Why You Keep Defending Them (Even When You Know You Shouldn’t)

When you find yourself making excuses for someone else’s behavior, you know you’re in the red flag alert zone. You were conditioned to do this by the narcissist. You were taught to protect the abuser with an intensity that defied all the morals that are sacred to you. Later on, this extended to other people in your life. You noticed inconsistencies and bad behavior around you, but you internalized it instead of saying anything about it. Inside, you may have quite the debate, but defending the abuser often wins out. You can explain away just about anything. But true healing begins with true change. A first step is admitting the truth, even if only to yourself, about who someone really is and what their actions really mean. Because, you know what they mean. But it’s that embedded—deeply embedded—reflex of defending the abuser that usually takes precedence. So, first step, admit it to yourself. See and accept who they are. After that comes the harder part. This will take time for you to get to. It’s not an instant thing that can just happen. Other people may think that’s the way it is, and maybe it is that way for them. But for you, you’re going to need to decondition yourself. Because not only will you fear the consequences of your actions, you will see everything that could happen, and you will choose not to say anything about it. But you will also see that sometimes you do need to speak up. It will take some serious discernment. At this point, it can be helpful to write down what happened, what you thought about it, and what your internal back-and-forth argument about it was. Write it down so you can see it and process it better with the physical movement of your hand and seeing it on paper. It’s different than just thinking about it. And though you may still not fully process it yet, this will begin to sharpen your discernment and help you get to where you really want to be. To weigh what needs to be said and what genuinely does not… instead of what’s easy to suppress.

~Janice M. Burke

Image by Brandon Hoogenboom