I walked away from a relationship with a partner who I suspect had narcissistic personality disorder (NPD) and I (a diagnosed inattentive ADHDer) stayed too long.
Even though I lost three and half years of my life to a person who couldn’t love me and almost destroyed me, I now have my sense of self back.
The relationship forced me to hold up a mirror to my personality… and the pain I had been hiding.
Here are five things that I learnt from living closely with this complex personality type.
1. This personality type is extremely compelling to neurodivergent women — here’s why:
The first date with this man felt like, for the first time in my life, someone was taking the time to “understand” my intricacies and “connect” in a deep way.
It was intense and felt deeply familiar. In fact, he could have been a long lost family member. I left the date, and I flashed forward to our life with two children together. Though I didn’t admit it to my friends, I was sure I had just met “the one”.
This was highly unusual behaviour from me, as I was dismissive of first dates and afraid to let anyone in.
But narcissists are experts at mirroring you. It’s not intentional, but they will pick up on the exact tone of your personality and mould into what they think you want from life and expect from a partner. It builds a connection quickly before you know anything about them… it also provides you with a “perfect” person mirage that you will cling to for years to come… and who will never return.
I may be alone in this, but I believe people with narcissistic personality disorder and ADHD often have a level of “trauma” in common. Whereas ADHDers get trapped in the emotional side of their brain to survive, narcissists are stuck in the pragmatic side.
My personal trauma was related to parentification, where my parents emotionally over relied on me and I played the role of a stable partner to my Dad because my mum couldn’t. We would go out shopping together, do DIY together and he would tell me about his work worries.
Oddly enough, my ex-boyfriend had almost the same dynamic in reverse to mine. His mother was emotionally reliant on him from a young age because his father lost his temper a lot. Both of us were the “polyfilla” (or “spackle” for US readers) in our parents’ relationships.
He was highly advanced in the practical areas of life: Successful job, good savings, a “do-er”, whilst I, as a classic ADHDer was advanced in the emotional and creative side of things and lacking in the practical. Without even knowing the finer details of our respective traumas, there was a magnetic draw to one another to “complete” what the other person was lacking. He was attracted to my “joy” and “excitement”. I felt like I could rely on him.
2. They will offer you “everything” on paper, without giving you anything at all
Being in a relationship with a person with narcissistic personality types is playing a game that they will cheat to win. Even if they can knock at the front door, they will scale the rose trellis and break in around the back because they thrive on the deceit.
His particular game was to ask me what my dreams were and to “give” me everything on paper that my ego wanted. First, he let me choose my dream area to buy a home — (he didn’t want the responsibility of the choice) and it would make me feel locked into staying.
I had no ownership rights of the home, but he let me decorate it to my taste. From there he wanted me to pay for cleaning, food and eating out. His asset would continue to build in value, and my money would go to disposable assets.
He never told me he loved me, never gave me any reassurance or communicated openly with me about next steps together. Never talked about marriage or a “future”, though I sensed he wanted children.
When he gifted me anything he punished me by reminding me constantly how much it cost and encouraged me to “show it off” or “take a picture to send to [your] family”.
On the outside my friends thought I had hit some sort of jackpot and cooed about the house when they came to see it, but I felt completely empty inside.
I quietly built up my own reserves and thankfully had parents who knew something was seriously wrong to help pull me out. If I didn’t, and if I had have got deeper into the relationship I don’t know where I would have got the strength to leave it.
3. They are not “bad people” — they are hurt and want control
You are dealing with an emotional child, who has stunted development — act accordingly.
Like many neurodivergents, I see things in black and white. I think we do this to try and make sense of the world that has caused us pain and hurt — if we can identify a “pattern” we can avoid it next time.
When I was in the depths of despair in this relationship I had categorised him as a “bad” person. His character and the way he behaved with me was truly crushing. Once when I tripped down the stairs he said “be careful you don’t break the stairs”. Another time I was going to a business event and he “joked”, “you’re not allowed…women act slutty at these events to get business”.
He would frequently wake me up when I was in a deep sleep to get some reassurance if he was feeling unsettled. Each night he would come upstairs later than me, turn on the light and pull back the sheets forcefully to wake me up when I had gone to bed before him. Even if I tried to rest my head on his shoulder on a plane he would nudge me off him to wake me up. All of these things contributed to a constant brain fog and confusion.
Further, he was dangerously secretive and had multiple passwords across everything which he wouldn’t let me see. Yet, when the owner of our house had sensitive bank statements delivered by accident he opened all of her letters because he was curious about her assets.
He point blank told me a few times: “I don’t have feelings” and when he listened to his friend read a simple and beautiful love poem to his wife on their wedding day said: “It was nice, but I couldn’t really understand it.” Then when we watched a documentary about Trump on the plane he looked at me and asked, “do you think I’m like Trump… no feelings?”.
But the scariest cruelty came in the plausable deniability. Whenever I questioned him on anything, he would produce such a reasonable argument and gaslight me so deeply that I started to question my own sanity and judgement.
To call this “bad” is too black and white. But these people are unfixable and irrevocably damaged. They believe that with control they will have calm. Instead of questioning why they are this way or categorising them, start questioning why you are staying to put up with it.
4. They will charm the pants off your family and friends
To this day, my sister and some of my friends feel more sorry for him then they do for me. Recently my sister pointed out that I knew from early on that something wasn’t right and he wasn’t going to change and I still stayed. Earlier in the relationship she pointed out that I was wrong to stay with him if I wasn’t 100% sure in my gut and if I knew he wanted children (he was older than me by 7 years).
To my friends in particular, he appeared gentle, thoughtful and modest. He made slight reference to his successful job, but otherwise played it down and he quickly adapted to their character types and mirrored it straight back to them. In reference to me he “appeared” attentive, often paying for meals out with friends and booking things in advance and being generally helpful. He never missed an opportunity to impress in a subtle way. He also never missed an opportunity to ask me what they thought of him afterwards. He would rabidly ask for information when he knew he had made a particularly good impression.
When we visited our neighbours he led the conversation thoughtfully and good humouredly. I was always on edge because it was a choregraphed dance that I had to be in step with and at times he would nudge my leg if he thought I was talking too much. When we got home his animated face would melt into a worn mask and the good-humoured person at the dinner would dissipate immediately.
Speaking with friends now, they can admit I looked “unwell” with him, or they can point to me appearing “on another planet” but they can’t actually pick out anything from his side to cause those things because it was imperceptible.
Thankfully when he stayed temporarily with my parents his mask did slip. They saw that he could charm their socks off, but not really relate to me or provide eye contact or warmth.
5. Don’t stay to “fix” them or because they “need” you — you’re the wrong person to do the job
Things will move fast in these relationships and it certainly did for me. We bonded to each other at lightening pace, we plugged into each other’s sockets and melted to a level of co-dependence. Both of us saw much less of our friends and slammed our worlds together in a way that was hard to unstick.
A rarely relaxed but a few times he let me in to see glimpses of his “true child form”. He would get really silly and behave like a 9-year-old boy, telling silly fart jokes and misbehaving. I suspect this was the age where he was arrested in emotional development. He would swing between this personality and a humourless adult in a dark mood.
I kept thinking, even when I was in the depths of despair — if I spend enough time with him maybe I can make his inner child feel safe and “fix” the adult him.
I was not the right person for the job. I was highly sensitive and easily triggered myself. The more I realised he couldn’t meet my emotional needs and worse, he was draining the life out of me…the more I started to panic…
People with NPD need someone stable, calm and consistent to build trust with and bring out the best in them. I do not bring those particular traits to the table and I suspect many other neurodivergent women do not either.
The more he caused my sensitive personality stress through subtle criticising, withholding validation and being generally negative, the more I responded with angst, disorder and panic. No one was winning and nobody felt secure.
It caused a constant stream of confusion, pain and sent my brain into fight, flight and finally fawning where I struggled to take action and leave. I was so “bonded” to him that felt more sorry for him then I did for my own unhappiness and despair.
Finally: “what’s wrong with them?” no — what’s wrong with you?
Stop asking “what’s wrong with them?” and start gently asking yourself why you think you deserve to feel the way you do.
Though both of you feel extremely drawn to one another, that does not mean you are the right people to save each other. If you can’t accept them and feel settled with the darker side of their nature, do not hang around to be punished by it.
When his last girlfriend left him, she left behind a tennis hat which he picked up off the floor of his bedroom and passed to me: “It’s yours now”.
These people are sensitive but they are also survivors. They will move on and trust me — be absolutely fine without you.
