Newcomer, trying to build a happy life for myself

[Libria]

Hi. I'm in the process of recovery and rebuilding myself, after a being an echoist-caretaker type of person.  I have a narcissistic parent and a narcissistic spouse.  Of my two teenage children, one has personality issues that are still in flux, and the younger is an echoist-caretaker.  My recovery is important for myself and might also benefit my children.  They're both young enough to develop in wonderful ways.

The first phase of my recovery was dealing with narcissistic abuse.  I don't believe my narcissistic abuse was a deliberate effort to harm me. I believe the narcissistic abuse I received was committed by the blind instincts of people who didn't think beyond their momentary need to offload negative emotions and their momentary panic of maintaining a false facade. My mindset and my feelings were never important enough for them to deliberately manipulate, deliberately gaslight, deliberately drive crazy. Gaslighting and driving me crazy were simply side-effects of their distortions, delusions, and amnesia.

I've transitioned away from acting like an echoist-caretaker by focusing on and attending to my immediate sensations, my immediately feelings, and my immediate desires.  In other words, I detached from others' demands and reattached to my own wishes, but I did so in a childish way, like a blind, empty escapist-hedonist.  Which is OK for starters, but I can do better. 

In the next phase of my recovery, I want to rebuild my life and redefine myself in ways that have "meaning" and bring pride, as forms of greater happiness that go beyond momentary impulses. The transition I'm struggling with now is to balance my short-term versus long-term wishes.  I used to balance my short-term impulses against the expectations and demands of others, including the larger achievements and long-term career advancement that others expected of me (including the expectations of supervisors and non-narcissists).   Since I quit obeying the expectations of others, I'm in need of an opposing power to counterbalance my short-term impulses.

Right now, where I'm at, is struggling with choosing between my short-term desires and my long-term desires.
- Reading my printer manual versus letting my printer stay broken. 
- Eating ice cream versus doing aerobic exercise.
- Doing my budget paperwork versus procrastinating.
- Reading something meaningful versus binge-watching something forgettable.

This all sounds very mundane, but it's the stuff-of-life, and when I'm in the presence of multiple personality-disordered people (and with normal people who aren't dedicated to cleaning up the problems created by the personality disordered individuals) — in this context it's not trivial to just do the normal stuff-of-life.  Doing this stuff-of-life in a way that reflects my goals and values as well as my impulsive desires - that's what I need to do next, for being a healthy person and finding happiness for myself.

I hope this forum will help me on my journey,
Libria

[notrightinthehead]

Welcome! You seem well on the way to recovery. Check out the TOOLBOX tab for strategies that mi ght be helpful in your situation. See you around on the boards.

[treesgrowslowly]

Welcome.

Goals are often the way that we express where we are at and what we want for ourselves.

In recovery from NPD abuse it was helpful for me to link my goals to emotional experiences I wanted. For example fixing a broken printer can give us a sense of accomplishment or self confidence (as well as the ability to use our printer when we need it!).

Thanks for your initial post. And welcome to the forum.

Trees