WOES OF DEALING WITH A NARCISSIST

SOMEONE YOU CARED ABOUT WAS A NARCISSIST

READING THE SIGNS

When you should have cut the rope and taken a sprint, you chose flattering your partner for the final option. Chances are that you had a relationship with a narcissist who left a trail of wreckage behind them. You had a hard time dealing with them and you were left with a bad taste in your mouth. 

They came to you with a positive attitude and charming personality, had you engage in good conversations with them - wrecked you and moved onto somebody else. That’s because a narcissist puts his own feelings above their partner's, friend's and just about anyone's. Their happiness comes from a new person feeling attracted to them. Sometimes they want everyone to feel attraction towards them because in their mind they’re seeing themselves as the most beautiful and highly irresistible. They want to impress others. In an attempt to do so, they drift off towards infidelity.

Narcissists mostly are charismatic at first glance which makes them likeable. In the beginning you feel lucky but in the longer run you realize you’re dealing with a difficult person. Your thought later on would be ‘Is this the same person I met before?’ In a company, a boss in his relationship with the employee would think no different holding his head in regret.  

We normally imagine narcissists as those loudly bragging but they can also be reserved. The loud ones exhibit their grandeur. They do self-promotion and want to make themselves appear better in a crowd. The reserved ones are shy and not straightforward. The shy narcissists feel angry if they can’t get their way or are being ignored in a gathering. If there’s something they don’t like and you do it to them, they think of you as their opponents. They will whine to themselves ‘He doesn't understand me’.

Narcissists can worry about appearance a lot. They exaggerate their stories giving excessive importance to themselves. That’s not to say that those who take care of their appearance are always narcissists. People with this disorder are highly sensitive to receiving criticism.  They are usually making excuses and not ready to admit their mistakes.

Narcissists trade on their looks to be noticed and to be relevant. Fantasizing about their beauty, believing that they’re the best anyone can have and expecting regular praise never evades them. When people admire them as young beauties, they take it as their innate privilege. A strong belief that others are not up to their high standards makes them demean others. Later in their lives when they’re not given much importance, they suffer from narcissistic injury. Their self-worth starts going down and they think they no longer look good enough, often responding with provocative remarks when people cease to tell them what they want to hear.

On the other hand those who are not narcissists: it’s their turn to feel great. Having experienced less popularity in their youth, they bear an early shock but when they start growing up they don’t look at the world for the evidence of their physical attractiveness, values or inner strength. In their youth they lamented receiving no attention but young heals faster. It’s easy for them to move on. They do not have to hold the mirror up to the world to see their worth.

This post is dedicated to my classmates Aman Qureshi and Tania Munir.