It's Not You: Identifying and Healing from Narcissistic People

by Ramani Durvasula

And you will augment the radical acceptance because you are more broadly able to see that your life is better without engaging in unnecessary invalidating exchanges with people.

And in an ideal world, spend less time on social media. Something about the validation seeking, the rants, the comparisons, the cruel clickbait, and the egocentricity of social media just isn’t good for healing, so try to reduce your exposure.

Life is complicated and multiple things can be true. You do not, and actually should not, view these relationships through a black-and-white lens. To do so discredits your process of healing and simplifies a process that is anything but.

Discovering who you truly are and accepting yourself may be the strongest radical acceptance tool you have, because the more you know and accept who you are, the more you don’t sacrifice and subjugate yourself.

Radically accepting yourself means that you are kind to yourself on the bad days.

Recently I had someone with whom I have had a complicated relationship send me a mean-spirited email mocking my work. I felt the usual reaction rise up in me: the discomfort in my gut, the dry mouth, the tightening of my throat. I know that when this person pokes me professionally it leaves me feeling not enough, something that he has made me feel throughout my adult life. But I genuinely enjoy my work, and in that moment, I allowed myself to acknowledge that. I felt sad that his behavior never changes, but I also saw what he was doing. This time I didn’t critique myself for being “too sensitive.” And instead of responding, I leaned into my work harder. In the end, I never responded, which was a real shift for me, and it felt so much better.

I love what I do, he is always going to bait me, I don’t need to respond.

Healing doesn’t mean the loss didn’t happen. It means that it no longer controls us. DAVID KESSLER

The narcissistic relationship is an intricate dance: the narcissistic person projects their shame onto you, and you, because you’re an empathic and accountable person, may receive it, integrate it, blame yourself, and ultimately take responsibility for all the toxicity within the relationship. Only with this structure can these relationships persist. The day you finally accept that the narcissistic dynamic will not change and that it has nothing to do with you is the day these cycles shift—and the day the relationship stops “working.”

As Robert Frost once wrote, “The best way out is always through.”

You must process the losses in order to create the space in which you can cultivate yourself and healthier relationships and life.

In adulthood, decisions around maintaining relationships with your narcissistic parent can get complicated, because their presence can elicit the grief of your lost childhood. And since your narcissistic parent has not changed, you may reexperience the grief every time you see them.

The grief of narcissistic abuse is consistent with something called disenfranchised grief,[2] which is grief that is not acknowledged by others or socially sanctioned and supported as a loss or grief experience.

Call it what it is. Despite people telling you that this isn’t really grief, or just treating it as family or relationship issues, it is real. Identifying this experience as loss helps you understand and experience the profound impact it is having.

Narcissistic people rarely genuinely apologize, face meaningful consequences for their behavior, take accountability or responsibility, or meaningfully acknowledge your pain.

As a result, narcissistic relationships can feel deeply unjust—you get hurt and psychologically wrecked, and they get to move on with their lives with little insight into the damage they wrought.

(If they suffer, I will feel better). (But do show yourself some grace; it’s common to get lost in revenge fantasies for a minute, and

some survivors even find it helpful, just don’t get stuck there.)

Detaching and differentiating means that your healing takes primacy o...

Be kind to yourself, take a breath or a rest, and recognize that with time your growth and healing will supplant this injustice, but for now it needs to be grieved.

You recognize that the more you engage with the narcissistic person, the more you end up disengaging from yourself. Healing is the attempt to extract lessons from the suffering, taking what you learned and paying it forward into the rest of your life.

The key to healing is to grow and flex the psychological muscle that helps you recognize these toxic people and patterns as they come up, and instead of trying to change them, you manage them. You listen to your instincts and establish protective boundaries.

Good gatekeeping is often thwarted by lifelong narratives that show up in thoughts like Who do I think I am? for holding a boundary or Maybe I am asking too much for simply wanting respect, or, despite knowing what constitutes unacceptable behavior, not feeling you have permission to acknowledge it and step aside.

During this time, it’s essential to develop radical acceptance, avoid taking the bait, not fall for the future faking, and recognize the gaslighting when it happens. To limit the narcissistic person’s impact, it also helps to not take responsibility for their bad behavior.

Ask yourself questions out loud: How do I feel? How was my day? How is my energy level right now? Try to do this three times a day.

Talk to your inner critic. If you have some privacy, do it out loud: “Hey, inner critic, I get it, you are trying to protect me, and thank you, but I am an adult, I got this.”

intentional bedtime routine—brushing your teeth, washing up, doing some breathing, maybe reading something that feels good, turning off those devices—can not only feel like re-parenting, which most of us need, but also become a daily practice of bringing yourself down and giving your system a chance to rest enough to face another day.

You may believe that consensus is more meaningful than your subjective experience.

To become narcissist resistant, it is important that you realize that you don’t need the narcissistic person and are now reclaiming the parts of yourself lost to this relationship. Some of that entails becoming so comfortable with your solitude that you are more discerning about whom you spend your time with. After years of your identity being shaped by the narcissistic person, it can be terrifying to think of yourself without that reference point. But when solitude becomes a meaningful alternative, toxic people lose ground in your life.

The more present you can make yourself, the better you are at discerning unhealthy patterns and protecting yourself.

Allowing yourself to experience joy is a highly effective form of narcissist resistance.

Experiencing joy is an act of defiance if you are experiencing narcissistic abuse. It was taken away for so long that I can only liken it to letting in the light after you have been sleeping in the dark. You sort of squint for a minute, but as time goes on you become more practiced at seeking it out and reveling in it when you find it. It’s like your soul waking up after a long sleep, and you find you are still capable of feeling the good and not just the heaviness of constant rumination.

You’ve been taught to devalue yourself for so long, you may not even realize how wonderful your own company is.

The truth is, healing is more important than leaving. You can still heal and not make the massive leap of leaving the relationship, disrupting contact, or upending your life. Healing is about taking back your power, even if you do stay.

Healing means not judging your feelings.

There are no mistakes in this process, just lessons.

They gaslight me, they manipulate

me, we have a history, I love them, I wish it was different.

Remaining in a narcissistic relationship requires awareness, clear expectations, and self-compassion.

You can be happy for a friend and also envy them, and in your safest relationships or in a space like therapy, you may even consider exploring these feelings.

Catch your should-ing, recognize that it comes from a place of craving your own sense of normal and healthy, and practice self-kindness.

The key is to remember that boundaries are an inside job. It becomes less about you waiting for the narcissistic person to honor a boundary and more about you setting one for yourself that you can honor.

This is about knowing what qualifies as acceptable to you. It is a slow process, gradually disengaging from sharing important things about yourself and avoiding sharing feelings, emotions, aspirations, or negative moods with the narcissistic person.

You also need to be clear on your nonnegotia...

If I set a boundary, I am afraid they will reject me or that they may get angry.

The truth is, they might.

Low contact means you get out before the emotions start to flare. It is not as easy as it sounds because there can be baiting (the narcissistic person pokes at emotional issues that will get a rise out of you) and enabler pressures (“Oh come on, your brother isn’t that bad,” or “Stop being so cold, lighten up”).

You can have the superficial conversations and maintain a boundary, and you can extricate yourself when you start feeling uncomfortable.

DEEP you do not: Defend Engage Explain Personalize

You may believe that if the narcissistic person could just hear your point of view, things would be better—but they won’t.