17 Salvos of Silence
Silence is golden. Or rather, it is a golden weapon when deployed by our kind. The use of silent treatment against our victims is a major part of our portfolio of abusive manipulations. Easy to implement, very low in terms of energy expended but capable of reaping such considerable rewards in terms of fuel, control, the assertion of superiority and the administration of power, it is little wonder that we use it regularly. The application of silence can be used virtually at any time and in nearly every situation. This cold fury causes frustration, upset, fearfulness, concern, confusion and bewilderment. It is perfect at drawing fuel from our victims. It is astonishing just how it affects those it is used against, causing the emotional fuel to froth and spill from the perplexed and worried individual. It causes anxiety and has a most unsettling effect which ensures that those who are subjected to it are unable to understand why it is being used. By maintaining a heightened emotional state, we ensure that you never manage to grasp what is happening and why this passive aggressive tactic is being used. It plays to your desire to know what is happening and why, but you do not realise. You hover around us, asking what is wrong, why are you not speaking to me, what is the matter, please just talk to me. Every sentence you utter, every plea you make and every beseeched demand just makes us continue it all the more. In those instances, where the silent treatment is administered and we remain proximate to you, we will maintain a glacial mask. An impassive fixed expression which may be punctuated by the occasional baleful glare, but underneath this mask we are smiling and laughing at you. Look at how upset she is, see the confusion in her eyes and wait for it, here comes another question, another plea, another request to be put out of her misery. How the fuel flows and we revel in what we see.
Even when the silent treatment is utilised against you from a distance and we are not physically with you, we are savouring just how you will be reacting. We can picture you frantically jabbing your ‘phone as you send text after text asking us to come home, to call you and just explain what the problem is. We listen to your tear-infused voicemails as you ask us to just let you know that we are okay. Your sobbing promises to work things out and “whatever I have done, I am sorry, but please, please don’t do this to me.” Of course your failure to understand what you have done is used against you in two ways so that you are damned either way. Your admission that you do not know what you have done (which of course is entirely correct, how could you know what has happened when we just walked out of the living room when everybody was say quietly watching television?) just serves to underline, in our minds, that we are right to take this course of action. Good Lord, why should we bother to contact you if you cannot even be bothered to work out what you have done wrong. All the more reason to keep this silence going for a while longer yet. Furthermore, because it is so effective at troubling you and keeping you guessing as to what the reason for this icy front is, we want to continue it.
The silent treatment is used for many reasons. First and foremost, as with all manipulations, it is used to draw fuel. It is to exert control over you. It is to keep you in an emotional place and thus paralysed, unable to see what is happening and unable to think clearly. It is to reinforce that we are powerful, superior and mighty, whilst you are useless and pathetic. You do not know how to please us, you do not know how to remedy matters and you cannot even work out what you have done. You are useless.
There is also a further reason why we use the silent treatment. This is our way of killing you. True enough there are those of our kind who actually do kill their victims. Those people are idiots. They lack control, function and competence and allow their knee-jerk response to override their need for fuel and the ability to do as we please. By committing such an act, by losing control and killing, those of our kind who do this (invariably the lesser of our kind) not only destroy their primary source of fuel (often with no true contingency in place) but they then hand themselves on a plate to the authorities, a prison sentence and the attendance diminution in fuel gathering opportunities that arise from incarceration. As I wrote, they are idiots.
Those of us who exert control over our responses, those of us who are of a higher function, who plot and plan and calculate, do not go down such a route. No, instead we slay with silence and here are seventeen salvos which bring about that quiet death.
- Remaining in the room and saying nothing and not even acknowledging you.
- Remaining silent but staring malevolently at you.
- Talking to others in a social gathering but blanking you.
- Ignoring your telephone calls.
- Answering your telephone calls but saying nothing as we listen to you beg and plea before ending the call.
- Ignoring your text messages.
- Allowing you to know we have read your messages but never responding.
- Responding to everybody else’s comments on a social media post but not yours.
- Inviting everybody in a social group to which you belong, to an event, but not inviting you.
- Agreeing to meet for a date and not turn up.
- Sleeping in the spare room or on the sofa, anywhere but in the bed with you.
- Walking out all of a sudden and completely disappearing.
- Not engaging with you directly but acknowledging your existence through a third party – “John, did you hear something then? I thought I heard something squeak/whine/moan” used when you speak.
- Extending the silent treatment so it is meted out by lieutenants and members of the coterie.
- Responding to any written communication from you by writing “I do not recognise the sender of this letter/message/e-mail”
- We talk to you but only about our day, what we want to discuss and do not allow you to speak. We talk over you, ignore what you have to say and behave as if we are talking to ourselves in the mirror.
- You hear from other parties that we have been talking in terms as if you do not exist – “Yes, I am going to the wedding next week, I am happy to do so on my own, I am not being controlled then.” Even though you had no idea that we have such a plan in mind. Your existence has been eradicated and deleted by us and relayed back to you by proxy.
Yes, the application of the silent treatment is powerful indeed. It is regarded as a “death blow” against you.
Murdering without feeling has never been so damn appealing.
35 thoughts on “17 Salvos of Silence”
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HG: just to follow up on your answer, if as a former IPPS I responded nicely, albeit in few words, to a benign hoover and exN went silent for a few weeks, is this silent treatment or something else on his part? Just wondering what I may expect. Would appreciate your insight.
It is likely that you have been placed on the shelf. Although you are the former IPPS, you are being treated in a shelf manner. He has hoovered for fuel, got some and then there has been no need to hoover further, thus back on the shelf you go.
Thank you HG. Much appreciated. Had no idea that former IPPSs could also be shelved.
Dear HG: am a former IPPS currently discarded/disengaged and have known exN for over 15 yrs. If I respond to a benign email hoover and then the exN goes silent for weeks would that be considered silent treatment? And if so, is it aimed at maintaining exN’s presence in my thoughts or something else?
It depends on how you responded.
Ok I must be a freak because I loved the silent treatments ( once I figured out that’s what was going on ). It was like a vacation. Even as a teenager when my mother would use them, she’d be slamming doors, making all kinds of noise and I’d just soak the absence of her voice in and giggle at her transparency. She was getting all worked up for nothing because I wasn’t taking the bait. My father used to say oh well she’ll get happy again. Unfortunately she stopped using them once she caught on.
IdaNoe
I always enjoyed my mothers silent treatments, too.
Thank you HG. Am a former IPPS in the dynamic (discarded/disengaged for the fourth time or so; have known exN for over 15yrs).
Dear HG: would it be considered silent treatment if one responds to an email hoover from a mid ranger who then proceeds to ignore for weeks? If so, what is the purpose of such ST? Just making his presence felt or more?
It depends on where you are in the dynamic with the narcissist.
Thank you. Am a former IPPS (discarded/disengaged for the fourth time ir so; have known exN for over 15yrs).
hahaha The time He was silent to me after I found out the truth. I would call his cell phone and leave messages to fill it up wear he could not get anyone to leave a message. I would say one two three four..Or I would leave a song. “Who let the dogs out” so he got supply that was very irritating, Who let the dogs out was fitting hahahaha
He is DEAD , that’s too funny! 😁
Hello H.G, goodnight. One question, being an IPSS (even a candidate), I never reacted to a silent treatment, sometimes I did it for a day, for a week. and even for 1 month. However, he contacted me again, sometimes after “avenging” me with “more difficult tests”, for example once, he sent me a series of photos of chats with other women to WhatsApp (he told me that the phone had been cloned) but then I came to the conclusion that it was he who was trying to extract negative fuel. The question is, why did he come back, I know about Hoover, but did he really seem determined to try to “control” me? Why the energy expenditure, this was for 18 months? It is a challenge? Or is it the evil one? Is it possible that even if I have not responded to silence, I will continue in the idealization? His ex-wife was in devaluation, he also used me to give himself “value” before her. Thanks
He came back for fuel. There was a Hoover Trigger and the Hoover Execution Criteria were met.
Ok “The phone had been cloned” omg I cant stop laughing at the outrageous shit they try to pass off hahahaha
Oh yeah! At first I do not get angry for not giving pleasure to his ex-wife, who was the one who supposedly cloned him, so for not showing jealousy his cold fury was worse, he denied me sex and then he sent me a message. picture of his erect penis, and he wrote me “Look, I’m selfish”, then at 2 weeks he made a false discard, supposedly to go back to his ex-wife, I said ok, I can not force anyone to love me, I want that whoever is with me wants to be, the next day he called me and told me he was confused, that he wanted to be with me. Nothing I did was bother him, it was really what I felt, I do not usually chase people, but the whole thing came out like the coyote with the roadrunner After 2 months of this last “test” I got angry and started the contact 0 , I really thought that I could help him and that he was a good person, always I saw the abandoned child with an unhappy childhood …
I have a repertoire of a thousand lies more, as H.G says I breathed, he lied
Lol. You dependent slug. I’m able to exist happily in your pathetic silence. It’s a blessing.
HG. You had told me in an email consult that if an SIPSS ignores a text it could wound and she would be given a corrective devaluation thru a silent treatment.
How would the SIPSS know about the silent treatment if they are on the shelf?
Thanks
The next time the SIPPS tried to contact the narcissist they would be ignored through the silent treatment.
-#1, 2, 6 and 7 that’s my N-ex. Completely ignoring my existance, not answering questions, say nothing, stare at me, walk out on me, etc. (honestly, what a relief to be divorced now)
-N-boyfriend gave me silent treatments by disappaearing from Social Media, so no contact either.
-Matrinarc used to give silent treatments at home, could last 5 days (these treatments ended when my father would beat one of us up, after that she would speak again). These days her silent treatment are like not reacting to anything on our family Whatsapp. Also if, for instance, I ask her how my dad’s trip abroad was, she will not respond, as this is not about her. If she wants attention, she will write: “I’m not feeling well, I think it is my heart, bla, bla…”
Then in the next message she’l write a non-existing word, like “pla “……. and then nothing…
Because we know her, nobody responds. The next day I’ll ask “what is ‘pla’? And then she’ll say something like “ooh well.. that was a mistake”.
It’s not. It’s to upset us, first telling her heart is not okay, and then give us the idea that she’s having a heart-attack.
Unfortunately, the day she would really have a heart attack, nobody’s going to believe her. Same thing happened to her mother. Always ill to get attention. The time she was realy ill, nobody believed her and she died in the hospital 2 days later.
How about if he plays music with his headphones on and sings aloud to block me out? This is akin to the silent treatment, and possibly even more irritating. He’s only 28. Do they start that young?
The one I met is 18…and after I read all articles published in the last days, I came to think that he is a master, believe me…today is my first day of silent treatment. This is the end
I’m sorry, Adelina. 18 is young. What a shame. He’ll never be happy or give you what you need in a relationship. I hope you can remove yourself from it. Silent treatments are the worst. If I’ve done some perceived wrong, or if I want to discuss something, he’ll simply turn on his headphones and sing to himself like I’m not there. I told him that so disrespectful. He says he does it to everyone.
Is leaving the “Mother” line blank (or N/A) when filling out a child’s emergency contact form a purposeful tactic similar to the silent treatment when the form is filled out by the Narcissist father? What about not opening or answering messages on a court-ordered parent communication site even though responses are required prior to 48 hours? I understand that the Narc does not follow rules, but is there more behind this than just entitlement?
Leaving the line blank is provocation and is a denial of your status.
The failure to open or reply to messages is a silent treatment.
I used to be astonished when she would be doling out the silent treatment to me and then call her mother on the phone and be so nice to her. Like nothing was even happening!
Are passive hoovers provocation? Or are they a precursor to malign of benign hoovers? Or is it A Narc whose likely well fueled and not interested in making an attempt to hoover, but if you go to them then they’ll gladly accept your fuel ?
Provocation.
This is tantamount to a fuel threesome or menage a trois, albeit incestuous and non-physical! You, her, mommy…FUEL, FUEL, FUEL! She gets to be in the middle, of course! Hehe!
What happens when a narc fails to prevoke? Do they get angry?
I
Shift to a different form of manipulation or seek fuel elsewhere.
The old lemme see what else I have in my bag of tricks lol Makes sense thank you 🙂