The Narcissistic Sucker Punch

So, I'm going to ask you, have you ever had this happen? And listen, drop it in the comments if any of the things I'm about to list out apply.

So, first example, it's your birthday. Maybe some friends are coming together and throwing together a dinner. Or maybe there's a little party or maybe you're just on a trip away to enjoy it. And either the night before or the morning of or even at the party and you're in a good place and happy to be celebrating, the narcissistic person baits you into a fight or acts like a victim or a sullen, passive aggressive wet blanket or just sits in the corner. You can just feel their tension.

So, here's a second example. You got great news at work. You got the promotion you'd been fighting for. Uh, you become, you come home, you're pumped, you're gonna make more money, it's a job you hoped for, right? And after you tell the narcissistic person the news or somehow they hear it from someone, the conversation turns into some grievance they have with you unrelated to the promotion or something that they are unhappy about.

Here's a third example. Let's say you do shift work or you came off an intense deadline at work. You drag yourself home. You are completely exhausted. It's all you can do to crawl yourself into the house. Maybe have a cup of coffee or put your feet up or just take a shower or go to bed. And that moment when you're just like, I just need to take a break. That moment is the moment that the narcissistic person chooses to share their disappointment or anger or something that they have been stewing about for a long time. Again, that is not necessary to share in that moment.

Here's another example. It's the day of your friend or family member's funeral and you are numb with grief. And that's the day the narcissistic person chooses to act like a sullen victim full of grievances or point out how you slighted them on that day. Why didn't you hold me a better seat? Why didn't you introduce me to those people? Why didn't you tell me exactly what the schedule was going to be?

I'm going to give you another example. I'm going to give you a lot of examples because there's a lot of ways this can show up. It's your kid's birthday. The day of their birthday party and you want to make it special for them. So, you've been running around getting the balloons and the cake and all the little details organized and right when it's almost go time. You know how kids parties are, right? You got two, three hours. It's like it's intense and people are about to come in to that party, that narcissistic person is acting like a victim and angry and maybe sort of silent treatmenty and they won't answer your questions. And then you go up to them kind of cordial like, "Hey, what's up?" I mean, obviously they've done no balloon picking up, no cake picking up. You gave up long ago on the idea that it would ever help you with something like this. And they turn to you and say, "Oh, it's nothing. I can see you're busy doing your thing. We can talk about this thing later. We don't need to talk about it now." So now on the day you wanted to be present for your child, you have a pit of doom in your stomach knowing that the other shoe is going to fall later and you aren't as present or even enjoying this special day for your child because you're like, "Oh god, oh god, what's, what are we going to talk about later?"

Another example, you get home from a hospitalization or the emergency room or some other medical issue that you were having and at that point is when they start in on you and try to bait you into a fight. Bringing up old stuff that you thought was long resolved or turning it into how they always have to deal with your problems exactly at a moment when you're not feeling well or might even be scared at what you learned.

I have no doubt you can think of similar examples of what I just gave. Well, there's a name for this and I call it the narcissistic sucker punch. A sucker punch, in case you don't know what one is, it's a punch that gets thrown when it's not expected or a person's utterly unprepared for it. It's, it's, it's sort of a, a fight you're not ready for, right? Um, there may be a false sense of security and that you thought stuff was figured out and then nobody's punching anyone. We got to figure it out. Then bam.

Listen, I don't care. I don't care how much you radically accept, are radically aware, and just get it, get it, get it, get it. I don't care if you could sit down right now and write a book about narcissism with all you know. It doesn't matter. In these relationships, there are times when our resistance is down. And then at those most vulnerable and preoccupied moments, and they aren't always bad moments, like the birthday party, it may be that your guard is down. Your hypervigilance may be turned down. And that may be because you're happy, you're excited, you're preoccupied, or because you're grieving, you're sick, or you're exhausted.

Narcissistic relationships and protecting yourself against all the manipulations and the gaslighting and the complaints. It's a full-time job. It's like being an air traffic controller. You can never take your eyes off the screens. And to be hypervigilant 24 hours a day is damn near impossible. Even the air traffic controllers get a break. And it will slowly kill you to live like this. The allostatic load, which is what we call that physiological wear and tear of that kind of sympathetic nervous system running all the time like that, it takes a tremendous toll on our bodies. But at those moments when we're sort of something else is there happening for us, whether they're good or bad, whether we're happy or wiped out, that is just when in an almost targeted way narcissistic folks decide to have a go at you.

To me, this may be one of the most mortal sins of the narcissistic relationship. Obviously, it's an abject manifestation of the lack of empathy in these relationships, but there's something almost sadistic about it. Remember, narcissistic people are not unaware. They know. They know it's your birthday. They know it was your friend's funeral day or they know that you work back-to-back overnight shifts. They know it. And they almost seem to take advantage of that moment or alternately they are triggered by that or both.

Listen, it's bad enough that any antagonistic person does the stuff that they typically do. Like again, the whole manipulation, gaslighting, invalidation, betrayal, future faking, blameshifting mess of it all. But on the days when we are air traffic controllery, right, we're vigilant and we're walking on eggshells. We are more prepared for their nonsense. It's sad that we have to be so prepared, but we are. And once our eyes are open and we feel safe enough to see what is happening in the relationship, then we can sort of see the gaslight for what it is. We can internally roll our eyes at it. We can see the lies. And while it is irritating and hurtful and all the things, it's not a sucker punch. We can see it coming and we can dodge wasting a whole day on it by not going deep, yellow rocking or the many other ways we manage the day-to-day. But the sucker punch, this is next level.

Well, you may wonder why. Why are they doing this? Well, at the core of it, narcissistic acting out like the sucker punch is about shame. Something pinged that sense of shame within the narcissistic person. Maybe it was rejection. Maybe it was a sense of abandonment. Maybe it was their sensitivity about not being prioritized or feeling important. Your dead friend got all the attention at the funeral, right? Maybe it's a sense of diminished power. But it all comes down to shame. And shame for narcissistic people leads to attack. The more severe the narcissism, however, the more that these narcissistic sucker punches feel straight up sadistic, like I'm going to ruin your party. I'm going to take all the air out of your balloon about your success. They, they really, it's calculated, right? Or it could be straight up callousness. Like, I don't give a damn that you're really sick. Or somebody who has literally no empathy for a loss you've experienced. Or it could be deep, deep minimization. Things like, whatever, please. Working two overnight shifts, that isn't that big a deal. Whatever. But in the middle, which is where most people find themselves, the sucker punch appears to be triggered by the omnipresent shame that exists in the narcissistic person.

So, the sucker punch could be a product of lots of things. Could be things like they don't feel like they're the center of attention. They feel competitive with you if something's going well for you. They feel that you are turning to other people for comfort or support, which you are because you have to. But then they don't feel chosen or prioritized. So they attack. And they also because if you're turning to other people, the narcissistic person isn't hearing your vulnerabilities as much anymore. So they don't have as much weaponry. It may be that the narcissistic folks feel entitled to insinuate themselves into every part of your life. And if you are having experiences separate from them, they will do this. The narcissistic person may feel left out and they are punishing [snorts] you for this. Something triggers that shame, the fragile ego, the insecure internal part of them. And then it's sucker punch city.

When your mood isn't in that, that state that you know in that either that completely numb state survivors have or that completely vigilant state survivors have, the narcissistic sucker punch throws you off. We aren't ready for it. And while surprise is not our friend in these relationships, we get surprised. We actually are a little surprised, maybe disgusted. I'm not sure what, which it is, but that someone would do this to us on a day when we are at our worst or we're down or maybe that we're happy or just exhausted or a day that's special. This is particularly difficult when you can't get out of the relationship and you just spend all your time doing all the workarounds to try to make the relationship work and minimize conflict and just try to keep the trains running on time. When these sucker punches come, again, it does feel calculated and sadistic. I mean, even when it isn't, it may just be their fragile, vulnerable acting out, it takes an already unsafe feeling relationship and can multiply that sensation substantially. Whether these sucker punches are sadistic and intentional or the more sort of vulnerable narcissistic punitive tantrum individually. Anyone watching this, you know your relationship and their personality probably well enough at this point to unpack that and figure out which way it leans.

The narcissistic sucker punch can also take the form of planting what I can only call a seed of doom in your gut. This is the sucker punch that doesn't come after an event, but rather it comes before. The example I gave of the children's birthday party. Perhaps this happens on the day of a wedding or a birthday or other celebration or even when you have a demanding workday ahead of you. Their sullenness begins. Now, particularly when it's a celebration, narcissistic people don't always like having to spend their day on a celebration of someone else when they're not centered in it. And so, you're trying to stay cheerful on this day, but as we do in these relationships, we fawn, we appease, we try to cheer them up so they don't ruin the day and they stay sullen because the sucker punch is a sucker punch. And even as you check in with them like, "You okay? You doing all right?" Right? They'll say, "Yeah, no, yeah, whatever. Yeah, I'm fine. Yeah, yeah, you go. You go have some fun. You go do your thing. We can talk about this later." So, now there's a this and you spend that day with the this in your gut and the tension rises and they're still being sullen and grumpy and disenfranchised and behave like a victim in the corner. And you may even try and give them the out and tell them, "Hey, you don't have to come." But no, if you do that, then the narcissistic person will say, "I knew you didn't want me to come. I know you don't want me around. You just treat me like a second-class citizen." So, you know, first of all, you can't win. But then, you know, that at the end of the event, you will have to listen to this, whatever this is, their aggrieved rant. This to me is actually the worst kind of sucker punch because not only do you get this nonsense thrown at you at precisely the worst time, but the whole damn day or event, everything gets spoiled for you. And then you still have to deal with the rant afterwards and hear things like, I don't know, I can't believe you actually went ahead and went to that party. I can't believe you actually danced at the wedding or stayed for cake when you knew I was having such a tough time. I told you I needed to talk about something. You always choose other people.

I know that scenario I just shared is so familiar to many of you navigating relationships, especially with vulnerable narcissistic folks. This often happens with family systems and it almost makes you dread any kind of big happy event. The sucker punch is abusive. Full stop. Narcissistic people are socially perceptive enough to know that this is not okay to do and yet they still do it. It is a power play. It is a punishment. It's about control. It plays on trauma-bonded dynamics such as guilt and self-blame. It plays on fawn responses. It plays on fear. It plays on your desire to protect the other people who are affected by these sucker punches. And it plays on just plain exhaustion.

Sometimes I believe this truly, it can help to know something is a thing. But just like any sucker punch, I mean, it's important to know what it is, but just like any sucker punch, by design, it can feel impossible to protect yourself against them. Sadly, radical acceptance means that the narcissistic person or people in your life will quite often ruin special days and will kick you when you are down. And when it happens, we will still feel hurt and angry. We will still be surprised because it feels like things just went lower in the relationship and you thought they were already that pretty low. Just when you think the stairs don't go down another level, there it is. But there is something about the narcissistic sucker punch that leaves us feeling sick, too. Many narcissistic sucker punch people will say that after the rant, the tantrum, whatever it was, they felt physically ill. They felt headaches, tension, worse fatigue than usual after one of these episodes. The sucker punch in the narcissistic relationship is that terrible confirmation that you cannot win. You can never fully be prepared in one of these relationships. And just when you think it can't get worse, it does.

And to keep in mind too, think of, think of a person who's always on the lookout for a sucker punch, right? If we saw them like, who's looking, who's looking for me? Who's, who's who wants to fight? Right? So the person who's like that, waiting for the sucker punch, waiting to punch people, we treat that person like they're crazy, right? Because sucker punches are not supposed to be that common. And unfortunately, they're quite common in these relationships. But just like the person we think is kind of off by always be like, "Who's, who's going to sneak up? Who's going to get me?" The person in the narcissistic relationship will say, "Oh my gosh, I am so anxious. I am so worried. What's going to happen after this event? What's going to happen during this event?" And people say, "Relax. Just be present. Stay in the moment." Without knowing you stay in the damn moment or not. You've been to this rodeo before. You know what's very likely to happen again. That pit of doom, that even just the presence of a happy event or a difficult day or a workplace success, instead of you being able to take care of you or lean into those days, you still have to put a lot of bandwidth in being worried. And more often than not, you will be the one who's portrayed as having the problem. Like, oh my gosh, all you do is worry. >> [snorts] >> Granted, the worry is no way to stop the sucker punch, but it's a natural drive to want to be ready for anything. You're going to miss a lot of life doing that, but we also miss a lot of life cleaning up after these sucker punches. Not sure that there is a good answer. Thanks again.