Emotional blackmail

And similarly, parents who feel like they're under constantly like the threat of their sword of Damocles, that they might come down on them and they might be cut off.

That's sort of an emotional blackmail that's tried to kind of sort of inherently coercive.

And I think, you know, there's an interestingly, there's something at parents, I think for a transgender adult, young adults or teens, the parent is always going to be an existential threat to an identity that just won't die.

You know, because I have, we have, as parents, we have, I have a canon of memory of my kids that they don't have for themselves.

Public if they don't give you money of some kind, right? So the most standard would be maybe you have a picture or an email or incriminating damning email, and they're like, "I'll keep this a secret if you give me $10,000." Right? That's typically how what we consider blackmail or extortion to be.

Right? And in many of these kinds of extortionate situations, what happens is that over time, it's never just once, and then once they know they have a live target, the blackmailer, the extortion, extort- ex- extorter, um, has that person in position, that they'll keep sort of, um, going back to the well, right? Keep that model in mind because w- I, you know, emotional blackmail's one of those things that we get asked about, and then I was looking at the literature about it.

Everything that was being described as being emotional blackmail, and I took some notes here, right? So things that qualify as, um, as emotional, um, blackmail are the silent treatment and withholding, being a victim.

They'll be a victim, and if you don't, um, if you don't do something that they need or give them something they need, that something terrible will befall them.

So they'll be yammering on about their, um, uh, their econ- their m- money problems and will come to you saying, "Oh, I just got the eviction notice," or, "I'm s- soon I'm not gonna have a car.

I'm not gonna be able to go see my family for Christmas." And so it's, it's, it's manipulation, right? By them p- playing the victim, the idea being that you would step up.

Um, if they don't g- they also will try to get their way by being moping or sullen, and that if you do give them their way, then they will pop up back to life, and you'll have a cheerful person in front of you, and won't that be great? Future faking, which even though, even though the emotional blackmail literature doesn't call it that, it's a lot of future faking.

They'll d- also do things, you know, they'll make a promise based on a future thing to get something from you in the present moment.

It's like she's slowly turning up the pressure, trying to make me feel like saying no would mean letting her die.

What started as a request has started to feel more like emotional blackmail.

She keeps repeating that I could save her life, like that's supposed to make the decision easy, but it doesn't.

It just makes me feel guilty.

Sonia Blunt had never before arranged a romantic encounter with a stranger in a hotel, but she pushed her nerves aside and set a date to meet Shane Cully.

While Sonia did her best to move on, Eric Locke was persisting in his campaign of emotional blackmail.

He accused her of blanking him at work and said that she was spreading rumors that he was stalking her.

And she replied, well, I haven't heard those rumors, but I would appreciate if you'd stop staring at me at work because it is making me feel uncomfortable.

So it is scary and sad that somebody would take advantage of that to such an extent and to manipulate her with her kindness and to use that against her.

Eric Locke could not accept a woman rejecting him.

When mother of one Sonia Blunt recognized his toxic behavior and made the decision not to keep dating him, Locke responded with every trick in the book, from begging to threats to emotional blackmail.

When none of his troubling tactics worked to win her back, he took the ultimate revenge, depriving a caring and beloved young woman of her life and cementing his place as one of the world's most evil killers.

It was one of those lazy afternoons, the kind where your brain bounces between random thoughts and web tabs faster than you can make sense of it all.

That's when I stumbled across this book, Emotional Blackmail by Susan Forward.

At first glance, the title struck me like a punch to the gut.

Blackmail? That word usually brings to mind shady deals and briefcases full of cash, not the soft, fuzzy terrain of close relationships.

Still, I was hooked.

Emotional blackmail, it sounded bold, almost scandalous.

And the kicker, it was happening right under my metaphorical nose.

Right under yours too, probably.