Peer victimization has led me to develop the fight-freeze type of CPTSD which would allow narcissists to pinpoint and target me more easily if they searched for prey. They're killers. It's hopeless. The only thing I can do is seclude myself. I have that weird disposition most normal folks think is weird anyway. Then we got the smear campaigners. Whatever

No, I don't even come close. I have the opposite problem I think. Instead of an exaggerated sense of self-importance I'm more likely to see myself as the most unimportant, pathetic, pointless person there is.

I was actually googling "Am I a narcissist?" a week or two ago. If the online quizzes are to believed, I am not.

Like others have mentioned, I *am* extremely self-absorbed. And lately I have been noticing that over time, I care less and less about other people...not just strangers but people that I actually used to care about. There's only an extremely small handful of people who I care about at all right now, and even with those people it feels harder than it used to be.

Thinking about this is actually what made me wonder about narcissism. But I think what's driving it must be my depression worsening over the last several years. The two phenomena track pretty well.

A simple and probably inaccurate test is...
If you held a door open for someone and they don't thank you or acknowledge you at all for your gesture, does it bother you?

If it does bother you, then you could possibly be one.

If it doesn't bother you one bit, then it probably rules you out of being one.

That always annoys the crap out of me. I think I've got a problem.

It annoys me a bit as well. I think I've got a bit of a problem.

Yes I really worry about this. I asked some questions on a Codependent forum asking if a specific thing I did was Narcissistic and they replied that it was not. To me it really seemed like it would be, I asked in two different codependent forums and the people running them both came back with the same answer. I would really just like to ask a psychiatrist if certain things that I don't feel/ do/ don't do make me Narcissistic. The first time I went to a mental health group I went there because I needed someone to talk to, but when I talked I kept asking people about them as I didn't want to come off as a Narcissist. I think probably I have traits.

Its uncanny the way they all can seem to follow very similar patterns of behaviour, even seems identical behaviour almost exactly in line with the known traits.


I think it would be easy enough to figure out if you were a narcissist

I think people pick up traits if their parents have narcissistic traits, both due to learning how to behave from narcissistic parents, but also in order to get their needs met as children, since the same parenting styles that led to the parent narcissist was how the parent was brought up.

My ex definitely had narcissistic traits, though I would fall short of calling her a narcissist. Her ex was quite probably a narcissist, though. I don't know if she was a codependent and kinda absorbed his traits, or needed to demonstrate his traits and learned them to appease him, or was always on the narcissistic side. She was emotionally abusive when she felt hurt or threatened, though, lots of silent treatment, passive-aggressive behaviour, it was her coping style to get what she wanted. I think I would be being generous if I said she acquired this from him, though, but it's possible, they were together 10 years. She seemed to think she was codependent, though.

I don't think narcissists worry too much about being narcissists. How could they? That would be flawed and not congruent with inflated self-worth. A vulnerable narcissist would see themselves as "obviously the victim", always. An overt narcissist might be happy to be a narcissist, they wouldn't worry about it. I don't believe either type would.

See above.

I worried I was a covert narcissist for a long time, fwiw. Am probably codependent.

I think as well, something that needs to be pointed out in this threat fairly urgently is that a true narcissist, a diagnosable narcissist isn't just having some narcissistic traits. Its a spectrum. Almost everyone has some narcissistic traits. People here, probably codependent, are identifying they have some narcissistic traits, not realising just what monstrous ****s narcissists are, and assuming they are narcissists.

*disclaimer, this isn't from the literature lol. So might be total horse****.

It does depend on a lot of factors of how narcs are brought up or not brought up. My siblings and I, I think we molded ourselves to be opposite of our mom due to our people pleasing tendencies we adopt from having to do so to her narcissism. As we got older, we grew repugnant and realize her abuse, so we molded ourselves as well to be opposite of her. Though my brother despite being a people pleaser to others, he does display a degree narc traits to family members, especially to me. My social anxiety growing up I think also might've blocked me a great deal in becoming a narc.

Always makes me wonder whether my grandma was abusive to my mom too growing up. Her story to us about grandma has always been how grandma treats her very well, is very affectionate and they are very close. But then, if that's the case, there is no way in hell that will mold my mom's personality to what it is today. I always think my mom might be having repressed illusions. Or also the other way around, where my mom is abusive of grandma, which will meant she was just born a narc. Because the interactions between her and grandma when I was a kid, I just always my mom bossing grandma around.




This. A true narcissist/narcissistic personality disorder is really one where it's bad enough where it becomes apparent, enough to cause recurring conflict and obstructs relationships.

Probably not healthy that I live with the demented self-torment of suspicions and questions that I feel like they can be neither confirmed or denied lol. Anyway, thanks to everyone who replied to this thread, it's been helpful.

[Edit: public service announcement to everyone on this forum who is way too ****ing hard on themselves--love yourself, you're alright as you are]

I think my mother has very strong narcissistic traits. I also am a people pleaser, sortof.

The conclusion I came to was that not so much I purposefully chose to become the opposite of my mum, but she created someone who will become, effectively a "**** recepticle" for her to offload all of her guild, and blame. I was sculpted, to effectively tolerate other peoples bad behaviour, and think its me at fault.

It's what makes me vulnerable to other narcissists and those who are willing to place me in that role again.

Undoing this, being able to maintain enough self esteem and self worth, and self compassion to have the strength to believe in myself, is incredibly hard.

But its important that over the last few months I have met some truly lovely people who have tried to help me, and havent just abused my nature. Natalie, Ben, Kamila, Catronia all from within services here in the UK have treated me with great kindness and have gone out of their way to help me.

I am constantly involved in a similar battle, for what its worth. Its the twisted part of people making us this way, not only are we not the abusers and have been abused, but we believe we are the ones at fault, and have to deal with that internal battle on top of whatever was done to us. Fwiw, I don't think you are a narcissist, and like me, you seem to be trying your best to improve yourself in the areas where you might be at fault. Believe me, this isn't what narcissists do, they aren't ever at fault, they don't spend time trying to fix themselves.

And I agree, people here are way too hard on themselves.

I think self-awareness goes a long way. Accepting that we're not perfect, and working to improve upon certain areas that we're lacking in.

Narcissists usually aren't self-aware, so if you think you are one you probably aren't. Modern society has been encouraging narcissistic tendencies in alot of young people, like Instagrammers walking around with their selfie sticks everywhere, so it is normal to feel that way. Full-blown textbook narcissists are generally disliked by most people, though (Take Onision from Youtube, for example).


Since I was raised by a mother that matches alot of the criteria for narcissist, I do worry constantly that I am turning into her. It is one of my worst fears and one of the reasons I have completely sworn off from having children or being in a relationship. It could probably take years of professional help to unlearn toxic behaviors you have normalized and grown up seeing your whole life. Until I have the financial capability to at least get it, I don't think it would be right of me to ever give someone that emotional baggage.

Even while writing this very sentence, I continue being self-conscious about it right down to how many times I use "I", "Me" and "My" words (Yikes! 8 so far? ) and I've had it ingrained in my mind by my mother that I'm some sort of master manipulator, due to her telling me things like "Only I know the real you", "You're just pretending to be nice to others", "You're wicked/evil", etc. etc. throughout my childhood. It doesn't help that recently I also feel like other people have been uninteresting and that I seem to mostly only seek out give-and-take sort of connections with others rather than genuine ones. This fear was confirmed when I recently lost a friend due to me asking her too many favors. She ended up feeling insulted, like I had just been using her, and stopped talking to me after that.

My father has felt insulted that I seem to only call him when I need money. To be fair, I'm not sure what else to talk with him about so it's things like that make me wonder if I'm just not doing it subconsciously. Since I've mostly given up on friends and family, I've tried to emotionally distance myself by wanting to view my relationships in a more business manner. I don't think I ever wanted to turn into a selfish and insensitive person from that, though.

No Donistired, based on what you wrote I don't believe you are a narcissist. As someone mentioned earlier narcissists are not self aware of themselves and hardly ever do any sort of introspection. If you are someone that is going through a lot of emotional pain or struggling with anxiety, that could lead you to focus less on other people due to emotional overload but it doesn't necessarily make you a narcissist. It seems that you are thinking about how your actions impact other people and you're acknowledging guilty feelings. A narcissist would never do that. They avoid feelings of guilt and don't think about and/or don't care about how they treat other people.