February 2025 Well we took you to Stately Homes

[AttilaTheMeerkat]

A new thread indeed!.

I will have a look into it. I need someone to make sense of it. I know what and why he’s doing it I just wish I wasn’t ill so I could have the energy to do more. It’s scary being chronically unwell with 2 kids.

It's not about making sense of it. It's about giving you tools you can use to help you manage your response to it better, so that you can built behavioural habits that work for you instead of against you. The same applies to managing a chronic illness - there's lots of evidence that therapy can help someone develop skills to cope with chronic pain, for example. It's about focussing on what you can do/change, not what you can't.

Yeah it’s the crippling fatigue I really struggle with. I want NC, I don’t want to hear or see the thing that caused this. I can’t stop myself from reacting. I mean how can you face a man that repeatedly raped and abused you. He even gave my daughter pocket money to pass onto her half sister. So she gave it to her without me prior knowing saying my kind daddy gave you this. I don’t want stop her talking about her dad either, she obviously has a completely differently opinion of him. I once had a great support group but Covid put a stop to so many services.

Hi, I'm not sure if this is the right place for this or not but hoping maybe people will be able to advise because I feel like I'm losing my mind!

I've recently had no choice but to move back in with my parents. I left as soon as I turned 18 because things had just been bearable but when my marriage ended I had to move away and with the distance things had been better and my parents had promised me lots of support if I moved in with them and naively I believed that my mum in particular had changed. More fool me. I'm working hard on getting moved out as soon as I can but I'm waiting on my old house selling.

My issue is that my mum takes accountability for absolutely nothing she does. Everything is my fault. I'm apparently awful to her yet her behaviour has (to my mind) been unacceptable. I'm not allowed to use the bath in the house because she thinks I'm so fat ill break it (I'm a bit overweight but nothing that excessive). She goes through my bin and monitors what I eat. She undermines me constantly in front of my son. Continually infantilises me and questions and disapproves of every decision I make even when that means doubling back on advice she's previously given. Recently I decided to take ds on holiday as I had a bit of a windfall and realistically I won't be able to take him away again for quite some time and I've saved a lot towards my new house so I felt like I was in a position where I could afford it and felt the space would do everyone good - certainly it would do me good. She was so angry, looked at me like I was a bad smell when ds told her and then insisted she'd need to come with me and then got offended when I said no. Then said I probably wasn't capable of booking a holiday by myself. In the past she's used her spare key to get into my house thinking i wasn't home to snoop and used her position working in a bank to add herself onto my bank accounts. She's currently angry that I won't give her my money to save on my behalf and can't think why I wouldn't want to do that.

I've always tried to do the right thing, to never be too hard work, to never have to ask her for anything or rely on her for anything. I'm educated, I work hard in a good job, I'm a good parent to my child and I'm a decent person. But when she acts in these ways and i try to call her out on it it just goes in one of three ways, either she starts talking about how awful I am and uses that as a way to excuse her behaviour, she giggles and laughs and holds her hands and pouts like a child being told off or if she's really caught out and can't lie she cries suicidal ideation because she knows that shuts the convo down, takes to her bed and tells all her friends and her minister how awful I treat her. I dread to think about what they must think of me because in other settings she acts like this godly, polite, overly nice person. She repeatedly tells everyone that I make things up which she's been doing since I was a child because she was physically abusive and i think looking back she was scared I'd tell someone.

I just hate that she still has the power over me that she can suck the positivity and energy from me almost instantly with a cutting comment and a nasty look. But the worst part is when she starts to play victim my dad fully enables her and tells me off for being mean to her! I am never angry, never shout, never be disrespectful and I always try to choose my words and be firm but fair, I'm just trying to defend myself. And then I come away doubting myself and wondering if I am too harsh on her and if I am the problem. I feel awful because obviously they're letting me live with them and she constantly buys things for ds which is really nice and helpful but it just complicates it so much because I feel torn between being hurt and angry at her behaviour but then guilty for feeling that way because of how much they're helping me out and how good they are to ds. I know I need to move out as soon as possible but renting is not an option so I just need to find ways to survive this until I can get free and clear.

She's an evil mad bitch don't bother trying to unpick it. Can you get a short term rental until you get your house money? Are you working? Tap your Dad secretly for a loan for a rental deposit if necessary.

@Blueebell1984 Thats abuse, and it sounds serious enough for you to contact Women's Aid. Give them a call, or look at the forum on their website. They might be able to help you leave.

Yeh you've got to get out of there because of DS. He can't live with her if she physically abused you as a child, he's at risk. She's not good to him, he's the golden child and you're the scapegoat. GC get psychologically damaged too. She's sucking him in with the gifts. Your house could take a year or more to sell/ buy, by which time he's formed a relationship with her that he thinks is good and he's older so can maybe keep contact with her himself, which all means he's at continued risk of psychological harm. If you leave ASAP he'll forget about her and she wouldn't be part of his life, which would be the best thing for him. If it was just you there'd be practical workarounds to minimise her impact but not with a child. Even if you have to rent a room in a HMO or flatshare with a single friend, you've got to get out of there for his sake. He's watching you be treated like this and learning it's ok, when it isn't. Your mum is loving all the drama, she lured you there to abuse you both (because what she's doing to DS in making him witness her treatment of you is abuse and sooner or later she'll turn on him too).

Could you live in your house till it's sold?

Can't live in my house until its sold as ex is still there and I had to move ds away from him and would be too far to commute to my new job. I do think the house will sell quickly going by others on our street it's just getting an offer in and the paperwork done and dusted. I'm not near any friends etc only family so no option to stay elsewhere or Co-let. Couldn't ask my dad he'd probably tell her, he used to stick up for us a lot when we were kids but he also worked a lot so I don't think he realised just how bad it got when he was at work. At least he's now always there when ds is there and I keep us both out of the house until ds bedtime so there's very little overlap when we're all together so incidents that ds has actually seen have been very few, the atmosphere is the main part I don't like him witnessing as well as the emotional drain on me. She's on best behaviour when my dad is around usually and will only make nasty comments when we're alone so she can deny it and accuse me of lying.

Obviously I know it's a far less than ideal situation for ds and my plan is to reduce all contact significantly as soon as we get moved in somewhere. I just feel like I need to stick it out until I'm in a financially viable position to actually leave and be secure. Being able to buy is a big thing for me because rental costs plus childcare would be very difficult for me to manage comfortably. It will be the difference in ds having security and an inheritance so I really am trying to push through for that.

@Blueebell1984 You have chosen a situation that suits you and financially beneficial for you but it comes at a huge cost.
Of course your mother is enjoying you having come home tail between your legs, this is how she will see it and that you are unable to cope and cant support yourself or your child. You have trapped yourself and she knows she can be as horrible as she likes and you have no power but to accept it. You are not an adult of equal standing in her house, you are her scapegoat.
It will not get better.

I don't even think about Easter but it's like my system let's me know there are some holidays people spend with family and I'm not part of any of it. I'm ruminating about why I was chosen as a scapegoat whilst doubting that I ever was the scapegoat and that I'm probably just exaggerating.

I'm angry at my parents and especially my mother for how I was treated. It means I have spent a life in isolation and loneliness and never feel I belong. I have a couple of close friends, but I'm nobody's number one. They have a family and I dont.

I'm glad I'm not the golden child because it means I could escape. But do golden children even know that something is off. Do they ever have these brutal realisations of a lost childhood, that they were robbed of their authentic self and their autonomy. I often wonder what they know. If they know anything at all. And if they don't, how come? I can't imagine they dont. I knew something was off as a child. How could grown adults not have moments of clarity and wonder?

Oh @Twatalert, loneliness is hard. Sending you virtual chocolate.

I wonder similar stuff, how do people go through life with such dysfunctional behaviour? Do they not realise how crazy they are acting?
Are they deliberately manipulating people or do they actually think they are right in what they are doing?

@tinaabbot I don't understand how some scapegoats end up so ill with autoimmune disease, eating disorder, insomnia, panic attacks and depression, usually several of those, and how their origin family and the golden children don't seem to have these obvious struggles.

My health has improved greatly since I left and processed some of my trauma. For the first time I can just sleep like a normal person and feel refreshed in the morning for example. I don't understand how these people live. How do they not get ill staying in this environment.

That's such an interesting question!

We do actually get really ill, and have lifelong weaknesses. And they don't! And they live forever.

Is it pure self interest? If they continuously put themselves first then they are getting the best of everything.

Also any stress or danger they take a huge step backwards and throw someone else under the bus to save themselves.

Then they see us as weak for not living as they do. Actually it takes enormous strength to buck the trend and refuse to go along with their mad world.

They're parasites, feeding off their children.

Their internal worlds must be a dark disgusting mess of being terrified of not measuring up to whatever weirdness is in their peculiar minds.

Fucking cockroaches.

Ha! But don't they say cockroaches will survive a nuclear war?

I think the golden child spends their life actively working to please the narc parent.

The difference between the GC and the SG is that the GC role means they get stuff right. The SG can never get anything right, even when they do exactly what the narc has told them to do. My father was an expert at this. He could find fault in absolutely everything. And if you did exactly what he said he wanted, he would turn around and say that he was only testing you and he couldn't believe you fell for it, or deny having ever said he wanted it and say you were a liar. Sometimes he would say at first that you'd got it right, and then two days later be laughing in your face at how stupid you were to think that was the right thing to do. It was crazy making.

The stress of never, ever being able to get it right is what drives the hypervigilance, keeps us stuck in permanent fight or flight, exhausts our immune systems and makes us chronically ill. It makes us into people pleasers. And because we're trained into operating this way, we become codependent, and end up in other relationships that work the same way.

But with the GC, if they are similar to the narc that what the narc wants is a comfortable thing for them to want too, they can function. That said, I think a lot of GC do fall apart at some stage. Look at all the professional athletes bullied by narc parents who had grand plans for them who have problems with drugs and alcohol and who struggle to cope.

I struggle with loneliness too. You're not alone. x.

The silver lining is that thank fuck did I never get married because I would likely have chosen a narcissist because of how messed up I was. In my 20 I wouldn't have recognised a good person if it slapped me in the face. So thank god I don't have to get divorced now and so on.

That's a very good point that GC get stuff right. They still abandon themselves but maybe their nervous system isn't on high alert all the time. So that's how they sleep.

I've been married a couple of times and I just can't do it. It's not for me, I gave myself a product recall.

I'm much much much happier single but eternally grateful that I managed to get a couple of kids out of the marriages.

Do you feel lonely or do you feel ashamed about being alone? My kids and dog are enough for me I'm very very self contained.

My ex sister is a former gc and honestly it was laughable to watch. She'd literally sprint round to Mum and Dads to tell on me. It was so desperately important to grass and be the goody and me the baddie. This carried on right until their death, in her 50s. I'd be confronted with the 'crime' and say 'so fucking what, you know i left home 30 years ago right?' Pathetic.

She must be so lost with no mummy and daddy to preen for and no one to grass on.

I actually feel lonely. I crave connection now that I know what it's like to feel safe with some people. I just don't know where they are and I haven't done much to change that. It's beautiful. I know I probably romanticise it. I want good conversation and authenticity. Not necessarily a relationship as I am straight and think the very vast majority of men are mysogynist even if just subconsciously and won't have any of this. I see it at work all the time and it's just sickening. I have lost faith in men tbh. I'd rather live with my cats who happen to be boys lol and do my own thing.

I was one of those 'i don't need anyone people' and I don't, but I do need connection. Humans need connection. And now that I know how to regulate, sleep etc life alone is all of a sudden very boring and a bit sad too.

Did you say that you're autistic? I may be mixing you up with someone else.

I think it's hard to make a friendship from a standing start, it's a lot to hope for from a stranger.

Think about what interests you chess, board games, indoor climbing walls, knit and natter, gardening club.

Hi, all, I jump in and out of this thread. I’m struggling today. I went no contact with my abusive narcissist mother at Christmas time. I’m in my 30’s and she has tore my whole life apart and she has spoiled every single happy occasion. Over Easter she dropped in a bag of gifts and Easter eggs for my children and a birthday card (3 weeks late) for my daughter. I found this really upsetting as I hate knowing she can show up to my door and that she thinks it’s ok to drop in and only try and have a relationship with my young children. I sent her an email saying she is not welcome in my house, to stop buying gifts and to stop contacting me. This is the first communication since I told her to leave me alone at Christmas. I have her blocked on lots of social media and text, email was the last avenue in. She has my email but never tried that one. Naturally this is not a nice message for her to receive but I can’t live my life like this, in fear of her showing up and at main events like Christmas birthdays and Easter. My brother who is also a narcissist and I am no contact with for 3 years sent me a 1 word text, “evil”. I’m sad but clear this is still the right way forward for me and best for my mental health and my family.

I am rattled all the same. Easter and she is still upsetting me on a special occasion and I don’t even talk to her.
They're malignant.

I understand, of course. The evil text from your evil brother saying that you're evil confirms that she received and understood your email. This is good news.

Block both of them now on every single avenue possible. If you're on sm, come off it, create a fortress.

Can you move house? I did, I'm so so much healthier and happier.

We are in the market for a new house so this just creates a greater sense of urgency to find something. I do think that would be quite freeing.

If they think I’m evil for asserting my boundaries I must be the total opposite. I’m a better mother and wife since I went no contact as they don’t hurt me anymore. This is just such a set back. I had the email sent before I even thought twice, it just felt like, right I need to actually tell her explicitly to stay away and stop buying stuff for my children because I’m not giving it to them.

I said explicitly on this email that she will not abuse me infront of my children any more. I mean it too.