DECLUTTERING MY TODAY FROM THE REMNANTS OF YESTERYEAR! WHAT REMAINS? POST NO.29/N (A 10 minute read)
REELING!!!!! That is how I keep FEELING recently. Isn´t that to be expected though, now that I am going round and round, counter-NARCISSIST, trying to UNRAVEL myself from my NARCISSIST master´s lair. Yes, I get dizzy! Yes, I FEEL like I keep losing my sense of direction!
Yes, I FEEL like I am spinning much of the time but what I can also FEEL is that I am breathing much easier too! I have to take breaks every now and then, just to steady myself for a while before I push on for another concerted stretch of UNRAVELLING/DISENTANGLING myself from the male NARCISSIST´S bonds, which are invisible to the eye but have kept me absolutely chained down for almost three decades!
I ran out of space in the last post but strangely enough, last summer I had to collect six large boxes of my nephew´s things which I had left in storage. The woman who had provided me with that facility was wanting to move on and so requested that I came and collected my stuff. Fair enough!
Why was that all in storage you may ask? We had moved into a much smaller apartment and have very limited space for storage of anything that is not in daily/regular use. Plus, these are all my nephew´s bits and pieces and I wanted them kept safely out of the NARCISSIST´S way.
Dreading all the back lash that I FELT would be automatically coming my way, I was driven to the said location by the NARCISSIST and the boxes were loaded into the car. All seemed to be going without any nastiness; we weren´t home yet! Nothing to do with him being nice of course. Oh, NO! He had been hissing and spitting regularly about two mats of HIS that were missing.
I knew where they were and had deliberately not brought them into the home. I did not want them in the home. They do not go with the colour scheme of the lounge. But there was no space for these very large boxes indoors and so, they were placed on the back terrace and I covered them well with plastic sheeting.
Not before I had taken out my nephew´s soft toys. My own toy lion "LEO" was in one of the boxes too. Out came these sweet faces from my past and my nephew´s past. I FELT such joy and sadness mixed together as I remembered my nephew´s love for these soft toys and all that had been assosciated with them.
The two said mats were taken out with glee and straight away, went down on the floor in the lounge. The NARCISSIST was happy. He had some of HIS possessions out of HIS sight and he would not rest until they were back in his possession.
Those cuddly toys are all now sat beside me as I type and actually, they have helped me greatly. They have helped me to see my own "Little Girlness" and why they still provide me with so much comfort. I talk to them, I hold them, I cuddle them and I kiss them. They allow me to FEEL how it is to give love again. They are a direct connection with my nephew and that as I said in the previous post, was the only thing that was ever genuine throughout that first series of this CRAZY show.
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| WE ALL NEED SOMEONE TO CUDDLE! |
What I have lacked during this whole relationship has been a sense of continuity. Whilst my nephew was in my daily life, he was growing and advancing and that allowed me to share in his continuity. I know that I was trying to create for him the ability to build continuity through our own relationship which was growing year on year.
That is what has not happened with the male NARCISSIST partner. Not at all! We are INTIMATES who have FAMILIARITY with each other but we have no genuine INTIMACY at all. He keeps his thoughts and FEELINGS secret from me and I keep all things of prime importance to me, secret from him.
No trust at all. I trusted him initially but quickly saw that it was not altogether wise to share much of depth and meaning with him. He had an innate habit of backfiring when I talked of deep meaningful things. He has used my passions and weaknesses to torture me with. Using all that he knew about the inner me, he has tried systematically to convince me that I was a completely UNWORTHY human being. And succeeded!
I am listening in to the inner thoughts of a self-confessed NARCISSIST who has been in therapy for some six years now. It really is horrifying to hear the truth from a NARCISSIST and so painful too but if we do not wake up to our reality, we will miss the chance of knowing happiness altogether. His name is Lee Hammock and in this post he explains why you don´t ought to share much with the NARCISSIST. WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU SHARE GOOD OR BAD NEWS WITH THE NARCISSIST!
ALL GREAT RELATIONSHIPS ARE BUILT AROUND TRUST!
The male NARCISSIST never even considered trusting me, not for one moment and still to this very day, he confides nothing that is of importance to me, to me. I can see why he didn´t want me to know of his disastrous financial dilemma but why did he have that dilemma in the first instance?
His wife and her family had trusted him and supplied him with the necessary finances to set up a home and business. But he obviously broke their bonds of trust and eventually they withdrew their financial support from him.
The day that his wife saw him for what he really was/is, she wanted him out of her life. It was not her fault that he had these debts, oh, NO! But quite likely the designer clothes, the new car, the meals in restaurants and bars at all hours, plus being a smoker, well, if the business wasn´t being run efficiently, there would not be any money for those extravagances.
HE put himself before everything else then just as he does now. All of his money, time and effort has been invested into his FALSE-SELF´S image and reputation. That is all that matters to him, I can see it so clearly now. His main RESPONSIBILITY as he sees things, is to his FALSE-SELF´S needs. That FALSE-SELF must be fed and nurtured and look the part when out of the home!
His wife suffered dismally no doubt as she was married to him and as such, had her name permanently tied to his. It was around twelve years before he finally allowed her to divorce him. Bearing in mind that for all of those twelve years he was living with me, you can see how the NARCISSIST destroys one life after another.
He refuses to accept responsibility for anything that is related to his FALSE-SELF. Those debts, they are nothing to do with me! I will not be held accountable for my deficiencies, for my lack of effort, for my complete inability to live as a bonafide ADULT; NO WAY!
He FELT no sense of obligation towards his two children either. He truly FELT nothing for the daughter but he did/does have a foolishly IDEALIZED image of his son though. Quite likely his son was the only person who ever showed him UNCONDITIONAL love. His son has cut him out of his life and I can understand that decision.
His mother has not been making up stories about this hideous male who WAS her husband and their father. NO! She revealed her former husband in all of his ugly NARCISSISTIC colours. The son might not have wanted to believe her in his childhood but his father revealed his true self to his son and since then he has wanted NO CONTACT at all.
Those two children could not even trust that their father cared for them and he hasn´t at any time, rather like my own mother who has never really cared about her three daughters at any time of their lives. He, just like she, puts more importance on how they are perceived as parents by outsiders. When your own father will not lift a finger to help you, his child, then you know that your father is a useless, selfish NARCISSIST!
His daughter wanted to be able to FEEL something positive towards him but she had known of his character profile from her mother long before spending time with her father. She could never LIKE her father and I can only say that it was watching this absurd attempt of his to ACT the part of father, that helped me begin to understand what male GROOMING is all about.
He tried always to GROOM his daughter by being Mr. Nice Guy, by always saying "YES!" By allowing her to say things to him that would have caused him to fly into NARCISSISTIC rage with any other person. He was absolutely lost as to know what to say, or what to do with his daughter. He had no parental FEELINGS or notions at all.
Just as my elder sister did not want to be alone with her son ever, neither did the NARCISSIST ever want to be with his children by himself. To their credit, they both treated me pretty well but they did not hold back ever on telling him just what they thought of him. They told him that he was a lousy father and that he had severely mistreated their mother.
No, they had no positive FEELINGS towards their father and I can so understand why! He tried so hard to be someone that they could like but he just came across as what he was. A NARCISSIST who was GROOMING and they both FELT uncomfortable with him. Neither of them TRUSTED him.
I had already learnt not to trust him and was keeping my dialogue to the absolute minimum, just enough to serve the purpose, just enough to keep him quiet. I think that above and beyond everything that is lacking in a relationship with a NARCISSIST, this lack of trust is the reason that you cannot really, TRULY, call this liason a sentimental relationship.
Because it is NOT a reciprocal, sentimental relationship. It is a commitment made by one person to conditions that will never be honoured and a commitment by another person, to lie continuously to prevent the other ever knowing their schemes!
IF YOU CAN´T BEAT THEM; JOIN THEM!
Now, I am never going to suggest that any one person in this whole world joins up with a NARCISSIST, whether they be male or female. NO, NO, NO and NO! I can see that part of the challenge of life is trying to avoid becoming ENMESHED with NARCISSISTS. Trying to meet HUMAN-BEINGS and have healthy, reciprocal relationships.
But if your relationship (for want of a better word), is built upon lies and those lies are never admitted, they are never revealed, then what truth has there ever been in that union? The only truth that matters is that you were both in difficult times of your individual lives and that is what drew you together. You became TRAUMA BONDED.
That is as far as the reciprocity goes. Neither of you had anyone, or anywhere to turn to for help. You were both clutching at straws and taking a chance/risk. And just as always when you make poorly judged decisions, you will almost surely come out losing and very probably, sustain considerable injury too.
So, in short, without realizing that I was ACTING as a NARCISSIST myself, that is what I was beginning to do. With him and anyone connected to him. Anyone who has a connection with him, or should I say, who has a connection with his FALSE-SELF, is someone else with whom I have to ACT my part of CINDERELLA.
The little, down-trodden nothing who this GREAT human-being has taken PITY on and is catering to their well-being. How absurd is the NARCISSIST in truth? Can he not see that other´s are seeing me, ragged CINDERELLA and wondering "What the hell is he doing with that old, rag bag?" But of course, that is his design.
"She ought to FEEL grateful that he has such a generous heart!" OH, the ENABLERS of this world, you make it so difficult to find any moral support. Let alone conclusive, concrete, real physical support and that is why so many women are killed every year by their husband or sentimental partner. Whether he is husband or live-in partner is irrelevant, isn´t it?
What he is to her is just the one thing. DEATH! Firstly the DEATH of your own self and your character, the DEATH of all your hopes and dreams, the DEATH of all your relationships with others, the DEATH of all happy moments. He only represents HELL and DEATH seems so often, like a sweeter option.
I know, I am fighting to move away from taking my own life in order to escape this monster! And lest anyone should FEEL for me and all of us who are literally driven out of our own mind´s, personality´s and lives, let me comfort you by telling you that NO! A male NARCISSIST monster is not going to be the reason that I renounce life!
HE is not going to have that pleasure. It is sad that already one can see that he would see my suicide as a VICTORY. The ABSOLUTE VICTORY in fact. He had stripped me of any will to live. Those who display NARCISSISTIC PERSONALITY DISORDER are indeed very, psychologically sick people.
For INFJ types like myself to have actually almost succumbed to their permanent battle tactics, shows just how deep our EMPATHY can run. It shows how we never give up hope that we can HELP a sick person become healthy again. But for our efforts, we pay with our own health.
We lose our physical, emotional and psychological health in our attempts to support the NARCISSIST through all of his disasters. We are taking on board all of the consequences of his refusal to grow into a responsible HUMAN ADULT who can be held accountable for his actions and who has a sense of responsibilty.
And so it is that I now have to behave just the same way as he does in order to survive. "This town ain´t big enough for the both of us" being the NARCISSIST´S mind set, nothing that he has ever done for me has been FOR me. It has at best been for the obtention of good opinions from others (NARCISSISTIC supply) but most times it has had more tangible benefits to himself somehow!
There are supposedly two people in a couple but if you are living with a male NARCISSIST as is my case, you will, when you finally wake into your reality, see that your whole relationship from day one, has only ever been about one person. HIM! HIS WELL-BEING! HIS COMFORT! HIS FUTURE! HIS PENSION!
I think this is what hurts all victims of NARCISSISTIC ABUSE most really. It is the recognition of the facts, actually acknowledging the EVIL person that the NARCISSIST really is. Of course he has never cared about you! That is why he can systematically at any given moment, treat you with the utmost scorn, loathing, rejection and total lack of consideration or concern for you and your FEELINGS.
Harsh as it is to admit, we have to admit that these are not the ACTIONS of a normal, rational, well-balanced human being; are they? If you hated someone deeply then maybe I could understand but this is the person who ten minutes before, you were LOVE-BOMBING!
Just to round off I will tell you that whilst I was decluttering the NARCISSIST´S wardrobe I had my ulterior motives, one of which was to get rid of the designer labels and the other was to move my nephew back in!!!!! I wanted the top cupboards empty so that I could store all of my nephew´s things indoors. And I achieved my purpose!! The ground gaining process continues. Little by little, day by day, pulling further and further away from him and cutting through the TRAUMA BONDS that have kept me in deep, dark places for far too long.
Like I said, I am trying to think like a NARCISSIST with regards to him. I have no RESPECT for him anymore. Why should I? He has never RESPECTED me and I have given him nearly thirty years to start trying to do so!
My thanks to you all for your time today. I will get on with the second series in the next post. I have so much to off load and so little space in which to do so. It is my sincerest wish that none of you are living unhappily with a NARCISSIST.