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Recovering From Abuse

Two Truths And A Lie – Empower You After A Toxic Conversation

Toxic relationships suck the confidence out of even the most badass person.  I mean, we’re all badass on some level.  But, a toxic person’s mind games and ‘crazy making’ tactics tangle-up your heart, mind and body with invisible chains – you obsess, defend who you are and suppress your true feelings without realizing it.

I fell prey to the circular conversations, criticism and manipulation for years until one day, after a typical criticism fest, I noticed that I was spending hours having a rebuttal conversation in my head.  I thought about every reason my ex was wrong about me.  I stopped and asked myself, “Why are you trying to convince yourself of something you already know?”  The answer was simple – I was responding to the negative things he said about me as if they were true.  Only I know what is true about me.

My defensiveness and the hurt I experienced with each of these conversations came from the fact that my ex was wrong about me.   He painted me as all black or all white – all good or all bad.  Well, there was a grain of truth in some of what he said – but he exaggerated or outright projected untruths about me – I am not selfish, not making him treat me this way and don’t make decisions that only benefit me.  We all have our moments of putting ourselves first and I made decisions that protected me and my three kiddos.  Me making him treat me like crap was a straight-up lie.

I started looking at my truths and his lies – breaking that habit or cycle of handing all the power over to my ex by standing on my truths and my reality.  Two truths and a lie helped empower me to stand up for myself and avoid the crazy making moments.  Here’s how it works:

After a negative conversation acknowledge two truths – these can be true feelings,  what you want to change about your situation, how the conversation affected you, if any part of the conversation had truth to it (of course, accept this truth without judging you)

For example, after that particular conversation my two truths were:

  1. I don’t trust my own husband anymore – emotionally or otherwise
  2. I am a giving person – my husband is the only person who has ever accused me of being selfish.

Now acknowledge one lie from your conversation

For example, I acknowledged that my ex telling me that I only make decisions that benefit me is a lie.

Finding two truths and a lie allowed me to stop that endless loop of negative /defensive thoughts and focus on empowering thoughts.  The next time you get caught up in a toxic conversation, see if this strategy can help you.

 

Namaste!

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Three Reasons Your Toxic Break Up Is A Great Thing

Break ups are excruciating.  That’s why there are so many sad country songs about them.   Break ups create insecurities, amplify our critical inner voice and parade our flaws for everyone to see.  Our instinct, or our desperate hope, is to not feel even a drop of pain.  Not feeling any pain is impossible, but we try with distractions, denial or a nice bottle of wine.

Breaking up with a toxic human adds a whole new level of agony because there is no closure, your self-esteem is buried somewhere in the backyard like a body and hope hangs around like second-hand smoke.  I was in the middle of berating myself for feeling sad over someone that hurt me on a daily basis, when I looked at this journey in a different way.  Instead of looking at what I lost – I opened up to how full my life is with or without my ex.  I realized that with my ex out of the house and out of my life, everything felt lighter.  I discovered three reasons my break up is a good thing.  See if these truths help you too.

  1. This is the catalyst to discovering who I really am and being my true self – I have nothing to lose now – my toxic ex already walked out of the door.  The relationship wasn’t based on the real me.

 

  1. My mind is free to focus on accomplishing my dream of publishing a book. (The break-up helped me rediscover why I had that dream) I spent way too much time defending myself in my mind.

 

  1. I am starting fresh – healing what led me to attract a toxic man, asking what I value and learning how to set boundaries.  I put up with and overlooked sooo much abuse and b.s.!

There is no ‘correct’ way to move on from a toxic relationship – the most important thing to remember is giving yourself grace.

 

Namaste!

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Divorcing In Winter – Is It More Difficult?

Divorce is a short ride to hell on its own.  But having sobbed during a blizzard and obsessed about my soon-to-be ex while shoveling snow, my unfortunate divorce from a narcissist in December led me to the question – Does winter make divorce hurt more?  If divorce hits harder in winter, what can I do about it?

I say HELL YES, divorce sucks worse in winter.  Winter’s artic cold, snowy roads and shorter days makes me hibernate – by that I mean – on winter nights you can’t pry me out of my house with a crowbar.  As the sun sets early evening, my anxiety rises.  And even on somewhat decent days – the dreariness of winter makes me sad.  I am not sure if it literally makes me sad, as in Season Affective Disorder (SAD), but it’s somewhere close.  Adding a divorce to this winter season, makes the cold days and nights that much colder.

I couldn’t find any research that talked specifically about winter making divorce seem harder in winter without a reference to Season Affective Disorder.  So, I did a little research and found the official definition of SAD. According to The National Institute of Mental Health, (NIH) SAD is a type of depression that starts around fall/early winter and ends in spring/summer. SAD has a recurring seasonal pattern and you have to meet the full criteria for major depression coinciding with specific seasons, meaning winter or sometimes summer, for at least 2 years.  It seems that technically, a divorce won’t bring on SAD, or make you depressed, but I still say winter makes the emotions surrounding a divorce more intense.

If winter does make a divorce worse, what can we do about it?   I recently started this book, Before You Know It, and one fascinating study associated heat/warmth with feeling better emotionally.  The book talked about anything warm, coffee, soup, and a special treatment called Whole Body Hyperthermia (WBH).  My initial status conference is tomorrow and I am sad and nervous to see my soon-to-be ex for the first time in months.  I can’t get in for a whole-body hyperthermia treatment – so I am experimenting with hot chocolate, a heating pad and the sauna after my work out tomorrow morning.  Will let you know if it actually makes a dent in this winter divorce misery.

Namaste!

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WHOSE DISCARD IS IT ANYWAY?

I’ve spent hours wrapping my mind around the dissolution of our five-year lie and the cruel way my soon-to-be ex-narcissistic husband left.  But, like all the effort and emotion I threw at this relationship, it’s wasted energy.  In reality, he controlled the dramatic ending, but I choose to stay gone and move on.  He discarded me first.  But, I discard the lie, hope he’ll change – the man he really is without the ‘mask’.  I choose to gather the shredded remains of my self-esteem and to stop long enough for the left-behind pieces of myself catch up.

Our initial status conference is the end of January – bringing with it the finality of this twisted journey and my first glimpse of this man since he stormed out the front door to our house in December.  My inner voice is shallow at first blush – telling me I better look fantastic – lose five pounds, get my hair done and wear those tight jeans and cute shoes he used to ask me to wear on “date night”.  The unease felt heavy in my stomach, just like old times with my soon-to-be ex.  He needs to regret walking away, realize he’s a dumbass for letting me go.

But, basing any kind of closure or even a spec of validation on a narcissist is begging for more pain.  They don’t give anything – except destruction and dark energy.  My inner voice kept talking, whispering about bringing my true self to the initial status conference – focus on the good coming into my life now that his toxicity is gone – like my beautiful clarity now that he’s out of my life.  Thriving after the narcissistic discard is most important, not what he thinks or feels.

Whether my shallow inner voice or my empowering inner voice is talking – both know that the best revenge is finding a better life without his manipulation, criticism and the toxic relationship.   He doesn’t have the capacity for regret – good thing I don’t need it.

Namaste!

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One Reason Crying in Public is A Good Thing – Even “Ugly” Crying

Sadness hijacked me, so crying in public was inevitable.  I cried in Starbucks, at the gym and at Barnes & Noble among the books in the relationship section.  How fitting.  My crying jag ended with a great book on toxic relationships and the start of a new friendship.   Society is afraid to show sadness – but that closes us off to the support of other humans.  I say – if you’re going to cry in public then “ugly cry”, honey.

I need to rewind. My soon-to-be ex narcissist walked out after blaming me for his emotional affair with a twenty-four year old girl.  (I mean come on!!)  To say I was hurt, angry and bewildered is an understatement, so I called my friends to sort through my toxic relationship, admittedly ad nauseam.

Talking to friends can be dangerous if they don’t understand what emotional abuse does to a person’s psyche.  This friend told me, “Shame on you for letting him beat you down every day.”  That hurt, but when she added how she was too strong to ever experience that, I lost it.  Of course, this twisted pep talk happened as I walked into Starbucks.  Having reached an emotional saturation point, I wrote for an hour before succumbing to a crying spell.  Embarrassed, I went to the gym to sweat it out.

Now, all of this is important, promise!  As a spiritual person, I believe in signs.  Cosmic signs, angels showing up – what ever you want to call it.  At the gym, I hopped on the elliptical, so I could read the book, The Universe Has Your Back by Gabrielle Bernstein.  Gabrielle referenced another book, A Course in Miracles, and I felt an uncontrollable urge to find it.

Tearing up at the gym was my cue to leave.  Barnes & Noble was the logical next stop.  I headed straight for the customer service desk and asked the lady behind the counter where the books on narcissistic abuse and grieving would be.  She escorted me to the section and as she grabbed a book from the shelf, I started to sob.  Exposed in the midst of an ugly cry, I explained how my husband just moved out in an extremely narcissistic fashion and how our toxic relationship had gotten in the way of grieving my mother’s passing two years ago.

The customer service lady nodded her understanding, and mentioned how she knew all too well what I was going through.  She started crying.  There were two other customers in that book section.  Our crying triggered some innate empathy response, and they started crying.  The customer service lady left in the wake of a sniffle, but was immediately followed by another Barnes & Noble employee.  She said, “I hear people are crying over here.  Do you ladies need some tissue?”  Of course, we needed tissue, so she got a box of Kleenex, offered to hug us all and left.

One of the other customers had a small sample of essential oils and, out of kindness, gave it to me.  This started a conversation and the surprise that we knew a mutual friend.  She offered to sit and commiserate with me over coffee, so we made plans to go to lunch that week.

We went to lunch and, what I hope is a long friendship, began.  This heart crushing life change, torturous soul-finding expedition and erosion of my emotional composure has shown me many truths about myself and my life, forcing me to become vulnerable in public.  If you’re crying in public, your life has reached a certain point – listen to it.  If my husband hadn’t left, if I never had that hurtful conversation with my friend and hadn’t  gone to Barnes & Noble  – I would still be ignoring the truth about my life – I’m in a toxic marriage and need to grieve my mother.

 

Namaste!

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Not Hiding The Hot Mess Any Longer

I am a Colorado native, on my second marriage, raising three kiddos, trying to navigate the corporate world, fulfill my dreams, while keeping a thread of sanity.  My life experiences are anything but ordinary – they are good, bad and ugly.  Some are hilarious at the time, and some funny after.   All are a means to grow!

This life doesn’t let you rest for long –

This blog is meant to relate to people who have life all figured out, pretend their life is all figured out or gave up pretending.  I am proof that you are not alone.  My greatest challenge is recovering from emotional/narcissistic abuse.  This blog also speaks to those in abusive or challenging relationships, with empathy, tools to empower and the power of experience to relate.  My mission is to show you, through my crazy life experiences, that we are all strong enough to conquer our fears, stand by our true self and laugh at ourselves along the way.

Namaste!

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A Short Guide To Riding Out An Emotional Rollercoaster

To feel stronger, I took his pictures down today and tore some of the cards he gave me in half.  And, full disclosure here … threw away a pair of his underwear that was in the laundry.  Throwing away his underwear felt better than anything.

It has only been a few days since my husband packed up the big television from the basement, took some of his clothes, and moved out of our house.   Riding a roller coaster through a hurricane would be a smoother ride than this, even though my true self is saying a prayer of relief because there isn’t much of her left.

Divorcing someone you loved is tragic.  Divorcing a narcissist is a different breed of hell.  I imagined leaving this toxic marriage for over year – so his emotional affair with a twenty-four-year-old woman and moving out is a gift; a gift to me and my tattered soul.  So, why am I destroyed?  Anyone living with a narcissist/psychopath or partner with borderline personality disorder can relate to those emotions that one minute hold you up and the next cut you in half.  I found a couple of ways to find peace until either the storm or the roller coaster ride ends.  Hopefully they will give you peace too.

1. Don’t fight the emotions, they fight dirty.  Emotions will win every time.   We want to resist them, but they need to come out.   The nasty urge to cry until you collapse hits in the oddest moments, made worse with helplessness and bewilderment from somewhere you didn’t know existed.  One minute, you’re washing dishes, seeing your future much stronger and more peaceful future.   The next minute, you’re thinking “What the hell”,  asking how you will “Stay Calm and Chive On,” or if there was something you should have done differently.

2. It sucks, but sitting with those dark emotions awhile, acknowledging that they are here and will return.  Accepting that emotions move through in waves makes their visit a little less pleasant.  These emotions come from a toxic relationship.  If you can think of them as releasing from your body, heart and soul, they become a good thing – even though they hurt like blazes.

3. Question what your broken mind or ego is telling you – literally.  Question them out loud if that works.  I have “I can’t do this, survive this, I’m dying,” moments at least 20 times a day.   As a particularly harsh moment of ‘I can’t do life without him’ entered my mind, I followed the fear to the end.   I looked at my life, all the things I’ve accomplished despite the constant criticism and snide comments, and said, “You’re doing life pretty good right now.”  Imagine how far you’ll go not drowning in crazy-making drama.  It worked!

A narcissist leaving is a good thing.  A fantastic gift.  When you are beaten down and your self-esteem is shredded, the gift is lost in the hurricane winds and the roller coaster gives you a permanent ‘stomach dropping’ feeling.  The reason why is elusive.  If you can accept that it hurts and sit with those emotions, they can become part of the healing and growth process.

Namaste!

 

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