Learn Psychology & Analyze Her Early On

[logicallefty]

I've always thought I was pretty well versed in psychology. I've studied sociopaths and psychopaths a lot after a really toxic relationship in 2009-2012. I've always know that there are a mix of crazy traits in all women, and I've known for quite some time to never expect a relationship to last forever.

I kicked an 18 x month LTR to the curb in January. I have posted about it. The bad news is it has been one of my hardest breakups to get over. The good news is I've had two women in my bed since the end of January, neither of which time went really well but that's another story. I'm out there engaging with women, going to the gym, and going on about my life.

The point I am getting to is that this last GF I let my guard down and I failed to profile her other than just "crazy female traits". I just read this article here about 50 traits of a Narcissist. And WOW, with as much objectivity as I can put, she is 44 of the 50.. I was getting mind fvcked and didn't even realize it.

Is Your Partner a Narcissist? Here Are 50 Ways to Tell

An expert's checklist for gauging where you stand.

www.psychologytoday.com

Lesson Learned and Goal of this Post: Analyze them early. Learn the different psychological disorders. They are all going to have traits from different ones, that's a given. But I didn't ever expect that she was this bad of a narcissist. I totally missed this one. Should have caught this 1-2 months into the relationship.

 

[cola]

One of the best things you can do is not only to observe how she treats you, but her relationship with others.
How does she get along with mom & dad? How does she get along with coworkers? How does she treat the waiter at the restaurant?
If she doesn’t get along with most people the problem is her.

This is the best way I’ve found to see what type of person she really is. I’m not sure this 100% relates to your situation @logicallefty

 

[logicallefty]

One of the best things you can do is not only to observe how she treats you, but her relationship with others.
How does she get along with mom & dad? How does she get along with coworkers? How does she treat the waiter at the restaurant?
If she doesn’t get along with most people the problem is her.

This is the best way I’ve found to see what type of person she really is. I’m not sure this 100% relates to your situation @logicallefty

Thanks Cola. She has a really bad work history and issues with co-workers. Been fired like 4 times in 6 years. Her parents, things are so-so. She gets along with them but they keep their distance from her which I think is so they don't get roped into her problems too much. She has three sons; close to one, so-so with one who keeps his distance like the parents, and one who has a lot of resentment for her. Restaurant people and others she usually treats well. I've seen her blow up on the phone with customer service people tho, like literally turn purple yelling at them. I've also seen her loose like 3 close friends in 18 months and she has 3 close ones left but she smack talks them all the time. All in all, I would say she has more enemies than friends and nothing is ever her fault. It's all them 100%.

 

[logicallefty]

To be fair to your ex, narcissism shouldn't even be classified as a psychological disorder, unless those traits are demonstrated by a man; for women, it's more or less status quo. What made Narcissus noteworthy, after all, was his possession of the female characteristic of physical vanity. If Narcissus had been a woman, there would've been nothing memorable about that story.

Yeah I suppose so. I guess another thing that nailed me was once I read this and can now put two and to together with her and these traits of a narcissus, I've read many other articles on "How to deal with a relationship with a narcissus". The uniform answer: YOU DON'T, IT'S NOT POSSIBLE.

 

[xplt]

I've read many other articles on "How to deal with a relationship with a narcissus". The uniform answer: YOU DON'T, IT'S NOT POSSIBLE.

It is not possible. Except you have no selfrespect. Be glad you took the exit! If they sense that they have no more control over you, they drop you and you will move on the moment you realize what you‘ve been through.

 

[Billtx49]

Yeah I suppose so. I guess another thing that nailed me was once I read this and can now put two and to together with her and these traits of a narcissus, I've read many other articles on "How to deal with a relationship with a narcissus". The uniform answer: YOU DON'T, IT'S NOT POSSIBLE.

Sounds like another post relationship education there. The one thing you forgot to mention in the OP was the initial rationalization failure when the quirks or abnormalities start to surface. I think it’s where most men fail in what should be an ongoing vetting process and in many cases the clues are few and so far between that they’re only viewed as normal, i.e., ‘that’s just the way she is’

The education you suggest might be the only way to totally avoid an occurrence like you mentioned though, with it the minor yellow flags become big red ones when intelligently added together.

 

[ubercat]

3 kids that's the exit sign

 

[Lynx nkaf]

"How to deal with a relationship with a narcissus". The uniform answer: YOU DON'T, IT'S NOT POSSIBLE.

That's what wikihow says about passive-aggressives "just avoid".

That book 'Dangerous Personalities' by Joe Navarro was read by me to my ex. There's only one in this whole library system. So I brought it over to share. A couple pages from each chapter. Especially the lists pages on the character traits of the various personalities. We were sitting at his dining table. First I would match several traits, then he would match several traits....it was like we were holding up two, 2-way mirrors pointing at each other.

Weird and unsettling to both be somewhat redpill aware and self cognizant and yet be honest about negatives and admit accountability.
We had a lot in common with character traits.

I didn't know you had this serious of a breakup(from a narcissist) Logicallefty.

You are going to be ok, I just know it.
Really appreciate you sharing your post breakup observations.
The important thing is you know now. You survived.

 

[logicallefty]

3 kids that's the exit sign

Agreed. When we started dating her youngest was a senior in high school. And 50-50 with his dad. If she had three young kids at home then no I would not have dated her. I am done with my parenting duties for the world.

 

[Lynx nkaf]

"just avoid".


I didn't know you had this serious of a breakup(from a narcissist) logicallefty. It is concerning you experienced a former toxic relationshiop '09-'12 as well.

You are going to be ok, I just know it.
Really appreciate you sharing your post breakup observations.

You have the ability to thrive and grow and keep surviving.

 

[NSX-R]

People who own restaurants, bars or anything similar have this talent naturally and they are able to analyze almost everyone. Why? Because they have been with so many people and they have been observing them all the time . Thats one of the biggest part of their job . That’s why they’re able to do it . Some like me call it a talent but others call it experience .
What I’m trying to say is that there is no book out there as good as real life experience. Maybe you can get few pointers but if you want to analyze people better then be around a lot of people and observe .

 

[ImTheDoubleGreatest!]

It’s important to note however that this list of 50 is just words on a screen. Nuance is important, because oftentimes someone can have these traits but not actually be important. A lot of times it’s just a couple of these traits in conjunction with others, not these specific traits by themselves. For example, #12:

Does your partner never ask about you, your day, or your feelings, even in passing?

This could be because they themselves are busy with more important things, or simply because they lack the awareness/just don’t know that something may be wrong. Or they see just through your body language (e.g. happy smile on your face) or through knowing other external factors (e.g. you told said person yesterday how you just got a job promotion) that you’re happy.

What a lot of narcissists will do is they’ll sulk and want you to keep asking them what’s wrong even if there is nothing. And you might even notice that they’ll do that simply just because they want to manipulate you (i.e. get you to beg). But if you have self-respect, you’re not gonna beg lol. Then they’ll come across lists like this and use the above point to rationalize you as being a narcissist instead of them, after which they’ll say to themselves that they don’t have to change but that you should rather (and of course they only want you to change simply because they want to manipulate you; then ‘changing’ you = then manipulating you).

I’m just giving examples of how this stuff can be turned against you lol. You just gotta be able to spot it and nip it in the bud by either calling out their manipulation every step of the way, or by letting minuscule things role of your back (i.e. laugh it off/take it as no big deal; “like water off a duck’s back”). The latter should typically (but not always, depending on the situation) be used for bigger acts of manipulation so that it it keeps her in check and let’s her know that you know her game; the latter should typically (again, not always, still depends on the situation) be used for smaller acts of manipulation so that she sees that most things don’t really affect you, and also bc if you call her out for small things, she can turn it against you to make you look like the bad guy (i.e. “you can’t take a joke”, “you always have to make me out to be the bad guy”, “you always put me down”, etc.).

~~~~

Now, I’d like to point out something from everything I just wrote: out of all the manipulative tactics that I’ve listed above, you’ll see that ALL of them are done by using logical fallacies. A manipulative person will always use logical fallacies to manipulate, they’ll never really use logic.

I’d also like to point out another thing: the natural mode of reasoning for men is logic; for women, it’s logical fallacies. It’s something that I’ve personally noticed whenever I’ve engaged in ‘girl conversations’ just to learn more about women/sharpen my skills lol. You’ll see that they use logical fallacies to justify their decisions and/or explain something rather than use logic. This is why oftentimes, men will say “women think with their emotions”. It’s not even that, it’s specifically logical fallacies (well that, and the fact that women are more neurotic than men and continue to become more neurotic with age lol).

Now what is interesting about all of this is that we see actual evidence behind it. When looking at gender differences among various psychological pathologies, we find that after severe trauma (particularly childhood trauma), we find that men tend to develop antisocial personality disorder (ASPD) whereas women develop borderline personality disorder (BPD). This would also explain why men tend to have ASPD at a ratio of 3:1 relative to women, whereas women tend to have BPD at a ratio of 3:1 relative to men. Newer research says that that there are no gender differences among those with BPD, (that men and women have it at the same rates) but I strongly disagree simply because all they did was change the definition of BPD to include antisocial and sociopathic traits lol. Also because BPD = neuroticism, and, as mentioned before, we know that women tend to have higher rates of neuroticism than men do, with this difference only increasing with time (i.e. women becoming more neurotic with time, and men becoming less neurotic with time). So it just doesn’t make sense.

 

[lamath]

Same thing happened to me, when i was randomly reading about personality disorder.

Not all personality disorder are easy to spot, covert narcissist is what i think i was dealing with.