My feelings and feeling a little bad about how I think of another person.

[debkor]

Ok here is what think since I figured out my nh was an n.  I removed myself from being a rational person to argue with an irrational person and be observant to his responds and actions.  (for my own sanity).
As far a T,  he is using it to his advantage.  Is he aware of it, yes and no.
He has selective thinking, and memory. He takes what his  T says to him and makes it fit in his make-believe world to fit his own needs or actions.  I do believe that he really thinks that his way is absolutely correct and he gets frustrated why I can’t fit into his world.  Exactly, I can’t I’m not in his realm. This is a very sick man. I feel pity that someone actually is so lonely and so alone and so afraid of himself that he ruins everything good in his life (and when he does) moves on to start all over and repeat history.  He is an empty shell of a person.  I even noticed he is mirroring my image.  He says and does what I would do in a situation. It’s actually very sad. I do not personalize it anymore with myself since I realized what he is.  I have come to terms with it.  I cannot get anymore response, empathy, compassion from him, then I would a doorknob. A doorknob would only lock me in, lock me out, or work correctly.  Yes, I might be saying ,  geese I should change that doorknob and procrastinate on changing it.  I would probably curse, get mad, yell at the doorknob.  I would laugh and think ok kid you really lost it (now your mad at a doorknob that has no feelings and is just doing what it is doing) but this doorknob is a danger to you and your children. You can’t afford to get locked in or out. Lets say, I couldn’t afford to remove the doorknob or replace it I would simply warn others of the doorknob and not to shut the door.  It may work or not.  Do not trust that door. The doorknob is DANGEROUS.  It only serves a purpose to open, close and lock.  It didn’t personalize me (it would do it to anyone who happened to be there in it’s room) until it was removed, replaced or fixed.  My doorknob is beyond fixing.   I can’t talk  to it and make it  work correctly, after all it’s just a doorknob(ya right, like the door knob is going to feel bad and start working correctly)  It’s just a doorknob!!!  Door knobs has no feelings it just serves a purpose (to it’s room). 
This may sound really harsh but these are my feelings.  I door knob cannot hurt my feelings cause it possesses none of it’s own but I will not close that door and let it get me trapped or any of my loved ones. I am aware of what it can do to the unknowing and I am protecting myself from it’s room and protecting my children from it’s room and anyone else that dares to enter.  Enter at your own risk!!! IT”S BROKEN!!!!  You know, I feel actually guilty expressing my feelings about an N.  They are human too, aren’t they?

*deb*       
By the way I love this board and all of you

[pennyplant]

Oh, that guilt!  They take advantage of our over-active consciences.  Guilt seems to be bigger in us than in them.  And I don't  know how to reconcile their humanity with what they do that hurts us so much.  They do feel hurt as well.  But they certainly deal with it in such a freakish way.  Like some kind of short circuit.

There are people who have hurt me, and the way things worked out, I grew to really "hate" those people.  The original bond or connection I once felt with them got broken.  So, it is easier to keep them out of my life.  But the others who have hurt me--they didn't break that bond for some reason.  And those are the ones I have trouble keeping my distance from.  I still care for them on some level.  It's going to take awhile with them.  I still feel guilty having bad thoughts about them.  It's a struggle.

PP

[Brigid]

Deb,

As far a T,  he is using it to his advantage.  Is he aware of it, yes and no.
He has selective thinking, and memory. He takes what his  T says to him and makes it fit in his make-believe world to fit his own needs or actions.
his is a very sick man. I feel pity that someone actually is so lonely and so alone and so afraid of himself that he ruins everything good in his life (and when he does) moves on to start all over and repeat history.  He is an empty shell of a person.  I even noticed he is mirroring my image.  He says and does what I would do in a situation. It’s actually very sad.

I could say these very same things about my xh.  In retrospect, I know that I enabled him, mothered him and made him look like an adult to those around him.  When I would suggest that he stand up to someone or take more responsibility, he would turn it back on me and make me look like a b***h that was not kind or caring about others.  In social situations, he would appear to be the "fun one" and I was boring and didn't really enjoy life like he did.  Someone had to be the adult.

When he decided to leave home and therefore forced to make his own decisions, he couldn't do it.  Like your h, he would mirror whatever I had done in the home and had no clue how to do it on his own.  I still remember the phone conversation we had a week after he left, when he talked about getting his own place to live (he we living with Mom and Dad at the time), and he asked "where do you think I should get a place?"  My response was, "I don't give a sh** where you live.  Figure it out yourself."  He ended up moving into the exact same rental unit we had lived in as a family while our house was being built.  So pathetic. 

At one point after the separation, I told him he was an empty shell of a man.  He looked at me like I was insane since he had always come across as so caring and kind to others and always putting himself last.  I understand now that that was his way of manipulating, but at the time I believed it, as did everyone else (and I guess he had himself believing it too).

As I move on with my life and my anger toward him dissapates, I have to make sure that I do not fall into my old patterns and start enabling him again.  This would only relate to the children now, but I'm sure that I'm still capable of it.  I don't want to feel sorry for him--I actually don't want to feel anything at all for him.  I am willing to be cordial and polite for the sake of the kids, but I don't want to be his friend because he will just learn how to take advantage of that situation. 

He is a master of using guilt to his advantage.  I must remain immune and indifferent to it.  I do believe that he is doomed to make the same mistakes over and over again, too.  He doesn't know how to do it any differently.

Brigid

[movinon]

As far a T,  he is using it to his advantage.  Is he aware of it, yes and no.
He has selective thinking, and memory. He takes what his  T says to him and makes it fit in his make-believe world to fit his own needs or actions.

Boy does this sound familiar!!!!!!!!!!!!  The SOB is actually DANGEROUS b/c he can use "recovery" terms to make himself seem like he knows things.  He's picked up what he's "supposed" to be like w.out making the adjustment.

Another thing I heard lst night is that they choose people that are "givers", nurturing.  Well, that's me.  I'm a giver and I have sure found that I'm nurturing although I never believed it before.  So they have some part in it.  At least mine did w/ the clinging on.  He proposed to me w/in 6 weeks of meeting me and I was just desperate enough to say yes. 

Strange, he often said how "desperate" I was for him jokingly, but could it be that he knew a woman had to be desperate to be with him?


Movinon

[Hopalong]

Brigid, that is amazing about the mirroring...choosing the same apartment complex.
I have not picked up on that, is it an N behavior?

Movin, you have such wide-open eyes. I hope you feel proud and strong for all you've learned.

Hops

[Brigid]

Hops,

Brigid, that is amazing about the mirroring...choosing the same apartment complex.
I have not picked up on that, is it an N behavior?

It wasn't just the same complex, it was the same exact unit (these were townhouses), and it was not the only one available for rent at the time.  When I lived there with him, which was about 9 years ago, we were a family of four with a dog and cat, and we needed to be in the kids' school district, so we needed a larger place.  Now he lives by himself and my daughter only stays with him one night every other weekend (and sometimes she goes for weeks or months without staying there), and my son has only stayed there 2 nights in 2 1/2 years, so he didn't need nearly that much space.  But he cannot think for himself, and without me or some other responsible adult to guide him, he is adrift at sea.  Obviously, his still married girlfriend can't be of much help, nor could one consider her a "responsible adult."

The really funny thing is that my bf also lived in that exact same unit with a group of guys back in the 70's before he was married, and there are about 200 units in that complex. 

I don't know if the mirroring is an n trait per se, but since they are very often childlike in their behaviors and thought patterns, I suppose it could be.   Instead of someone saying he's so much like his mom or dad, they could say "You're so much like your ex-wife."     Just as long as no one ever says I'm like him, I'll be fine.

Brigid

[pennyplant]

Debkor and Brigid both mentioned mirroring.

I have seen that too with the possible N co-worker.  Most people who know him think that he is never at a loss for words and is always so entertaining.  I have seen him at a loss for words, which surprised me.  Then I realized that almost all of what he said during casual conversations seemed memorized.  It was whatever jokes he had heard on the radio while driving into work that day, all the funny commercials and cartoons he remembered from when he was a kid, trivia kinds of stuff.  Who sang the number one song of the year 1983, stuff like that.  One time when I thought he seemed a little off, he told a joke that I knew he had told many times and suddenly forgot the punchline.  If I told him something that I had thought of on my own, you know, had put quite a lot of thought into and come up with an answer to something I wondered about, well later that day or the next time he was reminded of it, he would parrot it right back at me.  He seems like a tape recorder sometimes.  It's not something I have noticed other people doing to this extent.  He doesn't seem to learn these things, just memorize them.

PP

[Hopalong]

PP:
Aha. VERBAL mirroring I do get as an N trait. Substitute Mom in this sentence and it is exact:

He seems like a tape recorder sometimes.  It's not something I have noticed other people doing to this extent.  He doesn't seem to learn these things, just memorize them.

Interesting about Brig...the SAME apt. I can imagine it took on the feeling of martyrdom for him, as well.

This mirroring thing is interesting. Well, it's boring, ultimately, as though these people have no faith in their own ability to create. But it's a more subtle clue to N-ishness, perhaps?

Hops

[Brigid]

PP said:

Most people who know him think that he is never at a loss for words and is always so entertaining.

So you've met my exnh!

My ex also did the verbal mirroring--not with me--but he was very good at imitating voices.  He would entertain people for hours with his many impersonations.  He actually did imitations of other people's imitations, i.e., Dana Carvey doing George Bush or the Church Lady.  He could watch an episode of SNL one time and be able to repeat most of the schticks they did and the jokes they told the next day (but certainly not remember what time his daughter needed to be picked up from gymnastics, after 30 times of doing so).  Interestingly, if someone else were to try and share something similar with him, he would find it boring and repetitive, but thought we should all be entertained for hours by his repeating everything he had seen (even if we had been watching it also).

I have never before made a connection from this behavior to his nism, but it sounds like it may fit into the ever-growing list of undesirable traits.

Brigid