If you're here and you've survived narcissistic abuse, my first and instinctual response is to warmly greet you. You've been through so much, and a lot of it won't be understood by the majority of people. It's my aim to make the majority the minority.
Survivors carry little habits that look like nothing from the outside. But inside? They're whole conversations. They're proof of what you lived through. And I want to name them, because nobody else will.
You'll have taken things from your experience with the narcissist you know, and will do them when no one is watching. You may not even realize what you're doing, but if I don't highlight them, I will never contribute to awakening your awareness. I'm here to advocate for you.
1. Shower Time Equals Conversation Reply Time
I don't know about you, but I love to take a shower. I always go into mine with every intention to shut the world out for a few minutes and just be in the moment.
I switch the water on, and seven times out of ten start thinking about what I need to do next, or tomorrow, or at the weekend. For survivors of narcissistic abuse, they tend to go back in time and think about conversations they had with the narcissist.
One client told me she rehearsed an entire breakup speech in the shower, two years after she'd already left. Two years! That's how long the silenced voice stays loud.
Sometimes, it isn't even about conversation, but rather the comeback they wished they'd said instead of staying silent or that they may not have had the opportunity to say. Hindsight is a wonderful thing, but it's really useless when you spend those times you should be relaxing, stressing even further.
It's something survivors can't help, because that conversational loop feels constant. It doesn't mean they're obsessed, but it's just that your mind was silenced for years, and now you're finally allowed to speak and be you, you do so when you're in a safe enough space to.
2. Checking Up On The Ex: Is There Somebody New?
Survivors don't necessarily do this all the time, and it doesn't occur alongside any panic or fear, but it's there, and every now and then, they will check up on the narcissist, now their ex. It's a strange thing, because it does stir up emotions that can confuse.
Relief, for sure.
One client told me she scrolled his profile late one night and saw the new girlfriend, and her first thought wasn't jealousy. It was, "Oh no, run." Recognise that?
You're no longer suffering. But also relief, and even feelings of pity for their new partner, who is now the one to receive all that control and negativity.
Believe it or not, this isn't about not being over them, it's more to do with getting closure, one step at a time. The heavier and stronger the relationship, the longer that might take.
3. Evidence Is Stored
You have it all somewhere, and by 'it all,' I mean evidence. You saved the screenshots even though you deleted their number, and the voice notes, too. There's a folder perhaps on your computer that nobody else even has an idea is there.
I had a client open her laptop and show me a folder labeled 'taxes 2019.' Inside? Two years of screenshots. Smart, right? Nobody snoops through tax folders.
If so, you are a true survivor of narcissistic abuse, and you're keeping it all in one place just in case.
You don't want to start blackmailing, and you aren't into creating a new set of dramas, but it's there if they return into your life and try to gaslight you. You have everything you need to reassure yourself that your relationship with them really was that bad.
The folder gives you options, and rightly so.
4. 'No' Is Practiced In The Mirror Daily
No. That word a survivor can be too afraid to use for a long time, until one day, they decide to practice it in front of the mirror…
See also 5 Creepy Things Every Narcissist Hides Somewhere in Their House…And it feels good. After years of being shut down, made to feel guilty, punished; now the control lies with you.
I had a client say no to her ex over the phone for the first time, and she told me her hand was shaking the whole time. But she did it. And then she did it again.
The word no used to be something you only heard, and never said. Now the tables have turned, and you, if you are a survivor, take all the time you need in order to strongly stand behind it with any opportunity you can. It's like strengthening a muscle.
5. Crying That Occurs In The Strangest Of Places
I fully understand why survivors cry in the sorts of places you'd never imagine, I mean, to survive abuse is to also grieve a happiness that never got a chance to exist.
And so, there survivors can be: in the parking lot, or on your walk home from work, or in the commercial break of your favorite TV show that hadn't triggered you in the slightest. With grief, it surfaces, then settles.
New grief rises, as you realize you've lost something else you didn't even think of prior.
One client told me she burst into tears in the cereal aisle because she suddenly remembered she was allowed to buy the brand she actually liked. Wild, isn't it?
Nevertheless, it's all coming out, and it's finding the most random times to do so. Often that is those times you feel your safest, or most automatic.
Grief enters the room when it finds a time to rise from the ground, and when you stop being busy, that will be where you feel those tears coming. In a way, this is good.
It means survivors are finally able to process what happened, even if it does seem to catch you by surprise.
6. Observance Of Other Couples: Where Wonder Takes Over
You know the kinds of couples I mean. The ordinary ones that are laughing in the park with their dog. The ones down the yoghurt aisle in the grocery store happily picking up their essentials. The ones holding hands while waiting to cross the street.
There's comfortable silence, and no pressure to be anybody but themselves. Survivors will observe them just that little bit longer than other people might.
A client said to me recently, "Alexander, I watched a couple share a sandwich on a bench and I cried in my car for twenty minutes." That's the weight of it.
It's that wistful feeling of, "Could that have been me? Will it ever be me?", or more painful, "Is that what love is supposed to look like?"
I will save anybody the complications of overthinking: Yes. That's what relationships are supposed to look like. Normal, easy, without having to perform for anybody. And I know all relationships hit harder times, but on the whole, that's what they are.
Two people, no romantic fantasy needed, who just care, love, and trust each other. Survivors were denied this, and noticing the difference is a crucial step towards their healing.
7. They Talk To…
Listen, I'm not here to judge whatever narcissistic abuse survivors talk to. It could be the houseplants, it may even be to the empty room they're sat in, or the photo of a passed loved one on the mantel.
Heck, it might be your dog; I'm here for all of it. It's not that they're unwell or losing their minds in any way. It's quiet, private if anything. It's a way to vent, though.
It's how people process what's happened, and how they can do it in a way that feels safe to them.
One client told me she reads her journal out loud to her cat every night. The cat blinks slowly at her. She said it's the first time anyone listened all the way through.
Safety is the one thing they need after all they've been through, so I don't blame them one bit. When talking to any of the above, people aren't bothering themselves with what the object or animal is; they're just wanting something uncritical to lay down their thoughts to.
It's soft and survivors can let go, letting it all out. I imagine it's much more productive for them to talk to their peace lily in the kitchen than it was ever to speak to the narcissist. They would have interrupted, laughed, mocked, perhaps not even listened to.
Suddenly, none of that matters as they're able to take and hold the space to speak without judgment. It acts like a reclamation, and I am in support of it.
8. Apologizing For Things They Didn't Even Do
You knock something over in your own kitchen, and the word slips out before you've even registered what happened. "Sorry."
To who? The mug? The floor? The empty room?
This one breaks my heart a little, honestly. Survivors apologize on autopilot. They say sorry for sneezing, for taking up space on the sidewalk, for asking a perfectly reasonable question at work.
Why? Because for years, every single thing was somehow their fault. The narcissist's bad mood. The narcissist's spilled drink. The narcissist's job that they didn't get. So now the reflex is baked in. Apologize first, figure out if you actually did anything wrong later.
I had a client tell me she apologized to her own cat for being late with dinner. She laughed when she said it, but then she got quiet. Because she realized she hadn't done that before him.
It fades, I promise. But for a long while, sorry is the first word out of your mouth, even when nobody is in the room to hear it.
9. Rehearsing The Conversation That Never Happens
You know the one. The big conversation. The one where you finally say everything you've been holding in for years.
You rehearse it in the shower. In the car. While you're loading the dishwasher. You say their name out loud, sometimes. You picture their face. You imagine them actually listening for once, actually getting it.
"Do you have any idea what you did to me?"
See also 8 Ways To Ruin A Narcissist's Life Without Breaking A Sweat"I'm not going to let you talk to me like that anymore."
"You don't get to do this again."
And it feels good for a second, doesn't it? Powerful, even. Like you've finally got the words lined up right.
But here's the thing. That conversation will never happen. Not the way you've planned it. Because they don't listen, they never did, and saying all of it out loud to them wouldn't land the way it lands when you're alone with it.
So you keep rehearsing. Not because you actually want the confrontation. But because somewhere in you, that voice needs to be heard, even if it's only you hearing it.
