Episode Transcript
[00:00:08] Speaker A: Welcome to 9834, the weekly podcast that lets you see what it's like to actually go to therapy. I'm Shannon Miller, a licensed clinical social worker currently in private practice, who has the privilege of sitting across from clients each and every day watching their therapeutic process unfold. We start each episode with the same question. What took you to therapy today? I have the pleasure of sitting across from Antonia, a woman in her mid 40s, living here in the midatlantic region of the United States. She's been my client for approximately five years, and today she's going to discuss what it's like to be in a relationship with a narcissist, how to get out of that relationship, and how she's picking up the pieces afterwards.
[00:00:48] Speaker B: So when I first came to therapy, I wanted to feel a better connection to myself, mainly also because I was in a new relationship, newish relationship, and moving into a place where I was getting close to getting married and moving into a new kind of life with someone. I had moved from California to Pennsylvania and with a partner who had children. And so there was a couple of landmines I was coming across in terms.
[00:01:25] Speaker C: Of integrating my new life with his.
[00:01:30] Speaker B: Children and also just acclimating to my new move.
And our relationship wasn't evolving, maybe as it should. And so I wanted to take impetus on myself to help my own personal growth along so I could be a better partner and be a better person moving into this new phase and try to do it in a healthy way.
[00:01:56] Speaker D: So when you started therapy, was there any glaring thing, or was it just basically overall, I need to be the.
[00:02:03] Speaker C: Best partner I can be?
[00:02:05] Speaker B: I mean, the glaring things were trying to navigate my relationship with Mark.
It was really to try to navigate my relationship, but also to try to understand how to.
The children thing was really hard for me also. So there's the two major things, and I had turbulent relations with my father my whole life. But again, that had something that was a topic I had spoke in therapy many times before. So I felt somewhat okay and grounded in that. As far as, like, I've learned what I've learned through that, I didn't know if I needed to kind of dig that back up again. But it's pretty much my relationship and understanding how to be a stepmother when I have never wanted kids myself. I've always been child free by choice. And so here I was sort of jumping into this partnership with someone, with children.
[00:03:04] Speaker C: So those were the main reasons.
[00:03:09] Speaker D: Okay, so then once you started therapy, what happened? Where did therapy take you?
[00:03:15] Speaker B: Well, it helped to start to give an understanding around.
Looking at my relationship in a couple.
[00:03:28] Speaker C: Of different ways, that really helped to.
[00:03:33] Speaker B: See that it wasn't all just me and that there were things that I just weren't really letting settle in my conscious mind that were instances where there's two people that it takes two to tango, and there's instances where he may be bringing up his old shit or his old baggage or his way of how he is. That was really not conducive to a true partnership. And so it brought that up. It also brought up patterns of, I guess, the men in my life having sort of a little bit of a holier than thou kind of mentality. And also issues around the fact that this is actually a fact, is that I actually wasn't meant to be born. Like, my parents wanted two kids and I was born ten years later and I was a big mistake. And so I was definitely something that.
[00:04:40] Speaker C: Was, I don't want to say not.
[00:04:43] Speaker B: Wanted, but I was told a lot by my father that I was a big roadblock in what he was expecting to do with his life. He only wanted two kids, and then the third one comes along ten years later. And so I think all of that brought in with me where I needed to always mold myself into little boxes for the people in my life or men in my life. So it kind of highlighted that and then also related or unrelated complexity around jealousy factors with his kids that I was experiencing and really ashamed of, super ashamed of it, because it's like you're the adult, you got to be the bigger person. These are just kids. His kids were at the time six, seven years old or so. So definitely I should be the bigger one here. They need to have a good father and why am I being jealous of his time? So there is these things that kind of were brought up during therapy that I was tackling and trying to understand.
[00:05:53] Speaker D: So it's interesting that you connect it back to your father and your relationship patterns. Can you speak a little bit more to that of how you started minimizing yourself and putting yourselves in little boxes to be pleasing specifically to men?
[00:06:07] Speaker B: Yeah, I see it throughout my entire life. And it's mainly because, again, the more I could do that in my younger days and even going up through when I started dating and in my twenty s and thirty s, whatever is, I really just saw how effective it was to.
Once you got a little bit of. A little bit of a morsel of someone's attention and someone has some interest in you, that I was really good at being a chameleon. In fact, there's been a couple of people who've called me that. You don't even really know what they're really saying.
It was just something that it was, like a way to protect myself and to sort of ensure that I could control the way relationships were going, because I could easily just meld myself into place.
[00:07:02] Speaker C: And Matt really seemed.
[00:07:07] Speaker B: At the time, a great partner to be with, even.
[00:07:12] Speaker C: Though I had made that assumption from.
[00:07:16] Speaker B: A very uninformed place, like living in California, not near his kids, the honeymoon periods of relationships that really cloud your.
So I really kind of was melding myself into place. I'm like, oh, he has kids, no problem.
[00:07:30] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:07:31] Speaker B: No, I never wanted kids. But let me see if I can do okay. I can totally do it. What's wrong with kids? They're kind of fun. They're not full time, so that means I can have some weekends free and some weekends I can do this mom thing. So it just became almost like, this way to sort of test myself, because I can always accomplish and do the thing really well. I've been able to do that even with my career, with everything I've done. I've been able to kind of rock at it. So I'm like this, sure, I can do this thing.
And again, slowly but surely, just getting stripped away by this narcissist that I wasn't even seeing happening all along the way.
[00:08:15] Speaker C: So that's the part that was unexpected.
[00:08:18] Speaker B: Was just like the bit by bit of really kind of losing yourself along the way, that you didn't even really.
[00:08:24] Speaker C: See it happening where, you know, you.
[00:08:33] Speaker B: The thing is, I don't really think I had a really strong sense of self ever so much. It was just always about pleasing. So then as you're going along, and I used to be really creative, and then that's no longer happening, and all of these things, and then you become just a shadow of yourself.
Did I answer the question?
[00:08:57] Speaker D: Yeah. So the word narcissist gets thrown around quite a bit. I mean, it seems to be the word of 2024. So tell me how you can use the word for confidence. Like, do you know for sure that it's narcissistic, or what did you see in the relationship that allows you to use that term?
[00:09:19] Speaker B: And again, not being a clinical therapist, I don't know for sure if I'm using it right. But I think where I'm seeing it.
[00:09:28] Speaker C: Is he really tried to tear me.
[00:09:32] Speaker B: Down and keep me kind of in a box and sort of contained his whole thing about even being interested in me in the first place was the fact that he loved that I was creative and really passionate and outgoing. But then that became a threat once we started being together. And then also, I just noticed that the way that when we would have disagreements, and by the way, disagreements are a great thing in relationships because they help you grow into better relationships and better beings into who you are. And he brought out the worst in me, so he would use our disagreements.
[00:10:15] Speaker C: Or my, like, hey, this is something.
[00:10:18] Speaker B: That'S going wrong as a way to attack back on me. So he was never seeing it as a way that he could get closer into understanding who I am or how did you feel when I say that? Oh, well, let me tell you what I meant. And of course, I don't want to hurt you, so let me rephrase that.
He never saw it that way. It was always around. Well, there you go again, you and your daddy issues, and you're obviously broken. You obviously can't figure this out. I obviously did nothing wrong, so, of course he never did anything wrong. And even through all of the years of therapy and all of the different things that we would try to do, it would always come down to he'd sometimes nod his head and be like, yeah, 50 50. That's how relationships are. But in the end, it was very much, once the camera was off and the therapy session was over, he was very much like, okay, that was painful.
Do you feel like you got what you needed out of it and you just need to kind of keep seeing your own? He would tell me, I need to keep seeing my own therapist. I need you to work on these things. And that he was like, I really don't see what I did wrong. There was nothing that he did wrong. So that's where I attached that narcissistic thing.
[00:11:31] Speaker C: He manipulated arguments all the time where.
[00:11:35] Speaker B: I would bring out something vulnerable or something about my father, and he would use it against me for emotional warfare. So I knew I couldn't expose anything.
[00:11:46] Speaker C: To him or else he would use it against me.
[00:11:50] Speaker B: Oh, well, because you did that, this is the reason he tried to diagnose me. Well, there you go. There you go again.
[00:11:59] Speaker C: And so he was always right.
I was the broken one, and also.
[00:12:08] Speaker B: I was the one that was less.
[00:12:11] Speaker C: Valuable because I didn't have the children.
[00:12:15] Speaker B: Well, I'm the one with the children, and that's the thing to do in life, and you're the female that didn't want children. And so obviously, you're broken. You're broken because you got the daddy issues.
He didn't want the children. You don't know what you're talking about.
[00:12:35] Speaker C: But don't worry.
[00:12:36] Speaker B: Stick with me. Stick with me.
I'll help you through this. That was his tagline.
[00:12:44] Speaker C: Stick with me. So I think that's the answer.
[00:12:49] Speaker B: That's how I saw the narcissistic.
I think that's what it means.
Is that the answer?
[00:13:01] Speaker D: How did therapy help you pick apart where your responsibility was and where his was? How did you start to recognize the narcissism? Was it in therapy that you started that? Just talk to me about that.
[00:13:14] Speaker B: Yeah, it was in therapy, but I really wanted the marriage to work, and so there was a large part of it where I was not accepting, because I think that you, as a therapist, I can say that, right. You were guiding me to kind of ask questions around, helping me to sort of pinpoint these realizations, right. But at the same time, I didn't want to. I mean, I was like, no, I need to work on myself more, and I need to get better at being in a relationship, and I need to not be so jealous about his kids. And so there was a while where.
[00:13:56] Speaker C: I was kind of denying it, and.
[00:13:59] Speaker B: I think for even a while where I don't want to say that I resented therapy, but where I was like, I'm not sure if this is helping me because it's just trying to point out that Matt's doing something wrong.
And I'm a part of the problem, too. I'm in this relationship, too. Relationships are 50 50, so I need.
[00:14:19] Speaker C: To be able to fix my part.
[00:14:24] Speaker B: So I think that's where I evolved to.
But then just as time went by and, you know, years went by, time went by. I definitely just was able to pick more up on the clues within our arguments or within our conversations or in the way that he treated me, sort.
[00:14:44] Speaker C: Of this demeaning way that he would just handle me.
[00:14:50] Speaker B: The respect wasn't there, and the reciprocity between the relationship was not there.
I was just a part of his life. And it wasn't that he had to do anything to be in a relationship. He had to do the jobs. He had to travel. He had to take care of the kids.
I just had to kind of tack on and figure out where I could fit in the gaps. And I saw that more and more. And as I brought that up more and more.
[00:15:24] Speaker C: I became just more aware of it.
[00:15:26] Speaker B: So it was a small thing with a bunch of denial at the very front of it because I'd picked up my whole life I'd moved from California. I mean, everything was so different.
I put all my eggs in this basket.
[00:15:44] Speaker D: Right. And recognizing what was going on meant that you would have to upend your whole life.
[00:15:49] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:15:50] Speaker B: And that I'd made a big mistake. And that, once again, that my decisions were not based in who I really am, but these superficial feelings of, like, I don't want to be alone.
All the reasons why you don't get into a relationship. Like, not thoroughly investigating this person before doing this, I felt foolish deep down.
Fuck. But then I was just like, hey, I'm that person who. That can turn all things around. I've been able to do this all the time in my life, so this should be the same. People can change.
So I always wanted to think that way.
[00:16:34] Speaker D: So then you begin to recognize that he is a narcissist and where your responsibility to the marriage begins and ends.
[00:16:44] Speaker C: And then what did you do?
[00:16:49] Speaker B: What's weird about it is that I.
[00:16:51] Speaker C: Didn'T really do anything.
[00:16:54] Speaker B: As in, like, a conscious. Like, okay, I'm going to do this, this, and this, this slowly but surely. I was getting sick. Like, my body started getting sick. I stopped sleeping really well.
I just felt terrible. It started just manifesting in all of this stuck, and this. Like, this is wrong. I'm being treated wrong. I can't be in this. It wasn't a mental thing. And all of a sudden, I just.
[00:17:21] Speaker C: Was unhappy, sick, trying to avoid being home.
[00:17:27] Speaker B: And so I didn't really consciously start to do anything. It's just my life all around me kind of started crumbling with my health.
[00:17:36] Speaker C: And where I wanted to spend my time.
[00:17:43] Speaker B: Again. It's like I didn't want to come.
[00:17:45] Speaker C: To the mental realization that it was done.
[00:17:49] Speaker B: It was over.
Yeah, that's how it worked.
I couldn't smart my way out of it and use my intellect to figure out a plan. And it was like everything started breaking.
[00:18:06] Speaker C: Down around me, so just to the.
[00:18:09] Speaker B: Point where I could not do it anymore. So it was a breaking point. Scarlett breaks camel's back it was like.
[00:18:15] Speaker C: One of those moments where all of a sudden.
[00:18:20] Speaker B: It just was like, I saw it all. I knew what I had to do.
[00:18:24] Speaker C: And the pain of staying in it.
[00:18:26] Speaker B: Was worse than the pain of not knowing how it was going to unfold once I got the ball rolling. So I was like, okay, it's critical mass.
It's time to kind of move forward.
[00:18:38] Speaker C: And also just rehearing through therapeutic sessions.
[00:18:44] Speaker B: Like conversations that we had had and conversations around behaviors with my father and behaviors, recalling what Matt had done in conversations that were just parallel and really not just very destructive and selfish and narcissistic and not a part of a real relationship, just remembering those things because my brain kept wanting to default back to the good stuff, which was starting to get smaller and smaller and smaller in percentage of how many times it.
[00:19:17] Speaker C: Happened, but just having.
[00:19:22] Speaker B: That stability around, stay focused on these things because this.
[00:19:28] Speaker C: Is the reality, right? You can't just keep trying to hold.
[00:19:32] Speaker B: On to the fumes of a couple of good moments that happen here and there where the whole thing is based.
[00:19:37] Speaker C: Around you needing to fit and you.
[00:19:42] Speaker B: Needing to kind of stay in this.
[00:19:43] Speaker C: Small life with him.
[00:19:47] Speaker D: And so where are you at now, and how does therapy fit into your life now?
[00:19:54] Speaker C: So now that I'm out of the marriage, yay.
And I'm just trying to figure out who I am. Trying to figure out who the fuck.
[00:20:08] Speaker B: I am with him for about eight years, and I even don't even know to this day, it's hard for me.
[00:20:16] Speaker C: To kind of pinpoint who I am, what I want.
[00:20:21] Speaker B: I'm trying to figure it all out, like in my mid 40s, when we should be well beyond figuring out these things and just sort of trying to also relive the pattern so I don't have to think about relive that again in the future.
It's just trying to kind of reconnect to those things and just re remember the things that we don't want to repeat.
[00:20:46] Speaker C: Right.
[00:20:47] Speaker B: And so I think that's where therapy comes into play and just trying to let go of those old habits and ways of thinking and just embracing the.
[00:20:57] Speaker C: New habits and ways of thinking, and.
[00:21:00] Speaker B: I don't even know what those are completely.
Even today, I'm in between jobs, and I don't have a lot during the day. And it's just like, this should be the time I should be having a great time without a job, and I have one coming where I could do things I really want to do and do those things I never get time to do, but I don't know what those are. I'm so clueless.
I've wandered so far away from who I am.
[00:21:31] Speaker C: It's just.
[00:21:32] Speaker B: It's just so crazy. It's so crazy, you know? And I've always been so, like, proud of myself that, like, oh, you know who you are?
[00:21:40] Speaker C: I just fuck that.
[00:21:41] Speaker B: No, I've been stripped down to a nub. And so moving forward now, I'm just like, how do we kind of rebuild into that? And I think where therapy is helpful.
[00:21:53] Speaker D: Almost where do you see your therapeutic process going from this point forward?
[00:21:58] Speaker B: I mean, that's a good question.
You tell me.
[00:22:03] Speaker C: It's one of those things where, as.
[00:22:07] Speaker B: I kind of relaunch myself into the.
[00:22:09] Speaker C: World, I just want to be able.
[00:22:13] Speaker B: To understand my boundaries big time and have that rooted into who I am and even some sort of vision for who I am becoming in the future. So I think it's just having.
I don't even know, because I don't know if it's like digging more into the stuff from the past because again, I feel like there's been a lot of that, and I feel like just.
[00:22:39] Speaker C: Making sure that those patterns around the.
[00:22:43] Speaker B: Dysfunction don't repeat themselves in the future. And so maybe having those touch points in therapeutic sessions where as I'm moving into this new phase, there's like, checkpoints around, how are you feeling? What are you coming across? Are you noticing any other patterns coming up?
[00:23:02] Speaker C: So I don't know if it's like.
[00:23:04] Speaker B: A touch point coach type thing, because, again, we can keep diving into deeper things, and I think that we've done a lot of that, but I think.
[00:23:15] Speaker C: It'S just more around, like, I just want to get. Maybe I'm being in denial, but I.
[00:23:20] Speaker B: Just want to get beyond this pain and beyond this feeling of kind of shame around getting into the marriage when I kind of always had a weird, deep down feeling about it and so trusting that. So just having therapy sort of help you to trust yourself more and know.
[00:23:40] Speaker C: That you have the kind of the.
[00:23:42] Speaker B: Power to self provision and make it.
[00:23:46] Speaker C: Through a more authentic future self.
So that, I think would be my answer or it is your answer.
[00:23:59] Speaker B: That's my answer.
[00:24:01] Speaker D: Okay. And is there anything you want people to know about therapy or your process or how it can be helpful that I haven't asked yet or that you haven't told us?
[00:24:12] Speaker B: I think what I would say is, when we were working together, did I bring up the question around, like, hey.
[00:24:25] Speaker C: I'm feeling a little defensive around this.
[00:24:29] Speaker B: Realization that it might be Matt, this would be like five years ago? I don't know if I ever actually vocalized that to you or not or if that was just something I was.
[00:24:38] Speaker C: Thinking, oh, it's something that came through.
[00:24:40] Speaker D: In the way you would respond, in your answers. I don't think you ever directly said it, but it was when I would poke at it.
[00:24:47] Speaker C: You would.
[00:24:50] Speaker D: Find reasons to excuse the behavior or explain the behavior or talk about your responsibility in the equation, basically, you taking responsibility for the way he would handle a situation.
[00:25:02] Speaker C: Yeah, but I was. What happened quite a bit.
[00:25:05] Speaker B: Right.
[00:25:06] Speaker C: Okay. All right.
[00:25:07] Speaker B: Yeah, I think for me, it's just around the takeaway is that you just have to kind of completely just fall into trust. You want to trust who you're seeing, but also just that whatever is coming up, it's something that you want to be able to talk about, even if it feels uncomfortable to talk about it. I think it's just really important to.
[00:25:29] Speaker C: Kind of bring that out into the.
[00:25:30] Speaker B: Light where you could even have a debate with your therapist about it. So that would be really helpful because.
[00:25:39] Speaker C: Maybe had I been more open to that, I could have come to conclusions faster.
[00:25:45] Speaker B: It was more of like, trying to learn from you and move into a different lesson. It wasn't anything where I even questioned.
[00:25:55] Speaker D: So you're saying that don't be afraid to question the therapist and have the debate with them about why are you asking this? Or what are you getting at?
[00:26:04] Speaker C: Let's talk about this.
[00:26:06] Speaker B: Yeah, I think that's it. Because, again, I didn't want to have confrontation with you, something you don't want.
[00:26:14] Speaker D: To shy away from in therapy. Have the confrontation.
[00:26:16] Speaker C: It's a safe place to have it.
[00:26:18] Speaker B: Right?
[00:26:19] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:26:19] Speaker B: And so I think that's the takeaway. There's just going to be things that just don't pop up right away. So you have to kind of trust more of a longer term approach where time has gone by and habits and behaviors have repeated themselves to where you can actually start to see it all come together. As far as the incidents that you're working through, along with what's happening in a therapeutic session, you have to give it some time.
I think that was another big thing that I feel is really great about working with you. I've known you now for a long time, so you've seen me through all the things. And so I really think that there's a benefit there to something more long.
[00:27:05] Speaker D: Term that's really great to hear, especially in sort of a therapeutic climate where twelve sessions and you're fixed, that's not.
[00:27:14] Speaker C: Always the case for you.
[00:27:16] Speaker D: You did therapy for a while and then took a break in there for.
[00:27:21] Speaker C: A couple of years.
[00:27:22] Speaker D: Year or two.
[00:27:23] Speaker B: Yeah. I mean, you and I had different times where there was some breaks. Maybe once or twice that happened. Actually, I think it happened, but I'd tap you back on the shoulder like a year or so later.
And that was really helpful because, again, having someone with that trained eye and perspective to sort of come back in and say, where are you now? Was really helpful to kind of reframe it again and sort of re remember what happened from that perspective, because, again, I only have my own perspective. I'm living in my own brain. But you've been kind of with me through these touch points throughout the years.
[00:28:02] Speaker C: And so I think that was really beneficial.
Great.
[00:28:07] Speaker D: Well, thank you for sharing your story with us.
[00:28:10] Speaker C: Thank you.
We figured out along the way that.
[00:28:15] Speaker D: The marriage just isn't working.
[00:28:17] Speaker C: No. And that you knew it and you.
[00:28:23] Speaker D: Just couldn't come to see it yet.
[00:28:24] Speaker B: Or you couldn't allow yourself to see it, unfortunately. And this happens to some people, but it takes years for them to get to it. Some people, it takes, like, many years of trudging through it. But my body was starting to break down, and I knew exactly the reason why it was happening. I almost couldn't avoid it. And again, I think I'm kind of lucky because of that. So I wasn't in it for two or three decades.
[00:28:55] Speaker A: So, dear listener, this is typically the time when the microphones go off and the screen goes dark. But I kept the conversation going with Antonia, and I asked her when is she ready to date, even if it's in that fun sort of way. And that kicked off a more casual conversation about where she's at, not only about dating, but about other things in.
[00:29:15] Speaker B: Life, too, even in a fun way. That's very non committal, very short term. I'll get there, but I'm just not there right now. I'm still feeling really broken.
[00:29:25] Speaker C: How about art?
[00:29:26] Speaker D: Have you reengaged with your art?
[00:29:29] Speaker B: Not yet either.
Again, it's like when you're with someone, a narcissist, you get stripped down and you become unrecognizable.
I think that all of that will come back.
[00:29:50] Speaker C: But right now, I'm just trying to.
[00:29:54] Speaker D: Have you put yourself in environments where your creativity could come back.
[00:29:59] Speaker B: I have, actually. I've tried to force myself to do it.
[00:30:03] Speaker C: Okay?
[00:30:04] Speaker B: But I'm not because I know actually, sometimes that works. Sometimes I'm like, just put your body where you need to be and then just give it 30 seconds and just see if something clicks.
[00:30:16] Speaker C: But.
[00:30:19] Speaker B: There'S a lot of shame around him that I remember that he would.
[00:30:24] Speaker C: Talk to me about who I was.
[00:30:27] Speaker B: When I was an artist and how it was all over the place and unpredictable, and I never saved money. And good thing he came along to save me.
[00:30:35] Speaker C: So I'm just, like, not there yet.
[00:30:44] Speaker B: The fucker fucked me up.
[00:30:46] Speaker C: Yes, he did.
[00:30:50] Speaker D: But you're stronger than that, too.
[00:30:52] Speaker C: And so you will rise up out of this yeah. As you have professionally.
[00:31:03] Speaker B: I've done before. I've done it before. I can do it again.
[00:31:06] Speaker C: I know.
[00:31:06] Speaker B: I'll fucking do it again.
I'm not even sure of anything. I need to feel like that stability underneath my feet. I need to feel like, hey, I did this. I made this job happen, and I'm moving through it, and I just need to kind of get some other things. I think it'll all naturally come, and I think maybe not focusing it on it too much anymore will help.
[00:31:27] Speaker D: So that reminds me of a quote that I really like, that I was looking at as I was making the newsletters for the other stuff. It says, truth, like love and sleep, resents approaches that are too intense.
[00:31:43] Speaker C: Right.
[00:31:43] Speaker D: So you got to come at truth gently.
[00:31:46] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:31:47] Speaker C: Sometimes you do, for sure. Especially if it's a truth.
Yeah.
[00:31:55] Speaker B: I mean, there's different levels of it, right. Sometimes it just can't be in your conscious mind right away, right there in the open, like a sign. It just is something that has to.
[00:32:04] Speaker C: Kind of come back and emerge, because.
[00:32:07] Speaker B: My identity didn't get stripped down overnight either. It took years for him to wear me out. Wear me down.
[00:32:14] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:32:16] Speaker B: And not seeing the signs in the beginning of what narcissistic people do and the love bombing and all of that, I was overcome with how amazing it was in the beginning.
[00:32:26] Speaker C: Right.
[00:32:27] Speaker D: And then we're always trying to get back to that amazing place, right. So, like, they love bomb, and then things get really shitty. But you have this vision of the love bomb time in your life, and you're always chasing that, and it allows you to sort of forgive all the things in the present because, you know, they're capable of that thing in the love bomb phase.
[00:32:48] Speaker B: Absolutely.
Because they're so charming.
They've based their life on being the confident know it alls, and they understand, and then they know how to find.
[00:33:02] Speaker D: Little weak points and weaponize them against you, right?
[00:33:06] Speaker B: Oh, yeah. Oh, 100%. There was no such thing as real, true intimacy where I could be vulnerable because I knew that would come back around and be like a line on my neck. So it's like I couldn't be open. I couldn't trust. I couldn't. All of that, I knew I wasn't respected. God, it was all the worst things. Just someone who brings out the worst in you.
[00:33:28] Speaker C: I turned into an angry, artless bitch.
[00:33:32] Speaker B: I know now, 100%, I don't know anything except that whomever I'm with in the future, I want to feel like they're bringing the best out of me, and I'm bringing the best out of them. It doesn't have to be anything else. It just has to be this. Like, it's not the tearing down of someone. It's like this person makes me feel like I'm the best version of myself. And even though there might be hard times and even though I might trip and get upset because they're calling me out on something, ultimately, it's because they love and respect me so much, and.
[00:34:03] Speaker C: They see this bigger part of me.
[00:34:05] Speaker B: And I want that feeling, like I never had that feeling. It was always this contraction feeling this, like, okay, get into the box.
You can fit into it. You know what I mean? And who is this? Yeah. Why do I have needs? Of course, I'm not as important as him. He's the one with the children, and that means that he's well up on the level of humans that are doing the better things in the world, and I'm just the dumb art school girl that doesn't bring anything to anyone.
[00:34:37] Speaker D: I hope you can hear it as you're saying it, of just how insidious it is. And narcissists play the long game, too. It's just peppering little bits here and there. You take the chance you're vulnerable. They pour lemon juice on it. When that doesn't make you pliable enough, then they pour salt in with the lemon juice. And then when that doesn't work, they stomp on it to make sure it gets really ground in until you're just completely flat out impliable.
[00:35:04] Speaker C: And then repeat.
[00:35:07] Speaker D: And do it all in the name of I love you so much. Can't you see what I'm doing for your benefit? Or there's just complete intolerance of your experience of the relationship.
[00:35:20] Speaker B: Absolutely.
Stick with me. Don't worry. You're broken and everything, but stick with me, and I'll fix it. I'll fix you.
[00:35:29] Speaker D: And we're of the Disney Princess generation that wants the night in shining armor that will do that for us.
[00:35:36] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:35:37] Speaker C: It's so fucked up. Yeah.
[00:35:40] Speaker B: And then even throughout the divorce stuff, he was just like, okay, yeah, I know. You got to do your thing and file your little papers and act like you're going to go through with this, but I'll let you have that. You can have that.
But once we get back together, once.
[00:35:58] Speaker D: You calm down and you get over this.
[00:36:00] Speaker B: Yeah, I'll take you back. Yeah. You're having one of your episodes again, and it's caused from those issues you had with your father and the fact that it's just so insidious. It's so crazy. Oh my God, that's never going to happen again.
[00:36:19] Speaker A: And that's where my conversation with Antonia really ended. Look, you can't open a social media app without seeing the word narcissism thrown around like it's just confetti. It's everywhere, and everyone that has needs or wants that overshadow yours gets slapped with a label of being a narcissist. It's the latest in pop psychology, and it's having its moment as the latest word de jour. Remember when we labeled all neat freaks as having OCD and we're all still really holding our boundaries? Look, it's true we all have narcissistic moments, but having a moment is vastly different than having a personality organized around narcissism. Moments don't cause emotional damage, but being in a relationship with someone, romantic or not, who consistently sees the world from a position of superiority, can do emotional damage. If you think you might be in a relationship or friendship with someone with a narcissistic personality, or maybe you're not even sure, but social media posts aren't giving you the information you need, it's time to talk it out. Apricity expat therapy currently has three licensed and experienced therapists with immediate availability. We're not looking to label you, your partner, your friend, or anyone else. We're here to support your emotional and mental health needs in whatever capacity you want in a way that social media just can't do. Visit our website at Apricity expat therapy to schedule a free consultation today.
