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According to researcher Dr. Gottesman, there are “four men of the apocalypse” or four communication styles in a relationship that can predict its inevitable demise. These are criticism, contempt, defensiveness and stonewalling.

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Is your partner kinder and more respectful to others in public than they are to you behind closed doors? Do you find that the way your partner treated you in the beginning of the relationship is unrecognizable from the way your partner treats you now?

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They engage in what I like to call “coded language.”

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Gaslighting is essentially psychological warfare, causing the victims of malignant narcissists to continually question their own reality.

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If you find yourself lying to family and friends about seeing him, or you feel uncomfortable telling people you are seeing him, this is not a positive thing to be doing. 

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Day after day you would make snarky remarks and stabs at me. You would even talk about how much of a failure I was to friends and family and I would hear your words come back around. “Sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me” does not apply here; you threw me back in the black hole I finally escaped from.