It is common for a narcissist to bring up their past contribution or your past mistakes to avoid taking responsibility for their own actions.
Most narcissists tend to be very narrowly focused on whatever they want now. They could care less about what you want or any past promises that they made to you. The actual truth is not very important to most people with narcissistic personality disorder.
But as clinical psychologist Dr. Ramani Durvasula points out, narcissists often have a habit of staying in contact with their exes in a way that is solely about their own needs. "The central motivator for narcissists is validation," she explains. "And an ex is often a really interesting place to get it...
As a general rule, narcissists will say negative things about their exes when they want to invalidate, devalue, degrade, and minimize them and positive things when they want to use their exes to maintain a positive public persona or manipulate their current partner into feeling jealous, insecure, competitive, etc.
Narcissists lack empathy and they cannot relate to the emotional experiences of someone else. For this reason, when the narcissist hurts you, they are unable and/or unwilling to understand how their actions negatively affect you.
Unless they have had a lot of successful psychotherapy for their NPD, they do not feel guilt, shame, or self-doubt so long as their narcissistic defenses hold. This means that they do not think there is anything for them to regret, no matter how hurt you feel.
Some narcissists may be able to feel bad about something they've done to hurt someone else. It isn't guilt they feel, so much as regret (or even anger) that things happened the way they did. But any “remorse” they feel is likely to be about how that behavior affected them rather than how it affected the victim.
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.
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.
They may say "you'll be lost without me," or "you'll never find someone like me." Don't listen, Orloff advises. It's just a trick to get you to come back to them out of fear.
They lack a psychological trait known as Object Constancy, so they can't stay emotionally connected to someone who is not physically close. In other words, when you're out of sight, you're (mostly) out of mind. But, even when they've captured their new supply, their thoughts will land, occasionally, fleetingly, on you.
Narcissists get over their exes very quickly. In a survey we conducted among 300 people who experienced narcissistic abuse in a romantic relationship, we discovered that the average amount of time it took for a narcissist to get over their ex was three-and-a-half weeks.
Narcissists are motivated by feeling superior and expanding their power, and so the only things that matter when helping others are receiving adulation, fame, influence, opportunities, notoriety, and other resources. They dont actually care about others because to them other people are just things to use.
For the person on the receiving end, someone experiencing a narcissistic collapse may look out of control, extremely angry, and vindictive. In some cases, it may look like someone withdrawing altogether and giving them the silent treatment.
Though typical narcissists do not discard people because they crave attention, covert narcissists may go to extreme measures to permanently discard you.
They WILL move on quickly because narcissists tend to view other people (including their partners) as conveniences — and once you are no longer useful, they will move on.
Narcissists rarely take breakups well, because breakups often involve some amount of rejection and acknowledgement of personal failure—two things a narcissist can't handle. They may lash out and try to blame you for everything that went wrong, or they may make extreme promises to change and beg for you to stay.
While people with narcissism aren't devoid of emotions, their motivations may be self-focused. They can know they're hurting your feelings, but as long as it elevates their status, they may not care. Someone living with narcissism does cry. They can feel regret, remorse, and sadness.
“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.
For a person who is narcissistic, their self-esteem is often tied to your relationship with them. When they see that you have moved on and are now dating someone else, they will feel jealous and threatened.
They can have deep regret for failed relationships and they may feel loss very deeply. But they feel that regret and loss only insofar as they relate to their own agenda and feelings. Their remorse points inward. They may feel very sad that they lost someone and they may genuinely miss that person.
Narcissists carry a LOT of shame. From mistakes made in the past, fear of not being enough, to fear of criticism in the present and future. For many narcissists their lives are rather shame-based but, they will never admit it.
The best way to shut down a narcissist is to walk away from them. If all else fails, you can physically remove yourself from the conversation. Even if they keep talking, simply turn around and walk away. If they follow you, close the door.
The most effective weapon to fend off narcissists is self-love. When you love yourself, it is more difficult for the narcissist to manipulate you and get under your skin. It will hurt them to know that you do not need them, that you are better off without them, and that you love yourself exactly as you are.