I know for many, walking away from a narcissist can be so difficult.
When every bone in your body knows that staying with them is wrong, but there’s a part of you that still can’t do it, you end up freezing.
To freeze is to be unsure. You’re torn, so it’s easier in that moment to do nothing, than take the action you know you need to take.
That’s why you’re here today. To learn why, and to find ways to become unstuck forever.
#1 Never imagining you’d be walking away
I know that. I know it well because it’s one of the most common things you contact me about.
I never thought I would walk away from the person I thought was my soulmate.
I thought we would last forever.
I could never see myself walking away from them.
But times change, and things shift that cause you to reconsider. Suddenly, walking away doesn’t seem as unappealing as it once did.
Now you’re at the point where you are actually seeing a life for yourself outside of this abusive dynamic.
Why?
Because you finally see that it’s abusive!
#2 When the mask slips, you know it’s time
When you know it’s time is often when you see the mask of the narcissist slip away.
It was firmly on at first, and that’s why you thought they were so lovely. It turns out, they’re simply just good at acting.
As you watch the mask fall to the ground, you’re greeted with a hard truth:
- The narcissist exists, and not the nice version you saw initially.
- Everything they said to you was just an act.
- They can pick and choose when the mask slips, so you seem to be the only one who notices.
- Their cruel, twisted ways become obviously apparent, leaving you in no doubt you’re facing an abuser.
It has to be time at that point to let go and walk away. The energy you gave them before can’t be returned, and you can’t turn back time and make none of it happen at all.
The hurt I know you feel will be real, and I would never try to take that away.
- You feel silly for falling for their tricks.
- You hate that the narcissist saw a weakness or vulnerability in you.
- You hate that your good nature was taken for granted.
You want to walk, and every part of your mind and body together are telling you to do it, but for some reason, you can’t.
Instead – you freeze.
#3 Freezing: a trauma response
When the nervous system kicks in and gives you a fight-or flight response to deal with, the freeze response can be incredibly challenging. Here’s why.
To freeze, is to do nothing. You can’t flee (the flight response), because you’re being stopped by fear and uncertainty.
You worry about what the consequences might be of you walking away.
Will the narcissist chase you, will they intimidate you into returning? Maybe they will smear your name around and make sure nobody talks to you.
Then there’s fighting. What good would that do? It’s ineffective to fight with a narcissist because you’re likely to not win.
Freeze is a state of mental and physical paralysis, where one way or the other simply isn’t an option for you. What can that mean?
For a lot of victims stuck in freeze mode, they deassociate.
They pull back emotionally from their abuser and disconnect with themselves.
That can worryingly include their sense of identity, memories, or any feelings they have.
Everything just stops mattering.
#4 Overload
I think that’s what it all boils down to, and the science behind it all would strongly agree.
Freezing is a sign that your nervous system is completely overloaded, and you as the victim, enters a state of survival.
This isn’t about surviving the moment, we all know you can do that. This is more about surviving what’s to come.
If you take door A, you have to survive it. If you take door B, you have to survivethat, too.
As you freeze, your body shuts down. It wants to protect you from further threat, but that’s the key here.
Why should a victim see leaving a narcissist as being any kind of threat to themselves?
That would be because you’ve been convinced that you are worthless alone.
Leaving the narcissist feels like a threat because you know how angry they get. You know they will want revenge, and to punish you for walking away.
#5 The guilt and shame
A huge reason why victims freeze when they know it’s time to walk away from a narcissist is because of the guilt and shame the narcissist piles onto them.
What do you mean, you’re leaving?
How could you do this to me?
You know I am trying my hardest!
You’ve hurt me so much.
I can’t live without you.
Then the shame:
I can’t believe you think you would survive a day without me.
Look at you thinking you have some kind of say or power.
Do you honestly think it suits you to be so direct?
Both guilt and shame play a huge part in the freeze response largely due to the programming of anticipation a person experiences.
You’re now used to thinking about all the what ifs and worst case scenarios.
You dread your own thoughts coming true, but you’ve spent enough time with the narcissist to know that bad things happen, and your anxious, heavy thoughts can indeed come true.
Freezing helps none of that come true, at least for the time being.
The problem is, the longer you stay in freeze mode, the more problems you will have trying to decide what to do.
That’s where it’s easy for a lot of victims to slip back into old relationships and patterns with their abuser.
#6 Trusting in yourself
Trusting yourself is the most crucial part of all of this. I have to tell you to listen to your gut, and whenever it’s telling you to walk away, it’s telling you for a good reason.
I make a point of saying it because we all know that narcissists will talk you out of facts that you know, and convince you that the blue sky is in fact, green.
You learn through their gaslighting to not trust your own thoughts or opinions, but you can never really ignore what the gut is trying to tell you.
#7 Moving on from the narcissist and not looking back
Stepping out of the freeze response, or any trauma response, won’t be easy.
You will fight against patterns of thought and behavior that you’ve become very used to.
Beginning to trust what’s right and wrong, and seeing abuse for the horror that it is, will go a large way to help you overcome feeling like you can’t move forward or back, left or right.
