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May 26 - June 10, 2024
acceptance can be framed as an opportunity to finally settle into and bring your authentic self to your healthy relationships.
yet it is central to your healing that you cultivate your true self and share it with others.
but they said that with acceptance, they could now disengage and yet remain authentic to who they were.
First, you must accept the unchangeability of narcissism and narcissistic abuse. Second, you must accept the process that will unfold after you leave.
Whenever I sit with a client who is in or is about to enter the process of a divorce from a narcissistic person, I warn them that this will get so bleak and abusive that they will doubt their decision. Some folks will share that the abuse got so much worse after a relationship ended that they almost wanted to go back in just to make it stop. This is why radical acceptance is so crucial—to end one of these relationships also means having your eyes open to what is about to happen, so you can prepare and not lose your resolve. Even with a moderately narcissistic person, the post-separation
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realistic expectations are the core of radical acceptance and are essential to coping with and healing from narcissistic abuse.
And once you become proficient at realistic expectations, you will be close to crossing the finish line of radical acceptance.
variable empathy,
entitlement,
grandiosity, invalidation, dis...
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manipulation, and gas...
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Plan on these things ...
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The good days in narcissistic relationships can undercut your realistic expectation...
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When a day comes when they are bringing the charm, charisma, and some performative empathy, enjoy it for the sunny day it is, but don’t burn ...
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Having realistic expectations also means not succumbing to the narcissistic person’s excuses, justifications, and future faking.
Radical acceptance is not engaging with them or trying to point out the evidence of why you know they will cheat again.
It’s the knowing without the engaging.
Realistic expectations are also about information management.
that a relationship? It’s not a deep one, but there never was the possibility of a sustained and close relationship with them.
Many if not most of us who leave may find ourselves surprised by missing the narcissistic person, wondering if they would be “proud” or impressed if they saw all we were doing, and that healing is harder than you expected.
Realistic expectations mean acknowledging that healing often looks like two steps forward, one step back.
We’ve all written that text or letter or email where we explain ourselves to a narcissistic person: the long, meandering email, the text that goes on far longer than a text should. You probably wrote that letter because they never listen to you while you speak, and they gaslight, interrupt, or confuse you so much that you get tongue-tied. Maybe you thought if you wrote it out carefully, then they could see your point of view clearly. But it never works. They read it and either respond with an obscene emoji, send an eviscerating and scathing response, or gaslight you (again).
Then by destroying it, you acknowledge that the narcissist will never hear your words, which fosters acceptance.
On the good days it’s easy not only to forget all the toxic stuff that happened but also to lose sight of how much of ourselves we give up for these relationships.
real power to writing things down and seeing them, not just thinking about them.
This is a list of all the awful stuff that happened in the relationship.
This list is equally important if you are going to stay in the relationship. The slippage away from radical acceptance is more pronounced for people who stay.
Once you pull back the curtain on the more compelling or demanding narcissistic people in your life, you will see that there are more people like this in your world than you initially recognized. If we do not see them clearly for who they are, we run the risk of enabling or minimizing their impact.
When any of these less-than-healthy folks text you and you see that little toxic symbol, that reminder may be enough to stop you from engaging.
You can expect to feel guilt, fear, and anxiety when you begin to eliminate or distance from these difficult people, but you will also feel relief.
your life is better without engaging in unnecessary invalidating exchanges with people.
Purging your social media feed is also part o...
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This exercise forces the dissonant truths to be simultaneously tolerated so you see your situation holistically and don’t rationalize what is happening.
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. You loved these people; in some cases you still do. You may have compassion for their histories and gradually recognize that their behavior is not good for you. This is some of the hardest work of radical acceptance but it also gets you to a place where you realize that radically accepting does not mean that you have lost your empathic recognition of who this
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especially with a parent, often steals the opportunity to radically accept yourself because you were never able to be seen or heard or valued.
to appease the narcissistic person,
to suppress your real self to survive in the relationship.
This isn’t about rigidly holding a position. This is about being able to take note when another person is asking you not to be yourself.
You aren’t likely to cut off your own arm because a narcissistic person asks you to, yet most of us have cut off sizable parts of our souls in the name of narcissistic “love.”
This time I didn’t critique myself for being “too sensitive.”
In the end, I never responded, which was a real shift for me, and it felt so much better.
love what I do, he is always going to bait me, I don’t need to respond.
Building radical acceptance can be a soul- and eye-opening process. You’re letting go of the hope that the narcissistic person will become kind, empathic, and interested in your life and you are recognizing that the invalidation, hostility, and carelessness are here to stay.
separating from their reality and upholding your own.
Radical acceptance raises tremendous grief, a unique grief that can overwhelm us and keep us stuck.
Healing doesn’t mean the loss didn’t happen. It means that it no longer controls us.
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.
Ultimately, not running away from the grief but making the brave and painful journey through it is essential to the healing process.
Her death was a wake-up call to the reality that life can end at any moment, and looking back, Lauren was saddened to realize just how many opportunities and dreams she had passed up due to the fallout of narcissistic abuse.
being seen, witnessing a loving and respectful marriage, feeling safe enough to ask for guidance, and feeling valued.