Getting over narcissistic ex...why is it so hard?

[yorkshireme]

NC'd for this as I didn't want it linked to my other posts.

After two years I've just broken up with a man I now know (mostly thanks to MN) to be a textbook narcissist. Some of his traits included:

• love bombing and future faking right from the start. I thought I'd hit the jackpot (how wrong I was)
• the insane ex who had the affair that ended their marriage
• the same ex who now apparently tries to stop him seeing their young daughters
• gaslighting
• breadcrumbing (now I'm out of it I can see that he had me like a fish on a hook. I'm so ashamed)
• he was never at fault for anything, ever
• hero complex (particularly around his job)
• obsessive eating patterns
• subtle but persistent criticism of things I did
• flat out denial that he ever hurt me, despite treating me like something on his shoe for the last few months of our 'relationship'.

It ended because I found out he was with someone else. He's an arsehole and I'm a million times better off without him. But why is it so, so hard to get over him?

I just read your OP again and wondered if you could make a similar list about yourself? All your thinking and the way you've presented it is about him. Can you make a list of your behaviours within 'the relationship' without actually talking about him specifically? Like, 'I responded to breadcrumbing by pretending to myself that it was enough', that kind of thing?

You need to be thinking about you, not him.

The reason it feels good to read about narcissistic traits is because it validates you. It helps you to think 'Yeah, it was actually him just being horrible, rather than me being silly/sensitive/whatever' Have a look at relationship dynamics regarding validation. Every relationship needs validation from both partners, but those who fall prey to narcissists often lack the self validation bit, which is the bit that goes 'Hey, you're out of order criticising me like that. i don't like it, and if you won't stop, I'll leave you.'

Were you invalidated as a child? We usually learn these dynamics as kids, from the way our parents treated us, and each other.