How to Protect yourself from Narcissists, Psychopaths and Borderlines

Are you a self-described crazy woman magnet or crazy man magnet? Have you dated one emotionally unstable, emotionally unavailable and psychologically stunted person after the next? Are the majority of your exes a museum of various personality disorders — narcissists, borderlines, histrionics, dependents, paranoiacs and psychopaths, oh my?

While your former love interests may indeed have been as nutty as the Planter’s Peanut factory, lightning rarely strikes the same place more than once. Therefore, it’s time to look at your role in what attracts you to and attracts Crazy to you. In most cases, it’s a lack of boundaries, a lack of self-respect, faulty relationship beliefs, attitudes and behaviors learned in childhood and being easily manipulated by guilt, obligation, fear and pity.

Pining for a woman or man who mistreats and abuses you and calling it love is, obviously, a problem. For that matter, someone who regularly disrespects and devalues you, who lies to you and cheats on you, who financially exploits you, who undermines you and erodes your self-esteem, who makes you feel invisible — does not love you. None of these things add up to love, and if you believe they do or make excuses for being treated so shabbily you’ve got some work to do.

In other words, it’s time to do some Crazyproofing. It’s kind of like babyproofing, but instead of making a residence safer for a baby or toddler you’ll be making it safer for you to be in relationships. How? READ MORE.

Want to Say Goodbye to Crazy? Buy it HERE.

Counseling, Consulting and Coaching with Dr. Tara J. Palmatier, PsyD

Dr. Tara J. Palmatier, PsyD provides services to help individuals work through their relationship issues via telephone or Skype, particularly men and women who trying to break free of an abusive relationship, cope with the stress of an abusive relationship or heal from an abusive relationship. She combines practical advice, support, reality testing and goal-oriented outcomes. Please visit the Schedule a Session page for professional inquiries.

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Relationship Boundaries, Part 2

Do you have a pattern of dysfunctional and toxic relationships? Don’t despair. If you’re codependent and not personality disordered (e.g., narcissistic, borderline, histrionic, sociopathic or psychopathic) you can break this pattern. It probably won’t be as easy or fast as you’d like, but it can be done. Change, even when it’s desired, is often painful and difficult. That’s why it’s called growing pains.

Basic Relationship Boundaries, Part 1 discusses the importance of reciprocal relationships, personal boundaries and not enabling other people’s abusive behavior. Before you can have a healthy relationship, it’s helpful to understand how and why you’ve gotten yourself into trouble in past and present relationships.

Most people who have unhealthy relationship patterns can trace it back to their childhoods. If your parents didn’t teach you to take care of yourself and have healthy boundaries, which is true of many codependents, then you need to begin with the basics. Again, don’t beat up on yourself. How are you supposed to know how to do something if no one ever taught you? Or, worse yet, taught you to ignore your own needs and well-being in order to take care of them instead? How are you supposed to know what a functional relationship is when your parents modeled toxic and dysfunctional relationships?

If you were expected to take care of your mother’s and father’s emotional and physical needs as a child it was a role reversal. It’s called parentification and is a form of child abuse. Adults are supposed to take care of their kids, not the other way round. If you’re codependent, you basically have to learn how to care for and love yourself as an adult in the ways your parents did not and could not when you were a child. READ MORE.

Want to Say Goodbye to Crazy? Buy it HERE.

Counseling, Consulting and Coaching with Dr. Tara J. Palmatier, PsyD

Dr. Tara J. Palmatier, PsyD provides services to help individuals work through their relationship issues via telephone or Skype, particularly men and women who trying to break free of an abusive relationship, cope with the stress of an abusive relationship or heal from an abusive relationship. She combines practical advice, support, reality testing and goal-oriented outcomes. Please visit the Schedule a Session page for professional inquiries.

Obsessed with a Crazy Ex: Are You Stuck?

There’s a new article on www.Shrink4Men.com that discusses some of the reasons men and women have trouble getting over an abusive ex. It also challenges the old “But I love her” error that so many targets of abusers make.

Here’s the link:

Obsessing Over an Abusive Ex: Thoughts on Being Stuck

Shrink4Men Coaching and Consulting Services:

Dr Tara J. Palmatier provides confidential, fee-for-service, consultation/coaching services to help both men and women work through their relationship issues via telephone and/or Skype chat. Her practice combines practical advice, support, reality testing and goal-oriented outcomes. Please visit the Shrink4Men Services page for professional inquiries.

Why BPD/NPD Mothers Sabotage their Children

This article discusses potential ways some Borderline, Narcissistic and other personality disordered mothers sabotage and harm their children’s intellectual, emotional, psychological, physical and moral development.

To read the article, please follow this link:

Why Some Borderline, Narcissistic and Histrionic Mothers Sabotage their Children

Shrink4Men Coaching and Consulting Services:

Dr Tara J. Palmatier provides confidential, fee-for-service, consultation/coaching services to help both men and women work through their relationship issues via telephone and/or Skype chat. Her practice combines practical advice, support, reality testing and goal-oriented outcomes. Please visit the Shrink4Men Services page for professional inquiries.

Comments from the Edge: Understanding Crazy Talk

This article goes through an email by a self-identified borderline personality disordered woman line by line in order to break down the blame shifting, distortions, emotional reasoning, lack of empathy and refusal to hold oneself accountable that is typical of many individuals with this characterological disorder.

To read the article, please follow this link:

Comments from the Edge: What your NPD/BPD Wife or Girlfriend Says vs. What She Means

Shrink4Men Coaching and Consulting Services:

Dr Tara J. Palmatier provides confidential, fee-for-service, consultation/coaching services to help both men and women work through their relationship issues via telephone and/or Skype chat. Her practice combines practical advice, support, reality testing and goal-oriented outcomes. Please visit the Shrink4Men Services page for professional inquiries.