I keep having flashbacks of my NPD mother from when I was a child.

[Before you can make things better, you have to stop making them worse...]

My mom is a very different person now. She's accepted, forgiven, dealt with so many of her own issues from her childhood. And I have so much respect for her for that. She's had a hard battle to fight her entire life, from a sadistic grandmother who regularly threw her to the wolves and gaslighted her, who'd also endured a horrifically tragic life through first world war, to neglectful parents who barely acknowledged her presence except when she messed up, to a husband that became very violent and cruel to her as well as always draining her of every cent she made they struggled to stay above the poverty line.

She's amazing now. Some of her NPD facets show through sometimes, but she's worked so hard to heal herself and is devoted to the same for others. She is genuinely special.

I don't blame her is my point. I'm an adult now. I have all the power to heal.

I've been working hard at healing my childhood traumas, but I'm slowly beginning to see how much of it I've repressed. I have started to get flashbacks of those moments that left the biggest trackmarks on me. I see it through my own reactions to my pwBPD. I realised how much I dissociate when he starts to rage.

I don't hear my pwBPD. I hear my mother. Which is why it's so hard to be rational and validate him. Because in those moments, I'm that small 6 year old, stuck with my mom on the room, unable to leave because she refuses to let me leave. She commands that I stay. That I listen to her rage. Tell me how stupid I am, how I intentionally act the wrong way, screw up to be malevolent. That I'm just like her sister. The I'm manipulative. The only way to get her love was to never say no.

With time, I became old enough to walk away when she tried that. The worst part is that she'd often charge after me. Repeatedly try to provoke me. Except that at point I'd stopped fighting her, I'd dissociate if I stayed. She didn't like that, shed just try to push harder to see me cry. Except I was only physically there at that point, and I could barely feel my body. When I was younger, I used to hyperventilate through my sobs. She'd tell me that I had nothing to cry about... .That she had the abusive neglectful childhood. That I was lucky to have such a good mother who didn't hit me.

I was also reluctant to let her buy me stuff as a kid. I used to think it means I wasn't spoiled. But really, I preferred playing the martyr that never wants again, that rather give than receive. Because if I let her buy me anything, she'd guilt me over it for days. How hard she worked. How I never appreciated her gesture, no matter how much I enabled her for it. I still am reluctant to let her buy me anything. I'm expecting the guilt, even though she buys things for me out of good intentions and wouldn't do something like that anymore. Boundaries. That much I learned from both this site and  Cloud/Townsend book.

Sorry for the long childhood story. This has all started dawning on me pretty recently. The worst of it was from 5-8 years old. When I was 18 I left to study abroad. I was mostly leaving her. It seems like she took that time to get better, find help.

[misuniadziubek]

My mom is a very different person now. She's accepted, forgiven, dealt with so many of her own issues from her childhood. And I have so much respect for her for that. She's had a hard battle to fight her entire life, from a sadistic grandmother who regularly threw her to the wolves and gaslighted her, who'd also endured a horrifically tragic life through first world war, to neglectful parents who barely acknowledged her presence except when she messed up, to a husband that became very violent and cruel to her as well as always draining her of every cent she made they struggled to stay above the poverty line.

She's amazing now. Some of her NPD facets show through sometimes, but she's worked so hard to heal herself and is devoted to the same for others. She is genuinely special.

I don't blame her is my point. I'm an adult now. I have all the power to heal.

I've been working hard at healing my childhood traumas, but I'm slowly beginning to see how much of it I've repressed. I have started to get flashbacks of those moments that left the biggest trackmarks on me. I see it through my own reactions to my pwBPD. I realised how much I dissociate when he starts to rage.

I don't hear my pwBPD. I hear my mother. Which is why it's so hard to be rational and validate him. Because in those moments, I'm that small 6 year old, stuck with my mom on the room, unable to leave because she refuses to let me leave. She commands that I stay. That I listen to her rage. Tell me how stupid I am, how I intentionally act the wrong way, screw up to be malevolent. That I'm just like her sister. The I'm manipulative. The only way to get her love was to never say no.

With time, I became old enough to walk away when she tried that. The worst part is that she'd often charge after me. Repeatedly try to provoke me. Except that at point I'd stopped fighting her, I'd dissociate if I stayed. She didn't like that, shed just try to push harder to see me cry. Except I was only physically there at that point, and I could barely feel my body. When I was younger, I used to hyperventilate through my sobs. She'd tell me that I had nothing to cry about... .That she had the abusive neglectful childhood. That I was lucky to have such a good mother who didn't hit me.

I was also reluctant to let her buy me stuff as a kid. I used to think it means I wasn't spoiled. But really, I preferred playing the martyr that never wants again, that rather give than receive. Because if I let her buy me anything, she'd guilt me over it for days. How hard she worked. How I never appreciated her gesture, no matter how much I enabled her for it. I still am reluctant to let her buy me anything. I'm expecting the guilt, even though she buys things for me out of good intentions and wouldn't do something like that anymore. Boundaries. That much I learned from both this site and  Cloud/Townsend book.

Sorry for the long childhood story. This has all started dawning on me pretty recently. The worst of it was from 5-8 years old. When I was 18 I left to study abroad. I was mostly leaving her. It seems like she took that time to get better, find help.