Hi all:
I'm posting today to see if anyone else has encountered a situation similar to mine regarding my Nparent.
I have an N mom and, as a mother, she is a typcial N in terms of her self-absorbtion, lack of interest in anyone but her or her fellow Ndaugher (my sister, not me), lack of empathy, affection, etc. However, my Nmom is also a grandmother. I have an 11 year old niece. She seems to have acted in similar ways with her as with her own children. My Nmom has always claimed to "adore" children. The truth is she only interacts with children up until the age when they are completely dependent on her and dote on her. So, she's fine with children up until the age of 5 or 6 when they begin to become individuals and don't need to constantly crawl into her lap, depend on her for every tiny thing. In other words, when everything is about the attention the child gives HER, not vice versa. My Nmom acted like this with my niece as well. Once she became the age when she developed her own personality and ideas, she had not much use for her. For instance, she used to babysit one day a week. Once my niece grew into her own (5 or 6 yrs old) and became active and playful, my mom wanted none of it. She would sit in a chair and read a newspaper, refuse to sit at a table and play with her, etc.
However, my Nmom tells everyone and their brother how this grandchild is the "center of her life". On the rare occasions when she accepts my brother's invitation to see my niece, my Nmom always ends her visit by hugging my niece and whispering in my niece's ear things like, "Don't forget you're MY special girl." "You're MY perfect angel." She makes it their little "secret" but makes sure everyone sees this and knows what she is saying.
On the one hand, I'm grateful that my niece gets to hear these sentiments from her grandmother (despite my mom's real motivations). But, selfishly, I can't help but feel hurt and sad that she could never do that for me either as a child or adult. In addition, my mom has always been cognizant of my niece's development and issues. For example, she expresses concern that she develop good self-esteem, make friends, never be alone when her parents are working. It irks me because she never had any of these concerns for me.
So my question is, for those of you with Nparents, do you find their behavior differs with grandchildren? Do they show more attention to them than to you when you were children? Is their narcissism still evident in how they treat the grandchildren?