Save Your Sanity: Help For Toxic Relationships

Don't make your children feel like pawns, messengers, or casualties of your divorce! In a perfect world, after divorce, your children would only know that life is more peaceful with two homes, and that they miss the way things used to be with both parents in the home. (Of course, if there was a lot of tension, bickering, and anger, they won't miss that at all!)When you co-parent well, you eliminate exposing the children to adult issues. Right? I sure hope you said "Yes!"Children have enough upset to content with when parents separate. It's enough to deal with moving, losing time with their friends, missing the non-custodial parent, feeling uncertain about what's going on, and not have the right things in the right house at the right time. These are kid concerns!FIVE GOAL/AFFIRMATIONS TO KEEP TOP-OF-MIND WHEN CO-PARENTING: I am the model I want my children to follow. Therefore, everything I do and say demonstrates who I want my children to strive towards becoming.I communicate with my ex in the way I wish for

#Hijackals--those relentlessly difficult, demanding people--NEED to be the center of the attention, the star of the show, the center of your Universe. And, they have to come first. You, then, are expected to be their adoring, validating audience, clapping at the least of their ideas. Exhausting, and inappropriate...at the least! Whether they take center stage by being charming, or by being nasty, doesn't matter to them, as long as they occupy that space and garner your attention.#Hijackals® believe that life should revolve around them, their needs, wants, thoughts, feelings, and desires. NO! That's not true. But, have you been falling into step with what they want? Time to re-assess!Yes, she can be charming, alluring, and magnetic.Yes, he can be amusing, engaging, and promising.But. it's all about them. That's not a recipe for a healthy relationship. It's toxic!Is this sounding familiar? If so, it's time for a change. It's time for a clear look at what's really going on, and decide if you're ready to do somet

"It's crazy-making! No matter how wrong s/he is, it's always my fault!" Have you ever said that about a parent, partner, ex, friend, sibling, co-worker? Infuriating! Frustrating! Endless! It has to stop. And, unfortunately, that's up to you. A #Hijackal--a relentlessly difficult person with narcissistic, anti-social, borderline or histrionic behaviors--will never entertain the remote possibility that s/he has made a mistake, or is wrong. Right? Nasty!#Hijackals have been damaged in ways that cause them to be hyper-vigilant, always on the look out to defend themselves against blame. Even when there is nothing to guard themselves against, they make up things. Have you experienced this? If you're with a #Hijackal you certain will know what I'm talking about!Blame becomes a pre-occupation for Hijackals. Their immediate response is to reject it or deflect it. That means it's coming back your way. Hence, the Boomerang of Blame.----------------------------------------------------------------------I'M HERE TO HELP YO

Do you bend over backwards to keep people happy? Do you try to live up to other people's expectations? If you answered "Yes" to either of those, you may be accepting a relationship that is actually emotionally unsafe for you. It may be a toxic relationship!Another way to know if you need to question your emotional safety is to recognize that you fell in love with someone who swept you off your feet, and seemed absolutely perfect, and now, you find yourself with a person who puts you down and wears you down to the point of exhaustion.That's what #Hijackals do! They "get" you with the picture of perfection, and keep you in a private place of pain, sadly enough.(If you're wondering if you're with a #Hijackal, get my free gift for you: my ebook, How to Spot a Hijackal, HERE. )Did you fall in love with a person who was so amazing that you thought you'd been blessed with a soulmate? Then, did you find the relationship deteriorating into something more like being cursed with a cellmate?You want--and need--to listen

People can drive you crazy, right? Toxic people are best at it. And, yet, you might still be telling yourself that you can change them. Is that true...even a little bit? Everyone has bad days. Everyone goes through rough patches. You've been there yourself.Someone you care about is overwhelmed or stress to the point of snippy-ness or name-calling. It's surprising and annoying, but you understand. Why? Because it only happens once in a blue moon!But #Hijackals®, those relentless difficult people, they want to suck you in, use you, and spit you out, right?They're motto seems to be, "Come closer. Stay away." Crazy-making!It's time to recognize--and realize down to your toes--that you cannot change a narcissist, or a person with narcissistic behaviors. You cannot!You could stand on your head and spit wooden nickels for a year, and it wouldn't do anything but make that person think that they had a wonderful degree of control over you! Not the result you wanted, right?-----------------------------------------------

Jealous? That's a big issue that can easily cause major relationship problems! Have you already learned that? Are you ready to stop repeating that mistake? Great!Jealousy is the green, fire-breathing monster that is lying in wait to devour your relationships, and hurt your heart. When you want to stop living in fear of being hurt, you can. I can help. You want to be free of jealousy because it uses far too much energy with no good return on that investment.Are you suspicious?Are you accusatory?Are you smothering?Are you too often blaming and shaming?Are you tired of living with all that fear? I hope so. It's too hard on you...and quite unnecessary. You may not know that yet, but it's true. It's unnecessary.Dr. Phil is correct when he says, "Jealousy is a poorly disguised need for power and control." Do you see that?It's just what you don't want to happen to you, right? You don't want someone who has a need for power and control over you. But, your jealousy may be a misguided effort to have power and control o

Have you heard that TV ad for air freshener that implores you to notice that you may have gone "nose-blind" to the unpleasant smells in your kitchen, garbage, basement, or car? Well, I think people go "nose-blind" to verbal abuse...and, to emotional abuse, too. It's time to stop! Today, I'm talking about the ways you might be justifying the bad behavior of a #Hijackal in your life, a relentlessly difficult, usually self-centered person who wants power and control over you...always. It's not just occasional. It's a way of life for them, and they have endless expectations that you will not only allow their verbal abuse, but you'll begin to believe you deserve it. YOU DON'T!!!!If you've had a #Hijackal parent, an emotionally unavailable parent who had unreasonable expectations of you, you may subconsciously be so used to the behavior that you don't see it in all it's awfulness. You're used to it, and even though it makes you uncomfortable, it is still "comfortably uncomfortable." It's familiar. And, that can cha

Self-confidence! Sounds good, doesn't it? You want to have, express, and experience it, and that's not always easy after a #Hijackal has trampled it. You can become self-confident, and today's episode will give you great steps! How are you doing with your self-confidence? Has someone bashed it? Are you ready to improve your self-confidence and step out with more conscious self-love? Great. You'll love this episode!Once you're on a downward path with your self-confidence, the world seems to conspire to keep you there. You even find ways to put yourself down and keep yourself down, especially if you've been with a #Hijackal of any stripe. That Hijackal could have been your parent, sibling, or partner. Time to stop letting that person have any say in how you live your life, and especially no further say in what you are capable of doing.----------------------------------------------------------------------I'M HERE TO HELP YOU FIGURE OUT WHAT'S GOING ON AND WHAT YOU WANT TO DO ABOUT IT!If you want to learn mo

You need to learn how to side-step toxic, passive-aggressive behavior, and save your sanity, right? Today's episode gives you 7 ways to do just that. Other episodes have talked about important aspects of being in relationship with a passive-aggressive person, and about what to do if you are being passive-aggressive. Now, how to protect yourself from the toxicity of passive-aggressive behavior coming from someone else!You feel the energetic hit of their toxic behavior, but strangely, most folks immediately question themselves. That's where you have to start making changes. Once you recognize the passive-aggression, you can then do things differently yourself. That's where your power lies.----------------------------------------------------------------------I'M HERE TO HELP YOU FIGURE OUT WHAT'S GOING ON AND WHAT YOU WANT TO DO ABOUT IT!If you want to learn more, share, ask questions, and feel more powerful within yourself and your relationships,join my Support Circle now.Off social media, safe discussion

Oh, the joys of being love-bombed, right? Only you had no idea that that was what was happening!You honestly believed you had found your partner, your person, your soulmate, the person who knew you so well, and could anticipate your needs. You just knew you'd be happy forever. All was well...until the "Gotcha!" That's the moment when you realized--much as you tried not to notice--that things were no longer as rosy as they seemed. You recognize that you are often being discounted, being belittled, and often, too much rage. Maybe, there is too much name-calling going on, too much blaming, too much fault-finding.And, on the flip side, there was not enough love, communication, emotional intimacy, or respect. You, if you were like most who found themselves with #Hijackals, found that you were being betrayed. Your trust was misplaced. You didn't want to believe it, so you made endless excuses and justifications for it.Now, you see it. You were raised by a #Hijackal, loved a #Hijackal, married a #Hijackal, or divorc

How many times have you heard someone--maybe on TV--say, "Oh, we're just going through a rough patch." Really? Is it? Or, is it abuse? It's SO important to know the difference, and that's what today's episode sets out to make very clear: the difference.Here's how Dictionary.com defines abuse:to use wrongly or improperlymisuseabuse one's authoritytreat in a harmful, injurious, or offensive wayto speak insultingly, harshly, and unjustly to or aboutmalignto commit sexual assault uponharshly or coarsely insulting languagebad or improper treatmentOK...big difference from a supposed "rough patch," right?There's no getting away from it. When someone treats you in a degrading, mean, discounting, or dismissive way, it's abuse!If you don't have strong boundaries that you express and maintain, you'll turn yourself into a pretzel, and end up being a doormat. You don't want that for a moment longer, right? That's why you need to see this clearly right now, whether it is happening to you or to someone you care about.HIGHLI

Whatever has the story of the Three Billy Goats Gruff got to do with covert narcissism? Just who is that troll under the bridge in the story? In your story?Let's take a look at that in today's episode of Save Your Sanity.Sad that any one has to live under a bridge, for sure. No doubt about it, the parents of a covert narcissist taught them how to do it. That's how they survived their childhoods. Unfortunately, those are the only strategies they currently have, and so....under the bridge!Covert narcissists love to live under a bridge, have a sad story to tell, and offer to "gobble you up" when you don't meet their needs. Today, I'm using this story to help illustrate how crafty covert narcissists are, how they hide in wait to pull you under! How they are lying in wait to make you wrong!Dr. Craig Malkin wrote that: "What's different about covert narcissists is that because they're introverted, they don't advertise their inflated egos." They may not advertise, but they still sell you that bill of goods.Are you f

HIJACKALS®! They exist! You've likely met one or two. Most everyone has. There is no real need for a diagnosis. The Hijackal will not subject him or herself to one, anyway. After all, s/he is perfect, right?All you really need to have is the ability to clearly see the patterns, traits, and cycles of these relentlessly difficult people, and know what to do to not become their prey! They are emotional predators.I created and trademarked this term, #Hijackals, to give you a way to easily talk about the patterns, traits, and cycles of the relentlessly difficult people in your life, and in a non-clinical way. After all, what you need is to know what to do when you're in a relationship with one, right? That begins with clearly being able to identify a toxic person's behaviors, and know that there are those patterns. That's helpful!Hijackals like to push you away. They do their upmost to push your buttons...or, at least, it sure feels that way. You might be surprised to learn today that they are really doing that fo

UNDERSTANDING THE IMPACT OF EMOTIONAL ABUSE AND NEGLECT ON YOUR LIFE IS IMPORTANT.If it happened to you, it can affect all areas of your life and relationships.THE GOOD NEWS: You can heal and we'll talk about this later in the episode with my guest.DR. JONICE WEBB, Author of the first book written on Childhood Emotional Neglect ( CEN )First, though, I invite you to answer this question:"Do you recognize what emotional abuse of children is? It's much more than you might think."Abuse is any behavior that is designed to control or dominate another person. Whether that is through fear, humiliation, intimidation, isolation, guilt, blaming, manipulation or denial. Therefore, emotional abuse is simply any abuse that is emotional rather than physical.It can include belittling, discounting, manipulating the emotions of another and constant criticism. It can be less obvious than that, such as continuous disapproval, or the refusal to ever be pleased by another in any way.It can be engaging chil

Constant drama in one of your relationships? Are you frustrated and resentful, but unsure how to change things? Do you fool yourself by making excuses for the other person's poor, damaging, or degrading behaviors? No more, OK? You will feel SO much better when you are confident that you can:set boundariesexpress your boundariesmaintain your boundariesset consequences for trampled boundariesfollow-through on the consequencesRight?Of course.If you had a #Hijackal parent, you are used to having your boundaries trampled. You likely wonder if you know anything different! That's because all Hijackals® believe that things should be their way or the highway. How dare you have a point of view, or a desire for something different than they want you to have!And, how about name-calling? NO! That's not OK at all.How do you stop it? In today's episode I use stopping name-calling as an example to take you through the steps to setting boundaries, through to following through on the consequences of trespassing a personal boun

Emotional grown-ups don't fight. Kids and needy adults fight. You don't want to be one of those, so a few essential tips for you in today's episode. Fighting is what kids do. They do it because they are trying to establish boundaries, power, and a sense of who they are. They don't know yet. Their skills are almost non-existent, except for what they have seen the adult in their lives do. Were those good models? Hmmmm....You don't want to fight, right? So, today, I'm suggesting you do these three big things to stay out of the fray.You know fighting never works. You might feel like to "really told him off," or, "I told it like it is," but did it really accomplish anything?Fighting with a #Hijackal is an absurdity, really. You can't get anywhere, and you don't feel better in the end. So, don't do it!Sure, for a few minutes, you feel like you got rid of a bunch of pent-up anger, and you needed to get a whole lot off your chest. BUT, what is the result? Did anything really change, especially did anything change for

I know, you don't want to believe that that person who said they loved you--or, that person who gave birth to you--will ever really hurt you...like in go to the hospital, or the morgue hurt you, right? You want to believe that they really love you, even though they only behave that way when they really want something from you. Sometimes, they also behave that way when things are going VERY well for them in life. BUT, usually, they are unpredictably frustrated, angry, raging, or giving you the silent treatment.THESE ARE SERIOUS #HIJACKALS®!When you hear about violence perpetrated in so many ways in the world--shootings, wars, subway "pushers", rape, beatings, I hope it is a wake-up call. Have a look at your life with a Hijackal and think about the possibility of violence. There may be none, and I hope that's the truth for you.However, many people simply don't want to look at that possibility of violence, and do nothing.I want you to stay safe, so today, I'm talking about something that really needs to be talke

Do you have a person in your life that is crazy-making? S/he promises to do something, and then somehow forgets?Or, a person who procrastinates regularly, then wants to make it your fault--or the weather's--that things don't get done? Then, you'll want to listen to this episode on the actual emotional abuse that happens when you are often experiencing someone else's passive-aggressive behavior.Passive-aggressive behavior is covert. Stealthy even!You're not really sure when or if you were hit, or when you might be again. It catches you off-guard, and causes you to question your sanity. You think:"Didn't s/he agree to do this? I'm sure that's the case. Yet, now that it is not done when promised, s/he is telling me I should never have expected them to do it!" Crazy-making!Passive-aggressive people are fearful of competition, conflict, dependency, and yes, intimacy. It's like their behavior is pushing you away, while their words ask you to stay. Confusing!Do you have someone in your life who can make chaos out of

Verbal Violators in any work situation make working together next to impossible. At a minimum, they make you cringe, avoid, and prefer to take sick days over going to work.In my book, Wrestling Rhinos: Conquering Conflict in the Wilds of Work, I talk about folks who commit "malpractice of the mouth!" Those are verbal violators, verbal abusers. These folks have control issues that lead to anger issues that lead to rage and lack of reason. And, they think they're right.You know that I talk about my term, Hijackals®. Those are the difficult, the relentlessly difficult people in life who just have to run everything, including their mouths! Well, you meet them at work, too.In today's episode, I'm giving you some thoughts on how to proceed when you're around folks whose "mouths enrage before their minds engage" as I say in Wrestling Rhinos.HIGHLIGHTS OF TODAY'S EPISODE:Three things that definitely cause verbal violence to eruptTwo things that must happen to make the working environment safe for allWhat to do if you

Is your relationship one-sided? Are you wondering if it's you? Does your partner have to "win" always? Is everything your fault? You're already confused, just the way a Hijackal® wants you to be. A Hijackal is a person who behaves in ways that are common to people considered to have narcissistic, borderline, histrionic, or antisocial behavior patterns. I created the term, Hijackals, so that you would have a way of talking about the behaviors without trying to make a diagnosis. You simply need to know the signs so that you clearly know what's really going on in your relationship.Hijackals love to reel you in with what is called "love-bombing." They have the ability to seem to be all that you ever wanted, your perfect partner, your soulmate. Then, once you've committed to them--and, oh, they're fast to want you to move in, marry, get pregnant--so that they can give up their false front and go back to being their real selves. Nasty, right?For today's episode, I'm reading my free ebook, How to Spot a Hijackal, wh