snowden1 - your parent's response to you questioning their lateness just about sums up these martyr type parents doesn't it? It is like by virtue of the fact that they gave birth to us (in my case they didn't but hey) they are wonderful parents. I really think these narcissistic, abusive, damaged freaks have no concept of the idea that you have to work at relationships and earn respect and love.
SoLonely - I am sorry to hear about the difficulties with your dh. He is going to have to adapt to the new you, accept your boundaries and support you. I must say I was a little anxious when you said he had been violent in the past and unsupportive in some of his comments about your recovery. That is not right whatever you have been through together. I am glad to hear you are urging him to be more considerate and change his ways. The question is can he? Will he? How damaged has he been by his childhood? I am not surprised others positive comments about their dh have triggered you.
Your holiday sounds like a big step. I too find I feel nervous at the thought of travelling and I worry I am becoming a bit too attached to staying at home or doing more local holidays. I wonder why that is when I always wanted to travel? Travelling with kids can make any parents anxious so don't put too much pressure on yourself. It is an adventure so take it one step at a time rather than getting overwhelmed with the whole picture.
Does anyone have pictures of their parents as young people? Tonight I found pictures of my grandmother on her wedding day to my grandfather. She was a beautiful woman but what struck me was her smile, there is something wrong about it. She seems to bear her teeth very slightly and her eyes don't show the emotion her smile is trying to. I can't really put my finger on it and maybe I am looking for too much in a snippet of time? Another photograph shows me on her knee as a one year old. We are at the forefront of the photo and this time she really is bearing her teeth in an almost snarling smile. My mother (her daughter) is in the background, blurred and insignificant. My grandmother looks full of health, youth and vitality but not in any genuine way. It is like the emotions of the time don't line her face with worry in the normal way. It is strange and uncanny.
When I saw her recently it was the strangest sight, to see an obviously broken woman but no outward signs of this. Lines and wrinkles did not decorate her face in the normal way a normal human life of happiness, worry, sadness and joy would be painted on the face of an elderly woman. I honestly thought that I could just see a mask that had been uncreased and uncracked by the damaged facade that lay just beneath. Yet now and then I caught a glimpse of the real damaged woman, probably a child ruined by abuse and forced to live this false and narcissistic life. I would catch it as I drove to pick her up from her hotel, before she had realised I was there and she looked like a twisted, strange and ugly woman standing there with yellow hair and cold blue eyes.
I really believe that narcissism underpins these toxic parents and I am fascinated by how it creates these almost ghoulish humans or half humans. And you catch snippets of it now and then in photographs or the strange things they say. There is a small part of me that feels sorry for them, for the small child they once were humiliated, beaten and unloved in all probability.
Yet I cannot forgive completely as this thread is testimont to the fact that a damaged childhood can be overcome and the pattern not repeated. My grandmother always seemed like the nicer of my two parents but she was quieter, colder and most certainly an abuser too. I can see it now oh so clearly and it makes me desperately sad for my birth mother who was mentally ill and I cannot help but wonder if this is in part to do with having my grandmother as a mother. I see now that my adoptive father groomed me with love and adoration initially and my grandmother was jealous and hated me because of this. But it was not real love and adoration but more like a seduction, I was seduced into thinking I was the apple of his eye if I just mirrored the narcissistic image he was obsessed by. When I tried to go my own way the abuse started and then she sat back and did nothing and even partook in it herself on occasion.
I still have a lot of hatred and anger towards her and this made her visit difficult but I also saw, really saw, who she really is and that was strangely comforting. I really am believing it wasn't me and it wasn't in my head.