The meaning of the word CREEP.

When discussing these types with others I have have frequently heard or had people hint that they would have gotten out earlier knowing that this person clearly had problems and was a narcissist. The problem with this though is this: They didn't seem to have a problem...at first. It was a slow progression where one is slowly worn down, groomed and the abusive behaviors slowly applied.

Calling all idiots!

Mr. or Ms. Narcissist is successful in controlling others because if they aren't they simply move on to someone else or groups of someone else's. The non players are side stepped, ignored, avoided or vilified as the case may be...everyone else is left to serve as their useful idiot.

Oh honey, let's not "fight"...play along like the way I treat you is COMPLETELY NORMAL!

I didn't catch the signs at the beginning of the relationshit (intentional) but they were there in retrospect. One of the biggest was all the testing.

"Can I upset you?
How far can i push an issue?
Will you yell? Will you punish me back?
Will you brood?
How vicious can I take it before you react? Before you leave?
What happens when I do something you love or hate?
Test, test, test.

Oh honey...lets not fight. I simply want to know what I can get away with before I start training you."

Covert Narc Training - Once you're brainwashed:

You are less capable than you ever thought you were. Forget that job in accounting or degree in psychology...your skills in counting or understanding the human mind will slowly be eroded, replaced with their fears, doubts and worry and deferred to the expert with their natural intuitive powers of intelligence and experience. Your JesusMahatmaMotherTheresaGandhi knows more than you and any other twelve thousand people and will be happy to guide and remind you of how much practice you STILL need.

You need to seek therapy, they'll say.
You need to find Jesus, they'll say.
You need to go to rehab, they'll say.
You need serious help, they'll say.
You are hurting this family, they'll say.
You are selfish and blind, they'll say.

I only want you to be a better person. Look at all the people I have convinced of your invalidity! See! It's not ME, it's YOU.

I'm only trying to help you. You can't help it. You just have a problem. You just have a disease. God can help. Counseling can help. I just want to live a long life with you! I am just trying to help you help yourself. Poor baby. It must be hard having that disease. I will be here for you, I just need you to show you care about our family by getting the help you so desperately need!

But be very clear: YOU are the one who needs help. You're an idiot if you think anything else.

They can't bear the mirror, but they can't stop looking into it and projecting onto you.

Control. First a little here and there. Then it is what color toothbrush you should buy and how best to use the toilet, what kind of pants you should be wearing.

When they socialize it is holy...when you do it is never with the right people or for the right reasons. Family will be portrayed as meddling, close friends as interring or bad influences and everyone else either beneath you, poor or lame. Never should you be left alone with others either. If by chance you are allowed they'll want a full briefing of what transpired.

Notice that each of these previous posts have an agenda behind them: control, isolation, unbalance, devaluing, etc.

It took time to slowly drip feed these abuses to you and it took time for you to doubt your perceptions, feel like crap and get lost in a cloud of fog. This is when it's easy to slide into drug or alcohol abuse to start to cope with the confused devastation and cognitive dissonance you are experiencing. It didn't happen overnight and it was likely subtle...it could and does happen to anyone! Do not spend a single moment questioning how this could have happened to you because it happens to people of all stripes, backgrounds and education.

...You know what the creepy thing is? I (Denise) didn't write this...this is copy pasta from another unfortunate soul who fell in the Narc trap. THEY ARE ALL THE SAME: Zombies.

Play along...

You better be on your best behavior...

Coming for you...

Onward & Upward

...we each had heard many of the same exact lines from our exes, the exact same behaviors and spent just as long trying to figure this stuff all out. Narcissism happens, and it happens to men as well as women. The same lack of empathy, the same cruelty, the same walking on eggshells. We are all much more alike than we are different. 

For extra brutality, add a beatdown section.

I have more respect, hope, and love

for the man who beat the crap out of me in drunken rages

stalked me for 18 months when I left him and went into hiding

attempted to murder my quadriplegic boyfriend 

and is now in prison for the next 16 years, with a lifetime no-contact order

than I do for you. 

Because he has a heart. He can FEEL. He feels regret. 

And he is man enough to sincerely apologize.

And he works hard to make his life right for his son.

Your crimes are worse because they aren't against a grown person

You slaughter your own children

without apology.

without so much as a single glimmer of recognition for your depravity. 

The world is safer with him here, and you in his place.

Alone, in a 8x8 cell, until you finally realize just how brutal 

your cuts to their souls really are. 

& how

You will be held to the highest standards and not allowed barely an in of fault.

The narcissist on another hand will act or do pretty much as he or she wants laughing at you privately as they deny any wrongdoing or unreasonability.

They will get away with murder while you have the book thrown at you for the most insignificant things.

Expect this and simply do the best you can...you and I know the truth.

Female Narc

It is a common misperception that male narcissists are more aggressive in general than female narcissists.  In fact, both sexes are equally narcissistically aggressive, but it is displayed differently.  From a descriptive analyses approach, the male narcissist is seen to be “overtly aggressive”.  That means that he acts out physically violent interactions, (such as hitting, yelling, threatening body shaping etc), whereas, the female narcissists are more likely to use “relational aggression” (RA).  Distinct from male physical aggression (where acts are meant to harm another person’s physical well being), female relational aggression is a covert means of harming others through damage of social relationships.  This is likely to be acted out through emotional violence, (i.e. manipulation, threats, purposefully silent treatment, spreading rumors, telling others not to engage with someone, talking about their victims to others etc).  This behaviour harms others through damage (or the threat of damage) to relationships or feelings of acceptance, friendship or group inclusion.

This subtle art of emotional devastation is acted out every day by narcissistic women everywhere.  Regardless of whether it is in the home, the workplace, or in community settings, this bullying behavior pervades all of the female narcissist’s relationships.  This type of aggression uses the threat of social isolation to hurt the victim, and its advantage resides in the value the victim places on belonging to a family, school, workplace or other group. As the female narcissist have no corresponding fear of social isolation, they do not value relationships, and therefore perceive themselves as having nothing to lose one way or the other.

Another factor that helps to keep narcissistic females off the radar is the fact that their victims (both male and female) are more likely to remain silent about female relational aggression then they would be about male physical aggression.  Male overt physical aggression has the advantage of being better understood by everybody, and instantly recognizable to the victim (and observers), whereas covert relational aggression is often very hard to identify or explain.  Often the victim is at a loss to identify the psychological abuse that they are experiencing.  The female narcissist is also very clever not to show her rage to witnesses, however when she gets her victim alone she will become absolutely malevolent.

Having said that however, when it comes to narcissism generally, both males and females are Dr. Jekyll’s and Mr(s) Hyde’s, and both are equally emotionally abusive and treat others as a means to an end.  I for one would welcome further research on female narcissistic relational aggression, and have it entered into the DSM V in order to simplify a diagnostic criterion.