Releasing attachment to highly charged emotions and events does not mean that one is “giving up” on themselves or “giving in” to abuse from others. It is simply a process that supports people in coping with past and/or current life circumstances that cannot be changed and that they are powerless over.
Adult Survivors of Family Scapegoating Abuse (FSA) who are also Empath-types can be particularly vulnerable to the manipulative tactics of the malignant narcissist. In today’s article, I share a key trait that a malignant narcissist exhibits that can draw vulnerable FSA adult survivors into their deadly web – a trait that defies commonly held beliefs about narcissism.
Betrayal is at the heart of being scapegoated. Betrayal is the constant in all the examples shared in this article. When exploring our scapegoating histories we see that our trauma doesn’t just come from the hurtful actions, the cruel words, the painful neglect and humiliations, or the psychological wounds wielded out by family members. Our trauma extends beyond tangible incidents: It permeates our psyches and our physiology…
5 myths that adult survivors of family scapegoating abuse (FSA) need to know: It has been my experience, after assisting FSA adult survivors in their recovery for the past twenty years, that the five myths I’ve identified and am highlighting here in my latest video can impede one’s full healing from this most painful form of family abuse.
Dysfunctional family systems are ‘closed’ systems that resist integrating information that threatens the accepted family narrative. Family members who have scapegoated you will rarely accept responsibility for their actions, despite how egregious their mistreatment of you has been. Below are five reasons why you are unlikely to ever receive an apology from your family for their shameful treatment of you.
A family that is dominated by a dysfunctional or narcissistic parent may result in its members living under a set of unspoken ‘rules’, rules which benefit the parent at the expense of their children’s well-being. The research I conducted on what I named family scapegoating abuse (FSA) suggests that dysfunctional families that scapegoat are also governed by a specific set of rules. This article reviews ten rules that I have identified as being evident in families that scapegoat one of their own.
Recovering from the traumatizing aspects of family scapegoating abuse (FSA) is an individual process and each FSA adult survivor’s healing journey will be unique. But no matter the recovery route you take, you will want to first ensure you build a strong foundation for recovery by addressing symptoms of complex trauma (C-PTSD).
When FSA adult survivors are chronically traumatized within their family-of-origin, they can develop a form of dissociation known as structural dissociation, whereby the personality lacks integration and expresses itself through ‘parts’. But it is never too late to experience your innate wholeness…
For the child victim of family scapegoating abuse (FSA), the ‘scapegoat story’ created by one or both parents (which the entire family invariably adapts and accepts unquestioningly) can negatively impact their mental and emotional health. When a parent is a malignant narcissist, the abuse the child experiences can be extreme, resulting in complex trauma (C-PTSD) symptoms secondary to grave psycho-emotional distress.
In the twenty years I have been working with adult survivors of family scapegoating abuse (FSA), one issue that typically becomes a ‘stuck’ point in their recovery journey is the sense of grave injustice they experience in regard to the wrongs done to them within their family-of-origin – Injustices that have never been acknowledged or validated. By anyone.
