The Silent Treatment. One of our most potent methods of manipulation.
Whether it is a present silent treatment where we talk to everyone else around you but not you or whether it is an absent silent treatment where we disappear and cannot be found or contacted, we know that this is highly effective.
It does not matter if the silence lasts for ten minutes or ten days the impact on you is considerable and your reaction is always the same. That is, of course, the main reason that we do it.
You will repeatedly ask us what is wrong as you fail to understand what it is that we are doing. You will hang around us, if that is possible, asking the same questions over and over again.
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“What is wrong, please tell me?”
“What is the matter, I wish you would tell me?”
“What is it? Why aren’t you speaking to me?”
Your concern related to silent treatment mutates into frustration and anxiety and even occasionally anger. All of these states suit us as we drink the fuel you are providing to us. If we absented ourselves then we will face a slew of text messages, e-mails, and voicemail messages as you keep ringing every five minutes trying to establish contact with us.
After a time the nature of the questioning changes as you shift from asking us what is wrong to hauling yourself over the coals. It is all so predictable.
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You ask yourself what is it that you could have done which has caused us such offense that we are no longer speaking to you. You analyze everything you have said and done over the last hour, the last five hours, the last day.
Did you insult us in some way and not realize it? Surely it was not that comment about our tie, that was a joke. Was that the catalyst for this silence? Did you fail to kiss us on our arrival home?
You cannot remember but these days you often find that is the case since the days all seem to merge into one as you pad around trying not to tread on those eggshells. If only the tiredness would lift.
You might be able to think straight then and be able to ascertain what is going on. You keep providing us with different suggestions and scenarios as to what has happened. You grope around, utterly unsure as to what it was that proved to be the trigger.
You issue apologies and it gets to the point that you do not even know what you are apologizing for but that does not matter does it? All you want is for this horrible silence, the aching absence to end.
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It has happened before and then it ended as arbitrarily as it arrived. You cling on to the hope that it will end as it did last time but then there is that gnawing doubt which keeps manifesting in your mind.
What if it won’t end? What if this is it and we have gone for good? Surely not and for what reason? The doubt is horrible and you feel a rising sense of panic which causes you to redouble your efforts to find us and offer yourself up in sacrifice in order to get us to come back.
I appreciate you explaining the intention whether conscious or not behind the silent treatment. Have I interpreted you correctly that you are saying when a narcissist goes silent treatment the root need the narcissist wants is attention . To be made a fuss of or loved or even have us be angry or exasperated which is negative attention? My exhisband of 37 years said he ran away when he was young because he thought his parents didnt love him. He was one of 6 kids and both parents worked full time in a caravan park 7 days a week. I would ask him what was wrong when he was unusually silent and he would reply angrily “there is nothing wrong” I knew intuitively he was not ok but he said I should believe him and not think I knew something was wrong when it wasnt. I can see the beginnings of cognitive dissonance where i began to not trust my gut anymore. I was smart, hardworking, attractive, had money, understanding, passionate, and forgiving. He treated me great until I lived with him and gave him all my money from selling my house. He became controlling, angry judgemental with holding. He said it was my fault. If only I would do as he said everything would be ok. I tried but eventually I didnt agree and couldnt tow the line. Then physical abuse. Why wasnt i enough? I separated from him 10 yrs ago until he did domestic violence counselling. He never has. He had affairs, moved 1200 kl away from us inc his only child who was 10 and has lived with an Asian woman 26 yrs younger than him. He refuses to help support his daughter and doesnt see her or ring. Is he a narcissist?