Sometimes I sort of lie without realising it, like when I suddenly change to mirror someone, as mentioned in a recent post:
I can limit mirroring to some degree, however, as always, my reality twists to make sense in the moment […]. My favourite colour is red but when you tell me yours is blue, I suddenly remember that gorgeous sky-blue Porsche I had and, well, wasn’t it always my favourite car?
I don’t feel like I’m lying at all when I tell you about the grandiose car and how I love blue. It’s maybe a slight manipulation, however, it feels sincere at the time. This is what happens when you live in the present and have fuck all impulse control. It’s only now I’m considering the accumulative effects of these sorts of lies.
One of my exes was a huge U2 fan. I’m not that bothered about U2: I prefer the Red Hot Chili Peppers. However, the second she told me she liked U2, I could suddenly remember liking them. Except rather than appreciating her taste from afar, I blurted out that I’d seen U2 live. Total bullshit.
Immediately I was worried she was going to ask where or when, however, she didn’t and so I got away with it. These sorts of lies require two people: a mirror like me and a receiver. If a lie goes out and you believe it, affirmation comes back in. You’re happy that I love Bono and blue and so I feel better. Once that happens, I either believe it (if it’s really small) or I sort of believe it. It’s assimilated into my reality. I know I’ve never seen U2 live and yet I sort of believe I have. I’ve even repeated that to other people. You’ve affirmed the lie and so that makes it quasi-real.
When the relationship grows and the reality becomes more unstable, the lies get bigger. Or, there are other rifts in the reality. For example, some of what your husband says might be contradictory, however, he may believe what he is saying. I once dated two women at the same time and told each of them I loved them more than the other one. This is because who I loved more depended on who was in front of me at the time.
Your husband is likely doing the kid thing of lying to get out of those other lies he told. When lies get that big, I am 100% aware of them, however, I will keep digging a hole if there’s a chance I can “repair” the damage, restore my reputation and get my own way.
I think, for me, most of the injuries I cause to others are the side-effects of trying to keep my ludicrous version of reality ticking along. This means keeping people on side (trauma bonded) so my needs get met (and there are a lot of those). I have beliefs about myself that I need constantly affirmed so my false self can do its job and keep me feeling alive. For example, I’m super special and the best at everything I do.
Since this is objectively not the case, reality has to change. This is unfortunate to anyone who is nearby at the time.
The other day my friend beat me at chess, fair and square. This cannot happen. I am perfect, I am brilliant at chess, I never lose. If I lose, that makes me vulnerable. The false self wobbles and falls down. So at some point over the next few days I will probably bat my eyelashes and casually drop into conversation that I let her win because she seemed to be having a bad day and I wanted to cheer her up. The result:
I am unbeatable at chess again
I am a good guy who cheers people up
She isn’t as good as me
I don’t have bad days, she does.
She is currently in the very, very early stages of being devalued. That’s when this kind of gaslighting usually begins and I find it impossible to stop. I may have done this during idealisation as well if I felt especially injured. That is less likely to happen then, however, as my brain is dripping with dopamine.
I might pay her a compliment shortly after I take her chess win away, like telling her it was still a really good game and I miss seeing her beautiful smile. I might mean it, I might not. This is to ensure I keep her on side. It’s conditioning and I never had to learn to do it, I just do it.
For her, the side effect of this repeating over and over is that she will doubt both her gaming abilities and her mental health. I don’t set out to do this, however, I’m 100% aware that this results. Another long-term side effect for her is that this kind of abuse is like crack, making it easy for me to manipulate her.
My narcissistic boyfriend loves to rewrite history and make up things that didn’t happen, especially when it’s about the abuse he inflicts. Is this a common narcissistic trait?
Rewriting history is very common. As others have said, it’s part of the gaslighting arsenal. It involves something called magical thinking.
Magical thinking is any bollocks that defies logic and makes my perception of reality correct. My youngest daughter says there’s a unicorn in her wardrobe that threw her socks on the floor. She’ll believe it for a while: she wants it to be true so she can dodge getting in trouble for her crimes of the sock. This is adorable because she’s 3.
Mentally, I’m about the same age. Magical thinking is how I can support my perfect false self and avoid shame. Since nobody is perfect, especially not a hideous asshat like me, reality has to warp and out come the unicorns.
The same goes with your boyfriend: how can he be wrong? How can he be an abuser if he’s perfect? If you remind him he has abused you, he will experience a narcissistic injury. That pain can’t stay in so it has to go somewhere, probably on to you, so there will sometimes be projection and blame-shifting as well as gaslighting.
Smaller, more believable edits to reality are the most effective. So slamming you into the wall and screaming in your face becomes, “It was a reasonable reaction! I raised my voice SLIGHTLY because you put me in a corner!”
My mother can’t be bothered with small and believable edits, preferring to opt for, “That never happened”.
Your boyfriend probably doesn’t know he’s doing this, however, it doesn’t matter; I know I do this and still do it. It’s not easy to explain. A little voice inside knows I’m full of hot air. However, a bigger part completely believes what I’m saying. It’s like when you get to the pub at 7pm and say, “I’ll just have one”. Then at 3am the next morning your friends are trying to carry you into your house while you’re slurring, “Wha…? Haaa… kebab?”
The best way to deal with this, other than to avoid his kind, is to keep records. My ex, who I’m co-parenting with, will not have an important conversation with me in person or on the phone without recording it. It’s how you can really catch us out.
the self-described narcissist blog post sounds fascinating, do you have a link?
Here’s the post I was thinking of.
Another post from the same guy:
And a third one: