Do people with sturdy boundaries....

[lighter]

::Nodding::

"A little selfishness goes a long way...."

That reminds me of the saying..... "Adults who aren;t getting their needs met.... can't meet the needs of a child."

and...

"Taking care of ourselves is the most loving thing we can do for our loved ones."

We model self care and we ensure we're taken care of, which should be a priority.

As for asserting ourselves, with abusive FOO members and spouses..... it makes no sense that people would do such a self defeating thing.  Eventually.... we're going to figure it out and things aren't going to stay the same.  

Right?

I guess the abuser operates on the assumption that we're stupid enough to allow them to get away with murder.... they'll be allowed to continue, unchecked: /

I guess they sometimes are

[Hermes]

IMO talking about boundaries is fine when talking about the "ordinary" badly behaved individual, or the common "jerk".  
The ball game is entirely different when the NPdisordered steps into the picture.  There are no guidelines, no rules, no nothing.  Everything is smoke and mirrors.  The smartest person can be taken in.  How could they not, when dealing with a disordered mind.  There is no proper basis for any kind of dealing.

I think I had sturdy boundaries all my life, came from a good kind family, independent, living abroad, working, nice social life, the usual normal existence.  Well, I can tell you, there is NO way of telling, not with the NPD.  In fact their very existence depends on seeming "normal", and better than normal.
 My ex was the most normal, "regular guy" type you could meet.  Looking back he was probably "too normal".  He was diffident, considerate, not flash, polite, pleasant, educated, non-smoker, did not drink except on the very odd occasion, in fact precisely what I expect most of you on here would like to find in a person or future partner.  People talk about red flags.  Nonsense.  You will see red flags, for sure, in the ordinary badly behaved, or the jerk, well in advance.
I would have run the other way had he displayed any freaky or flaky behaviour.  We were well into marriage before it became slowly evident that something was amiss, something pretty awful.  

Take care all
Hermes

[Leah]

Which takes me back to where I started ........ the Brainwashing techniques and the drip drip drip ...... like a dripping tap.

My husband was the silent N

In the beginning, there was no bad behaviour.

Clever

Devious

Sly

Crafty

Cunning

Smoke and Mirrors

....... Resonate with my married life experience with my XNH who was the classic "Wolf in Sheep's Clothing" 

Leah


PS.  He stalked my soul as a young person and interviewed my mother, then brainwashed and programmed me slowly ... drip drip drip

like a dripping tap.

Last year, I discovered that he had told a family friend after our few dates "I am going to marry her, she is mine"

[lighter]

Personal responsibility = common sense = making new mistakes and not repeating old mistakes

Once we're aware of the facts, we're responsible for our own wellbeing... no one else.  

We don't accept that others, who make promises, will be responsible for us.  No matter how sweet the deal sounds.

We're happy and secure enough on our own to say "NO thank you" to innapropriate unhealthy contracts that appear to offer comfort and pleasure, right?

Is that as simple as being wise enough to recognize when a deal's too good to be true?

Does that equate to being street wise?

Emotionally intelligent?

Healthy enough to find that kind of bait odd and unnatractive?

Is it that we have unresolved issues that open us up to an unrealistic sales pitch?  We want the promised gift so much we put on blinders to the red flags flying?

That's the key.  

Paying attention to everything, not just the parts that are attractive and make us feel safe and warm.

The history of the person selling the story.

The facts that don't quite add up.

The first unkind words or deeds that are turned back on us and explained away as a fault of our own..... the demands begin to trickle in softly..... and once we've accepted responsibility for someone else's behavior..... we're already cooked: /


If we understand that we're responsinble for ourselves.... and other'sa re responsible for themselves.... the we can't be fooled, can we?

[Leah]

Personal responsibility = common sense = making new mistakes, and not repeating old mistakes

Once we're aware of the facts, we're responsible for our own wellbeing... no one else.  

We don't accept that others, who make promises, will be responsible for us.  No matter how sweet the deal sounds.

We're happy and secure enough on our own to say "NO thank you" to innapropriate unhealthy contracts that appear to offer comfort and pleasure, right?


My view exactly, Lighter

Leah

[lighter]

Not saying everyone's taken in but..... what I am saying is that I believe, true or not, that there are red flags somewhere.

Old stories about past relationships.

A comment from a sibling or a parent.
  
A Grandmother's odd remark.

Co worker's resentments.

And.... I think they actually tell us who they are..... but they explain that they want to leave that behind bc we make them want to be better people, settle down, change their ways, be good family men.......

I couldbe wrong but this is my experience and my perception when it comes to people who prey on others bc that's what they are.... not what they do.

There's always a trail of chaos somewhere behind them, isn't there?

[Leah]

Back then, I was only a young girl, and bearing in mind that I was living enmeshed in my NFOO homelife etc.

But NOW ...

that I know ...

All those Red Flags areas that you have mentioned would be important for me to ascertain.

Checking out family and friends, including work environment, would be paramount for me.

Along with my own perception, intuition, gut feeling.  To discern and decide. 

It's my life, I own it, and I am responsible for it.

Leah

PS >  And if the man has nothing to hide etc., then he should have no problem with my doing just that, in fact, it should bode well, as he would see a woman who is reasonably healthy, mature, balanced and discerning.  He should hopefully, be pleased!! 

[Gabben]

 My ex was the most normal, "regular guy" type you could meet.  Looking back he was probably "too normal".  He was diffident, considerate, not flash, polite, pleasant, educated, non-smoker, did not drink except on the very odd occasion, in fact precisely what I expect most of you on here would like to find in a person or future partner.  People talk about red flags.  Nonsense.  You will see red flags, for sure, in the ordinary badly behaved, or the jerk, well in advance.
I would have run the other way had he displayed any freaky or flaky behaviour.  We were well into marriage before it became slowly evident that something was amiss, something pretty awful.  

Hi Hermes,

Wow - I could really relate with what you wrote above. Ever since I had a run in with a woman who was my therapist and is a N, I keep my eyes open for people who behave too nicely and or too normal or too perfect. It is important to listen not to what someone is saying but to what someone is not saying....listen for the withholding. My ex N therapist was so withholding and always played games of smoke screens and mirrors. After three years of friendship and therapy I still have no idea who she was and or is but she sure did want me to cross the therapy boundaries and be her groupie or follower...not normal behavior but she could act soooooo normal...it was always so confusing yet she was so talented at the game I would even rationalize my confused feelings to her benefit.

After only our first three sessions of working together she invited me into her prayer ministry which was the first crossing of a boundary with her. The second came when she started doing social things with myself and her other clients. She would surround herself with clients and somehow make sure that she was the focus and center of attention.  Then she started asking me to babysit. I noticed that I seemed be the only one of her clients who got the special invite to watch her son...I noted one day that my babysitting for her had the effect of making me feel more privileged or special than her other clients -- yuck!

She crossed boundaries all the time but her guise or excuse for crossing them was kindness...all in the name of love and fellowship she would say.

She was also emotionally shallow and extremely distrusting.


Here is an excerpt from the Dynamics of Evil (Leah recently posted here):

Such a person, by virtue of his olympian egotism, always regards others as inferior to himself. Everyone is a simpleton in his eyes. What helps afford him this illusion is that most people are unsuspecting and are unaware of the degree to which they are being taken advantage of, used and abused. This unawareness is not due to a general lack of intelligence in people, but to their tendency to project their own range of normalcy onto others. Hence, their disinclination to suspect someone so profoundly depraved to be in their midst, carrying on an existence that is fundamentally and thoroughly alie. But the character disordered conveniently regard this trait as evidence of intellectual inferiority and will take a twisted delight in the knowledge that they have so many fooled.

But it is necessary to know well how to disguise this characteristic, and to be a great pretender and dissembler; and men are so simple, and so subject to present necessities, that he who seeks to deceive will always find someone who will allow himself to be deceived.14
When it is a question of evil, it is precisely the element of disguise that people tend to overlook. We are wont to assume that evil, character disorder, profound moral depravity, psychopathy, pathological narcissism, etc., are easy to detect and that such people can only intimidate and inspire fear upon a first encounter. But this is only the case with those not intelligent enough to disguise their depravity, like the common criminal. The most dangerous among us are those intelligent enough to appear as paragons of virtue.


This so describes my N saint therapist - her disguise and lack of respect for others boundaries.

Lise

[lighter]

Herme.... what was the first indicator for you.... that your H wasn't what he appeared?

Did it just come out of the blue and hit like a hurricane or did it start small and get larger as he crossed your boundaries again and again?

What was his history?

No red flags.... I can;t imagine that an N would have no history of abuse or chaos in his wake.  

[Lupita]

“I was struck this afternoon by how some folks might perceive a lack of boundaries as a lack of common sense, and it drove me to distraction thinking about the difference between common sense and repeating old mistakes. What's the difference?”

Dear Lighter, I relate to this so deeply.

You cannot have something you do not know it exists.
You cannot produce something you have never seen.

For example the queen Maria Antoinette, from France, when she was told that people were rebellious because they were hungry, she said, why? Because they do not have bread, her servant said, then she said, no bread? Why don’t they eat cakes?

She did not know.

How can you set for your self  something you have never seen or experienced?

[Hermes]

Dear Lighter:

You have my word that there were no red flags, none.  As I mentioned in another post, I had been around, independent, worked and lived abroad, great FOO, and I think I was/am a fairly shrewd person.

Also, my ex met all members of my family before we married, including even cousins, and close friends.  None of those people saw absolutely anything "odd" about this man.  In fact, friends or relatives would say to me: "you are a lucky girl to have met such a very nice man". 

He had been married once before, (it does happen LOL), and I met him long after his divorce was over.  I saw no problem there.  Peope do after all divorce and remarry.  He kept in constant touch with his own family, and seemed very empathic towards them.  He got on well with my father and when around would help my mother with little tasks like bits and pieces of DIY. 
He was what one would call a nice conservative guy, and what many mothers would probably have called in the past "a suitable husband".  LOL.

The change was sort of imperceptible, and he, well, he became strange.  Then again, he had some physical health problems around that time, had been in hospital, and at first I thought it might be just bad anxiety.  Shortly aftterwards I became to think "he is going insane".  Yes! 
I had never in my life up to six or seven years ago even heard of a PD, and I had never heard the word "dysfunction" even.  Can you imagine.  I had never had occasion to even meet a mentally ill person, less so an abusive person. 
I was just torpedoed by the whole situation.  It was so unbelievable that this so "normal" man seemed to be becoming insane.  It made no sense.  I would catch him looking at me as if he had never seen me before in his life, for example. (And of course he hadn't really, because you are never ever really "there" for the NPD). 

Of course I reacted badly to his "devaluation", and decided "I am not having this stuff".  I gave back as good as I got.  Believe me, a useless exercise.  Neither can you reason with an NPD.  It is a no win situation. 

Fast forward: he was diagnosed NPD by a psych.  I listened to that psych with my mouth literally open.  I did not know what a personality disorder was!  But, at least I had an answer.  And that was it.

Hermes

[lighter]

Thanks and I can appreciate your story, Herme.

But..... there was a divorce in his past.  Did you not ask what that was about and did he not blame everything on her?

What did his family say about that union?

Is he still in touch with the ex?

Close touch with their family doesn't necessarily mean that they're good family men, as you've seen. 

When a man has a trail of ex's that won't have anything to do with him or when they seem to be insane women who stalk or have confrontations over and over again with each other, while Mr. WOnderful stands by and enjoys being fought over.... it's a red flag flying.

I think there are always flags, if we look hard enough and don't dismiss them.

What were you told about his ex and his past relationships?

I'm betting the story was used to build you up and make you feel very very special.

[mudpuppy]

  Some of these people are able to camoflage the red flags quite well and I have no doubt Hermes had no clue her ex was a nut. But Gabben is also right on the money when she says it is what they don't say that is what convicts them.
  Goes back to that "Assume Good Intent" idea of a few threads ago. If we assume good intent then we take things at face value and don't dig into someone's past. We don't really try to see what their family relationships are actually like deep down or what really happened in a divorce. The really good liars know how to make us believe they are trustworthy on the things we can easily see, which lulls us into not looking at the concealed things.
  The red flags are always there, but sometimes they're truly buried. The lesson, after being burned, is always do your spade work.

mud

[Hermes]

Dear Lighter and all

No, I was told no stories, or anything to build me up.  He had one previous wife, and that was it.  I was really not particularly interested in his former wife, at all.  As he seemed like a perfectly normal human being, why would I start to ask questions about his ex-wife.  I would not like someone asking me about my ex-husband, if they met me.
They divorced and that was it.  No, he was not in contact with her, but was on excellent terms with her now adult children (from her own first marriage, she was a widow).   I know for a fact they simply split the house, property etc. down the middle and each went their own way.  It happens. I think it is quite unhealthy lingering over old marriages/relationships, unless you absolutely have to see the ex because of children or whatever.
The few times he mentioned his first wife, he always spoke well of her, said she was a good person, but that (like I suppose can happen in many marriages) they kind of drifted apart.

Lighter, I already felt quite special, (I am special LOL), I do not/did not need anyone to make me feel anything LOL.  This man was so normal you would not believe.  There was none of this rush you off your feet stuff, or charm, or anything like that.  That kind of stuff cuts no ice with me.  I was a career girl, I did not particularly have an urge to get married, but this seemed like a very nice man to make a future with. 

I most certainly would never have asked his family about her/their marriage.  It would have been most inelegant.  He had been divorced about four years when he met me.

All the best and take care
Hermes

[Hopalong]

Personal responsibility = common sense = making new mistakes and not repeating old mistakes

Once we're aware of the facts, we're responsible for our own wellbeing... no one else.  

We don't accept that others, who make promises, will be responsible for us.  No matter how sweet the deal sounds.

We're happy and secure enough on our own to say "NO thank you" to innapropriate unhealthy contracts that appear to offer comfort and pleasure, right?

Is that as simple as being wise enough to recognize when a deal's too good to be true?

Does that equate to being street wise?

Emotionally intelligent?

Healthy enough to find that kind of bait odd and unnatractive?

Is it that we have unresolved issues that open us up to an unrealistic sales pitch?  We want the promised gift so much we put on blinders to the red flags flying?

That's the key.  

Paying attention to everything, not just the parts that are attractive and make us feel safe and warm.

The history of the person selling the story.

The facts that don't quite add up.

The first unkind words or deeds that are turned back on us and explained away as a fault of our own..... the demands begin to trickle in softly..... and once we've accepted responsibility for someone else's behavior..... we're already cooked: /


If we understand that we're responsinble for ourselves.... and other'sa re responsible for themselves.... the we can't be fooled, can we?

Oh BINGO, Lighter.
If I'd had you by my side, I could've skipped an entire horrible 2nd marriage.

You are wise and boy does that bode well for your own future...

once the way clears.

love
Hops