• 15 minutes 24 seconds
    The Financial Abuse Tactic Narcissists Use When They 'Have No Money

    They said they were managing the finances — because you weren't good with money.

    That every purchase had to go through them. But somehow, there was always money for what they wanted.

    They made you feel like a child asking for an allowance — in your own home. And the moment you tried to leave, you realized you had nothing. Because they had made sure of it. That wasn't financial stress. That was financial control.

    This Thursday episode, Kerry reads from real accounts from people who lived inside financially controlling relationships. Learn what the 'broke' narcissist tactic looks like from the inside.

    In this episode:

    • Why narcissists use money as a tool of surveillance and control
    • The 'broke' performance: how narcissists claim poverty while draining your resources
    • How financial abuse creates a dependency trap designed to make leaving feel impossible
    • Why survivors so often exit these relationships starting over — in debt, isolated, and exhausted
    • What financial recovery really requires

    Submit your question to be answered on air here!

    Resources

    Follow Kerry!

    Kerry Kerr McAvoy, Ph.D., an author and educator, helps listeners decode toxic dynamics, recognize manipulation, and rebuild self-trust.

    As an Amazon affiliate, commission is earned from qualifying purchases.

    This podcast/video is for educational purposes only. It does not constitute therapy, counseling, or professional mental health advice, nor does listening create a doctor-patient or therapist-client relationship. If you or someone you know is in immediate danger, please call 911 or contact the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline by calling or texting 988 (US/Canada).

    13 August 2026, 6:00 am
  • 29 minutes 3 seconds
    How Narcissists Use Love Bombing to Build a Financial Trap

    He checked the grocery receipt. And the look on his face said everything: he expected to catch you at something. 

    You weren't a partner. You were a suspected thief. 

    But that moment — that first time money became a surveillance tool — didn't come out of nowhere. It didn't start with the receipts, or the interrogations, or the separate account he opened without telling you. 

    It started the moment he made you feel like the luckiest person alive. Because that feeling — of being chosen, adored, and completely seen — was the setup for everything that came after. 

    This week, Kerry sits down with clinical co-host and  UK psychologist Lynn S. to break down exactly how narcissists use love bombing to lay the groundwork for financial control —  and why so many survivors don't recognize the trap until they're already inside it. 

    In this episode: 

    • Why money is never just money in a narcissistic relationship 
    • The "eating off my plate" impulse: the primitive threat response that drives financial control 
    • How love bombing creates the emotional dependency that makes financial control feel normal — even deserved 
    • The "empty jar" framework: why giving second chances too early is one of the most dangerous mistakes in new relationships. 

    Want to go deeper? 

    For the Podcast Extra interview: 

    Paid Substack subscribers get exclusive access to Kerry and Lynn's full conversation on "sitting in the grey" — the psychological skill narcissists systematically destroy, and why rebuilding your capacity to trust your own inner compass requires something most survivors never think to look for.

    🔒 Become a paid subscriber and unlock your access today: https://substack.com/@breakingfreenarcabuse 

    LYNN STRATHDEE is a UK-based psychodynamic psychotherapist specializing in echoism, narcissistic abuse recovery, and the unconscious patterns that keep survivors stuck in repeating relationship cycles. A former educator turned therapist, Lynn brings both clinical training and lived experience to her private practice, where she works with clients online and in person. Her approach goes beyond surface-level psychoeducation to the deeper identity work that creates lasting change.  

    Website

    Submit your question to be answered on air here!

    EMPOWERED Voices: Recovery to Resiliency

    A heartfelt podcast series that brings to light the challenges and triumphs of...

    Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

    Resources

    Follow Kerry!

    Kerry Kerr McAvoy, Ph.D., an author and educator, helps listeners decode toxic dynamics, recognize manipulation, and rebuild self-trust.

    As an Amazon affiliate, commission is earned from qualifying purchases.

    This podcast/video is for educational purposes only. It does not constitute therapy, counseling, or professional mental health advice, nor does listening create a doctor-patient or therapist-client relationship. If you or someone you know is in immediate danger, please call 911 or contact the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline by calling or texting 988 (US/Canada).

    10 August 2026, 6:00 am
  • 13 minutes 33 seconds
    Narcissistic Parents Don't Love Their Children — They Use Them

    They said they were managing the finances — because you weren't good with money. That every purchase had to go through them. 

    But somehow, there was always money for what they wanted. They made you feel like a child asking for an allowance — in your own home. And the moment you tried to leave, you realized you had nothing. Because they had made sure of it. 

    That wasn't financial stress. That was financial control. 

    This Thursday episode, Kerry  reads from your stories — real accounts from people who lived inside financially controlling relationships — to break down what financial abuse actually is and what the 'broke' narcissist tactic looks like from the inside. 

    In this episode: 

    • Why narcissists use money as a tool of surveillance and control 
    • The 'broke' performance: how narcissists claim poverty while draining your resources 
    • How financial abuse creates a dependency trap designed to make leaving feel impossible 
    • Why survivors so often exit these relationships having to start over in debt, isolated, and exhausted 
    • What financial recovery really requires

    Key Moments:

    00:00 — Caught in the middle: the child who can't take sides
    02:05 — "My worst enemy, but also my best friend": love with conditions
    03:39 — When the sensitive child becomes the target
    05:07 — The gaze that builds a self — and the one that breaks it
    06:36 — "I never said that": memory gaslighting and siblings who stop speaking
    08:55 — Protecting your kids: hypervigilance, loyalty binds, and staying regulated

    Submit your question to be answered on air here!

    Resources

    Follow Kerry!

    Kerry Kerr McAvoy, Ph.D., an author and educator, helps listeners decode toxic dynamics, recognize manipulation, and rebuild self-trust.

    As an Amazon affiliate, commission is earned from qualifying purchases.

    This podcast/video is for educational purposes only. It does not constitute therapy, counseling, or professional mental health advice, nor does listening create a doctor-patient or therapist-client relationship. If you or someone you know is in immediate danger, please call 911 or contact the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline by calling or texting 988 (US/Canada).

    6 August 2026, 6:00 am
  • 34 minutes 18 seconds
    When Your Narcissistic Ex Weaponizes Your Children in Their Smear Campaign

    Your child comes home from a visit with the other parent guarded. Repeating things they couldn't have come up with on their own. Now they’re looking at you differently. 

    That's not just "divorce being hard." That's a smear campaign — and your narcissistic ex has recruited your own children to run it. 

    This week, Dr. Josh Davis — neuroscientist, psychologist, and author of The Difference That Makes a Difference — joins Kerry McAvoy to break down exactly how narcissistic exes weaponize children in their smear campaigns, and what you can do to protect your relationship with your kids without playing the narcissist's game. 

    In this episode:  

    • Why narcissistic exes target children in their smear campaigns and what they're really trying to accomplish  
    • The 3 signs your child is being used as a messenger or weapon against you  
    • How to respond when your child repeats the narcissist's narrative 
    • The one mistake most co-parents make that actually deepens the alienation 

    Exclusive Podcast Extra Segment

    Want to go deeper? 

    Paid Substack subscribers get exclusive access to Dr. Davis's most powerful technique — a simple mental shift that lets you step outside the chaos of a difficult co-parenting moment, see it clearly, and stop reacting 

    🔒 Become a paid subscriber and unlock your access today: https://substack.com/@breakingfreenarcabuse 

    DR. JOSH DAVIS is a neuroscientist, psychologist, and author of The Difference That Makes a Difference. His work helps parents build stronger connections with their children using tools from Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) and neuroscience.

    Website

    Book: The Difference That Makes the Difference: NLP and the Science of Positive Change

    Submit your question to be answered on air here!

    EMPOWERED Voices: Recovery to Resiliency

    A heartfelt podcast series that brings to light the challenges and triumphs of...

    Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

    Resources

    Follow Kerry!

    Kerry Kerr McAvoy, Ph.D., an author and educator, helps listeners decode toxic dynamics, recognize manipulation, and rebuild self-trust.

    As an Amazon affiliate, commission is earned from qualifying purchases.

    This podcast/video is for educational purposes only. It does not constitute therapy, counseling, or professional mental health advice, nor does listening create a doctor-patient or therapist-client relationship. If you or someone you know is in immediate danger, please call 911 or contact the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline by calling or texting 988 (US/Canada).

    3 August 2026, 6:00 am
  • 22 minutes 18 seconds
    Feed Swap: Covert Narcissist Relationships — When You Can't Live the Lie Anymore with Renee Swanson

    If you can name the patterns and see the behaviors, have you wondered why do you still feel so stuck?

    This week I'm sharing an episode from Renee Swanson of the Covert Narcissism Podcast — a feed swap I wanted to bring straight to this community. Renee unpacks what she calls "hitting the wall": the moment you can no longer live the lie in a covert narcissistic relationship, when you can't keep pretending that you're fine, that your family is fine, when it simply isn't.

    Renee Swanson, the host, walks through the two paths that lead there — the slow erosion that wears you down mentally, emotionally, and physically, and the sudden crack that changes everything in an instant — and what actually happens inside you when you reach that point: the numbness, the strange relief, the self-doubt. Then she gets practical about the conversation itself: what you're really trying to do when you name your reality out loud, the responses to expect (DARVO, minimizing, tears, an eerie calm), and how to stay grounded when it goes sideways.

    If any of this is your life right now, please be gentle with yourself as you listen — and reach out to a trusted person or a domestic-abuse resource if you need support. Find more of Renee's work and her coaching at covertnarcissism.com.

    Submit your question to be answered on air here!

    Resources

    Follow Kerry!

    Kerry Kerr McAvoy, Ph.D., an author and educator, helps listeners decode toxic dynamics, recognize manipulation, and rebuild self-trust.

    As an Amazon affiliate, commission is earned from qualifying purchases.

    This podcast/video is for educational purposes only. It does not constitute therapy, counseling, or professional mental health advice, nor does listening create a doctor-patient or therapist-client relationship. If you or someone you know is in immediate danger, please call 911 or contact the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline by calling or texting 988 (US/Canada).

    31 July 2026, 6:00 am
  • 17 minutes 43 seconds
    When Narcissists Weaponize Food: What Survivors Need to Hear

    Food shouldn't feel like a threat — but for narcissistic abuse survivors, it often does.

    In this viewer stories episode, survivors share exactly how the narcissist in their life weaponized food — turning meals into rituals of control, criticism, and shame. Kerry shares her own experience too. If mealtime ever filled you with dread, this episode will name what you lived through and show you why it happened.

    In this episode:
    • The specific tactics narcissists use to weaponize food
    • Why this coercive control tactic is so hard to identify
    • How emotional abuse through food leaves lasting shame, body image wounds, and even eating disorders
    • 3 concrete steps to begin reclaiming your relationship with food after narcissistic abuse.

    Submit your question to be answered on air here!

    Resources

    Follow Kerry!

    Kerry Kerr McAvoy, Ph.D., an author and educator, helps listeners decode toxic dynamics, recognize manipulation, and rebuild self-trust.

    As an Amazon affiliate, commission is earned from qualifying purchases.

    This podcast/video is for educational purposes only. It does not constitute therapy, counseling, or professional mental health advice, nor does listening create a doctor-patient or therapist-client relationship. If you or someone you know is in immediate danger, please call 911 or contact the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline by calling or texting 988 (US/Canada).

    30 July 2026, 6:00 am
  • 31 minutes 5 seconds
    The Real Reason Narcissists Make Food About Control

    Food is the most primal human need — and narcissists know it. The demands that ruin a vacation. The meal that is never made right. The praise given once, then withheld forever. These are calculated moves in a much larger control strategy.

    In this conversation, Kerry McAvoy and co-host Lynn S. decode the psychology behind narcissistic food control: why it is never actually about the food, how narcissists exploit your deepest vulnerabilities through something as basic as sustenance, and why recognizing this pattern is the first step toward disengaging from a dynamic designed to make you feel perpetually inadequate.

    Podcast Extra Exclusive Segment

    Want to go deeper? In this Members-Only episode — Lynn and Dr. Kerry unpack what happens after the recognition and why healing from food-based control takes longer than most expect.

    Find the exclusive second segment and weekly newsletter here: https://substack.com/@breakingfreenarcabuse

    LYNN STRATHDEE is a UK-based psychodynamic psychotherapist specializing in echoism, narcissistic abuse recovery, and the unconscious patterns that keep survivors stuck in repeating relationship cycles. A former educator turned therapist, Lynn brings both clinical training and lived experience to her private practice, where she works with clients online and in person. Her approach goes beyond surface-level psychoeducation to the deeper identity work that creates lasting change.

    WEBSITE


    Submit your question to be answered on air here!

    EMPOWERED Voices: Recovery to Resiliency

    A heartfelt podcast series that brings to light the challenges and triumphs of...

    Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

    Resources

    Follow Kerry!

    Kerry Kerr McAvoy, Ph.D., an author and educator, helps listeners decode toxic dynamics, recognize manipulation, and rebuild self-trust.

    As an Amazon affiliate, commission is earned from qualifying purchases.

    This podcast/video is for educational purposes only. It does not constitute therapy, counseling, or professional mental health advice, nor does listening create a doctor-patient or therapist-client relationship. If you or someone you know is in immediate danger, please call 911 or contact the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline by calling or texting 988 (US/Canada).

    27 July 2026, 6:00 am
  • 18 minutes 13 seconds
    Harmless Joke? No, It Was Sadism & Why Your Body Spotted the Truth First

    That flash of something is wrong you couldn't quite explain? Your body caught it before your mind could argue you down.

    In this Viewers' Stories episode, Dr. Kerry McAvoy reacts to a so-called "prank" a husband pulled on his wife — secretly serving her breast milk in their guests' coffee, then bringing her breakfast in bed: toast smeared with their newborn's poop in place of peanut butter. The wife wondered if she was overreacting. Too sensitive. Unable to take a joke.

    This is everyday sadism — cruelty dressed up as humor — and it runs on the same engine as narcissistic abuse and gaslighting: make you doubt what you felt, and you'll never confront what they did. That's the trap. Everyday sadism doesn't hide in the shadows. Your own decency blinds you, because you can't imagine someone who claims to love you could be this callous. So instead of confronting the person who hurt you, you turn on yourself — convinced you must have gotten it wrong. That self-doubt isn't a side effect. It's the point.

    In this episode: 

    • What everyday sadism and sadistic behavior actually look like
    • Why your body registers danger before your mind can rationalize it away
    • The exact mechanics of how cruelty disguised as humor enables gaslighting and coercive control in narcissistic abuse
    • Why survivors are conditioned to question their own reactions and not their abuser's

    For more on everyday sadism, be sure to check out Dr. Kerry’s interview with Joe Navarro.

    Submit your question to be answered on air here!

    Resources

    Follow Kerry!

    Kerry Kerr McAvoy, Ph.D., an author and educator, helps listeners decode toxic dynamics, recognize manipulation, and rebuild self-trust.

    As an Amazon affiliate, commission is earned from qualifying purchases.

    This podcast/video is for educational purposes only. It does not constitute therapy, counseling, or professional mental health advice, nor does listening create a doctor-patient or therapist-client relationship. If you or someone you know is in immediate danger, please call 911 or contact the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline by calling or texting 988 (US/Canada).

    23 July 2026, 6:00 am
  • 30 minutes 45 seconds
    How Dangerous Predators Hide Sadism in Plain Sight - Joe Navarro, Former FBI Agent

    The most dangerous narcissists don’t go ballistic: they peck you to death.

    After spending decades studying dangerous personalities, former FBI agent Joe Navarro has learned that the cruelest narcissistic abuse almost never looks the way we expect.  It hides behind the withheld compliment, the public put-down disguised as a joke, the silent treatment and the affection that never comes.

    In this conversation, Joe and Dr. Kerry McAvoy name the covert sadism living inside everyday relationships with a narcissist, and why it leaves lasting damage.

    Podcast Extra Exclusive Segment

    Want to go deeper? 

    In this Members-Only Interview — Joe walks through the practical steps to breaking free. Learn exactly the first step on how to get started. Find the exclusive second segment and weekly newsletter here.

    JOE NAVARRO, a former FBI agent and one of the world's foremost authorities on reading human behavior, has spent his life learning to spot dangerous people before the rest of us see them coming. Recruited into the FBI at just 23 — one of the youngest agents ever — Joe spent 25 years in counterintelligence and counterterrorism, catching spies by decoding the nonverbal signals most people miss, and went on to train both FBI agents and the wider intelligence community in the science he helped refine. Since retiring from the Bureau in 2003, he has become a sought-after speaker, consultant, and author — including the landmark Dangerous Personalities — helping people everywhere recognize the predators hiding in plain sight.

    Latest Book:

    Submit your question to be answered on air here!

    EMPOWERED Voices: Recovery to Resiliency

    A heartfelt podcast series that brings to light the challenges and triumphs of...

    Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

    Resources

    Follow Kerry!

    Kerry Kerr McAvoy, Ph.D., an author and educator, helps listeners decode toxic dynamics, recognize manipulation, and rebuild self-trust.

    As an Amazon affiliate, commission is earned from qualifying purchases.

    This podcast/video is for educational purposes only. It does not constitute therapy, counseling, or professional mental health advice, nor does listening create a doctor-patient or therapist-client relationship. If you or someone you know is in immediate danger, please call 911 or contact the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline by calling or texting 988 (US/Canada).

    20 July 2026, 6:00 am
  • 10 minutes 39 seconds
    Your Birthday Was Rigged to Fail: How Narcissists Sabotage Special Days

    It's your special day. Your birthday. Maybe the narcissist participated in the build-out or maybe they pretended not to notice. But you knew. And you got your hopes up. Perhaps this birthday will go differently.

    What you didn't expect was to spend the rest of your birthday managing their feelings.

    In this Viewers' Stories episode, Dr. Kerry shares submitted accounts of birthdays that ended in tears, anniversaries engineered to fail, and being asked to comfort the person who hurt you.

    This is the Thursday companion to Monday's episode, "Why Narcissists Destroy Your Best Days — It's Not Forgetfulness, It's Sadism," with psychotherapist Lynn Strathdee

    Submit your question to be answered on air here!

    Resources

    Follow Kerry!

    Kerry Kerr McAvoy, Ph.D., an author and educator, helps listeners decode toxic dynamics, recognize manipulation, and rebuild self-trust.

    As an Amazon affiliate, commission is earned from qualifying purchases.

    This podcast/video is for educational purposes only. It does not constitute therapy, counseling, or professional mental health advice, nor does listening create a doctor-patient or therapist-client relationship. If you or someone you know is in immediate danger, please call 911 or contact the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline by calling or texting 988 (US/Canada).

    16 July 2026, 6:00 am
  • 29 minutes 37 seconds
    Why Narcissists Destroy Your Best Days — It's Not Forgetfulness, It's Sadism

    The ruined birthday. The wrecked anniversary. The gift left in a drawer. It wasn't thoughtlessness.

    Dr. Kerry sits down with psychodynamic psychotherapist Lynn Strathdee to break down one of the most painful — and least-named — patterns in narcissistic relationships: the deliberate destruction of special occasions.

    Lynn identifies the core drive as pleasure at being the cause — a compulsion rooted in early development that, in character-disordered adults, becomes a form of covert manipulation. Your emotional pain isn't collateral damage. For a narcissist, it's the reward.

    In this episode:

    • Why narcissists specifically target birthdays, holidays, and anniversaries
    • The "pleasure at being the cause" drive — and how it escalates on your best days
    • Dry begging: the manipulation tactic hiding in plain sight
    • How devaluation becomes a source of narcissistic supply
    • Why you kept making excuses — and what this pattern reveals about NPD

    Podcast Extra Exclusive Segment

    If the sabotage only makes sense in hindsight — can you learn to see it in real time?

    Kerry and Lynn unpack the quieter signal most survivors train themselves to override: the "something feels a little off"whisper — and how to turn its volume up without becoming paranoid. Plus: the chat-history article that's been haunting Kerry about an ordinary couple, and what one partner had actually been thinking all along.

    Find the exclusive second segment and weekly newsletter here: https://substack.com/@breakingfreenarcabuse

    LYNN STRATHDEE is a UK-based psychodynamic psychotherapist specializing in echoism, narcissistic abuse recovery, and the unconscious patterns that keep survivors stuck in repeating relationship cycles. A former educator turned therapist, Lynn brings both clinical training and lived experience to her private practice, where she works with clients online and in person. Her approach goes beyond surface-level psychoeducation to the deeper identity work that creates lasting change.

    WEBSITE

    Submit your question to be answered on air here!

    EMPOWERED Voices: Recovery to Resiliency

    A heartfelt podcast series that brings to light the challenges and triumphs of...

    Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

    Resources

    Follow Kerry!

    Kerry Kerr McAvoy, Ph.D., an author and educator, helps listeners decode toxic dynamics, recognize manipulation, and rebuild self-trust.

    As an Amazon affiliate, commission is earned from qualifying purchases.

    This podcast/video is for educational purposes only. It does not constitute therapy, counseling, or professional mental health advice, nor does listening create a doctor-patient or therapist-client relationship. If you or someone you know is in immediate danger, please call 911 or contact the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline by calling or texting 988 (US/Canada).

    13 July 2026, 6:00 am
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