This month we’re talking about narcissistic lying. Here’s the thing: narcissists lie. A lot. It’s part of their nature. But did you know that all human beings lie? Our reasons for lying and the types of lies we tell are based on various grounds. The fundamental difference is motivation.
Self-serving Lies
We may tell self-serving lies (aka “egocentric lies”) to enhance our feeling of well-being, to achieve a goal, to avoid disappointing someone, or to avoid potential humiliation. Have you ever told a self-serving lie? Here’s an example: you offered to make a homemade veggie dip for tomorrow’s office meeting. But you didn’t have time to make it, so you wake early and go to the grocery to pick one up from the deli. You put it in a dish and add it to the table’s offerings. When you receive compliments, it feels good! So you don’t divulge that the dip was store-bought (Neal 2017).
We may tell kindhearted lies (aka “face-saving” or pro-social lies) to prevent someone’s feelings from getting hurt, to save a relationship, or to keep ourselves from losing status. We tell kindhearted lies because we feel empathy or because we care about the person we’re lying to. Sometimes we want to look like we care more about something than we really do, and so we tell a kindhearted lie.
Have you ever told a kindhearted lie to avoid hurting someone or to seem more interested in someone or something than you actually were? Same.
Narcissistic Lies
The current theory about narcissistic lying is that all narcissistic behaviors, including lying, are unconsciously motivated by shame and driven by previous narcissistic injuries.
Lying is central to a narcissist’s identity, but because all of their experiences are filtered through previous narcissistic injuries, they’ll view their lie as “The Truth.” In his book “The Narcissist You Know,” Dr. Joseph Burgo says about the narcissist, “He doesn’t see himself as a liar but rather as an embattled defender of the ‘truth’ as he has come to see it” (Burgo 2016).
Narcissistic behaviors, including lying, are unconsciously motivated by shame and driven by previous narcissistic injuries.
A narcissist’s lies are a combination of their character traits and life experiences, so there’s usually a small “kernel” of truth in each lie. It’ll be difficult and confusing for you to try to find that kernel, but your intuition will tell you it’s there. In their story, in addition to lying, they’ll also exaggerate any information that makes them look “good,” and they’ll just as easily minimize information that has the potential to make them look “bad.”
Because narcissists must believe that they’re always correct and never make mistakes, they often have difficulty knowing the difference between lies and the truth. It makes absolute sense if you remember that a narcissist’s entire life is a lie because of their false face. They carry grandiose beliefs about their false selves, and they need validation and affirmation to hold onto those beliefs. The false self keeps the narcissist feeling superior, and that’s essential to avoiding narcissistic injuries. They see anything that threatens their superiority as an attack and will respond as such.
Narcissists need to lie to keep the false face intact, and they need and expect us to believe those lies, or there will be hell to pay. Usually in the form ofnarcissistic rages or silent treatments.
Could you be feeling the effects of Narcissism Awareness Grief? Download thefree chapter to find out:
Practice conscious awareness: Self-awareness releases us from making impulsive and potentially damaging decisions.
Practice Ferocious Self-care: We take responsibility for getting our needs met instead of waiting for someone to change or to meet our needs for us. We are in control of ourselves. No one is responsible for us but us.
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Announcing- I AM: A Guided Journey to Your Authentic Self, Workbook and Journal
A step-by-step method to learn how to write the highest vibrating, most powerful affirmations to manifest love, positivity, peace, self-confidence, motivation, success, and other wonderful things.
Available worldwide in any store (ask and they’ll order it for you!) and on Amazon US, UK, Germany, Italy, Spain, Japan, France, Netherlands, Canada, Australia, and more.
As a result of growing up in a dysfunctional home, and with the help of professional therapists and continued personal growth, author Diane Metcalf developed strong coping skills and healing strategies. She happily shares those with others who want to learn and grow.
Diane is an experienced advocate, speaker, and writer on family dysfunction and narcissism. She holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Psychology and a Master of Science in Information Technology. She has worked in numerous human service fields, including domestic violence and partner abuse.
She has authored four transformational books about healing and moving forward, including the highly praised “Lemon Moms” series. This emotionally supportive collection explains maternal narcissistic traits and teaches how to reconcile past hurts to begin self-nurturing, healing, and moving forward.
The Lemon Moms series, as well as her other books and articles, are an aggregation of education, insight, and personal growth resulting from childhood experiences and her subsequent recovery work.
She writes about strategies for recovering and moving on from hurtful people and painful, dysfunctional, or toxic relationships on The Toolbox blog.
Cognitive dissonance is a type of mental stress that results from struggling to correct that surreal feeling between what we know to be real, and what we are told is real. It is the crazy-making component of gaslighting and the biggest cause of C-PTSD. Cognitive dissonance is the confusion and mental discomfort you experience when you live with contradictory beliefs, ideas, or values. It indicates a state of living with continually opposing or conflicting viewpoints, beliefs, or behaviors. It’s usually the result of manipulation, and specifically of gaslighting. To restore emotional balance, the affected person must change (or remove) the inconsistencies and conflicts. Most of us do this on an ongoing basis, without conscious awareness.
If you grew up in a narcissistic home you’ve probably experienced cognitive dissonance and have felt the resulting and ongoing confusion. Human beings weren’t meant to continually live in a state of confusion. Not knowing what to believe, what to expect, and not being able to trust our feelings, judgment, or senses is overwhelming and painful. Our natural state of “being” requires that our thoughts and interactions make sense because we need stability and security to be emotionally healthy and balanced. When we feel doubtful of our reality, or are so fearful of making a decision that we’re emotionally paralyzed, it may be the result of cognitive dissonance.
Although it doesn’t sound like it, some types of cognitive dissonance can be healthy. For example, guilt is a positive and healthy form of cognitive dissonance. Guilt allows us to see the discrepancy between “this is who I say I am, but this is what I did.” We feel guilty when “who we are” and “what we did” are not aligned. This misalignment causes us to feel empathy for the person we wronged. For example, if I believe I’m a gentle, kind, and loving person, and I make a cruel remark to someone, my perception of “who I am” no longer matches “what I did.” A gentle, kind, and loving person would not say mean things. I would be motivated by guilt to apologize to the person I hurt. The cognitive dissonance provided by our guilt drives us to atone for our actions, which is a positive thing.
Cognitive dissonance has a dark side and it’s harmful
When we’re gaslighted regularly, our level of cognitive dissonance grows, and the crazier and more out-of-touch we feel. We’re unsure of what’s real and what’s not, what’s true and what’s not, and we don’t know whether to believe our senses or only to accept what we’re told.
We all tell ourselves stories. It’s how we make sense of ourselves and our world. Our egos translate our experiences so that they make sense, but doing so while in a state of cognitive dissonance can keep us stuck. To get unstuck, we might choose to accept the best explanation that we can come up with, regardless of whether it’s accurate.For example, think about the possible explanations that a six-year-old might create, versus a twenty-year-old, or a thirty-five-year-old. Youth and immaturity work against us when we’re gaslighted as kids. We’re not experienced or knowledgeable enough to imagine plausible and realistic explanations. At ten, if my best friend doesn’t reach out, I might think it’s because she doesn’t like me anymore. But at thirty, if I haven’t heard from my friend, I might think it’s because she’s busy with life, working, prioritizing self-care, etc. I can choose any number of explanations, and they’ll align with my current self-concept.
Now, if I formed the belief in childhood that I’m unlovable, and I carried that belief with me into adulthood, my interpretation of others’ behavior will reflect that belief. If I have strong self-esteem, then my interpretation will reflect that. We interpret our reality using these emotional “filters.” It’s important to remember this because our filters can and do change. Our perceptions and interpretations also continually change and develop as we mature physically, intellectually, socially, spiritually, and emotionally.
Remember that “beliefs” are thoughts that have emotions attached to them. Eliminating inaccurate beliefs is a primary key to healing. What thoughts and feelings are still connected to your childhood beliefs? For example, if you were told as a child that you were not smart, then as an adult you may still believe it. You may never have examined that belief to determine if it was really true. Instead, you probably accepted and internalized it as truth and took it with you into adulthood. Now as an adult, you can examine it objectively. Make a list of the feelings, thoughts, and actions that come with that belief and write about them at length. Is the belief still relevant today? Why or why not? Explain. It’s helpful to learn about therapeutic approaches like Tapping (Emotional Freedom Technique,) Neurolinguistic Programming, and Cognitive Behavioral Therapy which can eliminate faulty beliefs and help create healthy new ones. Take time to investigate other methods of changing beliefs. We acquired our beliefs as children. As adults, we get to replace them with ones that serve us.
Cognitive dissonance is one of the most challenging aspects of healing. Because of gaslighting, we’ve learned to disregard or mistrust our perceptions, judgment, and memory. We may have learned to trust and accept someone else’s interpretation of the world and events and we may now rely on their interpretations, judgment, and perceptions instead of our own.
When you were gaslighted as a child, you probably also received unexpected or inappropriate responses. Your response to the gaslighting may have been determined to be incorrect, unreasonable, or shameful. You may have wondered why you received strange looks causing you to question your actions and words. Now, as an adult, you may be fearful for your mental health, you’re concerned that you may be losing your mind. You may accept that you’re the illogical one, or that you’re mentally ill. Gaslighting often leads to depression, anxiety, helplessness, hopelessness, or exhaustion. If it’s severe, you may feel like your sense of self is “fuzzy” and “reality” feels dreamlike. You probably can’t think clearly and have trouble with problem-solving and making decisions. This is more cognitive dissonance as a result of the gaslighting.
I’d often get confused, stressed, and frustrated when my mother denied doing or saying something I’d witnessed. I’d ask, “You’re saying that I didn’t see what I know I just saw?” And she’d reply in an exasperated or dismayed tone of voice, “You dreamt it,” “You imagined it,” or “So-and-so did that, not me.” It shouldn’t surprise you that I grew up to continue that tradition. I excelled at self-gaslighting. When you convince yourself that you didn’t just hear what you know you heard or that you didn’t just see what you know you saw….you are self-gaslighting. We do it to protect ourselves from further trauma.
Self gaslighting
For those of us who’ve experienced gaslighting as children, it likely caused harmful cognitive dissonance and reduced us into confused, uncertain, dependent shadows of our true selves. It robbed us of our ability to think logically, make decisions easily, use sound judgment, and recall accurately. Instead, we doubt ourselves, always second-guessing our thoughts, emotions, and decisions. I believe that gaslighting is the most harmful and destructive form of manipulation because it undermines our whole sense of self and crumbles our stability.
Self-gaslighting also contributes to cognitive dissonance. When we tell ourselves that someone’s actions or behavior was our fault, we’re self-gaslighting. We may convince ourselves that we somehow provoked their hurtful behavior, or we take responsibility for the things they did to hurt us. When we self-gaslight, we not only accept blame, we intentionally place it on ourselves. We lie to ourselves and then spend precious emotional energy, convincing ourselves that we’re not. It’s exhausting. Throughout your healing process, remind yourself not to do that anymore. Be honest with yourself now. Stand up for yourself and become your own advocate. If you won’t, then who will? Tell yourself the truth and stop accepting gaslighting from anybody, including yourself, period. Practice mindfulness to become aware that you’re doing it and stop every time.
Humans have a natural need for their attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors to co-exist peacefully with each other. This is called “cognitive consistency.” Living in a state of cognitive consistency means that we feel stable, relaxed, and secure. For example, if I believe I’m an honest person, and I act accordingly, it means I’ll tell the truth even when it’s uncomfortable or it gets me into trouble. Doing so means I’ll maintain my integrity and my cognitive consistency.
How cognitive dissonance is resolved
Most of us consciously or unconsciously resolve cognitive dissonance by doing one of these three things:
Change our thoughts: Choosing this option means you change your thoughts and beliefs to match those of your narcissistic mom. For example, you accept your mother’s perspective that you lack common sense, rather than continue believing that you have sound judgment. Now you agree with your mother, which eliminates the emotional conflict and cognitive dissonance.
Change our actions: With this approach, you change your behavior, so it matches your beliefs about yourself. Using the above example, you find ways to demonstrate that you actually have sound judgment and common sense. Your actions now match your mindset, eliminating the emotional conflict and cognitive dissonance.
Justify our perceptions: You really do lack common sense and sound judgment, and you rationalize this by minimizing their value and significance. In essence, you trivialize your lack of common sense and sound judgment to eliminate the emotional conflict and cognitive dissonance.
Resolving cognitive dissonance isn’t always done on a conscious level, although we may be aware that we have choices to make. At some point, we’ll use one of the three methods to keep our sanity intact.
Eliminating cognitive dissonance isn’t a “one and done” thing. Typically, and speaking from my own experience, we play around with the three possibilities for resolution, trying them on, seeing how they fit and feel. Eventually, we settle on one that suits us best, that causes us the least mental and emotional stress.
Because my mother liked to overwrite my perceptions and memories with her own, I heard a lot of, “I never said that,” “You imagined it,” “You dreamt it,” or “It wasn’t me.” I was in a continual state of self-doubt and confusion from her insistence that I perceived and remembered events inaccurately. My ability to make decisions and to trust my own senses was severely negatively impacted. I eventually came to believe that the discrepancies between my own observations and those of my mother were flaws in my memory and perception. I became obsessed with explaining the disparities between what I observed and what I was told I observed. I remained in a state of cognitive dissonance throughout my childhood. If you can relate, I urge you to start your healing journey now and recover from the resulting cognitive dissonance.
Tools for Healing
Conscious awareness: Be aware and make conscious choices before acting. Self-awareness releases us from making impulsive and potentially damaging decisions.
Self-care: We can only choose to focus on and be responsible for ourselves, our own thoughts, actions, and behavior. The good news is that we can change ourselves with patience, persistence, and practice. We can take responsibility for getting our needs met, instead of waiting for someone to change or meet our needs for us. We are in control of ourselves and no one is responsible for us but us.
Announcing- I AM: A Guided Journey to Your Authentic Self, Workbook and Journal
A step-by-step method to learn how to write the highest vibrating, most powerful affirmations to manifest love, positivity, peace, self-confidence, motivation, success, and other wonderful things.
Available worldwide in any store (ask and they’ll order it for you!) and on Amazon US, UK, Germany, Italy, Spain, Japan, France, Netherlands, Canada, Australia, and more.
As a result of growing up in a dysfunctional home, and with the help of professional therapists and continued personal growth, author Diane Metcalf developed strong coping skills and healing strategies. She happily shares those with others who want to learn and grow.
Diane is an experienced advocate, speaker, and writer on family dysfunction and narcissism. She holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Psychology and a Master of Science in Information Technology. She has worked in numerous human service fields, including domestic violence and partner abuse.
She has authored four transformational books about healing and moving forward, including the highly praised “Lemon Moms” series. This emotionally supportive collection explains maternal narcissistic traits and teaches how to reconcile past hurts to begin self-nurturing, healing, and moving forward.
The Lemon Moms series, as well as her other books and articles, are an aggregation of education, insight, and personal growth resulting from childhood experiences and her subsequent recovery work.
She writes about strategies for recovering and moving on from hurtful people and painful, dysfunctional, or toxic relationships on The Toolbox blog.
After much reading and researching about narcissism, have you started to recognize that someone’s narcissistic behavior has negatively affected you?
If you feel angry, then good for you! You might feel so overwhelmed with anger that you’re not exactly sure what you’re specifically angry about. You might feel like you’re angry all the time, at just about everyone. Or maybe you’re just feeling annoyed, irritated, resentful, or in a bad mood. Those are forms of anger too.
Feeling annoyed, in a bad mood, or resentful can make you feel bad about yourself and lower your self-esteem.
Unexamined anger can create issues between you and others, or cause problems in your relationships, drain your energy, and lower your ability to think clearly and make decisions.
So, let’s talk about why you might feel some form of anger after recognizing how someone else’s narcissistic behavior has negatively impacted you.
Narcissists, whether they have a few narcissistic behaviors, or full-blown Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD,) mistreat others. The hypervigilance, trauma bonds, and cognitive dissonance created during this wounding also create emotional triggers.
If you have a memory, or when a certain event happens, and you immediately feel angry, it’s because your brain hasn’t fully processed it before reacting. These types of knee-jerk reactions are your “emotional triggers.”
To identify our emotional triggers, (aka “buttons“) we need to examine our feelings and our reactions to these feelings in deeper detail.
For example
If I’m in line to buy something and someone cuts in front of me, I might immediately feel angry and lash out at that person. Why would I do that? Well, it’s about how I interpret what’s going on, but the causeof the anger might not be what I assume it is.Isolating the cause (the “trigger” or “button”) is what this article is all about.
This first step is not about judging yourself. It is about gaining awareness. It’s about getting to know your mind and catching what it’s doing without your permission. Noticing when unconscious programming takes over is a necessary step if you want to discover your triggers.
How to discover and control emotional triggers
In the previous example, if my interpretation of the offending line-cutter is “they think they’re more important than me” or “they think they don’t have to wait like the rest of us,” or “what an entitled so-and-so! How disrespectful!” then I’ve given the line cutting behavior a specific meaning which relates to myself, and it may or may not be an accurate interpretation. The interpretation I’ve given the behavior might trigger feelings like: I don’t matter, I’m not important, or I’m not respected. It’s these first emotions that I feel(I don’t matter, I’m not important, I’m being disrespected) that trigger my anger.
But what if I stopped and gave the benefit of the doubt? What if I changed my interpretation? Maybe the person is stressed and in a hurry and didn’t notice the line? (I’ve done this myself.) What if they’re asking a quick question and don’t actually require service? (Not a nice thing to do, but still understandable and totally unrelated to me personally.) There are many other interpretations or reasonsfor someone’s behavior besides the limited ones that we can think of.
Let’s go deeper
Did you know that no one can “make” you feel angry? No one can “make” you feel anything, really. Our feelings are a choice. The behavior that results is also a choice. Those are big statements, and they’re backed by research. I’ve included the citations at the end of the article.
When you start this process of self-examination, it’s like peeling an onion. You’ll uncover hidden thoughts, beliefs, limitations, and judgments, and there will be surprises along the way. Everything that you uncover is an insight that will allow you to see yourself, and your world, from a larger perspective. This is called personal growth.
Example of a trigger
Let’s say someone does something, and the first thing that pops into your mind is that they think you’re not important! That you don’t matter! That you should be ashamed! Or that you’re stupid, don’t belong, or that they don’t like you. You immediately feel angry and want to say something mean or hurtful, or maybe you want to physically hurt them.
But let’s stop and take a closer look at what just took place. Upon closer inspection, you see that they didn’t actually SAY anything. Themeaningfor their behavior is coming from you and it’s causing you to feel an emotion! That first (primary) emotion is what’s causing your anger.
Whoa. Can you see that? Your interpretation of what they did may be correct or incorrect. The person has not actually said that you’re not important, that you don’t matter, that you should be ashamed, that you’re stupid, etc. It feels to you, through your interpretation, like that’s what they said or implied. Your interpretation determines what you will feel next. Do you see how your interpretation can drastically affect what you feel and what happens next?
Interpretation happens in your mind, and most of us, when we haven’t yet become aware, do not notice when it happens. That’s because it happens unconsciously. But after today, and when you start to apply conscious awareness, you will become aware of it. And when you change your interpretation of a memory or a present event, your primary emotion(s)and your resulting behavior also change. But what does that mean for you?
Now what?
After you acknowledge that you’ve interpreted a memory (or a present event,) and that the meaning caused you to feel a primary emotion (shame, dismissed, unimportant, disrespected, mocked, etc.,) that triggered anger, you can stop right there and question whether your interpretation was accurate or not.
Try to find out why you gave the memory or event that particular interpretation. Why not a different one? Asking and answering this question involves taking a fearless look at our less-than-perfect character traits and noticing which ones need improving. This is the opposite of blaming. This is knowing ourselves on a deeper level; knowing our buttons and why they exist in the first place. It’s about not only knowing what the buttons are but how to turn them off and shut them down for good.
Here are some primary emotions, or “buttons” that might trigger anger when pushed. Hint: It would be helpful to examine each one of these and journal your thoughts and insights about what you discover.
Primary buttons that trigger anger
1. Loss of control, powerlessness, victimization
If feelings of victimhood or loss of control are the primary emotion, you’ll be triggered to feel anger because you want to regain control over what’s happening, or what’s perceived to be happening. (Remember, a lot of this is your own interpretation.) These feelings, in particular, could cause you to overreact or lash out at others who triggered them. That’s because the loss of control, victimization, and fear are closely related. If you notice that you’re over-reacting or lashing out, take a look to see if you’re feeling powerless, victimized, or afraid.
2. Fear
Feeling afraid and feeling a loss of control are related, because the amygdala (a memory-creating brain structure) saves memories, not as stories, but as chunks and fragments of sensory input. Your memories are saved as bits and chunks of sounds, sights, smells, touches, and tastes. For those who have C-PTSD, any of these fragments that are also connected to fear can also trigger anger because of the strong need to regain control of the situation. (See number1.)
Our minds use fear as a method of keeping us safe. Even though fear is uncomfortable, it is a natural response, not a sign of weakness. When a memory causes you to re-experience feelings of fear, it’s OK to remind yourself that you’re in a safe place and that you’re experiencing a memory. It’s safe to examine this disturbing feeling a little deeper. When you begin to get a clearer picture of what’s really going on behind the scenes in your brain, by discovering the root cause of the fear, you’ll start to uncover the actual primary emotion trigger. Once you find the trigger, you can begin to understand it better, which will start you moving forward to remove its power in your life.
3. Frustration
Frustration is an emotional response to dealing with conditions that are outside of our realm of control. Being blocked from the desired outcome, or being challenged by a difficult task, are examples of events that can cause frustration. When someone feels frustrated, and it’s combined with fear, (for example, there is a difficult task that must be completed before a certain date to avoid negative consequences, and that date is drawing near) they may become aggressive. Often, when we feel frustrated, there is also a sense of powerlessness because you’re in a situation where you want to do something and you can’t. You feel like you have no available choices, or you don’t know what those choices are.
Focusing on a solution, rather than the problem, is always helpful. If you’re feeling frustrated about something, here are some questions to ask yourself that could change your perspective, and uncover a solution-
What is it that I’m trying to achieve?
Am I feeling blocked in the way I’m going about getting it?
What are some other ways I can get it? Think of at least two.
What steps can I take right now?
Do I need to start working on accepting that I can’t change this situation?
Do I need to change my goal, rather than give it up?
Am I allowing fear to control my responses? How can I change that?
4. Feeling tired or overwhelmed
Feeling worn-out or exhausted impacts our ability to cope with challenging situations. When we’re tired, our minds can’t work at full capacity, and we may find ourselves misperceiving, misunderstanding, or making poor decisions. When we need rest, our patience and emotional resilience are low. You may feel like you’re at your limit for what you can handle, and that’s also connected to feeling frustrated. When you’re at your limit, feeling like you have no more ability to cope can feel scary and may cause you to feel afraid. Being pushed over that limit can trigger anger.
Are you beginning to see how fear keeps coming up in these scenarios? Fear is connected to many of our triggers.
When you’re feeling overwhelmed, stop and see if you can find the cause. Are you tired? Under more stress than usual? Are you in pain? Have you experienced a loss? Have your responsibilities increased? Have you lost a support system? Had a financial loss? What else has changed in your life recently?
Break the cause into smaller chunks and see where it becomes unmanageable. Do you need to ask for help with this unmanageable piece?
What are some healthy ways that you can start to respond to feeling overwhelmed? (Hint: take a nap, go to bed early, eat something if you’re hungry, call someone, move your body; go for a walk, do something physical, talk to someone, read.)
5. Grief
Grief is an overwhelming emotion, and it’s one of the hardest to deal with. Part of the dawning awareness that someone’s narcissistic behavior has negatively affected us, is noticing a strong feeling of loss. Feelings of loss can be confusing and painful, and often when going through the process of Narcissism Awareness Grief, we feel that sense of loss. We aren’t mourning for what we had. We are mourning for what we didn’t have; we are mourning for what could have been.
We mourn our lost sense of self. We mourn the love and acceptance we never got to experience, especially if we’re an invisible or scapegoat child. We grieve our lost sense of security because we were gaslighted. We mourn all the lost time, the time spent believing lies and engaging in people-pleasing. We mourn the loss of a soul connection. It’s natural to feel angry when there’s such a huge amount of loss.
When you’re angry, and you’re not sure why, ask yourself if grief could be the cause. Does the current situation remind you of something you’ve lost, could have had, or desired? If your anger is indeed grief-related, that’s an indication that you need to start working through the grief. Learn about the stages of grief and Narcissism Awareness Grief in particular. Get into a support group or find a therapist. Please don’t let being stuck in grief rob you of a happier future.
6. Codependent coping
When we’re codependent, we likely don’t know how to validate and affirm ourselves, and we look to others to fulfill those needs. When we don’t feel good about ourselves, have low self-esteem or have low self-confidence, we look for validation and approval from others. And we may go to incredible lengths to please others in order to get that validation, affirmation, and some semblance of self-worth. When we have a weak sense of worth, our anger jumps out in defense. When someone doesn’t acknowledge or appreciate what we’ve done for them (even if they didn’t ask for our help), we feel hurt and resentful, and those can trigger anger.
Codependency ends when we start feeling “good enough” and can approve and validate ourselves. Validation is incredibly important. Once you’re able to validate yourself, you‘ll be less likely to seek out others to do it for you. You won’t need to step in and do things for others when they haven’t asked you to. You’ll begin to know yourself more deeply than you did when you were focused on care-taking someone else.
Why do you need this person’s approval? Why is the approval so important to you? What will their approval change about you? What will happen if you don’t get it? If you don’t get it, would that change anything, really? What beliefs about yourself would it change? Is their approval the only thing that will cause this change? What can you do to start feeling better about yourself regardless of how they respond to you? What else might improve your self-esteem? What might increase your self-confidence? When will you start doing those?
7. Betrayal hurt
When we go through Narcissism Awareness Grief, we often feel betrayed. Betrayal hurts our hearts and can affect how we think and feel, and what we believe. At least temporarily.
It’s hard to understand how and why someone could hurt us so deeply. These underlying hurt feelings, along with those of disappointment and betrayal can all trigger anger. Acknowledge the feelings of pain, betrayal, and disappointment. Work on accepting that the narcissist in your life truly cannot behave any differently. Without a desire or motivation to change, there will be no change. The changes in how you feel must come from you.
8. Weak boundaries
If we have weak boundaries or don’t enforce the boundaries we have, the more likely we are to react in anger when they’re challenged or violated.
You are worthy of love and respect simply because you exist. If you’re in a situation where you’re treated unlovingly or disrespectfully, that may cause you to feel angry or resentful. You may not understand why you feel that way. You feel that way because that person is not validating you. Being validated is a basic human need. If someone’s invalidation triggers your anger, you may want to look into self-empowerment and ways of developing a stronger sense of self-worth. When you value yourself and can validate yourself, it’s less likely that another’s lack of validation will trigger you.
By taking the time to understand where your anger comes from, you’ll learn a lot about yourself and begin to heal your triggers. You’ll begin feeling a new sense of peace and calm. When someone or something triggers you, you’ll consciously understand what’s happening and be able to deal with it accordingly. You’ll feel in control of your feelings instead of like your feelings are controlling you.
Will all of your triggers ever be healed? Probably not. I say this because you’re alive, having new experiences, and developing new triggers throughout life. Discovering and healing triggers is a life-long process. It’s just part of good self-care.
Sometimes all it takes is awareness of what’s happening “behind the scenes” in your brain to uncover an unknown trigger. Sometimes when I notice a trigger being activated I say to myself, “I’m being triggered right now,” and it’s often enough to shut down a potentially ugly scenario and maintain my emotional control. With a little practice, you’ll begin noticing your triggers and responding to them in a different, healthier way. You’ll begin seeing your anger as a tool for deeper self-understanding.
Beck, A.T. (2008). The evolution of the cognitive model of depression and its neurobiological correlates. American Journal of Psychiatry, 165, 969-977.
Gross J.J (2014). Handbook of Emotion Regulation. 2nd ed. New York: Guilford Press.
Metcalf, D. (2020) Lemon Moms: A Guide to Understand and Survive Maternal Narcissism
Plassmann, H., O’Doherty, J., Shiv, B., & Rangel, A. (2008). Marketing actions can modulate neural representations of experienced pleasantness. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (USA),105(3), 1050–1054.
Solomon, R.C. (2007). True to our feelings: What our emotions are really telling us. New York: Oxford University Press.
Announcing- I AM: A Guided Journey to Your Authentic Self, Workbook and Journal
A step-by-step method to learn how to write the highest vibrating, most powerful affirmations to manifest love, positivity, peace, self-confidence, motivation, success, and other wonderful things.
Available worldwide in any store (ask and they’ll order it for you!) and on Amazon US, UK, Germany, Italy, Spain, Japan, France, Netherlands, Canada, Australia, and more.
As a result of growing up in a dysfunctional home, and with the help of professional therapists and continued personal growth, author Diane Metcalf developed strong coping skills and healing strategies. She happily shares those with others who want to learn and grow.
Diane is an experienced advocate, speaker, and writer on family dysfunction and narcissism. She holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Psychology and a Master of Science in Information Technology. She has worked in numerous human service fields, including domestic violence and partner abuse.
She has authored four transformational books about healing and moving forward, including the highly praised “Lemon Moms” series. This emotionally supportive collection explains maternal narcissistic traits and teaches how to reconcile past hurts to begin self-nurturing, healing, and moving forward.
The Lemon Moms series, as well as her other books and articles, are an aggregation of education, insight, and personal growth resulting from childhood experiences and her subsequent recovery work.
She writes about strategies for recovering and moving on from hurtful people and painful, dysfunctional, or toxic relationships on The Toolbox blog.
Narcissists love the silent treatment. It’s their secret weapon when they want to manipulate and hurt in a big way. Using the silent treatment is a way to inflict pain without causing visible evidence.
Research shows that when we ignore or exclude someone, it activates the same part of their brain as physical pain does. Narcissists instinctively know that this manipulative technique is extremely hurtful. It’s traumatic to those it’s inflicted upon (Eisenberger et al. 2004).
Because I write about narcissistic mothers, I’ll note here that a narcissistic mother gets her sense of self through her children. She needs to protect her self-image and her reputation as a loving, caring mother, so her children are a necessary part of her identity. This is why the silent treatment is so meaningful to her. To a narcissistic mother, when she uses the silent treatment, it’s as if she’s cutting off a very displeasing part of herself and, at the same time, understands how painful it feels to the person she’s shunning. I’ve heard others remark that my mother was the kind of person who would cut off her nose to spite her face. Win at any cost, right?
The silent treatment is a punishment that consists of “hurt and rescue.” It can continue for months or even years and is often used to teach a lesson or to manipulate behavior (Eisenberger et al. 2004). For those of us who’ve been subjected to this form of abuse, it kept us anxious by triggering our fear of abandonment. (Saeed, K. 2019).
When I was seventeen, I endured my mother’s silent treatment for a little over three months. She had given me the silent treatment before, and she would again, but this instance lasted the longest. For the entire three months, I was met with stony silence any time I attempted to interact with her. She would not make eye contact with me. There was no acknowledgment that I existed whatsoever.
I broke our silent relationship now and again, testing to see if she would respond, and each time I was met with cold rejection. The message was loud and clear that she was not finished punishing me, and my attempts were not going to have an effect. It was as if I was invisible. I remember needing affirmation from others that they could see me and that I existed. I felt like I was heading into insanity.
One day, as mysteriously as the silent treatment had started, it ended. When my mother broke the silence and spoke to me, it was some little unimportant phrase that had no real significance, but it indicated the shunning was over.
I couldn’t figure out what I had done to offend or anger my mother, to cause her to take such extreme action as the silent treatment. I spent an excessive amount of time obsessing about it, replaying scenarios and conversations repeatedly, looking for the cause. I never found it, and of course, we never discussed what happened. If I was supposed to learn a lesson, I never knew what it was. Maybe the whole thing was nothing more than a show of power, meant to demoralize and unsettle me. It remains a mystery to this day.
When a person is actively ignored, it causes such psychological and emotional anguish that it can actually be seen on brain scans (Pune Mirror 2019). The silent treatment triggers a fear of abandonment, which is very frightening, but for children like me who’d already been abandoned by one parent, it is unbearable. I was obsessed with thoughts like, “Who will take care of me?” “Will I ever matter?” “Will I ever be safe?” “Will anyone ever love me?”
The fear of abandonment causes anxiety, worry, sleep loss, and inability to concentrate. Imagine trying to learn in school or study for tests while being actively ignored and rejected by a parent. With every silent treatment, we go deeper into survival mode, and we can experience panic attacks, appetite loss, binge-eating, racing heartbeat, nightmares, depression, confusion, and obsessive thinking. With each, we learn to focus more on our mother’s behavior and her needs. We learn to provide what she needs and wants because we fear we’ll be emotionally or physically abandoned again. The need to please and appease her becomes overblown.
A narcissistic mom understands that she’ll get away with rejecting and shunning because, as children, we have no choice but to welcome her back when she decides to return to our lives. We need her, after all, and she knows it. When she’s ready to acknowledge us again, we’re so happy, aren’t we?
The narcissistic mom likes knowing how hurt we are by her silent treatment. Our pain demonstrates to her that she is all-powerful and can devastate us if and when she chooses. It’s a great form of narcissistic supply.
Every time we go through the silent treatment, we’re diminished. Each time we endure active ignoring, we question our self-worth. Our self-esteem and self-image are further eroded, and our fear of abandonment escalates. Despite our accomplishments, acknowledgments, or friendships, we find ourselves desperate for our mother’s approval, which is, of course, always out of reach. We may come close, but we never quite make it.
We eventually accept that we aren’t worthy of her love or attention. We settle for any crumbs of affection or attention we can get from her. We learn that we’re somehow inferior and will never be able to please her, although we should continue trying.
This repeated process is called “trauma bonding” and is another example of the powerful emotional bonds created between abuser and abused. Over time, trauma bonds become very resistant to change, contributing to the development of a codependent relationship.
Conscious awareness: Be aware and make conscious choices before acting. Self-awareness releases us from making impulsive and potentially damaging decisions.
Self-care: We are in control of ourselves and no one is responsible for us but us. We can only choose to focus on and be responsible for ourselves, our own thoughts, actions, and behavior. We can change ourselves with patience, persistence, and practice. When we take responsibility for getting our needs met, instead of waiting for someone to change or meet our needs for us, we are healing.
More Resources You May Like:
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Announcing- I AM: A Guided Journey to Your Authentic Self, Workbook and Journal
A step-by-step method to learn how to write the highest vibrating, most powerful affirmations to manifest love, positivity, peace, self-confidence, motivation, success, and other wonderful things.
Available worldwide in any store (ask and they’ll order it for you!) and on Amazon US, UK, Germany, Italy, Spain, Japan, France, Netherlands, Canada, Australia, and more.
As a result of growing up in a dysfunctional home, and with the help of professional therapists and continued personal growth, author Diane Metcalf developed strong coping skills and healing strategies. She happily shares those with others who want to learn and grow.
Diane is an experienced advocate, speaker, and writer on family dysfunction and narcissism. She holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Psychology and a Master of Science in Information Technology. She has worked in numerous human service fields, including domestic violence and partner abuse.
She has authored four transformational books about healing and moving forward, including the highly praised “Lemon Moms” series. This emotionally supportive collection explains maternal narcissistic traits and teaches how to reconcile past hurts to begin self-nurturing, healing, and moving forward.
The Lemon Moms series, as well as her other books and articles, are an aggregation of education, insight, and personal growth resulting from childhood experiences and her subsequent recovery work.
She writes about strategies for recovering and moving on from hurtful people and painful, dysfunctional, or toxic relationships on The Toolbox blog.
If you suffer from narcissistic abuse syndrome, you are dealing with trauma bonds, as well.
What is a Trauma Bond?
Trauma bonds occur over time through the use of “intermittent reinforcement,” which is a type of behavioral “conditioning” where a reward (or a punishment) is given irregularly instead of every time the desired behavior is observed. In other words, periods of abuse are interspersed with periods of kindness (or the absence of cruelty). This cycle of “always guessing” keeps the target on high alert in survival mode. They never know when the abuser will be cruel or kind. It’s like a game of chance, like playing slot machines or Bingo. Sometimes you win, and sometimes you lose, but it’s the possibility of winning that keeps you going back for more.
Any behavior that keeps you on high alert, or focused on your mother’s behavior, is capable of forming trauma bonds.
How are Trauma Bonds Created?
Trauma bonds are created in several ways:
Love bombing: The love bombing dynamic occurs when a narcissist, including narcissistic mothers, unexpectedly showers you with love, attention, kindness, or affection. Love bombing comes in various forms—gift-giving, forgiveness for past “offenses,” anything that makes you feel validated or special. Love bombing helps form a trauma bond because it’s a form of intermittent reinforcement: you never know when it will happen.
Verbal abuse: Shouting, name-calling, sarcastic comments, character assassination, backhanded compliments, insults, demeaning remarks, “put-downs” and shaming are some examples of verbal abuse. The abuse happens on an irregular schedule, so it’s a form of intermittent reinforcement (spoken cruelty interspersed with periods of civility and kindness.) The resulting shame causes a trauma bond.
Positive reinforcement: Although it sounds healthy, positive reinforcement can also create trauma bonds. When a person, (including children) is rewarded for doing something they didn’t want to do, or obeying without question, there’s a trauma bond created. Healthy relationships don’t require rewards.
Victim blaming: When a narcissist blames their target (or the narcissist mother blames her child) for the cruelty inflicted upon them, they will likely believe they deserve it because they’ve been conditioned to. This belief establishes a trauma bond.
Silent treatment: When a narcissist purposefully ignores you, that causes feelings of helplessness, anxiety, and fear of abandonment. Having no control over the situation, you’ll focus on the narcissist and wait for their acceptance, however long it takes.
“Moving goalposts” (aka changing the goal): Narcissists often redefine or change their expectations, sometimes several times, during any interaction. Doing this ensures a frustrating encounter for those involved. A narcissist, (including narcissist mothers) is never satisfied, and keeping you emotionally invested in their happiness creates trauma bonds.
If you struggle with narcissistic abuse syndrome you’ll often doubt your self-worth and sanity. Targets of narcissistic abuse tend to focus on their faults, failures, and inadequacies, whether they’re real or not. Sometimes these “deficiencies” began as an idea expressed by the vocal narcissist.
There are several symptoms of narcissistic abuse syndrome. Many of these are the same as those of complex post-traumatic stress disorder (C-PTSD,) which affects people who’ve experienced serious traumas.
Narcissistic Abuse Syndrome symptoms include:
Accepting an imbalanced sense of responsibility
Intrusive, or unwanted thoughts
Unhealed triggers (physical and emotional responses to similar past traumatic situations)
Flashbacks or nightmares where the target emotionally re-lives a traumatic experience
Avoiding people, places or conditions linked to the narcissist or the traumatic event
Feeling isolated, abandoned, or detached
Feeling alert or hyper-vigilant, or easily startled (“fight or flight”)
Negative thoughts about self and world
Insecurity
Shame
Accepting misplaced blame
Difficulty concentrating or sleeping
Depression
Self-destructive behaviors
Involvement in abusive romantic relationships
Lost trust in family or friends
Feeling worthless or unworthy
Lost sense of self
Holding the narcissist in high esteem
Doubting their judgment and decision-making skills
Ignoring their own needs
Devaluing or minimizing their contributions to relationships
Making excuses for a narcissist’s behavior
Continually trying to please the narcissist
Attachment issues
Weak boundaries
Addictions
Anxiety
Perfectionism
If you constantly wonder about your narcissist’s emotional state, for example, what will he/she be like today? Should you try to avoid them? Or do you frequently-
think about what you could be (or should be) doing differently to please them?
believe your relationship problems are all your fault?
deal with mood swings, lost sleep, anxiety, apprehension?
These are all symptoms of Narcissistic Abuse Syndrome, and if you have any of them you may also have trauma bonds. The good news is that you can detach from the abuse and heal. Keep learning and doing the work.
Could you be feeling the effects of Narcissism Awareness Grief? Download thefree chapter to find out:
Announcing- I AM: A Guided Journey to Your Authentic Self, Workbook and Journal
A step-by-step method to learn how to write the highest vibrating, most powerful affirmations to manifest love, positivity, peace, self-confidence, motivation, success, and other wonderful things.
Available worldwide in any store (ask and they’ll order it for you!) and on Amazon US, UK, Germany, Italy, Spain, Japan, France, Netherlands, Canada, Australia, and more.
As a result of growing up in a dysfunctional home, and with the help of professional therapists and continued personal growth, author Diane Metcalf developed strong coping skills and healing strategies. She happily shares those with others who want to learn and grow.
Diane is an experienced advocate, speaker, and writer on family dysfunction and narcissism. She holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Psychology and a Master of Science in Information Technology. She has worked in numerous human service fields, including domestic violence and partner abuse.
She has authored four transformational books about healing and moving forward, including the highly praised “Lemon Moms” series. This emotionally supportive collection explains maternal narcissistic traits and teaches how to reconcile past hurts to begin self-nurturing, healing, and moving forward.
The Lemon Moms series, as well as her other books and articles, are an aggregation of education, insight, and personal growth resulting from childhood experiences and her subsequent recovery work.
She writes about strategies for recovering and moving on from hurtful people and painful, dysfunctional, or toxic relationships on The Toolbox blog.
A lot of us do. Journaling is a great way to work through our problems, express emotions, and get our thoughts OUT and onto paper. It’s a terrific way to affirm, pay attention to, and really “hear” ourselves. If you’ve ever journaled and felt the sense of clarity or peace that comes from collecting your thoughts and expressing them in writing, maybe it’s time to try “expressive writing.”
Expressive writing is a bit different from just writing thoughts and activities in a journal. It is used as a way to deal with old or new traumatic events or memories. When using expressive writing, it is necessary to reflect on a specific challenge, traumatic experience, or memory in order to discover new meaning in the event.
Benefits of expressive writing
According to researcher Dr. James Pennebaker, a psychology professor at the University of Austin, Texas, people who use expressive writing to journal have improved mental and physical health.
Dr. Pennebaker pioneered a study of expressive writing as a coping mechanism for trauma. His, and hundreds of other studies have verified the benefits achieved by people suffering from PTSD, cancer, depression, and various other mental and physical ailments. This journaling technique was found to strengthen the immune system, reduce pain and inflammation, lower infection rate from colds or flu, and decrease depression symptoms. It can also improve memory, sleep quantity and quality, and attitude. It’s clear that there are many benefits associated with expressive writing!
How it works
Using expressive writing allows the writer to recognize a painful or traumatic experience and describe it as a problem to be solved. Doing this allows the writer to identify a particular problem and organize their thoughts and feelings, using written language to create the narrative. This process helps break the rumination cycle, which, in my experience, helps decrease or eliminate cognitive dissonance. Research shows that labeling our emotions actually calms the limbic system and the fight or flight response. (Look up “name it and tame it.”) The prefrontal cortex, which is in charge of executive functions, regains control, and a deeper meaning and understanding can be created around the memory or traumatic event. This leads the writer to feel a new sense of control and personal power regarding the traumatic event. The more we do this this type of journaling, the easier it gets.
When people become more comfortable thinking about and remembering a traumatic event, they are more able to share their feelings with others. Expressive writing may indirectly lead writers to seek emotional support, thereby accelerating the healing process.
As demonstrated in a 2006 study published in the Journal of Psychological Science, expressive writing can also improve relationships. The study found that when one partner wrote about their relationship in detail, both partners began using more positive language when texting each other. The relationship also lasted longer.
Don’t like to write?
If you don’t like journaling, you can still use expressive writing. Recording your thoughts has been shown to work just as well.
To use the technique, write without judgment, self-editing, or correcting spelling or grammatical mistakes. Just write it as you think or feel it. Write for 15 to 20 minutes for at least three consecutive days. Deep dive into your thoughts and feelings and write about them in detail when you do this.
I’m a big fan of journaling using expressive writing. I wrote the “Lemon Moms Companion Workbook” to supply the necessary prompts, questions and challenges to help you use expressive writing as one of your healing tools.
from Lemon Moms: A Guide to Understand and Survive Maternal Narcissism
Tools for healing:
Conscious awareness: Be aware and make conscious choices before acting. Self-awareness releases us from making impulsive and potentially damaging decisions. Practice mindfulness.
Announcing- I AM: A Guided Journey to Your Authentic Self, Workbook and Journal
A step-by-step method to learn how to write the highest vibrating, most powerful affirmations to manifest love, positivity, peace, self-confidence, motivation, success, and other wonderful things.
Available worldwide in any store (ask and they’ll order it for you!) and on Amazon US, UK, Germany, Italy, Spain, Japan, France, Netherlands, Canada, Australia, and more.
As a result of growing up in a dysfunctional home, and with the help of professional therapists and continued personal growth, author Diane Metcalf developed strong coping skills and healing strategies. She happily shares those with others who want to learn and grow.
Diane is an experienced advocate, speaker, and writer on family dysfunction and narcissism. She holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Psychology and a Master of Science in Information Technology. She has worked in numerous human service fields, including domestic violence and partner abuse.
She has authored four transformational books about healing and moving forward, including the highly praised “Lemon Moms” series. This emotionally supportive collection explains maternal narcissistic traits and teaches how to reconcile past hurts to begin self-nurturing, healing, and moving forward.
The Lemon Moms series, as well as her other books and articles, are an aggregation of education, insight, and personal growth resulting from childhood experiences and her subsequent recovery work.
She writes about strategies for recovering and moving on from hurtful people and painful, dysfunctional, or toxic relationships on The Toolbox blog.
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