Realize that people with NPD can't feel regret. Imagine how much happier you could be with someone else who genuinely appreciates you. They won't regret the way they treated you either because they'll find ways to justify their behavior.
It is common for people with a narcissistic personality disorder to regret discarding or losing someone, but it does not mean what you might think. If they feel regret, it is not because they hurt you. It is for losing something that they value. You are a possession, not a real person.
They Will Experience a Narcissistic Injury and Go Into a Narcissistic Rage. If a narcissist were to realize that they no longer have control over you, it could cause them to experience a narcissistic injury and fly into a narcissistic rage.
Some narcissists may be able to feel bad about something they've done to hurt someone else. It isn't guilt they feel, so much as regret (or even anger) that things happened the way they did. But any “remorse” they feel is likely to be about how that behavior affected them rather than how it affected the victim.
It's true: Your narcissistic ex will remember you but not — never — in the way you hope they will, as the “great love of their life”.
They're not going to contact you immediately following a disengagement or breakup. A narcissist will wait months or even years until you've almost forgotten them and can think of them without fear. If the narcissist in your life is an ex, they may wait until the relationship you had after them has ended to strike.
Yes, they often do come back to relationships. A narcissist will repeat their cycle of abuse as long as they need you as a supply. Even their distressing discard performance will leave you in a firm belief they're done with you; a narcissist will come back.
People with high levels of narcissistic admiration experienced less anxiety and sadness after a breakup and maintained positive perceptions of their exes. They were also more likely to initiate a breakup and attribute it to their lack of interest in their ex.
Be unattainable and focus on your well-being.
Don't give the person with NPD the satisfaction of seeing you lonely or depressed—they'll feel like they still have power over you. If they call or text, ignore them. If you can't, tell them that you're busy doing something else.
But here is the rub: Over time, the narcissist usually senses that you are pulling away, and it is then that your problems take on a different form. Narcissists hate feeling that they might be rejected or that you might conclude that they are defective. So, they go into compensation mode by turning the tables.
A narcissist is likely to be enraged when they begin to lose control. They may lash out at you, go on a smear campaign, or purposefully ignore you. They may also lovebomb you to reel you back in. Their main goal is to get your attention, provoke a response, and regain power.
Interestingly, the narcissist doesn't just fear to lose you because you make their world go round. They fear to lose you because you also make their world look good.
At the end of a relationship, narcissists may become combative, passive-aggressive, hostile, and even more controlling. People with NPD often fail to understand other people's needs and values. They are hyper focused on their egos, but do not account for how their actions affect others.
The narcissist may indeed regret this loss, but not out of any real concern for the person – instead, they experience regret because they no longer have someone to reflect their false sense of self back to them. It is a superficial kind of regret that has nothing to do with true empathy or understanding.
When that occurs, ancient feelings of emptiness, abandonment, and shame return with such “vengeance" that they're compelled to turn up their defenses a notch, prompting them to further denigrate—through what's commonly referred to as "narcissistic rage"—those now able to see through their façade.
The narcissist is hurt because usually there wouldn't be anyone to give them the attention and satisfaction they would get from their partner, not until the no contact phase is over or they find another person to work their “magic” on. So, does a narcissist miss you after no contact? In many cases, they will.
Unfortunately for a narcissist, she says, the next person will always end up being boring because time breeds familiarity, requiring the narcissist to look for something new. "They are always waiting for the next new thing," she adds. "You are not boring, narcissists are just bored with everything."
Although they will try to mask it as much as possible, a narcissist will get angry, seeing that you have moved on already. Deep down the show of grandiosity, narcissists have a fragile sense of self-esteem, which is easily threatened when they see their ex with someone else.
Narcissists can feel emotional pain, but not usually in the same way as others. The emotional pain they may feel is usually related to underlying selfish needs. Underneath the displays of superiority and sense of entitlement, they often feel empty, powerless, and shameful, which they perceive as weakness.
Beware of narcissists trying to lure you back with hoovering. Breakups with narcissists don't always end the relationship. Many won't let you go, even when it's they who left the relationship, and even when they're with a new partner. They won't accept “no.”
Someone living with narcissism does cry. They can feel regret, remorse, and sadness. These emotions, however, don't often have roots in empathy.
True narcissists (people with NPD) don't usually miss their exes. What narcissists do miss, however, is the attention you gave them when you were together. They need their "narcissistic supply," someone to be a constant source of care and support.
A narcissist's fundamental motivation is to dominate those closest to him. This kind of domination is particularly insidious. A narcissist wants her victims to care more about what she thinks about them than what they think about themselves. Once the victim makes this shift they are trapped by the narcissist.
Once the narcissist realizes you're not coming back, the panic sets in. Now they regret what's been abandoned, lost, and destroyed. This was their fault and you both know it. But now they carry the weight of that guilt.