Sensitivity

[gratitude28]

So, the children of narcissists are quite sensitive to criticism. It causes them real pain, because it inflames old wounds. To avoid this pain, they are conscientious and try hard to be liked. Since they aim to please, so long as you respect their boundaries, you can easily get them to do anything they do not think is wrong or foolish. Yet they have been trained to feel that something's wrong with them if some intolerant person just can't stand them being the way they are, looking the way they look, feeling the way they feel, or thinking what they think. All this manifests itself as low self-esteem and marks them as sensitive.

I pulled this off of H&H's post under, What Helps... and she borrowed it from the doubles site.

This is me to a "T."

I get very upset if someone doesn't like me for any reason... even if the person is someone I do not care uch for or have respect for. I am making progress in this area. I am also not trying to be the pushover that I once was. Again... I am making progress!!!

Beth

[moonlight52]

Hi Beth , You are younger then I am I was very very sensitive to criticism .

I am not as much as I used to be .Much rolls off my back.

I remember 13 years ago my Mr moon and I and our older girl and baby went to a counselor just after the new baby came.

It seemed we just could not adjust .ALL 4 of us in the room with T and my Mr. MOON and older D pointed at me looked at the T
and said its all her fought. Well the T sent me and the baby out of the room and explained to Mr Moon and older D that I could not be responsible for all the trouble.

Now they laugh and say they know I AM NOT THAT POWERFUL to be responsible for all there feelings .So our little foursome has come a long way.

LOVE AND LIGHT
MOON

[gratitude28]

How sweet that you all went together moon! And it sounds like you had a kind and thoughtful counselor.

You are right moon, a lot of my sensitivity did have to do with age. I am growing a thicker skin (and some wrinkles to go with, but that's another story  ). It happens a lot less often that I care when someone doesn't like me. And I stand up for myself a lot more often.

Your moon family sounds so nice.
Love, Beth

[pennyplant]

Yes, Beth you have also described me to a "T".  I like how you have summed it up.  It is so logical.  It may describe some other people I know as well.

Not being liked by people who I don't even like is something I have had to deal with every day during the past year.  You see, a couple of them are my next door neighbors!  We live in the country but our houses are close together and we have driveways that are only about six feet apart.  There used to be a wild hedgerow between the properties, which gave some privacy, but the neighbors chopped it all down, even the part we own, because they don't like messy trees.  Each of us uses a side door as a main entrance and these side doors face each other.  The neighbors also spend many hours a day right in the driveway rather than in their yard.  So, several times each day I have to "not" interact with people who don't speak to me or acknowledge me, yet they will speak to my husband and acknowledge him.  They don't usually speak to my husband when I am with him.  They wait until he is alone and working on the house or something.  They will then rush over and start jabbering to him.  If I'm in the house I can hear this and it is annoying.  My husband does try to avoid them but can't always.  While this is not a horrible thing, and I'm getting used to it, it does force me to have to think about this issue all the time.

I mean, now I am finally learning about how to approach people I have had trouble with.  I am learning to let go of past poor behavior and re-approach people and make something of a friendship or at least a civil and polite relationship with them.  But I have stopped myself in this case, even though the current situation is so uncomfortable.  The reason I have stopped myself has to do with my very first impression of these people.  They were exceptionally needy.  They monopolized the conversation and every topic was about some disaster or else just something about them.  I knew right away that these were the type of people who in the past I had let overwhelm me with neediness until I couldn't stand them anymore.  Incredibly stressful.  And I no longer want those kind of people as friends.  No matter what, apparently.  Though it is hard to be snubbed by them nearly every day, and it is hard to be alone more at times compared to my earlier life, it is harder still for me to let these kinds of people into my life.  I have always let these types of people silence me!!!  And have always resented it!!!  Now, finally, I am strong enough to tolerate this awkward period where I'm learning to let go of the bad habit of befriending ANYONE just to have friends.  Next step, picking better friends and learning how to keep them.

Moon, I'm so glad everyone came to their senses about your "power"!  Often it is so easy to blame mom.  I'm so glad nobody does that anymore at your house.  Everyone has to own their part in the family.  It's better for everyone that way.

Love, Pennyplant

P.S.  I am growing a new hedgerow on our side of the property!  I don't think the neighbors will be interested in chopping this one down!!

[Healing&Hopeful]

Hi all

Yes, Beth… this resonates with me and was one of the reasons why I posted it on the what helps.  I don’t take criticism very well at all, though I do try a lot more now to not take it personally and try and look more objectively at where the person is coming from.

Moon…. I loved your post, and am so glad your family went to see the counsellor. 

PP…. I can relate to what you mean about having needy people in your lives, and gaining knowledge to change this… I think you are doing very well.

Take care

H&H xx

[Brigid]

I, too, am very sensitive about how others feel about me.  My father criticized my every move growing up, so I didn't know how to react when someone said something nice and certainly couldn't take a compliment gracefully.  I had to become hardened to it over time, or would have crumbled under the weight of insecurity and unworthiness (is that a word?).

Now that I have virtually no one being critical of anything I do, I feel this huge burden has been released of trying to always live up to someone else's expectations and holding myself to a standard that no healthy person would choose to place on oneself.  I'm still sensitive (overly so), but in a much healthier way.

Brigid

[adrift]

Pennyplant wrote:

I have always let these types of people silence me!!!  And have always resented it!!!

BINGO!! That has been me to a T in the past.  I've let people walk over me, silence me, ignore me, mistreat me and I didn't have the guts to stand up for myself and it caused me so much inner turmoil which then came spilling out in many ways!  Mostly I put up with lots of stuff from my parents and I was conditioned from an early age to take it and say nothing and that conditioning then spilled over into other areas of my life.  I let my first boyfriend mistreat me and while I knew what he was doing was wrong, I was so conditioned to accept crap that  I put up with abuse and then hated myself for it.   The resentment built through the years until I was one heap of bubbling anger.  Once, I erupted on my MIL (she's a true N if there ever was one) and while it caused turmoil for a while afterwards, she now treats me with more than anyone else cuz she knows I'm not gonna take her crap. Well, maybe she doesn't treat me with respect, but she knows better than to tread on me or look to me for sympathy. 

I've always been very sensitive about what people think of me and every little slight (real or imagined) would bring up all the old hurts and all the things my parents said about me.   This is terrible to say, but I'd never have been able to begin to heal while my parents were alive.  I was too conditioned to caving  in to them and too afraid of losing my inheritance (which I felt I deserved for all I'd done and endured) to stand up to them.  My life is more peaceful now that they are gone and I've been able to start healing.  The Karpman triangle helped me so much to see where my dad was a Persecutor and he needed to see me as someone who deserved persecution in order to satisfy his own N needs.   My mom played the Victim and the Persecutor with relative ease, switching back and forth depending on which one of us she was trying to manipulate--me or dad.   I remember so many times she'd call me and say that she wanted me to go buy a new dress for my oldest daughter (my only child at the time) and to put it on her credit card. ((This from the woman who denied me matching clothes when I was growing up yet insisted I go to the local preppy private school ))  And when I would say that my daughter didn't need anything (she didn't, one summer she had 14 church dresses ---the other grandparents were buying her stuff left and right) my mom would insist that my daughter (DD1) needed this or that and for me to go get it.  If I waited to go, mom would get mad.  So eventually I'd give in and go shopping and get DD1 something just to make mom happy and then mom would tell dad what I'd bought for my DD1 on my mom's credit card and he'd be ticked with me!!!  He never said he was mad, but I could SO tell.  I thought at the time, and still think, that my mom lied to dad and told him that I'd asked for something for DD1 and that mom also lied and said she felt like she needed to help us out  (she didn't need to) and that she told my dad this so she could shift his anger about the money from her to me.  Now,  my mom had money to spend, but dad was a total penny pincher and tighter than Dick's hat band.  Before my mom died she kept insisting that I go get some crossstitch items (that she had done for the kids)  framed and put it on her credit card and I never did.  After she died, I said to my dad (he inherited her money) I said to my dad that I might go get the prints framed and put it on her card (this particular card had my name on it as well) since she had always wanted to pay for them and dad got an attitude really quick and said, "NO YOU AREN'T, I'VE ALREADY CANCELED THAT CARD".  I'd be willing to bet that he canceled it before she died---he so didn't want me to have any access to her money.  But that was o.k. and I think my "o.k." attitude about it probably took him back a little. 

My dad would never have questioned anything my mom said, he could/would never see through her because if he had allowed himself to really see her then he would have felt like he'd made a mistake in marrying her (dad's mom didn't want him to marry my mom) and dad could never admit mistakes----so I was the scapegoat.  It's easy to accept all that now, though, because I understand the dynamics and really know that it was their problems, not mine, that were at the root of it all.


Adrift