The past few months have been a whole lot of what I thought I never wanted to do or be. It's involved AA meetings and therapy, two things I am sorely disappointed in myself for having to attend. And most recently, and perhaps most embarrassingly, I have found myself buying and reading self-help books.
Since my counselor said that my mother might be NPD, I have been reading about it voraciously online. It's brought me to a few websites and blogs, where I gained what information I could, but realized that I would need to get books to really understand. From what I could tell, Dr. Karyl McBride's Will I Ever Be Good Enough: Healing the Daughters of Narcissistic Mothers was the place to start. So I went to amazon.com to buy that, and ended up getting Dr. Susan Forward's Emotional Blackmail: When the People in Your Life Use Fear, Obligation, and Guilt to Manipulate You and Toxic Parents: Overcoming Their Hurtful Legacy and Reclaiming Your Life as well.
They were delivered today, and I rushed home from work to get them. I'm on page 143 of 219 of Will I Ever Be Good Enough. So much information, I am overwhelmed. Perhaps I should've read it slower.
I'm relieved by the validation. I'm completely irked seeing my personality type laid out plainly in print, and having to think that maybe I'm not who I am because of my own hard work, but because my mom's Crazy pushed me into it. It explains to me why I am overachiever in many ways, yet still feel completely uncomfortable with success. It explains why alcoholism is a part of my life.
As the daughter of a Nmom, there are three steps to recovery, it says.
Step 1: Gather background information, identify problem, diagnose problem, understand problem on cognitive level.
Step 2: Process the feelings related to step one, grieve, feel, reprogram negative messages.
Step 3: Reframe, view differently, make decision to change, change.
So here I am, stuck somewhere between step 1 and 2. I find myself completely frustrated that my cognitive mind can't just snap my emotional mind out of it and get on with Step 2.
3.21.2011
3.19.2011
Narc
After going to two months of meetings, I have decided that AA may not be for me, because I'm having trouble connecting to the people -- as I often do in large groups. I also have this nagging feeling that I may be susceptible to any addiction right now -- to work, to food, to sex, to anxiety meds, etc -- because of the emotional baggage I've been carrying around. So, I decided to see a counselor that has experience with addiction.
My first appointment was last week. My husband has been trying to coax me into therapy for years. But I was absolutely terrified of baring my soul to anyone and of being so vulnerable, and so always put it off. I have been nervous a month, running through my head the questions she might ask and the answers I will give, and telling myself not to soften the truth like I do for everybody else. She's here to help me, and she can't unless I give myself fully to the process.
Three minutes in, I was bawling. She asked me where I thought the alcoholism was rooted, I said anxiety, she asked me where I thought the anxiety was rooted in, and I said work and my family -- no -- my parents -- no -- my mom. And then the stories from my childhood poured out, in tears and lip quivers. For once, they were the actual cruelstories without any editing to reduce the pity the other person might feel for me.
And then she asked me if I knew what Narcissistic Personality Disorder was. She described it, and told me that it sounds like my mother may have it, and that it's poisoning me, and that people with narcissistic parents often have to put up walls between themselves and their parents to protect themselves....that they sometimes I have to cut them off entirely.
I cried the whole way home, the whole night and the next day, as I researched what this meant. It meant that maybe she never loved me, because she's incapable of it. I have always thought that she doesn't have the 'mother gene'. But maybe I was wrong, maybe its that she has the 'me gene'. It meant that all of my memories have to be looked through this different lens.
And then, that's all I could think of...all my memories through this new lens. Doesn't it explain the blatant difference in treatment between my sister and I our entire lives? Doesn't it explain her snooping into anything she could use against me? Doesn't it explain her inability to complement except when it is inappropriate, and her ability to cut my legs out from under me during the times that should be nothing but celebratory?
It's exhausting. But exhilarating.
It wasn't me! IT ISN'T ME! I never could understand why no matter what I did, it wasn't good enough. And now I do! No matter what I do, it could never be good enough to get due (or any!) praise or unconditional love from her.
And now, I need to look through my own personality through this lens. How did this affect me? In what ways has my emotional health been affected by this environment? What do I need to do to protect myself from the narcissistic poison?
I was terrified of it, but tearing myself apart and finding where my roots end might just be kind of great.
My first appointment was last week. My husband has been trying to coax me into therapy for years. But I was absolutely terrified of baring my soul to anyone and of being so vulnerable, and so always put it off. I have been nervous a month, running through my head the questions she might ask and the answers I will give, and telling myself not to soften the truth like I do for everybody else. She's here to help me, and she can't unless I give myself fully to the process.
Three minutes in, I was bawling. She asked me where I thought the alcoholism was rooted, I said anxiety, she asked me where I thought the anxiety was rooted in, and I said work and my family -- no -- my parents -- no -- my mom. And then the stories from my childhood poured out, in tears and lip quivers. For once, they were the actual cruelstories without any editing to reduce the pity the other person might feel for me.
And then she asked me if I knew what Narcissistic Personality Disorder was. She described it, and told me that it sounds like my mother may have it, and that it's poisoning me, and that people with narcissistic parents often have to put up walls between themselves and their parents to protect themselves....that they sometimes I have to cut them off entirely.
I cried the whole way home, the whole night and the next day, as I researched what this meant. It meant that maybe she never loved me, because she's incapable of it. I have always thought that she doesn't have the 'mother gene'. But maybe I was wrong, maybe its that she has the 'me gene'. It meant that all of my memories have to be looked through this different lens.
And then, that's all I could think of...all my memories through this new lens. Doesn't it explain the blatant difference in treatment between my sister and I our entire lives? Doesn't it explain her snooping into anything she could use against me? Doesn't it explain her inability to complement except when it is inappropriate, and her ability to cut my legs out from under me during the times that should be nothing but celebratory?
It's exhausting. But exhilarating.
It wasn't me! IT ISN'T ME! I never could understand why no matter what I did, it wasn't good enough. And now I do! No matter what I do, it could never be good enough to get due (or any!) praise or unconditional love from her.
And now, I need to look through my own personality through this lens. How did this affect me? In what ways has my emotional health been affected by this environment? What do I need to do to protect myself from the narcissistic poison?
I was terrified of it, but tearing myself apart and finding where my roots end might just be kind of great.
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