{"id":1100,"date":"2025-09-04T07:00:00","date_gmt":"2025-09-04T13:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/?p=1100"},"modified":"2025-09-03T12:50:11","modified_gmt":"2025-09-03T18:50:11","slug":"when-protection-becomes-control","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/2025\/09\/04\/when-protection-becomes-control\/","title":{"rendered":"When Protection Becomes Control"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<h2><em><strong>A Psychological Look at Unknown Number: The High School Catfish<\/strong><\/em><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large is-resized\"><img loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/documentary-pic-1024x741.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-1101\" width=\"727\" height=\"525\" srcset=\"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/documentary-pic-1024x741.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/documentary-pic-300x217.jpg 300w, https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/documentary-pic-768x556.jpg 768w, https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/documentary-pic.jpg 1320w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 727px) 100vw, 727px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<h3><strong>The High School Catfish<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p><strong><em>Spoiler Alert! <\/em><\/strong><em>We are about to give away the end of the documentary in the first paragraph. If you don\u2019t want to know the end, save this article, go watch it, then come back.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Netflix\u2019s <em>Unknown Number: The High School Catfish<\/em> left me unsettled. The case was already disturbing enough. A teenage girl being harassed for over a year through anonymous texts and messages. But the real gut punch came with the reveal: it wasn\u2019t a jealous classmate, or an online predator. It was her own mother.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>That\u2019s the kind of twist that makes us stop and ask: <em>what could possibly drive a parent to do this?<\/em> As a counselor, I naturally look at these stories through the DSM lens. And while no diagnosis from afar can ever be definitive, there are some clear psychological patterns worth unpacking.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3><strong>A Digital Twist on FDIA<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>The closest clinical category here is <strong>Factitious Disorder Imposed on Another (FDIA)<\/strong>. We used to call it Munchausen by proxy. Typically, it shows up when a caregiver fabricates or induces medical illness in someone they\u2019re caring for, often a child, to maintain attention, sympathy, or control.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Kendra Licari didn\u2019t fake medical symptoms, but she created a crisis nonetheless. By bombarding her daughter with anonymous harassment, she generated a problem that only she could later \u201chelp\u201d solve. The dynamic is eerily similar: the parent manufactures suffering in order to keep the child dependent. This unmistakably produced severe distress in her daughter. Only this time, it\u2019s <em>Cyber-FDIA<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But FDIA alone doesn\u2019t quite capture the full picture. The content of the messages, sexually explicit, cruel, sometimes telling her daughter to kill herself, suggests something more than just attention-seeking or misguided protection.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3><strong>The Dark Triad Running the Show<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>To really understand this case, I think we need to look beyond disorders and into <strong>personality traits<\/strong>\u2014specifically the <strong>Dark Triad<\/strong>: narcissism, Machiavellianism, and psychopathy (Note that I am aware of the new <em>Dark Tetrad<\/em>, but sadism did not fit here).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul><li><strong>Vulnerable Narcissism<\/strong>: This isn\u2019t the loud, arrogant narcissism we often picture. Vulnerable narcissism is fragile and hypersensitive, desperate for affirmation and terrified of abandonment. In Licari\u2019s case, her actions look less like ego inflation and more like a desperate attempt to keep her daughter tethered to her at all costs.<\/li><li><strong>Machiavellianism<\/strong>: The manipulation was elaborate and calculated. Hundreds of messages. Fake accounts. Careful concealment. That\u2019s classic Machiavellian strategy: long-term deceit in the service of control.<\/li><li><strong>Psychopathy<\/strong>: What stood out most to me was the callousness. Watching her daughter spiral under the weight of harassment, and not stopping, reflects an alarming lack of empathy. Refusing to take full responsibility for her actions was another indicator of psychopathy. Even if she wouldn\u2019t meet criteria for full-blown psychopathy, the trait was alive and active.<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>With the statement, \u201cEverybody has broken some law in their life. Nobody is perfect\u201d, she made the Dark Triad evident. In this case, the Dark Triad wasn\u2019t just present, it was driving the bus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3><strong>Trauma and the Distorted Logic of Protection<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>Licari later shared that she had been raped as a teenager. She framed her harassment toward her daughter as a twisted form of \u201cprotection,\u201d suggesting she created a problem that would keep her daughter close, safe, and coming to her for help. In her mind, maybe she was shielding her daughter from the very dangers she had endured.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But here\u2019s the truth, trauma might explain why her fears were so heightened, but it does not excuse or fully explain her actions. Many people endure sexual trauma, often at the hands of someone close to them. Almost none go on to send their own child sexually explicit messages, attempt to ruin their life, or tell them to kill themselves.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This went deeper than <em>\u201cI got raped.\u201d<\/em> Trauma may have been the seed, but pathology was the soil it grew in.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3><strong>The Perfect Storm<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>At the same time, Licari was losing her job, suppressing her own trauma, and avoiding accountability. That combination created fertile ground for character flaws to take over. Without reflection, accountability, or support, trauma can metastasize. Stress, loss of identity, and secrecy cracked the door open, and the Dark Triad walked right in.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This is the part I can\u2019t stop thinking about. It wasn\u2019t just trauma. It was trauma + personality traits + a lack of accountability and boundaries. That\u2019s when fear of losing a child morphs into controlling them, destroying them, just to keep them \u201csafe.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3><strong>Why This Case Is Different<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>We all know parents who are overprotective. Many of us have seen trauma survivors carry their fears into their parenting. But this case is different. This isn\u2019t the natural endpoint of being \u201ctoo protective.\u201d It\u2019s something darker.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>That\u2019s why the story rattles us so deeply. It takes something familiar. It\u2019s the instinct to protect your child. Yet it twists it into something unrecognizable. The very bond Licari claimed to protect ended up destroyed. Or was it? The daughter\u2019s reaction to the news almost presented \u201cI figured it was her.\u201d Much like the story of Rapunzel, even though the daughter knew, she couldn\u2019t bring herself to accept what her mother had done.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3><strong>Why It Matters<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>It would be easy to write this off as one woman\u2019s madness. But I think it raises bigger questions:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul><li>How do trauma and personality pathology interact?<\/li><li>At what point does \u201cprotectiveness\u201d become control?<\/li><li>And what safeguards, like family, friends, and community, might have stopped this spiral before it escalated?<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>In an age where technology makes it easier than ever to monitor, manipulate, and entangle those we love, these questions aren\u2019t abstract. They matter for how we parent, how we relate, and how we check ourselves.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3><strong>A Final Reflection<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>The irony is crushing. In trying to protect her daughter, Licari destroyed her. The very bond she wanted to preserve now lies in ruins. That\u2019s the tragedy here. Love, once twisted into control, becomes indistinguishable from harm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The lesson for the rest of us is simple, but not easy. <strong>Real protection never requires manipulation. Real closeness never has to be forced.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We must recognize the line between care and control, and have the courage to stop before we cross it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Stay Classy GP!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Grainger <\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-container-1 wp-block-buttons\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-button is-style-fill\"><a class=\"wp-block-button__link\" href=\"buymeacoffee.com\/grainger\">Buy Me a Coffee<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A Psychological Look at Unknown Number: The High School Catfish The High School Catfish Spoiler Alert! We are about to give away the end of the documentary in the first paragraph. If you don\u2019t want to know the end, save this article, go watch it, then come back. Netflix\u2019s Unknown Number: The High School Catfish &hellip; <\/p>\n<p class=\"link-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/2025\/09\/04\/when-protection-becomes-control\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;When Protection Becomes Control&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0},"categories":[72,6],"tags":[193,192,36,191],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1100"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1100"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1100\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1102,"href":"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1100\/revisions\/1102"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1100"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1100"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1100"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}