I love you but I don't like you

[Meh]

"I love you but I don't like you" is what a Narcissist says or it's the message they send according to something I read.
It resonates with me.

[KayZee]

Blerg.  My mother used to say this to me all the time when I was growing up.

I suppose it's one of the reasons why I used to (and sometimes still do) fear intimacy.  When someone tells me "I love you," I mentally substitute in "I don't like you."  It's like in my inner child's mind, the two sentiments are interchangeable and the closer someone comes the more likely they are to hurt me.

Other NM favorites were: "You're so ridiculous, but I love you!;" "You're crazier than a loon, but I love you!;" "You suck.  Just kidding! You know I love you." The list of horrendous mixed message-y bullsh*t goes on.

I suppose maybe when the N says "I love you, but I don't like you" he or she is being emotionally honest?  Like, they're acknowledging "I love the way you make me feel when you're performing the way I want you to, but I don't like you, in specific (I don't know enough about you for that or care to find out)?  I don't know. I hate Ns. I'm feeling so fed up.

[sKePTiKal]

I could honestly say that about my daughter A.
I don't think that makes me N, though.

An N simply wouldn't know what loving another person feels like - and has no frame of reference for loving anyone except him or herself. In fact, most of an N's pain comes from finally grasping that it's not possible to make everyone in the world love him/her to that degree.

Hmmmm. Food for thought.

[Twoapenny]

My mum made it clear she didn't like me or love me so at least there was less room for confusion

[gratitude28]

My NM says she loves me. But I don't think she does. I think she has put all of her self-loathing into me. She sees me as a "slut" and "weird" and "thinking I am perfect." So odd this combination...
I think I also had no clue what caring or love was. For the longest time I thought it was sexual attraction.
It's funny - she idolizes my sister. One day I asked my sister if she didn't think the E-Mail jokes NM sends are creepy and vulgur. Turns out she only sends the vulgur ones to me. Also, she gave me a book once she thought I'd like to read - it was full of sex scenes. Nice, eh? I have been happily and faithfully married for 19 years. Yes, I had sex in college. No, not more than the average person, in spite of my confusion.
Ugh!

[Meh]

Thinking that when certain life events or milestones happen that the Nar issue comes up again.

[Meh]

It's like in my inner child's mind, the two sentiments are interchangeable and the closer someone comes the more likely they are to hurt me.

Um hum. I get that.

[Meh]

My mum made it clear she didn't like me or love me so at least there was less room for confusion

Sorry two    It's sad growing up with N parents isnt it? Is for me, still is, no matter how old I am. To me it feels like a car accident happened or something but it's not.

I always felt unloved but was confused by what people explained to me or acted out. Or basically what they wanted me to believe I guess.

[Meh]

My NM says she loves me. But I don't think she does. I think she has put all of her self-loathing into me. She sees me as a "slut" and "weird" and "thinking I am perfect." So odd this combination...
I think I also had no clue what caring or love was. For the longest time I thought it was sexual attraction.
It's funny - she idolizes my sister. One day I asked my sister if she didn't think the E-Mail jokes NM sends are creepy and vulgur. Turns out she only sends the vulgur ones to me. Also, she gave me a book once she thought I'd like to read - it was full of sex scenes. Nice, eh? I have been happily and faithfully married for 19 years. Yes, I had sex in college. No, not more than the average person, in spite of my confusion.
Ugh!

Your NM sounds jealous of you.

Maybe Nar people are jealous of their children because the child comes along and usurps the N's position as the perennial child. Maybe they are jealous because they still want to be the child, so when the baby came along it made the N angry forever? I don't know, just thinkin random thoughts outloud.

Oh yuck, she only sends the vulgar ones to you. That is definitely not nice at all.

Maybe I'm lucky that my mother just tells me about the dog pooh, I don't get the sex scene stuff too much. One weird thing that my mother has done is sometimes make comments about the type of men she can imagine me with--often times much much older then me and it has a very odd feeling about it. People that I would never in my wild imagination think about sexually she will say something.

I've always been disgusted with my mother's sexuality though. Maybe that is normal to feel that way. 

[sKePTiKal]

Maybe Nar people are jealous of their children because the child comes along and usurps the N's position as the perennial child.

This is an interesting idea! I always thought that NM was jealous of my ability to be independent; think for myself; choose... to be different than her. To be normal, in other words... and have normal relationships. She certainly went out of her way to intervene, interrupt, and interfere often enough. That was why there was constant conflict between us. The only time she was overjoyed with me -- was after Twiggy's day the SHTF - and she TOLD me, it was because I was like her now.

[Meh]

mornin P

[BonesMS]

I have memories of the N-Queen making this HUGE show of how I was "her baby", etc., how much she loved me, ad nauseum and then watching her in a screaming rage in front of a psychiatrist demanding I be thrown out of her house because I was "mentally ill" and "refused to obey" her!  The words of the psychiatrist, in response to her tantrum, still stick with me:  "Your daughter is finally starting to think and respond like a normal 14-year-old!  Get off her back!"  Needless to say, the N-Queen was PISSED OFF because the psychiatrist would not obey her either!

Bones

[Meh]

I have memories of the N-Queen making this HUGE show of how I was "her baby", etc., how much she loved me, ad nauseum and then watching her in a screaming rage in front of a psychiatrist demanding I be thrown out of her house because I was "mentally ill" and "refused to obey" her!  The words of the psychiatrist, in response to her tantrum, still stick with me:  "Your daughter is finally starting to think and respond like a normal 14-year-old!  Get off her back!"  Needless to say, the N-Queen was PISSED OFF because the psychiatrist would not obey her either!

Bones

That's extreme emotional abuse. Well, having a witness was a good thing at least.

The "making a show part" sounds like one of the typical narcissistic traits.

[mudpuppy]

Narcissists don't love anyone.
Love isn't a feeling, although I question if they're even capable of truly affectionate feelings.
Love means sacrificing for the other person and when necessary putting them before you and making a commitment that come hell or high water you will continue to sacrifice and put them before yourself.
Narcissists are the precise opposite of all those things so it's irrelevant what they say. They don't like or love themselves and consequently can't like or love anyone else.

mud

[SilverLining]

I suspect what they think of as love may be just a feeling of attachment to sources of N supply.  There is a feeling of  emptiness there for them when the sources of supply are not available, and this is misinterpreted as real positive regard for another.   I can't recall ever hearing the word love in my FOO until after I was over 20 years old and out of the house.  Then all of a sudden my mother was using the L word all the time.  It was a way of trying to keep the association together, for her emotional support.  

Since it is such a shallow self absorbed feeling, it doesn't take much for it flip over into hatred.  All the other has to do is slightly disappoint or offend the N, and the supposed love instantly disappears.