Many Faces of Narcissist’s Discard

Overview

The speaker, Sambaknim (author of Malignant Self-Love and Narcissism Revisited, professor of psychology), presented a focused lecture on the concept of “discard” within relationships, distinguishing two primary types: external discard and internal discard. The talk emphasized how discards can be overt and unambiguous or covert, subtle, and destructive while remaining invisible to outside observers. The speaker linked internal discard closely to pathological narcissism, falsity, and the false self.

Key Definitions

• External Discard: A visible, observable termination or separation in a relationship (e.g., breakups, divorces, prolonged physical absence, infidelity). Characterized by unequivocal, public signals that are mutually acknowledged by participants and bystanders.
• Internal Discard: A covert, under-the-radar process where parties remain in the relationship publicly but have emotionally or psychologically given up. The relationship appears functional externally but is hollowed out internally.

Forms and Manifestations of Internal Discard

1. Emotional Absence
   • One or both partners stop being emotionally present, invested, or affected by the relationship.
   • They may stop arguing or engaging and treat the relationship as a burdensome obligation requiring minimal investment.
   • Emotional absence signals the death of the dyad even though the couple continues to cohabit or perform couple-like functions.
2. Indifference
   • Partners show apathy toward each other’s wellbeing, goals, mental health, and daily life.
   • Indifference can be reframed as “freedom” or “giving each other space,” but in reality it functions as a form of abandonment or anarchy within the couple.
3. Conversion of the Partner into a Secondary/Pseudo-object
   • One partner regards the other as an enemy, stranger, or hostile object rather than a friend and collaborator.
   • This can include embedding the partner in paranoid narratives, mutual distrust, and devaluation.
4. Setting Up for Failure / Imposing Impossible Standards
   • Creating demands and expectations that cannot be met to ensure the partner fails, thereby regaining moral or hierarchical superiority.
   • Behavioral devaluation is used to render the partner inefficacious, inferior, or shamed.
5. Other Passive-Aggressive Sabotage
   • Internal discard often uses subversive, passive-aggressive tactics that gradually dismantle the relationship “brick by brick” without visible rupture.

Causes and Motivations

• Fear of social judgment: Couples may avoid an explicit breakup because they fear societal stigma or external opinion, so they maintain outward appearances while discarding internally.
• Narcissistic dynamics: Pathological narcissism fosters falsity, confabulation, and simulacra; the internal discard is consistent with the narcissist’s false self and performative social reality.
• Strategic or punitive motives: Some partners discard internally to punish, control, or maintain superiority without the social costs of an open split.

Consequences and Observability

• External observers often cannot discern internal discard, even when noticing tension, conflict, or violence; surface behaviors may still suggest functionality.
• Internal discard corrodes the relationship’s foundation, producing a discrepancy between public-facing data (appearances, shared decisions, shared goals) and private reality (emotional detachment, devaluation, sabotage).

Comparative Summary: External vs Internal Discard

• External Discard: Clear, observable, unequivocal, involves real-world actions and consequences.
• Internal Discard: Hidden, subtle, emotionally and psychologically destructive, performative, and often undetectable by bystanders.

Central Thesis

The speaker argued that while some narcissists may perform an overt discard, the more common and insidious form is the internal discard—an invisible but effective strategy that dismantles relationships through emotional absence, indifference, devaluation, impossible standards, and passive-aggressive sabotage. This covert discard is a manifestation of pathological narcissism’s reliance on falsity and simulation rather than authentic relational reality.

Notable Quotes and Illustrations (paraphrased)

• “Discard” typically evokes the image of a slammed door, but it can also be quiet, camouflaged, and pernicious.
• Internal discard is like a tree that appears healthy outwardly but is hollowed by termites inside.
• Indifference is often mischaracterized as freedom but functions as a signal of exclusion: “You’re no longer in my life—who cares what’s happening to you?”

Implications for Recognition and Intervention

• Recognizing internal discard requires attention to emotional availability, patterns of devaluation, impossible expectations, and chronic indifference rather than relying solely on overt signs of separation.
• Interventions should consider the subtle, performative strategies used to hide the discard and address underlying narcissistic dynamics when present.

Conclusion

The lecture highlighted the complexity of discard dynamics, urging observers and clinicians to distinguish between external, visible ruptures and internal, hidden disengagements. Internal discard, deeply connected to narcissistic pathology and performative false selves, undermines relationships in ways that are often invisible yet devastating.