January doesn’t require clarity, decisions, or resolutions—especially if you’re healing from covert narcissistic abuse. In this New Year’s Day episode, Renee Swanson offers a grounded alternative to urgency, helping survivors orient gently after the holidays and begin the year with safety instead of pressure. Whether you’re still in the relationship, newly out, or years removed, this episode reminds you that healing is not a race—and you are not behind.

The holidays aren’t joyful when you live with a covert narcissist — they’re survival. If you’ve ever felt relieved when it was over, this episode explains why.

If the holidays leave you tense, exhausted, and walking on eggshells, this episode explains why. In homes shaped by covert narcissism, joy is often conditional—and peace depends on how well you manage someone else’s emotions. Using The Grinch as a metaphor, this conversation names the invisible ways narcissistic abuse steals holidays and shows how emotional abuse recovery begins when you stop performing for harmony and start protecting your peace.

If you’ve spent years trying harder—communicating better, staying calmer, lowering your needs, and blaming yourself when nothing changes—this episode names why. In covert narcissism in marriage, “trying harder” doesn’t create connection or safety; it deepens self-abandonment. This conversation dismantles the myth that leaving means you failed and explains why healing begins when you stop auditioning for basic decency and start choosing emotional safety instead.

How do you know if you’re actually healing after covert narcissistic abuse? This episode explores the quiet signs of recovery—internal safety, self-trust, and a nervous system that no longer lives in constant survival mode.

Why do you and your kids stop talking? This episode explores how covert narcissism and trauma quietly teach both adults and children that silence feels safer than honesty—and what safety has to do with healing, voice, and connection.

Chest tightness, stomach issues, and sleep problems aren’t random — they’re trauma responses. In Part 2 of this series, we break down what these symptoms really mean, why they develop after covert narcissistic abuse, and how your body has been communicating through discomfort all along.

Your body has been telling the truth about your trauma long before your mind could name it. In this episode, we explore the physical symptoms — from jaw tension to tinnitus to that constant eye twitch — that were actually survival responses to covert narcissistic abuse. These aren’t “random issues.” They’re the map of what your body endured.

Your adult children will eventually ask hard questions, and you deserve to answer them with honesty and integrity — without pulling them into the middle. This episode gives you the exact language, mindset, and emotional tools to support your children while staying grounded in your truth. If you feel misunderstood or judged by your kids, this one is for you.

You weren’t codependent — you were surviving. This episode breaks down the critical difference between fawning and codependency, especially for survivors of covert narcissistic abuse. With real-life examples, we untangle these two behaviors so you can stop blaming yourself for the ways your nervous system kept you safe.

This Thanksgiving, turn gratitude inward. Instead of thanking the world around you, this episode helps you thank the parts of you that kept you alive through covert narcissistic abuse—your fight/flight system, your emotions, your mind, and your resilience. A warm, healing reminder that your reactions were never failures… they were protection. And today, we honor them.

After kayaking over a mama alligator, I paddled up to my friend in full fight-or-flight — confused, shaky, and doubting my own reality. Her response grounded me. Her belief helped me process what happened. And it made me realize how unsafe people erase your reality… and how safe people give it back to you.

What if the biggest problem in your relationship wasn’t what you fought about—but the conversations you never could have? In this episode, I break down how covert narcissists twist normal everyday interactions into confusion, silence, and self-doubt. If every conversation leaves you feeling unheard, misunderstood, or blamed, you’re not alone—and it’s not your fault.

What happens when your kayak bumps over a “log”… and that log turns out to be a huge alligator? My brain protected me in the strangest way — by pretending what I was seeing wasn’t real. In this episode, I break down how dissociation works, why your brain hides danger from you, and how this explains the confusion you felt during covert narcissistic abuse.

Covert narcissism doesn’t have just one face. Some cry, some preach, some stay silent—but all twist reality to protect their fragile ego. Your story might look different, but the confusion you feel is real.

What if love felt more like a cardio workout than a connection? Join Renee Swanson as she hilariously (and heartbreakingly) describes life with an inflatable clown — the perfect metaphor for living with a covert narcissist who always needs air.

When a covert narcissist can’t control you, they control the story about you — and they often do it through your children. In this episode, Renee Swanson breaks down how parental alienation happens, why it’s so effective, and how to stay grounded when your child starts to turn away.

Resentment isn’t a flaw in your character—it’s evidence of how long you’ve been carrying someone else’s emotional load. In covert narcissistic relationships, resentment begins long before you realize what’s happening. In this episode, Renee unpacks how resentment forms, why it’s really an act of self-preservation, and how to transform it into clarity, boundaries, and release.

If your brain won’t stop imagining the worst, you’re not broken — you’re trauma-trained. In this episode, Renee shares how to break free from catastrophic thinking after covert narcissistic abuse using simple, compassionate tools that help you calm your mind and retrain your brain for peace.