The pain of regret due to staying in a toxic relationship far outweighs the pain of leaving it.

When you leave an abusive relationship, you're breaking free from a toxic person who will never value you as a human being. While there is a period of overwhelming pain that comes with leaving a narcissist, the longer you're away from them, the more you are able to see what an empowering choice you've made…and get to work on healing and reconnecting with yourself.

But, when we stay in toxic relationships, we lose in every area of our lives.

We lose other important relationships with friends and family. People we loved and who loved us. This often includes our own children!

We lose our self-respect, our joy for life, and our motivation.

We lose our careers, our homes, and often…custody of our children.

In the process, targets of narcissistic abuse often develop gravely serious medical conditions, some of which turn out to be fatal.

There is also the possibility that we can develop neurocognitive decline (I've worked with clients who were former academics and can no longer read a simple paragraph).

As you can see, there is nothing to gain by staying in a relationship with a narcissist. There is only so much that we're at risk of losing.

I can tell you from thousands of case studies the pain of staying in a toxic relationship far outweighs the pain of leaving it.

We all think we'll be the exception, but none of us are.

Always thinking of you.

Bahati