Narcissistic Abuse & Antagonistic Relational Stress
Narcissistic abuse and people who have antagonistic personality styles either use Overt (openly hostile) or Covert (insidious manipulation) behavioural tactics with the sole objective of exerting power and control over you.
Throughout the narcissistic or antagonistic cycle of abuse, in order to keep you off-balance, their strategies can go from one extreme to the other where you never quite know what to expect. You may not even realize the extent to which you are being controlled in your relationship.
Antagonistic Relational Stress is the experience and response of the survivor to narcissistic abuse and other antagonistic personality styles where your behaviour is no longer aligned to who you know yourself to be as you try to fix the tumultuous landscape in your relationship.
It is also important to consider that narcissism is not the only antagonistic personality style. Other presentations in adults may include: Substance Use Disorder/Behavioural Addictions, Mental Health & Personality Disorder Challenges, Codependency & Unhealed Childhood Trauma, PTSD & C-PTSD, ADHD, Autism and the list can literally go on. Being in relationship with someone whose behaviour you don’t understand can cause tremendous distress in you especially if your mood, time, choices and reactions are entirely dependent on this person.
How do you know your experience in your relationship is even abusive?
There is an established dynamic that creates an obsessive preoccupation in you about this relationship, with either a spouse, family member or adult child that looks like the following:
Love Bomb
The positive reinforcement you receive to keep you “hooked”. This creates a dopamine response in you where you can literally become addicted to the relationship.
Devalue
The tension building phase where you are criticized, blamed, shamed, shut out, silenced, and gaslit.
Discard
This phase can be an actual break-up (usually temporary), taking a break from the relationship or the threat of abandoning the relationship all initiated by the narcissist or antagonist.
Hoover
Manipulation tactics to lure you back into their vortex to repeat the cycle again.
The narcissist or antagonist in your life may use covert tactics such as the silent treatment or stonewalling. They withhold affection and intimacy. They are secretive. They may put you in harm’s way. They isolate you by denying access to important relationships and supports.
Then again they can be openly hostile to you through raging and threats of physical violence or abandonment of the relationship. They say everything is your fault. Then in key moments, they show you the person you love and the cycle repeats.
You have been blamed for so long, you are now blaming yourself. You do not even recognize yourself in this relationship and may always be seeking ways to fix it.
You feel you are living in a dual reality because the narcissist’s or antagonist’s words don’t match their actions, and you want to believe them. Their remarks have you believing you need to prove that you are not the person they accuse you of being.
Through psychoeducation, we will identify the patterns in your relationship and make the connection of how their behaviour affects you and how it makes you feel.
It can feel incredibly validating to connect the dots of your experience and break away from the cognitive dissonance or betrayal blindness and shift to conscious participation in your relationship.
It can become incredibly difficult to break out of this repetitive pattern without the support of an antagonism-informed counsellor who understands firsthand what you are going through. Counselling sessions can help you regain perspective of your relationship and begin to feel safe within yourself again – click here to schedule a 30-minute complimentary Consultation Call.
Wherever you are in your journey, my Inner Strength Boundary System: A²LDS
can help - link to blog here.
