"Children eventually grow up and leave home, but the inner bully goes with them. It systematically punishes any behavior, thought, body-flaw, feeling, healthy aspiration, etc., that is less than perfect, and like the parents that created it routinely scorns any kind of approval that comes their way. Whenever they are not at 100%, they frequently spiral down, deeper and deeper into excruciating fear and self-disgust.

Compounding this, adult survivors are also often unconsciously attracted to other bullies in the wider society who further traumatize them via what Freud called repetition compulsion. Survivors automatically accept their bad behavior because their childhoods taught them that it is too dangerous to protest unfairness.

In the worst cases, some untreated survivors can end up being captured by narcissistic bullies who psychologically enslave them. Others amass a history of failed persecutory relations that morph their inner critics into a posse of invisible bully-ghosts led by their internalized scornful parental sheriffs. Still others retreat into self-isolation to avoid the frightening threat of relationships altogether. And most tragically, some model on their narcissistic caretakers and become bullies themselves, making #DTD and #CPTSD self-generating legacies."