Abnormal Behaviour

Mental health changes such as depression, anxiety, grief, trauma or PTSD can lead to abnormal behaviour. Sudden onset conditions that stem from a moment of shock  or a moment when the nervous system was suddenly overloaded (by the straw that broke the camel’s back) can bring about emotional disregulation and sudden behaviour change. We can find ourselves behaving in ways that make us feel as if we don’t know who we are any more.

If this is happening to you, it is important for you to know this:

Abnormal behaviour is a normal response to abnormal learning conditions.

Whether we are aware of it or not, as we go through life, the people and circumstances around us are teaching us. Just as the things we directly experience influence our behaviours and beliefs, so too does our environment. If a dog bites us or someone we know, we might come to fear dogs. If, however, we see or experience many positive interactions with dogs, this fear can be un-learned. This un-learning might happen unconsciously by chance, or we can choose to change the way we think.

We can effectively train our minds to respond rather than react. We can unlearn what we have learned as a result of exposure to narcissists or psychopaths. The known effects on partners and family members of narcissists, sociopaths and psychopaths are these:

·      Confusion

·      Lowered self-esteem & self worth

·      Lowered trust in own intellect and intuition

·      Lowered belief in self (self-efficacy, including the ability to recover)

·      Dependency

·      Co-dependency

·      Trauma

In addition to behaviour change, sudden change can happen to: financial security, careers, long-term goals, children, security and stability, social groups and community. Any and all of these crises may require a great deal of “un-learning” in the process of recovery.

Identifying the abnormal (dysfunctional) learning conditions to which we have been exposed can take a long time and a lot of soul-searching. It requires courage and honesty. It also requires new levels of self-compassion and self-protection – things we may never have learned before we were exposed to the dangerous and traumatising narcissist. This new skill-set is particularly useful for highly sensitive people with levels of empathy that are often painful in a world that demands a “thick skin” and the ability to “bounce back”.

Compassionate Counselling can help you with science-based and mindfulness-based learning interventions to ease your suffering and restore the life devastated by the narcissist.

SPECIAL NOTE: for more thorough exploration of the trauma of Narcissistic Abuse, visit a site that deals with this mental health issue in detail….

© Nicki Paull