Reddit reviews The Covert Passive Aggressive Narcissist: Recognizing the Traits and Finding Healing After Hidden Emotional and Psychological Abuse

N’s use triangulation to essentially control the narrative by manipulating others to see things through their perspective, which is them the stable partner and you the exact opposite. They will say things like “well so and so agrees with me that you are blah blah, or I told so and so about a,b,c and they said you are [insert negative trait]
In your situation it sounds like he is doing it to your face which is even worse, these people are not your friends - at all.

Unfortunately is no way to defend yourself here, you end up just reinforcing the belief that you are x,y,z. And cause he is ‘such a nice genuine guy’ (false self they display to the world) why wouldn’t they believe him??

My ex used the same language, I don’t have many genuine male friends, women just understand me better. Umm yeah, with that massive chip on your shoulder and victim mentality it’s no wonder men don’t want to engage with you long term. It’s the traditionally (I’m generalising here so please excuse me) female traits of care and empathy and patience that they are relying on to hook them in.

I asked my Nex in the beginning if he was talking to any other women, he said no. Come to find out he talked to countless women, online, at the gym, at work, on these women centric (oops it just so happens only chicks seem to have the same dog breed as me) Facebook groups he joined. When I called him on it he said I was referring to ‘talking to sexually, not as friends, and I don’t talk to anyone sexually so you should have been more specific’. No MF’er you know exactly what I meant - Argghh!!!

I’m concerned you are still in this situation, it’s incredibly difficult to heal in the same place you were hurt. I am two years post break up, however only discovered covert narcissism through this sub about 6 months ago...it has reopened the wound as validating as it is to know if wasn’t me all along. I can’t imagine still being with him, and living ‘in the fog’ with a partner who will ultimately tear you down. 10 years, I’m gobsmacked you aren’t in a straight jacket by now, you are much stronger than you give yourself credit for.

The following book (suggested by another user here which opened my eyes to this type of abuse) was a fantastic resource for me, I highly recommend it. It has a chapter around intermittent reinforcement which is what he is doing with the future talk minus him scenarios, inserting maybes into your self conscious is an incredibly powerful, and effective psychological tactic narcs use as part of their arsenal.

https://www.amazon.com/Covert-Passive-Aggressive-Narcissist-Psychological-ebook/dp/B078KXGS98

https://www.amazon.com/Covert-Passive-Aggressive-Narcissist-Psychological-ebook/dp/B078KXGS98

Please read.

For me, The New Codependency by Melody Beattie was better than Codependent No More. I have been reading The Covert Passive Aggressive Narcissist: Recognizing the Traits and Finding Healing After Hidden Emotional and Psychological Abuse and it has been really helpful.