The Narcissist’s Motivation to Deceive (Part 1/2)

Hi Zari
Im having trouble believing my ex is a true narcissist. I have been reading a lot lately trying to understand why is he acting this way and still can’t believe he changed so much. (What if Im wrong?, what if Im being a judgemental bitch and missunderstanding everything?).
He is 33, a personal trainer, very good looking and very worried by his image. We were together for 1 year and 2 months. Everything was good at the beggining. He was the most loving, caring and patient boyfriend. I met him being very stingy and selfish… He has always been like that, but I accepted him the way he was because I had many flaws as well and tried to changed them all for him (one of those was being jelous). He has hundreds of women on his FB and have contact with many of them (most of them are the exact opposite to what I am… Fake big breasts, very sexy almost slutty looking and with naked pictures on their FB accounts). I passed the fact that he has contact with most of then and gets many private messages and proposals because I understood his job was going to require to keep that contact and I needed to trust him).
We started to have problems in our sexual life because he suddenly lost interest. He explained this happened to him everytime he was in a relationship and they he didnt know why but he knew there was something wrong with him. He acted like he didnt even like me anymore which of course, made me feel i was ugly, unsexy and unnatractive. I used to cry my eyes out but he didnt really care. I let if pass and finally got used to the fact that we were having sex when he was feeling like (maybe once a week or once every two weeks). I, again, tried not to judge him and supported him so i wouldnt feel like a demanding bitch.
He broke up with me once telling me he was tired of being in a relationship and wanted to be single again (date girls and go out for partying. He said he was feeling like cheating on me). We were apart for a couple of weeks but never stopped the contact. I thanked his honesty but still cried and begged him not to leave me so he ended up staying. After that, everything was good again. We were as loving and close to eachother as we have always been. I traveled back home to stay for 3 months with my family (where i am currently at) and he said he would wait for me (he said it, i didnt ask for it).
During a bad period of time for him, I was his support (I have always been his chearleader tho, ALWAYS admiring him and cheering him up and applaudimg everything he does because I know he likes that, he loves attention and admiration so I gave that to him), he lost his job, had family issues and was very depressed and I stuck by him all this time being the most supportive person I could possibly be.
He found a new job 2 months ago (while Im still awaywith my family) and thats when everything changed. He started getting a lot of money, got a new place to leave, bought many things for himself and I was never included. He was always speaking in singular (“I got a new couch and a huge tv screen so Im gonne be able to watch movies and chill… Im gonne do this or that” “I, I, I” “Me, me, me”).
I was now having difficulties with my family and asked him for support and he did support me… for a week or so. After few days he started acting very mean and complaining I was being negative and saying he didnt like the fact that I was so needy of support. He would get angry (and I mean very angry) if I ever cried or felt bad. But I cried because i was feeling alone and asked for his support! He would get angry and yelled and me so I would cry more! So he would get more angry, hang up on me and end up not talking to me for the whole day or maybe two (i felt it as a punishment), so I ended up apologizing for being “too sensitive” as he used to say.
It was a vicious circle. Everytime I (kindly) ask for his support, or tried to make him see why I got upset for him yelling at me, he would say things like “you dont accept me as I am” “if you dont like the way i am, then leave me” “this is me, take it or leave it”. Cold as ice. I then started to feel I had to walk on eggshells because he would explode and leave me any time. I asked him why was he acting like this, yelling at me, calling me names, telling me to shut up, and being a person i never saw before and he used to say “i dont know… I dont know why im like this” “this is unfortunately the real me, i was just pretending to be someone im not to avoid conflict because you know how much i hate drama”.
He began to do things to exclude me on purpose. Decorating his new house together with one of his new female clients KNOWING we were supposed to do this together!. I felt he was doing things he knew would hurt me on purpose. Not calling me when he say he would, not answering my texts, drinking (he was an alcoholic and quitted 3 years ago… He knows how important is for me that he doesnt drink), hanging out with his friend in times we were supposed to be talking (staying at his house 5 hours or more knowing we had agreed on talking at certain hour and how important was for me to talk to him now that we are in different countries) and having NO time to talk to me because he was being too busy, yelling at me, acting indifferent and cold…
And if I ever ever tried to say I wasnt happy about anything, he would get into a rage and stopped talking to me as a punishment. No matter how kindly or softly I would ask or tell my feelings. He was acting literally like he hated me! Out of the blue! For no reason!
He broke up with me again… One week ago, on my birthday… 20 days before I was going back with him… by text. All this because i got sad when I received a text for him saying “happy birthday” and told him I felt it a bit cold. He answered by saying that if I wasnt happy with anything he does for me, then I should leave him.
I slept, woke up feeling an emptyness inside and texted him asking “baby, did you meet someone? Are you seeing another girl?”
He answered saying “no, but I dont want to be with you” he didnt explain anything or called or answered my calls. He said there was nothing else to say. Treated me horribly, cold, mean and left me feeling what we had meant nothing. He said I was just one more girl in his life.
I have been reading a lot trying to understand how a person can suddenly change so much. He’s got money now, he doesnt need me so he dumps me when I need him the most. When i was there for him when anyone else was and now he is acting like i meant nothing,
Posting pictures of himself, saying how happy is he, (the day he dumped, on my birthday he quoted “this is the best day of my life… Im starting to build a future for myself”… Flirting with girls openly and knowing Im seeing this and that he is hurting me… And he still doesnt care!
He callled me 2 times but i didnt asnwer. He texted me saying he “was worried about me”. Not saying he was sorry for hurting me, but just that he was worried.
Some of the characteristics he has that I have recognized now with all this reading are:
-doesnt accept criticism (takes everything as an attack)
-he is always the star at his jobs… Everyone else is incompetent or stupid
-very attractive and image means everything to him
-no interest in sex with me
-often uses people (friends) or objects (cellphone) to make me feel unwanted, insecure
-doesnt empathize (when i cry he says im seeking for attention, too needy, too sensitive
– brutally honest (doesnt matter if he hurts me)
-often says he hates conflict
-refuses to apologiz and when he does, he does it backwards (im sorry, i shouldnt have let you make me angry)
-im continually cleaning up after him (never do dishes, never puts his shoes on his place, doesnt care if i just cleaned his place)
– always expect compliments and grattitude (even for things he did months ago… I still have to say thank you for a oair of shoes he bought me 6 months ago).
– he insults me and gets upset if “i cant get over it” quicky
-makes a big deal about giving me some present of making something special for mu birthday, christmas, etc., but ends up doing and giving nothing.
-dont like autorithy (quitted highschook because of it) (cant stand father or mother, or pretty much anyone telling him what to do)
-stingy
-selfish
-self-centered
-if i say ‘please dont do this again because it hurts me”, it seems he does it again stonger to hurt me on purpose
-i was perfect… Until i wasn’t (when i needed him, i stopped being needed)
– his mistakes are often forgotten, but my sins are continously brought up
Im having a real hard time figuring out what did I do wrong…
I was never unfaithful, never lied, cheat, or hurt him. I was 100% commited to him and still cant understand WHY.
Am i wrong?? Did i deserve this threatment?… Is it normal that people discards you and im being too sensitive??… DID HE EVER LOVED ME?
Please help me. Im having depression and feel anything is worth it anymore… What can I do? 🙁 …I feel worthless. Im so inlove with him that i cant believe this is his true personality.

Zari,
I read your book yesterday; it was what I needed to read. In August of this year, my narcissist left me. It wasn’t the first time, G-d knows, but it was the last. After texts throughout the day of being ‘my love forever’ and ‘growing old together’ and ‘love like he’s never known’, he announced he was leaving me in the morning. The issue (this time) was one of my five children. But….there was always an issue. After three years of what I now know was the *Idolize, Devalue, Discard* roller coaster through Hell itself, I was exhausted. I begged G-d to help me, to give me the strength to rid myself of this man, his endless drama, his un-kept promises, and his devastating abandonments.
I’d felt it coming. The distance, the headaches, the listlessness and disinterest in me, life, anything, had begun two months prior. I tried to make him happy. I waited on him. I rubbed his back, neck, feet. I accepted less ‘rent’ than we’d agreed upon. I bought him lunch; I worked my job and then helped him on his jobs. I praised him, built him up, listened to his litany of complaints – hoping that because we had moved in together (at his request) that this time (Oh! The Hope of ‘This Time’!) he’d pull out of it sans the turmoil, the attacks, the accusations, and the disappearance. Yea, right.
G-d did help me. That very night. For the first time, I let myself be angry. I refused to beg. He holed up in our bedroom, stomping down the stairs every so often to go to the porch, huff past me, rail at me a little of how I’d tricked him into moving in with me so I could control him! How I broke our agreement…etc etc. I did not defend myself, didn’t feel the desire or the need to try to convince him of the ridiculous trash that he was spewing. He left in the morning, waking his son and stuffing things in garbage bags in helter-skelter fashion. Oh, my heart was broken anew, but something inside me had snapped free of the delusion that it could ever be any different. The fact was that my heart had been breaking all along ….with every devalue, with every stab at my character, with every dig at my soul, with every indifference, with every secretive phone call on the porch, with every missed event, with every demand, with every accusation….
I went NC after he left, purposefully. I knew that if I met him even once, saw his sad face, looked into his beautiful, deceptively soulful eyes, I would run to him and forgive him any wrong…just like I’d done a hundred times. I loved him desperately. I cared if he was hurting. I wanted beyond wanted to make him happy.
TH had come into my life like a whirlwind. We’d been casual friends for some years – and when my marriage of nearly two decades fell apart (infidelity, lies, drug and alcohol abuse) TH waltzed onto the scene with comfort and camaraderie as he claimed to be going through the exact situation with his ex. (His divorce was in process and awfully public in the circle of friends we knew – everyone felt badly for him…..exactly like he planned it). About two months later, sitting in a favorite local hangout, TH simply looked over at me and said, ‘I’m in love with you.’ What followed was the *Soul-Mate-Effect* and a shit-ton of *Future-Faking* as you so aptly name it. I was hooked, caught, captured. I thought I’d found the man of my dreams. He swore it was the truth.
What ensued was six months of glorious rapture, followed by two and a half years of *Mind-Fuck-Extraordinaire*. I will tell that inglorious story. Someday.
Today, I write because TH nearly destroyed me – and if my story gives even one woman the strength, encouragement, and will to move on …..then it’s worth the terrible price I’ve paid.
TH left, coat-hangers swinging in the closet, empty drawers, the whole humiliating shebang. I didn’t hear from him for two weeks. Then he showed up with a moving truck and some helpers to retrieve his other belongings. He asked for his key, returned mine, and *poof!* he was gone again. But I knew he’d come back. And I’d have to face my very self. Could I stay away? I feared for myself. My family was in an uproar. They had never seen me behave in such a way as I had with TH. I couldn’t seem to send him away when he inevitably returned. I sacrificed my dignity, my self-respect, my damn self over and again in the name of TH…and I was ashamed that I couldn’t seem to help but to forgive him, love him, want him. This time, I knew I could not. If I did, I’d be lost forever. It was a frightening place to be, a frightening way to feel. I stuck (mostly) to NC. I refused to meet him. There were pleas to meet him for church – even though I’d begged him to attend with me many times to no avail. There were texts and messages galore. * His family wanted him to be with me now (after all he’d told me about how evil they were…I didn’t want anything to do with them – foolishly, I didn’t figure out until much later that all along he was telling them equally horrible things about me), that everyone told him how great we look together, didn’t I remember the first time he told me he loved me, the fantastic sex we’d shared, the fact that he couldn’t live without me. There were heartfelt messages of how he’d let me down and was supposed to protect me, not hurt me. He’d handled everything wrong – couldn’t I forgive him and we could learn to move forward. ( I nearly caved 50 times a day). But I waited. Because, I knew what was coming.
The tone switched, just like I knew it would. A day after he had showed up at my home and began yelling at my father, “You never liked me and poisoned the well against me – ” he went to go on, but my oldest daughter told him to leave, the messages began again in earnest. He said he’d seen me out walking with an overnight bag. He knew I’d been cheating. I was a liar and a cheat and had never loved him. I was a fake. I tried to swindle him out of his house. I was greedy, selfish, a horrible person. He said he knew that I’d set this whole scenario up just to hurt him. Claimed that my father had coached me to get what I could out of him and when he wouldn’t do exactly as I wanted, he told me to cut him loose and leave him – and that I was a sick woman because I threw him away to please my father.* I cried tears that never seemed to stop. But I did not respond until he sent me the worst message of all. He called me a cunt and a whore, said his family knew that I’d cheated on him, lied to him, and tried to destroy him. I sent him a message to stop sending me hateful messages or I would call the police.
Days passed silently. It had been six weeks of life without TH total, the longest I’d ever been without him.
My second oldest daughter came in with her husband and new baby son for a visit from Hawaii. They brought the baby over for me to sit with him because they were going out for their anniversary dinner. Just as they were coming in the house, TH stopped up the block, wildly honking his horn and then peeled away up the street.
TH sent a text out to his family and some of our friends that evening – saying that he’d finally ‘caught’ a man going into my house – I never was told the entire thing – I’m not sure I could handle the knowing even now. He then shot himself.
I found out in the middle of the night when the police showed up at my home. A welfare check, they said. I was devastated. I am still devastated. I sometimes don’t know if I’ll ever be truly okay again.
TH had spread terrible lies about me. It broke my heart to learn, but learn I did. I could not understand….WHY? And so began my search for answers. I began with emotional abuse and slowly found my way to NPD and Borderline Personality Disorder. I devoured everything I could find on the topic. I researched, sobbed, despaired. I wanted to die. My name has been dragged through the mud. So called friends have shunned me. TH’s family repeat his lies to anyone who will listen. They have accused friends of mine publicly of contributing to my ‘infidelities’. They blame me for his suicide. My life will never be the same. My two youngest sons’ lives will never be the same. My older three children only thank G-d that he didn’t hurt me and that I’m free….but that is a lie, just like TH’s love was a lie. I will never be completely free. Memories don’t go away.
Nearly three months have passed. I go to work. I watch movies with my sons. I talk with my daughters. My parents love and support me with zeal. My siblings check in with me and encourage me. I am healing. Slowly. I’m learning who I am again. It’s so fucking hard. But there is hope. I will recover. I choose to go on with life. I choose healing. Joy. Happiness.
If anyone reads this ….listen to Zari. Listen to your inner gut. Listen to your anger. Take what’s left of your self and get away from this man or woman who is stealing your soul, piece by excruciating piece.

Hye Zari

The story is my boyfriend,A, and i been together since early february and he used to text me and not text me but then he will find me and spend time with me as much as we can. We never fight and i tries my best to understand him as much and he really comfortable with me and story all about him to me.

He had this best friend, D, and its a guy since high school. They been upside down and grown up together through thick and thin. However my boyfriend had to go outside city for work for years and early this year he came back and be with and to see his bestfriend but his bestfriend disappear. They lately had issued whereby his bestfriend refused to contact him and ignored him everything and my boyfriend didnt understand whats going on.

What a small world, my bestfriend, K, which is a guy currently new bestfriend of D. My boyfriend knew about it but he was fine with it and he found that K is a very nice person which is indeed he is even though my boyfriend was so jealous with the closeness of D and K.

One day, D fell sick and my bestfriend K asked me to send him to someplace since he didnt have any transport. I didnt know that D was sick. I accidentally met D at hospital because of Sending K. And i keep it as secret since D and K didnt want my boyfriend to know about it. But i cant help it and i was so scared. Next two days i open up about it. He was so mad. He decided not to contact me. He even said it to my bestfriend which is a girl. He met her without telling me anything.

Until now he didnt reply any my text. He didnt even answer mycall. He didnt even care. He said to my bestfriend its just temporary and whenever he ready, he will be fine but Currently he said to my bestfriend that he doesnt want to see me. My bestfriend asked to consider bout it but he said “make sure she is not there or im out”.

And my bestfriend asked him whats about but he refused to talk about it and dont want to answer or give hint about his problem to me.

What should i do?? Its already 34 days he didnt contact me at all and never try to reach me even i tried so hard and now i been 2 weeks didnt contact him at all. Pls help me. I need ur opinion. is he gone totally gone? is he hoovering and hold me to hurt me so badly?

wow. Just…wow! I just realized today after reading all this that I’ve been in an on again/off again friends/lovers unhealthy relationship with an N for TWENTY-FIVE YEARS!!! I’m now on day 3 of No Contact.
I never knew I was being abused. I knew this person my whole life, I thought I knew everything about him. YEARS would go by without being in each others’ lives, at one point, we didn’t have contact for ten years. Then, I got into a “relationship” with him. After two years of his bullshit, I broke it off.
THEN I heard ALL the crazy stuff. He went ballistic in his texts…”I HATE YOU FOREVER!….I’M THROWING ALL YOUR STUFF IN THE DUMPSTER!…IT’S SOMEONE ELSE ISN’T IT I’M GOING TO FIND HIM SOONER OR LATER!…I’M TAKING MY DOGS TO THE SHELTER!…I NEED YOU LOVE YOU MISS YOU….WANT TO GROW OLD WITH YOU…I’M GONNA TATTOO YOUR NAME ON ME…FORGET IT I HATE YOU!….YOU NEVER HAVE TO BOTHER WITH ME ANY MORE!…I MISS YOU….
on and on and on. I stuck to my guns but kept occasional contact.
Fast-forward 2 1/2 years and here I am again. Thank god this time it was brief, but I recently got the Discard just last week. After a few texts and an email went unanswered, I sent one last text the other day…
“Don’t ever come crawling back”
I feel the pain of everyone here. It’s been a devastating betrayal I’ve been feeling. I didn’t eat for almost 3 days, and I felt like an invalid. But now I feel stronger, and since I had already done life coaching on my own over the past several years, I feel I’m much better equipped to handle this pain, anger and sadness then I would have been years ago. I still feel “taken for a fool”, but no WAY am I letting him back in again. I wish everyone here the very best and stay strong 🙂

Hey Zari,

Wanted to thank you for your work. (I’ve posted before esp. comments about Mr. Big on SATC.) I’ve been NC coming up on two years now and ignored every single attempt at hoovering, the most recent being two months ago. I have to be honest, I didn’t believe you in the beginning when you said pain will fade over time. After a decade of abuse, it didn’t feel like it ever would.

You know what? It does. But I also invested heavily in myself, which I found to be the true cure. NC is only the beginning. I’ve spent the last two years pursuing the old hobbies I once loved (and new ones), meeting people, focusing on my career, etc. I put myself first in every way. I think my biggest lesson from the N was the importance of making myself the center of my life. It makes you bulletproof.

And interestingly, the more I’ve focused on myself, the less I thought about the N. Honestly I kind of forgot about your website for a while, because I’d forgotten about NPD and been so focused on living my life, which is a good thing. I noticed about 6 months ago that I no longer carried any emotional triggers about what happened at all and felt at peace, so the last hoovering attempt didn’t make me feel anything at all. It felt like spam.

So thank you, so much! Your advice was spot on about everything.

Out of curiosity, what happens to Ns when you ignore them? It’s weird to realize that the fabulousness the N projected was all fake and they’re actually pretty boring and pathetic.

So what happens if u never show a suspicion and u were to ignore all weird odd behavior or if u know hes lying etc and u completely ignored it and said nothing? Would he up the ante and get more vocal trying to get a reaction out of u? Could this b a good way to tell if your truly dealing with a narc? If they enjoy getting away with things but have no audience for it does that make a difference ?? Thx

Zari, I’ve been reading these articles for about a year along with a few other blogs about the subject of soul sucking fucktards that joyfully eat our souls while we are alive. Yours is the best and I don’t know how you are always spot on but every article here is so accurate and true. It’s like these infantile morons were made in a factory within hell itself–constructed out of the same evil fabric and called by a different name. I’ve derived some deep healing and acceptance from your words. I know you could only write these articles from truly living this shit. Thanks for your heart and soul and the desire to sincerely help us men and women from succumbing to the mental downward spiral of agonizing over “these people”. Your words are a gift.