Overcoming Narcissistic Abuse

Written By Rebecca McGranahan

If you’ve ever been in a relationship with a toxic person, you know how draining and upsetting it can be. Toxic people come in all forms with varying levels of toxicity. One extreme example of this is the narcissist. While we all have some narcissistic qualities, narcissists have text book characteristics that give them away. Some of these characteristics are:

Grandiose sense of self importance; exaggerates accomplishments, feels superior Requires excessive admiration Has a sense of entitlement Interpersonally exploitative Often envious of others, feels others are envious of him Arrogant, haughty behavior Lacks empathy, unwilling to recognize or identify feelings and needs of others Believes he is special and unique, only understood by special or high status people Preoccupied with fantasies of unlimited success, power, brilliance, beauty, ideal love If you are in a relationship with someone who has five or more of these characteristics, there is a good chance you are dealing with a narcissist.

Narcissism is a cluster B personality disorder, developed in early childhood where most often the child has usually been either overindulged or abused. As a result, the child never learns to work with others or share and is permanently stuck in the egocentric stage. The temper tantrums that follow, carry on throughout the narcissist's life, as they feel they are entitled and deserve special treatment. A roller coaster ride with a narcissist always begins and ends in the same way: Idealize (Honeymoon phase) Devalue Discard. This cycle repeats itself until the victim is finally discarded by the Narcissist only to eventually be hoovered later in an attempt to suck the victim back into the relationship. If the victim accepts the Narcissist’s invitation back into their life, the cycle begins again but this time ends with an even more brutal, discard which will eventually be followed by another hoover and so on. There is only one way to recover from Narcissistic abuse and that is thru no contact. The first step is blocking this person on social media, your phone and your email. If you are co parenting, you ONLY speak about the children with this disordered person and you do not engage in their circular arguments where the narcissist will deflect what the victim is saying, change the subject to blaming the mark in some way, become the victim then attack with a fury that is referred to as “narcissistic injury”. Next, after you have deleted the narcissist from your life, you must educate yourself on the topic of narcissism. This will help you understand what has happened to you and how to begin to move forward without falling back under the charm of this disordered person.

Lastly, you must focus on you. During the hoovering stage it is not uncommon for victims to be pulled back into the toxic cycle and back under the narcissist's spell. We crave the endorphins that we feel during the honeymoon phase of the vicious cycle and this makes ending a relationship with a narcissist even more difficult. Often the breakup is followed by another form of devaluation as the disordered person slanders the victim to anyone who will listen then replaces them, usually on social media, with their next mark. This leaves the victim feeling broken and confused with zero answers as to what went wrong with the relationship. Getting closure from a narcissist is nearly impossible as they just don’t care. Realizing that this person was a facade, we must face the idea that the blame wasn’t all ours as the narcissist will say, but instead it is their sickness that left us feeling void and empty as the relationship was never real. We must also look inside ourselves to heal the wounds within us that allowed such a toxic person to infect our lives and damage our self esteem.. By keeping our focus on our healing, going no contact and educating ourselves, we will find that we no longer need these energy vampires to drain us of our self confidence, peace of mind and positivity. Instead, we can bring our center away from the toxic grasp of the Narcissist, heal ourselves and end their evil reign for good.

Written by: Rebecca McGranahan

Certified Holistic Lifestyle Advocate

Assistant Blog Writer