Sol (00:01)
Welcome to Coparenting Beyond Conflict. I'm your host, Sol, founder of the BestInterest app for coparents. At BestInterest and on this podcast, my goal is to help you find peace in the storm. Today, I'm joined by Dr. Kerry McAvoy, a retired psychologist, author, and the host of the Breaking Free from Narcissistic Abuse podcast. If you're struggling to find yourself after leaving a difficult relationship, this episode is for you.

Let's dive in.

Sol (00:27)
Hi Kerry, welcome to Coparenting Beyond Conflict. It's so good to have you here today.

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (00:31)
Thank you so much Sol, I appreciate it. Thank you for inviting me.

Sol (00:34)
I'm really excited about our conversation, your expertise. think it'll be really relevant for our audience. So thanks again for joining.

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (00:40)
I appreciate that. I hope it's helpful.

Sol (00:43)
So, Kerry I know you spend a lot of your time holding space for people that are in their darkest chapters, right? This is really intense stuff. And I'm just curious, how are we finding you today? And what is one thing that has brought you a sense of self today?

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (01:00)
That's very interesting because I've been going through my own journey. For those who follow me know that I also am a trauma survivor. My most recent relationship, which ended in divorce, I was widowed before. So I had a long-term relationship that ended, unfortunately, due to cancer. But then I got into a very toxic relationship. Despite being a psychologist for more than 25 years, I ended up marrying a narcissist who's really probably more of a psychopath.

So  I experienced a lot of trauma and it's impacted me and I'm also aging and I have physical issues that come up and and to see the intersection between our health and our healing. Physical health is very much connected to our psychological healing. So that's been something is very much on my mind that I've been working on is trying to take control back.

I mean, can we really control it? Well, we can control the degree that we put effort into it. And we really are mindful about what impacts us and make deliberate efforts to make changes towards health. But yeah, it's been a journey. a journey for everybody trying to recover from something that's extremely difficult, toxic, maybe even dangerous. For me, I was in a dangerous situation.

Sol (02:05)
Yeah, I hear that. And your point about how our physical health really impacts our mental health, we could dedicate the whole episode to that, that's a journey that I can relate to, in how do I break away from the machine, and go outside and exercise more, because every time I do, I just feel a lot better, it takes me away from the conflict and the struggles of my day to day.

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (02:13)
I know we could,

Mmm.

Yeah, yeah. For me, I've been dealing with chronic pain. I've been diagnosed with some chronic progressive diseases that are not going to change. But my lifestyle, my attitude towards myself, my own healing around trauma can either make those things less impactful or I can let them continue to escalate worsen,

control my life, the quality of my life. So those are the things I've been really working hard at, especially this year in 2026, I kind of turned the corner and said, I'm going to get super serious about this.

Sol (02:58)
Good. So on your own podcast, Breaking Free from Narcissistic Abuse, I know you talk about how abuse is not something that is just happening to you, but it ends up staying inside of you. Right.

For a lot of our co-parents, they maybe even have gotten to a point of parallel parenting and maybe they're not having a lot of interactions with their co-parent, but they still feel the co-parent inside their head, like this internal echo. And I'm curious, how would you suggest getting to a place where you silence that voice so you can hear your own voice again?

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (03:32)
Yeah, do

you mind if I back up and talk about how and why that happens? Because I think in order for us to take control of it, we have to understand the mechanism of it. One of the things that is amazing about human nature and the development of self is that we're a semi-open feedback loop. When we were first born as an infant, we're very open to suggestion and very open to feedback that we get.

Sol (03:37)
yeah.

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (03:54)
a baby's in a mother's arm or a father's arms or caretaker's arms, is being held and nurtured and loved and taken care of well, they think, "oh, I'm good, I'm lovable, I value, this person sees me and I'm important and they feel visible. And that gets, it's called interjected, it gets taken in and then shapes our sense of ourself. And then we begin to see ourselves as worthy of those things or deserving of those things.

When we move into adulthood, that process, of course, is not as open, there's not as much space to receive it, but there still is, there still is information that we're getting from each other. So even, if you notice, if you're in a, say a grocery line and someone sort of stares hard at you, and maybe even scowls, you end up thinking, is there something on me? Did I

do something? We start to wonder what's happening because that's the evidence of that loop that we're taking feedback in and we're then making adjustments based upon what we get from other people. When we get into a relationship with somebody who's emotionally immature, who has maybe a personality disorder or personality disordered traits, they have a lot of internal ego problems. They're really struggling to be stable, to manage life, to manage stress, and to manage even their sense of self and how they cope with

with failure and their poor decisions. And one of the mechanisms they do that with is, they offload that responsibility to somebody else. I'm not having a bad day or I'm not the one who's a failure. You made this happen to me or you failed to show up for me and this is why this happened. Or they do all these sorts of strategies to do that. Well, when you're in a relationship with somebody, that's information that is essentially

about you, even though it's not about you. It's really about their failure, but they make it about you. And because we're this open system, semi-open system, we take it in and it shapes us. Then we begin to try to protect ourselves so those bad moments don't happen. Then we shape ourselves more. We learn to be quieter, maybe not bring certain things up. Maybe we learn even how to keep

the home or to manage the relationship. We've learned all sorts of things as a way to keep those things from happening. The problem is it's really not an 'us' problem. It's a 'them' problem that they're making an 'us' problem. None of the things that you're going to do is going to be effective strategies, but we don't know that. And one of the things that we do in the effort to protect ourselves is we interject just like we did as an infant, that negative self that we hear from them.

We sort of bring them into our own head. If you look at Richard Schwartz work, Internal Family Systems theory, he says we do that in order for protection. It makes perfect sense. If you could critique yourself before that bad thing happened and stop doing whatever it was that you thought you might do, then that bad thing wouldn't happen. That negative person that you hear in your head is really essentially yourself trying to protect yourself from external consequences.

So what do you do with that? Because we do that. We all do that. I have mine in my head. He shows up six years later and I still hear him. So one of the things that I do is, acknowledge this is my effort to keep myself safe. What's happening right now that's making me feel insecure? What's going on in this environment is echoing something that I went through before, that I'm feeling insecure or shaky or stressed around. And then I tell myself the truth.

And that often helps. So what we're essentially doing is we're trying to quiet that part, that protective part down so that it doesn't have to stay so vigilant. These relationships, we just learned that we have to stay really on guard and be extraordinarily careful. And part of that is this system that you just described.

Sol (07:22)
Yeah, in a way we get trained to be hyper vigilant to everything around us and sometimes that was learned in childhood too, right?

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (07:30)
Yeah. Yeah. Sometimes it goes all the way back. I don't know if you feel this way either Sol or not, but I always feel a little squishy when somebody says that though, because, if you notice how much focus we have on victims, victims are always like, I don't want to be victimized again. But, on the other hand, none of us asked for any of this, you know what I'm saying?

And all of it really is actually the power of survival, which is to me an amazing thing that it goes to such extent to make us adapt and come out ahead. Although sometimes these adaptations are not always in our best interest, but they worked. Otherwise we wouldn't have done it.

Sol (08:01)
Yeah, and I'm glad you said that because it is a bit of a tough line, this victim versus empowered. You don't want to lose sight of the fact that, what happened wasn't right. And you didn't know any better.

But if you wallow in that victimhood, you are oftentimes stuck in it. And so what we like to advocate here on this podcast and you advocate as well is how do you take this situation and empower yourself so that you don't stay trapped?

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (08:32)
I agree with you. I see destructive pathological relationships as prisons. They really put us in a state and often there's lots of ways why that happens. A lot of double binds, for example, that occur within these relationships that keep us stuck and trapped and we don't get out of them because

often it feels very dangerous to leave them. It feels more dangerous to leave than it does to stay, even though actually that's not the truth. But that's the experience and the internal part of that relationship that most people, unless you've been inside of one, you don't see how it can be so dangerous, but it feels very dangerous to leave. But yeah, I struggle with us saying there's something inherently wrong or bad about victims. Yes, actually we're survivors, but we were victimized. And part of the victimization is,

the ways in which it keeps us stuck in these situations. And you're right, part of our healing is how do we reject those, back to the word that I used before, introjects? How do we reject them and then reclaim our power when we've been so disempowered?

Sol (09:29)
Yeah, I like that word prison because it is oftentimes an experience that a co-parent will go through. Here I am a parent and I'm a co-parent and I might be navigating the legal system. It almost becomes an act of performance of I need to be the perfect parent,

to avoid going to court, avoid a blow up, right? You're anticipating what might happen in the future using your fears, but that itself is its own prison, its own trap. Tell us more about that.

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (10:00)
Mm hmm.

Yeah, it is. fact, when I wrote the book, Love You More, I was very aware of fact that he was going to read it and he was going to seek legal counsel about it. I mean, I knew that was going to happen. I did hear from him. And yeah, he told me he'd already been doing that. So I found myself writing it from the angle of protecting myself from his thoughts and his possible legal action against me. And then I realized I'm being controlled. I can't say what I want to say if I'm

worried about what might happen about what I say. And I know I hear parents say the same, I don't have kids with this person. So I didn't experience that. But I have heard so many times "well, I can't do that because it might look bad." And then they're going to claim that I do this and this and that or that, and they're going to maybe call CPS on me. And, and you're right, we often think, get out of the relationship, then you've gotten out of the

bind, you got out of the worst part of it. No, no, you just stepped into the second act. You didn't realize there might even be a third act of this situation. These individuals are very, very good at being strategic and in a way that is so hypocritical that is enraging. And you're right, we, out of our vigilance and fear can continue, consciously and unconsciously, the role of

being disempowered, if we're not careful. I think part of the way for us to take our power back is to really be your best self and be yourself instead of worrying about the consequences, and to reframe what the post-separation period in a different perspective, to see the legal system for what it is. It has specific questions it's asking.

And it's really not about so much proving or disproving what happened in the relationship or proving or disproving this person's bad. It's really about custody and separation of community property. And sometimes we can kind of get clarity on that. It really helps.

Sol (11:39)
Yeah, I mean, it certainly helps you get out of the fear, learning that some of the things that you're really afraid of, honestly, in the modern family court system, 50-50 is the norm. So if you're worried about your kids being taken away from you, gosh, it sure takes a lot, way more than a misfiled CPS report to to have that happen. Sometimes you have to go through the experience one or more times to realize that

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (11:55)
Yeah.

Sol (12:05)
there's not actually that much to be truly afraid of. But that point where you get to that is empowering in and of itself because you don't feel as controlled by that boogeyman of the family court system.

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (12:08)
Mmm. Mmm.

Yeah. And the other thing I think is really helpful too, is to remember that this is not about proving or disproving your credibility. It's about proving the facts because they'll come in and they'll say all sorts of crazy stuff. Like, ⁓ he doesn't change the diapers often enough, they had a rash. Okay. Well, babies get diaper rashes. That's kind of common that happens, but you end up thinking you have to prove your, goodness as a parent

because that got said, when it it's about the facts. It's not a personal attack, but it feels so personal in these situations.

Sol (12:48)
In some ways you could even say that "perfect parent" role isn't healthy for you or your kids. You want to get to this place where you're living more authentically without the other constantly in your head controlling you. So what are some things that a co-parent might do to get to a more authentic center?

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (13:01)
Yeah.

I think remembering that that's what it's about, which is really, really helpful. If we often have a goal, we can say to ourselves, when I thought of myself as a parent, mother or a father, how did I want to show up today? What did that look like? What are the moments that I want to make sure that I create? We use the word 'create space for,' make sure that there's a way for that to happen with this individual. Then, who do I want them to experience me to be?

Because we often end up feeling we're reacting so much instead offensively acting, we react instead of act. And I'd love us to change the focus and say, 'how do I wanna show up today?' instead of 'what do I have to deal with today?' It's a very different mindset. I think the other thing that helps is to

create a space where feelings are safe and okay. Because we get so fearful of some emotions, ⁓ shame becomes almost toxic and intolerable, when everybody makes mistakes. It's okay to create an environment that allows people to make mistakes and know that the failure is part of growth. And then the other one we get terribly afraid of is anger. We end up thinking anger means that this is gonna go violent or become risky, dangerous. And no, anger just is a sign that

there's something needs to change. Being able to find a way to make space for these emotions and to teach your kids how to deal with these emotions, all of that is just really rich material, rich ways of us being a wonderful parent.

Sol (14:26)
Yeah, just to underline that, most of us co-parents come from challenging family systems. We ended up in a relationship like we did because of something from our youth potentially. And in that quagmire, we have this opportunity to learn more about ourselves and grow, and then to recreate a home where emotions are safe.

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (14:48)
Hmm.

Sol (14:49)
And our children do learn that there are ways for them to express anger in a healthy way, and other emotions.

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (14:57)
I think the other thing we forget because we get so used to being the last person on the list in these relationships, is need to see us have a self and take care of ourself, that we take time for ourselves. I don't know how many men get caught into doing this, but women in particular tend to feel like it's almost selfish

to pursue your own interests, to have outside relationships, hire a babysitter and go out. I think it's really important for you to always be nurturing yourself. I think back to the airplane example of oxygen, you really can't help somebody else's oxygen mask if you don't put your own on first. And part of us putting ours on is being a good steward with ourselves and making sure that we see ourselves in the room. Here's a little exercise that I would do in the office way back in the day. And this is before I

made abusive relationships a big focus. But I saw it so commonly that I would often ask clients to do this. I would ask them to shut their eyes and imagine a room and in that room populate it with the most important people in their life. And just see how they show up in this imaginary room. Who's the most brightest colors? Who's nearly faded? Who's standing in the center? Who's standing on the outside? And then the last question I ask is where are you standing in the room?

And that reveals a lot about how you see yourself and where you feel the greatest demand, what relationship you're struggling to sort of deal with and connect because they're often on the outside or faded people. And then where we place ourselves tell a whole lot about how much care we're providing to ourselves. And then the hope is, this would be my goal if somebody came into my office, would be that we have

those people be towards a center and everybody equally colorful and that we'd be there as well. But rarely is that the truth.

Sol (16:43)
As a co-parent myself, I know how difficult communication can be. That's why I created Best Interest, the co-parenting app that uses advanced AI technology to automatically filter out all negativity, promoting positive communication and helping you create a healthier environment for your family. Try it now and get with code Beyond10. Link in the show notes.

Sol AI (17:05)
And now, back to the show.

Sol (17:06)
What do you said about parents? I think it's a modern problem of the 'do everything' parent and these messages that we just have to be the super parent and preparing our kids for ultimate success means catering to their every need. And I agree. I think that that's not

teaching the right things to our kids. This is something I'm still learning how to But one of the things that becoming a co-parent, one of the gifts is, especially if you're 50/50, you have time suddenly for yourself. And that can be really scary and a really hard transition. But also if you approach it from a perspective of

okay well this is an opportunity for me to learn more about myself now...

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (17:49)
Yeah, because it's a big gift you give to your kids. I don't think we realize the significance of that. It teaches them several things for you to be a self. It's really what essentially we're saying. Because we just walked out of these relationships where basically you weren't a self, you were a tool. So you got used like you didn't matter and your kids saw how the other parents thinks you're worthless or even insignificant or maybe invisible.

parent's goal is to raise, not happy children, it's to raise adults. That's the goal is that you're trying to raise an adult. So how do you get them that to roughly age between 18 and 21, where they're able to basically adult themselves. And part of that is to recognize that other people are people and human and are deserving respect and love

and compassion. And the way you teach them is that you show up in their lives that way and they have to work around you as another person in their life who also has needs. Because inadvertently when we send the signal of 'I'm not here, I don't need anything, don't worry about me, I'm last on the list,' you're teaching them a narcissistic relationship. You're teaching them to see you as a tool. And that's not a good message to send. So as much as it feels

uncomfortable, maybe even selfish. And I'm not saying you leave them every weekend and go out and you ignore that they're there. I'm not saying that, but for example, when you're on the telephone with somebody, do they interrupt? When you're trying to finish the last bite of meal, are they making you stop and try to help them with their homework? Those are the ways in which I'm seeing that that's an, unfortunately, it's subtle messages of, I'm sorry, my life is primary, yours is secondary, it doesn't matter. No, we need to be

careful around each other and respect each other. You don't do that to them, they shouldn't be doing that to you.

Sol (19:30)
Yeah, and many times listeners will relate to the term codependency. That it's in their relationship and their marriage that ended. They were the codependent one in that relationship. They were the one who was serving and that maps, honestly, to our relationship with our kids often. That we want them to like us, so we do things for them.

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (19:35)
Mm-hmm.

It

I don't like the word codependency. I struggle with it really hard for lots of reasons. So it's not a word that you'll probably hear. Have I talked about it on my show? Sure. But I, but, only because other people talk about it. Here's why I don't like it because fawning is an adaptation. It's a survival adaptation. Codependency to me is doing it for the sake of approval so that you like me more.

Sol (19:54)
⁓

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (20:12)
Whereas most of us are not doing it because - we want lack of conflict. We don't want to feel scared. That's why we're doing what we're doing. So we've learned to put ourselves into the backseat out of protection. And you're right though, we then continue to do that everywhere. We walk into a room. this is what I just recently stopped in the last couple of years. I would walk into the room and I would immediately know the emotional temperature of their room. Who was upset with whom? Who was not talking?

Who's angry? What's happening between me and them, what's happening between them and everybody else? And then I would try to smooth it all over. You can tell probably I'm a peacemaker. And what I've learned is that's not my job, it's not my responsibility, and they can take care of themselves. Now I have the benefit, fortunately, of my children are now late 20s and moving into mid 30s. So I've been able to see them launch and yeah, that's been helpful.

It's hard because of what I really struggle with parenting. You're doing all this work and effort and you don't get to peak at the end result. You only find out what happens when you get there. So I'm thankful despite all the stuff that my family went through, like I said, we lost their dad to cancer when they were trying to leave home right at that stage. But they're all doing great and they've turned out wonderful. And they're adult men who are doing really well with their lives.

Sol (21:21)
That's wonderful to hear.

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (21:23)
Yes, you can go through big tragedies like us watching someone that we dearly love pass away really quickly and go and it was rough. There are periods of time where some of my kids went no contact with me because grief was so painful and there's so much anger to grief that we didn't know how to really process what had happened and how do you assign blame when there's no one really to put the blame onto?

So yeah, it was really, really tough. then the other thing that happened in our family is my oldest son was diagnosed with cancer as well. And fortunately, he's in remission, but then we went through that as well, the fear of nearly losing him too. So yeah, it's changed us and it's made us really close, we're doing well despite all of that.

Sol (22:03)
Wow, it's really wonderful to hear that you all went through those challenging moments and then found closeness through that.

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (22:10)
Yeah, we're each other's best friend, actually, these days. We have a standing date as a family. We get together every Friday evening for dinner and a movie. And we've now been doing that for five years, five years straight. And we all say it's the highlight of the week. So yeah, it's been wonderful. Yeah. So it is possible to go through these really tragic things that would shatter some people,

Sol (22:25)
That's really heartwarming.

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (22:34)
and come out the other side and find a space. Here's one of the things I've discovered. is other piece I think is so important when you're healing as a co-parent and you're healing as a survivor, is that you create space for really, really hard emotions. I let my sons cry. I will sometimes even open the conversation saying, this is something if your dad was here, he'd be able to help you with.

That's really hard. If he was here, we'd have this done. We create space to talk about really tough, hard, big things.

Sol (23:02)
Yeah, I think that's an aspect or an ingredient to emotional maturity and better relationships is being willing to face those challenging edges and allow space for processing, allow space between the relationship, because coming together, that repair can be so yummy and juicy and building of trust.

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (23:23)
It is. And we often avoid them because we think that somehow the pain is hurtful, and we don't realize that there's actually relief. I even found that in my office. I would often ask the really intolerable questions. So somebody comes in, and they're in a very dark space. I'll say, have you thought of harming yourself? And you'd think, well, why would you bring this? Like, you're suggesting that to them. Like, no, I'm admitting that sometimes we get to such dark places that those things are things we think about.

And just the act of naming it demystifies it. And the same goes with us and our kids. We can talk about the fact that they may have a very difficult relationship with that other parent. Sometimes it's hard when those things happen without saying, "yeah, your dad or mom are irritating." We don't need to talk about the other person, but we can create the place for them to be able to call out hard things or disappointing things. Like say another pickup

goes by and this person didn't show up and they've been looking forward to it all week long and your heart breaks with them as you see them crushed and they've been really looking forward to it. Or they come home at Christmas with the wrong gift because the other parent can't remember how old this kid is or even knows what their hobbies are. And again, you think, oof, they just didn't get seen. When they look like down in the dumps for you to say, "how are you doing?" "Well, dad got me this or mom got me that was really stupid." And like, "yeah, it's hard when you get gifts that aren't quite right.

I don't know what to do with that when that happened to me." See, just by that, you've opened up the place for them to say, "yeah, I'm hurt.' You know, they always miss this. And then you don't need to say, "yeah, they're not good at that." You can just say, "it's hard when that happens. I'm really sorry that that happened. That's hard. How can I be here today and listen to you around this so that you know that I feel bad that you're in that space?"

Sol (24:58)
Hmm. Yeah, you're approaching that situation with curiosity and not an inclination to fix, but just be there. Or blame. Hmm.

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (25:05)
Yes, or blame. Yeah.

Yeah. And then it just gives them so much. This is what I used to do with my sons because I have all boys and then I would say, "you can say you're angry and not do something with it. You know, I can separate behavior from feelings. You don't need to act just because you feel something, but yeah, you can be mad and say you're mad, but it doesn't mean you need to call me a name or use bad name."

Sol (25:18)
Mm-hmm.

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (25:29)
It really helps just to give language to all of this. And because what you're doing is you're setting the example that, despite what they've seen in these previous relationships, feelings in themselves are actual neutral things. You don't need to go to dark places with them. They're just information. I often tell people, feelings are like warning lights on a car. It's an indicator of something. That's all it is. It's just an indicator of something.

We can pay attention to it, we can ignore it, let it break down, or we can act like it's the end of the world, but it's just information.

Sol (25:58)
Yeah, sometimes that information gap between the two homes is really challenging for a co-parent. The things that you might hear from your kid about how they're being spoken to or treated. Like, wow, that's not how I would do things. And it's hard to know what to do about that. Do you have any suggestions for how to handle those sorts of situations?

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (26:23)
Again, that membership that I'm in, we see a lot of that because some of these relationships are with really very not healthy people. Sometimes dangerous people that are still active parents. So in those situations, what I often encourage is, to empower the child. But when we allow them to have an emotional reaction without having to do something with it, just allow them the space to do that, we're empowering them.

We're saying, first of all, that emotion is not scary and toxic and bad. It's not in itself inherently dangerous, which is really great information. But then we're also empowering them by having the feeling and being able to express it out loud. It's very validating for them. And I know that the urge is what can we do to fix it? Well, the reality is the legal system decides what you can and cannot do to fix this. Obviously, do all the right things. If it's abuse, please be documenting it.

Report it if you need to, contact your attorney. So I'm not saying not to do those things. But I think the thing that we often miss is to grieve the idealized relationship the child wishes they have that they don't have. That's really often what they're expressing is I wanted mom or dad to show up this way and they didn't. And this is what happened. And it hurt. I'm feeling embarrassed or upset or mad about it. But also I'm

hurt that I don't have that connection with the parent I wish I did. If we create space for that to talk about the loss, that's really, really helpful. It's incredibly healing for them, to say, "sounds tough. Wow, that really would be hard. I know you've looked forward to Christmas or whatever, this event for a lot, or you really wanted a lot out of this visit." Or "I know that you wanted to talk to mom and dad and you didn't get a chance to," or whatever it is that they didn't get to do. ⁓

I think being able to enter into that and see that as helping them mourn the loss of that idealized parent is so helpful. Because then you're teaching them that there's a difference between who this person is and what they wish this person was. Because where we get trapped as a victim, one of the reasons that we didn't leave is the hope that that idealized self would come back and they didn't. The person we met, we hoped that they would somehow show up or get enough

therapy or whatever, they would wake up and that they would return because they wanted the relationship with us. And that didn't happen, but it's the hope that kept us stuck. And what we didn't grieve is no, that person's gone or that relationship isn't what I thought it was, or this is what it turned into. And by letting go of that, then we're able to step into the reality and then ourselves take action. When we do that with our kids, we help them do the same.

Sol (28:47)
Yeah, and we're modeling for them such an important lesson that they're going to encounter difficult people in their own lives. This is giving them an opportunity to learn how to recognize it and to ask for better for themselves ⁓ and potentially support others that are going through difficult relationships.

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (29:02)
Yeah.

Yeah, I don't know if men do this as much as women do. I think this something that we've socialized women more than men around is that we often teach women their sense of self is dependent upon the healthiness of the relationship. In other words, "I'm okay if we're okay." I certainly had that. That was one of the things that kept me stuck in that relationship is that I couldn't be okay because we weren't okay. So I worked really hard to make us okay in order for me to feel better about myself.

I think it's really helpful when we give our kids the message that, you're separate from this relationship. You can have not a great connection with somebody and still be an okay, healthy, person. In fact, relationships tend to go better when you're well and functioning emotionally healthy. okay, then we're more likely to be okay. Cause then I'm doing the work of taking care of me so that it doesn't bleed into the relationship.

So I think that that's a really powerful message to give to the kids is just because mom or dad don't see you the way that they should or don't recognize your uniqueness or don't know how to connect with you in a way that makes you feel ⁓ important, seen, respected, that doesn't mean that you're less important, deserving and respected. You can give those things to yourself. And the way that you give those things to yourself is by

seeing the loss of it grieving it and realizing that was a failure of the relationship, not a failure of you.

Sol (30:22)
Mm-hmm.

Now in these co-parenting relationships where one co-parent is either emotionally immature or narcissist or borderline, oftentimes there are challenges in the direct communication, the communication that you're receiving from them. And that is one of the reasons why I built the BestInterest app for co-parents because it

creates that emotional airlock of protecting you from the the triggers and the challenges that can come up in that day to day and give you a space to heal. I'm curious from your experience, if you can speak to how reducing that type of direct charged contact can help accelerate a person's healing.

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (31:06)
Yeah, I've coined a term "semantic abuse," which is where a person deliberately consciously moves the verbal goalposts as a way to sort of keep the communication confusing, and so that they always protect themselves in the communication and come out on top in the power dynamic. Of course, then there's gaslighting and all sorts of wild things that can happen in these communications.

Reducing the contact help a lot when we are able to do that. I think even deconstructing the communication and seeing where the shifts are happening. Because we often lose the starting point, so we lose where it's tracking. I'm thinking right now of a communication I've had with somebody that's just like,

What are we even talking about? I don't even know where we started. We talk about picking the kids up the next thing you know, you're hearing about how you're terrible with the dog and that's not even the point. So yeah, it does help. I have some strategies that I urge people to do too. For example, stay on point. Don't, don't get pulled into the other side, side track, the rabbit holes that come up.

⁓ Be repetitive in what you're saying, just be very firm but repetitive. Are you going to be picking them up tomorrow? Okay, are you going to be picking them up tomorrow? Don't defend yourself, don't explain, don't justify things, you know, don't jade, J-A-D-E. Aall those things help.

Sol (32:18)
That goes with my own experience. Slowing down communication with co-parents is often so successful in helping them to heal themselves and find peace and find better connection with their own kids.

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (32:28)
Yeah.

It's hard because in those moments, so much gets thrown out and a lot of it's wrong and inflammatory. And you feel very attacked or certainly under the microscope in those moments. And you know, it's wrong. I have a real strong sense of justice. I think anybody who does, that's very irritating. You want to set the record straight. I don't know if people have noticed, but the more that you contribute to that conversation by trying to do those mechanisms, the worse it gets.

What a lot of us don't realize, maybe it's obvious to other people. I'm autistic by the way. So sometimes I'm not always the when it comes to picking social cues up, believe it or not, despite the fact that I'm a psychologist, I think that's partly why I went into psychology is because I really wanted to understand this mystery of relationships and why I was sometimes not getting things. But I didn't realize that people who are conflictual aren't looking for resolution.

They're often just feeding off the conflict and the chaos and that may even regulate them. They may even feel better because they stirred you up. And that that's the whole point of it. The whole point was to figure out who's picking Johnny up tomorrow. The whole point was they were upset and they want to get you upset so they feel better.

Sol (33:37)
It's so maddening and yet so relatable. Why does that happen?

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (33:42)
Because they don't have really good internal mechanisms to regulate themselves. It is three-year-old behavior for you not to be able to know, what is it that I want to get out of this relationship? How am I feeling right now? And how can I soothe myself as I go into this communication so that I don't bleed all over

this? Instead, just deal with my end of the street? They don't do that. They go into these situations looking to feel better. It doesn't even matter if it's co-parenting or parallel parenting or you're actually in a relationship. It's the same dynamic. Some individuals are broken down churches who have scaffolding up beside them and the scaffolding is trying to then fix the foundation, fix the structure so the structure doesn't collapse.

There are people who in themselves cannot psychologically hold themselves up and they use relationships to do that. All these mechanisms, conflict, dysregulation, attacking, all of it is an effort for them to offload all the ways in which they don't deal with their own internal stuff. Their shame, their failures, the stress, the fact that life doesn't go the way you want, the fact that they don't get what they think they deserve. All of that, they're managing it

via relationships and that's why they always have a relationship. If you ever noticed, they're never without a relationship. It's because they need that kind of activity from another person for them to feel okay, they're looking for stabilization. But that's not our job, to be scaffolding to another person, either by just engaging in the conflict with them or caretaking them. That's back to what I said, our goal is to grow adult children.

They need to adult themselves. That's not our job to do that for them.

Sol (35:15)
Yeah, it really isn't. Kerry, thank you so much for your insights. And now is the time to move to our lightning round. I'm going to read off some sentences and you just fill in the blank. Okay, you ready? All right. Healing is not a destination, it's a...

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (35:21)
Okay.

Okay, okay. ready.

lifelong journey.

Sol (35:33)
A healthy boundary feels like...

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (35:35)
respecting yourself.

Sol (35:36)
The biggest lie parents are sold about family court is...

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (35:40)
that it's about proving who's wrong.

Sol (35:42)
Tell me more about that.

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (35:43)
We go in there hoping that we can prove that the abuse actually happened. This is a bad person. No, it's about figuring out, can you guys parent together? No, they don't care. No. make the connection of just because that person was abusive to you that they may not be the best parent to the kids. They don't see that connection. They're blind to that. I think that's bad, but that's the way that it is.

Sol (35:51)
Yeah, the courts really don't care. They're not paid to care.

Preaching to the choir on that one.

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (36:06)
I know,

I know.

Sol (36:07)
You know you're thriving when you stop asking...

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (36:10)
What are they doing today? Meaning the other person.

Sol (36:13)
Yeah, just really disengaging from...

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (36:15)
I forget he's alive. I forget he's on the earth. That to me is freedom. It feels like a very distant dream to me.

Yeah, no, I have the luxury that I don't have to manage pick up tomorrow with him. So I understand that that's not quite the same. But to the degree that we're not constantly being activated.

Sol (36:32)
Yeah, it just goes back to, how do we reduce the daily conflict, the daily interaction and create peace for ourselves? And really that peace is the more you can disconnect and just focus on what matters and not on all the other. It's better for everyone.

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (36:46)
It is, it really is. Yeah, exactly.

Sol (36:49)
The most powerful mantra a co-parent can learn is...

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (36:53)
I don't know. That's a good one. What's yours?

Sol (36:56)
We allow

Something about self-love. I think This harkens back to something you were saying earlier, which is the more you learn to love yourself, the better you show up in all of your relationships. The less you engage with your ex when they're trying to attack you, the less with your new partner you're constantly kind of testing or feeling fearful of or whatever.

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (36:58)
Yeah, that's what I was thinking too.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Sol (37:20)
The more

you love yourself and you know you're gonna be okay, just the better you show up with your kids too.

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (37:25)
Yeah, yeah. I just recently interviewed Tammy Triolo, who wrote the book, Empathy Gap, and it's really about systemic oppression. So it takes abuse and moves it out into groups. And one of the things she said that kind of blew my mind is that if we don't have empathy for ourselves, we're going to struggle to have empathy for anyone else. And that's sort of what you're saying is the same thing is that we don't realize we think we're so empathic. And I'm not saying we're not. We often are self-sacrificial and self-abandoning.

We think that's empathy. We don't realize that because if it really had empathy for ourselves, then we wouldn't be so self abandoning. We'd take care of ourselves first and then then we'd love everyone out of that place. A lot of us really struggle with that. I struggle with that.

Sol (38:05)
I love that point. I'm gonna look that up. We'll put that in the show notes. but it's that.

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (38:09)
Yeah, yeah, the book

she wrote is called The Empathy Gap: It's Black and White. It's about racism. But when I read it, I read it about toxic relationships and it made me sob because what she's describing happens systemically, happens interpersonally. It starts interpersonally. Racism only exists because we don't like each other. And then we move it to we don't like people groups. I never put that together until I read her book. Great book.

Sol (38:32)
Yeah, and it sounds like it starts within. The more we hyper focus on the outside world and doing it for others, if we just focus more internally first, then it's like we're putting the mask on ourselves before we're helping others.

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (38:35)
It does.

Yes.

Yes. Yes,

exactly. It feels like selfishness though, but it's not. That's actually how we love others better.

Sol (38:52)
Mm-hmm.

Okay, moving on to the next question.

Self-worth is built by keeping promises to... ⁓

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (39:00)
yourself and others.

Sol (39:01)
A child's resilience is rooted in...

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (39:04)
ability to know that failure is survivable.

Sol (39:06)
One small act of self-reclamation is...

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (39:09)
Ability to say no. If you can say no to something that other people really want, but it's not good for you, you've in that moment reclaimed power for yourself. It's an act of reclamation.

Sol (39:20)
The journey towards learning how to say no is so powerful.

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (39:23)
It is. It's hard. It is. But it's in certain types of families, it's very dangerous.

Sol (39:25)
It's self-loving.

Yeah, yeah, in certain types of relationships.

This has been so great, Kerry. Thank you for joining us today and for your insights. And for a parent who's listening right now that's just really in the thick of things and they're feeling like they've just lost the fight and maybe they've lost themselves. What's a hopeful truth that you could give them today that would help them stick with it?

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (39:35)
⁓ Thank you so it.

Yeah, that it is a journey. It's not linear. It's extremely messy. And that if we can continue just to ask ourselves one small thing, like, what do I need or want today? And listen, learn to listen to yourself and show up for yourself. See back to the idea of the room. Where are you in the room? Let yourself be in the room of life. If you can start to just make yourself a little bit more visible every single day that you're going to regain your sense of self, step by step.

Sol (40:20)
That's great. For a listener who would like to reach out to you, learn more about your work or find your podcast, how can they do so?

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (40:26)
Yeah,

The best way to do this to go to KerryMcAvoyPhD.com on my website because I have everything that I'm doing there. You can find out about the app that I now have and the groups that I run, as well as the podcast Breaking Free from Narcissistic Abuse.

Sol (40:41)
Thank for all that you do and for all the healing work that you bring to the world. And we'll put links to the show notes to all of those things that you mentioned. Thanks again for being on today.

Dr. Kerry McAvoy (40:51)
I deeply appreciate it. It's wonderful to meet you and be here. Thank you.

Sol (40:56)
Thanks for joining us on the Coparenting Beyond Conflict podcast. To support our show, subscribe or leave a rating. Links for all books and resources mentioned on appear in our show notes or on CoparentingBeyondConflict.com. See you next time.

Sol (41:13)
The commentary and opinions available on this podcast are for informational and entertainment purposes only, and not for the purpose of providing legal or psychological advice. You should contact a licensed attorney, coach, or therapist in your state to obtain advice with respect to any particular issue or problem.