If you’re human…
and not some alien from another planet who ended up on Earth and is stuck here (through no fault of your own, of course),
because your own people have abandoned you (you volunteered for this mission and they warned you that if it goes wrong they’re just going to pretend they don’t know you because of intergalactic diplomatic issues),
they are giving you the cosmic version of the silent treatment (which is colder than the farthest planet from the Sun),
or maybe they just haven’t had time to notice that you’ve sent a distress signal (it’s a tiny blip on their radar and they’re so busy with so many blips… coming from all the beings from your planet and species which are spread across so many galaxies getting into all sorts of predicaments on other planets with other species).
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If you’re human…
you’re prone to lots of things which other humans are prone to,
but when they do it it’s annoying…
when you do it it’s okay and why are they getting annoyed at you!?!
If you don’t reply to their text, email, phone call, knock on the door, etc, you have very good reasons, excuses, justifications, righteous rightnesses, etc, which are logical and they should understand, empathise, and let you get away with something which… you don’t let them get away with when they do the same thing to you, in spite of the logical reasons, excuses, justifications, etc, which they give you and which you could understand and empathise with if you…
weren’t taking what they do to you personally while expecting them not to do that with what you do to them.
*conditions apply and batteries are not included (so buy your own and don’t blame the manufacturer because they told you in smallprint that batteries were not included).
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If you’re human…
and have somehow stumbled across information about narcissists and looked into it a bit…
read a few articles about it (skimming over the bits which were boring and didn’t apply to anything relevant to you)…
and found a few things which…
WOW!…
this totally applies to a bunch of people you know (but not you, of course, or just a little bit but those are crumbs which can be brushed off)…
and explains to you why they weren’t catering to your every need, dropping everything because you needed their attention ASAP, going on about themselves which was tedious because you wanted to go on about yourself because that’s interesting…
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made you think that some of those you know must be narcissists,
particularly because of the whole ‘silent treatment’ factor…
that must be what they’re doing when they ignore you… they must be giving you the ‘silent treatment’… because otherwise why would they not respond to you immediately when you contact them and need them to notice you then and there!?!
It’s not because they’re busy with their own lives, didn’t have time for you (WHAT!!!???!!!), were just taking a break (because they’re effing knackered out by life and the demands of it… oh, the good old days when the internet and texting, email, etc didn’t exist (and people waited patiently for you to have a private nap)… enjoying some radio silence because they’re perhaps a bit overwhelmed and need some ‘me’ time (if it’s not me=you time then you’re not interested or understanding about it!).
maybe you need a more defined definition of who a narcissist is and who a narcissist isn’t,
and what the silent treatment is and what the silent treatment isn’t…
because it can be confusing and it is easy to get confused… if you’re human.
Let’s go with an example from a recent story which has been doing the rounds in the news (in non-prime world news news – this stuff isn’t serious, but it’s serious in a way which is all too human and what happens in this kind of news ripples into what happens in other kind of news in certain ways, because it all involves humans – mainly).
One version of this story can be found here – This UCLA Student’s Alarmingly Heated Email Exchange is Reason Enough To Switch Rooms
The person who wrote this email:
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to her new college roommates whom she had not yet met is typically narcissistic…
and was typically narcissistic in her conviction that she was being given ‘the silent treatment’ – narcissists know the term ‘silent treatment’ and also what it entails – someone not talking to them when they want someone to talk to them, silence which they find incredibly uncomfortable and fill with all sorts of thoughts, words, talk and paranoia… but they don’t self-reflect and thus what they imagine during this silence when someone isn’t catering to their need for immediate attention becomes a reality.
If a narcissist decides that you’re giving them the silent treatment… don’t bother tryign to explain to them that you’re not, and what they think is the silent treatment is NOT the silent treatment (see below excerpt).
If I had received this missive I’d diagnose her as being a narcissist (even though I’m not a professional and not allowed to diagnose people)… and I’d be considering ways of getting out of having to share a room with this person (ways which might include not going to college at this time), because this is just the tip of their narcissist drama iceberg (she confirms this suspicion in a later email when she describes herself as a ‘ticking time bomb’ amongst other self-descriptions which don’t leave much room for hoping for the best).
If someone is this narcissistic when they don’t even know you (most narcissists are rather charming when you only know them superficially and inititially, they only show their nasty wet and fed after midnight gremlin side after you get to know them) then things aren’t going to get better from here…
One of the roommates decided to reply… and be bold about it, stand up for themselves and their other roommate, set boundaries and confront matters (I admire the gumption and bravery):
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Although it was a tad bitchy (can’t really resist a bit of tit for tat and frankly sometimes it’s the only way to get through to someone who speaks in the language of bitchy) it tried to stay on a non-bitchy course and did a good job of it…
it tried to explain that the perceived silent treatment was NOT the silent treatment…
but
a narcissistic person was involved and even if this reply had been written by the best diplomat in the galaxy… drama shit would still hit the fan
The narcissistic roommate’s subsequent reply confirms even more that this is ‘written by a narcissist’:
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because it’s a mess of contradictions and stories.
One minute she’s chilled as a chilly chilled chillness and the next minute she’s hot and about to explode… and everyone else must understand that this is not her fault but their fault, the fault of everyone but her – she’s trying here!!! She’s got issues (apparently no one else has these things) but she’s doing her best to sort those out (everyone must cater to this while she doesn’t actually do this but uses it to keep them under her thumb). She’s sharing and caring… now do what she wants or she’ll share the eff out of you until you wish you didn’t have a caring bone in your body…
Did I mention that this story contains humans…
and humans…
really can’t be contained.
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If you’re human…
you’ve probably inadvertantly made other humans think that maybe you were given them the silent treatment because…
You didn’t reply to their text, email, comment on your blog, phone call, etc… they may take forever to reply to you but you’re not allowed to take forever to reply to them, they won’t understand but will expect you to understand – this is human!
They took your lack of reply personally – rather than see it as being personal to you (you’re busy, tired, didn’t notice their message… eek!… your Wifi is a mess, you’re just… a worn out modern human)
Maybe you were deliberately ignoring them – they do this too to others, to you, but DON’T do it to them especially if they’re regular doers of ignoring others because… NO, No, no…. they can do it to others, others can’t do it to them! Or they’ll think you’re doing it to them for the reasons they do it to others and that’s just not what they signed on for with this contract of this relationship!
And other human stuff!
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If you’re looking for the ‘silent treatment’ you’ll find it…
whether it’s the official narcissist version of it is another matter entirely.
It’s worth noting that if a narcissist gives you the official narcissist silent treatment – it’s not about you it’s about them and if you want to understand what it’s really about you need to stop thinking it’s about you. It’s always about them – and the silent treatment which a narcissist gives you is usually triggered by the narcissist wanting to avoid something which made them feel embarrassed, awkward about, not perfect, ideal, and too human…
it’s where they go when they’re sulking because they made a mistake and think you noticed that mistake and will now never let them forget about it…
luckily for them you were probably not paying the kind of close attention to them which they’re convinced everyone should be, they think everyone is scanning them like they scan themselves and others, looking for faults, flaws, bugs, viruses, so what triggered their silent treatment went either completely unnoticed by you… or you just didn’t notice because you were paying attention to yourself rather than them (oh… what a faux pas!)
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The narcissist’s silent treatment… isn’t about you, isn’t for you, isn’t aiming to manipulate you… but the fact that it does allow them to manipulate you (perhaps only because you think that’s what they’re doing with it) is a bonus for them which you give them by letting such a thing as their selfish silence unnerve you and leave you open to them.
I’ve been there… let their silence make me play myself and then blame them for playing me with it…
Narcissists don’t really need to do anything (which is great because they feel paralysed most of the time due to their perfectionism and idealism) we do it all for them.
They sulk because they effed up and want to hide until no one remembers they effed up (until they can wipe it from their memory which is the same as everyone’s memory because… we are Borg)… and we turn their sulk into something done by Machiavelli (but Machiavelli isn’t who we think he was).
Perception is distorted and that distortion becomes what we see…
Look, look, look how much we’re bending over backwards to turn their frown into a smile… why!?!
If you’re human… you know why.
And now look at how angry we are because they didn’t appreciate what we did and we hated doing it so…
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now what…?
There’s a bittersweet side to the real silent treatment from a real narcissist – it’s pretty much the only time they shut up and you have a moment to yourself… without them wittering on and on and on…
we should carpe the diem out of it….
unfortunately rather than use that silence and moment to yourself for yourself… for some much needed self-reflection and other things which might be nourishing and helpful to you, you fill it with paranoia (a gift a narcissist teaches you if you didn’t already have it), you wait anxiously for the other shoe to drop (because with a real narcissist there is a shoe on the ceiling and it will drop… on your head… bringing all sorts of drama shit which was on its sole with it…), for the sword of Damocles to chop your head off (or something equally gruesome), you fill that silence with all your bogeymen… and they come to get you.
Your own bogeymen can make the bogies of a narcissist seem rather tame (or is that just me?).
If you’re human… you have what other humans have and can imagine what they have,
you think what they think and can imagine what they think…
and fill their silence with your noise, which may be the same as your own noise.
Narcissists are human… and have all the human mess which all humans have… it’s just that we don;t want our mess to be like theirs and so we prefer to see them as not being human.
They are…
we are…
mess ensues…
An Upturned Soul 
Debating, negotiating, being logical, nice or mean – is a no win no matter with a narcissist from my experience. It just becomes all “word salad.” I most recently got into a pointless and unproductive exchanges, and I once disengaged – she became even more abusive with the “silent treatment” following. From my experience, they truly believe others are doing the nasty things they do and once this paranoia sets, all logic and reality is lost. Self-reflection is non existent so in trying to get them to do so is fruitless.
Thanks for sharing your experience, and allowing me to vent and rant.
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Thank you for sharing 🙂
We always keep hoping that they’ll come to their senses and see some logic, and that maybe if we present them with an irrefutable argument they’ll pause in their melodrama starring them as the hero and for a moment see that we’re not the villain and we can work things out like normal humans do. And maybe for an instant they seem to actually get it, but then the lure of their endless epic drama calls and they’re off again, going around in the wash-cycle, frothing up with the soap opera they love so much.
It’s difficult when you can’t completely cut them out of your life – but your lil one will appreciate you being there. 🙂
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“Hope, it is the quintessential human delusion, simultaneously the source of your greatest strength, and your greatest weakness.” – The Architect in The Matrix.
Narcs bank off this.
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Great share!
Narcs are some of the most ‘hopeful’ people I’ve met. It’s a different kind of hope to the more usual experience of it.
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Loved it! Easily could have read another page or two…hehe. Totally related to and enjoyed the examples and playful quotes(especially Alex 😉 ) you are so very talented and witty, girl. Thank you again!
Maybe someday you could do a piece on going out to eat with the narc? With the typical nuonces….deciding where, deciding why, arguments over the menu, that “were not here for the food, but for the experience” lol…etc etc. Just food for thought(excuse the pun) not!
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Thank you very much 🙂
OMG! Ha! Yes, going out to eat with narcs!!! What a memorable experience!
I have a couple of memories of epic dramas which unfolded on a night out with my parents (frankly any night out as a family = drama). They loved having arguments in restaurants because they had a captive audience, witnesses, random strangers they could involve in their righteous indignation, and everyone else had to behave because of social standards – which narcs never follow but which everyone else has to follow.
There is nothing like being trapped in a restaurant with narcs who decide this is the perfect time to have a meltdown because their salad is a little soggy, the maitre d’ was too condescending, the person at the next table was looking at them in a funny way, they’re not sitting where they wanted to be seated, they’re surrounded by all the wrong people and the place isn’t living up to their expectations.
Great idea and food for thought 😉
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What an alarming college story. I hope the appropriate authority like counselor or some school psychologist stepped in or looked into it because it doesn’t look like it would end anything near good. Changing rooms would’ve solved the problem for the unlucky duo but I doubt the person in question will “bring the joy of college life” to another roommates. In my personal opinion, even if narcissism is involved here (and it obviously is, to a degree) it sure is coming entangled with something much more serious from the mental department and that is never good news, it should be left to the appropriate health professionals.
On the side note, it just shows you that you can never be prepared for the strike, even the person you have never ever met in your life or dealt with can turn your life upside down in a mere second because of a misunderstanding. I hope that people involved will find a positive resolution to this mess.
My narc-mother used to “silent”-treat me on a regular basis (especially after beating me up and leaving to “think” of my behaviour and then I had to crawl on my knees for forgiveness). It “worked as a charm” until I was around 12 y.o. I realised that it actually gives me some time of “freedom” from her. I started feeling deliriously happy when she was not talking to me, it was literally my golden ticket, escape from madness. I stretched those hours as much as possible but not in pain of rejection etc but in happiness of silence itself. I felt that the torture of silent treatment is basically my own doing – I dug into myself in search for more and more flaws and I was finding myself as a crappy being not worth of loving or living in the end (Just like the “thoughts” in the ‘Crush’ chat you posted). It was a bad road to travel and I didn’t like it at all. My mother has never discovered my “silent-escape”. As an extortion for something I was unable to give her, she tried to pull it on me when I was forty and it backfired at her. Man, the “injury” she “suffered” was enormous, I feared for the lives of my loved ones, that was a scary event.
Thank you so much for your posts, Ursula. I read them all. They help me to be strong, they help me to heal, they help me understand. I appreciate your thoughts and your wisdom. Thank you so much!
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Thank you very much 🙂
In an interview with one of the young women involved she said that she’d contacted the relevant person in authority at the college explaining the story and asking for a change of roommate but was told this wasn’t possible.
It’s a tricky situation all around. Trying to get those who’ve never dealt with a narcissistic person to realise how serious the situation is can be like trying to prove to the flat earth society that the world is spherical. It doesn’t matter if you have proof when people don’t want to see or believe something.
If you’ve never dealt with a narcissistic person before you tend not to believe that such people exist except in fiction. So the person trying to tell you about them seems to be the ‘crazy’ one and drama creator. The two young women are more likely to get penalised by the college for sharing this story online, ’embarrassing’ the college and causing ‘distress’ for their ticking time bomb roommate. The ‘easiest’ solution is for them to shut up and put up with things as they are – which is not an acceptible solution but is the sort of solution people who don’t have to live with their roommate will want them to take. They’ll probably get told that ‘they’re not in Kansas anymore’ and this is life so get used to it.
I’m always a bit cynical about happy endings to stories involving narcissists, because as you know they keep going and going and other people make excuses for why it’s okay for them to keep going.
Having lived with my mother I know how much that ‘ticking time bomb’ young woman really needed that bunk, that cupboard, and for everyone to cater to her need for everything to be as she needed it to be or else all hell would break loose. That’s a narcissist telling the truth – if they don’t get exactly what they want all hell will break loose and stay on the loose until everyone gives in to their demands. They don’t mean or want to be that way but they are so everyone else has to do something about it.
I remember feeling the pressure which my mother felt when things weren’t exactly as she needed them to be for her. You could hear the bomb ticking. The silent treatment often came after the explosion. And they tend to think that they are being reasonable, that they’ve been considerate and patient and someone else has caused them to lose their shit by not appreciating how reasonable, considerate, and patient they were being. My mother saw herself as the epitome of self-sacrificing martyr for the comfort of others… but if they didn’t grovel in appreciation she’d blow her top. Then she’d be embarrassed that she’d lost her self-control and therefore lost her self-image as virtuously patient. Similar to how this young woman kept saying how ‘chilled’ she was and how her ‘losing her shit’ was due to her being under intense pressure. The other two were also under the same kind of pressure (with extra pressure thanks to her) – but a narcissist just can’t bridge the gap between self and other.
It took me a long time to realise that my mother’s silent treatment after a blow up was more for her than it was for me. It was when she repaired the damage she’d done to her self-image. If I waited it out rather than grovel and try to win her ‘love’ back, she’d do that to me instead. She was at her best behaviour a short while after she’d gotten over her silent treatment period. Then the whole rigmarole began again.
There’s nothing more vicious than an old narcissist mother who is still trying to regain complete control over her child – still trying to make you be who you were when you were ‘hers’. Still trying to force you to be this doll she plays with and sometimes rips its head off, throws the head against the wall, then cries because the doll broke, and the doll has to glue its head back on.
There’s a primal fear which narcissist parents instill in you which never quite goes away (which can be quite useful at times if you end up in a dodgy neighbourhood or have to deal with dodgy people). You find your peace where you can get it and make of a fortress the things which narcs use against you.
Sometimes being strong and facing up to them is scary as eff, worth it, totally worth it, but fearsome! Your strength is beautiful!
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Thank you very much for your support, it means a lot to me!
I’m a hopeless optimist (or an optimistic pessimist?), I like the proverb “hope for the best and prepare for the worst”. That’s why I’m thinking there is a chance of a happy ending for the girls, I don’t like the idea of them giving up.
Besides, there are two of them against the “ticking cuckoo clock”. The email reply was written by one girl and posted on the social media by another. I’m thinking they are teaming up and that makes them a “planning-defence-attack” in action. Since the authority refused to switch rooms then it becomes the girls’ problem. They tried to solve it the easy way, it didn’t work, I think the media machine followed it. Depending on their FB -army they can actually successfully win it. Nothing is more hurtful for the narcs then to be publicly embarrassed. It’s like the whole smear campaign upside down. Well, they feed of everything, true to the bone; negative exposure is still a fame – to instil the image of an everlasting victim. The unhappy bird might “find” a convenient boyfriend to fly to. There are plenty of variables there. Even in the end, if they are stuck in the same room – two against one is still an advantage.
I have to admit that before I personally fell into abyss and realized who my mother actually was and how deeply twisted I am in regards to it, I had no idea of the actual definition of a narcissist (I mean it, NO IDEA! Almost 43 years of my life I truly believed my mother is a victim of circumstances and needs protection against the whole world. I have PhD in making excuses for her. True story. That’s me, nice to meet you.). I can understand perfectly how other people who have never ever had an encounter of the Third Kind simply deny their existence. It’s way “safer” escape to deny it rather than getting involved, it’s kind of basic human survival skills in action. And by the rules of denial – you have to do absolutely nothing about it.
I’m surprised that your mother had self-repair time during silent episodes and that she would behave after that (even for a short period of time). My mother used silent treatment rather on the highest peaks of achieving something. For example, like after a violent outburst, which was caused by the same stuff as in your mother’s case, except the explosion would cause the opposite effect – her face will lit up with some sort of euphoria (makes you feel quite uneasy), she will be in another place, wallowing in endless power and “achieving” her perceived perfection. I suppose, her purpose of silent treatment was primarily to hide her “achievement” and keep it to herself entirely and at the same time diminish the other party involved (who will be busy continuing the process of self-devaluation left alone in silence). That is why when this euphoria eventually wore out she expected the subject of silent treatment to crawl on their knees for her forgiveness, just to reassure her that she actually did have that episode of pure “enlightenment”.
My mother is of a covert and passive-aggressive variety, she does have a violent streak but she won’t admit any flaws out loud, and won’t proclaim herself a ‘ticking bomb’ (especially with physical evidence like an email) like the girl in the story did. That sounded way logical and calculated to me that’s why I’m thinking that the girl has other mental stuff going on outside of the picture and that may be more dangerous. Maybe I’m giving her too much credit and she is just young and inexperienced and used to get stuff by simply threatening people and get away with it easily. Of course, I speak from my own experience and there is a wide variety of narcissists out there, some do it with a straight forward approach and get away with it, it’s just strange to see that they would pull it on people they have never even met in person, wow factor, you know. Let’s hope we won’t cross paths with them.
I’m sorry for the long post, I talk a lot and it just resonates my personal mess deeply, sorting it out is a bit of a challenge. Thank you for sharing your stories, they give me hope that there is hope where I thought was a black hole. There is always a way out, it’s just hard to find it in the darkness, need to be patient and proceed with caution. The light is within us and it will shine if we just let it. 🙂
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Thank you 🙂
Personally I’ve found that talking about my experience in writing has helped me to figure things out, to sort through some of the internal mess, clarify some of the confusion. I think writing about it means you not only tell your story which is very liberating especially after years of silence, of keeping it all inside swirling within in a mass of knots getting knottier, but you also listen to yourself tell your story, you hear your voice even if it is very quiet at first coming through from you to you, and that kind of conversation is essential in figuring things out.
Children of narcissists get taught to not listen to themselves in several ways for many reasons – some of that is due to the narcissist wanting to control what you think to maintain their reality and being afraid of letting you think your own thoughts in case it shatters what they work so hard to create, some of it is due to having to live with a narcissist who is a parent, who has total control over you and your survival. Listening to yourself while living in the kingdom of a narcissist can increase pain and confusion, so you learn to stop hearing what you have to say. Some of it is due to trying to tell others what your parent is really like and others not listening to you, dismissing your words as fabrication (especially when you’re a child trying to talk to adults) and denying your self-expression because they just don’t want to hear it. So you stop listening and you stop speaking to yourself. Getting back in touch with yourself is healing – that is the real way out of the black hole feeling.
Not sure what will happen to those young women, but sharing their experiences online has made a difference – whether it is a positive or a negative difference is up to each person involved. Life always gives us challenges in one form or another. Learning to deal with a narcissistic person makes us dig deeper within – the problem isn’t just them, it’s also us because we’re such an intrinsic part of who they are – through us they seek themselves. And dealing with a narcissistic person can help us to find ourselves because it forces us to rely on ourselves and makes us get to know ourselves better.
There are many different types of narcissist – it’s a disorder which takes the shape of the person who has it and each person is different from others. There are many factors to consider – like generational influences, the narcissists who grew up with the internet and social media have an ever present alternative for narc supply at the tip of their fingers, and this has changed certain aspects of how their narcissistic tendencies express themselves. Social and cultural influences – certain social groups and cultures actually encourage people to behave narcissistically. Family environment – my guess is the young woman who was so demanding and entitled was simply repeating a pattern which worked in her family and social environment, but since she was doing it in a new social and ‘new family’ environment it didn’t get her the results which she’s used to getting when she behaves that way. Her narcissistic tendencies are more of the ‘Overt narcissist’ kind – the openly bossy bully.
It’s interesting that you mention finding out about narcissists in your 40’s – the whole NPD/Narcissist information boom has only recently taken off, and the internet has helped to spread that information far and wide, therefore our generation of children of narcissists are now getting the ‘labels’ to put to what we’ve had a lifetime of experience with but used other less exact labels to describe to ourselves and others (if we tried to describe it to others at all because discussing the issue of having a narcissist parent has only really become ‘okay’ socially in recent years, it’s almost ‘in’ to do it now and we know have an acronym for what we are, so we have a ‘label’ to place on ourselves as well as on our parents).
Life is such a strange thing – wait long enough and the world flips around, and sometimes it flips around so that you’re actually in the right place at the right time 🙂
Have you checked out – https://www.reddit.com/r/raisedbynarcissists – it’s an interesting and informative forum for ACoNs
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Thank you very much for your reply, I’ve checked out the Reddit thingy, there is a lot of info and spot on stories over there. I have joined a support group and a couple of forums, I’m not very active though, can’t adjust to the fast-paced internet environment easy, I’m more of linear learner but I don’t give up easy 🙂 I also watch youtube guys who went through this disaster and life coaches that educate people on codependency and it helps me a lot. At the beginning I was terrified at my own state of mind. I’m a long way out there to sort it all out but I think that I’m very lucky to find the answer so relatively early in life, helps me to change in everyday life and be less of a nuisance 🙂
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Sometimes I think of the internet as being too too fast and other times I see it as being oh so slow… download times are faster than upload times… which is perhaps a metaphor for life and relationships and stuff.
Respect your own pace, do what feels right… and if it at any time feels wrong then don’t keep doing it. Be your own guide through this world, online, offline, and beyond 🙂
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This helped me a lot today. And the borg bit made me laugh. I’m trying to enjoy the silent treatment while I can. Thanks
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Thank you very much for sharing 🙂
I find fiction is very useful for getting to grips with narcissists since so much about them is unreal, and as the saying goes – truth is stranger than fiction – so fiction can sometimes explain the strange in life. Especially the strange people and the strangeness they do. When I first came across the Borg… something clicked for me. They make me chuckle… although the first time I came across them they made me panic as they reminded me of things I did not want to think about.
Humour is important when dealing with narcissists, especially when trying to heal from their effect on you. If you can laugh… you’re well on your way to going to be okay!
Have you ever had one of those sobbing sessions where somewhere along the course of sobbing you suddenly find you’re smiling and you don’t know why… those smiles are precious things! In all the seriousness of dealing with a narcissist there is cause to pause for a laugh because sometimes it’s the only thing you can do (to keep from killing them or yourself) and it can change the course of a plot. They say and do some hilarious stuff… and some of the dramas you get sucked into are completely ridiculous. Laughter can take the edge off the knife which cuts.
One thing to do during a silent treatment if you can is to observe what purpose it serves for your narcissist which is personal to them – it’s often a hiding place for them where they repair damage they’ve done to themselves, and you can find out what makes them tick by what they do during a silence and what caused them to go silent in the first place. It’s often when they’re at their most vulnerable – which they hate being – thus it can be very revealing. If they knew how much they exposed about the person they are behind their personas during a silent treatment they’d never do it – but they can’t not do it because keeping up a persona is tiring and uses up masses of energy. At some point their engine fails usually due to too much stress and they zonk out.
Treasure the silence of the silent treatment is has many benefits to it once you get past how much it can hurt. You have power over what fills the silence.
Take care of yourself!
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