A recent research study conducted byMogilski and Welling (2017) showed that those who had darker personality traits such as narcissism, psychopathy and duplicity tended to stay friends with their exes out of pragmatism, sex and access to resources.
Studies prove that people with narcissistic personality traits, maintain contact with their exes because they've got something to gain such as sex or resources like money.
They will bombard their exes with affection and attention
Some narcissists understand this and may seek to use their ex's attachment to satisfy their need for validation. To this end, narcissists often bombard their exes with high amounts of affection and attention at once to reel the ex back in.
Whether you can be friends with a person with a narcissistic personality disorder depends on multiple factors: your definition of friendship, how realistic you are about the other person, your ability to maintain your boundaries, your level of tolerance for “bad” behavior, and whether what you both want from the ...
Essentially, narcissists will return to old relationships repeatedly until that former partner no longer gives them what they desire—attention. As long as former partners are prepared to take them back, they will remain on the list of willing ex-lovers who will be cycled through time and again.
People with high levels of narcissistic admiration experienced less anxiety and sadness after a breakup and maintained positive perceptions of their exes. They were also more likely to initiate a breakup and attribute it to their lack of interest in their ex.
"The central motivator for narcissists is validation," she explains. "And an ex is often a really interesting place to get it... They constantly need that fresh narcissistic supply, and they kind of know what an ex's supply is like."
By remaining friends with their exes, narcissists get to keep all of their former partners on a carousel of convenience: they can create a harem of people to use for sex, money, praise, attention or whatever else they desire, at any time.
Narcissistic friends seek out constant praise, prioritize their own needs, lack empathy, have high expectations of their friends, and often end friendships when they no longer serve them. Narcissistic relationships can cause emotional damage.
As a general rule, narcissists don't miss or love their exes — but they'll work hard to convince you that they do. Ultimately, people with NPD are incapable of genuinely missing anybody. They don't know how. Their brains don't work that way.
Simply put, a narcissist will become obsessed with an ex when he or she refuses to remain “friends.” The narcissist may be very open about this obsession, dragging as many people as possible into it.
Reality Check 101. It's true: Your narcissistic ex will remember you but not — never — in the way you hope they will, as the “great love of their life”. Most of the time they won't even think about you and you know why: They're too busy spinning their web to snare the next unsuspecting spider.
They may feel very sad that they lost someone and they may genuinely miss that person. But again, it relates to them. It's because in losing that person they lost access to their “narcissistic supply” (of validation, adoration, or sex).
At the end of a relationship, narcissists may become combative, passive-aggressive, hostile, and even more controlling. People with NPD often fail to understand other people's needs and values. They are hyper focused on their egos, but do not account for how their actions affect others.
According to psychologists, therapists and neuroscientists, narcissists can never change. They are obsessed with the idealised image of themselves, which they believe to be superior to everybody else.
“People who are narcissistic, they have a pretty big footprint. They have a lot of friends, they tend to date more,” said W. Keith Campbell, professor of psychology at the University of Georgia. “It's not that there are more out there.
Narcissists Will Eventually End Up Friendless and Unpopular, Study Confirms. Scientists have found that narcissistic people fail to retain their friends despite being initially popular. The report's co-author explains why.
One of the first things a narcissist does it isolate you from family and friends. They want you to be completely dependent on them and eliminate any support system you have in place. It starts slowly with them making comments that they do not like your friends or family.
So yes, narcissists can miss you in the sense that they feel bad when an emotional need isn't being met when you're not around and thus they want you back in their life. They need someone to boost their ego and make them feel good about themselves.
Hence, it is clear that a narcissist rebound relationship may last only a few months. Some break up after a short fling of two to three weeks, while others end the relationship after the sweet initial phase ends in just a few months.
Narcissists want to stay friends because they feel entitled to using you as a source of narcissistic supply as long as they see fit. If you allow them to remain in your life as one of your friends, they will be able to use a variety of narcissistic behavior patterns to turn you into a source of narcissistic supply.
In looking at the tense used in describing their memories, people high in narcissism talked about negatively valenced events in the past tense, suggesting that they wanted to get it behind them.