Quora: How do you unsilence a narcissist who uses the silent treatment on you to control you?

How do you unsilence a narcissist who uses the silent treatment on you to control you?

Originally Answered: How do you silence a narcissist who uses the silent treatment on you to control you?

How do you silence a narcissist who is using silence against you?

Um…they’re already being silent. What else do you want?

Are you trying to ask how you STOP the narcissist from using the silent treatment?

The answer to that is that you can’t. If a manipulation tactic works to make you angry, make you beg for their forgiveness, make you follow them around asking them to please just talk to you….it’s doing what they want it to do. It’s getting under your skin and getting your goat.

If you are trying to ask how you stop a narcissist smear campaign—how do you make them stop taking **** about you behind your back….also, you can’t.

But you can do a lot towards stopping their manipulative nonsense by not showing any response to it.

Enjoy the peace and quiet of the NPD silent treatment.

Laugh and shake your head if a flying monkey brings you some ridiculous tattle-tale story about the terrible things the NPD is saying about you.

Once they realize they have no power over you, they will move along. I suggest you move along first, though. There’s no reason to keep a narcissist in your life. They are poison. 

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 Posts tagged 'quora' were originally my answers to peoples' questions on quora.com. 

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Quora: If you tell narcissists about all their behavior: gaslighting, manipulating, projecting, play

If you tell narcissists about all their behavior: gaslighting, manipulating, projecting, playing victim, etc., what will they do?

 One of the most ‘fun’ tools in the narcissist’s toolbox is a neat trick called DARVO

[1]

 

Deny

Attack

Reverse Victim and Offender

Example:

“I am not gaslighting you! You are gaslighting ME! YOU are the narcissist! YOU are the abuser! YOU are the one playing mind-games!”

*runs away crying, tells all their followers and flying monkeys about what a mean, terrible, abusive, manipulative jerk YOU are*

The more intelligent, well-read, and well-informed the narcissist is, the better they are able to DARVO. When you hand a narcissist a self-help article or a book about NPD, they are going to use that information to add new spicy self-help and pop psychology buzz-words to the word-salad they dish out to abuse humiliate, smear, and devalue you with.

Congratulations, you handed your enemy a loaded weapon and they are going to do their best to destroy you with it.

If you must confront a narcissist*, don’t use buzzwords or psychological terminology. Don’t use self-help language. Just report the behavior as you see it, describe how it makes you feel and what your response to the behavior may be, and define your boundaries regarding the behavior. And then, enforce the boundary. Make sure the narcissist sees consequences. Every. Time.

Example:

“You have been screaming at me for 15 minutes. It makes me angry and sad when you scream at me. I am going to leave now. If you scream at me again, I will leave again,”

*I don’t actually suggest you confront a narcissist. They don’t care about your feelings and they don’t value the relationship. They are here to get whatever they can out of you and as soon as you cease to be useful, they will discard you.

BUT! If you have to interact, keep it simple, define the behavior you find intolerable, state the boundary you will have around that behavior, and then keep that boundary.

Finally, please take whatever steps necessary to remove the narcissist from your life. Go no contact, move away, quit the job, whatever it takes. Your peace of mind and future happiness are worth these steps.

Footnotes

[1] 

 

DARVO - Wikipedia

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 Posts tagged 'quora' were originally my answers to peoples' questions on quora.com. 

They were monetized but I am giving them away for free here. 

If you feel inclined to support my writing, here's my paypal 

And if you prefer to pay it forward, I recommend Safe Place as an excellent place to support.