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Capella University, what can't you do? Visit Capella.edu to learn more. On this episode of Narcissist Apocalypse, we have the return of Mercedes and we discuss feelings, shifting abuse, smear campaigns, shame, and healing. Welcome to Narcissist Apocalypse Q&A everyone. I am Brandon Chadwick, and with me today, we have the return of Mercedes. How are you? I'm doing well. Thank you. So for those of you that don't know Mercedes, Mercedes was a guest on our August 1st, 2022 episode. But before we get to Mercedes, if you want to be a guest on our show like Mercedes was on August 1st, 2022, please do go to our website at Narcissistapocalypse.com top of the page. There's a button that says guest form. Click on that button. It takes you to a guest form page. Read all the instructions and either send us an email at Narcissistapocalypse at gmail.com or fill out our guest form or press the submit button and please do send it in the format that we ask for. So today, we have the return of Mercedes and a little bit of a blur for people that have not listened to her episode. You were in a toxic relationship with a controlling manipulative human being. It's a story that you had about, you know, self-worth financial abuse, stalking, post-separation abuse, and it took you a while to realize that you were really living in a prison. So you wanted to come back today to share a lot of stuff that we didn't get to touch upon within your episode and a lot of stuff that was, I guess, going on in between realizations that you've had since then that have impacted your life. And a lot of hard truths, I guess, is the best way to put it acceptance of it. And, you know, then how are we going to react or be proactive with what has come up for you? So thank you for being here. And Mercedes, the floor is now yours once again. Thank you so much, Brandon. And thank you for having me back. There was a lot of stuff I felt like I didn't cover, partly because there's just so much stuff to talk about in any given episode. And I have of late, I went back and listened to my episode in preparation for this one. And I remember you telling me that I wasn't causing and feeling things. And that is very much the truth. I think I avoid doing that because I get afraid of what will come up when I do. I'm afraid that if I stop and really process what's going on that I will just go to a place that I can't come back from. And so I tend to protect myself. And yet there are times I can't help it. And I do come back. So I guess this episode is going to be about really understanding and accepting what's actually happening and what's going to keep happening and what I can do about it other than of a way to pretend like it's not actually going on. So I remember when I did that during your story. And to me, when we're telling our stories, a lot of the story has to do with the story of your feelings. And I was just trying to get you to start digging deeper as far as your feelings go so it can translate to someone else so they can understand your feelings. Because everyone's story will have similarities here and there, but they're different. But your feelings will always be the same and people can grab on to that language and tell things. Tell themselves what they're feeling and tell other people what they're feeling. And it was, to me, it was glaringly obvious while we were going along that, you know, you have the story that was going on. And I always say stories, the stories, the story. But you were, every time I had to ask a feelings question, you kind of just skip it. You would puddle jump and kind of move over it. So it's nice to hear that you started to like understand that process of what was going on. I definitely understood it. And I think, and I think in that environment too, I'm trying to come across as composed and together and, you know, skipping over those helps me sound composed and together. And yet I realize that when I listen to episodes that do have more of that, and at your right, I relate to them and I understand them and I connect with them. And that's what I want to do more in my life as a whole. I feel like I've a role to play in my life and with my kids and being the one that holds it together and forges forward is what I do every day. So showing up in another way is just takes a little bit more effort on my part. Yeah. So the first thing, I think, I think a big parlour talk about, I guess it's my healing that that has been my focus post separation. And I lived in a lot of denial for a long time. And so the first thing I want to, I guess my list is a list of things that I wish I knew earlier. And the first thing on my list is about the post separation abuse. And that is that the abuse is never going to stop. And I find this a particularly difficult thing to really internalize and understand because I want it to stop. But it will. And I think a lot of people think it will eventually. And for some, perhaps it does. Perhaps it does. You know, it's not everybody's life is not the same. But for you specifically, we're talking about that you have kids with this person and that you have a relationship with this person of parallel parenting. And that your specific type of abuser is just someone who is always going to have find a problem with everything and there is no co parenting going on at all. Exactly. Exactly. I have children with him and we have many years to go as the children are still quite young. And, you know, I try to do sort of more of a parallel parenting situation because I know that that's what we can do. That's the only thing we can do. But he continues to push more of a co parenting model and it just doesn't work. And so it results in a lot of tension and anxiety for the children. And the reason he does it is because him and his wife have a very particular image they need to hold up. And so in order to keep that image up, he needs to look like an amazing co-parent and behave like an amazing co-parent, at least on the outside. And so because of that, because of his need to project this image, which I wasn't totally clear on, you know, at the beginning, I couldn't quite figure it out. He continually comes at me because he needs it to sort of be something else. So he's pretending on the one hand to look a certain way, but he's doing other things behind the scenes. And, you know, I didn't notice for a long time the things that I was constantly on the lookout for. And because he's always around, it's like he needs to continually remind me like I can get to you. I'm around. You never know. And he doesn't follow me like he used to, but he's always around. And I have so much energy inside of me that is anxious and on the lookout and hyper vigilant. And I guess I didn't realize it was there until recently when I really was thinking, wow, every time the make and model of the same truck that he has drives by. I'm checking the license plate, I cannot stop myself, even though I tell myself, don't look, you don't need to look, it doesn't matter, I can't help myself, and my kids do the same, it's just, we have very prescriptive things in our parenting agreement, it is a very thick one in order to close loopholes, and it doesn't really matter, you know, for instance, we are supposed to never be at the kids school at the same time, and he shows up constantly, and he just needs to be around, you know, he'll park near our park, or he'll come over to my vehicle, or he'll walk past it and stare in the windows, or it's like just needing, and it's in blatant, like it's a blatant violation of the agreement, but it doesn't matter, it just, it takes a toll, and I guess I didn't realize the toll it was taking, I really thought it was going to stop, everybody kept telling me, don't worry, once the, once the money stuff is settled, it comes down, and once, you know, then after the first year or two, and it really, it really hasn't, I sort of, I like to compare like this, like the, the system of abusive behavior is like a closed energy system, and again, I'm going to sound like a nerd all over again, like I did the first time, but it's like the law of conservation of energy, right, that says the energy can't be created or destroyed, it just gets converted from one form to another, and you know, and so that's what he's like, it's like the abuse, it'll calm down in one area, and you end up with this sense of, okay, well maybe, you know, he's not texting me 40 times a day, maybe it's calm down, it really hasn't, the energy inside of him doesn't go away, it just moves to another form, and now it's shifted more into the litigation and illegal abuse, and you know, as much as the communication has calmed down, it's just another form now, and it'll just keep doing that, and I will be the subject of that abuse for a very long time, and the children, the children as well, for forever. So when you said it takes a toll on you, tell us about your feelings of what a toll means. I have very, I feel in a lot of despair, a lot of the time, I feel totally helpless, and really frustrated, I get, I bounce back and forth in this sort of energy of, like why, why won't it stop, and I get, so I get angry with myself about the thoughts that I have about it too, you know, I really don't like the thought why me, I hear this all the time, I say it all the time, people say to themselves why me, why doesn't it happen to me, and I remember my mom when I was a kid one time, you know, a teenager, and I said that, and she looked at me and said why not you, as in, and what she meant by that was it's not that you're being targeted, it's not that you're somehow special in a good or bad way, it's just sometimes things happen, and you can handle it, you can handle it, it isn't why me, like it's not a victim thing, it's not like I'm somehow the focus, and that works on from a meta perspective, you think okay, these things happen, but from a smaller perspective, he is targeting me, so I have this really, like, deep anger around that, and I feel very hopeless a lot of the time, and I don't like that feeling. We were supposed to record much earlier than we did today, because something happened over the holidays, and you were unable to record with me, so within that time, that must have been a real kind of collapse that was going on, so what happened there as far as how it affected you, because at that point, you're unable to do a day-to-day, or just keep an appointment, not that I'm upset about it, but I'm just trying to point out like this is, when it happens, and something can happen, it can be a domino effect on your ability to do things. Yeah, and I didn't take that lightly, because I know how much reliability is important to you, I've been listening to you for a long time, and I know that actually it is for me too, and I think that's why I remember, and so I didn't take that very lightly, so I had a lot of guilt around that as well, to be quite honest, because I knew that I was affecting other people, so it took a lot for me to get there, and just quickly, essentially, what happened was we had issues around the time that he dropped the kids off on Christmas Eve, and so we have a really wonky Christmas time schedule, and the way that it fell this year is he had four days before Christmas Day, and five days after Christmas Day, and the only 24-hour period I had with the children, or the children I had with me, was like new Christmas Eve to new Christmas Day, and because he decided to travel during one of the worst winter storms we've seen in many years, at least where I am, flights were delayed and canceled, and which I get, it happens, I mean, it is what it is, but the children were dropped off almost nine hours late, so our entire Christmas was gone, the big family dinner, I mean the table was set, the turkey was in the oven, the whole thing, and it all just evaporated, and unlike me, the kids get dropped off late all the time, I eat that time constantly, I don't ever do it back, you know, if he drops an off late, I stick to the schedule on the other end because it's what's best for the kids, they, I mean, you teach kids not to keep doing stuff back to people, and in this case though, I acted slightly, I wouldn't say out of character, it was a conscious choice, but I decided to take those nine hours back, and so what I did was instead of going, you know, noon to noon, I went, you know, 9 pm to 9 pm, essentially, and what that caused was, of course, that was a unilateral decision, and what it caused was him showing up at our door at noon on Christmas Day, my family was here, and you know, fashion on the door, he called the police, luckily the police didn't even reach out to me, which was good, because I'm sure the police are not in the habit of calling children out of houses, let alone on Christmas Day, and so, but the children, the issue here is the children were so distraught, and they were hiding in our, you know, walking closet, and that is what takes its toll, is the children who just are upset and scared and embarrassed, I internalized that, because I can't can't fix it, you know, I can't change this, I can't make him any different, or the situation different, I didn't what I thought was right, and I would do it again, in this case, I don't think I, it wasn't a rash decision, it wasn't reactive, it was, I felt I was justified this time, but, you know, and I knew he would punish me for it, and I knew he'd probably use the children, but I still thought it was the right thing to do, but it, the children, you know, when the kids beg you not to go back, over and over and over, and you're having to prepare your children at every transition, okay, let's talk about what we can say, or what we can do if we're uncomfortable, or you know, when the, because what happens is they get peppered with questions, which is a really good way to wear people down, and these kind of people are really good at it, and us adults don't have the ability to withstand that, unless we get out, so that's what it, it, to me, is it just, it shuts me down, the feeling of hopelessness is, is curpling. That's a lot. It is a lot, and, you know, and it ebbs and flows, you know, and yeah, I think we were supposed to record the week after, I can't remember, but it was, or a few days, I don't remember the date, but it was just, I was not going to be in any kind of space that was, like it's almost like you get clouded by these bigger emotions, like some of the emotions are just so big that they just cover everything else, and I can't think straight, it's like I'm flooded, and I need to get that under control, you know, because I do, I admit I can have, I have a, I've very strong sense of justice, so I struggle a lot when things feel so deeply unjust, that overtakes my, I don't know, my thinking, yeah. And what is you being out of control? I'm now your therapist. Yeah, yeah, I mean, that's interesting. I don't know, I'm trying to remember, because I, I work really hard, I'm like irritable, like if I'm out of control, I'm irritable about [BLANK_AUDIO] everything. You know, every tiny little thing that my loving, compassionate, wonderful husband does will just be like, oh, you know, it's, it's like it. It seeps into just every minute of my day. And I'm just, I'm just bitchy. I mean, quite frankly, because I'm, I'm, I'm pushing down because like, there's times where I want to scream or throw things or I want to drive over to his house and, you know, put a back through his windshield. But, but of course, I'm not going to do any of those things. And so it, it just, it's like it seeps out like a, like a, a saver or something. And in these bits and pieces all over. And it, like just this cloud over every day. It's not nice. So did you scream? I don't think I screamed. No. Do you want to go to the corner over there and scream away from the microphone? No, I don't think so. Not today. Anyway, it's not today. I find that, I, I, maybe I should try some of that screen therapy. Maybe that would, that would, or a radio room, cathartic or a radio room. Exactly. But again, I get afraid. I get afraid of going there. I feel like I'm going to snowball and then I can't turn it off. Like I, he, I'm just that angry with, with what he does. My therapy session with you is now complete. All for, we'll do with something else another day, or I'll actually send you to a real therapist. Have you like that? Did you, did you think that our conversation was going to be going this way at all? No, no, but I'm glad I did because I do need to talk about this stuff. And I think it adds a certain level of humanness to me that can otherwise be robotic. There's rewarding and then there's remarkably rewarding with Chase Sapphire Reserve, like earning eight times points on Chase Travel and four times on flights and hotels. Learn more at chase.com/safirereserve. Cards issued by JP Morgan Chase Bank and a member FDIC, subject to credit approval terms apply. What I might do, and I'll just share a little bit more to about the other, or terms. I talked about how, you know, we just shift away from a certain kinds of abuse and move into other ones. So I find this false hope. I had, I routinely would have this, this false sort of feeling that maybe it's, it's dying down now and it's over, but it's not. And I think that just really coming to terms with that has been really helpful for me. I started my own business about eight months ago. And when I started sharing it, you know, it's a business where I do help people like me. And when I started sharing a little bit about what I was doing and, you know, released my podcast, it, he, of course, was very upset. And so now he's filed, you know, a civil suit against me. And so I'm, I constantly, I'm already going back to court on a regular basis to, on the family side, because of your regular breaches of court orders, they're, he's still in contempt of like a four-year-old court order in terms of, it's just like a money thing. But, you know, it's just this, this constant relentless, there's always something else. And so I, you know, I had to go to court a few months ago to tame, you know, the children's passport. It's for a trip, because again, it's the same nonsense around not wanting to. We just want to make everything hard. And so now I have this civil suit as well. So as much as, I'm sure his civil lawyer told him to zip his lip, because his defamation suit was dead in the water, because this, I mean, defamation is, is non-existent as soon as all the stuff is true. And so when he, I'm sure his lawyer saw that the stuff was true and he went, okay, zip it. So he has, he has zipped it quite well, but everything else fires up. And, you know, showing up more, breaching other orders, it just, as I said, it just converts to another form. Showing up at my door, you know, he loves to just remind me that he has access to me. So he keeps me off, you know, off kilter. And as much as I love stability, like I'm off homebody, I love feeling like my feet are underneath me. And, you know, he loves to rock the boat. So the next thing about the abuse as well, then I really, I really need to come to terms with it. It's not going to be just from him. So they are going to, he will have enablers and, you know, a big one in my case is his wife. And she's his biggest supporter, his biggest flying monkey. She may or may not also be on the, you know, narcissistic spectrum. I don't really know. But there's certain, she also might be being abused as well. So it's a really terrible situation. But because of this extreme need to look at the perfect family, the two of them are like, just in this together. And, you know, they're going to come at me in every way possible. And so they talk about me to anybody and everybody who will listen. And I'm sure anybody who meets me for the first time already has a story about me. And, you know, it's just like they're like these hyper keeners that are involved in everything. It's just exhausting. But I'm a common enemy. So it works for them. Early on, I had issues from his mom and his sister as well, just terrible, nasty, you know, messages and, you know, his, and we, you know, we talk about the mothers in these scenarios. I mean, every situation is different. In my case, learning that like his family is not my ally. And I should have, I wish I realized that sooner that knowing your allies are takes time and consider everybody not an ally. I mean, you have to be rude to them. But just keep the men and arms like until you're sure because his mom was not. I thought she wasn't at all makes sense now. So you also realize that the abuse isn't just directed toward you in the aftermath of everything. So walk us through that. Yeah. So I would say the abuse other than directed towards me and through the children and to the children. It also goes towards primarily my husband, my current husband and a little bit to my, my sister and my parents early on, but primarily my husband. And so he is very, very angry towards him, obviously. And he's now, you know, he threatens you. It's funny because my husband probably has, you know, 30 pounds of muscle on my ex husband. And yet he continually tries to go him to fight him. He calls him names. He like, when, you know, the answer is the door. My husband answers the door. He's telling him to step outside and, you know, he's going to kick his ass and all this other stuff. He's shoved him trying to get him to go. He kind of a really creepy, weird story that I'll tell quickly is, I think it was last mother's day. My ex husband likes to try and bring me gifts on mother's day and force the kids to give it to me, which causes the children quite a bit of anxiety. And they plead with him not to make them do it. And he makes them do it. And at this last time, I put the gift back outside after they left. And I sent him a message that said, I do not want this. I just let that boundary. Please come collect it by such as such a time I'm going to throw it out. So he did show up. But when he was leaving, he ripped the card apart. He ripped the interior part that had his creepy note on it and put it on my husband's windshield under his wiper and left. And it's just so weird and twisted. It's like he wanted my husband to know whatever weird things were in there. I don't even remember what it was now. So yes, it doesn't stop. It goes a lot after my husband. My husband has done a very good job at keeping his composure. But it's just only because he's probably the most level human I've ever met. A lot of people would not be so fortunate. And as soon as you snap, everybody thinks that you know that you will react it or whatever. So at the beginning of the show, we use the word acceptance. So in your healing process here, what have you had to accept that you didn't realize that you had to accept earlier on? Well, I will start with the biggest thing on my list, which is the fact that I will always be the villain to many people in my life. So obviously to him, to his whoever his spouse is, I mean, I don't know. I have no idea if he'll stay with this wife, but maybe. So to her, her family, anybody they talk to, that there's just no redemption from that I and not even that I necessarily feel like I need to redeem myself. It's just that I'm evil. And you know, every time I go anywhere, I go into a meeting with a teacher, I go into, I talk to a new coach or, I don't know, anybody. I just think to myself, I wonder what they think about me already. And what if they decided about me before I even walked in the door? And I think I said this, I have it in my notes here that I say that my false reputation precedes me that I walk into a room and I just, I had good work out of any how to meet. I don't know, and there's this discomfort. My kids' friends, like their parents, I know the ones that are tighter with my ex-husband, and I communicate with them, and there's just always this discomfort. I have to get really comfortable with people not knowing my story. They don't understand, and just not feel the need to compulsively overshare, because it doesn't come across well, even if I do. And it doesn't matter, they're not entitled to it anyways. Being a rural follower at heart, it is not easy. I try very hard to live my life with integrity. That doesn't mean I don't make massive mistakes, 'cause I do, but I try really hard. It matters to me a lot to be a good person, and to try to do the right things for, you know, my kids and my family, and my friends, and everything. You know, I want to advocate for other women, and I want it, this is just part of who I am, and so being this villain, it feels, it's not me, and even with them, like not so much with him, him I don't really care, but even his wife, you know, I think to myself, there are times when I think, I wonder if I could just explain it to her, and she wouldn't think this. So the next thing on my list, actually, this is, okay, so as much as I said, the first thing is the biggest, this one's probably equally as big. This is something I repeat to myself all the time, which is I do not control him. Very early, I tried to control everything. I thought I could manage. I thought I could, as I said, back to convincing, I thought I could convince him, control what he does at his house. I could, you know, just take care of everything for my kids, and because also when we were married, I was the primary caregiver, and I did control everything, but it is just not the case. And really deeply coming to terms with the fact that his house, his rules, what they eat, what they wear, what they watch on TV, they watch terribly inappropriate movies, as far as I'm concerned, age and appropriate violence. Actually, this is the thing, it's the violence that bothers me. I actually don't care about the sex in movies. I mean, it makes them a little uncomfortable, and obviously nothing too, you know, graphic, but that's not the part that I'm worried about. It's this violence and the edit that we normalize, this violence is just not healthy. And for kids, you know, and it bothered me for so long. It bothers me the amount of control that their stepmother has, and they're so uncomfortable. My kids say we don't want to do it, but she's making us do it. And I'm so bad, you know, we'll just tell you, you don't want to, and you can't do that, because you empower kids as best as you can, but you just don't get to control. And that's a lesson I learn. I've relearned it every day. Every day when I hear about something else, I just have this ache that I want to just know, that's not how you do it. But I guess the way that I shift from that is I really do ask myself, okay, as soon as I say I can't control that. My next question is, what do I control? And a big, big part of that for me is my health. And it got to a point where I was maybe a little bit obsessive about my health, and now I've come to a better place. You can have too much of a good thing. But that is where all of my power lies now. It doesn't lie in the movies that they watch or the violence of, you know, people doing awful things to one another. It lies in what my kids see when they're here with me. And when they see someone who looks after themselves and cares about just their own health and they're healing, it's almost like an antidote. They can watch that violence, but they get the other side when they come and live with me. - So another thing that you had written down to me was that you were learning to give yourself grace. So tell us about that. So forgiving myself for marrying him. For a long time, I was so angry with myself. You know, how could you be such an idiot? How could you fall for this? How, you're like, you're smarter than this. Like when people say, I don't people think it's supportive, but I will say this to anybody who's supporting somebody in this sort of scenario, saying things like, oh, I didn't think you'd ever be in a situation like that or you just don't seem like the person who would let somebody treat you like that. Those things are super not helpful. So because I already think that about myself. I already think that it's what did I do? I'm better than this. But learning to sort of say that it happens to anybody. As I hear other survivor stories and, you know, and in this circle, this club of people. So learning to give myself a lot of grace and not being so angry with myself that I'm still checking license plates or looking over my shoulder or for the longest time, I wouldn't open my big garage door until I was in my vehicle, which parks in the garage, in my vehicle doors locked, then I would open the big garage door 'cause I was afraid he was out there waiting for me. And forgiving myself for that, 'cause I used to say like, oh, what an idiot. Stop doing that, but just letting that go. Now I don't. Now I open the garage door and I work hard. - So as far as the shame goes with everything, was it time that reduced it, like what was the biggest help for you? - Definitely time, but I would say it's how you spend that time. You need the time, but you also need to fill that time with things. If you're filling it with negative thoughts and filling it with constant, you know, this internal narrative that just beats you up all the time, that's not good. So time, but also surrounding myself with the right people. That's been a big part of it. People that just don't see it that way. People that are external to me that just don't agree with the way that I see myself. And my family, my very supportive family, my very supportive husband, my friends, the ones who have been there from the beginning, and they see me differently. And they, you know, they support my business and they love the things that I say. And they just believe in me. And actually, I had a really supportive boss as well. At the job I was at the time. And he just, he just, I don't know. He just, it's like, there's people around me that just gave me the automatic benefit of the doubt. And you just start to see things differently with enough of those people around you. - And what did you learn about parenting? - About parenting. I actually recently heard something by Dr. Guevara Mate, I think is how I pronounce his name. And he said, he was talking about how children internalize everything and they personalize everything. So when they're young, when their parents are mad or angry, they say, well, then I must be bad. I'm doing something that's caused that. But the reverse is also true. So I mean, this part of why abuse is so traumatic, I think for children is because of that internal shame that they then feel that they must be bad. But if you're happy and healthy, then they will internalize that too. My kids tell me all the time how much they love when I'm happy. Like they'll just smile at me and I'll say, what are you smiling at? And they'll say, well, mommy, you're happy. So that makes me happy. And so they really deeply personalize that. So looking after myself, looking after my kids, and just showing them what looking after themselves looks like because then they'll carry forward. I can't, so my next point on the list is that I can't rescue my kids. And so the idea is that that really, I can't rescue them. So what do I do? I show them how to rescue themselves. You know, it's like Glenn and Doyle says, like, my kids do not need me to save them. My kids need to watch me save myself. And that's because they're going to learn that. I can't save them from their father, but I can show them what taking care of themselves is like, which they're going to really need to know how to do to have him as their father for the next God knows how many years. It's 40. And that my job really is to prepare them and not protect them because I really had to come to terms with the fact that in my case, there's a good chance, and actually in many people's cases, because a good chance, the abuse won't ever be, quote, bad enough, which makes me sick to save. But the reality of it is that the family court system, the abuse really needs to be so bad. So they're going to be there half of the time, whether I want them to or not. It's about preparing them, not protecting them every minute. And in order to help that, the last thing on my list is that everything in my life centers around being calm. And so they have this ability to, I give them the space to unwind, to come down. Transition days are so hard. They're so wound up from that toxic household. I mean, he tells his kids to go F themselves and to F off. I mean, these are children. These are elementary age children. And this is very, the environment is so toxic. There's so much fighting. So I need to be the most calm. And this is what Dr. Kostiola talks a lot about, is it's about being like the calmest space possible. And, you know, my job is to show them a healthy relationship. relationships are like that's the long in the short of it and right now they can't choose what their relationships are and they can't choose the relationship they have with their dad but they will come a time where they can choose their relationships and I need to show them what it looks like. I need to be the exact opposite of their dad and his house and relationship. So before we end off our episode, our show today, do you have any words of wisdom or advice once again? I really think surrounding yourself with a community is more important than I gave it credit for especially early on. I tried to take care of everything myself and I thought it's my problem. I'll deal with it and it really proved that I needed more people around me and I needed more people that saw me differently than I saw myself and you know I would say I see myself so much worse than so many people around me including my kids and they deserve more than that and I you know I owe it to my kids to be you know what they need and I can't do that alone. And the relationships of my life are a huge part of that and so just finding communities of people by whether I mean online is good as well obviously anywhere you can find them and just have and I guess that's a little I mean I guess we hear this all the time but I didn't realize how important that was and I mean and hiring if you are hiring people whether you're hiring legal professionals or anybody else really looking for people who support where you're coming from and they they have they grasp the concept and build you up as opposed to just telling you that all the stuff you're saying is impossible and you know crazy. Well Mercedes I want to thank you for coming back and being a guest today. You're going to help a lot of people with all of your learning lessons your healing lessons you know everything that's kind of gone on since you being on the show all your revelations so thank you so much for being our guest today I really can't thank you enough you're going to help so many people so from the bottom of my heart thank you for being here. Thank you for having me again and if you want to be a guest on our show like Mercedes was today please do visit our website at Narcissistapocalypse.com top of the page there's a button that says guest form when you click on that button it takes you to our guest form page please do read all of the instructions and other send us an email at [email protected] or fill out our guest form and press the submit button and please do send it in the format that we ask for also at our website we have our very own support group so if you need support please do join our support group today it's a very own safe social network by pressing the support group button at the top of the page there you will find that we have zoom meetings every Wednesday night Thursday afternoons and Saturday nights and we have forum boards read a post on to your validation to get support for everything that you're going through people on there are survivors like yourself who have gone through it or who are going through it and it's just a great community for you to really have your experience validated and to get as much support as you can so please do join our support group today and if you need even more support please do visit our friends at domestic shelters.org they have articles and resources they are free to help you make sense of what you are dealing with they have every phone number every email address every web address for shelters and domestic valence agency no matter how big or small the town you are from and they have it on domestic shelters.org it is a wonderful organization so please do go visit them today and that is it for today's episode so for myself and Mercedes we hope you have a good night there's rewarding and then there's remarkably rewarding with chase sapphire reserve like enjoying access to our award-winning lounges with two complimentary guests every time you travel learn more at chase.com/sapphire reserve cards issued by jp morgan chase bank and a member FDIC subject to credit approval terms apply