I was fortunate in a lot of ways because my mother was not as out-of-control as many other N moms were. So, she didn't really put down what I achieved and didn't castigate me for the occasional low grade either. It was just that achievements were taken for granted rather than given positive feedback, so that I did not value my achievements that much either. My dad, who was not an N, would say, "Good" matter of factly. But he also was matter of fact about low grades ... just asked "Did you do your best?" and if I answered "Yes" he'd say "OK, then. That's all I can ask."
My mom had a hard time praising and I have had the same problem. I had to force myself to verbally praise, and for a long time it felt stilted and fake. But I knew logically I needed to do it so I made myself praise my kids until it felt more natural.
Actually, my experience with my mom kind of sheds light on the whole process of becoming an N, because she is sort of halfway between "normals" and the abusers that some of you others have experienced. Very uncomfortable with emotions, well, with POSITIVE emotions. She is much more in touch with her negative emotions --- anger and anxiety. You can tell that she feels understood if I tell her I am worried about her. I have learned to let go of a lot of my own anxiety and worry, but that is still how I express to her that I care. I know that she understands the word "worry" as an expression that I care about her.
The main thing school did for me was to give me a venue where I could know what the criteria for success was, I could show that I could meet those criteria, and I was free to pursue my interests. And wonder of wonders, I became successful at it!
At home, my mom's environment, she did everything for me and then complained that nobody ever helped her. She did that to my dad too. She didn't rage or anything, but you were always in a catch-22 bind. She had to have everything done on her schedule and done her way, yet she felt mistreated because she "had" to do everything. More like she trained us not to try! She had no patience for teaching me to do anything. She would give lip service to knowing that patience is a virtue, but would also laugh about having no patience like she was proud of it. Very subtle crazy-making.
My cousin recently had an experience with his N mother (my mother's sister) that is just an exaggeration of what both of us have always gone through with our moms. His very elderly father recently had hip surgery, and the drs. gave very specific instructions on what to do to build him back up to health. One of those instructions is to remove all obstacles, including things like throw rugs, from the house, and to use a special chair in the bathtub. My cousin installed the bath chair for his dad, all the while his mother was complaining it was in her way. His mother refused to fix the house (they live in a very small, post-WWII frame home, most cities have whole neighborhoods with houses like that so you can probably picture it). She collects all kinds of crap --- dolls, porcelain figures, etc. so their house is pretty crowded. There are throw rugs in the threshold of every door in the house. My aunt's idea of caring for her husband was to keep him in his chair (after all he might fall with all that crap in his way) and to give him "spit baths" --- the Southern expression for sponge baths --- in his chair. My cousin was furious. He felt his mom was deliberately trying to keep his dad debilitated, although to hear her tell it she was sooooo attentive.
That is an extreme example but it is similar to what I went through growing up. My mom felt she was soooo attentive, but it could have easily have had the effect of debilitating me.
It wasn't just my mom. Even though my Dad was not an N, he was wrapped in cottonwool by his parents (his dad was probably an N), and did his share of passing along the pattern. I do have to give my mom a great big credit --- she stood up to my dad and insisted I be allowed to go away to college. That is a biggie and I would feel unjust if I did not say that. Of course, we lived in a huge metropolitan area, and she felt I would be safer at the small university in a small town that I wanted to attend, as opposed to driving in the city every day to go to school from home. So that turned out well, no matter what her motives were. She also knew that when I went off to college, she would prefer not to know every time I came and went, because of her own nerves. I guess I can relate to that, although it seems like a selfish reason to do the right thing.
My mom's narcissism was so subtle that if she hadn't gotten worse in her later years, I might never have seen it. My dad was terminally ill when I went back for my masters degree, and my mom was very nasty to me about it. I guess because it was taking time away from them. It seems like when she is under stress she gets nasty rather than depressed.
No matter how subtle it was though, it took its toll on me. Earlier in life I could not have explained to you why school was such a liberating place for me, but it was. Mom's need to be the only competent one in the house had a bad effect on me, whether I recognized it or not.
