Author: FTHMG

by

Darlene Lancer, JD, LMFT

A trauma bond is an attachment to an abuser in a relationship with a cyclical pattern of abuse. Patrick Carnes, Ph.D., coined the term in 1997. He defined it as an adaptive, dysfunctional attachment occurring in the presence of danger, shame, or exploitation in order to survive. It is a trauma reaction created due to a power imbalance and recurring abuse mixed with intermittent positive reinforcement; in other words, good and bad treatment. The abuser is the dominant partner who controls the victim with fear, unpredictability, belittling, and control.

Behavioral psychologists call “intermittent reinforcement” conditioning (or “training”) behavior through the use of giving intermittent rewards. Positive reinforcement is when the abuser acts friendly, romantic, or vulnerable following the abuse. It’s easy to go into denial about the abuse to maintain a positive connection with the perpetrator and cling to the hope that the relationship will improve.

Looking for rewards can become addictive, like constantly checking your phone or email. This is how gamblers keep chasing an elusive win to get back their losses, even as they go into debt. Slot machines are programmed to encourage addictive gambling based on this phenomenon. This repeated pattern leads to a cycle of abuse. There may be expressions of remorse or false promises that the abuse will stop. This is similar to the “merry-go-round” of denial that accompanies addiction where the addict promises to quit.

Surprisingly, research confirmed that the reward-seeking behavior continued even after the rewards stop coming! In studies, rats neglected their grooming and other self-care habits but kept pushing the reward lever like a slot machine.

You can get addicted to emotionally unavailable partners because they may periodically want closeness. You become dependent on and addicted to your partner’s attention and validation. You can become addicted to any sign of approval or bits of kindness or closeness that feel all the more poignant (like make-up sex) because you’ve been starved and are relieved to feel loved.

Similarly, the mix of positive and negative feelings toward a Jekyll and Hyde abuser creates confusion and makes it hard to leave. Narcissists might intentionally withhold communication and affection to manipulate and control you with rejection or withholding, only to randomly fulfill your needs later. You become anxious and try even harder to decipher the narcissist and how to please him or her to get what you previously had but to no avail. Like the experimental rats, you get accustomed to long periods of not getting your needs met. This is how you become increasingly childlike and dependent on the narcissist — watching and accommodating to avoid abuse and to receive the occasional reward.

Trauma Bonds and Stockholm Syndrome

The term “Stockholm syndrome” originated from a bank robbery in Stockholm, Sweden in the summer of 1973 when bank robbers held four people hostage for six days. This syndrome describes captives who sympathize with their abuser in life-threatening situations where they are isolated and can’t escape. Prisoners align with their captors. Any act of kindness or even the absence of abuse feels like a sign of friendship and being cared for. The abuser seems less threatening. Prisoners imagine that they’re friends and share common values and goals, believing they’re in it together and may view helpers or the police as the enemy. In the Stockholm robbery, the prisoners sided with their captors against the police who rescued them.

Because of the emotional and psychological bonding, Stockholm syndrome terminology has been expanded to cover intimate relationships that are less perilous than hostage situations. However, this application is controversial. Some people also argue that it’s not even abnormal behavior because it’s normal in the prisoner situation and adaptive. In fact, statistics show that friendliness and empathy for the abuser reduce violence against prisoners.

Signs of Trauma Bonding

Codependents are loyal to a fault. They are often preyed upon by and attracted to narcissists and abusers and feel trapped and hard to leave any relationship. This tendency is exaggerated in trauma bonds. You want to protect the abuser rather than yourself. You make excuses for the abuser or hide or lie about the abuse to other people. You feel guilty when you talk to outsiders or think about leaving the relationship or calling the police. Outsiders who try to help feel threatening. For example, you might see counselors and twelve-step programs as interlopers who want to brainwash and separate you and your partner. This reinforces the toxic bond and isolates you from help, which is exactly what the abuser wants!

Some conditions and signs are:

1. You cover up or conceal the abuser’s behavior to other people.
2. A cycle of behavior that’s hurtful to you, despite your complaints.
3. You feel protective of your partner and feel guilty talking about the abuse.
4. You rationalize the abuse or make excuses for your partner.
5. You don’t want to leave or don’t like the relationship but feel unable to leave. Logic is distorted or is no help.
6. You obsess about the relationship or the abuser.
7. You doubt your feelings and perceptions.
8. You blame yourself and accept blame for the abuser’s behavior.
9. You continue to hope that things will improve, despite evidence to the contrary.
10. You cling to any sign of positive attention from the abuser.

Effects of Trauma Bonding

Over time, trauma bonding increases dependency. You attempt to avoid conflict and become more deferential. Meanwhile, your self-esteem and independence are frequently undermined by emotional abuse. When you object, you’re attacked, intimidated, or confused by manipulation. Consideration from your partner may become rare. Nevertheless, you’re hopeful and accommodating and keep trying to win back crumbs of loving attention. This behavior is common for victims of abuse who become attached to their abuser. You may have been gaslighted and have begun to doubt your perceptions due to blame and lies.

You might give up hobbies, interests, and friends and completely lose yourself trying to please and not displease your partner. This pattern may have developed in childhood and is now activated and exacerbated in your current relationship. Trauma bonding is resistant to change. Our brains are wired to attach and before recovery, these bonds aren’t within our conscious control. So don’t judge yourself.

As denial and cognitive dissonance between reality and your beliefs and perceptions grow, you do and allow things you wouldn’t have imagined when you first met. You develop “learned helplessness.” Your shame increases as your self-esteem declines. You feel guilty or responsible for the abuse. You wonder what happened to the happy, self-respecting, confident person you once were. Trauma bonds can harm your mental and physical health and create an increased likelihood of depression. This worsening trend parallels the chronic progression of codependency and makes it harder to leave.

You’re especially susceptible to becoming dependent on an abuser if you have codependency and/or the relationship dynamics are similar to what you experienced with a distant, abusive, or withholding parent. The trauma bond with your partner outweighs the negative aspects of the relationship. You not only fear retaliation but also the loss of the emotional connection with your partner, which seems worse than the abuse. Some common symptoms are:

1. Shame and low self-esteem
2. Depression and anxiety
3. Distrust in yourself and other people
4. Difficulty concentrating and functioning at work
5. Prolonged irrational feelings of guilt, even for leaving the abuser
6. Intimacy issues in new relationships due to shame and fears of abuse and abandonment
7. PTSD or CPTSD as a reaction to abuse even after leaving
8. If you don’t leave the relationship, you may suffer a loss of self, depression, health conditions, and possible addiction.

If you’re experiencing abuse, don’t isolate or hide the fact. Reach out and get support. Seek counseling. It’s essential to seek treatment to leave an abusive relationship and to heal from trauma. There are many modalities available, including CBT coupled with EMDR or Sensory Experiencing (SE). Also, join a 12-Step program such as CoDA or Al-Anon. Additionally, take steps to overcome codependency. Raise Your Self-Esteem, learn How to Be Assertive, and practice self-love. These relationships are very hard to leave. Learn how to handle abusive relationships, restore your self-esteem, and acquire the strength to leave. Get Essential Tools for Improving or Leaving Narcissistic and Abusive Relationships.
© 2022 Darlene Lancer

As Americans increasingly report feeling overwhelmed by daily life, many are using self-care to cope. Conversations and social media feeds are saturated with the language of “me time,” burnout, boundaries and nervous system regulation.

To meet this demand, the wellness industry has grown into a multitrillion-dollar global market. Myriad providers offer products, services and lifestyle prescriptions that promise calm, balance and restoration.

Paradoxically, though, even as interest in self-care continues to grow, Americans’ mental health is getting worse.

I am a professor of public health who studies health behaviors and the gap between intentions and outcomes. I became interested in this self-care paradox recently, after I suffered from a concussion. I was prescribed two months of strictly screen-free cognitive rest – no television, email, Zooming, social media, streaming or texting.

The benefits were almost immediate, and they surprised me. I slept better, had a longer attention span and had a newfound sense of mental quiet. These effects reflected a well-established principle in neuroscience: When cognitive and emotional stimuli decrease, the brain’s regulatory systems can recover from overload and chronic stress.

Obviously, most people can’t go 100% screen-free for days, much less months, but the underlying principle offers a powerful lesson for practicing effective self-care.

A nation under strain

Americans’ self-rated mental health is now at the lowest point since Gallup started tracking this issue in 2001. National surveys consistently detect high levels of stress and emotional strain.

Roughly one-third of U.S. adults report feeling overwhelmed most days. Sleep disruption, anxiety, poor concentration and emotional exhaustion are widespread, particularly among young adults and women.

Chronic disease patterns mirror this strain. When daily stress becomes chronic, it can trigger biological changes that increase the risk of long-term conditions like heart disease and diabetes. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that 6 in 10 U.S. adults live with at least one chronic condition, and 4 in 10 live with multiple chronic conditions.

https://www.youtube.com/embed/QMOc-4zNj30?wmode=transparent&start=0Stress triggers physiological responses that can lead to a range of symptoms.

How people try to cope

Many Americans say they actively practice self-care in everyday life. For example, they describe taking mental health days, protecting personal time, setting boundaries around work and prioritizing rest and leisure.

The problem lies in how they use that leisure time.

Over the past 22 years, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics’ American Time Use Survey has consistently found that watching television is the most popular leisure activity for U.S. adults. Americans spend far more time watching TV than exercising, spending time with friends or practicing reflection through activities like yoga. Other common self-care activities include watching movies and gaming.

Modern leisure time increasingly includes smartphone use. Surveys suggest that mobile phones have become the dominant screen for many Americans, with adults spending several hours per day on their phones.

For many adults, checking social media or watching short videos has become a default relaxation behavior layered on top of traditional screen use. This practice is often referred to as second screening.

Although many people turn to screen-based activities to wind down, these activities may have the opposite effect biologically.

Why modern screen use feels different

Pre-internet forms of leisure often involved activities such as watching scheduled television programs, listening to radio broadcasts or reading books and magazines. For all of these pastimes, the content followed a predictable sequence with natural stopping points.

Today’s digital media environment looks very different. People routinely engage with multiple screens at once, respond to frequent notifications and switch rapidly between several streams of content. These environments continuously require users to split their attention, engage their emotions and make decisions.

This type of mental multitasking draws on the same neural systems people are often attempting to rest with leisure. The result is a far more fragmented and cognitively demanding environment than in the past.

Americans now spend approximately six to seven hours per day on screens across multiple devices. Splitting attention between more than one screen at a time, such as using the phone while watching television, is common. This juggling exposes peoples’ brains to multiple streams of sensory and emotional input simultaneously.

Survey data also suggests that Americans may check their phones roughly 200 times per day. In doing so, they repeatedly pull their attention back to screens during routine moments.

Modern digital platforms are designed to maximize engagement. Algorithms tend to prioritize emotionally arousing content, particularly anger, anxiety and outrage. These feelings drive clicks, sharing and time spent on platforms. Research has shown that this design is associated with higher stress, distraction and cognitive load.

When ‘rest’ doesn’t restore

Against the backdrop of daily hassles and competing demands, it can feel like relief to flip on the TV. Practices such as streaming or so-called bed-rotting – spending extended periods in bed while scrolling – often are framed as a form of radical rest or self-care.

Other common coping behaviors include leaving the television on as background noise, scrolling between tasks throughout the day or using phones during meals and conversations. These strategies can feel restful because they temporarily reduce external demands and decision-making.

However, pairing rest with screen use may undermine the very restoration that people are seeking. Digital media stimulate attention, emotion and sensory processing. Even while people are sitting or lying still, being onscreen can keep their nervous systems in a heightened state of arousal. It may look like downtime, but it doesn’t create the biological conditions for restoration.

How to wind down

Evidence suggests that mental relief comes not from adding new coping strategies, but from reducing the number of demands placed on the brain.

Here are some evidence-based strategies that support genuine restoration:

• Reduce digital multitasking, such as using your phone while watching television. This lowers stress and cognitive strain.
• Limit task-switching and interruptions. This improves focus and reduces cognitive fatigue.
• Spend time in low-stimulation environments, including quiet spaces and outdoor settings. This supports mood and emotional well-being.
• Unwind with analog or low-novelty activities, such as reading print, journaling, gentle movement or device-free walking. These pastimes allow mental engagement without overload.

The goal is to intentionally reduce mental load, not to abandon all digital devices.

To improve well-being in our overstimulated society, it’s important to understand the difference between feeling as though you are unwinding and actually allowing your brain and body to recover. In my view, fewer screens, fewer inputs, fewer emotional demands and more protected time for genuine cognitive rest are important components of an effective wellness strategy.

Dr. Pickering is a Professor and Chair of Public Health at Gonzaga University. Her educational background includes a PhD in Education, a MS in Physical Education with an emphasis on Exercise Science and Pedagogy, and a BS in Health with an emphasis on Health Promotion and Wellness. 

1. Assess your motivation, but honestly.

Boundaries are relationship expectations that establish how you do (and don’t) want to be treated.

After a breakup, many people struggle to set and maintain new boundaries with an ex.

Honestly evaluating why and how you want your ex in your life is key.

Source: Mixmike, Getty Images

When we fail to set boundaries and hold people accountable, we feel used and mistreated. —Brené Brown

After a breakup, the way we relate to our former romantic partner shifts dramatically. Sexual, romantic, and daily shared life patterns stop or morph, making way for a new normal for each partner. This leaves many in an uncomfortable state of transition, wondering whether they can still have their now-ex in their life—and how.

Transitioning from being lovers to friends, platonic colleagues, or even just civilized co-parents is much easier if there are good boundaries.

Boundaries are relationship expectations; they reflect how you want to be treated and what you’re going to do if someone violates those expectations (APA; Cloud & Townsend, 2017). This can include everything from how you want someone to talk to you to whether you want them to touch you to how much time you want to spend with them (Warren, 2023). In this way, boundaries keep you safe in your interpersonal relationships.

If you find yourself wanting a non-romantic relationship with your ex after a breakup—or if you must have one of necessity, because you work together or share parenting responsibilities—here are 4 steps to help you set new boundaries.

Step 1: Assess Your Motivation, Honestly

Before trying to be friends or non-romantic partners, it’s essential that you really explore what’s driving your desire to be connected in the first place. Why do you want to be friends with your ex? Is it because you really care about them and think you can add to one another’s life in a meaningful way as friends more than you could as lovers? Or, for example…:

• Do you want to stay connected because you’re afraid of being alone?
• Do you feel guilty about the breakup or your role in the relationship ending, so you’re trying to ease the pain?
• Do you selfishly want a tie to your ex because they’re still in love with you, to ease your ego in case your next relationship fails?
• Are you secretly aware that you want to continue a sexual connection with your ex without commitment but won’t directly tell your ex that?

Knowing why you want to stay connected is key to setting healthy relationship expectations. If you’re honest with yourself and realize that staying friends with your ex is coming from a less-healthy place that has nothing to do with them as a person, you may decide that cutting off contact is a better choice.

Step 2: Describe Your Ideal Relationship

Once you’ve honestly admitted your motivation for keeping your ex in your life, it’s time to figure out what an ideal non-romantic friendship with your ex would look like. Given that you’re no longer together, how do you want them to be in your life? Ask yourself questions like:

• What does “being friends” mean?
• How often do you want to talk or see one another?
• Do you still want to see them? When and under what conditions?
• Do you want a relationship or are you mostly hoping it’s not awkward to run into them because you have mutual friends?

In addition, are there any dealbreakers to being friends? For example, are there things you don’t want your ex to do, like stopping by unannounced; calling late at night; sending sexy photos; or continuing to have sexual interactions?

Get as clear as you can about how you would like—and not like—to have your ex in your life moving forward.

Step 3: Share Your Perspective With Your Ex

Now that you’ve figured out some of your motivation for being friends and what you’d like that relationship to look like, it’s time to share it with your ex and get their feedback to see whether a friendship works for them. For example, you may say something like:

I know things are changing between us because we broke up. Even though we’re not romantically together anymore, I want to be friends with you because I really care about you as a person. You’re funny and I really like you as a person—we just weren’t good together as romantic partners. What I hope is that we can be friends moving forward. To me, that means we can see each other once in a while—maybe grab coffee or catch up sometimes. I know we’ll run into each other at parties too.

What I really don’t want is for us to be awkward saying hi or feeling like we can’t interact anymore. Or for being friends to hurt either of us as we date new people. So, I think it’s better not to hook up with each other moving forward. What do you think about what I’ve said? Do you want to try to be friends with me? Do you think we can? Do you think it would be healthy for you?

Step 4: Evaluate Over Time

As you establish what you want and need in your new friendship with your ex, it will be important to continually see how it feels to you over time. If your ex acts in a way that is inconsistent with the new relationship you’ve outlined, it will be important to respond.

For example, if they continue to pursue sexual interactions even when you’ve said you aren’t available for them, you may need to say something like: “Please don’t come onto me in a romantic way; we aren’t together anymore”; “I don’t want to be in a sexual relationship with you anymore, so I’m not going to respond to your advances”; or, “I’d appreciate it if you don’t stop by my place unannounced anymore. If you do, I’m not going to let you in.”

Like all relationships, you’ll get more information as you go. If you find that your new interactions or way of relating isn’t healthy for you or them, change it until you find something that works. Ultimately, that may mean that you aren’t capable of being friends— at least not yet.

The Naked Truth

Clear boundaries exist in all healthy relationships. They establish the kind of relationship you’re willing to be in and how you will respond if someone treats you in a way that’s inconsistent with your values and personal needs. When you’re going through a breakup, setting new, clear boundaries for yourself and your ex is key to moving on in a healthy way—whether they ultimately stay in your life or not.

Copyright Cortney S. Warren, Ph.D., ABPP

Note: This content is only for informational and educational purposes and should not be considered therapy or any form of treatment. I cannot respond to personal requests for advice over the internet. Best on your continued journey.

Cortney Warren, Ph.D., ABPP, is a board-certified clinical psychologist and former tenured associate professor of psychology at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV). She earned her bachelor’s degree from Macalester College in 2000 and her Ph.D. in clinical psychology from Texas A&M

Our interest in narcissism has never been higher, with Google searches for the word “narcissist” having steadily increased over the past decade. This term has become part of everyday parlance, readily thrown around to describe celebrities, politicians and ex-partners.

A byproduct of our growing interest in narcissism is a curiosity about what types of narcissist exist. But this is where things get tricky. A search for “types of narcissists” on Google returns wildly varied results. Some websites describe as few as three types. Others list up to 14.

What’s going on here?

What is a narcissist?

The word “narcissism” comes from the Greek myth of Narcissus, a boy who falls in love with his own reflection.

Over the past century or so, conceptualisations of narcissism have evolved. It is now thought of as a collection of personality traits characterised by grandiosity, entitlement and callousness. “Narcissist” is the term used to describe someone who scores highly on these traits.

A narcissist may also meet the diagnostic criteria for narcissistic personality disorder, a mental health diagnosis that affects about 1% of people. It’s broadly described as a pervasive pattern of exhibiting grandiosity, needing admiration and lacking empathy.

Importantly, not all narcissists have narcissistic personality disorder.

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Read more: Think you might be dating a ‘vulnerable narcissist’? Look out for these red flags

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How many types of narcissism are there?

There are two main types of trait narcissism (which are distinct from narcissistic personality disorder). These are grandiose narcissism and vulnerable narcissism.

Grandiose narcissism is associated with a grandiose sense of self, aggression and dominance. Vulnerable narcissism is characterised by heightened emotional sensitivity and a defensive and insecure grandiosity that masks feelings of inadequacy.

Recent models have identified three core components of narcissism that help explain the similarities and differences between both grandiose and vulnerable narcissism.

1. Antagonism is common to both grandiose and vulnerable narcissism. It’s linked with traits such as arrogance, entitlement, exploitativeness and a lack of empathy.
2. Agentic extraversion is unique to grandiose narcissism. It’s associated with traits such as authoritativeness, grandiosity and exhibitionism.
3. Narcissistic neuroticism is specific to vulnerable narcissism. It’s associated with fragile self-esteem and a tendency to experience negative emotions and shame.

A person will likely meet the diagnostic criteria for narcissistic personality disorder when there is a convergence of high scores across each of these components.

Also, while diagnostic criteria emphasise the grandiose aspects of narcissistic personality disorder, clinicians report an oscillation between both grandiose and vulnerable narcissism in people with the disorder.

Vulnerable narcissism has a considerable overlap with borderline personality disorder, particularly in terms of its causes and the displayed personality traits. A person who only scores highly for vulnerable narcissism is more likely to be diagnosed with borderline personality disorder than narcissistic personality disorder.

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Read more: Borderline personality disorder is a hurtful label for real suffering – time we changed it

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Are there other types of narcissists?

Given the consensus in psychology on the two main types of trait narcissism described above (which sit alongside the clinical diagnosis of narcissistic personality disorder), how can we account for the many sources describing other “types” of narcissism?

First and most concerning is the proliferation of pop psychology articles that describe types of narcissism for which there is no good evidence.

They feature terms such as “cerebral narcissist”, “somatic narcissist”, “seductive narcissist” and “spiritual narcissist”. But searching for these terms in peer-reviewed academic literature yields no evidence that they are valid types of narcissism.

Some articles also use terms often considered synonymous with grandiose and vulnerable narcissism. This likely comes from early literature, which used a range of terms to describe types of narcissism. One review from 2008 identified more than 50 different labels used to describe types of narcissism.

Conceptually, however, each of these labels can be mapped onto either grandiose or vulnerable narcissism.

Often you will see “overt” and “covert” being described, sometimes alongside descriptions of grandiose and vulnerable narcissists. Some researchers have proposed overt and covert narcissism as being akin to grandiose and vulnerable narcissism. Others argue they are more appropriately considered expressions of narcissism present in both grandiose and vulnerable narcissism.

Lastly, a number of these articles describe narcissists by drawing on specific expressions of grandiose or vulnerable narcissism. For instance, they describe “antagonistic narcissists”, “communal narcissists”, “agentic narcissists” and “sexual narcissists” alongside grandiose and vulnerable narcissists.

These descriptions imply each of these are mutually exclusive types of narcissism, when really they should be thought of as aspects of grandiose and/or vulnerable narcissism. In other words, they are examples of how narcissism might be expressed.

The danger of labels

Narcissism’s multifaceted nature has likely contributed to the array of terms people use to describe narcissists.

Some of these are valid constructs. When used accurately, they can be useful for identifying the different ways narcissism is expressed – particularly in intimate relationships, where high levels of grandiose and vulnerable narcissism are associated with perpetration of abuse.

However, online articles that inaccurately describe and categorise narcissism are anything but helpful. This content fuels armchair psychologists, who then jump to assign the label “narcissist” to anyone they think is displaying narcissistic traits.

Even when accurately applied in clinical settings, diagnostic labels aren’t always useful. They may bring stigma, which can discourage people from seeking mental health support.

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The word narcissism became something of a buzzword. And in recent years the word has been popularized on social media and in the press.

As a result, social media and other online platforms are now rife with insights, tips, stories and theories from life coaches, therapists, psychologists and self-proclaimed narcissists about navigating relationships with narcissists or managing one’s own symptoms.

The term “narcissism” is commonly used to describe anyone who is egotistical and self-absorbed. Someone who exhibits narcissistic traits may have a personality disorder known as narcissistic personality disorder.

Over the past decade, the rapid development of social networking sites has caused profound changes in the way people communicate and interact. Social media websites such as Facebook, TikTok and Instagram can feel like a narcissistic field day. In seconds, one can share self-enhancing content – flattering pictures, boastful statuses and enviable vacations – with a vast audience and receive immediate feedback in the form of “likes” and reinforcing comments from followers.

As a licensed couple and family therapist who specializes in relationship issues related to attachment, I have worked with many couples with one partner who is on the narcissistic personality disorder spectrum. One reason the narcissistic partner is challenging to treat is that they’re adept at persuading their partner that they are the dysfunctional one.

Defining narcissism

Dr. Otto Kernberg, a psychiatrist who specializes in personality disorders, differentiates between normal and pathological narcissism using a framework that assesses a person’s capacity to participate in satisfactory romantic relationships.

Don’t let yourself be misled. Understand issues with help from experts

Normal narcissism refers to a well-integrated sense of self that is generally for the greater good, such as a healthy sense of pride in oneself and one’s accomplishments. Pathological narcissism describes extreme fluctuations between feelings of inferiority and failure with a sense of superiority and grandiosity.

Each person has a bit of normal narcissism within them. This can take the form of having self-confidence and even a modicum of entitlement while still displaying empathy and emotion. Research shows the role of healthy narcissism occurs at subclinical levels in everyday populations and can help motivate people to enhance themselves and to progress in life.

But when striving for achievement or gain involves an excessive desire for attention and approval and an outsize, grandiose sense of self, it is no longer in the realm of healthy narcissism.

A pathological narcissist sees everyone else as an extension of self. Those in a narcissist’s life, especially in their inner circle, must always demonstrate perfection because they contribute to the narcissist’s own self-image. Like many personality disorders, narcissism manifests itself in intimate relationships through the cycle of idealization and devaluation, creating the concept of the so-called toxic relationship.

Finding a victim

A narcissist chooses their partners based on whether the partner affirms their grandiose sense of self. And since having that affirmation is the key driver for a narcissist’s relationship, they are generally not interested in learning a lot about the other person.

The things that attract narcissists are not the personal characteristics of the other person or even the connection that comes from the relationship. If the person has a reputable status in their eyes and they find the person appealing, they are usually willing to move forward quickly in the relationship. Unfortunately, as a narcissist’s genuine interest in the other person is typically superficial, the narcissist often loses interest in the relationship just as suddenly as they began it.

Narcissistic abuse is a form of extreme psychological and emotional abuse marked by manipulative communication and intentional deception for exploitation by a person who meets the criteria for pathological narcissism.

Forms of narcissism

Narcissistic abuse can be insidious and hard to recognize. Since the signs of narcissistic abuse aren’t always obvious, it’s important to name and recognize them.

• Gaslighting: The narcissist uses a manipulation strategy known as gaslighting to make the victim doubt his or her own ability to make a decision or take an action. People use this technique to maintain control over the other person’s sense of reality. When gaslighting occurs, victims are left feeling doubtful and insecure and some even have difficulty recognizing that they are being gaslighted. In some relationships, a co-dependency develops between the narcissist and the victim in which the victim accepts the narcissist’s position of authority.
• Victim mentality: This mindset, which is common for those with narcissistic personality disorder, implies that everybody owes the narcissist something. In my clinical experience, I have often witnessed the narcissist creating a false narrative about how they did not get what they were supposed to get in life because they were wronged by others. This story allows them to feel entitled to have anger and resentment toward anyone, especially toward people they perceive as successful.
• Cycle of idealization and devaluation: Narcissists form polarized beliefs about themselves and others, meaning that their opinions of themselves and others can be exceptionally positive or unrealistically negative.

During the idealization stage, the narcissist creates a sense of unbreakable connection with the victim. No matter what type of relationship it is – whether romantic, professional or familial – it moves fast and has an intense quality to it.

At some point, the narcissist’s partner will disappoint them in some way, usually not on purpose. As a response, the narcissist will criticize every move, jump to conclusions and react dramatically to these perceived disappointments. The narcissist will begin to see their partner as flawed and accuse them of not being the perfect partner they were supposed to be. This phase is characterized by verbal and physical abuse, humiliation, bullying and smearing.

Feelings of emptiness: According to Kernberg, the psychiatrist mentioned above, the inability of narcissists to develop fulfilling and lasting relationships results in a chronically empty internal world.

Narcissistic personality disorder patients will often find themselves “waking up” at age 40, 50 or 60 with a desperate sense of loss. The narcissist often struggles with feelings of emptiness that stem from relying on a false grandiose sense of self that prevents them from being vulnerable. In turn, they project their feelings of emptiness onto the partner in a relationship. Many of these patients suffer from a loss of identity and sense of helplessness and feel alienated from the world.

Navigating relationships with a narcissist

Since the narcissist often develops controlling and manipulative relationships with the partner’s friends and family, the victim may feel reluctant to rely on their intimate circle for support. Finding a therapist who specializes in narcissistic abuse recovery is the first step to start the healing process.

I have had a lot of patients tell me that their therapists aren’t familiar with the term “pathological narcissism.” If they’re not, I suggest that, if possible, these patients find therapists who specialize in emotionally focused therapy or transference focused therapy. These therapies help identify destructive patterns of communication as they arise during a therapy session, rather than focusing only on interactions that arise outside of therapy.

From my perspective, relationships with a narcissistic partner are some of the hardest to treat. The narcissistic partners are often unwilling to participate in therapy because they will not admit that they need help and find it challenging to collaborate with the therapist. Effective couples therapy is rare but not impossible and can occur only when the narcissistic partner acknowledges that their expectations are unreasonable and destructive.

Here are tips on how to avoid ruining relationships because you took offense.

• When people are emotionally triggered, they lose sight of how their response might affect their relationship.
• They say and do things they later regret because they misperceive the situation as a dangerous emergency.
• With effort and guidance, people can learn to change their response to being emotionally triggered.
• Learning to pause and think through possible responses before acting is the single most important thing to do.

Source: Vitaly Griev/pexels

Many of my clients have had traumatic childhood experiences that left them with extremely sensitive, invisible emotional wounds. When someone accidently touches one of those wounds, they find it exquisitely painful. Their pain is proportional to all the past traumatic experiences that created the wound, not just the current incident, and so is their response. For short, psychotherapists call this whole experience getting “triggered.”

This is very common with people who have borderline or narcissistic personality disorders, but you do not have to qualify for a personality disorder diagnosis to get triggered. Most of us have our own unhealed wounds from our past and occasionally overreact when other people accidentally activate them.

I am focusing here on intimate relationships, but the same principles apply in other situations.

What happens when someone gets triggered?

My clients who get triggered describe a remarkably similar chain of events:

1. The partner says or does something that my client finds offensive.
2. My client gets triggered and reacts by saying or doing something nasty designed to hurt the partner and get revenge.
3. The partner either withdraws or fights back.
4. Sometimes my client later realizes that he or she overreacted and tries to make amends.
5. The pattern keeps repeating until the relationship ends.

How do people who get triggered describe their experience?

Here is a typical description from one of my clients:

Everything happens very fast. Too fast! One minute we are happy, and everything is fine, and the next minute I feel as if I am under attack. It feels like an emergency.

It does not occur to me to stop to think things through. I feel in danger, and I want to hurt my partner to punish them for causing me pain. If they try to defend themself, I get furious, and the situation escalates. I get even meaner. I am prepared to fight for hours even days. I need to win.

Later, after I cool down and have time to think about it, I am a bit embarrassed by my behavior. I often say incredibly hurtful things that I don’t really mean. Afterwards, I just want to forget the whole thing and move on as if nothing happened.

The Anatomy of a Trigger

I have used my clients stories to create what I think of as the “anatomy of a trigger.” Here is the basic pattern:

1. Your view radically narrows so that only the current moment and your response to it seem relevant—like looking through a microscope instead of a wide-angle camera.
2. You feel a sense of extreme urgency and believe that you have to act immediately or else something terrible will happen to you.
3. You lose sight of the big picture and do not see or understand the downside of your behavior.
4. Your basic goals are to take control of the situation, take revenge, punish your partner, and prevent something bad that you think this person might do to you in the future.
5. You may end up regretting how far you took things, if it negatively impacts your other goals—such as having a partner who loves you.

As a psychotherapist who specializes in the treatment of personality disorders, I have developed some methods to help my clients understand their reactions and get better control over what they do when they feel triggered.

Steps for Working with Your Triggers

When I work with my clients on their triggers, I explore the issues I have described above. Below are the type of questions and homework suggestions I use. You can adapt my therapy method to suit your own needs. I recommend that you start a therapy journal where you jot down your answers to these questions, your homework results, and any other related thoughts and insights that occur to you.

Step 1—Identify Your Triggers

1. What exactly are you reacting to?
2. What specifically has the other person done or said that triggered you?
3. Have you gotten triggered by similar things with other people?
4. How often do you get triggered by these things?

Homework: Write down everything you can think of that has the potential to trigger you. You can start with times you were triggered in the past. Then, going forward, keep track of when you get triggered and what caused it.

Goal: Encourage self-reflection and increase your awareness of what triggers you.

Step 2—Why Are You Triggered?

1. Why does what the other person did or said feel so important?
2. Are these triggers related to painful incidents in your past?
3. Think about the details of these past incidents, including how old you were, the circumstances, who was there, and what made these incidents so painful.
4. Can you see how your current sensitivities may have originated in these past traumatic incidents?

Homework: Write down the answers to the above questions and any insights that you have as you do this exercise. Going forward, when you feel triggered note exactly what the person is doing or saying and try and relate your response back to earlier painful incidents in your life that may have sensitized you to those issues.

Goal: Increase your awareness of the origins of your triggers.

Step 3—What Do You Feel When You Are Triggered?

1. What emotions are you feeling?
2. Why does it seem so urgent that you need to respond immediately?
3. What are you concerned might happen if you do not act?

Homework: Answer the above question based on your memories. Then pay close attention to how you feel going forward when you are triggered. Use your journal to keep track of your feelings after every incident.

Goal: Understand the feelings you are experiencing that lead you to act in ways that you later regret.

Step 4—What Story Are You Telling Yourself?

1. Think about this: The strength of your negative reaction when you are triggered depends on the story you tell yourself about how much danger you are in.
2. Try and get in touch with the stories you tell yourself when you are triggered, and the assumptions embedded in those stories.

Homework: Try and discover the story you tell yourself about your partner’s behavior that increases your sense of danger or betrayal and leads to you behaving so badly. Write an alternative story that also could be true which feels more calming.

Goal: Understand that your reaction is based on your assumptions, not objective truth.

Step 5–Do You Notice Your Impact on Your Relationship?

1. Are you able to pause to think things through when you are triggered?
2. Do you stop to weigh the possible long-term consequences of your response?
3. Are you able to consider the impact of your response on your partner and the future of your relationship?

Homework: Practice pausing when you are triggered. During the pause, think about the likely long-term effects of whatever you plan to say or do next.

Goal: Learn to pause to evaluate the long-term pros and cons of your possible responses.

Summary

Everyone gets emotionally triggered occasionally. However, if you frequently get triggered and often regret it later, you may be motivated to do something about this situation. The good news is that with hard work and a bit of guidance, you can update your responses to be less destructive to your relationships.

Generation Jones—those born between 1954 and 1965—has always been a “bridge” group. They sit between the traditional Baby Boomers and the cynical Gen X. In the fitness world, they are the pioneers who lived through the jogging craze of the 70s and the aerobics boom of the 80s.

Today, they aren’t looking for “senior exercises,” but they also can’t train like 20-year-olds. Here is how the Jones Generation is redefining fitness:

1. The Shift from “No Pain, No Gain” to Functional Longevity

Jonesers grew up with the high-impact culture of Jane Fonda and heavy iron. Now, their hack is Functional Training. Instead of just chasing big muscles, they are focusing on mobility and balance—the things that ensure they can still hike, travel, and play with grandkids well into their 80s.

2. The Power of “Practical Idealism.”

This generation is known for being practical. They don’t want a “miracle pill”; they want a routine that works. For a Joneser, a fitness hack isn’t a 90-day extreme transformation—it’s a sustainable Mediterranean diet tweak or a 15-minute daily resistance band routine that fits into a busy career or early retirement.

3. Tech-Savvy Wellness

Unlike older Boomers, Generation Jones is highly comfortable with tech. They were the ones who bought the first home computers. Today, they are the primary demographic using wearable tech (like Apple Watches or Oura rings) to track heart rate variability (HRV) and sleep quality—using data to “hack” their recovery.

4. Protecting the “Jones” Engine: Joint Health & Protein

While older generations might focus solely on cardio, Jonesers are leaning into strength training. They understand that maintaining muscle mass (sarcopenia prevention) is the ultimate anti-aging hack.

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The Bottom Line: Generation Jones doesn’t want to be “old.” They want to stay in the game. By blending the grit they learned in the 70s with modern bio-hacking, they are arguably the healthiest “aging” demographic we’ve ever seen.

Stop Calling Them “Boomers”: Why Generation Jones is the Ultimate Fitness Underdog

If you were born between 1954 and 1965, you’ve been ignored by marketers for decades. You’re too young for the “Woodstock” nostalgia and too old for the Gen X “Slackers” label.

But in the fitness world, Generation Jones is currently pulling off the ultimate “bio-hack.” While the internet argues over Gen Z vs. Boomers, Jonesers are quietly becoming the strongest, most resilient people in the gym.

The “Jones” Edge: Why You’re Built to Last

You didn’t grow up with participation trophies. You grew up with the 1970s oil crisis, the original jogging craze, and the grit of the analog-to-digital shift. That “Practical Idealism” is your secret weapon. You don’t want a “magic pill”—you want a routine that actually works.

You married a man who has not yet separated emotionally from his mother. How can you tell? One very obvious sign is she (mother) will be trying to control her son, you, your marriage, up close and from a distance not long after you’ve married her son.

The message to you, his wife (or lover, if you want to drop the married part) is, you can marry my son but I stay number one in his emotional life.

Can you tell there is an underlying emotional maybe physical competition going on in this message? Of course you can. It’s pretty obvious.

The problem is, your husband has not yet left his mother. You see it’s a pretty basic formula. If you don’t leave your mother you don’t have the emotional space to be truly married.

When you are truly married you are committed 100% to another woman, your wife/lover. You’ve left one woman (mom) to fully commit to another (wife/lover).

The complication from the son’s side is, not wanting to let go of his mother. Some men reach adulthood but they are not yet finished with their mothers. I would recommend to such a man that he not get married until he is ready to ‘divorce’ his mother. If my advice is heeded things could turn out OK.

The plan is, stay bonded to mom until such time that you are convinced that it is time to separate, meaning go off and commit to another woman. This other woman, your wife, in effect becomes #1 in your new life. Now you’re truly married.

And by the way, your marriage has a better chance of surviving if this more complete commitment has occurred. When your mother-in-law is still pulling the strings on her son, things can get pretty dicey especially when there is conflict between you and your husband.

You see, the mother who hangs onto her son past the time she is supposed to is expressing a certain kind of ‘narcissism.’ The narcissistic mother is trying to cure her problems within herself by hanging onto and expecting emotional things from her adult son.

There’s a certain selfish, perhaps self-indulgent quality to this. She is really only thinking of her own needs and not the needs of her son or her daughter-in-law for that matter. You can get married, but that doesn’t mean you belong to anyone but ME.

Now you have a dependent son and a narcissistic mother. Perfect fit. This co-dependent arrangement when it hits adulthood is bound to create dysfunction in both. The dysfunction often shows up the clearest in their relationships with others.

A narcissistic mother’s marriage (worse if she doesn’t have a husband) often suffers when unhealthy triangles dominate her love life. The two most common triangles are: son-mother-father and wife-son-mother.

When the narcissistic mother has dug her claws into her dependent son you can pretty much bet there are underlying marital problems in the mother’s marriage to her husband. What will often happen is the narcissistic mother and her husband get to ‘avoid’ dealing with their marital problems by getting over-involved in other activities and people. For the narcissistic mother it’s her son’s life. For her husband it might be over-work, another woman, or simply emotional withdrawal.

When the triangle consists of son-wife-mother, the narcissistic mother’s control in her son’s marriage is bound to create marital problems for him and his wife. This triangle indicates that there are two women vying for one man. This never works out well. Conflicts increase over time and allegiances are strained.

Of course this kind of emotional arrangement can get pretty complicated when her son’s wife is trying to get her mother-in-law’s ‘love.’ A lot of people are psychologically immature when they get married and try to compensate for what they didn’t get in childhood (love) now from their spouse’s family. This is quite common in contemporary marriages.

Problem is, it’s bound to be disappointing when your mother-in-law is narcissistic. Number one, she has little or nothing to give, and number two, you (wife) are the competitor (in her mind at least) for her son’s adoration and affections.

Number three, unfortunately, you can’t really make up for past love life disappointment by getting an adult person to ‘parent’ you. It’s healthier to heal the hurt as loss and learn how to make the best life for yourself with mature forms of love as an adult person.

A son’s efforts to ‘make peace’ between his wife and his mother, while walking the ‘line’ between them, is quite demanding. He’s bound to do a lot of fire fighting and repair work. If his wife is temperamental and expressive he’ll certainly have his hands full.

In my experience there’s always an underlying well of resentment in these men. Look at how much they have to pay attention to everyone else’s needs while sacrificing their own. What they don’t realize is, they have a right to a life of their own. Parenting is supposed to be a time-limited function and we are not supposed to nurture our own parents. We are supposed to put a big part of the love we have inside into our own lives.

In my experience, once sons in this trap start feeling bad and looking for a way out, this idea of having personal choice and rights has the potential of putting a pretty healthy fire in their bellies. From then on it becomes a matter of gaining personal freedom and owning your own love life.

If his marriage survives his separation from his mother (guilt), he and his wife will be able to have more of the marriage they dreamed of. And mom gets a chance to go fix her own marriage.

Dr. Thomas Jordan, clinical psychologist, author of Learn to Love: Guide to Healing Your Disappointing Love Life. Need help fixing your disappointing love life? Confidential Love Life Consultations available by phone, inquire at drtomjordan@lovelifelearningcenter.com.

1. Skip empty “affirmations.”

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John was 25 when he came to see me for psychotherapy. The previous year he had quit his “boring office job” and moved back in with his parents to figure out what he wanted to do with his life. He now had a part-time job as a barista, played video games, and saw friends on weekends. As for figuring out his life—he wasn’t.

“I think what’s holding me back is my self-esteem,” he said during our first session. “I just don’t feel good about myself—in any way.” John had tried to improve his self-esteem by repeating positive affirmations several times a day: I’m going to be a big success, and I can do anything I put my mind to.

“The positive affirmations you’re using are not good,” I explained to John, “both grammatically and psychologically. But the bigger problem is there seems to be nothing in your life that is nourishing your self-esteem—you’re not doing anything that would make you feel good about yourself.”

Indeed, we have to nourish our self-esteem. If we want to feel good about ourselves, we have to do things that actually make us feel proud, accomplished, appreciated, respected, or empowered, or take steps that make us feel that we’re advancing toward our goals. John was doing none of these things.

5 Steps to Nourishing Self-Esteem

1. Avoid generic positive affirmations.

Positive affirmations are like empty calories. You can tell yourself you’re great but if you don’t really believe it, your mind will reject the affirmation and make you feel worse as a result. Affirmations only work when they fall within the range of believability, and for people with low self-esteem, they usually don’t.

2. Identify areas of authentic strength or competency.

To begin building your self-esteem, you have to identify what you’re good at, what you do well, or what you do that other people appreciate. It can be something small, a single small step in the right direction, but it has to be something. If John were a champion video game player, that could have done the trick. But he wasn’t that dedicated. As a result, the hours he spent playing did not provide his self-esteem any emotional nourishment.

3. Demonstrate ability.

Once you’ve identified an area of strength, find ways to demonstrate it. You’re a good bowler, join a bowling league. If you’re a good writer, post an essay to a blog. If you’re a good planner, organize the family reunion. Engage in the things you do well.

4. Learn to tolerate positive feedback.

When our self-esteem is low we become resistant to compliments. (See “Why Some People Hate Compliments.”) Work on accepting compliments graciously (a simple “thank you” is sufficient). Hard as it might feel to do so, especially at first, being able to receive compliments is very important for those seeking to nourish their self-esteem.

5. Self-affirm.

Once you’ve demonstrated your ability, allow yourself to feel good about it, proud, satisfied, or pleased with yourself. Self-affirmations are specifically crafted positive messages we can give ourselves based on our true strengths (e.g., I’m a fantastic cook). Realize it is not arrogant to feel proud of the things you are actually good at, whatever they are, as when your self-esteem is low, every ounce of emotional nourishment helps. (See “The Difference between Pride and Arrogance.“)

Self-esteem is not fueled by hope—“I’ll be successful any day now”—or by false beliefs—“I’m the greatest.” It’s fueled by authentic experiences of competence and ability, and well-deserved feedback. If those are lacking in your life, take action to bring them into your daily experience by demonstrating your abilities and opening yourself up to positive feedback (from yourself as well as from others) once you do.

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