Post Narcissist Stress Disorder is a relatively new addition to the DSM. It is also an ironic one, given that Narcissistic Personality Disorder was removed from the same volume in 2013 to the protests of the majority of psychologists who know anything about the disorder. But academics aside, Post Narcissistic Stress Disorder is a diagnosis here to stay. The narcissists who abound in today’s society will see to it. The emotional trauma one endures with a narcissist is severe. Some survivors must struggle with symptoms similar to soldiers returning from war. The levels of abuse endured in a relationship with…
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Objectification, for most of my life, meant little more to me than car ads with beautiful women and calling pretty girls hot tamales. I knew it was bad in a vague sort of way without connecting it to myself. It wasn’t until I saw a therapist years after my divorce from a narcopath that I began to see that I had turned myself into an object. A good object, but still an object. My therapist looked at me dead on and said one of the most significant things anyone has ever said to me. Alice, you are not a tool.…
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Firstly, let me say that I am a past master of denial. One cannot stay in an abusive marriage for as long as I did and not have expertise in the exercise of denial. But often, we misunderstand what exactly is being denied when we talk about this subject. Often, it isn’t the situation that we are unable to face, but our feelings about the situation. I could admit that my husband was abusive. What I couldn’t admit to was the fear, agony, anger, and helplessness I felt within an abusive marriage. And so I convinced myself I was just…