Episode 63: Top 10 Lies A Narcissist Will Tell You

s Sara 00:04

Empowered people make informed decisions that lead to living a life without regret. This is Sarah khaki and Shawna woods from Atlanta divorce law group. And this is the happily ever after divorce podcast. Welcome to the happily ever after divorce podcast. This is Sarah khaki with Atlanta divorce law group, and I’m joined by our very own Managing Partner, Shawna woods. And today, we are going to break down the top 10 lies that a narcissist will tell you. Shawna, these are fun to do. But they can be a little heart wrenching,

s Shawna 00:39

it can be very heart wrenching. When you think about the fact that any relationship when these are said to you, oftentimes you are internalizing them. And I think it is important to poke fun at them, I think it is important to call them out. And then when you recognize them in your relationship, to be able to go, I see this for what it is.

s Sara 01:01

And I appreciate you saying that. And the purpose of us doing this top 10 list that a narcissist will tell you is supposed to almost be a love letter to all of our clients and anybody that we work with that comes to us. And we can tell there is a pattern of abuse that they have succumb to and there is a programming that has gone into their mind and belief system over who they are, what they’re going through, and why they’re having such a hard time moving forward with their lives. Because even though the narcissist may not be in the picture, or the narcissist is not in that room with them, when they’re making these life changes with us, it’s still the narcissist voice coming up. And to Shawna’s point, we want to do a pattern disrupt here by saying these poking a little fun at them, and bringing awareness to the person who is been under this sort of a household where this these are the things that things told them as truths for them to adopt.

s Shawna 02:08

Absolutely. Those people who are trapped in a relationship where they think business reality,
when it’s not.

s Sara 02:14

Okay, so let’s let’s shake up some false beliefs and disrupt some use of patterns here. All right, so Shawna I’ll go, then you go, all right, my first top 10 lie that a narcissist will tell you is your children will never forgive you. Let me break that down. When somebody decides to come in and make a life decision, and stop the abusive relationship they’re in and say, I no longer want to be a part of this toxic relationship. The narcissist will turn something against them, and use something to the person that they love. So much like your children, you love your children so much. If they feel that you’re no, they’re no longer the center of your attention. They’ll use something else and weaponize it against you. And a lot of times for any parent that loves and adores their children, they will use the children to say they will never forgive you. And they know that that is a core wound that is really hard to ignore and avoid when you hear those words. It’s about control. It’s about controlling.

Yeah.

s Shawna 03:34

All right. So my first one is, it’s not my fault. It’s your fault. And you hear this often when someone is engaging in an argument of I did one little thing and then you blew it up. You blew it out of control. And now we’re in this fight. Now we’re in this fight. And it’s your fault, you should not have reacted that way. What this really is, is you should not have any boundaries. I should be able to mow over all your boundaries, and you can’t get mad at me about it. Because then it’s your fault. There’s only room for one person to have feelings here.

Absolutely. All right,

s Sara 04:15

my next one, my top two reason sorry. My second lie that you’ll hear from a narcissist is you are the one who broke this marriage. Okay, so first of all, hear me out. It takes two people to make a marriage work. It make takes two people to break a marriage. So there’s no, never Is it possible to for one person to break a marriage completely on their own. It takes participation. and narcissists will not take any responsibility. The narcissist will not participate in any self awareness or any self growth and they will put all of the blame on you. And they will use all sorts of data points, data points to validate that. And it doesn’t mean those data points are not accurate. But they do not tell the complete full story of what broke that marriage apart.

s Shawna 05:17

Yeah. All right, my next one. I never did slash said that, I would never do or say something like that. And this accomplishes a few things for the narcissist, right? It puts themselves in the situation of an elevated, right? Oh, gosh, I would never hit that I would never abuse anyone, I would never say that to you. That’s just so impossible. And the second part that it does is make that other person feel like their own reality is untrue. And a lot of times people will come to us and say, you know, I’ve recorded it, because I need to tell you, it was true. And so it’s the flipping of that script, right? Taking this horrible thing that they’ve done, or said and did, and making it all in your head so that it’s never on them.

s Sara 06:14

Andthat’s again, the seeds that they play, it plants inside of your head. So that you think Am I crazy? Or is this for real? And you’ll and you’ll that will stick with you for a while. Okay, my next top lie that a narcissist will tell you, you will end up with nothing if you leave me. Obviously, in divorce law, we hear this a lot when we are helping somebody leave a toxic relationship where they’ve been with a narcissist for a while, no matter how much we put the law in front of them and explain to them over and over again, this is how division of assets works. This is how child support works. This is how alimony works, custody work, this is how custody works. They still have this subconscious programming that’s going on that I will leave have nothing if I leave him or her because that’s what they said. And they’ve truly been convinced of it because the narcissist does a really good job of isolating you, not only from friends and family, but from reality, so that the only reality you know, is the one that they feed you. And after a while, that’s only stories you’ve heard is what they’ve told you. And they’ve made damn sure that you’ve internalized it. So we go through a long process with our clients who are coming out of a narcissistic relationship or relationship with a narcissist to unprogram some of these false beliefs they have of what will happen after divorce.

s Shawna 07:54

Absolutely. When you’re sitting with clients like that they’re almost scared to have anything of approach that other person that Oh, you don’t understand how smart they are. You don’t understand how good they are. You don’t understand how charming they are. No, everyone loves them. It’s because of just what you said. They were programmed to believe all of that, that they’re nothing and the other person has something. My next one is really on the line here. You’re mentally unstable, you’re crazy. There is something so wrong with you. You don’t see reality the way it is. Given it goes back to this control. this destabilization of your own mental
sanity, so that they can take control and anytime you do anything they don’t like, you’re mentally unstable.

s Sara 08:50

And it makes you question your instincts and makes you question yourself and it makes you question is Is this person really abusive? Is this person really a narcissist? Or am I being crazy and this is why we see marriages that have lasted for 20 plus years. And for some point, they might have had we had a client like this year 23 all sudden the blindfold comes off. And because how did last that long? because one person made the other person mentally completely codependent on the other one and shut off any logical reasoning to question what the narcissist was feeding them. Anytime they did. No, no, I must be crazy. All right, here’s my next top lie that a narcissist will tell you. You have turned the kids against me and this one breaks my heart. And what typically happens here is the narcissist probably up until the children were of age 10 or 11 or so were just charmed by that parent. , they were just charmed by the parent that wanted to just show up for the fun that the Thrive and getting all the attention and not taking on any real responsibility and just playing with the kids. And they did all these things because they want to get love from the kids not truly to give love to the kids. But children around the age of 10/11, When they’re coming close to their teenage years, they become quite doubtful of this behavior. And they start challenging things in adults, even if they have non narcissist, parents, they start challenging things in adults, and they start asking the
tough questions, and they want to know why. And they start thinking for themselves, well, it becomes harder for the narcissist to control the narrative with those children.

And then when  these kids turn to teenager, that rebellion starts playing up, they may not adore that parent the way they used to. And while the other parent was always able and willing to be an adult and be a parent and take responsibility and give love give self esteem, give security to the children. The narcissist parent can’t handle that. And they feel like, wow, this child doesn’t adore me and love me like they used to, they’re not giving me self esteem like they used to, they’re not looking at me as a hero like they used to, instead of realizing that’s just children growing up, and it’s my job to be an adult in their life and give them love self esteem and security instead of taking it from them. They blame the other parent and say, It’s because of you that this child does not love me like they used to you’ve turned them against me. And actually what’s probably happening is the healthier parent is trying to get the children to calm down and not rile up the narcissist so that the household can be peaceful and can operate and the children can see that. they can see the tension the healthy parent has around the narcissist parent.

s Shawna 12:06

You hit on so many good points they’re the children in particular not just are the is the narcissist seeking love for them. They’re seeking validation from the outside world about look how good my children are. Look, it’s a mini children are their status. Yeah, they’re their children are their status. And they may dress them like themselves, they may push them into activities that they want from themselves or what from themselves. When a child comes into their teenage years, that’s really where their mental capacity is developing and thinking, Oh, I am my own person, right. And so when this child is pulling away from the narcissist, they may not even be rebelling, they are just finding their own voice in their own person. And the narcissist can’t handle that, because they cannot see a world outside themselves

s Sara 12:57

because a children’s just a reflection of their ego. Beautiful.

s Shawna 13:02

Okay this one is a hard one because we get this a lot. And you will never no one will ever believe you. And it does go back into what we’re talking about when they say that. You’re crazy. You know, I didn’t do that. And I’m not defending the narcissist because I never will. In their minds. No one will ever believe this person because they don’t believe that person. A narcissist reality is so skewed towards their own viewpoint to their own self importance to their own lies, right?

s Sara 13:45</h5

well they’re incapable of empathy, right?

s Shawna 13:48

So no one will ever believe you is because I don’t believe you. I haven’t believed you. I haven’t seen the good in you. So they kind of stopped someone from going out and telling their friends or their family or a divorce attorney. By intimidating them into thinking if I speak my voice if I use the words to say what’s going on in here. People will really see that I am crazy. And no one will believe me.

s Sara 14:22

That spot on. Here’s my last lie that a narcissist will tell you. You are abandoning your family.

Yeah, again, going for the jugular On the person that they know these are words, feelings, and belief systems that if I put it in their face, they will stop and I can control them I can put the walls up around them. And most likely this individual that lives with this narcissist has left already, because they don’t want to leave their family. And because that is a big pill for them toswallow.

And they’ve put up and put up and put up. And now that they’re at a point, their breaking point and realizing that this isn’t healthy for me, it’s not healthy for anybody involved, especially if there’s minor children involved. And they are planning to leave or get divorced, the word abandoned, it’s thrown at them. And that word has legal significance. And unfortunately, it is not at all mean, what how the narcissist has been using it. abandonment by the law means you’ve left without leaving any form of being contacted. You’ve left leaving all your financial responsibilities behind but leaving all your parenting responsibilities behind

s Shawna 15:55

for a significant amount of time, not thinking that you went away for the weekend.

s Sara 16:00

Or that you took the children with you and went and stayed at your family’s house and left, you know, the your spouse, here’s where me and the kids will be staying. Right. While you know we’re sorting this out. That is not abandonment.

s Shawna 16:16

No to your point abandonment does have a significant legal meaning. And most typically, when  you’re going through a divorce, neither one of you have quote unquote abandoned the other. It’s about leaving someone in financial destitution, or leading someone without the ability to contact you respect to a point where we had to have a faults ground to follow a divorce. So this abandonment that they may be feeling abandoned because they can no longer control you and you’re not right there for them to push your buttons. But that does not mean the law looks at it that same way.

s Sara 16:53

And that word is just emotionally packed, and emotionally controlling.

s Shawna 17:00

Yeah, there is a book that I do recommend. I’ve been listening to it on Audible and I find it to be an absolutely fabulous explanation of a lot of things that go on in relationship. It’s called the narcissist playbook by Dana Morningside and if there, I’ve been sending out to several of our clients. If there is ever a book that would speak to a lot of things that people are just now discovering, I think that’s a good one to begin to look through.

s Sara 17:30

That’s fantastic. Shawna, did you have a last one.

s Shawna 17:33

the last one. You never cared about me.

s Sara 17:38

The victim one

s Shawna 17:39

the victim one, if they cannot control you because they are so smart, and so good and so financially stable and you are so mentally unwell, then their last card that they can play is a  very emotionally manipulative one. You never cared about me, it was all about my money. It was all about my status. What they’re doing is actually parenting, what it is for them. It’s all about their money. It’s all about their status. It’s all about play projection, how good they are so to projection, right, because they cannot fathom that someone would fall out of love with them. Wow. So they have to say, well, you just never fell in love with me.

s Sara 18:27

Well, there you have it. There’s our top 10 lies that a narcissist will tell you. Hopefully you can  hear those and through the pain, maybe get a smirk on your face. Let the blindfolds come off and let the pattern be disrupted. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks for listening to the happily ever after divorce podcast. If you’d like to learn more, go to Atlantadivorcelawgroup.com forward slash resources