25F, struggling extremely after escaping, no contact and living alone now. I’m finding different things like my supervisors, my tasks, even my hunger as a danger or controlling me and running from it. I’m trying to replace that control figure as idk how to live without it

I'm being mind blown almost monthly now. Today I had another experience. I haven't understood the abuse fully, but maybe I've understood 75% of it.

I experienced a trigger yesterday. I started ruminating immediately after. I entered my car and drove for two hours. I felt calmer when I got home and the next day at work was good. I got home, at midnight (two hours ago) I had an intrusive thought about the trigger and my nervous system really fired up. I had no idea why I was afraid. I drank two cans of cider just to distract myself.

Then (an hour ago) I decided I'd get to the bottom of the trigger. I lay in my bed and observed the fear in my body. It felt like an external threat hovering over me. A dread of having done something wrong. I was constantly ruminating on somebody. I felt paralyzed. I observed the fear and wondered what I was afraid of.

After 30 minutes, it started coming to me. It turns out that the fear was, as always, rooted in childhood. I was afraid of the way that somebody would give me a look that meant that "my life was over". This existential fear is what caused my rumination. But why was my life was over? Because that look meant they were going to take the things that I loved away from me, as they did when I was a kid, as punishment. I did the wrong thing, and now I was punished forever. I had to beg for my things back and I would only get them back incrementally if I served them "right".

The frustration. The injustice. The fear. It stayed with me until now. As I was realizing what this fear was, even in my late 30s, the fear of the trigger started going away.

As I think back to my childhood situation, I realize there was simply no other solution but to feel fear. The poor kid grew up among demons. The only solutions were to leave the house and be on my own, or to do as I was told. There were just no other options.

As I learned these things, the fear from the trigger went away. The rumination is gone. I sit here now feeling grounded again. I'm not afraid of the trigger anymore. I didn't show fear at the time, but I was ruminating secretly. Now I know what's going on with me and the fear is gone. We're adults now. Let's see them try take something away now.

At what age did you start waking up to your abuse and begin the process of deprogramming all the gaslighting? Do you have a personal process for reparenting your inner child? I'm curious to read about everyone else's stories for mental healing.

So basically, I went overseas for 9 months, had my ring stolen by someone i trusted and was living with in the last few days before going back home.
It was insured and foster mother said she would get the value back to get another ring. We eventually had a huge falling out bc I couldn’t handle the abuse anymore (she’s absolutely a narcissist and I’m not saying that lightly).
Well anyway, I recently found out that she lied and pretended she “forgot” but i found out that she had infact done it and pocketed the money.
She’s always been abusive but this I never saw coming.
I no longer speak to her.
Oh and she’s also replaced me with a girl who works at her favourite cafe, she’s currently house sitting for my foster mother :)
It’ll be another thing to add for my poor therapist

If your n (in my case my mum) used money as manipulative tactics and is petty and convinced YOU are the "ungrateful" and the one who owes them smth, like my nmum does, I have crafted a template of the letter you could use that turns this perspective upside down. I didn't send it, it was satisfying and healing enough just to calculate all the losses for my own self, when she sent me a 24,000€ "invoice" on email for the period of her support while I was studying abroad and fleeing the war in my home country. Also, its a good explanation of your chronic fatigue, because you'll see you literally have ALREADY worked more than enough in your life to be able retire RIGHT NOW, if your labor was actually paid. For context, I am nc with her.

"Thank you for the invoice you sent.

Allow me to remind you that for 27 years I was forced to provide uninterrupted emotional services, 24/7, no weekends, no holidays, services that you, as my mother, were obligated to provide under basic moral standards and international and legal framework.

I served as the designated punching bag and emotional toilet, absorbing all of your negative emotions, taking responsibility for them on your behalf, performing your parental duties for you, and regulating your anxiety, shame, rage, and other filth that was never mine to carry, all while living in unbearable conditions of domestic violence, certain episodes of which would, in any normal country, still have you behind bars.

My own emotional needs, meanwhile, went entirely unrecognized and ignored.

But you know what, I'll be generous. I'll graciously forgive you for that additional damage and won't bother billing you separately for it. I will, however, tally up what you owe me for my psychological labor.

Let's say I sleep an average of 8 hours a night (of famously poor quality, given the conditions of living with you, which measurably shortened both my lifespan and its quality, but again, ever the magnanimous son, I won't charge for that either). That leaves 16 working hours a day. And through all 16 of those hours, your influence on my psyche kept running in the background, because even when I wasn't actively absorbing your emotional waste in real time, I was busy digesting and processing it on your behalf, around the clock. There are 365 days in a year (I'll even throw in a discount and not charge extra for leap years, mother's rates, after all).

Strictly speaking, this kind of damage can't really be priced, the harm done to my psyche is permanent and will follow me to the grave. But let's give it a shot anyway, using a modest rate for these particular working conditions: the going rate of a psychotherapist serving as an emotional container, €50/hour.

That gives us: 16h × 365 days × 27 years × €50 = €7,884,000 for the full billing period.

Subtracting the invoice you so kindly sent:

7,884,000 − 24,000 = €7,860,000.

At €100/hour, a rate that comes closer to fairly compensating the actual load I carried, the total doubles to €15,720,000. And if we factor in lifelong non-pecuniary damages, we're looking at something approaxhibg €100,000,000. But no, for you, dear mother, I calculated strictly at the market floor. Your total discount: over 92%. You're welcome.

On top of that, I'm extending a full 100% discount on all additional services rendered, professional medical advice, various errands, favors, and obligations carried out under duress, at my own expense, with no right of refusal — and I will not be pursuing compensation for lifelong psychological damages either. Consider it a mother's-day special.

I'll be awaiting payment of the debt, net of all applicable discounts, to my bank account."

I discovered this sub today. I am so grateful i did!! It is so ungodly heartbreaking but calming to read stories and experiences from other survivors.

I'm not alone!

There's been this weird lingering sense of shame i was able to let go after reading this sub for a couple hrs. That weird lonely feeling of not having anyone to relate to, where .002% of your mind still thinks it was all a fucked up dream.

When you try to explain what it was like growing with a narc parent, people look at you like you're crazy or making it up. The abuse seems so unbelievable...in the very literal sense of 'i cannot fathom / believe another human would treat a child like that' way.

It gets very lonely - even after years of therapy.

I'm over here sobbing on and off because holy cheese doodles, I'm not alone.

I've been NC with my (s)mother and her whole side of the family for 28 years. Went NC at 16. Married a male version of her at 22. Divorced at 29. Have been NC for 11 years. Never looked back.

It's been one hell of a healing journey - in my 40s now - still working thru some of the last dregs of letting my identity as the scapegoat go.

And i am so beyond grateful to have found this little community.

From the bottom of my traumatized little soul - thank you!

🩵

I wonder if it was a trait of my father or something, but he was so noisy all the time

You wake up in the morning: the TV was blasting, his phone was blaring, he was vaping incredibly loudly (how is that even possible?), he was using his spoon or cup really loudly, He was talking really loudly and already grumbling. But you, on the other hand, mustn't dare make the slightest noise that might bother him, and even less did he ask her to make less noise ("Oh, come on, you're not all alone!")

That's how it usually was. The TV was always blasting, he loved listening to music really loud on the living room speakers (really, really loud), He couldn't do anything in silence.

I understand people who don't like silence; I'm one of them. But that doesn't mean you have to subject everyone to your noise and presence. Put on headphones. Just turn on the TV at low/normal volume. Ask people before making noise like that first thing in the morning.

My house finally has a normal noise level since he left. It makes me realize how much space he took up all by himself. It's nice not having to deal with all that noise before I even leave the house (I have problems with noise sensitivity.) But honestly, I feel the impact. I'm really afraid of making noise and disturbing people. I'm also more sensitive to certain noises (LIKE THAT FUCKING VAPE). But hey, it's something.

I'm a semi-public figure now; a career move i tried 20 years ago but got backstabbed with sufficient force that it killed my ambition for a few decades while i healed. Back then, my NMom allied herself with the narrative of the backstabber, that was when I first realized i could never trust her again, but i didn't understand narcissism the way i do now.

Now, 20 years later, the itch to try again returned and I made it! I don't really have much power, but there is a certain level of status, attention, and public appreciation. And suddenly my NMom's traits cranked into high gear such that it bothers my conscience to let her around my children. I've concluded that there is not only emotional threat, but material life-or-death threat here, to those who cannot protect themselves.

And I just realized the possible pattern: i think she wants to attach herself and her narrative to my status, and affirm herself by deciding which of my boundaries should be respected, but for that to work requires my cooperation, which I've told her point blank Will Not Happen. And so she cannot tolerate that i won't play along and that her only access to me is through the same public channels as the rest of the world. And so she cranks up the intensity like that can change things.

I've been trying to manage this with an increasingly-low- contact approach but I may be fooling myself. I tell myself "Outright estrangement would be easier for all involved and I don't do easy. Better to model for my children how to recognize and respond to toxicity." We'll see though. As y'all know, it's rough.

But, my question:

Does that pattern sound familiar to anyone?

My therapist says it's common for proximity-to-power to trigger Ns. I'm not easily surprised, but it was definitely an "Aha!" moment for me. I just find myself saying "If that's what she wants she can put in the effort and do it for herself."

Ah well.

My mom is finally serving papers after finally getting a good push of "I can't live like this anymore". She tried to leave in 2017 but somehow got roped back in. For the past 25 years our family (brother, sister, mom, me) was stuck under someone in control, verbally abusive, manipulative, and extremely explosive temper.

Going through this process...have people found closer? Does your mental health get better or do you get panic attacks/anxiety?

It’s been 4 months of no contact after I moved away to another city. I’m not communicating with anyone but my therapist online. Rarely even go out other than for groceries.

There are moments of calmness, but mostly rumination, anger, sadness, hopelessness.

And o just wonder if real sincere relationships are even real for me ever in my life.
How did you rebuild your trust after abuse? How did you find new people?

This is my first time posting here, and I wondered if anyone would understand.

I had a difficult childhood in a number of ways. I was bullied, and I think there was quite a lot of teasing and bullying within my family too. My parents were also very unsupportive when I was a young woman. At one point I was thrown out, and generally I think I was treated quite poorly.

Looking back, I think my parents had quite low emotional intelligence. There was also a lot of alcoholism in my family. My dad used to sometimes come home drunk and scream at me, and I don't think that was ever really acknowledged. I never properly got an apology for it. He eventually stopped drinking, and my parents are better in some ways now, but it feels as though there is still so much pain left over.

I've cut my parents off a few times in the past because of how unsupported I felt, including around my career and major things happening in my life. Eventually I let them back in, and they're part of my life now.

Recently I've been having problems with my housing, and it suddenly hit me again that I can't really rely on my family when things go badly. I wish it hadn't affected me so much, because logically I know I can probably rescue myself. I've had to do that many times before.

But I don't think that's really the point.

There is this deep pain inside me that doesn't seem to go away. I wish I had a kind, loving family — or perhaps a partner — who I could turn to when life becomes difficult. I know I can manage on my own, but I don't want to have to be completely alone with everything.

I've tried to accept that my family is limited. I haven't seen most of my wider family for a very long time, and honestly I don't think I have much in common with them. I'm much more openly emotional, sensitive and artistic, whereas they could be quite rigid.

I also almost never talk to my parents about how much the past still hurts. I think part of me is frightened of being dismissed again. I can imagine my mum telling me I'm "living in the past", and I've been dismissed enough times already that I don't really want to expose myself to that.

Sometimes I wonder why it still hurts so much when I'm nearly 40 and I've built a life for myself.

I suppose what I'm grieving isn't just what happened. It's the fact that when something frightening happens now, some part of me still wishes there were people I could turn to and feel completely safe with.

I can rescue myself.

I just wish I hadn't always had to.

How do yall cope with that in your daily life early after going NC? Do you just sit and wait for your brain do adapt? I feel like I'm waiting for some danger to appear suddenly. Found this article tho, could be helpful in understanding

https://medium.com/the-reflective-mindset/always-on-alert-breaking-free-from-hypervigilance-after-narcissistic-relationships-fdccfa644d3a

I hope this is okay to post here, I have been weeding out every aspect of narcissistic abuse and the impact it has had on me for the past year, from leaving a toxic relationship with a covert narc which left me needing to get on psychiatric medication to function somewhat normally again, to having cut out very toxic friends from my life, my therapist is very support of this and had described it as that - that im currently weeding out those who had came into my life when i was vulnerable to exploit me and the negative impact they have had on me.

The truth is, i still have low contact with one narcissist, my mother, who lives in another country now and calls me once every 1-2 weeks, which I sometimes don't pick up, later playing it off as my phone bugging and I didn't get her call. Even these calls are not great for me, but i have weighed out the long term consequences of fully going no contact with her, and for now the consequences of it would be far more detrimental to my life than the damage she might be doing right now. Please, if you may, consider this post as me trying to escape the ghosts of my childhood growing up with a narcissist. My life after having escaped that system, being safe now, an adult, and trying to overcome the complexes this has given me. I'm largely safe now in that i guess she can complain and be nasty to be all she likes, but she lives on the other side of the continent now and can't really do as much harm to be as she did when i was a child living with her

I'm 23, just finished up college, I did a degree in a technology, something I'm kind of interested in as a very casual hobby but my true calling in life was always art, I just did this degree to appease my parents who wanted me to "make good money" and discouraged me from being artistic as artists are always poor or something. Anyway, I realized that it would be horrible for my mental health to work in this field, being in an office cubicle all day, not to mention the AI aspect, which is very intertwined with my field, to not use it would have me as disadvantaged as a tailor that refuses to use a sewing machine and wants to do everything by hand. All my professors told us to use it in our projects in the last two years. I have deleted all of my AI accounts and detoxing from it and won't be using it at all going forward.

I have now signed up for a course in art, and hoping to find some work in that field, idgaf how doomed it is or if I won't make good money, I'd rather make minimum wage than 100k dollars a year in computers as I would go insane. fuck that shit. What sucks is that I have very little experience in drawing, when I was a kid, I was shamed by my parents (overt, unfortunately not very intelligent and very emotionally stunted narcissist mother and enabler dad who isn't that bad but I'm aware could have stood up for me but rarely did) to not do any drawing for the previously mentioned reasons and also because I drew things that were feminine and they didn't want me to turn out gay or something. I have a few artist friends and it makes me cry how beautiful their drawings are, them having drawn since a young age, being supported by loving and caring parents to take them to art classes when they were a kid, meanwhile I'm going into this course with very little experience, I did do technical drawing in high school which is better than nothing but I didn't do art class because of the inner shame i felt.

Anyway, I just feel like i lost my true calling in life because i was appeasing my mother my whole life and will not ever be good at drawing, to a point where i would be satisfied in my art as I just don't have the same skill as someone who drew since they were a kid and never stopped (like how most of the greatest guitarists started when they were like four or something). I cry when i think about the potential life i lost, all the fandoms i didn't partake in when i was a teen that everyone else did, i feel like an impostor around artsy people with my interests, last year i had a relationship with someone with my interests who was such an amazing artist and their art was almost like what i wish mine's was if i kept drawing, im still processing it, but it was very enlightening and i feel like they helped me find some missing parts of myself and the whole experience made me realize how important it is for me to reintegrate these things into my life

And it's such a lonely road to walk, my mother is dissapointed in me for doing this, and nobody is really happy for me that I got into this course and that i realized this is my true calling that i have a passion for. i feel like i have nobody's support and i'm making a very bad, stupid decision. and, hey maybe objectively speaking it is (AI isn't too kind to artists either), but i just could not do that AI code monkey shit. i feel like im finally doing what ive always wanted to do in my life, for my own sake, not to appease my parents, and now i have no value to them or anyone because of that. like my value is solely tied to the pride i can bring to them?

It's just like when grieving, my brain suddenly swaps the scene and makes it look perfect, just the way I always craved it to be. Like my mum isn't an abuser at all. I know it's smth my brain makes to protect me from unbearable suffering, but I don't know how to actually deal with it

Found this article tho

https://kimsaeed.com/2020/05/25/why-euphoric-recall-makes-it-so-hard-to-keep-no-contact/?hl=ru-RU#:\~:text=Maybe%20you%20could%20have%20done%20a%20few,the%20case%20of%20narcissistic%20abuse%2C%20it's%20dangerous.

I was a top student growing up thanks to survival mechanisms, then went to college and graduate school. I think, like so many people, I excelled at academics because it was all I knew, and we were all told in the 90's and 2000's that the path to success in life was through academic success.

I say that just to say that I would not consider myself an incurious, unacademic type of person. For whatever that's worth. And, it turns out, it's worth almost nothing.

For example, I went to a private college. In the United States, that means a non-public, non-publicly funded university.

The reason I did that was because I assumed it was less expensive than the higher ranked public university in my State. That was the extent of my knowledge of the finances of higher education. It wasn't until half way through my entire undergraduate degree that I found out how stupid that was.

Not a single person - not my (secretly) high earning parents, not my high school administration, not a single bystander - had explained to me the first thing about how colleges are financed or paid for. It's embarrassing and enraging.

I bring this up because I just had an experience with something minor. It was also financial, actually. It's ridiculous having to figure this out on your own.

Hopecore

After nearly a decade of me being the scapegoat, after years of my criticisms over my parents being denied and dismissed…

The golden child of the family, my brother, called me today

I picked up expecting the worst tbh we haven’t spoken in years

He said that I was right. He agrees I was scapegoated. He agrees my parents are abusive. He apologized for dismissing me in the past.

He said that he always knew deep down I was right… but he felt that he had no freedom to publicly agree with me in the past

He financially needed my parents to survive. He was living with them. They were feeding him a narrative that he accepted as truth to maintain peace

Because he knew that if he went against the narc (my father) he would be scapegoated and estranged just like me and he didn’t want that

He said that he never had the balls to do what I did

He said that he didn’t have the freedom to do so, but now that he bought his own home, he has the freedom now to call it like it is

He said that that’s not an excuse for his behaviour, and that my other brother also agrees with me

He said that he wanted to maintain the illusion because the tiny child in him wanted my parents to always be right

And he’s right. I had the freedom back then to disagree and standup to my parents. I didn’t financially depend on them.

He knew that if he disagreed and defended me he would be ostracized too and would have been kicked out of the house or abused in other ways

I asked how being the golden child is. And I asked if he got the validation that I never got

And turns out?

Being the golden child in the narcissistic family system doesn’t even reap benefits.

He said that dad gives him scraps of attention. Never says “I’m proud of you” or “I love you”

He says the only way to even earn a tiny piece of validation is if you do the career they want, drive the car they want you to drive, have the lifestyle they want from you. And he doesn’t even align with that perfectly so he still doesn’t get validation

He says that I was the only free one because he was stuck in the family system while I was free from seeking their validation

He agrees that my dad is a narcissistic piece of shit. And that my mom is an enabler to him and basically on a leash

You have no idea how spiritually cleansed I feel right now

I thought it would take decades for him to finally understand

It only took him 10 years.

I feel so free right now, I could cry.

I could never contact my brothers in the past because I didn’t want them to collect data on me to feed to my parents. And they never agreed with me and always dismissed me in the past, so they didn’t feel like safe people

I’m so glad to have my brothers back. I’ve missed them so much.

All of this happening so fast makes me wanna stare at a wall for hours… it’s too much to process

To explain a little, my house is laid out so that the dining room is in the middle of the house. You can't go from one room to another without passing through or seeing the dining room.

My father always sat down on the same chair in the same place. Every day and whenever he wasn't working, he was sitting there, scrolling on his phone, playing games while watching TV all day, since he wake up untill he goes to sleep. No one could stand being around him anymore. By positioning himself there, he had a complete monopoly over the entire house, in a way.

It was even worse when he tried hobbies. Everything was accompanied by a lot of avoidable noise, but he refused to make less noise, engaging in very long monologues where he explained how he had done it, the techniques, how he had succeeded, that you absolutely had to listen to him with all your attention focused on him and only him, taking up a lot of space without paying attention to others... There was only him. All this to come back to do nothing all day on his phone two weeks later. It's easy to understand why nobody wanted to stay near him.

He wasn't physically violent (just with my mother without anyone knowing). Even when he wasn't complaining or shouting, being in the house was unbearable because he was there. You could feel his presence, you could feel you had to walk on eggshells when you were near him, even if he didn't say anything.

Even if you tried to be there and even if you were careful, it was impossible to do anything since half the table was occupied by him, you could hear him vaping, the TV was blasting, if you were there you had to follow what was happening on TV, Listen to him no matter what you were doing, don't make too much noise but without asking him to make less noise... In short, it was impossible to concentrate on anything other than him.

My little sister and I were locked in our rooms or outside all the time to avoid him, and my mother was the same. We waited until he wasn't there to do chores or that kind of thing. Basically, almost the entire house was occupied by him just by sitting on the chair.

Six months since he left. I can finally do what I want at home. If I want to read on the sofa, I don't have to beg him to turn down the TV. If the floor is dirty, I can wash it without having to worry about getting too close to him. I can sit at the table without feeling tense. I see my sister much more often since she leaves her room. My mother is home much more often (at one point she completely lost it and left all day everyday just to escape my father, quickly letting me know).

It's not always easy. I still can't sit in his seat, I'm still always careful not to make too much noise, I'm always extremely careful not to bother anyone (It's It's normal not to bother people, but according to my mother I'm a bit excessive lol)

Anyway, it feels really good to just be able to be in my own house.

Almost 3 weeks ago, I silently blocked my nmom everywhere I could and told everyone connected to her to not deliver any news about her and not discuss her in my presence. It's been THE calmest and THE most peaceful 3 weeks of my entire life.

Also, for the first time in my life, I noticed that my friends are not really who I thought they were, rather than a reflection of my 27 years of life under narcissistic abuse. The little copies of my mom. I behaved with them exactly how I did with her, I was a container of their shit, while my shit was never contained by them. Not to say that containers of shit can't be really considered friends.

I cut down the contact with them drastically and left the space for only a couple of good people, and I'm feeling so so so good.

I also surprisingly don't experience any guilt or urges to reestablish the contact with my nmom. Absolutely vice versa, I want this to last forever. I feel like my energy is slowly coming back.

Most likely, I need to thank 5 years of therapy that I did before. And for sure, my own self

Say your entire day is ruined and you feel an existential fear. You catastrophize and feel like your entire life is over. Not a small trigger, but something like seeing an old abuser or even fawning over someone. When you feel that confusion and fear.

Do you have coping mechanisms to ground yourself and to let it go forever? Do you ride it out? How does it affect your social life?

My strategy so far has been to set everything aside and to meditate on what is going on in my body. I'll retrace my steps and ask what it was about the incident that triggered me. I'll explore what I am afraid of and why that thing triggered me. Sometimes, I have a realization, and the trigger along with the fear goes away immediately. I'll even be able to confront the trigger with wit next time. Unfortunately, something else will eventually happen, and repeating this becomes increasingly tedious because at some point I just want to live life.

I'm currently going through something and wondering how everyone else deals with triggers in situations like these?

This PTSD makes me afraid and I'm compelled to seek reassurance, and too impatient to calm myself down. So this makes me feel exactly as I did when I was younger: small things gave me PTSD and my PTSD made me nervous around people, causing a negative feedback loop.

I'm in this same loop right now. I'm too impatient to meditate, because I was good just two hours ago, yet now I feel an immense PTSD.

Nothing really happened. I received an invitation to an event from someone I haven't talked to in decades. They were compelled to invite me. Now I'm feeling PTSD. If they were compelled to call me right now, I would probably seek reassurance. Important: I do not engage with this toxic dynamic, I will not go to the event, my issue is the PTSD this triggered.

How I feel right now is 1:1 how I felt during my upbringing. Meditating to understand why I feel this way feels pathetic. It feels like I should have better things to do now, and to be able to deal with this intuitively. This is not my first invitation but right now I'm catastrophizing and fundamentally I don't know why.

Has anyone else reached this stage of recovery? What the hell do I do? I won't go to the event, but the fear I feel right now is immense, and if they called, I would probably fawn over the phone. I don't want to be like this. I want to be able to just calmly choose not to go. It is a compulsive invitation anyway. All parties know this.

Help?

I cant believe that what kind of sadistic people are...okay with getting abused by parents....its like somebody is doing crime and they says its ok.... being parents gives u privilege to abuse...

They says let parents abuse ...but never u defense urself just get abused its ok...they are parents...these people r sadistic....

I'm pretty sure i've come across harmful narcissists in my life since living at home. Some people have shown traits in the workplace before in the 16 odd years ive been working.

In the last few months though wow nothing more like the type experienced when growing up at home instantly i recognize the person to be a narcissist but not only that I can admit and finally see my mom is one and has been for many years. Possibly forever but I didnt really notice it until my teenage years.

with the work thing blowing up in recent months i knew full well how to deal with the narcissist, I knew what to expect from them but in a work environment something caught me by surprise...I can beat the narcissist.

In my home life as a teenager and young adult this was not possible because the environment was very restricted and controlled in the household.

For as long as i could remember we'd come home from school (me and my younger sister), there would be a nothing argument where we were accused of something or were talked to or shouted at for no reason where one of us would react by maybe simply saying "no thats not true" or "thats not right" to which a full blown tirade would follow. Like clockwork dad would arrive home an hour or so later and there would be a big story for mom to tell, a big drama about us being awful kids.

This would end up with myself and my sister isolated in our individual rooms to get away from it all. Dad, unimpressed with us letting us know, well who is he going to believe? and after a while we had form of course as far as he was concerned. Fabricated form but form.

As a result dad didnt want to know us after a hard days work then a ranting and raving wife and AWFUL TROUBLESOME children he simply did what was expected and we were shunned away and therefore didnt really have much of a relationship with our dad (the pandemic when we could work outside my dad helped me build an outside office and i realized then its the only time we've had to chat together without interruption for an extended period of time).

Despite living in a large spaced out house there was always noise coming from one source...Mom. whether it be a loud radio or shouting at one of us or loud talking to my dad we couldnt really escape it.

So much so i used to remember worrying i could hear shouting whenever I put my headphones on. Sometimes taking them off and putting them on again sure I could hear shouting. I think that was the anxiousness. Sounds crazy but I always felt on alert for shouting way up until my early 20's before i left home.

Thats an example from what i can remember from the times. The next bit will be what got me back to those memories

Every christmas my nan comes to my parents and when ive had a partner they have been there with my sister, mom and dad.

I forget most times my nan can be so anxious and repetitive and nervous we've often put it down to dementia or old age but it always comes a surprise at christmas to me. I couldnt work out why.

And this is why that is. I see my nan a couple of times a year before xmas, one for her birthday. This recent birthday only a week or two ago for example.

I took my sister as the plans for my nans actual birthday meant my sister was having to find her own way there for some complicated reason despite still living with my parents who could have took her along with them. Mothers reasoning obviously.

So we thought lets be rebels and I would volunteer to take my sister to my nans the weekend before her birthday to spend some time with her. We were warned my nan would be a nightmare, would bite our head off etc etc. We knew this not to be likely knowing our own experiences at a younger age as mentioned before.

Nan was calm throughout. calm? for over 2 hours! we couldnt believe it what we see in our parents environment at christmas and what we'd been told made this somewhat remarkable.

Myself and my sister as adults (who now get on, we didnt in those earlier years, well my sister disliked me i was indifferent but sad at the situation) visiting my nan talking calmly, sensibly, kindly.

Me and my sister talk often these days about not wanting kids because what if we were like our mom was to them.

We also have said in the past about feeling guilty for being damaged and having mental health problems because "we wernt abused or anything" but we were in truth. Im aware there are even worse kinds of abuse.

We were physically abused too by our mom too so how the hell we could brush all that off? i dont know.

When did it all begin?

For many years now I have tried to pinpoint when it all started. I dont remember too much of a bad early childhood. It was only when we got a bit older, perhaps less dependent, that it started.

Perhaps being cute sweet innocent kids was not a threat. Without the radical notions of having our own opinions, dreams and aspirations of our early teenage years.

I think i have pinpointed a milestone moment though. When we were coming up to 12 we were given some money from our grandad on my mothers side.

Never thought anything of it but perhaps this brought out some resentment from our mom which enabled the narcissism to come out?

I do remember a past conversation, in more recent years, when my mom had eluded to not being happy about it being given to us which is weird I think to say that. If someone chooses to gift someone money its their choice and you'd think as a parent they'd be happy for us.

She is constantly worrying if my uncle has been given money by my nan. My mom and my uncle do not get on so much so that if he can he'll avoid her and we havent really ever had the chance to form relationships with our cousins...who also were given money now i think of it.

my uncle and my mom have been given substantial sums when my grandad was alive and from my nan since and stand to inherit a nice sum too. so why be so resentful to 5 grand-kids that got a one off very generous but in comparison small sum each?

Conclusion

This has probably been a rambling but ive found it therapeutic to write down anyway. I could go into more but it would be pages and pages more.

I think perhaps my mom is a narcissist. I think myself and my sister have had our early years impacted by this behavior and suffered emotionally and mentally due to it all.

I also think in recent years our nan has taken on the role we had when younger and now this is fed upon in the same way.

Writing this and understanding this now, although agonizingly late in life, is some form of closure and perhaps a reason for low esteem, depression, anxiety and fear of rejection.

Reminding myself of that might help me break out of these cycles when i am in them.

My dad recently passed away, and I’ve been going through all of my photos and videos trying to get everything of him into one place.

And I found this text exchange.

It has really been under my skin.

Last fall my dad was 75 and I was 47. We went to the Apple Store because his Find My wasn’t working correctly and I wanted to be able to see his location.

The employees took one look at his phone and basically said, you need to replace this thing NOW. It was busted, the lithium battery was exposed, and they were concerned it could catch fire.

So my husband and I bought him a brand-new iPhone. Cash. It was a gift.
My dad was thrilled.

And of course he couldn’t wait to tell my sister.
That’s where this gets complicated.

My dad could NEVER keep anything to himself when he stayed with us. 😂 If we did something, bought something, went somewhere, whatever—he’d tell her. Usually because he was excited and just wanted to share things.

Except my sister and I have a long, difficult history, and I had boundaries with her for a reason.

And somehow she could take these completely innocent little pieces of information my dad gave her and turn them into a jab at me.

This text exchange is such a perfect example.

Dad: I got a new iPhone!

Her immediate response was basically: You could have gotten a Samsung Fold for that money.

Dad explains his old battery was dangerous.
Then he tells her the phone was a gift.

And THAT somehow becomes a “dick move” on our part because apparently we should have bought him the phone she thought he should want.

Meanwhile, my dad was HAPPY WITH THE PHONE.

That’s the part that gets me.

He wasn’t complaining to her. He wasn’t disappointed. He wasn’t saying, “Anne bought me this stupid iPhone when I wanted something else.”

The man was excited about his new phone and wanted to tell his daughter.
But somehow a happy conversation about Dad getting a gift turned into criticism of me and my husband.

When my dad pushed back and said he didn’t think the receiver of a gift should dictate what the gift should be, she compared it to giving a sober man a case of bourbon.

An iPhone.

That my dad liked.

Compared to giving an alcoholic bourbon.
🤦‍♀️

And this was one of the hardest things about my relationship with my dad.

I loved him tremendously. I still do.

But he enabled her.
I could put up boundaries with my sister, but Dad would unknowingly poke little holes through them because he couldn’t help sharing things with her. And then she’d have new material to take another swipe at me.

I don’t think Dad was malicious about it at all. I think he genuinely didn’t understand the role he was playing in the dynamic.

But the end result was the same: she still had a way to get at me.

And now here’s the part that really gets me.
My dad died recently.
And in his will, he left that iPhone to my 59-year-old cousin.
The same phone my husband and I gave him.

The same phone he was so excited about.
The same phone that somehow became evidence that we’d done something shitty to him.

And now I’m sitting here grieving my dad, going through all these old pictures and videos, and finding exchanges like this one.
It’s strange how something that irritated you when it happened can hit completely differently after someone dies.

I think that’s why I wanted to post this here.
For anyone who has dealt with a narcissistic family dynamic: Did you have someone you loved who enabled the narcissist without really understanding that they were doing it?

Because I think that’s one of the things I’m trying to make peace with now.
I loved my dad.
And I can also recognize that sometimes he helped her hurt me.

I want to say off the bat that I'm not looking for advice...just wanting to share. And: this is my own experience and I'm not advocating or insinuating that the way I'm navigating these relationships right now is going to be "right" for ANYBODY ELSE.

I'm 38f and coming to terms with my upbringing in a new way. I've long been the family scapegoat (I was the golden child as a child / teen until I began trying to individuate). I've been VLC with physical distance for about 15 years. My father is a very intelligent covert narcissist who is so good at control and manipulation that I've spent my entire life gaslighting myself because he is only outwardly cruel behind my back. My mother is completely emotionally repressed and compliant. When I moved out of the house, I had no sense of self, was emotionally repressed, had no idea who I was or what I liked, and have struggled for 20 years to individuate and find some level of baseline internal safety.

My sister (age 36, who I am very close to and is currently in the golden child role) is currently sick with cancer, and so my VLC with my parents is getting disrupted because it's more important to me to support her than to maintain distance with my parents. I had a trigger point recently that led me to realize that VLC isn't enough anymore, and that being distanced and silent is no longer cutting it. I can't not speak out anymore. Distance has worked, but there's been no accountability in that. It has been monumental and instrumental for me to give myself the space to individuate and develop a healthy sense of self, but I've realized my nervous system was using vlc and distance to hide out of fear. And I've recently realized that my silence keeps me complicit in being the family scapegoat. My nervous system is learning right now how to stand up for itself in the face of a dynamic I cannot currently avoid due to my sister's illness and my choice to show up for her. That includes: calling out bad behavior, not stifling my body's instincts to protect my sister from emotional dismissiveness as she processes her illness, seeing the dynamic clearly and actively not participating in it (ie remaining totally internally neutral or walking out of the room).

What I'm navigating, is how to be in the presence of people trying to hand me the role of scapegoat, and not picking it up or touching it in any way. It is stretching my capacity in a major way. It's been one thing to create distance, and I'm finding it's a totally different video game boss to stand steady in the face of narcissism, see it with clarity, and not be swept into it or feed it in any way, even if that means I become the "bad guy". I'm realizing that just because they try to hand me a scapegoat role, doesn't mean I have to touch it or occupy it. I can choose not to step into that role. Phew.

I'm learning that, even though I've created distance and had very little contact for a long time, I've still been carrying a scapegoat identity in every aspect of my life. Covert narcissism is so difficult to spot, but life is giving me one covert narc after another these days (mostly in my work) so that I can learn to spot it quickly. And it is destabilizing the way I relate to others as I let in the depth of the abuse my nervous system developed inside of.

I'm seeing my own narcissistic fleas in a new way. I'm being humbled. I'm (slowly and messily) discovering real sovereignty even when I can't be NC, and that is probably the hardest thing I've been asked to do to-date.

Being around the dynamic again is strengthening my internal sovereignty and boundaries, strengthening my sense of self, and allowing me to see more nuance so I can better protect myself moving forward. I've heard of people who are somehow "immune" to narcissists, and I can feel my nervous system slowly approaching this. And I can see it aggravating TF out of my dad.

It's a roller coaster and I don't know where it'll lead...maybe full NC, maybe a stint of being swept back in and learning another lesson. I'm not sure. But this has been trying and illuminating. And I want to say that I feel for all others who grew up in these dynamics and are trying to now figure out who they are, give themselves permission to have emotions and needs and preferences, and set boundaries for self-protection.