Boundaries.
The narcissist has most likely shown more than once that they do not respect you, they have violated your trust more than once, very few relationships can survive this alone, a relationship with a narcissist there is too much selfishness on the narcissists part for it to ever work.
Parents, friends, siblings, work colleagues, if they are on the narcissist personality disorder spectrum, they will most often take down your values, mismatch your reality, playing your beliefs against you. Hence, you lose your boundaries and your dignity, your personal respect, all while they gaslight you into believing you have a problem, so you don’t realise they are causing your problems.
You’re far from alone in this, as you have compassion and care for others, wanting to help those around you, seeing the good in them, pleasing others before yourself to keep others happy, you often lose who you are and have your boundaries taken down one by one, with all the gaslighting, pity plays. Manipulative abuse narcissists do without people even knowing what’s happening, if it’s your parents you never knew any different, if it’s a partner or boss, they treat you so well at the beginning that you look for the good in them when they treat you so wrong, also with their projection onto you for who they are, and the blame-shifting, with the gaslighting, we are often left believing it’s us in the wrong, working harder and harder to please them, to get the nice them back, slowly sinking ourselves whilst they take further control over our, minds, our dreams, our health, our happiness, and who we are.
A narcissist has plain disregard for other people’s boundaries, often using them as a challenge, to get others to drop their boundaries. Once you lose your boundaries in a narcissistic relationship, you become so weak from all the abuse. It’s not easy to rise back up. However, it is possible.
Everything is controlled and dominated by the narcissist when you don’t leave, don’t call the police or end the relationship because your mind is confused as the narcissist has manipulated you into believing it’s all your fault. You then make excuses, and the worst thing about excuses is in our minds. They are valid. It’s then hard to get out. Then because of the trauma bonding, it’s hard to stay out. Narcissists try to shame us into not speaking out, not because we should be ashamed, because they should be ashamed, they fear exposure for who they truly are.
The fact they show their two different faces, the play nice admiration face, and the evil, envious face, leaves us with cognitive dissonance, so our minds and reality are no longer match our beliefs. We are living in two completely different realities that confuse who we are.
So now you are out. You need to recreate your own boundaries. Start by telling yourself, “I’m worthy. I love and respect me, and my boundaries are in place so people can not hurt me.” learning to not people please, saying No can be incredibly hard, after this kind of relationship, as the narcissist will be so used to running straight over your boundaries, they may react badly towards you, in the hope they can take them down again, don’t let it stop you, some are dangerous, so always keep yourself safe.
You’ve learned not to stand up for yourself with them, now is the time to learn to be assistive for yourself and protect your boundaries. No longer fear reactions from others. If they react, they are not interested in how you feel. They don’t respect you.
You have to use your determination to help yourself live a happy life and make sure you reinforce and stick to your boundaries from now on. With you, words you have to follow with actions or the words don’t mean anything, so if someone disrespects your boundaries like the narcissist, your action is to then let them go. Cut them off, live a happy, peaceful life without them.
If you don’t stick with your boundaries, the other person will not take you seriously.
You might fear change right now, and you might be scared of change. Remember, where you are right now is not where you want to be, so you need to change somethings to get to where you want to be.
Albert Einstein said, “insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting change.”
So if you want to change, now is the time to change up what you are doing, then keep going until you get the results for you that you want.
The narcissist will not change. They are in the wrong, but now Is the time to create boundaries and focus on you.
Boundaries are not to scare people into doing what you want, as the narcissist controlled you. You can not and do not wish to control others. You just wish to take control back of your own life.
Boundaries are for you, to stand up for yourself and say. “I don’t like this anymore, and I’m no longer going to put up with you treating me this way.”
The narcissist’s problems are their problems. You can not help them or fix them. You can help and heal yourself,
No longer take responsibility for others actions, be honest with yourself and break down your denial. Learn the reality, break that trauma bond and regain your identity.
Ask why you find it hard to say “no” if you just want others to be happy, or fear people’s reactions, or you find it easy. Write down all the reasons you hate saying no to others.
Then ask yourself if those reasons are more important than your own self-worth and your own self-respect.
Put your life first, put yourself first, put your choices first, take control back of your own life, put your life back into your own hands.
Know that only you are in charge of your own life, change is scary, sometimes it’s good, once people disrespect your boundaries and you start saying no, you’ll feel so much better, you’ll realise you don’t need that kind of negativity in your life.
Once you start, you’ll get your self-respect and self-love back, and you’ll look at yourself in a whole different light, you’ll look at that narcissist in a whole new light, you’ll become a lot happier, love yourself first.
You don’t have to do things for others just to be loved. Those who are worthy will love you for you.
Things like “I will no longer allow people to guilt me into doing something I don’t want to do.”
“I will no longer associate myself with people who put me down or call me names. I’m worth more.”
“I will no longer associate myself with those who don’t respect me.”
“I will not associate with people who do drugs.”
“I will give people one chance, if they blow it’ll they’ll no longer be getting a second chance.”
Whatever yours are, write them down.
Make boundaries for certain people, then enforce them.
Then your own personal boundaries, for your own self-worth.
“I’ll not see someone every day, I’ve not known for very long,”
“I will stop checking my ex’s social media.”
“I will not continue arguments that are pointless.”
It’s not selfish to have boundaries and no longer allow people to take advantage of you.
Tell yourself, “My opinions are valid, I can respect others opinions, I don’t have to take them on as my own.”
Stop making excuses for others. To protect yourself, just walk away.
You can change to who you want to be. Communicate your boundaries with others, and if they don’t like it, it’s not your problem.
A narcissist puts themselves first and destroys others. You put yourself first to give the best of yourself to others, boundaries are personal to you. Learning the behaviour, you will and will not accept from other people. It’s not selfish to take care of you first. You’re not doing it to manipulate others. You are doing it to find the right people who will walk with you, and eliminate toxic people who just want to take you down.
So, one example is, if someone always borrows money, never pays you back and you don’t mind, are honest and open, let them have some money if you don’t mind.
If someone always borrows money, never pays you back, yet they will lend you money, let them have some money.
If someone always borrows and always pays and you don’t mind, let them borrow from you.
If someone always borrows money, making excuses after excuses not to pay you back, twisting stories and lying, making you angry, don’t loan them money. You have every right to say no.
It’s all about asking yourself if your mind if you want to say yes or no, it also depends on the people you are dealing with, so you might loan your car to one person who’s good to you, you might need to say no to another person who only ever takes from you, whether they are narcissistic or not.
Boundaries.
Click the links below to join, Elizabeth Shaw – Life Coach on social media, for more information on Overcoming Narcissistic Abuse.
The online courses available by Elizabeth Shaw.
For the full course.
For the free course.
Click here to sign up for the free online starter course.
To help with overcoming the trauma bond and anxiety course.
Click here for the online course to help you break the trauma bond, and those anxiety triggers.
All about the narcissist Online course.
Click here to learn more about the narcissist personality disorder.
The narcissists counter-parenting.
Elizabeth Shaw is not a Doctor or a therapist. She is a mother of five, a blogger, a survivor of narcissistic abuse, and a life coach, She always recommends you get the support you feel comfortable and happy with. Finding the right support for you. Elizabeth has partnered with BetterHelp (Sponsored.) where you will be matched with a licensed councillor, who specialises in recovery from this kind of abuse.
Mind games narcissistic people play.
