How Long Can A Narcissist Stay Married? (Can They Have A Happy Marriage?)
How long can a Narcissist Stay Married? Can you expect a long-term commitment from a narcissist? Can Narcissists love you? How is it committing to a narcissist? How is it to marry a narcissist? Should you marry a narcissist? If all these questions are crossing your mind, due to several reasons then being here and reading this article to the last bit would provide you with the answers or the solutions you are seeking!
How long can a Narcissist Stay Married? If this question is popping into your mind, then there can be reasons,
- You are dating a narcissist, and you are thinking to plan a future with them
- You are married to a narcissist and have started seeing some changes in their behavior
- You have a doubt that your narcissistic partner can be cheating on you
- You want to commit to a narcissist, but have some doubts
- You are not sure how would your life be if you marry a narcissist
There can be many more reasons, but these are a few basic questions that can come to mind initially for a person who is either dating a narcissist or is married to a narcissist. Even if you do not fall into this category, and are just concerned about your narcissistic family member. For instance, for that matter can be; a parent worrying about their narcissistic children, a sibling concerned about their narcissistic brother or sister, or a friend or acquaintance for that matter worried about their loved one.
If you are any of the people mentioned above, then do not get worried as we would be providing answers for, How long can a Narcissist Stay Married? Can they have a Happy Marriage? through this article.
Contemplating a relationship with a narcissist
A relationship with a narcissist might feel equal in the initial stages, but during the later stages, it might feel like you are the only giver in the relationship as they only receive and give very less. They take you as a negligible take. You might always be acting as their support, but they would be MIA(Missing in action) while you need them. Having a relationship with a narcissist is difficult because they would disregard your presence in their life until they need you.
Dating a narcissist is very puzzling as you cannot figure at what stage you are at while dating them. You cannot put all pieces of a puzzle together while dating a narcissist as their behavior is different every time you try to approach them.
When they are in a good mood and happy after obtaining a supply from you they would be appreciating your presence in their life, but as soon as you try to prove them wrong or put your thought forward, they would be arrogant and you would not hear from them for days. So you are often confused about whether to continue dating them, move on to the next step and commit to the relationship by asking them to marry you, or just run away from the relationship.
How does it feel to realize that you are dating a Narcissist?
You almost lose your self-worth, self-love, and self-respect and most importantly you lose yourself dating a narcissist. You are completely blinded by their manipulative tactics that you almost forget what a normal relationship looks like. You begin to doubt yourself, your life choices, and even sometimes your sanity. Because a narcissist can affect that profoundly if you are not self-conscious and blindly follow how a narcissist guide.
All a narcissist cares about is attention, supply, money, ego boost, and control above all. So until they have all this, or until you continue to provide them, but as soon as one of the things starts deteriorating they can make such a fuss, which makes you question your life choices.
Narcissists are usually materialistic and obsessed with everything which makes their social image lustrous. So they would appreciate you publically and would do everything that benefits them, but they are self-obsessed people who do not care how you feel or just disregard your feelings.
How does it feel to realize that you are married to a Narcissist?
Narcissists seem or appear to be joyous and successful in their marriages. But are they really successful and happy? Their outer facade which they present on social media or to other people always presents themselves as happy, joyous, laughing, and living life to the most which seems better than everyone. They seem to be the perfect partner in the marriage who knows how a happy marriage works! They would post pictures of them romanticizing their partners and seeming to have a happy marriage. But, is it any true in reality?
Are narcissist relationships long-term?
Can you plan to spend your life with a narcissist? A lack of empathy makes it difficult for a narcissist to genuinely devote themselves to their partner. They continuously fear real feelings, as they think they might lose their power and love can make them weak. Narcissists hate weakness as power, control, money, supply, and competency are all they love. Narcissists may not know or do not want to acknowledge the concept of love as their relationships are completely based on receiving their supply be it with multiple partners.
Can a Narcissist Fall in Love?
A narcissist is capable of feeling all emotions, it is just that they d not acknowledge them and express them due to their vulnerabilities. They fear expressing emotions can make them emotionally weak and vulnerable to their partner. They fear that once they surrender to their feelings they might lose control.
Narcissists are afraid to confess anything as according to them they are perfect, have no faults, they are superior to others and nobody can understand them better than themselves. Thus they lack empathy, care, emotional bond, and intimacy. They would be emotionally unavailable to you. Narcissists have very low self-esteem and are insecure about what others would think of them.
Narcissists are afraid of commitments and lack emotional bonding. They might be making false promises or commitments, but they do not come true to them. They prefer to date many prospects, but refrain to give life-long commitments.
Dating a narcissist is full of challenges. You have to keep up with their unrealistic expectations, tantrums, emotional unavailability, and toxic traits. A Narcissist can make you feel like you are on cloud nine for one moment and the next moment is like they don’t even want to be with you. They are uncertain of their own feelings or you can say they hardly have feelings and acknowledge them.
Can a Narcissist have a Happy Marriage?
The answer to the question, “Can a narcissist have a happy marriage or is it just a parade of fake pictures on social media?” is a hard “No” or a “Maybe”. This is because a narcissist can just pretend many times that they have a happy married life, and the thought of a narcissist committing to marriage and working hard to maintain a successful and happy marriage also seems a bit stretched. Narcissists can definitely love, but they are not very fond of committing.
Despite all the problems in a relationship, a narcissist certainly knows how to win hearts. They talk smooth like butter and manipulate even harder. So when they feel their nasty behavior has created problems in the relationship they would talk gently like nothing has ever gone wrong and try to hide the matter, convincing you to let go and try to win your heart either by displaying intimacy or some convincing fake truth that may lead to the closure of the matter.
They might provide emotional arguments regarding the dependency of both partners, the family requirements, the financial matters, and how you mean so much to them since the day one of the relationship. Narcisst would manipulate emotionally and create a false scene where you are unable to process or think straight and you get easily manipulated by their sweet but fake truths which are usually sugar-coated to stop you from seeing the problem and continuing the relationship.
Why does a couple where a narcissist is involved always seem so happy?
This point will be discussed from two viewpoints which might help you understand why does a couple which involves a narcissistic partner seem so happy!
Note – Here the scenario is when you are involved with a narcissistic partner in a relationship or a marriage, and the matter is discussed from the perspective of two partners; that is you and your narcissistic partner.
From the viewpoint of the narcissistic partner(the abuser)
In a couple where you and a narcissistic partner are involved in a relationship or a marriage, both people just try to pretend their happiness. A narcissist is obviously trying to just fake scenarios and the whole personality facade to keep you involved and obtain what they want. Your narcissistic partner might be faking happiness, just to show the world how happy they are and create a pretense image for the world for the couple.
Narcissist love to project and reflect a perfect image or love to reflect the world as a perfect couple from the outside, but internally there might be many issues that a narcissist would not even know, or just pretend everything to be alright without addressing it.
The narcissist would be continuously suppressing issues to not lose control and trying to keep the relationship going with the help of either financial power or manipulative tactics that are aimed straight at your hearty emotional side.
Narcissists would not even be noticing any problems because according to them there might not even be problems, as they are perfect. They would seem so happy to show the world that they are perfect beings even with a partner and have a happy marriage. They would also not be wanting to ruin the source of the supply, and all the other requirements they might fulfill from the relationship just by making an unnecessary fuss. So they just seem to be happy with the relationship.
What is Narcissistic supply?
A narcissistic supply is everything that makes a narcissistic life fulfilled. It is that one thing that a narcissist always craves even if it is in its negative forms, that is attention. One can even say that a narcissist is only able to fulfill their life purposes on the basis of supply itself. They feel handicapped without their sources of admiration, attention, validation, importance, and everything that makes them feel special. Narcissists seek supply more than anything, and they could do everything to obtain their dose of supply.
From your viewpoint(the victim)
Narcissists tend to would be hurting you often and regularly while still pretending that everything is okay. plus you might not be wanting to create any more tension in your relationship than there is already plenty because of the narcissist. You might also be just not willing to reveal the truth of the relationship and upset anyone including the narcissist, so you just as well be enduring by ignoring the nasty.
Drama, exaggeration, and overreaction go hand-in-hand with a narcissistic partner. They know how to make a scene out of small and unimportant things. They are the drama king and queens of your world. Sometimes they specifically choose drama to draw attention and other times it just comes out of their natural instincts.
Narcissists just roll over and project the anger of some other problematic situation that they might be facing onto your situation as they do not know how to handle things smoothly and efficiently. They cannot keep things separated and sorted. So when they do this, they automatically channel exaggeration, anger, drama, and negativity of one situation over the other.
Narcissists are masters of words and dialogues that can manipulate you and confine you to give up against them. They are smooth talkers and even do smooth arguments. There is no winning against them in verbal fights and arguments as they can just smash your ego and your say in the matter.
The only thing keeping you happy in a toxic relationship would be the fear of abandonment, lack of love, the response from the narcissistic partner, and the habit or the used to or the familiarity of the feeling of normalizing the normal without even realizing it to be toxic.
Reasons why people would be involved in a toxic marriage
- Fear of abandonment or the feeling of being left out or alone
- Lack of financial independence
- Fear of functioning all alone on their own
- Social pressure or abiding by social rules
- Certain religious beliefs
- Due to the pressure of the family
- Not wanting to bereave children of their one parent
- To secure a child’s future
Many people fail to leave a narcissist as the narcissistic partner has made them so dependent on them. They would not want to ruin the relationship by complaining and getting used to the toxic relationship. With the passing of time, they start feeling normal about the toxicity and get used to the abuse. They would feel that by ignoring the abuse they might be able to keep up with the relationship. People might even be embarrassed to discuss such relationships with friends or family due to the fear of either being embarrassed or looked down upon or just being a topic for gossip.
How long can a Narcissist Stay Married?
Maybe narcissists have a different definition of love or marriage or they are different in their approach to marriage. As their relationships are based on transactions (i.e until they can gain from you)they may not willingly try or would never truly understand the normal meaning of love as you may perceive and expect. They may love you in the way that they understand love.
If you are willing to accept their terms of love then you can have a sustainable relationship with a narcissist. You may also not reach a dating stage sometimes with a narcissist where love or emotional bonding is required as narcissists are incapable of having long-term relationships. While in some cases you might fully commit to a narcissist and they might also do the same and get married, but many times the relationship might not turn out as you expected it to turn up.
As long as you are trying to cope with all the abuse and toxicity of the relationship with the narcissistic partner, the relationship might function smoothly, with you making almost all sacrifices, keeping your voice down, following the narcissist most of the time, learning to live with toxicity on several intervals, have enough narcissistic supply, ignoring all the red flags, develop a coping mechanism against the narcissist, try to be happy as often as possible, neglect all the flaws of a narcissist, just keep enduring their toxicity but giving them the taste of their medicine from time to time then you are good to go with the happy marriage with a narcissist.
What should you do in order to keep the marriage going with a narcissistic partner and increase your endurance?
A Narcissist person craves attention all the time, lacks care and empathy, can be rude and blunt, ignores other people’s feelings, and has troubled relationships, thus they can not be an ideal partner for you. But if you still have to put up with them, or bear with them somehow you may create boundaries.
Be direct about what you need and expect from them, put your thoughts and feelings with a strong head, do not feel guilty unless your mistake, make new friends or keep dating other people as soon you notice red flags and meet people who really cheer you, seek help if you have to, go for therapy, and maintain a certain and safe distance with a Narcissist. Doing all this may secure your mental peace and happiness.
Inference
Narcissists seem or appear to be joyous and successful in their marriages. But are they really successful and happy? Their outer facade which they present on social media or to other people always presents themselves as happy, joyous, laughing, and living life to the most which seems better than everyone. They seem to be the perfect partner in the marriage who knows how a happy marriage works! They would post pictures of them romanticizing their partners and seeming to have a happy marriage.
As long as you are trying to cope with all the abuse and toxicity of the relationship with the narcissistic partner, the relationship might function smoothly, with you making almost all sacrifices, keeping your voice down, following the narcissist most of the time, learning to live with toxicity on several intervals, have enough narcissistic supply, ignoring all the red flags, develop a coping mechanism against the narcissist, try to be happy as often as possible, neglect all the flaws of a narcissist, just keep enduring their toxicity but giving them the taste of their medicine from time to time then you are good to go with the happy marriage with a narcissist.
From Relationship, Depression, and Personality Disorder to Narcissistic problems, I have helped a lot of people find their solutions. Upon gathering a number of common problems that people face, I decided to put the information on this blog so that anyone can get their answers easily.
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