Hi all! It's been a roller coaster of a couple weeks involving a business trip and an injury that's kept me from posting - who knew that an index finger could cause such excrutiating pain while typing? ;) Although I'm becoming fairly good at this whole hunt and peck style of typing, I'm having trouble reconciling that I simply cannot type as fast as I can think! I'll be healed up in a few days and will return in force - lots of thoughts cookin' in the old brain - but until then I wanted to re-post this comment I received from KFL5 on my The Big Picture post with a request that anyone with ideas for her respond with their own wisdom and experience.
She asks:
Thank you for this post! Glad I'm not the only one with thoughts like these. I sent my mother an email in Dec. saying that I'd like to communicate via email for a while because phone conversations have not been constructive, and that I think everyone of us should be accountable for what we say to each other (in my mind, verbal abuse from her and my 2 siblings; gaslighting and denial of horrible things said to me, etc.). She has completely ignored the letter's content, but sent a cordial email on Christmas and another for my birthday. That's it. Anyone else deal with the heartbreaking feeling of abandonment when you are finally able to set some emotional boundaries? How silly of me to think that my NM would actually have a heart and try to work through our relationship. Nah, easier to just ignore the elephant and keep up your Emily Post facade. Do I wait until eternity for a response? If I give in first and acknowledge that she ignored my email, am I feeding her N supply??? Please help, experienced folks! Your blogs are keeping my head above water. Thank you for your courage and honesty! K.
I, of course, have many thoughts in answer to your questions, K, but I'm going to have to save them until I can articulate without having to backspace every two characters. (Grrrr!!!) I will say, though, that in my opinion you opened up a conversation that you feel you need to have honestly with your mother regarding the non-constuctive and hurtful conversations, and her response is at the very least, dismissive. By following the 'letter of the law' while refusing to acknowledge the actual core issues, she's either denying - yet again - that those issues exist or she's making it a game to try to ensure that you break your own tentative boundary BEFORE she does, thereby making you - yet again - the 'bad guy' while absolving herself. (I can hear my own NM here, "Well, I followed all of Vanci's silly little rules and she still isn't happy!")
I won't tell you what to do, but I will tell you that I think you are asking yourself - and all of us - the absolutely right questions and I acknowledge the difficulty of your doing so while admiring you for your courage. Keep asking!
Love,
Vanci
A similar thing has happened to me. I requested that we communicate in writing for a while after a horrendous confrontation with my NPs. My thoughts were similar...very few people can manage to shout, swear and fling verbal abuse in writing because most of us tend to calmly arrange our thoughts before committing them to paper.
ReplyDeleteMy NPs at 1st honoured my request but what they wrote was hardly communication. They simply pretended nothing had happened. I wrote to them a couple of more times trying to get them to. at the very least, acknowledge something unpleasant had happened. No luck so I went full on NC.
Now the NPs and my NGC younger brother have decided to stomp on the boundary I laid down by trying to reach me by phone. These attempts I have totally ignored, but I'm sure they'll regroup and try another tactic.
I no longer kid myself that things can ever change with my NFOO. Acceptance has set me free.
mulderfan,
DeleteYou said, "I no longer kid myself that things can ever change with my NFOO. Acceptance has set me free."
I agree, and would add that freedom and contentment WITHOUT them in my life followed shortly thereafter.
Love,
Vanci
Wow, KFL5! Sounds to me like your NM is working from the same rulebook as my N mother-in-law. If it's okay with you, Vanci, I'd love to take a stab at answering this on my blog. (I think my comment might end up being too long).
ReplyDeleteJonsi,
DeleteFine by me!
Love, Vanci
Thanks Vanci!
DeleteI've written my response to KFL5 on my blog.
KFL5, here it is: http://jonsi-jonsi.blogspot.com/2012/03/helping-sister-out.html
Hi, new reader on the scene :)
ReplyDeleteKFL5, her silence IS her response, a passive aggressive response. You know she read it, since she's sent you e-mails and not called. My advice is to leave it at that, there's not point in engaging her about her failure to give a direct response to your initial e-mail.
I met with my NM in a public setting to confront her and lay down some boundaries, especially about her constant invalidation. That's her favorite tool in the narcissistic tool chest, I swear. She literally walked out on me while I was still talking. I started sobbing in public, in front of complete strangers who had witnessed the exchange due to NM raising her voice. They were much kinder to me than she was! Anyway, I know how devastating it is when you finally make a stand and they respond with cold indifference. You never forget the heartbreak, but it does get easier with time, I think.
Adela,
DeleteThanks so much for your insight and for making yourself known. I've added you to my reading list.
I agree that the lack of response is a response, and that it's one of invalidation and indifference.
KFL5, Adela is right; we don't forget the heartbreak, but we do learn how to use it to understand ourselves and our feelings as well as to come to the realization that their painful actions toward us are about, first and foremost, their dysfunctions and problems and lack of abiity to love.
It does get easier to bare, it really does.
Love,
Vanci
Hey, Vanci. Here's what I'd tell her:
ReplyDeleteI'm so sorry... I don't know the specifics of the situation, but here's what I'm guessing ... Your mother probably always reacts like this (or has reacted like this) in the past, right? When you, as a child or adult, said your feelings were hurt or tried in some way to hold her acccountable, she probably dismissed your feelings and clung to her "Emily Post" facade ... didn't she? It sounds like lifelong behavior from her in how she reacts to unpleasantness or any attempt to hold her accountable for what she has done.
I know the reasons we send emails and letters to our narcissistic parents is because we want to be heard, we want to be understood, and most importantly, we want to be loved. We want the person to take responsibility for what she is doing, to be damn sorry, and to hug us (or at least, be nice for once) and value us.
But the thing is, a true narcissist won't do any of that. She won't ever, ever, ever take responsibility for her actions. Ever. It's a horrible thing to say. And my heart hurts in saying it, but the truth is that a narcissist parent will never admit their crappy behavior and will, in fact, punish the abused adult-child by either being dismissive or raging against them.
My mother is the dismissive type. She never replied to me in almost a year after I sent her a letter saying how hurt I was, how I unloved I felt. And she has systematically told all our mutual friends and our family members that she has been wronged and Kiki is a sick, sick girl.
She's had a year to think it over. And still, nothing.
It hurts so terribly to have our parents dismiss us, especially considering how long we've tried to make them love us. But they are incapable of it. And, as my therapist regularly reminds me, "Kiki, their lack of love for you is about their lack of loving, and it has nothing, absolutely nothing to do with your not being loveable. You are loveable and valuable. And just because your parents can't notice it, it doesn't mean that you aren't worthy of love. You are. Now, surround yourself with people who love you and can love you in a healthy way."
So.
I could write forever about this ... about how the letter is more (or should be more) about establishing our boundaries and being brave and honest to who we are, and not expecting the narcissist to do anything differently. I could write posts and posts, but then this comment would be entirely too long.
I know it hurts, hon. It hurts a lot. But the pain is survivable ... and in time, healing begins ... slowly ... surely... but first, there's that searing pain of realization. It'll be OK ... (hugs)
Kiki - hi!
DeleteI just couldn't have said this any better:
"Now, surround yourself with people who love you and can love you in a healthy way."
Except maybe to add, "And blow a big fat raspberry at anyone who thinks you shouldn't or tells you that you're unlovable!"
Love,
Vanci
You all are just wonderful. Thank you for your thoughtful responses. I just wrote a brief thank you to Jonsi on her site as well. It's very comforting to find people out there (wherever you are!) who can relate. My husband has been so supportive though this crud, but he can't possibly know what it feels like to have the people who raised him turn their backs. He never liked my NFOO anyway, and he saw their facade long before I opened my eyes to it. All I knew (until 2 years ago) was that I never really felt comfortable around them.
ReplyDeleteMy NF was diagnosed with cancer almost 3 years ago. He blew up at me a month before he died because I expressed an opinion he didn't like. My N-sister stood by and threw me under the bus along with my NM. My GCN-brother (my twin, incidentally) wasn't even there but fell in line with the family rejection of me. My dad told me not to visit him anymore because I only caused "conflict." I nearly had a nervous breakdown after this and started seeing a therapist.
My dad started hospice, and amidst nasty phonecalls telling me how much I'd upset him and the whole family, my mother was shouting about how much I needed to BE THERE FOR MY DYING FATHER. (It's like kicking your dog multiple times and then wondering why the hell he doesn't come anymore when you call him.) On my therapist's advice, I flew to say goodbye to him, spent the day there, and then flew back that night. It was all I could handle emotionally. The nastiness continued because I wasn't there on the day he died, and my family will never let me forget that. They've now taken on more of my dad's N personality, and they still point to how awful I am to the family.
Here's the thing: if you mix N people, cancer, and death, they THRIVE. If you don't march to their beat, they can hide behind cancer and death to justify their nasty behavior ("we were in shock; what do you expect?!") and vilify yours ("WE needed you--how couldn't you BE there?!"). Lest they forget that I was trying to grieve the loss of my father, N or not, in the middle of all this.
There is so much more to the story, and I'm not sure where to put it, but it has to come out. I think it would help me heal. Any ideas?
Thank you all!!
K.
K,
DeleteUgh. This a classic scapegoat dynamic. They're not emotionally evolved enough to deal with their lil lives being disrupted by someone else's disease and passing, so they found an easier/more familiar route to cope - hurting you. Narcs work very hard at one thing; setting up their lives with the correct/supportive surrounding cast of characters. Change that and they become insanely violent. I'm so sorry that they did this to you!
As to your question:
"There is so much more to the story, and I'm not sure where to put it, but it has to come out. I think it would help me heal. Any ideas?"
I do have a suggestion. :) It's very easy to start a blog on blogger or wordpress... :)
Love,
Vanci
K, if you had been there on the day he died, they would all have pretended you had behaved badly and still 'never let you forget it.' They would have followed some version of this scenario no matter what the circumstances (if you had been held up on a hijacked airplane that day and risked your life singlehandedly vanquishing the hijackers, they would never stop accusing you of being more interested in getting publicity than in your family's crisis). --quartz
ReplyDeleteI agree with Quartz - I think, regardless of whether you were there or not the day your NF passed, they STILL would have found ways to guilt you and hurt you. It's so sad, but narcs are famous for using legitimate life circumstances (births, deaths, weddings, etc) to manipulate you. From the sounds of it, you did what was healthiest for you, and from an outsider's perspective, I think you did more than you had to for them.
DeleteThis part of what you said really got me: "Lest they forget that I was trying to grieve the loss of my father, N or not, in the middle of all this." No matter how evil or abusive he was, he was still your father, and you have the right to feel sad over that loss. (I would argue that he was probably never the kind of father you needed, and that it wasn't his death that "took him away" from you, but still, the fact of the matter is that you had every right to feel sad about that loss, without the rest of your FOO spending their time trying to kick you back onto place.)
If ever they showed there true colors, that was it!
Bingo!
DeleteIt's about having someone to blame, your actions are completely irrelevant, like Quartz and Jonsi said.
We can never please them, they are unpleasable (though we are not unpleasant.) If you'd followed all their impossible instructions to a T and been absolutley perfect, perfect, practically perfect in every way, it still wouldn't have been enough. I mentioned once in my NFOO that I liked rain.
And whenever it rained a lot after that, someone in the NFOO would invariably look at me and say something to the effect of, "Well, Vanci's probably enjoying this rain even though it's ruining (insert inane activity on the Narc's schedule here) for ME."
It doesn't matter what we do - it's THEM.
Love,
Vanci
Back when the FOG was really thick, I was so determined to please my NPs that I took it to ridiculous extremes. Once when I had promised to drive them on some errands I fell and broke my left foot in four places. When I called to say I couldn't make it NF raged that they had important things to do so instead of going to emergency I drove down to help them...take their empties back to the beer store and go to the bank! Even though I was in agony they then wanted to go out for their "regular" Wednesday lunch. Get this! I took them for lunch!
ReplyDeleteNothing I have EVER done has changed the way they treat me! Correction: The more I did the worse it got.
Now you know why "Fuck 'em!" is my favourite expression.
This is a show stopper story. Top ten, best in class.
DeleteHahaha, mulderfan, I love it. You're all absolutely right--sometimes the more you do, even when you think you're trying to alleviate their angst a little, it just gets worse (probably because they know they just manipulated you, and they want to keep pushing to see how far you'll go!). Visible sacrifices--including a BROKEN foot--don't get us anywhere.
ReplyDeleteFor the first year after my dad died (that would be last year), I think I believed that my being miserable most of the time (feeling guilty and ashamed that my family was angry with me) was my "penance." I thought that feeling poorly would somehow turn the karma train around in my favor. Now I realize--WTF??? And what a waste of energy. No amount of sorrow that I showed changed their feelings about me. I even apologized to my dad (yes, for having a different opinion that upset him--again, WTF) because I just wanted him to stop directing his anger at me as he was dying. I now realize, of course, that he couldn't come to terms with his death (or his life, for that matter), and no amount of apologizing would work. It was so much easier to be angry at me. My stupid NFOO family members couldn't--and still can't, or won't--see that, and they enjoyed blaming me for my dad's anger. It kept them out of his line of sight, bonded them against me, and allowed them to ignore their own problems with my dad and their feelings about his death.
The crazy thing is that I thought my dad was the only N in my family...until he died and the others showed their true colors. Unreal. The golden rule just doesn't apply here. I can be so dang nice, and it just bites me in the ass.
K.
The more things you do for them, the better they become aware that they can manipulate you.
ReplyDeleteAs for the question. My mother does the same when I enforce boundaries - she says nothing to communicate me she acknowledged my request, however she does comply, but this leaves me confused and waiting for an answer for a while. I think that's a strategy, they comply - so you can't accuse them they didn't, but they also don't allow you to enjoy it, they want you to stay confused and eventually break the boundary yourself.
So true, Alexandra! "They also don't allow you to enjoy it." They know you're frustrated, and I think that by complying without responding, they feel they can keep the upper hand while you stew. Ugh.
ReplyDelete