Not Every Discard by a Narcissist Involves Being Discarded

verb

give (someone) a lower rank or less senior position, usually as a punishment.

When a narcissist demotes their supply it involves placing them on the back burner in a very strategic way, by reducing their role in their life.

This can be done in many ways but the one method I’ve seen (and experienced) the most is the narcissist weaponizing friendship as a means to trigger their supply into once again desired behaviors and compliance.

Demotions are also more commonly used on the narcissist’s primary supply because they still need whatever resources the primary supply provides, so they actually cannot afford to get rid of them.

It’s the subtlest way a narcissist discards their primary source of supply without actually getting rid of them because it involves them being given a lesser role in the narcissist’s life without actually being removed from their lives.

At the point of demotion, the primary source has committed some kind of offense that has injured or triggered the narcissist.

Maybe they’ve started setting boundaries, saying “no” more often, or started putting themselves before the narcissist in some vital way.

In some cases, a demotion will take place when the narcissist instinctively feels like their primary supply source is about to discard them.

The shock of them beating the primary supply to the deed usually shocks the primary supply into a cognitive dissonance that jumpstarts the abuse cycle from scratch while reversing the chase.

This is where dopamine manipulation comes into play:

Dopamine: The Narcissist’s Greatest Weapon Against You
The real reason most victims of narcissistic abuse become addicts — and how it’s done.
medium.com

This is also how victims of narcissistic abuse who are about to escape end up tricked into another cycle with their abusers.

Just as they are utilized in the corporate world, demotions are nearly always used as punishment by the narcissist. And here’s exactly how one narcissist I knew almost weaponized it perfectly.

…

Meet Quentin (the Malignant Narcissist)

I was introduced to him through my friend Nadia

For context, Quentin and Nadia dated years ago but were trying to rekindle what they had.

As much as Quentin wanted to pick up where they left off and resume their relationship, Nadia wasn’t comfortable moving at the same speed.

She kept claiming she needed time which left Quentin waiting for a commitment while pulling out all the stops (love-bombing her) to convince her to make a decision. As time went by, Quentin’s mask started slipping.

One night while we were talking he admitted that his dynamic with Nadia was frustrating him because he was being forced into a “submissive” role when he preferred to be the dominant one in all of his relationships.

What was causing this submission?

Respecting Nadia’s boundaries.

The lack of control over where (and how) the relationship was steered left him without the control that he was accustomed to.

He was being forced to take it slow, which narcissists hate to do because they tend to prefer their relationships fast-paced.

He was also being forced to wait and see if he would be chosen, which narcissists might actually hate even more since it involves them feeling devalued.

Narcissists like to be the ones to initiate and end their relationships.

Having supply decide whether or not they want to pick you is a massive blow to their ego. But things were about to get much worse because Quentin was about to turn the tables in a way none of us saw coming.

…

The Battle of the Narcissists

When the malignant narcissist and the covert narcissist collide

Nadia’s breadcrumbing had increased as Quentin became even more suspicious. He was increasingly losing control of the situation.

No matter how much he love-bombed or catered to her it didn’t work. He wasn’t getting the attention or commitment that he wanted.

In fact, the harder he appeared to love her the less she seemed invested or interested. Things got worse as he started catching her in a multitude of lies.

It finally came out that Nadia had actually been messing with a man at her job when she and Quentin had gotten reacquainted — and had never stopped.

I think now is actually a good time to tell you that Nadia was a covert narcissist. She was breadcrumbing Quentin so that she could receive a double dose of lovebombing from two separate sources.

She was also triangulating him to punish him for the mistakes he made when they dated the first time around.

She didn’t “need time” because what she wasn’t doing with Quentin she was doing with the other guy.

Once the truth was out, Quentin was fed up because he realized Nadia would have kept him on a chase had he not found out about the other man.

The only thing he had left, to gain control over the situation, was to change the dynamic entirely. He wanted to be compensated for all that energy he had put into Nadia. So… he demoted her.

…

From Primary Supply to Backup Supply

Quentin reversed the chase while leveling the playing field

Quentin told Nadia that he felt it was best that they backed up from doing anything romantic and focused on only being friends.

But here was the catch:

Quentin told Nadia that this would be a “probationary period” to see if they could eventually build their way back into a relationship.

Nadia agreed to his terms because she wasn’t really in a position to say “no” unless she actually wanted to lose him.

This is how Quentin reversed the chase while turning the tables on Nadia by demoting Nadia from his love interest to his “friend”.

The parameters of this demotion involved him withholding all of the perks she received when he was lovebombing her while administering the bare minimum of his,

time
communication
affection
attention
and energy

In other words, he was breadcrumbing her now.

Suddenly it was Nadia who was trying to pursue him and was now the one feeling anxious and unsettled, as she waited around for any semblance of his attention.

Quentin had regained control of the situation and was no longer the submissive in this dynamic. He was fully in charge and calling all the shots.

Just the way he liked it.

But this was only the start of his pattern.

…

Meet Alicia (the New Supply)

The backup supply that nobody knew about

Alicia was a coworker of Quentin’s that he was very attracted to sexually but had avoided at all cost, out of respect for Nadia.

within a week of Nadia’s demotion, Quentin told me about Alicia.
the day after he told me about her, Alicia approached Quentin at work, expressing interest in him. (Ironically.)
the day after Alicia approached him, they went on their first date where he also met her daughter.

Let’s be clear, he and Nadia were still actively building.

But now he was breadcrumbing her and growing even more distant; as well as initiating the beginning stages of entertaining another woman.

His reasoning:

If she had treated me the way she should’ve and given me what I asked for I wouldn’t have made these decisions. If she had stepped up I wouldn’t have had to step out.

This was about revenge.

Quentin was now treating Nadia exactly how she had spent the past three months treating him.

As I said earlier, narcissists will often demote supply from a romantic love interest to a friend as a form of punishment.

And here’s why.

Demotions are a form of withholding

It’s a devaluation maneuver that leaves the primary supply scrambling to not only get back in the narcissist’s good graces but it puts them in a competitive space as they try to earn back their previous position.

When it came to Nadia, Quentin withheld affection and romantic expressions more and more while contacting her less and less.

He also made no time to see her.

On Nadia’s end, this sudden demotion actually affected her.

On the one hand, she didn’t want to give him the relationship she kept dangling over his face but she still wanted to receive all of the perks of being treated as though she were in one.

(She called what they had a pseudo-relationship)

Without realizing it, this maneuver was getting her in line, just the way Quentin wanted.

As things fell apart between them, Quentin and I would have another conversation where he would express his plan to officially let Nadia know that he no longer had any interest in moving things past the friend zone.

He was, however, going to leave himself open to explore where things go with Alicia. And Nadia knew none of this was going on. And he felt this was fair as he had been unaware of her coworker’s existence.

At the time of a demotion, it’s common for the primary supply to be triangulated with the new supply.

This is where all of the narcissist’s attention is now going and why it was so simple for them to shift their focus, to begin with.

But, unbeknownst to Nadia, she was about to be permanently demoted by Quentin… until she surprised him with a power move of her own.

A self-discard.

…

The Checkmate None of Us Saw Coming

And how it revealed Quentin’s ulterior motive by unmasking him

Two nights after his date with Alicia, Quentin got into a heated conversation with Nadia where she told him it was best they went their separate ways.

She realized it was unfair to make him wait for a commitment she wasn’t ready to give him.

Nadia meant this, from the heart.

She was letting him go.

Her self-reflective and genuine demeanor added an extra layer of shock to the outcome because it gave Quentin nothing left to work with.

Nadia had discarded herself and she did this by demoting herself from being his friend to now becoming somebody that he used to know.

And this affected Quentin — but not for the reasons you think.

Me and Quentin were on a video call and Nadia was actually texting me when it happened. So, I saw his face the exact moment she texted him this.

He was shocked and for a moment, he was actually speechless.

When I asked if he was okay he told me that he wasn’t.

When I asked him why, his only reply was…

I never got my lick back.

(Meaning, he never got his revenge.)

Now, I was speechless.

He had me fooled.

An eye for an eye

Initially, I actually felt his decision to demote Nadia was justified because she was playing him.

I also thought his progression with Alicia was natural because of how it appeared to have flowed. After all, she approached him (according to him).

I also felt it was understandable because it was clear Nadia could not be trusted as someone to romantically build with.

But now it was clear:

Quentin reducing Nadia’s role in his life to that of a friend had nothing to do with building a more stable foundation for a potential future together.

he demoted Nadia as a form of punishment
and he only pursued Alicia to hurt Nadia (and move his revenge plot along)

Nothing about this situation was sincere, at all.

This was a punishment that served his ego and he was willing to take down whoever he had to in order to make sure Nadia paid the price.

An eye for an eye.

A co-worker for a co-worker.

Which meant Alicia wasn’t a love interest at all,

She was a pawn in a grander scheme.

…

Quentin Was Hiding His Motive in Plain Sight

By using Nadia’s covert narcissism to hide his malignant narcissism

Quentin wanted Nadia to chase and pine for him, just so he could reject her. He was using the promise of a “potential future” to bait her into this.

The same way she did him.

The reason his strategy was more covert than hers was because hers was revealed first; leaving him in the convenient position of actually being and looking like the victim.

(This was a matter of who appeared to be the lesser of two evils.)

And he knew this.

Because if you found out you were being triangulated and played, who would argue with you for moving on and exploring other options?

Especially if you told the person who betrayed you that you were no longer going to be moving in a romantic direction with them.

This is why he chose this particular powerplay because sometimes that’s exactly the type of supply a narcissist needs most,

Someone to reject.

The problem now was that Nadia would no longer be that supply for him so he ended up getting it from Alicia the following morning.

When he got to work, she greeted him warmly only to be met with a cold demeanor as he told her that he was only interested in being just friends now.

He specified that this demotion was a result of him “needing time to heal from the ways things had gone with Nadia”.

This is probably a good time to also tell you that Alicia knew about Nadia and was aware of Nadia’s dynamic with Quentin when she went on her date with him. Alicia agreed to his terms.

Just as Nadia did.

Only, Alicia made it very clear to him that whenever he was ready and open to it, she would be waiting and willing.

Alicia’s demotion only made her more determined to be a backup source of supply for Quentin, as long as it meant she would eventually be chosen.

She was playing the long game by playing the waiting game.

This is exactly why narcissists like Quentin utilize demotions

They weaponize the roles their victims play in their lives because they know they will usually get away with promoting and demoting their supply sources because sometimes that’s all a good supply source needs,

Something to earn.

In Alicia’s case, it was Quentin’s affection.

Same as Nadia.

The only reason this didn’t pan out the way it was supposed to with Nadia is that she demoted and discarded herself and walked away.

Not only did she refuse to be his friend, but she also refused to be in his life. She removed herself from the equation and took her energy off the board. Now, there was nothing and no one for him to play (or play with).

Without even realizing it, she took away his primary su[[ly source and left him with no real supply of substance.

Alicia couldn’t provide what Nadia did. More than that, Alicia wasn’t enough of a challenge. She was too easy — and willing.

Narcissists — especially malignant narcissists — like a challenge because it’s in the winning and the conquering that they feed their egos and get the most out of their supply.

The moment Nadia sent Quentin that text he knew he was about to starve because now he was left without any real sustainable source of supply.

Without her even realizing it, Nadia won.

About Me — Linda Sharp
The writer who has to write in order to stay alive — I am not kidding.
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This post was previously published on medium.com.

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