My narcissist is my mum. I’m at the point now at 46 with 2 children of my own to walk away. Has anyone done this with a parent?
Yes thank god for lockdown I say (because she stopped coming around) that then gave me the distance I needed to evaluate our relationship.
I think the turning point came when I realised that I was married to a full on narcissist.
I thought about my life (I am 43) and honestly I felt almost as if I'd been groomed by her and conditioned to accept mind games gaslighting and lack of love.
So when I met my husband (and it all happened very quickly a whirlwind romance) I got that immediate connection and sense of familiarity....you feel like you're known them all your life?
That's because you have!
He is frighteningly similar to her controlling yet evasive money obsessed and greedy never appreciates anything...yet stingy with others..fake what I would call insincere charm that at the same time draws people in because they both know how to read people and discover their vulnerabilities?
Neither of them is ever responsible or accountable for anything it's always someone elses fault (usually mine because I fitted that role and was desperate for validation).
So during lockdown when I had zero help from either of them and full on responsibility and getting so tired and frustrated that I'd end up constantly ill (which of course was my fault because I am weak) I decided that the one thing I could do was to deal with the actual source the original pyschic vampire my mother.
When I finally got the courage (on my birthday) to tell her my husband was abusive she listened and betrayed no emotion and then rang up my husband behind my back and started the same old dialogue that she always does and pretends to be worried and frames me as the problem.
What are we going to do about ######
So that was it my heart calcified....I decided then that I would cut her out one way or another....
We had one last meeting....she just walked into my house unannounced my body straight away feel very nauseous....
So that was it the feeling was too intense to ignore (thank god for my body finally giving me the push needed).
Since then she's tried writing letters sending gifts phoning my husband crying and sending text messages but I don't respond (I think I've gone cold turkey) and tbh I never will.
I don't want someone in my life who makes me feel ill.
Dealing with my husband is bad enough sometimes although the good thing is that he works long hours and I don't have to see him much!
He is like a (as I said before) lightweight version of her but more childish (I think narcissists are immature people) and condescending...(sometimes inwardly I just laugh at him because he can be so pompous).
I find yoga and meditation help to reclaim my headspace and create that all important distance?
One thing at a time one step at a time...I realise I don't have the relationships to people that I would like or a first for me (deserve) but I try to remind myself that I'm not to blame.
I got caught in the narcissists net....they can actually brain wash you into accepting their version of reality so that you see the world as a hostile almost dangerous place that isn't safe.
How is it safe when all your boundaries have been smashed to pieces? Or worse you were never really allowed to develop them in the first place?
So if your even considering cutting her out I would say do it narcissists never really contribute anything they only take and drain you.
Also as I found out to my cost she never really fancied being a grandmother it cramped her style and reminded her she was old (there again the narcs inner child the one that doesn't want to grow up and lose the sense of being the centre of the universe) so she never helped out.
Would occasionally grace us with her presence talk down to my children (as if from a great height) never took them out or babysat or played with them or related to them as people.
Just sat there expecting to be fawned over....so my children have never really had a grandmother and well it's the same as me never really having a mother...
As you probably know they just wreck havoc and cause discord.... I have never had a normal life and my grief has hit me very badly especially this week that to a certain extent my children haven't had a normal or comfortable or secure life either.
This is despite me bending over backwards to try to compensate....which didn't work.
Just ask yourself is it really worth it?
Also the horror that happens when as I did you get a sense of history repaying itself?
Break the cycle if you can I broke at least part of it and yes i grieved for it and yes I've felt so lonely and lost but the way I see it once you open your eyes to what is going on you can never really fully close them again....?
Unless delusion is a place you are comfortable with? Or constant numbness or a feeling of cognitive dissonance.....
No one deserves to be reduced to that to feel so crazy or fragile that they can't even trust themselves anymore (and I had moments like that) but I always came back to reality.
I won't let them win (or at least not completely) and I want a better example for my children.
So take care do what you can listen to your instincts
and intuition find the inner voice that can hopefully help you to get in touch with what your really feeling (And not just what they want you to feel) and try to trust yourself and do what you can?
I wish you well sorry about the long post or if I'm oversharing too much but I kept all this hidden away from people because she turned my family (growing up) against me and I could never tell people how bad she made me feel or get them to believe me?
That's because she was daddy's little girl and doted on and spoilt and vain and domineering and yet they all hung on her every word she ruled from a young age....and has expected to ever since.....
Great for her but terrible for me who was always consigned to the shadows.....and that's literally all I was just a shadow projection her own inner demons and darkness that she never admitted to but would I gladly play that part?
I had no choice....and I have spent most of my life almost as a lurker too afraid to be seen or heard finding myself in various degrees repulsive and unlovable and repugnant...I still feel like I have that shame.....but it lifts occasionally and I catch a glimpse of a different possibility?
One that doesn't involve self hatred....
I am reading You're not broken....by Christopher Michael Duncan it's giving me solace and I repeat that phrase to myself whenever I feel threatened which is quite often (my nerves can play up) and it helps....it soothes....it's a rejection of maternal brainwashing (my father was just her enabler another sychophant).....
I know at least I've taken the first steps (often the hardest) if any of this speaks to you know that you can do the same if you feel that you either need or want to....
I don't consider myself an example to others or especially unique or interesting or brave but I do know that anyone can be pushed to their limits when enough really is enough....it's best not to leave it to get to that point but sometimes we get so consumed by something or someone that it's hard to break free.
So be gentle with yourself do not judge yourself hey judge them instead! (,It's a great temporary release) and most of all listen to your body.
If you feel in any way like I did that your in the presence of a predator then either create distance or if like me that isn't enough cut her out?
She will most likely try to hoover you back in or bring out the flying monkeys (as I said she even got my husband to do her bidding).....
At least forewarned is forearmed.....
Good luck I hope I've been helpful and I wish you all the best.
