June 2, 2025 • 18 mins
Leaving a Narcissistic Parent // How to Emotionally Distance from a Narcissistic Parent
This episode came from a YouTube listener’s question on how to leave a narcissistic relationship — and for me, that brought up one of the hardest experiences I’ve worked through: leaving a narcissistic parent.
In this episode, I share my personal story of growing up with a narcissistic parent and what the emotional process of leaving really looked like — because it wasn’t clean, it wasn’t quick, and it definitely didn’t happen all at once.
These relationships aren’t just painful — they’re confusing. A narcissistic parent relationship can blur your sense of self so much that you don’t even realise how far you’ve lost your voice until you start to get it back.
Here’s what I share in this episode:
-
Why leaving a narcissistic parent feels emotionally impossible
-
A personal story from one of the most painful moments of my life — and how my dad’s reaction made everything painfully clear
-
How shame, guilt, and emotional manipulation kept me stuck for years
-
Why therapy became the turning point — and what it felt like to hear a professional say, “It’s not you.”
-
What rebuilding self-trust actually looked like (and why I couldn’t do it alone)
If you’re in a relationship with a narcissistic parent where everything is always about them, where your feelings are minimized, and you constantly question yourself — please know: You are not too sensitive. You’re not broken. And you are not alone.
This isn’t about blame. It’s about choosing your mental health. It’s about honoring your truth — even when that means walking away from someone who was supposed to love you.
Recommendations from this episode //
📚 Earth To Moon by Moon Unit Zappa 👉 https://www.amazon.com.au/Earth-Moon-Memoir-Unit-Zappa/dp/0063113341
📚 I'm Glad My Mom Died by Jennette McCurdy 👉 https://amzn.asia/d/gfSBzJt
🧠 Havening Therapy 👉 https://www.havening.org/directory/grid/practitioners-list-grid
🧠 EMDR Therapy 👉 https://www.emdr.com/what-is-emdr/
Join the email community // Get reflections, insights, and practical tools to support your personal development journey—delivered straight to your inbox. 👉 https://selfdevelopmentcollective.com/email-sign-up/
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:01):
Hi there.
My name is Giulia, and welcome tothe Self-Development Collective.
Here we explore personal developmentin a way that honors all parts of
ourselves, including the tricky parts.
I share genuine stories andreflections mixed with ideas from
psychotherapy and self-developmentto help us figure out how to live
more authentically and build deeperconnections with ourselves and others.
(00:21):
I am so excited to have you here.
Hey guys, and welcome to this episodeof The Self-Development Collective.
Now, in this episode today, I wantedto bring to you an episode about how to
get out of a narcissistic relationship.
This was a topic requested onYouTube by a YouTube listener.
So thank you very much for this.
I do wanna start by saying that I amtalking from having a narcissistic parent,
(00:44):
this is something that I worked extremelyhard over the years with my therapist.
I loved this question because I had theintention of talking about, what to do
when we are ready to emotionally distanceourselves, from a narcissistic parent.
this person had a great specificquestion, how to get out of
a narcissistic relationship
(01:06):
leave that relationship becausein many ways it is challenging
to leave, especially the parentrelationship is tricky because there
are so many other ties involved.
You've got other family members whoI know from my experience, especially
with cultural expectations, didn'taccept the choices that I made.
They really struggled with them,and I think that's just a reflection
of their values and I completelyunderstand that perspective.
(01:29):
But knowing who I am now andthe choices I make, I know that.
I have to make the choices that areright for my mental health, even when it
doesn't align with someone else's values.
And even if that personis important to me.
I think that's just a practiceof learning boundaries.
But how do we actually get outof a relationship like this?
The thing with narcissistic relationships,to be honest, makes me feel a bit icky
(01:51):
talking about it because that part of me
still struggles.
Talking about this is quite challengingbecause narcissistic relationships,
have this way of, manipulation.
They have this, way of making it likeit's you and you are so in their world
that you just don't know otherwise.
It really is their storyand everything feels.
(02:13):
Like for example, if I think of my dad andI think of the relationship with my dad, I
didn't see any red flags because I was sofar into his world that they didn't exist.
My own version of things, myown opinion was non-existent.
Because unless it was somethinghe agreed with, it usually wasn't
something that was supported.
So I think the biggest thing withnarcissistic relationships, if we
(02:34):
are finding ourselves in them, isfirstly to ask where they might exist
within our history because if we'reused to being in a caregiving role,
if we have been through a trickychildhood where maybe manipulation or
neglect were part of those stories,
narcissistic relationships can betricky because if we haven't developed
a firmer sense of self through ourchildhood and through our early teenage
years, narcissistic relationships,that's their green flag because
(02:58):
they make things about themselves.
It is their world.
It is about making themselves feelbetter, and it is so easy to get caught
up in that world where we don't exist.
So let's get into it.
Now I wanna give you an exampleof a memory that came up when I
started thinking about this work, therelationship and what it was like.
So when my brother was, reallyunwell, we found out that his
(03:19):
brain cancer had progressed.
We made the decision to takehim to Germany for treatment.
We, at the time felt like the optionshere were limited, so we went there.
It cost a lot to go there.
It cost over a hundred thousanddollars for the treatment.
I had a discussion with my mom and she wassaying how she was gonna sell the house.
And I was like, I don't think that'sa good idea, because things are really
(03:39):
tough as it is, and to have no hometo come to, was a really hard idea.
But also my mom had workedreally hard throughout her life.
I don't even know if we would'vehad time to sell the house and
move and do all of that with this.
We were.
Time poor, so I was like,i'm gonna raise the money.
So I went and created this GoFundMe,and at the time my dad had moved away.
My dad moved away when my brother'ssituation had stabilized, but it was
(04:02):
only stabilized for, about a year.
So what happened was he had leftand we weren't really, from my
understanding, getting money from him.
I know I wasn't, I know my brother wasn't.
And my mom had struggled to get.
Money from him, although I'm entirelysure that that was a different story
that he told other people, which isagain, another thing, narcissistic,
people have this great skill ofmaking themselves out to be completely
(04:25):
different in their outer relationships.
They're often seen as charismatic.
And my dad was fun and charismaticand amazing and supported to other
people, coached all my, I had onecousin that was oh, he's just amazing.
He just helps me through everything.
And I think they can come across likethat to outer relationships, but the
inner relationships are very different.
And I think being a child ofnarcissistic parent is another one
(04:46):
because they are very role based.
It's about them.
They are the parent, they are incharge, and there's a sense of
entitlement with that too, right?
I've gone on and I've raisedmoney and I've done all this work.
And I didn't mention him becauseat the time he wasn't in our
lives and he hadn't contributed.
Part of the challenge wasbecause he wasn't contributing.
So I didn't say anything about him at all.
(05:08):
I just left him out and I wrote abouthow my mom was still working and she
was struggling herself, which was true.
We were spending a fortune on differenttherapies for my brother, really trying.
He had brain cancer, which turnedinto a grade three brain tumor.
So we were time crunched.
We knew that, and we knewthat we were limited.
And so we were trying alldifferent therapies and
things were really expensive.
(05:29):
My mom's wage was everythingwas going to that, right?
So I decided to raise the money.
I did that.
And I'll never forget the call Igot from my dad where he was livid.
And that is another thing, right?
Narcissists, they know howto make you feel small.
And they will do thatwhen they feel small.
They are going to transfer thatfeeling that they do not wanna feel
and they're going to give it to you.
(05:50):
And that is what mydad did in that moment.
He called me because at the time Ididn't really consider the cultural.
Implications of my choice, right?
I had something to do.
I was determined I was gonnaraise that money and I was gonna
help my brother, and I did it.
I didn't think about what other peoplewould think about it because I didn't
have the luxury to think of that.
My dad called me.
He was livid, and angry.
(06:11):
And I remember him saying,you didn't even mention me.
It's like, I don't even exist.
Who do you think you are?
And another thing that I thinknarcissists do is they give you
this vibe again, entitlement.
Something, that he said to me was,without me, you would be nothing.
You wouldn't have the house that you have.
And by the way, the house hewas talking about was my family
home that he built with my mom.
And I was like, listen, it wasyour choice to have kids and it was
(06:33):
your choice to build that house.
And while I'm eternally gratefulto have a physical safe space, they
just put that on you and they expectyou to feel grateful for the choices
that they made, if that makes sense.
The sacrifices, they want to really beseen for their sacrifices and they feel
that you owe them for those sacrifices.
And that was the hard part.
So it's really interesting becauseif I look back at it now, right?
(06:55):
We were in a really tricky situation.
I was trying to help my brother.
We didn't have the money wedidn't even raise enough.
I think we got help from morefamily members, but even so,
everyone was so generous.
Amazing.
The cost of it was that expensiveand instead of acknowledging the
fact that I had raised the money.
To help my brother.
He hammered me so badly.
Honestly, I can't even remember entirelybecause I think that part of me that
(07:18):
felt so shamed by, it doesn't evenwanna remember, but I felt so bad.
I felt so badly about that.
My brother, I'll never forget, my brotherlooked at me and he said, thank you.
He was trying to say he knewhow much I was copying it.
And he was like, thank you.
And I remember looking at himsaying, I do it all again.
I do it all again for you, becauseI think that's the thing, right?
(07:39):
When we are stuck in thatworld of narcissism, it can be
really hard to see out of it.
And I had already started tosee out of it at that point.
So while I was really upset, I wasable to look at it and go, okay,
this is not entirely about me.
He doesn't like the fact thathe wasn't included in the
way that he looks to others.
Right.
But the reality of it was, I just hadn'tmentioned him because he wasn't involved.
That was just the truth of it for me.
(08:01):
So I think the thing is withnarcissistic relationships, they
usually work in one direction.
It's usually theirs.
So it's never about you.
I think I remember readingthat, narcissists see their
kids as an extension of them.
And I think that comes in so many forms.
In narcissistic relationships,it can be challenging because the
minute you start to question them, itbecomes a threat to their identity.
And so it gets worse.
(08:21):
It gets a lot harder.
I remember once I was upset aboutsomething with my dad, I was upset about
a choice he made and I was crying onthe phone and he was like, listen to
yourself, you should be embarrassed.
These are the types of things hewould say, when I was upset, which
is it's hard to imagine a parentlike that and I think it's hard to
be in a relationship like that too.
When I think of other people I knowhave been in challenging relationships
(08:43):
with narcissists, I can hear.
The things that they wouldtell me, they tend to go for
those character attacks, right?
Like, you are this type of person,you are that type of person.
You can't do this, youshouldn't be doing that.
And again, we're so far into thatworld that we start to believe it.
So this is leading to my point.
How do we get out of a relationshipthat we are so far in that
we can no longer see out of?
(09:04):
I don't think that I would've been ableto get out of things the way that I did
without seeing the therapist that I saw.
When we're in a narcissistic relationship,when we're stuck in their world, we
sacrifice our sense of self, if we goto them and we're upset about something,
I know for me, in my experience,it got narrowed down to nothing.
It wasn't really acknowledged.
What happens is we learn totrust their voice over our own.
(09:27):
We are so used to going to themfor approval and understanding,
because if we don't, then we usuallybear the challenging parts of
narcissism we bear the abuse of it.
I think that when people talk aboutgetting out of relationships but when
I sit back and I think about that,there was no way I was gonna be able
to get out of that by telling myself,
you can know that you're ina narcissistic relationship.
(09:48):
You can see the red flags.
There's still a part of youthat is so used to being
silenced that you question it.
You question your own thinking somuch, and you trust them so much
because that's part of what makesthem feel bigger, you're constantly
going to them, you are seeking theirvalidation, you're seeking their support.
(10:08):
we are not in a space where we'restuck in that relationship with
ourselves, where we don't have anyself-trust that listening to ourselves
and being like, this isn't right.
The way you're treating me isn't right.
I just don't think that that would'vebeen enough for me to get out of it.
I do think that having anexternal third party unbiased
voice was what saved me because.
Even within my own family structure, if Itried to point out different things that
(10:32):
my dad was doing, it wasn't acknowledged.
Narcissists can come across.
Extremely charming.
So the experience of other peoplearound us that know us is different.
And they might not see the red flagsin the way that a professional might or
someone who's been in that relationshipand already gotten out of it.
So this is the key pointthat I want to make.
When we are trying to get out of anarcissistic relationship and validate
(10:53):
our experience, I think the best way,is to continue to use that external
strategy but find someone else.
To trust in, to trust their view.
What happened was I was talking tothis therapist for two sessions, I
spoke to her telling her about my dadand what was happening, and she looked
at me and she said, he's difficult.
I remember the moment andI thought, so it's not me.
(11:16):
Mind blown.
You don't know me, you'rejust hearing my experience.
You don't know my family youare hearing what's happening and
highlighting to me it's not me.
And I just couldn't get past thatbecause I had spent majority of
my life thinking that it was,and I was so stuck in that world.
That it was always me.
In Narcissistic relationships,it's always going to make you need
(11:38):
to be small for them to function.
And so I was tiny and when she saidthat to me, she was the one that
highlighted to me about narcissistic.
And she was in Australia.
She was what's called aclinical psychologist.
A clinical psychologist in Australiais actually able to diagnose.
And so from that perspective, shewas that was her job to diagnose.
She was the one that told me my dad wasnarcissistic, and I couldn't believe it.
(12:00):
I was like, what do you mean?
So if you feel like you are, in thissituation, my biggest piece of advice
is, allow others to validate your storywhen you can't believe yourself yet.
Because I did not have the inner trustto believe what was happening for me
yet, I needed an external perspective,and I want to share with you two other
(12:22):
ways to do that because not everyonecan afford a therapist, I was extremely
fortunate that I could at that point, andhonestly, that was a turning point in my
life, I could not come back from that.
She had pulled the veil from my eyeseven now, I think about how that
tiny moment shifted my entire life.
And so if you feel like you're ina narcissistic relationship, that
validation becomes a key player.
(12:42):
Because we can't find our ownvoice, but we can lean on other
people's voices until we can.
And that's something that I did.
I leaned on her voice and thenI started learning and reading.
I want to give you two memoirs that I'veread recently so the first one is, I'm
glad my Mother died by Jeanette McCurdy.
That's about a narcissistic motherand, earth to moon by moon unit zapper.
(13:04):
And that's about a narcissistic dad,I just read that three weeks ago
and my therapist recommended it andI went into her last week and said
to her, oh my God, that's my dad.
And she was like, yeah.
I think it's important to continuouslylean on those voices that have
survived until we can find our own.
By Survived, I mean gotten outof the relationship themselves.
Right.
Have survived the relationshipin the sense they are.
(13:28):
Free from it can recognizeit, and reflect on it.
And so these two were really good.
Another one is, YouTubehas great resources.
There's a particular speaker, apsychologist that talks about,
narcissistic relationships the redflags and strategies around what to do.
I think that continuouslyreinforcing those stories.
is important in that first stepof recognizing where you are and
(13:50):
starting to build that self trust.
Because by telling ourselves that we needto get out of it is often not going to be
enough because we have made ourselves sosmall and the self-trust is not there yet.
If I had tried to listen to myself,I knew, I knew that something
wasn't right, but I just didn'ttrust myself enough to follow it.
But when I heard it from someone else,that was when I found the courage and the
validation to start moving towards that.
(14:12):
Now, the second thing I did, which issomething I wanna talk to you about
as well, is with this particulartherapist, I did what was called EMDR.
The second thing that I wanna talkabout is the fear of the reaction that
we're gonna get when we start settingboundaries with a narcissistic person.
I knew with my dad itwas not gonna happen.
I remember once, I was doing some work andhe came in, to my mom's house and he was
(14:36):
telling me what to do and I looked at himand I said, I didn't ask for your opinion.
I knew that that was gonna.
Fire him up.
But also I didn't know howelse to set boundaries.
Now, I probably would've, if this wassomething that was happening now and I
don't see my dad, but if I did, I wouldleave the room or I would make sure that
I had a buffer, like a person near me.
That was the best way I knew what todo, and I remember him being livid
(14:58):
to the point where it nearlyescalated into a physical argument,
and someone had to step in.
My mom had to step in between us becauseI was just trying to set that boundary.
You keep telling me what to doall the time and how I should be.
And I remember just looking athim and being no, I've, I'm done.
I can't do this.
And so what happened was to do that, Iactually did EMDR with a therapist because
(15:20):
I was so frightened of his response.
I was so scared of what he wasgonna say, what he was gonna do.
And so EMDR, was about helpingto desensitize myself to his
reaction and reduce the emotionalcharge I had, which allowed me to
start setting those boundaries.
There's two types of therapiesthat I would love to talk about,
which is HAVENING and EMDR.
(15:41):
I do a lot of havening with my therapist.
That's another one to lookinto, but EMDR is another one.
This one's more about rewiring the brainto cope with the response we're gonna
get from them, because it can be reallytriggering and we can get very frightened
and overwhelmed really quickly whenwe are starting to shift our role in
a narcissistic relationship, or we'retrying to exit that relationship, which
(16:02):
for me, started with shifting my rolein that relationship and to do that and
to really feel like we can do it andnot be overwhelmed by the experience.
HAVENING and EMDR are two really great.
Psychotherapies they are notsomething that I can teach.
But I would look for an EMDR or ahavening therapist to help work on the
fear around exiting that relationship.
(16:23):
The fear around having your own voice,the fear around the disconnection when
it comes to narcissistic relationships.
So when I did that EMDR, I remember.
Not being super phased by his response.
I would still get scared.
That's just my experience.
Someone was always there with me.
I did remember feelinglike he would lose it.
He would get upset.
(16:43):
and I would be like.
Nah, I'm not doing this anymore.
I wanna summarize what I personallysuggest from my experience.
Start small.
I think that learning to trust ourselvesdoes begin with taking action, but we
still need, seek that external validationat the beginning of making those changes.
Trying to change that strategyoff the bat is too hard to start
(17:04):
listening to ourselves more.
Personally, I needed that external help.
I needed that therapist.
I needed to hear the memoirs.
To delve into that world ofunderstanding, other people's experiences.
Out of all of them, the memoirswere the most powerful because they
gave me examples of people that hadstepped out of those relationships
it gave me the courage, the memoirscan be really helpful because they
give us examples of people that havedone it, they become inspirational.
(17:28):
They become a form of selfvalidation for us, and again, a
therapist is another way to do that.
Relying on those YouTube videos,getting out there and hearing other
people's stories around that is.
Really important.
And the EMDR and havening,that was one session.
I didn't do EMDR again orHavening, until, four years later.
(17:49):
And that EMDR again was part of thatsupport of helping me to feel less afraid,
less reactive to his response, whichI was so used to, basing my life on.
Those were the stepsthat I would start with.
These Are the things that helpedme to get out of it, to survive
it, to start trusting myself.
(18:09):
I hope that to the person whorequested this directly, I
send you my thoughts, my love.
I know how tricky theserelationships can be.
I'm thinking of you and I hope that youfind these starting steps supportive.
Definitely have a look at the memoirs.
They're the most accessible andother people's stories have a way
of empowering us to do the same.
(18:30):
I'm sending you my thoughts andthank you for requesting this.
I will be tagging you on YouTube.
Thank you to the rest of the listeners.
I will catch you in the next episode.
Hi there.
My name is Giulia, and welcome tothe Self-Development Collective.
Here we explore personal developmentin a way that honors all parts of
ourselves, including the tricky parts.
I share genuine stories andreflections mixed with ideas from
psychotherapy and self-developmentto help us figure out how to live
more authentically and build deeperconnections with ourselves and others.
(00:21):
I am so excited to have you here.
Hey guys, and welcome to this episodeof The Self-Development Collective.
Now, in this episode today, I wantedto bring to you an episode about how to
get out of a narcissistic relationship.
This was a topic requested onYouTube by a YouTube listener.
So thank you very much for this.
I do wanna start by saying that I amtalking from having a narcissistic parent,
(00:44):
this is something that I worked extremelyhard over the years with my therapist.
I loved this question because I had theintention of talking about, what to do
when we are ready to emotionally distanceourselves, from a narcissistic parent.
this person had a great specificquestion, how to get out of
a narcissistic relationship
(01:06):
leave that relationship becausein many ways it is challenging
to leave, especially the parentrelationship is tricky because there
are so many other ties involved.
You've got other family members whoI know from my experience, especially
with cultural expectations, didn'taccept the choices that I made.
They really struggled with them,and I think that's just a reflection
of their values and I completelyunderstand that perspective.
(01:29):
But knowing who I am now andthe choices I make, I know that.
I have to make the choices that areright for my mental health, even when it
doesn't align with someone else's values.
And even if that personis important to me.
I think that's just a practiceof learning boundaries.
But how do we actually get outof a relationship like this?
The thing with narcissistic relationships,to be honest, makes me feel a bit icky
(01:51):
talking about it because that part of me
still struggles.
Talking about this is quite challengingbecause narcissistic relationships,
have this way of, manipulation.
They have this, way of making it likeit's you and you are so in their world
that you just don't know otherwise.
It really is their storyand everything feels.
(02:13):
Like for example, if I think of my dad andI think of the relationship with my dad, I
didn't see any red flags because I was sofar into his world that they didn't exist.
My own version of things, myown opinion was non-existent.
Because unless it was somethinghe agreed with, it usually wasn't
something that was supported.
So I think the biggest thing withnarcissistic relationships, if we
(02:34):
are finding ourselves in them, isfirstly to ask where they might exist
within our history because if we'reused to being in a caregiving role,
if we have been through a trickychildhood where maybe manipulation or
neglect were part of those stories,
narcissistic relationships can betricky because if we haven't developed
a firmer sense of self through ourchildhood and through our early teenage
years, narcissistic relationships,that's their green flag because
(02:58):
they make things about themselves.
It is their world.
It is about making themselves feelbetter, and it is so easy to get caught
up in that world where we don't exist.
So let's get into it.
Now I wanna give you an exampleof a memory that came up when I
started thinking about this work, therelationship and what it was like.
So when my brother was, reallyunwell, we found out that his
(03:19):
brain cancer had progressed.
We made the decision to takehim to Germany for treatment.
We, at the time felt like the optionshere were limited, so we went there.
It cost a lot to go there.
It cost over a hundred thousanddollars for the treatment.
I had a discussion with my mom and she wassaying how she was gonna sell the house.
And I was like, I don't think that'sa good idea, because things are really
(03:39):
tough as it is, and to have no hometo come to, was a really hard idea.
But also my mom had workedreally hard throughout her life.
I don't even know if we would'vehad time to sell the house and
move and do all of that with this.
We were.
Time poor, so I was like,i'm gonna raise the money.
So I went and created this GoFundMe,and at the time my dad had moved away.
My dad moved away when my brother'ssituation had stabilized, but it was
(04:02):
only stabilized for, about a year.
So what happened was he had leftand we weren't really, from my
understanding, getting money from him.
I know I wasn't, I know my brother wasn't.
And my mom had struggled to get.
Money from him, although I'm entirelysure that that was a different story
that he told other people, which isagain, another thing, narcissistic,
people have this great skill ofmaking themselves out to be completely
(04:25):
different in their outer relationships.
They're often seen as charismatic.
And my dad was fun and charismaticand amazing and supported to other
people, coached all my, I had onecousin that was oh, he's just amazing.
He just helps me through everything.
And I think they can come across likethat to outer relationships, but the
inner relationships are very different.
And I think being a child ofnarcissistic parent is another one
(04:46):
because they are very role based.
It's about them.
They are the parent, they are incharge, and there's a sense of
entitlement with that too, right?
I've gone on and I've raisedmoney and I've done all this work.
And I didn't mention him becauseat the time he wasn't in our
lives and he hadn't contributed.
Part of the challenge wasbecause he wasn't contributing.
So I didn't say anything about him at all.
(05:08):
I just left him out and I wrote abouthow my mom was still working and she
was struggling herself, which was true.
We were spending a fortune on differenttherapies for my brother, really trying.
He had brain cancer, which turnedinto a grade three brain tumor.
So we were time crunched.
We knew that, and we knewthat we were limited.
And so we were trying alldifferent therapies and
things were really expensive.
(05:29):
My mom's wage was everythingwas going to that, right?
So I decided to raise the money.
I did that.
And I'll never forget the call Igot from my dad where he was livid.
And that is another thing, right?
Narcissists, they know howto make you feel small.
And they will do thatwhen they feel small.
They are going to transfer thatfeeling that they do not wanna feel
and they're going to give it to you.
(05:50):
And that is what mydad did in that moment.
He called me because at the time Ididn't really consider the cultural.
Implications of my choice, right?
I had something to do.
I was determined I was gonnaraise that money and I was gonna
help my brother, and I did it.
I didn't think about what other peoplewould think about it because I didn't
have the luxury to think of that.
My dad called me.
He was livid, and angry.
(06:11):
And I remember him saying,you didn't even mention me.
It's like, I don't even exist.
Who do you think you are?
And another thing that I thinknarcissists do is they give you
this vibe again, entitlement.
Something, that he said to me was,without me, you would be nothing.
You wouldn't have the house that you have.
And by the way, the house hewas talking about was my family
home that he built with my mom.
And I was like, listen, it wasyour choice to have kids and it was
(06:33):
your choice to build that house.
And while I'm eternally gratefulto have a physical safe space, they
just put that on you and they expectyou to feel grateful for the choices
that they made, if that makes sense.
The sacrifices, they want to really beseen for their sacrifices and they feel
that you owe them for those sacrifices.
And that was the hard part.
So it's really interesting becauseif I look back at it now, right?
(06:55):
We were in a really tricky situation.
I was trying to help my brother.
We didn't have the money wedidn't even raise enough.
I think we got help from morefamily members, but even so,
everyone was so generous.
Amazing.
The cost of it was that expensiveand instead of acknowledging the
fact that I had raised the money.
To help my brother.
He hammered me so badly.
Honestly, I can't even remember entirelybecause I think that part of me that
(07:18):
felt so shamed by, it doesn't evenwanna remember, but I felt so bad.
I felt so badly about that.
My brother, I'll never forget, my brotherlooked at me and he said, thank you.
He was trying to say he knewhow much I was copying it.
And he was like, thank you.
And I remember looking at himsaying, I do it all again.
I do it all again for you, becauseI think that's the thing, right?
(07:39):
When we are stuck in thatworld of narcissism, it can be
really hard to see out of it.
And I had already started tosee out of it at that point.
So while I was really upset, I wasable to look at it and go, okay,
this is not entirely about me.
He doesn't like the fact thathe wasn't included in the
way that he looks to others.
Right.
But the reality of it was, I just hadn'tmentioned him because he wasn't involved.
That was just the truth of it for me.
(08:01):
So I think the thing is withnarcissistic relationships, they
usually work in one direction.
It's usually theirs.
So it's never about you.
I think I remember readingthat, narcissists see their
kids as an extension of them.
And I think that comes in so many forms.
In narcissistic relationships,it can be challenging because the
minute you start to question them, itbecomes a threat to their identity.
And so it gets worse.
(08:21):
It gets a lot harder.
I remember once I was upset aboutsomething with my dad, I was upset about
a choice he made and I was crying onthe phone and he was like, listen to
yourself, you should be embarrassed.
These are the types of things hewould say, when I was upset, which
is it's hard to imagine a parentlike that and I think it's hard to
be in a relationship like that too.
When I think of other people I knowhave been in challenging relationships
(08:43):
with narcissists, I can hear.
The things that they wouldtell me, they tend to go for
those character attacks, right?
Like, you are this type of person,you are that type of person.
You can't do this, youshouldn't be doing that.
And again, we're so far into thatworld that we start to believe it.
So this is leading to my point.
How do we get out of a relationshipthat we are so far in that
we can no longer see out of?
(09:04):
I don't think that I would've been ableto get out of things the way that I did
without seeing the therapist that I saw.
When we're in a narcissistic relationship,when we're stuck in their world, we
sacrifice our sense of self, if we goto them and we're upset about something,
I know for me, in my experience,it got narrowed down to nothing.
It wasn't really acknowledged.
What happens is we learn totrust their voice over our own.
(09:27):
We are so used to going to themfor approval and understanding,
because if we don't, then we usuallybear the challenging parts of
narcissism we bear the abuse of it.
I think that when people talk aboutgetting out of relationships but when
I sit back and I think about that,there was no way I was gonna be able
to get out of that by telling myself,
you can know that you're ina narcissistic relationship.
(09:48):
You can see the red flags.
There's still a part of youthat is so used to being
silenced that you question it.
You question your own thinking somuch, and you trust them so much
because that's part of what makesthem feel bigger, you're constantly
going to them, you are seeking theirvalidation, you're seeking their support.
(10:08):
we are not in a space where we'restuck in that relationship with
ourselves, where we don't have anyself-trust that listening to ourselves
and being like, this isn't right.
The way you're treating me isn't right.
I just don't think that that would'vebeen enough for me to get out of it.
I do think that having anexternal third party unbiased
voice was what saved me because.
Even within my own family structure, if Itried to point out different things that
(10:32):
my dad was doing, it wasn't acknowledged.
Narcissists can come across.
Extremely charming.
So the experience of other peoplearound us that know us is different.
And they might not see the red flagsin the way that a professional might or
someone who's been in that relationshipand already gotten out of it.
So this is the key pointthat I want to make.
When we are trying to get out of anarcissistic relationship and validate
(10:53):
our experience, I think the best way,is to continue to use that external
strategy but find someone else.
To trust in, to trust their view.
What happened was I was talking tothis therapist for two sessions, I
spoke to her telling her about my dadand what was happening, and she looked
at me and she said, he's difficult.
I remember the moment andI thought, so it's not me.
(11:16):
Mind blown.
You don't know me, you'rejust hearing my experience.
You don't know my family youare hearing what's happening and
highlighting to me it's not me.
And I just couldn't get past thatbecause I had spent majority of
my life thinking that it was,and I was so stuck in that world.
That it was always me.
In Narcissistic relationships,it's always going to make you need
(11:38):
to be small for them to function.
And so I was tiny and when she saidthat to me, she was the one that
highlighted to me about narcissistic.
And she was in Australia.
She was what's called aclinical psychologist.
A clinical psychologist in Australiais actually able to diagnose.
And so from that perspective, shewas that was her job to diagnose.
She was the one that told me my dad wasnarcissistic, and I couldn't believe it.
(12:00):
I was like, what do you mean?
So if you feel like you are, in thissituation, my biggest piece of advice
is, allow others to validate your storywhen you can't believe yourself yet.
Because I did not have the inner trustto believe what was happening for me
yet, I needed an external perspective,and I want to share with you two other
(12:22):
ways to do that because not everyonecan afford a therapist, I was extremely
fortunate that I could at that point, andhonestly, that was a turning point in my
life, I could not come back from that.
She had pulled the veil from my eyeseven now, I think about how that
tiny moment shifted my entire life.
And so if you feel like you're ina narcissistic relationship, that
validation becomes a key player.
(12:42):
Because we can't find our ownvoice, but we can lean on other
people's voices until we can.
And that's something that I did.
I leaned on her voice and thenI started learning and reading.
I want to give you two memoirs that I'veread recently so the first one is, I'm
glad my Mother died by Jeanette McCurdy.
That's about a narcissistic motherand, earth to moon by moon unit zapper.
(13:04):
And that's about a narcissistic dad,I just read that three weeks ago
and my therapist recommended it andI went into her last week and said
to her, oh my God, that's my dad.
And she was like, yeah.
I think it's important to continuouslylean on those voices that have
survived until we can find our own.
By Survived, I mean gotten outof the relationship themselves.
Right.
Have survived the relationshipin the sense they are.
(13:28):
Free from it can recognizeit, and reflect on it.
And so these two were really good.
Another one is, YouTubehas great resources.
There's a particular speaker, apsychologist that talks about,
narcissistic relationships the redflags and strategies around what to do.
I think that continuouslyreinforcing those stories.
is important in that first stepof recognizing where you are and
(13:50):
starting to build that self trust.
Because by telling ourselves that we needto get out of it is often not going to be
enough because we have made ourselves sosmall and the self-trust is not there yet.
If I had tried to listen to myself,I knew, I knew that something
wasn't right, but I just didn'ttrust myself enough to follow it.
But when I heard it from someone else,that was when I found the courage and the
validation to start moving towards that.
(14:12):
Now, the second thing I did, which issomething I wanna talk to you about
as well, is with this particulartherapist, I did what was called EMDR.
The second thing that I wanna talkabout is the fear of the reaction that
we're gonna get when we start settingboundaries with a narcissistic person.
I knew with my dad itwas not gonna happen.
I remember once, I was doing some work andhe came in, to my mom's house and he was
(14:36):
telling me what to do and I looked at himand I said, I didn't ask for your opinion.
I knew that that was gonna.
Fire him up.
But also I didn't know howelse to set boundaries.
Now, I probably would've, if this wassomething that was happening now and I
don't see my dad, but if I did, I wouldleave the room or I would make sure that
I had a buffer, like a person near me.
That was the best way I knew what todo, and I remember him being livid
(14:58):
to the point where it nearlyescalated into a physical argument,
and someone had to step in.
My mom had to step in between us becauseI was just trying to set that boundary.
You keep telling me what to doall the time and how I should be.
And I remember just looking athim and being no, I've, I'm done.
I can't do this.
And so what happened was to do that, Iactually did EMDR with a therapist because
(15:20):
I was so frightened of his response.
I was so scared of what he wasgonna say, what he was gonna do.
And so EMDR, was about helpingto desensitize myself to his
reaction and reduce the emotionalcharge I had, which allowed me to
start setting those boundaries.
There's two types of therapiesthat I would love to talk about,
which is HAVENING and EMDR.
(15:41):
I do a lot of havening with my therapist.
That's another one to lookinto, but EMDR is another one.
This one's more about rewiring the brainto cope with the response we're gonna
get from them, because it can be reallytriggering and we can get very frightened
and overwhelmed really quickly whenwe are starting to shift our role in
a narcissistic relationship, or we'retrying to exit that relationship, which
(16:02):
for me, started with shifting my rolein that relationship and to do that and
to really feel like we can do it andnot be overwhelmed by the experience.
HAVENING and EMDR are two really great.
Psychotherapies they are notsomething that I can teach.
But I would look for an EMDR or ahavening therapist to help work on the
fear around exiting that relationship.
(16:23):
The fear around having your own voice,the fear around the disconnection when
it comes to narcissistic relationships.
So when I did that EMDR, I remember.
Not being super phased by his response.
I would still get scared.
That's just my experience.
Someone was always there with me.
I did remember feelinglike he would lose it.
He would get upset.
(16:43):
and I would be like.
Nah, I'm not doing this anymore.
I wanna summarize what I personallysuggest from my experience.
Start small.
I think that learning to trust ourselvesdoes begin with taking action, but we
still need, seek that external validationat the beginning of making those changes.
Trying to change that strategyoff the bat is too hard to start
(17:04):
listening to ourselves more.
Personally, I needed that external help.
I needed that therapist.
I needed to hear the memoirs.
To delve into that world ofunderstanding, other people's experiences.
Out of all of them, the memoirswere the most powerful because they
gave me examples of people that hadstepped out of those relationships
it gave me the courage, the memoirscan be really helpful because they
give us examples of people that havedone it, they become inspirational.
(17:28):
They become a form of selfvalidation for us, and again, a
therapist is another way to do that.
Relying on those YouTube videos,getting out there and hearing other
people's stories around that is.
Really important.
And the EMDR and havening,that was one session.
I didn't do EMDR again orHavening, until, four years later.
(17:49):
And that EMDR again was part of thatsupport of helping me to feel less afraid,
less reactive to his response, whichI was so used to, basing my life on.
Those were the stepsthat I would start with.
These Are the things that helpedme to get out of it, to survive
it, to start trusting myself.
(18:09):
I hope that to the person whorequested this directly, I
send you my thoughts, my love.
I know how tricky theserelationships can be.
I'm thinking of you and I hope that youfind these starting steps supportive.
Definitely have a look at the memoirs.
They're the most accessible andother people's stories have a way
of empowering us to do the same.
(18:30):
I'm sending you my thoughts andthank you for requesting this.
I will be tagging you on YouTube.
Thank you to the rest of the listeners.
I will catch you in the next episode.
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