What If Protecting Yourself Is the Honest Thing to Do?

Cycle breakers are often raised to believe that honesty = full disclosure and transparency… even when the other person has a history of weaponizing that honesty against them.

In this episode of You’re Not Crazy, we’re digging into the messy middle between brutal honesty and self-abandonment—especially when it comes to dealing with parents who have borderline personality disorder (BPD) or narcissistic personality disorder (NPD).

So many of us value being open and real because we didn’t get that growing up. But when it comes to setting boundaries with toxic parents, that same desire to be transparent can backfire—leaving us feeling overexposed, manipulated, and unsafe.

In this episode, I’m sharing:

• The difference between honesty and over-disclosure
• How I decide what to share (and not share) on this podcast and in my own life
• Why you don’t owe anyone—not even your parent—access to your most vulnerable truths
• And the underrated boundary no one talks about: walking away when you're being mistreated

→Ready to learn why your boundaries haven’t been working—and what to do instead? Grab my free mini-course at confidentboundaries.com/course

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Disclaimer: This podcast is not therapy. If you’re in crisis, please call the 988 Crisis Lifeline.

You're Not Crazy is owned and produced by Torie Wiksell and Confident Boundaries, LLC.

Episode Transcript

Torie Wiksell (00:14):
Welcome to You're Not Crazy, a podcast for the
adult children of parents withborderline and narcissistic
personality disorders.
I'm your host, tori Wixel, atherapist and coach with over a
decade of experience in themental health field.
Now let's jump in.
Hi guys, welcome back to thepodcast this week.

(00:34):
I am so excited to be back withyou.
If you can hear it in my voice,I'm still trying to get over
this cold, or COVID, or whateverit was, that I picked up from
my toddler two weeks ago.
It is happening.
It is just a slow process.
I ended up losing my voicecompletely for three or four

(00:54):
days last week.
That was a journey in and ofitself, since I talk all day
long, both personally andprofessionally, so that was
quite the experience.
But, as you can hear, mypersonally and professionally,
so that was quite the experience.
But, as you can hear, my voiceis back.
It's just not back to 100%.
So hopefully by this time nextweek I will be sounding like
myself again.

(01:15):
I wanted to let you know that Iwill be recording a bonus
episode of the You're Not Crazypodcast.
It will be posted for all ofthe Confident Boundary members
and bonus podcast episodesubscribers.
Over the last week or two, I'veasked people in the membership

(01:36):
to send me their questions andthey've sent some really great
ones in, so I'm really excitedand I think I'm going to start
doing this every so often.
I think I'm going to devote oneof the two monthly bonus
podcast episodes to a questionanswer session.
So if you're interested inchecking those out, check the

(01:58):
show notes.
Everyone in the ConfidentBoundaries membership gets
access to bonus podcast episodes, or you can subscribe just to
the bonus podcast episodes aswell, so definitely check that
out.
It's going to be a greatepisode.
I will probably still besounding like this when I record
it, so bear with me, but Ipromise I will get it out to you
ASAP.

(02:19):
Let's jump into the episode.
One thing I want to talk abouttoday is honesty.
For so many of the people thatI have worked with throughout
the years.
For myself, honesty is veryimportant in being an authentic
human being who is truthful anddependable and reliable.

(02:44):
These are really importantvalues to a lot of cycle
breakers.
I have noticed quite oftenpeople get really stuck on this
idea that they do not want tolie to their parent.
They don't want to withholdinformation from their parent

(03:07):
because that feels dishonest,and so I think this is worth
talking about on the podcast,because this is a place where
people really struggle withboundaries.
There is a very black and whitebelief system around this that,
I think, gets in the way a lotof times.
Not surprising we grew up in ablack and white world.

(03:28):
It is unshocking that we wouldhit a roadblock in our healing
journey due to viewing thingsthrough a black and white lens.
Before you turn your vodcast offand say, tori, I'm not
interested in you telling me Ishould start lying, hear me out.
Let me explain.
I value honesty as well.

(03:49):
I consider myself a prettyhonest person and I try to be
truthful.
What I want to say is that thereis a big difference between
being 100% honest about everyaspect of your life, with every

(04:11):
person in your life, and beingsomeone who is intentionally a
deceptive person.
Those are very extremes right.
Never telling a lie and alwayssharing every honest, detailed
answer to anything you're everasked by anyone.

(04:33):
That's a very extreme versionof honesty.
Being someone who isintentionally deceitful and
manipulative is the polar end ofthe spectrum.
Where we need to be on ourhealing journey when it comes to
most things, is somewhere inthe gray area, and by that I'm
not telling you that you need tobe deceptive at all.

(04:55):
I don't think that you have tolie at all.
I also want to reframe the waythat you're looking at being
honest.
You're not required to providethe same amount of disclosure
around your life to everyone inyour life, including your
parents.

(05:15):
It is not dishonest to onlyshare details that you are
comfortable sharing with theperson that you're sharing them
with, and I know that thatsounds like such a simple idea,
but for so many of us it'sreally not.
Because we weren't allowed tohave thoughts that were our own

(05:38):
growing up, we were not allowedto have our own opinions or
views or desires or plans thatdiffered from what our parent
wanted for us, and the idea ofstanding firm in our truth and

(05:59):
our voice and our opinions issomething that we've had to work
really hard for, and so I getit, because I've lived it too,
and I still do.
I still live this.
I want to be authentically me.
I want to be the version of methat I always wanted my family

(06:19):
to know and to see and tounderstand.
I want to be myself.
I don't want to be plain,pretend that feels awful, and
just the last thing I want to do.
At the same time, I'm also superintentional about what
information I share about mylife and with whom I share that

(06:43):
information.
Let's just look at the podcast.
I talk a lot about my life andmy journey on the podcast.
There are also things about mylife and my journey that I will
never share on the podcast.
There are details, there areexperiences, there are things
that I have dealt withthroughout my life many of them,

(07:07):
but not all of them in regardsto the relationship with my mom
growing up, and there are a lotof things that I would never
tell anyone outside my closest,most intimate circle of people.
Those are people liketherapists, my spouse, my

(07:28):
closest girlfriends.
I would never share thatinformation with people outside
of my most intimate circlebecause that information, those
experiences that I've lived,these things are very
emotionally vulnerable for me.
There are things that I'm stillworking on healing because I'm

(07:52):
human.
We never cross a finish linewhen it comes to that.
There are things where, if Iwere to share it and people were
to take that and misconstrue itor criticize me for it, these
are things that I would feel aton of pain around.

(08:15):
It would be really hard for meto deal with.
The things that I share on thispodcast are things that I have
done a lot of healing workaround.
If someone were to listen tothis podcast and have something
negative or critical to sayabout it, I mean to be honest it

(08:35):
would make me feel sad, but notbecause I expose part of my
trauma.
It wouldn't lead to me beingfurther traumatized.
It makes me sad when I seesomeone ranks the podcast one
star.
That makes me sad because Ilove this podcast and I put a
lot of time and energy into itand I care about it and I want

(08:59):
it to be helpful.
So those things make me sad,but they don't make me sad
because I have given someoneaccess to a part of me and my
story that I'm still figuringout and I'm still working out,
and that is a really roundaboutway of saying that.
I think it's so important thatwhen we look at honesty and

(09:21):
being honest with people,including, but not limited to,
our parents we need to reallylook at it through this lens of.
It's not about tellingeverything that I'm asked or
nothing at all.
It's about creating boundariesaround how much of my personal

(09:42):
world, how much of my life andmy feelings and my plans and my
actions and my goals do they getaccess to, and only you get to
decide that for yourself.
Only I get to decide that formyself.
But that should be an activedecision.
That is a big part of healing.

(10:04):
It is looking at healingthrough this really gray lens,
this very flexible lens of I canwithhold parts of myself that
are not safe with my parent, andthat is not a deceitful or a
dishonest thing to do.

(10:24):
I can just say no if they askme something that I don't want
to share with them.
If they ask me for informationand I don't want their feedback
on it, I can just decline toanswer.
Something came up during a groupcoaching call last week and

(10:45):
this was such a great point.
One of the people in thecoaching call had said if your
parent is mistreating you, youare allowed to get up and walk
away, no matter where you are.
Even if you're in a familytherapy session, you're allowed
to get up and leave.
That is something you areallowed to do, and I think this

(11:09):
is such an important thing tocall out and to say out loud,
because it is so true you do nothave to be an audience for your
parent while they aremistreating you.
You don't have to give themthat audience.
Yeah, it's going to piss themoff if you don't, but okay,
that's their journey.

(11:29):
They're already pissed off.
You do not have to give them anaudience to go through their
drama situation, their beratingyou, their criticizing you,
their shaming you.
You don't have to take it.
When you were a kid, you didn'thave a choice, but as an adult,

(11:52):
you very much have a choice nowand you don't have to give them
that audience.
You don't have to tell themaspects of your life that you
don't trust them with respectingor treating kindly you know.
Again, coming back to my closecircle, these are people who I
trust completely.

(12:14):
These are people who I've liveda lot of life with, I've known
for a very long time, who haveshown me that they are worthy of
my trust because they don'tthrow things back in my face
when they're upset with me.
They don't threaten me, theydon't misuse vulnerable

(12:36):
information that I've sharedwith them.
These are safe people who careabout me and respect me and want
the best for me, and so I think, when you're really looking at
being a truthful and honestperson and figuring out how to
be that person in yourrelationship with your parent,

(12:57):
that it's really important toremember your parent that it's
really important to remember.
Your parent is not a safeperson to be open and honest
about with everything.
If they were, you wouldn't behere listening to my podcast
right now.
You're here because they're nota safe person, and so I really
want you to think about creatingboundaries around honesty that

(13:20):
respect your well-being andprioritize your sense of safety.
That is my philosophy onhonesty when it comes to being a
cycle breaker and looking atthings through a more flexible
lens that offers self-protection, so that we can heal and get

(13:44):
out of this cycle of meeting ourparents' needs before we meet
our own, because we all deserveso much better than that.
Thank you so much, as always,for joining me for this episode
of the You're Not Crazy podcast.

(14:06):
If you haven't already, hop onover to confidentboundariescom
slash course and sign up for myfree mini course why your
Boundaries Aren't Working Withyour Toxic Parent.
When you sign up, you'll getaccess to a super easy to breeze
through mini course.
There's a 15-minute video,which is the meat of the course,

(14:28):
a couple shorter videos thatare one or two minutes each, and
a mini workbook with twoworksheets that are really going
to help give you clarity as towhy your boundaries haven't
worked thus far.
This is the step one beforeyou're ready to take my
boundaries workshop.
So head on over there, sign upand I'll see you next week.

(14:52):
Bye.
Thanks so much for joining mefor another week of You're Not
Crazy.
If you like the podcast, pleasemake sure to rate us five stars
and leave a review.
It helps so much.
And make sure to check the shownotes for discounts and updates
of what's going on in my world.
Okay, I'll see you next week.