Blame-shifting support?

[mostly_sunny]

Hi everyone,

I'm new to this forum and to learning that what I've experienced my entire life has a name! Despite all of this learning, I'm still terrified that this could be me...

Hoping to hear a little about other people's experiences of having the blame shifted onto them? (If people are up for sharing!)

I'm also stuck on how to let go of all of the shame that has amassed from being the issue all of the time for so so many years? Deep down in my core I know that I know the truth (that I am a non-disordered regular human how has experienced cluster B abuse)... but I also carry all of that shame and confusion that people have dumped on me... and I have no idea how to let it go?

Crazy making indeed! 

Thank you

[treesgrowslowly]

Hello and welcome to the forum mostly_sunny,

I'll share some thoughts about your questions.

Sounds like you are at the beginning of the learning. With learning comes understanding, (aha moments) but also a lot of grieving. A lot of realizations that are painful. Take care of yourself as best you can as you learn.

Like you said, people have dumped their confusion and their shame onto you. Once you see that, you're able to see the source of the FOG, was other people's dysfunction. Not yours. I can see from your writing that you already realize that.

The things I have successfully 'let go' of, are things I spent time understanding, and then grieving. I believe the recovery process involves redefining a lot of ideas and concepts that were defined (poorly, or inaccurately) by our abusers for us. They tried to tell us what self-care, self-esteem, self-confidence looks like, and if they were narcissistic, then their definitions of those things were mostly (or fully) inaccurate, unhelpful, and likely damaging to us.

For example, around narcs what you will hear is that their need are important...and your needs are selfish. This is how they see the world. Their definition of 'selfish' doesn't includes anything they did. According to them, they are not selfish, they are not acting entitled, you are. (and so on).

I cannot count how many times I wanted to go to a particular store, or I needed to rest, and I was told that I wasn't "allowed" to. Meanwhile, anything the NPDs wanted to do, we had to facilitate / enable. The shaming was often subtle. It was rarely an overt "you don't deserve that" but more covert in that their behaviour ensured that I went along with their plans and their definitions of things.

Letting go of the shame happens over time. For me, I had to learn a lot about how their PD disordered thinking worked, so that I could unpack the things I had been through in life.

Many of us recommend videos and books here that have helped us to have a real, accurate and healthy definition of ourselves and our needs. If you happen to know people IRL who have a healthy view of you as a person, and who truly treat you well, then spending time with them can help. If you don't happen to have that, then spending time with books and videos that promote a healthy sense of self, will help you to re-affirm the healthy beliefs you want to have about yourself.

Good luck in your learning,

Trees

[Cat of the Canals]

Welcome, mostly_sunny.

For starters, the fact that you ever ask yourself the question "is it me?" is a good sign. PDs rarely self-analyze that way, and when they do, I believe they feel an instant, overwhelming urge to blame someone else.

My NPD/BPD mom is a perfect example. I've heard for years that she "wishes we were closer." There is a clear undertone of blame in this statement. I am withholding something from her. I am not doing enough. The notion that she shares 50% of the responsibility in our relationship never occurs to her. The idea that she has never been emotionally open with me (so how could I be with her???) never occurs to her. In her mind, the relationship works one way. She wants. I give.

I internalized this for YEARS. I felt wholly and absolutely that there was something wrong with me that I should feel this absolute inability to have a really open and honest relationship with my own mother. The notion that she might share responsibility for the state of our relationship (doubly so since she raised me) didn't occur to me until I started putting the PD puzzle together. Suddenly I understood. I'd been protecting myself from her for my entire life without even realizing it.

Then I felt kind of stupid. How could I have not seen it before???? But when you're raised in the dysfunction, you have been conditioned to see it as "normal" or at the very least "acceptable." There is rarely someone there to tell you, "This is not right. This is not how people should behave." We are told that WE are the problem, and we believe it. Because we trust the people telling us so. We have to because as children we literally depend on them for survival.

The beginning of this journey is hard. I found journaling very helpful. When I was first figuring it out, I was writing in my journal at least once a day, sometimes more, and I probably did that every day for several months. I needed to do something to stop the thoughts from swirling around inside my head. I also read a LOT. I'd say my top 3 PD books are Understanding the Borderline Mother (Lawson), Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents (Gibson), and Stop Caretaking the Borderline or Narcissist (Fjelstad).

Best of luck to you.

[mostly_sunny]

The things I have successfully 'let go' of, are things I spent time understanding, and then grieving. I believe the recovery process involves redefining a lot of ideas and concepts that were defined (poorly, or inaccurately) by our abusers for us. They tried to tell us what self-care, self-esteem, self-confidence looks like, and if they were narcissistic, then their definitions of those things were mostly (or fully) inaccurate, unhelpful, and likely damaging to us.

Hi Trees,

Thank you for taking the time to respond!
If I'm really honest, I've been hurt so much that I was scared to come back to the forum to see if anybody had responded to my post! In my brain somewhere, I was fully expecting to be told off, told that this wasn't an appropriate question etc. so, even though you're a stranger responding to a stranger with little tiny pixelated words... the effort genuinely means the world right now. Just knowing that I am OK... that this is OK... is huge.

Also, this is excellent advice. I think I might be similar to you. I find that I get hung up on, or ruminate on the things that don't make sense to me. Understanding things and being able to successfully integrate that understanding makes a huge difference. This is helpful to be reminded of!

Seriously, thank you

[mostly_sunny]

Welcome, mostly_sunny.

For starters, the fact that you ever ask yourself the question "is it me?" is a good sign. PDs rarely self-analyze that way, and when they do, I believe they feel an instant, overwhelming urge to blame someone else.

My NPD/BPD mom is a perfect example. I've heard for years that she "wishes we were closer." There is a clear undertone of blame in this statement. I am withholding something from her. I am not doing enough. The notion that she shares 50% of the responsibility in our relationship never occurs to her. The idea that she has never been emotionally open with me (so how could I be with her???) never occurs to her. In her mind, the relationship works one way. She wants. I give.

I internalized this for YEARS. I felt wholly and absolutely that there was something wrong with me that I should feel this absolute inability to have a really open and honest relationship with my own mother. The notion that she might share responsibility for the state of our relationship (doubly so since she raised me) didn't occur to me until I started putting the PD puzzle together. Suddenly I understood. I'd been protecting myself from her for my entire life without even realizing it.

Then I felt kind of stupid. How could I have not seen it before???? But when you're raised in the dysfunction, you have been conditioned to see it as "normal" or at the very least "acceptable." There is rarely someone there to tell you, "This is not right. This is not how people should behave." We are told that WE are the problem, and we believe it. Because we trust the people telling us so. We have to because as children we literally depend on them for survival.

Hey,

This is similar to my response to Trees, but honestly, thank you so much for taking the time to respond. Being heard, seen, validated, accepted is something I don't even have the words for yet. This whole journey has been a nightmare. I haven't spent my entirely life trying to be better, wondering what's wrong with me, why I can't seem to have the relationships with my family that other people seem to be able to have with theirs etc. then being drawn to other cluster Bs in the world... the whole thing has been reinforced and reinforced to the point where it's hard to accept that maybe I've been living in an upside down fever dream this whole time. Knowing that there are other people out there with the same experiences to me is HUGE.

Thank you for taking the time to respond

[Lauren17]

Hello Sunny,

I'm just coming out of a long term marriage to a uNPD. As many of us do, part of my healing has included looking back on my FOO. I don't think there were any PDs there, but there were lots of classic family dysfunctions. Mom took to blaming me for everything in what I believe what an attempt to offset my dad's anger, as I was his favorite.

You asked for examples, well here goes:
Dad is angry we had meatloaf for dinner? Lauren asked for it!
Brothers were playing catch with grandmas antique vase and cracked it? Lauren was playing too and she dropped it!
And on and on.

When I moved out of the house, stbxh stepped right in.
I was blamed for his mothers passive aggressive behavior. I was blamed for his weight gain. I was blamed when the Tv stopped working.

I think the healing part starts with identifying the problem.
Then understanding their motivations.
The hardest part is understanding why you've accepted the blame all these years.

This forum has been invaluable to me on this journey. One of the biggies for me was sharing in these examples and learning from others experiences.

One last thing. I cried when I read the first responses to my first post. Youre now part of a community that understands.

[treesgrowslowly]

Hi mostly_sunny,

What a great name!

I am glad you are here. I joined here years ago. The support I got when I was learning how to live Out of the FOG was invaluable. So I get how big it is to have that from folks.

So many of us here have been treated poorly (boy that is an understatement) and are generous souls who want to connect and share kindly with others. If we can help each other along, it makes the healing journey easier to go through. It helps me a lot to be here and reflect on where I'm at in my own journey. We never stop learning about ourselves.

Glad you are here,

Trees

[gj438]

Hello,

This is fully normal to experience this blame shifting feeling, as part of the abuse process. I think that people with PD do suffer immensely and they need to blame someone else for it, and may therefore be genuinely convinced that you really are their abuser. And since they are convinced of it, they can convey this idea very easily. Besides, we all make mistakes, and so yes, it's possible that at some point you made a wrong move or something. This strengthens the blame shifting even more, and in my experience the people with PD didn't hesitate to point out these wrong moves I made (it didn't come to their mind to compare them with the whole abuse they did, though).

But remember: you are not responsible for their suffering, their disease is. You are ok, if you made mistakes at some points it is also ok, and it happens to literally every human being, and yet we are not all abusers.

It also happened to me. The very night when he sexually abused me, my NPD coworker told me "now you see, you have everything you wanted". As if I was the one who had manipulated him into doing this, as if I was abusing him. This little sentences get into your head and this is partly responsible for this feeling that it's your fault. But part of this feeling also comes from us, I think, from our inability to understand what's happening and our need to find a logical explanation. Sometimes the most logical explanation we can come up with is that we are guilty. But it doesn't mean that it is true. The truth is, I think, that there is no logic in this type of abuse cycle.