Last week, I was sent a Facebook reminder of a picture featuring me with my narcissistic ex and a mutual friend from three years ago. I didn’t fully know it at the time, but this photo was a prelude to the final discard and subsequent end of my narcissistic relationship.
But who cares, right? People are awful and toxic relationships (hopefully) crumble and die all the time. What does any of it matter?
I ask myself this quite a bit, and it’s that doubt that holds me back from sharing more of my personal experiences and insights concerning the topic of narcissism and narcissistic discard from a layman’s perspective.
But someone must care, because the mere eight posts I’ve written over the past year have earned thousands of unique views from wayward explorers sailing the digital sea seeking information about narcissism.
These two posts dwarf the others in their popularity:
New Supply, Narcissistic Discard, And Dr. Ramani’s Truth
Narcissists Discard And Move On To New Supply Quickly | Dr. Ramani Explains
It’s no wonder why. I feel comfortable in assuming there’s plenty of people out there who have been dumped and replaced with another person with great haste and minimal hesitation. It’s the mighty and feared narcissistic discard followed by the introduction of the new supply. I know it intimately well.
People experiencing this want to understand what’s going on and what’s happening to them.
So What’s My Deal, Really?
Sure, I bandy these popular psyche-babble terms around—narcissism, narcissistic discard, the new supply, love bombing—but I am only a layman and armchair know-it-all. I’ve read a lot of books on narcissism and dark personality styles, and I’ve consumed even more blog posts and YouTube videos. But I have zero training as a mental health anything.
I do, however, have a lot of experience writing and telling stories, long and short alike.
It’s not a high-risk guess to assume the writing I’ve produced on the topic of narcissism doesn’t come from generic curiosity. It was born of personal experience. Unless you’re a trained shrink specializing in personality patterns and disorders, I doubt anyone really cares about any of this—until the weird and abusive stuff starts happening to you, that is.
With that said, this is my deal:
I was in a romantic relationship that began in 2013, and it started its official decline during the summer of 2018. No, the relationship was not warm and prosperous, and there was no single event that spiraled a picturesque life into a crash of misery and ruin.
The relationship was tense and fraught from the beginning, with all of the “red flags” you’d expect. They appeared early. The appeared consistently. They appeared strongly. And I ignored them all in favor of the rationalizations I built and perpetuated in my own mind.
But I was native, insecure, and the attention my narcissistic ex showered me with was intoxicating and addictive. The love-bombing was real and strong.
It should be noted this was a gay relationship between two men. So, for the sake of Google’s approval, let me get some SEO out of the way and officially say that I was in a gay narcissistic relationship with a gay narcissist. My then gay narcissistic partner is now my gay narcissistic ex.
Narcissism is a thing the gay community… very much so. But that’s another story for another day.
Aren’t I Over It Yet? Why Bother Write About This?
I’m over it in that I don’t miss my old relationship and I don’t speak to the gay narcissist I was with anymore. I’m over it in that I no longer having emotional investment in this person or the situation anymore.
But the whole thing still remains a curiosity to me—a loud and obnoxious abnormality in my otherwise rather quiet and controlled life—and I can’t help but pick it apart. And judging by the popularity of these writings thus far, there is some kind of audience out there that wants to know about these sorts of relationships and what they are all about and the impact they have on people.
I find it especially curious that a person’s mind can be so shallow and so warped that he can compartmentalize his life. With this comes a great ease in casually replacing people in and out of a life. This is an oddity to me because, yes, I experienced it (hence my writing on narcissism, the discard, and the new supply), but also because of how foreign it is to my handling of the relationships in my life. What was I thinking, really?
When my gay narcissistic relationship fizzled out in 2018, it was countless blog posts and YouTube videos that kept me afloat. They gave me some kind of stability throughout the long and dizzying days of confusion and despair.
I’d like to now return the favor.
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If you’re interested in learning more about narcissism, toxic relationships, dark personalities, and sexuality, then I highly recommend the books below.
Please consider buying through the provided Amazon Associate links. While the content on my website is yours to read for free, I do appreciate any support offered toward my work.
The reading list includes:
Should I Stay Or Should I Go: Surviving A Relationship With A Narcissist (Dr. Ramani Durvasula)
The Human Magnet Syndrome: The Codependent Narcissist Trap (Dr. Ross Rosenberg)
The Sociopath Next Door (Dr. Martha Stout)
Without Conscience: The Disturbing World Of The Psychopaths Among Us (Dr. Robert D. Hare)
In Sheep’s Clothing: Understanding And Dealing With Manipulative People (Dr. George Simon)
Being Homosexual: Gay Men And Their Development ( Dr. Richard Isay)
The Velvet Rage: Overcoming The Pain Of Growing Up Gay In A Straight Man’s World (Dr. Alan Downs)
