Can a narcissist love? Whilst a narcissist will find it easy to shower you with affection initially, it’s not often you can have an enduring loving relationship with a narcissist. In a way, they are self-sabotaging their relationships through fear of being vulnerable. A narcissist will, at all costs, be unable to show weakness in their character, as it would directly conflict with their superiority complex. Once the idealisation or honeymoon stage of the relationship passes and imperfections begin to surface, the narcissist will become guarded.
A narcissist will shut you out, so you don’t see their inadequacies.
They’re incapable of showing emotional intimacies because that would mean opening up and exposing their flaws, and they don’t want you to think they have any. It’s usually needed to take a relationship to the next level and form a deeper connection, but that’s not an option for someone with NPD. When we hurt them, a narcissist will ultimately deflect their pain onto us to avoid being judged or wounded.
They will push love away from them because it involves being vulnerable. So they use it as a self-soothing strategy to avoid hurting themselves. They need you to believe that they are perfect in every way for them to keep feeling this themselves. Having you as this source of emotional supply to uphold their ego is paramount. When you no longer meet this, they will devalue and discard you to find another supply elsewhere.
Can a narcissist love? In short, no. You can’t have a loving, sustainable relationship with a narcissist. Once you hold them accountable or no longer meet their needs, they will shut down and move on.
Narcissism and Love Bombing
People with Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD) or people with narcissistic tendencies use any manipulation tactics possible to win someone over. So it would make sense that love bombing plays a considerable part in helping them build new relationships. This is because they ultimately want to gain your trust and affection by any means necessary to feed their own needs. They may come across as confident but they demand validation from outside sources because they’re incredibly insecure. They require affirmation from everyone. So they will shower you with all the affection to make you believe they are the best person out there for you, the best business partner, parent or best friend.
Their only real intention is to serve themselves and they do that by taking what they can from you; it can look like:
- Securing you as a source of supply to uphold their ego
- Having your undivided attention
- Having you available to them whenever they require
- Making financial gains from you
- Helping them progress in their career
- Assisting in showing others they’re a good person
Can a narcissist love or is it Love Bombing?
Love Bombing is quite simply defined as bombarding you with love. It’s a form of emotional manipulation typically used as a mode of control adopted by those with narcissistic tendencies. At the same time, it’s also prevalent in emotionally and physically abusive relationships.
Best described as a way to groom a prospective partner and their friends and family to cultivate a sense of trust and commitment. They will put you on a pedestal and shower you with expensive gifts, excessive attention, grand gestures, perceived acts of kindness and elaborate dates.
For the person on the receiving end, it can feel like love or adoration whilst also feeling intrusive because of the intensity and frequency it’s happening.
In the beginning…
The love bombers’ intention is to hook you on to them. They want to reel you in with a false reality of their true self. In a sense, they display the “perfect” version of themselves entirely tailored to your needs and desires.
Future faking and false promises are made often when love bombing is present. They’ll promise you the world and everything in between and talk about a perfect life together. But, it’s tough to disbelieve because they’ve never shown you anything other than adoration, and so you fall under their spell.
So can a narcissist love you? No, but they’re experts at pretending they do and fooling you with fake romance.
Love bombing most commonly comes under the umbrella of emotional abuse. You’ll often hear it mentioned in the cycle of narcissistic abuse. Most prevalent in the idealisation stage of abuse where the perpetrator focuses on attaching you to them. However, there are forms of love bombing through all stages of abuse. Often used as a tactic to reel you back in after a period of either emotional or physical instability in the relationship. After all, if there wasn’t this glimmer of hope, why would you stay with them? So they intermittently love bomb you throughout to keep you engaged and reliant on them.
Can a narcissist love you into foolishly thinking you’re in the honeymoon phase?
Love-bombing can easily be mistaken early on as the ‘honeymoon phase’ of the relationship, so it can be challenging to identify as a red flag. The issue is, after a while, the relationship slowly morphs into being unhealthy and has more complicated ups and downs you could have imagined. What’s even more formidable is that you don’t notice the transition.
The love bomber has already set the standard for how good the relationship can be, so you find yourself holding onto that as a reason to stay. You will start to crave the intense feeling you had initially, so you will try even harder to win it back. And so, you find yourself stuck in the cycle of feeling loved, invisible and disregarded for as long as they want you to, or until you cannot take it anymore and choose to leave the relationship.
When asking yourself the question, can a narcissist love? You need to be mindful that real love doesn’t make you question the relationship all the time. Of course there will be ups and downs, but theres a balance between you. You’re not constantly chasing love and hoping for things to get better again.
The “soul mate” effect
Also referred to as future faking. The abuser creates the illusion they are everything you have been looking for. They have essentially been studying you and mirror all of your wants and needs into this perfect little package: your perfect partner, your missing piece or your happy ending.
The abuser will sell you a picture of a perfect relationship where everything remains the same as it has been through the entire love bombing process.
It is essentially securing you as a source of supply for the abuser’s needs whilst letting you attach yourself to this fantasy love story they have created.
My experience with love bombing:
Future faking was one of the main reasons I found myself in a cycle of abuse. The beginning of the relationship seemed absolutely perfect: she was attentive, loving, kind, caring and passionate. She enchanted and mesmerised me and appeared to be everything I was looking for. She was present and consistent whilst also coming across as vulnerable and honest.
I would receive endless loving messages daily, always be available, consistently want to spend time with me, shower me with sweet little gifts and whilst not expensive, it made me fall for her even harder. She would talk about how perfect we were for each other and how lucky we were that we found each other. I started to believe in the love story she was narrating despite the fact we barely knew each other.
Within ten days of dating, she told me she loved me. Of course, I returned it; after all, what wasn’t there to love?
I thought I had found the person I was meant to be with.
Jeez, how wrong was I?
“Love bombers are displaying the perfect version of themselves entirely tailored to your needs and desires.”
Love bombing examples
Intense and frequent flattery
They compliment you consistently. In the beginning, narcissists are brilliant at really building you up to make you feel good about yourself. Whilst this is welcomed in any relationship, they aim to make you reliant on them for reassurance. So when you no longer receive it from them, you try harder to get it. Providing this attention early on lays the groundwork for what is to come next.
They’re always available
They’re messaging/calling/emailing you all the time, even when they should be busy at work or with friends and family. They’ll send you long loving messages or tag you in cute quotes on social media. They are just willing to see you at the drop of a hat at any moment in time. This creates the illusion that they are thinking about you all of the time, reinforcing the illusion that their feelings are genuine.
Fast moving
Saying ‘I love you’ comes incredibly easy for these individuals and often within the first weeks or months of dating. After that, the relationship tends to move at lightning speed. Intimacy and relationship milestones happen very quickly, such as moving in together or getting engaged.
Gift giving
They lavish you with expensive or thoughtful gifts often. Although they may not have any sentimental relevance to the giver, they are trying to buy your love and devotion.
The constant need to want to be around you
They’re so into you they always want to be around you. Unfortunately, it is often misinterpreted as love or adoration, but it’s another tactic to reduce your autonomy and isolate you. They don’t want you spending time with anyone other than them.
It’s hugely important in any new or old relationship that you have time to yourself outside of the relationship.
Smooth talkers
They can tell you everything you want to hear, and they are great at mirroring your interests. You’ll find yourself dumbfounded that you’ve found someone with such similar interests and morals. They’re just reflecting on what you want, solidifying the thought that they are the one for you.
Excessive PDA
The handholding, kissing, and intimacy in public may all be a bit much, like back off for a minute, dude! We all like a little attention now and then, but there’s a time and a place. They’re testing your boundaries at this point; how much can they get you to do to show you you love them.
What does love bombing sound like?
Can a narcissist love?
Real love vs Love bombing
Healthy affection:
Most importantly, love is a profound connection built over time. It’s based on mutual respect, honesty, trust and commitment. None of these things can be created with someone in a matter of days or weeks. Instead, the pace is set whereby both parties are comfortable. There are no crossings of boundaries or feelings of rushed or forced intimacy.
With the right person, you will naturally feel safe and secure. You will not have feelings of confusion when faced with bumps in the road. You learn about each other in all aspects, the good, the bad and the ugly; we all have these parts. We accept these wholly; they’re not weaponised against us or used to hold you down.
Unhealthy affection
The intense and immediate artificial connection is based on a person’s appearance or perceived sense of them. You don’t know each other at the beginning of a relationship. Therefore, what you’re seeing is the best version this person has to offer, without going too much further. The intimacy lacks any real depth. It may be acutely physical and feel fantastic to be so close and connected to this person at the time. But, true intimacy comes from knowing a person in various situations over extended periods.
Everything feels rushed and maybe moving at a pace you’re uncomfortable with. But because it feels so good, you ignore those little red flags and mistake it for love. The constant flattery, communication and future faking should set off little alarm bells, and this shouldn’t be ignored. If you feel at any point early on that you are not comfortable with a situation, take a step back. Ask yourself why and address it, don’t ignore it 🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩
How to stop love bombing
Awareness
Just be aware of the amount of attention they are giving you. Does it feel like a bit too much so early on in the relationship? Is it not representative of the amount of time you have known them? Trust your gut and ask yourself, am I comfortable with this?
Boundaries
You’re allowed to set your boundaries to what feels comfortable to you. If they’re trying to rush intimacy or giving you the attention that makes you uncomfortable or seems unnatural, tell them. You don’t owe anyone anything, and if something doesn’t feel natural to you, don’t force it and absolutely don’t do it.
Communication
Confide in someone you know and trust about it. It’s easy for them to sweep you up in the ideal they present. But talking to someone who knows you can sometimes bring us back to earth. They can help you question the relationship to help you see what’s happening. Sometimes it takes someone outside of the situation to see something that we might be missing.
Or you can talk to the person that is love bombing you, let them know you’re not comfortable with it and open the communication for healthy boundaries. If they respond badly to this then that is a red flag in itself and would give you further insight into their intentions.
The aftermath
What I found coming out of the relationship, before finding out about emotional abuse patterns and their effects, was that I was looking for this instant, intense feeling from the start in future relationships. I had the feeling that nothing was ever going to compare to what I had felt for her. If it didn’t feel all-consuming initially, then it wasn’t worth my or their time. So in a sense, I was using this abusive relationship as a marker for all future relationships. In turn, I would have been seeking out the same unhealthy behaviour patterns in anything new.
It took a lot of self-reflection and time for me to release that I was seeking something that didn’t exist. The beginning of the relationship that I pined after so much was nothing more than fake promises and empty compliments with no pure intentions.
Once I became aware of this, my mindset changed completely. I was adamant that I wouldn’t keep falling into the same old patterns and dedicated time for self-reflection and growth outside of the dating game. Although this can be altering, creating a sense of self-awareness and taking responsibility not to repeat the same mistakes ultimately led me to make much more healthy connections and relationships.
Is it our responsibility?
Whilst the abuse we suffer is not at all our fault; we do have an obligation to ourselves to resolve the issues they have caused us. The people that have abused us have probably forgotten about us. We are no longer a blip on their radar. However, they leave us with a mountain of psychological problems to work through. If we don’t heal from this, it will only cause problems in future relationships or, even worse; we become the abuser.
If we don’t want to fall victim to these behaviours again, we have to ask ourselves: what did we need from this person? Why did I require this type of attention? We’re all guilty at some point of needing someone else for some form of validation.
But what would happen if we were able to gain validation entirely from ourselves?
To me, it looked like freedom.
This is still a work in progress for me and probably will be for a long time. But I finally am at the point where I don’t need someone to tell me that I am worthy of being loved.
Once I had this change of perspective, I found connections with people I never thought I would and build healthy relationships and boundaries with those around me.
Do you think you have experienced emotional abuse?
Do you think you have experienced emotional abuse, or maybe you are currently in a toxic relationship?
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