I don't miss you. I miss who I was when I was with you.

I hate the way it ended.

I hate the last fight we had.

Now all I can think about is what was said and what I should have said instead. If only I had chosen words more carefully. If only my grip around the glass had been calmer, I wouldn't have dropped it and shattered it into a million pieces.

If only I had been better. If only I knew how to handle myself, explain myself, and even see the situation with more maturity. More compassion. I could have avoided losing you.

I thought this way for so many months. I was reeling, crying, self-isolating, and hating myself as I mulled over the final words spoken between us. I could not handle how it all ended because I never even saw it coming. I had no idea that Saturday that the words I used and the emotions I expressed would be the driver for a failed relationship. Because I saw only my own faults and how it had to have been me.

That is what you wanted me to see. To feel. To collapse into myself like a dying star and just fold. That's what you knew would happen all along.

What I could not understand like I do now - is that I was groomed from the start to be the pawn of a game. Like every other very diluted and detached bond in your life - our relationship was fake.

I could not imagine such a thing, being used or manipulated.

I thought we were so close. Inseparable. Perfectly matched.

That's what an abusive person wants you to believe. That you two are so aligned. So perfectly matched, whether it be friends or lovers. The lines are blurred in fact. Because flattery goes a long way for a person who is so deprived of basic love and acceptance. That's why you choose them that way.

Now I know.

It is insanely hard to spot when you connect with someone who makes it feel like they understand everything and appreciate everything about you. When they celebrate you and gift you. When they think everything you do is great, inspired, and amazing.

It is insanely hard to comprehend that there is something off when a person is always there to say the right thing at the right moment. To entertain you. To match your energy and provide you with all the joy you could want.

It feels healthy. It looks healthy. It sounds healthy. Doesn't it?

Every win. Every share. Every confession. Every secret. All matched. Received. Understood. Supported. Never judged.

Doesn't that mean a person is safe to connect with?

When you meet and instantly connect over deep stories and experiences. When you tell them about the trauma and hardships, finding out they went through the same exact things. So you think wow, someone else gets me. Someone else knows what it is like.

"To understand a narcissistic relationship is to analyze a mirror and understand how it actually works. Which you can only do long after being discarded and reeling over the loss. That is the only time you can finally look up and realize the thing you are crying over... it is who you were when you were with them. It is your own reflection staring right back at you. " - Jean Grey, Jaded Savior Blog

I am finally at that moment of looking back into the mirror. Realizing I was loving who I am all along. I was seeing myself while being distracted by a lot of fluff and love bombing.

The worst part of missing a narcissist is realizing that the person was not real. The relationship was not real.

And it hurts that you cannot SCREAM out to the world the moment you realize this.

When you suddenly have a head-spinning nauseating realization that the person you thought you were with or connected to for so long was entirely an act to mirror every single thing that you experienced, liked, wanted, or dreamed of.

The truth is, you do not know that person at all. It was all masks.

So what now? Now my smile is gone. The masks are off and I can see it for what it is.

But who can I tell?

By the time you realize what it was... the bridge has long been burned and not just between you two.

A narcissist does not just simply leave you.

They literally discard you and replace you with somebody new.

Someone completely unsuspecting. Someone who may have even been in the shadows for a while before it all ended.

Someone who is being fed stories and examples of how terrible you are. Of how you do all these bad things and treat people awfully.

By the time you lose your relationship, chances are you have also lost several friends and possibly relatives or family friends.

A narcissistic person builds an army around you and then squeezes you out. If anyone finds out on your end what is happening, those allies of yours will be shamed and shunned as well. You will all be shamed and told you are the bad ones. It will get ugly.

It always gets ugly.

A narcissistic person will tell others that you are the narcissist. So that no one will believe you when you try to call for help.

Their new close buddy will back them up and there will be so many stories already spread around.

A narcissist loves to play telephone.

By the time it gets back to you, your character has already been twisted and several people have already cut you off.

They like to cut you down to being totally alone and worthless.

A narcissistic person will EXPLODE on you and then plot everyone against you because they are not trying to work it out or protect your feelings. They are trying to protect themselves. To any cost and any extent.

It will not end with the final fight either. They will make you suffer if you try to retaliate or speak out in any way. If you try to speak up for yourself or build evidence against them immediately, they will fight back with 10x force.

It is going to take a long time to really feel okay again. As you pull apart the facts from the fabrication, there are some things you should really think about. Acknowledging these little flags and discrepancies is how you shatter that mirror. It is how you begin to really heal.

I started to think about the relationship in its entirety. How it began.. how it all felt... how it carried on.. what the strongest bond factors were... and then the facts around how it began to unravel. This is how I really saw how it was a narcissistic bond. A healthy relationship would not experience these patterns:

1. The relationship began with intense commonalities around trauma and abuse. A sharing of intense past stories that seemed to line up and be so similar. A quick bond over the traumatic details felt intense and special. (This can absolutely be non-romantic and often is a friendship even if it turns into more between some).

2. Several promises get made over the year but as you will later discover, those things will never happen. It seems promising as you go along, but in hindsight you will not believe how much you were sold with no hard proof or outcome. What kept you strung along was the faith, and loyalty you had to that person - with good reason because they said and promised all the right things.

3. Love bombing - you may receive presents, surprises, even money from them. There will be a whole lot of upfront and constant surprises that make you feel so loved. THEN you will experience some scary, low points from that person. You will feel compelled to help them and nurture them because they treat you so great. It will feel like they only share this vulnerable low point with you. Their mental health will seemingly suddenly decline and or a crisis will occur to which they feel like pushing you away dramatically. At this point, you will want to help them so badly. This is when they begin to flip the power and start emotionally manipulating you so you will fight to prove your love or loyalty. You will promise to support and or help them through it unwaveringly. Later, that promise you made will bite you in the butt.

4. The rollercoaster was heading up, up, up and it felt great. Then it goes steady for some time... until you start getting the eerie feeling that something is off or wrong. There really are problems and red flags but you are too close to the person to see them at that point. The other shoe is actually about to drop.., but you doubt your own suspicions. When it drops finally and they are so cruel or messed up to you, you go into somewhat of a shock. You gaslight yourself and they do the same - making it out like you caused the crash. You were being too clingy or paranoid or close to them. Seemingly out of nowhere they go on distance binges. This means they begin to take space and time away from you, which is the opposite of the intense time they spent with you for months prior. You feel insecure and like you did something. But when you confront them about it they make you feel needy. Worse, they might actually deny taking any space or acting any different so you feel nuts because you see and feel the changes happening.

5. The people around this person ADORE them. They are more like fans of the person than close friends but you never notice that difference. They just seem very admired, appreciated, and adored. They might also have distant fans... people who are from the past, exs, or acquaintances that give them attention here and there. Usually through a private means of communication like on social media comments or inboxes. You kind of feel jealous or weird about it but cannot put your finger on why. You only come to learn later on that some of these people were trauma bonded to this person. And others were lightly being strung along via flirting or empty chitchat that creates a fun little relationship on the side for them. This happens in both platonic and romantic relationships with a narcissist. It feels sh*tty regardless because this creates secrets and uncomfortable tension between you and them whenever you insinuate or mention it. This is deliberately created by the abuser to make your boundaries feel blurred or to make you show signs of jealousy. It makes them feel further worshipped and adored.

6. You get used to a pattern, or the rollercoaster, of ups and downs with this person. You start to even sense and feel uncomfortable every so often when you know things are either about to be good or bad. You were used to a lot of good with moments of bad but now the script is flipped. After a while there is a lot of drama, fighting, gaslighting, manipulation, ghosting or periods of space, and other tactics to make you feel like you are being treated really poorly. Then they will come to you with a perk or present to make you feel good, sometimes even provided to you immediately after the bad events as an apology. This reminds you of how it used to be when it was all gifting and love. This is the symmetry of the love bombing, still reinforcing the bond and the loyalty you have towards them. The thing is - while you provide time, energy and sanity to them constantly - they only provide the rollercoaster in return. Promises that never happened are becoming more obvious to you. You have built up resentments, anger, and fear so you have outbursts more often and feel depleted. Which the abusive person then focuses on heavily. They let you know often how aggressive, argumentative, and mean you are. They say they are tired of it and how you have just changed. You feel ashamed, sad, and so drained you take on blame for the situation. It must be you.

7. Once you have reached this part, they are already building a new relationship with someone else - be it a new friend or lover. They are already grooming someone else to be the new target of the sweet and kind version of them. They are gearing up to bully and beg people around you towards hating you. Soon the blowup will occur and many people will not have your back, but have theirs.

8. When that blowup finally happens, it will feel like a RANDOM Saturday for you. It will literally be out of nowhere for you emotionally even though things have not been good for a while. You have only deemed that as a rough patch. You have not picked up on the patterns from this angle we are now discussing. You have only been first-person experiencing the abuse. And that was deliberate. You were completely led on to take this role. You played it well and they were absolutely working towards blaming you for the end of the relationship. So much that they will bring up "several things you did" and how tolerant they were of it all. They will throw vulnerable things at you and say some pretty cruel statements to break you. They want you to feel powerless. There will be no back and forth conversation. There will be no mature analyzing, reflection, or helpful problem solving to work out the relationship. You are not just being dumped but discarded and replaced.

9. Finally, the smear campaign comes. This is the days, weeks, and even months after the relationship ends where that person goes around to everyone saying how bad you were. They will try and get people against you, bad mouth you as the liar or abuser, and come up with stories about how they suspected for a while before they finally set boundaries with you. Many people will believe them. Some people will be bullied and blackmailed by them to hate you and/or remove you from their lives. This is all meant to smear your reputation and name. They want this to happen to cover their tracks. They want people to dislike you so much that nothing you say will hold any substance or value. That way no one will believe you if you try to tell them about the abuse you endured. Instead, you will just feel crushed and alone.

As you can see and probably (unfortunately) relate in some way, it is really challenging healing after being dumped by a narcissistic person.

If this person was your "best friend", you will feel really empty for a while and distrusting of friendships. You will feel that burn of having put so much time bonding with someone only to be hurt and betrayed, especially when they begin to smear your name. You will feel betrayed by many people, not just them. Because you did not see it coming that multiple people would take their side.

The smear campaign can be even more hurtful and ugly when it was an ex-lover. This person made sure to drag family, mutual friends, and possibly children into the smear campaign (if you have kids together). Co-parenting with a narcissistic person could be the most difficult aftermath of all.

Healing after being discarded is messy. People experience trauma bonding, or feeling connected to and needing their abuser, after experiencing prolonged abuse where they needed to attach to the abuser in order to survive. This type of survival mode does not easily dissipate after the relationship ends. In fact, for months after you may want to call or message the person reeling over the breakup or final fight. Each time you want to reach out to them, there is a great source of shame and pain because you realize how bad they were for you.

When you find yourself missing a narcissistic person, I want you to know that it is not THEM you are missing. You are missing who you were and how you felt when it was good. You are remembering the love bombing and still blaming yourself. You are remembering the good you saw in them and what you wanted them to be for you. You are taking on most of the blame, if not all, for the downfall of the relationship and their bad side.

With a narcissistic abuser, there are brief moments of love and bliss that seem genuine and eluding to some hidden loving depth they have. The truth is, they used affection and praise to manipulate. It allowed for the emotional abuse to throw you off. It allowed for you to build loyalty and love so you would stay for the bad.

You are a victim of abuse. And nothing about the relationship was healthy.

What do you do when you finally realize these patterns and come to terms with them being an abuser?

You draw a line in the sand. And you do not cross it again.

You have to remember that the best thing you can do is move on with the awareness of these red flags. That and you have to cut off connection. No social media stalking. No messaging. No texting. No hanging out or trying to run into them. No thinking that this person could possibly change because of something you do. You have to make a clean break away.

Once you realize the relationship was a mirror and the things you "loved" were actually your own qualities, you can begin to work on loving yourself again. This time with deep intention and purpose.

You can write about it, talk about it, and realize how these horrible experiences have shed light on where you lacked self worth and appreciation for who you are.

So who are you? You are someone worthy of love, honesty, loyalty, and NO tension. No emotional turmoil. No rollercoaster.

You are someone who gets to only have healthy friendships, dates, and deep relationships.

You are someone who is going to steer clear of red flags and seek out green flags in relationships. ( Seek out my published story "Healthy boundaries in friendships and relationships" on my Vocal Profile)

Lastly, you will finally let go of the "should have said" and "should have done" mentality. Because it was not your fault you did not know better or see it. That is how an abusive bond occurs. You were being manipulated and psychologically played with in order to make sure you did not see it all. So love yourself enough to understand it was not because of you or anything you did.

Time, self awareness, self love, and personal development will help you move forward. You will never forget what you endured. But it sure will help you change your future.

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Some of my favorite books for self development and healing:

Psychopath Free (Expanded Edition): Recovering from Emotionally Abusive Relationships With Narcissists, Sociopaths, and Other Toxic People Paperback

It Didn't Start with You: How Inherited Family Trauma Shapes Who We Are and How to End the Cycle

Why Can't I Just Leave: A Guide to Waking Up and Walking Out of a Pathological Love Relationship

Narcissistic Abuse and Codependency: The Complete Recovery Guide to Spot, End, and Get Over Narcissistic and Codependent Relationships. How to Escape from The Big Trap of The Covert Narcissist.