narcissistic mother and enabling father
Posted: Mon Mar 08, 2010 11:55 am
LONG! My story/vent!!
I am not sure how active these threads are but I will post anyway
I was raised with a narcissistic mom, as the title states. I am the oldest of four girls. My mother from the time I was little had to dominate her sphere of influence and be in complete control. And she had to receive little voluntary emotional and physical deferments every day, whether solicited by her directly or not. Life was @#!*% and home was a tense, cold, on alert- 24 /7 trap.
FOR example of the tokens of our loyalty- Like coming to her to tell on someone else, or report any kind of activity another family member said or did, that was not wrong in and of itself, you just knew mom would be pleased at your loyalty(ugh!) proven by stabbing someone else in the back. She would then go to that person later, after putting her own nasty spin on whatever she heard and say, ' so and so told me 'blank' that you said/did. Is that true? don't even TRY to lie, b/c I have asked God to show me when you are doing something wrong' or'be sure your sin will find you out' that is what the Bible says' and proceed to grill, interrogate, elicit a confession from the person under attack(that her version is the truth of course) that they are guilty of SOMETHING, (and she got it if it took hours or days just to shut her up and get the process over with,true or not), then impose new 'standards' 'consequences' basically rules and more hoops to hop through or else.... Throughout these DAILY ocurrences, one was required to look her in the eye with proper shame and guilt visible-anything else garnered shrieking about rebellion, proper respect and honoring ones parents or death, her job being to address my sin nature because discipline is a sign of love, for my own good, I'm just like her mother,((!))
( an alcoholic who abandoned her kids aka my mom. after my granpa had an affair and divorced her, so the kids ran the streets for a while, then she married a sexual predator and alcoholic who would routinely rape, molest and brutally beat the kids, making them sit on the floor, not furniture, and locking them out of house all day, in the country, rain or shine. )
I was 'like' her as a child, though(?)....I look nothing like her and I am not an alcoholic, adore my sweetie after 8 years still, love my children..ugh!
Anyway,then would come smacking and the silent treatment, with evil looks, reputation sabotage, and snide comments to ANYONE who(she thought) was 'on her side', at church, school, friends of the person's-even as a teenager, work. The rest of the family was expected to follow suit in the treatment, agree with her, join in and a person was basically free game- she would sit back and watch like she didn't care b/c one now 'deserved' it. She was mad always. She was suffering in her anger. Therefore so must everyone else be angry and show her pity for all she had to put up with.
If a person in the family chose to be kind or nice to the one fallen from grace, they were either courted by her suddenly sunny charming smile and sudden friendship to 'her' side-we were all starving for affection, so of course, she 'won'- she would even walk away with the would be kind person at her side chanting in triumph-'I win, I win, I ALWAYS win!!'
That is a small example of the loyalty tokens you had to offer.
And, of course their was the fun little game of whether she 'accepted' the usual offerings, or rejected one coldly after she did her damage, requiring more 'work' emotionally, more hoops to jump through, more doing ABC to get 'blank' from her- often just being treated with any kind of civillity filled the blank part-like 'the Queen is pleased, you may now kiss my hand' and the next minute roaring 'Off with your head!!' for no deserved reason except that the pleased feeling she got from watching one grovel for her didn't seem to last very long, and the minute any relief or childish joy that things were now seemingly 'ok' came through, she would torque up the pressure with more insistent demands or drill YOU now about some imagined suspected rebellious thought she was sure she had seen on your face at any given time(or whatever the 'issue' was). She fancied herself particularly discerning that way(her catch phrase,ugh)and an excellent judge of character.(!)
I have had wooden spoons broken over me as a child, slapped, pinched, jerked around, cheeks squeezed together, screamed at with the spit in my face.. then had her claim she didn't spank us very much when we were little?! She made that declaration in the middle of two of my adult younger sisters and I and our husbands(who she never talks to, even when they are in the room,btw, just about them), and said with total confidence(total amnesia too)!!! We were trying to talk about OUR kids, nothing about her at all... We all stared at her then to my surprise, the other sister who got a lot of crap,like myself, but still acts loyally usually, AND the Golden child(one of them) both said 'what??? yeah right, mom!' and, 'oh, yes, you did!!
She could not believe she had been contradicted so blatantly, even by her pet, but didn't dare take on all three of us with her usual 'evidence' dredging, temper tantrums etc especially not with my husband there, whom she hates, but will not cross. She left.My dh has a degree in psychology, and he spotted her a mile away, but she very determindly says she doesn't believe in psychology, not biblical(here we go!) or depression..or fill in the blank issue, all is just self pity or unconfessed sin..ugh!
He has never been arrogant, rude or anything but repectful, calls her maam, despite her coldness- she hates it, because she can't find anything tangible to be wrong with him. She literally makes stuff up if she doesn't get her daily updates and tells everyone and I mean EVERYONE her demeaning stories as if it was truth. I have every former acquaintance back East thinking this elaborate story about my husband and I that is like its about a totally different couple, total fiction- and she convinced everyone after we moved out west he was physically abusive, drug addict and alcoholic , and the reason I wasnt talking to her or dad was because he woudnt let me-ugh! that he held some kind of terror control over me and was pure evil with snake oil... No, he doesnt drink, gave up smoking when we had our first baby, never did drugs b/c he watched his bro fry his brain with them and chose not to,...and he dotes on me and is so kind to me and the kids... compared to what I grew up with, I am in heaven despite the financial hardship. when we lost the cars during the economy downturn and we were still recovering from his unemployment phase, he walked 5 miles through city when we didn't have bus money to get food at the store and then walked or rode the bus - EVERY day, without complaining and tried to play with the kids a little- even if he did fall asleep while they read to him their books or color lol, or snugggled on the couch watching a cartoon with him,,aw, darn, here I go... he is a good man to me and very physically affectionate too, which was new to me at first, but I love it:).
When she was visiting with my sisters a few years ago, he showed up from work with some flowers for me along with the nights bbq groceries and my favorite chocolate bar with a big sweet kiss, (he knew I was stressed with her there of course)- which he does when he saves his spare change, he doesn't care if there are people there or if it is just us... But in front of Mom..ugh, bad. She was livid and so jealous she could hardly see straight. And she gave my Dad the silent treatment until he went to buy her flowers too, which were all she could talk about.
He had left the military and couldn't find a job with the economy the way it was. So we moved far away and got a good job, until the company downsized....he was laid off. She used that as evidence of his incompetence to care for his family, and when we lost our home and vehicles, and I refused to talk to her about the situation in any detail because of 'I told you so!' attitude, and the old 'I am always right, or I always win!!' thing, even cut off all communications to realign myself and the family(STRESS!!) since I couldnt handle her interrogations and suspicions(let alone blatant lies and remarks about my dh) AND everything my family was going through.
She convinced my father that in the last phone call we had had that reading between the lines' she had 'discerned' that I was in distress(no, really?? hmmm, maybe HER grilling me and not taking NO for an answer?? Or maybe insisting my hubby had SERIOUS issues that SHE and EVERYBODY else there could see,...yeah, right, mom) and I had to reexplain that no, she was totally offbase, there was just a lot of downsizing, which led to no jobs, which leads to no house, to no cars...ugh! But no-it HAD to be the evil no good careless husband all along, to prove she had been right all along about me 'eloping' with 'that boy' she refused to meet!...after an engagement, as a grown woman, on my own(no, I just married him despite 'her' not showing up at the wedding or giving me the scriptural 'blessing'...), and to clinch it, when I did not call her back within the week we were notified to leave our home or answer her phone calls after the continued pressure, and we were(sigh) finally forced to leave our home, she freaked out on dad until he called around my city for info and found out we were gone from our home. OH heyday- juicy details to add to her story! Then they threatened to call the police if I did not respond immediatly, they would assume i was in physical danger- through my email! What?? Because I didn't call you that week?? Kinda busy, not really wantin to tell someone who will announce it to the world...hello!
They THEN called my dads relative in my city who rarely speaks to my father (I wonder why?), but owns a chain of the same stores in this city that my husband was then working at for a different owner(who my uncle knew-not in a friendly way) , and told him what they had 'found' out about our 'situation' mixed in with their interpretation and hateful assumptions about my husband himself. my relative, out of humoring my dad( ),decided to contact the OWNER of my husbands store and asked WHY he had hired a crazy person to work there, then made a crack at the owners taste in employees, like he was desperate or something, hiring anyone off the street.
My husband was called in to stand before the OWNER,(who needless to say was seriously irked at my relative's needling and the embarrassment my family was causing him, (UGH!) ) and in front of the regional manager, the store manager, and his assistant, and the floor managers currently on shift, demanded dh to explain to him WHY he had family members coming to see him claiming he was close to a murderer who had buried his wife and kids in the desert somewhere..that they knew he had lost his house and what exactly was going on, and it better be good... UGH! UGH! UGH! SO humiliating for my sweet hubby, a complete SHOCK to walk into that... Tried to explain my mom is a crazy manipulative witch who had been trying to get at him and our marriage since before we married...he was met with the raised eyebrow..
I think I watched him, my tall manly military vet shrink about 3 inches when he told me what his boss said MY PARENTS said about him... then said I had to come visit his work with the kids to PROVE we were alive and physically ok!! Or the police were going to be called..oh, and he put under investigation with the company, too, to see if there was ANY reason for such extreme claims...ugh!!! And he would be fired if family interfered with work again...
Of course the investigation was dropped, and he still works there- in fact, he rose to assistant manager at the company and will be managing his own store this summer- he took the store as assistant manger from #33 to #2 in overall standings in the company, #1 in certain specific areas, and has saved them a ton of money, and caught some thieves who were running the store into the ground.... Needless to say, he has received awards now, and been invited to the owners bonus dinner to be publicly recognized for his work. i could go on, but I am writing a book here as it is...jk
DH said to me ''the best way to prove people like your mom wrong is to succeed despite them...and let's not go there again..' their behavior just motivated him to be a better man, not give up, get scared of 'what they would do next', or whatever else .
My parents were cut off completely after an icy confrontation, they claimed they had 'valid' reasons' to take the actions they took, did not do anything wrong, WE were wrong(unspecified though as to how), and could only 'have a relationship with us if we (dh specifically) reconciled with them and apologized(WHAT??), THEY were the parents, deserving biblically of respect, and would NOT apologize since their motives were right. Almost getting him fired and SLANDERING him is RIGHT motives??
Questioning them and saying they were incorrect in their actions and pointing out the damage they had caused- and a very, very bad time for him to be unemployed AGAIN! Thank God he did not get booted out the door based on their stories. We pointed out the 'precious' grandbabies would have been homeless? Why not financial help instead of meddling with his job connections negatively? OH NO! We all know you can;t give money to help people who are addicted, right?? Brother...So how was there concern there again? Of course we were told we were 'impertinent' and 'disrespectful' and 'if we only knew how upset they were' and the consequences were 'not their fault' therefore 'there was nothing to be sorry about on their end' UGH! They were 'disappointed in us, STILL think dh is WRONG and MANIPULATING THE SITUATION to make them look bad. That everyone else they know would SAY THE SAME thing- people who have never met my hubby or I only know through my parents, mom mainly, and only have had her perspective on me and dh for oh 6 years now??
I could go on. They contacted me recently through a social site, but when I held to my guns and refused to give out address or phone number info the guilt tripping, snipes and religious lectures on forgiveness and reconciliation started. They acted like nothing had happened previously- I know it is my mom puppeteering my dad like always, or he catches @#!*% for it from her behind the scenes, but he goes along with her full hog nowadays, like he wants to believe her, and please her, just tired of fighting her and the anger, no kids home anymore- supporting his spouse, he says. Which means to attack me and discredit me, takes out his full frustration on me that i won't TRY to make mom, or him happy, or show RESPECT, as they define it..- the old childhood ritual... Mom always said to him I would try to get between them(?) if he talked to me or defended' me about anything, and she would grill and berate him in private for every detail of the conversattion. It always had to include her, and she was convinced it was about her. He always gave, and said nothing when she would rip me apart for it later.
I live across the world from them now, and am getting attacked by them and everyone else I ever knew from church and family and family friends whom they have gone with their 'grieved and sad, sad' tale of my lies and deceit and dishonor and refusal to let them see their grandchildren. Mind you- not MY children- THEIR grandchildren..mom's mainly, of course- dad is just her willing mouthpiece and her in the third person in her conversations... her way of adding 'weight' to her guilt trips...'dad is so grieved right now with you...' etc.
Anyway. Thanks for letting me vent. I am so glad it is not just me and I am not crazy. I could list so much more here, but this is already so long...thanks to everyone for having the courage to post... I still have a sneaking fear of getting 'caught' and 'catching it' and for 'telling ' UGH!
Sunny