*The Unwavering Obsession Of A Covert Narcissist
Out of sight, out of mind? Here’s how it really works with a covert narcissist.
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I’m living in a state of
mass confusion
False illusion
Pained obsessions of you.
When I was 18 years old, my covert narcissist ex wrote a song.
About me.
He called it Obsession.
It was the closest thing to a love song he would ever write. The lines above are from that song.
I still remember every word..
I read them now and I can’t believe how he nailed it.
How he managed to describe, to a “t”, our coming relationship. He nailed the essence.
Mass confusion.
False illusion.
Pained obsession.
Did he think about me?
He thought about me.
He thought about me all the time.
He was obsessed.
If you’re with a covert narcissist, you’ve probably asked yourself some version of the following: do they think about me?
Do they miss me? Am I on their mind?
Some people will tell you no, they don’t miss you.
They don’t even think about you. Out of sight out of mind with a narcissist, people say.
Which is true enough in some circumstances.
Like when they are trying to grab supply from other people.
In that situation, it’s true.
You rarely enter their minds.
The other time they stop thinking about you is when you enter full devaluation mode.
During full-on devaluation, they begin to detach from the relationship and rarely think about you.
You become a ghost haunting your own life.
They don’t call or text anymore. You rarely figure into their future plans. Sometimes it feels like you don’t exist at all.
But they need you.
They think about you.
Thinking about you is your covert narcissist’s great obsession.
Until they replace you, the primary supply source, with another primary supply source, the supply they get from others will never rival the reliable dose of grandiosity they get from pushing your well-worn emotional buttons and puppeteering you with the deft hand of a master manipulator.
So while they might forget about you for a minute or two while they’re flirting with the waitress at the coffee shop — or while they’re telling their new work colleague they’re single and available— -in a much bigger sense, you’re always on their mind.
I’m going to tell you that they think about you all the time. Constantly. They have to.
You are the only thing that makes them real.
Without you, they barely exist at all.
Your covert narcissist is like a helium balloon.
Infused with your essence, buoyed by your expansiveness, they soar.
You are a beautiful, bright balloon, bursting with color and sunlight. They imitate your hue. They copy your vivid optimism. Lighter than air now, they ride the warm currents of your realness — your easy authenticity.
To the casual observer, they might even seem alive. After all, they move. They dance. They seem to go wherever their shadow-whims take them.
They’re not alive. They’re dead.
These narcissistic balloons.
It’s the air that animates them.
It’s the wind that promenades them across the sky.
You are their Animus. Their wind. The ghost in their machine.
Without you, they are just empty scraps of latex.
You transfuse them with life-giving anime; you swirl the air.
Your inner force loans them the appearance of life.
All your knowledge, all your hopes, all your passions, all your optimism, all your capacity for kindness, all your nostalgia, all your love, all your meaningful, small acts — these qualities fill the well they draw from. Without you, coverts are sad, plastic leftovers, deflated and bedraggled, flat and unremarkable. Without their Animus (you), they’re the trash you sweep up when the party ends.
Without you, they’re inanimate. Non-living.
Narcissists are the real walking dead.
You are three-dimensional. You are genuine. You have breadth, depth, and width. You are an ocean. Your feelings run as deep as the sea.
Covert narcissists are shallow puddles.
A puddle will reflect the sky. For a moment, and with enough imagination, you might mistake its inch of muddy water for a deep mountain lake or a dark, roiling sea. But step into it, and you will quickly discover that it’s barely even a surface. You will immediately understand that a puddle doesn’t contain the vast mystery of an ocean. It’s just a pedantic indentation in someone’s retail asphalt.
A covert narcissist is a parking lot puddle full of dingy, stagnant swamp water. Scrape the surface of a covert narcissist and you’ll find an overgrowth of questionable molecules resting there until the next big storm. They will always inhabit the most convenient depression in any given piece of ground.
Does a narcissist think about you?
It depends on how you define YOU.
They obsess over the idea of you.
They fixate on controlling you.
They ruminate constantly on new ways to provoke you, goad you, insense you, madden you, gall you.
Only by making you small can they be big.
By this definition, they don’t think about you — the real you- at all.
They fixate on the idea of you.
Just like they don’t love you.
They love the idea of you.
Mostly, they love the idea of you loving them.
Do they want to think about you? Hell no. They want to think about themselves. All day, every day. But you have something they need as much as food when they’re hungry or water when they’re parched . They need a self.
They borrow it — from you.
Their sense of grandiosity, their belief that they have a place in this world, their bluster — masquerading as confidence — it’s all built on your foundation. They are your mirror. They consider you an extension of themselves. A living, breathing plaything. A talking, walking, endlessly amusing toy.
They can’t stop thinking about the idea of you. Even when they leave, they’re never truly gone. They linger.
They always return.
You’re the one who has to leave.
You must shut the door and shutter the windows or they will crawl back in.
Their so-called discard is, in truth, a lie.
It’s up to you to make it real.
You’re the one who has to make their lie, your truth.
GOOD LUCK OUT THERE-myla
Obsession
Sleepless nights watching shadows dance
To the music of a forgotten chant
Hear the wind and the rain as it calls
It’s all part of her tormenting call to me…
To me…
Everywhere I look
I see those eyes
Piercing through my very soul
Everywhere I look
I see your smile
Someone help me get control
I’m living in a state of
Mass confusion
False illusion
Pained obsessions
of you.
— Song by Dan K, 1993, Used by permission
You have all the power.
You’ve always had it.
Rise up and take it.
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DOMESTIC VIOLENCE: If you’re with a narcissist, leave. Go no contact if you can. If you’ve been a victim of physical or emotional abuse, call 800 — 799 — 7233
