When you think of a narcissist, what is the first thing that comes to mind?  For most of us, what comes to mind is the brash, aggressive, loud, confident person who will do anything to attract attention and whose ego walks into the room even before they do.  This is the traditional view of the narcissist which many of us are aware of and it’s not incorrect, it’s just that this is nowhere near the full story.  The reality is that there is a form of narcissism that is hidden from view, that is hard to detect except to the trained eye and if anything, is even more dangerous than overt narcissism which can be spotted from a mile away.  This hidden form of narcissism is what is known as covert narcissism.

A narcissist, whether overt or covert is driven by the compulsion to have certain underlying needs met, which is what leads to their narcissistic, selfish behaviour.  We know that narcissists crave attention, and while the overt narcissist will force you to meet this need through aggressive and unreasonable demands, the covert narcissist will use manipulation to get you to meet their needs.  They may do this for example through pity plays whereby they portray themselves as the victim of life’s unfairness.  The underlying need for attention is the same in both narcissists, it’s just that the strategy for meeting the need is different.  We also know that narcissists have an inflated sense of their own importance.  While the overt narcissist will openly show their inflated ego by putting down others or trying to outdo them, the covert narcissist will display this in more subtle ways such as through the belief that they are always right, which means they will hardly ever listen to or consider or accept others’ views.   Covert narcissists also lack empathy just like overt narcissists do, it’s just that the covert narcissist hides their lack of empathy through the good-guy act.  The overt narcissist simply doesn’t care what you think of his behaviour towards you while the covert narcissist is always haunted by the threat of exposure and will therefore go to great lengths to hide their real self.  They will sabotage you while pretending to be innocently unaware of what they are doing, maybe even apologizing profusely when you confront them, but this is just an act.  At their core, they are not good people and will behave in the same ways over and over again, all the while pretending to be the good guy.

The overt narcissist simply doesn’t care what you think of his behaviour towards you while the covert narcissist is always haunted by the threat of exposure and will therefore go to great lengths to hide their real self. 

The interesting thing about covert narcissists is that they genuinely believe they are the good guys.  You will find this type of narcissist hidden behind a façade of godliness, family man, best friend, advisor, counsellor, etc.  The most dangerous thing about the covert narcissist is that you won’t see them coming.  At least with the overt narcissist, once you know how to identify the signs, it becomes very easy to spot them and thus keep your distance.  With the covert narcissist, it’s a whole new ball game.  This person could be in your life for decades, draining your energy and driving you almost to the point of insanity, but you will never know that you are dealing with a narcissist.  Many people in long term relationships with covert narcissists attribute their troubled relationships to normal relationship hiccups that can be resolved if only they are patient enough, put in enough effort or love their partner enough.  But despite everything, the relationship never gets better, it only keeps getting worse until eventually after decades of suffering, they may decide to throw in the towel and leave.  The irony is that to the outside world, it will always appear as if they were married to the perfect person, the ultimate good guy, and no one will understand why they decided to leave. 

What could cause a narcissist to go into stealth mode?  In many cases, it may be because the narcissist himself was brought up by a narcissistic parent and they learnt early enough that they had to hide their own narcissism in order to survive their narcissistic parent.  They simple learnt other ways of meeting their narcissistic needs without antagonizing their narcissistic parent.  It could also be that the narcissist simply developed the most efficient way of meeting his needs in line with his personality.  While the overt narcissist will use aggression and force to have his needs met, the covert narcissist simply learnt that he is most likely to have his needs met through manipulation.  Therefore, the underlying need is still being met, it’s just that each type of narcissist uses a different strategy to achieve this.

So now that we know that narcissists do not all behave the same, how do we identify the covert narcissist and keep ourselves from falling into their dangerous traps?  Well, there are some signs to look out for that could help you identify this type of person but you need to pay close attention as they are subtle and will likely not ring any alarm bells at the beginning of a relationship.  If you are already in a long term relationship with a covert narcissist, these signs will help you understand what you are dealing with and why no matter how hard you try your relationship never seems to settle down into an easy, harmonious ride but is always full of bumps.

1.  They are passive-aggressive

A covert narcissist will never confront you head-on; they would rather hide their aggression and fury and passively confront you.  For example, they may retreat behind a wall of silence, giving you the silent treatment which may go on for extended periods.  By not confronting you directly but rather showing their displeasure in this manner, it enables them to maintain their good-guy image and at the same time manipulate you into wanting to restore the peace.  For normal people, the silent treatment is an unbearable punishment that hits you at your very core making you want to do anything to end it, even if it means apologizing and taking the blame for something that was not your fault.  The covert narcissist lacking in empathy can employ sustained silent treatments without themselves feeling the pain that a normal person feels.  Other forms of passive-aggression they employ include coming late or not showing up for meetings or dates thereby communicating how unimportant you are.  They may also embarrass you with other people present knowing that you can do nothing about it, then later behave as if nothing happened or as if it was all innocent fun.  If you suspect you may be in a relationship with a covert narcissist, think about all the ways they treat you badly while still maintaining an image of themselves as the good guy.  Think of the ways they make it look like they are not really doing anything while you who are on the receiving end know they are doing something and whatever it is they are doing is hurtful.

2. They think of themselves as victims

The covert narcissist always has a sob story from their past that they use to manipulate you into pitying them and giving them the attention they need.  They will talk about how their last girlfriend cheated on them, how their parents divorced when they were young and they never got over it, how their boss has it in for them and is making their life miserable, how their colleagues at work are jealous and take all the credit for their achievement, how they were abused as children, how they lost their jobs and can’t find a new one, etc.  The thing is, no one is denying that bad things happen to people all the time.  The fact is, bad things do happen to everyone, but one way or the other, we learn to cope, we overcome these problems and maybe even learn from them and grow to become better people.  We were never meant to remain in the same place years later, blaming all our problems on our parents’ divorce or our cheating spouse.  We are supposed to learn our lessons from whatever happened and move on to become better people.  The covert narcissist however will not want to move on from whatever happened in the past.  They will use this victimhood to paint themselves in a positive light or to make themselves appear like a martyr.  They will drain your energy with their constant need for validation and reassurance which goes beyond the normal need for comfort that one experiences immediately after something bad happens to them.  The covert narcissist will wear their victimhood like a cloak that is constant and unchanging which therefore means they need to be handled with tender loving care all the time.  Mind you meanwhile, they will not be interested in hearing about your suffering but will expect you to provide a listening ear to their woes.  It is a constant need for attention that will eventually drain you and drive you up the wall.

3. They lack emotional availability

One hallmark of narcissists is their lack of emotional availability and this is true of the covert narcissist as well.  If you’re in a long-term relationship with a covert narcissist, you will feel alone in the relationship.  They will be there with you in the physical sense, but you might as well be alone in the relationship for all the emotional support you will get from them.  Whereas they will expect you to listen to them and support them in whatever they may be going through, the same courtesy will not be accorded to you.  Your issues will be minimized if not dismissed altogether, while their issues will be made to feel life-threatening and all-important.  They will suck all your emotional energy until you constantly feel drained, but they will never invest their emotions in you.  If you go through difficulties, be it a job loss, difficulties at work, or the loss of a loved one, you will do it alone.  While the covert narcissist will be good at making all the right noises e.g., claiming to want to work at the relationship, with time you will realize that that’s all they are, noises, but underneath there is no real interest in making the changes necessary to make the relationship work.  If you find yourself feeling as if you are all alone in a relationship, then your partner could be a covert narcissist.

4. They will never compliment you

When you’re in a normal, healthy relationship with a normal, healthy person, you will always find things about each other that you appreciate, that you want to compliment.  With a covert narcissist, this will be strangely absent.  Due to their inner insecurities or perhaps inflated ego, they will never want to admit that you can do anything good or anything worthy of complimenting.  Behind this is also the fact that the narcissist probably envies you for the qualities you have that they will never have.  Ironically, these qualities are the same ones that drew the narcissist to you, that made you a target, but once in a relationship with them, they will envy you for your positive qualities and thus you will never hear a compliment come out of their mouths.  At the end of the day, a narcissist wants to feel like they are better than you, hence the subtle put-downs you experience from them.  They will deny you the satisfaction of feeling good about something you have done or a positive quality you possess.  Think of the sullen bully in the playground who feels bad when everyone is happy and having a good time.  How likely is it that this kind of person will ever compliment you for the good in you when anything good in you only draws attention away from them?

5. They are empty inside

When you spend enough time with a narcissist, there is one thing that will always gnaw at you at the back of your mind.  This person feels empty in a way that you can’t quite put your finger on.  With time, you start realizing that you don’t know who this person is however long you have been with them.  Whereas with a normal, healthy person, you will always get a sense of who they are in terms of their likes and dislikes, their beliefs, their opinions, their quirks and proclivities, with a covert narcissist you will get the sense almost like they are playing a role.  You will almost feel like they don’t know who they are because they are like chameleons that adapt to whatever environment they are in.  Sometimes you will feel as if they are taking on your characteristics; for example, if at some point in the past you expressed interest in something, you will hear them later proclaim interest in the same thing without ever mentioning that they got the idea from you.  You will also notice that they subtly behave like whoever they happen to be hanging out with at the time.  This emptiness is a particular trait of narcissists whereby they adapt to whatever environment they are in and become whoever they need to be in order to have their needs met.  With a covert narcissist, this is very subtle and you may not notice it as easily as you will notice it with the overt narcissist who will display his emptiness conspicuously in his eagerness to draw you in.  With the covert narcissist, this is, unfortunately, something you may only notice after a long time of being with them.  You may experience this almost as a niggling feeling, a question in your mind that surfaces from time to time: who are you?

6. They have troubled relationships

Due to their difficult nature, narcissists have one characteristic in common and that is their troubled relationships.  With the overt narcissist, this will not be so difficult to understand as their aggressive, ruthless or openly brutal nature is easy to observe.  With the covert narcissist, it will be more subtle.  Although they come across as good guys, you will find that they have many troubled relationships at work, at home, with ex-partners, with siblings, parents or even with people who were previously their friends.  The reality is, even though they may be able to fool some people with their good guy act, their underlying selfishness will always cause problems in their relationships.  Naturally, with their victimhood mentality, they will have various ways to justify these troubled relationships and they may somehow succeed in fooling you.  But the longer you stay with them, the more you will start to question whether the problem is the other people or the problem lies with them.  It’s normal of course to have one or two troubled relationships, but if you observe this pattern consistently manifest itself in all their relationships, then you need to start questioning the narrative which paints them as the victim.  Is it true that they cannot hold a job because all their bosses somehow have it in for them?  Is it probable that all their colleagues are jealous of their accomplishments?  Is it possible that all their exes are evil, manipulative people?  Or is the problem seated right there in front of you in form of the covert narcissist?

7. They feel as if they own you

If you have been with a narcissist for any length of time, you will start having the vague feeling that this person thinks they own you.  They will somehow want to curtail your freedoms, they will want to know where you’re going and what you’re doing and who you’re with, they will want to control what you do with your money, how you dress, who your friends are, etc.  It is almost as if they see you as an extension of themselves.  Rather than seeing you as a human being in your own right with your own personhood, they see you as part of them.  With the covert narcissist, this will be done in subtle ways such as going through your phone, using sarcasm to manipulate you into doing what they want, lecturing you about the kind of people you hang out with, etc.  While the overt narcissist will aggressively exert their control over you through brutal force, the covert narcissist will manipulate you into doing what he wants for example by questioning your choices, by mocking what you want to do, or by pretending to be concerned about you.  In the end, without quite understanding why you will feel that this person thinks they own you and they are convinced of their right to exert their will over you.

While the overt narcissist will aggressively exert their control over you through brutal force, the covert narcissist will manipulate you into doing what he wants for example by questioning your choices, by mocking what you want to do, or by pretending to be concerned about you.

8.  They think they know it all / they think they are God

When you spend enough time in a relationship with a covert narcissist, you will realize that the possibility that they could ever be wrong seldom crosses their mind.  As far as they are concerned, they are always right and thus it is their way or the highway.  It is almost as if they think they are God, so convinced are they of how right they are or how wise their views are.  Whatever opinion or view they have seems to them to have come straight from God, thereby affirming their oneness with God.  And if they are one with God, aren’t they then God?  If God is speaking through them, doesn’t that then mean that when they speak it is the voice of God that is speaking?  And if you argue with them, aren’t you arguing with God?  If you happen to be with the religious types, they will be firm believers in the ideology that God has placed his mantle of leadership on them and thus they have a God-given right to rule over you.  They will firmly believe in the natural hierarchy or order of things whereby God speaks to them and they, in turn, speak God’s word to you.  It will never occur to them that God could speak directly to you.  So firm is their conviction that we might as well dispense with the necessity of having a God who is separate from them and instead consider them as God Himself in the flesh.