narcissistic relations bc we are too sweet

My gran was manipulative, I was manipulative, my brother was manipulative.

However, I have changed and accepted the past. I'm not cured, but I no longer act the victim. I was every bit as guilty.

With my mother, it's more than just 'I don't like her' or 'I don't agree with her.' I'm afraid of her. I always have been because I've never known when she will turn nasty and hurt me. However nice I am to her, it is not good enough and she turns on me.

She is very charming and likeable (in public)...except when she is spiteful, angry and cruel (in private). When describing her behaviour some years ago, someone pointed me to the Daughters of Narcissistic Mothers page and I was horrified to read a neat description of my mother there. I joined an online support group and our accounts of our mothers' behaviour are scarily the same. They say 'do we have the same mother? I could have written that word for word.' It's like the mothers have book of instructions on how to behave and what to say, it's very spooky and sounds like some kind of defined disorder.

I don't go round telling people that my mother is a narcissist, but I've just come to accept that she has some sort of mental condition that makes her behave cruelly to people, especially to her only child (me) and my family. Narcissism, BPD, bipolar, whatever... something is wrong.

I have read A LOT about narcissism and similar disorders now. Thanks to learning all this, I can now spot people who behave the same e.g. potential friends, colleagues etc, which has helped me greatly to navigate through life.

People like this are exhausting aren't they. I can't take any more of my mother, she is too much, and I'm glad she's safely ensconced in a retirement community. She was nice til my dad died when I was 13, well she was nice after that but just got worse and worse as I got older.

And when I hit 20, that was the end. I became someone to compete with after that and she was and still is always trying to outdo me and be better than me. The only time she was nice to me after age 20 was when my daughter was born. She helped us out a lot because she loves tiny babies. But when daughter got to about 3 and started getting her own ideas, mum went back to being angry.

There are sooooo many examples of how she hurt me, manipulated me and was cruel to me (sometimes my life was in danger) that I can't and don't want to go into them here.

But I've got a diary of them and that's my evidence to contradict all those times I think 'oh but she was just having a bad day, she must love me really' etc. Because she is super, super charming when she wants something, then suddenly snaps back into evil biatchh, then back again to charming. Like a split personality.

But I survived with the help of my wonderful husband, who can't stand her. I made a list long ago of things I was NOT going to do and say with any children I had, and hopefully I'm bringing up my daughter to be much happier and more confident than me.

My mother and brother are narcissistic. Predominantly they were angry, violenct, aggressive, and controlling people, but then there are more subtle things they would do as well, like manipulation, blaming, shaming, mind control, "joking" as a way to put you down, and gaslighting. Well everything was about control and dominance, while appearing on the surface as though everything was perfectly fine, it was just a façade to hide their ways. 

I have a high tolerance for bad treatment without being aware, because that was "normal" treatment for me. I mean living with them was very cult-like, I had no rights to speak or any kind of freedom of my own, no value as a human being, and I was there to serve them like a slave. I had trauma from them, I was blamed heavily for everything that was wrong, but I was not allowed to fault these "rulers" in any way, because if I did I'll get punished and treated like a criminal. I deteriorated while I was living with them. I didn't look in the mirror because I was shattered, physically and mentally. 

But I'm in a much better place now though, and I've learned have more confidence in myself, and to do the things I enjoy. 

I am 100% sure about my sister and mother in law - I actually spent the afternoon around my sister's - the conversation ended up talking about our childhoods - both parents are dead so I was filling her in on our violent dad and my (undiagnosed) aspie mum - and with my wife there to corroborate the events, it was interesting to see her blinkers come off and her having to re-measure my life.    

She's also terrified of me making contact with her ex and all her lies coming out - which was the real reason she invited me over - to convince me that a bloke I knew for 25 years was a terrible person.  

Unfortunately for her, we already know the truth.

My mother is a narcissist. I am estranged from her, and she tries to weasel her way into my life with sly manipulative ways sometimes, and she tries to control the family members that I do speak to. I've also dated quite a few narcissists. I am very empathetic so I want to help, but ironically the relationships have ended because of my autism (I am socially embarrassing, apparently).

Also will check out that site! I've worked through some of this. I think the recent turn of events with her silence over the last few years has really brought a lot to the light - settled and unsettled. I was willing to tolerate to a point as an adult, but she got greedy. And the scales tipped.

Sending hugs back. Glad you're able to create a much more healthy and loving relationship with your daughter!

LOL thanks! Good reminder!

Oh wow! I believe I have experienced a version of all of this. My mother always flirted with my boyfriends. But I do recall my sons father and her competing for my attention when they weren't besties. I recall trying to conceive of ways to escape them both at 20.

Mine acts like the ultimate martyr. And needs everyone around her to be cheerful - "smiles on, boys and girls." to my brother and I. That woman could put on such a show in public. To top it off, she BROUGHT the 2 of us to her rehearsals for a Theatre Production of Oliver. Where she played Nancy in a scene where Nancy was Raped. Ah. The power of ones imagination. Especially an autistic one. 

I literally am beyond thankful to have had the grandmother I did - who I think the ASD imaginative and logical self and also Gluten problems are from. She was always concerned for our well-being, always giving us space to breathe. She had an unbreakable routine. Every parenting win is in gratitude to her.

I do recall pretty traumatic events - crying behind a chair secretly in the corner so I wouldn't be seen. I didn't want comfort as it would be a fvcking production. I literally spend time occasionally in my imagination being an 'older sister' to that little girl and enjoying everything that my mother couldn't be bothered to appreciate. And I can be OK with the mother being broken herself. It's just weird feeling like I'll also be OK if I never see or talk with her again. That's really the saddest bit. I don't just dislike unresolved issues. They haunt me. And this one will definitely need the help of a therapist... 

I think we have to be careful with this. Allow me to put on my big, grown-up, politically-correct hat for a moment.

The word narcissist gets tossed around a lot in our selfie-obsessed, celebrity-driven culture. And, like Nazi, which has become a go-to word to describe people we don't like or who don't agree with us, narcissist has also become the go-to word used to describe people who have wronged us or have acted (or continue to act) in a selfish manner towards us.

Narcissistic personality disorder (NPD) is a mental disorder and we should be careful about using it as an insult for people that we don't like or with whom we have had problems.

We use far too many terms for mental disorders as casual insults, and it causes a lot of stigma, pain and suffering for those of us with a mental illness.  It's okay to call someone's behaviour as selfish, arrogant or behaviour, but we should we be labelling them as narcissists unless we have medical evidence to back up our assertion? Probably not.

I'll take off my big, grown-up, politically-correct hat now. 

Yes. Keep away from them, they will never change...

How horrible for you! Wedding days. Yes. These people can't stand not being centre of attention. My mother tried her utmost to ruin my wedding day, aided and abetted by my aunt (who makes my mother seem cuddly and sweet)

*sending hugs*

Ugh. I'm sorry you had to go through all that **hugs**

'Walking on eggshells' 'Only room for her emotions in the room'. So familiar! If I had problems, hers were greater, I always did the wrong thing and broke some mysterious rule of hers every day. When I was pregnant or ill or heartbroken, then she pounced! Doing her most cruel things when I was at my weakest. She flirted with my boyfriend when I was 22, to the extent that I had to ask him 'do you want her or me?'

And did you get the 'lovely in public, horrible in private' thing? People who don't know my mum think she is wonderful, but she does weird, horrible things in private that if I repeated them, no one would believe me. But there were never any bruises, marks, obvious signs like that- she is far too clever. 

I can't imagine treating my own daughter like that! I look after her most when she is at her weakest, I don't pounce.

I didn't even know I was allowed to have emotions til fairly recently, or even understood how I felt about things. I found the Childhood Emotional Neglect website by Dr Jonice Webb, that is a great resource. Basically saying just to stop often every day and ask yourself: how do *I* feel about this? What do *I* want? It's so simple but has helped me so much.

I'm wondering if I was somehow trained to be autistic by being starved of emotional knowledge and allowance to even have emotions?

However, my mum was a party animal when I was little. We had so many parties, holidays, trips etc that were so much fun. If she is happy and amused, busy and socialising, she is lovely and great fun. But when she is bored or jealous or thinks I'm getting something she isn't, she turns nasty and spiteful. So you can imagine how she hated me getting a boyfriend, getting married, pregnant, having a baby. Those were all things to compete about, to hurt me about, to spoil.

I can't imagine treating my daughter like that! I'll be proud at everything she achieves!!

I feel this. My mother had a traumatic childhood which made it difficult to stand up to her. Both her and her brother are these intense, presumptuous, arrogant humans who need symbolism and epic chaos in their life, who demand truth at all costs but can't properly think critically, so their 'truth' is skewed. My uncle fully believes we were planted here by aliens.

She slapped us into conforming, demanding respect (eye contact), demanding one thing after the next. Most of the time I couldn't 'read the room' or my 'timing was bad' though it was always like walking on eggshells around her until I was so withdrawn in my late teens I could barely notice. Once people know her, she isn't well liked (and this does make me sad) but married  (I'm going to use this term very loosely) a psychopath and they sort of have this creepy symbiotic relationship. He's SO manipulative ugh. I just try and avoid him. I haven't seen them in years. I moved out at 17 and was in survival mode till about 27 when I started getting help learning how to simply exist. 

There's always only been room for her emotions in the room. And while she has some autistic traits, she's also so incredibly manipulative - is this something they learned in the 70's? She never really saw me as a child, yet demanded she 'knew' me. I used to journal as I got older and redirect my rage on to these notebook pages. I couldn't identify at the time what it was from so it would just be incredibly dark and raw. In high school she had read something and was shocked, overbearing... angry? As a young adult she needed to compete with bloody everything. I hadn't realised in my 20's she had stopped talking to me at some point. I didn't realise this was a thing or a tactic until several years ago when I put together the trauma with an ex not speaking to me for a month and worked out this how this manipulation tactic worked. I also didn't realise just how abusive she was psychologically and physically, though I started gaining clarity in my late 30's. I lacked proper education, proper tools, someone to recognise my autistic traits. My half sister's father eventually got her the help she needed but here I am in my mid 40s just realising I didn't continually get 'let go' from admin heavy positions half my adult life for any other reason than I should've been given the right education. 

These humans who are easily offended and so selfish! She's lived far enough away from me over the last 20 years now that I hardly had to see her though we'd have phone conversations which always left me far more stressed... she would think we were having 'deep' conversations but I would just be frustrated with her inability to critically engage, trying to tie up loose ends, sort out the logic and apparently she'd FORGET everything. I finally broke 3 years ago when she demanded we should be 'friends'. I'd had enough and ended up sending an email too quickly, which I didn't regret but the way it was worded wasn't the best. She's stopped talking to me since and I want to feel bad but I don't. The longer her silence, the more I recall how she's humiliated and betrayed me, how she had no right to treat me the ways she did. How out of order her expectations are - she's the bloody parent! Grow up! Ugh. I vacillate between being content at not having to deal with her ever again, she can pass into the next life and I will wish her bon voyage from afar - after all, I've done my fair share of tolerating intolerable and unethical behaviour... and wishing it wasn't this way. I too, had found Daughters of Narcissistic Mothers and wished it were not so. Narcissists are created, like monsters. It's a shame. But the work I've had to do to become someone trustworthy and valuable to the humans I'm invested in, the work I've had to do to become someone responsible. 

All of us could use support groups for this. There's a book by a Christian counsellor from the states called the Mother Factor. It's actually quite enlightening. If you're not religious, it's still quite enlightening as the author uses basic principles which apply to most everyone. This book really helped me!

Mother ,brother ,First partner, second partner.[ the familiar ugly]

I have the worst mother in law in the world,  she has hired private investigators to follow us and photograph our children ,The facts of her life are crazy from trying to get her daughter arrested on her wedding day ,to putting her children into care to manipulate other people.

They really hate not being in control or having to face the truth. 

Oh yes. After decades of dealing with my difficult mother, someone online suggested I look at Daughters of Narcissistic Mothers and boom! There was my mother, described on the page. Competitive, angry, manipulative, unpredictable, I've got a diary of all the weird and cruel things she's done. But luckily she moved away a couple of years ago and I have only see her once since then due to the pandemic.

Looking back at my life I've realised a lot of my friends and ex boyfriends were narcissists, because that is all I knew and thought that was what love and friendship were like. I'm verrrrrrry choosy about who I have as friends now.

I have a narcissistic sister and mother in law.   They spend their lives controlling and manipulating their victims.    Unfortunately, they are now both old enough to have no more victims left.    All their friends have gradually walked away.

Sister preys on her adult daughter and mother in law preys of her middle-aged son.    Both have Stockholm Syndrome.

Narcissist seek out vulnerable people and then separate them from their support base -  there's loads of youtube videos explaining how they work.     The trick is to spot the patterns and starve the monster.