Pathological Relationships
Our histories with pathological relationships, no matter how long or short, create what is called cognitive distortions.
Distortions are memories, dipped in trauma. They take on the worst part of the lies from the perpetrators without any correction to what really happened. This creates a warped view on reality.
It happens when we are trying to make sense of what happened. However, it is inextricably connected to the pathological’s warped sense of reality. That could be a parent, partner, boss or friend. It produces a spider web of feelings and wrong beliefs and not-quite-clear memories. Each spun together with a tiny strand of shame and worthlessness that connects all the other strands to make one big web that is produced to control.
Too often we fail to challenge any part of this web. Years may pass as the web holds you in place with feelings of shame and foggy memories. These cognitive distortions are what narcissists, psychopaths, sociopaths and anti-social personalities use to spin your best traits and turn them around into years of dissonance and instability. This dissonance challenges your sense of reality as it doesn't match with your internal beliefs and what is happening. Or what you perceive to be happening. It continues to keep you off balance giving the narcissist, psychopath, anti-social and sociopath control.
Untangling the distortions, the dissonance and the gaslighting is a unique approach that is not retelling of a distorted story. Retelling is re-traumatizing. Allow your story to be challenged and untangled so you can break the patterns that have kept you stuck in trauma.