Playing the victim
Some of my experiences
Narcissists will highly likely play the victim when you leave them.
I remember one relationship with an ex when I told him it was already over,
he yelled through the phone ‘you know my dad used to bash me!?’
This had nothing to do with what we were even discussing. He simply just wanted me to feel sorry for him in hopes that I would return to him.
It was clear that he was throwing another tactic at the wall to see if it would stick,
when all his other tactics didn’t work.
And when I said nothing, he hung up.
Even in my relationship before that one,
in the moment that I tried ending the relationship for probably the 4th time,
he told me that he was sorry for hurting me,
and he was only that way because he was sexually abused as a kid,
and promised to try and better his ways.
I don’t know if that was true or not, but I actually did feel sorry for him in that moment.
And dumbly, I forgave him and went back for another round of abuse.
At the time, I felt guilty for leaving him,
in what I thought was the time he needed me the most.
I returned thinking I could help him, but I was simply being manipulated.
Wanting sympathy
Just remember, they will use their real or made-up childhood traumas to excuse their toxic behaviors,
just so they can make you feel sorry for them, excuse their abusive behaviors
and feel guilty for abandoning them in their so called ‘time of need’.
They will even use someone else’s victimhood story as their own.
This works because we likely have strong empathic qualities that drew them to us in the first place.
As empaths, we tend to ignore our own pain and put other people’s needs first, even our abusers.
The vulnerable narcissist knows that highly empathic individuals can be easily manipulated into feeling sorry for them.
I know that having had my own traumas, struggles and pain as an empath ,
made me have sympathy and understanding for anyone’s victimhood story for most of my life.
They may also come at you with a crisis and beg and plead with you for your help and support.
Or they may tell you how hard it’s been without you, and if only you would give them a second chance.
I used to believe I had to be the strong one and help them,
because it was I who truly understood their pain due to my own pain.
Their acts of vulnerability and insecurity pulled at my heart strings
and I would give them the sympathy and attention they were after over and over.
It took me a long time to realize that the longer I stayed caring for their needs,
the more they took from me and the more I was enabling them whilst losing myself at the same time.
They need us for supply
Narcissists are completely selfish and co-dependent.
They don’t cry because they’ve hurt you and that’s why you’re leaving them.
They cry only for themselves, because they can no longer use you as supply
and they don’t want to take accountability.
Simply by you leaving them, they have lost power and control,
this alone can make them feel like a victim and feel the need to punish you.
They feel entitled to have access to who and whatever they want.
If they can’t obtain what they want, then they will simply blame, insult or intimidate.
And smear your name with lies, and playing the victim to anybody who will listen or believe them.
