Holding Boundaries

I was inspired by a recent post on Upsi's "You Don't Have to Dance for Them" blog to document my often-used process for making and keeping safe boundaries.  In the four years that I have been NC with my entire FOO, I've had to get very, very good at drawing, keeping and holding boundaries with them.  Apart from the pervasive Narc tendencies to push, then push, then push the Scapegoat some more, I also live in the same small town (about 7,000 people) that NM, EF, OS and YB and their anciliaries do.  With no geographical distance between us, my safe boundaries are part of the protection that I put on every morning before I go out into the world; keys? check, undies? check, boundaries? check.  I am in public most of the day and any one of my FOO Crazymakers can find me if they choose to at any time, so I keep my emotional tool belt stocked. 

My boundaries keep me safe and also give me the ability to know myself, even in the face of sudden direct or proxy attacks.  Should NM or one of her minions surface, internal knowledge of my safe, sane and reasonable boundaries is one of the tools that give me the immediate, intuitive knowledge of how to keep myself safe.  It's one of the ways that I know right away that I am being violated, disrespected and treated poorly and that I have every right to defend myself by choosing not to engage.

Having boundaries firmly in place allows me to say, calmly and with dignity, "As I've said, I have no interest in discussing this with you," and to head for an exit.

I'm a thinker and a system-designer in everything I do.  I see organizational layers where other people see messes, so it follows that I've condensed this very important part of my life (or my defense system, really) into a few bullet points.

When faced with a situation that screams for boundaries to be set, I ask myself these questions:

1. Is this a reasonable boundary?
Reasonable or unreasonable isn't an issue of how I feel about it, how comfortable I am with it or, in the early days, how I thought it would be received.  It's really a logistical question.  For example, my primary boundary with NM has been for some time, "I will only meet with you in the presence of a therapist(s)." 

NM's proven over and over again that without a third party observer present, she lapses into blaming me for her faults, gaslighting, revision of history and just plain makin' shit up.  It's unsafe and unproductive to even try to have a convo without a referee.  So, there must be a witness, and that's a reasonable request.  I use my therapist because it's one of the things I pay him for and he's a safe ally to me.  She's welcome to bring her therapist too, if she wants to make it more neutral.  Reasonable, right? 

It would be unreasonable of me to set this boundary if I didn't have a therapist available.  It would be unreasonable of me to say, "I will only meet with you on the sixtieth Tuesday of years in which the bluest lagoon on the planet has turned red."  If I find that I want to set an unreasonable boundary, I have to stop and consider that I'm not quite sure of my intentions.  If my intention is to make it difficult for NM to meet with me, then, really, I need to consider that my boundary should be something along the lines of, "I won't meet with you."  If my boundary is reasonable, I move on to number 2...

2.  Will I be able to maintain this boundary?

Clarity has been key for me in boundaries over and over again.  When dealing with a Narc, particularly the one who managed to get her claws into me when I was still pre-verbal, I've found that my first learned/instinctive reaction when I make a choice to 'defy' the Narc is one of confusion... followed by shame... followed by more confusion and self-doubt.  This is, after all, what I was hard-wired to do.  That's one of the reasons that it's so important for me to be clear - to make sure that I have at the ready a correct 're-learned' healthy response prepared ahead of time.  If I've been clear with myself that my boundary is reasonable, safe and that I deserve to have it respected, I don't fall back into my old patterns of acquiesence and acceptance of blame for defending myself like I used to. 

When I set a reasonable boundary that I fully undersand and can without a doubt stand behind, I am prepared for whatever the Narcs pull out of their crazy arsenal and throw at me. 
For example, using the above 'therapist-present' boundary, I can easily maintain it; it's clear, tangible, black-and-white.  Either NM makes an appointment to meet at the therapy office and we have a conversation, or we don't talk/meet/speak/write/etc.  An example of a non-maintainable boundary would be:
"I won't meet with you unless you're going to be nice/honest/kind/etc."
Those words are subjective, and pliable language is like modeling clay to a Narc; they can make it whatever they want it to be.  And they will, oh, yesssssss, they will.  And it will be my fault by the time they're done, so, if my boundary isn't clear enough to maintain, I have to go back to the drawing board and figure out how to provide more clarity.
If I find that my boundary is reasonable, clear and maintainable, I move on to 3...

3. Am I willing to accept the consequences of this boundary, no matter what they are and even if I don't like them?
Here's the thing about Narcs: they do absolutely what they want to do, regardless of the cost to others, period.  They blame, they shift, they manipulate, they lie, they dodge, they justify, they rationalize, they reinvent reality and they selectively listen and remember in order to suit their needs, wants and desires.  Trying to pin a Narc down with the truth or reality is like trying to staple jello to a tree.

So, when I've set a clear, maintainable and appropriate boundary, I've created safety and sanity for myself.  My Narcs don't want me to have safety or sanity; if they did, they wouldn't abuse me in the first place.  It is ALL, really, ALL about them.

When I don't give them what they want, the reaction is overwhelmingly, violently, huge.  HUGE.
To have a relationship with a narcissist, one must abide by the narc's rules, which are really quite simple: what the Narc says is the truth; what the Narc does is right; the Narc's needs are met first, middle and last; the Narc gets credit for the good; the Narc takes no responsibility for the bad.

Boundaries that deny the Narc any of those things (which really means any boundary at all, doesn't it?) are game-changers.  Narcs don't like that.  So they attack.

When I set the original 'therapist-present' boundary, NM told me that she wouldn't abide by it.  She couched this, of course, in her manipulative statement that "mothers never give up on their daugters," which really meant that she would contact me however the hell she pleased.  I told her that was unacceptable to me and that I wouldn't answer her calls or notes, but if that's what she wanted, she could have it.  I hung up the phone.
So she had OS call me.  She had EF call me.  She had YB text me.  Uncle emailed me.  NM had OS drop off 'presents' for my DD's at my place of employment.  I gave them to charity.  She mailed me a package (more presents for DD's) with no return address.  I mailed them back with a letter reiterating my boundaries and clearly stating, again, that they were absolutely non-negotiable.  She called me the next day 'to talk about it.'  I told her that if she wanted to talk, she could respect my boundaries and make an appointment with the therapists.  She told me that she couldn't do that because she was 'uncomfortable' with my therapist.  I told her that we wouldn't be talking then and hung up the phone.

After another few rounds with all the minions, I was stressed enough to declare the same boundary with all of them.  I didn't want to have to do that; I'd held out hope that I could have some kind of normal relationship with at least OS and YB, but NM took my line in the sand and declared war, using her other children and EF as her army.  I drew a line.  They chose. 

Is that what I wanted?  Not neccesarily, but I had to be prepared to accept the outcome of my right action.  If I'm not ready to handle the outcome regardless of what it is, well, I'm not yet ready to set the boundary and I need to reinforce my support.  In this case, I was ready and I defended myself and through that process, I learned a lot. 
Specifically, I learned that the people who care about me care about my boundaries; they care about me, my thoughts, my feelings, my heart, my soul and my spirit.  And they show me that they care by supporting me in keeping myself safe.  If I had doubts about who those people are, well, boundaries create a clearer picture of who's who, when they work. 

I've managed to stay safe and sane for a long time now using this process as one of my tools.  I hope it helps someone else, too.

Love,
Vanci