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| "this is wild" "omg, wow" "it thought ur voidwalker was small and flying there no clue why" |
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| "made ur voidwalker a dragon here why a dragon?" |
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| "again gets voidwalker wrong I love the frogs they capture neopets/wow" "True... I like this one the best with the 2nd voidwalker, lol" |
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| "No, that one's the best! xD" |
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| "♥" "No, that one is! xD" |
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| "this one ur frogs in armor battles with u?" "That's kinda cute, lol" |
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| "muh voidwalker iz dead!" "ai is odd but it tries" |
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| "ok, really going to bed now for reals gnight!" "xD" |
I never grieved the loss of an actual person so hard before. I totally forgot about this bullshit because of the distraction. When I came to (because I was being shocked into yet another breakup after many years of a pact not to), the punishment had already begun. Never occurred to me that someone who dealt with a severe amount of grief would take advantage of it off of someone else. I thought what we had was love and that things had gotten better for many years prior. Then I remembered more and more of what was put on hold while I had let myself trust. I had been betrayed. Don't be fooled; pushing someone away, instead of being accountable and standing by them with support - is not actually love. The pillar who wanted me to rely on them for so long, and who I was so proud of, suddenly revealed themselves to be nothing more than a disappointing facade, illusion, mirage, and useless addiction.
- Narcissist: an individual characterized by an excessive preoccupation with themselves, their own needs, and their own image, often at the expense of others. While the term is often used casually to describe someone who is arrogant or self-centered, in a clinical context, it refers to Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD), a mental health condition marked by an unreasonably high sense of importance, a deep need for excessive admiration, and a lack of empathy for those around them.
Key traits associated with narcissism include:
- Grandiosity: An exaggerated sense of self-importance and a belief that one is special or unique.
- Need for Admiration: A constant requirement for excessive attention, praise, and validation.
- Lack of Empathy: An inability or unwillingness to recognize or identify with the feelings and needs of others.
- Entitlement: Unreasonable expectations of especially favorable treatment or automatic compliance with their expectations.
- Exploitation: A tendency to take advantage of others to achieve their own ends.
Behind the mask of extreme confidence, narcissists often struggle with fragile self-esteem and are easily upset by criticism, which they may perceive as personal attacks.
- Narcissism is not something one is born with, but rather develops through a complex interplay of genetics, neurobiology, and early childhood environment. The most significant factor is attachment trauma or emotional neglect during early development (often before age 5), where a child fails to receive adequate empathy or secure bonding. This lack of emotional mirroring forces the child to construct a grandiose false self as a defense mechanism to cope with deep-seated insecurity and pain.
Three primary developmental pathways contribute to this outcome:
- Emotional Neglect and Abuse: Severe trauma, abuse, or inconsistent parenting prevents the child from developing empathy, leading them to view others as tools for survival rather than separate individuals.
- Overvaluation and Overindulgence: Children who are excessively praised for superficial traits (appearance, status) without realistic feedback or emotional warmth may develop an inflated sense of entitlement and superiority.
- Genetic Predisposition: While not the sole cause, inherited traits such as an oversensitive temperament or specific brain structures can increase vulnerability, acting as a catalyst when combined with adverse environmental factors.
Ultimately, narcissistic personality disorder (NPD) is understood as a maladaptive coping strategy formed in infancy or early childhood, where the individual becomes stuck in a state of inability to integrate both positive and negative aspects of themselves and others, resulting in a rigid, self-centered worldview.
- Covert narcissism is a subtype of narcissistic personality disorder characterized by an inflated sense of self-importance and a constant need for admiration that is hidden behind a facade of humility, shyness, or victimhood. Unlike overt narcissists who are openly grandiose and attention-seeking, covert narcissists internalize their traits, manifesting as vulnerable, introverted, or self-deprecating individuals who are hypersensitive to criticism.
Key distinctions include:
- Hidden Grandiosity: They maintain the same core narcissistic traits as overt types—such as lack of empathy, entitlement, and self-absorption—but express them through subtle manipulation rather than direct boasting.
- Manipulation Tactics: They often use passive-aggressive behavior, guilt-tripping, silent treatment, and martyrdom to control others and secure the validation they crave.
- Fragile Self-Esteem: Driven by deep-seated shame and insecurity, they may fish for compliments or play the victim to receive reassurance, making their narcissism difficult to spot until significant relationship damage occurs.
- Vulnerable narcissism, also known as covert narcissism, is a subtype of narcissistic personality disorder characterized by introversion, hypersensitivity, and emotional fragility, contrasting with the overt grandiosity of typical narcissists. While these individuals harbor an internal sense of entitlement and superiority, they mask it behind a façade of humility, shyness, or self-pity to protect their fragile ego.
Key traits include:
- Hypersensitivity to Criticism: They interpret even mild feedback as a personal attack, often reacting with defensiveness, withdrawal, or passive-aggressive behavior rather than direct confrontation.
- Chronic Victimhood: They frequently position themselves as misunderstood or mistreated to garner sympathy, validation, and attention while deflecting responsibility for their actions.
- Passive-Aggression: Instead of open hostility, they use subtle tactics like the silent treatment, procrastination, veiled criticism, or feigning forgetfulness to punish others or assert control.
- Hidden Envy and Resentment: They often feel deep envy toward others’ success, which they mask with subtle digs or by framing their own lack of achievement as a result of external injustice or lack of appreciation.
- Need for Indirect Validation: Rather than openly boasting, they fish for compliments through self-deprecation or by emphasizing their hardships, seeking reassurance that they are special or superior without appearing arrogant.
These individuals often struggle with emotional instability, low self-esteem, and a lack of genuine empathy, using their perceived vulnerability to manipulate relationships and maintain a sense of control over those around them.
- Women who are not motivated by financial gain are often attracted to narcissists due to psychological conditioning, empathy, and the initial charm displayed during courtship.
Early Stage Charm and Mirroring
Narcissists often appear confident, charming, and magnetic in the beginning, traits that society typically finds attractive in partners. They engage in "love bombing," intensely mirroring a partner’s interests and making them feel uniquely special and valued. This creates an intoxicating initial connection that feels like deep intimacy, causing victims to overlook early red flags because the experience matches their idealized fantasies of romance.
Psychological Triggers and Trauma
Many women are drawn to narcissists due to unresolved childhood trauma or having been raised by a narcissistic parent, leading them to subconsciously seek out familiar, albeit dysfunctional, relationship dynamics. Individuals with high empathy or low self-esteem are particularly vulnerable, as narcissists exploit these traits by demanding exclusive attention and validating the partner only when they comply. This dynamic creates a trauma bond, where the intermittent reinforcement of affection and withdrawal is mistakenly interpreted as passion or deep connection.
Codependency and Self-Worth
Codependent tendencies or a strong need to please others can make a woman an ideal target, as narcissists seek partners who will facilitate their self-centered needs without demanding reciprocity. Some women are also attracted to the perceived strength or success of a narcissist, viewing themselves as capable of "fixing" or supporting their partner. This attraction is often reinforced by gaslighting, which causes the victim to question their own reality and stay invested in the relationship to regain the initial validation.
- Narcissistic fuel, also known as narcissistic supply, is the attention, admiration, validation, and emotional reactions that a narcissist compulsively seeks from others to maintain their inflated self-image and prop up a fragile sense of self-esteem. It functions as the essential sustenance for their "false self," allowing them to feel powerful, superior, and in control while avoiding deep-seated feelings of shame, emptiness, or inadequacy.
This fuel can be derived from two primary sources:
- Positive Supply: Admiration, praise, adoration, flattery, and validation.
- Negative Supply: Fear, anger, submission, tears, humiliation, and even pity, which some experts argue provides a more potent sense of control.
The term is often used interchangeably with narcissistic supply, a concept introduced by psychoanalyst Otto Fenichel in 1938, though "fuel" emphasizes the addictive, consumptive nature of the need. Narcissists view others not as people but as sources of emotional energy to fill a psychic void, often engaging in manipulative behaviors to extract this fuel regardless of the harm caused to the provider.
- Hoovering is a manipulative tactic used to lure a person back into a toxic or abusive relationship after they have attempted to leave or create distance. Named after the vacuum cleaner brand, the term metaphorically describes the abuser’s attempt to "suck" their former partner back in to regain control and restore their source of narcissistic supply.
This behavior is commonly associated with narcissistic personality disorder and other cluster B personality disorders, though it can occur in various abusive dynamics. It typically follows a period of devaluation or discard and involves strategies such as love bombing, gaslighting, gift-giving, feigning crises, or making false promises of change to exploit the victim's vulnerabilities and trauma bonds.
Unlike genuine reconciliation, which involves sustained behavioral change over time, hoovering is a reactive maneuver triggered by the abuser’s fear of abandonment, loss of control, or ego preservation. It is not a clinically recognized diagnosis but is widely used in psychology to describe this specific pattern of emotional abuse and coercive control.
- Love bombing is a manipulative tactic and form of emotional abuse where an individual overwhelms another with excessive affection, attention, gifts, and flattery to gain control and create dependency. While it often mimics the intense early stages of romance, it is characterized by incongruent intensity, rapid pressure for commitment, and a disregard for the recipient’s boundaries.
Key characteristics include:
- Overwhelming gestures: Constant texting, lavish gifts, and declarations of being "soulmates" very early in the relationship.
- Coercive control: Using affection to isolate the victim from friends and family or to make them feel indebted.
- Abuse cycle: It typically serves as the "idealization" phase in a cycle of abuse that often progresses to devaluation and discard.
Although sometimes used benignly in therapeutic contexts (e.g., helping troubled children), in romantic and social dynamics it is widely recognized as a red flag for narcissistic abuse, cult recruitment, or coercive control.
- Narcissists turn the tables on victims by employing a suite of manipulative tactics designed to shift blame, distort reality, and maintain control. These methods include gaslighting to undermine the victim's perception of reality, lying to cover up misconduct, and shifting blame to avoid accountability. They frequently use triangulation by recruiting third parties to validate their false narrative and isolate the victim.
Key strategies include:
- Projection: Accusing the victim of the very toxic behaviors the narcissist is exhibiting, such as cheating or lying.
- Baiting and Reactive Abuse: Provoking the victim into an emotional reaction to then portray the victim as the aggressor or "crazy" person.
- Smear Campaigns: Spreading gossip and lies to friends, family, and colleagues to damage the victim's reputation and gain sympathy for themselves.
- Minimizing and Denial: Dismissing the victim's concerns as oversensitivity or denying events occurred entirely to invalidate the victim's experience.
- Playing the Victim: Positioning themselves as the injured party in response to confrontation, often using past hardships to excuse current wrongdoing.
- These tactics effectively reverse the dynamic, making the actual victim feel guilty, confused, and responsible for the narcissist's behavior.
- When a narcissist says they are tired, it is typically a manipulative tactic rather than a genuine expression of physical fatigue. This phrase is often used to shut down arguments, avoid accountability, or elicit sympathy through what experts call the "pity ploy."
Key meanings and functions include:
- Avoidance and Deflection: They use tiredness to escape difficult conversations or responsibilities, expecting you to pander to their needs while offering no empathy in return.
- Control and Exhaustion: By claiming exhaustion, they may intentionally keep you emotionally drained and unable to fight back, making you easier to manipulate and control.
- Victimhood and Competition: They may frame themselves as the victim to one-up your struggles, turning your concerns into a competition where their fatigue is deemed more significant.
- Devaluation: In some contexts, saying they are "tired of pretending" or "tired of fighting" signals that they are devaluing you or the relationship, often preceding a discard phase.
Ultimately, this language serves to center their experience while invalidating yours, creating an environment where you feel guilty for having your own needs or for challenging their behavior.
- Discarding the narcissist's discard (often called the "final discard") refers to the survivor’s decisive act of going no contact and refusing to engage with the narcissist’s abandonment, which is a critical step in breaking the cycle of abuse. While the narcissist initiates the discard to devalue the survivor and seek new supply, the survivor’s refusal to beg, plead, or respond denies the narcissist the narcissistic supply they crave, effectively ending their control.
Key dynamics of this process include:
- Denial of Supply: Narcissists discard partners when they no longer provide adequate validation; by not reacting, the survivor removes the emotional fuel the narcissist relies on.
- Reclaiming Agency: Taking the initiative to discard the relationship transforms the survivor from a passive victim into an active agent, disrupting the idealize-devalue-discard cycle.
- Risk of Retaliation: Discarding a narcissist first may trigger narcissistic injury, potentially leading to smear campaigns or attempts to punish the survivor for rejecting their control.
- Healing Imperative: Success requires strict no contact (no texts, social media checks, or conversations) to allow for neurological and emotional recovery from the trauma bond.
He never recovered from attempting to strangle me. I matched his hands on my throat with my hands on his while I "saw" Erik getting mad in the background (I was still grieving). Long story short, my nervous system fucking works. It was never my intention not to come back by for a year; it must've been a total subconscious decision since the original act was never addressed with any actual accountability. But no shit, I mean, would you have?
