“Stick with your boundaries long-term or [toxic people] will use any weakness overtime to sneak back into your life,” says Mackey. “If you told yourself you wouldn't respond to their texts, don't. Block their number and block them on all social media. Don't send them any e-mails and don't check in six months from now.”
“There can be a real grieving process when cutting off a toxic family member,” says MacMillan. “Grief that the relationship is not working, especially if it once did. Recognizing this process takes time and cutting yourself a little slack when it comes to self-judgment is key.”
As a general rule of thumb, ignoring your ex and then getting back in contact later is used for getting an ex back. On the other hand, blocking an ex is probably one of the best ways to actually get over an ex, assuming you can keep them blocked.
If someone is tormenting, causing pain or discomfort, or refusing to leave you alone, then blocking them may be necessary. In such cases, the psychology of blocking can be empowering, providing a sense of relief and peace of mind, while putting a stop to unwanted messages and posts on social media.
When it comes to love and breakups, one social media power move that everyone has been involved with, in one way or another, is blocking. Though blocking exes has become easier than ever, it's not without critics.
Blocking someone after the end of your relationship does NOT mean that you hate them, don't care or don't love them. It just means that you care about YOURSELF more.
If they're really incapable of controlling themselves, they may even threaten you. This is why it's generally not a good idea to let a narcissist know you're going to block them ahead of time. Avoid the confrontation by just blocking their number and social media accounts and move on.
Blocking would hurt more because it is a gesture of permanent closure. When you are ignoring someone, there is a scope for you might talk to them after a break.
The narcissist has likely unblocked you because they aren't getting their narcissistic supply filled somewhere else, or the blocking of you is no longer filling their narcissistic supply. For the narcissist, their narcissistic supply is always being used up and they are on a constant search for how to refill it.
People with toxic traits know they have them
But many people with toxic traits don't realize that their behavior impacts others. You may have toxic traits that you don't know about. Some toxic traits, like absolutism, manifest subtly.
Toxic relationships generally follow three stages: idealizing, devaluing, and discarding. Learn about each of these stages and the impact it has on you.
Leave their "playground" The only way to win with a toxic person is not to play. Leave their "playground".
The toxic traits of a toxic person include unsupportive and unpleasant behavior, being manipulative, judgmental, controlling, and self-centered. Such people can be the cause of various negative feelings and emotions that you may be experiencing like depression, anxiousness, worthlessness, and unhappiness.
Blocking doesn't just give you the ability to completely hide someone's account and their content from yours, but it prevents that person from ever having access to viewing and interacting with your account too.
When someone blocks another online, they are engaging in the act of social rejection, which, they know, is likely to impact the psychological well-being of the person being rejected. Indeed, in many cases, the blocker intends to damage or punish the blockee psychologically.
Silent treatment is mostly in your presence. While they will not block you, they may refrain from or delay responding. Your desperate calls, texts, emails are great food for them. By blocking you, they would be depriving themselves of high quality narcissistic supply.
Essentially, the point of the silent treatment is to make the victim feel confused, stressed, guilty, ashamed, not good enough, or unstable enough so that they would do what the manipulator wants.
Experts on narcissistic abuse recovery all agree that contact with someone like this always results in pain (Payson). Maintaining zero contact is essential for you to be able to heal and cognitively and emotionally process the mental hurricane that hit.
Simply put, narcissists hate being ignored. They probably want to make you feel ashamed, regretful, and rattled. They want to be in control and will go to any length to keep feeling empowered. It's critical to understand that a narcissist will not leave you alone the first time you ignore them.
Blocking isn't just a mental health break. Use the option after lecturing someone and giving them no chance to respond and it's a manipulative move. It's something narcissists often do online to control a narrative.
On this, social media experts agree: The answer is yes. “It's OK to block, unfriend or shut down an account for pretty much any reason,” said Daniel Post Senning, the great-great grandson of etiquette icon Emily Post and a co-author of the 18th edition of “Emily Post's Etiquette.”
If you don't want to do it because you're worried about what other people think, block them anyway. What is this? As long as it makes you feel better, what he thinks or what others perceive it to be doesn't matter. So don't overthink blocking him – it's completely fine for you to block him.