The Dynamics of DARVO

DARVO—”Deny, Attack, Reverse Victim and Offender”—is a powerful manipulation tactic often used to silence those who speak up about harm. In this episode, Dan and Rachael unpack how DARVO shows up not only in personal relationships but also in churches, politics, and other systems where power is protected at all costs.

Together, they explore the deep psychological and spiritual impact of DARVO, particularly in narcissistic relationships or systems. Drawing from Dr. Jennifer Freyd’s work on betrayal trauma, they name the disorientation, grief, and exile that often follow when someone dares to speak what is true.

What happens when cruelty masquerades as righteousness? When loyalty is measured by silence? This conversation holds space for those heartbreaks—and offers fierce, grounded hope.

In a culture that often gaslights those who cry out for justice, Dan and Rachael remind us: love, truth, and healing are not just possible—they are sacred acts of resistance. And it’s not something we confront alone. With the presence of wise, compassionate others—therapists, pastors, friends, and communities of care—we can learn to trust what is true, reclaim our voice, and boldly participate in the redemptive work of love.

Episode Transcript:

Dan: You have heard me talk about the conflicts Becky and I have had in the kitchen, particularly with the infamous dish rag. Again, the issue was for those who don’t remember, so many moons ago, Becky looked at me and said, are you afraid of the dish rag? And I’m like, what? She said, well, you never squeeze the water out. I’m just assuming that you’re terrified of it. That’s why you don’t want to touch it. Well, it was humorous. It was a point well made, and I began squeezing that damn thing to make sure it was as bone dry as humanly possible. Okay? So that’s the context. We were out with friends and something came up about conflicts since COVID and the dishrag came up and I said, with an immense, shall we say, integrity uncertainty, that it’s no longer an issue. And Becky cackled, first of all, that’s a really important word. I love my wife’s laugh, but this was a cackle. And she went, are you kidding? Maybe one out of 10 times do you squeeze that terrifying piece of cloth? Something along those lines. And I did not handle it well. First of all, I just said, that is not true. That is not true. What is wrong? Why are you so against me? In fact, you are the one who I picked up that dish rag not long ago and it was soaking wet and I had nothing to do in the kitchen. Alright, so talk to me.

Rachael: Unfortunately, Dan, this is a very textbook case of what many would refer to as DARVO.

Dan: Alright, I know that. So we set that up. Let’s just say it’s so painful at times when you’re thinking about something and thinking about it. Actually, we’ve been talking a little bit about wanting to do a podcast on this concept called DARVO. We’ll get to what the acronym means in a moment. But I got caught. I really did. I got caught. And so one of the things that I want people to hear is we begin this, almost all of us, or at least those of us who have some degree of anger, tend to overreact and tend to use this strategy, whether we know what the acronym means or not. It’s just when she began to name, oh my gosh, you just reversed the issue on me, that it was one of those sweet/hard moments where thankfully her laughter and kindness was part of the invitation to address something that really is quite ugly. And when there isn’t the capacity to name its presence and power, it is culturally familially, personally interpersonally, it is just cancer. So DARVO, talk to us about DARVO, Rachael.

Rachael: It’s really interesting because maybe like some of you listening, this is a phrase I kept seeing, especially with regard to calling out narcissistic abuse or narcissistic systems or situations of domestic violence. I started seeing it a lot in stories I was reading about spiritual abuse or sexual abuse, playing out in churches and what was happening to the victims and survivors of that abuse. I actually had to go… cause it was being used. We all know what this means. I work with survivors of abuse and it was not a phrase that I was familiar with, so I had to go look it up. And then you had to remind me because I looked it up, but the actual words didn’t stick, but the sense of it did. So DARVO, this methodology of really, I would call it deflection and harm that’s utilized like you just said, often relationally, but it can happen in a more collective sense where there’s denial, attack, and then reverse victim offender. So it’s often language I use to help people understand what it feels like to be gaslit in a moment where you are actually trying to communicate, I’ve experienced harm. So why this would be playing out in a spiritual, abusive church context. Someone is saying, this harm happened to me, but then there’s a kind of responsive denial, oh, it wasn’t that bad. Exactly what you just did. Like, no, I don’t remember it that way. Or even, well, that wasn’t my intent. And then a movement toward attacking the other person, whether it’s attacking their sense of reality, attacking their character. You might see it something even like here you are again, always harping on me or always needing to tell me what I’m doing wrong, whatever it is, there’s a posture that is actually directing violence back towards the other person and then flipping the script where the person who’s actually perpetrated harm now is saying, and you are the one who’s violent. So that reverse victim-offender switch. So this is actually, I’m glad that you started off by sharing some of your own moments of falling into this pattern. And I think you named it very well in saying, yeah, we’re all capable of this. Is there any capacity to realize we’re doing it and to actually disrupt it and to move in a different way? And when we see DARVO play out in a way that is actually very detrimental is when there’s not a capacity to tell the truth, to take accountability, to stop the harm. So it actually intensifies the sense of denial has to get louder, and I think starts to involve deflection, right? Like, oh, whether the deflection is towards the other person in a dynamic or whether it’s toward a group of people in a larger collective dynamic. It’s just really nasty stuff.

Dan: Oh, it is. Well said, nasty stuff. So let me finish the story before we go on much further. Becky was able to say the phrase, you DARVO’d me, and it’s like, oh, it’s so true. So as we were coming down from my accentuation, I said to her, I said, well, is it literally one out of 10 because I really believe that I had been doing way better than 10%. And she looked at me and she said, alright, so I used a little hyperbole. You want to shoot me for that given you are the king of all hyperbolic interactions. I’m like, Ooh, now did I just get DARVO’d vote? And the answer is no. It was playful. It was not a fun interaction, but there was a context for us to be able to come to. Can we join that? There are almost always in marriages, different perspectives about conflict or a problem. But when you are creating this power dynamic to ultimately shut down the other so that there can’t be dialogue, there can’t be perspective giving, because not just power, but ultimately the shaming, the contempt, and a key word for those who have in one sense exposed structures, especially in systems or in churches or in politics, there is the threat that you will pay a almost astronomical price for challenging our view, my view, of reality or what I demand you hold as reality. So these are interpersonal, but we’re also, should be clear, these are phenomena growing in a culture that just feels like when I began working in this field, I would’ve said we lived in the age of anxiety. I’m not going to say that anxiety’s not a deeply profound issue, but I would say even more so that we we’re in an age of cruelty where again, in the context of the political campaign, Trump, Vance and others suggested that immigrants who were fully legalized, fully legalized were eating dogs and cats. And when even the governor, Republican governor Ohio disputed that cruelty, debasement, dehumanization, it didn’t matter. It was just part of political process. So we know that in a heightened, polarized, contemptuous, in some sense, dehumanized world, DARVO is what I would say is not the exception is the fundamental rule for how power is gained, sustained, and then a structure to make sure there’s no one who violates the perspective or reality being offered to others. In that case, obviously no dialogue, no capacity to come to mere facts to be able to look at reality. One out of 10, really, Beck? No, it’s probably six out of 10, but the point being I’m not perfect on that. Well, for all of us, we live in a DARVO age.

Rachael: Absolutely. Again, we’ve named this before. DARVO is going to intrinsically impact stories and how stories are told and how memory is held. So why you would see exhibits disappearing from museums, because it’s going to expose the truth in ways that change the story, change the script. So you’re absolutely right. And yeah, it’s again, we don’t have to completely focus on narcissism. We can come back here and we can get to it eventually, but any narcissistic structure has to depend on something like DARVO because it doesn’t actually have enough of a core self to be able to reflect, to be able to have empathy, to be able to care how it’s impacting others. It’s about maintaining power. And so you might have, that’s why in a system like a church or political environment, you have many people that maintain loyalty. And often it might be because they worship the person holding the power or they feel like they’ll get some of the power, but oftentimes it’s because they see this DARVO playing out and they don’t want to be beneficiaries of it. So as long as they can stay out of the direct line of fire, as long as they can stay compliant enough, then they won’t experience the humiliation, the gaslighting, the exile, the harm, the punitive measures, the scapegoating. So yeah, and I think I want to just take a moment to speak to any of our listeners, and I know many of our listeners like you and I come to this with experiences of abuse and when you have experienced abuse, you’ve likely experienced something of this impact. And so this lands in our bodies in really terrifying and heartbreaking and infuriating ways. So as you’re listening, maybe you’re making connections, maybe you’re remembering experiences. So just a deep encouragement and invitation to kindness.

Dan: So well said. Most of this began with a University of Oregon psychology professor by the name of Jennifer Freyd or Freyd, depending on your pronunciation of her last name, which is F-R-E-Y-D. And her work particularly, and what she has come to call Betrayal Trauma Theory, which essentially opens the door to why those who’ve been abused have experienced sexual abuse, sexual violation, tend to have either distorted memories and/or memories which feel aphasic, that is, it may be a thin awareness of something that may have occurred, but no particularity, no structure of a beginning, middle, an end. And we’ve spoken quite a bit about the nature of what happens with trauma and the fragmentation. So we’re not going to step into that other than to say that this issue of DARVO began in the realm of sexual violation. And what I would say is almost inevitable is if you’re in the presence of a narcissist, and sometimes you almost have to create the word like a real, real narcissist, which we use by using words like malignant or predatory. Every narcissist is malignant and predatory, but some on a scope are even more severe than others, given that it’s almost inevitable if you’re in a narcissistic structure and or interacting with a narcissist, DARVO will be at play. And in that, one of the things that we can underscore is it leaves people under not just threat of the consequences, a lawsuit, being fired, not being part of the tribe because you’re not sufficiently loyal, all that if you add to the reality of literally having a sense that I can’t perceive what’s true anymore. I mean, I would hope that even if you are a very strong Trump advocate, that when he stated that Ukraine started the war, it’s so fundamentally bonkers that you’re going, well, I watched, I watched on TV, the Russian troops cross the border into Ukraine. So when things get said that you know are outside of the realm of facticity, and yet someone saying something that’s absurd, but everybody else seems to be coming alongside saying, oh, that’s right. It can’t help but begin to create that distortion. What is true. And so for many who have experienced DARVO in its more acidic and violent form, it isn’t just feeling threat. It’s that internal, what’s true, and am I at fault? And here’s part of the dilemma with regard to some of the material we’ve taught. We’ve always said we always have a part in any marital failure, even when there is something clearly the other has done wrong. There’s still a part I play though I’m not responsible for their choice. So it’s really easy to, in some sense, come to be distorted and think that it’s biblically true, that perhaps I am at fault for this man’s affair or the anger that’s being directed. If I’d only been more quiet, if I’d only been more submissive, if I, again, madness, madness, pure unadulterated madness. Yet you can see why effective, why DARVO is so effective.

Rachael: Let me gather myself because I’m pinballing internally between rage, fear, sadness, confusion, just that I think what you’re putting words to that, and we face this all the time, like that sense of can I trust my own perception of reality? And when the people who have power in a relational dynamic, in a political structure, in a religious institution, like that I’m… are telling me something that is inherently untrue or distorted and others go along with it. Just that sense of how do I hold onto a sense of reality? And it’s, for me, in my experience, it’s been, I can actually get to the reality piece. What do I do with the grief and heartache that I might be alone in holding that reality? When you look at a family system, for example, if you are one of the first in your family to break from a very dysfunctional family system, that heartbreak of experiencing DARVO from the people that you think maybe you’ll ally with me, you experienced the same abuse, right? We had this same experience. You’ll come with me like, look, I’m telling the truth. And then they don’t, or they toe the family line. So there’s a lot of grief involved, and I remember you saying this to me one time when I was in a certain relational dynamic negotiating, how would I participate or not participate in the distorted reality? And you said something along the lines of, I think you’ve done enough work now to be able to enter grief. And for me that was a significant, and I’m not trying to jump ahead, but it’s just where my mind and body are going is like what comes up for me, even underneath the fear and the rage, which I also feel like necessary emotions to have, when you’re trying to break out of this kind of insanity and harm and threat, you need something of the volition of anger and the clarity I think that righteous anger brings, right? Fear is a very reasonable response to this kind of behavior and gaslighting.

Dan: Oh, it’s predatory, and you, again, it’s the intersection of prey versus indeed the one who is being victimized again, not only in the initial violation, but in the effort to redress the harm, you become a double, triple, victim. Freyd at one point says this, “by denying and attacking and reversing perpetrators into victims, reality gets even more confusing and unspeakable for the real victim. These perpetrator reactions increase the need for betrayal blindness. If the victim does speak out and gets this level of attack, she quickly gets the idea,” and here’s the key phrase, “that silence is safer.” In terms of what I personally see with regard to Congress is that, and this has been certainly vocalized well before my speaking, but congresses in some ways in the Republican world silenced, even though there are vast many who differ with an example like Ukraine invading Russia, but to challenge that, to actually challenge whether or not Trump lost the 2020 election, the basis of those who work for him, again, it’s irrefutable that one of the basis for being able to be within the Republican sphere at this point in time is that you never challenged Trump as to whether he indeed lost the election. So right from the beginning point, loyalty, whether we’re talking politically, whether we’re talking a church, whether we’re talking a family, the notion that you are exposing the gaslighting, the refusal to engage the truth, and then you encounter DARVO. And if there there’s not silence, which often is not enough to project loyalty, but at least if you’re not silent, the consequence will be a form of exile if not execution. So we’re in not just politically, but as a culture, particularly a believing culture. We are in a profoundly dangerous day where there are plenty of people who differ with the cruelty, the dehumanization in many ways, the violence against what it means to love your enemy, to bless your enemy, even if you perceive that person or party or process as an enemy, the call of what does it mean to bless or what does it mean to love in a day in which cruelty is a sign of not just power, prestige, but maturity. In other words, it’s so deeply…

Rachael: Well, if empathy is a sin, then yes, other things are being valued as righteous, that feel problematic.

Dan: So you go, did I wake up in a different world? And I think there is a sense of this has been progressing for quite a number of years. But it is a cultural phenomena, and I’m seeing it leak into many of the believing communities that I love, I love and just see this turn toward righteous-viewed violence and in a way that, again, to stand against DARVO in a family, in a marriage, in a political process to say, this is not of God. It feels so ridiculous to have to say that, but to underscore it has to be named. I’m sorry.

Rachael: Oh no, I just going back to power. If the goal is to gain power, to preserve power utilizing the tools, weapons, and realities of this world, if you’re thinking in a Christian theology, the powers of sin and death, if the goal is to preserve power, and you have to align with the powers of sin and death in order to do so, because you know the way of the cross is never going to lead you to empirical power unless, I mean, I think that this is truly, I think when we look at the history of Christianity, that’s been a dance, that it has been that many Christians and people have been playing with, this is not new. That’s a dance we’ve been playing with since just a few centuries after our God died on an empirical cross as a way of showing a different kind of power. There’s a reason why the early Christians were martyred, and for the most part, they were not being martyred because they were rising to political power through seats of political power. They were being martyred because just by their very acts of a different kind of economy, a different economic way of being, a different resource sharing a different advocacy of the vulnerable, they were exposing the powers. And that’s very threatening when you look at our history in the United States and the people who have been killed, some might say by our own very government, they were often people exposing the misuse and abuse of power and injustice. And so this is not a, I think when we’re talking about the use of DARVO coming from the church, it’s not a new phenomenon and it’s not even a new phenomenon starting with Christianity, you and I have talked about this, the history of the prophets, the minor and major prophets are in many ways speaking to this grasping of worldly power, often with good intention. This is how we’re going to bring about the kingdom of God, the righteousness of God, maybe sometimes the love of God, but it’s usually unclear who gets to benefit from that love. So there’s something about, I just think we’re going to have to keep contending with what kind of power we actually believe will save us. And that’s why baptismal identity is in some ways so fundamental. And so I will say just for myself, something I’m reckoning with, because when you talk about love your enemies, which again, I think we have to get into the nuances of what does that mean? Because it doesn’t just mean submitting to violent powers what love looks like, right? For some of us, that is what we were told. That’s what our parents were told to stay in marriages. Well, love overcomes. If you’re being abused, you just keep submitting and keep, because that’s what love is, right? So these are waters that have gotten really distorted. But even when you say that, even though I know that’s what I’m called to, there is something in my heart right now that says, no, I will not love my enemies. So I’m not preaching to other people. I’m probably preaching mostly to myself.

Dan: Well, that’s true, but I think you’re also preaching to me. So between the two of us, let’s preach. And part of the process of coming to utilize in your mind this lovely acronym and many times a acronym like DARVO, really creates a clarity. I mean, I’ve been dealing with the category of betrayal from the standpoint of sexual abuse since I wrote The Wounded Heart. So it’s not new to my soul yet. I have found it really helpful, and particularly in that interaction over the dish rag for Becky to be able to name “you just DARVO’s me,” and I’m going, well, it didn’t immediately break my heart, but it did eventually. But the reality of having an acronym like that where you’re able to go, oh, this is denial. There are many people who get accused of something, and it is appropriate to deny that. So we’re not saying that any denial is in and of itself a use of DARVO, but when the turn to denial opens the door to the dehumanization of the other, to a belittlement, a degrading of the other, you are already in that DA. You got the DA happening, and almost inevitably there will be in the attack, the reversal, so that you experience, even though you felt harmed, you are now the perpetrator. So just going back to that allows us to begin to address how do we deal with it? And I think for me, politically, familially, interpersonally, the first issue is knowing what’s the threat. Because I think for most people who are DARVO’d, there’s fear, and the fear is exclusion, denigration greater harm. And you got to own up to, if I address this, what’s the price I’m likely going to pay? Because the fear, I think, as you’ve named it, is absolutely legitimate. If you’re not afraid in the presence of DARVO, you’re reckless and are addicted to the arousal that comes with danger. That’s not good. So starting with, what might you lose if you begin to address the reality that DARVO has occurred, would you concur? Where would you go as threats are being owned? What’s in that and how does proceed?

Rachael: Yeah, yeah. I think that’s very wise. And I don’t think it means, it’s kind of like it takes you into that category of innocent as a dove wise as a serpent, right? I’m someone, so much of my story has been I’m a fighter. I’m going to fight. And I think so much of my maturing and growing has been because I’m always going to sense the threat. I’m a storm watcher, so it’s like there’s a threat. I’m more the like, we are under threat. I could sense it in literally subtle ways, and I could sense it in the very explicit ways. And it’s not my job or calling to go contend with the bully of every threat and actually is not often the most effective. So I do think dealing with the threat, and in some ways it’s what you see with so many communities, oppressed communities who are familiar with oppression in a time like this where it’s not a new oppression that’s emerging, but the way it’s being empowered, exposed, made more explicit and unapologetic, which should scare all of us. That’s the most scary place of an abusive cycle. When the abuser is out in the open and unapologetic and unashamed and still allowed to stay in power, that’s way more scary than when the threats are happening in some ways behind the scenes. Or just by these kind of outliers out here, that’s not a real representation of that was just a lone person, or that was just a bad cop, or, oh, that was just an unfortunate policy. It’s like when the powers are aligned in a family system. So a lot of times when I’m working with someone and they’re talking about more subtle abuse, but then they tell us a moment of where the abuse was out in the open and no one did anything. That’s actually where your body goes, oh my God, this is really bad. Because I at least always hoped if someone knew about it, maybe they would do something to intervene, they would stop. And so when you see communities again that have known firsthand the impact of the threat saying, this is why you need community, this is why you actually need to move toward connection. You need to move toward resource sharing. So I think a part of dealing with a threat is actually realizing this is not something that you take on alone.

Dan: No. And to begin that process, there has to be an ownership. I am up against a person or a system that is violent and punitive and requires, again, it isn’t about truth seeking, it’s about a particular way of being in the world where when you don’t align with it to the nth degree, you will pay the price of some degree of violence and punishment. So owning that, I think allows you to not be what Freyd eventually talks about as this betrayal blindness. It’s hard to differentiate. Is that just denial? Well, yeah. Is it just one sense, the threat so high that I will align myself with what facts seem to indicate this perspective is true, therefore, ignoring or denying all the facts that indicate it’s not true. So when we attempt to engage a policy in a church policy, in a political process, it’s a whole lot more complicated than, this is good, this is bad. And in that, the question is can there be dialogue? Can there be differentiation and challenge, but also a kind of, but I hold this view, but let me understand your view. That notion of a dialogic approach to difference is so radically complexly different from the assault of DARVO. So I think owning that allows you to build boundaries. But to me, a very important phrase with someone with a narcissistic structure or personality, when you build boundaries as righteous as they are, they are arousing to the narcissist because now you become a challenge to be destroyed or consumed. And so I’ve worked with a lot of people who feel like they’re up against a DARVO type structure, and so they build boundaries and it’s like, good, right? But did you think they were going to be effective? Did you think they were going to change something of the process of interacting with this person? It only incites therefore in that arousal, in that inciting to in one sense, manage and conquer you. Things are inevitably with boundaries going to get worse, much worse. So the boundary isn’t protective, the boundary is actually provocative. It’s actually inviting that DARVO-using narcissist to come after you with even greater intensity. And if you’re naive, thinking it will help make things better. It’s where I find a lot of marriage counseling, a lot of interpersonal work, people just going, it didn’t work. I’m like, well, no, it worked brilliantly. Because what it’s done is apocalyptically, and your use of that word is the righteous use. It’s come to reveal even with greater clarity, who and what you are up against. So boundaries, when they’re righteous with good folks, they do preserve and protect. But with narcissists, it’s only going to arouse a greater desire to consume you and destroy you. Thoughts?

Rachael: Where I go, it’s like, so what do we do? What do we do? What’s the hope? Because there’s something in me that goes, no, it is still the right move, but it’s a part of a larger process. So my thought is, well then what’s the more that has to continue to happen when we’re up against these kinds of realities, knowing that boundaries will potentially incite more harm? Do we stop? Do we just give up? What do we do?

Dan: Well, and one of the phrases that has come into a cultural awareness is this term gray rocking, which…

Rachael: I have not heard this term

Dan: Serious?

Rachael: But I mean, I have two teenagers and a toddler, so there’s a lot I’m missing these days.

Dan: Well, I’m a little surprised, but I’ll just say gray rocking is where you engage the person without energy, but with a kind of, it’s a gray rock. Why would I pick it up? It doesn’t have sparkle, it doesn’t create intrigue. At least that’s how interpret it. It’s just a rock. Just walk by the rock. And so it is a pattern of, in one sense, benevolent indifference. I’m not against you, but I will not get sucked into your drama, into the violence, into the threat. Now that’s a form of boundary building, but most boundary of, I will not let you do X, that’s arousing. Gray rocking is alright, so you’re yelling, essentially, enjoy your yelling, I’m going out in the backyard. So in that process of not getting entangled, you are diffusing some of the power of that narcissist. And therefore what you’re doing is kind of limiting access to your body, to your heart, to your mind in a way that I think for most narcissists is one of the most difficult realities. The narcissist wants to be seen, wants to be in control, and in one sense manage the drama of what’s happening in the interplay of the relationship or the world. And in that, the best course is, again, as I put it, a benevolent indifference. And in that indifference, you’re limiting access and knowing that it’s very possible, they’re going to follow you outside, they’re going to continue. And as I’m not saying this is easy by any stretch, but it’s that choice to be, I won’t fall into your web, I won’t give you what you want, which is compliance or a fight. And in that I’m not a victim in the sense of I won’t be in the position of giving you the pleasure of having that power over me. It is one of the best, shall we say, interventions you can offer. But only if you’ve counted the cost that if it’s a marriage or a friendship or a political party, it probably means, and again, this is heartbreaking to say, unless there’s movement on the part of the person using that structure, it means you’re going to leave the party, you’re going to leave the church and heartbreaking. You’re going to live in a way in which the narcissist in a marriage is going to, in one sense, in the loss of power, not want relationship with you. And so you are literally moving ultimately toward cutting off the relationship. And that is where I think most people caught in this cycle of DARVO won’t enter that first category of dealing with the threat. If I continue engaging in a gray rock way, this political fight with my parent or with my spouse, or with a friend, it may mean the relationship may end. And that for many people is a threat too high. And as a consequence, they remain in the web even with a détente that underneath the surface is no resolve the so-called cold or hot war, but just waiting for another issue to arise. Thoughts?

Rachael: Well, I am very appreciative of this phrase, gray rock, gray rocking. I have not heard it, but it’s really helpful. It’s really helpful. And I’m actually like, oh, that’s what the 92% are doing. That’s what Black women are doing in the United States of America. They’re saying, you can keep picking fights with us. We’re going to be over here living life, choosing life, choosing goodness. So I guess, yeah, my sense is that sense of threat, again, back to grief. Grief, and I would say the spirit filled miracle of connection. What happens when there’s profound loss? And this doesn’t always happen in a linear way or a one-to-one way. Like, oh, I lose access to this community and then I just magically find another community. There’s typically a season of wilderness. If this is happening in a marriage that there needs to be a kind of accountability that does lead to a break in relationship. There’s usually a long legal battle. So this is not, there’s a lot of heartache and a lot of unnecessary carnage that if people would actually just get help, go to therapy, I don’t know, lean into the power of Jesus, they wouldn’t have to utilize DARVO to bring so much carnage to hold onto a kind of power that will not last. It will not last. It will not have the final say. It will not have the final word.

Dan: And that’s where we have to, in one sense, not as a panacea, but as the core of all hope. And that is I will not participate in the kingdom of death. I can’t escape the kingdom of death, but I will walk in to interactions politically, ecclesially, relationally with a sense that there’s always a way to honor your enemy. There’s always a way to be curious and grow in some sense of what is the truth the other is offering. I think there’s nothing in one sense, more difficult for the DARVO-oriented system or individual then in one sense to be open to intrigue, but with the capacity to, in one sense, gray rock when the violence becomes debilitating. So as we come to an end, I think we both feel this. It is so heartbreaking. And those who are in consistently DARVO settings, you need a voice, a presence, a kindness to be able to help you differentiate the gaslighting dark confusion from what your body and heart is actually saying is true. And that be it a good therapist, a good pastor, a good spiritual director, a good friend, is so imperative because in one sense, you need an intervention to help you step outside of the kind of swirling craziness to be able then to be able to know what does it mean to love? And it does not mean reentering to merely let the perpetrator have that power. But what does it mean, and obviously I have a bit of a resonance to this word, but what does it mean to boldly love and to invite that person into something of the wonder of what it means to be honored and forgiven.