Surviving narcissistic abuse is no mean feat.
The moment you know you’ve overcome the actual abuse is one thing, but living with the fact that the abuse has taken up a portion of your life is another.
There are signs that you are a survivor, though.
Signs you might not like, but they are indications that you have lived experience of abuse that you probably wish you could reverse.
Knowing them can sometimes work as an effective catalyst toward healing and beginning to learn (or re-learn) your worth.
Let’s look at those 12 signs that show you survived!
#1 You over-apologize
Over-apologizing comes from not wanting to offend or hurt anybody.
Why is that? Because you’ve gained a strong background in doing so (even though you never actually did anything wrong).
You didn’t make mistakes, you were cornered to do the impossible, and even then, the goalposts were changed so much you could never actually please who was asking for it.
And so you over-apologize. You fall over yourself to try to make things right.
This is a clear indication that somewhere in your past was a person whom you could never please, namely a narcissist.
#2 You struggle with what boundaries even mean
You want to have good, strong, solid boundaries, but the second you try, you feel guilty.
This leaves you feeling like boundaries just make you appear to be cold and uncaring of other’s feelings, so you let them slide.
Not just once, but over and over again.
Now you struggle with them due to past feelings of shame put on you for having them, and to even know what they fully mean or stand for gets you all in an emotional state.
#3 You don’t see yourself in the mirror
You look in the mirror and see the reflection of your face, but you don’t recognize the person behind it at all.
You want to, but you were made to feel like you and that person were strangers, and you were pulled away from them by the narcissist.
This was no mistake. This was ruthless and calculated so that you lost yourself and needed to rely on somebody else.
Not seeing who you really are means you likely have no direction in your life, which makes it hard for you to make decisions and choices that are for the greater good.
#4 Anxiety runs through your blood
Anxiety runs right through your blood, and you probably won’t recall a time where that wasn’t the case.
You worry, you find yourself wishing things were different, you feel small in the comfort zone that just about houses you because that too, is tiny, and you spend day and night worrying about the future.
That’s because in our relationship with the narcissist, you constantly had to second guess their moods and what drama would unfold.
#5 You feel lost
Lost without a single line of direction to go in.
You weren’t encouraged to grow, you weren’t inspired by the narcissist, and you were kept under emotional lock and key by them.
Feeling lost comes from never being given the chance to grow in your relationship. You were the one who had to do as they were told. The one who was under control.
So controlling your own life now feels just too big to think about.
#6 You worry about what people think of you
When you’ve been locked in a relationship with so many limits, rules and abusive moves, you will have spent a great deal of that worrying about what the narcissist thinks of you.
You’d have spent much time second guessing, thinking about how you can be the perfect person for them, and how you can make their lives easier and better.
You’ll never get it right.
Instead, you get it wrong, time and time again. You worry about what they think of you, and that branches out into people you know, like family or friends, too.
It’s wrong to constantly be made to feel like you have to question your character just because one person seems to want to make every waking moment hell for you, but that’s what narcissists do best.
#7 Money scares you
Having money scares you, and not having money also frightens you, too. That’s because you’ve been forced to believe that finances are more important than anything else.
The narcissist’s obsession with money becomes your obsession, but for different reasons.
You fear it. You fear spending it, earning it, or having it.
You fear what the narcissist will say when you rack up a purchase on the bank statement, and you also worry that you won’t have any and you will be thrown onto the streets.
These are all fears put on you by the narcissist.
#8 You realize you don’t have many friends
Not having many friends comes from so many factors that include:
- Not wanting to put yourself out there
- Not trusting people
- Not having the confidence to make friends
- Being isolated from the friends you did have by the narcissist
Suddenly, your world seems empty, and you don’t really have the tools to go out there and make new ones.
#9 Your hobbies are non-existent
There are no hobbies that will have stuck around with you all the while you were stuck with the narcissist.
They would have been pushed out of your system in order to leave you feeling and being that slightly more hollowed out version of yourself than you were before.
And the problem is, now your abusive relationship is in the past, you find getting hobbies hard work.
Probably something to do with feeling as though it’ll be taken from you, right?
#10 You lack any self-worth
Your self-worth doesn’t exist. It did once upon a time, but now it has faded into the past with your zest for life because the narcissist hated seeing you strong and full of joy.
Now it’s gone, you struggle to make sense of a world where you can be authentically you, and you don’t feel as though you’re worth good things happening to you.
#11 You don’t have any confidence
You want so badly to be the type of person who says yes to the adventures of life, or the opportunities to grow and be sure of your decisions.
That’s due to the fact that the narcissist you knew spent all their time gaslighting you and creating a world in which your reality did not exist.
And now? Now it still affects you big time. You want things to be different, but this type of thing isn’t a switch.
#12 You fear both failure and success
Both failure and success mean you tried, and if you’re with a narcissist, it’s them who will stop you from doing that as often as they can.
They don’t want to see you win, they want to see you lose. The trouble is, they will ridicule and slam you for losing, even though they pushed you there.
There’s no way of winning that war, and so both failure and success become a sticking point for you in a world where you cannot remain in limbo forever.
