Hi, I'm new to the board. "Voiceless and emotional" sums it up for me pretty well. I'm an introvert, and have been married to an NH for over 25 years.
I realize now that my mom was an N. She died a few years ago. About the worst event I had with my NM centered around my dad's death. When I was 11 years old, he fell to the floor one day from a heart attack, and NM told me to call for help. I fumbled through the phone book to get the emergency number (this was before "911"). She thought I was taking too long, and ripped the book out of my hand and got the number herself. After the funeral, when I was crying because I missed my father, NM told me I had to stop crying because it was all my fault he died -- my fault because if I hadn't wasted those "precious seconds" fumbling with the phone book, help would of came sooner and he would have lived. She never said this when anyone else was around - just repeated it to me every time I showed any emotion about my dad's death. (When I was about 25 years old, I learned from one of my brothers that my NM had an autopsy done right after dad's death, so she knew the whole time that he died immediately and there was nothing anyone could have done to save him. It was not my fault at all and she knew it, yet she repeatedly told me it was. Nice lady, huh? After his death, she became clinically depressed, suicidal, and very angry. I was the youngest child, and after my youngest brother moved away a couple years later, I lived alone with NM. Life with her was difficult, to say the least.)
To make matters worse, when I was 8 years old, I was so afraid of NM that when I broke a doll, I panicked and thought I had to destroy it. Not being too smart about these things at that age, I took the doll behind our barn and tried to burn it -- it was late August and we hadn't had rain for weeks and our barn caught fire instead and it burned down. My mom started questioning me about where I was when the fire started, and she became enraged and started choking me, but my brother came in, stopped her, and he made up an alibi for me -- then he told me I could never tell anyone the truth, and I agreed. That was great for a while, but my brother was 15 at the time and it didn't take him long to realize he had me over a barrel. He soon became a master at blackmail and psychological abuse. For years and years, when people were around us, he'd do things like make fire engine noises during dinner, use the words "fire" or "burn" every chance he could (while staring at me and smirking) ; he'd tell me they were coming to arrest me when we'd see or hear a police car; tell me I was a felon; threatened to "tell" if I didn't wash his car, cook for him, etc, etc. He thought it was fun to torment me, while I lived in constant fear. I began to withdraw more and more from people and just hated social situations -- still struggling with that to this day -- I still avoid socializing, have anxiety at parties, funerals, get-togethers, etc. So, before the age of 12 I felt like an arsonist and a murderer - and the self-hatred was pretty bad, too. Needless to say, it took a lot of years of working through all the childhood junk just to be able to put this part of my story in writing like this. There was lots more, for sure, but these two things I believe had the biggest impact on my life.
I met my NH when we were both 16 -- he was the son of a friend of the family. His mom was an N, and he has lots and lots of "mom" issues, which I found out later. In the beginning, it was so nice to have someone who I could do things for and who liked my company; unfortunately, it wasn't long after we got married that the criticism and other NPD traits started coming out. Even though I was his "yes-wife" and my world revolved around him for many many years, he was never happy with me. Within the last few years I've become aware of NPD and started to get a grip on my life, and things have been a lot better with NH in many ways, but I constantly sense his underlying resentment, though he recently told me how happy he was with his life in general. We pretty much live like college roommates - no closeness or communication at all. For many years I longed for communication and just wanted to make him happy – I realize now both were never possible.
I often think of getting out of this situation, but I honestly don't believe I could handle friends, family, and people from our church trying to “fix” our marriage. I get enough abandonment and invalidation from NH -- don't think I could handle more of the same treatment from other people who don't have a clue about NPD. I would end up feeling even more like it's "all my fault" (which seems to be the theme of my life). So, day after day I put on a smile, go to work (where I get to be around some great people all day), and try not to make waves at home, etc., but in reality I'm pretty miserable and don't see much hope in my future with NH.
