Love Bombing – Fun for the Narcissist

Peggy was a smart divorced single in her 30s – no kids, not attachments, a pretty full life of friends, family, and dating. She and her ex partner remain cordial but decided that their lives just didn’t match. He was married to his career, and she needed someone who could meet her emotional needs. He was emotionally invested in his career and admitted it.

Was Peggy looking for Mr. Right to come along? Yes. She wanted a relationship where she mattered more than a career.

Along came Bill, a love bomber par excellence, though she didn’t have a clue at the time. He showered her with undivided attention, told her she was the best thing that had ever happened to him, showered her with gifts, and basically swept her off of her feet. This is it, she thought. But she had no idea what was to come.

According to Dr. Alaina Tiani, Ph.D. psychologist, in an article published on the Cleveland Clinic website, “Initially, you might feel safe, secure and swept off your feet because grand gestures are a self-esteem boost and make you feel important and desired…But the love bomber’s ultimate goal is not just to seek love, but to gain control over someone else. Over time, those gestures are an effort to manipulate you and make you feel indebted to and dependent on them.” The full article on the Cleveland Clinic site is worth a read.

Most lover bombers had a mental health condition called narcissistic personality disorder. Let’s unpack that, so you know what you are dealing with here. And then, we’ll talk about the love bombing cycle.

Narcissistic Personality Disorder – What is it?

First and foremost, narcissistic personality disorder (NPD) is mental health disorder. It impacts how people see themselves and how their relationship formation with others. While some would describe it as extreme self-centeredness and arrogance, it is more. It is a behavior pattern of total entitlement, an almost majestic opinion of oneself, often to cover up feelings of low self esteem and inadequacy.

Typical Symptoms

• Sense of self-importance and superiority to others
• Need to be admired and praised by others
• Inability to feel sympathy or empathy for others
• Expectation of special treatment
• Achievement of selfish goals by taking advantage of others.

Causes of NPD

While this disorder is under continued study, it is believed to come from several possible conditions – some hereditary and others environmental. Experiences from early childhood such as an insecure attachment style with caregivers, trauma, excessive affection, pampering, and idolization from caregivers, and other. Though exact numbers of people with this disorder are not known, they may range as high as 5% of the total population.

How is NPD Treated?

There are several psychotherapy approaches all of which are aimed at getting narcissists to recognize their behaviors, understand where they come from, and to develop a normal healthy level of self-esteem.

Success varies, but it’s important to know that most narcissists do not seek treatment because they don’t see anything wrong with who they are.

If you are involved with a narcissist, don’t look for their behaviors to change unless they get into therapy. And even then, it’s likely to be a long and slow process.

Now let’s unpack the love bombing cycle, so that any reader here can make an analysis if they might be a victim.

The Love Bombing Cycle

Most of those who study love bombing agree that there are three stages in the cycle – the bombing itself, the devaluation, and the discard. Let’s have a look.

Love Bombing

Go back to Peggy’s story. She is thrilled with how she is being treated. And this is exactly what the love bomber wants from his manipulation. Remember, it is all about manipulation not any desire for a genuine relationship built on mutual respect, trust, and real affection.

It’s also important to understand that in the early stages of a new relationship, some of these behaviors are also present – it’s all part of the initial infatuation period, but it eventually resolves into a more mature and stable relationship based on mutual affection, respect, equality, and caring for one another. And if it lasts, the fairy tale “lived happily ever after” comes true.

The love bombing stage of a narcissist is different because the goal is to maintain control. These are the common behaviors:

• Showing extreme affection very early on
• Full and intense attention, almost 24 hours a day. Constant attention – calling, messaging, professing love
• Showering the victim with excessive compliments and extravagant gifts. In Peggy’s situation, for example, he took her shopping, picked out expensive clothing and jewelry for her and insisted she wear these items while he “wined and dined” her at high-end restaurants.
• The victim is put on a pedestal and made to feel so special.
• The perpetrator is usually quite charming with grand gestures and promises of all sorts of future plans – lavish trips and a permanent partnership, for example.
• The perpetrator also lavishes so much attention and takes up so much time of the victim, that the victim becomes more and more isolated from friends and family. This is all by design and to establish complete control. If you are experiencing this type of behavior, it should be a huge red flag. A normal healthy partner wants you to keep your family and friends close and honors those relationships.
• Doesn’t comply when their victim tries to set boundaries. For example, they may ignore the protests of the victim to reduce the constant contact so that they can pursue other interests and social events on their own.
• The love bombing phase of the cycle can last as long as a year, but studies show that the average is about six months on average, a bit less for female narcissists.

Another Key Point: Narcissistic relationships do not only exist with romantic couples, though these are the most common. Narcissistic tendencies can also occur in friendships in which one person uses the same manipulation tactics to control and isolate someone from their family and other friends.

What Comes Next – The Devaluation Stage

The love bombing phase and the grand romantic gestures now have the victim exactly where the narcissist wants them – pretty much in full emotional dependence. Once they gain control the love bomber is ready to move on to the next manipulative tactic

As the relationship progresses, the behaviors begin to change:

• That same person who couldn’t do enough now begins to become critical
• The lavish gifts and the fake promises for the future are gone
• The love bomber dismisses the needs and desires of their victim, don’t want to hear about the personal details their day, their job, their joys, their challenges, etc. These are the things that people in normal healthy romantic relationships share. It is no longer important as a manipulative tactic to this jerk.
• In many instances, they can engage in emotional abuse and other forms of domestic abuse. This can include becoming physically abusive too. Domestic abuse of any kind is never okay, and physical violence is actually a crime. It’s often hard for a victim to get out of an abusive relationship, but that is the topic for another article.
• Behavior often includes gaslighting, so much so that the victim comes to believe that they are at fault for everything or that what they are feeling isn’t true. This is an important part of the devaluation phase.
• Affection is basically gone. Sex may still happen, but it doesn’t include the previous gestures of affection in the love bombing phase.

This cycle of abuse reveals their true narcissistic traits, and that cycle of abuse only gets worse. The response of the victim can run from anywhere to loss of self-worth (almost always) and to feeling guilty, wondering what they are doing wrong. Their gestures of affection are ignored or outright rejected.

There is no positive attention given anymore. The goal of narcissistic abuse during this phase is to make the victim believe they are at fault for anything bad that happens to the abusive person. If they have a bad day at work, it somehow becomes the victim’s fault.

The emotional distress during this stage can be overwhelming and leave the victim not knowing where to turn or how to “fix” the situation. The narcissistic approach has been to isolate them.

The Final Love Bombing Phase – Discarding (or Hoovering)

This discard stage can be of two types:

The Discard

The damage has been done. The narcissist is no longer reaping enough satisfaction from the devaluing and has found someone else to begin anew. In short, the victim no longer serves their purposes.

The partnership will abruptly end, without explanation, and the victim is left wondering what the hell has happened. Worse, they are isolated and alone and are left to rebuild their lives on their own.

The “Hoovering”

How this word for this manipulative behavior came about is kinda strange, and it kinda goes back to the Hoover vacuum and/or to US President Herbert Hoover. None it really makes a lot of sense, but here it is:

The victim is manipulated to return to the jerk, because they have made promises to change, guilt-tripping, maybe have threatened self-harm, or some other dire reason. Nothing about this is in the least bit related to affection, empathy, or love. Just don’t do it!!

So, now you have the love bombing pattern – sounds like fun, doesn’t it?

• Maybe the best thing to do is to recognize the signs and red flags early on and have honest conversations with yourself about how you really feel about this love bombing crap.

The Warning Signs Are There – Pick Up on Them

Your feelings during stage one of love bombing are important and can alert you to warning signs of love bombing and an unhealthy relationship. Pay close attention to those feelings.

• Are you feeling a bit smothered by all of the attention?
• Are feeling uncomfortable in any way about their professions of love and being soul mates in such a short period of time after meeting?
• Are you reducing the amounts of time you spend with friends and family to meet their “demands” for your time?
• Do you feel pressure to commit before you are really ready? Is it making you uncomfortable?
• Are you changing your habits, giving up outside interests that you have always enjoyed in order to be with them?

Nothing is more important than your well-being, and the above are pretty clearly signs of love bombing and emotional manipulation. You are kinda changing who you are inside, and if that is giving you discomfort, it’s time to step back, take a breather, and talk to people you are close to, a really trusted friend or family member maybe. They may see it too.

But what it you have been taken in by love bombing and have been discarded? How do you get back to who you used to be?

The Recovery Process from Love Bombing

So, you ignored the signs of love bombing and have become a victim or a love bomber. Now that love bomber has discarded you. It’s pretty painful for real, and it has done a number on your mental health. How do you get through this, become who you used to be, and restart your life as the person you really want to be?

Probably the biggest issue you will have going forward is trusting someone else if and when you are ready for another relationship. Love bombing is emotional abuse, and that is not easily overcome.

Here are important steps every victim should take:

• Break free by cut off all contact with the love bombing jerk. And that means all communication – phone, social media, any mutual friends or acquaintances. Block, block, block! No exceptions.
• Re-connect with friends and family members that you have been cut off from during you time with the love bombing jerk. Seeking support from them as you go through this. Spend time with them as often as you can. They have real affection for you.
• Pick back up old hobbies and interests you have up because of the love bombing turd. Spend time with others involved in the same ones, socializing in groups. Every “normal” person you connect with helps restore your sense of worth as a person too.
• There is a difference between being lonely and being alone with yourself. Spend time and get comfortable with yourself again.
• Check out support groups among other victims of love bombing. there may not be one locally, but they are all over the web. Join a few and participate in the discussions. Listen to how others have healed from these toxic relationships.
• Retail therapy is always a good thing. Go out and get a new hairstyle and a new outfit!
• If you continue to struggle from the love bombing, seek help from a mental health professional. There is a grieving process, and they can help you through it.
• Don’t think about a new relationship until you are fully healed and over your love bomber.

Love bombing leaves pain and bruising. But before you move forward into any other relationship, it is important to have a clear idea and understanding of what a genuine relationship looks like. And use this understanding as a checklist of sorts so you avoid ever becoming the victim of another love bomber.

What Healthy Relationships Look Like

Here is your checklist. Use it to analyze any relationship you begin. Love bombing will not have any of this stuff.

• You both move at a pace that is comfortable for each of you. Love bombing pressures you to move faster than you really feel comfortable with in your gut. Trust your gut.
• Each of you have healthy boundaries that the other respects and does not cross. For example, if you have a standing date with your friends every Thursday night, that’s your independent time, and it should be respected. Love bombing doesn’t respect such boundaries, and when someone crosses your boundaries, be very wary.
• A healthy relationship means that each person shares their challenges, issues, successes, failures and more. And they help and support one another through communication, good listening, and even providing advice when asked. Love bombing means there is no interest in such sharing. It’s all one-sided, focused on the love bomber.
• Affection is genuine in the relationship. It doesn’t require lavish gifts, expensive dinners and such. That’s the stuff of which love bombing is made. A simple good morning text that says, “Thinking of you – hope you have a great day” or something similar at night. How about a favorite sandwich delivered to your squeeze at work for lunch? Maybe a date for breakfast on a Saturday morning. These are the thing that grow a relationship that is happy and healthy.
• Both people in a relationship lead their independent lives separate from each other. And they don’t encroach upon them. Love bombing doesn’t allow this. Love bombers don’t “allow” their victims to have lives of any independence. It’s all about full control.

That’s a Wrap…

You are now an expert on love bombing and everything that goes along with it. How will you use this information? Hopefully, it will allow you to see the red flags of love bombing before you become a victim. Beyond that, it may let you help a friend who may be in danger of falling prey to love bombing.

Love bombing is cruel; love bombing is heartless; and love bombing causes pain that is not easily overcome.

Genuine affection is mutual and should unfold at a pace that is comfortable for both parties. Love bombing, by contrast, tends to feel one-sided—with one partner showering the other with gifts, praise, and declarations of love—and moves at a pace where one partner feels overwhelmed or as if they’re caught up in a whirlwind. Someone repeatedly crossing stated boundaries—even if they claim to have positive motives for doing so—may also be an indicator of manipulative intentions. Similarly, while it’s normal for new partners to spend a lot of time together, feeling isolated from one’s family and friends because one is spending all their time with a new love interest may suggest that the relationship is falling into unhealthy patterns.

“Good relationships feel good,” states Dr. Tiani. “If it feels too good to be true, that’s probably an indication that there’s something going on. It’s important that when those feelings surface, you tune into that instead of pushing it aside.”