Ami - this is a great thread. I was just thinking on my morning walk how embarrassed I am for being here on this board and for having spent so much of life on a treadmill going nowhere because of her verbal abuse.
Sounds like your Mother was similar to mine, in that she encouraged (and paid for) my education, always tells me to keep trying and as a kid sent me to German School, Charity League, tennis lessons, ballet, horse-riding lessons, debutante balls and all sorts of other stuff, all the while making me feel inferior and putting me down. Problem is that was never about me - it was all about her unfulfilled childhood needs. When I say I am embarrassed, I am embarrassed by how I've let my NM treat me w/ disrespect and negativity and while I always had difficulties with her, I was always the good, respectful girl and continued to let her disrespect me and my needs. Thats exactly the pattern I've attracted into my life with work and love. I get it now, a year after finding out she is an N. One of the big problems here is that she is in denial, she claims she loves me, but she really doesn't - certainly not enough to care about my feelings. This is a pervasive and destructive theme in my love life as well (appearances of love and caring, yet disrespecting necessary emotional needs). Initially my problem was that I did not feel good enough for love, so it took me to 40 to even find a relationship, and that person was "emotionally unavaiable", as I descrived above. Additionally a normal person, when confronted with my list of hurts, would apologize and show some sympathy and ask how not to hurt one's feelings. She does not. She tends to deny it completely and tells me I'm oversensitive.
Also, at a young age - I think I was six - she sent me to stay the summer with my relatives in Germany. While there, I was playing with my cousins in a fenced yard and man across the street started shooting at us. He fired off about 20 bullets, before my Uncle came out and rushed us inside. When I told my Mother hte story on the phone, she didn't believe me until my Uncle told her. As I remember, he said not to mention it - but I was young and I did. I think he wanted to tell her himself, but I blew it. I'm really not sure how I felt about this at the time - but I do remember having trouble with honesty growing up as a child - but now I learn shes been completely dishonest with my Brother and I, so this is another warped value and manipulated feeling I have about myself that I am trying to straighten out. Someone (but only those very close to me) can try to imply that I am lying or not being truthful and I can crumble rather quickly, even when I've done nothing wrong.
Also, I should mention that my brother thinks she is BPD and he discovered that 10 years ago during his first divorce. So, while we might tend to disagree slightly on her problem (which is common among siblings) we agree she does have a huge problem. I tend to think the Nism comes out more between mother/daughter rather than mother/son, certainly it did in my case. But, he also tells me how negative, delusional, and undermining she is in his current marriage, so we agree completely on her "symptoms". Also, this label (BPD/NPD) comes from three different therapists and his Mother in Law who is a Stanford trained PHD in psychology and practicing therapist for 30 years. She interacts with my NM on a social basis and has for 9 years, so she is well aware and has observed these conflicts first hand, not just through reported stories from children (meaning me) to the therapist. So, we are very certain the problem is correctly defined.
I'm at the point in healing where I can identify the exact issues and paraphrase them in each category - work, money, love etc, and have a revised feeling and an plan of action to avoid future problems - so thats really helpful.
