The Covert Passive Aggressive Narcissist: Recognizing the Traits and Finding Healing After Hidden Emotional and Psychological Abuse (The Narcissism Series Book 1)

by Debbie Mirza

Covert narcissists tend to be financially successful people. They want to look good to others, and this is all part of the image that is so important to them. Because of this, they can often be found in leadership positions in organizations.

Most targets are self-reflective people, so they often look at themselves as possibly being at fault. It is the hardest and most foreign thing in the world to consider that someone who “cares” about you and treats you so well in so many ways is also sabotaging and controlling you. This is not a thought that enters the mind of a trusting, honest, self-reflective person.

When you are with a CN, you can never win no matter what you do. They will never be fully satisfied with you. You will never be good enough in their eyes. They have to have something they can hold over you in order to control and manipulate you.

When you live with someone who slowly brainwashes you to think you are the problem or that certain things are wrong with you, it takes time and a lot of undoing to be able to see clearly again.

CNs know your vulnerabilities. They know what will affect you and reinforce your insecurities and self-doubt. They know how to exploit your empathy and caring heart, to use it against you and control you.

Sex is a reflection of the truth of your relationship. It also demonstrates you can trust yourself. If you were in a relationship where you lost the desire for sex, it was because your body is smart. It knew you were not emotionally safe with your partner. If you experienced real love, you would have wanted sex, you would have reached orgasms, and it would have felt like love every time. You would have felt protected, respected, and cherished.

An amicable divorce is not possible when you are dealing with a covert narcissist. The breakup is sudden. It is a fire hose of so many different traits. You will experience intermittent reinforcement, smear campaigns, flying monkeys, lies, manipulation, crazy-making conversations, triangulation, absolute absence of empathy, devaluing and demeaning insults, emotional immaturity, profound selfishness, entitled superiority, and so much more during this discard phase. You will feel a betrayal like you’ve never known.

The constant criticism, both cloaked and blatant, causes you to feel paralyzed. You find it hard to build a new life. The discard phase is both physically and emotionally debilitating.

It is common for the CN to initiate the breakup, but for the victim to be the one to file for divorce. The CN will make it very clear they are done but won’t take any action to end the marriage because their reputation is their number-one priority and they don’t want to look like the bad guy/gal.

The CN’s smear campaign doesn’t end after the divorce. This can go on for years. They don’t want you to be happy. They don’t want to see you doing well. This is another thing that sets this divorce apart from normal divorces. They still want to control you and your life and the stronger you get, the more you don’t engage in their nonsense, they try to find other ways to hurt you.

CNs will use your kids against you because they use whatever they know will hurt and affect you the most. They do not care how this affects their kids. Some CNs will talk to their kids in a way that is very subtle, planting seeds of doubt about the other parent. The older the kids are, the more covert the manipulation will be. Triangulation can also come into play where the CN pits the children and the other parent against each other, and none of them notice who the instigator is. CNs use kids as pawns. It is incredibly sad. Children are also supplies for the CNs, and they will align with the child who gives them no conflict, but still thinks they are a good, innocent person.

CNs are not interested in resolving issues or finding harmonious solutions to conflicts that arise. They use conversations to confuse, control, and manipulate you. They will attempt to throw you off-kilter and keep you wobbling. They want you to not be able to see and think clearly. If you have kids together, keep the communication as limited as possible with the CN and stick to the facts. Stay away from emotional and personal conversations.

They will try to rope you into talking about personal things. They will try to trigger you through emails and texts. Take time before you respond. Breathe. Write back calmly, ignoring anything personal they said. Stick to logistics that need to be discussed. Keep your responses simple and to the point. Trying to engage in personal conversations with them is futile and will just bring you more pain. They want you to lose it. They want you to be unsteady, that way they can control you more. Stand firm and guard yourself.

“Make sure you never talk bad about your ex to your kids.” Part of this is true; you should not turn to your kids to vent or seek support. They are not your friends; they are not your counselors; they are your kids. Make sure you don’t just spout off about their CN dad or mom when you feel angry. This takes a lot of self-control, but it is worth it to hold your tongue.

With most separations, there are hurt feelings and there is anger, though usually after time, things calm down. Not so with a CN. Even years after the divorce is finalized, they will still smear your name and try to control and manipulate you and put you down. This happens particularly if you are the one who filed for divorce. That creates something called a “narcissistic injury,” which a CN rarely gets over. Any threat to their ego causes this. The constant revenge is startling. This is who they are; it has nothing to do with you. The best thing you can do is heal and learn the truth so you can see through their façade. The stronger you get, the less they will affect you.

“The psychopath (psychopaths and narcissists have similar traits) will often use word salad in an attempt to keep your mind occupied. Basically, it’s a conversation from hell. They aren’t actually saying anything at all; they are just talking to you. Before you can even respond to one outrageous statement, they’re already on to the next. You’ll be left with your head spinning.” The things they say to you are a mix of partial truths, blatant lies, weird conclusions, strange thinking, hurls of insults, compliments, “poor me” proclamations, and superior thinking. They speak to you in an exceedingly condescending way.

If you were the one to file for divorce, you might be feeling shame over that, wondering if you did the right thing. I want you to know that what you did took a tremendous amount of courage and strength. You stopped taking the abuse. You stood up for yourself. You made a choice to respect yourself, and you set a strong example for your children and those around you. Abuse in all forms is wrong and must not be tolerated anymore by any of us. You took a stand that not everyone does. What you did requires emotional fortitude, resiliency, and grit. By filing the paperwork, you said no more. No more devaluing, no more demeaning, no more health issues, no more sexual confusion, no more psychological torment. No more lies, controlling, insults, and disrespect. You stood up for love. You made the choice to protect your heart, your mind, and your body. By doing what you did, you gave others courage without realizing it.

Excusing their hurtful behaviors kept us in an abusive relationship and kept them completely unaccountable for their deplorable acts. It is time for us individually and as a society to stop making excuses for abusive behavior.

Whatever the reason for a narcissist’s abuse, the fact is CNs are bullies who ruin people’s lives, and that is not okay.

Most CNs are not interested in getting help. They are not interested in healing, and they do not think they have a problem. So for us to spend countless hours trying to figure out why they are the way they are isn’t helping them or us because there is no way of knowing for sure. We will just further exhaust ourselves, which after what we have been through, is the last thing we need. It is time to let them own their own issues, their own feelings. You are not responsible for their actions. You also are not responsible for their feelings, even though they will tell you that you are. You are not an unkind person if you let them heal themselves or go to someone else to heal. You are not here to take abuse from anyone.

The truth is this relationship never meant the same to them as it did to you. You approached it from a genuine, goodhearted, loving place. They did not. They acted like they did, but it wasn’t genuine. The reality is they have enormous issues and have projected them onto you for years, making you think you are responsible for things that have nothing to do with you.

CNs are not reflective people and are emotionally immature. They blame others; they don’t take responsibility for themselves, but instead project their own issues onto others.

Because of the way CNs treat their victims, it is easy to think you are at fault for so many things that have nothing to do with you. I want you to know that no matter what you did or think you could have done, there is no way this relationship could have thrived. Because covert narcissists do not have empathy, are self-focused, use people, and do not take responsibility for their actions, it is impossible for anyone to have a healthy relationship with them. Loving, healthy, life-giving relationships require certain essential traits, such as putting yourself in the other person’s shoes, showing respect, really listening, caring about the other person’s feelings, being self-reflective, and wanting the best for the other person. The relationship can only work if both people have these traits.

Think of someone who is your constant. Do you ever feel discombobulated around them? Does your stomach ever tighten when you are with them? Do they ever tell you all the things they think are wrong with you? When you are with them, do you feel like they enjoy you? Is it easy to think clearly around them? Do you ever feel belittled or demeaned by them? Are you ever in a pile of your own tears after being with them? Do you question yourself and doubt yourself when you are with them?

When you live with a covert narcissist, you are not with someone who is emotionally safe. Because of this, you learn to doubt yourself and to not see your happiness as being just as important as theirs. You are encouraged by them to not listen and not trust your own instincts. Your heart is not protected or loved.

If you are able to, the best thing to do with covert narcissists is to have no contact with them. Because they are manipulative and know what triggers and affects you, if you have any contact with them, you are putting yourself in a vulnerable position to be injured emotionally again and again. The more you are away from them, the clearer the truth will be. Just like coming out of a cult, you need to completely get away to be able to get stronger in yourself.

just stick to facts and planning issues, keeping personal thoughts and feelings to yourself. If you open up to them, if you are vulnerable in any way, they will hurt you, and that’s the last thing you need.

“We’ve been pre-programmed to believe that people only exhibit problem behaviors when they’re ‘troubled’ inside or anxious about something. We usually start to wonder what’s bothering the person so badly ‘underneath’ it all that’s making them act in some disturbing way” (George Simon Jr., Ph.D., In Sheep’s Clothing). I think it is true that narcissists are troubled people. They would not act the way they do if they weren’t. What we learn through our experience is they are not always innocent. They are not coming from a naïve place. For the most part, they do what they do to get their way. We are waking up to the reality that there are people in the world who simply don’t have good intentions, who are out for themselves and are not as they appear. There are bullies masquerading as the “nicest people” and no matter how kind and loving and understanding we are, they will treat us badly because they don’t care about our feelings. They want what they want and will do what it takes to get their way. They do not care who they hurt in the process.

CNs, whether they are parents, spouses, or coworkers, give out the same messages: “Something is wrong with you, and you will not be able to make it in this world without me.” The covert narcissist with whom you lived or worked wanted you weak. It was the only way they could control you.

When I jettisoned religion It must have really freaked her out because she lost an area of control over me. This is why she's never been able to let that go in her mind! She found another way to supplement it however by taking over the finances and refusing to let them go.This was another way to control me.

They sabotage birthdays, holidays, vacations, and meaningful dates

OMG! How true this is! We would be having a good vacation and then she would get pissed at me not telling her how nice she looked or some other incidental event that would ruin the whole thing