Understanding Narcissistic Behavior: Lying, Cheating, Jealousy, Control, and Their Reactions in Relationships

If you have come across narcissists in your life, you would know how difficult it is to deal with them. It is very dominant to understand them by understanding Narcissistic Behavior in depth. his makes it a little doable to be with them and deal with them. For understanding Narcissistic behavior like why they Lie, Cheat, feel and demonstrate Jealousy, want Control, and much more, it is crucial to know the reasons behind why they do what they do!

Understanding Narcissistic Behavior

Once well aware of the reasons behind their behaving in particularly different extravagant fashion, their Narcissistic Behavior would be simplified for us to understand better and in-depth. So let us know different reactions, traits, actions, relationships, and everything related to, “Understanding Narcissistic Behavior”.

A Narcissist is an individual who is excessively obsessed to have control over all situations in their life, control over all individuals and their behavior, and also expects everyone around the to focus just on them. They intend to be the center of attraction in all situations.

What is it like dating a Narcissist?

If you have a narcissistic dating partner or a narcissistic life partner, then you might have struggled many times to cope with their unrealistic and too much high and too many expectations, suddenly changed behaviors, big mood swings, and much more.

Dating a narcissist is complicated. Initial dating stages are like walking on rose petals and later stages or the phases before the discard phase are like walking on eggshells. During the initial dating stage, they would shower you with excessive love, compliment you, make your favorite dish, want to be around you all the time, note the most minor things, and make you extremely special.

Dating a narcissist is itself challenging. You have to keep up with their unrealistic expectations, their tantrums, emotional unavailability, and peculiar traits. A Narcissist can make you feel like you are on cloud nine for one moment and the next moment is like they don’t even know you. So dating a narcissist is almost unpredictable.

What are the dating phases while dating a narcissist?

There are three basic dating phases while dating a narcissist, let us know the phases of dating a narcissist as presented by mental health experts, psychologists, and knowledgeable therapists;

1. Attraction or Idealization Phase

The first and most menacing phase of dating a Narcissist is this phase. Attraction or Idealization is the step where they spot you and grab your attraction, like spotting a target for obtaining their supply. This step feels like you are on cloud 9. They would make you feel so special and out of the world, that you would think, you have found the love of your life.

During the Attraction or Idealization dating stage, they would shower you with excessive love, text you regularly, compliment you, make your favorite dish, want to be around you all the time, note the most minor things, and make you extremely special. They will play all sorts of love tactics to manipulate you and your thoughts just to make you fall in love with them.

There are some possible ways a narcissist would show their love or love-bombing you with their tactics,

  • They might take you to your favorite restaurant and say all kinds of cheesy things so that they can win you or lure you into a relationship. But remember this is just temporary, this would all fade away once they know you are into them and no longer you can be of much use to them.
  • They might also do things like buying expensive presents, going shopping with you, might choose a PDA(Public Display of Affection), and many more such means to lure you.

2. Devaluation Phase

The Devaluation phase begins as soon as a narcissist is able to completely lure you in. Once they gain your complete trust, this is when they start playing with your feelings and thoughts by using their manipulative tactics. They start showing their true face, gradually. To make their grip even firm on you and establish complete control over you they would try to isolate you from your friend group, relatives, and anyone you can rely on emotionally.

They would only want you to depend upon only them and nobody else. This is the phase when they would suck the positivity out of you and drain you. They would make you feel emotionally exhausted by insulting you when you do not agree with them, abusing you when you avoid them, making you feel guilty for not appreciating them, demanding money or love from you, keeping high expectations, fulfilling all their desires with you on their side, they would be mean to you, be sarcastic and crack jokes on you, humiliate you and even threaten you about breaking up.

This is the phase when you really realize what trap you are into! They would easily commence fights with you with the slightest inconvenience, or if you don’t give enough attention to them they would not let go of any chance of humiliating you, they would isolate you mentally and physically from others so that your attention can be completely on them and you can be their supply only.

The devaluation Phase is a grey phase, where you cannot bear them but cannot even let them go due to their manipulative tactics like love bombing along with insulting you or creating self-doubt in your mind, you would not be able to see the red flags as you would be in love them by the devaluation phase. Your self-doubt would be the highest and your self-confidence would have hit rock bottom by this phase. Thus devaluation phase is all about isolating you from others and using you for their benefit only.

3. Discard Phase or Rejection Phase

The Discard phase begins when the narcissist feels that the charm and chase are over, the excitement and lust are gone, and the purpose (whatever they have been using you for like money, physical intimacy, just to cop with their former breakup or a fresh supply) is over, and they finally can no longer use you for their gains.

This is the last and final stage where a narcissist would completely use you and when you are no longer available for them or become emotionally unavailable to them, emotionally drained, have no longer supply left, and start ignoring them; this is when they reject you and end the relationship abruptly.

The Discard phase is nothing but the time when a narcissist uses you completely until their satisfaction like their puppet, and when they no longer need you or find someone else they just discard you like something unimportant. They just end things abruptly without any firm reasons. They might even be cheating on their partners during this phase and thus they discard them and move on to other relationships.

Now we know what phases we have to go through while dating a narcissist, but when a narcissist is done with you, how would they treat their ex, how would they feel when their exes move, and much more? So let us know the after-effects of leaving a narcissist, or breaking up with them.

When you are in a relationship with a narcissist, you gradually realize that everything in your relationship is just about them. Even breaking up is one of the parts which is usually initialized by them as they get bored of you.

After leaving you or ignoring you for weeks, they would expect nothing to change and simply begin to act as if nothing has changed between you. They would leave you and you might be questioning yourself about what went wrong. But! Remember it is not your fault, it is just that they are bored with you and leave you without any notice. You can make them miss you or at least make them regret their decision of leaving you.

Narcissists often choose to lie over spilling the truth, and thus it is a common belief that narcissists cheat and are categorized as deceitful. To cheat or not to cheat completely depends upon the character development, life conduct, and choices of an individual, but sometimes some misconceptions and false beliefs may force us to conduct something which is not a part of our regular lifestyle like cheating. And thus there may be a few cases where narcissists are found to be cheating upon their partners, leaving them for someone else, or playing the game of dating and manipulating the feelings of more than one person at the same time.

Do Narcissists Leave you for Another Person? – Why would a narcissist cheat on you?

Falseness, lack of trust, breach of commitments, and disloyalty are some of the narcissistic traits that are an integral part of their character and personality. They even have control issues and so they can’t control their nasty desires, materialistic needs, and physical intimacy needs. They may leave you when they find someone better than you or for fulfilling their magnified needs for lovemaking. To fulfill their empty and shallow life, narcissists gain attention, praise, and whatever they need to present their grandiosity of life. So if they are getting all of these needs fulfilled by someone else in a better manner they might leave you.

If they are bored with you then also they might leave you. If you pressurize them to be bound by matrimonial rituals or responsibilities like childbearing then they may run away from those and find someone new and get their needs fulfilled. Narcissistic have a dating loop that is almost never-ending until they desire to settle down.

Narcissists even get easily bored and dissatisfied with their partner, once they feel their source of supply has been drained, so they might leave you for another person sooner or later. Narcissists do not have empathy leading them to completely ignore another person’s emotions and prioritize their nasty desires over their partner’s feelings.

They might cheat on you or leave you for another person when the narcissist feels that the charm and chase are over, the excitement and lust are gone, and the purpose (whatever they have been using you for like money, physical intimacy, just to cop with their former breakup or a fresh supply) is over, and they finally can no longer use you for their gains; these can be some of the most common reasons why narcissist would cheat on you.

How would a narcissist treat their ex? – How would a narcissist feel after breaking up?

If a narcissist has left you, then it is not a problem. They would often be in touch with you unless you completely break ties with them. A Narcissist would always want you to continue as friends even after breaking the relationship as romantic partners, so this depends upon you whether to be their victim again as friends.

Usually, a narcissistic ex-partner would want you back by all means or not cut all ties, but this may differ from person to person. They either try to be friends or friends with benefits or just keep you as a standby option for their futuristic source of narcissistic supply.

Would Narcissists be friends with you after breaking up?

Narcissists would simply not cut all ties with you and would leave some loose ends, through which they can be associated again. The narcissist seldom changes or it is a long process to change narcissist. It is a tiring process to maintain the friendship as you know a narcissist’s true nature. A narcissist would definitely not want to cut complete ties with you and would keep their options open for the future. They would want to be friends with you either for physical intimacy, to obtain their source of supply, or simply as a backup option.

A Narcissist craves physical intimacy, and when you are the most vulnerable they would insist that upon you. They would not tell you this but try to lure you for physical intimacy as soon as you try to recover from a breakup. They will play all sorts of love tactics to manipulate you and your thoughts just to keep you as an option for intimacy as friends. It is like a “Friends with benefits” situation. But once they get what they want to achieve, again they would show their true colors.

Narcissists would be negative friends even after breaking up with you and would also be intimidating to you. Narcissists have high levels of self-importance, self-esteem, and overconfidence, and also expect a sense of Entitlement from you always. They would never be positive about your ideas, your thoughts, or your feelings nor they would support you in any such hard situation which can drain positivity out of you too. Being with them may also affect you and at a certain point, you may also lose hope which creates negativity in life.

Narcissists can be cruel and inhuman sometimes. They actually enjoy your suffering when they leave you. They enjoy your pain, and tears and they even smile sadistically when they see you in pain.

The reaction of a Narcissist when He/She sees you cry

There are a lot of reactions that you can expect from a narcissist at your gloomy time when you cry. Seeing you cry can be sometimes enjoyable for a narcissist or even they can be cold and just ignore you. Rather than comforting you, narcissists can often be annoyed by your weeping, or they can just snap at you. They can also judge you for being soft, can make fake apologies for the time being to make you stop crying, can just turn a blind eye to the crying, can make it about themselves as usual, or just leave you weeping.

Can you trust a narcissist, when they say that they miss you and that they are miserable?

Would a narcissist actually miss you after you break up?

The answer to this question is dubious. On one hand, they can miss you indeed, but they would actually miss how you made them feel with your presence. The narcissist is capable of feelings and emotions, but they are so full of themselves that they do not want to understand anybody else’s emotions. They would miss how their ego was satisfied by being with you and how they used to feel good around you as you were the one they would drain energy from.

On the other hand, a narcissist would actually not miss you but they would miss their source of supply with whom they used to boost their thirst for an unquenchable ego. Narcissists would try to come back into your life from time often until they find a new supply. Supply is everything that makes them important like control, praise, worth, ego boost, and everything that makes them feel superior.

So until they find a new supply, a narcissist would miss you, try to come back into your life, and would also reconcile. As you can see a narcissist would do anything to obtain their supply, you can just stop their supply by not giving them attention. This would definitely grab their attention thus they would miss you.

However, there are ways to make a narcissist suffer though, but it is a bit risky and might even cost you your peace, a load on your mental health, or even a few unwanted consequences.

How to make a Narcissist Miss You and Regret Losing You?

After leaving you or ignoring you for weeks, they would expect nothing to change and simply begin to act as if nothing has changed between you. They would leave you and you might be questioning yourself about what went wrong. But! Remember it is not your fault, it is just that they are bored with you and leave you without any notice. You can make them miss you or at least make them regret their decision of leaving you.

So it is time for payback for them. Yes! you can get payback from narcissists as certain ways can affect them too. Yes, a narcissist has no feelings or does not develop an emotional connection, but tables can be turned on for you by playing a narcissist by using their own tactics on themselves.

There are ways in which you can make a narcissist miss you so let us know them,

  • Make new friends or date different people
  • Going no contact or cutting complete contact
  • Do not worry about what would a narcissist think
  • Understand that there is no remorse when dealing with a narcissist
  • Choose self-care
  • Let the narcissist know what they are missing when they are not with you
  • By not seeking a revenge

How would a narcissist feel when you leave them?

When you break up with a narcissist with a narcissist’s choice then it is not a problem, the problem starts when you leave them. They would not forget that easily or even might seek revenge for breaking up with them. They can be jealous of their exes if they seem happier than them. Jealousy is an emotion that a narcissist develops prominently in their lives; knowingly or unknowingly.

How do Narcissists feel when you move on?

If you move on first, they would be displeased with you and might make your difficult even after breaking up.

  • They would feel agitated and would be harsh toward you
  • They would try to seek revenge
  • There is no repentance or remorse, instead all blame game
  • They would hold you responsible for the breakup

After breaking up with a narcissist, you would probably cut ties with them, ghost them, or just ignore their mere existence to save yourself from all the rage, revenge, and everything in between. So it is better to cut complete ties with them, block them, and just focus on self-care and self-love.

In Conclusion

If you have to deal with a narcissist in your life without much choice, you might be knowing how difficult it is. You might not be aware of them being narcissists initially, but you or the family might suffer continuously because of them. So if you have a narcissist in your life, choose wisely before taking any steps further in the relationship, and do notice all the red flags because they are there all along the way.

So instead of confronting a narcissistic family member, you should learn to deal with them or cope with them, which can bring peace, happiness, and better bonding.

Ella Carrillo

Ella Carrillo

Hey Reader, I am Ella, an Online and Offline Therapist holding an experience of 6 years in this field. From Relationship, Depression, and Personality Disorder to Narcissistic problems, I have helped a lot of people find their solutions. Upon gathering a number of common problems that people face, I decided to put the information on this blog so that anyone can get their answers easily.

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