Where do I go from here

[Jarndyce]

Hello everyone,

Where to begin? I grew up in a highly dysfunctional household with my parents and older sister. It was a very controlling environment, both in terms of personal development but also physically. I would often be prevented from leaving the house, attending events or engaging in activities, mostly through guilt tripping or screaming at me and blaming me for being a general inconvenience. If I did go out for work or college or to visit friends, I would often be driven there and back or would have to give an itinerary of my movements, where I would be and when I would be home. If I missed a train or was even 5 minutes later returning when I said I would be, I would often be in for a night of abuse where my sister and parents would scream at me for hours that I was the worst (I'm being polite here). This continued until my mid-twenties when I finally escaped (I can't call it leaving home - It was an escape).

Most of my childhood memories are of my family screeching at each other and then turning on me when I tried to keep the peace. I would constantly be held responsible for the emotional wellbeing of my family e.g. 'You're making your mother upset'. If I pointed out my sister's abusive behaviour my parents would basically shrug and say 'she won't do it again'.

I grew up with the unshakeable feeling that I was a defective robot that came without a warranty.

Even after I left home and moved in with my (now) husband, I told myself a lie that our family was normal. That all families fought and that there was always rivalry between siblings. I didn't grow up in poverty or under alcoholism or divorce or physically abused so in my head, everything had to have been just peachy. I was still very enmeshed with my family, going home to them regularly and spending important holidays with them instead of with my husband's family. Needless to say my FOO never even acknowledged that I was in a serious relationship and treated my husband with a lot of distain.

Then, several years ago, my mother got sick and needed full time care. She would spend the next number of years in and out of care homes and hospitals. My sister essentially blamed me for her illness - the crazy logic being that since I was a selfish ungrateful human being who abandoned the family I 'made' her ill. Throughout the years I supported my mother as much as I could, although my sister and father, being so controlling, cut me out of a lot of it and then blamed me for not helping enough. It was during this time that I completely broke down and started going to therapy where - for the first time - I began to see the toxic cloud I had spend my whole life living under. I began to set some boundaries, walking away when my sister became verbally abusive, refusing to attend extended family events if I thought I might get 'trapped' there.

I should say something about my father here. I grew up thinking that he was the one person who was on my side. Often, he would acknowledge my sister's bullying behaviour, my mother's emotional manipulation - If there was something I really wanted to do, he would 'help' me to achieve it, while the two of us danced around the eggshells in the home. For this reason, when I started doing therapy, I thought I could tell my father all that I had learned and that he would, at least, hear me out. He denied that he had seen any of this, saying that he had done his best. I made it clear that i wasn't angry with him, I was only trying to protect myself by limiting exposure and that therapy was helping me to cope with, amongst other things, my mother's illness and her ongoing care needs as well as my 'relationship' with my sister. I thought, on some level, he understood this. I need to make it clear that my relationship with my father was never estranged. I had gone medium chill with my sister for self protection but I was still there for them. For all of them. I was trying to heal myself but I saw him as much a victim of a toxic system as I was. I need to make this clear, to make sense of what happened next.

Last year, my mother passed away. It was during lockdown, COVID was in full swing and it was a very difficult time. Our family dynamic was shifting. Despite weekly calls, my father seemed to feel as though I was not there for him (as if he was the only one who was grieving). Then suddenly, two months ago, he passed away as well. When my sister and I were making the funeral arrangements we started to talk about my parents will's. I discovered then that my father had disinherited me, leaving everything to my NPD sister. I was heartbroken and so confused. He was gone and I couldn't ask him why. The more I looked into it, the more I discovered that my extended family and many of his friends knew what he had done. He'd made his will several years ago - long before COVID and long before my mother's passing. I had sat with extended family and friends who knew that he had done - and no one said anything. No one even thought to ask me how I was doing. He had been telling them that he was angry with me - but not once did he ever say this to me. He had been acting around the extended family as though I had gone NC and as though we had been estranged - we weren't. We spoke at least once a week. No one, it seems, was even passingly interested in my side of the story. Did they not even find it confusing that my father was telling a story about estrangement and then I'd show up to an aunt or uncle's birthday, that they would find me at my mother's bedside, or in the family home at Christmas time. It's baffling to me that not one person thought to ask.

I'm trying to come to terms with this new reality, trying to understand that my father and our relationship was not, at all, what I had believed it to be. On some level I understand that I'm free, now that both of them are gone but I'm left with the sense that my entire biological extended family and their friends were in on some big joke at my expense - like 'there goes the idiot who keeps coming back for more, who keeps expecting a tiny crumb of familial love - what a fool'. I also find myself grieving for the 20's and 30's that I lost - first to a highly controlling family and then to the emotional abuse and my mother's illness that tied me to them. I'm now in my 40's and realise that a) I have no idea about who I am or what I really like or how I should live my life from now on and b) I feel like a complete idiot for giving so much of my life to a family that never loved me and only had contempt for me and c)  I have this deep sense of instability and loneliness inside because, although my husband and his family have taken me in as their own and I have a small but wonderful friend group who are really able to show up when I need them the most, I still can't shake the idea that I am vulnerable without a loving FOO and that the ground could simply break from under me at any moment and that I would just fall through the cracks.

I suppose when you feel like you're on the bottom there is no place to go but up. I also want to say thanks for reading all of this and for listening. I think I've needed some validation that none of this is/was 'normal', so thank you for bearing witness to it.

[Spring Butterfly]

Warm welcome and I so relate to so much of what you shared. You're in the right place and no it was not normal.

Because we grew up it was our normal so as adults we need to grieve, heal and create our own normal from scratch. That's why healing from cPTSD is different than PTSD. We have no normal to return to so we must create it. That is the part of "I have no idea about who I am or what I really like or how I should live my life from now on"

I landed here it took me a while to realize the enabling parent (in my case same as yours) is at the same time a victim of the PD behavior and part of the problem. There could be no abuse without an enabler. Some call it a toxic tango - the PD and enabler dance in tandem. They each have something the other needs and craves as sick and unhealthy as that sounds.

Often I have observed from reading here death does not free us. It ends the possibility of more abuse but we are not free of Fear Obligation Guilt until we heal enough to claim our life and move forward fully. Part of that healing process is mourning what we did not have or receive.

I feel like a complete idiot for giving so much of my life to a family that never loved me and only had contempt for me

You were groomed for this role from birth. It is what PD persons do by their nature. https://outofthefog.website/top-100-trait-blog/2015/11/4/grooming

I still can't shake the idea that I am vulnerable without a loving FOO and that the ground could simply break from under me at any moment

This is also a normal feeling because never having solid ground as a child our nervous system has no clue what that might feel like. We do not know what it is to feel safe. You can heal from all this and part of my healing included a sort of reparenting myself. To recognize I am there for me and as an adult need no one. You can learn to choose safe people and these people are an added blessing in your life. You love them not because you have a hole in your own heart and soul but because they add to your life in a positive way. Love from a place of appreciation not need is how it feels to me.

I'm glad you found this community and introduced yourself. Warmest welcome and if you haven't seen the Toolbox that's your first place for healing tools. Wishing you peace.

[Jarndyce]

Thank you so much. What you say feels so right to me. I had never heard about grooming before. It was very insightful to read about. Also, it's very interesting to hear how cPTSD is different because there is no normal to return to. I've often felt like this but now I can see that part of the healing process will be create a new normal for myself.

I'm so happy to have found this place and grateful to see that there is light at the end of the PD tunnel 

[escapingman]

Jarndyce, I am going through a divorce with a undiagnosed narcissistic woman. During this divorce I have got to know who my FOO really are, it is hearth breaking. My parents split up many years ago, my dad is now together with a highly narcissistic evil woman. My dad is the nicest person to me, when SHE is not around, but as soon as she is around all he cares about is her. I fully expect him to have written me out of his will, on her instruction, but still acting nice to me when it suits him.

I can also speak from my own experience, I was the enabler for my wife for many years. I was so deep in the FOG I would have and I did do whatever she asked me to do. Based on that, I am not sure I could ever blame an enabler, even if I find out one day that my dad cut me out of the will. Jarndyce, you need to remember an enabler has been brainwashed and does not know right from wrong. Please don't blame your dad, even though it hurts, he either wasn't strong enough or just couldn't get Out of the FOG. I just hope my dad comes Out of the FOG one day, but I doubt that will ever happen.

All my love and strength to you!

[goldtracedcloud]

Thank you for sharing your story here...it is something I needed to read.  In my 30s and trying to adjust my expectations of my dysfunctional family system now.  I have concerns that there will be nothing but hurt for me whenever my parents pass.  If they leave me in their will, I will likely have to deal with abuse from siblings (for sure the GC or NPD sibling will be the executor).  If they disinherit me, that will not feel good either.  Even though they are still alive, I can relate a lot to the grief and sense of vulnerability you describe.  Wishing you the best in your healing. 

[NarcKiddo]

Welcome.

Your story was sad to read, especially the ending. I, too, come from a very dysfunctional FOO. It took me almost half a century to realise that my upbringing was not normal and until my mid 50s to start doing therapy, which is helping enormously. Your penultimate paragraph resonates. Particularly the feeling of being vulnerable without a loving FOO - in my case my mother groomed me to believe that only my FOO matters and only my FOO can be trusted. Hah! What a joke.

Wishing you well in coming to terms with all of this. The community here is very warm and helpful.