Narcissism: How to Heal in the Aftermath Part III -The Hardest thing to Accept

There is one thing that seems universally hard for all survivors from an abusive relationship and that is what their role was. If you ask that question to survivors that are still pretty fresh from the breakup then you will very likely be defending yourself against some vitriolic and aggressive responses.

You might hear a response that start with:

☞ You are victim blaming ☞ You are a narcissist ☞ You are a narcissist apologist ☞ You are a flying monkey ☞ You are just as bad as them

These survivors are too close to their wounds to see any objective truth. They know that they were abused and some of them were horrifically beaten and broken in the worst ways by a person that was effectively a monster. The last thing they want to consider is what their role in their situation was, but nevertheless we all have a role in what happened.

This is a critical point and one that I hope readers really understand and internalize. If you do not acknowledge what your role was and how you got to be in that situation, then you are not fixing those aspects of yourself that allowed you to get into a relationship like that in the first place and therefor you are seriously at risk for doing it again. You must recognize you were susceptible to falling into that relationship for a reason and it isn’t just because they tricked you. They push boundaries and you let them.

Healthy people would have been out the door at the first boundary break with the first sign of major emotional abuse or manipulation or the first time they got violent physically. Its those with unhealthy attachments or unresolved trauma that stick it out and give chance, after chance, after chance, until they are so trauma bonded into the relationship they feel they can’t leave.

Its imperative that survivors recognize the things that made them vulnerable to the relationship which comes down to weak boundaries every time. Then they need to shore those boundaries up and not have any forgiveness when they get tested. Those alone can ward off a great many abusers because they only want those they can easily manipulate or those that will forgive. Your best traits are used against you .

Assignment: build up some protection in your ‘safety absolutes’ for yourself. These are the things you absolutely will not bend on. Make a list of the bare minimums that someone has to achieve or cannot break and then those are your boundaries. Don’t make exceptions and stick to those regardless of what happens. This will ensure you don’t repeat the past.