[lazide]

Be very careful with this around folks with Narcissistic Personality Disorder. Anything you say can and will be used against you to maximum destructive effect. Including them actively triggering the states that cause you to be confused and dysphoric anytime you seem to be starting to figure it out or get away.

And they will often actively lie to you or manipulate you if they know you’ll take what they say seriously and uncritically. There are many, many ways to do this.

Many ADHD folks are people pleasers, and NPD folks will actively use those people’s tendencies to destroy them and grin while doing it. I’ve seen it, it’s deeply disturbing.

Open and honest communication is great, with those capable of the same. Doing it with someone who is pathological is a recipe for disaster.

It’s possible to survive, but not until they’ve been fed through the meat grinder a few times and potentially after suffering more pain than you can possibly imagine.

[soulofmischief]

Sounds like you've been through the ringer yourself. I learned very early not to trust or be honest with authority figures.

Linking the people-pleasing to RSD and thus ADHD recently was a massive eye-opener. And the connection between people-pleasing and cutting people off as two sides of the same emotional spectrum.

[lazide]

Yes. I've personally learned it's not just authority figures though. I've had friends and lovers do it too. Identifying what I’m doing to trigger it helps. Trauma bonding is for all kinds of relationships [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traumatic_bonding], and folks with traumatic pasts do it pretty naturally sometimes.

Being overly honest to someone who is actually a problem is one of the common behaviors, as is forgetting some/all of their actual problematic behavior when they 'get better' so as to preserve the important seeming relationship.

"However, later on, repeated instances of abuse and maltreatment generate a cognitive shift in the victim's mind: that preventing the abuse is in their power. By the time the inescapability of the abuse becomes apparent, the emotional trauma bond is already strong.[12]"