Narcissistic grandmother - how to deal with her

[SuperBeagle]

Hi everyone,

I'm quite sure my grandmother is a narcissist. Have long suspected it, and tend to have my suspicions confirmed around every 6 months when she blows up about something. We've just had another falling out, and afterwards I received two lengthy emails effectively telling me that I'd be nothing/nowhere without her generosity and support.

1. She never gives anything without conditions
2. If you ever do anything that doesn't seem to "adhere to her script", she melts down and lashes out
3. She will never, ever apologise
4. She will go months without speaking to you if you fall out; until you choose to apologise and make the effort to get back into her life
5. She's a martyr: constantly talks about how other people tell her she's a wonderful person, wonderful grandmother, the best at this and that
6. Only talks about herself in conversations, and relates everything you say back to her
7. Has you constantly feeling like you're walking on eggshells around her
8. Is openly judgemental and very harsh in her criticisms of people both physically/mentally etc.
9. Plays her grandchildren off against one another and constantly compares them negatively with another grandchild

Now, she has burnt her bridges with 2/3 of her children, and the third has only been in her life for the last 12 months after not speaking to her for around 10 years. Of her 3 granddaughters, she's now only speaking to one. She fell out with granddaughter 2 (aged 35) around 8 months ago, and now she's fallen out with me.

I just don't know how to deal with this anymore. I KNOW if we ever repair our relationship that it will blow up again sometime within the next 12 months, and I'll be left angry and upset by whatever nasty thing she says next. But I'm not sure how you can cut ties completely. Aside from my mum and my sister, I have no other family (lots of mental illness in the family, rendering it impossible to be in contact with many of them - and rifts that have been going on for nearly 20 years now). I know it's an unnecessary stress in my life, but it's so difficult.

Any advice on what to do, or how to cut contact?

My mother is a narcissist everything you have written is the same with her.
My sister cut contact with her over 20 years ago and although I speak to my mother every few weeks on the phone I can go about 2 years between visits.
You will never get a narcissist to see themselves for who they are, you either accept it or go low or no contact.

Is someone like this in your life of any real value? Friends can be far more positive than a destructive relative.
How much of the mental health issues are caused by this person's actions?

I'd get out and get any help you need for yourself.

Check out outofthefog.net

They outline strategies for dealing with difficult personality types like this. It's quite a revelation. You've figured out there's no changing her, so all you can do is set clear boundaries and police them with consequences, or limit contact. There's a strategy called 'medium chill' that I've found helpful, for when 'no contact' is too difficult.

It is sad when you realise that you realistically have to give up on having a caring, satisfying relationship with a family member, in order to protect yourself. If someone's primary motivation is control and self-interest, they are never going to be able to give you respect and love. You are better off finding some of the lovely people in this world who can and will.

She doesn't add any value. Even when she's being nice to you and you're her "favourite", you are acutely aware that the peace will be shattered sometime soon.

I suspect that my grandfather had a cluster b personality disorder, but I didn't know him well enough to ever confirm that. My father moved 9 hours away from them at the first opportunity. I believe that my grandmother did the same things to her children that she now does to us, and that was compounded by the grandfather's behaviour.

One aunt has had long-term mental illness which means no one in the family is in contact with her. She has never been formally diagnosed (as she won't acknowledge that she's got a "problem"), but she doesn't display the narc traits.

The other aunt, I'm convinced, is a psychopath. I consciously have nothing to do with her, and even her own daughters - my cousins - have nothing to do with her now. She displays the narc traits of her mother, but she's a far more vindictive, cunning and dangerous person. Of course she and her mother don't get along as they are one and the same. There's a long and complicated backstory as to why I went NC with this aunt, but I never intend to have anything to do with her again if I can help it.

So it begs the question of where the mental illnesses began. By all accounts, my great grandparents were wonderful, kind and incredibly generous people. Both of my great uncles were the same. I often think that it was a case of two unstable, horrible people (grandmother and grandfather) unfortunately meeting and marrying. Who knows how much of this could've been avoided if they'd married other people?

Thanks skittles I'll check that out.

I don't think this has to be hard. If you are currently in contact you start detaching emotionally, you wait for the next blow up then you never bother making any effort to fix things and avoid any hoovering she tries.

Give her the number for silverline and tell her to crack on. She will end up one of those lonely old women who has no family around her because she has pushed them all away.
The downside of that is, that she may not be conscious of her behaviour and needs therapy.

It can be really difficult to cut ties with an elderly family member. Perhaps you can try to manage the relationship on your terms, monthly visit, weekly phone call. I wouldn't accept help, financial or other if it is not given freely.

I am going through a fall out st the moment with my mother who is a narcissist. All you described is my mother to a T. I have no advice sadly as it's an impossible task dealing with a narcissist however you have my sincere empathy and I wish I could offer advice xxx

My grandmother is awful. She was horrible to me as a child and only as an adult did I realise the emotional issues she caused me.

I feel occasional guilt about not having a close relationship with and frankly not caring much about her but then I remember what she is like. I'll be civil at family gatherings etc but I put up my shutters years ago and they are never coming back down. It's been very freeing and I can highly recommend detaching until you have only a superficial formal relationship with her, if that.

Thanks for sharing your experiences, everyone. Sad that it seems to be such a common thing!

I do feel pangs of guilt and wonder if it's just me, but I know it's not. I know she's the common denominator in all of her failed relationships. And I know she's likely to live another 10 years, so I don't want to subject myself or my children to her behaviour which is deteriorating as time goes on for however many more years. It's not worth the stress.

I suspect the next time I'll see/speak to her, if she doesn't contact me before then (and she probably won't) is at my nephew's 1st birthday in September. I'll be civil, but will avoid engaging in any lengthy conversation with her. The outofthefog site was very useful. I need to work on establishing my boundaries for when I have to deal with her.

Getting into the blame game is utterly futile where a narcissist is concerned, even if it is only in your own head.

I find reminding myself that it is choices rather than blame that's what is important is helpful.

A person with narc tendencies will always want to bring you back to the blame game because it is so subjective and therefore they can always win by imposing their view as dominant.

You have choices, your grandmother has choices. There are consequences to choices so for example with the martyrdom she has choices regarding what she does, you have a choice regarding how you respond to her attempts to martyr herself.

Even on the occasions where you have been drawn in and made choices which negatively affect you and feed her toxic behaviour/attitudes it helps you regain control to think of things in terms of choices (and consequences), rather than blame (and inevitably the deservingness of the narc to something they want).

I have a narc grandma. I love her as a family member, I can even quite like her and enjoy her company on occasion but you always have to keep in the back of your mind that she is a horrendous person and that you need to be sure you can deal with her and remain in control if you are going to have contact.

Very valuable perspective Offred I'm going to try to employ that mindset.

The last part of your message really resonates with me. When my grandmother is being nice, she's genuinely a fun person to be around. But ultimately, it always comes crashing down and I am forced to bear the brunt of the decades worth of viciousness she's clearly been stewing over even in her nice moments.

It has now been a week since we actually spoke. I have ignored the emails, and I'm sure that my lack of effort to contact her will be surprising to her. I am curious to see if and when she'll contact me, as I have always been the one to make the effort in the past. We have an annual "family get together" in October, and she's the one who organises it, so I do wonder if we'll be contacted about that no loss if we aren't

Yeah, it's not a 'family get together' at all really is it? It will be your grandma holding court. I'm quite fortunate in that my grandma never bothered with having a hold over my family as my mum moved away (only an hour away) and it was taken as a slight. She's never taken a real interest in us, we're not part of the holding court she does, though my mum has been.

My mum said my approach of remembering that she is a horrendous person, and that that's as ok to know in your heart as the love you have for her, has been helpful to her. I've also been given instructions that if my dad dies first I need to keep her away from her mum.