Adelyn Birch > Quotes

“If you fear that defending your boundaries is being controlling, don't worry. There is a difference between being controlling and having boundaries. Controlling people is about telling them what to do. Setting boundaries is about saying what you do or do not want to happen to you.”
― Adelyn Birch, Boundaries After a Pathological Relationship

“Beware of relationships that substitute intensity for emotional intimacy.”
― Adelyn Birch, Boundaries After a Pathological Relationship

“If we're highly empathetic and emotionally sensitive we're at greater risk of becoming involved with a manipulator.”
― Adelyn Birch, Boundaries After a Pathological Relationship

“Abuse can take many forms. It always involves a boundary violation, although every boundary violation is not necessarily abuse.”
― Adelyn Birch, Boundaries After a Pathological Relationship

“A manipulator belittles a victim by using behavior or language that diminishes or mocks his or her opinions, ideas, feelings, looks, or achievements. Belittling can be accomplished non-verbally through the use of eye-rolls, scoffs, or smug smiles; and verbally by using sarcastic, condescending, or mocking tones. An abuser will sometimes disguise belittling as supposed harmless joking.”
― Adelyn Birch, 30 Covert Emotional Manipulation Tactics: How Manipulators Take Control In Personal Relationships

“You might be a victim of gaslighting if you apologize often, have trouble making decisions, have changed significantly over the course of the relationship, feel you're in a constant state of bewilderment, or have become reclusive and withdrawn.”
― Adelyn Birch, 30 Covert Emotional Manipulation Tactics: How Manipulators Take Control In Personal Relationships

“The most important test of intimacy is to ask yourself if your relationship is a safe haven where you feel loved and accepted for being yourself.”
― Adelyn Birch, 30 Covert Emotional Manipulation Tactics: How Manipulators Take Control In Personal Relationships

“If you feel confused because someone tells you that they love you but they don't act like they do, judge them by their actions alone. You will have your answer.”
― Adelyn Birch, 30 Covert Emotional Manipulation Tactics: How Manipulators Take Control In Personal Relationships

“Look for the hallmarks of a healthy relationship: Intimacy, commitment, consistency, balance, progression, shared values, love, care, trust and respect. Listen to any alarm bells that go off in your head, and listen to friends and”
― Adelyn Birch, 30 Covert Emotional Manipulation Tactics: How Manipulators Take Control In Personal Relationships

“It's frustrating not feeling understood and not getting the emotional support you reached out for. Invalidation makes you wonder if there is something wrong with you for feeling the way you do. It undermines self-confidence because it causes self-doubt. This in turn diminishes self-esteem.”
― Adelyn Birch, 30 Covert Emotional Manipulation Tactics: How Manipulators Take Control In Personal Relationships

“Using the tactic of gaslighting, the manipulator denies, and therefore invalidates, reality. Invalidating reality distorts or undermines the victim’s perceptions of their world and can even lead them to question their own sanity. "I don't know where you got that idea." "It's all in your head.”
― Adelyn Birch, 30 Covert Emotional Manipulation Tactics: How Manipulators Take Control In Personal Relationships

“To know that you are loved for who you are, and to know someone else in all of their vulnerability and to love them as they are, may be one of life’s most fulfilling experiences, says sociologist Brene Brown.”
― Adelyn Birch, 30 Covert Emotional Manipulation Tactics: How Manipulators Take Control In Personal Relationships

“Shame is a very powerful tool for a manipulator. Few emotional states are more painful than shame. We feel guilty for what we do, but we feel shame for what we are. Shame is a feeling of deep humiliation, and some manipulators enjoy making their victim feel humiliated. It places them in a superior position.”
― Adelyn Birch, 30 Covert Emotional Manipulation Tactics: How Manipulators Take Control In Personal Relationships

“Vagueness is another subtle form of lying. When you confront a manipulator about something, they respond but their answer is lacking in details. They count on you not to probe them for more information.”
― Adelyn Birch, 30 Covert Emotional Manipulation Tactics: How Manipulators Take Control In Personal Relationships

“Emotional manipulation is emotional abuse. A person who controls your feelings and behavior with manipulation does not value or respect you or care about your well-being. Leave the relationship if at all possible, and seek professional counseling if necessary. Involvement with a skilled manipulator can result in serious and lasting harm.”
― Adelyn Birch, 30 Covert Emotional Manipulation Tactics: How Manipulators Take Control In Personal Relationships

“Lies of omission are one of the more subtle forms of lying. Instead of making a deceptive statement, the liar withholds the truth.”
― Adelyn Birch, 30 Covert Emotional Manipulation Tactics: How Manipulators Take Control In Personal Relationships

“Many of us find it hard to set boundaries and defend them because we fear doing so will cause rejection or abandonment. We may avoid confrontations to make things easier. We may feel guilt if we say no or if we think we might hurt someone's feelings. We fear boundaries will keep us from being loved.”
― Adelyn Birch, Boundaries After a Pathological Relationship

“Boundaries protect the things that are of value to you. They keep you in alignment with what you have decided you want in life. That means the key to good boundaries is knowing what you want.”
― Adelyn Birch, Boundaries After a Pathological Relationship

“If you’re a victim of this tactic, you will sense the manipulator is withdrawing. He or she is not giving you the attention and affection that they used to, and you will fear that something is wrong and that you are losing them. If you ask them if something is wrong, they will deny it or blame you. At some point the manipulator will act once again like the attentive, romantic, interested and loving person they once were. Your anxiety and doubt are relieved, and you are on top of the world. But then they withdraw again, and you are consumed with anxiety once more. By using intermittent reinforcement the manipulator will have you riding an emotional roller coaster, your moods and emotional well-being dependent upon whether he or she is withholding from you or rewarding you.”
― Adelyn Birch, 30 Covert Emotional Manipulation Tactics: How Manipulators Take Control In Personal Relationships

“Selfishness is self-absorption, self-seeking behaviour that either disregards the rights and needs of others or tramples them deliberately in favour of personal gain.”
― Adelyn Birch, Boundaries After a Pathological Relationship

“How someone responds to your emotions and perceptions will indicate how much they respect you, how much they care about you and your feelings, how capable they are of empathy and intimacy, and how much they are trying to change or control you.”
― Adelyn Birch, 30 Covert Emotional Manipulation Tactics: How Manipulators Take Control In Personal Relationships

“Never let the other person use absence, or create pain and conflict, to keep you, the seduced, on tenterhooks. ~ Robert Greene, The Art of Seduction”
― Adelyn Birch, 30 Covert Emotional Manipulation Tactics: How Manipulators Take Control In Personal Relationships

“Empathy is understanding and identifying with another's feelings or difficulties, and then conveying that understanding to them.”
― Adelyn Birch, 30 Covert Emotional Manipulation Tactics: How Manipulators Take Control In Personal Relationships

“Guilt is closely related to shame and anxiety. It is an uncomfortable emotion, so we are highly motivated to avoid it. We evade the torment of guilt by behaving the way others expect us to. Manipulators know this all too well and use it to their advantage.”
― Adelyn Birch, 30 Covert Emotional Manipulation Tactics: How Manipulators Take Control In Personal Relationships

“You often feel guilty and you find yourself apologizing a lot. You continually try to repair damage you believe you’ve caused. You blame yourself for your partner pulling away from you. You cannot understand why you keep sabotaging the relationship.”
― Adelyn Birch, 30 Covert Emotional Manipulation Tactics: How Manipulators Take Control In Personal Relationships

“The manipulator pretends he or she forgot something that’s important to you, such as an agreement, a promise, or a commitment, or even an ingredient you need for dinner that night that he agreed to pick up on his way over. The manipulator will look you in the eye and keep a straight face as they tell you they’re sorry, but they simply forgot your request or they don’t recall making that agreement. When a manipulator “forgets” something that is important to you, they are attempting to evade responsibility by blaming something out of their control.”
― Adelyn Birch, 30 Covert Emotional Manipulation Tactics: How Manipulators Take Control In Personal Relationships

“We all have innate emotional needs. If these needs aren't met, there can be serious consequences to out psychological health. Invalidation is no trivial matter. According to Steve Hein, MSW, author of the excellent and invaluable website, EQI.org, invalidation is psychological murder or "soul murder." Having”
― Adelyn Birch, 30 Covert Emotional Manipulation Tactics: How Manipulators Take Control In Personal Relationships

“With this tactic, you attempt to talk about a concern you have with the manipulator, such a suspicion that he or she is cheating on you. Instead of dealing with the stated concern, the manipulator simply denies your allegations, expresses incredulity that you could even think such a thing about them, and then discusses the real problem—your supposed character flaw, such as insecurity or jealousy—making it clear that they find it highly unattractive. Since this is yet another tactic that makes you believe the relationship is in trouble and it is your fault, you learn to not ask questions and instead doubt your suspicions and yourself.”
― Adelyn Birch, 30 Covert Emotional Manipulation Tactics: How Manipulators Take Control In Personal Relationships

“I love you.” “You’re so special to me.” “I don't know how I got so lucky.” “I’ve waited my whole life for you.” When a manipulator utters these words they are backed up by nothing,”
― Adelyn Birch, 30 Covert Emotional Manipulation Tactics: How Manipulators Take Control In Personal Relationships

“At its worse, emotional manipulation methodically wears down your self-worth and self-confidence and damages your trust in your own perceptions. It can make you unwittingly compromise yourself to the point of losing your self-respect and developing a warped concept of reality. With your defenses weakened or completely disarmed in this manner, you are left even more vulnerable to further manipulation.”
― Adelyn Birch, 30 Covert Emotional Manipulation Tactics: How Manipulators Take Control In Personal Relationships