My Awakening

Today, 30th September 2015 is the two year anniversary of what I refer to as the 'fall out' between my husband and my NF.  This is when it all started and was my 'awakening' to my family dysfunction.  I had tolerated so much from my NF, yet always brushed it under the carpet with voices of 'you're too sensitive' in my head.  Pick yourself up and go on was my motto, but the feelings of hurt did not go away as each time my father took it upon himself to 'fall out' with me and shout abuse and blame me for things, it took its toll on my invisible scar and always reduced me to floods of tears.  The fall out of two years ago was over the trivial matter of a misplaced t-shirt (my husband's).  I cried for days and was totally shocked at my husband having been drawn into my narcissistic and dysfunctional family unit.  

My husband and I had moved to our new property, with a business six months after my parents invited themselves to visit.  I had not invited them for fear of yet another rejection.   Previously, we had lived 1.5 hours drive away and in 11 years they had visited only once.  Whenever I asked EM to visit again I was met with indifferent mumblings, no definite answer or reason not to visit.  I now know (with the hindsight of the visit that went wrong two years ago) why.  It was NF who did not want to visit.  The heinous crime I had committed (at least the one that I know about) was that I had given him far too much pasta for his own liking and that his boiled egg was not cooked right.  I don't doubt that there were many more heinous crimes committed by myself and my husband on THAT visit!!  

How many times I had invited them to various things over the years - parties, birthday and Christmas only to be rejected with feeble excuses ... 'oh we aren't party people' and 'who are all these people anyway, where are they coming from' said in a tone that felt like NF was saying you haven't got any friends anyway.  So, after we moved I never mentioned them coming, and lo and bewhold as if my magic, they invite themselves.  I must admit I approached the visit with some trepidation, knowing what my NF could be like; however, so far, he had been nothing but sweetness and light with my husband, who actually quite liked my NF.  It was always when we went to visit NF/EM that HE would ignore me, talk to my husband and have me or EM jump up and down making husband comfortable with tea and cakes.  

So, they came to visit.  We were running a business from home, getting to grips with this, having just moved house and  we were still getting settled.  The house wasn't perfect, it was a compromise for us as we wanted the business and location.  We put them in what I thought was a comfortable room.  They arrived and didn't say a nice word about anything.  NF said you've taken on far too much (supportive!!!).  Whenever we talked about our plans, he knew someone who had done it, and done it better.  I put a nice meal on the table each evening, having worked a 12 hour day. On our day off, we took them out.  Having asked what they would like to do, and being met with indifference, we said okay then we'll go to ......  So, we took it upon ourselves to orgnaise a day out at the coast with fish and chip lunch.  Most people would say thank you, that was nice, but NO ... of course we are dealing with Narcissists (although at the time I didn't know it!)

Absolutely nothing done was good enough or right and was later to be all thrown back in an argument and letter.  NF/EM have always been 'bitchy'.  I can remember years of hearing them 'she this ...' and 'she that' as I walked out of the room.  I never confronted them.

Their true feelings over the three day visit were to come to light very soon.  On the day of departing, my husband couldn't find some of  his clothes.  NF had packed them in his suitcase, having been using the spare room for his luggage.  Hubbies favourite 'T' had disappeared.  He asked me had I seen it, which I hadn't, so he asked NF who was eating his breakfast (which EM had made for him as I was running my cattery business outside the house).  NF went into a rage, saying my husband had made him late, stopped him eating his breakfast.  All my hubbie had said was if he had a moment when he had finished his breakfast (politely) would NF mind checking if he had accidentally packed his favourite T-shirt.  Neither of us was prepared for the EXPLOSION that followed along with a barrage of abuse.  Poor husband had to take NF/EM to the train station, which he did silently and with reluctance, while NF raged at EM in the back of the car.  He was behaving like a diva.  He demanded someone carry his suitcase a short walk to the car.  When they arrived at the station, NF demanded to be dropped right outside the door: he couldn't possibly walk or carry is bag.  EM was crying (all MY fault apparently); NF was hurling abuse that we were a couple of 'half brains' and it was all our fault.  The T-shirt wasn't found, but several other items of my clothing were removed from NF's case before they left. The T-shirt came by delivery about a week later with no apology but a note stating that my husband was not welcome any more.  

The whole episide really warranted an 'oh what a fool I am for packing your T, so sorry!!' but no, when dealing with narcissists the whole thing gets blown out of all proportion.   Father accused husband of attacking him upstairs.  NF stormed downstairs holding his chest and gasping, shouting 'he attacked me upstairs'.  I know my husband too well and he was simply standing up to a bully.  Bullies don't like those who stand up for themselves.  Of course husband was in the wrong in NF's eyes and he should have meekly apologied (NOT!)    Before leaving, NF said 'I don't think we will be coming here again ... you have far too much on your plate without us being here'.  I felt terrible and apologised (DOH!).  I was reduced to tears.  NF said that husband was not to darken his (NF's) doorstep, EVER!!  Does that include me as well as I said to a blank stare from NF.  'We shouldn't have come' said EM, meekly to my husband.  Husband said you are always welcome to visit'.  Later turned round to a lie in NFs letter that husband had said to EM, 'too right you won't' (imagine the tone .... be visiting again). 

It was after this I realised the extend of the family dysfunction.  No parent in their right or sane mind behaves that way.  

I wrote a letter to EM a few months later, whilst I didn't apologise as really we hadn't done anything wrong, except try to be nice to them!  I did try to say that the matter of the t-shirt didn't need to be escalated to the level that it was.  A letter eventually (July this year) came back from NF (not EM) after I decided not to send a Father's Day card this June.  THAT clearly got him.    I couldn't bring it upon myself to do so: any love felt for NF had ebbed away two years ago. Shocked at the letter saying that we had planned and plotted the whole 't-shirt'  thing against him.  Why was husband in the spare bedroom (he keeps his clothes in there) and 'we both (myself and husband) know the answer to that one (DOH? AGAIN).  NF alleges husband said 'I'll say what goes on in my house" (AND HE DIDN'T).  NF in his usual tone says "charming".  They didn't want fish and chips - WE WERE BEING NICE!!!  Why couldn't they have had a nice meal instead?  The lounge was too dark.  IT WASN'T DELIBERATE, WE ALWAYS WATCH TV MY LAMPLIGHT.  Husband wasn't feeling well on last evening.  UNFORGIVABLE!! = Husband decided to have a bath and NF wanted the toilet.  YOUR DOWNSTAIRS TOILET ISN'T WORKING!!! Again, UNFORGIVABLE!  NF alleges we were far too tired and busy for them and NF/EM wouldn't come again after the 'way they had been treated'.  There was not enough wardrobe space as my clothes were hung up, the bedroom was too small and so the complaints went on and on with not a nice word said by NF/EM.  Silence is agreement on part of EM.  NF ended the letter, so full of twisted interpretations and lies, by saying 'well planned and executed, well done both of you'!!!!  I broke down in tears.  Husband read it and couldn't believe the lies.  During the said visit NF/EM went shopping as we had run out of eggs.  Yet husband had been out and got some the same morning.  No eggs in the cupboard for MY breakfast raged NF so WE bought some (for us NOT you).  What they didn't eat they took home.  They bought cakes for themselves and didn't share them.  I was so embarrassed.  I'LL have one of those scones said NF as EM jumps up (well as best she can suffering from peripheral neuropathy).  My NF is just NOT a nice person to be around.

At the reverse of the spectrum, husband's parents visited, full of love and bearing gifts, full of praise and encouragement.  Helping me in the kitchen when I am busy.  I just LOVE my mother-in-law as she is so thoughtful about other people.  God love her.

NF hates me being praised for anything.  When my husband said I had made some amazing novelty birthday cakes for his two children while they were growing up and we had photos of them, NF ignored this and said that his friend "I" (name withheld to protect identify) makes wonderful cakes.  When my husband said how well I had got the cattery organised after only 6 months, instead of supporting this, NF said the girl who runs the cattery we use is wonderful and she does this and that .... (get the gist, this person is wonderful, and you are getting too big for your boots).  

No wonder I have gone through my life under-estimating my own achievements and feeling uncomfortable if anyone praised me if I have done well.  It's always made me want to avoid the backlash that I got from NF for getting too big for my boots.

My husband's favourite saying is "be careful what you wish for".  I am trying to go no contact.  I know I am hanging in there for the sake of EM.  But seriously NF will get what he wished for by getting me out of his life.  BYE BYE!!

In the beginning ....

It’s tough to know where to start with writing this blog, but here I go.

I am the daughter of a narcissistic father (NF), an enabling mother (EM) with a narcissistic golden child (NCG) elder sister.  My realisation, or when the ‘penny finally dropped’ was when I was 48 years of age (more on that later). 

The realisation that my family was dysfunctional was like finding the last piece of a jigsaw puzzle: it all started to fit into place.  The moment that my father turned against my husband was the moment I thought “this cannot be right”.  My husband could never quite believe that my father could do or say the things that I said he did. My husband, like my father, said I was ‘too sensitive', and then .... my husband’s eyes opened to the narcissistic father that he is. 

My father and mother are now 79/78 years of age respectively.   I have neither seen nor spoken to my elder sister (NCG) in over 25 years.

I thought I had a fairly normal(ish) upbringing.  That said, something about my parents never sort of felt quite right.  What I mean by that is that they didn’t do the same kind of loving things that other kids’ parents did.  For example, praising their kids openly, going to school events for them (although my father did go to parents’ evenings, but looking back that seemed to be for his own ego as he would rant about what stupid teachers they were and how he could show them a thing or two about how to do their jobs).  My father was an academic, the youngest son of three and the first to go to university where he got a distinction in Economics.  He proceeded to national service and completed a teaching course, whereupon he obtained a job in a school, and later tertiary college working his way upwards to Vice Principal. 

My parents never told me as a child that they loved me.  Looking back this is where things really felt ‘off kilter’.  As I watched other parents, my parents seemed almost aloof and very different. They just didn't seem to behave like other kids' parents.  

It really wasn’t until after I got married, at the age of 38 (with no children of my own) and when I was accepted into the loving home of my husband’s parents (who are now in their mid-eighties) that I realised what a loving family looked like.  They listened, they understood, they forgave shortcomings, they were never angry at their children, and they clearly loved their children unconditionally.  Mine looked nothing like this.

Throughout all my adult life, from the moment I left home at 23 to work in London my parents rarely telephoned, and certainly never visited me.  I later went to work abroad and they visited once in 3 years.  I returned to London and they never visited.  If ever I rang from abroad, NF would ask ‘what do you want?   I could not even make a social call to say ‘hi, how are you?’  I felt like my father was glad that I had left.  He seemed to take great delight in telling me they had converted mind and my sisters bedrooms to 'alternative uses' in their house.  My father threw away so many things from my childhood that I would have liked to have kept.  I even caught him in recent years (this is another story I will blog about later), tearing up photos. When I graduated with a first class honours degree as a mature student and also graduated from my teaching qualification, a photograph which I (naively) gave them never saw light of day.  At the age of 35, I was upset at this.  My parents never had photos of either myself or my sister anywhere in the house.  I asked my mother what had happened to the graduation photo and she said 'oh it's in a drawer somewhere'.  Face down or now shredded probably.

Looking back, I was always slightly scared I guess of my father's rages.  As a young girl I remember always needing to avoid upsetting him and always trying to do the 'right thing'.

My father was not involved in our childhood upbringing which might have been normal in the 1960s/1970s.   He went to work, paid the bills and mother took care of bringing us up. 

Now to my mother (EM).  Mother made punctuated comments throughout her marriage, most recently in the last 10 years or so.  Such comments included how if she had her time again she would not get married.  Occasionally she would reminisce about her own childhood upbringing.  A narcissist mother (my maternal grandmother) and enabling father.  Seems my mother chose a man similar to her mother, although she has also nurtured him into the monster that he is now.  She waits on him hand and foot.  Jumps at his every whim. My mother says that my grandmother should never have had children.  She tells stories of neglect and abuse (although not physical).  She tells of her EF who handed over his wages at the end of the week and was given a small sum for his tobacco.  If my mother had experienced a loving childhood of her own she would have been a better mother.  She is one of those deep thinking emotional and sensitive individuals whom you just cannot fathom.  I feel that I really do not know my own mother.  I envy other women who do things with their mothers. Granted, given my mother’s age and (now) frailness, this is limited, but being able to take her out for lunch or other nice things, I am deprived because of my NF who won’t let me get close, who, whenever I visit, goes into a rage, shouts and blames me for everything under the sun.

When the final jigsaw piece was found, it started to dawn on me that perhaps it wasn't me, that I perhaps wasn't the bad daughter, or was insane or simply not a nice person.  Thankfully I have the support of a wonderful husband.  I have no children of my own.  I now believe that my decision not to have children is as a result of my own upbringing in my dysfunctional family unit.