If you’ve ever wondered why your body still panics—even when you know better—this episode is for you. Narcissists don’t just manipulate conversations; they manipulate states like fear, urgency, guilt, and confusion. And once your nervous system is activated, logic goes offline. In this episode, Christy breaks down three specific ways narcissists hijack your nervous system, why your reactions are not a failure, and how to begin calming your body so you can respond with clarity instead of spiraling. This is especially important for anyone co-parenting, navigating post-separation abuse, or dealing with a narcissistic parent or ex. You’ll learn how nervous system hijacking actually works—and why healing isn’t about “being stronger,” but about safety, regulation, and self-trust. Your Next Step in Healing If interactions with a narcissist still send your body into panic or shutdown, 1:1 coaching offers personalized nervous-system-aware support, communication strategy, and boundary clarity—especially for high-conflict or co-parenting situations. Email: https://shethrives.thrivecart.com/transformational-coaching-quarterly/ 6-Month Coaching Container Deep nervous system work, boundary integration, and identity rebuilding so you stop second-guessing yourself and start living from calm authority. https://shethrives.thrivecart.com/6-month-queens-of-peace-program/ 12-Month Coaching Container Long-term healing for complex trauma, co-parenting, family narcissism, and post-separation abuse—supporting true, lasting regulation and peace. https://shethrives.thrivecart.com/12-month-queens-of-peace-program/ Additional Support & Resources Boundaries Pocket Guide (Free) https://christyjade.ck.page/ce79ea9250 Copy-Paste-Peace Scripts https://christyjade.thrivecart.com/copy-paste-peace-scripts/ Empowered Boundaries Course https://shethrives.thrivecart.com/empowered-boundaries/ Free Facebook Community https://www.facebook.com/groups/christyjade TRANSCRIPT Speaker 1 (00:00): If you've ever thought, why am I still panicking when I know better? This episode is for you. Today, I'm going to break down three very specific ways narcissists hijack your nervous system so you can stop blaming yourself and start calming your body again. Welcome to your Thursday, thrive in five, your five minute pause from the chaos, the gaslighting, and that text you knew better than to reply to take a breath, queen. This one's for you. Alright, so welcome back. Let me say this clearly right out of the gates, if your body still reacts even after therapy, after setting your lovely boundaries and doing everything right, you are not failing. Your nervous system has been trained. So narcissists don't just manipulate conversations, right? They manipulate states. So states of fear, urgency, God, I hate that one. Guilt and confusion. So today we're not talking about just, oh, just ignore 'em or be stronger, right? (01:19) We're talking about how the hijacking actually happens and what helps you come back to safety. Alright? So the first way they use urgency to bypass your regulation, this one is very, very important and one that I didn't really learn about till later in my research. Education, knowledge, all of them, right? This urgency is something we all get conditioned to have. So it can be sneaky, it can be sudden texts, last minute demands, fake emergencies. I remember having some of those, like this needs to be handled right now or call me immediately. I've literally had a narcissist say, this is an emergency you need to pick up when I wouldn't pick up. And then it goes, you go, oh, okay. And then you find out it's not really an emergency, right? So urgency shuts down your thinking brain and activates what we are familiar with survival mode. (02:33) So your body doesn't ask, is this real? It asks, am I in danger? And once you respond from that place, the narcissist feels power again. So what do we do with all this, right? I can just, sorry, I'm just thinking back to that urgency feeling and how disruptive is right. So I just want to, I guess for solidarity sake right now, say I see you and I feel you in this space of urgency. And it's this just constant stress in your body that is feeling like everything's urgent and this fear of if you don't respond right away, if you don't do what they say, it's this tight chest tight neck. It literally changes your body, not just your mentally, but your body, your physiology. So one way to reframe it is that urgency does not mean importance. So what can help with this is before responding pause and orient, because you have to pull yourself out of this urgency. (03:55) You have to retrain, reframe your brain so that you don't feel stuck in this cycle. So orienting, I've talked about this on here before, but this really helps in these situations. So you can just pause wherever you are. This is great. You can do this tool anywhere. Name three things you can see. So I'll do an example right now that you don't have to think about it. This is non-thinking work. This is get in your body work. Okay, Queens, we need to get in our bodies way more. So how do we do that? Orienting is one step. So I'm looking at my beautiful floral picture. It always helps. I like to my eyes organically kind of gravitate towards the prettiest things in the room. So this beautiful, beautiful bouquet of flowers. So automatically I'm looking at that and remember to just kind of focus on the details, even if it's one detail. (04:57) There's just this one kind of magenta flower against the rest of the pastel. So I'm kind of just letting my gaze set on that and just observing that for a minute. And not even a whole minute, but a few seconds, 30 seconds. A second thing right now I'm looking at my flamingo. She's beautiful too, but what really crotches my eye is her glittering gold crown. Yes, I have a flamingo with a crown because how crispy is that, right? So I'm just letting my gaze settle on her crown and enjoying the reflecting light on the glitter as glitter is my favorite color all. And just kind of letting myself be present looking at that. And then I'm going to look another direction and I'm seeing a beautiful piece of artwork again, it's a different piece of artwork. I have a lot of artwork. I love art. (06:00) If you don't know that about me, now you do. And it's got some really beautiful teal shades in the background. And this also is a nice little cozy feeling because me and my stepsister and my daughter created this artwork together and it's just beautiful. So that's like an extra icing on the cake. If it is something beautiful or that has a nice story with it, but it doesn't have to be, it could just be like a couch cushion and you're just looking a little deeper into it, like the texture. So those are three things you can see, and you can name them out loud. You can say beautiful flowers, crazy old flamingo with the crown, gorgeous teal background of the painting, right? Then you put your feet on the floor, okay? Because this is, you want to get grounded. So you're getting present, you're getting grounded, noticing you're right here in this moment. Your feet are here on the ground, you are here. (07:12) And slow your breath. Inhale through your nose, exhale through your mouth. That's called a halo breath. Inhale through your nose and out your mouth, okay? And then ask, is this truly urgent or just activating? Now my example where that person said this is an emergency. Of course, when we have children, let's say your child is at their house, you are of course, no matter what, that's going to feel urgent, be urgent until the true story, whether it is or not. So you do have to respond to something like that. But there's a lot of examples, and you probably can already think of some that aren't truly based on urgency, right? So if they're saying, I want to know if blah, blah, blah, but it's really not that urgent, but they make it feel urgent. They have a tendency to get that control and that power over you. And you go, is this really urgent or is it activating? Or is it just what I've been taught to respond like this? Alright, so number two, another way is they weaponize tone not content. So here's why their message messages mess with you even when they're reasonable. (08:45) And that other people, I feel like we're always like, oh, other people don't see it, of things like that where it seems reasonable, but you know that you can see the difference or hear the difference. So it's not what they say, it's how they often say it. But that sarcasm, a kind of cold politeness. If you know subtle digs, maybe not so subtle digs, but we're talking about the more subtle things and concern that feels threatening. So your nervous system remembers who you are and how they make you feel, how it makes your body feel with their tone, with their actions, all of that, your body remembers, right? That's why we do somatic work, which I'll talk about in a little bit. Not just the words. It's not just the words, it's the whole energy around it. So that's why you reread their messages over and over. (09:54) I know you've done that. That's why your chest tightens that neck. Like oh, it's just everything the muscles contract in your body and that's why you spiral. The mental spiral is real. So you're not dramatic, you're conditioned. Okay, so with this one, what helps read the message once and identify the category, not the emotion. Okay, is it logistics? Is it information, useful information? Maybe, maybe not. Is it bait? Are they baiting you? Right? And so you respond only to the category, not the tone. Is it logistics with picking up your child? Don't take the bait part of it, just respond with an answer if you need to yet two o'clock, whatever time you agreed upon whatever it is, or is it just bait? Often it can just be bait. Now why would you do X, Y, Z? There's no real question in there. That is a bait question. (11:21)
