Research has found that people who received the silent treatment experienced a threat to their needs of belonging, self-esteem, control, and meaningful existence. This type of behavior reinforces the feeling that someone we care about wants nothing to do with us. It can feel as though you don't exist.
Clearly, silent treatment creates an atmosphere of anxiety, fear, and sadness that preclude an underlying sense of safety. As such, it causes unhappiness and psychological harm that most often heightens conflict in a relationship. It can lead one to feel anger, abandonment, rejection, and overall distress.
While using silence sometimes is just a short-term way to cool down, the silent treatment becomes a problem when it's used as a deliberate strategy to inflict pain and establish control. That treatment is never okay.
Using the silent treatment is an unproductive way of communicating within a relationship. It can sometimes be a form of self-protection, but at other times, it indicates emotional abuse. People who regularly use or experience the silent treatment should take steps to address it.
The silent treatment, while sometimes seemingly harmless when talking about it, can be a highly damaging and effective form of manipulation, coercion, and control used by toxic people. It is common, even though many victims feel alone and like they cant talk about it because no one will believe them or understand.
The silent treatment might be employed by passive personality types to avoid conflict and confrontation, while strong personality types use it to punish or control. Some people may not even consciously choose it at all.
If they give you the silent treatment, don't respond. Don't answer their calls or texts, don't check on them or care for them when they are sick and don't offer them any kind of support. –Walk away from the relationship.
Narcissistic silent treatment is a type of narcissistic manipulation and narcissistic abuse. Narcissists may use the silent treatment to communicate they are unhappy with you, to control you, or as a form of punishment.
If someone displays unmanageable emotions and easily flies off the handle, this is a serious red flag. Responding with uncontrollable rage or the "silent treatment" could point to abusive (physical or emotional) behavior in the future, says Trombetti.
The silent treatment is strikingly similar to gaslighting, as both flourish in power and control. In fact, some therapists call the silent treatment a form of gaslighting, used to cause personal uncertainty, and a sense of doubt when considering goals, self-views and worldviews.
Finding moments of silence can have significant psychological and mental health advantages and give you a greater sense of peace. With all of the constant noise you hear on a day-to-day basis, embracing silence can help stimulate your brain and help you process information.
Being silent as a form of defence
People that feel unable to communicate on an emotional level can feel safe behind a wall of silence. Instead of being present and engaged through difficulties they abandon you emotionally, physically and spiritually.
Don't let it stretch: Silent treatment will be effective only when partners reconnect quickly and make an effort to work through their issues. So, one clear answer to how long should the silent treatment last is to not let it stretch for days, weeks or months.
Silent treatment can be an immature way of dealing with situations and its practice should not be made a habit of. Imagine you have upset your loved one for some reason and they are angry with you.
It can cause emotional trauma.
A person who is ignored feels a wide range of confusing emotions. They may feel anger, sadness, frustration, guilt, despair, and loneliness, all at once. Naturally, such emotional confusion can have a damaging effect on your psyche.
No contact is you setting a boundary to regain control in your life. This is not abusive. Silent treatment from the narcissist is meant for you to “learn a lesson” and realize how wrong you were to the narcissist.
I had no idea that responding to the silent treatment gives the person doing it a false sense of control. That's definitely not OK. Left unchecked, the silent treatment becomes a pattern of behavior and emotional abuse that is used to manipulate over time.
The narcissist's goal with the silent treatment is to get you to think you are in the wrong, apologize, and then all blame is on you. They have effectively created a scenario where you have taken the blame while they sit back and wait for you to come to them.
They will have a violent, excessive, and disorderly reaction to the rejection. In a nutshell, they want and will try to create a scene. Simply put, narcissists hate being ignored. They probably want to make you feel ashamed, regretful, and rattled.
A narcissist's silent treatment can last for hours, days, weeks, or even months. Our survey among 500 people who have experienced narcissistic abuse revealed that on average, a narcissist's silent treatment lasts four-and-a-half days and usually ends when the narcissist needs more narcissistic supply.
If you ignore a narcissist and deny them their source, they may become enraged and try even harder for your attention – especially in ways that can be toxic or abusive. Ignoring a narcissist will enrage them because of their fragile egos. They'll feel humiliated and lash out against you to protect themselves.
On this page you'll find 7 synonyms, antonyms, and words related to silent treatment, such as: blackballing, cold shoulder, ignore someone, ignoring, ostracism, and ostracization.
Narcissistic Disappointment: They cannot understand why you would want to stay the way you are. When you resist their suggestions, they feel insulted — as if you have criticized them, not the other way around. They become angry, want to punish you, and may begin to get nasty.