I sat down with Dr. Isabel Morley—clinical psychologist, EFT-certified couples therapist, and author of They’re Not Gaslighting You. We unpacked how “therapy speak” has exploded into everyday conversation. The upside: people are finally talking about mental health. The downside: labels get tossed around so loosely that real dialogue shuts down. Calling a partner “toxic,” “narcissistic,” or “gaslighting” can feel satisfying in the moment, but it usually hardens positions and blocks the actual work—understanding behavior, impact, and what needs to change.
We clarified some of the most misused terms without getting jargony. Gaslighting isn’t “they disagreed with me”—it’s a sustained reality-twisting pattern that erodes your ability to trust your own mind. Narcissistic Personality Disorder isn’t “they were self-absorbed last night”—it’s pervasive, impairing, and diagnosed over time. OCD is not tidy preferences; it’s intrusive thoughts and compulsions that temporarily relieve intense anxiety. Bipolar disorder isn’t day-to-day moodiness; it’s distinct mood episodes. And “toxic” is most useful when it describes an unhealthy dynamic, not a flawed human being you write off as nuclear waste.
So what works better than label-slapping? Lead with specific observations and vulnerability rather than character judgments. “I feel sidelined when we don’t set aside time together” opens doors; “you’re a narcissist” slams them. Use boundaries to protect safety and autonomy—“If voices rise, I’m going to pause and try again in an hour”—not as ultimatums. Treat red flags as patterns you notice across time and contexts; one annoying moment (someone checking a phone at dinner) warrants curiosity and follow-up before conclusions. And when a partner shuts down, it matters whether that’s punitive stonewalling or emotional overwhelm—the repair plan is different.
We also talked about the social-media effect: short, viral posts make mental-health talk more visible but flatten nuance. A healthier stance—clinically and relationally—is to validate without necessarily agreeing (“I can see how that hurt”) and then explore context, accountability, and next steps. When a diagnosis truly seems relevant, slow down and gather history; day to day, focus on what’s workable—what actually moves the relationship toward safety, connection, and shared values.
If this resonates, check out Dr. Morley’s book They’re Not Gaslighting You and her romcom rescue podcast for smart, practical takes on relationships. And if you’re new here, subscribe to MindTricks Radio and the blog—we’ll keep translating solid clinical ideas into tools you can actually use.
FULL EPISODE TRANSCRIPT BELOW
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
We’re here today with Dr. Isabel Morley, a clinical psychologist and EFT certified couples therapist. She is the author of They’re Not Gaslighting You, Ditch the Therapy Speak and Stop Hunting for Red Flags in Everyday Relationships. She’s a contributing author to Psychology Today in her blog, Love Them or Leave Them, and co-host of the romcom rescue podcast. She has a private practice providing couples therapy and coaching and lives in the Boston area. Isabel, welcome to the show.
Dr. Isabel Morley:
Thank you so much for having me. I’m excited to chat with you today.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
Likewise. I’m really excited to have you here. I really enjoyed your book, which is titled They’re Not Gaslighting You, Ditch the Therapy Speak and Stop Hunting for Red Flags in Every Relationship. It was a really fun read and congratulations on writing such an awesome book.
Dr. Isabel Morley:
Thank you. That means a lot to me. Thank you. I really enjoyed writing it. It was done in a very short time frame, so that shows you that I really enjoyed writing it because it didn’t drag on.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
No, I could tell. Yeah, it was really fun. It was a fun read and it seemed like it was fun to write. And we’re going to dive into the book. I’m going to ask you a bunch of things today about the content of the book. But first off, I’d really love to start by learning a little bit more about you as a person, kind of how you got into this field of psychology, your journey to becoming a psychologist, and then ultimately what prompted you to want to write this book in the first place.
Dr. Isabel Morley:
I like to joke that the best explanation for why I’m a psychologist is that I’m a middle child. It’s a classic middle child who wanted to mediate every conflict in my family, wanted everyone to get along, and wanted to understand everybody. And that just drove this desire to better understand human behavior, human feelings, why we act and feel the way that we do. And although I dabbled with the idea of going to law school briefly when I was in college, I always knew that psychology was my path. So I went right from college straight into grad school to get my PsyD and from there just new dawn and to practice and have loved it. And I’m so glad I chose it and love couples therapy, which is what I do now is strictly couples therapy.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
Right. And you focus on emotionally focused therapy, it looks like when your couples practice.
Dr. Isabel Morley:
That’s right. I’m certified in EFT. So that’s my primary modality, but I also bring in Gottman and RLT and there’s just so much good therapy out there to incorporate.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
Yeah. It’s so funny you mentioned that you had considered becoming a lawyer because I did too when I was starting out. I think a lot of psychologists might have become lawyers, but I like to tell people I decided I wanted to use my gift for gab for the forces of good instead of the forces of evil, which—
Dr. Isabel Morley:
I love that.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
No offense to the lawyers out there, but it would have been a terrible match for me.
Dr. Isabel Morley:
I know. Curious why we wouldn’t have considered it because it’s a very different career path and a very different way of interacting with humans day to day, but the LSAT is what scared me off. I was hard to know to the logic questions. I guess I’m just going to go into psychology.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
So you had to suffer through the GRE instead, right?
Dr. Isabel Morley:
Yeah, that’s right, which was so much better. So much better.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
Yeah. And you also have a podcast yourself. It’s called the romcom rescue podcast. So you’re a fellow podcaster. Tell me a little bit about that.
Dr. Isabel Morley:
Yeah. My cohost that I Kira Sabin started a podcast about a year ago all about romcoms, where we pick popular romcoms or new romcoms and we go through and talk about what is healthy, what is not healthy, what we want to coach the main characters into doing or realizing and we sort of analyze it through this clinical lens to help people who enjoy romcoms, you know, not take that away from them, but say, listen, here’s what you should pull from this movie into your real life and here’s what you should leave. And this is just entertainment and it’s not realistic or it’s not healthy. And it is super fun. And I’m sure you feel this like doing a podcast, you have to love it to want to keep doing it every day, every week. So it’s enjoyable.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
Yeah, that sounds like a super fun topic. Do you find that people sort of take the romcom celebrities or their characters as a model for relationship behavior? Like is that kind of why you were inspired to do that?
Dr. Isabel Morley:
Yeah, I mean, clients reference romcoms, reference shows and be like, well, I wish my partner was like this or I wish I could respond in that way without recognizing whether or not that’s a way that people should act or realistically do act, you know, the grand gesture or the angry self-disclosure where they sort of call each other out for their bad behavior, all these things that I think are fun in theory, but not good in real relationships.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
Yeah, of course, that’s sort of Hollywood and it’s not always realistic. Yeah. So let’s talk about this concept of therapy speak and also this idea of weaponizing therapy speak. Can you just sort of explain a bit about that idea? You talk about it, I mean, that’s what your whole book is sort of about that. What is that concept?
Dr. Isabel Morley:
So therapy speak is when people take therapy or clinical terms and start using it in their everyday conversations to explain their experiences or their relationships. And it was the thing that never happened. I don’t know if you felt this way too, but like when I grew up, people weren’t using the term boundaries or holding space. Narcissists was used sparingly. These weren’t words in the common vernacular, but as more and more people have gone to therapy, as therapy has become more accessible and information about mental health has become more accessible, which is fantastic in itself. People have learned these words and started using them more freely. The problem is the pendulum has swung the other direction from no one talks about mental health, it’s stigmatized to now everyone talks too much about mental health and it’s misunderstood. And that’s where the weaponization has come in, where people now use these words to absolve themselves of blame or responsibility and pathologize everybody else in their life and sort of put this label on them that they’re the problem, which is, as I argue in my book, incredibly counterproductive.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
Right. So it’s using terms incorrectly and sometimes using them for the purpose of absolving oneself of some misdoing and blaming somebody else for things in ways that are using the therapy speak incorrectly and badly for that. So I want to dig more into that. Why, what is the potential harm of this causing, do you think?
Dr. Isabel Morley:
Unfortunately, I’ve seen it in session. I’ve seen an individual therapy with people using these words and then not being willing to sort of see their role in the problems that they’re experiencing and do that self work, which would benefit them. And I’ve seen couples use these words against each other in couples therapy sessions, which does so much damage. First of all, it’s a conversation stopper. When someone says everything you do is a red flag, like you’ve got to be a sociopath because of how unemotional you are about this. People are not then interested in engaging, being vulnerable, being curious together. Right. Like it’s just a wall that gets put up right away and it separates people. It can end relationships because there’s no sense of emotional safety and curiosity. And then there’s not anywhere you can go from that point.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
Yeah. So you mentioned relationships. You see that in the room when you’re doing couples therapy. So I imagine this is a typical place where you might see the weaponized therapy speak coming up where one partner is sort of accusing or blaming the other partner of one of these things that are the weaponized terms. Are there other typical relationship dynamics or dynamic interpersonal dynamics where you see this coming up?
Dr. Isabel Morley:
As in other types of relationships or just patterns that people do this with?
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
Yeah. Other kinds of relationships. So between partners, one person weaponizes against another. But what other ways do you typically see this coming up where people are sort of flinging and using these words loosely about other people?
Dr. Isabel Morley:
I hate to call out entire generations, but younger generations, millennials and younger, because they have had more access to these words, are really into using them and describing their parents and older people. Older people really don’t understand what’s happening. They don’t know these words. They don’t know what they actually mean. They don’t know what to do about it. So it doesn’t help them self reflect and make changes and grow together. It just makes them confused and defensive. And again, there’s just more separation. And then I think there are people who tend to use these words with everyone and everything in their life. They just sort of explain their experiences through the lens of clinical terms. And everyone they know crosses their boundaries or is borderline. And it’s never them. You know, the patterns don’t ever come back to maybe I’m doing something. Maybe I could shift this and see some progress and growth. It’s always everything else is pathological. And that’s hard to see just because, you know, people are going to keep suffering because they’re not. And what I would say is like, it’s just disempowering. They are not finding their agency and making change.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
So I got the sense in your book. You mentioned it at least once or twice where I think you say you sometimes call people out on this when you hear it, maybe patients when you’re in a session or I don’t know, you probably do this with your friends too, since it’s a topic that’s on your mind. How does that typically go over with people?
Dr. Isabel Morley:
It really depends. There are some people who are not open to it at all. And my challenging of it. Feels like further evidence of whatever they were saying that everyone is invalidating and gaslighting them because they’re not feeling heard and agreed with. But that’s the minority. I think most people are willing to be paused and to reflect on the words that they’ve used. And then what inevitably happens, Erin, is that they still use those words or similar clinical words, but they’ll sort of like wink and joke. I know I know. That’s not what it actually means. I know, Isabel, but I’m just saying it so you get it, which is fine. Fine with me. Fine with that. As long as we understand they’re not actually saying that person as a psychopath, you just think they’re behaving that badly.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
Right. Yeah. So let’s talk a little bit about social media and the internet. Now you talked about the younger generations, obviously. We call these the iPad kids. We have these Gen Zs, you know, these fun terms. But of course, social media and the internet plays a big role in disseminating information and setting the tone for pop culture. So what are, how do you put this into context, the use of social media and how that’s influencing people around therapy speak?
Dr. Isabel Morley:
I have to say that it really is overall a good thing. You know, people used to have no idea what depression was and there was no internet to look it up. And, you know, they would have to happen upon a doctor who diagnosed them and got them help. Right. And even then it was like very hush, hush, don’t tell anybody. This is something to be ashamed of. Now people are talking everywhere about mental health, about disorders, about how to take care of yourself and self care, which is wonderful. Like it’s people trying to take the best care of themselves mentally. However, social media doesn’t have any rules. And if you say you’re an expert in something, there’s no one, you know, asking you to remove that word from your account if it’s not true. There are a lot of influencers who think that their personal experience, their end of one counts for everyone else who might have that disorder. And it’s very hard to take these 20 second, 40 second, 60 second reels and get the full nuance of a term or a disorder. So I think there’s just a lot of confusion and misunderstanding and within good intent. But listen, I mean, spent four years learning the DSM and learning about these terms. And to this day, I still feel like I want to consult with somebody before I assign, especially the heavier personality disorder ones, like they’re, they’re complicated and they should be taken seriously. I feel like right now no one has taken them seriously.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
Yeah. And even clinicians, like it’s impossible to diagnose a personality disorder in one session. I think you really have to get to know the person, the pattern of behavior, really dig in because so many symptoms and so many behavioral patterns can be caused for so many different reasons. And a personality pattern isn’t something you’re going to know about somebody until you really get a chance to get to know them.
Dr. Isabel Morley:
Oh, yes, exactly. And I think that’s helpful for people to hear is that you and I, as trained as we are, couldn’t have a session or three or five and feel super confident. This person is 100% borderline or they are narcissists like hands down because there’s so much context you want to gather. Ideally, you’d have collateral information and you just have to experience them over time to see that pattern unfold. Whereas I think people now think they can sort of catch these early signs and draw the right conclusion and that that’s accurate. But a lot of the times it’s just not accurate.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
So would you say like, I guess consistent with what we’re talking about, that there’s a tendency toward like over pathologizing the glib use of these clinical terms leads to over pathologizing and even self-diagnosing. I don’t know. Now people probably go to chat GPT type in a few things and ask for diagnosis. Like, is that an issue?
Dr. Isabel Morley:
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, when I look at Instagram, the first thing I think is like, no one is well. There is no one who is mentally well in this world on this app, but right, because everyone thinks they have something. But when you look at the stats on the logic disorders, it’s like one percent of the population, six percent of the population. It’s not that many people. And I think the thing to remember is that the criteria for almost any of these disorders will resonate to some degree with all of us. Right. Like I thought I had ADHD at a moment in time when I was young because I was having a hard time focusing. I definitely don’t have ADHD. But if you’re sort of cherry picking symptoms, it’s very easy to do.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
You had mentioned in the book at one point, there was a section where you talked about it’s kind of interesting. And I think you might have cited some research for this, but the concept is interesting, this idea that people tend to align and validate another person’s self-diagnoses or characterizations of themselves. It’s sort of like a, I guess, maybe a cognitive bias of some sort. It’s kind of an interesting concept. What do you have to say about that?
Dr. Isabel Morley:
Well, I think we give deference to these terms, right? They’re medical terms and it feels inherently mean or doubtful to sort of tell someone, no, I don’t think that’s true for you when they have such conviction about it and when you don’t know their whole history and maybe they’re right. So we just tend to say, OK, right? Like if that’s what you’re saying, that’s what I’ll believe and that must be so hard. And that is like a lovely human response to hearing something, but it’s not necessarily accurate. And I know, I don’t know if you’ve ever felt this way in your work, but certainly with new clients who come in who say, you know, I have this diagnosis, armchair diagnosis, not given to them by a prior provider, but just they think they have it, it’s very hard to tell them. I don’t know. I don’t know if you do. Let’s actually wait and look at it and decide together because I don’t see it. It feels very invalidating to them, even gaslighting to them. So I think it just feels very sensitive.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
Yeah, I also imagine like this stereotypical scenario of a bunch of people sitting around and I’m just going to use women for this example, just for fun sitting around and one woman is like complaining about her boyfriend and saying, oh, he’s such a psycho. He’s a psychopath. And then all the other ones are sitting around like, yeah, you’re right, girlfriend. He’s a psychopath. And it’s just, you know, piling on this pathologizing without looking at nuance. And I mean, it’s not obvious. He’s not gender specific men do that too about about the girlfriends or whatnot. But it just sort of seems like there’s probably like an echo chamber of validation.
Dr. Isabel Morley:
Oh, yes. I mean, such an important point. You can validate to a fault and you can validate without agreeing, which people don’t realize you can say that sounds incredibly painful. I can see you’re suffering. What a terrible thing to go through without saying he’s definitely a psychopath. What an asshole. Like you don’t have to say that part. You might not agree. And a truly good friend will be able to say to you, that’s awful. I’m so sorry that you’re feeling this way. And I wonder if maybe he was going through this and that’s why he acted that way. Or if you could talk to him about it and see if he can understand your feelings. Like a good friend will empower you and challenge you and not just be an echo chamber for you, but a lot of friends don’t do that. And a lot of people feel afraid to do that.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
Yeah. And I imagine you can agree with your friend that some behavior the partner did was bad or wrong in some way, but that doesn’t mean that person is a psychopath or a narcissist. It’s the problem becomes and just sort of flinging and weaponizing these therapy terms, because then you’re creating something that is not there.
Dr. Isabel Morley:
Right. And then like I sort of argued in the book, confirmation bias. Once you’ve decided whoever it is in your life as a psychopath, you’re going to find evidence for it. Right. Like them forgetting to do something is like, oh, they don’t care about me because they’re such a psychopath. And so it really walks you down a dangerous road. The other point I make is if you really think that you’re dating a psychopath, you should be running. You shouldn’t be staying in that relationship and complaining about them. You should be getting out.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
That’s very true. Like people who really do truly, genuinely, legitimately have these kinds of diagnoses are not people. People would want to stay in a relationship for one more day because, as we know, a psychopath has no concept, no potential for empathy or for seeing anybody else’s point of view. That’s just a dangerous person to be in a relationship with. Yeah. So there’s a number of different terms that you go into some detail about in your book, and it was a lot of fun to read through these. And I was hoping we could pick out some of them and just briefly talk about how these are examples of potential examples of weaponized therapy, speak, and your thoughts and those. So there’s this cluster of a few that I think have some similarities. You talk people might use the term abusive, toxic, psycho. He or she is an abusive person. He’s so abusive. He’s toxic. He’s a psycho. Can you just speak a little bit about those terms?
Dr. Isabel Morley:
So I will say that abuse can be hard to spot on the line between bad behavior and abuse can be hard to see. And I think everybody is terrified of being an abusive relationship. And sometimes you’re in a good relationship where somebody acts in ways that count as abuse without them being what I would call like abusive. When I call somebody abusive, I mean, or like truly toxic, right? Is that they have no insight, they have no accountability, they have no desire to have insight or accountability. They do not want to work on it. They think you’re the problem and that’s the end of the story. Whereas a lot of people who behave badly, even very badly, then feel regret, see how it was wrong, take responsibility, try to change. And that’s a whole different category of person. But when we throw all of these people into the same bucket of like toxic without differentiating what kind of toxic and who you’re dealing with, I think you end up writing off a lot of people who may actually have had a lot of potential.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
So again, this comes down to behavior versus concrete behavioral patterns over time, a person can engage in a behavior that one might say that is sort of an abusive behavior or that’s an unhealthy behavior. But it doesn’t mean that person is categorically unhealthy, toxic or abusive. We have to look at the nuances of this.
Dr. Isabel Morley:
Yes, the big picture. And I’ll use myself as an example, as I do in the books, that everyone knows that I’m not perfect to. Stonewalling, like true stonewalling, can be an abuse tactic of punishing somebody for doing whatever they did that you didn’t like. So you just cut them off and give them the silent treatment until you feel like they fall back in line. That can be a picture of abuse. I stonewall not to try to control the other person or punish them, because I get so overwhelmed with feelings. I can’t think straight. I just want to cry and I’m trying not to cry. And so I disengage, but it’s not to be abusive. It’s not to get my way. It’s coming from a very different place. And afterwards, I’ll say, I know I shut down. I’m sorry. Here’s what was happening for me. If you just stop at, well, you stonewall. So you’re abusive because that’s emotional abuse. I won’t even have a chance to grow and to correct the behavior.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
Yeah. How about toxic? So nobody’s perfect, right? People do things or they react in ways that aren’t perfect. What’s the difference between that and a person being a toxic person? I don’t even believe there’s such a thing as a toxic person, but in the way that people think of that of that word.
Dr. Isabel Morley:
I have a hard time with toxic, too, because I don’t know what it means. It means everything and nothing at the same time, which is sort of what I argue. I think toxic means it’s not good for you. Whatever the combination of personalities is, whether the other person is the only offender or not, the situation is not good for you. It’s not healthy and it’s not changing. And you’re trying everything you can to make a change and it’s not getting better. That sounds emotionally destructive and toxic and is worth considering exiting or trying to get serious help for. But I think when people use toxic, they mean the other person. It’s 100 percent a problem making this a toxic situation for me versus our combination is clearly not working. We are two people who are flawed, trying our best, but we’re not making it work. And so therefore we should probably.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
I like that. So you’re talking about the situation as opposed to accusing the other person of being a toxic person. Like when I think of toxic, I think of like nuclear waste. I just don’t think another person can be nuclear waste. I mean, that’s sort of not fair to say about another human being. Yeah. OK. Gaslighting. Now, this is a big one. And I actually did a brief episode several weeks back about gaslighting because this term comes up so much, but you probably know more about it and are better about talking about it than I am. So I would love to hear your thoughts on this term gaslighting, what it is and what it isn’t and where it’s coming from.
Dr. Isabel Morley:
Well, obviously, in the book is titled, They’re Not Gaslighting You Because I Think It Is Just So Overused Now. And I have people left and right saying they’re gaslighting me. That’s gaslighting when it is not gaslighting. So I will say to everyone, gaslighting is a serious abuse tactic. It is born from a movie, a play turned into a movie. Like this isn’t from the DSM. This is just something that we’ve observed that now we’ve incorporated into our understanding of how abuse can occur where somebody makes you question your reality, makes you think that your memory is wrong, that you can’t trust yourself. You have to believe their version of events and it is truly crazy making. It does so much serious damage to people’s self-esteem and self-trust. Undoing it is a serious task. And I’ve worked with people post real gaslighting and it is horrific what they’ve endured. That is very different from somebody disagreeing, happened or invalidating your experience, right? Arguing with you. Those things might hurt, but that is not gaslighting. And some people might think this is nitpicking of like, why do you even care? Right? Like they’re using a word to explain their experience. But these words matter for the people who have suffered them. People who have been gaslit need this word to mean what it means. So that when they say that person gaslit me for five years, we all understand how serious that is.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
Yeah. And it’s also, I think, counter productive because when somebody is using another person of gaslighting them, they are then saying that person’s doing something bad or wrong, it’s almost like a reverse gaslight sort of, if you would say that. But it’s certainly not fair because if I have a difference of opinion from you or I disagree with you about something and I’m just trying to communicate it, maybe I’m doing it in kind of a clunky way because sometimes disagreements are kind of heated and you don’t speak as eloquently as you might. Then it makes it unsafe to be able to just sort of try to talk about something.
Dr. Isabel Morley:
I see this a lot. Two people are very fearful of entering conversations if they’re not adequately prepared or people want to do it and have it be documented. So they send an email and then can take their time composing a perfect response because they don’t want to be accused of anything and they don’t want to be used against them. And it’s just too hard to live that way. Humans are too messy for that to be a realistic way of connecting. And it’s not a good way of connecting. So I think that does happen. I think my my biggest concern with gaslighting and narcissism is that therapists are introducing it to their clients way more than I realized five, 10 years ago. But that therapists are the ones saying, it sounds like they may be gaslighting you or it sounds like they could be a narcissist. And I feel like that is scary territory to go down because clients trust us and they trust our interpretation, our clinical expertise. And we are in no position really to be saying these things so flippantly.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
Yeah, for sure. And I know gaslighting is not in the DSM. Here’s just kind of a little sidebar. I don’t know if this is something you do, but I have a DSM right on my desk here. And if the term like narcissism or narcissism comes up, I pull it out. I’m like, all right. Well, you think your partner is narcissistic. Well, let’s open this DSM and let’s go through the criteria and let’s talk seriously about this if you want to actually know if your partner is narcissistic. It is going through that. You were talking about people feeling invalidated when you tell them somebody is not a narcissist or you’re using this term incorrectly. I just I just defer to the DSM and say, let’s let’s talk about this if you want to know about that.
Dr. Isabel Morley:
Yeah. What I think is a great strategy and then people can sort of advise what the word means and how they’re using it.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
Isabel, let’s talk about OCD. Now, that is a diagnosis that is in DSM and you talk in the book a little bit. And I think this is accurate that people kind of use OCD loosely like, oh, I’m so OCD or you’re so why do you do that? You’re so OCD. So let’s talk about OCD. What is OCD in reality and when and how is it being used in a weaponized or in an inaccurate therapy speed form?
Dr. Isabel Morley:
So OCD is a disorder where people have obsessions and truths of thus they cannot get rid of, except through compulsive behaviors they engage in. And sometimes the behaviors make sense. Sometimes they don’t seem to match the obsession at all. So some people, for example, have obsessions that their loved ones are going to die unless they flip the light switch seven times and to make sure it feels right. And if they do it sometimes, it doesn’t feel right for some reason. They’ll do it again until it feels right. So it might be 49 times they end up doing it just because there’s this felt sense. And they’re terrified that if they don’t, someone they love will die. And that’s not rational and they might know it’s not rational, but it is the only way to alleviate those stressful thoughts. It can cause significant impairment in people’s lives. It, you know, they try to stop the thoughts and can’t otherwise. That is very different from people who like things done a certain way. People who like the house orderly and clean, people who want it itinerary for their vacation, that you might be type A and meticulous. But if it’s not addressing obsessive thoughts you have, then it’s just kind of your preference.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
Right. So with OCD, you tend to have anxiety that builds or mounts and there’s a real pressure to do something. Whereas if you just have a meticulous personality of ways that you’d like to do things, but you’re not kind of bubbling with anxiety, having to do it that way, or else something terrible will happen. Then that’s the difference between the clinical use of the term and the wrong weaponized therapy speak way.
Dr. Isabel Morley:
Yeah. Yeah. And yeah, exactly. And I see it weaponized in both directions where somebody says, I’m not going to do what you’re asking because that’s just your OCD and that’s ridiculous. And I’ve seen people say, you have to load the dishwasher this way because it’s my OCD and I can’t stand it if you don’t. Right. And either way, it’s inaccurate and it’s either judgmental or it’s controlling. Like you can have a strong preference for how the dishwasher is loaded. That’s fine. But it’s not your OCD and you don’t get to control other people’s behaviors as a result and people who have OCD are not trying to control other people. They are desperately trying to lower their anxiety. And if it affects other people, they feel bad about that. They don’t try to use it to get their way.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
Yeah. Good point. That’s right. Let’s talk about red flags. Now, red flags is an interesting one because I think it’s good that people are looking out for red flags and people are trying to be more mindful of being in a relationship where they’re not going to be abused and it is going to be healthy for them and people are looking out for red flags and potential like this person may not be a good person for me. But when is this idea of red flags used in an appropriate constructive way for people and when does it become a problem where you’re labeling red flags and potentially creating issues from you having relationships or continuing relationships?
Dr. Isabel Morley:
I think it’s exactly what you said. Like red flags are serious warning signs, right? Like flood, fire, this is dangerous. You should be aware this person might not be a safe person. And that is their original intent. And it is such an important thing. You do want to find those early signs. Somebody might really, really hurt you. It has expanded now until like any mistakes or minor bad behaviors, especially early on, could be red flags that this person is a certain way. So on a first date, if the person is 10 minutes late, right? Red flag, they’re inconsiderate, they’re playing games. You can make all sorts of conclusions from that. Definitely don’t go out again versus maybe the train got stuck. And so they, you know, left enough time, but still arrived late. And I see people trying to catch red flags that aren’t necessarily red flags. And unfortunately, the truth is red flags are best seen in hindsight. Once you have a better picture of someone, you can look back and see, oh, then being late was because they’re inconsiderate jerk and not because it was a mistake and you need a lot of red flags to sort of get a good sense of what the problem for somebody might be. And I think a lot of people now are extrapolating one mistake to the type of person they are.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
Right. OK. So, Isabel, you’re a provider and you have a patient, a young adult female who comes into your office and she goes on a date with a guy and she finds out that the guy does gaming with his friends and he looks at, he’s looking at his phone several times during their dinner, get together. And she comes back, talks about the date and says, oh, there’s a lot of red flags here. You know, he’s just sort of like this gaming media bum and he’s not going to be available or mature in our relationship. How do you tease apart whether they’re really, truly are red flags or this is her just jumping to that in a weaponized sort of way?
Dr. Isabel Morley:
I mean, as my chapter title says, I would say it sounds like maybe they’re just not for you, you know, those things that you’re considering red flags to somebody else might be exactly what they’re looking for. Who games and wants to have that shared experience might be psyched to find this out about him. So it’s not that this is objectively bad or wrong. It’s just not what you’re looking for. It’s not going to work for you, which is totally fine. But we don’t have to like label him and pathologize him as a part of that process. You can just recognize, you know, it’s not for me.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
Yeah. And also, I suppose you don’t really know enough about him yet. Like you could go out on a second date and inquire a little bit more about his gaming patterns and talk to him about his use of the media at the table. And yeah, like you said, give him a chance. And see if he’s able to self correct or realistic, maybe he hasn’t dated a lot or hasn’t been in a lot of relationships. And he doesn’t really yet quite realize, you know, maybe you need to make eye contact and put the phone down.
Dr. Isabel Morley:
Yeah, right. Maybe his dog was sick and he was checking to see if his dog was OK and didn’t think to tell you that there could be so many explanations for people’s behavior. So yeah, I love that. Like how about you give them a chance to make this correction and see if they can or want to.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
So let’s talk about narcissists. That’s a big one. And we’ve talked about it a couple of times already. But what is the difference between like clinically a person with narcissistic personality disorder, which is really what a narcissist is? I think somebody who you could diagnose with narcissistic personality disorder versus the weaponized version of that, the loose, flinging version, the therapy speak use of that term, narcissist.
Dr. Isabel Morley:
Personality disorders are a heavy diagnosis. I’m sure you’ll agree. There have to be indications the person has a pervasive problem in these ways. Since young adulthood, over a year, there’s a cross context and there’s a list of very specific criteria and for narcissism, there’s nine and somebody has to meet five of the criteria. And this is an important part. It has to cause impairment in their life. It has to affect their work, their relationships. And as I say, like a narcissist isn’t only a narcissist with you, right? Or like for a day, they are that way all the time as any personality disorder. And there’s a spectrum. And so I think people confuse narcissistic traits or full blown personality disorder level narcissism, and they also forget that humans are a little narcissistic, that we all have some envy, some grandiosity. We all have a need for admiration sometimes. And that doesn’t mean that we’re at the level of a clinical disorder. It means that this is just part of the human experience. And all of the disorders in the DSM are extremes of normal human behavior. It’s not like this is a whole different category of human. We all have bits and pieces. But when it reaches a certain threshold, which is someone arbitrary that we’ve decided is a threshold and when it’s a clinical concern, it’s impacting somebody, then it’s a problem. So it can be it’s a vague line and I recognize that. But yeah, people are saying narcissist left and right nowadays.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
Yeah, I think that makes a lot of sense. Like you said, we’re the only people who are in our own heads. So we are going to be self absorbed within ourselves. And sometimes when that happens, we’re not going to be the most mindful and thoughtful of other people that can happen sometimes. And so I think every time that happens or whenever that happens, if somebody is accusing the other person of being a narcissist, it’s the overuse of that term. Like you said, it’s extremes and it’s pervasive over time across relationships. And hopefully I would I would assume you would agree with us that if somebody feels like somebody else is being self absorbed and not being very thoughtful, you talk with that person about it and maybe the reactions you get in the way that you work on that as a couple, whereas friends over time would really determine whether or not that person is truly narcissistic or whether they have the capacity to try to recognize this and work on it with you.
Dr. Isabel Morley:
Yes, exactly. You know, EFT talks a lot about the benefit of being vulnerable and sharing your experience instead of finger pointing. And with the narcissistic label, people say, you’re a narcissist, you’re being narcissistic, you’re ignoring me, you don’t care about how I feel. And somebody’s going to be defensive to that. They’re going to explain why it’s not true or why they’re overreacting. And there there’s more evidence that they’re narcissists because they don’t care about how you feel, right? And they’re not taking responsibility versus I’m really sad. I feel like we haven’t had time together. I feel like I’m not important to you and like I don’t know how to get your attention. Oh, you’ll get a very different response from the other person. And maybe they won’t seem like a narcissist. So how you approach that conversation really does matter.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
Yeah, I love the EFT for that reason. Like it’s all about trying to empathize with the other person and allowing yourself to be vulnerable so the other person can empathize with you. And when you see that in sessions, it’s really awesome. I’m sure you love that. It’s great to see. But it’s hard because being vulnerable is scary and it’s very easy to become defensive and lash out because of that. And then it’s very easy to accuse the other person of having a personality disorder when they do it. It’s tough. Yeah, it really is. Yeah. OK, let’s talk about bipolar. Oh, my God, I’m so bipolar. You’re so bipolar. She’s so bipolar. He’s so bipolar. Well, what is real bipolar clinically versus the way people are using it inaccurately?
Dr. Isabel Morley:
Real bipolar are significant mood differences that last, you know, not a day, but several days or longer weeks for depression. And it goes between depression, hypomania or mania. So there’s different types of bipolar. It can get kind of confusing with an insecurity of like all the different diagnoses within this category. But for these disorders, you need to see a hypomanic or manic episode and often depression and the person experiences the world very differently during these different mood episodes. And like I said, this is not like you’re in a fight and they are manic just for the fight and then are better after. This is a sustained mood episode that is unconnected to whatever interpersonal issues you’re having. People, I think, use bipolar to explain feelings they don’t understand or they don’t like or somebody being a certain way in an argument because they just don’t have a better explanation for it. And people use it. I don’t know if you agree with this, but like when people’s moods change day to day, you’re so bipolar. I don’t know what to expect from you. Yesterday, you were in a good mood and today you’re in a crabby mood. That’s just a normal mood change. It might be annoying and frustrating to live with, but that’s within the normal range of the human experience.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
Absolutely. And oftentimes, moods are reactive. Right? People’s moods change because they’re reacting to something which is not something that happens with somebody who truly has bipolar disorder.
Dr. Isabel Morley:
Right. And I think we all wish we understood people’s moods better and could have people be in better moods. But I also made the case of like, you don’t always have to know why someone’s mood change. Sometimes you don’t know why you’re in a bad mood and like, that’s OK. You can just let it be.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
Yeah. OK. Isabel, boundaries. Let’s talk a little bit about boundaries. Now, that comes up a lot and I know that it comes up a lot in my therapy sessions. And I try to help people understand healthy boundaries for themselves. But how has how is boundaries used as a clinically appropriate and therapeutically appropriate term versus becoming a therapy speak weaponized type of term? What’s the difference?
Dr. Isabel Morley:
Oh, boundaries is such a good one. Boundaries is all about safety and autonomy. Like, how can I be in this relationship and feel safe with you while I’m close to you and make sure that I have autonomy to do what I need to do, make my choices. And if you feel like somebody is mistreating you or you do feel unsafe for any reason, you have every right to decide and enforce a boundary. Right. And that could look like listen, even though you’re very upset. If you start yelling or swearing at me, I cannot stay in this conversation. It’s too upsetting to me. So I’m going to leave and then we can try talking in an hour and see if it goes better. You can always make that choice. I distinguish universal boundaries of like, these are the lines that are if crossed abuse, no one right should like threaten bodily harm to you. No one should steal from you. These are not OK. These are boundaries that are just guaranteed. And then there’s personal individual boundaries that vary from person to person. Because like, I don’t want anyone yelling and screaming at me. But I know people who are like, I don’t care. I yell and scream too. That’s how I communicate best. And they won’t have that same boundary. And I think people misunderstand that you have to communicate your boundary. You have to enforce it and they could change over time and with people. So it’s just a very fluid thing that you have to constantly navigate and negotiate in close partnerships.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
With each one of these different ones that we just talked about, you have some others in your book. You offer some interesting insights about if you are the person using these terms inaccurately or somebody is accusing you, you’re sort of the victim of being accused of being one of these things. How can you respond to it differently? How do you spot it within yourself? How do you spot it within somebody else? And how can you do things to make that better for you or for the other person?
Dr. Isabel Morley:
Yeah, I mean, I think if any of these terms resonate for people and they think, oh, I have used that, I have thought that about my parent or my friend, I would go to the chapter and read it. And if you still feel like, oh, that does seem to fit. Then at the end, I would have them go and read through the steps. And if it’s someone you care about and you want to work on the issue with, I explain how to do it, how to communicate your concern and ask for change or support them in the process of getting help or consider leaving this relationship. If it is really too toxic or abusive and you don’t want to be in it anymore. So really just a more empowered approach of like either work towards change or exit the relationship and like you get to control that. And you can always do it without telling the other person you’re a sociopath. That was a red flag. That was a boundary violation. Like you never even have to say those words. It doesn’t matter. It doesn’t help. If you’re the person who’s been accused of one of these words, I think there is two general pieces of advice that I give. One is take a deep breath. It hurts. Never is not view you in that negative lens. But like respond effectively to what that other person’s heart is. Because if they’re calling you something, it’s because they’re really hurt. So try to attend to that first and then address their use of the word because that’s not OK, not effective, not going to help. Or if the person is repeatedly using these words in a controlling or abusive fashion, you’ve got to recognize that could be a real problem, that this person might actually be the abusive person because abusers are really good at weaponizing these terms to gain power and control. So like you really have to sort of be on the lookout. If you say three times, hey, please don’t say that I’m gaslighting you. You know, this is why I don’t think that’s happening. Like we can work through it this way. And the person still is always accusing you of that. I think you’ve got to be mindful of that.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
Well, Isabel, this has been a super fun conversation. I really enjoy talking with you about these concepts in your book and they’re very pertinent. Are there any final thoughts that you have on this subject that you’d like to leave us with?
Dr. Isabel Morley:
Yeah, I would say, you know, my big thing is I think you can leave the therapy terms in the therapy room with your therapist. And if it’s if you’re dealing with someone you really love, give them all the nuance and compassion and curiosity that they deserve. And I hope that for the listeners that they get that in return.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
Awesome. And so your book, once again, They’re Not Gaslighting You. Ditch the Therapy Speak and Stop Hunting for Red Flags in Every Relationship. Where can we find this book and where can we find out more about you?
Dr. Isabel Morley:
The book is on Amazon and Barnes and Noble and Target, all the usual places. And anybody who wants to get to know me more can go to my website, which is DrIsabelMorley.com. Go to my Instagram, DrIsabelMorley, or you can check out my romcom podcast, if that’s your thing. And I would love to hear from everybody.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan:
Awesome. Thanks. Well, great to have you here today and thanks so much for coming on Mind Tricks Radio.