Narcissism & Self-Doubt

We all occasionally have doubts about certain situations. However, when there’s a narcissist prominent in your life, those doubts can shift to questioning your own reality. You might wonder why you feel so hurt, and you might question your own thinking and feelings. To make matters worse, your other supports seem to have faded away. Family, friends or colleagues are no longer close to you and you realize you have become isolated. You might even feel like the narcissist has turned people away from you. You may feel very lonely.

You might not understand the shifting moods or unpredictability of the narcissist. If the narcissist is someone you love, this can be especially confusing and hurtful. Over time, we start to bend our ways to accommodate the narcissist to keep them calm, happy or satisfied. The problem is, they are never satisfied. This is when some people would get out of the relationship. But ‘co-dependents’ can’t. This might be the only way they know love. Many ‘co-dependents’ have a narcissist parent.

In some relationships, co-dependents cling to those fleeting moments when they had the narcissist’s approval or in some cases, adoration. We can long to have that back. It can even be addictive. It makes sense that we think, “I must be doing something wrong”. While continuously adapting our own behaviours, trying to please the narcissist or at least make life or work more bearable, we lose our sense of who we are and what is important to us as individuals. Anticipating the reaction of the narcissist is exhausting because ultimately, they hold their own power by denying you, your reality or your needs. Profound feelings of unworthiness can take hold. It felt so good to be treated as someone special in those snapshot moments when the narcissist was grooming you by building you up. But over time, this just wears you down.

This is a safe place for co-dependents.