Self Blame

[me01t]

What are some suggestions for handling self blame for reacting initially to what was going on? Sometimes I am able to rationalise it other days i feel like i am entirely to blame for making things worse for reacting.

[GentleSoul]

Sorry you are feeling this way.

It took me loads and loads of practice to not react to my uPD husband.  I still slip and do react sometimes. 

Especially when he deliberately pushes buttons. 

We have to be kind to ourselves, I think.

[treesgrowslowly]

I found that Pete Walker's explanation of how to handle the back and forth nature of our experience to lay it out well. He explains why we feel pulled towards and then away from our own self blaming.

[LemonLime]

Following this thread, as I have the same issue.  My therapist has helped me understand that my reactions to my sib's accusations are normal.  And she has acknowledged me for seeking help to make things better, and to learn how to respond instead of react.  I think we have to acknowledge ourselves for our baby steps, and forgive ourselves for having human-type reactions to being attacked.  We are doing the best with what we have.   And we are doing work to manage things in new and better ways.  I suppose one could always apologize to the PD for one's initial reactions.  It isn't the same as acknowledging wrong-doing, just in the response.  I'm at a point where I could probably do that...... "I'm sorry for my reactive words when you raised your voice at me.  I am working on responding rather than reacting" etc.  Not sure if you want to do that or not

[GentleSoul]

Thanks for sharing, Kat.  I agree that the reactions we have are normal human responses.

It is the PD that is twisting and manipulating that is the cause of the problem.  They provoke and touch raw spots in us purely to get a reaction. 

I had come to believe that there was something wrong with me because of the effect my uPD husbands behaviour has on me.  I now understand this is wrong. 

[treesgrowslowly]

Self blame can be seen as one ofnthe ways we get stuck with a way of thinking that comes from being a child and trying to cope with someone who isn't taking responsibility for their behaviours.

Learning about PDs can help because we see how little responsibility they took or take for their actions. There are days that are hard, for sure. There was some good advice here somewhere about observing people who seem to have good self esteem and notice how they deal with problems. It can help to find people you can use as examples of the behaviour we want to develop. Of course self esteem is the opposite of narcissism and narcissists can look loke they have high self esteem but people with real self esteem have learned how to problem solve and narcissists have not.

When I obeserve people who don't self blame, I see them teaching me to accept my feelings and not reject them.

[LemonLime]

 
I love your reply, Trees.   Hopefully not hijacking the post, but just want to comment on how much I love the idea of role models with high self-esteem.   I have found that idea very useful in the past few months.   My struggle is often one of wondering if my sib's over-the-top reactions to things I do (for instance, her perception that I am shirking my laundry duty), are justified or not.   She tells me that shrieking and making sweeping statements about my character are completely justified, given my horrible disregard for her.   She is very convincing in her arguments about how her reaction is what any thinking and rational person would do in the situation.  So, I have in my mind a few friends or acquaintances who stand out to me as exceptionally balanced people.  People who are thoughtful and careful in their words and who I have rarely, if never, seen rattled by any situation.   And I think to myself, "how would so-and-so respond to feeling slighted around the laundry?".   The response is never that they would get red in the face and shriek insults at me.   And that helps bring me back to the reality that it's my sib who is not well, and though I may not be perfect, I am well within the range of normal.  Thanks.

[HeadAboveWater]

While PDI's often have favorite barbs or patterns of manipulation that we can learn to ignore, sometimes they throw a change-up pitch that we didn't see coming. You may very well be dealing with someone who is programmed to seek attention. The more practiced you are at MC/gray rocking, the more the PDI will try to find novel ways to break through. And sometimes their actions have real consequences for nons. When we are navigating around disappointments, setting new boundaries, etc., we expend energy, which leaves us in a more vulnerable state. The way one manages a relationship with a PDI tends not to mirror healthy relationships, so it doesn't flow naturally; it takes extra thinking, planning, and effort. We can all fail to properly anticipate or just get a little worn out in such an environment.

[not broken]

I have found that the best medicine for self blame is to learn about oneself.  Once you get a glimpse of your authentic self, you will see the PD in a whole new perspective, and continue to be more and more true to yourself each day moving forward.  Two key things that have helped me a great deal are:

1.  SELF VALIDATION.  I realized that I have my own fear of abandonment and/or not being good enough, so the cycle of praise and love bombing was an addiction of sorts to filling my need of external validation.  That said, I gave my hwNPD the power to dictate what I did or was as being "good enough", and allowed his opinion to be fact as to whether or not I was selfish, rude, lazy, inconsiderate, greedy, etc.  He knew how proud I was to be independent and strong when we met, and he used every insecurity that I had ever shared with him (20 years worth) during his verbal attacks against me. 

2.  YOU CAN ONLY CONTROL YOUR ACTIONS.  I was convinced that if I could just get him to understand how he was making me feel, or that what he was doing was hurtful or that he was being unfair- that if he changed the way he was treating me, everything would be better.  I spent FAR TOO MANY years trying to be the caretaker and plan out every which way I could handle whatever came at me and then I would want to "show/explain" to him that what he was doing was wrong.    I ended up becoming a control freak myself.

One day in therapy I blurted out: I AM SO TIRED OF FIGHTING ABOUT WHO IS RIGHT AND WHO IS WRONG.  I realized that in our relationship, for me to be "right" or "to be allowed to disagree" or to simply have my own opinion; I had to prove him wrong.   And as many of us know, that's near, if not impossible to do in a relationship with a hwNPD. 

If you can remove "laundry" or whatever the topic is that you are arguing about, think about the process of what happens.  Someone can always argue about an action taken, but they can't argue or take away how you feel.  And if you own the feeling- and do not make it about he/she doing X and making you feel Y- then that feeling is yours and I suspect you won't feel as reactive to it.  Then you have a choice in how you express or regulate it for yourself, not him/her. Maybe you won't even have a reaction and this is one of the worst things you can do in their eyes.  When I stopped engaging and reacting to him, my hwNPD started saying to me, "yell at me, throw something, anything please, no response and ignoring me is worse than anything you could do."