Shaken Reality
Making the realisation about a parent’s narcissistic personality disorder is a strange thing.
Some of it is a shock and some of it is a relief.
It was NEVER you, despite how much you were told it was.
During the healing process you make another realisation:
The things you were told weren’t true.
The ground starts to crack beneath your feet.
About you
If you were the scapegoat, the narcissist would have projected their faults and flaws onto you.
So, whatever they accused you of doing or being was what THEY were.
They never ‘saw’ you, the real you.
Instead, they saw a target for their abuse. They saw someone that it felt good to them to make feel bad.
Whatever they accused you of, being for example:
selfish
stupid
Never finding someone to love you
A failure
About your appearance, being fat, too skinny, too tall, too short, etc etc
These are all the ways that they feel about themselves.
A part of you is validated.
You realise that there was a small and often quiet part of you that knew that there was something ‘off’ with them.
You didn’t really feel that way about yourself, and that was what hurt.
This is exactly what the narcissist enjoyed, witnessing your hurt. The more sensitive to them and their hurtful comments, the more of a sick kick they got from it.
You are none of the things you were accused of. In fact, I would go so far as to say that you are probably the opposite of those things.
It takes a while to really see how bad they’ve made you feel about yourself.
The child brought up in this toxic environment trusts their parent, and desperately wants to earn their love and approval.
The child is drawn to their narcissistic parent, seeking love. This is the trauma bond, relying on someone who uses your need for love to abuse you.
I don’t know how to make it clearer- they lied about what you are.
And the more you believed them the more it holds you back.
It’s something massive to process, not only the lies, but the sabotage. And how you were betrayed by those supposed to love you.
Everyone who you interact with sees you through their own lens of perception.
How they feel about you, is up to them. And it’s not your job to make them feel differently about you.
With a narcissist, they just see a target for their abuse. Someone sensitive, looking for their love and approval, someone that they can enjoy knocking down. And it doesn’t matter what you do, it will NEVER be good enough for them.
The most important thing is how you feel about yourself.
Sometimes it takes a while to readjust to trusting yourself and processing the lies you’ve been told.
Work through it, because it’s worth the effort.
About other people
Narcissists triangulate, they control communication between their family members or friends.
It gives them the power and control they need, because they can manipulate how other people feel about each other.
They can cause greater divides between siblings and further drive the wedge between other family members.
When they triangulate they will tell stories about other people.
These stories will be twisted to serve their agenda or outright lies.
The terrible stories about other people might actually be the actions of the narcissist themselves.
A narcissist will have started a smear campaign about their children since birth.
They will tell other people what a difficult child you are, how badly behaved and how selfish. And year after year they will embellish and exaggerate their lies about you.
The narcissist’s fear is that you will speak out about their abuse. So, they discredit you in advance, and over a lifetime so that you won’t be believed.
They divide and conquer.
Whilst the family are deeply involved in the contrived drama of the narcissist they don’t see the true source. They also don’t see the pleasure the narcissist takes from knowing that they can manipulate their family members so easily, it makes the narcissist feel superior.
The family turned on each other, is an excellent source of attention and energy for the narcissist.
All the time the narcissist is controlling it all, reigning over their family and relishing the drama and hurt they’ve cause.
This is how they control their families.
Everything you’ve been told by the narcissist has been to serve their agenda.
They want their target isolated, alone, afraid, reliant on them, lacking in self-confidence, doubting themself and unsupported.
If their target had the support of their siblings, other parent, or other family members then they could all unite against the narcissist.
This is the narcissist’s fear and they do all they can to prevent it.
Every story the narcissist told you about your family members is a lie.
Everything that you thought you knew, and have known for years if not decades, was built on lie after lie after lie.
The greater the lies told, the greater fear the narcissist had of you ever knowing the truth.
If you were told that other family members were terrible people, who lied and stole and cheated, the chances are that this is not true. In fact, the opposite is true.
These people probably saw through the narcissist and took measures to protect themselves.
The stories can be also to make you feel sorry for the narcissist.
Whatever you are told by the narcissist the chances are that the awful things they accuse other people of, is what THEY did to them.
It can be a great shock to realise this.
Everything that you thought you knew, is on shaky ground.
How you deal with it depends on you and the circumstances with family members.
If you have enough experience of the family member to believe that they are a good thing for you then take some tentative steps to reach out.
Take it slowly, don’t confide about your parent too soon.
Let the relationship grow and build trust.
Don’t forget though, that the chances are the narcissist also lied and smeared you to these family members too.
If you don’t value the relationship or don’t think that the family member is a good thing for you, then be willing to let them go.
The most important thing is the relationship that you had with them. Not what you were told about them.
If you need support during this difficult time, when you feel your world has been turned upside down, then book a POWER hour with me.
I’ll help you find your feet again.
If you have any questions please drop me a comment or email me at clarecomebackbrighter@gmail.com.
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You are not alone, Clare x
Originally published at https://comebackbrighter.com on July 27, 2021.