In Episode 1 of Unseen but Not Untold: Overcoming Covert Narcissistic Abuse, Dr. Christine C. Zacharia MD, integrative covert narcissistic abuse recovery expert and board certified endocrinologist, exposes the roots of covert narcissistic abuse in her own life.
This episode lays the foundation for understanding how covert narcissists embed themselves into relationships for years and even decades before they are fully recognized.
What appears as friendship… support… loyalty… is actually something deeply sinister and something calculated.
This is where Dr. Zacharia shines light on the illusion many survivors have come face to face with in their own lives.
In the next sequence of episodes, Dr. Zacharia explores how covert narcissistic abuse ultimately shattered the life she once knew — and, in the process, revealed a calling she never expected.
Before the Awakening: The Career Dr. Zacharia Once Believed Was Her Calling
Before that awakening, she takes listeners back to the life she once believed was her true purpose: practicing medicine.
For those unfamiliar with the specialty, endocrinologists are physicians who diagnose and treat hormonal disorders, including thyroid disease, diabetes, adrenal dysfunction, calcium imbalance and other complex metabolic conditions.
Dr. Zacharia practiced endocrinology for eleven years before stepping away from the field entirely in June 2025.
She describes being drawn not only to the science itself, but to the complexity and nuance of hormone-related illness.
“I found endocrinology both intellectually stimulating and deeply fulfilling. I loved solving complex hormone puzzles, treating patients and watching their health — and lives — improve over time.”
Beyond patient care, teaching became one of the most meaningful aspects of her career.
“Teaching was another joy in itself.”
Mentoring future health care providers gave her a profound sense of contribution and purpose.
“Educating and mentoring students, residents and fellows — watching them grow into confident, thoughtful providers gave me a deep sense of purpose.”
For many years, academic medicine felt deeply aligned with who she was.
“For a long time, academic medicine felt like my life’s calling.”
And in many ways, it truly was — at least for that chapter of her life.
Over time, the landscape of healthcare began changing dramatically in the United States. Additionally, COVID-19 reshaped medicine in ways few providers were prepared for.
Insurance denials increased. Staffing shortages worsened. Administrative pressures intensified. Patient frustration grew. Like many physicians, she experienced mounting burnout within an increasingly strained healthcare system.
Dr. Zacharia goes on to explain that her exhaustion extended beyond medicine itself.
“My burnout… wasn’t just from the broken healthcare system. It was coming from my personal life.”
“Behind the white coat, I was unraveling. I had become a shell of the woman I once was — trapped in relationships with people I thought cared about me… but were in fact my greatest enemies in disguise."
Before she moves to share her story, Dr. Zacharia makes this point clear to listeners and readers:
“This story comes directly from my life. For privacy, names have been altered and events condensed.”
Levi: The "Best Friend" Covert Narcissist
Let’s start with the college friend Dr. Zacharia now recognizes as a covert narcissist — someone she once considered her best friend.
She met Levi during freshman year of college.
“We lived in the same dorm building and I first ran into him one evening in the laundry room.”
She was there with her roommate at the time, Marissa, a friend from high school. Over time, the three of them began spending more time together.
Levi and Dr. Zacharia initially bonded over a shared connection to the music school. She had a scholarship in that department and he offered to collaborate with her on a solo project, which marked the beginning of their closer friendship.
“That’s when the friendship really started to take hold.”
At first, she noticed what she now recognizes as emotional immaturity.
“The more time we spent together, the more obvious it became that Levi was emotionally immature.”
At the time, she rationalized it.
“I kept telling myself, ‘Boys just mature later than girls,’ trying to make sense of this aspect of his personality.”
As the group dynamics evolved, Marissa and another mutual friend became frustrated with Levi’s immature behavior and no longer wanted to include him socially.
But Dr. Zacharia intervened.
“I insisted on keeping him part of our group. I felt bad — despite his immature behavior he seemed shy and I knew he could use the company.”
Looking back, she now sees this moment differently.
“Little did I know, I was standing up for someone who would never truly have my back — not then and not ever.”
As time went on, her friendship with Marissa began to shift as she connected with a new group of friends.
"Marissa started spending more time with a new group of friends and decided she wanted one of them to move in. Rather than wait till sophomore year, decided to push me out so that one of her new friends could live with her instead. Her behavior became increasingly disruptive and inconsiderate - escalating to the point that I had no choice but to move out."
The irony in this situation? Marissa was the one who insisted living together with Dr. Zacharia in the first place. She didn’t want to risk living with a stranger.
"My parents warned me against living with someone I knew from high school. They wanted me to have a fresh start — a chance to meet new people. My college counselor said the same. But Marissa wouldn’t take no for an answer. She even recruited some of our mutual friends to pressure me into agreeing."
Looking back now, Dr. Zacharia understands that Marissa’s refusal to respect her boundaries was a huge red flag — one she didn’t yet know how to recognize.
Smear Campaign: The First of Several Dr. Zacharia Would Experience in Her Life
"Eventually, Marissa turned our mutual high school friends against me. She turned Levi against me as well- the very person she didn’t even want a friendship with at the time."
Without hearing her side of the story, Levi aligned with Marissa’s version of events.
“He accepted her side of events without bothering to hear mine.”
This became the first time Dr. Zacharia experienced what she now identifies as a smear campaign.
“That was the first time I experienced a smear campaign.”
"A smear campaign — much like in politics — is designed to defame and damage someone’s reputation using half-truths or outright lies."
"With a covert narcissist, it often takes a more insidious form: they accuse the victim of the very behaviors they themselves committed. It’s a tactic to shift blame, rewrite the narrative and absolve themselves of any responsibility for their actions."
At the time, the emotional impact felt destabilizing. But this was overshadowed by a more severe experience years later with Levi and Jessie, a malignant covert narcissist, who she introduces later in the episode.
Eventually, Marissa apologized at the start of sophomore year but Dr. Zacharia knew not to let her back into her life.
“Thankfully, I knew better than to let her back into my life.”
But she didn't apply that logic to Levi.
“What I should have done — and didn’t — was end my friendship with Levi as well.”
She reflects now on the deeper pattern she would only recognize years later. If the people involved in the smear campaign don’t bother to hear the survivor's side of the story, they were already looking for reasons not to like them.
"This was the first big red flag in my relationship with Levi — but I chose to overlook it. I gave him another chance. And another. And another… too many times to count over the course of our 23-year friendship."
"Narcissists are constantly testing and pushing boundaries. If you overlook one transgression, they’ll keep testing to see how many more they can get away with."
"They take and take… for as long as you’re willing to give and give.
The Anatomy of Gaslighting: When Accountability Is Rewritten as “Just Joking”
" You may be wondering, wouldn’t someone feel guilty for acting like that? Emotionally healthy people would. But a narcissist wouldn’t."
Dr. Zacharia goes on to explain in the episode that narcissists show little to no remorse or guilt. Taking advantage of someone else’s patience, kindness and empathy doesn’t register as wrong to them. Instead, those traits are often misinterpreted as permission.
To them, a good-hearted nature can look like naivety — something to be tested, pushed or exploited. Their worldview is transactional, built on a “dog-eat-dog” logic where vulnerability is not protected but leveraged.
“But even the most patient and empathetic person eventually reaches a breaking point — that moment when you finally say, enough is enough.”
And when that moment arrives, the dynamic shifts.
“When you finally call them out on their behavior, they resort to gaslighting, blame-shifting and somehow make you feel like you’re the problem.”
This inability to take accountability is one of the hallmark patterns of narcissistic behavior that she now recognizes.
“That lack of accountability… it’s one of the classic hallmarks of narcissistic behavior.”
“It was present in my friendship with Levi from the very beginning.”
Fast forward to 2009, when Dr. Zacharia graduated from medical school. Levi’s response was not one of celebration, but of comparison.
“Levi was deeply jealous of my career — and that jealousy persisted throughout our friendship.”
Over time, that jealousy expressed itself through subtle degradation.
“He’d make backhanded remarks about my medical degree and looked for every opportunity to diminish me.”
Eventually, early in her intern year of residency, she reached her limit with his behavior.
“I called him out on it.”
She was ready to end the friendship entirely. His response, however, was immediate and disorienting.
“Why do you think I’m jealous of you? I’m not jealous.”
Then, to reset the narrative completely, he follows up his statement with this:
“I can’t believe you were thinking of ending our friendship over this. I was just joking.”
Dr. Zacharia second guessed her impressions of the entire situation.
“The way he said it made me second-guess my own impressions of the situation.”
The decision to keep him in her life is one that would cause irrevocable damage and lay the groundwork for upheaval in her life that ensued 13 years later.
What she understands now is that this is part of a broader pattern: the distortion of reality through denial, reframing and emotional reversal.
“Covert narcissists are so convincing because their acting skills are extraordinary. They could literally stab someone in the eye and say, ‘I’m not stabbing you,’ without blinking.”
DARVO in Action: When Reality Gets Flipped on Its Head
This conversation is a classic example of DARVO.
DARVO stands for Deny, Attack and Reverse Victim and Offender. It refers to a dynamic where someone first rejects the concern being raised, then shifts focus onto the other person’s reaction and finally reframes themselves as the one being unfairly treated.
Deny: Levi denied the interpretation of his behavior or feelings that upset her.
“I’m not jealous of you.”
Attack (shift of focus): Instead of engaging with the concern, the conversation moved toward her reaction, with emphasis placed on her consideration of ending the friendship:
“I can’t believe you were thinking of ending our friendship over this.”
Reverse Victim and Offender: Levi then minimized the original concern, reframing it as harmless:
“I was just joking.”
Jealousy Masked As Advice
Later that year, Dr. Zacharia set up an online dating profile and showed it to Levi to get his input as her friend. Levi made the same comment more than once:
“You shouldn’t put on there that you’re a physician — you’ll scare off men from dating you.”
She never agreed with him. She knew she didn’t want to date someone who would feel intimidated or insecure about a woman being a physician. That just wasn’t her person.
“But here’s the thing — while I held that boundary in dating, I didn’t hold it in friendship. I was completely okay being friends with someone who was clearly uncomfortable with my success."
"That disconnect… looking back, it shows just how trauma-bonded I was to Levi at the time — how much of myself I was willing to shrink just to make him comfortable.”
A trauma bond is a deep seated attachment that develops through repeated cycles of abuse and intermittent reinforcement. The victim becomes emotionally conditioned to seek connection and validation from the very person causing harm, reinforcing dependency and impairing judgment.
The Vengeful, Dark Side of Covert Narcissism
Alongside his jealous remarks and controlling behavior, Levi also revealed a darker, vengeful side. He had this maniacal laugh — the kind he’d let out whenever something unfortunate happened to her.
“That laugh was a glimpse of the sinister being at his core, but I brushed it off as… weird. It wasn’t a laugh you would normally hear from someone outside of cheesy horror movies.”
Anyone who has been on the other side of such a laugh understands the true pleasure a covert narcissist takes in seeing their targets suffer.
He also enjoyed talking about blackmailing people and seeking revenge when they least expected it. On more than one occasion he said the following to Dr. Zacharia, unprompted and out of context of an otherwise pleasant conversation.
“I will retaliate when you least expect it. So if you ever do anything to me, now you know.”
“He loved to keep me on edge, interrupting what should have otherwise been positive moments between the two of us. But in public? You would never even guess there was this side to him.”
The reality is that covert narcissists will expose themselves — but subtly and strategically. They’ll confess to manipulation or the motives behind certain behaviors — just not when it happens to their victim.
“When I reflected back on all of this during my healing journey, I felt… disgusted. Disgusted at what I tolerated. Disgusted at how many red flags I ignored.”
Dr. Zacharia recounts how there were so many signs screaming:
“Walk away!”
“He’s lying to your face, don’t believe him.”
“And yet… every time I voiced a concern, his performance was flawless. Convincing. His gaslighting so effective that I began to doubt my own reality. I questioned myself — over and over.”
That’s why, when outsiders look at someone in a covert narcissistic relationship and ask, “Well, why didn’t you just walk away?” the answer isn’t simple.
Covert narcissistic abuse is subtle, insidious and nearly invisible to everyone else. It leaves victims second-guessing themselves, trapped in a reality carefully manipulated by someone who presents as kind, reasonable and even generous on the surface.
Dr. Zacharia prided herself on her intuition — her gut instinct about people was usually right. So much so that friends often came to her for advice about new people in their lives. And yet, the one person who managed to make her doubt her own instincts was the covert narcissist.
“Levi constantly questioned the accuracy of my intuition. It wasn’t that I was wrong — he was trying to prove me wrong. And he succeeded for 23 years, until I finally learned about the existence of covert narcissism.”
Jessie: The Malignant Covert Narcissist
Fast forward to 2015 — the year Dr. Zacharia started her first job out of fellowship training as an endocrinologist.
She was excited to finally practice medicine and put into action the culmination of nine years of training. She still remembers the first day she met Jessie, a person she would eventually realize eight years later is a malignant covert narcissist.
“She was quiet. Withdrawn. Even after I introduced myself as the new attending in the office, she kept to herself — a stark contrast to the other physicians in the group who were eager to offer advice and share tips with someone new.”
What she did not realize at the time but understands now was that she was being studied.
“What I didn’t realize at the time but understand now was that she was studying me. Watching. Assessing. Trying to decide if it was worth her time to engage… whether I was a viable new source of supply.”
Once that period of observation was over Jessie made her move. A mutual coworker even joked with Dr. Zacharia about it.
“Jessie was observing you to see if you were cool enough to hang out with.”
At the time it landed as humor. Looking back now, Dr. Zacharia sees the situation for what it truly was - a period of evaluation at the hands of a malignant covert narcissist.
Jessie began making an effort to earn her trust. She bought gifts ensuring others in the workplace saw them. She even offered to help during an unusually busy call week in the hospital.
“She even offered to help me out when I had an unusually busy call week in the hospital. I never took her up on it but appreciated her nice gesture at the time.”
Jessie listened intently and appeared genuinely interested in her thoughts and feelings. In hindsight, Dr. Zacharia now understands that attention functioned as a way to get Dr. Zacharia lower her guard.
“What I didn’t realize then was that she was lowering my guard creating a space for me to share my vulnerabilities with her.”
Eventually she began spending time with Jessie outside of work. At some point she introduced her to Levi.
“Little did I know that introduction would set the stage for years of manipulation sabotage and emotional pain — a cycle I would not fully understand until much later.”
The First Red Flag: New Job and First Visible Fracture in Jessie's Mask
The first red flag in Dr. Zacharia's friendship with Jessie appeared in the summer of 2017. A job opening came up at the institution where she had completed her residency — just a fifteen-minute commute from her apartment in the city, compared to the hour-plus commute she had been doing from the city to the suburbs.
“Not only was the commute shorter, it also fulfilled my original dream of working in academic medicine — something I had always wanted because of my passion for teaching.”
When she had applied for jobs in Chicago after fellowship, there were no academic openings available. So when she saw this position two years later, she immediately applied, as the timing aligned with both her goals and the growing strain of her long commute.
Dr. Zacharia interviewed and was offered the job, with the support of her mentor — the physician who first inspired her interest in endocrinology during residency. She did not tell anyone at work about the new job until she was ready to submit her required ninety-day notice.
She did share the news with friends outside of work, including Levi. As was typical of Levi, his first reaction to anything positive in her life was anger and jealousy. That pattern showed up even in small things — a day off from work or traveling out of state for a medical conference.
Whenever he got upset, he would repeat the same line:
“That’s not fair!”
A simple phrase, but revealing. It exposed the resentment he kept beneath his modest outward presentation.
Narcissistic injury is a term used to describe the response narcissistic individuals have when something threatens their fragile ego. For a covert narcissist, fairness is not about equity but about control. Any moment they feel less important or inferior in the setting of someone else's joy, happiness or success, they view it as a personal insult.
Interestingly, when there were witnesses around, Levi was able to hold those reactions in. But his facial expression often gave him away — a cold shift, a darker look in his eyes that contrasted sharply with how composed he appeared externally.
Dr. Zacharia tried calling Levi out on this behavior numerous times, but each time he responded with gaslighting and blame shifting. His responses were consistent:
“That didn’t happen”
“I never said that”
“Didn’t we already talk about this?”
“You’re imagining things.”
“You should seek out some professional help.”
Over time, this pattern of gaslighting and blame shifting eroded her confidence and caused her to question her own perception of reality. It was subtle and insidious. It created a dynamic where she increasingly second-guessed herself just to maintain stability in the relationship. Eventually, that self-doubt turned into appeasement, which is how the cycle deepened.
Before a summer gathering hosted by a coworker, Dr. Zacharia asked Levi not to mention her new job in front of anyone. Of course, he did not respect that request. He blurted it out within earshot of Jessie. Jessie didn't say anything at the time, but Dr. Zacharia could tell she was puzzled by what Levi had just mentioned.
"Levi was accustomed to crossing boundaries without hesitation or remorse."
"In moments like this with Levi, I’d think back to my decision during residency to bring him into my professional circles. Deep down, I knew it was a bad idea, but he guilted me into it — insisting that I thought I was 'too good' for him.
"Instead of calling out his insecurity, I absorbed his shame and tried to prove him wrong — at my own expense. What I didn’t understand then but I do now… was that he was quietly monitoring my network. It made sense, in retrospect, why he would immediately friend colleagues on Facebook… Instagram… even after the tiniest interaction."
All of this groundwork worked to Levi's advantage in the coordinated smear campaign that ensued with Jessie 5 years later.
After the gathering, Dr. Zacharia called Jessie to explain the job news directly in her own words. As she spoke, she was met with silence. Eventually Jessie responded in an annoyed tone:
“Yeah. You could have told me, I wouldn’t have said anything.”
"As I kept talking, she kept responding with a drawn-out, 'Yeah...Yeah...Yeah...' That was her tell whenever she was annoyed or didn’t want to hear something. Eventually, she muttered a subdued, “ Well, I’m happy for you.” before we hung up. She sounded far from happy."
For the rest of the week, Jessie’s behavior shifted. She became withdrawn and passive aggressive.
Why Being “Nice” Comes at a Cost
Then Jessie started applying to new jobs, including the very second opening at the institution where Dr. Zacharia had just accepted her position.
“My new boss texted me for input on whether or not to hire her. Despite her malignant behavior toward me, I said yes… she’s a good physician.”
While that statement was true in terms of clinical ability, Jessie's behavior leading up to that moment had been increasingly unprofessional, disrespectful and manipulative.
“That in itself was grounds enough to tell my new boss not to hire her.”
But in that moment, Dr. Zacharia prioritized someone else over herself, just as she had done for most of her life.
“Once again, I chose to prioritize someone else’s feelings over my own — a pattern I had carried my whole life."
"I did something nice for her… but deeply unkind to myself.”
With time, Dr. Zacharia came to understand what this situation represented in what later played out in their dynamic.
“Here’s the truth: you cannot take the high road with a covert narcissist. They see your patience, your generosity, your empathy… as weaknesses to exploit. Being ‘nice’ and letting someone walk over you? That’s a green light for them to keep abusing you.”
It was only through later reflection and healing work that Dr. Zacharia began to distinguish between being kind and being agreeable at her own expense.
Once Jessie realized she could leverage proximity and opportunity within the same professional space, her behavior shifted even more with a sharper sense of entitlement and opportunism.
Weaponized Gift Giving, Backhanded Compliments and Dog Whistled Insults
As 2017 rolled into 2018, Jessie inserted herself more deeply into Dr. Zacharia's personal life, becoming part of the circle of friends she trusted outside of work.
Along with that closeness came a shift in tone. Subtle, passive aggressive remarks started to appear, increasingly aimed at something deeply personal: her upbringing.
“She implied that I grew up lacking, making intermittent remarks about it."
The intent behind those comments, as she later understood it, pointed to a superiority dynamic and a lack of boundaries.
“The fact that she felt entitled to make digs about their income revealed a lot about her superiority complex and her lack of boundaries.”
One day, while speaking with her coworker, Beth, about a tennis grip she had recently learned, Dr. Zacharia mentioned how much it had improved her game. She noted it was not something she had picked up during her childhood lessons.
Jessie, standing nearby, responded with a casual but cutting remark:
“What — the poor man’s grip?”
That moment became a turning point where Dr. Zacharia finally had enough.
Later that day, she texted Jessie to address the comment directly, clarifying that while she had not grown up wealthy, her parents had always provided well for her and her brother.
Jessie’s response came quickly, shifting into immediate defensiveness:
“Her response? Instant victim mode: 'I’m sorry, that wasn’t my intention.'”
The next day, Jessie escalated the performance further, appearing emotional in the workplace in a way that drew attention from others.
“She even shed crocodile tears in the workroom — making sure everyone saw them.”
Looking back, Dr. Zacharia recognizes that there was nothing she needed to justify or defend about her background. Yet, in the moment, the fact that she felt compelled to do so spoke volumes about the manipulation Jessie had already exerted on her life.
“Covert narcissists thrive on making you feel small, constantly testing and undermining you.”
“Trying to shame my upbringing and background? That was a deliberate, calculated low blow. Her tears were a performance — a way to appear empathetic.”
Over time, the pattern of Jessie's behavior became clearer and more consistent.
“Looking back, it’s clear: That comment, that moment, revealed her deeply rooted superiority complex, all hidden behind a carefully crafted mask.”
Not long after, it escalated again. A few weeks later, it was Dr. Zacharia's birthday week. Jessie brought cupcakes into the office and announced them as a celebration in her honor.
“Jessie bought cupcakes for the whole office — supposedly in honor of my birthday week. One known missing detail? I wasn’t even there that week.”
She sent a group message with a photo:
“Look, I brought cupcakes for everyone in honor of your birthday!”
The response from others was immediate praise, as the gesture appeared thoughtful and generous in a shared workplace setting.
When Dr. Zacharia later expressed that it hurt her feelings that the gesture was framed around her birthday while she was not even present, Jessie reacted sharply:
“How could you think such a thing of me!?”
In that moment, the narrative shifted. Jessie reframed the situation in a way that positioned herself as the injured party.
To those unfamiliar with covert narcissistic abuse, the situation might have seemed minor or overblown. But this was a building response to the degradation and belittlement Dr. Zacharia was already experiencing within the friendship.
“It was never about the cupcakes. It was about the intention — the quiet control behind the gesture.”
"That’s the thing about covert narcissistic abuse: it hides in plain sight. They stage small, seemingly innocuous moments just to provoke a reaction. And when you respond, they stand back — calm, composed — and make you look like the problem."
Reactive Abuse and the Beginning of a Smear Campaign
The psychology term for this is reactive abuse. But the term on its own can be misleading. It is not abuse in itself. It is a reaction — a predictable response to escalating provocation.
Dr. Zacharia likened the response to the principle behind the Chinese water torture technique.
"Think of the principle behind the Chinese water torture. A single drop of water seems harmless on its own. But when it keeps falling, over and over, the effect becomes impossible to ignore — exhausting, destabilizing and infuriating."
"That’s exactly how covert narcissistic manipulation works: small, repeated provocations designed to wear you down and make you react."
To this day, Dr. Zacharia believes Jessie's office smear campaign began that day and here is why. That evening, her coworkers held a group FaceTime call with her for her birthday. Jessie was not on the call.
"During the call, one coworker made a point of saying, 'You know, Jessie is a really good person,' with a look of judgment in his eyes. At the time, I didn’t understand the weight of this comment, but looking back, this is the moment he solidified his role as one of her flying monkeys."
A flying monkey is someone the covert narcissist uses to spy on, obtain information about or carry out abuse on their behalf.
"It is a term derived from The Wizard of Oz, where the Wicked Witch of the West used her flying monkeys to spy on Dorothy."
From that moment onward, Jessie’s behavior continued to escalate, gradually shifting what had once been a dream job into an increasingly toxic and destabilizing environment.
COVID Isolation and Evolving Covert Narcissistic Abuse Dynamics
Fast forward to 2020 when COVID hit. Dr. Zacharia viewed the isolation as a relief — a break from both Levi and Jessie. By that point, she was walking on eggshells around them and felt emotionally drained after spending any time together.
Since her employer allowed outpatient visits from home via telemedicine, she did not see Jessie in person for nearly six months.
When precautions eased that summer and they returned to the office, Jessie’s “mask slips” became more frequent. She appeared more bitter, resentful and openly angry than before.
It was clear the isolation had taken a toll on her — and on Levi as well.
What Dr. Zacharia did not realize at the time but understands now is how the lack of supply from lockdown affected Jessie on a deep level.
“That’s the thing with covert narcissists: their very existence depends on constant validation, reassurance, and attention. When they are deprived of it, they are forced to look within and are immediately confronted with the shame and deep-seated insecurity that surrounds their fragile ego.”
In 2021, Dr. Zacharia purchased her first home, taking advantage of low interest rates and favorable market conditions. Both Levi and Jessie reacted negatively to the news.
“Covert narcissists get upset when good things happen to you — especially when they can’t directly benefit from it. They’ll overshadow milestone moments and make everything about themselves.”
“For covert narcissists, life is a competition. They live in a constant state of lack. Nothing feels like enough — money, attention, praise, status, recognition — they’re always chasing more.”
“But no matter how much they accumulate, the emptiness never goes away. That void can’t be filled by material things; it can only be filled by a genuine connection with God which they lack.”
After learning about her home purchase, Jessie quickly began her own home search, frequently calling and texting. Levi followed suit, listing his home and beginning his own search shortly after.
"So, just like Jessie did when I got my new job, she immediately went on a home-hunting frenzy. Suddenly, my phone was blowing up with her calls and texts, as if her whole world was falling apart. She wanted to do everything exactly the way I did."
"Levi followed suit, listing his home right away and started his own search. Both of them were competing with me in real time. Instead of being happy for a friend, they turned what should have been a milestone celebration into a contest."
Cognitive Dissonance and the Trauma Bond
Yet despite Levi’s jealous behavior, he helped her move into her new home. He spent two full days doing it.
That created a persistent internal conflict for Dr. Zacharia. If he was truly “that bad,” why would he do something so helpful and consistent?
The psychology term that captures this experience is cognitive dissonance.
"Cognitive dissonance is the battle between what you’re shown and what’s actually real. You find yourself in an emotional tug of war. It’s when someone gives tangible proof they care while simultaneously making you feel like you’ll never measure up."
"Covert narcissists keep you swinging between guilt and gratitude, hurt and hope. And if you’ve ever felt like you can’t trust your own thoughts anymore — that’s not an accident. It’s by design. It fuels the trauma bond and explains why victims can stay trapped for years, even decades."
Malignant Covert Narcissism: Absence of Boundaries
Jessie ended up buying her new home directly across the street from Dr. Zacharia's home, in direct line of sight from her window.
"After she moved across the street, she started inserting herself into every part of my life. I knew something was off, but no one else seemed to notice. None of our mutual friends thought it was strange that she chose to move right across the street from me — in the third-largest city in the country."
One day in the workroom when no one else was there, Jessie made a resentful remark with her back turned toward Dr. Zacharia.
“Everyone else has nicer homes than me.”
"By this point, I was done feeding into her insecurity. I didn’t respond to her bait. She turned around and looked straight at me with a cold, resentful, hate filled stare."
Then came Dr. Zacharia's housewarming party. Jessie did not bring a gift, which was out of character for her.
At work, Jessie had cultivated a persona some colleagues described as maternal. She was known for buying gifts for others, even those she barely knew and making sure people were aware of it.
"She’d humble-brag about what she bought, constantly fishing for praise and validation. The truth is, most of those gifts were paid for through group contributions, but she always positioned herself as the generous one."
"Over time, I stopped contributing to what I thought of in my mind as her 'humble bragging fund.' I was beginning to see through the performance — through the manipulation hiding behind all that generosity."
Weeks after the housewarming, Jessie handed Dr. Zacharia a gift in private.
“Here — I didn’t smell it. I don’t know if it smells good or not.”
Before it was even opened, the framing already undercut it. Inside was a candle with a strong, unpleasant scent reminiscent of cheap cologne.
Then came the yoga mat on her birthday.
During COVID isolation, Dr. Zacharia had lost twenty pounds through consistent exercise after years of struggling despite disciplined diet and effort.
When they returned to the office after the pandemic, Jessie looked her up and down with an expression of visible disgust. Others had commented positively on the change after being apart, but Jessie did not.
After a birthday dinner with colleagues, Jessie gave her a yoga mat in private, saying, 'It’s time to get healthy."
She was already attending OrangeTheory classes regularly and had attended yoga classes with Jessie in the past. She knew Dr. Zacharia already had a yoga mat.
"So it wasn’t thoughtful. It wasn’t kind. It was a calculated dig disguised as concern. And, of course, she chose to do it on my birthday but behind closed doors of course. She had a reputation to maintain. By this point, Jessie had stopped even pretending to hide her jealousy in private. But the second there was an audience, she became a completely different person."
"Her image is everything to her. She would do ANYTHING to protect it."
Jessie and Levi: Two Intertwined Covert Narcissists
By the end of 2021, Jessie and Levi had become close friends, regularly texting each other. She was also present for his 40th birthday trip out of state.
At that point, Dr. Zacharia was spending more time with Jessie than with her own family. Jessie had become a pervasive presence in her life — a shadow she could not escape.
“I literally spent more time with her than with my own family. She had become such a pervasive part of my life — a shadow I couldn’t escape.”
She began adjusting her own space in response, adding plants and rearranging furniture just to block the line of sight to Jessie’s house. Even small daily moments became reminders of her presence.
“It was disturbing - living so close to someone who had become such an unwelcome presence in every part of my day. I was just grateful she didn’t live in the same building as me.”
Between Levi and Jessie, she found herself constantly walking on eggshells around them. Over time, the ongoing dynamic of their intertwined presence in her life took a toll. Rumination and anxiety became constant, leaving her emotionally and physically drained.
Dr. Zacharia began to exercise less, spent more time on the couch and her weekends were often consumed by rumination.
She became increasingly isolated, not out of preference, but as a way to avoid further emotional strain. The effect was a growing sense of numbness and disconnection from the world around her.
By early 2022, when Little Bug by Em Beihold was released, she found herself playing it repeatedly during her commute, describing it as a personal anthem during that period of her life.
"Fast forward to fall 2022 — I felt like I was living in a shell of myself. I increasingly withdrew myself from socializing. I cut back on my work schedule to help with burnout that was most related to my personal life rather than medicine."
Around this time, Levi suggested axe throwing at a fall festival as a way to lift her spirits. At first, she interpreted it as a thoughtful gesture.
But during the outing, while they were signing waiver forms, she told him that if anything happened, he should contact her family. He responded with a smirk:
“Great — then I get your home.”
"It wasn’t just inappropriate — it was revealing. It exposed how he truly saw me: not as a friend but as a possession to exploit. It just reinforced why I had withdrawn from socializing in the first place."
Dr. Zacharia's Thyroid Fights Back
Later that fall, Dr. Zacharia began noticing unusual weight loss, even though she was exercising less. Even patients started commenting and asking what she was doing to lose weight.
Then the symptoms escalated. She developed increasing anxiety, shortness of breath and palpitations so intense that she struggled to hold conversations with patients without feeling overwhelmed. It reached a point where she could no longer ignore it.
That was when she finally listened to her body and realized something was seriously wrong.
She asked her coworker Beth to run labs for her, trusting her as both a colleague and a friend. The results revealed a diagnosis she knew well as an endocrinologist.
“I learned I had Graves’ disease.”
Graves’ disease is an autoimmune thyroid disorder that causes thyroid hyperactivity. Symptoms include weight changes, tremors, sweating, anxiety, palpitations, hair loss and difficulty sleeping.
"As an endocrinologist, the irony of developing Graves’ disease wasn’t lost on me. I had treated this condition in others for years."
“Covert narcissistic abuse already puts you in a heightened state of anxiety - throw Graves disease into the mix and you feel as if you want to jump out of your skin. It felt like gasoline being poured into an already raging fire of anxiety.”
A week after her diagnosis, she walked into the workroom and found Jessie and Beth engaging in negative commentary about her. Jessie continued even after she entered the room. Beth, attempting to redirect the situation, blurted out: “Christine has a thyroid issue.”
"In that moment, God revealed to me a much needed truth I need to know about a person I thought cared about me as a friend. That day, I realized Beth wasn’t my friend nor a confidant. Not only had she violated HIPAA by sharing my health information without my consent, she was feeding information about my personal life directly to Jessie."
"I had been unknowingly arming the very person who had made my life a living nightmare, through Beth. Beth ended up being Jessie’s most faithful and abusive flying monkey. More on that in episode 2."
By late November 2022, Dr. Zacharia felt completely trapped — trapped by her diagnosis, by her work and by Jessie’s increasingly malicious presence.
"I didn’t know what to do or how to end the friendship, especially since she was so deeply woven into both my professional and personal life. Then, early December of 2022, I finally hit my breaking point."
Levi's Birthday: The Day Everything Shifted
Dr. Zacharia spent her Saturday lying in bed all afternoon. Her heart was racing from uncontrolled hyperthyroidism and her anxiety was mounting with every thought of the birthday dinner she was expected to attend that evening — a dinner for Levi and one of Jessie’s friends.
By that point, the idea of being around them was already unbearable, made worse by the physical symptoms of her thyroid condition.
Dr. Zacharia did not want to go. But fear kept her pinned in place — not just fear of social consequences, but fear of professional fallout if she didn't.
"By this point, Jessie’s manipulations didn’t stay in private; they seeped into work, quietly undermining me, making it clear that any misstep could be twisted against me. Every interaction felt like walking on a tightrope. I felt trapped, cornered on all sides, with no clear escape from the friendship or its consequences."
Why did Jessie keep Dr. Zacharia in her life if she clearly despised her so much?
"It wasn’t out of friendship. She kept me around because she could — because I was a consistent source of supply she could exploit. I was a people-pleaser who didn’t set boundaries — someone afraid of disrupting the peace, someone who lacked the words to explain her abuse to others who either didn’t see it or chose to turn a blind eye."
"It was not friendship. From her perspective, it was utility.
Covert narcissists thrive in such conditions — where boundaries are weak, self-doubt is high and external validation overrides internal certainty.
"They feed on their victim’s pain, anxiety and self-doubt. It gives their fragile ego a sense of superiority, control and validation. Every moment of discomfort, every second of fear, fuels them.”
By this point, Jessie’s influence was even more entrenched, given her entanglement with Levi.
"Unbeknownst to him, she was using him both for supply and as a flying monkey, extracting information about me while tightening her grip. She recognized his lack of loyalty long before I did. For her, it was a win-win."
Dr. Zacharia felt trapped. Then divine intervention stepped in.
"Levi had gone out the night before and texted us an hour before dinner that he was too hungover to attend. Jessie immediately texted me separately, asking if I was still coming. I knew this was my moment. And I seized it.
"I replied… NO."
Just like that, everything in Dr. Zacharia's life started to unravel.
"That moment shifted my life in ways I could have never have imagined. And reflecting back on all of this, it was the BEST thing that ever happened to me."