This week, I read a letter from a listener who’s been no contact with her mother for two years - but still feels like she’s living with her shadow.

Every bark of the dog, every knock at the door, sends her body into high alert. Even something as simple as checking the mailbox feels dangerous.

Myself and Dr. Ruth Callaghan will explore what it’s like when no contact doesn’t bring peace, and how our nervous system can become stuck in fight/flight - especially when the person we’re protecting ourselves from once felt impossible to escape.

Follow Dr. Ruth Callaghan on TikTok

Follow Dr. Ruth Callaghan on Instagram

Follow Dr. Ruth Callaghan on YouTube

www.callaghancounselling.ie

BEYOND SURVIVAL - The Therapy Podcast

Question - "I'm never going to find her easy but how do I regulate after exposure to her?"

In this episode, we hear from a listener - an only child - who has spent a lifetime navigating exhaustion, guilt, and confusion in her relationship with her aging mother.

Her mother calls her “my everything,” professes deep love, yet never asks about her life or family. Instead, she elicits promises, plays the victim, uses guilt to control, and bends the truth to suit her narrative.

For this listener, going no contact isn’t an option. So she’s learning to hold firmer boundaries — limiting visits, stepping back from constant caretaking, and seeing the manipulation for what it is — but still battles the heavy weight of guilt and self-doubt: “Am I being too harsh?”

With growing self-awareness and hard-won clarity, she asks a powerful question: "How do I regulate better when with her - and after?"

Together, Ruth and I explore how to stay grounded in contact with a narcissistic parent, how to recover from the emotional crash afterward, and how true healing often means redefining love, responsibility, and self-worth on your own terms.

Follow Dr. Callaghan on TikTok

Follow Dr. Callaghan on Instagram

Follow Dr. Callaghan on YouTube

www.callaghancounselling.ie

BEYOND SURVIVAL - The Therapy Podcast

This week, we read a powerful letter from a listener whoasks myself and Dr. Ruth Callaghan the question: "How do I decide whether or not to go no contact? I can't seem to spend time with them that doesn't involve drama?"

The listener describes growing up with a mum who seemed caring on the surface — "never shouting, just nagging, crying and hounding me, until she gets her own way" — and a dad who told her to “keep the peace.”

Now, as a mother herself, every attempt to set a healthy boundary is met with guilt, tears, and emotional pressure.

In this episode, we explore what it’s like when love comes with strings attached, how emotional manipulation can hide behind the illusion of softness, and the painful process of deciding whether connection is still possible — or whether protecting yourself means finally walking away.

Follow Dr. Ruth Callaghan on TikTok

Follow Dr. Ruth Callaghan on Instagram

Follow Dr. Ruth Callaghan on YouTube

www.callaghancounselling.ie

BEYOND SURVIVAL - The Therapy Podcast

Trigger Warning: Sexual Abuse

Q "What I’m currently struggling with is this pattern I have where if there is a pause in our physical intimacy due to life stress or other circumstances I feel incredibly afraid and triggered into feeling worthless and think our relationship is doomed."

In this deeply moving episode, we explore the lasting impact of childhood trauma on even the healthiest adult relationships. A listener grew up with a covertly narcissistic mother, being placed in the “gilded child” role, and enduring emotional enmeshment and covert sexual abuse. After confronting her past and investing in recovery, she finds herself triggered by fears of abandonment and worthlessness whenever intimacy shifts in her relationship.

Together Ruth and I unpack how childhood wounds can resurface in adult partnerships, why healing can feel like a maze, and what tangible, actionable, steps can help move from old patterns of survival into deeper connection and trust.

Follow Dr. Ruth Callaghan on Instagram

Follow Dr. Ruth Callaghan on TikTok

www.callaghancounselling.ie

YouTube Dr. Ruth Callaghan

BEYOND SURVIVAL - The Therapy Podcast

These weeks listener asks these 3 questions

• Is it unrealistic to expect her to change?
• How do I get her voice out of my head that I’m in the wrong?
• Have others found a way to be in a relationship with a mother with narcissistic tendencies

Listen as Ruth & Katie unpack these questions and what they really mean for your healing, your boundaries, and your sense of self.

Follow Ruth on TikTok

Follow Ruth on Instagram

www.callaghancounselling.ie

BEYOND SURVIVAL - The Therapy Podcast

How do we learn to parent, or even reparent ourselves, if we never had a model of healthy parenting?

In this week’s episode, we explore three powerful themes: our responsibility as parents, how to navigate our own triggers, and whether it’s really possible to “overlove” a child and risk raising a narcissist.

We also share some of our own fears and struggles, and offer practical, tangible advice on how to navigate these challenges with more confidence and compassion.

Follow Ruth on TikTok

Follow Ruth on Instagram

www.callaghancounselling.ie

BEYOND SURVIVAL - The Therapy Podcast

This week’s listener has worked hard to build a life where she feels confident, loved, and free to be herself. But when she begins to hold her boundaries, her mother shows her true colours and the cracks in the family dynamic become impossible to ignore.

Her enabling father seems to make attempts at connection, but the question remains: How do you confront parents about the pain they’ve caused, without losing yourself in the process?

If you would like us to answer your question email beyond_survival@outlook.com

Follow Dr. Ruth Callaghan on Instagram

Follow Dr. Ruth Callaghan on TikTok

Dr. Ruth Callaghan's Website

BEYOND SURVIVAL - The Therapy Podcast

Toxic guilt is that heavy, misplaced guilt that convinces us we’ve done something wrong, even when we haven’t. It’s one of the hardest legacies of childhood trauma, and it can follow us into adulthood, shaping how we see ourselves and our relationships.

In this episode of Beyond Survival, I read a letter from a listener who grew up in a large Irish family that looked perfect from the outside but was full of harmful behaviour and manipulation behind closed doors. Now, years later, the hardest thing to shake isn’t her mother's death, it’s the toxic guilt that still whispers she did something wrong.

Dr. Ruth Callaghan and I explore why guilt sticks so stubbornly for survivors of dysfunctional families, and what it takes to begin letting go of a weight that was never really ours to carry.

If you want us to answer your question on the Podcast email; beyond_survival@outlook.com

Follow Dr. Ruth Callaghan on TikTok

Follow Dr. Ruth Callaghan on Instagram

https://www.callaghancounselling.ie/

BEYOND SURVIVAL - The Therapy Podcast