NARM-Informed Trauma Recovery Coaching
You are not
the problem.
The survival effort is exhausting you.
Private coaching for adults recovering from narcissistic abuse, family scapegoating, CPTSD, and relational trauma — when you already understand what happened, but still live as if you have to fix yourself to be safe.
A calm 30-minute conversation. No pitch. No pressure.
- 12 Private Sessions
- $2,400 Total
- 60 Minutes Each
- NARM-Informed
- Coaching, Not Therapy
You have probably already done a lot of work.
You know the language. Narcissistic abuse. Scapegoating. CPTSD. Fawning. Shame.
You can explain what happened. You can name the patterns. You may have done therapy, read the books, joined the groups.
And still:
- You understand the abuse, but still feel ashamed.
- You know boundaries are allowed, but still feel guilty setting them.
- You know you are safe now, but do not feel safe.
- You function on the outside and feel hollow on the inside.
- You are tired of recovery feeling like another job.
Asking "why am I still stuck?" is not a sign you have failed.
It is often where real recovery begins.
This is not a willpower problem
You are not stuck because something is wrong with you.
You are stuck because your system learned, very early, that being fully yourself was not safe.
So it adapted. It learned to monitor, appease, hide, achieve, collapse, doubt itself, stay small, take responsibility for other people's feelings.
Those were not flaws. They were intelligent responses to an environment where connection depended on abandoning yourself.
Stuckness is not failure.
It is protection that has not yet felt safe enough to stand down.
What this work is
A space where your survival patterns are understood, not attacked.
This is NARM-informed coaching. Present-moment, client-led, and unhurried.
We are not here to fix you. We are not here to make you a better-managed trauma survivor. We are not here to push you toward forgiveness, no-contact, breakthroughs, or anyone else's idea of healed.
The work is to stop organizing your life around the belief that something is wrong with you — and to let the old protections gradually loosen as that belief loses its grip.
- Slow, relational, conversational
- No forced homework, no worksheets, no performance metrics
- No reliving the past for its own sake
- The authority stays with you
In session
We start with what is alive for you now.
A session is not a lecture, worksheet, or performance review.
We begin with what you want for yourself — not what you should want, not what anyone else thinks you should work on.
From there, we slow down the places where old protections take over: shame, guilt, collapse, people-pleasing, anger, self-doubt, or the feeling that you are somehow wrong for having needs.
We get curious about how those patterns are trying to protect you.
And we keep returning authority to you: your pace, your consent, your body, your choices, your life.
In plain English: we help your system notice that it does not have to keep organizing around threat, shame, and self-abandonment.
Inside the 12 sessions
Less effort to improve.
More room to be yourself.
Twelve private sessions gives the work continuity. The container has structure, but your healing is not forced onto a rigid timeline. You are not behind.
Some of what we often explore:
- The belief that you are the problem.
- The old, quiet sense that something is wrong with you — and the exhaustion of trying to fix it.
- Shame, guilt, and self-doubt at the root.
- Not managing them. Relating to them differently so they have less hold.
- Survival strategies.
- People-pleasing, freezing, over-functioning, hypervigilance — understood, not shamed.
- Your own wanting.
- What you actually want, underneath obligation and fear.
- Agency.
- The difference between an old survival reaction and a present-moment choice.
- Aliveness.
- What becomes available when you are no longer organized around being acceptable.
This is not about working harder on recovery.
It is about needing to work less hard at being yourself.
About Jim McGee
I understand this terrain from the inside.
I grew up in a family shaped by scapegoating and narcissistic dynamics. Like many survivors, I did not fully understand the impact until later. That recognition changed the direction of my life.
For over four years, I helped lead a private support group for survivors of narcissistic and sociopathic abuse. The group grew to more than 500 members and hosted hundreds of meetings. Sitting with survivors week after week taught me how often the visible problem is not lack of insight, but the exhaustion of still living under shame, self-doubt, and survival effort.
My work is grounded in the NeuroAffective Relational Model (NARM) and Daniel Shaw's work on traumatic narcissism. I hold a BA in Psychology from the University of Virginia (Psi Chi Honor Society). I am a NARM-Informed Professional.
I am not here to know your life better than you do. My job is to bring presence, knowledge, and a quiet respect for the self that was there before you had to become someone safer — and to make room for that self to come forward again.
What clients say
"Jim is really patient and nonjudgmental. For the first time, I feel like counseling is actually helping me feel safe enough to connect. I was originally hesitant to work with a male therapist because of my trauma history, but I've felt really at ease with Jim."
"Jim doesn't just coach from the surface — he goes to the root, and that's where real transformation begins."
"Jim is an excellent life coach when it comes to recovering from family trauma, narcissistic parents, and other complex trauma and its effects."
"I felt like I had a partner working alongside me rather than being alone in a dynamic that felt bigger than me."
"Very careful with his words and framing. Very recovery-focused."
Clients sometimes use words like "therapy" or "counseling." My work is coaching, not licensed psychotherapy.
What this work is pointing toward
More room — and what tends to grow inside it.
This work is not about becoming perfectly regulated or permanently finished with trauma.
The aim is more room.
More room between shame and collapse.
More room between someone else's emotion and your responsibility.
More room between an old survival reaction and a present-moment choice.
More capacity to notice what is happening without immediately turning it against yourself.
More trust in your own perception, your own pace, and your own life.
And inside that room, something quieter starts to happen.
The energy that used to go into monitoring, bracing, managing, and apologizing for your own existence can begin to return — to the parts of you that survival did not have room for.
It often shows up quietly at first:
A sense of being the one living your life, rather than the one managing it from a distance.
More access to your own wanting, warmth, humor, and ease — without having to perform them.
Choices that come from the adult you actually are now, rather than from the child who learned to read the room.
Closeness that does not require you to disappear, and solitude that does not feel like exile.
A slow return of the aliveness that was always underneath the survival effort.
NARM rests on a simple premise: the movement in all of us is toward connection, health, and aliveness.
The work is not to install that movement.
It is to help the old protections soften enough for that movement to come through.
Is this the right fit?
Honest about what this is and is not.
This may be a good fit if:
- You already understand a lot about your trauma, but still feel caught in the pattern.
- You want private, relational support rather than a course or group.
- You are looking for a calm, client-led process.
- You want to work with shame, self-trust, boundaries, agency, and the patterns that once made sense.
- You want support that respects your pace and does not pressure you to perform.
This is probably not the right fit if:
- You are in acute crisis and need immediate stabilization or crisis care.
- You want someone to tell you exactly what to do with your family, partner, or life.
- You are looking for diagnosis, treatment, or licensed psychotherapy.
- You want a rigid program with forced homework, worksheets, and fixed milestones.
- The financial investment would create survival-level stress.
If this feels like a good fit for you, a first conversation is the next step.
Investment
Specialized private trauma recovery coaching.
Clear price. No hidden sales conversation.
12-Week Private Coaching Container
- 12 private sessions
- 60 full minutes each
- Zoom
- NARM-informed, client-led, and paced around safety
- Payment plans are available through Affirm or Klarna, including 0% APR options for qualified clients.
This is private, specialized work for adults recovering from narcissistic abuse, family scapegoating, CPTSD, and relational trauma.
Book a free first conversationA first conversation is a chance for both of us to see whether this feels right.
Coaching, not licensed psychotherapy or crisis support. Many clients do both.
Common questions
No. This is coaching. I do not diagnose, treat, or prescribe. If you are in therapy, this can complement it.
Because insight does not automatically tell the nervous system it is safe. You may understand what happened and still have old protections — shame, freezing, people-pleasing, self-doubt, bracing — running in the background. This work helps you meet those patterns without attacking them.
No. NARM is present-moment. We may touch your history when relevant, but we are not excavating it.
No. Those decisions stay with you. We can explore the territory, but I will not take over your authority.
Yes. That hesitation makes sense. A first conversation is partly so you can notice how it feels to talk with me and decide for yourself.
This container is not designed for acute crisis. In the US, call or text 988 for the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline. We can talk honestly on a first conversation about whether this is the right level of support right now.
A calm 30-minute conversation. You can ask questions, share what brings you here, and get a feel for how I work. No decision required.
You do not have to keep proving anything.
Not that your pain was real. Not that it affected you. Not that you are working hard enough on recovery.
If you are caught between knowing what happened and feeling free from it, a first conversation is a quiet way to see if this is a fit.