Dealing with Highly Aggressive People
A practical article connected into the broader SelfGrowth topic graph.
Primary topic: Relationship Advice
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Browse published articles attributed to Darlene Lancer, with full-archive search.
A practical article connected into the broader SelfGrowth topic graph.
<img class="alignleft wp-image-22569" src="https://www.whatiscodependency.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/hopeless-nik-shuliahin-BuNWp1bL0nc-unsplash-1024x1019.jpg" alt="" width="364" height="363" />We can feel hopeless and helpless when we experience chronic abuse or repeated obstacles. You might feel stuck in poverty or an unhappy relationship. You could or be dealing with your own or someone else’s addiction that feels powerless to change.
The overall goal of codependency recovery is to become a full-functioning individual.
Abusers are long known for victim-blaming, because they never want to take responsibility. More recently a research psychologist Jennifer Joy Freyd gave this a name: DARVO, which stands for Deny, Attack, Reverse Victim and Offender.
<img class="alignleft wp-image-22890" src="https://www.whatiscodependency.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/compassion.jpg" alt="holding hands" width="404" height="270" />Empaths are more than empathetic. Like an HSP–highly sensitive person–they’re highly attuned to stimuli and other people’s emotions and energy, usually to a degree considered transpersonal or paranormal. They may be codependent and end up in abusive relationships. Let’s first consider some definitions. An HSP has a rich inner life and deep central nervous system sensitivity to physical, emotional, or social stimuli.
Good relationships run smoothly and enable you to enjoy your life, work, and activities beyond the relationship. You’re not always worrying or talking about it. Like a smooth-running car, you don’t have to keep repairing it. You may have disagreements and get angry, but you still have goodwill toward one another, talk things over, resolve conflicts, and return to a loving, enjoyable state.
Though powerless over an alcoholic-addict's ultimate behavior, we can influence them to get addiction treatment using CRAFT.
Wonder whether you’re in love or in lust? Whether your obsession about someone is a sign of love or addiction? Whether you’re staying in a troubled relationship because you’re addicted or in love? It’s complicated, and lust and love and addiction don’t always exclude one another. Endless analyzing doesn’t help or change our feelings, because we’re often driven by forces outside our conscious awareness.
Healthy boundaries are essential in recovery from codependency. They both build and reflect self-esteem. Learning to have healthy boundaries is an essential aspect of individuating and becoming an individual and autonomous person.
A practical article connected into the broader SelfGrowth topic graph.
<img class="wp-image-28597 alignleft" src="https://whatiscodependency.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/insecure-couple-marina-abrosimova-unsplash-500x500.jpg" alt="Relationship Anxiety" width="438" height="438" />
<img style="float: left; padding: 0 20px 20px 0;" src="https://whatiscodependency.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/Child-abuse-soupstock-AdobeStock_132085885-750x500.jpeg" alt="Healing Trauma and Your Inner Child" width="400" height="267" /> We all have an “inner child,” which is an unconscious archetype coined by Carl Jung. It holds our vulnerability, spontaneity, creativity, curiosity, and magical ideas. It also holds fears, anxiety, shame, loneliness, and insecurity experienced growing up and is a vital part in healing trauma.
1. Tell your children the truth, with simple explanations. Tell them where the other parent is. 2. Don’t bring up grievances or speaking derogatorily about the other parent to or in front of your children. 3. Don't discuss financial, legal or other disputes with your children. 4. Don’t say things that might discourage your children from spending time with the other parent. 5. Don’t pressure them to take sides. 6. Don’t argue, fight, or make threats in the presence of your children.
A practical article connected into the broader SelfGrowth topic graph.
<img class="wp-image-30542 alignleft" style="padding-top: 7px;" src="https://whatiscodependency.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/narcissistic-relationships-stages.png" alt="The Stages of Narcissistic Relationships" width="400" height="400" />
<img class="wp-image-28221 alignleft" src="https://whatiscodependency.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/addict-alcoholic-addiction-shutterstock_By-Photographee.eu-sm-scaled.jpg" alt="Signs of Lack of Empathy and What You Can Do" width="458" height="305" />
<img class="alignnone size-us_1366_500 wp-image-28693" src="https://whatiscodependency.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/couple-arguing-AdobeStock_84420001-750x500.jpeg" alt="Is My Relationship Toxic?" width="750" height="500" />
<img class="wp-image-28749 alignleft" style="padding-top: 5px;" src="https://whatiscodependency.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/man-shame-peopleimages-Canva-419x500.png" alt="Myths about Narcissism" width="346" height="413" />
A practical article connected into the broader SelfGrowth topic graph.
The term child parentification was coined in 1967 by family systems theorist Salvador Minuchin, who said the phenomenon occurred when parents de facto delegated parenting roles to children.
Children of narcissists and addicts (all substance abusers) grow up in a stressful, dysfunctional family environment, which in most cases leads to codependency. Due to the symptoms and <a href="https://whatiscodependency.com/why-narcissists-act-th
A practical article connected into the broader SelfGrowth topic graph.
Do you wonder whether you're a kind, empathetic person or are you codependent? There is a difference between empathy and codependency. There are codependents who are abusers and not caring, and some people who are caring and aren't codependent. So what's the difference?
Identifying gaslighting behavior and knowing how to combat gaslighting are essential to maintaining your self-esteem, and mental and emotional health.
Narcissists’ entire personality is a defense to help them manage their hidden insecurity and inner turmoil.
A practical article connected into the broader SelfGrowth topic graph.
Pursuer-distancer relationships cause a lot of heartache, especially for a pursuer. Learn about the mind of a distancer to understand your own or your partner's behavior so you won't take it personally.
Most codependents experience abandonment trauma in childhood, which can take many forms ranging from overt abuse to covert neglect. Even subtle signs that one of our parents does not listen to our thoughts, feelings, or needs send a message that we’re not valued for who we are as an individual. This abandonment trauma lays the groundwork for shame and codependency, which can be a precursor for troubled, adult relationships where we feel unvalued, not enough, and emotionally abandoned compounding our original trauma.
Narcissists can be hard to empathize with, but research on inherited narcissism shows they didn’t choose to be that way; they bear scars from childhood.
Emotional incest has been compared to actual incest because it similarly creates long-lasting effects on psychosocial development and into adulthood. Sometimes the targeted child is referred to as a “surrogate spouse,” due to parent-child enmeshment or a codependent parent-child relationship. Non-sexual incest can happen with a same-sex or opposite-sex parent. Invasive parents have difficulty maintaining an intimate relationship with their spouse and appropriate boundaries with their child. Dysfunctional Family Systemsr
Female narcissists can be harder to spot; first, because they’re less numerous, and second, because their behavior may be less assertive and public compared to male narcissists. Male narcissists outnumber female narcissists nearly three to one. However, narcissistic personality disorder is on the rise in women, as is narcissism in general.[i] Males are usually encouraged to be more confident, decisive, forceful, pushy, and self-assured. Due to cultural biases, male narcissists are bolder than their female counterparts and more likely to strive for wealth, power, and success in their work.r
There’s a saying, “The ending is in the beginning.” Codependent relationship problems start with their low self-esteem, lack of boundaries, and their idealization of love—that it will solve their deeper problems, including shame, which generates beliefs such as: “If I’m loved, I’m lovable,” and “If I’m needed, I won’t be abandoned and lonely.” Codependents have fantasies of how wonderful their relationship will be, “if only…” their partner would transform (with their help.)
Even before we enter the world, our brains and hormones are wired for connection. Our first relationship begins in our mother’s womb, where we recognize her voice and respond to her moods through hormones and stress responses. Later, her smell and touch become familiar. Affection and responsive communication are necessary for developing our brains and bodies. Early interactions with our parents shape our self-image and template for love and relationships. Our patterns of relating and reacting, attachment style, are often repeated in adult relationships—romantic and otherwise.
Healing is not linear or categorizable but is an obscure odyssey of the soul that meanders, stagnates, and has ups and downs. It warps time, intertwining our past and present, perspectives, relationships, and emotional struggles. For me, writing has been a gratifying and powerful healing tool along my journey. I decided to publish poems I’ve written and lessons I’ve learned in a new book, Unfettered Soul: Poems and Contemplations on Recovery.
Generational trauma is a form of trauma passed down to subsequent generations through environmental factors such as psychological transference and attachment behavior according to attachment theory. The psychological impact of a traumatic event, such as historical mistreatment, cultural dislocation, physical or emotional abuse, a natural disaster, or poverty, is passed down from one generation to the next, where individuals who did not directly experience the trauma still exhibit symptoms of it due to the experiences of their ancestors or parents.
We’re wired for attachment – why babies cry when separated from their mothers. Depending especially upon our mother’s behavior, as well as later experiences and other factors, we develop a style of attaching that affects our behavior in close relationships.
Often a partner of a narcissist is a narcissist attractor, but may not realize it until they’ve attracted more than one narcissist. They may have a narcissist in their family of origin, but not always, and not all children of narcissists end up with one. Not all partners of narcissists were raised in unhappy families. People who grew up loving and trusting their parents are also susceptible because they expect others to be loving and trustworthy. Thus, they are less guarded and naive to narcissistic manipulative tactics.
The conversation around trauma has become mainstream, as people seek to understand the effects of stress and emotional wounding on the body and mind. Countless books and studies have brought vital insights, exploring how trauma lodges in the nervous system and impacts our sense of safety, connection, and vitality. But amid all this knowledge, it’s easy to miss something essential: We’ve inherited natural trauma healing practices. Trauma affects codependents, including anyone who has lived with abuse, addiction, and high-conflict relationships. It’s often transgenerational.
Power exists in all relationships. Having power means to have a sense of control, to have choices and the ability to influence our environment and others. It’s a natural and healthy instinct to exert our power to get our wants and needs met. When we feel empowered, we can manage our emotions, we believe that we matter and that we can affect outcomes. We have a sense of efficacy in our lives, rather than being at the effect of others and circumstances. Instead of reacting, we can act because we have an internal locus-of-control.
When shame becomes toxic, it can ruin our lives. Everyone experiences shame at one time another. It’s an emotion with physical symptoms like any other that comes and goes, but when it's severe, it can be extremely painful. Strong feelings of shame stimulate the sympathetic nervous system, causing a fight/flight/freeze reaction. We feel exposed and want to hide or react with rage, while feeling profoundly alienated from others and good parts of ourselves.
Perfectionism is an addiction, meaning we’re repeatedly unable to stop our perfectionist behaviors. Like other addictions, perfectionism varies in severity and can have negative consequences. It harms our self-esteem, make us unable to accept other people’s differences and their mistakes and flaws, and it can rob us of time with them. We require that things look or are done in a specific, “correct” way in accordance with our perfectionist standards. Some perfectionists attempt to perfect their bodies with repeated surgeries or pursue athleticism to the point of injury.
Caring about someone with Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) tosses you on a roller coaster ride from being loved and lauded to abandoned and bashed. Being a borderline (having BPD) is no picnic, either. You live in unbearable psychic pain most of the time on the border between reality and psychosis. Your illness distorts your perceptions causing antagonistic behavior and making the world a perilous place. The pain and terror of abandonment and feeling unwanted can be so great that suicide feels like a better choice.
Guilt is good. Yes! Guilt actually encourages people to have more empathy for others, to take corrective action, and to improve themselves. Self-forgiveness following guilt is self-essential to esteem, which is key to enjoyment of life and relationships.
Do you feel trapped in a relationship you can’t leave? Of course, feeling trapped is a state of mind. No one needs consent to leave a relationship. Millions of people remain in unhappy relationships that range from empty to abusive for many reasons; however, the feeling of suffocation or of having no choices stems from fear that's often unconscious.
When an obsession dominates us, it steals our will and saps all the pleasure out of life. We become numb to people and events, while our mind replays the same dialogue images, or words. In a conversation, we have little interest in what the other person is saying and soon talk about our obsession, oblivious to the impact on our listener.
Everyone starts out in life wanting to be safe, loved, and accepted. It’s in our DNA. Some of us figure out that the best way to do this is to put aside what we want or feel and allow someone else’s needs and feelings take precedence. This works for a while. It feels natural, and there’s less outer conflict, but our inner conflict grows. If we’d like to say no, we feel guilty, and we may feel resentful when we yes. We’re damned if we do and damned if we don’t.
We all want to get our needs met, but manipulators use underhanded methods. Manipulation is a way to covertly influence someone with indirect, deceptive, or abusive tactics. Manipulation may seem benign or even friendly or flattering, as if the person has your highest conce in mind, but in reality it’s to achieve an ulterior motive. Other times, it’s veiled hostility, and when abusive methods are used, the objective is merely power. You may not realize that you’re being unconsciously intimidated.
When reality doesn’t match our desires and childhood coping mechanisms fail us, life presents us with painful lessons that may lead to depression. We face painful lessons that can lead to depression. The patterns we developed in response to unmet childhood needs can strain our relationships. If we were overly indulged or our disappointment was unconsoled in childhood, we become easily discouraged or more willful as adults. Both responses hinder our ability to adapt to reality. Stubborn self-will can prevent us from finding workable solutions.
Often a partner of a narcissist is a narcissist attractor, but may not realize it until they’ve attracted more than one narcissist. They may have a narcissist in their family of origin, but not always, and not all children of narcissists end up with one. Not all partners of narcissists were raised in unhappy families. People who grew up loving and trusting their parents are also susceptible because they expect others to be loving and trustworthy. Thus, they are less guarded and naive to narcissistic manipulative tactics.