In a narcissistic relationship, you are brutally forced to act out of character. You are pressured to do or say things that make you wonder, “Who am I? Who am I turning into?” For example, when the narcissist cheats on you, instead of leaving, you give them more chances. Loyalty may be one of the most important values in your entire value system, yet you violate it, of course, unintentionally. You also go against your moral code when reacting to their abuse, yelling, screaming, and giving them a real push back to protect yourself. But why do you do this? Let’s find out in today’s article.
Insulting the Narcissist
When you start insulting the Narcissist because they do not stop insulting you. No matter what you do—first, you request, you plead, you try to communicate with them, you try to show them that it hurts— “Stop name-calling me, stop passing comments about my weight, about my looks, stop judging my way of doing work, stop being so critical!” No, they’re constantly insulting you and putting you down. Then when it does not work, you start yelling and screaming, and still, they do not stop. You say, “Don’t bring my children into these conversations, do not talk about my parents, what have they done to you? What’s wrong with you for talking about my friends this way?” And so on.
Still, they do not stop; they relish your agony, they love to see you in pain. Finally, you start insulting them back. You say things you do not believe, but you say them out of anger, out of pain, and at the same time, hope that it’s going to put a stop to all of this. They’ll realize how much it pains, so they won’t say those things again. The opposite happens, it gets a hundred times worse. You can never ever get resolution with a narcissist; they want you to play that dirty game. You get hurt.
Making it Extremely Difficult for You to Move On
They make it extremely difficult for you to let go and truly move on. Why? Because they never talk about the cheating they did on you, they want you to bury it and act like it never happened. They never give you any form of closure, they never address your needs, wants, and desires. They always, always expect you to act robotic and be a doll to them so that they get to control your actions. Naturally, what would be your reaction to that? The desire to resolve things would come up because who wants conflict? So whenever you would try to open your mouth, whenever you would try to bring up something that still hurts you but they have done it in the past, they will call you a victim. “Oh, you love to be a victim of your circumstances, don’t you? You always love to talk about our past. This is the reason why our relationship is rotting, we’re not moving forward because of you.”
They may make it seem like you’re a person who likes to cry and complain about their past, you keep whining, “Move on already.” And all of those comments might gaslight you into thinking that you truly like to be seen as a victim when in reality, you may be forward-facing. You may want to move on, but are they giving you any resolution to be able to do so? Whenever you show them your wounds, you’re like, “Look at this, it’s because of you.” “You know what you said, hide it away, I don’t want to look at it.” Because to them, it’s like criticism. How dare you call me faulty? They make it about themselves, how crazy and delusional. When it’s about your arm, your heart paining, and they should just somehow try to heal it for you because it was caused by them. They offer no support whatsoever; instead, they ridicule you further. And this keeps you stuck eternally in a cycle of always trying to address issues with them, which is not who you are, which is not what you want to focus on.
Making it Extremely Difficult for You to Stay Calm in Arguments
They make it extremely difficult for you to stay calm and relaxed during arguments. Maybe you are a calm person by nature, maybe you do not want conflict at all, maybe you know how to negotiate and how to deal with conflict. But when having a conversation with a narcissist, it may seem like you have turned into a very reactive version of yourself. They push you left, right, and center until you start fighting them because that is their motive, until you start reacting to their abuse. Think about this, if you are chased by a tiger, wouldn’t you run away? Of course, you would.
So that’s why it’s a biologically correct response to this intrusive behavior. They do not take in the cues; rather, they do not want to take in the cues for calmness. They do not believe in settling things peacefully. Out of your righteous rage, you may say very painful things to the Narcissist during this argument and later feel like you are a bad person. You’re an evil person, which is your conscience kicking in telling you that that is wrong. But what else can you do in a situation like this where they leave you no option except reacting this way? And that is how you act out of character.
What does the narcissist do with your reaction? They run with it, showing everybody, “See, see what she said to me, what he did to me? I’m the victim in this situation, I am the one who is being abused.” But nobody, including primarily the Narcissist, puts their finger on the main problem— that you tortured him or her into behaving this way. What about that? You made them react to your abuse because of you constantly pushing and poking them.
Changing Your Overall Temperament
They change your overall temperament. You were known for your patience, now you get easily impatient and irritated. You are agitated almost all the time; you can’t be bothered. You are emotionally numb to the situation. When you were very open, always bubbly, always calm, always ready to be vulnerable, now you don’t want to open up at all. And the moment you feel like somebody intends to attack you (which may be true), you try to destroy them or you completely cut them off. You do not want to do anything with them, and you shut them down, you shut all the doors. This is not who you were. You were open to the world, you wanted to be there, you wanted to explore. And now you are afraid of even leaving your own room.
Settling for Inauthenticity
You settle for inauthenticity, of course, unintentionally. You accept things that violate you as a person. For example, their cheating behavior. I gave you this example earlier as well. Instead of leaving, you justify their behavior. You are forced to understand why they did what they did. For example, they tell you, “Oh, it’s because of you, you were not giving me enough attention, you were not loving me enough. So I had to find it somewhere else, and so and so this person promised that they would love me, they would fulfill that need.” So whose fault is it, mine or yours? Naturally, out of that gaslighting, out of the attempts made to change your perception about the problem, you will eat it up, you will believe it. And because of that chronic self-doubt, you accept that it was your fault and it’s you who needs to change. What does that lead to? Self-betrayal. Because yes, you may settle, but at the same time, what you’re unconsciously doing is you are violating everything that you have ever been.
Another example would be when you step out of this marriage, out of this relationship, to seek support from a third person. When you have a relationship with somebody else while staying with the narcissist, this is not something that you believe in, this is not something you would have done. But because of this situation, because of who you are with and what they have put you through, and because of the circumstances, you have now found the source of support. And you feel guilty about doing so. However, at the same time, you rely on them. It’s like they’re the only source that keeps you going, and you don’t know what to do or why you did it. However, what you feel is guilt because you are somebody who believes in transparency, who is a very honest person, and who believes in loyalty.
At this point of time, you are going unintentionally, of course, against all of that which leaves you with a lot of resentment towards yourself. You are ashamed to admit that you are with somebody while you are with a narcissist because people won’t understand it. So my recommendation would be, be compassionate towards yourself. It’s a very different situation that you’re dealing with. And then try to leave as soon as possible because it’s not good to stay here and there as well. This is not who you are. The longer you will do it, the more time it will take you to later forgive yourself or accept that you had to do it, which was number five, and that concludes today’s article.
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