This post is a somewhat poetic version of trauma and explores the Narcissistic Abuse Cycle
It starts slow.
Yet steady.
It grows in the shadows.
You can’t see it—
but you feel it tapping on your shoulder.
I’m here, it whispers.
I’m wreaking havoc in your bones.
Destroying your cells.
It’s the symptom:
A headache.
A headache you don’t think about.
Mostly because you don’t have to.
It went as fast as it came.
A twinge in your lower back.
A self-inflicted injury, you think.
But then—
the symptoms show up more often.
They linger.
You should probably get them checked.
But maybe another week will fix it.
Then one day,
you wake up,
and you can’t move your arm.
You swear just yesterday you were fine.
But you weren’t.
The MRI tells the truth.
You’ve been sick.
And blind to the small signs.
Now your suffering screams louder—
the sound echoing through sand,
the same sand where you buried your head.
The cancer has killed so many cells
that the only cure
is to kill the healthy ones, too.
And start anew.
The Narcissist
This is where emotional abuse from a narcissist lives—
and how it works.
It abuses,
then it loves,
then it punishes.
A cycle so quiet,
so strategic,
that recognition feels like betrayal.
Not of them—
but of yourself.
They ignore you for your mistake.
But they won’t tell you what the mistake was.
That would give you a chance—
a chance to do the right thing.
To be the good person you are.
And that?
That’s too dangerous.
Because the fumes of your virtue
would suffocate their control.
They don’t want good relationships.
Ones that bloom into reciprocity flowers.
That hurts their tiny, broken shadow of an ego—
an ego masquerading as self-worth.
But it’s not.
It’s emotionally starved.
So malnourished,
that even acknowledging your decency
would flatline it.
So they come back—
hoping you didn’t see the slit they cut behind your ribs.
And if you do bring it up—
address the symptom?
You’re a hypochondriac.
Overdramatic.
They weaponize amnesia.
Rewrite the timeline.
Fuel to rehash the past?
They’re running on fumes.
The Cycle
So back you go.
To the hamster wheel of ignorance.
Your feet move.
Your body tires.
But you’re getting nowhere.
And the Narc?
They keep feeding poison to your emotional health.
This is their door—
the one they slam when they’re punishing you.
But they can’t open it respectfully.
Respect would kill them.
Their conceit only survives on scraps.
So they lurk.
They wait for you to mistake their absence for punishment—
when really, it’s a gift.
They come back,
not with an apology.
Not with change.
But with dinner you bought
and expect to eat in peace.
The Treatment
That’s why you need chemo.
The healthy cells in you—
the kind, forgiving ones—
they want to fix it.
They want to save what’s broken
without causing more damage.
But the malignancy?
It’s merciless.
To survive,
you have to let the good die, too.
For a while.
You have to become unrecognizable.
You’ll look in the mirror—
hair gone,
skin dull,
eyes hollow.
You won’t see you.
Because ignoring the pleas,
resisting the urge to follow breadcrumbs—
that was never in your DNA.
But if you want to survive the abuse,
you have to relinquish the benevolent cells.
The Recovery
Your hair will grow back.
Your skin will glow again.
And one day,
so will your love.
Your trust.
Your hope.
But only after you’ve
banished the part of you that gave a damn
and starved the toxicant
of the power it fed on.
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