When Love’s Call Is Not Returned

Echo — the other side of Narcissistic Personality Disorder

When you become a woman of a certain age, you are bombarded with dating advice about Narcissistic Personality Disorder. This is the cocksure guy who will leave your world in ruin. He will mirror everything you ever wanted in what is known as love-bombing and then he will withdraw that love in the unexpected temper tantrum of a child. This will leave you wondering if you were ever loved at all.

After this happens, you will inevitably read many articles about other women who had it way worse than you ever did. Spending thousands of dollars on therapy doing the post-mortem of the relationship, unpacking all of the red flags until it becomes a blanket of comfort. It was always his fault that much was inevitable. He had no sense of self, so he had to mirror yours.

What this entire narrative forgets is the other half of the Narcissus myth — Echo. Echo was a stunning mountain nymph who used to entertain and distract Hera while Zeus had his way with other nymphs. Hera eventually figures out that this gifted storyteller has been the watchdog of indiscretion and punishes her by taking away her voice. Echo is doomed to reflect the snippets of others’ conversations. Given that Echo was enchanting Hera, we have to imagine she would have rivaled Homer in bardic abilities. For a woman to lose her voice in the world of men is a tragedy indeed.

One day Echo sees a very handsome prince and tries to engage him, but because of her curse…