END OF A NARCISSISTIC MOTHER´S FANTASY!

HAVING LIVED THE LIFE THAT MY MOTHER PLANNED FOR HER, MY ELDER SISTER BEGAN HER JOURNEY BACK TO REAL EMBODIMENT!! POST NO.37/N  (A 15 minute read)

Two weeks into the New Year 2010 I spoke with my elder sister and was horrified to find out that she had just been diagnosed with a rampant breast cancer and was about to undergo a mastectomy, followed by a series of chemotherapy treatments and lastly, radiotherapy!!!

My head was reeling as she slowly, calmly explained all of this to me in clinical terms. She had celebrated her graduation from university in the summer of 2009 and was ecstatic. At last she was getting her life back on track and yet it is only now, in these last few months that I understand truly what that moment meant for her.

She had wanted to be a nurse as a child; YES! She did say that many, many times and she was very good at caring for others, that actually came naturally to her then as I, her sister can testify. But when we went to the doctor´s surgery for all of our vaccines, she would invariably swoon and even faint on seeing a syringe!!!

If you know a NARCISSIST parent yourself, then you will know how they pick up on any sign of your vulnerability and this was where my mother made such a lasting impact on my elder sister´s happiness, or rather, lack of happiness. 

"You´ll NEVER be a nurse! You CAN´T stand a drop of blood! You FAINT at the sight of a needle! You CAN´T be a nurse!" All negatives as always from a NARCISSIST. An absolute DENIAL of you and your desires and visions of yourself. This is what prevents the healthy growth of an individual child!

It is the "You CAN´T do, you WON´T be able to do, you will NEVER get", that meets every aspiration that you ever have for yourself. Your NARCISSIST parent is in solid DENIAL of your attempts to develop your own personality and follow up on your aspirations.

They will not allow you to have a SEPARATE mind to them. You say, "I would like to try this". And your answer will be a direct DENIAL of your free thinking mind, "You WON´T like that!" How can they know if you will or WON´T like that, given that you have never tried? No, the problem here is that "THEY WON´T" like that!"

Or maybe "THEY WOULD" like that but were not able to have for exactly the same reasons and out of pure vengeance, will now meter out the same treatment of you. Every single attempt at INDIVIDUATION, that is to say every self-thought notion, idea or desire of your´s, would be systematically met with this NARCISSISTIC wall of opposition.

I can now see very clearly how my mother tried to shape my elder sister and convert her into the person that she herself saw herself as being, had she not been blocked and DENIED her own INDIVIDUATION from her NARCISSISTIC mother. Once more, I am sure you will be asking, "Why do they have to repeat the same scenarios?"

It goes like this, doesn´t it? Having been DENIED the emotional support, parental guidance and financial assistence to become the INDIVIDUAL person that they aspired to be, now as a parent themselves, they see their first-born child (in particular), as an empty vehicle that they can take control of.

NARCISSISTIC COLONIZATION

It is very disturbing to acknowledge that a person can be so CALCULATING and so MANIPULATIVE of innocent children but we must not forget that these sufferers of NARCISSISTIC PERSONALITY DISORDER, are very sick people who have not been able to SEPARATE or INDIVIDUATE from a NARCISSISTIC parent.

By their own EVALUATION, they have fallen far short of being the image of themselves that they had aspired to become. That was the fault of the parent fair and square. They know that but for some reason they are unable to blame that parent for their dominatory control of their psyche. 

They have become so familiar with cycles that accompany life with a NARCISSISTIC person, that they sit in DENIAL of those very painful and turbulent years spent with that abusive parent. They cover up and just cut off from them. If any child is estranged from their parent/s, you want to ask why.

But of course, as I have explained before, the first-born is seen by the NARCISSISTIC parent as an opportunity to live through that child. By making that child the very vision of the person that they had wanted to see themselves as, they can have access to the life that they were never able to have!

It is almost as a REINCARNATION for them, a re-birth, another opportunity to grow and develop as an INDIVIDUAL person. They can see that the new-born child is as an empty vessel in its early months. It doesn´t answer you back and you can say what you want to it!

From day one, you chose the name that your child would have to bear every day of its life. You chose where that child was born and where it would call home. You chose which nursery school they went to. Just as you chose their primary and secondary schools.

Absolutely normal things for parents to do. But maybe it is as we become more aware of the wider world around us, that as INDIVIDUAL people, we begin to form our own shape and mind. The day to day environment at school could not have been more different to your home environment.

Primary school was and hopefully still is, a place where all young children can begin to truly INDIVIDUATE from their parents and not be expected to be absolute replicas of their parents, as some would have their children be. It is typically the successful INDIVIDUALS who want their child to be a REFLECTION of themselves!!

But the female parent who has failed at INDIVIDUATION does not want their child to REFLECT them at all. NO. The failed INDIVIDUAL wants to create a child who can be written up and well talked of, whose success will REFLECT back on to them and they will receive PRAISE and APPROVAL for their great parenting!!!!

That is their underlying goal; to receive APPRAISAL! At the same time they are wishing to exact vengeance on their NARCISSIST parent who they hold RESPONSIBLE and ACCOUNTABLE for their lack of SEPARATION and INDIVIDUATION. 

"I´ll show you that I can live a better life than you. I will show you how to be a good mother. My children WON´T be held back, I will marry a man who can provide them with opportunities to grow and become the INDIVIDUAL people that they NEED to be!" That was the base theory of the crippled child living in an adult body, in an adult life!

So, in reality, my mother was trying to show her mother that she was a better mother and that she was able to provide us, her children, with a much better quality of life than her FAILED mother had been able to offer her and her siblings. And of course, she would be happy too!!!

My elder sister´s life up unto this point in time, had all been as a consequence of my mother´s DRIVING of my sister´s COGNITIVE RESONANCE and the notions embedded in her mind as a child. "You CANNOT FAIL! You MUST INDIVIDUATE! You MUST SEPARATE from me in order to be your own person!"

Maybe the intentions were good, in part at least, but if every self-thought idea and desire was absolutely ridiculed and decimated, how good were those intentions? This shows so clearly that the NARCISSISTIC parent is not CONSIDERING the child´s own wishes at all. The child MUST want to be the image of the parent´s wishful thinking.

As such, there is no tangible example of this INDIVIDUAL person that your parent is trying to turn you into. They are trying to construct the them that they wanted to be. Or at least, the them that they THOUGHT they wanted to be. 

Because quite logically, we all want many things at many times but how often do we find that once we have tried something, we no longer NEED to try/have/do that same thing again. Wishful thinking sadly, is built around perfect ideals. Wishing thinking comes in 2D; doesn´t it? What you CAN´T do with wishful thinking; is FEEL it?  

I WAS ALWAYS IN ADMIRATION OF MY ELDER SISTER! Photo by M.D. Duran on Unsplash.

YOU THINK YOU´RE YOUR OWN DRIVER UNTIL YOU REALIZE THAT YOU HAVE BEEN BUT THE CO-PILOT OF YOUR LIFE!

Maybe it is because I can see now myself how this male NARCISSIST that I live with, has usurped the DRIVING seat of MY vehicle (my body) and pushed me into the CO-PILOT´S seat, that I can see a direct REFLECTION of my elder sister´s life. I have had no control over my own destiny since he took over.

My sister was waking up to the reality of her unhappiness. The decades were passing and our society had changed much. Age is what it is and retrospect is such a useful, yet painful commodity. Is it not when our own unhappiness becomes so overwhelming that we recognize that we don´t even really want to be alive anymore?

Isn´t that the point where we seriously begin to look at where our unhappiness is coming from. My sister knew that on the professional level she was very unhappy. Her job had changed so much as to be barely recognizable as the same. She was hating work in London now. 

She re-started her FAILED plans to live in Australia. She made the bold decision to sell her property in London and return closer to our former home and be nearer to the family. She enrolled in sixth form again to take the required A levels for university entry.

At 42 years of age, she signed up for her nursing degree and was over the moon. This was what she had always wanted to do. She had wanted to nurture the caring part of her own personality and not be SELFISH and SELF-CENTRED as our mother trained her to be.

I was so proud of her achievements but she went to her presentation ceremony by herself. I of course, was unable to go and that saddened me because I knew that my mother´s FURY at my sister´s INDIVIDUATION would prevent her from going and my younger sister would not FEEL the NEED either!

As you might well expect, she went straight into the job of her choice on qualifying and was FEELING so very positive about her future. You can see how SELF-CENTERED she really was, can´t you? Even as I was sharing all of her successes and boosting her morale, she was in complete DENIAL of me and her son´s situation!

The local district nurse was my own elder sister and she really was enjoying her work. How sad that her NEED to care for others could only be expressed with others unreated to her. But how much of this was VENGEANCE and how much of it was for personal desire?

"I´ll show you that I can be a nurse. I´ll show you what it is to have the courage to change up your life if you are unhappy. I´ll show you what it is to be an INDEPENDENT woman living her own life!" If she had hoped for any APPROVAL or APPRAISAL from our mother, she was wishful thinking.

It truly hurt her that no APPRAISAL ever came and I could understand that so well. "You of course, know what I FEEL, don´t you? She has never given you any APPRAISAL either, has she?" "No sister, she hasn´t! The difference between you and me though, is that I stopped waiting for that to happen by the time I was eight, you are still waiting for her to change!"

My elder sister was a long-term victim of NARCISSISTIC ABUSE just as I have been and was guilty of NARCISSISTICALLY ABUSING me her sister, our younger sister, our mother and her son. TRAUMA BONDING being what it is, she knew that I was the only person who knew her REAL and FALSE SELVES and accepted both of them.

Just as I have my mother and my younger sister and am now doing with my partner. They are sick people who haven´t been able to live beyond their sickness. I have always looked beyond my sickness and tried to find health and meaning beyond the confines of my little life. Thankfully I met my WODAABE ladies down in Niger!!!

I wrote in my first published book ON THE OUTSIDE LOOKING IN in great length and depth about my meeting and consequent travelling with a group of Wodaabe ladies and their children. I´ll give you this link to a post published on 19th January 2023, where I remember these precious times. GETTING ETHICAL AND GOING ETHNIC DOWN IN NIGER

Tragically my elder sister died in the October and never did I FEEL that I NEEDED my partner more than I did at that time. Although he didn´t show it, he was ecstatic inside. At last the greatest threat to his total domination of me had been permanently removed. Just one more now (my nephew) and he would have me all to himself!!!!!

Next post I will pick up this sad story of mine as we arrive back in Spain with another era of life terminated and now truly terrified of my future. Thank you all for joining me again, do please come back for more. And I would love to hear from you!