Whether you are going through a break up with a healthy individual or an unhealthy individual, the break up is always a painful thing. Although, the break up with a narcissist is like nothing you have ever experienced. There is a great misconception that only physical and sexual abuse is considered as an abuse. The emotional, spiritual and psychological abuse that you might experience with someone who is a narcissist is much worst than the physical abuse. You feel pain like you never felt before. Its because the break up with someone with narcissistic personality disorder its not only a break up, its an abuse. The disordered individual will sadistically inflict as much pain as possible onto you and on
top of that he or she will try to destroy your life on all levels possible. It tells a lot about people by the way they leave you. The narcissist will leave you confused in a fog, crawling in the pain and totally destroyed. And even after the disordered individual will leave you bleeding on the floor with the knife stuck in your back, you will still feel the addiction to them due to a trauma bond (Stockholm syndrome). Its a great misconception that people can be addicted only to drugs, alcohol, food, shopping, gambling or sex. People can be actually addicted to other people too and its a valid addiction. You are addicted to your abuser not because he or she is such an amazing person but because of the great highs and lows your brain experienced in the relationship the same way as the drug addict experiences highs and lows with the heroin and once the drug is taken away from the addicted person, he or she suffers from the withdrawal syndrome. It is a chemical process in your brain. The chemical cocktail the narcissist mix for you turn your brain into a scrambled eggs. The thing that cause the addiction is not the drug itself, but the extreme highs and extreme lows that your brain needs to process. Once you are being discarded by the narcissist, you are going through the withdrawal syndrome with all symptoms of an addiction. The pain sucks. So, what to do about it?
top of that he or she will try to destroy your life on all levels possible. It tells a lot about people by the way they leave you. The narcissist will leave you confused in a fog, crawling in the pain and totally destroyed. And even after the disordered individual will leave you bleeding on the floor with the knife stuck in your back, you will still feel the addiction to them due to a trauma bond (Stockholm syndrome). Its a great misconception that people can be addicted only to drugs, alcohol, food, shopping, gambling or sex. People can be actually addicted to other people too and its a valid addiction. You are addicted to your abuser not because he or she is such an amazing person but because of the great highs and lows your brain experienced in the relationship the same way as the drug addict experiences highs and lows with the heroin and once the drug is taken away from the addicted person, he or she suffers from the withdrawal syndrome. It is a chemical process in your brain. The chemical cocktail the narcissist mix for you turn your brain into a scrambled eggs. The thing that cause the addiction is not the drug itself, but the extreme highs and extreme lows that your brain needs to process. Once you are being discarded by the narcissist, you are going through the withdrawal syndrome with all symptoms of an addiction. The pain sucks. So, what to do about it?
These are few of the techniques how to get over the narcissistic ex or any other type of toxic relationship and get free from a trauma bond:
1. Selective memory (Always keep reminding yourself of the reason for the break up or the reason why you went no contact)
If you did not go through a proper healing where you managed to heal those broken parts in you that attracted a toxic individual in the first place, the broken parts in you will be activated again craving the toxicity to come back to your life. You start to thing about all the good days you had together and totally forget the bad days full of horror you went through with the toxic person. You start to use a selective memory when you suppress the bad memory and activate the good memory. As the time goes by, the brain has the tendency only to remember the good times so only those are being activated. Most of the couples who have been in the toxic relationships, once they get back together, after some time they break up again and they break up for the very same reason as they broke up the first time. Because the problem inside of the toxic person did not vanished, its still there. Especially with the narcissists as they have personality disorder and repetitive compulsion syndrome, which means they will always repeat the cycles without any happy ending. Most of the people do not change, even most of the healthy people never change because it requires a lot of inner work and that is painful. Most of the people will avoid the pain of growth at all cost and rather choose the repetitive compulsion to jump from one toxic attachment to another. When the craving to be with your toxic ex or any other toxic individual will appear, always remind yourself of a reason why you broke up or why you went no contact.
2. False memory (Nothing will go away until everything will become exactly what it is)
When we were a little kids, the Disney fairy-tales programmed us to believe that the real love is perfect like a fairy-tale. Later in our life, the romantic movies romanticized the tortures, love triangles and drama in relationships so now we think it belongs to the culture of love. While non of that is true. But somehow we keep feeding those illusions always finding ourselves to fall in love with the fake charm princes, the fake princesses again and again. Its because codependency is like a wheel where the hamster runs in a circle of disillusion just like the codependents are running in the wheel of their disillusions being fed by the narcissist´s fantasies. In a relationship of a codependent and a narcissist, both of them feed from disorder of the other one and unfortunately its the codependent who always found herself or himself burnt again and again. In this quite disordered society, the hearts of codependents are hungry for love to the point that they compromise themselves to be OK with the bread crumbs and they are being easily trapped into the golden prisons of the predators who knows how to manipulate like the magicians. You say: "OK, OK, I´ve got it, but what to do about it?" The answer is: stop creating false memories. People have the tendencies to make their illusions (aka relationships) working at all cost because the fear of losing the narcissists or being alone triggers their deepest fears of abandonment that they developed in the childhood. They have a disordered style of an attachment. The codependent and the narcissist are very similar. They both have disordered style of the attachment. They feed the disorders from each other. They both lose themselves in fantasies and falling into the illusions. They love the idea of love, not the love itself. And for both of them, this issue is deeply rooted in childhood. They both have an unhealed wounds of feeling not lovable, feeling not worthy and feeling not good enough. It just manifests in a different way. The codependent´s heart is so hungry that he or she will do anything to make the dysfunctional relationship work out making himself or herself deaf and blind. The disillusions of the codependents are greatly supported and multiplied by the manipulations of the predators who take an advantage of the dreamers. The codependent wants to fulfill the illusion of being loved and special, the predator is only a great observer who skillfully knows how to serve the codependent the desired illusions and use this fantasy for trapping the victims and later abuse them. I am sure that even Eva, the wife of Adolf Hitler, had an amazing love bombing stage and a honey moon period in the relationship with Adolf. The beginnings are the most sweetest paradoxically with the most disordered people as the codependents and the narcissists share one same trait and it is the love for fantasy. They feed each other with the distortion of a reality. The cure for the magical thinking is the reality. The cure is to stop creating the false memories and to create a false ideas of what the relationship with the abuser really is. The cure is to not excuse the bad behavior of the partner and pretend the relationship is good while it is toxic just to not have the illusion destroyed. The cure is to destroy the illusions. The cure is not to let the emotions over-write the logic. The cure is not to fall in love with potential instead of who the toxic person really is and what he or she is really capable of. The cure for the illusion is to commit to the truth because nothing will go away until everything will become exactly what it is. And once it is exactly what it is, you are creating the real sense of self, the real sense of the reality and you no more produce the false memories. In most cases when the victims look back and evaluate their toxic relationships from the past, they don´t call them relationships, they call them "mindfucks". Because the reality was different than the imagination. The victim imagined something that actually never existed. People with a codependent type of a personality will form much healthier relationships in the future once the reality and the imagination will align with each other and become one. The toxic person was romanticized in the past and the perception of him or her together with the reality was distorted. As the time pass by and once the victim fully heal, the victim starts to see the toxic person differently. Once the healing process is in the end, the victim will suddenly realizes that the toxic person is totally different person. While in the past the victim saw the toxic person as a representation of love, today the victim see the toxic person as what he or she really is - the abuser. Today the victim see the abuser as a completely different person. As the victim of a narcissistic abuse progress in education about narcissism, he or she will realize that they misinterpreted the abuse for love.
The final cure is when the victims stop to create false memories and they let everything become exactly what it is. The cure is to stop adding to the story and to stop removing from the story. Let the story to be exactly what it is.
The final cure is when the victims stop to create false memories and they let everything become exactly what it is. The cure is to stop adding to the story and to stop removing from the story. Let the story to be exactly what it is.
3. Journaling as the tool to remove the brain fog
As one of the symptoms of PTSD after a narcissistic abuse is a brain fog, the greatest way (besides the therapy) how to remove this fog is journaling. Journaling is very important and powerful practice in the healing process as somewhere in the middle of the healing you will still go through a lot of brain fog and you will suffer from a cognitive dissonance where half of your brain will remember all of the real ugly and painful memories about your abuser but the other half of your brain will remember all the false good memories. The war between both of the parts of the brain causes a great conflict and discomfort in the victim. Its very important to come to the realization that the good memories were false and people who love you would never abuse you. The journaling will help you to segregate the truth from the illusion.
The journaling is helping the victims in so many ways. First of all, it helps them to make sense of what happened to them as the abuse shattered their thinking and they are experiencing paralysis. The journaling can help them to "keep their thoughts together". Secondly, the journaling help the victims to remember what happened as the narcissistic abuse hijacked the memory and they can suffer from amnesia and very strong brain fog. The journaling is also a great way to remember every single ugly thing they have experienced with the abusers so once the abusers try to hoover them in the future (most narcissist will unfortunately try to hoover and suck the victim back to the dark world sooner or later, sometimes even years later), the victims will stay resistant to the hoover by reminding themselves about the experience by reading their diary every time they feel they are falling back into the brain fog, illusion or into the manipulation of the abusers. In the weak moments in a recovery from the trauma bond when the victim might experience a craving for the abuser, it is very useful to decrease the cravings with leafing through the pages of their diary. One of the many excellent things about journaling is also that once you write the feelings and painful memories down, you remove the toxic energy out from your body and move the toxic energy onto the paper where it is safe to "store" it.
The journaling is helping the victims in so many ways. First of all, it helps them to make sense of what happened to them as the abuse shattered their thinking and they are experiencing paralysis. The journaling can help them to "keep their thoughts together". Secondly, the journaling help the victims to remember what happened as the narcissistic abuse hijacked the memory and they can suffer from amnesia and very strong brain fog. The journaling is also a great way to remember every single ugly thing they have experienced with the abusers so once the abusers try to hoover them in the future (most narcissist will unfortunately try to hoover and suck the victim back to the dark world sooner or later, sometimes even years later), the victims will stay resistant to the hoover by reminding themselves about the experience by reading their diary every time they feel they are falling back into the brain fog, illusion or into the manipulation of the abusers. In the weak moments in a recovery from the trauma bond when the victim might experience a craving for the abuser, it is very useful to decrease the cravings with leafing through the pages of their diary. One of the many excellent things about journaling is also that once you write the feelings and painful memories down, you remove the toxic energy out from your body and move the toxic energy onto the paper where it is safe to "store" it.
4. Reserve few pages of your journal also for your positive visions for your future and gratefulness.
As hard as it is to think about the gratefulness and your future after the narcissistic abuse, I fully encourage you to write a list of things you are grateful for and also the list of all of your dreams you want to fulfill in your future in your diary. The narcissistic individual projected a lot of negativity onto you with the narcissistic abuse and most likely you suffer now from depression. The only way to beat the darkness is to bring more light into the dark space. The more light you will bring into your mind, the less dark thoughts you will experience. As your healing will progress, all your future plans you wrote down in your journal will seem more and more realistic and possible so don´t be scared to go a little wild with the ideas. Where you are today is not the place where you will be in the future. Reading your journal every morning will help you to start the day with more positive attitude. If you feel insecurity and depression only to think about writing down the positive things, do it anyway. Do it through the resistance until you will become comfortable with this practice. The constant corroding of your self esteem during the narcissistic abuse and the constant projecting of the abuser that the world is bad and dark resulted in you feeling like there is nothing good waiting for you anymore in this world. This is not a true. The moment you take yourself out of the toxic relationship, you have to start working on yourself by reminding yourself that the world is also beautiful, bright and safe (because it is). With reading your positive lists in your journal often, you will remind yourself that there is plenty of positive things waiting for you in the future. By leafing through your positive pages in your diary you will work on reprogramming of your brain and subconsciousness. The same way as the negative programming has been installed into you by the narcissist, you have to use the same tactic but with the opposite energy - starting to positively programming your mind to be able to see yourself in positive way (because you are in fact fucking awesome!). The list of your positive visions for your future will become a great motivator for you to wake up from the bed each morning. As the healing will progress, you will find yourself with more physical energy, thats the turning point where you should start to fulfill even the smallest plans from your positive list and starting to replace one bad memory for one good memory, one memory at a time. The moment when the symptoms of the PTSD worsen, open your diary and start to read page by page to remind yourself of all things you are grateful for (there is always something to be grateful for) and remind yourself of the future that is waiting for you.
5. Make a list of a daily routine to support your health and immunity system.
Especially the first stage of healing is very exhausting, you will find yourself with very low to no energy and your health is most probably damaged. Creating a list of healthy daily routine will help you to get better and support the healing process. At this stage, it is very important to eat very nourishing foods such seeds, nuts, vegetable and to drink fresh juices and plenty of water (the best with a lime juice). If you are unable to digest anything solid due to your stomach upset and stress, try to prepare for yourself at least fruit smoothies. Do not forget to take your vitamin supplements and natural remedies for all of the symptoms as insomnia and stress to boost your immunity system. Consider also the sleeping pills (only for the first stage of healing!). Practice a good sleeping routine by getting in bed early even when you do not feel like, meditate with a calming sounds before you go sleep. Avoid dramatic and romantic movies. Go for a walk to breath a fresh air even you don´t feel like doing it. At this stage, avoid all people who are not supporting you, put you mentally down or do not siding with you, even if it means to avoid your beloved closest people. You do not need to avoid them forever but as most of the normal people are not educated in narcissism and they have no idea how serious PTSD and narcissistic abuse have impact on the health and well being, they might consciously or unconsciously take you through the roller coaster of a secondary abuse. The first stage of the healing is all about you, your "me time" and recovering your health. You do not need to do anything else than a self care at this point. Even when it means you put all activities or people aside for sometime. The recovery of your health should be your priority as without a good health the transition to the next healing stages will be impossible. First you have to fix your health as much as possible. You would be really surprise how healthy food and taking care of yourself with even the little slightest positive and healthy activities you do on daily basis can help you in your recovery.
5. Make a list of a daily routine to support your health and immunity system.
Especially the first stage of healing is very exhausting, you will find yourself with very low to no energy and your health is most probably damaged. Creating a list of healthy daily routine will help you to get better and support the healing process. At this stage, it is very important to eat very nourishing foods such seeds, nuts, vegetable and to drink fresh juices and plenty of water (the best with a lime juice). If you are unable to digest anything solid due to your stomach upset and stress, try to prepare for yourself at least fruit smoothies. Do not forget to take your vitamin supplements and natural remedies for all of the symptoms as insomnia and stress to boost your immunity system. Consider also the sleeping pills (only for the first stage of healing!). Practice a good sleeping routine by getting in bed early even when you do not feel like, meditate with a calming sounds before you go sleep. Avoid dramatic and romantic movies. Go for a walk to breath a fresh air even you don´t feel like doing it. At this stage, avoid all people who are not supporting you, put you mentally down or do not siding with you, even if it means to avoid your beloved closest people. You do not need to avoid them forever but as most of the normal people are not educated in narcissism and they have no idea how serious PTSD and narcissistic abuse have impact on the health and well being, they might consciously or unconsciously take you through the roller coaster of a secondary abuse. The first stage of the healing is all about you, your "me time" and recovering your health. You do not need to do anything else than a self care at this point. Even when it means you put all activities or people aside for sometime. The recovery of your health should be your priority as without a good health the transition to the next healing stages will be impossible. First you have to fix your health as much as possible. You would be really surprise how healthy food and taking care of yourself with even the little slightest positive and healthy activities you do on daily basis can help you in your recovery.
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