June 1st - World Narcissistic Abuse Awareness Day

Today is June 1st, World Narcissistic Abuse Awareness Day. 
 
Narcissistic abuse leaves no visible scars and is hard to believe unless the victim confides in someone who has experienced it themselves or in a trained professional in their respective field who possesses knowledge and experience that goes beyond reading theories and textbooks. 

Dare to speak and break the silence. 

Narcissistic abuse is the intentional and malicious exploitation, abuse and manipulation of the heart, soul, mind and spirit of another human being. It takes the form of coercion, emotional, spiritual, religious, financial, psychological, institutional or physical abuse. Narcissists are master manipulators using gaslighting, triangulation and flying monkeys who are part of a reward and punishment system doing their work for them. 
 
While the flying monkeys get their hands dirty, the puppeteer in the background keeps their hands clean, so that when they are caught others pay the price for their deeds. To a narcissist, flying monkeys are tools and the moment they have fulfilled their purpose, they are sacrificed, let go or scapegoated without blinking. 
 
Victims of narcissistic abuse are depleted of their energy and finances, isolated from friends and family who will not tolerate the abuse they are witnessing quietly, confused by manipulation tactics and tricked into reacting to the abuse that has taken place behind closed doors in public.

This is called reactive defense. It makes the victim look like the narcissist or the toxic partner and the narcissist or toxic partner like the victim. The script is flipped. 
 
Victims of narcissistic abuse are trapped in cycles of abuse and sudden loving behavior creating trauma bonding. In public the narcissist wears masks befitting the occasion, in private the masks fall and Dr. Jekyll turns into Mr. Hyde. 
 

“I see you”, black crayons & pastels, Kristin Raphaela Otti (2024, Wolfsberg, Carinthia)

The silencing of the victim and the silence of those witnessing the abuse keep the narcissist in power.

​Dare to speak and break the silence. 

Addendum
 
In this context be aware of reactive defense (formerly “reactive abuse”). Abusive and toxic people will consciously try to goad their victims into an emotional reaction after a traumatic experience, long-term abuse and studying their wounding and triggers. 
 
They do this to flip the script turning their victim into the offender and abuser, while assuming the victim role themselves omitting what they have done. More often than not, they have already planted seeds behind their victim’s back, lied, gossiped, triangulated and smeared them personally or used their flying monkeys and enablers, the people who know but consciously choose not to speak up. 
 
The emotional response of the victim to the prolonged abuse will be used against them, as they will call them “crazy”, “unstable”, “abusive” and “unhinged”.  It is one of the strategies a narcissist or psychopath will use to discredit their chosen target, take away their safety net and turn people, friends, colleagues, business partners and relatives against them, leaving them to stand on their own, experiencing another trauma, while they are receiving help and their victim is being shunned and isolated. 

​Kristin Raphaela Otti 
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If you are into reading and storytelling, I recommend reading Stephen King’s “Misery” and “Needful Things”. Leland Gaunt in “Needful Things” is a master puppeteer letting his flying monkeys do his bidding while not getting his hands dirty and if you have seen Kathy Bates starring in the movie adaptation of “Misery”, you know what it means to witness your perfect soulmate turn into your worst nightmare behind closed doors.