What are the characteristics of the man who marries a narc woman?

[Bellarina3]

I'm in therapy and I've finally worked out my dm is a very full-on narcissist. But today I looked at my father and I realise I don't know where he 'sits' psychologically? He patently isn't a mentally healthy individual. He was a wet rag really. My dm wore the trousers. He had an apathy about him yet he could be violent too. I'm interested to hear other's experiences of this dynamic in their parents so I can get a better understanding of the kind of person who bonds to a narc..

From my narc mother, and SD I'd say the same. Except he wasn't violent. He was bitchy and nasty about me from when I was around ten yrs old. He still likes the fact I'm the scapegoat and not him, I guess. I have no respect for him. He treats his own kids like shit as well, because she's jealous of them.
I don't know or care what made him this way, because he's done nothing to change it

Have you read about the ‘enabler’?

My mother is a narcissist and my father was an enabler, he was very under the control of my mother and did everything she requested, he was never physically cruel to us but wouldn’t interfere in her emotional abuse towards us.

Unfortunately a very close male friend of mine has over the last 2 years been swallowed whole by the worst narc female I have ever encountered. Very much a Mr Nice Guy, wet blanket, extremely well mannered, classic gentleman, people pleaser, weak parents, attempts lots of different things but fails each time, picked on at school, well off materialistically yet in debt, rich parents pay off his debts a lot. Tends to have more female friends, if friends at all, and never seems to fit in with the blokey blokes.

Very meek until something goes wrong for him, in which case he can erupt and rant for hours about how everything is Very Unfair.

Like a lamb to the slaughter.

I hadn't thought of enabler. I'm off to google..

My BFs ex is a narc.

He generally let her have absolute control, gave in easily and did everything she wanted in order to please her and feel loved in return.

He isnt violent, but does have his own issues and negative traits, which are impossible for anyone to work on in that sort of environment but hes a lot better and has made massive life changes that habe enabled him to have more control over his emotions etc as he was so severely imbalanced.

To be honest, the word i think youre looking for is co dependant.

Someone with codepenant tendancies are perfect and easy prey for narcissists.

My father an enabler. Nice guy but not good social skills. Most likely high functioning autism. Totally under the thumb. Put down when it suited her - sometimes to get attention. Sometimes built up when it would make her look good.

Was becoming more enabling as he got older.

I am no contact for 5 years so dont know the current situation

How can you be sure what your father was like when your mother started seeing him? Narcs are skilled at working their way into the affections of others and they can hide their flaws.

How do you think it will help you in life, to make a historic mental analysis of your dad? Sorry if this is not the right thing to say, but don’t you think it would be better for you to assess how your mum and dad are now, come to an acceptance of those current facts, and from there determine what sort of relationship you want (that is actually possible) with them, if any.

I think the characteristics are the same as a woman who marries a narc man.

However, it's doubtful that a well balanced confident individual would marry a narc.

Why would anybody male or female marry someone who felt they were superior to others, has a sense of entitlement, wants everything to revolve around them and has no empathy?

It's more likely that the narc showed their true self much later on in the relationship and the spouse wasn't strong enough to leave the relationship, because of their own issues.

Codependent..google Ross Rosenberg, he wrote an excellent book called the human magnet syndrome, he’s also done loads of you tube videos.

He describes two people in a relationship both on a spectrum. At one end in your narc and the other is codependent. In order for the couple to function they are usually on equal ends of the spectrum and balance out each other’s personality traits.

My friend is doing a physcology degree and she explains it better than me but being codependent isn’t a great personality trait/disorder to have they have the ability to recognise what they are and have the opportunity to learn to set boundaries. Where as the narc simply doesn’t feel they need help and therefore will only get worse.

Codependents have oodles of empathy, narcs have none.

It's more likely that the narc showed their true self much later on in the relationship and the spouse wasn't strong enough to leave the relationship, because of their own issues.

This^^

My dp was married to someone extremely abusive and controlling with a lot of narc tendencies. He was 19 when they met and she was 27. We are having a rocky time of it at the moment because there are things about him which I find very difficult to deal with. He is avoidant to the extreme. He hides from problems, pretending they aren't there and things come tumbling down around him. He's very passive and doesn't seem to be able to stand up for himself. He almost doesn't seem to know what his own preferences are and will go along with whatever the most dominant person in the room wants. If things do go wrong and he has no choice but to face up to them, he adopts quite a victim mentality, rarely acknowledging that his lack of forthought and planning has caused a negative situation. He likes to think of himself as a nice guy and is 'wounded' if you point out that non-confrontational doesn't equate to 'nice'.

Ive diagnosed my mum with NPD, typically she would never admit there was any faults with her. I think she trapped my dad by getting pregnant straight away. It was convenient for my dad as he had full custody of my older brothers and worked fulltime. I dont think she showed her true colours until later and by that time he just accepted that he was stuck. She has repeatedly stolen thousands of pounds from him but he has just let it go. He has now retired and the relationship is terible but he wont divorce her as he would lose a lot of money he worked very hard for. She wont divorce him as she doesnt have to pay a penny and all her wages are hers to spend.

I dont think either of them have been happy with each other. I learned very early on what she was like and have gone NC with her. Now i do see her sometimes and it seems i do the gray rock method without realising it.

FIL, married to NMIL, does MIL’s bidding basically. He’s a bit like a servant.

I think you can't generalise because true narcissists are very astute at reading people and manipulating them to their own ends.

For example, a male narcissist who wants extreme wealth may identify a woman he wants to marry for her family money, go for the love bomb whirl wind (Acting the perfect bf role), marry her, get her pregnant before begining to show his true personality. In that way anyone can actually end up married to a narcissist - because by that point they are stuck and the Narcissist begins that value, devalue, discard, revalue cycle that breaks a person's self esteem totally. A normal strong woman can be broken down to believe no one else would want her and feeling she can't leave.

Anyone can end up married to a narcissist if they don't have their wits about them and the courtship is whirlwind.

That said, narcissists do well with co-dependents and people with borderline personality disorders- people with a weak sense of self in other worse. A narcissist appears very confident, decisive and controlling and this can feel safe and comforting to a co-dependent or a borderline.

He was 19 when they met and she was 27.

This age gap creates an imbalance and the more experienced partner can become abusive because of their experience.

I'm very against large age gaps...especially where one partner is very young like this.

From my experience of reading on here. Women who marry narcissists or whatever type of abusive partner (not everything is oh so fashionable npd) are victims but men are weak spineless enablers.

I had two good friends who got married. I knew him first and really liked him and then she became a close female friend and I really enjoyed her company too. I emigrated so only stayed in distant touch over the years but still enjoyed seeing them. After 20 years she confessed to me he was bullying her and dominating her behind closed doors, to the extent that he once grabbed her around the neck in the car. She finally went to counseling alone and as she began to gain some self-esteem back he quickly started an affair with a mutual friend and left. It turns out he is a massive narc who successfully hid his abuse of his wife and children.

As she has recovered (is almost divorced) she has recognized that she was very co-dependent and he definitely love-bombed her early in their relationship. I never fancied him but we knew that plenty of women thought he was a real catch and there was quite an imbalance in the power of the relationship from the start because he was considered to have more “charisma” by many people. So he chose someone who he assumed did not have the same strength of character.

It turns out my dear friend was trained to be co-dependent by a mother with narc tendencies who always criticized her and put her down. She still struggles to see herself as someone other people like and want to have around and she was completed controlled by her husband during the marriage. I only saw them every couple of years but I am still very shocked that he was able to ‘hide in plain sight’ as a very insecure and angry man who blamed his wife and other people for absolutely all his problems. I thought I knew him and I didn’t because they put on a facade around friends.

wafflyversatile since there are few men posting on here about their abusive wives the most common descriptions are of abusive mothers, abusive partners and enabler fathers of mners. The nature of the site means that abused men are represented in the same numbers as abused women. Codependant or abused women will eventually look like enablers too to their dc if they stay with their abuser and keep the dc in that toxic environment. I don't think it's fair to say that mn mostly views women as victims and men as weak.

• aren't represented....