NAVIGATING NARCISSISTIC ABUSE | MY JOURNEY TO HEALING, PERSONAL EMPOWERMENT AND BRINGING MYSELF BACK TO LIFE

Do you ever find yourself questioning your reality? Are you feeling controlled and manipulated in your relationship and suspecting you might be involved with a narcissist? If so, join me on The Femme Cast as I share my deeply personal journey through the intricate world of narcissistic abuse. This episode serves as a guiding light for anyone navigating the complexities of toxic relationships.

Drawing from my own experiences, I candidly discuss the profound impacts of narcissistic abuse—how it can leave you feeling trapped, manipulated, and constantly second-guessing yourself. I reveal my struggles, the pivotal moment I recognized the toxic patterns, and the transformative steps I took to reclaim my life and self-worth.

In this conversation, we explore the hidden traits of narcissists and their profound effects on mental, emotional, and energetic well-being. From romantic partners to manipulative figures in our lives, we delve into recognizing these toxic dynamics and the empowering journey of detaching from them. 

Rediscovering your true self after narcissistic abuse is a monumental task, but it’s one that’s entirely possible. Tune in as we discuss the emotional withdrawal and self-preservation mechanisms that often leave individuals feeling in a state of paused existence. Particularly, we address the unique challenges faced by empaths and people pleasers who are particularly vulnerable in these relationships.

Through personal reflections and actionable insights, I aim to provide clarity, support, and a roadmap to healing and reclaiming your identity. This episode is for anyone ready to break free from toxic cycles and embark on a journey of personal empowerment and self-love.

Let’s do this. 

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https://thefemmecast.ck.page/meditations

Are you ready to rewrite your love story + glow from the inside out? If so, use the link below to register for my 21 Day Radical Self-Love Challenge.
https://thefemmecast.ck.page/21daychallenge

Want to get to know the more intimate details of my story? If so, click the link below to access The Femme Cast Diaries.
https://thefemmecast.substack.com/

Transcript

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 0:32

Hey you guys, what is up? Welcome back to the show. I am so excited and grateful to have you guys back. Today's conversation is gonna be really hard for you guys, and so please bear with me as I share some of the details of my experience. We're talking about narcissistic abuse today and what I wish I had known sooner about these types of relationships, and I want to share with you what I wish I'd known, specifically about what I was doing to attract these kinds of relationships and what I would do differently today and the impacts that these relationships had on me and my life. So we have a lot to digest here today. So we'll see if we can do it all in one episode. Hopefully I won't have to break it up, but we'll see how far we get today.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 1:22

And I just want to preface all of this with saying listen, I'm not a therapist. Yes, I'm a healer and a coach and I do a lot of energy healing work and a lot of inner child work Absolutely, absolutely. But I am not a therapist. So everything that I'm sharing today is my own personal experience what I witnessed within a narcissistic-abusive relationship, how I responded to it and what I noticed shifted within me after having had that experience and what I know within me was kind of the bait that was attracting these kinds of relationships into my world. And it wasn't just with romantic partnerships, you guys. It was all kinds of relationships. I had a partner who was very much an overt narcissist. I also had a partner who was a covert narcissist two very different types of behaviors. I had a coach who was a narcissist. Wow, that was fun. That did some damage. I even had a boss who was a narcissist. So different situations, different places, different dynamics, different emotions involved, but the outcome of each of those relationships was very similar in terms of the damage that it did. So we're going to talk a little bit about what that looked like for me and maybe that'll give you some if you're going through something similar, you know, maybe that'll give you, um, some clarity, cause I know I didn't have it. I didn't know it was in a narcissistic relationship until it was well over, probably like a couple of years over. I didn't even know what narcissists really was, to be quite honest with you. I didn't even know what narcissists really was, to be quite honest with you, and so it took me a while to really figure out that this was happening and by that time, like the damage had already been done. So again, everything I'm sharing personal experience with my own relationships and also going to be sharing a little bit about what I did emotionally and energetically to really support my healing.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 3:40

So if there's one thing I want you to take away from today, it's that attracting narcissistic people into your world can be avoided. It really can, and it starts with loving ourselves first. And I think you know people always give me so much grief over the whole self-love thing. Like you know, it's not a. And I think you know people always give me so much grief over the whole self-love thing. Like you know, it's not a cure-all, you know, but it isn't. It isn't Because this became my first line of defense against protecting myself and my energy against these types of relationships.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 4:11

It actually became a deterrent. To be quite honest, narcissists don't like when you love yourself Just going to put that out there. They get very irritated by it. So it really becomes the best narcissist repellent out there. It's very effective actually. I encourage you to try it.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 4:31

If you haven't done it, go ahead and you can sign up now for my 21 Day Radical Self-Love Challenge. It's totally free. You can find it in the show notes below or it's also on my Instagram. If you go to the link in the bio. It's there.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 4:45

So okay, so this is for you if you've been in a cycle of attracting very toxic, narcissistic people into your life and they could just be toxic, even if you don't know if they're narcissistic I mean toxic works we into your life and they could just be toxic, even if you don't know if they're narcissistic. I mean toxic works. We can deal with toxic too. It's all kind of triggered by the same types of things in some ways. Anyways, this is for you if you've been in a relationship with a narcissistic person or someone that you love is in a relationship with a narcissistic person, in which case, if that's the case, please do share this episode with them. Hopefully they don't get offended for you doing that, because they might not know that they're a narcissist, actually Meaning the person that you're sharing them with might not know that they're in a relationship with a narcissist. If you had told me that I was in a relationship with a narcissist, I never would have believed you. I thought he was my light and shining armor. Honestly, you're in a relationship that is toxic, but you're not quite sure if it qualifies as narcissistic. You know, we kind of got you covered here.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 5:42

So over the next several weeks we're going to be talking a lot more about this, because this was really, you know, going through these types of relationships and again there was the partner, the boss and the coach, three narcissists that came into my world all at around the same time. Three narcissists that came into my world all at around the same time, and the number that they did on me mentally I can't even like. It's mind boggling to me. I'm still to this day like I was having a conversation with somebody the other day. It's like I'm still having aha moments and moments of realization of the impacts that that relationship had. And this was years ago, right, but I'm still like there's still clarity coming, there's still realizations coming, there's still like, oh my God. So that's why that happened, right, but it was such a pivotal part, I think, in my journey and such a pivotal. It played such a pivotal role in why I do what I do today. So that's why I kind of want to take this next few weeks to really dive in a little bit deeper into that experience and what that looked like for me because I am so excited not to not that I went through. I mean. Well, yeah, I am kind of excited that I went through this because now I get to share it with you guys and this is such a powerful part of my story and can potentially help you if you're in a similar situation, so that part I'm really freaking excited about.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 7:12

So I want to ask you a question. So I want you to give some thought. Have you ever asked yourself and I remember asking myself this so many times what is wrong with me and why do I keep attracting these toxic and narcissistic type people into my life? What the fuck am I doing wrong? Do I have a bullseye on my forehead that says, please come and bully, shame and gaslight me to your convenience? That says, please come and bully, shame and gaslight me to your convenience. Please come and abandon and reject me again and again and again. I deeply love this kind of behavior. No, I didn't love it, but those are the kinds of people that I was attracting.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 7:49

So I'm curious if that is you, or if that's ever been you. If you go to my profile on Instagram at TheFemCast, and just send me a DM, let me know. Like I'm really curious what's been your experience with this, because I know I'm not the only one out there. I know this for sure. So let me know, let me know how that lands for you. There's also another realization that I had recently. I'm going to try and feed into all this. So, hopefully, this I'm really hoping this conversation makes sense at the end of it, because I'm trying to cram so much into this one fucking episode. Like it'll be epic if I can actually get it done in under 40 minutes. I'm going to give myself a medal, honestly, okay, so we'll get into the nuts and bolts of it now.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 8:37

So, like I said before, I did not know that I was in a narcissistic relationship until it was over and I'm talking like well over. It was like a couple of years now where you know the door had closed on the relationship. It was I'm not going to say it was out of mind, because the reality is is sometimes being on the receiving end of a narcissistic relationship and the effects that it has on your mindset. It can almost not leave an I'm not going to say it leaves a permanent imprint, but that person stays in your mind quite a bit longer after any feelings are done After you've ended the relationship. You no longer miss the person, you no longer want the person back, but for some reason, they are always somewhere in your mind and they're always playing tricks on you. And there's this like mental, mental and energetic attachment. That happens when we're in a relationship with a narcissist and this is really the most, I think, detrimental part of you can leave the relationship, yes, but you have to work on the mental stuff. That happens as well. There's mental impacts of being in a narcissistic relationship. There's emotional impacts of being in a narcissistic relationship. There's emotional impacts of being in a narcissistic relationship and there is energetic impacts of being in a narcissistic relationship.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 10:03

I was still, for the longest time, energetically attached to these people. Well, after they left my world, they were no longer even in my orbit and yet here they were. They were still energetically attached to me. They were always an afterthought in my mind. What are they thinking? What are they saying? What are they going to do when they see my feed? What are they saying about me with their friends or with my coworkers, or to my other boss? What shit are they trying to pull behind my back? What nasty rumors are they spreading around me that I don't know about. These are the things, and that took a very, very, very long time, very long time, in fact, I would say.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 10:50

In some cases it's still there with certain things, with certain aspects, and I have to catch myself there with certain things, with certain aspects, and I have to catch myself, and it takes a lot of mental awareness to say, hey, you're safe, honey, you did what you needed to do. It's time to live your life. Now you can't let these things as scary as it can be and I know it's scary like as scary as it can be, and I know it's scary and it is scary, um, you have to live your life. You can't let these, these thoughts run the show anymore. So it takes a lot of mental awareness. Now, again, the hardest part, I think, in all of it was in realizing what was happening, because I didn't know I was in a relationship with a narcissist. At the time I had no idea. I had no idea my ex was a narcissist. I just knew he was toxic as fuck, but I didn't know he was a narcissist. I didn't know my coach was a narcissist. I didn't know my boss was a narcissist, until well after. Until well after.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 11:56

And the funny thing is is that you know narcissistic traits and toxic traits. There's some overlap but they're very different, especially when we're talking about overt narcissism. Covert easier to miss, right? If you're in a relationship with a covert narcissist, way easier to miss, and that's why sometimes I think covert narcissism is actually more dangerous, and we'll get into in a later episode how to really differentiate between the two, because I've had relationships with both.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 12:25

I've been in a relationship with a covert narcissist and an overt narcissist, but the problem was in both actually both dynamics. In all of them there were so many other toxic traits that they were bringing to the table that the narcissism was almost hidden behind all these other toxic traits that were going on. So in the pool of all these toxic traits that I was seeing which, by the way, I had seen in all of my other partners and I had grown very much accustomed to oh my God, sorry, guys that got loud. So I had grown very much accustomed to a lot of these toxic traits. So here was this hot mess of toxic traits and right in the middle, swirling in between all of them, were these narcissistic traits that were new to the mix. I hadn't seen these. Oh, these are new. I hadn't seen these before. Wow, what's this all about? It was like it's like you'll know this if you live anywhere near where I do. Like we.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 13:33

We get a lot of tornadoes here in the summer, but they're very small. They're very. They're really not that big. We're technically part of Tornado Alley but we're in the tail end of it here in the GTA and Southern Ontario. But and sorry, there's a car going by right now. There's it's summer. I can't, it is what it is. I have to like record podcasts at like four in the morning, if you, for you guys not to hear cars like roaring by my apartment every day and that's just not happening.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 14:01

So it's like having when we get with, like when we get our tornadoes in the summer, they're typically smaller than the ones that you typically see out in flatlands and prairie area. They're smaller, they're on the ground much shorter periods of time and they're usually engulfed in thunderstorms. So the reality is that even if there's a tornado there, you rarely actually see it, that even there's a tornado there, you rarely actually see it Because it's engulfed in all this like wind and rain and hail and like you can't see it, like it's tiny, and so sometimes we don't know if a tornado happens until after the. Whatever the geologist, the weatherologist, whatever you call them go and investigate to see the damage path and then, based on the damage path, they'll tell you if there was an actual tornado that happened and what registered on the Fujita scale. You know what I mean, like you just don't know. So we basically we see downed trees, downed power lines, cars flipped over, and we're all like glued to the news to find out if there was a tornado the next day, if there was a tornado the day before, based on the damage that was done. That's the only way they know. Very rarely do you ever actually see the tornado. There have been a few that we've seen, but most of them fairly hidden.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 15:22

So I say all of this to paint a picture of what this looked like in my world. It was like the toxic traits were the storm right, and then inside all that stormy weather, all those toxic traits, was this tornado twirling and swirling around in the middle that you didn't actually see. It was just kind of thrown into the mix of the thunderstorm Shitstorm actually. So that's how I describe it Like you didn't see it, you didn't know it was there until it was kind of like, until it literally ripped your house out from its foundation and threw it across the fucking lake. And then you're like, oh, maybe there was more to that than just your typical toxic relationship. Maybe there was more to that than just your typical toxic relationship, because my house landed on the other side of the lake. Maybe I need to look at this. Do you know what I mean? Like, that's how I describe it.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 16:20

And so, like I said, by the time I realized what was happening, the damage had been done. I had lost trust in myself, I had lost confidence. I had lost trust in love, in relationships. It didn't even feel safe to me to be in a relationship anymore. It didn't feel safe for me to be in love anymore. It didn't feel safe for me to trust anymore. It didn't feel safe for me to be in love anymore. It didn't feel safe for me to trust anymore. It was the most love felt like the most unsafe place for me to be. Being vulnerable was the most unsafe place for me to be.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 17:08

And you know what happens next, which we'll get into, was probably the most frightening thing, but it was almost as if, because there was all this lack of safety, lack of confidence, lack of trust in self and even in my life, right, lack of trust in self and even in my life, right, it was like something in me split. There was like a separation. That happened within me, which we'll get into more a lot later, but it's. It was like, hmm, how do I explain it? It's very hard for me to articulate this because I have to really get into my body to be able to articulate what it felt like. It felt like I created this shallow, empty shell version of me.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 17:55

So it's like here's a part of me that was wounded, here's a part of me that was hurt, here's a part of me that was repeatedly bullied, shamed, badgered, lied to, manipulated, ghosted, gaslighted, rejected, abandoned, and who felt so unsafe putting herself out there, letting them herself be seen, letting herself be vulnerable, being seen by them, so that you know, so she would. Um, she was terrified of subjecting herself to more criticism, more bullying, more badgering, right, and so it was almost like it was like I left my body. It was like I left my essence, my soul, what made me me, what made me lovable, what made me beautiful, what made me the very essence of who I was. It was like it left my body and all that was left was empty shell. So anything that you throw at it, anything that you say about it, anything that you have to judge it, or leave it, reject it or abandon it, it didn't really hurt anymore because I wasn't there leave it, reject it or abandon it. It didn't really hurt anymore because I wasn't there. It was just the empty shell.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 19:12

And this even showed up. This showed up in every area of my life. You guys, it was the most messed up thing I've ever experienced and I couldn't articulate what was happening. I didn't even know it was happening until after, years later. This is something I kind of discovered I'm going to be honest, really recently that I did this.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 19:33

It's like I muted myself. It's like I was suddenly on pause. I left the fucking building. You guys, I left the fucking building. I was no longer there. All that was left was this facade of me, this shell of me, still talking, still breathing, still engaging, but I'm not really in it. My essence was out. It was out the door.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 20:02

And do you know what happens when your essence leaves the building? You stop giving, you stop receiving, you stop living. It's like you're living life on pause or on mute. It's like you're somewhere off in the ethers, while this doppelganger that you created is kind of going about living life for you. Because it's so much safer to do it that way, because now, if anybody bullies that empty shell, if anybody comments, ridicules, badgers, taunts, shames down, talks, smack about, well, it's not me, so it doesn't hurt.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 20:56

It's a protection mechanism that I experienced as I pulled myself out of the equation. I took myself out of the game, you guys, I took myself out of life and it was like this great, long, epic pause that I went through because I wasn't really living. I was just sort of there kind of coasting. Um, it's hard because it took me a really long time to realize what was happening, took me a really long time to realize it. And when I think back to all the years that I spent, all the years that I spent crying and wondering why things couldn't work out like other things not these relationships I'm talking about other things in life now it was like I was working towards so many other things and and trying to, to do things to make my life better, to make my experience better, to call in better relationships, so many things that I was working so hard at.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 22:17

But I wasn't in it Because I was hiding somewhere else. It wasn't in my body anymore. It was just the shell, and the shell right that we leave behind after these situations happen to us, after we experience these types of relationships where we don't feel safe anymore. These shells, they can't do the work on our behalf. They're just a shell, they're a representation. They're not actually you With your soul, not with your essence, not in it. How can you create anything? You can't? It's impossible, right?

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 25:28

And I think the hardest part of all this is there's so many things that are hard, like how much I settled in these relationships, the lengths that I would go to to please them, the bs that I would tolerate, like it was just nuts, all because I was afraid of losing them, all because I was afraid of losing them. And what did I? What was I afraid to lose? I don't know, because the person who they showed me in the beginning wasn't really the person that they were. The person that they were was mean and abusive and would put me down and would make me feel less than, and would shade me and berate me and bully me, and I was still there trying to make it work. I was still there thinking if I could just do something differently, if I could just be like it was like their behavior was happening because I had done something wrong. Because that's not. That's not who they showed me they were. In the beginning, this person was amazing. This was the.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 26:49

I mean, when I met this partner like when I met this guy, oh my God, it was like everything I wanted and more. When I met this coach like when I met this guy, oh my God, it was like everything I wanted and more. When I met this coach, I was like, oh my God, she's going to be the one who can actually help me get to where it is that I want to go this girl's for real. When I met that boss, it was like, wow, this is the best boss I've ever had. He actually cares about me and my performance and what I want. I've never had that. I've never had a boss ask me what do you want?

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 27:16

So obviously, now that they're judging me and rejecting me and abandoning me and shaming me and treating me so horribly, I must have done something wrong to make them treat me this way. So therefore, I need to change or fix something about me. What was it that I did wrong? How can I change this? How can I take it back? How can I show up in a way that will make them be who I know that they are deep down. And that is a lie, because the person that they show you when you first meet them is not who they really are. That's only who they show you to get you to start feeding their narcissistic supply. And once you start to feed that narcissistic supply which we're going to talk more about in coming weeks then they start to show their true colors. So it actually has nothing to do with you. So it actually has nothing to do with you.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 28:15

And I think the hardest part was how long I did think that it was me, even after it ended. And I think that's part of you know always having. You know, always having struggled with self-worth issues since I was a little girl. I think that comes from being a people pleaser and an empath. When we pick up on cues that people around us aren't happy, as empaths do I know you're not happy right now, I can feel it. I can feel it a mile away. And as a people pleaser, we automatically assume oh, you're obviously not happy because I fucked up and you're obviously not happy because I fucked up and you're obviously being mean to me because I've done something wrong. Otherwise you wouldn't be mean to me like this. You would be the Prince Charming who I met, whatever a month, two months, six months ago. And so I kept myself in that for very long, to the point where, like I said, I, my essence, my mojo, everything that made me me, left the fucking building out, gone, and all that was left was that, that shell that would kind of go about life and pretend to be doing things and taking action and making decisions, but it wasn't really living, because there was still my essence, was still hiding in a corner somewhere, afraid of being seen, afraid of ever seeing them again, afraid of them.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 29:54

Seeing my social media posts, listening to my podcast, seeing me out on the street, out with somebody else, out with friends, it really, it really impacted. The level of impact that it had on my life was far beyond that of a typical breakup. You know breakups, we know we go through them. They break our hearts. We eat a lot of ice cream, we eat a lot of cookies, we cry a lot, we binge, watch a lot of trash until we get through it. Maybe we shop a lot, we get out there, we start dating, whatever. Whatever it is that, whatever toxic behavior we have when it comes to healing or not toxic doesn't have to be toxic, but you know what I mean. We do it, we do it, we get through it and eventually we get out there and we start dating again.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 33:25

This experience left an imprint on my life, where it was my life before these relationships and my life after these relationships, and the two were very, very, very different and, like I said, because there was more than one narcissistic dynamic that came into my sphere around the same time, it impacted all areas of my life and so, in the end, you know, I was fighting to hold on to these relationships. I was fighting to make these partnerships work, these relationships. I was fighting to make these partnerships work. These jobs work, these relationships work, this coaching, engagement work. I was fighting to make all of it work and, in the end, and to not lose them and to not have them abandon me or walk out on me or reject me, and in the end, I lost myself in the process. We get lost in these relationships because we are constantly being made to feel like we need to be something else, like something in us is innately wrong, it's not enough, it's not what they need to fill their narcissistic supply. So they will keep shaming and blaming and rejecting and abandoning us until we do what they need us to do in order to feed their narcissistic supply.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 35:03

And when you're an empath and a people pleaser, you don't see that as toxic. Or if you've grown up in, you know, in environments where you know there was a lot of these types of relationships kind of happening in your orbit, you know it becomes all about I must really be doing something wrong. There must really be something wrong with me, or otherwise people wouldn't be so mean to me, people wouldn't be treating me so badly. I must be a really bad person, or I must be. I must be maybe not a bad person. I knew I was a good person, but maybe I was being really misunderstood or maybe something I was doing was which I thought was good was actually really bad behavior.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 35:54

It just became such a mental fuckery, you guys, and in trying to figure out who it was that they were needing me to be, I lost who I was and then when whatever I didn't lose. I hid away anyway. So it's like I completely disassociated from myself and my life completely. And you know, again, it was like, it was like not really living. It was like living, it was like being on pause or on mute. Shell was there, but nobody's home.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 36:45

Um, I think the breaking point for me I don't know if there was one breaking point, to be quite honest I think the realization came when I realized, you know, and this is something I always do with my clients when we work together in one-on-one it's like let's look at your life, let's look at the timeline, right, what was happening when? When did things feel good? When did things stop feeling good? When did things stop working? Suddenly, when was there an abrupt block? That happened, right.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 37:12

And so I look back on my life and I looked at okay, well, you know, this was. I mean, I always had toxic relationships in my world. It wasn't anything new, but there was a definite marker where the relationships got very painfully toxic. I saw them as toxic, but they were actually very narcissistic relationships. But I remember thinking to myself okay, well, I've always kind of experienced these types of relationships, but these three were really different, right, they felt much more painful, they hurt much deeper. They got into my head more. It's been hard trying to get them out of my head right. And I also looked at all the other areas of my life that kind of went on pause. I started to struggle in my career. I started to struggle with my weight. I started to struggle with my friendships. I started to struggle with my weight. I started to struggle with my friendships. I started to struggle with my finances. I started to struggle in every area of life. And these were the markers. Like it happened around the same time as these relationships came in. And I'm not going to lie, because it took me a long time to figure out what it was. And it's funny because I think the realization came ironically and I've told you guys this so many times, this podcast has healed me so much the realization came when I was, you know.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 38:34

I noticed that when I was talking on my podcast and I was recording an episode and I can't remember which episode I was recording now it escapes my mind, but I can remember feeling like why do I feel like I'm not here? Why do I like I'm here, like I'm talking, I'm sharing, I'm doing all the things, I'm laughing, but emotionally it's like I'm not here, it's like I'm checked out. What is that feeling? There's like a numbness that happens, or a veil or something. It's the weirdest thing.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 39:06

And then I started noticing myself in different interactions. I'm like, well why? I remember the feeling, and I remembered it, feeling like a disconnect, like an emptiness. And then I started paying attention to how I showed up in different relationships and I was like, oh, this is that same feeling. I feel that disconnect, I feel that emptiness when I'm with this person, but with that person I actually feel like my whole emotional being is in my body, whereas with this person I feel like my emotional being is out of my body, it has left the fucking building. Being is out of my body, it has left the fucking building. What is that? And I was trying to put my finger on it and I realized that that had started happening when those narcissistic relationships came into my life. And that's when I started having all these challenges in all these other areas of my life.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 40:03

And I realized because, you know, there was always this element of being afraid to see them again, these people. I never wanted to see them again as long as I lived. I never wanted to cross paths with them. I never wanted them to see me on social media again. I never wanted to see them on social media again. I mean, there was a time where I wouldn't join groups because I was afraid my coach would be in that group, because I'm in a lot of, you know, facebook entrepreneurial groups and I'm always afraid that she's going to be there. I'm like, no, I don't want to be in that group because I don't know if she's in there. You know, I there was other Facebook groups that my ex-partner would have been involved in. That I was like no hell, no, I don't want to go to his like area of the geographic area that I live in because I don't want to run into him.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 40:46

All of that happened around the same time, and that was my breaking point, when I realized that, oh my God, I've put my life on hold. I've checked myself out, I've checked myself out, I have taken myself out of the game for fear of ever having that happen to me ever again and, as a result, it has impacted every single area of my life and has held me back in more ways than I even care to count. Fuck, no, fuck no. That's not happening, not on my watch. That is not happening, not today, satan. We are not going there.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 41:36

So I made a decision. I made a decision that these relationships weren't going to hold me back anymore. Now, mind you, this was after I had already done a lot of work. By this point, I already knew that these relationships were narcissistic. By this point, I had done a lot of the work, but what I wasn't figuring out was the impact that it had had on all the other areas of my life and how much I had missed out on as a result of not wanting to ever see or be seen by them ever again. And that was the biggest aha moment, I think, for me in all of this, and that really became the nice, neat little bow around all the work that I had done on these types of relationships. So we're going to be talking a lot about what these relationships look like, how you can identify with them and some of the work that I had done around bringing myself back online again and making myself feel whole again and feel confident again, because the, like I said, the impact that these relationships had on my confidence and my trust in myself and my, my faith in life and relationships was just devastating.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 43:00

We're also going to share a lot about, or I'm going to share a lot about how I got out of these relationships, because that in itself is an art, and if you're a people pleaser or an empath, it is not easy to do. Stepping away first of all, identifying that you're in it is one thing. Learning to walk away from it is an entirely different conversation. That in itself is a battle, but I'm going to share with you what I did and how I got through it, and hopefully it'll support you and guide you. If you find yourself in the same situation. And again, if you think someone you know might be in this kind of a situation, please share this podcast with them. Hopefully it will help them. The more people that see this, that listen to it, the more ears it will reach. So please help me get this conversation out there into the world. Now what I'm going to say is for your next step, or my next piece of advice for you.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 43:54

Before we get into the next episode, which should be coming out in a few days, I want you to think about how is it that your relationships are making you feel. If there's one specific relationship that you're concerned about that you're not really sure. I want you to ask yourself how do you feel in that relationship? Do you feel safe? Do you feel loved? Do you feel heard? Do you feel seen? Do you feel fearful? Do you feel like you're always walking on eggshells? Do you feel like you're always walking on eggshells? Do you feel like you're altering yourself to avoid a negative response or reaction from your partner or from this person? If so, that's something that you want to look at. You also want to look at how would you show up differently if you felt safe to be yourself. How is it different? Do you see a difference in how you show up in this relationship versus how you show up in other relationships? And now you know, we want to be clear.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 45:01

Like sometimes we don't show up as ourselves in relationships because we're just afraid of judgment. We're afraid of people judging us, of, you know, thinking badly of us, of letting them down, of. Oh my God, it's just going to take too much work trying to explain to them why I am the way I am. So I'm just going to pretend that I'm not. But if you're actually afraid of this person's response, if you're afraid that they're going to get angry, that sorry guys, there's so much honking going on, I got, I'm telling you I got to start recording at 4am or something. If you're afraid that they're going to get angry or aggressive to the point where it makes you like you become nervous to be around them, makes you like you become nervous to be around them, that's something that you need to look at. If you find that they're always trying to control your thoughts, trying to telling you it's one way, when it was really you remember really another. These are all things you need to start paying attention to and, like I said, we're going to dive a little bit deeper in upcoming conversations, but I just want you to kind of get your feet wet and kind of get an understanding as to where you're at and what.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 46:10

What energetic imprint are your relationships making in your energy field? We want to be really, we have to be very careful, you guys. The reality is is we're all here, we're all spiritual beings having a human experience, and we're we're going through our own human and spiritual evolution, and the way we go about that evolution is through the relationships that we call into our reality. So how we engage with these relationships and how we interact with these relationships is so important to our own spiritual growth and development and we have to be really aware of the types of relationships that we're inviting in and entertaining. And I want to say bending, accommodating, bending to please, accommodating to please. You know what I'm trying to say bending, accommodating, bending to please, accommodating to please. You know what I'm trying to say. Like, we want to be really careful about these things because they do have an important impact on our evolution and there's always something there for us to learn and heal, especially in the most difficult ones. So, stick around.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 47:26

If this sounds like you know you might be in this kind of a relationship dynamic right now, you're not really sure stick around, make sure to subscribe, make sure to share this episode with anybody else that you think might be in a relationship with somebody who's a narcissist or just very toxic, let them know about this, let them know we're here, I encourage them to subscribe and just know that we're going to be putting I'm going to be putting a lot more content around this conversation in the coming weeks, okay, and if you want more support from me in terms of, you know, moving through any toxic relationship patterns that you might be experiencing, if you yourself might have been in a toxic relationship in the past or an artistic relationship in the past and you've lost touch with yourself. You've lost, you've disconnected from your essence and your life and you're living life on pause. Please send me a DM up-level and book your first 90-minute up-level and flow intensive with me. I promise you we'll get to the bottom of why it is that you're calling in these types of relationships and we'll re-engineer your energetic blueprint so that you're no longer a match for these types of relationships. It's energetic work. We'll do the energy work. We'll do the emotional work. I'm also going to give you practical tips to help you so that you're no longer a vibrational match for these kinds of relationships, or at least give you an advantage, right, I mean? Obviously, choice has a lot to do with the kinds of relationships we end up in, but we're going to give you the foundations so that you feel more solid, getting out there into the world and attracting the right people into your space.

MARIA @THEFEMMECAST: 49:08

Okay, and if you're not ready to do that, go ahead and sign up for the 21 day radical self-love challenge. It is totally free and, like I said before, it is the number one deterrent for these types of relationships People who show up with radical self-love for themselves are literally repellent to narcissists, like they're not going to want to be around you because they know they're never going to get what they need from you. They're going to go to somebody else. Trust me, it works. It's a little bit weird at first, but it works to somebody else. Trust me, it works. It's a little bit weird at first, but it works. Okay. So that is it for now, you guys. So, if you've loved this episode, it would mean the world to me if you would leave a rating and a review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify or wherever you're seeing this. And until next time, you guys, massive, massive love.