Love shouldn't be a problem. It can't always be an easy road either. But loving a narcissist is trouble.
The problem comes not only when you are with them but after you leave them, in recovery. Because you can't just forget the memories of when you loved them and when you wrongly thought they loved you. It hurts. There is a grieving over this that is hard to admit to yourself, never mind others. So that during recovery from narcissistic abuse you are constantly in a state of cognitve dissonance and it drives you mad. You can go from feeling angry at them to feeling sorry for them and back again.
Our minds want closure, they want a conclusion and once the mind has that it rests. But with narcissistic abuse it is difficult, even years later to get this closure. To stop thinking about the good times. Some survivors try to only focus on the bad times and remain in a state of anger and even hatred. But not everyone is capable of doing that, to some it can be damaging. You just do what works for you.
So what do you do with your feelings of 'sometimes good and sometimes bad' memories of the narcissist in your life?
What I did to stop the madness of 'sometimes good sometimes bad' stuff was to make peace with it all. To accept that this is how it is. That it is ok for me to think about the narcissists in my life with love or anger, when it comes. What happened is that eventually the strong emotions I once felt started to fade. It didn't stop me from thinking the same thing but it had less charge each time.
Trauma bonding leaves you with a tug at your heart towards the narcissists. But if you can feel that tug but not do anything about it, not go back, you have, in fact, begun the process of healing. You can still think of going back but know you never will. Then you can start to grieve what never was, never will be. The loss is great.
You can't just pretend you loved someone or that you had good times, even if they were faked by the narcissist for their benefit. Our minds store that stuff.
In healing you have to go over all those times and it hurts so much. So if you are going through this just know that it fades but may always be there. And like grief over a person who has died you may grieve the loss of the person you once thought you loved. You will also have to grieve the fact that this person may have never loved you, or hated you, used you in the most horrible way. But you have to find your own way to heal from it.
Betrayal trauma is real and it takes time and courage to face it. You build your life around it, despite it. Then one day you realise that you have to love yourself. That all the love you gave to others may have been a way of avoiding loving yourself. You looked for it outside. But real love comes when you begin to love you, as you are, unconditionally. You don't need a narcissist to fill that need anymore. It is within you. This is the conclusion.
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