Category: Narcissist Abuse Recovery

Jackson MacKenzie saved my life. Okay, maybe it wasn’t quite that extreme, but his book, Psychopath Free, kept me going in some dark moments. His website was one of the first that I found and spent time on in the aftermath of the initial “unmasking.” You know what I’m talking about. The revelation (or series of revelations, in my case) that showed me that something was terribly wrong in my past relationship. Psychopath Free is a classic in the literature on narcissistic abuse. Let me count the ways: His original list of 30 Red Flags for Spotting Toxic People from the book (and website)...

“You used to wrap yourself in fairy tales like a blanket, but it was the cold that you loved. Sharp shivers as you uncovered the corpses of Bluebeard’s wives. Sweeter goosebumps as Prince Charming slid one glass slipper over your little toes. A perfect fit. “But by the schoolyard, real princesses floated by you on fall winds. You saw the gulf between you and rich girls, and vowed to stop believing in fairy tales. But the stories were in you, deep as poison. “If Prince Charming was real, if he could save you, you needed to be saved from the...

Being in a relationship with a narcissist exposed me to massive amounts of pain that were difficult to explain. There was sadness, grief, loneliness, confusion, fear, anger, humiliation, shame. This emotional roller coaster is one you should never experience in a healthy relationship with someone who claims to love you.   While in the middle of it and even after I went no contact, it often felt like I had lost so much–parts of myself, friends, time, my ability to focus on anything good in my life, the illusion that he was looking out for me and that he was the partner...

Getting over a narcissist is one of the hardest things we ever have to do in our lives. My narcissist ex-boyfriend was the first man that I ever really loved. For me, overcoming the abuse I suffered at his hands meant understanding why that fact mattered so much. It’s not because took advantage of it, although he did. And it’s not because it seems ridiculously naive or hyperbolic, although it may. It’s because I have to trace back why. Why was he the first? Why then and why him? It wasn’t as if he was my first boyfriend. I’d been...

Anyone can be a victim of a narcissist or psychopath. In fact, narcissists and psychopaths manipulate everyone in their social worlds to some degree. Narcissistic abuse recovery that truly gets at the heart of this fact is essential in getting over a narcissist and ultimately healing from narcissistic abuse. Whether you are recovering from a relationship with a narcissist or trying to leave one, these may be five of the most important questions you may ever ask yourself. Together, they may help you to see how you were drawn into the narcissist’s web so that you can find your way out– or keep...

In the film Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, after a couple goes through a bad breakup, each person in the relationship separately undergoes a medical procedure to have all memories of the other person entirely erased. I always thought this was such a fascinating concept. If you remove the memories of someone, what remains? If I grow and change through my interactions with others, does the changed version of myself remain if the other person ceases to exist in my world? Who do I become at that point? If I have been traumatized by the relationship but it can...

Codependency is real. The link between narcissistic abuse and codependency, however, is a stereotype I’d like to dispel because it can be harmful. More specifically, it’s a myth that all men or women that get into relationships across the board who have been in relationships with narcissists were codependent before they got there. It’s inaccurate and inappropriate for outsiders to apply that term to survivors simply because they have been abused by narcissists. I’ve written about why at length. To recap, I described how the definitions of “codependency” are so broad and numerous that they ignore the special ways that...