Bachelor Juan Pablo Galavis showed us a side of him that we did not know existed this season. Although to be fair we only saw about 10 minutes of him during Desiree’s season. Juan Pablo prided himself on being ‘honest’ with the ladies. This ‘honesty’ often came off as brusque, rude, arrogant, disrespectful and dis-‘honest’, leading many to believe Juan Pablo Galavis may have a personality disorder, perhaps a disorder known as narcissism.
So is Juan Pablo Galavis a narcissist?
Narcissism is a term for a An Axis II DSM-IV personality disorder characterized by an inordinate and unhealthy fascination with oneself. It originated from Narcissus in Greek mythology who fell in love with his own image reflected in a pool of water. A 2012 popular book on narcissism by David Thomas, Narcissism: Behind the Mask, suggests that narcissists typically display most, and sometimes all, of the following traits:
- An obvious self-focus in interpersonal exchanges
- Problems in sustaining satisfying relationships
- A lack of psychological awareness
- Difficulty with empathy
- Problems distinguishing the self from others
- Hypersensitivity to any insults or imagined insults
- Vulnerability to shame rather than guilt
- Haughty body language
- Flattery towards people who admire and affirm them
- Detesting those who do not admire them
- Using other people without considering the cost of doing so
- Pretending to be more important than they really are
- Bragging and exaggerating their achievements
- Claiming to be an “expert” at many things
- Inability to view the world from the perspective of other people
- Denial of remorse and gratitude
Check, check and check. This would seem to describe JP to a tee. We definitely saw hypersensitivity to any insults or imagined insults.
He blew off GMA the day after the finale aired because of how he was being treated by the media. Juan Pablo outright refused to do ANY publicity for the show after the finale aired.
He also got VERY defensive with Chris Harrison when Chris confronted him on his behavior with the women.
He certainly showed difficulty with empathy, particularly in the case Andi Dorfman and Clare Crawley. Everything was always ‘Okay”.
Andi accused JP of only talking about himself, not asking anything about her, and disrespecting her by talking about his overnight date with Clare.
“I’m all for honesty and saying your true feelings, but there’s some things that you don’t say to someone if you care about them,” she says. “You don’t tell them that you just had an overnight date, you don’t tell them that they barely made it here.”
In fact on WTA Andi adds: “I think he thinks he was a very good Bachelor,” the 26-year-old tells host Chris Harrison, adding ….. “borderline narcissistic to the point where he was going to go down as the best ‘el bachelor’ in history.”
In the end, the single dad chose 26-year-old model and pediatric nurse Nikki Ferrell proclaiming, ‘I like you a lot.’
Nikki claimed that she wanted him to say, “I love you.”
But on the AFTR show Chris Harrison directly asked him if he ‘loved’ his amazing lady and he said:
‘I’m not going to answer that question, Chris.’ Chris was appalled at Juan Pablo’s inability to even tell Nikki he ‘loved’ her.
He also displayed a considerable amount of name-dropping and bragging around Andi Dorfman. Andi proclaimed this after a night of bragging from JP:
“Waking up this morning I could not wait to get out of the fantasy suite. The fantasy suite turned into a nightmare,” she said……. “I saw a side to him that I didn’t really like. The whole night was a disaster.”
Juan also apparently promised producers that he had a big surprise for everyone on the AFTR show (clearly alluding to an engagement), then when Chris calls him on the promise Juan denies it.
Juan Pablo said he already talked to the executives before the show and told them there is absolutely “no surprise,” saying, “This is my secret. I’m here happy with Nikki.”
Narcissists love to lie and manipulate others.
So is JP a narcissist? Irregardless of an official diagnosis Juan Pablo certainly displayed an unhealthy self-centeredness, smugness, egocentrism, and a lack of empathy which made him one of the most hated Bachelors in Bachelor history and made him a nightmare for the ABC production team.