The Covert Narcissism Podcast

If you feel confused, unsettled, or unable to name what’s wrong in your marriage—even though nothing sounds “bad enough”—this episode is for you.

Many people living in covertly unhealthy dynamics don’t experience constant conflict or obvious explosions. Instead, they live inside a fog of mixed signals, emotional reversals, and conversations that never seem to stay where they start. This episode is designed to ground you in reality ...

Healing from covert narcissistic abuse doesn’t follow a calendar—and January doesn’t require clarity, decisions, or resolutions.

If you’re entering the new year feeling foggy, heavy, or unsure, this episode is for you. Instead of pushing urgency, motivation, or “fresh starts,” this conversation offers something survivors of covert narcissism actually need: orientation, safety, and permission to go slowly.

In this New Year’s Day epi...

In this episode, Renee Swanson discusses the challenges of navigating holidays with a covert narcissist, emphasizing the emotional toll it takes on family members. She explores the concept of survival in these relationships, the importance of self-care, and encourages listeners to shift from merely surviving to thriving in their lives. The conversation highlights the need for awareness and understanding of emotional manipulation, a...

In this Christmas-themed episode, Renee Swanson explores the impact of covert narcissism on personal relationships, particularly during the holiday season. Using the metaphor of the Grinch, she discusses how covert narcissists can subtly steal joy, anticipation, and traditions, leaving individuals feeling hollow and anxious. However, she emphasizes the importance of community and reclaiming one's truth, integrity, and peace, encour...

Covert narcissism in marriage keeps survivors trapped by the belief that if they just tried harder, the relationship would finally improve.
If you’re exhausted from over-functioning, self-blame, and emotional gymnastics in a narcissistic marriage, this episode is for anyone questioning whether the problem was ever really you.

In this episode, we unpack one of the most damaging beliefs in narcissistic abuse: “If you leave, it’s becau...

Covert narcissism recovery often shows up quietly—through internal safety, self-trust, and a nervous system that no longer lives on high alert.

Many survivors wonder how to tell whether they’re actually healing, especially when there’s no closure, no apology, and no clear “finish line.” This episode shifts the focus away from the covert narcissist and back to you—helping you understand the subtle but powerful signs that healing is ...

Covert narcissism and trauma quietly teach adults and children that silence feels safer than honesty.

If you’ve noticed yourself going quiet, choosing your words carefully, or avoiding hard conversations altogether — or you’re watching your children withdraw, shut down, or stop sharing — this episode explains why that happens and what safety actually has to do with healing.

In this episode, we explore:

• Why people stop talki...

In Part 1, we uncovered the surprising physical symptoms of trauma that often go unnoticed — the jaw tension, the tinnitus, the eye twitching, the constant bracing your body learned to do in order to survive covert narcissistic abuse.

In Part 2, we continue that conversation by focusing on three symptoms that confuse survivors the most:

• chest tightness — that “heart armor” feeling that makes it hard to breathe

• digestive...

When you live in the backwards, upside-down world of covert narcissistic abuse, your body often understands the danger long before your mind can name it. The symptoms you thought were “random,” “weird,” or “just stress” were actually your nervous system trying to protect you.

In this episode, we explore the physical signs you didn’t recognize as trauma responses — the jaw tension, the chest tightness, the digestive issues, the slee...

Talking to your adult children about a covert narcissistic parent is one of the hardest and most emotionally loaded challenges survivors face. You’re carrying years of truth inside you — experiences that shaped your life, your self-concept, your safety, and in many cases, the childhood environment your kids grew up in. And yet, speaking that truth openly can feel dangerous. It can feel like badmouthing. It can feel like you’re putt...

So many survivors walk into healing believing they were “codependent,” when the truth is far more compassionate and far more accurate:
What you were doing wasn’t codependency — it was fawning, a trauma response your nervous system used to keep you safe in an emotionally dangerous environment.

In this episode, we break down the difference between fawning and codependency in a way that finally makes sense for survivors of covert narci...

This Thanksgiving episode is unlike any you’ve heard before.
Instead of forcing gratitude outward—toward family, toward traditions, toward circumstances that may feel complicated or painful—this episode brings gratitude back home. To you.

Survivors of covert narcissistic abuse often carry shame for the very responses that kept them alive. They question their anger, their confusion, their anxiety, their numbness—never realizing these...

In Part 2 of this story, we pick up right where the alligator encounter left off — not with danger, but with the emotional aftershock that followed.

My body was still shaking, adrenaline pumping, breath unsteady. I paddled straight toward my friend in a heightened state: frightened, confused, and trying to make sense of whether I had truly just kayaked over a mama alligator… or whether I had imagined the whole thing.

And what happe...

In a healthy relationship, conversations might be difficult at times—but they are possible. You can talk, clarify, repair, and understand each other. But when you’re living with a covert narcissist, communication slowly becomes a maze you can never find your way out of.

In this episode, I share how the most ordinary exchanges in my marriage became painful, confusing, and emotionally draining. It wasn’t yelling. It wasn’t name-calli...

In this episode, I’m taking you with me on a peaceful Florida river… right up to the moment my kayak bumped over what I thought was a floating log. Except it wasn’t a log. It was a massive mama alligator. But the most surprising part of the story isn’t the alligator. It’s what my brain did in the exact moment of danger.

Instead of panicking, screaming, or flipping into the water, my mind calmly told me, “Huh. I didn’t know alligato...

Covert narcissism isn’t one-size-fits-all. Some manipulate through silence, others through guilt or tears. Some quote scripture, some play the victim, and some simply vanish into the quiet coldness that leaves you questioning your worth.

In this episode, Renee Swanson explores how covert narcissism exists on a spectrum—why it can look completely different from one relationship to the next, and even from one day to another. Through ...

Ever feel like you’ve been living in a circus you didn’t sign up for?
In this episode, Renee Swanson uses humor to shine a light on the exhausting emotional reality of living with a covert narcissist — through the story of an inflatable clown and a bicycle pump.

You know the one: it’s dramatic, unstable, takes up too much space, and leaks air faster than you can fill it. Your job? Keep it pumped up. All. The. Time.

Through laughter ...

What if your greatest fear as a parent has already come true?
You can feel it — your child pulling away, repeating phrases that don’t sound like them, looking at you through someone else’s eyes. This is the painful reality of parental alienation, one of the covert narcissist’s most devastating tools of control.

In this episode, Renee Swanson explains how covert narcissists quietly rewrite your child’s reality — turning love into con...

Resentment is one of the hardest emotions to face after covert narcissistic abuse—because it shows up long before you even realize what’s happening. You start resenting them for the confusion, then resenting yourself for pulling away. But what if resentment isn’t bitterness at all? What if it’s your system’s way of saying, “I’ve had enough.”

In this episode, Renee Swanson breaks down why resentment builds in these relationships, ho...