**A longish post with some triggery stuff, be warned.
I was always the family Scapegoat; my fulfillment of that role was one of the few constants of my childhood, adolescence and early adulthood. I've read and believe that two of the core requirements for my being elected to this role (without my say,) are these: I was the strongest in my family and I was the most compassionate in my family. I'm not sure if I was the SG because I have these traits or if I have these characteristics because I was the SG, though I've an idea it's a mutually inclusive cycle and one feeds the other.
Still, I can't help thinking that if those two character traits of strength and feeling were what made me the logical choice to bear the sins of the NFOO, there's one trait that made me a 'bad' Scapegoat. I have a nasty tendency to tell the truth, you see, even when it's inconvenient, even when that truth doesn't fit into the carefully constructed web of lies that the NFOO needs to continue to function in their dysfunction. As the truth-teller, I was compelled to disallow the lies, to keep a true record of what was really happening in the NFOO, sort of like an archivist or diarist, even if I was only allowed to do so in my head. (I'm sooo envious of people who have their old journals and diaries to refer to for clarity. I NEVER kept a journal, that would have been incredibly dangerous; they would have found it and it would have been used against me severely.
So I wrote, I wrote volumes and then each night I destroyed those pages or I took them to school the next day and flushed the torn up little pieces of my pages.)
The NFOO didn't care one bit that I was put into the highly conflicted situation as a young child of knowing the truth while being forced to deny it and perpetuate the lies. I was put on stages and in pulpits and told to sing about the unconditional love and forgiveness that NM and ENF's false perception of a certain unnamed savior could bring on Sunday mornings... then screamed and raged at for some menial imagined offense I'd committed on Sunday afternoons. I was sexually molested by my father while he came home to 'check on' me between his Seminary classes in preparation for his ordainment as a minister... then told that I was to blame because I was 'too loving.' He once reached around me from behind and cupped my breasts in front of my mother to 'show' her that I needed a new cup size in my bra. She responded by sending me to the store with him to get a new bra. I was almost 10 years old.
I've written before about the blame game that started with my siblings (particularly NSis) at an almost pre-verbal age for me and how the NParents allowed and encouraged it. I've written about all sorts of abuses, some of which I write about and then read through and think, "The fuck did I live through that?" Some that I haven't written about here are so horrifying, so disgusting and so painful that I don't know that I'll ever be able to share them, or that I should.
I'm sorry to share so much and particularly sorry if that's triggering for any of you. I do have a purpose in laying it out on the line in black and white, though, and it's this:
These things happened, they are real.
How does a child live with this type of abuse? At 10 years old, I had no concrete understanding of detachment or compartmentalization. I couldn't talk through my feelings with anyone - there was no one. Even if I had been allowed relationships with anyone outside of the Clan who might have been willing and able to help me, I wouldn't have known how to even verbalize what was happening to me. What child can? We are taught that X=Love by our parents, who are the only available providers of Love. Even if Love hurts and feels icky, we infer that They=Love and we are just feeling it wrong or something along those lines.
So, I did what we all do as children, I used my only ace up the sleeve. I learned to forget, and when I couldn't exactly forget - when the memories turned into nightmares to break through my conscience in the REM state and send me back to reality screaming and sweating - well, then I had to just Pretend to Forget.
At one point I remember that I was convinced that if I did anything 'bad,' you know, like if I sinned by thinking bad thoughts about a classmate or disobeying my parents, I'd be punished by memories of my father hurting me (and my mother knowing and doing nothing.) Pretty fucking sick. But, hey, I was eleven, I did the best I could with what I had.
So I pretended for a long time to forget. I survived until I was almost 14 by this strategy.
And then... and then... and then... I just couldn't do it anymore. I couldn't pretend anymore. So I told. That didn't work out so well for me as I was simply then made to lie to even more people. Being forced AGAIN to Pretend to Forget pushed me off the deep end and changed the course of my life - I headed steadfastly and willingly into all kinds of darkness from that point forward. Pretending to Forget makes us sick, see? But I didn't have any other choices. Fortunately, I survived this too.
Having my daughters saved my life, and I have to be careful here because this is tricky. I don't mean that they are responsible for me or that they should take care of me; that's just not their burden. I do mean that I had a moment when I learned I was pregnant with my oldest in which I was aware that I had to make a conscious decision; grow up and be a good parent or don't take on the responsibility of having and raising this child. I chose, fortunately, to learn how to be a good parent. I wasn't perfect and I'm still not, nor do I think I or anyone else ever will be. But I tried and trying meant choosing to stop hurting myself, for her sake if nothing else. E for Effort, as we say.
And at some point on that miraculous journey of loving my girls, it became clear that I wouldn't Pretend to Forget anymore, that I would tell the truth again. I began to Forget to Pretend. I began to voice the truth. I began to stand up for myself, for others who needed it and for, most importantly, the reality of what really happened.
When NM's addictions became so glaring that I had to act, for mine and my FOC's safety if nothing else, I spoke the truth. I Forgot to Pretend that NM is the victim of circumstances, life, pain, me. I Forgot to Pretend that she was incapable of making a good decision to seek help and follow it through. I Forgot to Pretend that it was okay for her to overdose on pills and then drive the grandchildren around. I even Forgot to Pretend that it was normal that my grown siblings and their families all lived with the NParents rent free and didn't have jobs other than sucking off DH and I financially. I Forgot to Pretend that the Crazymaker Clan was normal, to be looked up to and respected even.
And then all hell broke loose. They can't face it, you know, the truth. They can't and won't. Their houses of cards are built on the foundational web of lies they've crafted, and it only takes one voice like mine to expose those for the sham they are.
So, what does a Narc do when you Forget to Pretend? Simple. They make it your fault for telling the truth, and then they attack in any way they can. If their house is coming down, well, they're aiming the bricks at you.
What happens to a Scapegoat when we stop Pretending to Forget? We can get out. Whether we get kicked out or we catapult ourselves out or we tip-toe out in the dead of night, telling the truth is the way that we begin to head for the exit.
I turned 35 years old today, and I am more convinced now than I ever have been that life's too short be around anyone who wants me to forget who I am or what I stand for. I'm officially too old to mess with anything but reality. And in my case, this stubborn insistence of mine to only deal with truth when it comes to the NFOO means that I will never have a relationship with anyone in the NFOO.
So, I'm not pretending anymore and I'm not forgetting anymore and that means that I don't have to deal with them in my life?
Happy effing birthday to me!
Love,
Truthfully,
Vanci
Tuesday, May 1, 2012
Saturday, April 28, 2012
Leaping and Looking
I've been thinking about the crux, the point of no return, the straw that breaks the Scapegoat's back, the Stand; the Jumping Off Point that we all seem to come to in our own ways and by our own paths.
It seems to me that we as ACoNs are raised from our earliest moments in the stew of dysfunction that a Narc Parent brews. It waxes and wanes, thins and thickens at times, but we're steeped in some version of it in some form... always. I hear ACoNs and survivors of abusive relationships talk about the 'good times' a lot, and we seem to need to state - whether we're convincing ourselves or others I'm not sure - that there were good times.
I think that this is at least partially an extended function of our defense mechanisms; no one wants to believe that their primary caretakers or chosen partner, the people who taught us about 'love' and helped us to define (for better or worse) our definition of the face that greets us in the mirror could be outright mean or evil. We, taken as a whole, want to believe that there's good out there.
I learned at my NM and ENF's knees to make excuses for the poor and hurtful and malicious behavior of those around me. It's what they taught me was right. They sculpted me to meet their needs, just like the clay and putty that I was in their hands. What else could I possibly have been as a dependent child? Water truly does rise to its own level, you know? And they had the benefit of setting the slope and degree of the pool.
But then I went and did something that they hadn't counted on; I acted of my own will and accord and contrary to what they wanted and planned for me to do. Narcs in general are unable to do any long term planning of consequences when there are other free thinking participants involved in the action. They're like six-year olds with a chess board - they can only win as long as you make the moves they want you to. Make an un-predicted move and all hell breaks loose in their psyches; suddenly it's YOUR fault for not playing their game right! How dare you! The nerve!
What did I do? What was the real cliff-hanging moment that started my awakening to their true natures? I'd like to think that I. Made. A. Stand. That I turned around one day and knew what was right and took action, that I was the catalyst for change. And that's right in part, because I WAS the reason that change happened. I DID do the work I needed to in order to grow, to change, to strengthen my self and to remove myself from their carefully crafted water table. But what was my jumping off point, really?
I don't remember the first Aha! moment that I had, but I do remember a three week period where, in my confusion about how to handle the ever increasing demands of the NFOO and how to get help for my mother who was spiraling further and further into serious prescription drug abuse, I committed the ultimate NFOO sin repeatedly.
I sought help from outside the Clan.
In my desperation to do something, anything, I talked to people about things that I'd never talked about before - and I told the truth, the real truth, not the Crazymaker version of the truth. That was it for me, the beginning of the end of the way things had been. Alice Miller wrote some version of this premise and I say it all the time and I'll say it again; the truth - once known - cannot be unknown. (I love the AAism for this: A head full of program and a belly full of whiskey just don't mix! True that.)
I stayed in that truth by continuing to talk, continuing to listen, continuing to find and use new resources and continuing to act in ways that felt both like freedom and betrayal at the same time. In getting and staying honest, in drawing and holding reasonable boundaries I was setting myself and my FOC free from the tyranny of the NParents and some slowly evolving part of me knew this at the time. But I also felt like I was betraying every tenet of belonging to the Clan that had been laid out - because I was breaking those rules of silence and isolation and control - and there was a lot of shame and confusion and drama in my heart at the time because I felt bad... for being good. I'd been inundated with the belief that good for Vanci was equal to Vanci being bad.
I stuck to my new path to freedom by continuing to seek new knowledge, striving over and over again to change my perceptions and behaviors and most importantly by continuing to reach out and open up to other people in my life outside of the NFOO in whom I could trust (or at least in whom I hoped I could trust.) Before I knew it, those helping hands - true friends, counselors, new confidantes, cyber friends like you, self-help books and every other resource I could lay my hands on - had helped me to lift myself out of the rabbit hole and I could see my path clearly.
My path took me to No Contact so that's what I know the most about, but I'm not suffering under any delusion that NC is the only path. What seems to be important for us to heal is that we see our path and stick to it, whatever it is. So, no matter where you are on your path to freedom, here's my little tidbit of advice and comfort: The fact that you're here, that you're on your path, is enough. Keep searching, keep reading, keep writing, keep learning, keep reaching, keep stretching. Keep looking, keep leaping - and the order of those actions isn't necessarily important so long as we keep moving forward.
Martin Luther King Jr. put this concept very eloquently: "Take the first step in faith. You don't have to see the whole staircase; just take the first step."
Love,
Vanci
It seems to me that we as ACoNs are raised from our earliest moments in the stew of dysfunction that a Narc Parent brews. It waxes and wanes, thins and thickens at times, but we're steeped in some version of it in some form... always. I hear ACoNs and survivors of abusive relationships talk about the 'good times' a lot, and we seem to need to state - whether we're convincing ourselves or others I'm not sure - that there were good times.
I think that this is at least partially an extended function of our defense mechanisms; no one wants to believe that their primary caretakers or chosen partner, the people who taught us about 'love' and helped us to define (for better or worse) our definition of the face that greets us in the mirror could be outright mean or evil. We, taken as a whole, want to believe that there's good out there.
I learned at my NM and ENF's knees to make excuses for the poor and hurtful and malicious behavior of those around me. It's what they taught me was right. They sculpted me to meet their needs, just like the clay and putty that I was in their hands. What else could I possibly have been as a dependent child? Water truly does rise to its own level, you know? And they had the benefit of setting the slope and degree of the pool.
But then I went and did something that they hadn't counted on; I acted of my own will and accord and contrary to what they wanted and planned for me to do. Narcs in general are unable to do any long term planning of consequences when there are other free thinking participants involved in the action. They're like six-year olds with a chess board - they can only win as long as you make the moves they want you to. Make an un-predicted move and all hell breaks loose in their psyches; suddenly it's YOUR fault for not playing their game right! How dare you! The nerve!
What did I do? What was the real cliff-hanging moment that started my awakening to their true natures? I'd like to think that I. Made. A. Stand. That I turned around one day and knew what was right and took action, that I was the catalyst for change. And that's right in part, because I WAS the reason that change happened. I DID do the work I needed to in order to grow, to change, to strengthen my self and to remove myself from their carefully crafted water table. But what was my jumping off point, really?
I don't remember the first Aha! moment that I had, but I do remember a three week period where, in my confusion about how to handle the ever increasing demands of the NFOO and how to get help for my mother who was spiraling further and further into serious prescription drug abuse, I committed the ultimate NFOO sin repeatedly.
I sought help from outside the Clan.
In my desperation to do something, anything, I talked to people about things that I'd never talked about before - and I told the truth, the real truth, not the Crazymaker version of the truth. That was it for me, the beginning of the end of the way things had been. Alice Miller wrote some version of this premise and I say it all the time and I'll say it again; the truth - once known - cannot be unknown. (I love the AAism for this: A head full of program and a belly full of whiskey just don't mix! True that.)
I stayed in that truth by continuing to talk, continuing to listen, continuing to find and use new resources and continuing to act in ways that felt both like freedom and betrayal at the same time. In getting and staying honest, in drawing and holding reasonable boundaries I was setting myself and my FOC free from the tyranny of the NParents and some slowly evolving part of me knew this at the time. But I also felt like I was betraying every tenet of belonging to the Clan that had been laid out - because I was breaking those rules of silence and isolation and control - and there was a lot of shame and confusion and drama in my heart at the time because I felt bad... for being good. I'd been inundated with the belief that good for Vanci was equal to Vanci being bad.
I stuck to my new path to freedom by continuing to seek new knowledge, striving over and over again to change my perceptions and behaviors and most importantly by continuing to reach out and open up to other people in my life outside of the NFOO in whom I could trust (or at least in whom I hoped I could trust.) Before I knew it, those helping hands - true friends, counselors, new confidantes, cyber friends like you, self-help books and every other resource I could lay my hands on - had helped me to lift myself out of the rabbit hole and I could see my path clearly.
My path took me to No Contact so that's what I know the most about, but I'm not suffering under any delusion that NC is the only path. What seems to be important for us to heal is that we see our path and stick to it, whatever it is. So, no matter where you are on your path to freedom, here's my little tidbit of advice and comfort: The fact that you're here, that you're on your path, is enough. Keep searching, keep reading, keep writing, keep learning, keep reaching, keep stretching. Keep looking, keep leaping - and the order of those actions isn't necessarily important so long as we keep moving forward.
Martin Luther King Jr. put this concept very eloquently: "Take the first step in faith. You don't have to see the whole staircase; just take the first step."
Love,
Vanci
Tuesday, April 17, 2012
Hiatus
Hello my cyber friends and fellow ACoNs!
I didn't expect to be out of commission quite as long as I have, so thought I'd pop in and let you all know that I'm still here but haven't have any time lately to post.
I'm recovering from major oral surgery (went well, did fine with the pills, etc.) and that's necessitated much, much, much more rest and sleep than I typically need, so sleep has taken priority over posting (I'm a late at night writer girl.)
Also, the sun has finally started to peek out and my gardens are caaaaaaaalling me.
I'll be back to posting as soon as I can stay awake at night long enough to do so, but in the meantime, know that you're loved, lovable and worth whatever it takes for you to feel safe.
Love,
Vanci
I didn't expect to be out of commission quite as long as I have, so thought I'd pop in and let you all know that I'm still here but haven't have any time lately to post.
I'm recovering from major oral surgery (went well, did fine with the pills, etc.) and that's necessitated much, much, much more rest and sleep than I typically need, so sleep has taken priority over posting (I'm a late at night writer girl.)
Also, the sun has finally started to peek out and my gardens are caaaaaaaalling me.
I'll be back to posting as soon as I can stay awake at night long enough to do so, but in the meantime, know that you're loved, lovable and worth whatever it takes for you to feel safe.
Love,
Vanci
Monday, March 26, 2012
Facing Fear
Some of my earliest memories involve fear. I was, as a child, and still am, as an adult, afraid of all sorts of things. Some of my monsters are real and rational, some are the stuff of vapor. Some have a chance of coming to life in the light of day, some only have a chance of taking form if I wake up tomorrow and discover that there's a Statue of Liberty half buried on the beach, that kid from the Twilight Zone who turns his dad into a jack in the box has moved into my town and H.P. Lovecraft was a sci-fi Nostradamus.
Regardless of the likelihood of my fears, though, what exists on every plane through every possible or impossible scenario of terror, what resonates in every cell of my being is this single truth in relation to those fears; the fear itself is real. That physical, visceral response when I'm scared that sets all my internal alarm bells ringing, that's tangible. When I am scared, my pulse shoots through the roof, my breath quickens, my muscles tighten and ready for a flight or fight response. Adrenaline courses through me and my senses become hyper-aware. My fists clench and my jaw tightens, the fine hairs on my neck and arms stand on end. I can hear the faintest sounds, feel the slightest touch, see the tiniest movement. I'm ready, I'm switched on - because that fear is real. It's telling me that there's danger. It's telling me that I will have to take action. It's telling me that I am afraid because there is something to be afraid of.
I was terrorized.
Let me state this again in more detail for the sake of clarity.
My mother and father terrorized me throughout my childhood, and my mother and father allowed each other to terrorize me. When I realized that they were hurting me and stood up for myself, they terrorized me further still by convincing me that I was either deserving of the terror, OR (just to make sure they had a back door,) that the terror didn't really exist.
They did this because they are sick, twisted, mean, evil, abusers.
They terrorized my sister and brother too, and I have empathy for those childhood siblings of mine. But NSis and GCYB dealt with the terror by becoming terrorizers, too. So they no longer have my empathy, sympathy or any other -athy.
My childhood of torture at the hands of the master manipulator Crazymakers left me with pain, scars and fear. Facing fear all the way through to resolution as a child, particularly as a child with no external support, is almost impossible. So a child, this child, me, I, used the only tool at my disposal; I made it ok. I pretended. I pretended, specifically, that it wasn't as bad as it truly was, and this is how I survived.
So I grew up. Allow me to be clear, again, about how the torture and terror of my childhood ended. It became the torture and terror of my adolescence, and I was so ingrained with the imaginary storybook family that I'd created in order to survive that I just kept pretending. So they just kept torturing and terrorizing me. Childhood terrorization became adolescent terrorization became adult child terrorization.
Bang up job on being consistent, mom and dad.
And then I changed. It didn't happen overnight - it was a process to get to the jumping off point, but one day I made a stand. I decided that I wasn't going to allow them to terrorize and torture me anymore, no matter the cost to me, real or imagined.
I had to run the worst case scenarios in my head and in my conversations with the real and true people in my life who loved me in order to get to this point, because I had to find a way to actualize the fear on my own before I faced the real fear of the Crazymaker affront. I ran the cost/benefit models over and over while asking the questions that I needed answers to before I could make a stand and keep it.
Some of the first ask and answer sessions with myself went like this:
"Is it really that bad?" I asked.
"Well, maybe not, but it hurts..."
"Could it be you?" I asked.
"Well, maybe, but not all of it..."
This segued into something like:
"Don't you have a right to an opinion?" I asked.
"Well, I think I should, but I never really have..."
"Shouldn't you be able to have space?" I asked.
"Well, I think I should, but they might not like it..."
And eventually (this is where it would be helpful for you to think of one of those old cut-scenes in a movie where the shot is of the calendar pages being ripped off one by one in quick succession,) the Q and A became something like:
"You have a right to be treated with respect, right?" I asked.
"Yes, I do."
"If you lose them in your life like they're promising, is that the end of the world?" I asked.
"No, it's not."
"Are you ready to stand?"
And the answer was yes, you know. I was ready to stand even though I was afraid because I'd finally come to understand that my fear of the outcome (losing my 'family') was more manageable than my reality of the pain of having them in my life.
They're crazymakers, pain dealers, emotional terrorists. And they're so good at it that they made me believe - with their primary tool of fear - that leaving them would be even more painful than continuing to let them hurt me. Once I understood that fear was the thumb they kept me under, I could face it. I could own it and look it in the eye and say, "Yep, I'm scared. Terrified in fact, but I've faced bigger, stronger demons than this fear."
And that's when I knew I'd survive, at the very least. I hoped - only a little bit, just a little tiny bit - that I would find a way to be ok, even. I never thought I'd be me the way I am now;
Happy.
Healthy.
Free of motherfuckin' fear.
But I'm glad I am, and I'm glad I had that little bit of courage that it took to face my fear, because what follows is one of the most important lesson that I've learned in life, and I wouldn't have learned it without the very real fear that the Narcs taught me:
When we've been raised, instructed and taught by evil people, we've been taught to fear that which will set us free.
That's a lesson they didn't mean to teach me, you know, because it set me free. And that was the last thing in the world that they wanted.
So, here I am, and I still have my residual fears; heights, talking apes, spiders, the smell of Old Spice, dark, clowns with pointy teeth, deep water, man-sized wind up toys, aliens that look like giant ice cream cones with sixty-two eyes and telepathic powers. You know, the run of the mill stuff. I work through them as they come up.
But I no longer fear myself. And I no longer fear doing what it takes to protect myself.
I'll take that trade.
Love,
Vanci
Friday, March 23, 2012
And They Came
Late last night I posted about the monsters of memory that I've been feeling bubbling under the surface of my soul. My intent in writing the post was to call out the monsters.
It worked.
I didn't dream last night, and I had the only full night of restful sleep that I've had in a couple of weeks, since I first started noticing this restlessness. But I woke up with a clear picture of a connection that I haven't made before.
My oldest daughter is a sophomore in high school. She's oh-so-smart and driven to succeed and has incredibly high standards for herself. I support this as well as I can and I'm very proud of her for setting her own goals and working to achieve them. She applies a lot of pressure to herself and I find increasingly that my role is to support her through helping her to manage her anxiety and stress by providing perspective and humor and occasionally technical support.
Last week she decided that she wanted to apply for acceptance into the National Honor Society and I've been helping her to fill out her various forms, gain recommendation letters and get her essay together. Last night I was crawling around on the floor trying to figure out what had happened to the computer printer so that she could print out her final essay.
This is a stark contrast from how I was supported in high school. I was very smart, too. I actually skipped the eighth grade entirely and still signed up for and scored high marks in honors classes my freshman year of high school. Then, I made my revelations about ENF's sexual abuse of me mid-year. That didn't go well. ENF and NM's outright blame the victim game pushed me further over the precipitous edge of my teenage sanity. I started seeking fulfillment in other, more destructive and scary - even life-threatening - areas. I started drinking, smoking and promiscuously having sex. I sought out relationships with people who I knew wouldn't treat me well, in fact, I knew that these bad boys and girls would treat me just like the trash that it had been proven to me that I was. I shot my middle finger in the air to NM and ENF with the only tools I had, effectively - I'll destroy my self, then, thank you very much.
And what did my parents do? They let go of the reins. I ran rampant and they largely didn't say a damned thing. Why? Because I wasn't worth it to them, that's why. In fact, it worked to their advantage that I went on a single-purposed spree of vengeance against the only person I could damage; me. Cause later in life they were certainly able to (and did, frequently,) point to my destructive behavior and say, "See! Look! She wasn't a good kid! It was her fault!"
Now, keep in mind that I skipped a grade, and my birthday is late in the school year. So, coming up on the end of my freshman year, I was just barely 14 years old. Awfully young to carry the weight of the world.
There was never any talk of NHS applications or college planning in my house, well, at least not with me. Narc Older Sister had been given assistance, and in fact later in life I remember driving the nine hours to visit her (when she was actually capable of living away from the Clan for a few years) with a check from NM and ENF to her for $10,000 to help pay for her college education. I'm horrified in retrospect that they had the gall to ask me, the child they NEVER helped with schooling, to transport this blood money. They did the same thing a few years later when she got married; having me take her a check for $2,000, and when I got married a year later having nothing to give me. NM actually said, "Gee, Vanci, it just seems like when it comes to you there's nothing left."
This is one of the monsters that's been peeking out. These are firm, clear memories that I've never lost hold of, but here's the difference and the reason that I think they've been wiggling. My oldest daughter is a fantastic person, but she's a sixteen year old. By definition, she sees the world as an extension of herself. What matters most to a sixteen year old is herself, and that's fine, that's normal. That's teenage-dom. They're incredibly self centered because their world is absolutely wrapped up in their own skin and maybe about six inches of space around themselves. It's temporary and neccesary for growth, even if it is extremely annoying.
In other words, while I've been crawling around on the floor trying to find the damn dusty printer cord, she's standing there sighing and making noise that it's late and she really needs to get this essay printed and why does this always happen to her and nothing's ever right and blah, blah, blah.
And I just want to scream at her, "You think your life's hard?!?"
But I don't. Because I don't want her to live in the hell that I did.
So I'll help her with her essay and I'll take her to the college power hours and I won't let her teenagery selfish attitude push me too far, because I need to recognize that one of the reasons I'm having a hard time is because I'm seeing this beautiful young lady receive all the help and tools she needs to be succesful, and these are tools that I never received. I won't resent my child for asking of me what I wasn't given.
And now that I've made the connection and put it in black and white, I feel ever so much better and here's what I take away from this whole thing:
I'm a better parent than either of mine were, by miles.
My daughter won't have to fight the battles that I did because I've kept her safe from harm to the best of my ability.
Both of these incredible milestones are possible only because I cut the NFOO off from us. If those aren't the biggest fuck you's to the Nparents I can think of, I don't know what is.
Cause you know what? They couldn't destroy me in high school, where I still graduated with a 3.5GPA while drunk (literally, I was drunk at my graduation,) and I won't allow the memory of their horrible parenting and abuse to destroy me now or effect my children.
Love,
Vanci
It worked.
I didn't dream last night, and I had the only full night of restful sleep that I've had in a couple of weeks, since I first started noticing this restlessness. But I woke up with a clear picture of a connection that I haven't made before.
My oldest daughter is a sophomore in high school. She's oh-so-smart and driven to succeed and has incredibly high standards for herself. I support this as well as I can and I'm very proud of her for setting her own goals and working to achieve them. She applies a lot of pressure to herself and I find increasingly that my role is to support her through helping her to manage her anxiety and stress by providing perspective and humor and occasionally technical support.
Last week she decided that she wanted to apply for acceptance into the National Honor Society and I've been helping her to fill out her various forms, gain recommendation letters and get her essay together. Last night I was crawling around on the floor trying to figure out what had happened to the computer printer so that she could print out her final essay.
This is a stark contrast from how I was supported in high school. I was very smart, too. I actually skipped the eighth grade entirely and still signed up for and scored high marks in honors classes my freshman year of high school. Then, I made my revelations about ENF's sexual abuse of me mid-year. That didn't go well. ENF and NM's outright blame the victim game pushed me further over the precipitous edge of my teenage sanity. I started seeking fulfillment in other, more destructive and scary - even life-threatening - areas. I started drinking, smoking and promiscuously having sex. I sought out relationships with people who I knew wouldn't treat me well, in fact, I knew that these bad boys and girls would treat me just like the trash that it had been proven to me that I was. I shot my middle finger in the air to NM and ENF with the only tools I had, effectively - I'll destroy my self, then, thank you very much.
And what did my parents do? They let go of the reins. I ran rampant and they largely didn't say a damned thing. Why? Because I wasn't worth it to them, that's why. In fact, it worked to their advantage that I went on a single-purposed spree of vengeance against the only person I could damage; me. Cause later in life they were certainly able to (and did, frequently,) point to my destructive behavior and say, "See! Look! She wasn't a good kid! It was her fault!"
Now, keep in mind that I skipped a grade, and my birthday is late in the school year. So, coming up on the end of my freshman year, I was just barely 14 years old. Awfully young to carry the weight of the world.
There was never any talk of NHS applications or college planning in my house, well, at least not with me. Narc Older Sister had been given assistance, and in fact later in life I remember driving the nine hours to visit her (when she was actually capable of living away from the Clan for a few years) with a check from NM and ENF to her for $10,000 to help pay for her college education. I'm horrified in retrospect that they had the gall to ask me, the child they NEVER helped with schooling, to transport this blood money. They did the same thing a few years later when she got married; having me take her a check for $2,000, and when I got married a year later having nothing to give me. NM actually said, "Gee, Vanci, it just seems like when it comes to you there's nothing left."
This is one of the monsters that's been peeking out. These are firm, clear memories that I've never lost hold of, but here's the difference and the reason that I think they've been wiggling. My oldest daughter is a fantastic person, but she's a sixteen year old. By definition, she sees the world as an extension of herself. What matters most to a sixteen year old is herself, and that's fine, that's normal. That's teenage-dom. They're incredibly self centered because their world is absolutely wrapped up in their own skin and maybe about six inches of space around themselves. It's temporary and neccesary for growth, even if it is extremely annoying.
In other words, while I've been crawling around on the floor trying to find the damn dusty printer cord, she's standing there sighing and making noise that it's late and she really needs to get this essay printed and why does this always happen to her and nothing's ever right and blah, blah, blah.
And I just want to scream at her, "You think your life's hard?!?"
But I don't. Because I don't want her to live in the hell that I did.
So I'll help her with her essay and I'll take her to the college power hours and I won't let her teenagery selfish attitude push me too far, because I need to recognize that one of the reasons I'm having a hard time is because I'm seeing this beautiful young lady receive all the help and tools she needs to be succesful, and these are tools that I never received. I won't resent my child for asking of me what I wasn't given.
And now that I've made the connection and put it in black and white, I feel ever so much better and here's what I take away from this whole thing:
I'm a better parent than either of mine were, by miles.
My daughter won't have to fight the battles that I did because I've kept her safe from harm to the best of my ability.
Both of these incredible milestones are possible only because I cut the NFOO off from us. If those aren't the biggest fuck you's to the Nparents I can think of, I don't know what is.
Cause you know what? They couldn't destroy me in high school, where I still graduated with a 3.5GPA while drunk (literally, I was drunk at my graduation,) and I won't allow the memory of their horrible parenting and abuse to destroy me now or effect my children.
Love,
Vanci
Thursday, March 22, 2012
Calling Out the Monsters
I'm struggling with shadow memories right now.
It's been five years since I made my Stand with the NFOO, and almost as long since I declared NC. I've had two brief interactions in this time, once when NM was in ICU and once in a follow-up counseling appointment. I left those interactions reaffirmed in my decision to sever all ties. Any niggling doubt as to whether or not I would ever reestablish contact under any terms was blasted away by the revelations of ENF and NM's direct abuse of one of my DDs. NSis and GCYB stand with them, just as they have from the beginning, and I'm not interested in knowing what they know or hearing their side of the story. They were abused just as I was, they're aware of who and what they stand with. They're adults and can make their own decisions about the degrees of evil they're willing to live with and absorb and further pass on. Their silence and guilt by association leaves them in the same category of abusers that NM and ENF are in. When you throw your lot with thieves, you're complicit. Period.
I'm fucking done with these people. Done. Like wouldn't piss on them to put them out if they were on fire done. If they call me, I won't answer and won't listen to the voicemail done. Emails will be deleted unread done. Letters will be returned unopened done. If they show up on this blog they'll be deleted done. If I see them anywhere, I'll walk the other way done. We're talking a turning of the back without even a fart in their general direction done. There is no conceivable circumstance that could occur in my life that will change this. Done.
And I think that this absolute and crystal clear internal knowledge that I will never have a relationship with any of them has begun to open some previously locked (chained, deadbolted, barred and guarded,) door within me. I've remembered a lot over the last few years, and I've been in the fortunate position to accept these memories and to see them clearly for what they are and to analyze how they've affected me. This, more than anything, has been a key to my healing.
Clear, concrete memories are tangible. I can wrap my hands and my heart and my head around them, and I can process them. Ugly as they are at times, I can haul them out of the shadow world of doubt and insecurity and put them on the kitchen counter in the bright light of day and make them show themselves. I can chop them up and slice them and dice them and dissect them and see them for what they truly are at their core. Without that clarity, well, it's like fighting steam.
I have certain tangible memories that have surfaced over the last few years that are, simply put, horrors. They're not repressed memories so much as things that I just had to put in a box and lock away in some part of my soul until I was ready to see it for what it was. I always remembered them, but I didn't always have the strength to let them out of the box. They're the stuff of nightmares, and they've come bubbling up at appropriate times, usually triggered by something that's happened in some other, safer area of my life. I've done what we all have to do when the monster peeks out of the closet; I've made a decision to face the demon du jour. The other option, of course, is to flee, but I've found that the fight response is more effective. And I've become better each time I've battled it.
I can feel something bubbling up now, and I'm trying to be ready for it. I just hate this part. Hate it, hate it!
I'm stuck here in this limbo of restlessness; not sleeping very well, fighting off invisible monsters in a semi-conscious state, snapping at things that I'd normally take in stride, feeling sensitive for not a whole hell of a lot of reason, generally just weirding myself out for no obvious reason.
What I've learned in the last few years is two-fold, though.
First, it'll come. I have to relax, do the day-to-day, keep myself in what we in AA recovery call 'a fit spiritual condition,' and it will come. The locks will turn, the chains will fall off and the door will open. The monster can't, won't or doesn't want to stay hidden away in the closet. It'll peek out eventually, I know. Although some part of me dreads its appearance, another - stronger - part of me knows that the confrontation will be anti-climactic - memories are only shadow monsters after all - and I will be better, feel better when it's done.
Second, I know that I'm going to be fine, no matter what comes out of that door. I know because it's happened before and I've been fine, even better for dealing with it. I know because you've done the same and look how well you are! :) And I know, most importantly, that I'll be fine because the only possible monsters are memories and I'll only have to deal with what was done to me from behind the safe boundary that they can't ever do these things to me again.
Still, I wish it would just come out and let's kick some gravel, already. I'm too busy doing things like living my happy and healthy life with people I love to sit on my ass waiting for the nasty to surface.
Patience may very well be a virtue, but I'm not sure it's one of mine!
So I'm doing what I know to do, which is something very, very odd that I think most normal, non-ACoN, non-abused people don't have to do; I'm seeking triggers. And one that sort of wiggled in tonight came from the strangest place. Ever seen the movie Kung Fu Panda 2? (I cringe as I even type it; really? I watched this movie? This is what I did with my evening?) There's a scene where the baby panda's mother is essentially about to sacrifice herself to protect her child, and I started tearing up. Visible/tangible evidence of a mother's protection of her child is a pretty obvious trigger, i.e., something that my farcically pathetic excuse for a madre didn't provide, but really? An animated movie with kung fu and panda in the title. Wow. What's next? Talking dog movies? LOL.
Laugh or cry, we'll see what dreamland brings tonight. Whatever it is, I'm ready.
Love,
Vanci
It's been five years since I made my Stand with the NFOO, and almost as long since I declared NC. I've had two brief interactions in this time, once when NM was in ICU and once in a follow-up counseling appointment. I left those interactions reaffirmed in my decision to sever all ties. Any niggling doubt as to whether or not I would ever reestablish contact under any terms was blasted away by the revelations of ENF and NM's direct abuse of one of my DDs. NSis and GCYB stand with them, just as they have from the beginning, and I'm not interested in knowing what they know or hearing their side of the story. They were abused just as I was, they're aware of who and what they stand with. They're adults and can make their own decisions about the degrees of evil they're willing to live with and absorb and further pass on. Their silence and guilt by association leaves them in the same category of abusers that NM and ENF are in. When you throw your lot with thieves, you're complicit. Period.
I'm fucking done with these people. Done. Like wouldn't piss on them to put them out if they were on fire done. If they call me, I won't answer and won't listen to the voicemail done. Emails will be deleted unread done. Letters will be returned unopened done. If they show up on this blog they'll be deleted done. If I see them anywhere, I'll walk the other way done. We're talking a turning of the back without even a fart in their general direction done. There is no conceivable circumstance that could occur in my life that will change this. Done.
And I think that this absolute and crystal clear internal knowledge that I will never have a relationship with any of them has begun to open some previously locked (chained, deadbolted, barred and guarded,) door within me. I've remembered a lot over the last few years, and I've been in the fortunate position to accept these memories and to see them clearly for what they are and to analyze how they've affected me. This, more than anything, has been a key to my healing.
Clear, concrete memories are tangible. I can wrap my hands and my heart and my head around them, and I can process them. Ugly as they are at times, I can haul them out of the shadow world of doubt and insecurity and put them on the kitchen counter in the bright light of day and make them show themselves. I can chop them up and slice them and dice them and dissect them and see them for what they truly are at their core. Without that clarity, well, it's like fighting steam.
I have certain tangible memories that have surfaced over the last few years that are, simply put, horrors. They're not repressed memories so much as things that I just had to put in a box and lock away in some part of my soul until I was ready to see it for what it was. I always remembered them, but I didn't always have the strength to let them out of the box. They're the stuff of nightmares, and they've come bubbling up at appropriate times, usually triggered by something that's happened in some other, safer area of my life. I've done what we all have to do when the monster peeks out of the closet; I've made a decision to face the demon du jour. The other option, of course, is to flee, but I've found that the fight response is more effective. And I've become better each time I've battled it.
I can feel something bubbling up now, and I'm trying to be ready for it. I just hate this part. Hate it, hate it!
I'm stuck here in this limbo of restlessness; not sleeping very well, fighting off invisible monsters in a semi-conscious state, snapping at things that I'd normally take in stride, feeling sensitive for not a whole hell of a lot of reason, generally just weirding myself out for no obvious reason.
What I've learned in the last few years is two-fold, though.
First, it'll come. I have to relax, do the day-to-day, keep myself in what we in AA recovery call 'a fit spiritual condition,' and it will come. The locks will turn, the chains will fall off and the door will open. The monster can't, won't or doesn't want to stay hidden away in the closet. It'll peek out eventually, I know. Although some part of me dreads its appearance, another - stronger - part of me knows that the confrontation will be anti-climactic - memories are only shadow monsters after all - and I will be better, feel better when it's done.
Second, I know that I'm going to be fine, no matter what comes out of that door. I know because it's happened before and I've been fine, even better for dealing with it. I know because you've done the same and look how well you are! :) And I know, most importantly, that I'll be fine because the only possible monsters are memories and I'll only have to deal with what was done to me from behind the safe boundary that they can't ever do these things to me again.
Still, I wish it would just come out and let's kick some gravel, already. I'm too busy doing things like living my happy and healthy life with people I love to sit on my ass waiting for the nasty to surface.
Patience may very well be a virtue, but I'm not sure it's one of mine!
So I'm doing what I know to do, which is something very, very odd that I think most normal, non-ACoN, non-abused people don't have to do; I'm seeking triggers. And one that sort of wiggled in tonight came from the strangest place. Ever seen the movie Kung Fu Panda 2? (I cringe as I even type it; really? I watched this movie? This is what I did with my evening?) There's a scene where the baby panda's mother is essentially about to sacrifice herself to protect her child, and I started tearing up. Visible/tangible evidence of a mother's protection of her child is a pretty obvious trigger, i.e., something that my farcically pathetic excuse for a madre didn't provide, but really? An animated movie with kung fu and panda in the title. Wow. What's next? Talking dog movies? LOL.
Laugh or cry, we'll see what dreamland brings tonight. Whatever it is, I'm ready.
Love,
Vanci
Tuesday, March 20, 2012
Heartbreak and Freedom
In my Help a Sister Out post, KFL5 asked some pertinent and difficult questions, and you wonderful readers really stepped up to the plate to share your experience and hope with her. Thank you, thank you, thank you. My finger's all healed now and I can type again, yay!, so I wanted to add a few of my minimal cents.
The question, "Anyone else deal with the heartbreaking feeling of abandonment when you are finally able to set some emotional boundaries?" was the one that really resonated with me; the one I keep going back to.
Oh, ouchie, I remember this feeling. I had to dredge a bit to get back to it, combing through memories that feel like ancient history but are really just a few short years ago. I want to start by saying that I don't feel this anymore. Feeling abandoned required that I had ever felt like I belonged in the first place. For some time, I DID feel this. I'd always had the NFOO in my life and they did an excellent job of filling up my every waking moment with their demands and needs and convincing me that my worth was directly related to their happiness, so at first, absolutely, I was stranded on a metaphorical deserted island all by myself, or at least that's how it seemed.
Circumstances and force of will kept me in that lonely place, even when I was tempted to just give in and jump back into my previously allotted role within the fucked up painful system that was all I'd known as 'family.' It felt, a lot of the time, like the wind was just whistling through the gaping hole in the middle of my soul. Even the horrible something that we've known can be more comfortable to have than the emptiness of uncertainty. I feared the void, but not quite enough to want to fill it back up with the awfulness that was the NFOO. Almost, but not quite.
Still, I was shocked and wounded that these people who'd claimed to 'love' me could turn on me so easily, so quickly, so thoroughly. Even worse, their abandonment was made worse in that it proved to me that the feeling I'd always had that I would be dropped like a hot rock if I didn't do exactly what they told me to do was fact. I couldn't chalk up my insecurities to my own overactive imagination anymore (and after all they'd trained me so well to do so.) Their abandonment of me made me realize what was true; they really didn't love me and I was just their scapegoat, object, pawn - not even a person, just something to be used at their convenience and to their ends.
The isolation that they imposed after my stand was nothing short of what they'd always threatened. They refused to speak to me rationally, they refused to be civil, they made it a point to reach out to every single person that we knew mutually and rally as many of those people as they could against me. Effectively, I said, "This is what I need to feel safe, this is the space that's acceptable to me, this is the way I'd like to communicate."
And they replied with attacks on my character, attacks on my mental health, attacks by proxy through my children, attacks on me behind my back and to my face and to anyone with half a minute and the ability to hear the attacks they manufactured against me. Attack, attack, attack. I asked for space and they launched the armada.
It was awful. It was heartbreaking.
But, the last thing that I had in common with the NFOO was this: we both underestimated my strength of character.
I'm certain that they are still, five years later, baffled that I haven't come crawling back to them. When I met with NM in my counselor's office in June, she let her expectations of my behavior slip out between the lines of her carefully crafted speech when she stated (talking about NSis) that "some people in our family are more willing to forgive than others." She - and therefore they, let's not forget that the NFOO follows the whimsy of NM, always - can't understand a Vanci outside of her own framework. In her mind, I am wrong and it's only a matter of time before I seek her absolution for my sins. The twisted logic and warped mind behind that particular curtain is fucking mind boggling. Incidentally, when I called her on this bullshit, the conversation went South FAST.
I underestimated myself, too. In truth, it was their actions that pushed me further and further in my resolve to stop the abuse and break the cycle. The crazier they got in their need to control me, attack me, win at all cost, the clearer I became in my boundaries. Every time they crossed a line, I drew a firmer, bolder, tighter circle around myself and the FOC. Bet they never saw that coming! (And I didn't really either until I did it!)
So, that deserted and abandoned feeling abated in direct proportion to what became my choice to live a life apart from them. It is, after all, impossible to feel abandoned by something that one's chosen to leave. And the longer I stayed away, the more difficult it's become for me to see how the hell I ever stayed there in the first place. There's truth to the saying, "Once known, a thing cannot be unknown." Sometimes I think they're like a black hole; get too close to the vortex and it'll suck you in; try to get away and you'll discover that it takes an awful lot of power to get out of proximity. The best plan once you've got a little distance is to lay on the warp drive and never look back.
And that's what I feel now. Not abandonment, not heartbreak, not even sadness most of the time. I feel... free. I feel like I took a lot of bullets but somehow managed to dodge the widow maker that had my name on it. I feel like a hungry shark swam into my legs and then got distracted by something in the opposite direction. I feel like I missed the launch of the Titanic and got left on the dock with my ticket in hand. I feel like I somehow, someway, got a pass and a chance at a whole new life, one that is only possible without the Crazymakers in it.
Cause this life I've lived without them? It's so, so, so much better than it ever was with them. I had to get some road behind me to see that, to feel that, to be able to embrace that, but it's the truth. I had to go through those awful feelings of loneliness and heartbreak and abandonment to come out the other side with the innate, deep-seated knowledge that people who love me don't seek to make me feel those things.
And once I had that under my belt, it became easy to look around and see the large group of people that were by my side all along rooting for me and holding their arms out to me in genuine concern and care and love for me just the way I am. Now that's freedom, baby.
I'll close with this:
It gets better.
It gets so much better.
Love,
Vanci
The question, "Anyone else deal with the heartbreaking feeling of abandonment when you are finally able to set some emotional boundaries?" was the one that really resonated with me; the one I keep going back to.
Oh, ouchie, I remember this feeling. I had to dredge a bit to get back to it, combing through memories that feel like ancient history but are really just a few short years ago. I want to start by saying that I don't feel this anymore. Feeling abandoned required that I had ever felt like I belonged in the first place. For some time, I DID feel this. I'd always had the NFOO in my life and they did an excellent job of filling up my every waking moment with their demands and needs and convincing me that my worth was directly related to their happiness, so at first, absolutely, I was stranded on a metaphorical deserted island all by myself, or at least that's how it seemed.
Circumstances and force of will kept me in that lonely place, even when I was tempted to just give in and jump back into my previously allotted role within the fucked up painful system that was all I'd known as 'family.' It felt, a lot of the time, like the wind was just whistling through the gaping hole in the middle of my soul. Even the horrible something that we've known can be more comfortable to have than the emptiness of uncertainty. I feared the void, but not quite enough to want to fill it back up with the awfulness that was the NFOO. Almost, but not quite.
Still, I was shocked and wounded that these people who'd claimed to 'love' me could turn on me so easily, so quickly, so thoroughly. Even worse, their abandonment was made worse in that it proved to me that the feeling I'd always had that I would be dropped like a hot rock if I didn't do exactly what they told me to do was fact. I couldn't chalk up my insecurities to my own overactive imagination anymore (and after all they'd trained me so well to do so.) Their abandonment of me made me realize what was true; they really didn't love me and I was just their scapegoat, object, pawn - not even a person, just something to be used at their convenience and to their ends.
The isolation that they imposed after my stand was nothing short of what they'd always threatened. They refused to speak to me rationally, they refused to be civil, they made it a point to reach out to every single person that we knew mutually and rally as many of those people as they could against me. Effectively, I said, "This is what I need to feel safe, this is the space that's acceptable to me, this is the way I'd like to communicate."
And they replied with attacks on my character, attacks on my mental health, attacks by proxy through my children, attacks on me behind my back and to my face and to anyone with half a minute and the ability to hear the attacks they manufactured against me. Attack, attack, attack. I asked for space and they launched the armada.
It was awful. It was heartbreaking.
But, the last thing that I had in common with the NFOO was this: we both underestimated my strength of character.
I'm certain that they are still, five years later, baffled that I haven't come crawling back to them. When I met with NM in my counselor's office in June, she let her expectations of my behavior slip out between the lines of her carefully crafted speech when she stated (talking about NSis) that "some people in our family are more willing to forgive than others." She - and therefore they, let's not forget that the NFOO follows the whimsy of NM, always - can't understand a Vanci outside of her own framework. In her mind, I am wrong and it's only a matter of time before I seek her absolution for my sins. The twisted logic and warped mind behind that particular curtain is fucking mind boggling. Incidentally, when I called her on this bullshit, the conversation went South FAST.
I underestimated myself, too. In truth, it was their actions that pushed me further and further in my resolve to stop the abuse and break the cycle. The crazier they got in their need to control me, attack me, win at all cost, the clearer I became in my boundaries. Every time they crossed a line, I drew a firmer, bolder, tighter circle around myself and the FOC. Bet they never saw that coming! (And I didn't really either until I did it!)
So, that deserted and abandoned feeling abated in direct proportion to what became my choice to live a life apart from them. It is, after all, impossible to feel abandoned by something that one's chosen to leave. And the longer I stayed away, the more difficult it's become for me to see how the hell I ever stayed there in the first place. There's truth to the saying, "Once known, a thing cannot be unknown." Sometimes I think they're like a black hole; get too close to the vortex and it'll suck you in; try to get away and you'll discover that it takes an awful lot of power to get out of proximity. The best plan once you've got a little distance is to lay on the warp drive and never look back.
And that's what I feel now. Not abandonment, not heartbreak, not even sadness most of the time. I feel... free. I feel like I took a lot of bullets but somehow managed to dodge the widow maker that had my name on it. I feel like a hungry shark swam into my legs and then got distracted by something in the opposite direction. I feel like I missed the launch of the Titanic and got left on the dock with my ticket in hand. I feel like I somehow, someway, got a pass and a chance at a whole new life, one that is only possible without the Crazymakers in it.
Cause this life I've lived without them? It's so, so, so much better than it ever was with them. I had to get some road behind me to see that, to feel that, to be able to embrace that, but it's the truth. I had to go through those awful feelings of loneliness and heartbreak and abandonment to come out the other side with the innate, deep-seated knowledge that people who love me don't seek to make me feel those things.
And once I had that under my belt, it became easy to look around and see the large group of people that were by my side all along rooting for me and holding their arms out to me in genuine concern and care and love for me just the way I am. Now that's freedom, baby.
I'll close with this:
It gets better.
It gets so much better.
Love,
Vanci
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