No Visible Bruises

In this episode, we will analyse narcissistic abuse from the polyvagal theory perspective. We’ll use this theory, remarkably well explained by Deb Dana, to understand how our nervous system responds to abuse, and use that knowledge to lift and remove the shame and guilt attached to those reactions. 

What You Will Learn In This Episode:

- What is the polyvagal theory, and how the ladder analogy can help us to better understand our response to abuse

- What are the sympathetic, dorsal vagal, and ventral vagal responses of our system, and what they mean

- How triggers affect our "position" on the trust ladder

Understanding how and why we react to abuse is the first step to acknowledging that we are not weak and powerless, and that what is happening is not our fault. We need to get curious about what our system "sees," and what it is trying to protect us from. 

Resources:

- Join my Narcissistic Trauma Recovery Programme™ https://go.carolinestrawson.com/heal-the-trauma-of-narcissistic-abuse

- Join my Facebook group at https://www.facebook.com/groups/thriveafternarcissisticabuse 

- Connect with me on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/carolinestrawson/

- My website: https://www.carolinestrawson.com/

Today's episode is directed to parents who went through abusive narcissistic relationships and who have adult children. We will talk about how triggering it can be to watch our adult child taking our place in that abusive relationship, and the best way to deal with it. I share some advice on how to talk to our children in these situations, and how to deal with the challenging circumstance of seeing our child becoming a narcissist. 

What You Will Learn In This Episode:

- The difference between co-parenting young children and adult children with a narcissist

- What is the best way to talk to our adult children about their narcissistic parent

- Why our children look more aggressive with us than with the narcissistic parent

- How to protect our relationship with our adult children

Questioning our children why they are still in touch with their narcissistic parent has the same effect as asking a victim of domestic abuse why they don't leave their partner. Their system makes them feel weaker, worthless, and even more powerless, and we must wait for our children to see things for themselves, as well as accept that perhaps they never will. 

Resources:

- Join my Narcissistic Trauma Recovery Programme™ https://go.carolinestrawson.com/heal-the-trauma-of-narcissistic-abuse

- Join my Facebook group at https://www.facebook.com/groups/thriveafternarcissisticabuse 

- Connect with me on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/carolinestrawson/

- My website: https://www.carolinestrawson.com/

In this episode, we will have a conversation about anger. We will analyse the difference between regulated and dysregulated anger, its long-term effects, and what happens within us when we feel angry. We will also look at anger through the Internal Family System lens to understand why it scratches the scab of our worthiness wounds.  

What You Will Learn In This Episode:

- How dysregulated anger is a sympathetic trauma response

- Why our protective parts choose anger to deal with some issues

- Can being stuck in anger for a long time be a natural part of a healing process?

- The questions we must pose to our angry, protective parts 

If we approach our angry, protective parts with curiosity, looking beyond the anger and trying to understand what those parts are trying to distract us from, we will look at what triggered us in a different way. We will realise that our system is trying to soothe the pain from our wounded, younger part. 

Resources:

- Join my Narcissistic Trauma Recovery Programme™https://go.carolinestrawson.com/heal-the-trauma-of-narcissistic-abuse

- Join my Facebook group at https://www.facebook.com/groups/thriveafternarcissisticabuse 

- Connect with me on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/carolinestrawson/

- My website: https://www.carolinestrawson.com/

Today's episode is about empowerment. We will learn that the power to heal from narcissistic abuse is within ourselves. We will analyse and understand why we hand over our strength and energy to the narcissist by seeking external validation, and looking for an answer outside of us.

What You Will Learn In This Episode:

- The three main characteristics that make my approach to narcissistic trauma recovery different

- Why we give our power away by looking for external validation

- What we need to know to understand that the power to heal from narcissistic abuse is within ourselves

Although we might feel that trauma is the narcissist, it is not. Trauma is what we hold in our bodies, and what we say to ourselves about what happened. Getting curious about that will help us understand why we feel a certain way around narcissists, which could be the first step into our trauma recovery journey. 

Resources:

- Join my Narcissistic Trauma Recovery Programme™ https://go.carolinestrawson.com/heal-the-trauma-of-narcissistic-abuse

- Join my Facebook group at https://www.facebook.com/groups/thriveafternarcissisticabuse 

- Connect with me on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/carolinestrawson/

- My website: https://www.carolinestrawson.com/

Today's episode is about positive psychology and how I use it in the work I do. First, we will define what positive psychology is and talk about its origin and purpose. Then we will go through the PERMAH model, and finally, we will discuss post-traumatic growth and why we must remain curious about it. 

What You Will Learn In This Episode:

- What positive psychology is, and where it comes from

- What is the PERMAH model, and how it can help us increase happiness and decrease anxiety

- Why it seems impossible to think about growth at some stages of narcissistic abuse

- What it means to do the somatic work, and how it can help us

Focusing on the six pillars of the PERMAH model when we are coming out to heal our narcissistic trauma is the best way of levelling up our well-being. If we focus too often on the things we don't want from our past, we might get stuck in the past, and then growing will become more challenging. 

Resources:

- Join my Narcissistic Trauma Recovery Programme™ https://go.carolinestrawson.com/heal-the-trauma-of-narcissistic-abuse

- Join my Facebook group at https://www.facebook.com/groups/thriveafternarcissisticabuse 

- Connect with me on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/carolinestrawson/

- My website: https://www.carolinestrawson.com/

In this episode, we will talk about the diagnosis of narcissistic personality disorder (NPD). We will analyse the nine traits determined by the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) to diagnose the narcissistic disorder.

We will also talk about covert narcissists, the difficulties with getting a diagnosis and how it impacts the victims of abuse, and the issues with medicalising NPD. 

What You Will Learn In This Episode:

- What are the nine traits established by the DSM to diagnose a narcissistic personality disorder?

- Why we say that there are much more than nine traits that we should look at

- Why it is hard to get the NPD diagnosis, and how that affects the victim of narcissistic abuse

- What a covert narcissist is, and why we consider them the most dangerous type of narcissists

As narcissists would rarely recognise they have a problem, getting a diagnosis becomes almost impossible. This adds pressure to their victims who are looking for help, and that is why we need to be careful when we hear that someone is a narcissist, and be ready to listen to the victims. 

Resources:

- Join my Narcissistic Trauma Recovery Programme™ https://go.carolinestrawson.com/heal-the-trauma-of-narcissistic-abuse

- Join my Facebook group at https://www.facebook.com/groups/thriveafternarcissisticabuse 

- Connect with me on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/carolinestrawson/

- My website: https://www.carolinestrawson.com/

In today's episode, we will talk about something I get asked a lot - are narcissists born that way? We will discuss the impact of intergenerational trauma on a narcissist's development, the role of their protective parts, and the root causes of their behaviour.

What You Will Learn In This Episode:

- Why we say that narcissists are formed and not born

- The connection between a narcissist's intergenerational trauma and how their protective parts show up

- How worthiness wounds are formed 

- Why as a society, we must start looking more at the root causes than symptoms of narcissistic behaviour

When we talk about compassion, and understanding narcissistic behaviour, we are not talking about justifying their abuse. We talk about using empathy to understand the origin of their conduct, to know what triggers it, and to understand what it triggers in us, so we can build boundaries around it. 

Resources:

- Join my Narcissistic Trauma Recovery Programme™ https://go.carolinestrawson.com/heal-the-trauma-of-narcissistic-abuse

- Join my Facebook group at https://www.facebook.com/groups/thriveafternarcissisticabuse 

- Connect with me on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/carolinestrawson/

- My website: https://www.carolinestrawson.com/

In this episode, we will discuss a controversial topic - can narcissists be cured? To answer this, we will consider two antagonising positions, those who say it is possible, those who say it can't be done, and we will also look at the middle ground. Most importantly, we will focus on the things we can change in our relationship with the narcissist. 

What You Will Learn In This Episode:

- The issue with labeling narcissists, ignoring the root causes of their disorder, and medicalising them

- The benefits of looking at the situation with compassion and curiosity to ourselves

- What is a narcissist’s main goal, and what triggers their behaviour

- How to change our focus from curing the narcissist to looking at our reactions

Although it might sound shocking to hear, a narcissist's primary goal is not to be abusive. Their main purpose is to protect their self-worthiness wounds, so they project their protector parts on their abuse victims. As they won't see or accept this, and they justify their actions, we can’t help them, but we can focus on how we respond to their behaviour, and how we let it affect us. 

Resources:

- Join my Narcissistic Trauma Recovery Programme™ https://go.carolinestrawson.com/heal-the-trauma-of-narcissistic-abuse

- Interview with Professor Sam Vaknin, Author of Malignant Self-Love: Narcissism Revisited  

Part 1: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/037-interview-professor-sam-vaknin-author-malignant/id1527479270?i=1000514048886 

Part 2: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/038-part-2-interview-professor-sam-vaknin-author-malignant/id1527479270?i=1000514982380 

Part 3: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/039-part-3-interview-professor-sam-vaknin-author-malignant/id1527479270?i=1000515945205

- Join my Facebook group at https://www.facebook.com/groups/thriveafternarcissisticabuse 

- Connect with me on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/carolinestrawson/

- My website: https://www.carolinestrawson.com/

Today, we will talk about the magnetic relationship between narcissists and codependents. We will dive deep into their origins, why they attract each other, and why they seem like a match made in heaven - or more accurately, made in hell. 

What You Will Learn In This Episode:

- Why certain people only attract narcissists to their love life

- The role of the worthiness wounds in codependents' and in narcissists' behaviours

- How codependents can heal their emotional core wounds, and prevent themselves from attracting narcissists

Once a codependent identifies the core wound that triggers their protector parts to make them constantly give so they feel worthy or lovable, the chances are huge that they prevent those protector parts from acting on their behalf. With narcissists, on the other hand, this is almost impossible, since they'll never look at their worthiness wounds. 

Resources:

- Join my Facebook group at https://www.facebook.com/groups/thriveafternarcissisticabuse 

- Connect with me on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/carolinestrawson/

- My website: https://www.carolinestrawson.com/

In this episode, we will talk about what happens when the narcissist knows you figured everything out, and what we can expect when they show their true colors. I will share a bit of my story with my ex-husband, and what happened when I confirmed my suspicions about him, and I let him know that I knew everything I needed to know. 

What You Will Learn In This Episode:

- How narcissists diminish the pain of feeling worthless

- The three ways of ending a relationship with a narcissist

- Why I stayed for years in my abusive marriage

- What happened when I told my ex-husband I had everything figured out about him

Although narcissists appear to be confident and secure, they are precisely the opposite.  When we let them know we are aware of their game, we become a shining spotlight on their worthiness wounds. They have two options, to look themselves in the mirror acknowledging the damage they've done, or smear and try to diminish us. Unfortunately, they tend to choose the latter option. 

Resources Mentioned:

- Book: Caroline Strawson - Divorce Became My Superpower: A Story Of Narcissistic Abuse Recovery, Gaining Perspective, Power & Positivity: https://www.amazon.com/Divorce-Became-Superpower-Narcissistic-Perspective-ebook/dp/B07H6GF4FV/ 

- Join my Facebook group at https://www.facebook.com/groups/thriveafternarcissisticabuse 

- Connect with me on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/carolinestrawson/

- My website: https://www.carolinestrawson.com/