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Narcissistic Relationship Survival Kit PART 1 : 9 KEY PRINCIPLES 1. Learn to Call Abuse, Abuse. Make a list of all the “not nice” things your ex would do, consider that even though you don’t think its right to call it abuse that maybe these not nice things that made you feel bad were in fact actually “abusive”. If you were trained in your childhood to ignore your feelings and needs then this might be quite hard for you to do, but please do try. 2. Establish “no contact”. Do not communicate with your ex in any format, if they continue to try to contact you then use the “grey rock” technique. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JBv8Rj00CNY 3. Perform a Sanity Check: accept that yes, the person is sick and therefore the whole relationship was sick. It’s hard to accept but accepting it will make you saner. 4. You are not yourself right now, you are probably experiencing some “emotional dysregulation” and “complex ptsd” as a result of the relationship. You might be: paranoid, hypersensitive, quick to anger, over adrenalized, suffering from poor sleep and nightmares prone to obsessive or catastrophic thinking etc All of these are symptoms of Narc abuse https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oh2Sswfl4-w https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R0k5DvjiRNU 5. Seek Stability, Support, Sanity (explained in the video that came with this ebook) 6. Remember that you have been isolated in a one man/woman cult for some time, you might be a little odd. Be aware of that when seeking to reconnect with family and friends. 7. Expect grief, sadness and then anger. Learn how to allow and process these feelings in a safe and boundaried way. Be kind to yourself, practice self-compassion. 8. Time to rebuild your foundations: adopt a new philosophy of life, start by promising to be rigorously honest with yourself and to always acknowledge your needs from now on. Acknowledge traumatic abuse experienced in childhood and adolescence. Develop and assert new boundaries, learn the skill of self assertiveness.

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Narcissistic Relationship Survival Kit

PART 1 : 9 KEY PRINCIPLES

1. Learn to Call Abuse, Abuse.

Make a list of all the “not nice” things your ex would do, consider that even though you don’t

think its right to call it abuse that maybe these not nice things that made you feel bad were in

fact actually “abusive”.

If you were trained in your childhood to ignore your feelings and needs then this might be quite

hard for you to do, but please do try.

2. Establish “no contact”. Do not communicate with your ex in any format, if they continue to try

to contact you then use the “grey rock” technique.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JBv8Rj00CNY

3. Perform a Sanity Check: accept that yes, the person is sick and therefore the whole

relationship was sick. It’s hard to accept but accepting it will make you saner.

4. You are not yourself right now, you are probably experiencing some “emotional

dysregulation” and “complex ptsd” as a result of the relationship. You might be: paranoid,

hypersensitive, quick to anger, over adrenalized, suffering from poor sleep and nightmares

prone to obsessive or catastrophic thinking etc

All of these are symptoms of Narc abuse

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oh2Sswfl4-w

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R0k5DvjiRNU

5. Seek Stability, Support, Sanity (explained in the video that came with this ebook)

6. Remember that you have been isolated in a one man/woman cult for some time, you might

be a little odd. Be aware of that when seeking to reconnect with family and friends.

7. Expect grief, sadness and then anger. Learn how to allow and process these feelings in a safe

and boundaried way. Be kind to yourself, practice self-compassion.

8. Time to rebuild your foundations: adopt a new philosophy of life, start by promising to be

rigorously honest with yourself and to always acknowledge your needs from now on.

Acknowledge traumatic abuse experienced in childhood and adolescence. Develop and assert

new boundaries, learn the skill of self assertiveness.

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PART 2 : 1O STAGES OF GREIVING

This was sent to me by a lady who wishes to remain anonymous. She describes herself as a mental

health professional who has been in a narcissistic relationship, beyond that I don’t know anything about

her. It’s a good piece I hope you enjoy it:

If you’re on this site you are most likely trying to understand Narcissist Personality Disorder, grieving

and or healing from a rel ationship with a narcissist. There are several grieving stages after a narc

relationship. I’ve been utilizing all sources during my grieving period such as support web sites,

licensed therapist, books on Narcissist Personality Disorder and support systems. I was so beat

down and abused that I literally hit “rock” bottom. I don’t want to disclose the cycles of abuse or

ruminate over the horrific events because it’s a never ending diorama! The first thing I’d like to

disclose is that narcs come from both genders. I used male gender so the verbiage flowed easier.

What I’d like to do is let everybody know how I managed to move on and get on with my life. Healing

from a narc was absolutely daunting, confusing and one of the hardest endeavors I’ve been

through.

Stage One: Denial………… For example: “He didn’t cheat on me, he loves me, he said I’m the only

one he loved, things weren’t that bad, I love him, I will never find another man who loves me, etc.”

One effective way to get over the denial stage is to journal ALL the abusive languages, lies and traits

he exhibited to everybody during your relationship. I wrote down all the hurtful things he said and did

to me during our relationship. If it hurt, I wrote “ouch” that hurt. If I was upset I’d use profanity. It’s

your healing process and be authentic, brutally honest and real. Write down all your hopes,

disappointments, anger, sadness, lies, and broken dreams. I also wrote down abusive things he did

to his family and associates. I currently have nine pages and still going.

Stage Two: Educate yourself and be familiar with all the pathological behaviors or Narcissist

Personality Disorder (NPD). There is a lot of information out there and the more we understand their

psyche the easier it is to understand they didn’t love us the way we wanted to be loved. You must

remember, they are incapable of loving another person. They were only with you as an extension of

their ego, to fill their Narcissist Supply and most importantly, so they didn’t have to be alone. We

have to face that we fell in love with a fake ho llow person. They are not capable of loving us. Period.

They don’t change and never will, they are broken people. The more you understand NPD the easier

it will for you to understand their pathological lies and behaviors. I kid you not, when I was on a

backpacking trip in Europe I hiked with a man for 300 miles who continued to talk about his ex and

the abusive behaviors he endured from her. He tried to rationalize irrational behaviors for 300 miles!

Please don’t’ get stuck in this step. You can’t empathize with a narc, you can’t understand their

behaviors so please walk away and don’t try to understand their lies.

Stage Three: Write a goodbye letter, write down ALL your hurt, sadness and disappointments. Tell

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your ex how he hurt you, how you felt, how many times you cried over him etc. This was the hardest

assignment for me. My letter was raw and real. I also had to let go of the relationship with mutual

friends and his family. Not only are we saying goodbye to our ex narc, we are saying to part of our

old lifestyle. If you feel like staying home in your pajamas all day, do it. Give yourself permission and

time to grieve. Of course do not send him the letter.

Stage Four: The dreaded “NO CONTACT”. This is also a hard one, brutally hard nonetheless. I

failed at this too many times. At night when I felt lonely or had a few too many beers I’d write him an

email and tell him how horrible of person he is. It felt good to let him know I knew his secret and

would never be with him again, HOWEVER, don’t do it. They will use it against you and assume you

want them back. No contact is very hard because it’s the absolute “closure” tool. When I say no

contact I mean, no Facebook creeping, dating sites, talking to old mutual friends, email etc.

Absolutely NO CONNECTION or CONTACT! Block his number, filter his emails to ga rbage etc. I

discovered after I’d creep on his FB or interact with mutual friends it brought back some of the good

memories and I was sucked back into pain. No contact is much easier on our psyche than keeping in

touch with ex. It’s almost like quitting smoking, each day gets a little easier. Take one hour or even

day at a time. They were an addiction to us and the only way to break free is to completely let it go. If

you need help in this area (I did) just remember they don’t care about you or how you are doing.

They only care about themselves. Period. You are their food, their supply. They fooled you into

believing they cared about you and will continue doing so.

Sta ge Five: Go back over stages one through four, add more notes, add on to your goodbye letter

and continue to give yourself a pat on back for no contact. Give yourself a weekly reward for not

corresponding to contacting anybody in the old narc world.

Stage Six: Expect hovering, they will come back and try to get in your head or back together.

Remember they are only coming back when they need your supply. It’s not about you and they d o

not miss you as a person. They miss your lack of boundaries and how you made them feel alive.

Remember if they can get a reaction out of you after no contact it will excite them. Even a negative

reaction will be misconstrued and they will persist. Do not respond to them. Period.

Stage Seven: Ask yourself why you stayed in this relationship? What attracted you to him? Why did

you stay? What are you deep dark secrets that need to disclose with yourself? They say, “the devil

you know is sometimes easier than the devil you don’t know.” This part of healing took a long time, I

had to go back to my childhood, understand the relationship with my father and why I continually

chose broken men. I’m still in this stage and most likely will be a long time. This isn’t necessarily a

stage, it’s more of seeking the intrapersonal psyche. What are your automatic thoughts? When you

are dreaming or thinking what’s going on? I had an epiphany when I took my daughter to my dad’s

house so she could pick up a personal belonging. I sat in the car and she goes, “Are you going in?” I

responded, “No he could care less if he sees me or not.” That’s the hard core truth and it was hard

wired in my psyche. I pick men who treated me like my father did. I continue to be attracted to

emotionally unavailable hollow men, however now I’m aware of it and using cognitive behavioral

approach.

Stage Eight: Be aware of another narc relationship. . First of all, I’ d like to explain, my ex narc was

attracted to me because I’m the overachiever type, empathetic, educated, physically fit and have

very poor boundaries. Narcissists have ex ray glasses and if you demonstrate any of these

characteristics you will be sought and picked by a narc. Narcs love empaths (people who are highly

in tune with others emotions). They seek us because they are drawn to our emotionally sensitive

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traits. Remember in the future narcs will still be attracted to you, be cognizant of this!

Stage Nine: Time to rebuild your psyche and self-worth. Identify you true friends, those who see the

good in you. Let go of the toxic people in your life. We all know who they are and the last thing we

want to do is lose more friends.C2� However, they need to go. Love the genuine kind hearted

people, they will love you back. Instead of getting recognition form a partner, get recognition from

yourself. Do something! Run a marathon, take a class, join a gym, advocate for a political cause you

believe in. By doing this for yourself you are training yourself to make yourself happy. I learned to

run marathons by taking each mile at a time. I literally pushed myself 10% with each mile. It took a

long time and I made it. I even ran Boston Marathon! I use to be overweight and smoked cigarettes.

The 10% rule works very well, little steps!! It does sound cliché, however it is a very important step.

Stage Nine: Be cognizant if you get stuck in a stage. It will happen and it’s a normal process to

vacillate and have self-doubt. Getting stuck in the “venting” stage is too easy, be aware of it.

Stage Ten: Accept your thinking errors, accept past denials and most importantly. learn from your

experience. Use the pain inflicted by narc as energy and knowledge to help others. I’m not going to

say a prince will sweep you off your feet and you will live happily ev er after. When you know you are

healing you will be able to look in the mirror and see the sparkle come back to your eyes. It will

happen!

resources and support:

facebook https://www.facebook.com/pages/Richard-Grannon-The-Spartan-Life-

Coach/421569931230215?fref=ts

forum http://spartanlifecoach.unlimitedforum.com/

youtube https://www.youtube.com/SPARTANLIFECOACH

copyright Richard Grannon 2015 www.spartanlifecoach.com