Latest / The Dr. Psych Mom Show with clinical psychologist Dr. Samantha Rodman Whiten / The Gray Rock Method For Dealing With Difficult People... With A Cameo By My 12 Year Old

Transcript

The Gray Rock Method For Dealing With Difficult People... With A Cameo By My 12 Year Old · The Dr. Psych Mom Show with clinical psychologist Dr. Samantha Rodman Whiten

• 0:05
  Hi everybody and welcome to this episode of the doctor, psych mom
• 0:09
  show. I was, I received a request
• 0:14
  actually, somebody just responded to my constant
• 0:18
  requests for podcast topics and I said, what could make you
• 0:22
  subscribe? And this person said an epic to
• 0:26
  talk about how to deal with people with high narcissistic
• 0:30
  traits. And I said, I think I have
• 0:32
  something with that. With the I hate my copay Parent
• 0:35
  episode where I talk a little bit about Grey Rock, but she
• 0:40
  wanted me to go more into the Grey Rock method in detail.
• 0:43
  So before I dive into that, if you have not yet subscribed
• 0:47
  particular, if you are this person that I, in fact, a making
• 0:50
  this episode 4, please do click on subscribe, so that you can
• 0:53
  get access to all of my great episodes.
• 0:56
  The most recent one was how couples handle money.
• 0:59
  Okay, so today I have a special guest, which is my 12-year
• 1:04
  Daughter. Say hello, what's up?
• 1:07
  Okay so this is in fact going to show us that even a
• 1:11
  twelve-year-old can learn how to do the gray rock method and that
• 1:15
  you can in fact each a twelve-year-old, how to do the
• 1:17
  gray rock method unless this fails in which case you cannot
• 1:21
  teach a 12 year old to do the gray rock method, don't
• 1:24
  embarrass mommy. All right so the gray rock
• 1:30
  method means that you act like a boring Gray.
• 1:34
  A rock to anybody that's trying to create a lot of drama in your
• 1:38
  life. And you wouldn't think that this
• 1:40
  would work you would think that the person who's trying to
• 1:42
  create drama with just keep on going forever and ever trying
• 1:45
  to, you know, make, you know, draw blood from literally a
• 1:50
  stone, which is what you're trying to act like they don't.
• 1:52
  They actually stopped fairly quickly because anybody that
• 1:56
  thrives on drama will they will stop talking to you.
• 2:02
  If you're not very interesting, they To get interesting pieces
• 2:06
  of information out of you that they can use against you and
• 2:10
  they want to she's laughing. And they want to see your
• 2:16
  reaction if they criticize you and they want to basically make
• 2:20
  little remarks that are going to somehow get a, you know, like
• 2:24
  some sort of dramatic reaction from you because they thrive on
• 2:27
  drama. That's not because they're like
• 2:29
  horrible people. I've told you guys what I think
• 2:31
  about the whole dark abuse culture like Narcissus, Sister
• 2:35
  suffering from a personality disorder frequently.
• 2:37
  They were abused or neglected as children and they were also
• 2:41
  probably raised by narcissist but just because somebody
• 2:44
  suffers from something doesn't mean you have to be dragged down
• 2:47
  with them so you can empathize with somebody that's whole life
• 2:50
  is thriving on drama. That must be a really difficult
• 2:54
  way to live and it was real tough way to be raised.
• 2:57
  But that does not mean that you can't assert boundary.
• 3:00
  So the gray rock method means that you act like a grey Rock.
• 3:03
  So what a great I could be very interesting to talk to no.
• 3:07
  Thank you doing excellently and so a great Rock would be really
• 3:14
  boring. So basically a grey rock is
• 3:16
  basically going to say oh uh-huh.
• 3:20
  Yep. Oh.
• 3:22
  And then maybe sometimes I'll talk about the weather or
• 3:25
  they'll redirect to some kind of boring topic of conversation
• 3:28
  like, oh, hey, did you see? I have this table.
• 3:32
  Look, it's a table and any A boring thing that you could
• 3:36
  think about and a good one, by the way, if if you're talking
• 3:39
  about a narcissistic family member, a grandparent, who likes
• 3:44
  to talk about the kids frequently, they'll bring out
• 3:46
  all their crazy stuff with you, but they will talk about the
• 3:49
  grandchildren forever. So whenever they start to try to
• 3:51
  talk about you, you just redirecting, you say, oh, hey,
• 3:54
  did you know that I signed up Madison for dance camp and like
• 3:57
  they're kind of confused but they'll talk about dance camp
• 4:00
  forever. Just because it's part of their
• 4:02
  worldview to be a good grandparent and or they They do
• 4:05
  care about Madison and dance camp despite otherwise being a
• 4:07
  kind of miserable person. So we're going to try to do a
• 4:10
  lot of that. Aha, okay, yup.
• 4:14
  Sorts of comments in a pleasant mild Bland tone, befitting kind
• 4:18
  of a rock and a little bit like a child's little like rock
• 4:22
  puppet. Like just the happy Pleasant
• 4:25
  Bland Rock. And so I'm going to act like the
• 4:29
  difficult narcissistic old mother.
• 4:34
  Other Italian things is a real big stretch from her out that
• 4:40
  such a stretch but I'm going to be even older and even worse and
• 4:45
  you are going to be just in the prime of your life younger than
• 4:49
  I am now. And I'm going to be visiting you
• 4:51
  at your home and I'm going to be acting like the super
• 4:53
  narcissistic difficult parent, and I'm going to start making
• 4:58
  all sorts of comments that are super passive-aggressive and
• 5:03
  critical. And you're just going to say
• 5:05
  aha. Yeah.
• 5:07
  Like a grey Rock. So let's see if you could do it.
• 5:09
  So, I'm gonna come in and these are all drawn from, you know,
• 5:13
  sorts of comments that clients have shared with me that they
• 5:17
  have received from narcissistic parents in their tone and their
• 5:22
  type. Alright, so here I am.
• 5:24
  It's Christmas and 20 years and I am visiting it.
• 5:30
  My 32 year old daughter and I'm coming in and I And I open the
• 5:35
  door. Hi there, huh?
• 5:39
  Sweetheart, did you cut the view?
• 5:41
  What are you eating? It seems like you're you.
• 5:45
  You're you look like, you are have been eating a lot of junk
• 5:49
  recently. Have you seen a weather outside?
• 5:53
  Oh, why why? Yes, I do see the snow.
• 5:56
  But honey, is that table supposed to be?
• 6:00
  So dirty, is that kind of the look that you that Guys are
• 6:05
  going for just just dirty. Well, you know, I have children.
• 6:09
  Anyways, back to the weather. Yes, yes sweetheart.
• 6:13
  It is cold. It is cold out there.
• 6:15
  Um, I did tell you about all of my die tell you about about how
• 6:19
  badly I'm suffering with all of my various ailments, oh no.
• 6:23
  Oh, so um, but you know, you have to call more it makes me so
• 6:27
  sad when all of my friends children call them three or four
• 6:31
  times a day and you don't ever call me Honey, don't you even
• 6:36
  care about me at all? I do you like to come in?
• 6:44
  Was I out there that whole time? Yeah.
• 6:47
  Okay. So we keep a very Bland kind of
• 6:51
  toad, we don't get upset and let's go for some more.
• 6:54
  Mmm. Yep.
• 6:56
  Okay. So did I tell you honey that the
• 6:59
  last time that you visited and you left all of my friends asked
• 7:02
  why you didn't act more loving Toward me it was so terribly
• 7:06
  humiliating. I'm sorry.
• 7:09
  Oh well I'm sorry. Really isn't good enough.
• 7:11
  Honey. I think that we really ought to
• 7:12
  talk more in depth about it. Do you remember when you were
• 7:15
  young how I sacrificed been worked my bones, my hands to the
• 7:19
  Bone for you honey. Hmm.
• 7:22
  It was so hard for me to be such a self-sacrificing mother all
• 7:27
  the time and sometimes I just don't think you even care.
• 7:30
  I do care. Do you care enough honey?
• 7:33
  Hmm. You do, hmm.
• 7:36
  Sometimes I just feel like nobody would care if I even
• 7:39
  perished in a fire. I think people would care these.
• 7:44
  So my 12 year olds, get a little bit more sucked in that you
• 7:47
  should. But overall she doin pretty
• 7:49
  good. I know a lot of adults who are
• 7:52
  older than that. That would start saying things
• 7:54
  like no Mom, no Mom but I love you.
• 7:56
  We all love you Mom. It's okay, it's okay.
• 7:59
  And meanwhile you know they they're getting increasingly
• 8:02
  stressed out unable to deal with the Situation.
• 8:05
  So, we had a couple of good Segways back to the weather and
• 8:08
  a couple good M&M's. And so that was it for my
• 8:11
  daughter. Let's give her a rounding
• 8:14
  rounding a rousing. Applause.
• 8:17
  I'm applauding you sweetheart and I can go if you want.
• 8:23
  Alright, she learned a lot through the end.
• 8:25
  Definitely did. Okay.
• 8:26
  And all right, I'll be up in a sec.
• 8:31
  So anyway, hope you all like that guest appearance and that
• 8:35
  is basically what you have to do.
• 8:38
  I mean really the the narcissistic parent, they'll
• 8:41
  keep going over and over and over and over the same goddamn
• 8:46
  topic over and over and you're trying to get a rise out of you
• 8:51
  and if you stop giving the rise to but they're going to stop
• 8:53
  doing it. Like you, there's something
• 8:56
  called an Extinction burst and behavior training where the
• 8:59
  animal no longer gets rewarded for its Here.
• 9:02
  So it starts doing the behavior that used to get the response
• 9:06
  more and more and more and more. So if you stop rewarding a
• 9:09
  pigeon for pecking on a lever by giving it a pellet, it will
• 9:15
  continue to baek and baek and baek and baek like a crazy
• 9:18
  pigeon until finally, it realizes that nothing is coming.
• 9:22
  Hopefully, you're feeling it in another way and this sad
• 9:24
  example, so would you have to do is realize that you will change
• 9:28
  your behavior to be very Bland to say aha.
• 9:31
  Huh, okay sure uh-huh. Yep, okay.
• 9:35
  Oh, hey, did you see Madison's dance recital?
• 9:37
  Video for four hours. Cool.
• 9:40
  Mhm. Yeah, okay.
• 9:43
  Okay. See it was hard.
• 9:44
  Even for her when she knew what I was trying to tell her to do
• 9:47
  just to nod. If I say it sounds like you
• 9:50
  don't even love me. It's hard to not.
• 9:52
  Say I do love you. You could say that depending on
• 9:56
  how truly, you know, you feel about your parent.
• 10:00
  You know, you may want. To say sometimes.
• 10:02
  Yep, I'm sorry. Yep, it's okay up.
• 10:04
  I'm sorry, but even the I'm sorry, can go down a rabbit hole
• 10:09
  as we even saw with my little skit.
• 10:12
  So what we want to do is understand that as you start to
• 10:16
  change your behavior, you're going to get a rapid Extinction
• 10:19
  burst which should not make you think that All Is Lost, In fact,
• 10:23
  this means you're doing the right thing so if you start to
• 10:25
  do your gray rock and you may get some drunken phone call from
• 10:28
  your mother that night at 2:00 in the morning and all you got
• 10:32
  to do, never pick those up. By the way, if you have a parent
• 10:34
  that drinks, don't pick up. Don't pick up after a certain
• 10:36
  time of night, that a lot of people have figured this stuff
• 10:39
  out by themselves clients who are adult children of
• 10:41
  Alcoholics. But if you have a borderline
• 10:43
  parent, a narcissistic parent, you should have your phone
• 10:46
  usually on. Do not disturb with favorite
• 10:48
  numbers to go through so that your parent cannot wake you up
• 10:52
  in the middle of the night or anything like that.
• 10:54
  But anyhow, they are going to try even harder to get a rise
• 10:58
  out of you because they don't know what the hell happened.
• 11:01
  Happen. But if you truly never give in
• 11:04
  and never go back to indulging their drama, they will stop and
• 11:09
  they will move their attention. Unfortunately, to another family
• 11:11
  member or hopefully just some friend of theirs or some
• 11:14
  acquaintances or somebody else. And they will leave you alone
• 11:17
  because you're no longer giving them what they need, which is
• 11:21
  this drama which they, I'm sure were raised with themselves and
• 11:25
  which they consider necessary for any relationship that they
• 11:30
  are in you. Have now decided that it's not
• 11:32
  necessary for a relationship that you're in.
• 11:34
  And in fact, it's very unhealthy.
• 11:36
  So they are not going to want much to do with you on a deep
• 11:39
  level. If you stay consistent without
• 11:42
  giving them this drama back and therefore you have thereby
• 11:46
  asserted your boundaries and allow there to be some peace in
• 11:49
  your relationship. There are some people this
• 11:51
  doesn't work with but most do because it's basic behavior
• 11:54
  training. They can no longer get the
• 11:56
  response from you. So eventually they stop trying
• 11:59
  and they reconfigure their Up with you, they're kind of
• 12:02
  disappointed in you and that would have to be cool with you.
• 12:04
  You could work in your own individual therapy on being,
• 12:07
  okay? That they're going to find your
• 12:08
  pretty boring. They're going to transfer most
• 12:11
  of their attention to someone else, maybe a sibling or
• 12:13
  somebody that doesn't know how to Gray Rock.
• 12:15
  But remember, that's good. You don't need that kind of
• 12:18
  attention. So you are a great Bland rock as
• 12:22
  my daughter, pretended to be. And hopefully you see that that
• 12:28
  can be learned and my daughter got to do a cameo.
• 12:31
  Performance and and she was very good at it.
• 12:36
  And hopefully I have cleared up a little bit about exactly what
• 12:41
  gray rock looks like in practice and that can help you in your
• 12:45
  dealings with difficult people. Not just people with
• 12:47
  narcissistic traits, but borderline traits as well.
• 12:50
  And also people who are just really depressive.
• 12:52
  And down constantly saying - stuff, constantly, just don't
• 12:55
  engage on the negative stuff. Either you are a bland gray
• 12:58
  rock. You don't have to be a positive
• 13:00
  Polly. Don't ever try to change their
• 13:02
  mind, it's just ah, ha right. Okay, uh-huh, right.
• 13:06
  Okay. And as my daughter in the moment
• 13:09
  said I'm sorry, I love you even when she was doing her little
• 13:13
  skit with the you know evil you know 20 years that hence mother
• 13:20
  she you know sometimes you feel drawn to say those things if
• 13:23
  your particular person is somebody that would be that you
• 13:28
  do still say I love you too then you could say that but But most
• 13:31
  of all you stick to Aha. Yup, hmm.
• 13:36
  So I'm sorry. Sorry to hear that.
• 13:38
  Yeah, mmm-hmm, okay. And you're just plain old
• 13:41
  boring. All right.
• 13:42
  Hopefully you guys like this and you like my daughter's little
• 13:46
  guest appearance and I'll talk to everybody soon.
• 13:48
  Have a great day, and please do subscribe.