[strongFaith34]

I wonder how many MLCers are actually covert narcissist ? I was reading psychology threads on another forum and people were discussing how they never realized their partners were covert narcissist until the discard (i.e. bomb drop).

The partner begins the relationship with love bombing the person of interest and they imitate the interests of the person they are interested in. I wonder if many of us on this forum had relationships that began this way? I see the MLCer love bombs their new partner, adapting to whatever her interests are.

They suppress their negative emotions because they don't know how to deal with them, when a conflict arises in the relationship they shut down because an MLCer cannot accept their is something wrong with them. My MLCer was always this way from the beginning. If everything was going good, it was great but the moment I wanted to discuss somethign that was bothering me, MLCer could not handle the discussion.

Most covert narcissist were raised in a way where their parents did not give them affection and love unless they did something the parents approved of like achieving some award, or getting good grades. Many children raised in this type of environment were treated as objects only given love and recognition for outward acomplishments. These children grow up seeking love, attention, approval constantly. When the LBS is no longer of value to them, they discard what they consider "objects" once we serve them no purpose, and they have found a new source of supply. (narcissist discard)

I am now under the impression that my MLCer who devalued and discarded me at bomb drop was truly a covert narcissist all along. When I look back, I saw hints of narcissism which I thought was just him being a perfectionist or not being able to handle arguments/critcisim, always seeking approval from others. At some point his mask fell off, I remember saying to him after bomb drop, this is not who you are, why are you acting like this? His response, "this is the real me".

I'm sure this doesn't apply to all MLCers but I wonder how many MLCers were actually covert narcissist which explains the small percentage of MLCers who actually come out of MLC. Also, the false returns overlaps with narcississtic behavior where they want to control you and keep you on the side as a source of supply or give you just enough attention to keep hanging on waiting for them to return.

[strongFaith34]

From another blog:

The horrible, never-ending and disastrous eventuality for narcissists is that all relationships with others will end up being discarded, discredited and delisted by them.
The real reason for this is because the narcissist has completely discarded themselves.
The narcissist has attempted to kill off their own True Self; they have disowned and divorced themselves from it and put a fictitious character in its place (the False Self).
When the deeply damaged, wounded and abandoned True Self emerges, the narcissist lines someone else up, projects their pain onto them and tries to destroy them, which unconsciously is all about trying to destroy their shameful True Self – the inner vulnerable parts that they have no desire to meet, heal and resurrect in order to become whole.
The narcissist does not relate to him or herself with empathy, love, kindness, vulnerability or self-honesty or self-soothing. Instead, the narcissists self-relationship is delusional; it operates in egoic and pathologically disordered ways, designed to prop up the False Self and grant this fragile insecure identity the feed of significance.
The narcissist has no resources to relate to you as a valued human with a soul, because people cannot grant what and who they are not Being to themselves.
When we realise this deeper truth, we can stop trying to hold narcissists responsible for caring about us and valuing us. They have NO ability to.
Which then leads us to our true liberation …
How can we take our power back by healing what we need to?

[OffRoad]

Also read up on Borderline Personality disorder. Ignore the "If you do these things, you have BPD" sections, there are shades of BPD. I very much believe my XH is a shade of BPD. In his case, his parents(mother, actually) didn't expect outside accomplishments, they expected a "mini-mi", who only thought what they thought, and was never allowed a differing opinion. Also, his mother projects her feelings onto others. If you grow up with that, how do you know your own feelings?

I do believe a good portion of MLCERS have a chemical component or an emotional component, or both, that led to the MLC. My XH had a whole slew of acronyms assigned to him, along with dyslexia and dysgraphia.

So if your MLCER was a covert narc, how would that change how you are dealing with the situation? Or would it?

[strongFaith34]

Personally it reframes my view of the person I married and am now divorced from. It removed the expectation that I will ever receive a sincere apology for what he did or any real empathy for ditching his family and kids because this is something ingrained from childhood, few if any  narcissist will ever self reflect and take accountability for what they did wrong.

[SteelSpine]

I came to this same conclusion about my h as well. There was a hollowness about him, always, just something I could not put my finger on.   I cannot say, as so many here do, that my spouse  became the opposite of what he used to be, when the crisis hit. There were always hints of a self-absorption in him, that I had grown skilled at spackling.

I do believe that a great many MLCers are covert narcissists to some degree, and not just temporarily.

I feel that this explains a lot of the behaviors that frustrate the LBS's.

So many here believe that the crisis is still going on, for years and years, and I'm just not buying it anymore.

I am convinced that their crises can - and do - end, without them making peace with the LBS, or wanting to reconcile, or even reconnect.

Particularly in this day & age, in a society that glorifies narcissism and rewards it. It is on the rise.

[FromAbroad]

Very interesting topic.

I can't speak for everybody, but I do agree. I think my XW is a covert narcissist. Right after BD somebody mentioned MLC to me and I started reading. Every box was checked. I had her up on a pedestal and couldn't see her flaws. However after yet another brutal discard my eyes were opened. I started to see our relationship for what is was. At the same time I read a lot about covert narcissism. And it fitted like a glove.

There was huge Love bombing right from the start. She liked everything about me. Told me she loved me since the first week. We moved in from the very first day. And through the years she always told me how I was a "gods gift". However when I look back at it. It was mostly words throughout the years. She basicly always put me down. Gave me the silent treatment a lot. And always had me wondering what I did wrong this time. I was even scared buying the groceries, knowing that if I picked the wrong thing she would get mad. All her friends always told her how lucky she was, when at the same time she was always complaining about me. But I couldn't see it, I always thought she loved me, and whenever she would be mad (a lot) it was my fault.

There are other things that point to NPD. She has had the very bad childhood. She told me she can never be alone. And since the age of 14 she hasn't. From one relationship into another (a lot). She is always the victim. In 16 years I have never seen her take responsibility for any relationship problems, with me, coworkers, friends and family. It's always their fault and if things don't go her way she cuts them off or uses the silent treatment. I now remember many conversations, where I was confused, her telling me I did this or said that. And me not remembering those things and telling her so. Which basicly ended up in her telling me I always change the things I say and how it is hard to live with something like that.

I don't even want to talk about the discard. But the projection, gaslighting, blame-shifting and a lot of other things are so obvious now. I do think she has (had) a crisis, but it will be on top of a personality disorder (NPD/BPD).

It does make me wonder sometimes, if we arent't fooling ourselves with MLC. Maybe it is just NPD and the touch-and-goes are just the hoovering of a NPD. Maybe we are the ones closing our eyes and holding on to false hope. Maybe we have rewritten history ourselves to and MLC is just a thing we keep telling ourselves, since that way we don't have to admit/face the fact that we might have been in a abusive relationship all along.

I don't have the answers and I don't want to offend anybody. But it does make me wonder sometimes. But I don't think it really matters also. The aftermath is about the same. We need healing and growing for ourselves. Whatever the cause of the discard was.

[New Day Rising]

I tend to agree, but I'm still not convinced on the aspect of covert narcissism/Bipolar/Just plain old clinical depression for me ex, but a lot does stand in favour of covert narcissism and I suppose depression can co-exist with narcissism.

I know that I met my ex at a vulnerable time in my life and he did completely and utterly love bomb me and he was with someone else at the time. We did, however, not get together until about 6 months after he split from his then girlfriend.

I had moved a lot and I was trying to find where I belonged, so to speak. I was also in my early 20's. I had been to University and moved to New York and then onto London and then back to where I live now. I didn't know anyone, but I was beginning to forge friendships in a city heavily involved in the music scene and I was beginning to find my feet. I had found somewhere to rent and shared with a few people. Ex was part of this circle I was now hanging out with and now I look back, I think he targeted me because I was vulnerable. It was back in the day of dial up internet and I woke up after a night out to find a message on AOL from him telling me he really liked me. We had had some superficial talk, but he was best friends with a house mate and what I didn't realise was that this house mate really liked me too. Ex was encouraging this friend at the same time as pursuing me. It was odd, but I only found this out later.

Everything moved pretty quickly after this. Before I knew it, we had a flat together and then had bought a flat together.

I look back now and realise that this was very odd, but I hadn't had much experience before this, if I'm honest. I had dated people, but nothing long term and I was looking for someone with commitment.

And he suffered from depression really badly. There were days he couldn't get out of bed. He was doing his degree and I was working full time and I would drive home on my lunch break and make sure he was up and get him to his class and drive back to work.

I know I enabled a lot of his behaviour and he didn't want an equal partner, he wanted a mother. The mother he didn't have (a lot of Foo issues) and filled that gap. I got him through Uni, through his masters, helped him pass his driving test and to a place where he was financially stable. I was now in a position where I needed his support and for him to pull his weight and then BOOM, off he went to meet someone else that would fill the void that I was no longer fulfilling.

He was never happy. He looked at other people and thought they always had it better. Sometimes he would occasionally say something like 'We actually have it pretty good, don't we?' and I'd say 'We've always had it pretty good. We're very privileged'. He would say things to me sometimes, like 'You need to meet someone better than me'. I always thought it was the depression talking.

Then, we had these crazy episodes, which were formulaic in pattern, every 4 years and in winter, he'd lose the plot. He'd say he needed to be on his own, he'd go out partying, spending crazy amounts of money, I'm guessing drink and probably drugs were involved. He'd hang out with a new group of friend who 'got him' and then the crash would come and he'd be full of remorse. Wonder what the hell he had done. Not be able to live with himself.

And, I was a bloody doormat. If the formula is right, he is due another 'crisis' this winter. I'd be interested to see how this develops. I'm not sure I'll find out though, but he's married to someone else and is no longer my problem.

But, I read a lot on covert narcissism and see my ex. His whole family think he's in midlife crisis and I believed this for a long time. They think that one day he's just going to wake up and go 'What the f*** did I do?'. I protected his family from a lot of his crazy, so I understand why they see it that way and maybe he will wake up and think this, but who cares. Too much damage has been done to me and my kids.

I am addressing my own issues through counselling and working through my own foo issues to think about his and why I enabled this man for so long.

[Treasur]

I too don't want to offend anyone and accept that people may see things differently. With time though I am becoming much more cautious of labels. Including MLC actually. And my xh WAS actually diagnosed by a psychiatrist with both severe depression and anxiety a bit after BD. But was it cause or effect? No idea. I was diagnosed with PTSD so that's a label. It did help me to understand things happening in me that I couldn't understand and get the right treatment for it, that's true. Was it useful to anyone else? Not sure. Did my xh's diagnosis help him understand his own behaviour and find a path back to health? Doesn't look like it from the little i know, but truthfully no idea.

Why mighg we be cautious? Bc humans are complicated, bc we are not objective as LBS and bc we all have traits that operate on a scale...and move around in reaction to context and events.

I do think it is normal to try to find a why label as part of trying to make sense of something big that we don't understand. But often the Why label doesn't change much about the what in front of us. We are dealing with patterns of behaviour not thoughts really...and no one can really reliably guess at what is in someone else's head. So perhaps it is more useful to respond to the patterns of what people are doing as opposed to the underlying 'cause' of why they are doing it? Maybe there is even a risk that we skew our own perception of what we see if we label too rigidly? Or stops us seeing people as people first?

I suspect the deeper need to have a label is about our own past perceptions and our future hopes or assumptions perhaps? Interesting video on this very issue here fwiw https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=xUXMAVgCToM

[Couragedearheart]

Narcissist or narcissistic traits. Does it even matter?  The reality is that those traits are the thought processes and coping mechanisms and survival defenses of a small child against severe abuse. Wether it is a true Personality Disorder, or learned behavior from being raised by a person with a personality disorder, or just a survival mechanism from past abuse.....it’s still a hurt person hurting people.

I find I don’t really care, if we are letting go, and not trying to affect a certain outcome, then it matters very little. If this is God’s way of healing it, then they have free will and so do you....they either come back healing or they don’t return....and you still have a choice.
Just my personal opinion.

[gman242]

strong, I went down that path too and I don't know..

I think personally from what it sounds like and from my own experiences, we've got avoidant attached spouses. Typically that happens when a spouse grows up in an house where the parents aren't available and they often have to care for siblings and or the parent, in cases of alcoholics and drug addiction.

Any emotional confrontation upsets them because they've never been through them, in what someone would consider a "normal" way and don't know how to react to them without being defensive, which one could argue is actually being offensive. I used to have this saying with my wife that when she was mad at me, i was in trouble and when I was mad at her, I was still in trouble.

They lie frequently or through omission, to hold all the cards and somehow they manage to have all "the dirt" on you. Simply putting forks in the wrong slot in the drawer could be an argument that would end in divorce. Or at least the threat of it.. to keep you in check.

The biggest thing though is that they never had a stable parent to model on and they don't understand their feelings and can't label them we way most people do and by extension, they can't process them as normal people. They just turn it on you instead. Like with the forks, you'd say "I want to help you so I put the dishes away". they would say "if you cared, then you'd know where I wanted the forks to go".

Nobody ever gave to them and they have a lot of ways of keeping the scales tipped in their favor. Read into it.. on the surface it looks covert narcissism. it's really tough to tell..