Narcissistic abuse is all about betrayal. What exactly is betrayal trauma? How does betrayal trauma affect our current and future relationships? How do we cope with having been betrayed? Did you know that trusting others is actually deeply embedded in our brains, so what do we do when we don’t trust?

In the first half of this episode, Kris dives deep into the above questions pulling from journals like psychology today among other studies and psychology journals. In the second half of the show, Kris will answer questions from listeners in the live chat.

—

Hello and welcome to We Need To Talk with Kris Godinez podcast. I’m your host Kris Godinez, licensed professional counselor. I help people get out of, and stay out of, toxic relationships. This podcast is for informational and educational purposes only the views and opinions stated herein are mine and mine alone. They do not represent the ACA, the APA or any other therapist for that matter.

I want to thank my sponsor betterhelp.com. They are an online therapy company. Whether you are in the US or international. They will set you up with a qualified licensed therapist. PhD level or Master’s level. If you are interested in more information, go to betterhelp.com/krisgodinez.

Alright, so today’s current event, so a lot of my clients recently have been freaking out over the news. So, they’re watching the news obsessively, as we all kind of do occasionally. And it’s driving them crazy. And so, what you got to remember guys, here’s my current events. Hello, everybody. The thing about the current way news is done. In the old days, back when dinosaurs roamed the earth in my time, in my time, we used to have a half an hour, every night, Uncle Walter. Walter Cronkite would come on, and he would say, here’s what’s going on. And that was it. And then we’re done. And then we went onto the honeymooners or whatever else was playing, I don’t know, honeymooners was actually before my time. But anyway, the point being is, is that we didn’t have this 24-hour news cycle that had to get ratings that had to be relevant, that had to be catching people’s attention all the time. So that’s what I wanted to remind you of the way the news cycle is now if it bleeds, it leads. So, in other words, they are intentionally doing things that are going to catch your attention and make you pay attention to make you watch and click on that article. Because it’s all ratings. It’s all getting the ad revenue. It’s all getting the ratings, etc., etc.

So, what’s my recommendation for that? Stop. I seriously don’t watch or look at the news more than once a day, I do one first-time thing in the morning just to see what’s going on in the world. And then I let it go because it’s kind of it’s doing that Buddhist worry chart. Is there a problem? Well, yeah, I mean, really, I mean, we got the earthquake in Syria, we got the, you know, the balloons flying over America, we shot something down over Canada, and oh, my god, and the Ukraine, and ah, yeah, right. So, there is a lot that’s going wrong. What can I do about it? Well, I can donate to Doctors Without Borders. Yes, I do. And I do do that. I can write senators. I can write representatives. I can do what I can. But then after that, I have done what I can, let it go. Because if you don’t, it’s going to literally drive you crazy. And the anxiety is what gets us going, and we have enough anxiety coming out of abusive relationships.

So that’s kind of what I wanted to get across is that if you’re falling into that obsessively, looking at the news, reading the news articles, following the news, etc., etc. And you find yourself a nervous wreck, then stop looking at the news, like, once every couple of days is fine. You know, for me, I keep current just because I like to know current events, what’s going on, and what’s affecting my clients. And I don’t have so much of that reactivity. Occasionally. I do. Occasionally I do. And then John, and I will talk, and then I will go I’m not going to look at the news for a few days. So, you know, it’s a matter of understanding that it’s a 24-hour news cycle. They’re doing it for ratings. They’re going to say the worst things that are possibly going on. You do the Buddhist worry chart. Is there a problem? Well, yeah. Okay. Can I do something about it? Well, limited. Okay. Well, then do that limited thing that you can do, and then let it go. Yeah, so that’s what I wanted to say about current events. So Alright, there it is.

Let’s dive into today’s topic. So, today’s Super Bowl Sunday, I’m having John put up the suicide hotline number and the domestic violence hotline number, just because you know, just because so anyway, I wanted to talk today about betrayal trauma. Now, somebody has been asking me repeatedly. Please talk about betrayal trauma. Please talk about betrayal trauma. So, betrayal trauma is a phrase that was coined in 1991 by Jennifer, Freyd, I think. And what it involves is everything we’ve been going through. But what it covers is betrayal, trauma is any time, anything lets us down or betrays us. So if it’s an institution, if it’s a government, if it’s a friend, if it’s a parent, if it’s a lover, if it’s, you know, anything that we have relied on, for our survival, in some way, shape, or form, whether that’s mental, emotional, physical, or religious, whatever, anything that we have literally leaned on like that, and they have poof, and we go thunk that’s a betrayal, trauma, and it can be from literally any kind of betrayal. So, like, institutional, governmental, friends, family, etc., etc.

So let me pull up the article that I thought was really cool. Let’s see if I can find that one. Where did it go? Where did it go? Because they had a whole thing. Okay. The term was first coined by psychologist Jennifer Freyd. I said it right. Yeah. It occurs when a person’s trust is violated by a person or system that they rely on for survival. So that can be families that can be government institutions, etc. In other words, when you trust a person or an institution to provide you with physical, mental, or emotional needs, and they are able to do so or worse, they end up harming you instead. This can have significant and lasting impact. Okay, so this article is on psychology today. This is called the cause and effect of partner betrayal trauma. And this is by Wendy Boring, Bray DDH LPCC. Okay. And this was written in 2021. Okay, so that’s just kind of giving you the definition of what betrayal trauma is.

A common example of betrayal trauma is when children have been neglected or abused by their caregivers. A key distinguishing factor of betrayal trauma is the reliance on the betrayer. And this goes for all of us who’ve been abused by a narcissist because we have relied on that we expected them to be a, you know, normal, functioning human being. Oops, they’re not victims of betrayal trauma do not have the choice to leave the situation as is so many of the instances of domestic violence they are in because of the dependent and dependence on the perpetrator to meet their physical, mental, emotional needs. Failure on behalf of the perpetrator to meet those needs forces the victim to adapt in order to survive and or maintain the relationship.

So, this is why I wanted to put the Oh, thank you. This is why I wanted to put the hotlines up. Traditionally Superbowl Sunday for some reason does see a spike in domestic violence. Perpetrators do keep people stuck, financially, financial abuse, you know, making it so that they can’t get out. So, this is why I want to talk about this. Also, I forgot the meet and greets. So, I will be in Santa Barbara. Sorry, middle, middle of the show. Hello. Um, I will be in Santa Barbara on Saturday. So, the cut-off for tickets is Thursday night. So, if you don’t sign up by Thursday night, you’re not going so. So, third Saturday in Santa Barbara. And then I’m going to Vancouver, BC, which is May 9, no. May 20. I’ll be there May 20. And then, I will be in Portland, Oregon, and Boise. And those are the ones that are going to be in July. But I haven’t gotten the dates yet, because my niece hasn’t gotten back to me as to when exactly she wants me to come up. So as soon as I find out that information, I will pass it along to you so then we could get rocking and rolling. So sorry about that. Okay, back to betrayal, trauma. So, partner betrayal trauma. Okay, this is what most of us have dealt with. We’ve also dealt with the family. A lot of us have dealt with institutional betrayal trauma. I mean, how many times has a target of domestic violence called the police, and then the police arrested the target as opposed to the perpetrator? I just.

Kris Godinez  09:22

And then of course, they’re saying things like, Oh, we’re lowering our standards for hiring police and we’re not doing as much training, and I’m like, opposite of what you need to be doing. Opposite land. Logic. Common sense. Not so common.

Anyway. Betrayal, trauma, sorry, went off on a tangent. Okay. Um, all right. Regular use of the term betrayal trauma is pretty new. Many mental health professionals might be more familiar with seeing the foundations of betrayal trauma in certain attachment styles or developmental trauma. In other words, when focusing on relationship between the child and the caregiver, betrayal trauma doesn’t just occur in caregiver contexts though. Partner betrayal trauma is when the perpetrator is the significant other such as a boyfriend or girlfriend or spouse. It is entirely possible, in fact. It’s relatively common for an individual to be reliant in some way on a partner. Hold on. This might be financial. This might be physical might be safety, to betray that trust might look like cheating, manipulation, physical, sexual, emotional abuse, religious abuse, financial abuse, withholding, or misusing financial resources. In some cases, a person might not be entirely reliant on your partner, at least not literally. But it feels as though leaving the perpetrator is not an option.

So, a lot of us, when we’ve left, how many of us, and I know I know I did, I felt like my world was going to crumble. I felt like I was just going to, you know, blow away in the wind, you know like I ceased to exist because everything was about the abuser, right? Whether that’s a parent, whether that’s a romantic partner, whether that’s a friend, a boss, an institution, whatever, so we feel like we’re going to cease to exist. We lose ourselves we lose ourselves we lose who we are, which is why I keep saying Self-Esteem Workbook Glenn Schiraldi work it work it like a boss, Disease to Please Harriet Braiker boundaries, deal breakers, work that like a boss that’s going to keep you safe. And that’s going to remind you of who you really are. So, there is that. Hold on back to this.

Okay, regardless of how or in what way a person is reliant on the partner when the perpetrator betrays the victim’s trust, it can leave a lasting mark, say a person was happily married for 20 years, they shared everything with the spouse, including the home and children and relied on the spouse to provide a stable, loving relationship. Suddenly, they learned that their spouse was cheating on them. How might that affect them? Well, that would destroy any trust. Now, the thing with narcissists is they generally, if they’re cheaters, they’ve been doing it since before the wedding guarantee, and they will continue to do it. And what happens to us is we go into denial when we’re first confronted with it, and one of these articles that I picked actually deals with that why we go into that denial phase and denial is deadly guys because it gives the perpetrator gives the abuser another chance, and we don’t want to give them another chance. Okay, hold on going back to this betrayal, blindness, oh, this is the one that describes that. Okay.

So, the impact of betrayal, blindness, many current therapy, clients are seeking help with partner betrayal, trauma, and yet they have no idea of the root of their problems. This is because partner betrayal trauma can take many different forms depending on the person, their age, and when the trauma occurred, and the trauma itself. Betrayal blindness, a large part of partner betrayal, trauma is betrayal blindness. This is when the person consciously or unconsciously ignores signs of betrayal to try to preserve the relationship.

So, in other words, we see the red flags, saw the red flags, and we went, Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, it’s no Is this a fluke? No, is it? No, I don’t…they didn’t really mean it. Oh, it was an accident. Oh, did you know they may deny behaviors. So, the abuser themselves will deny behaviors. They’ll make excuses or they’ll flip the script and blame the target of abuse. They will become very defensive if questioned about their actions by avoiding the signs of a betrayal and individual can make the impact on themselves significantly worse, as they work harder and harder and harder to maintain the relationship because think about it. It is a one-sided relationship. It takes two to tango and if the abusive partner is out seeking outside narcissistic supply, you’re going to be twisting yourself into a pretzel, or you have twisted yourself into a pretzel, and we have all twisted ourselves into pretzels at one point or another trying to make this unworkable, untenable relationship work. We all do it. We all we have done it don’t do it anymore. But we have all done it. Okay. Difficulty

Okay, is that as a result of this kind of betrayal? And this goes for parental betrayal too. You know, when parents abused their kids when they scream at them, when they yell at them, when they call them names, put them down? They’re breaking a trust. They’re breaking a trust and trust is incredibly hard to get back again, not impossible, but incredibly hard to get back again. So, we have difficulty trusting in other relationships. Having been betrayed in previous relationships, a partner of a victim of partner betrayal trauma may find it incredibly difficult to establish new positive, trusting relationships. They may be terrified and experiencing more betrayal, which could then prevent them from being able to trust to develop trust in their partners, friends, or even family members. This is very true. It’s kind of like, how do I explain this? It’s like once you’ve been betrayed, once you’ve been harmed, once that trust has been broken, literally by anybody, you’re kind of like for Missouri. At that point, the show me state, you show me prove to me, prove to me you’re safe, you know, that kind of thing. And we do that. And it’s, it’s because of the betrayal that we’ve gone through. I mean, John and I’ve had multiple conversations about that because something will happen. And I will feel like, ooh, this behavior reminded me of my dad or whatever, and I’ll have to be like, Okay, got to tell you, a three-year-old inside of me is going Screw you, and I’ll trust you. And then we’ll work it through, you know what I’m saying? And, you know, that kind of thing. And it’s it, it colors, our relationships, it does it and to this day, and you know, I’m 58 years old, I’ve been working on this my entire life, I still every once in a while, we’ll have those little, I don’t trust you. I don’t trust you. I don’t trust you. I don’t trust you know, and you got to just kind of go okay, little inner child, hello. You’re okay, and you’re safe. Everything’s fine. Look at this. Are there red flags? No, we’re not seeing red flags.

But if you’re seeing red flags that don’t trust them, but you got to learn to trust your gut, I think more than anything else. And that’s really what I took away from this article is that because of all of this, we learned not to trust ourselves because of the gaslighting, the lying, the cheating, the stealing, you know, the flipping the script, the whole thing, we get an altered definition of love, someone who has experienced significant betrayal by a partner might subconsciously come to terms with this by adjusting their personal definition of love. In other words, they may begin to consider things like abuse, infidelity, jealousy, or any other form of betrayal. Because Jealousy is a form of betrayal as a normal part of love, and begin to not only expect it but to seek it out. And this is where we’ve got to not normalize abuse. So, John and I were talking about this. This morning, we were talking about how these television shows and movies always portray like this, you know, oh, it’s got to be painful. And it’s got to be a struggle, and you’ve got to fight for this person’s attention and steal them away from another person. And, and I’m just sitting here going, No, no, no, no, you don’t. So, it really is looking at our cultural dysfunction. As to what real love is real love is not, you know, painful, it’s not if it hurts, it’s not love.

Kris Godinez  17:51

If it hurts, it’s not love. It isn’t Love is Respect. Respect is love. Love is Respect. So, if it hurts, it’s not love. And I really, I wish to God that they would teach psychology healthy psychology in high school is to what is a healthy relationship because a lot of the kids have dysfunctional families. They don’t know what healthy looks like, you know. So, it makes sense that we have this weird idea of what love is when we come out of one of these things or when we’re still in one of these things. Because we’ve adjusted, we’ve sacrificed our boundaries, we’ve made adjustments so that we can keep the relationship or that we can get whatever we think we’re getting out of it. But we’re not getting anything out of it because it’s abusive, so, okay, hang on, okay. We have the added extra bonus of possibly being re-victimized if a person’s definition of love has been altered to include betrayal and abuse, it makes the sense it makes sense that they would be at higher risk to be victimized again in the future, either by the same or other partners. So, remember, if there’s no work being done on the self, if there’s no work being done on your self-esteem, your boundaries, your deal breakers, you’re going to more than likely have that inner child go looking outside and go oh, somebody who kind of sort of reminds me of the parents, I had the hardest time with or the partner, I had the hardest time with a look half of a doodoo sandwich, half of a doodoo sandwich. Total doodoo sandwich!

So, you don’t want to do that. Lowered self-esteem by being betrayed by one’s partner can seriously affect one’s perception of themselves. Yes. How many of us lost ourselves and felt like we weren’t pretty, or we weren’t smart, or it wasn’t okay to have a sense of humor, or was it okay to laugh? Or was it okay to do our crafts or sing or act or dance or, you know, whatever, because they were constantly putting us down or when they did the devalue and the discard. They damned us for everything that they originally loved us for. Of course, that’s not really love because you don’t love the person like that and then flip the script and go oh, no, I hate you for all of that because that’s what they do. Because they want us dead. So, um, yeah, I mean, it’s lowered self-esteem. You betcha.

Mental health challenges. Unsurprisingly, partner betrayal can lead to serious mental health issues, potentially to the level of diagnosable mental health disorders such as depression and anxiety. Additionally, people with betrayal… partner betrayal often exhibit signs of say it with me… PTSD, CPTSD, like hypervigilance, insomnia or dissociation. It also can create because the level of cortisol in our system, physical issues, like fibromyalgia, like you know, you know, other autoimmune things.

Okay, so all right, moving past betrayal, four steps to avoid surrendering your happiness and success to others. So, this is by George Everly. He’s a Ph.D. ABPP. I don’t know what that stands for, FACLP. So Okay. All right. So, trust is biologically hardwired, we are hardwired to trust because it literally takes a village, you know, we have to, we need each other to get things done, basically. So, it’s not. It’s not bizarre that we need other people. And when I say need, I don’t mean need, like a psychological unhealthy need. It’s more like a, it takes a village kind of thing. So, in the phases of betrayal, betrayal is a breach of trust. It’s not only a psychological injury; it’s a physical injury as well. The moment you are betrayed, your first reaction psychologically is confusion. How many of us were like ah, coffee would be good. Let’s go get a cup of coffee. Um, what’s going on, you know, that just you know, confusion. The sympathetic fight or flight nervous system is activated, and your body is flooded with adrenaline, unlike fear, where danger where you can focus your response and be like, Oh, crap, we got to get out of here. We got to do this; we got to do that. A betrayal is more diffused. The second phase of betrayal is denial. You simply cannot believe that this treachery has taken place. Your heart rate decelerates as you try to make sense of the senseless of the circumstances at hand. Third phase usually consists of one of two pathways, although sometimes they will toggle between the two. One pathway is to self-blame. So immediately we go, What did I do wrong? You know, how did I make this happen? So, we self-blame? No, no, no, no, no, no, no. When a narcissist when an abuser does what they do, it is entirely their fault. Absolutely.

Psychologically, sorry, physiologically, okay. One pathway is self-blame. The other is anger. So, remember, anger is the bodyguard of the softer emotion. So underneath the anger is all the fear and the hurt and the sadness and the confusion and all of that, so we get angry when we get hurt. So physiologically, adrenaline and cortisol are typically elevated and chronically so. Cortisol is a corticosteroid, which serves to increase blood glucose levels and diminish the efficiency of immune systems as well. It also has catabolic properties, setting the stage for a myriad of stress-related illnesses. Yep, finally, the angrier you become, or the more you blame yourself, the better you are, the better you become at it. Until, through a mechanism of neuroplasticity, it becomes a habit. And you ultimately lose yourself in the reiterative process that the phase repeats themselves. So, in other words, if we get stuck in the story, if we get stuck in the it’s my fault, it’s my fault. It’s my fault, or we get stuck in the I’m going to get you, I’m going to revenge on it a bit. Remember, you know, we get angry, but we never get underneath to the softer emotions. We keep telling that story and telling that story and telling that story again, and we get stuck. Betrayal has the potential to become a chronic plague upon your happiness and success. But that does not have to be so.

Four Steps to moving past betrayal. Number one, please don’t blame yourself. And with the anger, get underneath that seriously. Anger is just the bodyguard. The softer emotions, we’re angry because it’s part of the fight-flight-freeze or fawn, but really what’s underneath the anger? The betrayal, the sadness, the hurt, the confusion, the What the frick, you know, that’s what’s underneath. If so, the anger will keep you stuck. Blaming yourself will keep you stuck because you’ve got to understand when you’re dealing with a disordered personality, there’s no there there. There is no there. If they cheated on you, they’ll cheat on their next partner. They’re never going to be faithful ever. So, it’s not you. It’s them. Get with a good trauma therapist do EMDR do tapping that helps, you know, work through that trauma, work through and stop putting the blame on you CPTSD from surviving to thriving by Pete Walker, work chapter three, put it back on the abuser. That’s where that’s where the blame and the shame and the anger and everything else needs to go to it’s not yours. It’s not your luggage. Give it to them.

Number two. Okay. Okay, understanding that there is no why. There is no why. It’s like, abusers are crazy. They’re cray cray. Let’s just be clear. They’re cray cray. There is no one. If you’re looking for the why you’re never going to find it. What you’re going to find is the how. So how did this happen? How did I miss the red flags? How did I trust this person that didn’t, and this is not victim blaming, I want to be very clear. This is working on inner child stuff, who set you up to be groomed, who set you up in your family to be groomed to believe a liar, to be groomed to believe that that’s all you deserve, that you don’t deserve better. You know, that’s what I want you to work on. All right. Remember, the fight or flight function of the amygdala is fueling your reaction. The Angular Gyrus will dampen the amygdaloid. All you have to do is turn it on. So, he’s saying forgiveness. I’m saying screw that noise. What I’m saying is acceptance. It is what it is, and stop seeking revenge. I think that is the big thing that we get stuck in. So, a lot of us, when we have been harmed and especially if we come from a family that was big into revenge, you know, I’ll get you, I’ll show you, I’ll fix your wagon, all you know, all of that crazy stuff. That’s kind of a knee-jerk reaction that we go to. So instead of going to revenge, it’s not so much forgiveness. It’s acceptance. It’s like this happened. And I do not deserve to be treated this way. Because I respect myself. Self-esteem boundaries. That should be what are your deal breakers. So, a list of deal breakers should be things that you will not put up with from any body, anybody? Anybody. So that would be lying, cheating, stealing, rewriting history, gaslighting, flipping the script, game playing, smearing, you know, a myriad of stuff, manipulation, etc., etc.

Kris Godinez  27:52

So, all the things that narcissists do, so yeah, so it’s, it’s, it’s having that self-love, that self-respect, and knowing that you don’t deserve to be treated like that ever, by anybody ever, period. Okay, back to this in how are we doing on time? Okay. Okay, ah, are you going to hang on?

All right, the more you give into the anger, and the more you give into the you know, the revenge, the grieving, you’re going to grieve, he’s, they’re basically saying, Don’t grieve. I’m saying screw that noise, too. I’m saying grieve, but recognize that what you’re grieving for is not the person that betrayed you. You’re grieving for the illusion of who you thought they were, which sucks, because the hardest grief you’re ever going to do is grieving the loss of somebody who is still living and breathing and walking the face of this planet. Because it’s the illusion that you are grieving the illusion of the person you thought you knew that you really didn’t. So that’s really kind of crazy.

Make a promise to yourself. To no longer surrender control of your happiness to others. Now, that does not mean stop trusting it means start trusting yourself. And if someone because, remember, if someone is throwing red flags, and it’s starting to look like a Communist Party leave, you cannot fix them because you did not break them. It is not your job. Nobody can fix them. The only person that can fix them would be the higher power in them. And that would be it. So, you know. change does not happen overnight. Start small. With practice moving past betrayal will become a habit. The more you practice, the habit will become a trait once it is a trait. It will be a new you mirror work, looking in the mirror, working on self-esteem, working on boundaries, working on acceptance, not so much forgiveness, if you want to forgive them. That’s great.

But the problem I had was when people think of forgiveness; they think it’s like a tabula rasa, like a clean slate like oh, you know, I forgive. That’s okay. And then they go and do it again. No, forgiveness is not a tabula rasa. It’s not forgiveness if you want to get meta about it. It’s acceptance. It’s like, okay, I get it. You’re disorder. You’re dysfunctional. You harmed me, you did it on purpose. I’m not going to give me another chance. I’m also not going to let you live rent-free in my head one more bleepity bleep second, go pound sand, have a nice life, and kick them out, kick them out, kick them out. Get rid of them. They do not need to be in your life. They, I’m sorry. They don’t get to be in your life. They treat you like doo-doo. They don’t get to be in your life. You have more value than that. Can you tell how much I really don’t like abusers. So yeah, so that is all that’s why I’m saying don’t go for the forgiveness. Forgiveness, I think in our society has been skewed.

It’s more the acceptance. This is what it is. Worry chart. Is there something I can do about this? Nope. They’re disordered, not even. And here’s the other thing, do not go to therapy with them. Guys. If this is like, you know, multiple times cheating, or multiple times, gaslighting or multiple, they will use the therapy to abuse you do not go to therapy with them. And, of course, we’re coming up on Valentine’s Day, which is this week. Oh my god. So, I can’t tell you the number of times this week that I’ve had clients call me going. You will not believe who just sent me a text. I’m like, oh, yeah, I would. So, you know, it’s that, Oh, baby, baby, I’ll change. It’ll be different. I promise. Actions speak louder than words. Trust the actions, not the words. Okay, one more thing. And then I’m going to…

Okay, six ways to regain your sense of self and your sense of trust, engage in self-care, find ways to nurture yourself to regain balance. They take us off balance. They literally rip the rug out from underneath us, parents, bosses, institutions, governance, you know, whoever has betrayed us. So, find ways to get your sense of balance back. Self-esteem, confidence, and resilience. That’s where the mirror work comes in. Walking in nature helps a lot. Invest in your personal community. Trust friends, friends that are trustworthy. You know, spend time with trusted friends and trusted family. That’s a really good way. Find compassion for yourself. That’s the big thing. read and learn. So read up on how abusers act. You know, The Object of My Affection is in My Reflection, Coping With a Narcissist by Rokelle Lerner, After the Affair, can’t remember who wrote that one. But that’s another good one. You know, that’s kind of geared towards getting back together with the person, but it can be helpful to healing yourself after your partner has cheated on you. Journal, journal, journal journal, get creative with it, paint, write, sing, you know, do things like that, dance it out, do whatever you need to do. And then allow yourself to trust yourself. And then, out of trusting your gut. You’ll learn whether or not people are trustworthy. So really, its actions speak louder than words. Look at the actions; don’t look at the words. That’s the big thing and trusting ourselves means we work on self-esteem, boundaries, all of that good stuff, physical health, mental health, emotional health, the whole thing. Really listening to our gut. How many times have we been in a situation where you met somebody? And this happens to me a lot. I meet somebody, and I’m just like, nope, stay the hell away from that one. And then it turns out, oh, look at that, you know, they were a narcissist, or they were an abuser, or they were whatever. So, trust your gut. Your gut does not lie to you. The head and the heart will lie. They tell stories. Well, what about this? What about that? What about….? The gut is a simple yes or no answer to a yes or no question. practice trusting your gut. And what you do is you start with things you already know the answer to so for me, I know I’ve told the story a million times. Sorry, guys. I hate peanut butter. Hate it. hated it. Hated. But I love Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups. So, if I asked my gut, okay, gut. Do you like peanut butter? It’s like this visceral like, I can feel my gut roil like it’s like, oh, no, I hate peanut butter. But then if I go gut, do you like Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups? Oh, yeah. No story, just simple yes or no. So, practice with things you already know the answer to and then take it out to something you don’t know the answer to that’s not going to be life-threatening or life-changing and see how that goes. And you keep practicing until you learn to feel your body’s response to your gut instincts. So that’s what I want you to do. Okay, let’s see last one, and then we’ll get to the questions.

Okay, this one is also on Psychology Today by Jack Shaffer. for betrayal and human relationships, there was something in this one that I wanted to make sure to hit. Ah, To love is to risk being hurt. And that’s why we are so afraid of trusting again because love is trusting if you don’t trust, you don’t have love, basically. So um, it’s really, it’s a process. It’s a process of learning to trust yourself, listening to your gut instincts, loving yourself. And out of that, like I said, practicing, practicing, and giving yourself permission. Because when we’ve been in abusive families, or abusive relationships, the first thing they do is tell us that we do not see that pink elephant taking a dump in the corner of the living room. And so, we learn to shut our trust of ourselves down, I want you to take the blinders off. Yeah, you do see the pink elephant taking a dump in the living room. You always have that’s why they picked you out as the scapegoat. So yeah, you want to get back to Yes, I do see that. No, I’m not going to deny that I see that. Thanks for playing is that’s what our abusers have. They were parental units would do. No, you don’t see the dysfunction. Now, yeah, I’ll give you something to, you know, cry about I’ll give you something to be angry about. And they’re not allowing us to trust our gut instinct. They beat it out of us, literally. So, start working on trusting your gut. 100%. Okay, let’s hit the questions. Okay.

Um, do narcissists accuse you of betrayal while it was them doing it? 110%! They are projectionists! They project like projectile vomiting onto the target of abuse, the very things that they are doing. So, they will point the you, you, you, you, guns. Remember, there’s two fingers pointed out at you. But there’s six-pointed back at them. They’re talking about themselves. So, they do the you, you, you, you, guns. And I’m jealous because your cheating, no,  they’re jealous because they assume you’re going to behave the way they behave.

Kris Godinez  37:07

Let me say that again. They started accusing because they assume that you’re going to behave the way they behave. And so, they will accuse us of cheating. They’ll accuse us of lying. They’ll accuse everything under the sun. Guess who they’re talking about? They’re talking about themselves. They’re talking about themselves. So yeah, absolutely. 110% they do that! My late narcissist mother betrayed everyone but always said she was betrayed and that no one else is to be trusted. No one has to be trusted. Yeah, that’s total projection total project. And remember, if they are a covert narcissist, what a covert narcissists do, and what are they love more than anything else in the world to be the victim. So even though it’s clear that they are the ones that are abusing and harming other people, they’ll get out the world’s smallest little violin and start going, Oh, I’m the victim. Nobody ever writes. Nobody ever calls and, you know, look, look at what I’ve done for you. And you do nothing for Oh, go blow it out your rear. You know that, seriously? That’s what they do. They love being the victim more than anything else. Okay, so yes, they will absolutely accuse you of the very things that are doing. So that’s how you know they’re cheating. So seriously, what I tell my clients when they sit down on my couch, and they go, my partner is suddenly accusing me of cheating. I’ve never given any reason or sign or symptom, I’m not cheating. I look at them, and I go, go get tested, go get tested, and nine times out of 10. They come back with an STD. So, because this cheating has been going on for way longer than you know about, because that’s that is the old story of the toad and the scorpion. It’s their nature. That is their nature. That is there will always be a narcissistic, selfish, self-centered. POS that will never change. So yeah, if you suspect your partner is, you know, if your partner is especially getting ballsy enough to start accusing you, I would go get tested. Absolutely. I mean, this was a parent thing. But yeah, if you’re in a romantic relationship yet Absolutely.

Do narcissists go out of their way to betray their adult children? Yes. By interfering in personal stuff. They have nothing to do with my narcissist started calling people to tell lies about me to hurt me. Absolutely. They need chaos and drama the way the rest of us need air. Like, I’m not even kidding you. So, they will interject themselves into personal business. They will call friends of the child, the adult child. And years later, like, recently, there was one that was in their 90s that started doing this. And thank God, the friends were all clued in, and they were like, yeah, no, we’re not buying this. We know you’re doing child so yeah, I mean, it just. It’s crazy. It really hits. That’s, that’s when you just kind of got to go, wow. Oh, you put the front and dysfunction, lady. Seriously that’s it’s pathetic. And it’s sad but yeah, they will absolutely do that they need drama and the best thing to do is go no contact or low contact. So, a lot of people are like,

Oh, but they’re old, and I, I feel sorry for them, and they don’t have anybody else, and you know, whatever, okay, we’ll go to the contact level that you’re comfortable with, but my recommendation would be low to no contact and tell them nothing, give them nothing, give them nothing they can use Don’t tell them anything that’s important or personal or anything else. So, there’s that. Okay. Um, all right. And really, what you can do is, you know, you just tell the friends, there’s, you know, they’re, they’re narcissistic, they’re I don’t know what her game is. But please don’t engage, you know, and the ones that do engage the ones who are willing to believe the worst of you, do not deserve the best of you. Let me say that again. Anybody, any flying monkey that is willing to believe the worst of you does not deserve the best of you kick them to the curb? Kick them out of your life. Alright.

Okay, how can I best support a victim going through betrayal in the work environment, this is there is hard evidence the victim is being set up by the abuser, but the majority are believing the abuser. Well, as we all know, HR is there to protect the company. So, if there is a setup going on, you want to mention the words lawyer and HR. So just tell them to get an attorney that does business law, tell them to talk to HR, and don’t allow the setup to continue for you for support. You just keep encouraging them to go do the right thing, which would be to get an attorney, which would be to talk to HR, which would be to file a hostile work environment complaint with the EEOC. okay.gov. So, yeah, file a file a hostile work environment complaint with the EEOC, get an attorney, talk to HR, you know, and go from there, encourage them to do it. This is not your job. This is not your problem; you encourage you encourage them. In other words, you’re giving them courage to do the self-protection stuff. It’s not your job to get involved, as in, you’re going to go do it. But you tell her the steps; the steps would be okay, speak to HR, let HR know what’s going on. Talk to a business attorney. That’s really the way to handle it. So, you know, and the other thing would be start for another job, because some corporations, I’ll tell you, corporations are only as healthy as the people at the top. And if the people at the top are not healthy Hello Disney company with a certain Bob, not the current Bob, the old Bob, you know, it showed the company started falling apart. Anyway, the point being, they’re only as healthy as the people at the top.

So, in remember, HR is there to protect the company. Now, most companies do not want an embarrassing lawsuit. It’s sometimes you got to play poker; you got to play. You know, it’s like, Okay, fine. I’m hiring an attorney. I’m filing a complaint with the EEOC have fun with that. And you’ll see how quickly they a lot of times they turn around; sometimes they don’t, sometimes they don’t care. But you know, you just give her the advice, and then let her do all the work or him do all the work because it’s not your job to do it for them. So, there is that,

Um, okay, how can we tell if betrayal from cluelessness? Oh, how can we? Sorry, how can we tell conscious betrayal from cluelessness in the workplace? For example, whether a boss was trying to publicly embarrass me in a meeting or just stating a disagreement in strong terms, it’s going to be behavior, it’s going to be behavior. So, if the boss is stating in strong terms that it’s a disagreement. And it felt like an embarrassment to you, I would go to the boss and just be like, you know, all you had to say was I disagree. I would have gotten it. Just and then, if they do it again after you’ve made them aware of it, now we’ve got a pattern of behavior. So once is a fluke, twice is a coincidence, three or more is a pattern of behavior. And that’s the way I run my life. So, you know, it’s like, give him the benefit of the doubt once bring it to their attention. If they do it again. Isn’t that interesting? And if it happens after that, nope, this is who they are. Does that make sense? So, with a healthy, normal person bringing it to their attention once is enough because there’ll be like, Oh my gosh, that’s not what I wanted to do. I don’t want to hurt you, and I don’t want to harm you. I don’t want to embarrass you. I want to keep you on this team. I’m really sorry. Let me make sure I don’t do that again. But if they do it again after you brought it to their attention, that should be throwing some red flags. So yeah, absolutely. Okay. Um, and that goes for any time you feel harmed. It’s like, if it was truly cluelessness, and the person is brought to the person’s attention, they will give a true, sincere apology, which is Oh, my God, I hurt you. I am so sorry. I did not mean to. That was not my intent. I will make sure that this does not happen in the future. What can I do to mend the relationship? That’s a true apology. Anything less than that? If they throw it back on you. If it will, you did this, and you did that? Ah, that’s a narcissistic apology that tells you right there in there who you are dealing with. Believe them the first time. So yeah, absolutely. Okay.

Kris Godinez  46:05

What to do when PTSD is an anxiety disorder. I’m working on emotional regulation. Someone in my life refused to educate themselves and keep retriggering with invalidation. Shut up and relax. Oh, my God, no, that does not help. Okay. So, it depends on a lot of things. Because I’m not quite sure of the context, I will go back and finish reading the rest of the question. So, a lot of clueless people, when somebody is being triggered, they’ll tell them to calm down. In the history of never has telling somebody to calm down worked seriously. And, in fact, if you want to find my foot up your hind end telling me to calm down, you know what I’m saying? So, you don’t tell somebody to shut up and relax. That’s, that is insulting, that is insulting. And it’s arrogant, and it’s stupid. And it’s something that an abuser would say, boom, something that an abuser would say somebody who’s empathic, somebody who’s kind, somebody who’s caring would be like, are you okay? Breathe? Are you okay? It’s all right. It’s okay, breathe because that we’re not breathing when we’re panicked, right? Or when we’re anxious, we’re not breathing. We’re getting tense. We’re like ready to fight flight freeze or fawn given to the abuser. So, telling somebody to shut up and relax. It’s it just insulted it. They’re, they’re showing you who they are. And if you’ve made them aware of your triggers, and they do it anyway, they’re doing it on purpose, just like I said in the last question, so it’s like, you know,  once is a fluke twice as a coincidence, three or more times as a pattern. So, you know, don’t put up with it. Don’t put up with it. Don’t hang around. Don’t be around it. Okay, let me see if I answered that. Okay, it doesn’t help me having people dismiss me or trivialize their behavior because they’re gaslighting you, Yes. 110% feeling unheard. unseen by these people. It is deliberate, it is insensitive, and then they deny it. So that’s an abuse that’s abuse there that you just gave the definition of gaslighting abuse right there. I feel I go into a dissociated set shutdown. Absolutely. 110%. So, my recommendation there’ll be around these people do not for your mental health, do not these people are beyond your means to change or help, or whatever, because they’re not listening to you. Abusers love to make us feel unheard. And unseen. That’s their intent. They want us to feel powerless. They want us to feel insignificant. They want us to feel minimized. They want us to feel crazy. They want us to feel all the nasties. They want us to feel all the nasties. So, when you’ve told somebody, you know what triggers you, and they do it anyway. And they’ve done it more than once or twice. Do not be around them. Do not be around them. That is a pattern. They’re not going to change. They’re going to continue their behavior of you. Don’t be around them. Seriously. It’s it for your health. Do not be around them. They’re abusive. You just gave the definition of gaslighting abuse, boom, right there. So don’t be around them. It’s not you. It’s them. Get with a good trauma therapist. EMDR is great. Tapping is great. CBT is great. DBT is great. Get to a good trauma therapist and work on the triggers so that you’re not so triggered.

So, somebody was asking me the other day, it’s like, well, do the triggers ever go away? I will say no. I don’t think they ever completely go away. But I do think that our response to them is less. What’s the word I’m looking for? It’s less I was going to say violence. I guess it’s less, you know, it’s less urgent, or it’s less feeling so life and death, okay? The triggers are always going to be there. Like I said, every once in a while, I’ll get hit with a trigger about trust, and oh boy, I get really triggered, but at least I’m aware of it now. And I can be, like, verbalizing it and going, Holy cow. I just got triggered by this. Let’s talk. Right. But I think a lot of our triggers, I mean, I have a startle response still. But it’s not it’s not a startle response followed by a scream. It’s usually just okay. It’s okay. So, I think they lesson a little bit or responses to the triggers lessens a little bit, but I don’t think they ever really truly go away. I really don’t because it’s ingrained in our amygdala, you know, oh, that’s a threat. Okay, we got to do something, you know. So, um, yeah. Okay, hold on. Give me a good trauma therapist. I think that’s going to help you the most.

Okay, what to do with tension when people break things, yell, and shift the blame? They know you have traumatic history; they don’t mind displaying and then denying poor behavior that causes you more issues. Get away from it. Absolutely. If it’s a work environment, find a different work environment. If it’s a family situation, go no contact. Absolutely. 100% they’re showing you who they are. That that whole denying it. That’s gaslighting. Yeah. Or getting defensive when you point out the behavior that’s get away from them. They’re bad juju.

Alright, how do you stop dreaming of the betrayal? I got cheated on two years ago by a narcissist in new supply. I still dream in detail about our last argument very triggering. I would write it out. literally write it out, like exactly what you’re seeing, what you’re dreaming about the event, etc. And then Daydream it differently. Say what you need to say. So, I one time had a dream, excuse me, when I was young, I was probably, Yeah, many young adults, maybe 20s. And in my dream, and this was the most wonderful dream, I tied up all my family members, and I told them exactly what I thought it felt so good. And so, I talked it over with my therapist, and she was like, Well, this is what you wanted to say that you couldn’t say. So my recommendation with that particular traumatic dream is write it out. Go back through Daydream it and see exactly what you want to say. Or even write out what you want to say, turn it into a script, turn it into a movie, turn it into whatever, but redo it. So, you’re saying what you need to say and betrayal. Like I said, it’s not just emotional. It’s not just psychological, it’s physiological. So, taking your power back, just even just daydreaming that you got to say exactly what you needed to say, will help you start taking your power back. Also, again, get with a good trauma therapist. What is it about this, that your subconscious keeps playing over and over and over again? Now, it could be a couple of things. It could be unresolved, right? Because it’s just leaving abuse is literally like one of those stupid coffee commercials from the 70s. So, there was this coffee commercial that never ended. It was, I can’t remember was a Folgers? I can’t remember anyway. It was this little song that went da, da, da, da, da, da and it just went on and on and on, and it never stopped.

Kris Godinez  53:41

So, we tend to replay stuff over and over and over again because there’s no period on it. Well, there’s never going to be a period on it. You’re never going to get what you want or need from the abuser, whether it’s a parent, a boss, a coworker, a friend, a lover, or whatever, they’re never going to take responsibility because they’re douchebags. So, in they’re incapable of it. And they won’t. Or they could they won’t. They’re ego won’t let them because they’re 100% ego up here. So, you’ve got to put the period on it. What do you need from that scene? What would help you feel better about that scene? What is incomplete? So, dream it back through? Do a conscious dreaming, do a daydream of it, dream it back through work through what do you need? What are you not getting? What do you need? Why does that keep popping up? Because two years later, yeah, I can kind of see that. It takes about three years to work it all out of our systems. But specifically, what is that about? Is it that you didn’t get something you needed? Was there something you wanted to say? You know, what, what are you working on here? There’s something going on. Okay. Um, okay, so All right. So yeah, you want to work that through and get with a good trauma therapist, so that would be my suggestion for that.

Okay, kids. That is it for today. Um, I can’t remember Want to talk to you about next week, so I’ll mention it in Wednesday’s video. So, you guys go have a great day behind yourselves. Drink plenty of water. Remember, I am going to be in Santa Barbara this weekend. If you don’t get tickets by Thursday night, I am not going to be available. So, you won’t be able to go is what I’m trying to say. I’m also going to be in Vancouver, BC in May 20. So, I will be there. Thank you, guys, so much. Please share these videos with people that you know need them. Subscribe, like, etc. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, you guys. Be good to yourself. And don’t forget to do your work. Work on self-esteem. Trust your gut. You’ve got this, okay. All right, my loves be good, and I will talk to you later. Bye.

Thank you so much for listening to this podcast. You can always listen live on YouTube every week Sunday at noon, Arizona Mountain Standard Time. And if you want to find out more or listen to other episodes, you can go to Krisgodinez.com and if you have a chance, subscribe to this show on whatever podcast app you use and let other people know about. I want to thank my sponsor betterhelp.com. They are an online therapy company. Whether you are in the US or international. They will set you up with a qualified licensed therapist. PhD level or Master’s level. If you are interested in more information, go to betterhelp.com/krisgodinez.

You’ve been listening to the podcast version of We Need To Talk with Kris Godinez.