Ladies, hang on to your ovaries! Gentlemen, don’t drop your balls! The rest of you, grab something to hold on to cause a big emotional bomb is about to drop on you.
I am going to reveal a small chapter of my romantic life (which is, totally, like super busy…I swear!) and it will be a sob story, so if you feel your gagging reflex cannot handle much, better leave this post right now.
You have been warned.
Once upon a time...
...I was just minding my own business, wallowing in self-hate as usual, when a boy approached me out of nowhere. It was at a uni party and I just thought he was trying to get me away from the food table 'cause I was stuffing my face like a pig. Didn’t really care about him though. Then he started to text me. A LOT. Asking me all these annoying questions and making lame jokes. I was like “Hey, I just met you, and this is crazy, so lose my number, don’t ever talk to me…maybe?”
Of course, that didn’t stop him. Instead, he became interested….in ME! No one is EVER interested in me. I’m a lone wolf, going around unnoticed…stealth level: pro.
God, that dude totally knew my weakness – being weak!
Long story short, I totally fell for him. I know, shocker.
Now, let me skip the story even more. I spent long months pining away for him, putting him on an imaginary pedestal, not being subtle about my fragile feelings AT ALL (Screw all my imaginary boyfriends, this guy was the real deal!)! I’m not gonna go into details (you, pervs!) but we were not a couple. In fact, no one knew about us. I was still invisible everywhere. The only time we spoke was over a text or when he invited me over. But we texted, A LOT! In fact, he was a total chatterbot (of course, only in late night hours because fuckboys, duh).
It was still something for me...
...a bright colour to my grey days, a chocolate topping to my coconut ice cream, a Tyrion to my Game of Thro- ok, I’m stopping. Then, one day, he just stopped. He totally ghosted me. Barely replying to any messages, barely sparing me look when we met somewhere (which was kind of admirable, considering we had the same friends group).
It took me an embarrassingly looooong time to figure out what he was. Not just a fuckboy, he was a freaking narcissist! By that time, I had never encountered a narcissist before (or at least I thought so). Therefore, I did one thing I do best:
RESEARCH (Hells yeah! - I'm weird, I know.)
I read hundreds of articles online and even bought a book on narcissism with one intention only – to fix my dream boy (Feel free to sigh out loud, roll your eyes and facepalm.).
Everything I found out, fit him perfectly:
- Charming to no end...you will like them. At first at least.
- Smooth-ass talker...most of them like to talk. A lot.
- Starving for attention…but they mainly talk about themselves. It gets really repetitive to hear all about their successes (which are not necessarily so impressive).
- Compulsive liar...as long as it makes them look good in front of others.
- Entitled as hell...self-promoting. Name-dropping (“Did you know that the dean of the university himself asked me to wipe his ass?” “Yeah, you might have mentioned it, once or twice…”)
- TONS of friends – NO friends...God, it looks like they are the most popular kid on the block. Look closer and see how many real friends they have.
- ZERO empathy...like absolutely non-existent, towards anyone. Empaths (a.k.a. doormats like me) fall an easy prey to them.
- Manipulative bastard...never taking the blame; simply afraid to have their clean-like image destroyed.
Did I sound bitter? I think I sounded bitter.
I think the funniest thing is that so many people actually fall for the bulshit. Overheard a girl describing him as one of the nicest guys she’d ever met. That sounded like me in the first few months. Poor girl. She had no clue what shitstorm was coming her way.
A-ny-way…
…you might have concluded from my story and description that I never managed to improve his seriously damaged personality. It’s actually a quite severe mental disorder (NPD – Narcissistic Personality Disorder) and is one of the few that take a toll on the people around, rather than on the afflicted person.
Mayo Clinic defines NPD like this:
Narcissistic personality disorder — one of several types of personality disorders — is a mental condition in which people have an inflated sense of their own importance, a deep need for excessive attention and admiration, troubled relationships, and a lack of empathy for others. But behind this mask of extreme confidence lies a fragile self-esteem that's vulnerable to the slightest criticism.
And the solution?
Everything I ever read about NPD communicated the same message:
RUN FOR THE FUCKING HILLS!!
(Might be a loose translation.)
And I did. I ran. I am far away from him. Far away from everyone.
With zero trust issues whatsoever…
Bottom line
Keep on distrusting people. They are all out to get ya! Better stay in and binge watch Breaking Bad!