The Wrong No Contact
No Contact.
This is what anybody who has been a victim of our kind must achieve. Whether that status of victim stems from being a friend to a narcissist where you are taken for granted, used when the narcissist needs a lift or someone to moan to or whether it is the beaten down and trampled Intimate Partner Primary Source who was wife, boyfriend or partner has endured and suffered extensive abuse, no contact is the antidote.
Building that robust and effective wall of no contact can be difficult. It is time consuming, requires rigour and perseverance and not only are you trying to repel the advances of the narcissist who is trying to breach your no contact regime, you also have to fight against yourself and your emotional thinking which is trying to make you breach no contact as well. Indeed, it is often your emotional thinking which proves to be the harder enemy to conquer and it is not a one-off battle. Your emotional thinking, because of who you are and the emotional infection your engagement with the narcissist has caused, means that this is an ongoing battle which requires your repeated vigilance. Through the application of understanding and building your Logic Defences, the task does become easier, but it is not one which goes away. Like any wall, it must be checked, maintained and patrolled, otherwise holes and breaches occur and the narcissist will impact on you once again.
Time and time again I see people who think they have put in place no contact and they have not. Sometimes it almost beggars belief that the victim thinks they have established no contact – it is obvious they have not. In other instances you could be forgiven (if forgiveness was something I gave) for thinking you have implemented no contact but in actual fact you have not. There are many instances where people think they have instigated no contact and all they have done is embark on The Wrong No Contact. Here are just a few of the many ways in which you might be getting no contact wrong and the risks that come with this.
- Looking At Social Media
Just because the narcissist does not explicitly know you have looked at his or her social media does not mean this is no contact. Indeed, we rely on you doing so and expect you to look at our social media, that is why in certain instances you are not blocked from looking at our Facebook account, Twitter feed, Instagram and so forth. We want you to look at it. Just because you are not interacting directly with us, just because you are not commenting and we are not replying, just because you are not adding likes – this is not no contact. If you are looking at our social media you are likely to see indirect jibes made about you, Relationship Bulletins about your replacement, reminders of the golden period and even direct attacks against you. This will result in :-
- a risk you will be upset, hurt, angry
- the maintenance of the emotional infection because you are thinking about us
- a surge of emotional thinking which may cause you to contact us to attack us for our barbed comments towards you, to seek answers when you are upset about the reminder of an anniversary or similar
- stopping you from moving forward
2. Not Blocking Our Number
You may think that it will be the first thing you will do when you commence no contact. You block our number from your telephone and mobile phone so that we cannot call or text you from the relevant number. Of course we may get around this by using a different device therefore that is why you are better served by changing your telephone numbers, but if you do not change the numbers then you ought to block the new number of ours which appears and keep doing so, like a matador dodging the on rushing bull each time to avoid harm.
Nevertheless, the number of occasions I see people who claim they are no contact but they have not blocked our number is higher than you might think. These people think that if they, as victim, do not contact us, then that is no contact. No, it is not. Of course, those people who do not block the number are giving in to their emotional thinking because they WANT the narcissist to contact them.
If you do not block our number, this is not no contact. One of the easiest hoovers for us to perform is to text you. It uses no effort, it brings with it a reduced consequence of wounding (say compared to ringing you on the telephone or seeing you in person) and allows the drawing of fuel. If you do not block our number, you are lowering the hoover bar to such a low level that hoovers are more or less inevitable.
The emotional thinking of victims tells them things such as :-
- It is over, there was a ‘final discard’ he will never contact me anyway;
- If she does text me, I won’t reply and that will wound her, so actually I am ‘winning’;
- There might be an emergency and therefore I cannot block him
Utter rubbish.
There is no such thing as a final discard. We will contact you, subject to the Hoover Trigger being activated and the Hoover Execution Criteria being met. If you do not block us, this is going to happen. You will be hoovered.
If you allow a text through, you are maintaining the emotional infection and you will suffer a surge in emotional thinking which may very well result in you responding and before you know it, you are not only providing fuel but you are being drawn back into the Formal Relationship. Months later you will ask ‘how the hell did that happen?’ Every text which arrives adds more and more to your emotional thinking until such time that you can no longer resist. Oh, I hear your protestations that you can resist but i have witnessed such resolve melt away. If you are playing Russian roulette and pull the trigger once and do not blow your brains out, you have survived. Pick the gun up again and again and again and eventually you will kill yourself. This is the similar effect of repeatedly engaging with us by allowing those texts through – you WILL succumb.
So what if there is an emergency? I know you are kind, decent and honest but we are no longer your concern in that respect. You need to remind yourself that you have no obligation towards us (of course our perspective will make us tell you differently) and therefore that False Suicide Power Play Hoover is not something you have to deal with. If you co-parent establish a mechanism whereby the narcissist e-mails routine communication to you. You tell the narcissist in advance that you will check the e-mails once a week at a set time and never deviate from this. This way you cater for communication regarding the children but only expose yourself once a week to potential hoovers. When the narcissist realises this is being done, see how the hoover attempts diminish. If you need a mechanism for emergency communication, tell the narcissist to contact a third party who will then contact you. Use this gate keeper.
3. Keeping our telephone number
You may say that you will not use it and therefore think that this is no contact, but once again, this is not no contact. With our number sat in your phone, even if you have changed the description to ‘Arsehole Number One’ , ‘Shit 4 Brains’ or ‘Narcopath’ you are creating problems :-
- You see the name and number and you are then reminding yourself of us and thus this is a form of Ever Presence ;
- You are leaving open a gateway. There will be an occasion when your emotional thinking surges and causes you to try to contact us. If our number if there you will use it and message us or ring us. If there is no number, you cannot call us.
Do not come up with the nonsense of ‘I have memorised the number so I will remember it anyway so what difference does it make if I keep the number in my phone?’ Bollocks. Your memory is fallible and over time if you have not used our number, you will eventually forget it altogether or at least get some numbers mixed up. If it is still in your directory, you will ring it.
Delete that number. Do it and do it immediately.
4. Talking to friends and family about us
You may think that because you are not engaging with us directly then this must mean no contact is in place. It is not in place if you continue to talk about us to your friends and your family. This is causing you to engage with us, albeit indirectly. All this does is result in :-
- You continuing to think about us with the consequential impact on your emotions;
- The continued feeding of the emotional infection which you should be purging, not feeding ;
- Allowing your emotional thinking to surge with the risk this may control you once again and you end up contacting us or succumbing to a direct hoover with all that follows from that
It is of course inevitable that you will discuss the situation with your family and friends especially when you do not understand what you are dealing with. However, once you realise you are dealing with a narcissist then there does not need to be any more discussion. If you are not sure whether the person is, do not discuss it with your family and friends, they invariably have no idea whether the person is or not, they have no expertise. Indeed, they may well be revelling in joining in the ‘narc hating’ sessions which are actually not helping you at all. Alternatively, they may well be sick of hearing you going on about him or her and want you to shut up, but tolerate it out of a sense of loyalty. If you are unsure, ask me and I will give it to you straight, one way or the other.
Once you know, you go.
No more debating it with your best friend. No more mulling it over with your football mates after the game in the pub. No more ‘ifs and buts’ discussions with your parents. This person is a narcissist and you are not to dedicate any time to discussing this person. If you have to discuss an arrangement concerning the narcissist because they are collecting the children from your parents, then that is allowable but keep it to that. You do not need to tell people what the narcissist did or said. All you are doing is repeating this person is a narcissist, you already know this, they already know this, so why keep going on about it?
You do it because your emotional thinking wants you to do so. It wants you poring over the latest misbehaviour because it craves the horrified gasps from your friends or looks of disapproval from your mother. You do not need these responses.
Do not talk about us. Explain to your friends you do not want the narcissist spoken about to you. If they try to do so, politely explain again that this person means nothing to you anymore and therefore there is no need to talk about them.
5. Watching what we are doing
You may make the intelligence agencies proud of your covert observation of us as you watch where we go, who we are with and what we are doing. You do not need to do this. Again, once you know what we are, get out and stay out. Yes, I understand it is so tempting to know what we are up to, are we seeing someone else, what does he or she look like, why are we going to these places but all you are doing is succumbing to your emotional thinking which is conning you into maintaining a link with us.
Your emotional thinking will tell you that it is permissible to engage in this behaviour because you are not contacting us directly, you are merely observing. These are examples of your emotional thinking conning you into thinking this stalking and observation is a good idea
- You are gathering evidence to tell other people what we are doing to confirm what you have told them previously (you do not need to – you know what we are, that is all you need, you do not have to persuade other people)
- You are gathering evidence for a court case (you do not have to do it – hire somebody to do this or if you cannot afford to do that, have a friend or family member do it – also question whether you really need to this evidence)
- You want to know who the narcissist is seeing so you can warn this person about us (part of your decent nature but unnecessary – you owe the new person no such obligation to warn then and in any event it is unlikely you will be believed because of the smearing we will have done against you)
- You just need to know for your own piece of mind (utter nonsense, you do not need to know at all)
Recognise these sleights of mind by your emotional thinking and act on them.
If you keep watching us, all you are doing is
- Creating harmful emotions that impact on you
- Keeping the emotional infection alive and growing
- Causing your emotional thinking to surge so you contact us directly
- Being spotted by us and suffering a hoover (benign or malign)
- Being spotted by us and being on the end of a restraining order or similar for harassment etc
These are just five examples of The Wrong No Contact. There are many more. Be alert for them, recognise them and understand why you are not implementing no contact. Stop letting your emotional thinking con you.
Once you know, you go.
Get out, stay out.
28 thoughts on “The Wrong No Contact”
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Hi HG, a family member of my ex narc went to a family reunion. He was there but didn’t show his face for the whole two days they were in town. They were really perplexed as to why. They didn’t know at the time we had split. And he had always presented himself to everyone he was the perfect caring loving gentleman. Was his hiding because he thought I’d exposed him? I have been no contact for over 18 months now and he’s not tried to contact/ hoover me although I’ve had a few dodgy Instagram and fb requests which I have ignored
It is difficult to provide an accurate answer without more information about the relevant individual and the circumstances prior to the reunion. I recommend you utilise an email consultation https://narcsite.com/private-e-mail-consultation/ so you can provide me with more information and I can then give you an accurate answer.
Ok thank you and will do
I deleted the narcs number but did not block it. At the time I had no idea what he was. He is still blocked on social media and if he has spies on there, oh well. I’m on it maybe once a week and if he tries a Hoover because my wall isn’t thick enough I’ll just have to add a few more layers. This is not confidence that I’m so over it I can handle it. I have a place to for help (here) and measures I can put in place should the need arise.
I’ve raised the bar as much as I can for the moment. I’m too tired to do much else.
Sir Tudor, exactly correct & excellent writing, as usual, of course. Wish I wasn’t so curious or nosy. You’re right, not our business.
What amazes me HG, is the fact not only do you know what other N’s are thinking but you also know what are our excuses for not deleting or because in our head, this is the FINAL DISCARD. It’s rather facinating how you hit that right on the head. Mind blown! Is it wrong I want to mess with him when and if a hoover comes back. I won’t respond which will anger him. And then that will cause his mind to wander thinking I’m with another man. Maybe I feel a bit vindictive with everything he has put me through.
Ex’s that know nothing about NPD won’t go NC.
That’s why today N-ex hub is dating his ex again (left her for me 29 years ago)
That’s why musician Narc’s ex started following him again on SM, after they broke up last year and she later unfollowed him.
That’s why I know these thing, because I didn’t go NC with either of them.
The N/E force is strong.
HG may I ask a question .your wisdom would really help me here.Whatever you advise I will stick to rigidly.
I am doing well again got back on the GOSO horse .
However my birthday is coming up very soon .I don’t know if this will be a Hoover trigger and I know it will be a dangerous time for emotional thinking to creep in.
Ex narc toyed with me , then dropped off the face of the earth again last month ,ignored my last contact .This pattern was constant.
I really don’t know if I will get a boring happy birthday I doubt it ,but if I do ,how do I react .
Do I ignore completely I actually want to but,I fear this will give him negative fuel.
Do I just give a cold polite one word cheers , like I do not care why he disappeared again.
I’m confused but instinct is telling me IGNORE , I bet this question is even borne out of emotional thinking .
A birthday is a hoover trigger, however your comment suggests that a hoover will get through to you – why is that? Why is your no contact regime so robust that this cannot happen? That is what you need to be focussing on – stop the hoover even getting through.
Thank you HG
You are right HG you got me there , red faced now.
I must block him I know , I feel ridiculous. Weirdly I feel I have some control when he is not blocked , stupid thinking I know now.
I keep stupidly thinking if I block him he will see this as being fuel or me looking for him to chase me down .
Ok stop myself with the lame excuses ,I know you see right through them , so do I who am I kidding , no one . I’m going to block him right now Sir Tudor.
Guilty, guilty, guilty of #3, 4 and 5. To my credit, I am tenacious, with time it is getting better, but I’m still not 100% well. I get triggered and my emotional thinking is my worst enemy. It has been 6 months since physical contact or last time I saw him. I can’t seem to hurry this recovery. I wish I could.
I keep his cell #. I’ve told myself it is to keep the text msgs should I ever need to go to court or defend myself (bull roar), I’m in therapy so still talk about him, but socially I excuse myself from saying his name, and just the other day I almost drove by where he was working to see if he’s still around (difficult to resist). Is there any hope for me???
Do not trust to hope, instead rely on my material. Remove his cell number and I suggest you organise a GOSO consultation with me as I will ensure you move forward.
One of the most satisfying moments of the whole shit storm of having a narcissist refuse to give up trying to destroy my marriage was when I emailed her last year to tell her to stop talking about my husband and asking about “how we’re doing” to mutual friends. She immediately emailed my husband, and I immediately blocked her from his email. She was livid, LOL.
Her last email to me (she would try to email him after being blocked and then forward her email to me after she got the “not accepting email from you” message, LOL) said “If she doesn’t stop I’m going to do something about it! Make her stop!” Of course I didn’t stop, because I know how badly she needs to have the last word. I emailed her back, laughing at her plea to “make me stop” and told her to keep my husband’s name out of her lying mouth.
That bitch didn’t email me again. It’s no fun to tangle with the woman who snatched her husband back from you and is impervious to your ranting.
I am your worst pupil, HG, I just don’t learn it.
I wasn’t sure up till now if my eldest sister is a narcissist, and hadn’t put too much thought into it, but no doubt left now. She was supposed to be a witness for me in court, but wrote 3 weeks before the court date directly to the court, without consulting me or my lawyer, that she didn’t want to come as she was giving pottery lessons that day and she couldn’t say anything about the matter, and also that I had vanished to a foreign country without her knowledge (which isn’t even true, but I hadn’t exactly asked her permission). She had before agreed with me on being a witness and to what she would be able to testify for.
I got so furious that I answered her horrible!! e-mail (all about money and who was supposed to look after our mother) after several months now, asking her what she thought she was doing, and if she had thought about the consequences at all. As the mention of my (non-) residency outside our country can even lead to me loosing my insurance.
I had also then answered her money and care-for-mother questions, for the first time telling her that I knew about her grand arrangement with my parents, when she had gotten all the money my grandfather had intended for us all, but my father then inherited all himself; and when she then had built a house for my parents, but in her name. Which she had never bothered mentioning to me. And telling her that this wasn’t my decision to have our mother live in her house in her village now because of this and that I had no intention to move there, too, like … why would I.
I had also mentioned that she didn’t know about my plans because she had never had any interest in any of my plans, problems, whatever, but especially not one year ago when I had severe health problems, and she didn’t care at all what would become of me.
–> –> So, the point is – her answers are of course without exception: she has no responsibility, nothing is her fault, she had just written the truth to the court, she was entitled to the money and everything she ever did and she has nothing to do with the consequences of her doings, and nothing was her decision anyways. (My mother says my father had decided and she had nothing to do with it, now my sister says the same). No word about my health, or anything else concerning me, other than “she had her own problems”. Not a single word about what any of that means for me, and not a single question about how I am doing.
And I just should have maintained no contact and not gotten provoked to answer any of her abusive claims, and not reacted to her letter to court at all.
HG,
as I learned narcissists are totally consumed by the seduction of a new shiny object which in their mind would be a great IPPS. But sometimes, if they discarded former IPPS recently, they like to play with their ex’s emotional state to drink some negative fuel from former partner and mix it with fresh fuel from a new shiny toy they are seducing..
But what if the discard took place a year ago, a victim has moved on, a narcissist is blocked for months and the former partner doesn’t produce any fuel and also at the same time there is a new victim a narcissist tries hard to ensnare as his new IPPS? I would say provoking a reaction from the former partner doesn’t make sense in this situation, all the hoovers are doomed, the ex do not rect so he should focus on a new toy.
So why a narcissist tries to hoover a former victim with passive hoovers (listening to his former partner’s songs online for example) between the dates with a new candidate for the IPPS?
As a low-energy method of hoping to provoke the former IPPS into breaking no contact.
This makes me wonder if we are been told to go “No Contact” with you, HG, in order to prove that we are truly “ceasing the power”? Maybe it is a test.
You are sincere and convincing, and a rescuing hero. Though mine is at work, until I go, I have started gray rock. It feels good too, getting over this, and not having to care anymore about him. It’s true though, any interactions put him on my mind the rest of the day. But I don’t see him everyday anymore. The knowledge you give us is everything.
Yes, dear.
“Once you know, you go.” I need to put this on my fridge door. Thank you Mr. Tudor.
Pleasure.
How do you block their number when you are going through a divorce and have a child involved? No orders have been made for custody and I left, I have my child and he’s saying I just took him. How is this going to work in court if I block his number?
Consult with me and I will give you all the tools you need to co-parent with a narcissist and protect yourself.
Superb article.
Accurate, funny and constructively instructive.
(As usual)
HG. If you block from your phone and then unblock because you think it has been 2 months and the narc will have given up by now is the narc checking to see when you unblock as to hoover you again?
Block and stay blocked. Do not run the risk.
If the narcissist is not blocked on Facebook, he will perceive this as a sign that I am not over him, and that I am spying or interested in him, and that I want contact. Right?
Does blocking on social media wound the narcissist?
It depends on what else is going on his fuel matrix and your position in it. He may not even notice that he is blocked/not blocked. If he is not blocked, there is an electronic conduit that remains open and you will be hoovered at some juncture.
Blocking on social media does wound the narcissist when the narcissist tries to hoover through social media and finds he cannot.