This Is Psychological Warfare: The Eight Stages of Narcissistic Abuse

This Is Psychological Warfare: The Eight Stages of Narcissistic Abuse. 

For too long, narcissistic abuse has been reduced to four buzzwords: love bombing, devaluation, discard, and hoovering. This language has given many survivors their first mirror, a way to name something that had no name. But it is not enough. It never was. It does not explain why survivors end up in psychiatric facilities, in courtrooms, in hospital beds, or worse. It does not explain the neurological collapse, the institutional failures, or the body count.

Because this is not relationship dysfunction. This is psychological warfare.

Narcissistic abuse is a highly strategic system of psychological destruction, grounded in coercion, domination, and cognitive erasure. It mirrors tactics found in classified interrogation manuals. And yet, it is happening in civilian homes every day, with no legal recognition and no meaningful protection for those trapped inside it.

We need a new model. One rooted in trauma science. One that offers clarity instead of chaos. One that gives survivors the language they were never given and holds predators accountable for the war crimes they commit behind closed doors.

That model is here.

The Eight Stages of Narcissistic Psychological Warfare™

This model reframes narcissistic abuse not as a toxic love story, but as a premeditated operation. It includes the terms many already know gaslighting, trauma bonding, triangulation, smear campaigns but places them within a precise structure that reveals the intended outcome. This is not a cycle. It is a kill sequence.

Each stage builds toward a singular purpose: the destruction of the survivor’s identity, memory, reputation, and voice.

1. Indoctrination™ – Grooming the Victim for Capture

Often mislabeled as love bombing, this stage is not love. It is Constructive Fraud of Intimacy™. Through mirroring, future faking, flattery, and rapid attachment, the narcissist engineers a false persona to gain psychological access. What appears to be chemistry is actually strategic seduction. Survivors are not consenting to a relationship. They are consenting to an illusion. The narcissist collects data—emotional, historical, psychological—for the purpose of control. This is the gateway to trauma bonding, which we formally define as Trauma-Encoded Dependency™. The survivor is neurologically hijacked before they even know what they are inside of.

2. The Psychological Breakdown™ – Stripping Identity

This is where intermittent reinforcement begins: a system of unpredictable rewards and punishments that creates confusion, dependency, and self-blame. Devaluation accelerates. Confidence is attacked. Boundaries are violated. The survivor is subtly trained to question their thoughts and surrender their instincts. Identity begins to collapse. The trauma bond deepens. The survivor is not just being criticized. They are being rewritten. Their selfhood is being replaced by the abuser’s ever-shifting expectations. This is not instability. This is strategic psychological demolition.

3. Psychological Enslavement™ – Creating Dependency

The narcissist begins enforcing total dependency. Friends are removed. Finances may be entangled. Daily decisions are monitored or mocked. The survivor becomes tethered to the abuser for emotional survival. The trauma bond solidifies into Trauma-Encoded Dependency™. The nervous system begins responding to abandonment as a threat to existence. The survivor is not in love. They are managing captivity. They believe they need the abuser to survive because their identity has already been broken down and replaced with fear.

4. Mental Reprogramming™ – Controlling Perception

Gaslighting is no longer occasional. It is constant. Reality is warped. Memories are challenged. Emotional responses are invalidated. The narcissist implants new narratives and seeds doubt with precision. Triangulation is introduced. Survivors are pitted against exes, friends, or family members. Simultaneously, the smear campaign begins. The narcissist begins shaping the narrative before the survivor even leaves. By the time the victim collapses, the world is already primed to disbelieve them. The abuser has become their interpreter of truth. And reality now belongs to them.

5. Psychological Punishment™ – Crushing Resistance

Every boundary becomes an act of war. Silence is weaponized. Public humiliation becomes normalized. Sudden abandonment is deployed to induce fear and reattachment. The survivor is punished for asking questions, expressing needs, or seeking safety. Intermittent reinforcement intensifies. The survivor learns that any act of self-preservation will result in abandonment. They become addicted to hope. They begin betraying themselves to avoid the next punishment. What they think is a fight for love is actually the death of their voice.

6. Psychological Submission™ – Enforcing Helplessness

This is collapse. The survivor stops resisting. Their body may be present, but their will has dissolved. Their thoughts are no longer their own. Their instincts are muted. They may defend the abuser to others. They may stop speaking altogether. This is not weakness. It is the result of prolonged neurological battery. They have been taught, through repetition and psychological terror, that resistance equals punishment. At this point, they are not choosing to stay. They are afraid to move.

7. Psychological Captivity™ – Ensuring Long-Term Control

This stage is often mistaken for the end, but it is not. The relationship continues. The narcissist begins implementing soft discards emotional neglect, strategic distance, and ambiguous silences punctuated by hoovering. The survivor is cycled in and out of connection. They are not released. They are rotated. Comparisons to new supply may begin. The survivor is made to feel disposable, yet never fully discarded. Every return of affection reactivates the trauma bond. The victim becomes a background character in their own life, held in captivity by silence and craving. This is not freedom. This is a final conditioning loop. They are being prepared for the kill.

8. Destruction and Erasure™ – The Final Betrayal

This is not a breakup. It is a psychological execution. The narcissist is done. And their final act is annihilation. They unleash the full smear campaign. They tell your secrets. They destroy your reputation. They may release explicit material, file false claims, or weaponize mental health records. The goal is to erase you socially, professionally, and emotionally. Survivors often experience homelessness, forced hospitalization, suicidal collapse, or complete nervous system failure. Some are criminalized. Some are institutionalized. Some are dead. This is not relational fallout. It is the end result of Psychological Homicide™. And it was premeditated.

This Is Not Abuse. It Is Civilian Psychological Warfare.

The old model—love bombing, devaluation, discard, hoover—is not enough. It cannot account for identity collapse. It cannot name the trauma imprint. It cannot support legal reform or psychiatric diagnosis. And it cannot prevent future victims from walking into the exact same operation without ever realizing they are at war.

The Eight Stages of Narcissistic Psychological Warfare™ offer a new framework. One that exposes the pattern. One that empowers survivors. One that forces the world to finally confront the reality of what this is. Because this is not about heartbreak. This is about human rights.

The tactics used by narcissistic abusers are nearly identical to the ones outlined in the CIA’s KUBARK interrogation manual. They include isolation, disorientation, humiliation, gaslighting, induced dependency, and emotional starvation. If these acts were committed in wartime, they would be classified as torture. They would trigger international tribunals. They would be prosecuted under human rights law. They would end with the perpetrators held to account under the Geneva Convention.

But inside civilian homes? Survivors are told to get over it. To move on. To stop exaggerating.

This model exists because that denial can no longer stand.

Help Us Speak the Truth Loud Enough That the Systems Must Listen

Please help me get this out to the world. I truly believe in the work I’ve done. I believe survivors deserve better than dismissal and diagnosis. I believe we change this epidemic by changing the language.

Narcissistic abuse is not a bad breakup. It is not emotional immaturity. It is not “just” trauma bonding.

It is Psychological Homicide™. It is Neurological Battery™. And it is a global public health crisis hiding behind the mask of charm, influence, and projection.

First responders, hospitals, lawyers, court systems, churches, therapists, families, and friends are all complicit in the erasure of survivors when they call this abuse and not what it really is psychological warfare.

This is psychological torture being deployed in bedrooms, living rooms, and courtrooms, and there are no statutes protecting the victims. But if the same acts were committed across a border, we would call it what it is: human rights violations.

We must stop minimizing this.

We must stop labeling survivors as difficult, dramatic, or unstable.

We must start using the correct language so that courts, clinicians, and communities can begin to respond to the actual threat because until we do, survivors will continue to die in systems designed to discredit them.

Change the language.

Change the system.

Change the outcome.

Get your copy of Voiceless No More on sale today on Amazon: https://a.co/d/aTYHk2j

Excerpt from Voiceless No More: The Legal War on Narcissistic Abuse

 Excerpt from Voiceless No More: The Legal War on Narcissistic Abuse

There comes a moment after abuse when the silence feels unbearable. You sit in the wreckage of what was supposed to be love, your body trembling from a war you never signed up for, your mind replaying every scene with the same devastating question: how could they? The grief is not just for the relationship, it is for the self you lost while trying to survive. Yet what the world rarely tells you is that your pain is not random, it is not weakness, and it is not your fault. What you endured was not merely “a bad relationship.” It was Narcissistic Psychological Warfare™, a premeditated campaign designed to break you down, to rob you of your voice, and to make you doubt your reality until you believed silence was the only safe option.

But here is what the narcissist did not calculate: silence, once broken, becomes a weapon. The moment you find the words, the moment you name what happened to you, you begin to dismantle their entire system of control. And that is why this book exists, not just as testimony, but as prosecution. This is the case against them, and it is airtight.

When you think back on your experience, you may hear their words echoing like an endless verdict: you are too sensitive, too dramatic, too much, never enough. Those were not observations, they were weapons. Those words were launched at you like missiles, calculated to target your deepest empathy and turn it against you. Every time you tried to defend yourself, they turned the attack into your indictment. Every time you told the truth, they rewrote the story until you were cast as the villain. That is not love. That is Constructive Fraud of Intimacy™, and it is admissible as evidence in the court of truth.

The courtroom, of course, is not always the four walls of a legal building. It is the space inside you where you decide that your story matters. It is the survivor groups where your testimony reverberates and finds witnesses who nod with tears in their eyes because they too have lived the same script. It is the global movement rising now, declaring that narcissistic abuse is not a misunderstanding, not a lovers’ quarrel, but a crime of Psychological Homicide™. It seeks to annihilate identity, to suffocate the soul, to make you voiceless. And yet here you are, reading these words, proving you are anything but voiceless.

The first time I realized I was not alone was not when a friend believed me, not when a therapist nodded, not even when a police officer took a statement. It was when I saw another survivor write the exact words I had been too terrified to say out loud. “He made me doubt my mind.” That one sentence shattered the isolation. It felt like someone had just reached into my prison cell and handed me the key. That is the power of validation. It is not cliché. It is oxygen. And once you inhale it, you realize just how starved you have been.

You may still hear their voice in your head telling you that no one will believe you, that you are overreacting, that you are crazy. That is not your voice. That is the residue of Neurological Battery™, the constant rewiring of your nervous system through gaslighting, silent treatments, intermittent reinforcement, and unpredictable rage. They conditioned you to accept chaos as normal, to mistake the adrenaline of fear for the rhythm of love. You are not crazy. You are recovering from a war crime disguised as romance.

And you will recover. Not because they set you free, but because you decided their sentence is over.

Let us call the abuse what it is. They infiltrated your trust like a hostile agent. They studied your weaknesses, not with love, but with predation. They mapped out your empathy like a battlefield. They launched campaigns of charm to disarm you, only to drop bombs of cruelty when you least expected it. They trained you to fight battles that had no end, to apologize for crimes you never committed, to beg for peace they had no intention of giving. This is not melodrama. This is strategy. And the narcissist is not a lover who failed you. They are a perpetrator of psychological warfare.

And here is the cross-examination they never wanted you to conduct.

Why do they smear your name the moment you leave? Because they know the greatest threat to their power is your testimony. Why do they portray themselves as the victim? Because if they control the narrative, they can continue the abuse by proxy. Why do they insist no one will believe you? Because they are terrified someone will. Every tactic they used to silence you was an admission of guilt. They feared exposure, so they tried to bury you in doubt. But their fear reveals the truth: your voice is the weapon they cannot withstand.

I want you to know this, not as theory, but as fact: the shame you feel is not yours. Shame is the toxic waste they deposited in you to keep you quiet. It is their crime scene fingerprints all over your soul. The healing comes when you scrape away that residue and return the shame to its rightful owner. Say it with me: it is not mine. It never was. It never will be.

Survivors often ask me, how do I prove what was done to me? And the answer is, you already are. Every scar in your nervous system is evidence. Every panic attack is testimony. Every night you woke up with a racing heart is an exhibit in this case. And when you tell your story, you are not just speaking for yourself, you are entering it into the global record. That is why perpetrators hate survivors who write, who speak, who rise. We are not just witnesses, we are prosecutors, and our case is airtight.

There is one truth I want to lodge so deeply in you that no gaslighter can uproot it. You were not weak for staying. You were strong for surviving. They did not break you because you were fragile. They targeted you because you are powerful. Predators never waste time on prey with nothing to offer. They saw your light, and instead of celebrating it, they tried to cage it. That is their crime. That is their confession. And your existence here, still breathing, still reading, is Exhibit A that they failed.

This movement is not about revenge. It is about reckoning. Revenge is about them, but reckoning is about truth. And truth is the one force they cannot counterfeit forever. When the mask fallsand it always does the narcissist stands exposed not as brilliant, not as charming, but as pitiful. They are revealed as addicts of supply, scavengers of empathy, architects of nothing but destruction. And you, the survivor, are revealed as the one thing they could never kill: the voice that names the crime and refuses to be silenced.

If you hear nothing else, hear this: you are defended. You are not crazy. You are not alone. And you are not guilty. The world has ignored this epidemic for too long, but your voice is evidence, your story is testimony, and your survival is the verdict.

https://healloudlymovement.godaddysites.com/

Get your copy of Voiceless No More on sale today on Amazon: https://a.co/d/aTYHk2j

When a dark empath rises,

 When a dark empath rises, they do more than seek personal liberation they create an environment where the narcissist is utterly exposed, stranded in a hostile reality where no one will take their bait. The dark empath understands that narcissists thrive only in shadows, manipulating those who can’t see them for what they are. But when the dark empath steps into their power, they become a force of brutal honesty, tearing down every mask the narcissist wears and flooding their life with unfiltered light.

In this supernova, the dark empath doesn’t just walk away or cut ties they dismantle the narcissist’s entire ecosystem. They begin revealing truths, sometimes in ways so direct it’s unsettling, to everyone in the narcissist’s life: friends, family, colleagues. The narcissist’s web of enablers and potential victims is dismantled, thread by thread. For the narcissist, this is pure terror. There’s nowhere left to run, no new supply left to groom. The dark empath has methodically shut down every escape route, leaving the narcissist in a barren field of their own isolation.

The dark empath doesn’t flinch in this role. They know they’re pulling away the only comfort the narcissist has the endless cycle of finding, using, and discarding people for validation. And they know exactly how devastating it is for the narcissist to confront this emptiness, this wasteland where they’re no longer able to hide or thrive. The narcissist is forced to stare into the abyss of their own inadequacy, and the experience is shattering.

This isn’t a mere injury; it’s a destruction of the narcissist’s very essence. Narcissistic mortification doesn’t just bruise their ego it obliterates it. They’re left grappling with the truth they’ve always evaded: that they can no longer manipulate, that they are powerless, and, perhaps worst of all, that the dark empath sees right through them, beyond every lie, down to the core of who they really are.

This reckoning isn’t fueled by revenge, but by a fierce sense of justice. The dark empath becomes a guardian against future harm, a force that ensures no one else falls into the narcissist’s snare. And as the dark empath stands, unwavering, the narcissist finds themselves trapped in a reality they can’t manipulate or escape froma nightmare of their own making.

Daniel Ryan Cotler

https://healloudlymovement.godaddysites.com/

Get your copy of Voiceless No More on sale today on Amazon: https://a.co/d/aTYHk2j

 

Dark Empaths: The Unlikely Protectors Against Narcissists and Psychopaths

 Dark Empaths: The Unlikely Protectors Against Narcissists and Psychopaths

Let’s talk about dark empaths and their surprising role in our emotional landscape. When you hear the term “dark empath,” it might sound a bit contradictory. After all, how can someone be both dark and empathetic? But these individuals possess a unique blend of emotional intelligence and an understanding of darker personality traits, allowing them to stand out as protectors against narcissists and psychopaths.

What makes dark empaths so special is their ability to see through the facades that manipulators often put up. They can read people’s emotions and recognize when something doesn’t feel right. This heightened awareness means they’re often the first to notice when someone is being mistreated or manipulated. And rather than just standing by, dark empaths tend to take action. They step in to support others, whether it’s comforting a friend in a toxic relationship or calling out harmful behaviors in a group setting.

One of the most powerful aspects of dark empaths is their ability to create safe spaces for open conversations. They approach difficult topics with empathy and understanding, making it easier for others to engage in discussions that might otherwise feel intimidating. By shining a light on uncomfortable truths, dark empaths help foster an environment where healing can take place and where manipulative tendencies are challenged.

However, it’s important to recognize that dark empaths are not without their own challenges. Their understanding of darker impulses can sometimes lead to ethical dilemmas. They might wrestle with their own feelings and the temptation to manipulate. But many dark empaths have a strong moral compass that guides their choices, driving them to use their insights to uplift rather than exploit.

In a world filled with emotional challenges, dark empaths can emerge as unlikely heroes. They remind us that understanding the darker sides of human behavior doesn’t have to lead to harm. Instead, it can be a powerful tool for good, helping to create a more empathetic and supportive community for everyone.

©️ 2024 The Narcissistic Abuse Recovery Community Blog 

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🗣️ What It Really Means to Heal Loudly™

 🗣️ What It Really Means to Heal Loudly™

Healing Loudly™ doesn’t mean going public before you’re safe.

It doesn’t mean broadcasting your story to strangers.

It doesn’t mean naming your abuser if that could put you in harm’s way.

And it sure as hell doesn’t mean performing your pain for validation.

Healing Loudly™ means refusing to heal in silence or shame.

It’s about refusing to carry someone else’s crimes like they’re your burden.

But how you “speak” can look a thousand different ways:

Writing a poem you don’t show anyone yet.

Telling a therapist or trauma-informed coach the truth.

Confiding in one safe person.

Posting anonymously in a support group.

Or eventually… going public, exposing your abuser, and advocating for change when you are ready.

 🔥 Safety is not optional.

Loud is not always public.

Loud is not always verbal.

Loud is not always now.

Every survivor’s journey comes with different levels of risk emotional, financial, legal, even physical. You must assess your own safety. You are not a coward for protecting yourself. You are not failing the movement by choosing quiet power while you heal.

The Heal Loudly™ Movement is not a demand it’s a permission.

Permission to stop whispering your story in the dark.

Permission to stop apologizing for surviving.

Permission to heal without shame in your own voice, at your own pace.

Get your copy of Voiceless No More on sale today on Amazon: https://a.co/d/aTYHk2j

The Woman Who Saved Me: Donielle Jolie Yanez and the Power of Healing Loudly

 The Woman Who Saved Me: Donielle Jolie Yanez and the Power of Healing Loudly

Before I could name the abuse, she gave me the language to survive it.

When You’re Drowning, You Don’t Need a Lecture You Need a Lifeline

I didn’t discover Donielle Jolie Yanez because I was curious about narcissistic abuse. I discovered her because I was dying from it.

There are moments in survival that don’t feel like life. You’re breathing, but you’re buried. You’re screaming, but no one hears you. You’re surrounded by people, but you’re utterly alone with a truth too dark and too twisted to explain. That’s where I was when Donielle’s voice reached me. Not through a therapist’s office. Not through a self-help book. Through a screen raw, shaking, defiant, and real.

She wasn’t giving a lesson. She was giving a lifeline.

Not Just Another Creator A Survivor Who Told the Truth Without Apology

Most content about narcissistic abuse follows a pattern: neat lists, clinical terms, ten signs you’re being gaslit. But Donielle wasn’t just another creator reciting facts from a textbook. She didn’t speak about abuse she embodied what it means to survive it.

She told her story like it bled from her chest. She wept on camera. She raged on camera. She broke down and stood back up, sometimes in the same breath. There was no filter, no performance, no polished persona. Just the brutal, aching truth of someone who lived it and refused to let others die in silence.

She wasn’t reading off a teleprompter. She was reading out of her soul.

The Puzzle Pieces of My Survival

The first time I heard her voice, something in me cracked open. I didn’t have the words yet for what I had endured gaslighting, psychological warfare, identity erosion. I just knew something was wrong, and that it had almost killed me.

Donielle gave me the first puzzle piece. Then the second. Then the third and fourth. She named what I couldn’t. She decoded the abuse I was still entangled in. And in doing so, she showed me that I wasn’t crazy. I was being systematically dismantled by someone who knew exactly what they were doing.

Her videos weren’t just informative they were oxygen. They were validation. They were survival.

Donielle Jolie Yanez: A Hero of the Movement

In a world that rewards silence, Donielle chose to speak. In a world that gaslights survivors, she stood in her truth and said, “No more.” She was one of the first to heal loudly to weaponize her story not with revenge, but with radical honesty.

She is not just a survivor. She is a life-saver.

She didn’t just educate. She connected. She didn’t just talk. She reached. And in doing so, she became a hero in a movement that’s been starving for leaders who bleed authenticity.

I know I’m not the only one she saved. I’ve heard from hundreds of survivors who say the same thing: “She made me feel seen.”

Her Impact on the Work I Do Today

If it weren’t for Donielle Jolie Yanez, I wouldn’t be alive to write this. I wouldn’t have founded the Heal Loudly™ Movement. I wouldn’t be fighting for the Voiceless Justice Act or the FRANKIE Initiative. I wouldn’t have found the strength to speak for the thousands of survivors who were silenced some permanently.

Every speech I give, every survivor I reach, every life I help pull out of the darkness it traces back to her. Her voice sparked mine. Her courage lit the first fire.

She didn’t just help me understand what narcissistic abuse was. She helped me understand that I could survive it.

A Legacy of Truth-Telling That Saves Lives

Donielle Jolie Yanez is not a footnote in this movement. She is its foundation.

She proved that storytelling is survival. That a trembling voice is still powerful. That vulnerability is the most radical form of resistance. And that when one survivor dares to speak the unspeakable, a thousand others find their breath again.

She healed loudly before it was safe, before it was trending, before most people even knew what narcissistic abuse was.

Thank You, Donielle

This movement is built on truth-tellers. On warriors. On people who refused to stay silent even when their voices shook. Donielle Jolie Yanez is all of that and more.

She gave us the language to understand our trauma. She gave us the mirror to see it clearly. And she gave us the courage to live, even when living felt impossible.

This is not just an article. It’s a thank you letter to the woman who saved my life.

Donielle, wherever you are thank you for healing loudly

The Narcissistic Abuse Declaration of Independence

 The Narcissistic Abuse Declaration of Independence

By Daniel Ryan Cotler

Founder of the Heal Loudly Movement

Author of Voiceless: The Silent Epidemic of Suicide Due to Narcissistic Abuse

Architect of the Voiceless Justice Act and the FRANKIE Initiative

When in the course of human survival, it becomes necessary for those who have been psychologically terrorized to reclaim their autonomy and separate themselves from the control of their abusers, a decent respect to the truth requires that they should declare the causes which compel them to this separation.

I, and all survivors of narcissistic abuse, hold these truths to be self-evident:

That all human beings are born with inherent worth.

That no one is entitled to control another’s mind, body, emotions, or identity.

That psychological abuse is a form of violence strategic, intentional, and designed to destroy.

That narcissistic abuse, when left unchecked, leads to fragmentation of identity, collapse of will, isolation, and, in far too many cases, death by suicide.

That this abuse is not merely “toxic” or “unhealthy” it is premeditated character assassination, psychological warfare, and soul murder.

For too long, society has minimized, dismissed, and misunderstood this form of abuse.

For too long, survivors have been silenced, blamed, or told to “move on” while their abusers walk free.

For too long, we have been forced to endure in silence what should have been exposed and prosecuted.

We declare the era of silence over.

We assert our inalienable rights:

The right to name what happened.

The right to speak loudly, clearly, and without shame.

The right to sever all ties with our abusers emotionally, legally, and spiritually.

The right to be believed, supported, and protected.

The right to heal on our own terms.

The right to pursue justice, accountability, and systemic change.

The right to live without being defined by the people who tried to destroy us.

To that end, I issue this Declaration of Independence from Narcissistic Abuse on behalf of myself, and every survivor who has been demeaned, dehumanized, discredited, and driven to the edge.

Let it be known:

I reject every false narrative constructed about me.

I reject every smear, every lie, every attempt to cast me as unstable, untrustworthy, or unworthy.

I reject the illusion that my silence is noble, that my suffering must be private, or that my voice is too much.

I know who I am in the marrow of my bones and the fire of my spirit and I will no longer ask permission to exist.

I am no longer available for abuse. I am no longer interested in being understood by those committed to misunderstanding me. I am no longer afraid to take up space.

I affirm, publicly and without apology, that I survived.

I affirm that my survival is not shameful, but revolutionary.

That my scars are not evidence of weakness, but of war.

That every attempt to erase me has only made my voice louder.

That I will not be defined by the cruelty of others, but by the strength it took to live through it and rise.

To the abusers who waged psychological war on my mind and body: I name you. I hold you accountable.

To the systems that enabled your abuse and protected your lies: I indict you. I call for change.

To the survivors who still believe their pain must stay hidden: I see you. I fight for you. I speak for the voiceless.

Let this document serve as notice:

We are done healing quietly.

We are done begging to be believed.

We are done accommodating the comfort of those who covered for the abusers.

We will Heal Loudly.

We will organize, legislate, educate, and expose.

We will change laws. We will shift culture.

We will no longer be collateral damage in someone else's pathology.

We will rise, not as victims, but as a global community of truth-tellers united, loud, and unafraid.

I, Daniel Ryan Cotler, affix my name to this declaration as a survivor of narcissistic abuse, a witness to its deadly consequences, and an advocate for a world where psychological warfare is no longer tolerated, minimized, or ignored.

This is my line in the sand.

This is our revolution.

This is the Declaration of Survival.

This is the beginning of the end for silence, for denial, and for abusers who believe they can destroy lives without consequence.

Signed,

Daniel Ryan Cotler

Survivor. Advocate. Author. Leader of the Heal Loudly Movement.

Founder of the Voiceless Justice Act and the FRANKIE Initiative.

Voice for the Voiceless.

Functional Freeze: The Trauma Response That Looks Like Laziness But Is Actually Psychological Shutdown

Functional Freeze: The Trauma Response That Looks Like  Laziness But Is Actually Psychological Shutdown

By Daniel Ryan Cotler, Narcissistic Abuse Expert & Survivor Advocate.

🧠 What Is Functional Freeze?

Functional freeze is a severe trauma response often misdiagnosed as laziness or depression where the body goes through the motions of living, but the mind is trapped in psychological shutdown. This is a nervous system freeze response, commonly found in survivors of narcissistic abuse, complex PTSD, and prolonged emotional trauma.

Unlike acute panic or emotional breakdowns, functional freeze is subtle. Survivors can appear “fine” while feeling disconnected, exhausted, numb, or even dead inside. It is not a personality flaw it is a survival mechanism rooted in unresolved trauma.

🔍 Key Symptoms of Functional Freeze

Common signs include:

Chronic exhaustion and inability to get out of bed

Emotional numbness and mental fog

Disassociation or feeling “checked out”

Forgetting basic tasks or how time passes

Inability to take action despite needing or wanting to

People in functional freeze often blame themselves, but this is not a motivational issue it’s a trauma response.

⚠️ How Narcissistic Abuse Creates Functional Freeze

Survivors of narcissistic abuse are highly vulnerable to functional freeze because the abuse is repetitive, subtle, and psychologically destabilizing. Over time, the nervous system learns that neither fight nor flight is safe so it shuts down instead.

When you're gaslit, stonewalled, manipulated, and emotionally invalidated long enough, your body stops trusting the world. You go into freeze mode not because you're weak, but because your brain has adapted to survive psychological warfare.

This is what psychological abuse does it breaks down your sense of agency while forcing you to keep functioning.

🧬 The Brain Science Behind Functional Freeze

Functional freeze is not “in your head”it’s in your nervous system. Trauma literally reshapes your brain:

The amygdala goes into overdrive, constantly scanning for danger

The prefrontal cortex (responsible for logic and focus) shuts down

The hippocampus shrinks, impairing memory and time orientation

This is neurological trauma, not just emotional distress.

🤐 Why It’s Misunderstood

The freeze response is misunderstood because it looks invisible. Survivors can go to work, post on social media, or respond to texts but inside, they’re shutting down. Society sees functioning and assumes wellness. But the truth is:

Functional freeze mimics high functioning depression

Survivors are praised for coping while internally collapsing

Most people including doctors don’t recognize it as trauma

💬 What Survivors Say

Real words from those living in freeze:

 “I want to shower, I just can’t get up.”

“I don’t even know how I’m alive right now.”

“It’s like I’m watching my life from the outside.”

“I’m so tired of pretending I’m okay.”

If you relate to these words, you are not alone and you are not broken.

🛑 Stop Calling This Laziness. It’s Psychological Captivity.

Functional freeze is a symptom of psychological captivity, not weakness. Telling survivors to “just get motivated” is retraumatizing. They don’t need a pep talk they need trauma-informed support, somatic healing, and safety.

This is not burnout. This is not a bad attitude.

This is the cost of being trapped in emotional abuse long enough that your body shut down to survive.

💡 How to Start Healing from Functional Freeze

Recovery isn’t about willpower it’s about nervous system repair. 

That includes:

Somatic therapy (body-based trauma healing)

Polyvagal work (regulating the vagus nerve)

Self-compassion, not self-criticism

Safe, validating relationships that don’t gaslight or minimize

Functional freeze is reversible, but only when we name it, understand it, and treat it like the legitimate trauma response it is.

📢 We Need Awareness, Legal Recognition, and Justice

It’s time to educate the world about what psychological abuse does. We need trauma-informed doctors, therapists, judges, and laws that recognize this isn’t emotional drama it’s emotional damage.

Support survivors.

Expose the truth about narcissistic abuse.

And help us make history by signing our legislative petition.

👉 Sign the Voiceless Justice Act Petition Now

📍 www.change.org/VoicelessJusticeAct

Narcissistic Abuse SURVIVOR STORIES “He Said He Can’t Wait to Go to My Funeral”

Narcissistic Abuse SURVIVOR STORIES

“He Said He Can’t Wait to Go to My Funeral”

Submitted to the Heal Loudly Movement. Name changed for privacy.

This one… this one leaves no room for doubt.

No room for pretending narcissistic abuse isn’t deadly.

No room for soft language or silence.

She came forward because her soul has been shattered. Not metaphorically literally. Systematically. Deliberately. And in writing, her abuser told her exactly what he wanted:

“I can’t wait to go to your funeral.”

Let’s not dance around what that is.

That is premeditated psychological murder. That is a narcissist admitting the endgame.

And yet… no consequences.

This survivor wasn’t just abused by one person she was hunted by an entire family system.

A cult of enablers.

A circle of silence.

The kind of multi-front abuse that erodes everything: your mind, your trust, your identity, your hope.

 “Nobody will listen to what I have to say.”

That line should haunt us all. Because it echoes in every survivor’s chest.

She’s not alone in that. The courts ignore it. Friends drift. Therapists sometimes minimize it. And the world just… doesn’t know what to do with a victim whose abuser never left bruises, only invisible burns that never stop hurting.

But we do.

We know.

And we are listening.

 “It’s just as bad as a serial killer. They’ll lock up a serial killer. But they let this happen. Every day.”

She’s right. Narcissistic abuse is predatory. It’s life-threatening. And it should be criminal.

It’s not “just emotional abuse.” It’s psychological warfare designed to end lives in slow motion.

It’s not “just manipulation.” It’s a pattern of destruction that mirrors tactics used by dictators and cult leaders.

And it should never never—be legal.

The Voiceless Justice Act was written for people exactly like this.

For the ones screaming into the void, begging for someone anyone to hear them before it’s too late.

To the survivor who sent this: you are not crazy. You are not broken. You are not alone.

You are evidence.

And now, you're part of the resistance.

⚖️ CALL TO ACTION: Help Us Make Narcissistic Abuse Illegal

Sign the Voiceless Justice Act petition to criminalize narcissistic abuse, hold abusers accountable for driving victims to suicide, and protect survivors before it’s too late.

🖊️ www.change.org/VoicelessJusticeAct

Narcissistic abuse is life-threatening. It is psychological murder.

And it’s time the law caught up with the truth.

ORIGINAL MESSAGE (Unedited)

 I was abused by a narcissist and his whole family. He still tortures me. I knew I wasn’t crazy. But nobody will listen to what I have to say and now my soul is shattered my life has been ruined. I have in writing from him that he can’t wait to go to my funeral.

We need to fight together and make this illegal because it is life-threatening for narcissists to be able to abuse somebody and get away with it.

I think doing something that makes it illegal would help those who don’t have a voice. It would give those a voice who need to be heard.

It’s just as bad as a serial killer. They will lock up a serial killer, and the one victim that got away they help.

#narcissisticabuserecovery #narcissisticpersonalitydisorder #Voiceless #thevoicelessjusticeact

Narcissistic Abuse Survivor Story She Doesn’t Even Know She’s Dying"

Narcissistic Abuse Survivor Story (Anonymous Submission)

"She Doesn’t Even Know She’s Dying"

I have a friend who is being destroyed by narcissistic abuse. Not by one person nbut by many. By a lifetime of trauma stacked on top of trauma, like bricks on her chest she was never strong enough to carry but no one ever helped her unload.

She’s been hurt in the worst ways, by more people than I can count. It started with the unthinkable trauma from a family member. The kind of trauma that rewires your brain, your spirit, your instincts. Now, every man she meets becomes another abuser. It’s like she’s trapped in a loop, repeating the same pain over and over, and I can’t pull her out.

Her brain is locked in survival mode fight, flight, freeze. Sometimes fawn. She doesn’t realize how broken she is, because this has become her normal. She’s been held against her will. She’s disappeared into jails and courtrooms and toxic relationships and come back acting like nothing happened. The police won’t help unless she files something. But she never does, because she doesn’t believe she’s worth saving.

I’ve tried everything. I’ve called sheriffs. I’ve begged people to listen. I have my own health problems, and still I pour every ounce of what I have into trying to help her. I don’t even know how. It’s like the words just come out of me when we talk. I think it’s God. I think He’s using me to reach her. Because she doesn’t talk to anyone else like she talks to me. And I don’t talk to anyone else like I talk to her.

Sometimes I feel like we knew each other in another life. Our souls are bonded. She is the only person I speak to every single day. And when she disappears, I worry it’s the end. Her family doesn’t care. Her mom’s checked out completely. My own family says I should walk away that she’s dragging me down. But I can’t. She's special. Her spirit is rare. And she’s worth saving, even if the world doesn’t see it.

What hurts the most is watching someone you love drown while everyone else calls it “drama.”

They don’t see the trauma.

They don’t see the little girl still begging to be rescued from that first betrayal.

I don’t want pity.

I want people to wake up.

This kind of trauma doesn’t go away on its own. It kills. Slowly. Silently. And no one even writes a report.

I won’t let her become another silent funeral. Not if I can help it.

I don’t know what else to do but I know she’s not crazy.

She’s just never been safe.

And I’m not giving up on her.

#narcissisticabuserecovery #narcissisticpersonalitydisorder #Voiceless #thevoicelessjusticeact

SURVIVOR STORIES “I Died. And Came Back to Tell the Truth

 SURVIVOR STORIES

“I Died. And Came Back to Tell the Truth.”

Submitted to the Heal Loudly Movement. Name changed for privacy.

In 2021, she met a man on a dating app charming, attentive, magnetic. The kind that sweeps you off your feet and makes the whole world feel like a movie.

It felt like fate.

She followed love from Denmark to Cyprus, and finally to Nigeria, where they married. It should have been a fairytale. But like so many survivors of narcissistic abuse, what she thought was love quickly unraveled into something much darker.

When they returned to Denmark, everything changed.

Behind closed doors, the mask fell.

What followed was a descent into deceit, manipulation, and psychological abuse.

What she once called romance became control.

What looked like love became a slow, calculated undoing of her identity.

 “I lost myself. I couldn’t see a way out.”

The emotional damage was catastrophic. The gaslighting was relentless. She was isolated from her support system. Her reality was twisted beyond recognition. The pain built up until it swallowed everything including her will to live.

Then came the suicide attempt.

This wasn’t a cry for help. This was her body giving up because her spirit had been broken.

She was clinically dead for several minutes.

Dead.

Until doctors revived her and pulled her back.

“I died. But I came back. And now I’m telling the truth.”

This is what narcissistic abuse does.

It doesn’t just ruin reputations or cause emotional pain.

It kills.

Quietly. Invisibly. Legally.

And it’s still not criminal.

How many more survivors have to die or come closebbefore we call this what it is? Psychological murder. Emotional terrorism. A human rights violation disguised as a relationship.

This survivor lived to tell her story. Not everyone does.

And now, her voice joins the growing chorus demanding justice

⚖️ CALL TO ACTION: Join the Fight to Criminalize Narcissistic Abuse

Sign the Voiceless Justice Act petition today.

Help us make psychological abuse a crime. Help us hold perpetrators accountable. Help us stop this epidemic before more lives are lost.

🖊️ www.change.org/VoicelessJusticeAct

Narcissistic abuse is a silent killer. But we’re done being silent.

Narcissistic abuse Survivor Stories

 SURVIVOR STORIES

“Her Truth Didn’t Die With Her”

Submitted to the Heal Loudly Movement. Name changed for privacy.

Some stories come in and leave a mark on your soul and this one carved itself in deep.

A survivor recently reached out after watching one of our videos about emotional murder. Her message hit like lightning: painfully honest, deeply moving, and tragically familiar to far too many of us.

She lost her mother to suicide.

But it wasn’t just suicide.

It was emotional murder.

 “The day I lost my mother, I knew how, why, and who was responsible.”

This survivor watched her mother suffer at the hands of a narcissistic abuser for years until it broke her spirit. She tried everything: speaking out, pleading with family, friends, even the police. But no one listened. Not really. Not enough.

They closed the case. Wrote it off as mental illness.

But they never asked what caused that illness.

They never questioned who cultivated the despair that killed her.

Her father her mother’s abuser still walks free. Still wears the costume of a good man. He even has the churches fooled. But behind closed doors, this man orchestrated the slow and steady destruction of a woman’s will to live.

  “I can’t tell you how many times I’ve tried to explain it what he did to her. What he put her through. But people don’t want to see it. He plays the part too well.”

This survivor is done being silent. And she’s right to be. She called it what it is: a public safety hazard. Because when abusers are never held accountable, they don’t stop. They just move on to the next victim.

And we we who see it we have a responsibility to expose it.

 “I truly believe if we got enough people’s stories out into the world, it would make a difference.”

She’s not wrong. That’s the heart of the Heal Loudly Movement. Her story and her mother’s story deserve to be heard, honored, and remembered as more than a statistic or a quiet tragedy.

Because her mother didn’t die because she was “mentally ill.”

She died because she was emotionally tortured.

By a narcissist who still pretends to be the victim.

And that that is the epidemic no one wants to name.

But we will.

And we’ll keep naming it.

Loudly.

“Her truth didn’t die with her. Not on my watch.”

ORIGINAL LETTER (Unedited)

> I was truly so moved by your video, the day I lost my mother I knew how, why and who was responsible. I watched my mother live a sad life of torture until it ultimately cost her her life. I can’t tell you how many times I've tried to express what you did in your video to loved ones, friends, anyone who would listen to me to expose her abuser and try to hold him accountable for this unforgivable treatment to my mother. I pleaded! With the police to listen to me and they closed my mother’s case and chalked it up to mental illness without realizing who, what, and why her mental health deteriorated resulting in her taking her own life.

The pain this monster has inflicted on me and my mother will unfortunately never stop because he paints himself as this perfect man on the outside to everyone—he even has the churches fooled.

I wanted to reach out because this is something I’m extremely passionate about. When you said it was emotional shmerder... That's literally!! What it is and it won’t stop if we don’t spread awareness to others. In my opinion it’s a true and valid safety hazard to society that monsters like that walk around and just continue to their next victims with no repercussions!

My mother did take her own life but the truth and facts are so much deeper than that. The horrendous actions of my father is and should be held responsible.

If I can help in any way! Whatsoever to the message you're trying to send, I'm all in! I truly believe if we got enough people’s stories and what they went through out there in the world it would make a difference. So again please let me know. I’ve finally come to a place mentally where I’m ready to share my mother’s story, her truth. No one should ever! Go through narc. abuse.

If you’ve read this and made it this far, thank you so much! Your video made me realize I’m not alone and what my mother went through is very real. So again thank you! For all you do!

⚖️ CALL TO ACTION: SIGN THE PETITION TO END EMOTIONAL MURDER

Join the fight for the Voiceless. Sign the Voiceless Justice Act today.

👉 www.change.org/VoicelessJusticeAct

Too many survivors die before they’re believed.

Too many abusers walk free, hiding behind charm, status, and false smiles.

And too often, the truth is buried with the victim.

This is not “just” suicide.

It’s psychological homicide.

It's emotional murder.

And it's happening every single day.

Victims of narcissistic abuse aren’t just “sad.”

They’re systematically broken down isolated, gaslit, manipulated, and driven to believe death is their only escape.

This epidemic is real. It’s silent. And it’s deadly.

The Voiceless Justice Act is a federal petition to recognize narcissistic abuse as the lethal psychological warfare that it is and to hold abusers legally accountable when their victims are driven to suicide.

No more silence. No more dismissal. No more pretending narcissistic abuse isn’t fatal.

🖊️ Sign the petition. Be a voice for those who no longer have one.

www.change.org/VoicelessJusticeAct

“Tactics of Psychological Warfare: How Narcissists Break You Like the CIA”

 🎥 Series Title:

“Tactics of Psychological Warfare: How Narcissists Break You Like the CIA”

The 100 War Tactics of Narcissistic Abuse 

By Daniel Ryan Cotler

“This Is Psychological Warfare Not a Breakup”

This isn't drama. This isn't a messy relationship. This is psychological warfarebthe kind designed by intelligence agencies to break prisoners of war.

And narcissists are using it. Every single day.

They're not just toxic. They're tactical. Every mood swing, every silent treatment, every gaslighting session is not random. It's programmed. It's calculated. It's a weapon.

These tactics come directly from CIA interrogation manuals, KGB psychological operations, and military torture programs. And survivors of narcissistic abuse are living through this hell silently, invisibly, every single day.

And what happens when people don’t understand it? They tell us to “just move on.” They say, “it couldn’t have been that bad.” Survivors are left to question their own minds, feel crazy, isolate themselves, and collapse under the weight of confusion and shame.

This series will expose 100 psychological warfare tactics used by narcissists one by one so the world can see the full truth. Because this isn’t a personality disorder gone rogue. This is a methodical destruction of identity. A systematic erasure of the self. A soul-level genocide.

And we’re done being quiet.

This is the beginning of a movement. This is the call to every survivor who was ever gaslit into silence, into shame, into suicide.

Follow the series. Share the truth. And support the Voiceless Justice Act at www.change.org/VoicelessJusticeAct.

This is war. But this time, we’re fighting back.

Tactic 1: Sleep Deprivation Weaponizing Exhaustion

Sleep deprivation is one of the most powerful torture methods ever documented. The CIA's own KUBARK interrogation manual, used to break down prisoners of war, outlines it clearly: deny someone sleep long enough, and you can make them confess to anything, believe anything, forget who they are.

Narcissistic abusers use this same tactic without a prison, without a cage, and without a single weapon. Just your bed. Just your brain.

They pick fights late at night. They create chaos as soon as your body starts to rest. They accuse you of cheating at 2am. They storm into the room yelling when they know you have an early shift. And they do it again. And again. And again.

Why? Because sleep deprivation doesn’t just make you tired it makes you vulnerable. It dismantles your ability to think critically. You can’t focus. You can’t regulate your emotions. You become foggy, confused, compliant. You forget what’s real. You start to break.

When you’re deprived of sleep for long enough, your brain literally starts to malfunction. You experience memory loss. Impaired decision-making. Emotional instability. Your immune system weakens. You get sick more often. You lose your appetite. You gain weight or lose it rapidly. You cry for no reason. Or you stop crying completely.

It doesn’t stop there. Survivors often report terrifying episodes of sleep paralysis waking up frozen, unable to move, with hallucinations that feel demonic. That isn’t “drama.” That’s what the brain does under chronic trauma and exhaustion.

Your nervous system enters permanent survival mode. You live in fight-or-flight. Even in silence, even in safety, your body doesn’t relax. You flinch at night noises. You wake up sweating. You dread going to bed, because bed is now a war zone.

And when you finally get out of the relationship, your sleep still doesn’t come back. You stay wired. You stay exhausted. The trauma is burned into your nervous system.

This isn’t a spat. This isn’t toxic communication. This is psychological warfare.

Sleep deprivation is a crime against the mind. And in narcissistic abuse, it’s used to soften you up so you won’t notice the next lie, the next betrayal, the next manipulation. Because when your mind is too tired to fight back, the narcissist wins.

This is only one of 100 documented tactics used by narcissistic abusers that mirror war crimes and interrogation programs.

If you're a survivor, this is not your fault. You were broken down methodically.

If you're not a survivor, now you know. This is not a messy relationship. It’s an invisible battlefield. And too many people are dying on it without a single soul realizing they were ever at war.

This is psychological murder.

Support the Voiceless Justice Act and help us expose, criminalize, and eradicate psychological abuse.

👉 Visit www.change.org/VoicelessJusticeAct

Because silence is what they count on. And silence is what we’re ending.

Today is Narcissistic Abuse Awareness Day. For those who are looking for closure.

Today is Narcissistic Abuse Awareness Day. For those who are looking for closure.

If you are reading this, then you already know how devastating narcissistic abuse is. This kind of abuse doesn’t just break hearts it breaks lives. It destroys self-worth, dismantles identities, and far too often, it ends in tragedy. Many people don’t survive it.

And for those who do, they’re often left haunted by questions that may never be answered. They find themselves searching for closure, clinging to the hope that the person who hurt them will one day offer an apology, an explanation, or a moment of remorse.

But here’s the truth that no one wants to say out loud: That apology is never coming. That closure you’re hoping for will not come from your abuser. They are not capable of giving it to you. Closure requires empathy, accountability, and a conscienceband those are not traits that narcissistic abusers possess.

So today, I want to talk to you about creating your own closure. Because healing cannot begin when you’re still waiting for validation from the very person who invalidated everything about you.

The hardest truth in all of this is realizing that the person you loved the one you fought for, the one you believed in doesn’t exist. That person was never real. You fell in love with a carefully constructed illusion. A false self. A mask. And coming to terms with that is like grieving a ghost.

It is painful. It is confusing. You feel like you’re mourning someone who isn’t dead but also someone who never truly lived. And yet, your love for them was real. That needs to be honored. You are not foolish for loving them. You are human. You loved with your whole heart, and that is something to be proud of.

But here’s the next step. In order to heal, you have to separate the person you loved from the person who abused you. You have to split them into two. And to do that, you need to say goodbye to the fantasy. You need to let go of the version of them that you created in your mind the version you believed in.

I suggest something that changed everything for me: have a funeral.

Not for the abuser. But for the person you thought they were. Write a poem. Write a eulogy. Write a goodbye letter. Then go somewhere quiet alone, or with a few trusted people and read it. Say goodbye. Mourn the loss. Cry. Rage. Honor your love, and then release it.

This is your closure. This is the beginning of reclaiming your life.

When I did this, it broke me wide open. But it also helped me separate the illusion from the reality. It helped me stop confusing the mask for the monster. And that separation is what kept me from getting sucked back in. It is what gave me the clarity to stay away and the strength to rebuild.

Every day, I wake up and I still grieve the person I thought I loved. It feels like they died. So I treat it like a loss. Like I’m a widow. But I also remind myself: that version of them never existed. It was all a lie.

And in grieving that lie, I found the truth.

To every survivor out there today, I want you to know: your closure is not waiting in their apology. It’s waiting in your hands. You have the power to create it. To declare it. To honor your pain, and then begin your healing.

You are not broken. You are breaking free.

Grieve the ghost. Say goodbye to the illusion. And then rise.

Because healing is not about what they do.

It’s about what you do now.

How Many People Have to Die Before Narcissistic Abuse is Taken Seriously?

 How Many People Have to Die Before Narcissistic Abuse is Taken Seriously?

Narcissistic abuse is not a buzzword. It is not a dramatic overreaction or a therapy fad. It is a deliberate, premeditated form of psychological terrorism that leaves behind a trail of invisible corpses. The victims may look alive, but inside, they are often shells battling complex PTSD, addiction, chronic illness, dissociation, and far too often, suicidal ideation that ends in tragedy.

So we ask how many have to die before this form of abuse is treated with the gravity it deserves?

When someone takes their own life after years of psychological warfare, the world shrugs. Families are told they were mentally ill. The abuser walks free. The victim’s truth is buried with them. Suicide by narcissistic abuse isn’t in the textbooks. It isn’t in the courtrooms. It isn’t even part of the domestic violence conversation. And yet, it is one of the most deadly forms of interpersonal violence in existence.

Let’s be blunt: narcissistic abuse kills. It kills through despair. It kills through isolation. It kills by stripping victims of their identity, their voice, their stability, and their will to live. It kills slowly systematically while the abuser remains protected by a society that refuses to name the crime.

We have hotlines for physical abuse. We have shelters for battered spouses. But where are the safe houses for victims of narcissistic abuse? Where is the emergency response for someone whose mind has been hijacked and fractured by coercive control? Where is the training for law enforcement, for judges, for therapists, to recognize the weaponized empathy, the calculated cruelty, and the psychological chains that bind victims to their abuser?

Instead of being believed, survivors are often pathologized. Instead of protection, they face disbelief. Instead of justice, they endure retraumatization. If they speak out, they’re called crazy. If they stay silent, they’re buried by the weight of unprocessed trauma. Either way, the abuser wins.

This must end.

We need a radical shift in how we understand, legislate, and respond to narcissistic abuse. We need legal recognition that psychological abuse is not just damaging it is deadly. We need to establish clear pathways for intervention, protection, and accountability. We need education that reaches beyond the therapy room and into schools, courtrooms, hospitals, and media platforms.

And above all, we need names. We need to call narcissistic abuse what it truly is: psychological murder.

The Voiceless Justice Act and the FRANKIE Initiative are designed to change this broken system. These policies seek to establish a federal registry for verified narcissistic abusers, implement national education and training standards, and finally criminalize coercive psychological abuse when it results in suicide or life-threatening trauma.

It is time to stop whispering about what’s happening in the shadows. It is time to stop sanitizing the truth. This epidemic is stealing lives.

How many more have to die?

Take action now. Support the Voiceless Justice Act and the FRANKIE Initiative. Sign the petition at www.change.org/VoicelessJusticeAct.

The Most Dangerous Lie I Ever Believed: “They Made Me Feel This Way

 The Most Dangerous Lie I Ever Believed: “They Made Me Feel This Way”

By Daniel Ryan Cotler

Today, I want to speak directly from the heart. This is one of those honest conversations where healing meets truth, and maybe, just maybe, you’ll recognize a version of your past self in what I’m about to say.

For years, I carried a belief that felt completely true. But it wasn’t.

I used to tell myself things like:

“They made me feel like I had no worth.”

“They made me feel invisible.”

“They made me feel like I didn’t matter.”

And I hear countless survivors say the same thing. These words sound right. They feel valid. After all, when someone constantly violates your boundaries, chips away at your self-worth, and manipulates your reality, what else are you supposed to feel?

But here’s the truth that changed everything for me and I share this not to judge, but to empower.

They didn’t make me feel that way.

What hurt me most was that I kept allowing myself to feel that way… by staying.

Let me break that down.

Every time I tolerated disrespect, I reinforced the idea that I was willing to be treated that way.

Every time I kept quiet to avoid conflict or make someone else comfortable, I silenced my truth.

Every time I made excuses for cruelty, I participated in my own devaluation.

Every time I lowered my standards, looked the other way, or accepted another broken apology I was sending a message to myself and to them:

“You can treat me this way. I will stay.”

It wasn’t because I enjoyed being treated poorly.

It wasn’t because I didn’t know something was wrong.

It was because, deep down, I hadn’t yet recognized my own worth.

And here’s the hardest part of all:

The deepest grief I carried wasn’t over what they did to me. It was over who I allowed myself to become in order to keep them in my life.

That’s not self-blame. That’s self-awareness.

Healing is not about punishing yourself for what you didn’t know. It’s about telling the truth to yourself for the first time in a long time.

It’s realizing:

I wasn’t just a victim of what they did.

I became a participant in what I allowed.

Before you put your guard up, let me be clear this isn’t about blaming yourself for the abuse you endured.

This is about reclaiming your power.

It’s about recognizing the only thing you’ve ever truly had control over:

The power to walk away.

The power to say, “This energy is not welcome in my life.”

The power to understand, “This behavior is not love.”

The power to decide, “This pain has no place in my purpose.”

The power to declare, “You don’t get to define my worth.”

If you are still giving chance after chance to someone who has repeatedly shown you who they are…

If you are still hoping they’ll change if you just love them a little harder, suffer a little quieter, or wait a little longer

I urge you to ask yourself:

What part of you still believes you don’t deserve better?

What part of you thinks pain is the price of connection?

You don’t have to be fully healed to have boundaries.

You don’t need to be perfect to say no.

You don’t need their permission to protect your peace.

All you need is one moment of truth.

One moment of clarity.

One moment where you decide:

“I’m done shrinking myself to fit into someone else’s small version of love.”

“I’m done handing over my value to people who don’t know how to hold it.”

“I’m done letting others dictate how I feel about myself.”

Because here is the truth:

Your value does not decrease when someone else fails to see it.

It only decreases when you forget it’s there.

So today, I encourage you to stop asking, “Why do they keep making me feel like this?”

Instead, ask the real question:

“Why do I keep letting them?”

And then, without shame…

Without guilt…

Without waiting for anyone else’s permission…

Take your power back.

Because it was never theirs to keep.

They just had it on loan.

When Intimacy Is Used as a Weapon: Speaking the Truth About Intimate Partner Violence

 When Intimacy Is Used as a Weapon: Speaking the Truth About Intimate Partner Violence

There’s something I need to talk about something many survivors of narcissistic abuse and intimate partner violence have experienced but rarely feel safe enough to name. It’s the kind of abuse that doesn’t leave visible bruises, but it leaves permanent scars on your psyche, your sense of reality, and your ability to trust.

For me, it was one of the most psychologically shattering parts of the abuse I endured.

For the first time in my life, I thought I had found both the physical and emotional connection I had always longed for. Until then, people had either been attracted to me but emotionally unavailable, or they had loved me in theory but discarded me when I needed real intimacy. I never had both not at the same time. But with my abuser, it felt different. At least at first.

He made me feel seen. He made me feel beautiful. He created an illusion of safety and depth. Sex felt intimate, even sacred. He mirrored all my dreams and convinced me we were building something real. I believed it with my whole heart. I believed I had finally found what I had been searching for my entire life. But what I found was a carefully constructed lie. When the truth unraveled, it shattered me in ways I’m still learning how to understand.

What made it even more psychologically confusing what turned the pain into trauma was what he did to me when I was most vulnerable.

There were moments when I was on the brink of suicide moments where I was disoriented, desperate, and completely broken. And instead of helping me, he used those moments to tighten his grip on me. He would tell me that how I acted in the next few minutes would determine how the night went. Then he would bring out drugs. Sometimes he would inject them into me himself. I wasn’t in any state to make decisions. I was fighting for my life, and he knew it. He took advantage of it.

And then he would force himself on me.

But it wasn’t just physical assault. It was psychological assault. During the assaults, he would start describing our wedding day in vivid detail. He would ask me to imagine us adopting a daughter together. He would make me name her right there in the middle of what was happening. And when he would finish inside me, he would whisper things about forever, about family, about a life he was pretending we were building together.

And I just stood there. Dissociated. Disconnected. Confused. Dazed. Trying to make sense of what was happening to me.

This is what makes intimate partner violence so hard to talk about because it doesn’t always look like violence. Sometimes, it looks like love. Sometimes, it looks like connection. Sometimes, it looks like a wedding proposal in the middle of a rape. It’s not just betrayal. It’s betrayal that is wrapped in false tenderness, designed to make you question your own memory, your own reactions, your own worth.

For a long time, I couldn’t understand why I didn’t fight harder. Why I didn’t run. Why I didn’t scream. But the truth is, I was in survival mode. I was manipulated, drugged, emotionally entrapped, and psychologically broken down to the point where my nervous system shut down. I wasn’t “letting it happen.” I was being held hostage inside my own body.

This is what needs to be understood: intimate partner violence is not just about physical beatings. It is about psychological bondage. It is about coercion. It is about weaponizing vulnerability and exploiting the deepest parts of someone’s soul. It is about manufacturing connection as a form of control. And when someone does that to you, they are not loving you they are dismantling you.

If you’ve experienced something like this, I want you to hear me clearly: It wasn’t your fault. You were manipulated. You were conditioned to believe that this was love. You were made to feel like you had no choice. And what you felt the confusion, the pain, the dissociation that was your body trying to protect you.

There is nothing shameful about how you survived.

You may still be trying to make sense of it. You may still be wondering if it was “really” abuse because there were times it felt so real. But abuse that disguises itself as love is still abuse. And when someone fuses intimacy with terror, connection with coercion, and affection with assault that is intimate partner violence in its most insidious form.

One day, you’ll be able to call it what it was without shame.

One day, the confusion will start to clear.

One day, the power they stole will begin to return to you.

And on that day, you’ll realize: You weren’t discarded.

You were set free.

#survivingfrankiezerella #narcissisticabuserecovery #narcissisticpersonalitydisorder #narcissistexposed #toxicrelationship #narcissistabuseawareness #empathsunite #healedloudly #healingjourney #breakthecycle #empathpower #thevoicelessjusticeact #psychologicalwarfare

The Hardest Question in Healing: Why Did I Stay?

 The Hardest Question in Healing: Why Did I Stay?

This one’s going to be hard to hear. But if you’re reading this, I know you’re ready. Maybe not ready to be comfortable but ready to be honest. And honesty is where healing begins.

To truly take your power back, you have to do something that almost feels unfair. You have to take responsibility not for what they did, but for what you allowed. For what you tolerated. For what you excused. Not because it was your fault. It wasn’t. But because you’re the only one who can reclaim your life now.

Let’s be clear: You didn’t cause the abuse. You didn’t deserve it. You were manipulated, gaslit, lied to, broken down. You were made to question your reality, your instincts, your worth. You survived something most people can’t even imagine. And you did the best you could with what you knew at the time. That deserves compassion not shame.

But healing asks you to go deeper. To ask the question that gnaws at your soul in the quiet moments:

Why did I stay?

It’s not a question of blame. It’s a question of truth. And it’s a question only you can answer.

I asked myself that same question—over and over. At first, I came up with all the usual reasons.

“I thought I could fix them.”

“I didn’t want to be alone.”

“I believed in their potential.”

“I was trauma bonded.”

“I was afraid of what would happen if I left.”

And all of those were true. Every single one. But they weren’t the deepest truth. And healing doesn’t stop at the surface.

So I kept digging.

And eventually, I found something raw. Something so vulnerable it almost shattered me to name it:

I stayed because I was trying to protect my innocence.

I didn’t want to believe people could be that cruel.

I didn’t want to let go of the belief that everyone had good inside them.

I didn’t want to accept that someone I loved could see my pain and keep causing it anyway.

Holding on to that innocence was my last form of hope. If I could just love them more, be better, give more grace maybe I wouldn’t have to confront the terrifying truth that some people aren’t good. Some people use love as a weapon. Some people hurt others and don’t feel bad about it. Some people know exactly what they’re doing.

And that broke me. Because if I let that truth in, then the whole foundation of how I saw the world would collapse. It felt safer to keep believing that there was something I could do to fix it.

But that illusion was costing me everything my peace, my sanity, my self-worth.

There is no shame in how long you stayed. There is no shame in how hard you loved. But at some point, you have to stop fighting to protect your old beliefs and start fighting to protect yourself.

Because staying in that cycle was never love. It was self-abandonment. And you don’t deserve to keep abandoning yourself in the name of loyalty, hope, or fear.

You deserve honesty. You deserve to look at your reflection and say,

“I see you. I know why you stayed. And I’m not judging you. But we’re not doing that anymore.”

You have to answer the question not to blame yourself but to free yourself.

Healing doesn’t ask for perfection. It asks for truth. And the truth is, your power begins where your denial ends.

So ask the question. Let the answers come without shame, without judgment. Just truth.

Because behind every hard answer is a door back to yourself. And you’ve been gone long enough.