Psychology | Relationships

How to Break Trauma Bond and Build Confidence with Seven Helpful Tips.

Recognize the signs and patterns of trauma bond and learn how I escaped this terrible abuse so that you can too.

Leaving a narcissist, or any toxic relationship, can be extremely difficult. This is because the toxic person (I will avoid labeling narcissist because I am not a licensed therapist, and that term is overused) baits you in and then pushes you away many times. This intermittent cycle of reoccurring reinforcement of rewards through loving actions followed by punishments is extremely emotionally abusive. Often this is very subtle and hard to recognize. The abusive, or toxic person, will use gaslighting and projection, they will even lie and manipulate leaving you feeling crazy and as if you are never good enough. If you try to leave they bait you back in.

The first step is awareness.

Start to notice the patterns of behavior. Are you repeating the same arguments? Do you constantly break up and get back together? Does he or she blame or shame you? Do you constantly feel as if no matter how hard you try it is not enough? Do you make excuses when others express concerns for you? Do you experience more bad days that good in the relationship? Do you feel he/she loves you one minute and then beats you down the next? Do you have extreme highs and lows?

If you answered yes to more than two of these, you are likely in a toxic relationship and may be trauma bonded. Consider talking to a professional therapist. It took me a very long time to realize I was trauma bonded. I kept returning to an unhealthy relationship — this went on for literally four years off and on. I have been told it is as hard to leave a trauma bonded relationship as it is to stop taking opioid drugs. I have never taken drugs, so I have no comparison, but I definitely know that leaving a trauma bond is painfully difficult. However, now that I am on the other side, I can say that I feel free, and I look back and question why on earth it took me so long. He never loved me. I loved him and wanted him to love me, but all he did was manipulate me.

Here are Seven Ways I Broke Free from Trauma Bond

1. As hard as it is, remind yourself of all of the nights you spend crying yourself to sleep.
2. Remind yourself of all the times you questioned whether you were enough because of that person. You are enough, in fact you are more than.
3. Remind yourself how many times they continued to blame and or shame you and drive your mistakes into the ground no matter how many times you apologized and tried to make things right and resolve conflict. And ask yourself if they ever took accountability or made efforts to improve the relationship.
4. Remind yourself that even though they made you feel as if you could not do anything good enough, you can.
5. Remind yourself that you are amazing and that is why they were manipulating you to begin with. That is why they chose you.
6. Start a project, create a new hobby, develop new habits, and recreate your life. It is never too late to start fresh. You are stronger and moree capable than you realize.
7. Choose self-love and self-appreciation because no one can take that away from you and you do deserve it.

Conclusion:

Trauma Bond is tricky and painful, but it is possible to break, and you will be better when you do. Recreate your life and remember the toxic person chose you as their prey because you are a beautiful empathetic special person. They likely have beaten you down emotionally, maybe even subconsciously, so do the self-work. Talk to a therapist or coach, practice positive affirmations because those work to reprogram the subconscious mind and you will become more confident.

Examples of positive affirmations:

I am enough and will not let anyone else decide my worth

I am beautiful inside and out

I will stay away from negative forces in life

I have beautiful qualities to offer this world

I choose to see the positive, even in difficult times

You will get stronger. You will find what you are seeking. We are energetic beings. By strengthening your own self-love and self-worth you will naturally attract someone you deserve who will treat you with kindness, respect, loyalty, and love.

One book I highly recommend is, Recovery from Gaslighting and Narcissictic Abuse, Codependency, and Complex PTSD (3in 1), by Don Barlow.

Block this toxic person. Make a list of every hurtful thing they have said or done to you and read it each time you start to miss them. They will reach out and try to get you back if you do not block. They will use email to try to reach you because you cannot block email, so send it to “junk” and try not to bother reading it. They will try to make you feel guilty, but it is ALL manipulation. If they try to trash your reputation and say terrible things about you, do not try to defend yourself. That just feeds into what they want which is getting your attention. Block, ignore, and rise above. The truth will set you free. Ultimately people will see you’re your character and they will see his/hers. Remember, it will be difficult, but YOU are worth it, so push through the pain and storms and look for the rainbow.

Thank you so much for taking the time to read this. I am Libby Shively McAvoy. This topic is near and dear to my heart as I have survived both physical and emotional abuse. You can let life crush you or you can choose to let it expand you. I chose to expand. My goal is to awaken, inspire, and empower others to live the life they love through awareness, acceptance, and forgiveness. This, in combination with reading, yoga and meditation, going within, putting it all into action and helping others is how I have healed and built the life of my dreams. No one said it would be easy, but I am living proof that it is definitely worth the effort of personal development. I invite you to join Medium with my affiliate link here to read unlimited articles both by me and many other incredibly talented and inspiring writers such as BichoDoMato, Vidya Sury, Collecting Smiles, and Kim Petersen. Please comment and tell me something about yourself, who your favorite writers are, and what content you would like to see me write about next.

Peace and Light,

Libby

I am including a couple more of my stories in case you would like to continue reading.