-narcissist
Subscribe to The Dead Poet Society here:
https://thedeadpoetssociety.substack.com/embed
Lol… that part 😹😹
LOL
“…insecurities you don’t even know you have.” Or insecurities you know you have but can’t seem to find the right strategy to overcome.
This wasn’t a question as much as an admission. 🫣
“YOU DON’T EVEN KNOW YOU HAVE”. Sometimes we have insecurities we don’t know about until a situation happens that causes us to look inward, and then we find out that was an insecurity.
A lot of people carry insecurity they don’t know about, they see it as normal.
Amen Becky!!! So true and working on mine too!!! Please do write that article!! 😘❤️
Yes. I was able to walk away from some members of my family when I lost the fear of abandonment, when it came to the point that I didn’t care if I lost them.
Life with a Covert Narcissist
The Slow Disappearance of Self
Life with a covert narcissist doesn’t feel like chaos at first. It doesn’t come with shouting or slammed doors. It’s not a storm that shakes your house. It’s more like a soft, persistent fog that slowly seeps in and blurs everything you once knew about yourself.
In the beginning, it feels like you’ve struck gold. They tell you y...
Read more on:
https://thedeadpoetssociety.substack.com/p/life-with-a-covert-narcissist
Subscribe to The Dead Poet Society here:
https://thedeadpoetssociety.substack.com/embed
Excellent article! It took me a couple years to understand this and that I was in a deeply covert narcissistic marriage. It was the last time the mask dropped I determined I was done. But it was only because I had educated myself and done the heavy lifting in counseling. While it’s sad my marriage didn’t survive, the relief is amazing. The freedom from tyranny intoxicating! Thanks for getting this type of message out there!
I've experienced both. The covert narcissist type is the worst in my mind. Only in retrospect do I see the behavior in other relationships as well. For me, the tell tale sign is the inability to treat you as an equal. I had a friendship like this as well. She was so sweet. But, now looking back at it I realized her intense jealously as well as her inability to ‘show up’ for me. Everything was amusing. Everything was a joke. It’s sad looking at the relationship now. She would never admit there was anything that required self examination. There was never apology or repair. Total mind f’ing confusion as the behavior never makes sense. I readily recognized narcissism in men. But, I didn't expect it from a friend. I felt blindsided.
I can’t imagine it in a friend. I felt blindsided after 20 years beginning to figure it out. I can’t believe it took me so long. I was always told I was amazing and beautiful, etc., but no mutuality. It was control and manipulation and gaslighting. It was so freaking hard to figure it out and see. I can’t imagine it in a friend. Blindsided is a good word. It would be nice if all narcs had to walk around with an N on their forehead.
That's the problem. You are so amazing and beautiful, etc. Lol. You probably truly are all of those things. But, how often do we receive validation from other people in the world? Most people are preoccupied by their own pursuits. They’re not spending their time building others up. Maybe the world would be a better place if we could do this for each other in a sincere manner. But the world has become almost exclusively transactional. We've all become ‘extraction machines’. What can I take from you? What can you take from me? Grabbing hands. It isn’t easy to trust under these conditions. Whenever anyone reaches out to me, in the back of my mind, I’m thinking, What do you want from me? Unfortunately, I feel I need to question motives. But this is what our world has become.
my issue with this is like with most pop psych stuff it reifies the false notion that there’s a binary between narcissists and non-narcissists, which is also more simply good vs bad people. everyone has narcissistic traits and defenses, and most people have a narcissistic ‘part’ of them that’s brought out in certain ways. so in the standard parasocial way we’d predict, everyone identifies as a non-narcissist ‘good’ who reads stuff like this, thinks of the narcissistic ‘bads’ in their lives, and then goes on avoiding looking at their own narcissism. what’s more interesting to me is looking at our own narcissism. it’s much harder to do than pointing out the bad narcissists all around us, all these people trying to control and manipulate us. they’re around, but we’re also them.
Yeah, it’s one thing being able to identify and respond to narcissistic behaviour in others, altogether another level with yourself. One of the things about being a narcissist is that you’ve got a great big engine in your brain telling you you’re in the right about everything.
And if you start finding you’re surrounded by narcissists… yeah it might be worth asking a few self-critical questions!
Good point! Yes…we need to be looking at ourselves FIRST. I went back through this article and replaced every “narcissists” with “I” or “sometimes I”. Shocking and it’s what I needed.
Excellent point!
That first quote in the article reminded me of every troll online. And not just the trolls, but how a lot of people act online. I really do think narcissism is a baseline in US culture.
There are a couple of good books which agree with you
There IS a binary and it’s an extremely important distinction.
“Narcissistic traits” is not what the author is addressing; it’s the pathological variety like we see in the felon and rapist global terrorist. You also left out healthy narcissism, like the kind that propels us to leave an abuser. I am trolled with death and rape threats daily by sadistic Nazis with the pathological variety. No, this is not a “both sides” scenario and no self-evaluation is required on my part. Do your research on the clinical version of narcissism. It has nothing to do with “pop psychology.”
Good point!
Life with a Covert Narcissist
The Slow Disappearance of Self
Life with a covert narcissist doesn’t feel like chaos at first. It doesn’t come with shouting or slammed doors. It’s not a storm that shakes your house. It’s more like a soft, persistent fog that slowly seeps in and blurs everything you once knew about yourself.
In the beginning, it feels like you’ve struck gold. They tell you y...
Read more on:
https://thedeadpoetssociety.substack.com/p/life-with-a-covert-narcissist
Subscribe to The Dead Poet Society here:
https://thedeadpoetssociety.substack.com/embed
Most people don’t realise how many predators go into the helping professions because they know they’ll have a never ending stream of supply. It’s absolutely stomach turning. I’m sorry this was done to you. It should have never happened. Well done for turning your trauma into something that helps you and others.
I know all too well. I experienced a covert narcissist psychiatrist. It was not fun. It required a psychotherapist and EMDR to undo the damage. After that experience, I can readily see through the charade. Cody’s articles are helpful. I also appreciate Ross Rosenberg’s work as he calls out covert narcissist mental health professionals. It’s so much more common than people realize, especially in psychedelic field.
I've run into a number of psychedelic faciltators high on their own supply. The fact that counseling M.A. programs do very little screening coupled with the fact that there's a desire to do cutting edge psychedelic work is a recipe for disaster. Psychedelic healers use the mantra ‘trust your inner healer’ as an excuse to abdicate themselves if responsibility for facilitating integration. They just to bask in the knowledge that they've become enlightened. All they need to do is show up with incense and a Buddha with some Native American music playing in the background. Those poor souls who haven't quite figured it out is the mentality. New Age is often a front for all kinds of ethically questionable behavior. When you've been ordained to save humanity what accountability is required?
I’m sorry this happened to you, Anna, and I can well imagine it was a nightmare. I’ve encountered some questionable characters in the field myself and I’m very careful around anyone calling themselves enlightened, or displaying signs of spiritual / psychological / emotional bypassing. ‘Poor souls who haven’t quite figured it out yet’ is a classic example.
Thank you, Jasmin, for listening. Even though I've done a lot of processing around these relationships, I can still feel anger and disappointment for the way I was treated. I truly appreciate your support and validation.
There are multiple points with this one: first, as always well done. Second, I hope this “therapist” is disbarred or whatever you call it in therapy land. Third: I’ve spent a lot of time researching this and THE MOST compassionate book I found on the subject was called Rethinking Narcassism. Extremely empowering book! Most people aren’t actually narcissists but we label them as such and there’s such a thing as healthy narcissism. Good self esteem, confidence, proper boundaries. It’s a scale and unless someone has actual NPD most are just narc tendencies. I very much leaned towards narcissism before I began healing. No joke. Was I a narcissist, no. But I clearly had tendencies towards such. Most of us do. Either echoists or narcissists… we make this such a black and white issue without realizing or taking responsibility for how we contribute to it. With all that said, Cody, I’m really sorry you experienced this from a therapist especially…
I'm glad you and others are saying similar things. We all need to keep firm boundaries in the right place. Otherwise we enable bad behaviour from ourselves and those around us.
I have come across a narcissist only once, after a workshop I led. She was a participant and She had attempted to "take over" the workshop and tried to turn it into an invidual session. I had not let her, and god was she unhappy about it !
afterwards started explaining to me how terrible I was at my job, all the things the people there actually needed and that (off course) I had absolutely failed to address.
As she was telling me what a failure of a sophrolgist I was, I looked at her in the eye, not displaying the least emotion.
The moment she understood she had no way to induce a reaction from me, she stopped.
She wanted power over me and I gave her none.
#3: I DON’T REMEMBER ASKING YOU A GODDAMN THING!
-Jules Winnfield
How do we translate this playbook to politics and the current narcissist in the White House?
This!
Very well written and clear guidance, Cody. You are a healer. Thank you for helping others. And my empathies for experiencing this horrible therapist. And congratulations on being wise enough to get out of a bad relationship. Did you report her to local, State and National agencies that licenses therapists?
My experience has also led me to the same conclusions about narcissists’ motivation and behaviour. Thank you for writing your observations for everyone’s benefit. I’d just like to add that some of the phrases in your list can only be said when the narcissist doesn't have power over you (e.g., is not your boss).
This is simple enough. Just say no to drama. An essay or more feels good and validating to me. Did not realize it was fuel for their fire. A different reality they are experiencing at someone else expense. It never stops until they have no one to play the game.
This isn’t an article, it’s a life manual!
Very helpful article Cody. I don't know if you remember me telling you about the guy who studied me inside an AA meeting, "love-bombed" me and got me addicted to his affection? After a couple months, he texted me to never contact him again and showed up the next morning to my AA home group. Knowing nothing, I took it as abandonment. I was devastated and then humiliated as he played my emotions in front of all those people. But, thanks to this article, I understand he had lost control and was trying desperately to regain it. That's what is was, right?
Thank you for this article. My boss is a narcissist, and I followed a similar journey discovering that’s what she is. When I lodged a formal HR complaint, is when I first really challenged her and I saw the manipulation, guilt, making herself a victim all intensify. She was eventually ordered to apologise to me, which, I requested in writing - can you imagine how much that stung! Even after being told to, though, she still couldn’t offer an apology, just talked of how it had been stressful for her also! So narcissistic! Since then, I refused to enter into mediation as she wouldn’t apologise and remain at the workplace, but only speak to her in a professional capacity on only topics relating to my work. She has tried to regain power by attempting me to talk casually, but I do not respond, and as it’s not a requirement of my job, she can’t do anything about it. She is quite lost, but it feels nice to finally have boundaries and some control at work again. This article resonated with me so much. I’m glad you too, have been able to identify and manage the narcissist in your life. A narcissist as a therapist sounds horrific!
This is great. I was married to a narcissist, I was fortunate to get sick of it and leave.
I never really thought about a friend being this way, but make sense.
I have a neighbor that I enjoyed being friends with but it was always all about her, and her constant drama. She would always ask for favors and how she owed me and never reciprocated.
The day came when I put my foot down and told her I was not able to help her with all her favors any more and that was it.
Never heard from her again and avoids me at all cost.
My mom had a shocking break with a friend of something like 40 years when, apparently for the very first time ever, mom disagreed with her friend. Her friend made it sound like my mom was mean to her, and never spoke to her. I think friend may have been a low-level narcissist?
I’m saving this so I can review it often until the phrases become automatic in the heat of the moment. Thanks so much from a little stranger out in the universe who really needed this today 🩷