The narc partner to narc partner pipeline

[TiredOfNarcs]

I don't think this gets talked about enough and it's the reason why it makes my skin crawl when people shame you for not being on good terms with any of your exes: once you've had one relationship with a narcissist, it's so easy for that shit to happen again due to how you've been programmed.

My first relationship was kiddie stuff, both of us being fifteen years old at the time and acting out of immaturity, but the way he bullied me and regularly picked apart my appearance, mannerisms, and voice had left me with a lot of insecurities that made me more vulnerable to the next, more dangerous "relationship" a few months later with a guy who preyed on those insecurities in order to use me for sex (my first time, too) before discarding me.

Again, this instilled a lot more overt insecurities into me that likely played a big role in how I ended up in my most toxic relationship with a man who was quite literally committing a crime by being with me due to our age gap (though I didn't see it that way - I saw myself as mature for my age and unable to have healthy romantic relationships with other "immature" high schoolers due to those past relationships). And even if this ex and I had been the same age, what he did to me definitely still would've been SA, not to mention our relationship ended because I caught him cheating so there's that lovely little bit of additional trauma on top!

So not to make my love life sound like a shitty rendition of "All You Wanna Do," but I swore off relationships for several years after that experience, healing myself and my ability to form romantic attachments to men and promising myself that I would never end up with someone like that man again. In fact, it wasn't until I was the same age he was when we broke up that I felt like I was ready to be in a serious relationship again...only for the new guy to turn out to be a narc as well. Because my previous relationships (especially the last one) had been rife with controlling tendencies and constant demands for attention 24/7, this new guy's total apathy toward me and my life felt refreshing and okay. While previous relationships I'd been in involved him being lovey-dovey with me in public but mean to me in private, this new guy was the opposite where he'd swear up and down he loved me in private but was callous and rude to me in public. While I felt stifled and hyper-monitored in past relationships, this new guy wasn't interested at all in how I was doing or what was going on in my life - it was all about him. And it took me forever to realize the new guy's behavior was just the opposite end of the same narcissistic spectrum, and that he was just as manipulative as my other exes, just in different ways.

A fucking year and a half of dating this guy just to realize I was dealing with another fucking narc who had managed to reopen the wounds I spent three painstaking years trying to heal.

And yet I'm going to be told I'm the "damaged goods" and the "red flag" for making the truthful statement that all of my exes were bad.

It's such a massive slap in the face. I feel like a fucking idiot.

[notrightinthehead]

Welcome to the club of people who have bad taste in the partners they choose. I am an honorary member.  Lots of books have been written about us, there is a lot of info to be found online,  search for 'trauma bond' and that might make interesting reading for you.
Bottom line seems to be that without doing the painful work on oneself and healing one's own trauma and insecurities one is predestined to repeat the pattern. Recently I have read the books by Jackson MacKenzie and found them helpful. But books are not enough. I found that either therapy, or a self help group like CoDA in addition to this forum here are absolutely essential to keep me moving forward towards healing.