There was a woman I once loved — let’s call her Naomi.
She loved how soft I was, how I listened instead of shouted, how I cared too much instead of too little. But somewhere along the way, softness became something to fix.
She left, saying she needed someone “stronger.”
Months later, I found out she’d married a man who didn’t just silence her, but broke her — often in ways I could never imagine doing.
And yet, even after everything, she’d still reach out sometimes. A message here, a memory there — as if she wanted to keep me close enough to feed on, but far enough to never face herself.
And for a long time, I let her. Because part of me wanted to believe that maybe she’d see the difference. That maybe I just wasn’t enough then.
But that’s how it is with narcissists, isn’t it?
They leave you doubting your worth, while convincing you that love is something you must earn by being more, or less, or better — anything but yourself.
1. The Illusion of “Better”
When a narcissist treats someone else better, it’s rarely love.
It’s strategy.
It’s a new stage, a fresh audience, a performance rehearsed with lines they once practiced on you.
They know what didn’t work last time — the words that made you cry, the ones that made you stay. So, with the next person, they tweak the script. They become more patient, more attentive, more charming — for a while.
It’s not that you weren’t enough.
It’s that you were the rehearsal.
They’re simply refining the act, not themselves.
2. The Quiet Battle Within
For months, maybe even years, you might find yourself comparing. You’ll scroll through photos of their new love, searching for clues —
a better smile, a happier pose, a caption that feels like a dagger: “My person.”
But what you’re really searching for isn’t them. It’s proof that you mattered. That the pain meant something.
Healing begins when you stop needing their next chapter to justify your own ending.
You weren’t broken — you were just too honest in a world that confuses tenderness with weakness.
3. What the Narcissist Can’t Fake
Here’s what narcissists can’t keep forever: consistency. The show always starts beautifully — grand gestures, deep conversations, attention that feels like light.
But eventually, the mask slips. They grow restless, bored, hungry for a new supply of admiration.
What begins as love soon becomes control, and what feels like home turns into a mirror maze — one where only their reflection matters.
And while you heal, they repeat. Different faces, same emptiness.
4. The Turn Inward
There’s a point in healing that feels like standing in a quiet room after years of noise. You don’t quite know what to do with the silence.
It almost feels like loss — but it’s peace, disguised.
That’s where I found myself, months after Naomi disappeared for good. One evening, I looked at the message thread — years of giving, explaining, apologizing — and for the first time, I didn’t feel anger or sadness. I just felt done.
Not with her — with the story.
And in that quiet, I understood something simple: it’s not that narcissists love others more,
they just love themselves in different ways.
5. The Reclamation of Worth
If you’re reading this wondering why they seem happier now,
why the person who broke you can suddenly smile so easily —
remember: what looks like peace may just be performance.
Your healing won’t look like theirs, and that’s okay. Theirs will be public — polished, filtered, loud. Yours will be private — slow, grounded, sacred.
They may post a picture of new love, but you’ll learn to sit in the stillness of your own.
And that’s the kind of love that lasts — the one that doesn’t need an audience.
6. The Whisper That Stays
Healing from a narcissist isn’t a victory march. It’s a quiet return to yourself.
A remembering that love doesn’t have to hurt to be real. That peace isn’t boring — it’s home.
You may never get the apology you deserve, but you’ll get something better — a self that no longer seeks validation from someone who only mirrors pain.
And maybe one day, when they treat someone else “better,” you’ll smile — not because you’re over it,
but because you finally understand:
They didn’t love you wrong because you were unlovable. They loved you wrong because that’s the only kind of love they knew.
I write stories about creation — not just in the cosmic sense, but the human one. Stories about how small things become infinite when touched by belief.
