Chelsey Brooke Cole: Who's Safe to Tell About Narcissistic Abuse

After narcissistic abuse, people tend to swing between two settings. One is the old one: assume the best of everyone, no boundaries. The other is the overcorrection, where nobody gets in at all. Chelsey Brooke Cole says the ground you need is in between, and she calls the skill discernment.

Chelsey Brooke Cole is a psychotherapist, coach, and best-selling author who specializes in narcissistic abuse, complex trauma, and relational trauma. She knew as a child that she wanted to do this work, started college at sixteen, and finished her master's at twenty-two. She arrived at this specialty from two directions at once: clients whose relationships did not respond to any standard couples-therapy approach, and her own relationships, which she describes as bringing its own shame given her profession. Her book is If Only I'd Known, built partly from more than four hundred survivor stories she collected. This is one of several conversations she and Lisa have recorded together.

In this episode, Chelsey works through disclosure decisions one setting at a time. Sharing online, where she suggests generalities, careful timing, and specific pages or private groups rather than an open post early in your healing. Recovery groups, where she explains why the pity-driven version of narcissism is drawn to them. Therapists, where she tells people to interview before committing: what do you mean by trauma-informed, how do you work, how many people have you worked with. Her rule is that credentials do not override how you felt on the first call.

Lisa brings in the legal-abuse angle, including why an open case changes what you can safely post. Chelsey and Lisa then cover dating again without deciding in advance that everyone is dangerous, the boundary test that reveals more than any conversation, enablers who are otherwise decent people, and a question from BTGO's support group about a parent whose ex reaches every new school friend's family first. Chelsey's answer is the same one she gives for surviving a smear campaign: a story can outrun you for a few weeks, and it cannot outrun years of you being consistently who you are.

As always, this is strategic education, not legal or mental-health advice for your specific situation.

🎓 What you'll learn

• Why telling the wrong person can push you backward into doubting your own account
• How to share online safely: generalities, timing, and where to post instead
• Why recovery groups attract the pity-seeking version of narcissism
• How to interview a therapist before you commit, and the questions to ask
• What not to post while you have an open case, and why judges care
• Dating again: the boundary test, and the "sweet" pushback that still ignores your no
• Active and passive enablers, and setting limits with otherwise decent people
• Neuroception: what a genuinely safe person feels like in your body

⏱️ Chapters
0:00 Intro
1:00 Why telling the wrong person sets you back, and Chelsey's path into this work
5:00 Sharing your story online, and the timing that matters
8:00 When toxic people turn up inside recovery groups
10:00 Don't assume a therapist gets it: how to interview one
12:00 The legal warning: what not to post with an open case
15:00 Dating again without deciding everyone is dangerous
17:00 The boundary test, and the pushback that ignores your no
20:00 Enablers, flying monkeys, and the friends who won't hear it
24:00 The playdate problem, and outlasting a smear campaign
28:00 Neuroception: what a safe person actually feels like

Keep going 💜
Book a free 30-minute discovery call and we'll help you map your next steps: https://beentheregotout.com/call
📘 Been There Got Out: Toxic Relationships, High-Conflict Divorce, and How to Stay Sane Under Insane Circumstances — https://www.amazon.com/dp/194627495X
📘 Been There Got Out: When Your Ex Turns the Kids Against You (our parental-alienation book) — https://www.amazon.com/dp/1967674183
🔗 Chelsey Brooke Cole: https://www.chelseybrookecole.com/
🔗 If Only I'd Known, by Chelsey Brooke Cole: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0C6XT19Z4

🎧 More with Chelsey Brooke Cole on this podcast
Ep 12: Spotting a Narcissist on Social Media
Ep 137: Mindset Shifts for Healing From Abuse

About Been There Got Out
Chris Barry and Lisa Johnson are high-conflict divorce, custody, and co-parenting strategists, and the founders of Been There Got Out. They know these cases from the inside: both have successfully represented themselves in family court. Few attorneys have a playbook for a case like this — Chris and Lisa write yours with you, so you and your kids can get through it as unscathed as possible.