6 days ago
How to Stop Repeating Toxic Relationship Patterns After Narcissistic Abuse
Do you ever feel like you're stuck in the same toxic patterns — whether it’s in romantic relationships, family dynamics, or even friendships? Maybe you’ve walked away from a narcissistic parent, partner, or sibling... but somehow, the same energy keeps showing up in different people. You’re not crazy — and you’re definitely not alone.
In this episode, we’re diving into why these unhealthy patterns repeat and exactly how to break the cycle for good. You’ll learn how trauma bonds form, how to spot the red flags within yourself, and what it takes to choose peace over chaos.
Whether you’re dating again, setting new boundaries with family, or simply doing the inner work, this episode will help you trust yourself, heal deeply, and rewrite your story.
Grab your Survivor's Journey to Peace Call and Blueprint here:
https://shethrives.thrivecart.com/journey-to-peace-coaching-blueprint/
My Empowered Boundaries Course:
Hey Queens, welcome to, but still she thrives. Do you want to stop getting caught up in that wicked web of a creepy crawling narcissist? You find yourself up late at night replaying the abuse you put up with and wondering how you can heal now, do you wake up hoping for healthy relationships and peace only to feel totally exhausted and mind effed? Girl, I see you. I'm Christie. I too had to disconnect from toxic people in my life and I wished I could undo the damage. I felt ashamed, lonely, and kind of lost. But I'm a stubborn Italian and I refuse to give up. I found ways to recalibrate my mind and body more quickly than I thought and can now share them with you. In this podcast, you will find coping tools, healing methods, and confidence boosters so you can trust yourself and find peace and freedom. So shields up ladies, let's go protect our peace.
(01:00)
Welcome to, but still Sheet Thrives. It's your host, Christie, Jade. Good morning, good afternoon, good night. Wherever you are with your shiny queen crown, you are looking hot. All right? So I am really excited about this. Okay, I think I say that on every episode. I get really excited about all of this. I'm very passionate if you don't know. But today's episode we are talking about breaking patterns. This means breaking patterns for yourself. This means breaking patterns for your children, which I know all you mamas, I know not all of your mamas, but I have lot of mom clients. This is one of their biggest fears is their kids have, I can't word today, but seeing them with these patterns, worrying that they will also repeat the patterns, right? The children looking up to their role models, their mom. So we're going to talk about that.
(01:56)
We're also going to talk about breaking that pattern within yourself. I know a lot of us worry when we are going through it or right after being out of a narcissistic relationship or just if we haven't really healed and it's a couple years later going, why am I still repeating these patterns? Why am I surrounding myself and not seeing red flags? So this is all important stuff, but we're going to try to knock it out here in this episode on a zoomed out approach. If you ever want more customized help, you're narcissistic recovery, coach Christie is here for you, and all the information on working with me as a coach will be in my show notes or a description, okay? So we're going to touch on why we repeat the patterns, the awareness being step one with anything. You got to be aware of what's going on and the new patterns you can create, right?
(02:51)
New pattern, new you that you 2.0 as I always call it, and then we'll wrap it up. So let's dive in. Get your little flippers on. We are going to dive in Pool of fun. First of all, let's talk trauma loops and familiar dysfunction, okay? What feels familiar often feels safe, even if it's not. So I want you to think back whether you had trauma in your childhood or you were in a romantic partnership for a long time and you were used to that. When you get familiar to being mistreated, maybe you don't know any different because you grew up like this in your childhood and that could have led you to later having romantic relationships that were not so hot. Even friendships that were not healthy. We have that toxic word thrown around all the time, but that's what it is. Or even accepting abuse in an office environment.
(03:51)
These things happen often because what feels familiar feels safe, even when it's harmful. Knowing that I want you to look at your life. What parts of your life were you not treated well? And you might have to go way back and it may have started again in childhood, may have started in a relationship in your teens, maybe your first little lovely romance in high school. There was some sort of dysfunction, some trauma, and it conditioned you to be almost tricked into feeling like this is comfortable, right? I won't say safe because it's not safe, but there can be comfort even if you don't feel safe because that is what you are used to, okay? So that's why we often repeat the patterns because either we don't know any better, we haven't lived with anything else or it feels the most comfortable, so we tolerate it.
(04:57)
So again, it could be from childhood, past relationships, even office relationships, even the mailman. No, that probably didn't happen. Alright, so there's that. And if you didn't have the modeling of healthy boundaries and love, if you had a parent that stepped all over your boundaries and spit on 'em and chewed 'em and spit 'em out again, all of that, you didn't know any other way. You didn't have that loving, healthy relationship where someone respected you and you could be tricked because if you had a narcissistic parent, let's say you would get love bombs. So on one hand you're like, oh my gosh, they made me feel so special at times and they would shower me with gifts at times. And then on the other side of that though, in turn, what did they do? They dismissed you, they manipulated you, they gaslit, you twisted everything around, right?
(05:56)
They abused you. They could have mentally, emotionally, physically abused you and then, oh, I'm so sorry, blah, blah, blah. Maybe they didn't say sorry, but they can when they want something or they want that cycle to continue. If you look up the abuse cycle, I have a whole episode on it. It explains a lot of that. So if you had a very toxic modeling growing up, that can also be why you repeat those patterns. You don't have the knowledge. You don't even know what it feels like to have a very healthy, balanced relationship. So it makes sense. You would repeat the pattern. So we're not going to go shaming ourselves or blaming ourselves. So then we get to the awareness, identifying the red flags in yourself. And this is where I feel bad, but you know me, I'm always going to give it to you straight.
(06:52)
I am always going to give it to you loud and clear. People pleasing and me and my husband have had this conversation where he feels like it shouldn't be a negative thing. People pleasing like it's supposed to be a positive thing. People pleasing to me is not positive. I know, I know. Hold it in. Don't yell at me just yet. Being kind to people, positive, loving people positive. Putting others above yourself at certain times for certain situations. Positive being a people pleaser, which really means you are just trying to please people all the time. That usually includes excluding yourself or putting people first before you or feeling so uncomfortable saying no to people that you go against your own grain. That is a negative. So that is a red flag in yourself. People pleasing is not at all. It's cut out to be okay. I know it might hurt.
(08:01)
Just shake it off. We still got more. So you got to be tough here on this show. Alright, ignoring your gut instincts. The feeling, it's when you were, let's say, dating that guy before you were married and you felt like, oh, he got pretty angry right there. That felt like that didn't feel right inside. But then he got me those beautiful flowers and he took me on that beautiful trip to Hawaii. Shit, I'll take him. Just kidding, just kidding. He took me to Hawaii and he told me how beautiful it was. He makes me feel so special. But what was your body feeling? What was your body going through? I myself dated this guy in my early twenties. I call us Eminem and what was his damn ex's name? Kim Eminem and Kim where? And he was not physically abusive. I'll add that in there.
(08:58)
But there was a lot of ups and downs and I remember that gut instinct. I mean it flared up all the time. I'd be like, God, he is so dismissive. And he would cancel plans on me like last minute all the time and just how he spoke to me. He called me names, not nice names, not ones I'd feel comfortable writing down on a piece of paper. One started with the C, okay, I'll give you that hint and that, but was then met with poetry, flowers on my car in the middle of the night. We didn't live together. He would come up 30 minutes for his, I'm so sorry. After he would treat me like dog dudes. And that happened continuously. Talk about the cycle of abuse. Oh my goodness. I went to a therapist during this time and she literally did a diagram on a big piece of paper and was like, Christie, this is you.
(09:57)
You are in this wake up. That was my gut instinct, knowing damn well she was right. I cried. I wouldn't cry if it wasn't right. I cried and I stayed because I ignored that gut instinct until I couldn't anymore. And thank God I got out asta baby. The other thing is overexplaining, when you have to overexplain, I'd be like, well this is overexplaining for people covering up for people. Oh, well he had to do this because this and this and this. And he did that because it did over explain, over excusing, let's call it. Okay, so when you are over excusing people, when you're ignoring the gut instincts and people pleasing, we're going to wave that red flag. I literally have my arm up in the air like a crazy person over here. No one can even see me waving the red flag. Okay, that's your red flag that you have control of.
(10:53)
That's the beautiful thing. Okay, so notice what you're drawn to next. Are you drawn to intensity? I was addicted. I think to that high there were the highs and the lows. What's that though? That's inconsistency. So you are used to whether you're drawn to it, you want to say, going back to what's familiar, that familiarity of the up and down and up and down, which I had from my childhood. There was somewhere in my childhood that I had an up and down relationship and guess what felt super familiar that did when I had my romantic relationship. It's like, oh well this is love. That's what I thought. Oh yeah. Oh well, it's just what happens in relationships. I didn't know any better. There's big highs and there's low lows. It's chaotic. So you are actually being drawn to chaos, intensity and inconsistency. So I'm here to tell you, in case you don't know yet and you haven't experienced it, there is consistency. Love. I'm going to say love, not there is love is consistency. Love is not intensity. Healthy love is not intense up and down. Okay? And it's understanding. And I bet if you were in a narcissistic or abusive situation, there was not understanding. Yeah. Now I want you to create your emotional red flag list. What does that mean? Emotional red flag list. Let's look at yourself. Are you a people pleaser?
(12:42)
Do you ignore your gut instincts? Do you make excuses for people? Do you speak reasons to yourself about how you may cause certain things? Because that is what an abusive person will manipulate you to believe. And you might still have some of that now. So evaluate yourself and if you need help again, want to work one-on-one to create this list, email me. We can have a call to help evaluate yourself so you can be aware of what exactly you are doing on your end that you can control. You might not think you can. I'm here to tell you, sister, I turned it all around. Here I am. I people pleased a lot in multiple relationships in my life and I am now ask anyone. I know it's a big nope for me. Now, I am not a people pleaser. I'm kind, I'm loving. I do what I need to do for the right people who deserve it. And then also strangers and I do give to charity and all that good stuff too, but I will not sacrifice my peace for somebody else. Okay, so this is going to get us to the new patterns, the new you 2.0 practical steps. Pause before choosing. I love this. And ask yourself, I want you to write this down in your notebook. Write on top of that emotional red flag list. Ask yourself this important question. Is this piece or just familiar chaos?
(14:31)
Is it familiar chaos? Is it familiar or is it peace because you deserve peace? It may be boring at first. Trust me, my husband boring. He's not boring. But at the beginning of our relationship, I felt like, what the hell? There's no issues, no problem. I mean there was one problem that I made a bigger problem because I needed chaos because that's what I was used to. But kibosh that thank God there was no real problems, there was no real issues. It was so peaceful. I didn't know what the hell to do with it. Now I'm so glad I chose peace. Okay, also rewiring your nervous system. I've got an episode on that meditation, somatic healing, slowing the F down, not thinking everything is so urgent. You might have some of that. I do. I still have a twinge of it. I'm not perfect. This queen is not.
(15:27)
I might be a queen, but I'm not God, I still have that. It's like an urgency we get if you've gone through abuse, you develop an urgency usually where you're kind of on edge. So that can make us have inside of our bodies more of a tension where we like to do, do we have to be doing right? You can go opposite too. But for those who can relate to that, you need to slow down. And if you're depressed and you're too slow laying on the bed, we need to get up and get our body moving. Body moving either way is great. It's the way you do it. You have to evaluate if you're going way too fast, you need to stick some yoga, some meditation in there. Do some breath work. And I do all of this stuff with my clients. I have somatic healings.
(16:19)
That's all we do. They're amazing. If you're interested, pop me a if email or I'll put my link there too. But you have to rewire your nervous system and you do it from the inside out with somatic healing. It's the inside and you are working from there instead of that head therapy work, which it has its place too. Now, if you are going into dating, if you are, I know a lot of my clients are divorced, starting to date, maybe you're not even thinking about it yet and you're just friending. You're just finding a new crew of friends. You've dropped some of them. They were controlling just like your ex. There's so many situations we could have here, but we have to do that from our healed self, not our old wounds. So you do want to be in parallel making sure you're doing the work, you're doing the meditation, you're doing the somatic work.
(17:14)
You're with a therapist, you're with a coach like yours, truly, right? Because if you're entering relationships with your old wounds, it's not going to work out. I'm just going to let you know that that's not saying you can't go on dates and whatever, but until you're really doing this work, you need to go very slowly in your relationships. Don't be a jumper. Okay? So for this, let's do a journal prompt. In that lovely book you can do, you have your emotional red flag list and your little quote is this piece or familiar chaos. And now you can add a journal prompt. What does safe feel like? Not just exciting, what does safe feel like in your body? What does safe feel like in your mind spiritually, anything in any way you want to write it. What does safe feel like? Truly buzzword for us. Okay? That is one of my affirmations I do with myself almost every day. I used to do 'em every day, multiple times a day when I was doing the heavy work. I feel like I'm on maintenance now, but I am safe. The first time I said that, guys, that affirmation, I cried a river. The Nile River actually came out of my freaking eyes, my tear ducts. It was crazy. I have really big tear ducks.
(18:57)
So look, you are not doomed to repeat these patterns. Every conscious choice is a little sparkle in your new foundation. Okay? So just start light. After you do your list, look at one emotional red flag, one pattern. You are ready to break today and you can email me. I'd love to hear, email me. What is one pattern? You're ready to break and I will send you back. I promise I will write back to every one of you. What's one pattern you're ready to break? And I will send an encouraging response back and maybe a little tip if you need it. You can ask me if you want a little tip. So these are not repeating the patterns. And maybe I'll do a separate episode. This is a little longer than I thought it would be about repeating patterns for our children. This alone, guys obviously helps because you are a role model.
(20:00)
So what you are living, oh, who said this was it? I might've been my B fff. I think she told me this quote. Yes, it was okay. She said she heard this somewhere. I don't know where, but I love it. Your children don't absorb what you say to them. They absorb who you are. Now say it again for the people in the back. All the way in the back. Your children don't absorb what you say to them. They absorb who you are. That means you got to live it. You can't say don't let anyone treat you poorly and then have your best friend be talking down to you and demanding you be here at this time. And they see that it makes no sense. They're watching mom be treated like dooo bags while you're telling them not to be treated like dooo bags. That's not how it works, sis.
(20:54)
Okay, so that's a big one. I love that quote. Write that down. You have a lot of writing today in a writing mood. So we can do another podcast more specific to that. I'll write a note to do that. But just doing this work yourself is such a huge step in breaking the cycle. They are absorbing everything. My daughter, I should do an episode on what my daughter has learned from me. She could tell you she's 10 years old and she's the healthiest human I've ever met in my life. So just saying all that to say that just modeling does way more than you think. But I will do a podcast more specific to what are things you can say or do specifically with your child to help them not break? No, we want them to break the patterns, to not continue the patterns that you maybe have been continuing.
(21:51)
The people pleaser, the tolerating certain things we should, not the believing things that crush our confidence, any of that. We don't want that for our kids. We always want our kids to have it better than we did. That's every parent's dream, isn't it? So you are not doomed. Don't worry, you got this. And of course, sign up. And for my Facebook, I have a private free Facebook group. Go get in there. And also if you want to have one-on-one coaching with me, we have fun. We have fun, and it is empowering and it will shift your life. I'm just going to throw it out there. I haven't had one client complaint about their shift when they have done ongoing work with me. So again, my link will always be there in the description. I hope you guys have a beautiful day. Let's take a big deep breath in and let's do a couple affirmations. That's how I roll. Inhale through the nose and release out the mouth.
(23:01)
Inhale through the nose, out through the mouth, and then repeat after me. Let's do this one together guys. If you're driving, don't say it out loud. I don't want you crying all over the road. I am safe. I'm going to say it again. I am safe. I am deserving. I am deserving because I am a queen. There you go, you got it. Alright, I will see you in the next episode. Love, love, love. And don't forget to email me to tell me what little red flag of emotion is on your list that you would like to shift most. And it's fierce Mama C at Gmail. I always put it in my show notes, but it's fierce mama. M-A-M-A-C at Gmail. Alright, see you in the next one. Bye.
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