Am I Having a Nervous Breakdown

[Hepatica]

I talk to myself and say that what I am doing by going no contact is what is best for me, not my abuser. I am putting my own needs first, which I'm not used to doing. I fear the consequences and retribution but that is because of what I am so used to.

Abusers are all about power and control. When their targets of abuse behave differently and become assertive and set boundaries they don't like it. They try other tactics to push all your buttons to get the reaction they crave. You are no longer feeding their narcissistic supply which they don't like. The best thing to do to a narcissist is to stay calm, not react and ignore them, they would hate that.

As targets of abuse we can get conditioned to behave in certain ways over years, even decades, of abuse. Behaving differently can become upsetting for ourselves because we are not used to it. Then we doubt ourselves for behaving in ways other people would consider to be quite appropriate.

I have not contacted my uBPD/NPD sister for a year and she still lives in my head all the time taunting and abusing me. I have even been starting to question my own behaviour and thinking that I maybe abusing her by not contacting her, which is absurd. What I am doing is protecting myself from any further abuse. I do not have to keep putting my hand in the fire to get it burned over and over again.

The counsellor and author Kris Godinez on YouTube talks about "intermittent periods of positive rewards" where the abuser is calm, loving and kind. The target of abuse craves those times because that is when our feel good hormones are released and we feel so good and relieved. The target of abuse can become addicted to the feel good hormones and the abuser can be like a drug dealer taking them away at any time by being abusive. So we can forgive any abusive behaviour in order to have the feel good hormones back again. Kris Godinez explains it much better than I can but it all made sense to me when I first heard her talk about it. I never realised that my abuser was my drug pusher and I was addicted!

You've done well to set firm boundaries and to put a lock on the gate. Well done. I fear cutting the grass in the unfenced front garden in case my sister suddenly appears to torment me. I live with anticipatory dread and hyper vigilance all the time. I am fed up living in fear all my life.

Be gentle with yourself. You are doing the best that you can.

So much wisdom there guitarman. Thank you. I've read it a few times and I will continue to work on everything you've mentioned and strengthen myself. I know what you mean about the anticipatory dread and hyper vigilance. I am wondering if one day I'll take an assertiveness training class or even now try to figure out some very short, strong sentences to prepare myself for the run ins. I feel like I need to prep for this stuff in a kind of martial arts way. 

nanotech - Wow. I can actually relate very much to your examples. My sister is very very covert and has an incredibly charming mask and I have seen her mask fall off really only a handful of times, and only if you spend days with her. But yes, I've heard her make sinister comments about her daughter's body to her daughter and she's given me backhanded comments that I think about later as I wonder why I felt strange after she said something to me. She's ultra covert. My mother is like the woman version of Don Cherry (Canadian blowhard) and my father is also really tight with his mask. I find the covert kind of scary bc you don't think to defend yourself until you identify it and that came years later with me, and only with education about narcissism and toxic behaviour. My mother was just so obvious it was like, as long as I take a wide berth around her I'll be okay, whereas my sister and father try to draw you in so they can take a bite out of you. All in all, hardly a safe feeling when I am around them and I understand exactly what you are saying.

[BettyGray]

Oh, no! The things we have gone through....

Your story reads like something out of a movie. You know those scenes where things are quiet and then all of a sudden someone is standing RIGHT There, out of nowhere. Shudder.

Serious boundary violations by your father. That is so creepy.

One thing I realize more and more is the absolute projection of it all. In my family, they were all quick to point out who they knew that needed therapy. Surprise - it was never them.    I don't think therapy would have worked with a group of narcissists like them, but ooh boy did they need it.
Nanotech, same thing about your mom's comments about your weight. They're really just talking to themselves - its quite pathetic.

When I was still in contact, if I started to have a moment of clarity they would  ask me "are you off of your meds?" It was so absolutely insulting. Because to them the only explanations for me having a mind of my own or reason for challenging them had to be 1) brainwashing by my therapist or DH or 2) going off of my medication.

All of the book recommendations here are fantastic. They were very helpful for me. I'm glad you're able to talk to your therapist about this. Sometimes we don't realize how abnormal our PD relatives' behavior is until we tell our stories to someone else. It's not like we can have these conversations with friends who might not understand, so therapy is usually where the realizations happen. When I recanted my story to therapists and psychologists, all I needed was the look on their faces to wake up to just HOW abusive was my previous environment.

I am so sorry you are doubting yourself. If you feel you're having a nervous breakdown, it's probably your body begging for mercy.

In the first months of NC, I absolutely would say I had a severe emotional collapse. I kept thinking they would just show up at my house (even though I live far away). I became increasingly paranoid. My heart jumped into my stomach when cars drove down my street. I put extra locks and window coverings up. I couldn't go to work. There would have been no way I could concentrate.My brain didn't work in a rational manner. It was a very dark time. My therapist diagnosed me with C-PTSD, which I had never heard of before. I did read "From Surviving to Thriving" which made it all click. C-PTSD is horrifying. It takes time and hard work to learn to manage it, but it is possible.

I hope you're able to keep your distance and nurture yourself out of this horrible situation. They have absolutely NO RIGHT to invade your personal space, step on to your property, or steal your mental energy.

[nanotech]

Bit off topic but In regards to my previous post I just wanted to make it very clear that I didn't consider being called a lesbian an insult. I would hate to have given the wrong impression on that. I'm as opened minded as they come regarding an individual's sexuality.
But the PDs in my family are small -minded on this.
The interesting thing, regarding projection, is that there is a family member on my sister's side ( lovely person) who is made by her mother and grandmothers to keep quiet about her sexuality -for fear of my UNPDdad finding out. 

[DistanceNotDefense]

I'm late to the game and have been keeping track of your posts, Hepatica. I really hope you're feeling better and that your therapy session did you some good, and got you more clarity. Going NC really is a confusing time! I'm there myself and it's so new to me.

"I've caused all the problems. I am a terrible person. I just can't accept my parents as they are. I am hurting everybody. If I just stop being so stubborn and learn to manage my expectations about my imperfect family then I can end this pain. But my stubbornness will not let me go there. And I don't have a cheerleading team in real life to help me move through this. I feel so terribly alone and today is one of the hardest days I've had in a long time."

I have these same thoughts! But here's the thing: does your family accept you as you are? Based on what else you've posted and things they've said, body shaming etc., they don't. So you don't need to accept them, either.

No doubt you've already tried managing your expectations, too, to still have them in your life. And they still brought you pain. This is the pain. It's OK to do what you need to do to end the pain.

Like Call Me Cordelia said, let us be your cheerleaders. 

"I also had thoughts around the step I have taken in putting a lock on the gate to my garden and entrance door. There is something final about this that speaks without speaking that I am fully no contact now. I honestly think I am scared. My uNPD father was a terrifying parent and I feel so afraid of him now that he has no power to enter my private space. I don't think he'll physically harm me, but I am scared that he will use his sisters to psychologically terrorize me and I feel very outnumbered by them and the rest of the disordered family system. It fits with this intense feeling I have to run. I am scared of them."

I had the same feelings when I was so fed up I blocked all family by social media and text. My gut was screaming at me to do it, it was done with the mind games and bull****. I listened.

And I thought "Oh God is this NC then? I didn't think I'd arrive here so quickly while coming Out of the FOG." I have that thought every. Single. Day. And it's been three months. I assume the shock wears off and it stops becoming not a question, but an answer. Not there quite yet though. I still step in puddles of doubt.

If your sisters come around and terrorize you you have every right to cut off contact with them, too, for the exact same reasons. I started off cutting off my uNPD/sociopathic sibling years ago. Then realized that she was manipulating other FOO to get at me when she realized she had no influence over me any longer. A fun, sick game to her. I've quickly realized (as other members here have sadly realized, too) that if one FOO member is sick the others are sick, too, and if they are doing the PDs bidding towards you willingly (knowingly or unknowingly) then they might also need to be go. But only when you're ready for it.

"After a minute or so inside I saw him entering my garden and up the steps to my front door. I raced to the door to lock it and his freaking hand was on the door handle. He walks right in if we don't lock as if its his house. This is why we finally put a lock on our outside gate, so he can't get as far as the front door. He has never ever ever respected boundaries. It makes me furious but I am still so afraid of him that I can't have it out with him."

If a friend, stranger, or acquaintance did this to you and just walked into your house making ridiculous demands and spewing negativity, what would you do?

It's not unreasonable that you're doing this, locking and protecting yourself. You have every right. Your father's behavior is insane. He obviously feels like he has the right to "access" you like a punching bag or a toy doll.

You deserve to protect yourself from this and you deserve better. You also deserve peace of mind from it.

"My father has this sort of weird effect on me - like he is examining me like a cruel scientist and knows exactly where my most fragile parts are and uses them against me. Plus just being near him puts me in survival mode. I can't find the way to ghost it. I am instantly anxious on site of him."

This does sound sociopathic/psychopathic. Or at the very least sadistic. My uNPD sib is the same way. Last time I talked to her it was so cold and calculated, scanning me for weaknesses and utilizing them to see me squirm, and then "feigning" over the top emotional responses that seemed completely empty. It was definitely somewhere on that ASPD spectrum. I haven't talked to her since and I'm sure it's like a crack in her plate.

You don't deserve to be immersed in that, either. No one does. Take care of yourself, you have every right to, no matter who it is!

Also: with my CPTSD, the instinct to "run" or to "hide" can be very strong during flashbacks, and I realize it was because escape and hiding were my go to survival tactics that really worked for me in youth (even to the point of moving out of my home in adolescence, which was huge for me - I almost emancipated myself!). It's a hard thing to wrestle with when your brain might not realize you're, in reality, safe when you're flashing back but it wants to indulge those coping methods again and again. It's a slow process of rewiring yourself to lean on other coping methods because those old ones won't work.

Pamper yourself, swaddle yourself with your favorite comforting blanket, drink hot tea, take a hot shower or bath, slow down, hide away for a bit, read a comforting book, watch a comforting show... whatever you need that helps you feel safe in the present.

And hugs if you need one