Thank you so much for starting these threads. I’ve spent the last week reading this one and the first one- in fact I haven’t finished this one yet so apologies and I will continue once I’ve posted this.
I am so sorry for what you all have been through, and I am also incredibly impressed at your resilience and ability to address the challenges these people have caused you.
I recognise so much of what is written, although to a lesser degree so I’m not sure if my mother is actually a narcissist or just selfish and unaware. However I am always so concerned about passing on her behaviours to my children that since reading this, I am now thinking about it 24:7.
My mother is one of 6 children who ostensibly had a happy upbringing, however it was catholic and she became pregnant at 15 and was taken to a halfway house for a termination and then it was never spoken of again. I believe she was quite unruly. She spent all of my childhood having affairs, including the one that broke up my parents- with his childhood best friend. My dad is a kind but passive man (still friends with the man involved!), who my mum derided for years afterwards and told us was uninterested in seeing us- I now believe that was untrue although he has never stood up for me.
My mother has never truly shown any interest in us. She claims to love us all and yet there was a total lack of parenting, we looked after ourselves (I collected my sister from school and cooked all the meals from a very young age). She took no interest in our education. We were all very bright and have not capitalised on that. She actively discouraged degrees as she felt vocational studies were preferable- all of her family were medics/pharmacists etc and she would say that unless we followed a scientific route it had no value- I became a nurse which she looked down on but then accepted as I was the only one (three daughters) who followed her into healthcare.
I was a well behaved child, very sensitive and worried. She used to call me a martyr because I was good, and ungrateful if I questioned anything. We grew up with a variety of men in the house, she would have loud sex with them when we were in bed but we could hear it all. She was so unpleasant about people’s looks, particularly women. Calling larger women “big fat lardy girls”, saying people’s eyes were too close together, nose too big etc etc. She would comment on my appearance in strange ways- I remember her suggesting I was somehow being sexually provocative when I preferred a shorter dress on one occasion (I was about 8?), and she would point out that I had “a pot belly” if I wore something slightly tight fitting as a teenager (I didn’t- I was stick thin, but when I objected she said “but I don’t have a flat stomach so it’s not an insult!”).
She only ever discusses other people and throughout our lives she would bitch about my sisters to me, I have never asked but I am sure she does the same about me, to them. Conversations are non existent, she asks nothing about me. I even feel uncomfortable after an exchange as I am worried I have spoken too much, there are awkward a silences where most people would enquire about the other person (me) and yet she doesn’t so I volunteer information. She expects to see my children and tells people all about them proudly and yet never plays with them and wants to continue telling me boring stories about eg how awful her friend looks. Expects me to ignore the children to listen to these monologues. My children happen to be very friendly and chatty so she has the impression her relationship with them is good, but no insight that she gives nothing to them. In one occasion my son (reception age at the time) asked her if he could read to her and she just said no, as if, why would I do that??!
I also had my hair cut short as a child, and have never questioned the narrative that I wanted short hair- until reading all of your stories. I can only remember being upset about it being cut off.
All of this kind of pales into the insignifance of what she did when I was in my twenties. I began an affair with a married man that continued for around five years. She was my “best friend” at the time as I became more isolated and unhappy, it was incredibly self destructive. She knew about it from the beginning and she all but encouraged it. Then, when others found out about it and my family including her staged an intervention, she pretended she didn’t know and allowed another family member to talk to me as if I was crazy. She just sat there. My confidence was nonexistent. I made attempts to extract myself from the situation that included terrible decisions and on one occasion I was seriously sexually assaulted by a man I had gone on a date with. She came to A&E when I called her and took me home, never mentioning it again.
I find it hard to forget these events, as the weirdest thing about it all was that she seemed almost jealous of me. That sounds insane but it’s how it felt. I gradually got to a better place and I met my now husband, who is immeasurably kind and supportive. I honestly didn’t ever think happiness would happen for me, and yet my mother behaved, and continued to behave upset and put out. I think she truly resents the fact that I am not unhappy and sitting at her house smoking with her and drinking wine (I think she me an alcoholic too), instead of being overjoyed that I am happy with a husband and children who I love and who love me. On one occasion she let herself slip (she was drunk) when I called out her snide remarks about my (then) boyfriend not paying her enough attention- she screeched that yes she was angry that I had “left her”.
I feel that my experiences are nowhere near as bad as many of the I have read here and she can have moments of being kind. But I find myself consumed with distress and mistrust of myself and my memories, actions, thoughts and character. I am wondering what I need to do about it.
Sending support and love to you all (and apologies for the very long post!)