The relationship between you and the narcissist is over, but your nervous system doesn't know that yet. That's why it's still activated and on full alert, waiting for danger that is no longer present.
Months can pass, and this may still be the case, so be patient with yourself, and understand that these 9 anxiety symptoms are common, but also fixable with time, healing, awareness, and a healthy dose of self-compassion.
I had a client tell me she still ducked when her phone buzzed, six months after going no contact. Her body remembered what her mind was trying to forget.
Trust that anything is possible. You've got this.
1 Each time your phone goes off, your stomach drops
You check out your screen, wondering who has lit it up, and naturally, you're expecting that person who has a large track record of making your life hell.
Suddenly, your heart starts to beat through your chest, and you're jolted into the present moment with a huge, "What if." It's not the narcissist, it's just a friend, yet that anxiety is alive and well in your entire body, and you experience this daily.
No, you're not going mad; you're normal. You're reeling from your time with the narcissist, and even though you're longer together, it's as if they have a cord to pull you back in emotionally. You remember these:
Where are you? Who are you with? Why haven't you come home yet? Your body said to brace for something similar, just because you got a text.
That anxiety comes from the level of abuse you tolerated, and the narcissist is out of the picture, but your body still needs time to catch up.
One client told me she still flinches when her husband, her lovely, kind husband, texts to ask what she wants for dinner. Her body hears, "Where are you?"
2 You wait around for the ultimate catch
Wait, what? Someone gave you a compliment? What could this possibly mean?
There doesn't have to always be a catch everytime; people can just be nice and there be nothing they want or need from you, or any good mood it causes you to be in to be later ruined with some cruel act or behavior.
The problem is just not realizing that. Instead, you're anxious, and you want to remember said compliment because the narcissist trained you to worry that a nice word meant you'd pay for it at some point.
Many narcissists give money to their victims, telling them to treat themselves to something nice. At first, it seems like a generous, kind and authentic move, but it's nearly always followed by;
I gave you that money and you wasted it on this? I gave you that money and you can't even have my dinner ready in time? This is how you repay me? Ouch. It's no wonder kindness freaks you out and makes you panic.
I had someone tell me recently that when her new partner brought her flowers, her first thought was, "Okay, what does he want?" That's the damage talking, not her.
3 You find yourself constantly over-explaining
I'm sorry. I did it because I wanted to (...) and it meant I (...). I was just thinking if (...) then (...) because (...). The narcissist doesn't care what you have to say, but the more you speak, the more they have to use against you.
Doesn't that sound nice and ideal for them? That's what overexplaining does, and sadly, you get caught right up in it every single time.
It means you can be lined up for questioning when you get home late from somewhere, and they know they're so in control, they will sit back and watch you fluff and fumble your way through trying to make them happy.
You're used to overcompensating, trying to leave no room for conflict, but all you end up doing is creating more of it in the narcissist's eyes. Now?
See also 5 Creepy Things Every Narcissist Hides Somewhere in Their HouseNow you offer anyone all the information they want about you, and you overexplain why you do everything because you're so used to feeling like you have to.
The barista asks why you want oat milk and suddenly you're giving them your medical history. A friend cancels plans and you apologise for being available. It's exhausting.
4 Silence doesn't make you relax at all
Quiet and still, calm and serene. It sounds nice, doesn't it? To you or I, it just may be. To anybody who has lived with a narcissist, it's just not the same.
Peace feels as though danger is right around the corner, because a narcissist never wanted to live in a happy home for long. Whenever you'd be happy, or having a positive day, the narcissist will have made a dent in that.
Making an argument out of nothing, deciding to give you the silent treatment simply because they're bored; it sent you spiralling and feeling as though you had to walk on eggshells.
Those explosions always came, so silence was a calm that you never learned to trust, as you overthought every part of it.
You'd sit there in the quiet thinking, when is it coming? What did I do? Because silence with a narcissist was never silence. It was the wind-up.
Those with anxious tendencies will have had to have lived through the worst silences, and see them as a threat to their nervous system. Does that sound like I've written about a part of you?
5 You're always saying sorry
Sorry, sorry, sorry. It's a word you say frequently, but the more you feel you say it, the less of a difference it actually makes.
You don't even know what you're saying sorry for half the time, but even if you feel like you're taking up too much space, you still say it in the hope it makes everything better. When the narcissist is gone, that habit will still remain.
It's a conditional effect of living with a narcissist, and your way of trying to predict anger or conflict before it happens, so apologizing is your way of peace-keeping.
You bump into somebody in the store, sorry. Someone else steps on your foot, and you're the one apologizing. Sound familiar? That's not politeness, that's a nervous system stuck on high alert.
It's a survival tactic that stays with a victim for life unless they do some real work to heal from never being made to feel good enough.
6 You can't stop replaying conversations
This one is enough to keep you up at night, and it frequently does as you think about those conversations you had years ago you wish you could repeat.
You pull every word, every reaction apart in the hope it changes the outcome, but of course you know it can't because that would involve changing the past. The narcissist didn't understand you. They misunderstood your tone.
So you rewrite it. What if I'd said it softer? What if I'd stayed quiet? You audit yourself for a crime that was never yours to begin with.
You're hypervigilant, and that's a side effect of tolerating narcissistic abuse. Analyzing every word was something you had no awareness you were doing, but that's where it got you, and it's a symptom that can be tricky to shift. Your brain needs to learn peace before it can unlearn this.
Once it does, you'll find that letting go of old conversations become a little easier to manage.
7 When certain tones of voices wash over you, you tense up
Words alone aren't enough to get you into a certain mood, it has to be tone, too.
Tone is so important, as it's left to the other person to try to assume a mood or emotion, and narcissists will plant whatever tone they see fit in your mind when it suits them.
If they want you to feel on edge, they've got the perfect tone for that, and so once they leave, those tones can be found in the slamming of a door, or in a sharp exhale from someone.
A client told me she froze in a cafe last month because a stranger sighed the exact way her ex used to before an explosion. Her whole body remembered.
It makes sense after what you lived through, and that doesn't make your anxiety a flaw in your character, it's just evidence that you were in an abusive relationship, and that there's a lot to untangle from it.
Your mind and body tried their best to keep you safe, and now it's your time to heal and overcome. It is possible.
8 Your body flinches before your brain even catches up
A door slams somewhere down the street and you're already halfway out of your chair. A hand moves too fast in your peripheral vision and your shoulders shoot up around your ears. Someone drops a spoon in the kitchen and your stomach drops with it.
This is the part nobody warns you about. Your body kept score of every single thing that happened, and it's still keeping score long after the narcissist is out of the picture. It reacts first.
Your thinking brain shows up a second or two later, going, "It's fine, it's just a door, calm down."
But by then the flinch has already happened. The heart rate is already up. The breath is already shallow.
I remember standing in a supermarket once and a trolley clipped a shelf behind me and I nearly cried on the spot. Over a trolley. That's what living with a narcissist does. Your nervous system stays on duty long after the threat has walked out the door.
9 Making decisions? Forget about it
Even the smallest choice becomes a mountain. What do you want for dinner? Uh… I don't know. Which appointment slot works? Erm, can I get back to you? Should you take the job, sign the lease, say yes to the coffee?
See also Do These 3 Things And The Narcissist Will Suddenly Respect And Fear YouBlank. Total blank.
Years of being told you were wrong, dumb, dramatic, ungrateful, whatever it was, have basically wired your brain to distrust its own opinions.
So when a decision lands in your lap, even a tiny one, there's a split second of panic where you scan the room for someone to tell you the "right" answer.
And there's nobody there anymore. Which is good. But it also feels awful, because now the weight is all yours.
I see people apologise for ordering the wrong coffee. Apologise. For a coffee. That is what living with a narcissist does to your decision making muscle. It doesn't just weaken it, it convinces you the muscle was never yours to use in the first place.
Rebuilding it takes time. Start small. Pick the coffee. Keep it.
