How Narcissistic People Erode Healthy and Loving Relationships

No one falls into the arms of a narcissistic person by accident.

It’s a slow, manipulated slide in which they are shown what they want to see by people who can be as charming as they can be diabolical. Once the victim is isolated in place, the narcissistic person is able to take control and call all the shots for the relationship.

It’s all a part of the cycle.

Most relationships that dissolve into narcissistic abuse don’t begin that way. They begin in love, with two parties who are excited and seemingly perfect for one another. Then the games begin. For those trapped in narcissistic relationships, what was once a healthy and loving partnership slowly dissolves into an energy-draining, scary, and emotionally brutal experience.

Who is the narcissistic partner?

For the narcissistic person, a relationship is an opportunity. While the person they draw in may be imagining a grand ending, and happy horizons, the narcissist is imagining how that relationship will make them look. To true narcissists, their romantic relationships are about personal validation and creating a mask that hides their insecurities.

That means the narcissist expects anyone they couple with to conform. Partners and spouses — even children and extended family — are expected to reinforce the delusion. They are expected to play along with the narcissist’s masquerade.

“Relationships with narcissists are held in place by the hope of a “someday better,” with little evidence to support it will ever arrive.” — Dr. Ramani Durvasula

There is three parts to a narcissistic relationship: idealization, degradation, and destruction. First, a narcissistic partner mirrors the perfect partner and creates an ideal relationship you let your guard down in. Next, your self-esteem is broken and you’re convinced you are powerless. The narcissist’s rules must be adhered to.

Failing to play by the narcissist’s rules, whatever those rules may be in the moment, ensures swift punishment and can even bring the final phase of destruction down upon those who fall in love with their narcissistic counterparts.

This ensures an endless cycle of chaos. The narcissistic partner is at once hot and cold. Their moods and their feelings can change on a dime. Everything must exist to affirm the way they want to feel about themselves. Their insecurities and their fears must be masked at all times.

Usually, this manifests as someone who uses communication as a means of manipulation. It looks like relationships in which one partner always feels emotionally unsafe, or as if they are walking on eggshells. It’s a devastating place to be. Playing the role of the narcissist’s partner isn’t healthy. In fact, it often rips apart those who get caught in the clutches.

How do narcissists erode the foundations of healthy relationships?

For those who have avoided their clutches, it seems obvious. How could you fall for such a manipulative person, these individuals ask? The answer remains the same. The slide into a narcissistic relationship is a slow one. The worst elements of personality are usually held back by the narcissistic person until it’s too late. Slowly, over time, they undermine all the elements of a healthy relationship to create something far more toxic and damaging.

Draining energy

Dealing with a narcissistic person is extremely hard work. It’s meant to be. Narcissists wear their victims down over time. They commit so wholeheartedly to always being right, always being free of blame, that they spend years gaslighting their victims and repeating conflicts over and over again.

Example: A narcissist asks you for something that you’re not comfortable doing or giving to them. So, instead of taking that no for an answer, they will begin a nagging campaign that targets you in your weakest moments, while bringing up pain points or mistakes you made in the past. Eventually, you are so worn down that you don’t care to defend yourself.

After months or years of this treatment, partners, and spouses become emotionally exhausted. It gets hard to stand up for themselves. Eventually, many of them give up altogether. They accept that there is no changing the behavior and that the most positive way to deal with them is by giving the narcissist what they want (or not dealing with them at all).

This loss of energy undermines the healthy elements of the relationship. When you’re no longer able to fight for yourself, the power dynamics become off balance and the narcissistic person can take control and call the shots on anything and everything important to them.

Weaponizing dialogue

Words are weapons to the narcissist. They turn your words against you and twist their words into transparent threats and accountability shifters. Most narcissistic people will say anything to get what they want. Word salad also becomes a weapon that leaves partners and spouses confused and red-handed with guilt.

Example: You’re feeling hurt by something your narcissist said to you. When you approach them and ask them why they would say something so hurtful, they laugh and tell you that you’re too sensitive. When you press the matter, they may go on an unrelated rant about something you did months earlier or tell you that you’re crazy.

Healthy relationships require healthy words, they require two partners who can be open, candid, and honest with one another — even when tough emotions and accountability are involved.

Narcissists cannot tolerate accountability, it threatens their delicate egos. Terrified of exposure as being less than perfect, they use words to defend themselves and to obfuscate. Communication turns into gaslighting and into conflict. It turns into destruction and a tool of shame.

Without healthy communication, partners of narcissists learn that they are never emotionally safe. Worse than that, these words can be used to undermine their sense of reality and place them in a compromised situation, prone to accepting more abuses.

Destroying self-esteem

Narcissistic people prefer to be on the top of the pile when it comes to their relationships. Sure, they like partners who are smarter than them, more accomplished than them, better looking than them. On the outside, they want their relationships to be a reflection of how special, good, and “normal” they are.

Inside a relationship with a narcissistic person, it’s very different. They don’t want their partners to have a strong sense of self, or high enough self-esteem to question the manipulative tactics they’re using.

Example: You have been with your partner for several years and you’re starting to notice a distance. So, you go out of your way to create a sweet surprise for them. You plan for weeks and dip into your savings. On the big day, however, your narcissist seems unimpressed. They then criticize you for picking the wrong balloon colors, doing it without them, or any other manner of small issues that make you feel sad for even trying.

So narcissistic partners work hard to undermine their partner’s self-esteem. Even if the partner makes them look good on the outside, inside an intelligent, well-spoken, and a successful spouse is a threat. Narcissists destroy threats, and they do this by tearing them down.

Like everything else, the narcissist does this subtly, and slowly. Rarely do they come out and degrade their partners openly. They prefer to criticize everything they do. They like to undermine action and teach the victim to hate themselves from the inside out.

Building stone walls

There are a lot of walls in the relationship with a narcissist. They put up walls around anything that makes them look “less than”. Get too close to any of their secret fears or insecurities and you will be locked out. Narcissists emotionally shut down and shut others out of their lives by stonewalling. Refusing to talk, and refusing to be open, they teach their partners to compensate for their silence.

Example: Your narcissistic person misses a big event that was important to you. When you confront them about it, they get mad at you for calling them out. Instead of conflict, though, they go silent. For days they refuse to speak to you — even when you ask if they love you. Eventually, you become so insecure you chase them around the house begging for them to come around. Their initial disrespect is forgotten.

There’s a big cost for these stone walls. Victims of narcissistically abusive partners can teach themselves to take responsibility for the narcissist’s emotional state. When the silence sets in, they go over and beyond to smooth things over and get the narcissist back in their good graces.

Always, this involves doing what the narcissist wants and telling them what they want to hear. Eventually, victims can feel like they’re walking on eggshells and always avoiding the edge of an emotional chasm they don’t quite understand.

Eliminating trust

Make no mistake, there is no trust in a relationship with a narcissist. You may trust them not to cheat, not to leave you — but you will never feel emotionally safe. You can’t be, because that emotional safety is dependent on the mood of the narcissist and whatever delusion they’re invested in about you, themselves, and the relationships as a whole.

Example: Something big happens at work and it really hurts your feelings. When you come home and tell your narcissistic partner about it, they laugh at you and say something like, “I told you that you weren’t that smart.” Not only is your self-esteem hit, you learn that you can’t open up to your narcissist unless you want a dagger to the heart. Support is never certain. Trust becomes scary.

This trust is broken down over time. Every conflict, every nasty comment, scary explosion, and bad rumor, teaches their partners not to trust them. Repeated exposure to pain is a powerful teacher. For the victims of narcissists, the lessons are always the same. Don’t make your pain known and don’t open up too far unless you want more pain.

Creating delusions

We know that narcissistic people exist in a state of delusion. It’s a coping mechanism. Hiding desperately delicate egos behind a waterful of self-doubt and self-loathing, they create storylines in which they are important, perfect, or free of whatever insecurities they have. These delusions are dangerous, however, as narcissist expects everyone around them to confirm these delusions.

That’s why partners and families of narcissistic people get trapped in a lifetime of performance. They have to dress the way the narcissist wants them to dress, talk the way they are desired to talk, and even choose relationships and careers that confirm the narcissistic person’s delusions.

Example: In public, your narcissistic partner expects you to stick to a script. At parties and family get-togethers, you know you have to tell everyone how great things are. Behind closed doors, however, you are filled with fear and hurt. When you confront the narcissist about it, they go nuclear and call you a liar and ungrateful.
Yes, the narcissist is hurt by these delusions. The lives they create are never really their own. They’re entirely directed by the desires and standards of other people. But those delusions don’t just limit the life they get to experience. They limit the lives of those around them.

Partners of narcissistic people rarely have the space they need to blossom in their own lives. To the narcissist, they exist as a doll. They are desired to play along and never step outside of the dollhouse. How can a healthy relationship thrive in an environment where both parties aren’t free to be fully themselves in their own lives?

What can be done to stop this erosion?

One cannot live peacefully for very long in a narcissistic relationship. Once the walls come down, the abuse and manipulations accelerate. The only thing that can be done is to secure ourselves in this process. If you want to break out of the lies, out of the constant heartbreak, then it’s necessary to rebuild your self-esteem, set stronger boundaries, and refuse subpar relationship behaviors in the first place.

1. Hold tight to self-esteem

The greatest tool you can ever wield against a narcissist is high self-esteem. It’s the one thing that can make their behaviors transparent to you. The more you love yourself and know your worth, the less likely you are to fall for their lies and subversions. Consider the love you have for your child, for your pet, for your family. Think how that love makes you react in the face of threats.

The same applies when dealing with a narcissistic partner. The more self-assured you are, the more confident you are in your mind and your body, and the less powerful they become (and the more obvious their insecurities are).

Lean in slow. Rebuild your sense of self. Reconnect to the things that make you feel good. Surround yourself with high-quality friends and experiences that confirm you are a powerful and worthy person. Fall in love with yourself, the good and the bad, from the inside out. As your self-esteem builds, your tolerance for abuse will minimize.

2. Demand better relationships

It’s nice to blame our bad relationships entirely on the narcissistic people we pick. Unfortunately, we can’t hold them fully accountable. It’s more of a 90/10 mix. Narcissistic people are absolutely responsible for every manipulation, and every wound they inflict. We have to look at ourselves in the equation too, however, and ask what it is in them we found so attractive in the first place.

At some point, you have to demand better relationships for yourself. Look around. What treatment are you getting from your narcissistic partner? How is it making you feel? Is that acceptable to you? Are you willing to spend the rest of your life feeling exactly the way you feel at this moment?

You will get better relationships when you demand them. Start now setting higher standards for what you’re willing to settle for. Look first at your friendships. Are you investing in people who take more than they give? Do you exist to confirm their reality? Course correct here, then look to your relationship. Figure out where you’re ready to draw the line with the narcissist and demand they respect it.

3. Live entirely in reality

The spouses of narcissists often end up there because they get swept up in the delusion. There’s a lot of charm and a lot of mirroring that happens to create idealization. The narcissist will always appear perfect, but that perfection is a delusion. Many people like living in delusion because it’s easier than accepting reality.

Reality is the only safe place for victims of narcissists to dwell, even if doesn’t feel that way. Yes, it threatens the narcissist. It can lead to a lot of meltdowns and a lot of scary emotional moments. That doesn’t mean it’s wrong. In fact, getting that reaction from a narcissist can mean you’re on the right track.

You must insist on living in reality, outside of the gaslighting and delusions of the narcissistic person in your home. This takes away their power. More importantly, it empowers you to escape. As painful as it may be, you must see reality as it is to see the narcissist for who they are. Escaping their games is the best way to escape their traps.

4. Have iron-clad boundary lines

Last but not least, you must focus on your boundaries, specifically your absolutes. Narcissistic partners have no respect for boundaries. It’s part of how they take power. When you create lines, they push them. Crossing those lines allows them to see your reactions and whether or not you have the backbone to stop them and stick up for yourself.

You are going to have to draw a non-negotiable line at some point. This line exists for you and it exists for the narcissist. On one side of this line must be the way you desire to be treated, the way you desire to be spoken to. On the other? You must have the things you will absolutely not tolerate under any circumstances.

Violating this boundary line must exist in an instant change within the relationship. There are certain lines that even our partners are not allowed to cross, and if they do, they deserve to be cut off. It’s not cruel. It’s accountability. To respect boundaries is to respect a person. To respect a person is to love a person. Demand that from your narcissist as a minimum, and if they can’t give it to you? Be prepared to walk away from them forever.

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The root of narcissism makes a relationship with a narcissistic person one of the most challenging connections. Their inherent insecurities and the desperate desire to mask their truths can make them unstable, unsupportive, controlling manipulative, and cold.

Those traits undermine the foundational needs of a healthy and loving relationship. Stuck in love with a narcissist, you don’t feel like a part of a village. You can feel more alone than ever. There’s no trust. There’s little emotional safety. Where can you build from there?

Narcissistic people can spin a dangerous web. Avoid letting yourself get trapped in it. Remember who you are, what you deserve, and that there is healthy and fulfilling love out there…but it can’t be found without first having a healthy love for yourself.

© E.B. Johnson 2024