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Mothering Sunday

I’m sitting here thinking about all the people who are going to find tomorrow hard, and my heart is aching for you.

For those who find Mothering Sunday hard, whether it’s because you aren’t one, don’t have one, wish you had a different one, or any of the other multitude of reasons, you’re in my thoughts.

To make tomorrow easier, please consider these ideas.

1. If you want to be a mother but aren’t for whatever awful reason

First of all, you are not alone. Talk about it. Talk about the pain mother’s day brings you. Talk about the mother you would have been, and talk about how much it hurts that you haven’t got that chance.

It can be helpful to plan a structured day doing things that children won’t be involved in or perhaps you want to be around children. The most important thing is that you put your needs first, and you understand that it’s okay to meet them. This is painful for you, and your pain needs to be acknowledged and allowed.

With that in mind, remember that you don’t have to suffer in silence. If it hurts too much to be around your own mother or mother in law, or any other person being celebrated tomorrow, you have every right to say no.

Ultimately, keep yourself safe.

2. If you have lost your own mother.

If you are grieving your own mother, tomorrow will highlight your loss, and may bring a depth to your grief you only experience on these difficult days.

It might be helpful to write your mother a card or letter, telling her how much you miss her. It might be helpful to do something that honours her and her memory, and the legacy she leaves.

Again, your pain is valid. Even if you have children of your own, your pain should be acknowledged and respected. You have the right to take some time to consider the loss you have experienced. It does not detract from the love you have for your own children, it is totally separate, and that’s okay.

3. If you don’t have the mother you deserve.

If you are someone whose mother was abusive, tomorrow may be a bitter pill for you. Even if you have kids of your own. When we don’t have the mother we ‘should’ have done, days like tomorrow are especially hard. You do not ‘have’ to acknowledge your mother. You do not have to suffer abuse because she gave birth to you. You do not have to keep other people happy, and you do not have to tolerate contact because it’s mother’s day.

Your pain is valid. Your experience is real. Just because someone else thinks you should tolerate abuse because someone gave birth to you doesn’t mean you should.

You are allowed to make tomorrow all about you and you do not even have to breathe in the direction of the person who shares your DNA.

If someone is attempting to force you to do so, may I suggest you ask them why they would wish you to suffer abuse to make them feel more comfortable?

4. If you’re a single mother and tomorrow won’t be any different to every other day of the year.

Tomorrow is about you more than any other mother. Tomorrow is about you fighting every battle parenting has thrown at you. Perhaps you are in contact with the other parent and perhaps not.

Either way, if you don’t have someone who takes the time to take your child to get you something, tomorrow may be tough because your single status seems bigger than ever.

Try to carve some time out for yourself if you can. Get a take away, put off the washing, cleaning, and any other weekend.

Love your babies and celebrate yourself. You’re amazing. You work hard to give the love of two people. Remember to celebrate yourself on Father’s Day.

And finally, if you have a wonderful relationship with your mother, I’m thrilled for you. I truly truly am. But I BEG you. Do not project that relationship onto others. Do not assume that other people can put the pain of abuse or loss aside in order to pay homage to an arbitrary date in a calendar where we are asked to revere those who gave life.

Motherhood is a privilege bestowed on many, respected by most, and longed for by more than you will ever know.

If you know someone who may find today hard. Please send them some love. As I am doing now.

Love to you all

Helen

[wpvideo FMODCsvH ]

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Imposter Syndrome: Your Friend

Imposter Syndrome.

Well, who am I to be telling you about this? It seems a lot of us suffer from the feeling that we don’t deserve what we’ve got, or that we’ve got to the place we are by luck, or that we’ve somehow tricked everyone into giving us the responsibility we have. It seems many of us are scared that we are eventually going to be ‘found out’, and exposed as a fraud.

If you can relate to those feelings, you may be suffering from imposter syndrome.

So what is it?

Well, it’s all those feelings. It’s a psychological pattern that means the sufferer believes they’ve somehow got the achievements and accolades they have by luck, chance, or tricking others into giving them those things. It ignores the effort, work and external evidence of competence and ability and dismisses the experience and intelligence that others recognise.

Interestingly, when research first started, it focused on the prevalence among high achieving women, although it has now been recognised that men suffer it just as much. Equality rules!

Imposter syndrome is one of those things that nags at us like a little gremlin on our shoulder. The pervasive feeling that taints and stains every promotion, qualification, achievement or win of any kind is hard to ignore. Whilst everyone around you congratulates you, offers admiration, praise and acknowledgment, the gremlin sits, and whispers that you don’t deserve all that is bestowed on you.

And that whisper can be louder than any other noise in the room.

So why does it happen? Why do we dismiss our own achievements? Why do we minimise all our effort, blood, sweat and tears? Why do we sit waiting for someone to catch us out? Waiting for someone to see through this elaborate plan we’ve created to get us to the position we are in. Waiting for someone to say ‘wait a minute, you don’t belong here!’ at the top of their voice in a room full of other people waiting to agree.

Well, as ever there are a number of reasons, but largely as always in my school of thinking, it’s based in childhood. Our perception of what we are able or capable of doing is based in the messages we have received as a child. So for example, if you did well in a test, were you praised, or were you asked why you didn’t do better? Was your achievement revered as a stand-alone result of your hard work, or were you asked how everyone else in the class did? Were you told to study harder and harder or were you told you have worked hard enough, and it’s time for a break?

Essentially, what we are talking about is the knowledge that however good you are, however hard you’ve worked, it is GOOD ENOUGH.

People who struggle with imposter syndrome generally have low self-esteem and self-confidence. They may have grown up around messages such as that they aren’t trying hard enough, they aren’t doing well enough, just generally that they aren’t ‘enough’. It’s a horrible horrible feeling, and often this sense of fraudulence is something that holds people back from achieving their hopes and dreams, or even just trying for a promotion or pay rise at work, which is why it’s so important to challenge it. Imposter syndrome stops us from achieving our potential and leads to a lifetime of regret.

So how do we stop it happening? Obviously, my first thought is going to be therapy therapy therapy! If you can’t get to therapy, then you can start by challenging the thoughts associated with the feelings.

I’m going to break a boundary and share something personal with you. I wouldn’t normally do this, but I think it’s pertinent and relevant, and likely helpful.

When I got the email confirming the award of Master of Arts, my immediate response was ‘I’ve tricked them’.

My second response was ‘you’re not that clever’.

I don’t mean not clever enough to do a Masters (that battle had been beaten for me by a wonderful and supportive tutor), but clever enough to trick the two markers, and the full university exam board.

I started to reflect on everything I had done to get to that moment. I challenged thoughts that were saying ‘you couldn’t possibly have done this, you don’t deserve this’.

I looked for evidence. And that’s what I’m going to ask you to do when you’re feeling like you don’t deserve what you’ve achieved. Reflect on everything you’ve done to get there. Look at all the late nights and early mornings, the studying, the sacrifices. Look at why someone else might look at you and think ‘yeah, they deserve this’. Ask yourself how you would react if a friend spoke to you that way. Ask yourself if you would speak to anyone else that way.

And then tell that nasty little gremlin something that might surprise you to hear….

‘I know you’re there, and it’s okay. I’m sorry you feel like we don’t deserve this, but I promise we do. We worked hard to be here. We know what we’re doing. We didn’t hurt or sacrifice anyone else to get here, we belong here.’

Because you’re gremlin is scared. Scared of not being enough, of being caught out, and he’s trying to protect you. And in that way, he’s actually a little bit helpful.

Here’s the thing. That niggling feeling, that horrid squirmy, disconnected, ‘it’s not meant to be me’ feeling, is actually pretty helpful.

And here’s why:

It keeps you in check. It keeps you grounded. It keeps you working. It keeps you striving. It stops you from becoming complacent, arrogant, thoughtless, careless.

It helps you.

It’s a funny thing when you start to realise that once we’ve started building a relationship with our gremlin, once we get him into a proportional place, we can start using him to our advantage. Once we decide to talk back to him, he becomes our friend, and pushes us further than we ever thought we could go.

Thanks for waiting for this,

Helen Villiers LLB PG Cert., PG Dip., MA 😉

(no awards for drawing though 😉 )

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Narcissistic Parentification

So, here I am, the last in the instalments about parentification. Today’s offering is on Narcissistic Parentification. Grab a drink, a snack, and get comfy, because not only could this be long, but I suspect for some of you this might be painful, and I really want to ask you to keep yourselves safe in reading this.

Before you start reading, please make sure that you have some grounding techniques to hand for any anxiety it might trigger, or PTSD responses. This is a very concerned trigger warning.

Okay. Ready? Let’s go.

What is Narcissistic Parentification?

Well, if you’ve read the other blogs about instrumental and emotional parentification, it’s all those together and more. What makes Narcissistic Parentification unique is the ‘projection’ of the parent’s ideals onto the child.

This means the child lives out all the things the narcissistic parent idealises about themselves OR all the things the narcissistic parent loathes about themselves. It’s one huge ego trip, and results in defined family roles, that positions the child in either ‘golden child’, or ‘scapegoat’.

For the golden child, it sounds as though they get an easy ride, and in some ways that might be true, they certainly escape the worst of the abuse. But from where I sit, as a therapist, I sometimes think that as the scapegoats are more likely to escape the narcissistic abuse, in some ways they’re the lucky ones. Because at some point, they’re going to start questioning why it is they are always blamed for everything, or punished more severely, or excluded, or criticised more than their sibling. Because one day, they’re going to wake up and realise that they deserve more than being the vessel of their narcissistic parent’s self hatred, they will fight against the narrative they’ve been given, and they will figure out who they are, not who they’ve been TOLD they are.

My experience shows that the golden child is unlikely ever to do that. I’ve come across it once. Someone who knew they were the golden child, and were able to protect their sibling in adulthood. It stands so freshly in my memory because it is something I have never heard of before, and never come across since. I’m sure I will again, I’m sure it has happened, it’s just excruciatingly rare (in my experience).

As a result, the impact of narcissistic parentification for the golden child is just as big. The golden child will adopt the role of idolizing and defending their parent against all and any criticism (because as the projective object, they’re also defending themselves). They will likely become co dependent, possibly narcissistic themselves, and as a result be unable to self-actualise. This in turn will possibly cause depression and anxiety, unhealthy relationships, and an inability to break away from the image projected onto them by the parent.

The golden child will be moulded to hold everything good about the parent (as the parent sees it in themselves) the parent will likely ignore any wrongdoing or behaviour, and when the golden child offends, hurts, inflicts or does anything wrong towards the scapegoat, it will somehow become the scapegoat’s fault. The golden child will be exonerated from all responsibility and the scapegoat will be made to hold it all. So the golden child may never be able to form any kind of healthy relationship. It may seem like they have the blessed life in many ways, but they will be miserable, unable to sustain relationships, and unlikely to find their way to a place of health because the cost of recognising that they or the parental system are the problem is too high.

That’s why I feel sad for the golden child. And that’s why I think the scapegoat is the most likely to win in the horror that is a narcissistic family system.

So what about the scapegoat?

The scapegoat may also develop significant mental health issues, as a result of a crippling insecure attachment due to the barrage of abuse and criticism, the scapegoat may attempt to hold themselves to a level of perfection in order to gain any scraps of love or affection, but they will never be good enough. They may have difficulty forming healthy relationships before therapeutic intervention, and may repeat the relational pattern of abuse. They are more likely to get involved with a narcissistic partner due to the relational pattern. They will likely be isolated and excluded if and when they start to fight back against the negative projection from family.

The scapegoat is the escape artist. The scapegoat has most chance of breaking the cycle.

So what else happens in narcissistic parentification?

Well, the narcissistic parent will rely on triangulation to divide and conquer their children (where there is more than one child). They will use Idealisation and Devaluing behaviours to do this. They will give with one hand and take away with another. The idealisation behaviours may extend as far as comparing one child to the other e.g. ‘why can’t you be clever/funny/pretty/lovely etc. like your sibling?’. They will use shame, blame, criticism and fear as a way to control both golden children and scapegoats. They will gaslight everyone around them especially the children. ‘I didn’t mean it like that’, ‘you’re being oversensitive’, ‘that’s not what happened’, ‘it’s your own fault because you did xyz’.

Basically, in a narcissistic family system, no one escapes unscathed. It is too easy to resent the golden child for the elevated position they inhabit, but their elevation is also their isolation. They know somewhere in their psyche that their position comes at a cost, that they must toe the line so as to remain in favour. The risk of the attachment rupture is too great to step away from their role.

The scapegoat faces such hideous emotional abuse; they are at real risk of developing significant attachment disorders, including Borderline Personality Disorder. Should they attempt to break free from the abuse they are subjected to smear campaigns, and even in their absence will hold the position as the vessel that carries all the family dysfunction.

They can enforce boundaries, heal, build new healthy relationships, but they will never have what they need; a healthy parent.

The impact of narcissistic parentification is so high that it’s impossible for me to capture it all in one blog. But if I can ask you to remember something, it would be this:

Whatever happens in the narcissistic family, no one escapes the horror. Not even the golden child.IMG_3119.JPG

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Emotional Parentification

So a couple of days ago I wrote about Instrumental Parentification. In that blog I explained that there are 3 types of parentification, Instrumental, Emotional, and Narcissistic.

Today I’m going to write about Emotional Parentification.

So, what is Emotional Parentification?

Well, ultimately, and most simply, it is when the parent relies on their child for an inappropriate amount of emotional support.

It has been argued that it’s the most damaging of the parentification types, but that argument doesn’t refer to narcissistic parentification, only Instrumental and Emotional. I would agree, but as long as narcissistic parentification is included within the description of Emotional parentification.

Anyway, I digress…!

The best way to describe Emotional Parentification is through examples. Essentially, it is where the parent crosses emotionally inappropriate boundaries, and makes a child their confidant, or their friend, or the go between two parents.

For example, a child being told secrets that are beyond the appropriate knowledge for their age, such as the abuse experienced by a parent, sexual relationship things with the parent’s partner, financial worries, etc. The impact of this behaviour is that the child (who initially only knows relationships through those they experience at home) starts to feel responsible for how everyone around him or her feels.

The parent who confides in their child about their emotional state, beyond the realms of teaching the child that it’s okay to be happy, sad, angry etc., is crossing a boundary into Emotional Parentification, and that isn’t okay. Telling a child about their own sexual abuse, or how Daddy doesn’t love them (the parent) anymore is way over that boundary.

Sharing intimate adult details of relationships is inappropriate. I mentioned earlier the idea that a child is a ‘go between’ between two parents. I cannot emphasise enough how inappropriate that is. Adult relationships between two parents are no business of a child. It does not in any way help a child to know that one parent has cheated, or done something else to compromise the adult relationship. It puts the child in a position where they might have to choose between parents. It means the child is fighting an adult battle with one parent on behalf of the other.

When this happens, when a child is exposed to the ‘wrongdoings’ or character flaws of the other parent, they start questioning their own identity. All that matters in this situation, is the child’s own relationship with their individual parent.

Relying on a child for positive affirmation, validation and attention is also crossing that boundary. Again, the child is being put in a position where they are made to feel responsible for how the parent feels, and if that is negative, the child experiences a huge amount of guilt. The Emotional Parentifier may even capitalise on that guilt, and they may punish the child for not offering the expected/required response. The Emotional Parentifier might never allow or validate the achievements of the child unless they can make it about themselves somehow (although that’s crossing into Narcissistic Parentification too).

Emotional Parentification is essentially where the adult is looking for a relationship with a child that is not based in guider/learner, but more friend/validator, and it’s legacy is emotionally crippling for the child who later becomes the adult.

In a similar response to Instrumental Parentification, this adult might find it very very difficult to say ‘no’ for fear of upsetting others. They will feel incredibly guilty or berate themselves horribly if they cause perceived pain to others. They will feel responsible for how every single person they interact with feels, although they may be able to stand up for and defend others with gusto.

To avoid Emotionally Parentifying your child, ask yourself if what you’re asking from them benefits them, ask if they really need to know what you’re about to share with them. Ask what their emotional response or experience will be as a result of this interaction.

I see loads of posts about parents saying their children are their best friends, and whilst I don’t want to dismiss or devalue the power of a wonderful and intimate bond with your child, we cannot look at our children as our friends. They aren’t. They are our children.

It is a parent’s job to provide and environment where a child can learn to trust their own judgement, grow and establish boundaries, feel comfortable with the emotions of others, and learn how to both fail and be criticised.

It is not a parent’s job to seek a relationship that validates the parent as a human or even a parent; it is not a parent’s job to rely on the child to make them feel good. It is not a parent’s job to share information about adult relationships with a child, especially when the other adult is also a parent.

If you take anything away from this today, please remember this. Parent first, friend second, love always.

As ever, feel free to ask any questions ☺

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Your circle

Your circle.

Your circle will accept you 100% as you are.

They will never ask you to conform to something they need you to be. They will never ask you to be less, and they will never ask you to be more. They will support you in public and correct you in private. They will love your flaws as much as your strengths. They will hold you up when you are falling, and cheer you on when you are flying. They will laugh with you and they will cry with you. They will guide you through mistakes with compassion, not judgement. They will love you most when you are at your most unlovable because they will know that it is in that moment that you need it most. They will shout about your wins, and grieve your losses with you. They will know that in your imperfection is exquisite perfection and they will LOVE it.

You deserve nothing less than your circle. ❤️

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Instrumental Parentification

One of the things that I hear repeatedly in therapy is the parentification of children from a young age, particularly children of narcissists. It’s something that parents need to be very careful not to do to children, so as to avoid the impact of that behaviour, which I’ll explain later.

So, I guess the first thing is to establish what it is.

There are three types of parentification. The first is Instrumental Parentification, the second is Emotional Parentification, and the third is Narcissistic Parentification.

Because this topic is big, I’m going to break it into individual blogs for each one, so I can do them each justice.

I’ll start with Instrumental Parentification (I suspect most of you want to know about Narcissistic Parentification, so sorry if I’m disappointing in the first two instances!)

This is when, a parent burdens a child with too many of the household chores and responsibilities. A child who is asked to look after a sick relative, or other children in the house, who is made to cook or clean more than is appropriate for their age. A child whose natural social development is inhibited by the responsibilities at home.

One example of that inhibition might be where a teenager is repeatedly required to stay home to look after younger children instead of joining their friends to go to the shops or for sleepovers etc. Once a month or every couple of months yes, but every weekend? No. It’s not appropriate for a child to raise children they didn’t have themselves.

So, finding the line between appropriate and inappropriate might be hard, but ultimately, it comes down to asking a child to do something that is beyond the scope of their years, and takes too much of their personal time.

For example, a 10 year old can unload the dishwasher and feed the dog every day, but they can’t hoover and mop the floors every day too. They can put the bins out for the rubbish lorry with some assistance, but they aren’t responsible for emptying all the bins and carrying all the bags outside. They can sit with their younger sibling for 10 minutes, but they can’t be left with them for hours without adult support and supervision. They aren’t responsible for cooking every day, or bathing smaller children.

Good parenting means teaching your child life skills such as cooking, cleaning and laundry, but it isn’t about making them wholly responsible for those chores, and punishing them when they get it wrong or if they aren’t ‘up to standard’.

Part of family life is pitching in, but finding the balance between teaching and holding responsible for is vital.

The impact of Instrumental Parentification is one where the child grows into an adult who feels they are responsible for much more than they are. Have difficulty asking for help, could have problems with perfectionism, anxiety, control. They may struggle with boundaries and being able to say ‘no’, even when completely overwhelmed and unable to complete the tasks they already have. They may be the complete opposite of that too!

They may feel their only contribution is to help others and not be able to accept help from others at all. They will seem strong and independent.

Please don’t misunderstand this. Children need to help around the house and learn what it takes to look after themselves, but they also need to be a kid and learn about balance and fun and joy in being young.

To help guide on what’s appropriate for the varying ages for household chores I have attached an image to explain. I cannot emphasise enough that, just because they are capable, it does not become their exclusive responsibility, merely something they do to help their parent.

As ever, please feel free to ask any questions.

ad5361192aab08a0ea56f6a1843a5edf.jpg

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Toxic Masculinity

Okay, I’m going to try and venture into this topic. It’s contentious. I truly believe it’s a thing, and I also believe that it’s as damaging to men as it is women.

What is toxic masculinity?

You all gave such interesting answers; answers that gave me food for thought, and also helped me understand how women connect with the concept. Some responses were (rightly) angry. They referred to the privilege that comes with being born male. They referred to the sense of entitlement that seems to be taught to boys from a young age. They referred to misogyny, chauvinism; boys will be boys, oppression of women.

All of those are right in my humble opinion.

Here’s what it means to me.

Toxic masculinity is where a boy is taught to protect and defend his ego against every dent or damage above all else. Toxic masculinity is where a boy (who later becomes a man) is taught that to display emotion is weakness, need is weakness, a desire to be loved is weakness, to be rejected is weakness, to be less than a woman in any way is weakness.

Toxic masculinity is the societal belief that men are the superior gender, and that by the power of penis they somehow deserve more, command more respect, and are entitled to more for less effort.

So what happens when toxic masculinity plays out?

Well, in extreme circumstances it facilitates psychopathy, murder and rape. How many male serial killers have you heard about exacting their revenge on one individual by murdering other similar looking individuals (usually but not always women). How many women suffer as a result of toxic masculinity due to domestic violence, emotional and financial abuse?

And how many men suffer domestic, emotional and financial abuse because they’ve been taught that to be abused means they’re weak. To be in distress is weak, to have an EMOTION is weak.

Toxic masculinity comes in phrases such as ‘man up’, ‘be a man’, ‘don’t be such a girl’, ‘boys will be boys’, ‘ ‘boys don’t cry’, and so forth. Any phrase that shuts down a man’s right and ability to connect with his emotional response can be considered such a phrase.

Toxic masculinity no doubt has a hideous manifestation for women, but something that often gets lost in conversation is the impact it has on men.

The gender construct that means to be a ‘man’ demands that men shut off all emotional responses apart from anger. You may remember the blog I did a while ago about anger, (it’s here if not!) I stated that anger is ALWAYS a mask for pain. When someone shows me anger, I know they are hurting. They will often deny that, but usually come back to me a few weeks later saying they realised that it was rejection, disappointment, fear, loss or any other number of feelings.

So men can only express anger and have that emotion accepted. Now. I have spoken before about how a healthy sense of self is developed in childhood when the parent accepts and mirrors the emotional responses in their child. That way the child knows and accepts their own emotions. So when society teaches us that boys aren’t allowed to cry, be sad, hurt, dejected or any other emotion, so they get angry. (And then get punished for that, but not typically told they aren’t ‘allowed’ to be it)

The highest suicide rate in the UK in 2017 was for men aged 45-49 (Source) men are three times more likely to die by suicide than women. Three times.

So toxic masculinity incites entitlement, the absolute belief that they as male are totally within their rights to help themselves to whatever they want, be it career, women, presidencies 😉 or other, but it also oppresses men too.

I have seen many conversations on social media where a teenage boy has been raped by his female teacher, and largely men are suggesting he would have enjoyed it, that they would have loved a teacher like that har har.

So let’s flip the roles. If it was a teenage girl and her older male teacher we would be horrified. Why is it alright for a boy to be raped and not a girl? Toxic masculinity. The idea that men are only motivated by sex, that they all want to be getting it as much as they possibly can from the age of about 12 is toxic masculinity and it’s not right.

So, the big question. How do we fight it? If you are a parent of boys, teach them that all their feelings are valid. Teach them that they’re urges are natural; teach them they can be abused and that they can be sad. Teach them to be accountable, to take responsibility for their behaviour. Teach them that women are wonderful and equal to them. Teach them to judge on merit not gender. Teach them they are emotional beings who are allowed to exist outside of a social construct created to determine their gender.

 

Teach them they’re human.

Toxic Masculinity.JPG

 

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Addiction….not a dirty word

I’ve been wondering what to write about lately. Lots of my blogs are informed by client work or observations I’ve made, or even conversations with friends. This one isn’t so much, but it is something personal to me that feels important to share.

When I decided I wanted to become a therapist, I started out expecting to work within addiction, but as life does, I’ve moved away from that as a particular focus, although I obviously face it in the therapy space fairly regularly, and I welcome it. Here’s why:

Addiction is something that sparks great controversy. Whenever the subject arises, I brace myself for comments that are derogatory, unkind, judgemental, and dismissive. And sadly, I’m usually right to do so.

Addiction is something this country seems to be plagued by. Whether it’s alcohol, drugs, gambling, shopping, sex, work, fitness, food, whatever, if there’s a dopamine response, you can bet someone who is struggling with emotion will use the activity to supress their emotion.

And that’s what addiction is. It’s avoidance. It would really be better to call it that rather than addiction, so that’s what I’m going to do from now on.

When someone is in avoidance, whatever their substance or behaviour, they can be VERY challenging to be around. It is absolutely your right to put in strict boundaries that meant you aren’t taken advantage of, but it doesn’t mean you have to let go of compassion all together.

If you are in avoidance, it is hard to see, because those behaviours are keeping you SO safe. They help you function day to day, or at least you think they do, and it’s impossible to break out of the behaviour, because you to do so is to face the thing you are avoiding, and that is not only hideously painful, but also incredibly scary.

When in avoidance, everything becomes about maintaining that position. Everything. In avoidance, you heartily swerve anything that may make you look in the mirror to see your pain. In avoidance, you may hurt those around you to maintain that state. Unfortunately, that capitalises on your avoidance, because now you have to avoid the pain and guilt of hurting those you love.

When someone is in avoidance, rather than judging, or directing, or insisting they stop avoiding, perhaps it is more helpful to say you are there when they are ready to face what they are avoiding. Perhaps it is more helpful to ask them how their behaviour is helping them, and to listen to the response with compassion. Perhaps it is about saying ‘I won’t help you avoid, but I will help you heal’.

People in avoidance don’t need to be isolated further, they need to be embraced and sheltered from the storm inside their own bodies. People in avoidance are in pain and their pain needs to be held until they can look at it without wincing. (Please be clear, I am not asking you to suffer for someone else’s pain, you MUST keep yourself safe before anything else.)

I have never met someone in avoidance who hasn’t experienced a horrific trauma, or abuse, or particularly painful bereavement. I haven’t met someone in avoidance who has experienced emotional stability and been given emotional resilience in childhood. Every single person I have met (and there have been a fair few) who is in avoidance does not have the emotional tool kit to deal with the horrors they have experienced.

So please, when you see someone is destroying themselves and those around them with their avoidance, acknowledge their pain, keep yourself safe, don’t enable, but do try and offer them compassion.

Avoidance doesn’t discriminate, nobody is immune.

If you’ve been affected by avoidance, please get in touch with the wonderful Drugfam You can do so by clicking on their page.

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How to choose a therapist

Choosing a therapist.

Entering therapy can be really scary. It’s a bit like going to the dentist. We don’t want to, we know it’s going to hurt, but we also know that we have to look after ourselves and we sometimes can’t do that alone.

So how do we go about picking a person who’s going to hear our deepest darkest secrets and thoughts? How do we know who to trust or who will be best equipped to help us?

The first thing to do is work out what you want to gain from therapy. What do you want to be different? How will you know when you’ve achieved that? If your first thought is along the lines of ‘I would be better’, work out what better means. What does it look like? How will you know you’re better?

Okay. So let’s say you want to treat anxiety and only anxiety. Your best bet would initially to find a CBT therapist who will work with you to challenge and alter behaviours and subsequently symptoms. However they won’t work with the root cause of anxiety, that’s something a talking therapist would do. Someone like me.

I’m an integrative therapist, which means I draw from lots of different schools to help work with you to unpick and understand what’s happening.

There are also therapists who work exclusively in their school, so perhaps Psychodynamic, Jungian or Gestalt.

So how do you know who to go for? (Obviously my bias is in integrative, so I’m going to own that and try and bracket it!)

First of all, you need to look at qualifications. It is an absolute disgrace that in this country, anyone anywhere can pop a sign on their door and be a counsellor. With absolutely not one minute of training. Not a single one.

So look for qualifications. And look for a regulatory body. There are a few bodies, but generally the main ones are BACP, and UKCP, and COSRT is for psychosexual therapists (ideally a COSRT therapist would be a member of one of the other bodies too).

If you’re looking for a psychologist, look for the BPS.

Okay. So we have a regulatory body. Now back to training. Those bodies have a minimum requirement before they support membership for practicing counsellors. The minimum requirement is level 4 qualification. For comparison I’m a level 7, and a PhD would be level 8.

Then look at insurance. Are they insured? Then DBS, if that’s important to you.

Then look for their speciality. Are they experienced in the area you want help in? Are they trained in something you want?

Then comes the most important bit. Conversation.

Finding a therapist is like shopping for new shoes. They’ve got to be comfortable and a good fit, because you’re going to walk a lot of mile in them.

So take your time. Speak to a few, ask what their experience and knowledge is of your presenting issue. Ask them all the questions you can think of.

Most importantly trust your gut. If it doesn’t feel right, move on. A good therapist won’t take that personally. They may even help you find someone else. A good therapist will ask if it’s anything they’ve done or could do differently and support you in the experience of saying no. They will use it as an opportunity to learn.

Therapy is about you and your growth, it Is your choice and you can decide whether that therapist is right or not.

Any questions?

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Why can’t they see the poison?

It can be really tough when we see through someone’s behaviour, and recognise it for toxicity, and yet, others don’t.

Especially in narcissistic families, when the scapegoat realises the parent is abusive it can be isolating and frustrating that others in the same family can’t or won’t acknowledge how unhealthy the behaviour is.

The same applies when someone is in an abusive relationship, and they keep accepting obvious and transparent lies, or emotional or physical abuse, without disengaging from the relationship.

It’s because the unknown, or rather the thought of the unknown is MUCH more terrifying than the current reality, however toxic and abusive it might be.

Adult children on narcissistic parents often ask ‘why can’t my sibling see it? Why do they think it’s okay?’

It’s such a heartfelt question and has so much pain attached to it that it can be overwhelming for the client. Naturally it touches me too.

Here’s the thing. We repeat patterns we know because they’re comfortable. Change is something everyone struggles with, and drastic dramatic change, such as leaving a partner or refusing to be abused in a toxic family system, is terrifying.

How can you help? Don’t judge, allow their process, occasionally notice behaviours you don’t agree with, but refer to self rather than them. When we try and prise someone’s eyes open, they merely shut them more tightly, most likely blocking us out too.

Hold that person in their space, and move at their speed. And when they finally open their eyes, you can be there to help them understand the new way of seeing.

 

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Self Care isn’t just wine and bubble baths…

Tonight, after spending a lovely day with family, driving 2 hours there and back, I stood at my ironing board and faced my least favourite household chore.

I’m not an ironer, I consider myself more of an ‘aggressive folder’, and when the creases finally defeat me, I throw the offending item onto the ironing pile and ignore it for at least 6 weeks. I’m terrible for it.

But tonight, I stood there and ironed everything that’s been waiting for my attention, and as I lamented the curse I had bestowed upon myself, I realised that this was actually my Sunday Self Care.

You see, here’s the thing. This week is manic. Everyday I’m doing something that means my down time is seriously limited, and as such, my down time is going to be crucial. By clearing my washing and ironing pile this weekend; by making sure every item of clothing I need is clean and in the right place, I’m self-caring for future me.

I’ve talked about this before, I know, a brief comment on how I was looking after future me, and here’s why.

Future me has a lot on her plate. Tons of responsibilities, inside and outside of client work. I’m SO lucky to be in that position, but the danger is if I don’t keep a handle on things, I will burn out. I will wake up one morning and the idea of getting up and ready will seem like an Everest task, rather than a molehill. I’m always trying to keep my tasks like molehills.

I’m not always successful, and that’s okay, I do what I can in the moment to help future me, or Wednesday me. For example, on a Thursday, I see clients until 8pm. I then do notes and tidy the room and get home about 9pm. That’s super late, and leaves me little time to chill out before I need to go to bed. So, I cook dinner in the morning, and I make sure I have everything in place, so all I have to do is walk in, eat, and zone out watching re runs of whatever box set I’m bingeing on Netflix.

So ironing on a Sunday night, or cooking dinner on a Thursday morning is self-care. Self care isn’t always a bubble bath and a scented candle, it’s making sure that morning you will thank evening you and vice versa for the job that we didn’t have to do when we were already stretched thin.

So when you think about self care like that, what do you do for future you?

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Grandiosity in Narcissism

Over the next few weeks I’m going to be writing to describe the way each of the core traits of narcissism presents interpersonally. That is to say, how the trait will act out when the narcissist is with others.

One of the core traits in narcissism is Grandiosity. Grandiosity is experienced either overtly or covertly. That means the grandiose belief is either obvious, or hidden.

What is grandiosity? Grandiosity is an unrealistic sense of superiority, with no basis in reality. For example the person who believes they’re a medic, despite never having done any training, and garnering knowledge from T.V. shows or articles. Grandiosity is believing that they are better than others and should be treated as such.

In narcissism, grandiosity is considered pathological when it comes at a cost to others, when someone’s belief in their superiority results in interpersonal dominance and antagonism. It’s hard to distinguish grandiosity from entitlement, but the main difference would be that entitlement is much more interpersonal and grandiosity is more intrapersonal, meaning that it does not necessarily need others to fulfil the belief.

When overtly presented, grandiosity might look like someone who likes fast cars and big houses, who dominates conversation with the belief that they’re the only one who knows everything, or that they’re the one who knows best.

When covertly presented, it might be that the individual believes they are better than others, but keep it well hidden, only excluding those who don’t comply with that belief system.

Grandiosity is thought to be a self-enhancement, used to regulate self-esteem, and allows the individual the power to deny any characteristic flaws, and also gives the person unrealistic high expectations. When those expectations aren’t met, or the character flaws aren’t deniable, this can provoke what’s known as ‘narcissistic rage’.

Narcissistic rage involves the individual going to extreme lengths to gain revenge, and therefore rebalance the perceived power imbalance. If someone has in anyway contradicted or exposed the narcissists grandiose beliefs to be the hollow shell they are, that person will come under extreme attack from the narcissist, in the form of devaluing and discrediting, also known as the smear campaign.

Furthermore, when the narcissist feels threatened by attack, they will themselves attack as a form of defence. Grandiosity gives the overt narcissist the courage to keep ploughing their agenda, even when presented with contradicting evidence; and it might even be said the same of the covert narcissist, although it will appear much more subtly and passive aggressively.

The grandiose trait is one that doesn’t have an awful lot to say about it, other than a person with the pathological trait will believe they are better than others with not evidence to suggest why, and as such will probably avoid people who may indeed be better than them.

Whilst grandiosity doesn’t seem so harmful, in a family system, where others are an extension of the narcissist, if the partner or children do not comply with or fulfil the grandiose need, the narcissist will exclude, attack or smear campaign that person. It means children will be expected to achieve higher than anyone else, and will exist to please their narcissistic parent, and any signs of autonomy of failure will be met with one of those responses described above.

The exposer of this and any trait will likely be met with the narcissistic rage, and ultimately exclusion and isolation.

Next time, I will write about entitlement and exploitation together. 45640751_1946860695362663_6624783326601281536_n.jpg

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Suicide Part 2.

Suicide, part two.

When I wrote the previous post, I was thinking about people who experience suicidal ideation from a place where their external impact is perceived as one so negative that they wish not to be a burden anymore. I was describing what I can only describe as honest suicide.

As I wrote it, I knew I was missing a big piece of the story around suicide out, and it made me uncomfortable because it is big, it is vital to talk about it and I knew it was wrong not to bring it up. So here I am.

Very very often, emotional abusers will use suicide as a tactic to manipulate and control. They will threaten it, even attempt it to coerce and convince someone not to leave, because an empathic person will do anything to avoid the feeling of responsibility bestowed on them by the abuser.

Narcissists are well known for suicide attempts. In narcissists, suicide rates are higher than in general population. It’s thought that this is because eventually a narcissist will be ‘found out’, and the level of shame that this exposes them to provokes suicide.

It could however be argued that suicidal ideation is the best defence mechanism in the world for a narcissist/abuser. Because what person would criticise someone recovering from a suicide attempt? When attention is taken from a narcissist they will go to extreme lengths to pull the attention back on to them, including threatening or attempting suicide.

The point of this post is this. Whatever reason someone has for killing themselves, ultimately, that is THEIR choice. It’s the ultimate choice really, and their right to execute it with free will. I know there are legal situations where people have been pushed and provoked into suicide, so I exclude those.

We all have a responsibility for the choices we make, and choosing suicide lies entirely with that person.

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Suicide Part One.

I want to talk about suicide. It seems so current that I really feel like I need to voice some thoughts about it. I also suspect I’m saying something controversial that may not be well received. But I know those who are suicidal will relate to this, and I hope they will be grateful to be recognised, so this is for them.

There’s a comment I’ve heard SO many times around suicide that I find so deeply misguided and misunderstanding of what it means to suicidal that it feels important to correct it.

‘Suicide is SO selfish’.

No. Just no.

Suicide is not selfish; in the mind of the victim it is selfLESS.

People with suicidal thoughts and feelings often feel like they are a burden on everyone around them. Not just bothering people, but a millstone around the neck of every single person they’re in contact with, and an obelisk for those who love them.

When someone famous (or not) dies by suicide, we often hear how those around them had no idea how low they were. Sure, they had been fighting depression, but she/he had seemed so positive recently. How they were happy and smiling merely hours before. That they never complained and no one would ever have known they were suicidal.

That’s possibly because they didn’t want to increase the burden they perceived themselves to be. Or sometimes when the decision is made to complete suicide the person finds relief and is relieved of their own burden and so is at peace knowing their own suffering and the perceived suffering of others around them will be over soon.

It is never ever a selfless act. It is never done because you weren’t good enough. It is more likely they thought you were TOO good for them. Too good to be imposed upon by them in any way shape or form.

You and I both know they’re wrong, but for them it’s an absolute truth. Suicide is not selfish. It hurts those around them. It causes untold damage on those who love them, but my experience shows me that it is an act of horribly misguided kindness on those they wish to free from the burden of their own pain.

I’m not advocating suicide. Merely suggesting that we have to stop and look at the people around us. There are constant messages that someone who is suicidal should reach out and ask for help. How can they possibly? How can someone who feels like a huge 50 ton weight on people ask to add more weight?

We have to look up and really see those around us. Check in with people. Ask ‘how are you feeling?’ Because when you ask ‘are you ok?’ There’s an unintended agenda for the response to be yes. Leave space for someone to share their true thoughts.

You may have notice I have not said ‘commit suicide’. That’s intentional. Suicide is no longer a crime and for families where suicide exists there’s a stigma attached to the word ‘commit’, so therapeutic parlance excludes that word. We now either say ‘killed themselves’, ‘completed suicide’, or ‘died by suicide’. It both removes the dismissiveness and criminal element attached to suicidal actions.

All this being said. If you’re feeling suicidal here are some contact details for various areas. Please feel free to message me and I will do what I can to find you help nearby. You will NOT be a burden on me. Suicide is often very present in my therapy room. And I welcome it in and sit with it comfortably. You are not alone. Please share this post. Without being overly dramatic; it may save a life.

Argentina: +5402234930430

Australia: 131114

Austria: 017133374

Belgium: 106

Bosnia & Herzegovina: 080 05 03 05

Botswana: 3911270

Brazil: 212339191

Canada: 5147234000 (Montreal); 18662773553 (outside Montreal)

Croatia: 014833888

Denmark: +4570201201

Egypt: 7621602

Finland: 010 195 202

France: 0145394000

Germany: 08001810771

Holland: 09000767

Hong Kong: +852 2382 0000

Hungary: 116123

India: 8888817666

Ireland: +4408457909090

Italy: 800860022

Japan: +810352869090

Mexico: 5255102550

New Zealand: 045861048

Norway: +4781533300

Philippines: 028969191

Poland: 5270000

Russia: 0078202577577

Spain: 914590050

South Africa: 0514445691

Sweden: 46317112400

Switzerland: 143

United Kingdom: 08457909090

USA: 18002738255

#suicide #suicideawareness #suicideprevention #itsokaynottobeokay #therapy #counselling

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Active v Passive Support

I have just seen a devastating post on facebook about a little boy who has died unexpectedly. In the comments was the statement ‘know that you can message me any time of night or day and I will be here for you’.

Now don’t get me wrong, that’s so clearly heartfelt and sincere, but it made me eye roll a bit.

‘that’s not very kind of you’ I thought to myself, ‘why did you do that?’

Ah. I see.

It’s because it’s the kind of passive support that sounds great but doesn’t actually do a lot. Because here’s the thing. When someone is in the depths of despair, when they are grieving a loss, of whatever kind, when they are suicidal, alone, lonely, broken and wounded, they are unlikely to have the mental strength to reach out to someone and ask for help. They may even feel ashamed of doing so. So when you put the burden of support on the sufferer, it’s not as helpful as taking the burden of support on yourself.

Putting the burden of support on the sufferer, or what I think of as ‘Passive Support’, relies on the injured party reaching out.

When you take the burden of support, or ‘Active Support’ upon yourself, you give space and room for the injured party to feel comforted without having to ask for it.

In grief it can sometimes feel as though you ‘should be over it by now’, and it is then that it is probably hardest. Being an active supporter, you would be the one reaching out consistently. Not always saying ‘I’m here if you want to talk’, but just a ‘how are you doing?’ or sending a funny picture, quote or story. Active is support is being in the background saying ‘I haven’t forgotten about your pain, I’m still here’, without reminding them constantly they have pain.

Active support is suggesting a walk, a coffee, a quiet place where tears won’t feel shamed into submission.

Active support is strong and silent but there. Active support isn’t rescuing, fixing or overwhelming, it’s respectful, holding and peaceful.

Reach out to those around you. Just a ‘how are you?’ can be so well timed that you may help without ever knowing. Please don’t expect someone who is struggling to tell you, don’t be passive, be active.

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Telling the truth….

The most frustrating thing for children of narcissists is represented in this image.

Imagine finally coming up for air from the constant brainwashing; realising your family system is toxic and entirely constructed to defend the mirage of the narcissists image, only to have your truth questioned by those around you.

One of the questions on the AMA was ‘how can a family look so perfect from the outside, but be so toxic inside?’.

The truth of the toxicity is most fragile in those first few moments when the light begins to dawn on the hideous landscape you’ve been living in. There is a huge amount of self doubt, questioning, denial, minimalising and fear. The sense that things aren’t right but the fear of what it will mean to acknowledge that. The instinct is to hide. Pretend it isn’t real, and squash the emotions trying to bubble up to the surface. The cost of acceptance is so high it’s unfathomable. The potential loss of family, the scope of relearning, the inevitable pain and anger around this new fragile knowledge starts to take hold.

Imagine being in that position and trying to make sense of it. Imagine not knowing what’s real and what isn’t, whether your motivations, desires, pleasures are yours or theirs, how much you’ve missed out on because of their conditioning, rules, control. And then trying to tell someone.

Someone who responds ‘ah but your mum/dad are lovely’. Or ‘yeah but all parents are difficult’, or ‘well, it’s not that bad, they didn’t beat you or anything’.

Can you imagine? The dismissal? The dismissal of your emotion, much like has been done to you historically by your parent? The reinforced message of ‘don’t question us, we are your parents?’ The confirmation that once again you’re overreacting, over emotional, over sensitive.

That’s why it’s so hard to convince people. It’s not tangible. It’s constant messages of not being good enough, not meeting impossible expectations, not being helped, supported, loved unconditionally. The narcissist plays the perfect parent in public, only to make the child pay behind closed doors.

Convincing someone might need lists, of behaviours, of incidents, of conditioning, of criteria the parent meets. You may need to arm yourself, but you may find that someone is so well defended they can’t hear, because they are not ready to breathe yet. That’s on them. Not you.

It is not your job to convince someone of your truth. It is your job to know it.

If someone tells you their parent was difficult, simply respond with ‘I’m sorry, would you like to tell me more?’

Give space to people to find their feet in the new world, free from the fear of judgement or question.

You’ll be giving them a massive gift ❤️

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Anger.

Let’s talk about anger for a minute. I hear people saying ‘don’t be angry!’, ‘don’t make me angry!’ ‘I don’t want him to be angry with me!’.What I’m hearing there is an avoidance of anger. We are conditioned as a society to avoid and suppress anger ALL THE TIME.

Guess what?

That makes me angry!!

We are taught that anger is an emotion to be feared and avoided; that we must hold it in and avoid provoking it in other people. Sometimes we are taught it’s makes us or someone else looks silly. We are taught that anger is bad. Well I don’t think it is.

Anger is a really healthy and valid emotion, and one it’s important to make peace with because suppressed anger manifests in other ways, from anxiety, depression, self harm, addiction, eating disorders and many other psychopathologies. The avoidance and dismissal of anger is incredibly unhealthy, so it’s REALLY important to get in touch with our own anger, and understand what anger in other people provokes in us.

Apart from the damage internalised anger can do to our mental health, there’s another very good reason too.

Anger is often used by abusers to manipulate and control people into doing things they want them to do. Anger is used to provoke fear in others allowing the abuser to maintain a position of authority and dominance.

Anger is used by bullies in the same way.

Anger is set up to be a very powerful emotion, whereas, in fact, it’s not much different from any other emotion. One of the difficulties with anger is that we fear what we might do when angry, when the red mist comes down, we can’t control ourselves, and that seems scary. What if I told you that anger issues come from suppressing anger? That I believe that people who lose control in anger are doing so because they haven’t processed a root cause to their anger and so project it elsewhere and everywhere they see a trigger.

So how do we make peace with anger (oooo I love an oxymoron!)

Think back to when you were little. What happened in your family when you got angry? How did they react? Did they embrace it? Did they say they understood why you were so angry? Or did they dismiss it, looking at you as silly, mocking you, telling you you had no right to be angry?

When we understand the family narrative around an emotion we can start reframing it to a place we want it to be, and make friends with it.

The first thing to remember about anger that it is always a mask for another emotion. It is a defence emotion that helps us in survival mode to fight flight or freeze (or any of the other ‘f’s’).

So when we are trying to make friends with anger, we have to look carefully underneath it to see what’s actually going on.

Think back to a time you got angry. Perhaps you were overlooked for a promotion that you had been working really hard towards and now you’re angry that you haven’t got it. Why are you angry? Because it’s unfair? Because you’ve worked so hard? Or because it’s a rejection, and rejection hurts? Because it’s embarrassing to have been turned down and all your colleagues know? Because it feels shameful and humiliating to be left where you are and someone else chosen above you? (Which is ultimately rejection)

Once you know those feelings, you can start looking at them. How do you experience justice? Or more importantly, rejection?

If you are the opposite and find it difficult to connect with anger, try thinking about where anger sits in your body, and if it moves or grows as it gets stronger.

If you’re creative, try drawing it, give it a shape, colour, texture, size. If you don’t want to draw, describe it in writing. Tell the story of your anger and how you feel about being angry.

Find power in your anger. Not in a way to dominate or control, but in a healthy appropriate place where your anger helps you find your true feelings, and helps you set boundaries with others, because after all, it’s all about the boundaries!

I would love to hear your thoughts on this,

Helen

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I don’t have a choice…. Or do I?

‘I have to go to a family event this weekend. I would rather stay at home, but I don’t have a choice.’

How often have you heard someone say something like that? How often have you yourself actually said it?

When we think like that, what we’re really saying is ‘I don’t want to confront a situation where I will feel guilty for meeting my own need’.

You see, there is ALWAYS choice.

In his amazing book ‘Mans Search for Meaning’,  Viktor Fankl writes about his harrowing experience of being in Nazi Germany, Auschwitz, and other concentration camps.

He says this:

‘Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms—to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.’

Even as people went to their known deaths, he observed a choice in the way they met that.

We always have choice. When we deny our choice, we disempower ourselves, and deny our need and authenticity. Sometimes we don’t want to make the difficult choice, because we perceive the cost of it to be high, and in order to avoid that truth, we deny there is choice in it.

Ultimately though, we are the ones that pay the price, whether emotional, physical or financial, it is us who suffers when we don’t meet our needs.

Being honest about the choices we have and making peace with the ones we take allows us to live a more genuine life, one that empowers us, and allows us to set boundaries. It prevents anxiety, overwhelm, exhaustion from meeting everyone else’s needs above our own.

A while ago I wrote about how ‘No’ is a full sentence. How we do not have to justify the choices we make. If you say no to someone and they are cross about it, or they change the way they view you, that is their issue, not yours.

Emotionally healthy, boundaried people will not need you to explain why your need is more important than theirs. They will accept your answer without question, and allow you to put yourself first as and when you need to. They will not attempt to guilt you, bribe you, coerce you or manipulate you into meeting their needs, and they will not hold it against you.

Sometimes making choices is hard, but perhaps it is easier to ask yourself

  1. Why do I HAVE to do this?
  2. What is the cost to me?
  3. What is it about this relationship that demands I ignore my own needs?
  4. Is that okay with me?

Often when we are little we haven’t really been given the chance to exert our will or choose for ourselves, so it’s not something that comes naturally. Over time however with practice, you will find it gets easier.

The next time someone asks you to do something and you feel a little tug of disappointment, dread or fear, pause and reflect briefly. If you need more time to decide, ask for it. Because as Frankl also says:

‘Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.’

Go out and grow! Take care,

Helen

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Toxic People

Dealing with toxic people is highly unpleasant, but sadly a likely part of life. Today I’m going to explain what makes someone toxic and how to identify them. Tomorrow I will explain how to deal with them.

A toxic person will be someone who you might identify as draining. They will always be central to a drama, but always as the victim or perhaps as a rescuer who then becomes a victim. They will never take responsibility for their mistakes, and they will always need to be right. Usually they will only have unkind things to say about others, but it will be shrouded in a cloak of positivity; ‘Oh Celia is SO clever, I’ve no idea why she’s still single’ or ‘Gosh, doesn’t Celia work hard, shame her poor kids never see her’.

A toxic person won’t let things go, they will be evasive, lying, twisting and manipulating the truth to suit their agenda. Overwhelmingly however, they will be selfish. It will always be their needs that are met above and beyond anyone else’s and they won’t understand why yours even matter.

Remember those boundaries I talked about? They will ignore them completely. It is toxic people who will be most upset when you start enforcing them. The difficult thing about identifying a toxic person is that at the beginning they will make you feel like you’re the best thing that ever happened to them. They will be all over you like a rash, eager to be with you and push their way into your life.

You might feel flattered, but I can bet you feel one of those ‘tugs’ I’ve talked about. Again, listen to your gut, if something tells you something doesn’t seem right, you’re probably right, don’t ignore it based on visual evidence, think about it. What seems off? Why have you got that feeling? What do they do that seems unusual? Do they talk about other people in a bitchy way? Do they have a long string of ex friends? Do they talk about themselves a lot? Do they want to know private information about you?

If you answer yes to those questions, you will need to look carefully at the situation and maybe distance yourself. Tomorrow I will talk about how to use the grey rock method to deal with toxic people. (It was meant to be today, but understanding toxicity seemed an important step!!)

Thank you

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Projection

Projection: Psychological defence mechanism that people use to deny behaviours they perpetuate, by accusing others of doing the same things.

For example, the cheating husband accusing the loyal wife of having an affair (or the other way round!) when it is in fact him who is doing it.

Projection is essentially blame shifting, and exonerates the perpetrator by openly or subtly accusing another of their own behaviour.

We naturally project all the time. If we have a bad experience with a dog for example, the chances are we will attach that experience to all dogs.

However, projection is used by abusers and manipulators to control, gaslight and dominate the victim. The abuser accuses their victim to the point the victim may even start believing it about themselves. The abuser uses projection to deflect responsibility and undermine confidence.

So how do we protect ourselves against projection?

First off, we have to build our self awareness so we don’t get into a projection war. If you were once bitten b a dog, you know that the reason you are afraid of dogs is because of that. Now you know that it is not the fault of the dog in front of you, and the feelings might be better managed.

Then we look for the evidence. You know what is true. You have to trust your knowledge. You counter the accusations with ‘where’s the evidence?’.

That is REALLY hard to do when you are being subjected to it all the time. You may not even realise it’s happening.

So if you’re reading this and you think it might be happening to you, just stop and breathe. Try and recollect a time you were accused of something totally untrue, but you believed they must be right. What is true in their claims? Anything? Because the really clever ones will put a tiny little kernel of truth in to really confuse you.

Identify the truths and lies. Own your truth, by doing so you will be more resilient against the lies. Don’t allow them to bully you by their shouting louder. Be the grey rock.

Know your truth.