To those of you dealing with N parents and many thanks to Deb

[finding peace]

I have seen a number of new posters on the board over the past week or so who are at various stages of dealing with toxic parents.  I just wanted to let all of you know that I am thinking of you.  I know how hard it is when you first start to realize the depth of betrayal that we have faced.  Both of my parents were toxic.

When I first started posting on this board (only a couple of months ago – but feels like a lifetime ago), Deb wrote a post that was so full of compassion and understanding for what we have and are going through in learning to deal with the aftermath of toxic parents.

If you haven’t seen it, I have copied it below, I couldn’t say it any better than this – and wanted to forward her message to you.  Not all of it may apply to everyone, but I think there are bits and pieces in here for each of us.

(Deb I hope that you don't mind that I am re-posting what you wrote - if you do, please let me know and I will delete this):

I am so very sorry that your mothers could not give you the simple things like a smile or that looks wonderful even if you painted your nails up to your eyeballs.  If you cut your bangs off to your forehead which my daughter did.  I would still tell you maybe it's a good idea that we go to the hair cutter the next time but you look beautiful anyway.

Your mother could not give away what she didn't have.  You got short changed.  She was wrong. 

What I love about you girls is you know you were these great little kids.  What I really love about you is that you know now that there is nothing you could of done to change it so now you are accepting it.  There was nothing wrong with you. It was them.

Now you grieve. 

They were empty people.  Walking shells of something that resembles a mother.  They gave you life, food and a home but did not know how to live life with you.  They had no clue. They were already Inner dead when they had you.

But I see you are not.  You are very much alive inside out.  Your climbing through the rumble of explosions of craziness that was dropped upon you for years.  You see light and hands extended reaching to pull you through showing you there is life, good life.  Your leaving them behind with sadness and grieving but understand that you do not have to remain there with them.  You would of loved for them to see the same light but they can't they have always been walking wide awake with their eyes wide shut.   

You girls are very strong.  I feel scared and sad just from walking with you on your post.  I'm proud of you all too.

Love
Deb

Thanks again Deb - that post was beautiful, and will be with me always.

Peace

[Ami]

WOW Peace,
   That does say so, very much. Thanks for that .                            Love  Ami

[lighter]

Definately beared repeating.  

Thank you Findingpeace.

[Hopalong]

Thank you, Peace. I missed it before so I'm very grateful!

And ((((((((((((((((((((((Deb))))))))))))))))))))))))))))).

love,
Hops

[Certain Hope]

((((((((Finding Peace)))))))  thank you

 and ((((((((((Deb))))))))))  thank you

Walking wide awake with eyes wide shut... yes, that's existing in the N-zone.
Thank God for life!

Hope

[JanetLG]

Peace,

I remember this post, soon after I joined, too.

It helped me a lot, as it did you.

Deb has a wonderful way of putting it - very uplifting.

Thanks for posting it again, Peace. I've noticed several newbies this past week, and it always bears repeating when someon'e already said something so wonderful. It's not always easy to find the quotes that you're looking for, though, IMO

Janet

[debkor]

Peace,

No I don't mind that you reposted it at all.  It didn't come at better timing for me.  I was talking and thinking about my Xfriends children today and yesterday when I spoke to a mutual friend of both of us who had her children for the weekend. 

The things those poor kids are going through with the *crazies* from both parents.  At least the mutual friend gives her kids a *normal kid break* when they are with her.  I cannot do that anymore because I had to cut all contact from their mother which  means them too. *sigh*.  I was more then half way into slapping her into tommorrow she made me livid with what she did to her children. I stepped out.

The parents of the kids have split/divorced but the kids are the weapons to interact with each other.  Very sad and they get the brunt of it (I believe).

Ah, I just don't get some people and very difficult to even try to understand.  I know what you girls went through and then some when I hear and have seen what she has done to hers (conscious or unconsciously).   

I just don't buy that you are always (unconscious at all times) unless you are totally insane.  N's I do believe are not.  They just keep sucking people dry and punishing even if it is CHILDREN.  Twisted yes, insane no.

I think they are constantly not only gaslighting others but spend lots of time gaslighting themselves.  Maybe that is why they cannot feel guilt or at least admit to any. How can you when you are always confusing and twisting things. My friend is not really angry with her children.  She's angry with her mother from not getting what she wanted/needed and takes it out on her kids.  Then with her husband and not getting what she wanted from him it became a double whammy! against her kids. She was trying to fill her void to her childhood and got pissed when her little kids could not fill it. Afterall, hey, she really could not control her husband but she sure as hell could her children.  As much as she was mothering her children (or not or sometimes) she was mad because she afterall NEVER GOT IT.  How dare them make demands on her, be rude, grouchy, mouthy little kids that not always do what they are supposed to. SHE HAS A LIFE TOO YOU KNOW!!! SHE DESERVES TO DO WHAT SHE WANTS and when she can't whooboy, watch out for the pity party of having children and faking it as an ADULT.  She resents it.  She is taking out her childhood on them. I really do believe this.  She's not grown up enough to raise children.  In looks yes.  In mind no.   Then she resorts to gaslighting instead of taking a good look at herself.  She spends more time tricking her conscious into unconscious.   What BS.
Ah, I don't know.  I would really like to think this way instead of thinking of them as pure Evil. 

It really was not any of you that made your parents do/be/say/not say what they did.  You were just little kids. Beautiful, fun, amazing little kids living with an adult/mean/hurt/emotionally abused/neglected (Parent/kid) of you own. 
We know all little kids try to manipulate situations and it is up to the parent to help them grow and lead them into healthy adults.
How can an adult who is really not grown up and still manipulates everything there is even begin to raise a child. It's all about ME ME ME that it cannot be for YOU YOU YOU.   They could not do it as sucky as that may be.
 

You all amaze me with some of the parents you have had.  Take a good look at yourselves.  They short changed you but stop short changing yourselves.

I can say I think you were beautiful amazing little kids, something that maybe you did not hear or not enough.  I was not around then to tell you that but Look at you NOW.

I am around now.  I hear you. I listen to you and ya all pretty amazing!  Tell yourself that Now because I can see it in everything you write. 

What you didn't get as a kid I don't think they can give you even now as an adult. They just don't have it to give.  You have outgrown your parents.  They may be older in body but you have grown so much more then them in spirit and mind. 

They will always be children to a point and you can't parent your parents.  Just like I could not parent my friend or her children.  I had to let it go with some understanding of the dynamics of how they tick but nothing I can do about it.  Let it go with acceptance and sadness. 

I feel sorry for them.  They do not know what they have missed out on.  They just don't get it.
I do!!
I hope someday I can say this to my friends kids just like I say to ya all.

Take pride you all came a long way and are some very special people.
You all always have had what it takes.
Just needed to be told that by yourselves and others.  I'm one of the others.
Your looking through your own eyes and souls now.  Not theirs. 
Enjoy, love and take care of what you see.  You! 

Your not bad,ugly,stupid,skinny,fat, worthless or even golden.  Your just you!! Amazing yet so different (YOU) from what you were told.  It was lies what you were told from scared little kids in grown up bodies. 

Ah sorry this went into a rant because I was just talking about my friends kids and hoping how they will grow up with all this crazy stuff.

Sorry haven't been on typing.  Lurking for a bit because I'm sick with I think a sinus infections and the screen makes my head pound.

I need to thank you all because it was this board who helped me understand my friend and what she was doing with her children and maybe why.
I still don't know if I have it right but it kind of makes sense of no sense.

Kind of makes me think of the words PICK ON SOMEBODY YOUR OWN SIZE which may have well just been her own children (mind wise/age).  An Adult would have knocked her out or left her where she was standing  if she even tried to treat someone like she does them.  Kids picking on kids really.

Maybe that is why they cut you off orbully you more as adults because they are afraid and know they have loss of control  so they try to keep you that scared little kid that you once were.  They are no longer picking on someone thier own size and it scares them. You are a grown up with your own mind and that is the last thing they ever wanted and can not compete against. You frighten them.
Who's the kid now.   Very sad.





Deb

[Ami]

That wassbeautiful,Deb. I wish that I could have a transplant of it. Love    Ami

[Certain Hope]

((((((((Deb)))))))) That was the best rant I've heard in ages. Thank you so much for pouring out your heart.

I hope your sinuses clear up and you feel better soon... will be praying for that, for you. You are a genuine blessing.

Love,
Hope

[Hopalong]

Hi Deb...
Somehow, even if only deep in some memory cell, those children know you saw them and heard them.
I truly believe that every encounter with a compassionate adult helps abused, mistreated children keep alive a spark of hope.
I hope you can keep track of them, and the moment the oldest's 18, reach out...

Meanwhile, hon, can I interest you in a Neti pot?

love,
Hops

[bonsai]

I am so very sorry that your mothers could not give you the simple things like a smile or that looks wonderful even if you painted your nails up to your eyeballs.  If you cut your bangs off to your forehead which my daughter did.  I would still tell you maybe it's a good idea that we go to the hair cutter the next time but you look beautiful anyway.

Your mother could not give away what she didn't have.  You got short changed.  She was wrong. 

What I love about you girls is you know you were these great little kids.  What I really love about you is that you know now that there is nothing you could of done to change it so now you are accepting it.  There was nothing wrong with you. It was them.

Now you grieve. 

They were empty people.  Walking shells of something that resembles a mother.  They gave you life, food and a home but did not know how to live life with you.  They had no clue. They were already Inner dead when they had you.

But I see you are not.  You are very much alive inside out.  Your climbing through the rumble of explosions of craziness that was dropped upon you for years.  You see light and hands extended reaching to pull you through showing you there is life, good life.  Your leaving them behind with sadness and grieving but understand that you do not have to remain there with them.  You would of loved for them to see the same light but they can't they have always been walking wide awake with their eyes wide shut.   

You girls are very strong.  I feel scared and sad just from walking with you on your post.  I'm proud of you all too.

Love
Deb

What a lovely piece of writing.  Thanks to the writer and to the re-poster.

I'm new here.  Seems like a great place to be.  I have been a member of the LiveJournal "NPD_Family" community, as well as formerly a frequent poster on the Yahoo ACON groups (although I eventually found the latter too much to keep up with).

I have an elderly N-mom, 77 next week.  I'm a newlywed 41 year old woman (2nd marriage for both of us),  no kids by choice, and a high school music teacher at a wonderful private school in NH.  I'd spent many years catering to my mom, thinking that if I only tried harder or explained things for her one more time, somehow she'd become more reasonable...but in hindsight, the woman has been going through a "tough time" from the time of my very earliest memories.

I've been no-contact with her since 12/05.

As a way of letting it all out (in addition to therapy, which I've also been doing), I've been keeping a blog on my mom and NPD and my coming to terms with it all.  It's also a way of letting my closest friends in on what it's about...because I am so tired of telling the ridiclous stories about her life that I don't want to tell them anymore.  I want to write each down once, in detail, and know that it's parked there on the blog, should I ever need it in the future.  It's a lot better for me than trying to hold those memories in (I think I was doing just that, in order to have a template of "this is what an N looks like, so I can avoid one in the future".  Now that my close friends have read as much (or as little) of it as they're comfortable with, it's easier to move on.  I feel like I've "testified", put her "stuff" and how it affected me out there, and I'm more at peace for having done it.

Of course, anyone familiar with having an N in their own life will probably recognize a lot of what's there.  But (particularly when I started writing it, during the summer of 2006) I found the comments of others who've dealt with NPD to be so helpful and illuminating for me.  In fact, it was an anonymous poster on my blog that pointed me here (thank you, Anonymous).

For anyone who's interested, the blog can be found at:

www.houseofbonsai.blogspot.com

Thanks, all ---

Elise

[debkor]

Hey Bonsai,

Welcome nice to meet you.  I'm going to check out your blog. 


Hops,

I have been reading what you wrote to light and I am thinking more and more about the neti pot.  Boy did this make me sick in all ways.  I felt horrible. I didn't even want to talk even my jaw hurt.  I looked like I was always winking at someone or more resembled popeye with the one eye open and one shut.  I don't know why but for some reason I think that may make me feel better.    Oh whata beauty I was looking the last few days. 

P.S.
The one friend makes those kids feel very welcome and gives lots of TLC to them all.  They always had one of us to be there. In all this crazy confusion there is always a familiar face.

Deb

[JanetLG]

Deb,

I loved your 'rant'. It means so much to have someone validate us, however late.

I thought this was very interesting:

"Maybe that is why they cut you off or bully you more as adults because they are afraid and know they have loss of control  so they try to keep you that scared little kid that you once were.  They are no longer picking on someone thier own size and it scares them. You are a grown up with your own mind and that is the last thing they ever wanted and can not compete against. You frighten them."

I had anorexia from age 12, and I remember feeling even at the time 'she wants to keep me SMALL'. I remeber telling a doctor that, when I was 17. He told me it was my 'fault' (his words) that I was skinny, no-one else's. How I wish the medical 'professionals' would take their blinkers off! Being able to bully a 'smaller person' is exactly what she wanted to keep doing...so I believe she tried her hardest to keep me little, and controllable.

Didn't work, though!

Janet

[Certain Hope]

Welcome, Bonsai    and congratulations + blessings and best wishes on your new marriage!

I just made a quick stop by your blog and this caught my eye right away:  "she makes all conversations into brochures about herself"
Oh yes, that is so familiar. My mother is not the overtly monstrous NPD, but the more subtle aspects of her N'ish behavior have certainly had their impact. Trying to root them all out in order to defuse them is what I'm working on here. Looking forward to reading more at your site! And again, welcome!

Love,
Hope

[Hopalong]

Welcome, Elise...
Thanks so much for introducing yourself with a little sketch of your circumstances, that really helps. I have enough senior moments that if a new person comes on with no "bio", I can't keep track. I'll check out your blog too and look forward to getting to know you better.

Hi Peace,
BRILLIANT decision about your wedding, woman. Bravoooooo. And I feel exactly the same about the traditional ritual (as well as popeyed about how many people blow enormous wads of money on a ceremony that needs nothing but two committed hearts to sanctify it, imo).

Hi Deb,
Hope you're feeling much much better. That was a brutal sinusistis thing...errgh.

love to all,
Hops