Narcissism can infect friendships in silent, toxic ways! Overt narcissists tend to have obviously self-centered traits, and this makes it fairly easy to spot them and keep them at bay. Covert narcissists can be difficult to detect; they can pull you in with subtle, exploitative games. Often termed “vampire friendships,” they can leave you feeling confused, drained, and filled with self-doubt. But no matter the type of narcissist you’ve encountered, it’s easy to be taken in by their manipulative ploys and charisma. In fact, you might “suddenly” realize that a friend you’ve known for years has heavily narcissistic traits that were carefully masked. If you’re in a friendship (or other relationship) with someone that you think is deeply narcissistic, this important episode will help you notice and understand the common traits and tactics of those with NPD (narcissistic personality disorder) or severe narcissism. Join Dr. Carla as she discusses narcissistic traits and how they are revealed in friendships. Remember, you deserve healthy relationships built on trust, reciprocity, and empathy!

Check out this narcissistic survey: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/LXJZLC3

Topics discussed include friendship, narcissism, covert narcissists, overt narcissists, narcissistic spectrum, empathy, love, safety, reciprocity, honesty, gossip, gaslighting, imperfection, emotional vampires, vampire friends, vampire friendships, exploitation, and healthy relationships.

Please note that this episode may contain sensitive material; listener discretion is advised.

Emergency Assistance Note: If you or someone you know needs immediate support, please call your emergency services. In the US, 24/7 help is available by calling “911” or “988” (Suicide and Crisis Hotline). Support/informational links are in the show notes.

IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER: No expert is offering medical or psychological direction or advice; the content is purely informational in nature. Please consult your physician or healthcare provider before undertaking any new regimen or procedure.

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Joy From Fear: Create the Life of Your Dreams by Making Fear Your Friend 

Date Smart: Transform Your Relationships and Love Fearlessly

Aging Joyfully: A Woman’s Guide to Optimal Health, Relationships, and Fulfillment for Her 50s and Beyond

The Joy of Imperfect Love: The Art of Creating Healthy, Securely Attached Relationships

Imperfect Love Relationship & Oracle Card Deck by Dr. Carla Manly:

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The Dark Side of Narcissistic Friendships & Emotional Vampires

How to Identify Narcissistic Friendships & Emotional Vampires

Is there a friend in your life who you think might be strongly narcissistic? Are there red flags, like a lack of empathy, self-absorbed behavior, and manipulative tactics? Do you sometimes feel like you’re being taken advantage of or exploited for personal gain? Do you feel like the friendship is somewhat disposable, that the person might get rid of you if a better friend comes along?

Are there occasions where, after spending time with this person, you feel drained and emotionally exhausted, as if the very life energy has been sucked out of you? If so, you may have a narcissist and what is sometimes called a vampire friendship on your hands. Stay tuned for an interesting and illuminating episode about what narcissistic friendships look like and how you can pay attention to the red flags and distance yourself from people who call themselves friends, but engage in anything but genuinely friendship-building behaviors.

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It’s common for us to believe that our friendships are wonderful and perfect, or at least that there are relationships that grow over time. However, when it comes to friendships, sometimes, they’re tainted by a high degree of narcissism. It’s so important to be able to recognize narcissistic traits so that you can create friendships that feel safe, healthy, and good to you in the short-term and long-term.

Defining Narcissism on a Continuum and Its Core Traits in Relationships

If there is someone in your life who you suspect of having narcissistic traits to a high degree, even if they don’t have narcissistic personality disorder, you’ll want to tune in and take note of these very significant and problematic traits. To start, let’s talk about what makes narcissism narcissism. Narcissism is something that we all have in us. We all have a little bit of healthy narcissism because we need to think about ourselves in order to get proper food, sleep, clothing, and all of life’s necessities. Narcissism is part and parcel of being a human.

However, as we go up the continuum of narcissism toward where narcissistic personality disorder is, we see a pronounced level of narcissistic traits where the person is very self-absorbed, consistently looking out for their interests over other people’s interests, lacks compassion, lacks empathy, and lacks the ability to create a strong and true friendship or relationship.

It may look good. Sometimes, you may be drawn into a relationship where that person is able to show love and connection, or what appears to be love and connection. As the mask goes away over time, you’ll see these traits become more pronounced. That’s why you might have someone in your life who has a high degree of narcissism, but you don’t notice it at first because maybe you weren’t spending significant amounts of time together. As with any mental health issue, the more you’re around someone, the more you may see something, like heavily pronounced narcissistic traits, come into the room or relationship.

Let’s take a deep look at this. When we are in a narcissistic relationship, one of the first things we’ll notice is the lack of empathy. This is a part of someone high on that narcissistic spectrum. Narcissistic personality disorder cannot be diagnosed by a layperson. It must be diagnosed by a mental health professional. Often, people with narcissistic personality disorder don’t want to be diagnosed. They don’t see any problem with them.

You might have a hard time finding that what your gut instinct is saying is narcissistic personality disorder. The other person may not see that in themselves at all. This is part of the problem. The person who is heavily narcissistic, even if they don’t have narcissistic personality disorder, may not see any problem with how they operate because it feels familiar to them. It feels safe, genuine, and valid.

Often, narcissistic personality disorder begins in early childhood and is created as a coping mechanism for that person to get their needs met. There are lots of reasons why that will occur in someone, but that’s not the topic of this episode. This episode is about how it manifests in what some might call a friendship. The reason it’s not a genuine friendship is because a genuine friendship needs core components such as empathy, responsibility, investment in the relationship, not just for having their needs met in the short-term and long-term. That is something that a person who has a high degree of narcissism won’t be able to do unless they get ongoing treatment.

Some of the highlights or the key pieces of a so-called narcissistic friendship are that lack of empathy, so be on the lookout for that. Another key piece is that the person is often very charismatic. They are able to draw you in with their warmth, kindness, and gentleness. These are often highly superficial qualities that can erode, especially under circumstances that may be a bit difficult to navigate. Often, you start seeing the person’s true colors come out when in stressful situations.

What’s another piece of a narcissistic friendship? Another piece is especially if you’re dealing with someone who is an overt narcissist. The overt narcissist is more obvious, more flamboyant in their bids for attention and their bids for being the center of things and having life be all about them. The overt narcissist tends to have that bigger, obvious dose of narcissistic energy.

Whereas the covert narcissist tends to get their needs for attention and admiration in more subtle ways. They may make themselves the object of a derisive joke. They may be self-effacing and self-deprecating. That’s the more covert part. You’ll notice some of your so-called friends may have blatantly narcissistic personalities. Others may be more covert, a little more understated, but at that core, remember, is that part of the narcissist where everything goes back to being about them.

The narcissist is always going to, at the end of the day, be focused on themselves. They are the primary focus. Remember that no matter how much they confuse you by showing you doses of attention and friendship now and again, when push comes to shove, that narcissist is going to be looking out for themselves. I’m reminding you. I’m not talking about somebody who necessarily has narcissistic personality disorder. I’m talking about people who are higher on that spectrum of narcissism. They’re away from that normal, healthy range and going more and more toward the self-absorbed range.

Where else might you see narcissistic traits in a friendship? The narcissist will tend to use other people. They may call you only when there are times of trouble. They may call you when they need something, like help with a project. They may call you when they don’t have anybody else to talk to or no one else in their realm to hang out with. They will tend to make use of other people to meet their needs, especially if they’re lonely, struggling in some way, or simply bored.

Lack of Responsibility, Resorting to the Victim Role, and Gaslighting

Another piece of the person who is narcissistic is that in a friendship, they will have a lack of responsibility. If they’ve offended you, they will be very resistant to taking responsibility for offending you. They will not want to apologize. They will often see no need to apologize because, in their eyes, they’re often perfect or nearly perfect. They often find themselves in the victim role. This is important to notice about the narcissist. They will often resort to it being something you’ve done to them.

Even if you try to have a discussion with this type of friend and say, “I feel hurt when you did this or when you said that about me,” they’ll make it about them. They’ll say, “How could you say that? I’m a good person. Nobody else sees problems with me. I can’t believe that you said that.” Instead of being accountable or taking responsibility for something they’ve said or done that was offensive, they will make it back on you. This is a type of gaslighting that type of person is renowned for in a negative way. They will take something that you’ve said and create a different reality so that you are left wondering, “What the heck happened? That’s not my memory at all.”

When we look at this and call it a friendship, I use that term very carefully because true friends don’t engage in this behavior. True friends aren’t perfect, but when they realize something has gone awry, they’ll take responsibility. They’ll have the conversation about it. They’ll work through it. Which leads us to the next piece about a narcissistic friendship.

That person who is a narcissist will often hold heavy resentments. They don’t let things go, even though they say they do. You may have had an issue with this person 5 or 10 years ago and think it was resolved because you talked about it, but in another conversation, they’ll bring it up, and you’ll unexpectedly be the target or the focus of the issue.

You’ll think, “I thought we resolved this,” but no. The narcissist doesn’t like to resolve things. The narcissist likes to hold onto them and use them as ammunition at a later date. They will weaponize anything they find that is a vulnerability. They’ll save it in their backpack, so they can pull it out at a later date in order to have power and control over you or over the friendship. It’s a key piece.

The other thing about the narcissist is that they are so needy of attention and other people’s admiration that they will get it in whatever way possible. They may gossip about you in order to get other people’s positive feedback. Other people would then be like, “I can’t believe this person did that to you. You poor thing.” They may gossip about you because they’re bored.

A key piece about a narcissistic friendship, and this is something to be emphasized, is that the person will say anything about you behind closed doors, sometimes even in front of you, if it’s something that serves their needs. It’s hard to believe for people who are interested in strong and true friendships to say, “Why would that person gossip about me? Why would I overhear them talking about me? Why would they sell me out in that conversation?” Sadly, that’s what the narcissist does. They will sell you out because they are at the core of every relationship.

The Core Belief of Superiority, Intense Jealousy, and Toxic Envy

It is always going to be about them. They are smarter, better, and more entitled. They are more whatever it might be that is in their mind because they believe on a core level that they are superior. Whatever stories they’ve made up in their mind and make them believe that is true, it’s part of that defense mechanism, They created that to believe that they are these wonderful characters or wonderful people who have been victimized by life and who have not been given the breaks they need or deserve, the money they should have, or the success they should have.

This leads us to another piece. They can be intensely jealous. They can also be highly envious. Jealousy comes about in relationships. For example, you may have a friendship with another person. The narcissist may be very jealous of that other person. They may be jealous of your romantic partner. They may be jealous of a member of your family. They can get jealous in relationships because they believe that they deserve all the attention. They deserve you whenever they need you, even if you have something else going on.

When we look at the envy component in narcissism, and this is important, envy is about wanting something you have. We all have little bits of envy. It’s not that it’s a bad emotion. Envy comes up. We see something and go, “I’m motivated to get whatever this person has,” whether it’s their success or maybe a possession they have.

We can be like, “I’m going to work hard because I like what they have.” Envy can help us in that way. It can be motivating. However, envy can also work against us and our relationships. When we crave what somebody else has in a negative way, we don’t want to do the work. We just want to get what that person has. We want to take it from them. That’s where envy can be damaging in relationships.

When it comes to a narcissistic friendship, it can be so contaminated with envy, which is very toxic and heavy, that it will percolate through the relationship. You might not understand what it is at first, especially if you’re a person who doesn’t live in an envious space. You may go, “What is that about? They made a jab about my new purse. They made a jab about my partner. They made a jab about my promotion at work. They are constantly eyeing whether I bought something new. They want to have my travel destinations,” or whatever it might be.

Those are all signs of unhealthy envy because the person isn’t using their desire to be motivated to create change in their lives. They’re using envy as a way to try to bring you down so that in their imaginary world, they can get what you have or what they deserve because life is all about them. These are key pieces. They’re sad. They’re hard to process on some levels. For people who are genuinely good, kind souls who want strong and healthy relationships, these qualities may seem like, “How could they possibly exist?” Sadly, they do.

The “Emotional Vampire” Quality and Transactional Relationships

Another piece about the narcissistic friendship is that you feel very exhausted after being with this person. You’ll feel like they’ve drained your energy because there is a vampire-like quality to them. They will sink their teeth in, and I’m talking symbolically or metaphorically. They will sink their teeth into you to extract whatever it is they need.

Maybe they need your time. Maybe they need you to do something for them. Maybe they need you to write a paper for them or give them money. Maybe they need you to feed their sense of self-worth. Maybe they need you to give them lodging while they exit a relationship or something like that. That is how the person works. The narcissistic friend will be navigating using you as a stepping stone toward whatever it is they want next in life.

It’s not about building a reciprocal relationship where they are truly, deeply there for you and you for them. That’s reciprocity. When you peel back the layers of the narcissist, you will be able to see that what they do is very calculated and manipulative. That is another element that is the heart of the narcissist. There is a lack of a good relationship with honesty. They can be very dishonest. When you listen to their stories, their stories will change. You’ll think, “That’s not what they told me before. This is something different.”

They’ll be manipulative. That manipulation is part and parcel of who the narcissist is. Think of them as though they’re crossing the stream of life, and they’re moving from one stepping stone to the other. That’s how they see relationships. It’s transactional. It’s very much, “What can I get from you? What can you give me now?”

Let’s take a pause and remember that this is often not very obvious. If you’ve been in a friendship with someone for decades, a few years, or a few months, it may not be obvious. It may only come at a time when your psyche is able to put the puzzle pieces together, and you’re able to look and say, “This is what’s happening. Now, these dynamics make sense. Now, I’m getting what’s happened over time.”

You then feel possibly like, “How did I not see this sooner? How did I not notice this?” It’s because, especially if you’re a genuinely good human being with a positive outlook, you’re not on the lookout for people to take advantage of you. The idea of somebody who calls you their friend, but at the core of it is only being about them, might not be something that was ever on your radar, but now it is. Now you know that these kinds of relationships are out there and that they occur on a continuum.

Even a healthy friendship might have threads of this at times. The person says, “I want to go out with you, but I can’t because I want to stay in. I’m so tired.” That’s a bit on the self-absorbed end, but that’s healthy. That’s good to be able to openly state, “Thank you for inviting me out, but I’m going to stay in because I need good self-care.” That’s honest. A narcissistic friend might say, “You need to come out with me because I need you. It’s so important. You never do things for me. I need you to come out with me. I’ll be all alone,” and then you give in. That’s a tactic a narcissist would use. That’s the difference.

If you flip it and you want to go out, the narcissist might say, “I’m going to stay in,” and then you later find out that they went out with a group of friends and didn’t invite you. It’s not that that’s a problem that they went out without you. It’s the fact that they lied to you or manipulated you. Sometimes, it takes us years in order to start seeing these patterns.

That’s a list of some of the primary parts of a narcissistic friendship. You can look at my survey. They’re on my website. Take my narcissistic survey so you can see if someone in your life has a low, moderate, or high degree of narcissistic traits. That will help you get a sense of foundational stability about what you’re experiencing.

The Path Forward: Assessing Likelihood of Change and Setting Boundaries

What can you do? It’s up to you to decide if you want to have any level of friendship with this person. If you become aware that they’re high on that narcissistic spectrum and you say, “They don’t want to learn, grow, and forge a new healthy relationship with me,” that’s probably a pretty good conclusion. If the narcissist is not in ongoing therapy working on this issue, they will not change. Few narcissists seek therapy to change because they don’t see any problem with themselves. They think it’s everybody else.

If the person wants to change and shows you signs that they are wanting and willing to change, grow, evolve, and find ways to form a true friendship, that’s a big green light or a big green flag. However, in most cases, even talking to the individual about what you are experiencing, saying, “I feel like you take advantage of me. I feel sad about this. Here’s an example,” that person will likely come back at you, criticize you, put you down, and make it all about them.

You can see the absent desire to talk about the issues, find healthy strategies, and find ways to bring honesty, empathy, and genuine connection into the relationship. Those are going to be hard because most narcissists, even if they have good psychobabble going below the surface, getting to the heart of things, and being able to reflect on their own inner world, take responsibility, give solid apologies, let go of resentments, let go of passive-aggressive behaviors, and all of those things that are essential for the relationship to develop, are not going to be likely to do these things.

You can choose to try to work through some of these issues with the person. If you get a lot of green lights where they say, “I want to work on being more empathic. I’m sorry that I gossiped about you. I realize I made an error. I don’t want to do that. I don’t want to gossip about people,” that’s wonderful news. It’s a sign that a true friendship can be formed, but you want to make sure the person is serious and that they’re not giving you lip service. True friendship and true love, even imperfect as all love and friendships are because we’re all imperfect, are more about noticing where the stumbles are and moving from those stumbles in a more evolved, healthy way.

Narcissists are unlikely to do this because they don’t do that true, deep self-awareness work to be able to say, “I get this. It makes sense what you are saying. I see that I was gaslighting you. I don’t want to do that. I see I didn’t have your back over here, and I always have mine or try to have mine.” That takes a lot of inner work to be able to do that. Narcissists don’t tend to do a lot of inner work. Even if they know the psychobabble, going inwards is very scary for the narcissist.

What you might find is that you are left with accepting a very superficial relationship, backing off from it as far as your needs, expectations, and your willingness to participate and continue to be a doormat. You might have very strong boundaries, and the narcissist may fade away and go on to the next person they can take advantage of.

If this person has very high, what I call, emotional vampire-like qualities where they’re draining you, then it may be time, with graciousness and simplicity, to end the relationship and stop communicating. It’s not out of a place of being angry, resentful, or punitive, but from a place where you realize, “This isn’t healthy. Trying to talk about it with the person won’t get me anywhere because they’ve shut down my attempts before. I need to take care of myself. I’ll put my energy into creating friendships where there is truth, honesty, integrity, reciprocity, empathy, and all of those good things that I truly deserve.”

Remember, we are all works in progress. If you feel that there’s someone in your life, whether it’s a friend, family member, or partner, with whom you’re seeing these threads of narcissism, feel free to take my narcissistic assessment. It’s a nice survey that will allow you to see things a little more objectively, and then you can choose your next path forward. You deserve healthy, attuned relationships. Thanks, as always, for sharing your time and energy with me.

Important Links

• THE NARCISSISM ASSESSMENT: Mindset and Behavioral Tendencies, Scaled
• NAMI HelpLine
• Dr. Carla Manly’s Website
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